Environment

CLIMATE CHANGE: How rivers will behave

The outlook for the Limpopo is dry
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PRETORIA, 14 November 2011 (IRIN) - Soaring temperatures and erratic rains brought on by a changing climate may radically alter water flows in the world’s major river basins, including the Limpopo in southern Africa, forcing people to give up farming in some areas, says a new study.

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Urban planning failures putting lives at risk - expert

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alertnet // Katie Murray
A soldier plays amid water rolling past sandbags into the city near the military
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Failures of urban planning are putting lives, infrastructure and businesses at risk as weather shocks – like the floods now surging through Bangkok – become more frequent as a result of climate change, urban planning and climate experts say.

But focusing on improving building codes, land use regulation, public health and sanitation, and disaster response measures could help reduce risks, said David Dodman, leader of the cities and climate team at the London-based International Institute for Environment and Development, which works on sustainable development issues.

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UN: failure to reduce environmental risks will set back human development

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Damian Carrington
Children carry drinking water as they pass through a polluted pond in Allahabad,
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Droughts and rising sea levels could reverse efforts to improve living conditions of world's poorest people, report warns

Unchecked environmental destruction will halt – or even reverse – the huge improvements seen in the living conditions of the world's poorest people in recent decades, a major new UN report warned on Wednesday.

 

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Q&A with U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-Moon

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BRYAN WALSH
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It's the hard-working demographers of the U.N. who have counted the global population and have selected Oct. 31 as the date of the 7 billionth person. That makes sense because population is a major part of international development — and that's the business of the U.N. Bryan Walsh of TIME spoke with U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon in his office in New York City about global population, the challenges of development and the lingering threat of climate change.

 

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Warming Could Exceed Safe Levels In This Lifetime

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Nina Chestney
A general view shows the Iztaccihuatl volcano in the city of Puebla, 100 km (62
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Global temperature rise could exceed "safe" levels of two degrees Celsius in some parts of the world in many of our lifetimes if greenhouse gas emissions continue to increase, two research papers published in the journal Nature warned.

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Climate change could trap hundreds of millions in disaster areas, report claims

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Fiona Harvey
Climate change could cause extreme weather leaving millions of people trapped, a
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Report says refugees forced to leave homes by weather caused by global warming may end up in even worse afflicted areas

Hundreds of millions of people may be trapped in inhospitable environments as they attempt to flee from the effects of global warming, worsening the likely death toll from severe changes to the climate, a UK government committee has found.

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Canadian Arctic nearly loses entire ice shelf from global warming

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Charmaine Noronha
Canadian Arctic nearly loses entire ice shelf from global warming
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Luke Copland is an associate professor in the geography department at the University of Ottawa who co-authored the research published on Carleton University’s website. He said the Serson Ice Shelf shrank from 205 square kilometres to two remnant sections five years ago, and was further diminished this past summer.

Prof. Copland said the shelf went from a 42-square-km floating glacier tongue to 25 square km, and the second section from 35 square km to 7 square km, off Ellesmere Island’s northern coastline.

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Al Gore: clear proof that climate change causes extreme weather

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Severin Carrell
Al Gore: clear proof that climate change causes extreme weather
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Former US vice president tells Scottish green conference that evidence from floods in Pakistan and China is compelling

Al Gore has warned that there is now clear proof that climate change is directly responsible for the extreme and devastating floods, storms and droughts that displaced millions of people this year.

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The 'other' Arctic sea ice melt

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Reports focus on the possibility a record minimum for Arctic sea ice in September, but a major loss during the early summer months is climatologically more important

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Weather Disasters Keep Costing U.S. Billions This Year

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Mary Wisniewski
Weather Disasters Keep Costing U.S. Billions This Year
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Blizzards. Tornadoes. Floods. Record heat and drought, followed by wildfires.

The first eight months of 2011 have brought strange and destructive weather to the United States.

From the blizzard that dumped almost two feet of snow on Chicago, to killer tornadoes and heat waves in the south, to record flooding, to wildfires that have burned more than 1,000 homes in Texas in the last few days, Mother Nature has been in a vile and costly mood.

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