UN News Centre

Sustainable development is about people. Photo: UNDP/Zak Mulligan

9 August 2012 – United Nations Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon today launched a new independent global network of research centres, universities and technical institutions to help find solutions for some of the world’s most pressing environmental, social and economic problems.

The Sustainable Development Solutions Network (SDSN) will work with stakeholders including business, civil society, UN agencies and other international organizations to identify and share the best pathways to achieve sustainable development, according to a UN news release.

submitted by Cody Shearer

Image: Christos Nicolaides/Juanes Research Group

www.guardian.co.uk - July 24, 2012 - Posted by Nadja Popovich  

When the next outbreak of Sars or Swine flu hits, New York's John F Kennedy airport and Los Angeles's airports will likely be the key spreaders of disease, according to a new study. But while the influence of these super-hubs may not come as much of a surprise, the third most outbreak-friendly airport in the states is far smaller, and far less obvious – Honolulu International.

In a paper published Monday in the journal PLoS One, a team of researchers from MIT outlined a new computer model that predicts how the 40 largest American airports may contribute to the diffusion of contagious disease within the first few days of a potential epidemic.

photo courtesy of Harry Borden/Oxfam

www.independent.co.uk - August 5, 2012 - by Sarah Morrison

An unparalleled number of severe food shortages has added 43 million to the number of people going hungry worldwide this year. And millions of children are now at risk of acute malnutrition, charities are warning. One week ahead of David Cameron's "hunger summit", they say that unless action is taken urgently, many more could fall victim.

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Image: Keith Beall harvests drought-stressed corn beyond the reach of the field's irrigation system, in Eatonton, Georgia. Photograph: Erik S Lesser/EPA

guardian.co.uk - July 30th, 2012 - Suzanne Goldenburg

The Obama administration was urged on Monday to stop diverting grain to gas amid warnings of an "imminent food crisis" caused by America's drought.

US government forecasts of a 4% rise in food prices for US consumers because of the drought have sharpened criticism of supports for producing fuel from corn-based ethanol.

Meanwhile, research published last week by the New England Complex Systems Institute warned of an "imminent food crisis" because of the diversion of corn stocks to ethanol.

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submitted by Jerry Erbach

Ecocity Builders

Mission and Vision

Ecocity Builders reshapes cities for the long-term health of human and natural systems.

We develop and implement policy, design and educational tools and strategies to build thriving urban centers based on “access by proximity” and to reverse patterns of sprawl and excessive consumption.

Ecocity Builders and associates’ definition of “ecocity” is conditional upon a healthy relationship of the city’s parts and functions, similar to the relationship of organs in living complex organism. We are concerned with city design, planning, building, and operations in an integral way and in relation to the surrounding environment and natural resources of the region, utilizing organic, ecological and whole-systems lessons to actually reverse the negative impacts of climate change, species extinction and the destruction of the biosphere.

We believe the form of the city matters, that it is within our ability, and indeed crucial, to reshape and restructure cities to address global environmental challenges.

submitted by Susan Steinhauser

AMA - BulletinHEALTHCARE.com

mBio - Emergence of Fatal Avian Influenza in New England Harbor Seals

Many outlets reported on new research, published online July 31 in the journal mBio, which documents a mutated form of avian flu in seals. The sources all discussed the significance of the development, focusing on the risk the transmission of bird flu to mammals poses to humans.

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mBio - Emergence of Fatal Avian Influenza in New England Harbor Seals

Abstract

Image: New Delhi train passengers sit stranded in a darkened train idled by the massive power outage that swept across India on Tuesday.

Marianne Lavelle, Jeff Smith and Rebecca Byerly - July 31st, 2012 - news.nationalgeographic.com

In one of the world's worst power blackouts ever, more than 600 million people across India lost electricity Tuesday, the second massive grid failure in as many days, raising questions whether the government's failure to modernize and bolster its energy delivery system had finally left the nation at the breaking point.

Rail service was halted, streets were clogged at intersections with darkened traffic lights, and people sweltered without air conditioning in temperatures above 90°F (32°C), as authorities worked to restore power and pinpoint the cause of the problem. The outage that began Monday lasted 15 hours, and only shortly after service was restored, at 1 p.m. Tuesday, a far larger system collapse swept across the nation's northern and eastern grids.

Heavy traffic backs up at a toll gate along a highway on the outskirts of New Delhi as power outages leave half of India without power Tuesday, July 31.

cnn.com - by Harmeet Shah Singh - July 31, 2012

New Delhi (CNN) -- India suffered its second huge, crippling power failure in two days Tuesday, depriving as much as half of the vast country, up to 600 million people, of electricity and disrupting transport networks for several hours.

The first power grid collapse, on Monday, was the country's worst blackout in a decade. It affected seven states in northern India that are home to more than 350 million people.

But Tuesday's failure was even larger, hitting eastern and northeastern areas as well. Both blackouts cut power in the Indian capital, New Delhi, and left people sweltering in high heat and humidity.

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Image: The Ecology of Disease cover, by Olaf Hajek

Jim Robbins - July 14th, 2012 - nytimes.com

There's a term biologists and economists use these days — ecosystem services — which refers to the many ways nature supports the human endeavor. Forests filter the water we drink, for example, and birds and bees pollinate crops, both of which have substantial economic as well as biological value.

If we fail to understand and take care of the natural world, it can cause a breakdown of these systems and come back to haunt us in ways we know little about.

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Image: Singapore supertrees. Photograph by Wong Maye-E, AP

Tasha Eichenseher - July 26th, 2012 - news.nationalgeographic.com

A series of images and short articles by the National Geographic showcase green technology in cities across the world used to mitigate the 'heat island effect'.

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nasa.gov - July 2012

Extent of surface melt over Greenland’s ice sheet on July 8 (left) and July 12 (right). Measurements from three satellites showed that on July 8, about 40 percent of the ice sheet had undergone thawing at or near the surface. In just a few days, the melting had dramatically accelerated and an estimated 97 percent of the ice sheet surface had thawed by July 12. In the image, the areas classified as “probable melt” (light pink) correspond to those sites where at least one satellite detected surface melting. The areas classified as “melt” (dark pink) correspond to sites where two or three satellites detected surface melting. The satellites are measuring different physical properties at different scales and are passing over Greenland at different times. As a whole, they provide a picture of an extreme melt event about which scientists are very confident. Credit: Nicolo E. DiGirolamo, SSAI/NASA GSFC, and Jesse Allen, NASA Earth Observatory
› Hi-res of left image
› Hi-res of right image

Rising temperatures: The Baltic Sea represents the 'fastest warming marine eco-system examined so far anywhere on earth'

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A rise in temperatures in the Baltic Sea has triggered the growth of the water-borne bacteria Vibrio.

An international team examined sea surface temperature records and satellite data in the Baltic, as well as statistics on Vibrio cases in the region.

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Image: Cholera cases in MSF facilities

dailydot.com - David Holmes - March 9th, 2012

Five years ago, Ivan Gayton would spend months at a time in the African bush with no connection to the outside world except for a satellite phone or a high-frequency radio.

But today, the head of Doctors Without Borders in Nigeria spends 75 percent of his time on a computer or a cell phone, even when working in rural Africa. And while the sense of adventure may be diminished, Gayton says the new technologies have had an “astonishing” effect on his organization’s effectiveness.

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'The great profusion of life in the past – fossilised in the form of flammable carbon – now jeopardises the great profusion of life in the present.' Illustration by Daniel Pudles

guardian.co.uk - by George Monbiot - July 2, 2012

The facts have changed, now we must change too. For the past 10 years an unlikely coalition of geologists, oil drillers, bankers, military strategists and environmentalists has been warning that peak oil – the decline of global supplies – is just around the corner. We had some strong reasons for doing so: production had slowed, the price had risen sharply, depletion was widespread and appeared to be escalating. The first of the great resource crunches seemed about to strike.

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