Showing posts with label deforestation. Show all posts
Showing posts with label deforestation. Show all posts

Wednesday, 21 May 2014

Singapore haze; Indonesia forest slash-n-burn

Ashley Wells, Wisdom Quarterly; Rujun Shen from Singapore (Reuters.com, 5-21-14)
Smoke haze obscures building under construction, Singapore March 2014 (Tim Wimborne)
  
Singapore braces for worst smoke "haze" as Indonesia slashes-and-burns forests
Singapore is approaching its yearly "haze" [dense air pollution] season, when smoke from forest clearing in Indonesia chokes the air, with this year likely to be worse than 2013's record pollution thanks to lack of action in Jakarta and an expected El Nino weather pattern.

The prosperous city-state, which prides itself on its clean air, was shrouded in heavy smog from slash-and-burn clearances on the neighbouring Indonesian island of Sumatra last June which sent its air pollution index to a record high.

Is America better than Asia about polluting?
One year on, and an election-distracted government in Indonesia has still not ratified the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) 2002 Agreement on Transboundary Haze Pollution, and fires continue to burn in Sumatra.

That is despite outrage in Singapore as well as environmental groups putting pressure on Jakarta. Fires are used to clear land on plantations and can burn for weeks because of peat deposits below the surface.

There is also a growing likelihood of an El Nino weather pattern this year, meaning Singapore, as well as parts of Indonesia and Malaysia, could be set for months of intense haze with a knock-on effect on health and business, especially tourism. More

Thursday, 16 January 2014

Climate chaos: Forest fire rages in Los Angeles

Ashley Wells, Pat Macpherson, Wisdom Quarterly (COMMENTARY)

The Colby Fire is raging in the deep foothill suburbs of Los Angeles and moving west due to wind gusts and the state's continuing drought.

Temperatures are in the eighties, humidity is at 10%, and the chemtrails -- which seem to be more about geoengineering and toxic weather modification attempts lately, more so than spreading heavy metals and aiding HAARP experiments. Right wing AM radio has been laughing heartily at the misnomer "global warming" due to the polar vortex and dropping temperatures across the country, even the very chilly nights in California. But climate change is general and punctuated not a simple linear increase in across the board measures. All temperatures do not rise everywhere to call it warming.

Such simpleton logic and climate-denier misinformation is alarming. Increases in rain and flooding in one place means drought and fire in another. Hurricanes and cyclones spinning out of control is not a harbinger of a new ice age. Our declining snowpack shows movement in the other direction.
Glendora castle burns (sgvtribune.com)
And geoengineering (cloud seeding, aerosol chemical cloud/haze cover, squeezing more rain out of weather systems, redirecting hurricane paths with atmospheric agitators...) does not correct what human activity is disrupting. Their are natural cycles, and there are exacerbated cycles. Human doings are aggravating the problem. The result?

Monsoon patterns are changing; forest and freeze zones are retreating north; seas are acidifying; poles are melting (in general as seen over time); coral is dissolving; toxic fuels are leaving their mark; and corporations are raking in record profits. 

No one can successfully deny that the climate is generally worse -- hotter, colder, wetter, drier, and more chaotic. Look at the places it used to snow, used to rain predictably, used to cool, used to remain above water.
  • PHOTOS: Firefighters try to protect the main house as a fire burns a section of Singer Mansion on Kregmont Drive in Glendora (Los Angeles Times/Irfan Khan)
The central question is, Why? Even if all the planets in the solar system are growing warmer, our human-created pollution, our annihilation of ecosystems, our monocropping, our allowing of endless military-industrial complex war and crushing poverty, all of which exhausts natural resources, is contributing. 

What FOX News, Rush Limbaugh, and similar ideologues are doing is unconscionable.

Why would rightwingers, such as Tea Party racists and Tea Party egalitarians (are there many?), help the Koch Brothers, ALEC (American Legislative Exchange Council, the source of most actual conspiracies affecting the US and the world), Chevron, BP, and transnational corporations continue to ruin the planet while denying that something is terribly wrong? Sea levels are rising. Fukushima and nuclear sites on the East Coast of the US are contaminating. And Republicans, with plenty of help from their brothers the nominal Democrats, are colluding.


Meanwhile in nearby HOLLYWOOD-Land...

The West's version of Bollywood (the world's largest producer of movies, located in Mumbai/Bombay, India) does not stop even when the hills are on fire, the skies are choked with smoke, and a second coming of a post Ariel Sharon messiah is ready to launch (or be launched by the NSA, Mossad, and similar spying agencies around the world). Nominations were announced and it is looking very good for "12 Years a Slave," based on the true story of the American slave trade, and Amy Adams in "American Hustle," based on the true story of Abscam. "Gravity"? Bullocks. And better luck next time, Tom Hanks. See all the nominees: Oscar.go.com