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Did Climate Change Cause Russia’s Deadly Anthrax Outbreak?

Scientists are investigating whether melting permafrost has unleashed the bacteria. A photomicrograph of Bacillus anthracis bacteria, the bacteria that causes anthrax. CDC This story was originally published by the Guardian. A 12-year-old boy in the far north of Russia has died in an outbreak of anthrax that experts believe was triggered when unusually warm weather caused the release of the bacteria. The boy was one of 72 nomadic herders, including 41 children, hospitalized in the town of Salekhard in the Arctic Circle, after reindeer began dying en masse from anthrax. Five adults and two other children have been diagnosed with the disease, which is known as “Siberian plague” in Russian and was last seen in the region in 1941. More than 2,300 reindeer have died, and at least 63 people have been evacuated from a quarantine area around the site of the outbreak. “We literally fought for the life of each person, but the infection showed its cunning,” the Yamal governor, Dmitry Kobylkin, told the Interfax news agency. “It returned after 75 years and took the life of a child.” The tabloid LifeNews reported that the boy’s grandmother died of anthrax at a nomad camp last week. Authorities said the outbreak was linked to climate change. For the past month, the region has been experiencing abnormally high temperatures that have reached 95 Fahrenheit. Anthrax spores can survive in frozen human and animal remains for hundreds of years, waiting to be released by a thaw, according to Alexei Kokorin, head of WWF Russia’s climate and energy program. “Such anomalous heat is rare for Yamal, and that’s probably a manifestation of climate change,” he said. Average temperatures in Russia have increased by 0.43 degrees Celsius (0.77 degrees F) in the past 10 years, but the rise has been more pronounced in areas of the far north. The warmer climate has begun thawing the permafrost soil that covers much of Russia, including cemeteries and animal burial grounds. Thawing permafrost has also led to greater erosion of river banks where nomads often buried their dead, Kokorin said. “They didn’t bury deep because it’s hard to dig deep in permafrost,” he explained. According to custom, the Nenets tribe often inters its dead in a wooden coffin on open ground. The disease from thawing human and animal remains can get into groundwater that people then drink. The boy in Salekhard died from the intestinal form of the disease, which typically results in fever, stomach pain, diarrhea and vomiting. Other reports said a local cemetery was suspected, or infected venison. Three unusual sinkholes were discovered on the Yamal peninsula in 2014, a phenomenon that many scientists also tied to climate change. Thawing permafrost could have allowed gas in the ground to explode, they said. This summer, researchers have filmed grassy ground on an island off the Yamal peninsula that appeared to bounce under their feet. The phenomenon was likely caused by “bubbles” of methane and carbon dioxide, they said. View post:  Did Climate Change Cause Russia’s Deadly Anthrax Outbreak? ; ; ;

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Did Climate Change Cause Russia’s Deadly Anthrax Outbreak?

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Can Bernie Sanders Ride Fracking to Victory in New York?

The Democratic presidential candidates have divergent views on the controversial natural gas drilling technique. New Yorkers protest against fracking in 2014 a katz/shutterstock In this week’s tight New York Democratic primary, the fight over hydraulic fracturing, or fracking, is one issue of contention between Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) and former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton. And it could be a deciding factor for some voters. Sanders says he would ban all fracking everywhere. Clinton says the practice should be regulated and restricted, but natural gas is helping the U.S. move away from coal-fired power. Sanders’ campaign has capitalized on that difference, noting in an ad released on Monday that he “is the only candidate for president who opposes fracking everywhere.” Fracking uses a high-pressure stream of water, sand and chemicals to tap into shale formations to release natural gas. The practice has been highly contentious in New York, which contains a lot of natural gas in the Marcellus formation. A number of communities in upstate New York banned the practice, worried about potential impacts on groundwater, along with other health and safety concerns. In December 2014, New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo announced that the state would ban the practice entirely. (Sanders’ home state of Vermont banned fracking in 2012.) Read the rest at The Huffington Post. Link:   Can Bernie Sanders Ride Fracking to Victory in New York? ; ; ;

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Can Bernie Sanders Ride Fracking to Victory in New York?

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Science Has Found a Brilliant New Use for Your Kitchen Scraps

Turns out, dumping compost on grasslands can do a surprising amount for the planet. Steve Russell/The Toronto Star/ZUMA When John Wick and his wife, Peggy Rathmann, bought their 540-acre ranch in 1998, it was in bad shape. Located in California’s Marin County, a windswept region northwest of San Francisco Bay, the land had been worn down by overgrazing; the grass was gone and the soil was degraded. Neither Wick nor Rathmann knew how to fix it because the couple didn’t have any ranching experience—Wick worked in construction management, and Rathmann wrote children’s classics like 10 Minutes till Bedtime and Good Night, Gorilla. So Wick consulted his friend Jeffrey Creque, a rangeland ecology expert. Creque helped Wick repair the soil by bringing back some grass—which gave the two an idea: They knew that in addition to enriching the soil, healthy grass, through photosynthesis, could remove carbon from the atmosphere. So was there a way, they wondered, to grow more grass on Wick’s land and slow global warming at the same time? The theory made sense: Carbon that is absorbed by grass can be stored for hundreds of years in the grass’ roots and surrounding soil—a much better spot for it than in the air, where it warms the planet in the form of carbon dioxide. Carbon-enriched soil, in turn, feeds grass so it can grow taller and suck down even more carbon. In rangelands, this cycle takes place on a massive scale: Between the grass and the soil, a third of the world’s carbon is stored in these expanses. But tilling and overgrazing unleash that carbon. These practices also cause topsoil erosion, which compounds the problem by making it hard for grass to grow. To make matters worse, rangelands are often home to cows, and manure releases methane and nitrous oxide gases into the atmosphere. In fact, livestock are responsible for nearly one-fifth of the globe’s overall greenhouse gas emissions. Read the rest at Mother Jones. Originally posted here –  Science Has Found a Brilliant New Use for Your Kitchen Scraps ; ; ;

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Science Has Found a Brilliant New Use for Your Kitchen Scraps

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Why Congress Needs to Extend the Wind Energy Tax Credit

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The wind energy industry and environmental groups are calling on Congress to renew the credit. ali_pk/Flickr The wind energy production tax credit is a tougher issue than you might imagine for some good liberal wonks. On the one hand, wind power is great. On the other hand, tax credits are a market-distorting, inefficient way of making policy. They are basically spending disguised as tax cuts. Most tax credits that affect the environment — accelerated depreciation for the fossil fuel industry, the home mortgage interest deduction — incentivize sprawl, driving, and profligate dirty energy use. It is a rare, and tantalizing, point of agreement between good government advocates across party lines that we should throw out the whole system and operate a cleaner tax code. So it might be tempting, when you see Tea Party–affiliated, Koch brothers–backed groups such as Americans for Prosperity pushing to eliminate the wind energy tax credit, to say, “Hey, I agree!” Tempting but wrong. Continue reading at Grist.

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Why Congress Needs to Extend the Wind Energy Tax Credit

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If Only… Grazed Grasslands Could Sop Up All Industrial CO2

A popular talk on how livestock grazing can stop global warming gets a tough scrub. Original article:  If Only… Grazed Grasslands Could Sop Up All Industrial CO2 ; ;Related ArticlesDot Earth Blog: If Only… Grazed Grasslands Could Sop Up All Industrial CO2A Closer Look at Climate Panel’s Findings on Global Warming ImpactsClimate Change Seen Posing Risk to Food Supplies ;

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If Only… Grazed Grasslands Could Sop Up All Industrial CO2

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Scotts 14933 PatchMaster Sun and Shade Grass Seed Lawn Repair Mixing Bag, 14-1/4-Pound

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Omega 8004 Juicer (Color: White) Plus Organic Wheatgrass Growing Kit: Combo Includes Omega Juice Machine & Wheat Grass Grow Kit – Kit Includes Trays, Seeds, Soil, Instructions & More.

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Organic Barley Grass Growing Kit w/ Hurricane Barleygrass Juicer- Grow & Juice Barleygrass in Your Own Kitchen for Pennies a Day

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Omega 8005 Juicer and the Organic Wheatgrass Growing Kit – Combo Includes Juice Machine & Wheat Grass Grow Kit – Grow & Juice Wheat Grass for Pennies a Day. Includes: Electric Juicer, Trays, Seed, Soil, Azomite Trace Mineral Fertilizer, Instructions & a Book; Wheatgrass, Nature’s Finest Miracle By Steve Meyerowitz

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Organic Wheatgrass Growing Kit w/ Hurricane Stainless Steel Wheat Grass Juicer- Everything to Grow & Juice Wheatgrass

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