It is the official position of the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) and the National Oceanographic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) that the chemicals BP used in the Gulf of Mexico to disperse spilled oil pose no public health risks.
However, amid concerns that the dispersants might persist in seafood, the FDA and NOAA have decided to start doing some laboratory testing.
On August 5, an ice island four times the size of Manhattan broke off of a Greenland glacier and started floating toward the Nares Strait, the body of water that separates western Greenland from far northeastern Canada's Ellsemere Island.
Today NRDC, Oceana, and Mote Marine Laboratory launched “Waldo” – an ocean robot that will help defend the environmental and economic bounty of the Florida Keys from impacts from the Gulf oil spill.
Satellite imagery and aerial reconnaissance can only see what’s visible on the surface of the water – they’re not able to tell us the locations and movement of the submerged plumes of oil droplets. These plumes could well be drifting offshore of Florida and without looking to see if they’re there, we won’t know.
With the eyes of the world glued to the World Cup, there’s no mistaking that one sport can bring together people across the globe. But beyond the soccer field, this year’s World Cup is showing how a global clean energy future could unite us in an even more powerful way.
For the first time ever, people in Kenya’s Kibera, the largest slum in Africa, are watching the heroes of their favorite sport on television – solar-powered television.
“We take the oceans for granted. The amount of money spent on oceanographic research is trivial compared to space. How weird is it that we can drive a robot around the surface of Mars and can’t fix a leak in our backyard that’s going to impact millions of lives around the Gulf Coast?"
Inspired by the Exxon Valdez oil spill in 1989, Kevin Costner decided that the world needed a machine that would quickly and safely remove spilled oil from water. So he started building.
Last week, Patently Apple, a blog "celebrating Apple's spirit of innovation," noticed that Apple engineers, in 2008, had quietly filed a patent for a technology to embed solar cells under touch screens.
According to Wednesday's New York Times, the US government is not considering the possibility of detonating a nuclear bomb close to the source of the Deepwater Horizon oil spill.
People have been talking about it, though. On CNN last week, for example, anchor John Roberts suggested that we "drill a hole, drop a nuke in and seal up the well.”
From the world's second-most populous country comes one of the biggest carbon credit projects. India seeks to replace 400 million inefficient, incandescent light bulbs with energy-saving compact fluorescent lamp (CFL) bulbs at a considerably reduced price to the consumer. In the bargain, India is expected to avoid the emission of 40 million tonnes of carbon dioxide.
The National Academy of Sciences, a trusted government advisor on scientific matters, is calling for major legislation to limit greenhouse gas emissions.
While the Academy had mentioned in the past that climate change is a problem, they had never gone so far as to recommend a carbon tax or cap and trade system.
