"SALT LAKE CITY -- The U.S. Department of the Interior scaled back a Bush administration plan Friday to lease Western range lands for development of oil shale and tar sands, the unconventional sources of oil found in pockets of the Rocky Mountains."
"WASHINGTON -- Climate change is accelerating, and it will place unparalleled strains on American military and intelligence agencies in coming years by causing ever more disruptive events around the globe, the nation’s top scientific research group said in a report issued Friday."
A lot of environmental controversies were postponed until after the 2012 election (except in the GOP-controlled House). Now that's going to change.
"America's intelligence community was ordered to track poachers in Africa and Asia on Thursday as part of a new global drive against the illegal trade in elephant tusks and rhino horn."
"The West Nile virus epidemic of 2012, the worst in a decade, may be notorious for yet another reason: The virus, in some cases, is attacking the brain more aggressively than in the past, raising the specter that it may have mutated into a nastier form, say two neurologists who have extensive experience dealing with the illness."
"Money raised from carbon taxes on energy bills should be used to lift millions of households out of fuel poverty and boost the economy, it has been suggested."
Turns out that computer models may have been underestimating the severity of climate change.
"Hot and dry conditions in parts of middle America deepened an ongoing drought in many states over the last week, according to a climatology report issued Thursday."
"For a clue to the possible impact of climate change on modern society, a study suggests a look back at the end of classic Maya civilization, which disintegrated into famine, war and collapse as a long-term wet weather pattern shifted to drought."
"Rising temperatures due to climate change could mean wild arabica coffee is extinct in 70 years, posing a risk to the genetic sustainability of one of the world's basic commodities, scientists said."
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