Although denying that we have a special position in the natural world might seem becomingly modest... it might also be used as an excuse for evading responsibilities.
The fact is that no species has ever had such wholesale control over everything on earth, living or dead, as we now have.
That lays upon us, whether we like it or not, an awesome responsibility.
In our hands now lies not only our own future, but that of all living creatures with whom we share the earth.

- David Attenborough
 

When you've spent half your political life dealing with humdrum issues like the environment,
 it's exciting to have a real crisis on your hands.

- Margaret Thatcher
on the Falklands Conflict
 

Sun Pillars - When bright light passes from the sun, moon or an artificial light source through a portion of the sky containing a concentration of ice crystals, magical apparitions often appear...

Swift and Deadly - the resonant current effects of old nuclear tests and a revolutionary idea for using nukes to help the planet heal...

Common Radioactive Items - Thorium oxide coated gas lamp mantles used in ornamental gas lanterns and gas burning camping lamps are radioactive.  The thorium oxide is chosen because it can be raised to white heat without decomposing.  However, the mantle does become extremely fragile and will powder into a fine ash which can potentially be inhaled or ingested...

A Perfect Environment - When you've already acquired everything else you'll ever need...

Country Castles - Old rural barns can be a fire hazard.  They can also be an insurance burden for farmers.  One Canadian company has a solution.  It is exporting parts of barns and even entire barns to wealthy customers, primarily American customers.  There, the barns are transformed, mouseholes and all, into luxury homes.  Canadian heritage activists are concerned that their history is being trucked south but the owners and operators of the business say they are "preserving rural landmarks."  Which one is right?

Apartment Living - What "Apart" really means and "Is this what you mean by living?"

Arsenic Poisons Millions - "Complex geological reasons" threaten 25 million.  "Where?" you ask...

You don't miss your water, an old blues sage wisely said, 'til your well runs dry.  Down here on planet Earth, the well is starting to run dry.  We've seen projections that three billion people - half of today's population - will be short of water in 2025...

One Billion People Are Thirsty - What can be done?

Environmental Degradation in China - "...only 5% of household waste receives any treatment..."

Spirit Away - Tepuis [South America's "table" mountains] are islands in time where flora and fauna have grown for eons without outside influence, evolved to suit the inhospitable climate of soilless, windswept plateaux pounded by torrential downpours.  Notorious are "puri-puri" insects, which may be earth's most bloodthirsty creatures: nearly invisible, they've been known to drive unprepared visitors insane...

High and Wide - a couple of really nice satellite photos (but, then I think they all are) and a look at how deep the ocean is around NZ

Doomsday Argument - Suppose humanity will be wiped out imminently, that apocalypse is around the corner - after all, more than 4 billion of the 40 billion humans who have ever lived are alive today.  Thus, this is far and away the most likely time to exist.  Conclusion: Doom soon.

Embalming Recipe - Include cinnamon, cloves, and one last nip of alcohol

Grains of Sand - He discovered he could go around the world through deserts...

Average Time of First Freeze - At the time this map was published, downtown Buffalo and cities near the Lake Erie shore had not had a freezing temperature yet this season, although the average freeze date was more than 6 weeks ago (the first freezeless November on record.)  By 23 December, they had experienced only 1.2 inches of snow.  Things have now changed, however...

City Tunnel Number 3 is the largest capital construction project in the history of New York City.  The activated portion of the tunnel runs 13 miles, from the Hillview reservoir in Yonkers across Central Park, under the East River and Roosevelt Island into Astoria, Queens.  It will eventually span more than 60 miles, bringing water from the Catskills.  Cost?  More than $5 billion.  (People in the US use 3x as much water as Europeans.)

Winds of Change - In 1938, during a gliding competition over the Rhön mountains in Germany, 5 contestants flew into a thundercloud in search of lift.  Sucked into the violent centre, their sailplanes broke up; all parachuted free but were carried upwards into increasingly colder clouds; they couldn't escape the howling gale.  Rain soaked them; hail lashed their faces.  Only one, severely injured, escaped with his life.  It's difficult to imagine the ordeal of the others - over 10 km high, they must've been frozen, tossed about, stabbed by lightning - until the storm grew tired of its game and discarded their bodies...

Hurricanes are influenced by the ocean's salt content which changes the current which makes the temperature rise...

Tornado - "At last the great shaggy end of the funnel hung directly overhead.  Everything was as still as death.  There was a strong gassy odour and it seemed that I could not breathe.  There was a screaming hissing sound coming directly from the end of the funnel.  I looked up and to my astonishment, I saw right into the heart of the funnel..."

'Tis the Season to Be Swept Away - The US is the country with the highest frequency of tornadoes - every state has recorded at least one in its past (although they are extremely rare in Alaska)...

Controlling the Weather - "We call it taming the tornado - with just a little burst of microwave energy, we think we see a way to negate the trigger point in tornado creation.  We want to heat the cold rain..."

Also a Whirlwind Tour of Miami...

Lightning may seem relatively rare, but there are about a hundred flashes a second around the planet.  Ground strikes almost always create currents in the surrounding soil...

Nearly Perfect - Cruise on by if you're ever in the neighbourhood...

A Treetise - "No one owns trees.  They are shared and respected and loved by the whole community.  Landowners often don't realise that."...

The Beautiful Baobab - Tangy and exceedingly nutritious, the pulp makes a tasty food or, after soaking in water or milk, a refreshing beverage (with 6 times the vitamin C content of an orange).  Fermented, it makes a traditional brew.  The seeds may be eaten raw or roasted.  They yield an edible oil which can be used for cooking and is exported for use in cosmetics.  The leaves, similar to spinach, are eaten as a relish, especially in times of drought and are considered medicinal...

Environment for Sale - Marginal values are tricky - pollution in a big city may cause more harm...

Saving Unique Habitats - Farmers fear precious habitat on their own land will be locked up without consultation or compensation; one answer is to destroy it before that happens...

All-American Bioterrorism - In 1972, a white-supremacist group called the Order of the Rising Sun apparently created as much as 40 kilograms of typhoid bacteria cultures in a college laboratory.  They planned to contaminate water supplies in Chicago, St Louis, and other Midwestern cities, thereby leading to the deaths of "inferior" populations.  The plot was uncovered when two members of the group panicked and informed police...

Tolerable - If you have a high speed Internet connection and a freezer full of pizzas

World Habitats - "This is not some slow controlled change we're talking about.  It's fast, it's unpredictable and it's unprecedented..."

Stephen's Hawking his opinion: If you're planning a big celebration for the next millennium, you can just forget it!

The Threat of Rising Sea Levels - Seas are rising because global warming melts glaciers, nibbles away at polar ice caps and causes oceans to expand as water gets warmer.  Not much can be done as the rise is effectively unstoppable.  This may not bode well in a few years for any new buildings on Wellington's waterfront...

Poseidon Adventure - Not everyone agrees on the speed with which global warming is causing the oceans to rise: "...the current sea level rate of rise is 0.9 mm/yr - half the rate claimed for the last 100 years, and less than 1/5 the rate claimed for the 21st century..."

Mother Nature Speaks - Kavachi, near the Solomon Islands, produced eruptions 800 metres high every five minutes, ejecting ash and incandescent blocks of lava up to 70 metres above sea level...

Civilisation is a Pyramid Scheme - I'm not sure, but aren't those things against the law?

So No Place to Live Is Really Okay (Even If You're Dead)? - Networks of low-density suburbs make their residents totally dependent on their cars, one of the chief sources of greenhouse gases.  This dependence is one reason that Americans generate the highest emissions of greenhouse \ gases on the planet...

Truck Stop/Internet Cafe: will it help prevent the Oil Crash? - After decades of exploration, earth's geology and oil resources are fairly well known.  As fields empty, money helps scrape out hard-to-reach remainders.  210 billion barrels are left to discover and 1000 billion left to extract as indicated by a 40 year decline in oil's discovery.  But money can't create oil that simply isn't there...

Life after the Oil Crash - The end of civilisation as we know it...

A Hydrogen Economy? - Hydrogen isn't really an energy source, it's an energy medium.  Oil, wind, and solar are all sources of energy, but hydrogen doesn't exist naturally in a form we can use.  We have to create it with some other means...

New Zealand's Energy Options - of course, the same considerations apply to everyone...

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