Here's a good round-up of the biofuels debate. There's been a lot on this recently and I've also read good things about Times' opinionated coverage "The clean energy scam", which I haven't read yet.

Mars is even weirder than we thought, with scientists suggesting climate has changed on the planet in relatively recent times.

The US military plans to grow spare body parts, while alligators could be our friends, as 'gator blood has antibiotic properties. That just goes to reinfoce this argument for protecting biodiversity.

So losing pollinators is bad news on several fronts:

Wild bee decline 'catastrophic'

UK butterflies need good summer

Posted by Rob O'Neill at 2:09 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

The annual Canadian seal hunt polarises opinions and raises many issues.

Whatever your view of the bloody spectacle, the fact that it is even taking place this year is interesting in one incidental way - thick ice has caused it to get off to a slow start.

That’s a change from last year, when the annual cull was affected by a lack of ice.

As the link to National Geographic above says, the absence of ice a year ago was ascribed by some to man-made global warming. The fact the ice had been thin for most of this decade bolstered that view.
What to make of the situation this year? It doesn’t mean global warming isn’t happening, but the return of the ice in the waters off Canada’s eastern coast is an interesting phenomenon.

Posted by David Watson at 5:24 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)