Wednesday 31 December 2008

Happy New Year 2009

One in five mammal species on the planet are facing extinction. I ask 2009 for letting recover the number of Lynx individuals, our Iberian Lynx, the most threatened feline in the world, and that tigers don't arrive to the same situation because they are on the way.

We, like them, are a miracle of Life. Lets not allow that a miracle leaves us forever, at least, because of our fault.

Tiger - Link 1 and 2

Monday 29 December 2008

The Dog Meat Trade

Have your say by clicking here. Lots of Tanks.


Monday 22 December 2008

Merry Xmas to Everybody

Berta, great lover of animals, sent to me an e-mail yesterday to wish me Xmas. I "recycle" it given that recycling is something usual in my life and take profit of it to send you her message, my message. Thanks to everybody for devoting part of your prized time on my blog.

As they teach us, I WISH YOU A MERRY CHRISTMAS and that PEACE, HARMONY AND TOLERANCE invade ALL BEINGS and ALL CORNERS ALL OVER THE PLANET in 2009.

A very big hugh to everybody. 

I leave you a video which Berta sent to me. It is not a Xmas video, but it is charming or at least I think so. Have a very good time in company of your people and consume responsibly.

Wednesday 17 December 2008

Take Care With Your Xmas Gifts

Now it's time to buy many things as a gift to our mates and folks. And now more than before, we have to take into account things on the background of the things we get. Remember you have many things to say with your buy. You can decide the politics of many companies getting some products instead of others. And of course, think twice before getting something. Think that doubling the time you use something you are reducing twice the quantity of waste. And of course, if you are getting electronic devices, take also into account the word coltan.

I leave you a video to think about my words.

Friday 5 December 2008

Your Voice in December 11th


Click here to make your voice to be listened. If the web is loaded in Spanish, in the upper left corner you have a link to load the web in different languages.

Tuesday 2 December 2008

A Good Christmas Bonus

As usual! It was December 23rd 2006. I was reading the newspaper Levante and I could check that from public coffers, four million euros were going to be destinated to fund the repairs of Xativa's bullfighting square (Xativa is a little city in the south of the province of Valencia). I'd rather prefer investing the money in culture, sport or science because there's a lot of need of those subjects. These four million euros will be for: one.- to benefit builders (who have the support of our politicians to destroy our environment) and two.- to support a "party" to which no words exist.

Once more the famous quote is repeated: we can get by without school but not without bulls. And of course, the bullfighting square has to be finished before elections... Why on Earth have my taxes to have this fate? Because nobody has got four million euros from nowhere. If you want to have party, at the moment pay it yourself, because really it should be forbidden, I don't understand a party in which a living being is tortured.

Of course, some people are able to do any thing in order to not to lose the chair...

Tuesday 25 November 2008

Buy Nothing Day


Imagine that suddenly, we run out of money and, to prevent collapses, more fast than say Jack and Robinson somebody is pumping liquidity once more in our banking system. But in the background of this financial crisis, a crisis much more important is showing: we are working out of nature limits... fish, forests, fresh water, minerals, ground. What are we going to do when these resources are completely exhausted?

There's only one path to prevent the collapse of this human experiment on Earth: we have to consume less.

Click on the picture to get more information.

Saturday 15 November 2008

Wretch II

Once more I've been able to check that a daily use of the bicycle is a question of culture and education. Despite winters are harsh in Finland, it exists a daily use of the bicycles as a mean of transport. Obviously, bicycles are more used in summer (or at least I think so).

Here where I live, potential bicycle users put forward any thing: there is a lot of traffic and it is dangerous, it is very hot, it is very hard, I sweat, it is cold... ¡Cold!¡Cold! It makes me laugh at them. Last time I was in Finland we got -17ºC... The best thing was that I saw people cycling ¡Even elderly people!

Maybe in Spain somebody can think that who uses the bycicle in Finland is because they don't have any other resource. Maybe there's somebody, but from my point of view, if something characterizes Finland, is its way of life, a low index of political corruption (at least if we compare with Spain) and above all, if I haven't been misinformed, ostentation is not well regarded. What do we find here (in general)? Cyclists are sadly a minority. The car has become the totem of our society, in the reference of what you are or you try to be... ¡Get out of my road wretch!

Sunday 2 November 2008

A Week for a Rest

Some posts ago I wrote about my journey to Lapland in 2006. This post was written when I was there. I only would like to show you the things and situtatuons I lived there. Get your own conclusions.

I have decided to leave, only a bit, my blog during this week. This my holiday week and I need a piece of rest... Getting back to this land is excellent, I think at the moment... I wouldn't get back to my country...

I'm getting a lot of knowledge about my favourite subject, and, little by little, I've had the oppportunity to speak to people of the place about the behaviour of the climate. I have spoken to taxi drivers, tour guides and dogs breeders. Tomorrow we will visit once more the ice braker Sampo, it won't be like last time, but we will try to have fun as much as we can, thing which is not in doubt and I will take profit to try to exchange ideas with somebody of the crew.

I already have more things in mind for new posts, so from next week I will go back to write (meanwhile I will go updating some link). Just now we are in Kemi. It is -4 ºC in the street and no much time it will take me to go to bed. Good night.

Tuesday 21 October 2008

Sunday 12 October 2008

It's not for Me, It's for Them


Once again, President Bush has called for drilling in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge by 2010 in his new budget proposal.

The Arctic Refuge is the most important onshore denning habitat for America's vanishing polar bears. 

Urge Congress to permanently protect the Arctic Refuge now!


Tuesday 30 September 2008

Nice Picture, No Actions


In December 2007 I visited some friends that my wife and I have in Singapore. One of the places we visited was the zoo. To be sincere the Singapore zoo has been one of the best zoos I have ever visited so far but, in general, zoos are not my cup of tea. 


One of the attractions was the polar bear, that giant of the ice whose pictures move us. How nice! What a beautiful picture! What a pity he faces the threat of extinction in short! But what do we do when we arrive at home? What actions do we take every day? What's the percentage of people who do something to prevent, better said, to stop the melting of the ice caps? Only hot air... Nothing else... Things are getting worse... Methane is escaping from the ice: Have a look. Take it easy, it's better blaming on others. Keep sleeping.


Sunday 14 September 2008

Everything Has Been Stolen to Us

At the end of 2006, in my spanish blog I wrote some lines that, Ana Pérez Sanjuán from Greenpeace, sent to the magazine of such NPO. I thought it was worthy of being posted in my blog. Some notes before beginning.: Galicia is something like a "state" in Spain, not exactly, but for giving you an idea. The document was written as a consequence of the wood fires that year.

"Galicia's Prometeos, far away from stealing the Fire to the Gods looking for the Light and Life, they vile and cowardly steal such fire to the men to put out not only their inheritance but also their sons, grandsons' laugh and hopes.

Those killers of the Life have taken away the colour with all his blends, the smell with all its frangances, the smell of the dew in the morning and night dew soft shiver. They have taken away the orange-coloured moonrise among the twisted branches of the carballo (a vegetable), at the same time that the red-coloured sunsets among the green cloak of the mountains.

They have stolen the beautiful sing of the birds, the sound of the crikets at night, the sound of the cicada in the morning. Where's the walking of the frightened wall lizard, the wild boar's footprint, the astonished eyes of the fox, the wolf's howling or the light crack of the deer and roe deer with their elegant gallop among multicolored ferns?

They have stolen to us all the life beings on the Earth, the jubilation, the laugh, the summer and all the seasons during long, long time... Some of us have almost fallen silent, anothers won't come back to feel and see the freshing beat of the forest heart. But, in that fight which lasted more than ten moons and hurt suns, the Nobles and Knights of this odd age will leave us alone once more in the battlefield.

Take care Lords and Knights of that which is ours and that which belongs to itself, because never it will have an owner, so it is known that, when de jubilation comes back to the forests and specters lie in wait for, they feed on the life itself because you don't wipe out them, the inhabitants of this region, all over the Kingdom and the Empire let forests and wounded animals to die. But, the Moon and the Sun which see this, some day, they will took revenge on this, on the specters evil and on the Lords and Knights of this odd age who didn't know to carry out their oath".

After these lines the only thing I can do is to add this quote by Great Chief Seattle: the white man will swallow all the Earth and nothing will be left, only a desert.

Happy week to everybody.

Wednesday 27 August 2008

Something Is Happening - Part II

This is a post which follows a previous one some weeks ago. This is the second part of our wanted travel to Finland, a post in which I continued wondering what we were going to find when we arrived to Lapland.

"I don't know what we are going to find when we get to Kemi. Rain? Snow? Three days after cancelling our trip on the ice breaker the only thing the crew says is that.... it's raining.... It could see something usual if we don't know where Kemi is, even we could think such event is something punctual, but I don't think so. It takes an hour and a half to go from Kemi to the Artic Circle using not a high speed train of course.

As I said in my last mail, in the very beginning of December, it should be an ice sheet of 40 kms long. Now it's nothing at all.. I think the issue is not a silly thing. Anyway, below, I let you the last mail from the ice breaker crew (pay attention to the suspension points next to the word 'raining')

Good morning Pedro
Yes we have received you e-mail. You are wellcome to Sampo to have a lunch.
Do you want that we return the difference of amount on Sampo in cash or shall we return to your credit card (which we have charged) ?
PD Weather continues as already 2 weeks, it´s raining...
WBR
Sampo Tours
Annikki

----- Original Message -----

From: "Perico" <energias.renovables.ya@gmail.com>
To: "SampoTours" <Sampo@kemi.fi>
Sent: Wednesday, December 06, 2006 2:20 AM
Subject: Re: URGENT MESSAGE from
Sampo Tours

Hi Maija-Liisa, have you received my e-mail to confirmate the booking for
four persons?

Have a nice,

Peter.

P.D. What is weather like? Has it become freezing already?"



The question just now is: Will we have at the end of this summer a new record in Artic ice sheet melting?

That's all for today. See you.

Saturday 16 August 2008

Maybe... More than Simple Animals...

Two people raised a lion cub and he was named "Christian". He became very big to be kept for those people, so they decided to let him in freedom to live as a wild lion.

One year later they travelled to the natural reserve where the lion was. They were told that the lion wouldn't remember them. The video was taken in the moment they met.

Get your own opinion.


Sunday 10 August 2008

Something is happening

Skeptics of climate change say nohting is happening but I don't think so. One of the things I do when I go somewhere, if possible, is to ask older people of the place about how weather was like in their childhood and if things are changing. So far, every body asked agrees in that way. Anyway, I'm going to tell something that happened to me, my wife and our friends in December 2006. It was just some weeks before we began a journey to Lapland, Finland.

"Let's see, today is Monday and we begin the week badly. Our eagerly awaited journey to one of the most beautiful places we have been to has becoming one of the very first places in which climate change is showing its effects, or at least it's the way I interpret it. 

Two years ago we were in Rovaniemi. There a man aged in his mid-twenties and whose job was to prepare "safaris", told me that winter had begun unnormally: ice arrived later than usual and some weeks later it began to rain, which supposed that many places covered by ice became dangerous for walking. The same thing told me a ship attendant on the icebreaker Sampo in Kemi. That year, the ice sheet which covered the Botnia Gulf was one kilometer and a half shorter and of course it was thinner. About temperatures the assistant told me that they were enough warm: -4 ºC. The usual temperature in that moment should be -14ºC.

Two years later we go back the third time. We are departing next sunday, but the icebreaker staff has just confirmed me that there is no trip along the ice because simply there is nothing at all. It should be normal having 40 kms of ice in this moment but there is no ice.... no ice.... I can't believe it. The staff say that there have been  several of unsual warming weeks.... If there winters are becoming warmer I don't want to think how summers are going to be here....

Below I let you the answer of the crew. Later, get your own conclusions."

Dear Pedro

Unfortunately we are forced to cancel the icebreaker cruise on Saturday 16th of December due to the lack of ice. Normally the sea is frozen about 40km from the coast of Kemi in the beginning of December.

Now we have had several weeks exceptionally warm and windy weather here in Finland and there is no ice and snow because of it.

Instead of 4 hours cruise, which has been cancelled, we will organize the guided tour and lunch on Sampo.

Time: 12.00 - 13.30
Price: 30,- Eur/adult (15,- Eur/child under 12 years)
Incl.: guided tour on board and lunch (same lunch as you have chosen for the cruise)

Please let us know if you are interested to have a lunch on Sampo.

In case you want to cancel the whole Sampo visit, of course we will return the amount you have payed or compensate the difference of the cancelled cruise.

We apologize for this situation and wait for your contact.
Please acknowledge this message, thank you.

With best regards
Maija-Liisa Helistö

SAMPO TOURS

Friday 25 July 2008

Barcelona 2018

One Sunday on November 2006, I could read a piece of news in which it was said that, in the case some measures were not taken, in 2018 traffic jams would collapse the city of Barcelona. The truth is that piece of news atonished me because Barcelona is one of the best organized cities in Spain when you speak in terms of public transport or at least I thought so. The point was that public transport should be adapted to new demand. I couldn't help thinking the stacks and stacks of asphalt that were and are being spent.... think about it. We are fragmentating the envioronment at full speed and that's no good at all, above all for animals which need big extensions of land like iberic lynxes or bears.

I'm absolutely convinced that even with 18 lanes streets or roads, in not many years time, they would be collapsed. And why? Because we humans are as we are, there's no awareness , there's no culture of responsibility respect to the environmental limits. I know there are a very big bunch of people who couldn't care less pollution. To them is not a big deal to asphalt everywhere, it's not a big deal to fragment most ecosystems. Think about that, the less cars driving the less space we need to asphalt, I don't know if you catch me. Imagine if we have so much land asphalted in Spain that if we used all that surface to produce green energy we could supply all the energy that our country needs...... Go back to think about it.

To conclude, I think asphalting a lot of land impoverishes a lot of people, in the long term, and makes rich a few ones, in the short term. We almost have the same kilometers of highways than Germany, but Germany almost doubles us in population and the worst is that some of the highways built are not justified because they are underutilised. Dear politicians, please, change your policy of asphalting, because it is bread for today and hunger for tomorrow; please drivers, think about no using so much your box of four wheels, don't be so lazy above all if you are alone in your car. Put into practice this: 4 x 4 = four wheels for four people. Thanks.

Friday 4 July 2008

Out of Place

One weekend in November 2006 was one of those special weekends you keep in mind. It was a weekend spent in good company at the Mas of Noguera. "Mas" is a valencian word, valencian is a languaje we speak in the east of Spain and Mas means something like a rural house but not exactly. During that weekend I saw several times a happy group of cats, quiet, well regarded, well attended and keeping my way of thinking, in those moments came to my mind the introduction of foreign species....

It is sure that more than one people think that from the old times cats have been everywhere: but no, cats, as everything in this life, have had their own place and their own moment, up to the moment in which one mammal called "man" took it out from its original place.

Such a sweet image in the Mas could be translated into a fierce predator in the island of El Hierro in the Canary Islands or in an island-continent as Austrilia. In these places our friendly pussy-cat standed out in an environment which had never known its presence, imagine the catastrophe....

Homeless cats adpapted to live in the wild were about to die out the giant lizards in the island of El Hierro (Canary Islands). In Australia that type of cats went so far that authorities raised the possiblity of having a free-cat country in 2020. And why? It is very easy, a cat killed and kills about 1000 birds and small mammals a year. Similar problems have already been raised in some states of the USA.

Some day, to see things with more detail, I will tell you the story of the LightHouse Worker's Cat. I hope nobody thinks that I don't like cats at all, in fact I have one, neither I want people killing cats everywhere. The only thing I want is people having cats under control.


Tuesday 17 June 2008

Father's Love

It's something usual to have conversation at home with my wife about things we watch at TV. I remember of having a conversation one day about climate change and, from that point we jumped to the point of recycling and finally to the subject of transport by bycicle. We, in secret, many times laugh at people seeing how they try to justify why they use a car to get to work when really it is not necessary at all. But those people go far, even they try to justify why they don't do anything at all for the planet. The reason for not recycling is, according to them, that everything is thrown away to the same place or that the container is not in front of their doorway... even things so odd as "if the United States continue polluting I also will"... Cool!!! You have convinced me with such a great arguments!!!

Sometimes I'm astonished when some of those people show off about being fanatical parents, but they don't take care and do nothing to instill the minimum values about environmental issues, of course, like father, like son... Sadly, environmental issues are not things of crazy people: it is a must, imagine if it is so important than a 25% of the world's population die because of environmental problems.

So fathers and mothers, you that show off about being so good and complacent with your children, keep in mind that coming times are not as good as you think, I think they will face some very serious problems. The least you can do for them, would be to instill them some values which contribute to a better world, both socially and ecologically, it's not worth letting them a world in a mess when you leave so teach them to leave things as they found them. It's a moral and a survival must.

One day somebody told: There's no better education than the example.

Tuesday 10 June 2008

How dreadful!!

The Plot

Greenpeace just released the results of a four-month undercover investigation, and at this moment it's growing into the biggest scandal to ever hit the whaling industry in Japan.


Friday 6 June 2008

What You See Is What You Get



God, grant me serenity to accept
things I can't change;
courage to change
things I can change
and
wisdom to see the difference.



Reinhold Niebuhr

Tuesday 20 May 2008

Cigarette Butts

A vice that I hate a lot is smoking. I hate that damned smoke that many times passes long my face but, what the most I hate, is that unconscious habit, or not, of throwing away the butter, not being important the place in which someone is, of course. It doesn't matter at all whether we are in the city or in the countryside, the action is always the same: from the mouth to the hand and from the hand to the ground. Was the butter here before you arrived? Your waste is yours not mine nor from the others, I don't want to share your waste and nor the others, and of course, forests are not guilty for being you a filthy person. We are already doing enouhg smelling your smoke.

In my city, all litter bins at the streets have a little piece of metal to put out your cigarette and, if there isn't, is not my business but yours. In this case, you have to put out your cigarette crushing it with your foot and the following action would be to throw it to the litter bin. It could be room for another possibility, there aren't litter bins!!!! My God!!! It's easy, take the butter and put it inside your pocket. I have some acquaintances that do that, in fact they're being responsible for their waste. The last straw is to see somebody throwing his/her butter through the window, what kind of education does he/she have? Aren't there any ashtrays in the cars nowadays? Neither is my fault in that case. If you don't want to get dirty your car neither get dirty our streets. The car is yours but streets are from everybody so that's the problem, and things which are from a lot of people are not looked after, as so many another things.....

Smoker, three messages for you:
  1. Your butter and cigarette boxes get dirty OUR environment.
  2. Your butter is not easy to be recycled, have you thougt about it? It will take a long time to be recycled and maybe it will be eaten by an animal causing his death.
  3. If everyone of us threw away a butter, that would be translated into 6600 million butters, but the worst thing wouldn't be that, perhaps, the worst thing would be that they would fire our forests.
EOF.

Tuesday 6 May 2008

Coltan, Congo coffins?

Some time ago, I promised to my friend Paqui to comment some things about how the irresponsible consumption of mobiles had, has and will have, if nothing stops it, its repercusions in the environment and so far they don't seem to be perceptible to this very well-off society. I don't properly know the reasons, but maybe because of comfort, indifference or another unknown question, many people don't want to speak about some subjects because they say they go bad, but, as somebody said once: no to think in what you go bad is what hurts you.

From time to time you can see ads to change your "old" mobile for free. For sellers it will be a good thing but not for the environment. One thing annoys me: when somebody says to me that my mobile is as heavy as a brick..... go to hell!! Let's continue because I'm getting angry....

According to figures in Spain in August 2006, the mean of mobiles updating was one a year to the 59% of population and in that way, we accumulated a mean of 3.7 mobiles per person. Respect to recycling the device, it is the best option to get rid of it, but we have to take into account that we need energy and we still depend the most on fossil fuels, so you continue polluting.... A lot of plastics are impossible to be recycled because they are polluted by some of the metals that the mobile contains, but it is a minor problem because what it's really important is to recover half-precious and strategic metals. So let's see, what's the relation between this and Congo? That among those half-precious metals is coltan.




Coltan is a compound which presents a lot of resistance against heat and that extends batteries life. 80% of the coltan comes from Africa and the worst is that it comes from high conflictivity places as the Democratic Republic of Congo. Last figures I've got, say that more than 10.000 miners are working under subhuman conditions to extract coltan clay. In 2003, in response to several reports on injustice, corruption and violence, the most important mobile makers got measures to prevent that the coltan they used didn't come from Congo (in this way, I sent an e-mail to Nokia and nobody answered... did it get lost?). If I haven't misunderstood, 27 companies were accused of importing coltan from Congo, it is not strange.... the mobile makers want to reduce costs at any price, I suppose, and it seems that what it's happening in Congo is not a big deal... The question is that they can sell cheaper and get more benefits.

According to what I'm seeing I understand that the message is: we need progress at any price. What the hell does it mean for you that mines are run by guerrillas? The question is that belgian, dutch and german companies are feeding the subject. Some time ago BBC reported that in some places of Congo, childrens and farmers were obliged to work in mines, but it's not only a human rights problem but also an environmental one. As we know, miner industry is very agressive not only by sight but also in this case Kauri Bieja and Okapi National Parks have been invaded, destroying ecosystems and sensitive elephants and gorillas populations. In 2003 companies as IBM, HP, Compaq, Nokia, Ericsson or Siemens were involved. As you can see gold, oil and water would be comparable to the coltan because from a mobile, the internet or sending a rocket to the space... the coltan is necessary.

Another alternatives to the coltan have been taken into account, alternatives like copper... but it seems not to be as effective as the coltan, or litium, which is monopolized by two companies so it supposes high prices, and in that way, we have to remember that mobile makers only want to cut down costs....

Well, four things to finish:
  1. Try to take profit of your mobile as long as possible.
  2. Recycle your mobile when you want to get rid of it. Here an example.
  3. Environmental costs should be reflected in the final price of the devices.
  4. Watch the following video... something much better than my words.




EOF.

Monday 14 April 2008

Low Cost Flights? Part II

From time to time I have to refresh my memory respect to the harmful that flights are. Here I summarize you, because of royalties, a post sent by a reader to a spanish magazine whose name is CNR. You can find the writing in the 114th number in August 2006. I imagine you can find the report in the previous number.

OK, so, let's go.... The sender expressed her outrage when she realized that flying 1000 kms pollutes the equivalent to the bills of a whole year on electricity, heating and land transport during two and a half years. When she thought of the damage that an irrational usage of planes cause to the environment, she wondered whether it's worthy to live thinking about your daily acts to cause the smaller damage to the environment. Is it worthy to recycle, switch off lights or ride a bicycle? She compared the situation as giving aspirines to a terminal patient.....

By the way, the article had an excellent title: "Flying to the abyss". In the moment I wrote this post in Spanish, it was an update on CO2 emissions and those from the transport seemed to have increased. No long time ago, the transport emissions represented a 15% of the whole, in that moment it seemed that it got 25% even there was some survey which pointed to 40%. In any case, it seems that aviation was and is increasing its emissions year after year, so it should be a must for many people to get a plane as much once a year. By the way, domestic flights please do not. In Spain we could do it, perhaps... with an exception... Canarias Islands.

Wednesday 2 April 2008

Faster than Expected

Just as we get more knowledge about past climate and how the biosphere works and just as we get more powerful computers to mix all these things and make them to run together, we realize once and another that changes are happening faster than we thought last time. The British Antartic Survey released the following information some days ago.

British Antarctic Survey has captured dramatic satellite and video images of an Antarctic ice shelf that looks set to be the latest to break out from the Antarctic Peninsula. A large part of the Wilkins Ice Shelf on the Antarctic Peninsula is now supported only by a thin strip of ice hanging between two islands. It is another identifiable impact of climate change on the
Antarctic environment.

Scientists monitoring satellite images of the Wilkins Ice Shelf spotted that a huge (41 by 2.5 km) km2 berg the size of the Isle of Man appears to have broken away in recent days - it is still on the move.

Glaciologist Ted Scambos from the University of Colorado alerted colleagues Professor David Vaughan and Andrew Fleming of the British Antarctic Survey (BAS) that the ice shelf looked at risk. After checking daily satellite pictures, BAS sent a Twin Otter aircraft on a reconnaissance mission to check out the extent of the breakout.

Professor Vaughan, who in 1993 predicted that the northern part of Wilkins Ice Shelf was likely to be lost within 30 years if climate warming on the Peninsula were to continue at the same rate, says, "Wilkins is the largest ice shelf on the Antarctic Peninsula yet to be threatened. I didn't expect to see things happen this quickly. The ice shelf is hanging by a thread - we'll know
in the next few days or weeks what its fate will be."

Jim Elliott was onboard the BAS Twin Otter to capture video of the breakout for Vaughan and colleagues. He says, "I've never seen anything like this before - it was awesome. We flew along the main crack and observed the sheer scale of movement from the breakage. Big hefty chunks of ice, the size of small houses, look as though they've been thrown around like rubble - it's like an explosion."

The breakout is the latest drama in a region of Antarctica that has experienced unprecedented warming over the last 50 years. Several ice shelves have retreated in the past 30 years - six of them collapsing completely (Prince Gustav Channel, Larsen Inlet, Larsen A, Larsen B, Wordie, Muller and the Jones Ice Shelf.)

Professor Vaughan continues, "Climate warming in the Antarctic Peninsula has pushed the limit of viability for ice shelves further south - setting some of them that used to be stable on a course of retreat and eventual loss. The Wilkins breakout won't have any effect on sea-level because it is floating already, but it is another indication of the impact that climate change is having on the region." Ted Scambos of the University of Colorado says, "We believe the Wilkins has been in place for at least a few hundred years. But warm air and exposure to ocean waves are causing a break-up."

Here you have some things that were told on TV.



Friday 14 March 2008

An obvious sentence

Listen to me Pedro, I'm going to tell you a thing: don't forget that summer is for being hot and winter is for being cold. I was said that by a biologist with a lot of experience when we spoke about climate and the tremendous compsumtion of energy from the air conditioning machines when we try to go beyond the limits of necessity. If we add to the abusing compsumtion a bad building, in terms of energy efficiency, it is, houses bad insulated both winter and summer, the cocktail is very "interesting" in terms of waste.

In this part of Spain where I live, it isn't unusual to find the type of houses I say. In this way, you can see big houses for only two or three people and I wonder why such people need such big houses, maybe many times the reason is to show off.... in another words: ostentation and waste. Why not more little houses and more efficients? We are so proud that we are completely blind. Yes, Paco, yes, your house is very nice but in terms of ecology is an authentic disaster. I don't want to think of the so much kilowatts it devours for keeping the inside temperature. To think that you set the machine at 20ºC in summer and 25ºC in winter.... is an authentic nightmare for me....

Anyway, some recommendations, 25-26ºC would be very well for summer and 20-21ºC for winter as well. If we get the cold from Finland as a reference, normally, when someone gets into a hotel, he/she finds a 20-21ºC temperature, no more, that means that your clothes doesn't bother you, but neither you are cold. It is unacceptable that somebody wants to wear bermuda shorts at the expense of rising the temperature of the air conditioning. Be sensible.

Sunday 2 March 2008

Since town-planning scandals seem to "sing" a lot in our coastlines, it seems that now builders are looking at inland; deforesting and destroying our coastlines seems not to have been enough for those people, they have to destroy now our mountains. Madrid, Castilla León or Murcia are some of the examples.

A mayoress from a village of Murcia who expects to build a big estate on a inirrigated land as well as having deforested the last places which were left, says that water will be brought from a dasalination plant. Lots of thanks Miss Mayoress, thanks a lot for contributing to the green house effect. We are so corrupt that even we speculate with desalination plants in the way we don't built the most efficient ones, so we need a lot of energy for running them and the most of the energy that will be needed will come from non-renewable sources. Please, listen to me, whether you want or not: if it is not possible to hold more people in one place, why so much interest in going against nature? Money is the only reason to be justified, the money... the cancer of our daily world. Maybe any day will you understand the meaning of the word NO? Miss, school finished long time ago and what's happening makes me to think that you were not a brilliant pupil.

Well, many things, many words... but I continue thinking the same: consumers have the last word. Before buying a house we should think where and how the building has been built. We don't have only to appreciate a pretty landscape, an idillyc landscape and the most probable is that our home has been built destroying the house of "others". Anyway, everything can be reduced to the benefit of a few people and to the offense of the most, now and in the future, but of course, bullfighting, guitars and party have to be a must, the rest... can be forgotten.

Saturday 16 February 2008

More Whales to Port!

Some weeks ago I posted some comments about how whales are hunted. Recently, I came across Galaxio's blog, an argentinian who is one of those people who defend Life. The pity is that the blog is written in Spanish, so if you don't speak that languaje... forget it. Any way, I will summarise you such post. The post is the first you can see when the blog is completely loaded by your browser. After finishing the reading of the post you can watch a very interesting protest video. Here you have. The characters speak japanese but no worries because the subtitles are in English. I hope you enjoy it.

Have a good day.


Thursday 31 January 2008

Become a Switcher

I really hate seeing as people leave lights switched on everywhere at work, or how they don't do anything at all for switching them off when they are not necessary. I wonder why not to switch off lights when we have enough sunlight and even when it is healthier for our sight. I imagine that many people will think: go to hell! What's up with you guy? Have you to pay the bill? Come on! What I want is going some where further, it's not a question of having the boss paying the bills, it's a question of power generation and greenhouse gasses emissions. So, when we are at work, I ask for several people to switch off the lights, please, be careful. Doing things like that, be sure you will save lots of emissions which are changing our climate and poisoning the air we breath with nitrate and sulfur gases.

Here you have several links:

Wednesday 16 January 2008

A whale to port!

I don't know if you have ever seen a pulley arch. To have an idea.. something like Silvester Stallone used in his film Rambo. I had the opportunity to use it twice and apart from its shooting power, the thing the most surprised me was checking that there were some arrows whose tips were little blades.

Now is the moment to be a little cruel. Imagine for a moment that one of those arrows reach your abdomen. Do you imagine such a terrible pain? Now you have to multiply by several times the pain you have when you have stomachache. Are you doubled up? Half more round. Imagine such arrow reaching your thorax. Slow down, we have to use a slow motion. Listen, you can listen to as the ribs are crunching and how the arrow drills your lungs, they begin to get flooded, little by little you are having problems for breathing, the air is lacking... even you could begin to spit blood.

Let's go far away, we have to try that reality overcomes fiction. We have to add to all previous events that the arrow takes an explosive charge which blows open all your internal organs, don't you think it is wonderful? So that is what happen to whales when they are hunted. Can you imagine how they would shout if they could do it as humans do? It's something crazy, but it's happening just now in some place of the world. What a comfortable place is my sofa!!