We've complained about nauseous smells in Long Beach coming from the harbor, the cement factories, and the dreaded petroleum refineries for some time. After years of complaints, AQMD is investigating the recurring stench.

The post Nasty Gas Smells In Long Beach Launch AQMD Long-Term Investigation — We’re There, And It’s About Time! appeared first on PlanetSave.

Okay, I am going to go out on a limb here, but I will make a prediction: If the Democrats take control of the House of Representatives in the midterm elections, Donald Trump will not be president when the new House is sworn in. The famous op-ed piece that appeared anonymously in The New York […]

The post When Will Trump Be Gone? appeared first on PlanetSave.

Rachel Carson’s influential book Silent Spring, which documented the effects of the indiscriminate widespread use of pesticides on the environment, was published back in 1962, nearly 60 years ago now. Since that time, the book has often been cited as one of the drivers behind environmental action and regulation of various kinds. Following the release, […]

The post Silent Spring Was Published Back In 1962 — Flying-Insect & Bird Populations Have Still Fallen Precipitously Since Then appeared first on PlanetSave.

Sometimes, new products get invented by accident. Potato chips, for example. The microwave, the ink jet printer, and the implantable pacemaker are on the list. My personal favorite involves scientists searching for a powerful new adhesive that could be used to glue airplanes together. They failed miserably and created one of the weakest adhesives ever […]

The post Teenage Mutant Ninja Enzyme Chews Through Plastic Waste appeared first on PlanetSave.

An ocean dead zone is an area where there is not enough oxygen dissolved in the water to allow aquatic creatures to breath. To put it in perspective, imagine a person locked in a sealed chamber in which the level of oxygen is slowly but steadily decreased until they lie gasping for breath until they […]

The post Ocean Dead Zones Multiplying Rapidly, Threatening Food Source For Hundreds Of Millions appeared first on PlanetSave.

Everyone who has ever ridden a motorcycle or a bicycle is familiar with this situation. You are riding along, minding your own business and enjoying the sunshine, when suddenly a car pulls into your lane or pulls out right in front of you or turns directly in your path. It’s like the driver of the […]

The post Motorcycles & Bicycles Really Are “Invisible” To Many Drivers appeared first on PlanetSave.

Much of the Middle East is now slated to essentially turn to desert over the coming decades and centuries owing to climate change, and exacerbated by poor human judgment and short-sighted activities. It bears remembering that much of what is now the Middle East and the Mediterranean was before the human population expansion of the […]

The post What Do You Do If Your Country Is Facing Water Shortages Exacerbated By Climate Change? Pray, Apparently — Israel’s Agriculture Minister Leads Prayers For Water appeared first on PlanetSave.

The air pollution problems facing Iran, in particular those facing the country’s populous capital Tehran, seem to be growing rapidly based on recent events. As the result of dangerous levels of air pollution, schools in Tehran and in many other large cities throughout the country as well, were closed last week state media reported at […]

The post Iran’s Air Pollution Problems Are Growing Fast, As Evidenced By Recent Events appeared first on PlanetSave.

The growing use of heavy oils, tar sands, bitumen, petroleum coke, etc., by industry since 2000 or so has resulted in rapidly surging levels of vanadium emissions, according to a new study from Duke University. To be more specific, human-related emissions of vanadium now surpass those of natural sources by a factor of 1.7 — […]

The post Vanadium Emissions Surged Last 2 Decades — Increasing Use Of Heavy Oils, Tar Sands, Bitumen, Etc. appeared first on PlanetSave.

With the legislative and executive branches of government firmly committed to pretending climate change doesn't exist, will the courts act to protect the environment and the citizens of America? Don't bet on it. Here's why.

The post Cassandra To Courts — USA’s Activist Battle To Save The Climate appeared first on PlanetSave.

It is estimated that since the advent of the agricultural revolution Earth lost approximately half of its trees, and according to a recent survey as reported by Nature (the magazine), earth currently has only about three trillion trees. Image by UNclimatechange (some rights reserved) There are several organizations that are hard at work to plant back […]

The post Mapping The Global Efforts To Restore The World’s Forests! appeared first on PlanetSave.

New algorithms make it possible for scientists to predict the effect of injecting sulfur dioxide into the atmosphere to cool the planet. Is that a good thing?

The post New Algorithms Improve Accuracy Of Geoengineering Projections. Is That A Good Thing? appeared first on PlanetSave.

A new report released by a groups of over 50 US government scientists asserts that the rapid pace at which modern climate change is occurring is almost definitely driven by human activity — making for a blunt contradiction of the stance taken by many members of the current administration of President Donald Trump. In particular, […]

The post Report From US Government Scientists Says Modern Climate Change Is Driven By Human Activity appeared first on PlanetSave.

The US Environmental Protection Agency will begin barring select scientists from serving on independent advisory boards — a move possibly intended to clear the path towards the installation of industry-friendly advisors on the panel in question, according to critics. The new Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) ban-list is focused on scientists who have won agency-awarded grants […]

The post US EPA To Bar Certain Scientists From Serving On Independent Advisory Boards appeared first on PlanetSave.

Atmospheric methane levels rose fairly rapidly in 2016, as did atmospheric carbon dioxide levels (which saw the yearly average rise up to 403.3 parts per million), according to a new report from the World Meteorological Organization (WMO). Image: methane leaks in Boston, via Duke University The scientists involved in the report claim to not know […]

The post Atmospheric Methane Levels Rose Rapidly In 2016, Scientists Claim To Not Understand Why appeared first on PlanetSave.

Australia’s largest cities could begin experiencing extreme heatwaves with +50° Celsius temperatures within the relatively near term (within the next ~20 years), even if international climate change and greenhouse gas emissions reductions goals are met, according to a recent study published in the journal Geophysical Research Letters. To be more specific, the recent study dealt […]

The post +50° Celsius Heatwaves Coming For Australia? appeared first on PlanetSave.

Two major drought indices in Europe are deviating from each other in a way that’s consistent with many climate change simulations — further gaining ground in the march towards the attribution of major events like droughts to climate change — according to a new study published in the journal Scientific Reports. Image via NOAA/Earth System […]

The post Drought In Europe — Another Effect of Climate Change appeared first on PlanetSave.

Atmospheric carbon dioxide levels grew at a record pace in 2016, to 403.3 parts per million (ppm), up from 400.0 in 2015, the UN World Meteorological Organization just revealed as part of its annual Greenhouse Gas Bulletin. The growth rate in atmospheric carbon dioxide in 2016 was thus around 50% faster than the average of […]

The post Atmospheric Carbon Dioxide Levels Grew At Record Pace In 2016, UN Says appeared first on PlanetSave.

Hello, my name is Zach Shahan, and I have a problem. I’m a political nut. More seriously, I’ll admit that I’m strongly drawn to politics, follow policy & politics closely (some might say obsessively), and have sometimes struggled with how much time and emotion I invest into all of that. If I step back a […]

The post Why Republican Policy Sucks appeared first on PlanetSave.

While everyone is talking about electric cars and autonomy as a huge disruptor to the global economy, there is another elephant in the room that not many people seem to notice — lab-grown meat! A few days ago news broke that China bought $300 million worth of lab-grown meat from three Israeli-based companies — SuperMeat, […]

The post Talk About Disruption — Lab-Grown Meat Has Arrived! appeared first on PlanetSave.

The modern world has a problem of overspecialization. The limits of extrapolating generalized truths from what can be observed in limited contexts and over limited periods of times have become more and more apparent in recent years as the blowback of the industrialized way of life, and its associated ways of thinking and interacting with […]

The post Untreatable Super Malaria Spreading Rapidly In Asia — How Will Convergence Of Climate Change Induced Mosquito Expansion & Drug Resistance Play Out? appeared first on PlanetSave.

When you think of insecticides you probably think of dangerous chemical compounds that allow modern industrial agriculture (and its high yields) to occur, but that also have some negative effects on the environment and also on human/animal health. The effects of a certain class of insecticides on honeybees, for instance, may well be what comes […]

The post US EPA Approves Monsanto’s “RNA Interference” Insecticide — GMO Maize/Corn Intended To Actively Interfere With The Healthy Functioning Of Pest Genomes appeared first on PlanetSave.

While many people have pointed out the reality that cutting one’s consumption of meat is a notable means of reducing one’s carbon footprint, I haven’t heard many people bring up the subject of meat consumption by pets… Image by Patricia Marroquin/UCLA Considering how the practice of keeping a “pet” dog or cat has become vastly […]

The post Cats & Dogs Create Insane Amount Of Global Warming Emissions appeared first on PlanetSave.

Our #FakePresident has removed the United States for the Paris climate accords, leading some Americans to experience ecoanxiety. That’s a relatively new term that American Psychological Association used to describe the feelings of dread and helplessness the follow from “watching the slow and seemingly irrevocable impacts of climate change unfold, and worrying about the future […]

The post Beans For Beef: The Climate Change Initiative That Anyone Can Do appeared first on PlanetSave.

A dead zone larger than New Jersey is expected to appear in the Gulf of Mexico later this year. Similar dead zones are found in the Great Lakes and the Chesapeake Bay. A report by Mighty, a global environmental group headed by Henry Waxman, a former US Congressman, claims the dead zones are the result […]

The post Massive Dead Zone In Gulf Of Mexico Blamed On Meat Industry appeared first on PlanetSave.

Honeybees that are exposed to field-realistic (real-world, in other words) levels of neonicotinoid pesticides die earlier than those that are not — thereby reducing overall colony health — according to a new study led by York University. “A worker honeybee has been fitted with a RFID on its back so researchers can record when it […]

The post Honeybees Exposed To Real-World Levels Of Neonicotinoids Die Early, Damaging Colony Health, Research Finds appeared first on PlanetSave.

There are now more than 2 billion people worldwide who are overweight or obese, according to a new study published in The New England Journal of Medicine. So, to put that in a different sort of light, there are now roughly the same number of people in the world who are overweight or obese as […]

The post Study: Over 2.2 Billion People Overweight Or Obese Worldwide appeared first on PlanetSave.

Extra-virgin olive oil consumption protects against the loss of memory and lean ring capacity, and also against the formation of amyloid-beta plaques and neurofibrillary tangles in the brain (markers for Alzheimer’s disease), according to new research from the Lewis Katz School of Medicine at Temple University (LKSOM). The new findings are detailed in a paper […]

The post Study: Extra-Virgin Olive Oil Protects Memory & Capacity To Learn, Protects Against Alzheimer’s Disease appeared first on PlanetSave.

Republican politicians are an interesting breed of liars…. Politicians are supposed to explain to the voting public why their complicated, detailed policies are worth supporting and good for the country as a whole, or at least their constituents. But Republican politicians push one kind of policy obsessively, the kind that gives more money to the […]

The post Republicans Want To Rob America … To Cut Taxes On The Rich appeared first on PlanetSave.

Arguments for and against the use of genetic modification techniques in the agricultural and healthcare/disease-prevention sectors typically focus on potential impacts to human health, and/or to wider ecosystems and natural services (a much more important area to watch, in my opinion than human health). My issue with genetic modification and the use of genetically modified […]

The post Many Insects Resistant To Genetic Manipulation Via CRISPR Editing Tool, Research Finds appeared first on PlanetSave.

What happened with people who sided with Hitler and the Nazis in their quest to murder countless humans? As their crowd rose to the heights of power and prestige, many people who supported them must have thought their futures were looking up and they were setting up some kind of positive family reputation for future generations. To […]

The post On The Wrong Side Of History … appeared first on PlanetSave.

Ocean acidification created by continuing anthropogenic climate change will result in a collapsing food web, according to new research from the University of Adelaide. The new findings are the result of analysis focused around determining the effects of climate change on the world’s fisheries, and on overall marine biodiversity. Image via NOAA “Humans rely heavily […]

The post Ocean Acidification To Bring Collapsing Food Web appeared first on PlanetSave.

In a bit of news that shouldn’t be all that surprising to those who have taken a real look at the evidence, new finds at a site in San Diego have shown that humans have been living in North America for at least 130,000 years now. The new finds at the “Ice Age paleontological-turned-archaeological site in […]

The post Humans Have Been In North America At Least 130,000 Years New Finds Show appeared first on PlanetSave.

Over 600 people responded to a question on Ask Reddit to explain why they changed their minds about the dangers of climate change.

The post Confessions Of Former Climate Change Deniers appeared first on PlanetSave.

The United States. “We” elected a man who for decades has had a reputation as a con man. What could go wrong?… ♠ He talked about bringing all Americans health care — more affordable and cheaper health care. Turns out, after trying to push through a health care plan that would result in ~20 million Americans losing […]

The post When You Elect A Con Man, You Probably Got Conned appeared first on PlanetSave.

Forest elephant populations in Central Africa’s most important nature preserve, Gabon’s Minkébé National Park, have declined by between 78^ and 81% over recent times as a result of poaching, new research from Duke University has found. So, even in Central Africa’s largest nature preserve, poaching is still enough of a problem that forest elephants are […]

The post Forest Elephant Populations Have Seen An ~80% Decline In Central Africa’s Most Important Preserve Because Of Poaching appeared first on PlanetSave.

In conjunction with the decline of practically every other megafauna animal still in the world, giraffe (Giraffa camelopardalis) numbers have fallen by around 40% over just the last 30 years, according to new data from the IUCN. To put that quantitatively — there were between 151,702-163,452 giraffes in 1985; and around 97,562 giraffes in 2015. […]

The post Giraffe Numbers Have Fallen By ~40% Over The Last 30 Years, IUCN Reports appeared first on PlanetSave.

The iconic ring-tailed lemur of Madagascar (the only place that the primates known as “true lemurs” have ever existed) is rapidly headed towards extinction, according to new research from the University of Victoria in British Columbia and CU Boulder. The research found that as a result of growing levels of: habitat destruction, deforestation, open-pit mining, […]

The post Ring-Tailed Lemurs Declining Rapidly, Now Fewer Than 2,500 Left, Research Finds appeared first on PlanetSave.

There are now only 7,100 cheetahs (Acinonyx jubatus) left in the world, according to a new study from the Zoological Society of London, Panthera, and the Wildlife Conservation Society. The causes? The same ones as always — habitat loss and fragmentation, the “pet” trade, desertification (often driven by deforestation), and the over hunting of prey […]

The post Only 7,100 Cheetahs Left In The World, Study Finds appeared first on PlanetSave.

Despite some common presumptions on the matter, it seems that most deforestation occurring in the Congo Basin is the result of only a small share of locals, and those that are taking part aren’t doing so for self-sufficiency but rather to “increase their quality of life,” according to a new study from the University of […]

The post Deforestation By “Subsistence” Farmers In Congo Driven By Money-Making Not Self-Sufficiency, Only Very Small Portion Of Population Responsible For Most Deforestation, Research Finds appeared first on PlanetSave.

The ocean acidification that’s now occurring, as a result of increasing anthropogenic levels of carbon dioxide emissions, will led to cascading losses of biodiversity in many marine habitats and ecosystems, according to new research from the University of British Columbia and its partners. The new work is some of the first to investigate the likely […]

The post Ocean Acidification May Cause Cascading Loss Of Biodiversity In Some Marine Habitats, Research Finds appeared first on PlanetSave.

Specific coral genotypes (“individuals”) can live for more than 5,000 years (at the least) according to new research from the National Marine Fisheries Service, Penn State, and Dial Cordy & Associates. The findings — based on research focused on elkhorn corals (Acropora palmata) living around Florida and in the Caribbean — mean that corals are […]

The post Corals Grow To Be Much, Much Older Than Previously Assumed, Research Finds — Implications Relating To Ocean Acidification & Coral Bleaching Events appeared first on PlanetSave.

The USGS estimates that 10 million tons of CO2 was released over the 9 hour eruption of Mount St. Helens in 1980. That's a pretty huge number, but passenger vehicles in the USA alone emit as much CO2 as a Mt St. Helens eruption happening somewhere in America every 3 days.

The post US Passenger Vehicle Emissions Comparable To 1980 Mt. St Helens Eruption Occurring Every 3 Days appeared first on PlanetSave.

The coconut crab has the strongest pinching force of all crustaceans — with the force applied during pinching actually being greater than the biting force of all living terrestrial animals except for alligators — according to new research detailed in a paper published in the open-access journal PLOS ONE. Notably, the research found that that […]

The post Coconut Crabs Possess Strongest Pinching Force Of All Crustaceans (Greater Than Biting Force Of All Terrestrial Animals Excepts Alligators), Research Finds appeared first on PlanetSave.

While farming has long been a known phenomenon amongst various ant species, there’s much that remains unknown. With that in mind, new research has revealed some interesting things about the symbiotic partnership and farming that goes on between the ant species Philidris nagasau and at least 6 types of plant within the genus Squamellaria on […]

The post Ant Species (Philidris Nagasau) On Fiji Has Been Symbiotically Farming With Epiphytes For Around 3 Million Years, Research Finds appeared first on PlanetSave.

Bob Walker, a senior Trump adviser, says the new administration will slash funding for NASA to study climate change. He says half of all climate scientists doubt climate change is real.

The post Trump Will End Politicized Climate Change Science Says Key Adviser appeared first on PlanetSave.

Many people find the bright, vibrant colors of various fruits and vegetables to be culinarily appealing, and an apparent appetite stimulant. Interestingly, new research has suggested that these same compounds, that give plants their visual appeal (to the eyes of humans, and various other animals), help to improve brain-functioning in older adults. The new research, […]

The post Compounds That Give Plants Their Vibrant Colors Improve Brain-Functioning In Older Adults, Research Finds appeared first on PlanetSave.

Deforestation events and mass tree deaths — whether through drought, heat, and insect infestations — can have significant effects on global climate patterns, according to new research from the University of Washington. To put that another way, while deforestation and mass-deaths of trees can cause the complete upheaval of the local environment, effects also include […]

The post Deforestation & Tree Deaths Can Have Significant Effects On Global Climate Patterns, Research Finds appeared first on PlanetSave.