Guest guest Posted October 30, 2006 Report Share Posted October 30, 2006 Today for you 34 news items about Mama Earth's trees. Location, number and subject listed below. Condensed / abbreviated article is listed further below.--British Columbia: 1) Suzuki's Swan song, 2) Surrey city has odd tree saving priorities,--Washington: 3) Forest fire Cleanup to cost $28 million, 4) Wallowa-Whitman rec. plan,--Oregon: 5) pre-emptive habitat destruction --California: 6) Helicopter logging in Big Bear, 7) Idyllwild and the Esperanza fire,--Montana: 8) Science proves value of thinning young trees from old growth--New Mexico: 9) Visit Valles Caldera--Ohio: 10) plans for Pine Creek Historic Forest lands in Wayne NF --Massachusetts: 11) Logging is the sound of conservation?--Virginia: 12) Religion fights mountain top removal --North Carolina: 13) Last of the cherry bark oak trees, 14) $700,000 to study GE trees,--Canada: 15) Rene Levasseur Island is one of the last great areas --UK 16) residents in a Suffolk village to defend protected scotch pines again--Scotland: 17) A book about Scotland's oldest and most famous trees--Portugal: 18) Unkonwn disease killing cork oak--Lebanon: 19) " hima " is Arabic for 'protected area' --Ukraine: 20) Reforestation info--Russia: 21) International Paper aligns with Russian Mafia--Ghana: 22) Forest Watch--Ecuador: 23) Mapping for Territorial Defense--Brazil: 24) They claim they are not cutting rainforest to produce soy and beef, 25) logging levels lowest since 1991, 26) Xingu people tour Europe: Save our forest home, --India: 27) City has lost more than 1,100 trees, 28) greening 206 km of Kerala's coastline--China: 29) Successful crackdown on illegal logging lead to South East Asia's logging,--Thailand: 30) dedicated her life to saving the hornbill --Malaysia: 31) denial that oil palm planting affects wildlife--Indonesia: 32) Malaysia's human rights watchdog says people of Borneo need aid,--New Zealand: 33) Maori tribe has blocked logging--World-wide: 34) A satellite that thinks on its own and networks too British Coulmbia:1) Releasing what he insists is his " very last book, " a second installment to his autobiography, the 70-year-old Japanese-Canadian says he is looking forward to spending more time in the Canadian wilderness, carving wood and fishing. He regrets that after decades of campaigning for everything from cleaner air to sustainable farming, his work has not had more impact. " Nobody any longer knows what a sustainable future is, " the bearded, bespectacled environmentalist told Reuters in a recent interview in Australia to promote his book, " David Suzuki: The Autobiography. " " I feel like we are in a giant car heading for a brick wall at 100 miles an hour and everyone in the car is arguing where they want to sit. For God's sake, someone has to say put the brakes on and turn the wheel. Suzuki is no less passionate about preserving the planet than when his first series, " Suzuki on Science, " aired in 1969 but he wants more time for himself. Over his career he has written more than 40 books, including the best-selling " Looking At " series of children's science titles, and set up the David Suzuki Foundation. http://news./s/nm/20061025/sc_nm/life_suzuki_dc_12) It is ironic that the City of Surrey is trumpeting the enforcement of its new tree bylaw against a landowner who cut down several large Douglas firs while preparing an industrial site south of Cloverdale. While the loss of every tree is important, and large Douglas firs and cedars in particular are worth preserving, this site is one that few Surrey residents will ever notice. Located in the 18900 block of 54 Avenue, it is at the south end of an area which has long been targeted for industrial use. There were some significant trees on the property, but few people ever saw them. The property cannot be seen from any of the major roads nearby. Contrast this to the Kippan property on Bell Road, where hundreds of firs, cedars and other trees were cut down over the summer months, on a steep hillside that overlooks the Serpentine River. That scar on the landscape is very visible from Highway 10, where thousands of people pass by daily. That road is one of the main routes to city hall, and presumably politicians and bureaucrats passed by every day that the tree cutting was in progress, and it didn't even register with them. No one expects that most trees will be preserved in a city that has so many potential development properties. What has been disheartening in recent years is the way so many trees have come down in such a short time - and that's due to the rapid pace of development, a healthy economy and a city that hasn't really given much consideration to the aesthetic aspects of development, beyond the " form and character " of the actual buildings. If Surrey is really serious about preserving a few more trees, let me be the first to give city hall staff a list of areas with significant stands of trees under threat. City staff can start in their own back yard. The hillside along 60 Avenue between King George Highway and 152 Street contains some massive trees and lovely parklike properties. Development has been slow in coming to this area but it won't be long before there will be green rezoning signs all over the place. http://www.surreyleader.com/portals-code/list.cgi?paper=73 & cat=48 & id=760275 & more= Washington:3) CONCONULLY, Wash. -- Smoke still trickles from smoldering stumps in north-central Washington, the result of a massive wildfire that roared through 274 square miles of state and federal land. The Tripod fire wasn't the largest blaze of 2006 - Montana's Derby fire burned 297 square miles of forest and Nevada is cleaning up nearly 1 million acres, burned by several fires, in one region alone. But the remote land scorched in Washington state includes hundreds of miles of roads and trails, river channels and wildlife habitat that must be protected from erosion after the blaze. The U.S. Forest Service is asking for $28 million over the next two years to complete what may be the most expensive rehabilitation project the agency has ever undertaken. The recovery effort doesn't try to replace what's been damaged by the fire, but to reduce further harm to now-fragile land that is exposed to the elements. The team works long hours, for weeks on end, to evaluate hazards and develop a recovery plan to submit. An estimated 270 truck loads of straw have been delivered to the Tripod fire alone, to be dropped by helicopter in 1-ton bales over the heaviest burn areas. The straw provides cover from rain and snow for scorched soil. Less severely burned areas are to be fertilized to help damaged plants recover. Roughly 7,000 acres are to be seeded with sturdy grasses, and workers will clear such noxious weeds as diffuse knapweed and dalmatian toadflax that could choke out emerging plants. Terry Lillybridge, a plant ecologist on the team, estimates a 50-50 chance for success. " The success of seeding depends on what happens next spring, " he said. " You end up with a rainstorm that might not normally be a problem on a vegetated slope, become a problem. http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/local/6420AP_WST_After_the_Fire.html4) The Recreation Site Facility Master Planning document for the Wallowa-Whitman National Forest was recently made available to Wild Wilderness by the USFS. Significant changes in recreation management are planned. Our careful reading of this document reveals that gates have already been purchased for installation in 2006. Numerous campgrounds on the Wallowa Whitman National Forest that are going to be converted from development recreation to dispersed recreation are, in reality, going to be gated. The same is true for other kinds of developed recreation sites. For example here is what the document says about the fate of Mason Dam Boat Launch. " Add other feature to site. Begin charging a fee at site. Increase fee compliance effort. Install gate to limit off-season use; Pursue concession operation & initiating new fee for site use as part of new 2006 Concession package. " Those who have interest in outdoor recreation on the Wallowa Whitman NF might wish to explore this document in detail to learn what more has been planned. The url is: http://www.wildwilderness.org/docs/wwrsfmp.pdfOregon:5) Leroy Moser has owned 12.4 acres along Murdock Road since 1964. He'd always planned that his children would inherit the property, which was distinguished by its mature firs and madrones. But in September, he hired a logging company to clear-cut six acres, leaving a roadside vista of big stumps and piled branches. Moser, 74, who lives in Lake Oswego, intends to build houses on the land. Knowing that a city tree-cutting ordinance was coming and feeling backed into a corner by the city's desire to designate part of his land as a wildlife refuge, Moser said he was compelled to take action. " We just decided, well, if they don't have any trees, it can't be a wildlife area. " It's not an unusual story in the metro area. At least half a dozen times since 2004, property owners have cleared trees because they were worried that pending government regulations would designate their land as habitat and limit its development potential. The Cascade Policy Institute, a free market and property-rights group based in Portland, has come up with a term for it: " pre-emptive habitat destruction. " In the Sherwood case, Moser said the city indicated that it hoped to designate one-third of his property as a wildlife area. Moser also concluded that the city was about to adopt a tree-cutting ordinance, so he ordered the logging of six acres in September. Kurt Kristensen, who lives nearby, describes the Murdock Road tree cutting as " destruction of the last forest in Sherwood. " The city is facing " economic and environmental violence " at the hands of developers who don't pay the full cost of the growth they bring about, he said. Kristensen also criticized the city for not having a tree-cutting ordinance. Moser went through the state Forestry Department, which issued a logging " notification. " The department encourages cities to take regulatory control over state Forest Practices Act issues within their jurisdictions, but Sherwood had not done so when the logging took place. A state stewardship forester inspected the logging site and concluded that it was carried out in according with the Forest Practices Act, District Forester Dave Johnson said. " We're definitely concerned about the loss of forest land. Locally, a lot of it is becoming development. " http://www.oregonlive.com/metrosouthwest/oregonian/index.ssf?/base/metro_southwest_news/11613224333 16290.xml & coll=7California:6) BIG BEAR LAKE- the Mountaintop Ranger District is resuming the use of helicopters for tree removal as part of fuel reduction projects in Crestline and Big Bear. Helicopter logging will remove hundreds of dead and/or dying trees in areas inaccessible by conventional tree removal methods. The helicopters will lift dead and or dying timber, cut by professional fallers, and transport the timber through the air to a staging point or landing. In addition to the helicopters, heavy equipment to move logs and logging trucks can be expected in the areas to facilitate the removal of the material from the immediate area of the community. "We anticipate the helicopters will start operating shortly and continue as weather permits through November" stated District Ranger Allison Stewart. "These projects are all part of the continuing effort by the San Bernardino National Forest to reduce fuels around the mountain communities and Mountaintop Ranger District." Ranger Stewart added. In the Big Bear area, helicopters operations to remove woody material and help reduce wildfire hazard in the Wild land-Urban Interface Zones may be starting as early as the beginning of next week in the shaded fuel break units on the south shore of Big Bear Lake between Sand Canyon and Aspen Glen Picnic Area. On the west side from Twin Peaks to Cedar Pines Park, helicopter operations along the rim can be expected anytime after the first week in November on portions of Strawberry Peak and along Crest Forest Drive near the Crestline – Lake Arrowhead Water Agency offices. In the Cedar Pines Park/Valley of Enchantment area, helicopter operations can be expected in the Mojave River Road area and in the area between Waters Drive and Pine Drive. http://www.bearvalleynews.com/bvn%202102506.htm7) IDYLLWILD - Fear is never far enough away in a community hemmed by tinder-dry pines and whipped by wildfire-stoking winds. The Esperanza Fire has burned within 10 miles, and this town among the pines has felt its share of nature's wrath in the past. But the folks who live here are a breed apart, locals say with pride. The threat of fire and the inconvenience of snow are prices they willingly pay for the clean air and water and the slower pace. " It's part of living in a mountain area, " Mike Hynes, 72, said outside the U.S. post office in town Friday afternoon. " You just sort of get used to it. " Idyllwild -- population roughly 3,500 and elevation 5,300 feet -- is a mix of longtime residents, weekenders and more recent converts to full-time mountain living. People get to know each other. The mile-high town has been a seasonal retreat since ancient times, when Cahuilla Indians began to hike up each summer from the desert floor to escape the heat, a local historian said. In the 1860s, the loggers and sheepherders came, said Ben Killingsworth, who writes the Idyllwild Area Historical Society's newsletter. Tourism began in the 1880s, and logging gradually died out after the federal government in 1897 protected the area as a forest reserve, Killingsworth said. These days, thousands of people visit the area to hike through pine and cedar forests and Mount San Jacinto State Park. http://www.pe.com/localnews/inland/stories/PE_News_Local_D_idyllwild29.388c77f.htmlMontana:8) For centuries, fire had been a frequent visitor to the forest floor beneath this 300-year-old larch perched on a side hill far above Missoula's Grant Creek. Every couple of decades, fire cleared out the underbrush and most of the young trees trying to get a foothold in what was then a relatively open forest. For most of its life, this larch lived with relatively few neighbors. Somehow this larch and about 20 acres surrounding it were missed. No one's sure why. It could have been the fact that private, state and federal lands intersected nearby. Maybe no one knew who owned what. Whatever the reason, this small stand of old-growth forest was left alone. Later, a forest researcher named Steve Arno found his way in among this island of old-growth trees. His mission was to chart the fire history and characteristics of the stand. Using tree rings as his guide, Arno determined that fire had been a frequent visitor to the site as far back as the 16th century - right through the mid-1880s. Between 1885 and the fire of 1919, not much happened. From 1919 on, fires were squelched and the stand began to change. In that 75-year span, the stand missed three or four fire cycles. By the time Arno came on the scene, there were between 500 and 600 trees on every acre. In 1999, Arno and Mick Harrington of the Rocky Mountain Research Station's Fire Science Laboratory began a research study to see how the old growth would respond if the understory of trees were removed. A portion of the stand was thinned of everything but the old-growth trees. On about half of the treated stand, all of the large old-growth trees were left standing. On the other piece, some of those old-growth trees were harvested to provide openings in the canopy. Harrington worked with Anna Sala of the University of Montana's biological sciences department to see just how the ancient trees would react. Sala used a monitoring device that measured the amount of water moving inside the tree. She found the trees in the areas that had been thinned were using more water than those inside the area that remained unchanged. The researchers also found the foliage gathered from the thinned stands weighed more than foliage gathered from trees inside the other area. "There's less competition for moisture," Harrington said. "We found that trees were using it. They were capturing that excess moisture. Their buds were larger, water use was greater and tree growth was greater. "These trees were growing faster than the trees in the uncut area," he said. The bottom line: The trees in the area that was thinned were healthier. http://www.missoulian.com/articles/2006/10/29/news/local/news02.txtNew Mexico:9) Valles Caldera appears on the right as I top the rise coming down Hwy. 4, west of Los Alamos, N.M. For years, I've imagined cantering my horse across the sweeping, bowl-shaped meadow dotted with tree-topped lava domes, evidence of the area's past volcanic activity. But the meadow and surrounding country were privately owned until 2000, when the Valles Caldera Preservation Act allowed the federal government to buy 89,000 acres of the Baca Ranch for addition to the National Forest system. Plans for public access began to form, and this past July, the Valles Caldera opened for the first time to riders.That huge " bowl " visible from the highway is still off-limits, though, earmarked for elk and cattle grazing. Only the resident ranch foreman and his range riders may ride across it. But there are other craters designated just for outside riders: the El Cajete meadow and Redondo meadow. After saddling at an 8,400-foot elevation, I ride into a ponderosa-pine forest in the Jemez Mountains, navigating a logging road that dates to the early 1900s. For 3 miles, I'm in deep woods, taking in clean air, listening to the occasional birdsong and the rustle of shifting branches and small animals scurrying in the underbrush. The mountains can be glimpsed through the pines. Ahead lies a meadow - El Cajete, or " the washtub " - where the grass is higher than my horse's belly, a rare sight in the drought-stricken West. Along the meadow's rim, ponderosa and aspen reach skyward. The grass and wildflowers all flow into a sea of colors - red, white, yellow, orange and various shades of green that shimmer through El Cajete. It's heaven for my horse, who snatches mouthfuls of grass as I ride. In the mornings, elk graze in this meadow, their calves asleep, hidden in the tall grass. This quiet meadow is actually a volcanic crater. Volcanic activity beginning about 16 million years ago formed the Jemez Mountains in north-central New Mexico. The Jemez range can be described as giant piles of different types of lava, with a deep impression - the cliff-ringed, 14-mile-wide Valles Caldera - at the center of the pile. The Valles Caldera National Preserve is committed to maintaining the property as a working ranch, running a sustainable number of livestock and adjusting herd numbers based on range assessments. http://www.westernhorseman.com/stories/10282006/tra_20061028004.shtmlOhio:10) Wayne National Forest officials are seeking input on proposed improvements to Pine Creek Historic Forest lands in western Lawrence and eastern Scioto counties. Those plans have two centers of focus: firstly, to improve the condition of the forest itself and secondly, to improve the Kosmos Trail Project for all-terrain vehicles and off-road motorcycles. In the second endeavor, plans may be getting a little help from Uncle Sam. Gloria Chrismer, who is Ironton district ranger for the WNF, said the proposals concern an area of Lawrence County west of State Route 93 stretching into eastern Scioto County. Historically, these lands were covered with widely spaced trees that allowed light to filter through the leaves onto the ground, enabling smaller vegetation such as herbs and other plants that are consumed by animals to flourish. This in turn created a lucrative enticement for animals. Historically, periodic fires controlled overgrowth and culled undesirable plants. Forest fires in this area have become less common, allowing for the conditions that now exist: a preponderance of plants that do not support wildlife and do not add to the overall health of the woodlands. "This project is huge," Chrismer said. "We're looking at 28,000 acres. We want to improve the overall health of the forest, we want to reduce undesirable trees such as maple and we want to make sure that trees such as the oaks stay there." Chrismer said forestry officials want to thin out trees to allow more light to penetrate the forest floor; reduce undesirable trees and plants through prescribed burning, herbicides and other measures; reduce downed trees, leaves and limbs that create a fire hazard and create areas and create more enticing habitat for wildlife. Interested persons have until Nov. 6 to send their comments to Chrismer by mail to 6518 State Route 93, Pedro, Ohio 45659 or by email at comments-eastern-wayne-ironton. http://www.irontontribune.com/articles/2006/10/28/news/news325.txtMassachusetts:11) Bob Murray stopped on his way down the wooded trail to explain to hikers, for the third time that morning, why the sounds of logging machinery and snapping trees were interrupting the serenity of North Andover's Weir Hill Reservation. Strange as it seems, he said, that's the sound of conservation. The owners of the 194-acre wilderness, the Trustees of Reservations, are spending more than $84,000 in federal grant money to preserve habitat for a rare butterfly - the frosted elfin - and other rare plants and insects on Weir Hill. How? By clearing 16 acres of forest underbrush and chopping down dozens of trees. " I expect people may not be so thrilled, " said Franz Ingelfinger, an ecologist for Trustees properties in Essex County. He raised his voice to be heard over the machinery, which he likened to a choking vacuum cleaner. " But the end result is something we're very proud about, " said Murray, who manages Weir Hill Reservation. The frosted elfin butterfly lays its eggs in one particular type of plant, the wild indigo. Wild indigo is a relatively uncommon wildflower that doesn't grow in deep forests. It's found on Weir Hill because of the site's history of wildfires, which naturally clear underbrush and open the forest canopy to sunlight. The most recent fire on Weir Hill was in 1995, but the Trustees believe fires have been burning the southwestern slope of Weir Hill periodically for hundreds of years. The slope has just the right combination of thin soil, steep gradient, wind, sun and fire-friendly vegetation, Murray said. The tall oaks that remain on this slope have scars and cavities in their trunks to prove they have survived numerous fires. Some of the brush growing there even encourages fires with oils in their leaves. The tree clearing, which started Monday, will expand this natural open area and create more inviting spaces for wild indigo and butterflies, as well as scrub oaks, blueberries, black huckleberries and other species that like the openness of fire-prone areas. The open area on the ridge will also serve as a fire brake, preventing future fires from climbing beyond the ridge toward the Edgewood retirement home. The Trustees have been working with the North Andover Fire Department on the project. http://www.eagletribune.com/local/local_story_298064403Virginia:12) HALE GAP - The old rounded peaks of the mountains encircled the ridge, dense with trees smudged red and gold. But in the middle of the peaks, several stood stripped bare and chopped up, a result of an increasingly common and controversial coal mining practice called mountaintop removal. Ms. Chapman-Crane, her colleagues at the Mennonite Central Committee Appalachia and other Appalachian Christians are trying to halt mountaintop removal, and at the heart of their work, they say, is their faith. On the second morning of the four-day tour, the trip's leaders, Ms. Chapman-Crane and the Rev. Duane Beachey, marched their three-member group up the mile-long trail to Bad Branch Falls. Poplars, beeches, hemlocks and magnolias thatched together a canopy above the trail, and the rain of their leaves made a soft ticking sound. Wild ginseng and wintergreen lined the path. Cottage-size boulders leaned forward over a rushing stream below the trail. "Not every place on the mountains has waterfalls like Bad Branch," Ms. Chapman-Crane said. "But this is pretty much what it's like on the mountains here. The forests of the Appalachian range are like a northern rain forest." Mary Yoder, who had volunteered to come on the trip for her congregation, Columbus Mennonite Church in Columbus, Ohio, asked, "So this is the kind of place that gets blown up in mountaintop removal?" Mr. Chapman-Crane replied, "This is what would be lost, is lost, when they blast a mountaintop." The United States is rich with coal, and mountaintop removal has begun to replace underground mining in Appalachia as the preferred method of extraction because of its efficiency and lower cost. Mountaintop removal involves leveling mountains with explosives to reach seams of coal. The debris that had once been the mountain is usually dumped by bulldozers and huge trucks into neighboring valleys, burying streams. He talked of neighbors whose house foundations had been cracked because of the daily blasting, of a pond lost to sludge and of respiratory ailments because of the coal dust flying from the coal trucks. "The coal company says it's God's will," he said. "Well, God ain't ever run no bulldozer." http://www.nytimes.orgNorth Carolina:13) As a low fog rolled into the middle of the forest, Ricky Adkins pulled out his machete. The forest ranger traipsed through limbs and leaves on his way to the foot of a swamp in search of one special tree — a tree native to coastal North Carolina but located only on hills near swampy ground. Only two cherry bark oak trees tower tall along others in this old forest north of Jacksonville in the far reaches of Onslow County. Hunting for the cherry bark oak and other trees that are becoming rare in the county is becoming harder for the rangers. When accessible trees are finally located, the rangers can spend hours trying to collect the trees' seeds. The rangers lay long, black nets over the forest bed under targeted trees, which can't be reached by bucket trucks. Rangers will then check the nets weekly or sometimes daily to collect the tree's seeds. Sometimes, their labor yields nothing — bears and squirrels have their eye on the same prize. So do insects that burrow into the acorns and seeds, leaving behind a tiny larvae that eats the inside. Adkins remembers a day the forestry crew gathered a 1-gallon bucket of seeds; a mere 10 acorns were usable. "There are so many variables," Adkins said. "It's a hard job. But seed collection is very important." The N.C. Division of Forest Resources spends a large amount of their time in forest management, doing all it can to ensure forests are around for generations to come. "Over the years, forestry and timber has been the No. 1 industry in the county," Adkins said. "But with the onset of development, it's being lost. I think we've lost this year 3,000 to 4,000 acres (of forest). The development is very, very rapid… so timber is getting squeezed on it everywhere." http://www.jdnews.com/SiteProcessor.cfm?Template=/GlobalTemplates/Details.cfm & StoryID=46138 & Section= News14) RALEIGH – Vincent Chiang, a professor of forest biotechnology at North Carolina State University, has landed a $700,000 grant to pursue ethanol research. The U.S. Department of Energy and the U.S. Department of Agriculture funded the project, which will focus on development of biomass from trees that can be converted to ethanol. Chiang hopes to utilize gene research to get trees to produce greater amounts of cellulose and hemicelluloses that can be extracted for ethanol production. Cellulose and hemicelluloses are polysaccharides that make up 70 percent of wood's weight. But extraction of the polysaccharides is a complex process due to the presence of lignin that "glues" the polysaccharides together to form wood. "We have engineered trees with less lignin, and as a result we know that those trees are very useful for ethanol production," Chiang said in a statement. "Now we're interested in looking not just at genes that control lignin production, but at the genes that regulate how polysaccharides are made in wood." Chiang's research will focus on the eastern cottonwood tree. That tree species genome is the only one that has been sequenced successfully by researchers, according to NCSU. "We want to understand at the genome level what controls the synthesis of the three major components of wood," Chiang said. "If we can find the regulators that tell a tree to make more of one component and less of another, then we can engineer trees that are enriched with polysaccharides – a perfect feedstock for ethanol production." http://www.localtechwire.com/article.cfm?u=15365USA:15) Time Inc. participated in a study published this year by the Heinz Center that calculated the amount of carbon dioxide emissions produced over the entire process of publishing Time and In Style. Other magazine companies, including the Hearst Corporation, now say they are studying the Heinz report to consider the implications for their magazines, and Rupert Murdoch recently announced that the News Corporation is developing a plan to become entirely carbon neutral, meaning the company will reduce its carbon emissions and try to offset the emissions left over. "We've recognized that these are issues that are important to our readers and, increasingly, important to our advertisers," said David J. Refkin, the director of sustainable development for the Time Inc. division of Time Warner and a member of the board of the Heinz Center. "We're starting to see a movement where becoming carbon neutral is something many companies are considering." Large-scale manufacturing is, of course, better known as a source of the greenhouse gases that many scientists say cause global warming. Electric power production represents about 40 percent of emissions in the United States, and private motor vehicle use accounts for about 20 percent, said Michael Oppenheimer, a professor of geosciences at Princeton University. Still, the paper industry is not without its impact. Because of its consumption of energy, the industry — which includes magazines, newspapers, catalogs and writing paper — emits the fourth-highest level of carbon dioxide among manufacturers, according to a 2002 study by the Energy Information Administration, a division of the Department of Energy. "Few people realize the sheer scale and magnitude of activities it takes to produce millions of copies of a magazine," said Donald Carli, a senior research fellow at the Institute for Sustainable Communication, a nonprofit group in New York that is working to help advertisers estimate their ads' greenhouse emissions. "There's a hidden life that products have, and one of the challenges of sustainability is to make these lives known." http://action.earthjustice.org/campaign/land_giveawayCanada:15) The Rene Levasseur Island is one of the last great areas where we can find a large proportion of ancient boreal forest (its superficy is 2049 km2); This forest hosts an exceptional biodiversity with trees over 300 years old, many ancient forest ecosystems and a large portion of its territory still virgin; No studies were made to measure the impact of logging at this latitude (51st and 52nd parallels) With such a cold climate, regeneration is much harder; No studies were made either to evaluate the global impact of the logging on the ecosystem of the Rene Levasseur Island; The two areas that are protected (204 and 145 km2) are not enough to protect biodiversity. For the wellbeing of our forest, please sign the petition on our website. It`s very quick and simple, just follow this hyperlink: http://soslevasseur.org/en/node/48UK:16) ANGRY residents in a Suffolk village have vowed to take action after learning more than 100 trees they fought to protect could be torn down by a developer. Residents in Red Lodge, near Newmarket, are furious at the prospect of 142 Scots pine trees being taken down near their homes in Warren Road to provide access both to the village centre and the school. Resident Betty Duncan said she had campaigned for the trees to be protected when the estate was built, and believed a preservation order had been imposed. "We are furious - we were assured they would be protected," she said. As well as the application to take down 142 trees in Warren Road, Crest Nicholson, the developer, is hoping to win consent to remove 85 Scots pine and beech trees, and 29 Scots pine and silver birch trees from the Kings Warren Estate in the village. The developer has defended its application claiming it is going through the "proper channels" and vowing to plant new trees elsewhere. Forest Heath District Council said it would be checking the status of the trees before deciding if it would give the go-ahead for the three separate planning applications.Mrs Duncan and other residents of Warren Road are now planning to campaign against the trees being removed, as they believe they provide privacy for the estate. "The trees are mature, there is no need for them to be taken down," she said. "They can be a nuisance in the winter when all the leaves fall off but in the spring and summer its wonderful to see them - you feel as if you are actually in the country. I'm very bitter about it. I just think it's disgusting." http://www.eadt.co.uk/content/eadt/news/story.aspx?brand=EADOnline & category=News & tBrand=EADOnline & t Category=znews & itemid=IPED27%20Oct%202006%2021%3A14%3A08%3A070Scotland:17) A Book launched yesterday celebrates Scotland's oldest and most famous trees - including one said to have sheltered Robert the Bruce. Heritage Trees of Scotland features some of the rarest, tallest and most historic trees across the country. The Fortingall Yew is among 134 trees featured. The Perthshire tree, believed to be the oldest living organism in Europe, at 3,000-9,000 years old, stands in the churchyard at Fortingall. The yew was of religious significance in pre-Christian Scotland and the Fortingall tree may have had a role in Druidic ceremonies. The Bruce Yew stands at Tarbet, on the shores of Loch Lomond, and is believed to be the tree Robert the Bruce sheltered under to escape pursuing enemies in the 14th century. The King James II Holly, in the grounds of the ancestral seat of the Dukes of Roxburgh, is said to have been planted to mark the spot where James II was killed by an exploding cannon while laying siege to English-occupied Roxburgh Castle in 1460. The UK's tallest tree is also featured, Dughall Mor, a Douglas fir which stands 210ft tall in Reelig Glen in Inverness-shire. Some of the other trees featured were standing while Roman legions marched across Scotland to do battle with the Picts. A spokesman for the Forestry Commission, which published the book with the Tree Council, said: " Most of the trees are accessible to the public, and some are in rural areas which are more dependent on visitors to help their local economies. http://news.scotsman.com/scotland.cfm?id=1594942006 Portugal:18) The problem is killing trees in Portugal, the world's biggest producer of cork, as well as in Mediterranean countries in southern Europe, said Luis Silva, the global conservation group's forest officer for Portugal. " We don't know yet if it is a disease or if the mortality is caused by climatic factors and this is why the issue is being studied, " he told the Lusa news agency at the conference held in the southern town of Evora. The gathering was organized by the World Wildlife Fund together with the UN Food and Agriculture Organization, the International Association for Mediterranean Forests and Portugal's agriculture ministry. It is being attended by experts from Portugal, Spain, France, Algeria, Tunisia and the United States. " This conference aims to boost the scientific discussion of the problems of the abnormal mortality affecting coark and oak plantations, " Portugal's agriculture ministry said in a statement. Portugal produces 160,000 tonnes of cork per year. Neighbouring Spain is the second-biggest producer of cork followed by Algeria, Italy, Morocco, Tunisia and France. http://www.terradaily.com/reports/Cork_And_Oak_Trees_Dying_For_Unknown_Reasons_999.html Lebanon:19) It was born in the Arabian desert more than 1,500 years ago and is now being revived in the battle-scarred greenery of Lebanon. Already its success is heralding a regional renaissance. The pre-Islamic system of environmental protection known as " hima " -- Arabic for protected area -- means that the local population rather than a distant authority in Beirut decides how to manage the ecosystem, and also to reap its benefits. Now the village of Kfar Zabad in the eastern Bekaa valley, where overuse of land and water almost destroyed once vast wetlands, has seen the return of migrating birds. Hopefully, the ecotourists will soon flock there as well. " Hima means sustainable use of resources by and for the local community, " says Assad Serhal, whose Society for the Protection of Nature in Lebanon has set up two such projects in Lebanon since 2004, Kfar Zabad being one of them. Although their first use is unrecorded, himas were enshrined by the Prophet Mohammed in the 7th century, and the success of the system here has meant other Lebanese villagers are now clamouring to sign up for it. Before Mohammed, himas were often abused by tribal leaders to monopolise hunting or grazing rights. But with the advent of Islam came a religious understanding of the interdependence of all God's creations. " The system is about equality and the under-privileged; originally it was about giving land to orphans or women who lost their husbands in war, (or) the people who suffer in catastrophes like drought, " says Serhal, a US-trained wildlife ecologist. To this day, it is still haram -- prohibited -- to harm any animal or plant in or around the Saudi holy cities of Mecca and Medina.The revival of this ancient practice in Lebanon began when Serhal and his colleagues were poring over old maps of the country, which featured hundreds of areas marked as " himas " , a word that was new to his conservation lexicon. http://www.terradaily.com/reports/Lebanon_Sees_Revival_Of_Pre_Islamic_Environmentalism_999.html Ukraine:20) Ukraine's forests just gained another 800 saplings, planted by schoolchildren Sunday, Oct. 22, on a hectare of land outside Kyiv. The event, which took place in the Vyshgorod district of Kyiv Region, brought together 30 students from the Lyceum of International Relations No. 51, with government officials, representatives of the Slovak Embassy and members of various NGOs also in attendance. Anar Rusnakova, the founder and coordinator of the Slovak Fund in Support of Local Action and wife of Slovak Ambassador to Ukraine Urban Rusnak, said the goal was to teach children about the importance of environmentalism and revitalizing the forests of Ukraine. According to the European Forest Institute, 16 percent of Ukraine's land area, or 9,494 hectares, is currently forested. The trees were planted on land that belongs to the Staroselskiy state-owned forest concern. For every five rows of pine trees, the children planted one row of red oak trees, according to Anna Ostashko of the Kyiv Educational and Peacemaking Center. A metal sign was placed on the site to mark the planting, and students received brief instructions on how to correctly place the trees in the earth. http://www.kyivpost.com/nation/25308/Russia:21) U.S.-based International Paper on Wednesday announced a billion-dollar deal to buy half of a Russian timber company and form a joint venture to make office paper, packaging and pulp. The substantial investment comes amid jitters that the government is putting pressure on foreign ventures as it reasserts control over the economy. International Paper will pay about $400 million for 50 percent of Swiss-registered Ilim Holding, an Ilim Pulp subsidiary that controls four paper and pulp mills and valued at $1.3 billion. The new joint venture, Ilim Group, will invest $1.2 billion in upgrading its assets and technology over the next three years, International Paper chairman and chief executive John Faraci told reporters. The four mills now produce 2.5 million tons of forest products every year, bringing pre-tax profits of $250 million, Ilim Pulp chairman Zakhar Smushkin said. After the investments, they will boost capacity by 40 percent, or by 1 million tons, Faraci said. Each company will have an equal number of directors on the eight-member board, he said. The venture will be registered in Russia and have its headquarters in St. Petersburg. The deal should be finalized in the first quarter of next year. Roland Nash, chief strategist at Renaissance Capital investment bank, said the deal showed that foreign investors had not lost interest in Russian natural resources despite Royal Dutch Shell's problems with Sakhalin-2. The government has threatened to revoke a key license at the project over purported environmental violations. The move, combined with hassles at other foreign-owned projects, has fueled worries about investing in Russia. " It's a confirmation of the ongoing excitement that exists among foreign investors. ... International firms want a piece of the pie, " Nash said. " Obviously, everybody would prefer to invest without the political risk, but the sheer scale of natural resources in Russia means it's very attractive even under difficult circumstances. " http://www.moscowtimes.ru/stories/2006/10/26/003.htmlGhana:22) " The big trees, which since time immemorial had been protecting our rivers and dams, have been felled illegally and alarmingly by chainsaw operators, which as a result has dried up our water bodies, including the Akosombo Dam, " he disclosed at a Forest Forum at Nkawie. It was organized by a coalition of Non-Governmental Organizations (NGOs) known as Forest Watch Ghana (FWG) as part of its Forest Voices Project (FVC) and was facilitated by Rural Development and Youth Association (RUDEYA), Tropenbos Ghana and Ghana Association for Conservation of Nature (GACON). The forum offered a neutral platform for all manner of people and organizations with interest in forest management to engage in discussion of policies with the aim of ensuring equity, good governance and resource sustainability as well as helping to strengthen relations between the Forestry Commission (FC) and the general public for quality policy, good governance and sustainable forest management. Mr. Nyarko asked Ghanaians to stop blaming neighbouring Burkina Faso, who have recently built a dam, for our current power predicament, lamenting that our own inactions and ignorance about the essential usefulness of the forest, which we have depleted, had caused our present woes, adding, " Chainsaw operators have contributed immensely. " " The identification of crucial forestry issues, the changing forest policy direction to favour sustainable livelihoods and social acceptability, the checking policy implementation agency of the FC to ensure that their roles are carried out in accordance with laid down principles and laws, among others, would ensure the objective of FWG, " he said.http://allafrica.com/stories/200610250508.htmlEcuador:23) Mapping for Territorial Defense: Twenty-five Achuar, Shiwiar, Shuar, Zapara, Waorani and Kichwa leaders recently participated in a two-day workshop in the jungle-border town of Puyo to map all of the social and environmental conflicts occurring in their territories, particularly in areas that have already been identified as oil blocks or mining concessions. By working in groups, the indigenous leaders identified conflict sites in physical maps related to oil exploitation, logging, colonization, mining and others. The collectively drawn map will be vastly distributed among the indigenous communities and will be used as a tool to identify spatially where the conflicts are, not only for their own territories, but also those of their neighbors. The map will show all the indigenous territories, their boundaries and the areas that have already gained legal title and those that are in the process of being legalized. This year, Pachamama estimates that 350,000 hectares will gain final legal title which will recognize the indigenous inhabitants as the rightful owners of that land. The map will be ready and printed by the end of December. Pachamama facilitated and funded the workshop together with CDES (Center for Social and Economic Rights). http://pachamama.org/about/index.htmBrazil:24) SAO PAULO - Brazil on Wednesday rejected international criticism that it was sacrificing the Amazon rain forest to produce soy and beef. Agriculture Minister Luis Carlos Guedes Pinto said that only 0.27 percent of Brazil's soybean crop is grown in the Amazon region. Brazil produced a record 53.4 million tonnes of soybeans in 2005/05 (Oct/Sept). " Regarding Brazil's beef exports, less than 1.5 percent of production comes from the Amazon, " Guedes said at the opening of Biofach America Latina organic food products fair in Sao Paulo. Guedes said that Brazil farmed 62 million hectares (153 million acres) and could cultivate an extra 50 million hectares by using degraded pasture without " cutting down a single tree. " Brazil is the world's biggest beef exporter and No. 2 soy exporter after the United States. In September, preliminary official figures showed that the rate of Amazon rain forest deforestation slowed 11 percent in 2006. But an estimated 6,450 square miles of forest -- an area about the size of Hawaii -- could have been lost during the 2005/05 (Aug/July) logging season. http://today.reuters.co.uk/news/articlenews.aspx?type=scienceNews & storyID=2006-10-26T002908Z_01_N253 99779_RTRIDST_0_SCIENCE-FOOD-BRAZIL-AMAZON-DC.XML & WTmodLoc=SciHealth-C3-Science-825) SAO PAULO, Brazil -- Deforestation in the Amazon rain forest has declined to its lowest level since 1991 due to strict enforcement of environmental regulations, the Brazilian government said Thursday. Preliminary figures released by the environmental ministry showed 5,057 square miles of the rain forest were destroyed this year the lowest level since 4,258 square miles were lost in 1991. " We aggressively increased enforcement of environmental laws in the past years and it has worked, " said Joao Paulo Capobianco, the ministry's secretary of biodiversity and forests. The numbers released Thursday are estimates based on satellites images. The final results are expected before the end of the year. Last year, the rain forest lost 7,250 square miles. " It's the second year in a row there's a decline, so it's good news and we must applaud the government, " said Paulo Adario, director of Greenpeace's Amazon campaign. " But our preoccupation is that the average of annual destruction remains high, more needs to be done. " The highest rate of destruction in the Amazon was in 1995, when 11,200 square miles of forest were lost. The operations also led to the seizure of more than 28 million cubic feet of wood, nearly 500 tractors, 170 trucks and 650 chain saws, as well as fines totaling $1.3 billion, the ministry said. http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/10/26/AR2006102601338.html26) " We left our land in the Xingu to come to Europe to speak out about the many problems we are facing. All the headwaters of the great Xingu river are very polluted. This is because the white people who are agriculturalists throw in toxic pesticides. We are fisher people: we don't eat red meat. In the Xingu there is a lot of fish, every type of fish. Fish are so important to us and now the fish are dying. We are very, very worried because now a hydroelectric dam is being built on the Culuene river. Building has already started. I went to Brasilia to protest. All the indigenous peoples of the Xingu went to demonstrate there, and they told us they can't stop the dam. They keep on building. We went to the dam site to protest and they stopped work, but as soon as we left they started again. They don't care about us. When we go to see what is happening they don't want to know. So we need help. We have to fight for a better life. We don't want that dam. We want to preserve our land. The governor of Mato Grosso state, where we live, grows soya. That's all he does. He just orders people to plant soya so he can earn lots of money. He wants to grab half of our reserve, only to plant soya. I am beginning to understand things about the whites. What I see is that we, the Indians, respect them but they don't respect us. If you go to my land, all you will see is forest. It's unbroken. Now we have set up vigilance posts to protect it and the rivers. People come down the rivers in boats throwing out the rubbish and taking the fish. But I don't take things that belong to the whites. Funai (Foundation for the Protection of Indians) is responsible for our land. But we Mehinaku want to own our land. We want to register it in our name. We need our land and rivers for our life and traditions. My message to people in Europe is, please stand by us. We, the indigenous peoples of the Xingu, really need your help to stop these dams. This is very important - for all of us, for humanity. " http://www.guardian.co.uk/guardianweekly/outlook/story/0,,1896810,00.htmlIndia:27) The city is fast losing its green cover with trees getting the axe on anybody's whims and fancy. A case in point is Dadar where information gathered using the Right to Information Act clearly shows Mumbai has lost more than 1,100 trees for reasons best known only to the civic officials. Replying to the applications, civic officials said they do not have any criteria for appointing a private agency for hacking or pruning a tree and refused to divulge more information. "It is absurd that they don't check whether the person hacking the tree has any expertise in his job," said Bhaskar Prabhu, a local activist who filed the applications. Just a few days ago, miscreants hacked 100 trees on the Sion-Panvel expressway close to Mankhurd allegedly to give a better view of the hoardings along the Expressway. The Tree Authority, which had been appointed to take care of the city's green cover with an annual budget of Rs14 crore, has come under scanner from a Bombay High Court appointed committee for alleged mismanagement of funds. "We are aware that the Tree Authority is not using its funds responsibly. It is certainly a matter of concern for us," a senior civic official said. http://www.dnaindia.com/report.asp?NewsID=106042128) Thiruvananthapuram: The State Government has finalised a Rs.180 crore scheme for greening 206 km of Kerala's coastline over the next three years. The State Forest and Fisheries departments will jointly implement the `Kerala Theeravanam Scheme' with people's participation in nine coastal districts, official sources said. The scheme envisages large scale planting of trees, shrubs and mangrove vegetation suitable for coastal ecosystems to create a natural barrier for containing the ravages of the sea. Three per cent of the State's population, nearly 1,40,000 families, that live along the coastline are expected to benefit from the scheme. The project also has a component for improving the living conditions of 60,000 fisher folk families having no proper housing. The Government has identified an additional 106 km of the State's total 509-km coastline for the second phase of the " Theeravanam " project. In the first two years, nearly two lakh saplings will be planted along the coast. For achieving this, the Government has decided to constitute " Theera Vana Samrakshana Samitis " at the ward level. The ward member will be the chairman of the Samiti. Coastal wards will be asked to prepare " micro plans " for implementing the project. Only Samiti members or those nominated by them would be given the task of executing the project. Those living on coasts that come under the Coastal Regulation Zone (CRZ) norms would be encouraged to plant trees within their property. The Forest department has decided to take over nearly 150 acres of mangrove forests, which is now in private hands. Nearly Rs.9 crore has been set aside for conserving mangrove forests in Kerala. http://www.hindu.com/2006/10/28/stories/2006102807020400.htmChina: 29) BEIJING Upon determining that deforestation was to blame for devastating flooding by the Yangtze River in 1998, which killed 2,500 people and caused billions of dollars in damage, China promptly enacted an aggressive package of measures aimed at protecting its existing forest growth, rehabilitating distressed areas and reclaiming forests that had been converted to farmland. One central measure the government took was a stern, and by most accounts effective, crackdown on illegal logging across China. Given that forest coverage on Chinese territory is only 17 percent, compared with a global average of 34 percent, this move was prudent regardless of logging's contribution to China's flood control problems. The scholars reported that annual Chinese timber imports, after remaining below 11 million cubic meters, or 388 million cubic feet, for most of the previous 16 years, suddenly took off after the Yangtze floods. Timber imports rose 319 percent, to 40.2 million cubic meters in 2003 from 12.6 million cubic meters in 1997. By 2010, they forecast, timber imports could total as many as 125 million cubic meters. Chinese pulp and paper imports, meanwhile, rose by 1,650 percent between 1995 and 2003, they said. Much of China's demand comes from the voracious appetite of its own growing economy for wood and paper products. Still, according to the environmental advocacy group WWF, formerly the World Wildlife Fund, each person in China uses, on average, 17 times less wood than in the United States, and much of China's demand is related to its growing role as one of the leading world suppliers of furniture and building materials. A report jointly issued this year by western and Chinese research groups found that 70 percent of all timber imported by China is processed into furniture, plywood and other products for export, mainly to the United States, Japan and the European Union. Much of the timber is imported from Southeast Asia. Malaysia has stringent logging and export controls, but an investigation by the Environmental Investigation Agency, a conservationist group based in Britain, identified large- scale illegal timber exports from Malaysia to processors in China, aided by corruption and falsified customs documents, an EIA investigator, Julian Newman, said in an interview. http://www.iht.com/articles/2006/10/29/business/rchinwood.phpThailand:30) Pilai Poonswad, 60, has dedicated her life to saving the hornbill a large, magnificent forest bird, some species of which are endangered or facing extinction. For almost 30 years, she has trekked and camped in forests to study how hornbills live their lives, what they eat, what their breeding needs are and what kills them, in the hope of conserving them. Thanks to Ms Pilai's work, the Thai public now knows this rare bird _ once thought to have become extinct _ much better. We have also learned that as hornbills need a large area of fertile forest that can provide fruits for feeding and wood cavities for nesting, they can serve as an indicator of a forest's health. In fact, as seed dispersers and predators, hornbills themselves help maintain the forests' ecological balance. Now she has been recognised for her efforts, having won a prestigious Rolex Award for Enterprise. ''I am glad to have received the award _ not because it will be my personal glory, but I hope that the award will be an encouragement to people who work in the same field of conservation,'' Ms Pilai said. Conservationists often have to struggle to carry on with their work due to a lack of financial support. Ms Pilai's work has even put her health at risk. Once she had no money to hire helpers and had to carry her heavy load of research equipment by herself. Trained in parasitology and avian biology, Ms Pilai is currently a lecturer at Mahidol University's department of microbiology. She set up the Thailand Hornbill Project to study the biology and ecology of hornbills in 1979. It later became the Hornbill Research Foundation, in 1993. Ms Pilai is the first Thai woman to receive the award, which has been given to 55 people since its inception in 1976. The award aims to recognise people who break new ground in areas which advance human knowledge and well-being. http://www.bangkokpost.com/News/26Oct2006_news12.phpMalaysia:31) KUALA LUMPUR -- The allegation that oil palm planting has affected wildlife and the national forestry system has been described as an attempt to disrupt the oil palm industry by other edible oil producers. Natural Resource and Environment Minister Datuk Seri Azmi Khalid in refuting the allegation by certain foreign non-government organisations (NGOs) said " such allegations were motivated by an anti-oil palm and pro soya bean stand. They (the activists) are very sensitive about the natural habitat of the Orang Utan, " he said. He said the allegation was an attempt to bring down the palm oil industry which was strongly competing with the soya bean oil. Azmi was referring to the statement by United Kingdom Deputy Prime Minister John Prescott who said during a short meeting between the two, that wildlife habitat was being threatened by the clearing of jungle. He was speaking to reporters after accompanying Prescott who was on a three-day working visit to Malaysia which started Saturday. He said Malaysia had clear regulations on forestry and had several areas which had been gazetted as Permanent Forest Reserves meant for wildlife conservation. " No logging is allowed in Permanent Forest Reserves which have been gazetted, " he said. Malaysia, Indonesia and Brunei would create an area called the " The Heart of Borneo " in a continuous effort to conserve wildlife in Asia, he said, adding that this area would comprise two million hectares in which wildlife would be allowed to live in their natural environment. " When the delegation was told about this effort, they (the delegation members) were amazed because the area nearly equalled the size of England. " http://www.bernama.com.my/bernama/v3/news.php?id=226811Indonesia:32) Borneo - Malaysia's human rights watchdog has urged the government to give financial aid to some 4,000 Penan tribespeople on Borneo island where logging and other activities are threatening their survival, a news report said Friday. Some 40 families live in deplorable conditions in a hamlet in a remote district of Sarawak state and have no access to basic amenities such as electricity and water, said Denison Jayasooria, a commissioner with the government-backed Human Rights Commission. He told the national news agency Bernama that several members of the commission made the discovery during a visit last month to the Penan longhouses, large communal homes on stilts where several families live together. The Penans, among the last people on earth living exclusively from hunting and gathering, have been marginalized for decades and their survival is under threat as the state government continues to award forest land to companies for logging, palm oil plantations and reforestation, he said. The Penan live in small settlements in the mountains of northeastern Sarawak, Malaysia's largest section of Borneo, which it shares with Indonesia and Brunei. Sarawak sits next to Malaysia's Sabah state. They hunt wild pigs and deer with spears and blowguns, and pick wild fruit. Some 300 live still more primitively, keeping on the move as forest nomads. The Malaysian government says it wants to bring them into the mainstream, offering them homes with running water, schools and work. http://www.iht.com/articles/ap/2006/10/27/asia/AS_GEN_Malaysia_Borneo_Tribe.phpNew Zealand: 33) A Maori tribe has blocked logging in a state-owned forest claiming the presence of sacred burial sites, which it cannot identify. Crown Forestry has given up its legal battle to harvest pines on four blocks of the Waiuku State Forest on the northern banks of the Waikato River after losing an Environment Court appeal against a Waikato Regional Council decision not to allow logging because of Maori concerns. Crown Forestry operations manager Warwick Foran said: " We won't appeal. The judge has ruled the effects on Maori are greater than the benefit of allowing harvesting. " He could not put a figure on what the harvesting would have been worth. Ngati Te Ata told the Environment Court all four blocks over an area of 305ha were waahi tapu, or sacred, and it was not willing to identify particular sites. During the hearing, Crown Forestry expressed frustration with the iwi's attempts to use the case to get action on a stalled Treaty claim. Ngati Te Ata wanted $6300, or $150 an hour, to write a " Maori cultural values assessment " of the impact of logging and tried to call the Ministers of Maori Affairs and Treaty Negotiations as witnesses - something outside the court's jurisdiction. Crown Forestry called the asking price for the cultural assessment report an attempt to " frustrate the resource consent process to force the pace on their Treaty claim " . http://www.nzherald.co.nz/section/story.cfm?c_id=1 & objectid=10407665World-wide: 34) The Indonesian volcano Talang on the island of Sumatra had been dormant for centuries when, in April 2005, it suddenly rumbled to life. A plume of smoke rose 1000 meters high and nearby villages were covered in ash. Fearing a major eruption, local authorities began evacuating 40,000 people. UN officials, meanwhile, issued a call for help: Volcanologists should begin monitoring Talang at once. Little did they know, high above Earth, a small satellite was already watching the volcano. No one told it to. EO-1 (short for " Earth Observing 1 " ) noticed the warning signs and started monitoring Talang on its own. Indeed, by the time many volcanologists were reading their emails from the UN, " EO-1 already had data, " says Steve Chien, leader of JPL's Artificial Intelligence Group. EO-1 is a new breed of satellite that can think for itself. " We programmed it to notice things that change (like the plume of a volcano) and take appropriate action, " Chien explains. EO-1 can re-organize its own priorities to study volcanic eruptions, flash-floods, forest fires, disintegrating sea-ice—in short, anything unexpected. And now the intelligence is growing. " We're teaching EO-1 to use sensors on other satellites. " Examples: Terra and Aqua, two NASA satellites which fly over every part of Earth twice a day. Each has a sensor onboard named MODIS. It's an infrared spectrometer able to sense heat from forest fires and volcanoes—just the sort of thing EO-1 likes to study. " We make MODIS data available to EO-1, " says Chien, " so when Terra or Aqua see something interesting, EO-1 can respond. " EO-1 also taps into sensors on Earth's surface, such as " the USGS volcano observatories in Hawaii, Washington and Antarctica. " Together, the ground stations and satellites form a web of sensors, or a " sensorweb, " with EO-1 at the center, gathering data and taking action. It's a powerful new way to study Earth. http://science.nasa.gov/headlines/y2006/26oct_sensorweb.htm?list76998 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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