painted bunting
AmeriScan

AmeriScan: Feb. 17, 2014

Billion Birds Die Annually in U.S. Building Collisions … Yellowstone National Park Plans to Kill 800 Bison … Vermont Rejects Biomass Power Plant Over CO2 Emissions … New York Officials Propose Nation’s First Microbeads Ban … Used Plastic Bags Converted to Petrol Fuels […]

tusks
Latest News

Global Wildlife Crime Sting Arrests 400+ Suspects

NAIROBI, Kenya, February 17, 2014 (ENS) – Working together, law enforcement officers from 28 countries have made over 400 arrests of wildlife crime suspects and more than 350 wildlife seizures in a one month operation code-named Operation Cobra II. Several of those arrested were identified as wildlife trafficking kingpins. […]

whale
Latest News

Canadian Groups Win At-Risk Species Protection Case

VANCOUVER, British Columbia, Canada, February 14, 2014 (ENS) – The Canadian Federal Court ruled today that two Cabinet ministers acted unlawfully in delaying for several years the production of recovery strategies for four at-risk species threatened by industrial development, including the proposed Northern Gateway pipeline and tanker route. […]

leaders
Latest News

Forty-Six Nations Agree to Stamp Out Illegal Wildlife Trade

LONDON, UK, February 14, 2014 (ENS) – Wildlife poachers watch out! At the Illegal Wildlife Trade Conference, held Thursday in London, world leaders from 46 nations agreed on“decisive and urgent action” in a concerted effort to pull elephants, rhinos, tigers and other endangered species back from the brink of extinction. […]

bikes
Business

Booming Globally, Bike-Sharing Spins Its Wheels in Montreal

MONTREAL, Canada, February 14, 2014 (ENS) – “Today there are an estimated 639 bicycle-sharing schemes operating in 53 countries located in almost every region of the world, boasting a total of about 643,000 bicycles,” bike-sharing expert Peter Midgley writes in a new blog post for EMBARQ, a program of the environmental think tank World Resources Institute. […]

ivory
Latest News

Obama Bans U.S. Commercial Trade of Elephant Ivory

WASHINGTON, DC, February 12, 2014 (ENS) – The Obama administration Tuesday announced a new National Strategy for Combating Wildlife Trafficking that marshals the resources of all executive branch agencies. As part of the new strategy, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service will implement a U.S. ban on commercial import and export of elephant ivory. […]

presidents
Air/Climate

Obama, Hollande Cooperate on 2015 Global Climate Change Pact

WASHINGTON, DC, February 11, 2014 (ENS) – The leaders of France and the United States today agreed to expand their work to curb climate change in advance of the United Nations climate summit next year in Paris, where the world is expected to forge a global climate agreement to take effect in 2020. […]

No Picture
Latest News

Electric Cars Now and Then at the Chicago Auto Show

CHICAGO, Illinois, February 11, 2014 (ENS) – In 1901, visitors to the first Chicago Auto Show in the old Chicago Coliseum saw the latest models of electric cars right alongside petrol-powered vehicles. Back then, 38 percent of automobiles on U.S. roads were powered by electricity. […]

Singapore
At Risk

Three Oil Spills in Two Weeks Foul Singapore’s Waters

SINGAPORE, February 11, 2014 (ENS) – A containership and a chemical tanker collided in the Singapore Strait Monday afternoon, spilling some 80 metric tonnes of bunker fuel, the Maritime and Port Authority of Singapore reports. This is the third ship collision in Singaporean waters within the past two weeks that has resulted in an oil spill. […]

chemical weapons
At Risk

World First: U.S. to Destroy Syrian Chemical Weapons at Sea

THE HAGUE, The Netherlands, February 10, 2014 (ENS) – Syria’s chemical weapons are being moved to a U.S. Navy ship for destruction in the world’s first mission of its kind. The United States and other countries have years of experience destroying chemical weapons on land, but this is the first time anyone has attempted to perform the destruction on a seagoing vessel. […]

cock rescue
AmeriScan

AmeriScan: Feb. 10, 2014

New York Executes ‘Operation Angry Birds’ Cockfighting Bust … Duke Energy Spills Coal Ash Into North Carolina River … W.R. Grace Pays $63 Million to Clean, Restore Superfund Sites … Poll: Voters Support Carbon Limits on Power Plants … Groups Urge Public Disclosure of Oil & Gas Chemical Emissions … Oregon Chub Recovered, Says Fish & Wildlife Service […]

Obama
Food

Obama Signs $1 Trillion Farm Bill Into Law

WASHINGTON, DC, February 7, 2014 (ENS) – Today, President Barack Obama signed into law the nearly $1 trillion farm bill, which extends, expands, or modifies federal agriculture and nutrition programs, including farm income support, crop insurance, conservation, credit assistance, trade, research, food assistance and rural development through the fiscal year 2018 crop year. […]

sampling
Latest News

West Virginia’s Water Nightmare Closes Schools

CHARLESTON, West Virginia, February 7, 2014 (ENS) – Crude MCHM, one of two chemicals that leaked into West Virginia’s Elk River last month, was detected in the water supply of George Washington High School this morning, according to Kanawha-Charleston Health Department officials, weeks after the water was declared safe to use. […]

waves
At Risk

‘Massive’ Coastal Floods Predicted as Storms Flood Britain

LONDON, UK, February 7, 2014 (ENS) – Met Office forecasters warn that strong winds and big waves will bring risk of flooding and damaging winds along Britain’s southern and southwestern coasts into the weekend, intensifying storm conditions that have persisted all week. Globally, coastal regions face “massive increases in damages from storm surge flooding during the 21st century,” new research predicts. […]

toys
Latest News

Toxics Pervade Kids’ Products, Washington Disclosure Law Shows

SEATTLE, Washington, February 6, 2014 (ENS) – Makers of children’s products report that they are using toxic chemicals in children’s toys, clothing, safety products and bedding. The reports were filed with the State of Washington in 2013 under the state’s new disclosure law, the Children’s Safe Products Act, the country’s only such law. […]

whale
Latest News

New Species of Deep-diving Beaked Whale Identified

SYDNEY, Australia, February 6, 2014 (ENS) – A species of beaked whale that was previously misnamed has been correctly identified as a new species, based on the study of seven whales stranded on remote tropical islands in the Indian and Pacific Oceans over the past 50 years. […]

crusher
Latest News

France Crushes Three Tonnes of Smuggled Ivory

PARIS, France, February 6, 2014 (ENS) – Today in Paris, beside the Eiffel Tower, the government of France crushed 3.5 metric tonnes of illegal ivory seized over a period of 20 years by French Customs officers, becoming the first European country to carry out public destruction of government-held ivory. […]