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News Briefs
Solar cycles impact warming
Roughly 10–30% of the rise in global surface temperatures during the last two decades may be due to increased solar output, according to new research from Duke University. Nicolla Scafetta and Bruce West based their research on an earlier study that found that a two-year gap in satellite data had missed an increasing trend in solar luminosity from 1980 to 2002. Scafetta and West analyzed 22 years of satellite data to determine how the atmosphere would respond to increasing solar irradiance. Although the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change has concluded that the sun has not contributed to the 0.4 °C rise in global surface temperatures during the past two decades, global climate models need to account for solar activity, the authors say. (Geophys. Res. Lett. 2005, 32, L18713)
Trouble looms Down Under
Climate change will damage health. That’s the conclusion of a new report by the Australian Medical Association and the Australian Conservation Foundation, which predicts that average temperatures will rise by 1–6 °C by 2100. In Australia, up to 15,000 people could die every year from heat stress by 2100, up from about 1000 a year at present, while dengue fever and other mosquito-borne diseases could spread as far south as Sydney. Dengue fever in Australia is currently confined to the country’s tropical and sparsely populated far north. Australia has not ratified the Kyoto Protocol on Climate Change treaty. The report is available at www.ama.com.au/web.nsf/doc/WEEN-6GFAZM.
Great Lakes are suffering
The U.S. EPA could do more to ensure that states protect the five Great Lakes, the Government Accountability Office (GAO) notes in a report. GAO analysts reviewed how successful the states bordering the lakes and EPA officials have been in implementing the Great Lakes Initiative (GLI), a federal program designed to control toxic releases and protect aquatic life and wildlife. GLI has some drawbacks, the analysts found, primarily because it asks states to regulate only point sources, whereas nonpoint sources, such as air deposition and agriculture runoff, produce more pollution. EPA Needs to Better Ensure the Complete and Consistent Implementation of Water Quality Standards recommends that EPA issue a mercury permitting strategy, fully develop the partially operating GLI Clearinghouse to allow states to share pollution control data, and collect information on the success of current schemes designed to control releases into the Great Lakes.
More fish contaminated by mercury
States in the U.S. reported 395 new fish consumption advisories in 2004, bringing the nationwide total in effect to 3221, according to the U.S. EPA’s annual National Listing of Fish Advisories database. Nearly 65% of the U.S. coastline is under advisory, with 100% of the Gulf coast and 92% of the Atlantic coast blanketed with warnings. The percentage of lake acres affected has risen from about 8% in 1993 to 35% in 2004. More monitoring by states accounts for most of the growth in advisories, EPA says. Contamination of fish by mercury leads the way, followed by PCBs, chlordane, dioxin, and DDT.
