Take Yellowstone grizzly bears off the endangered list, officials say

According to wildlife experts, more than 700 grizzly bears are now living in the Yellowstone national park range lands and nearby land plots. While the Yellowstone Grizzly bear has been protected from hunting and other kills over the last decade, Yellowstone officials unanimously voted to have the bears taken off the national endangered species list.

http://www.theguardian.com/environment/2013/dec/12/yellowstone-grizzly-bears-endangered-list

Pesticides' effect on generations of field-workers

In a small village in southern mexico, known as Silanis Valley, a study was conducted with the hopes of finding out the effects of chemical farming on their health. The results werent very shocking there where indeed effects of the chemical fertilizers and pesticides. PBDE or Polybrominated Diphenyl Ethers, a common ingrediant in pesticides/fertilizers, when found in women, typically means a far lower chance of becoming pregnant, and those that are still normally fertile, often have their children born with abnormally low birth weights. The effects also travel with those new born babies later into life, for example IQ which is beileved to have roots in genetics, shows that many of the children who were born from a mother with high PBDE levels scored signifcantly lower on IQ tests, and also show signs of being unable to maintain focus, a clear indictor of ADHD, and issues like it. While we dont know all of the affects, it is clear that these chemicals dont pose any health benefits and should be avoided if possible.  

http://www.sfgate.com/science/article/Pesticides-effect-on-generations-of-field-workers-4833219.php

After Two Years of Nuclear Crises, Japan Opens Its Biggest Solar Park

Japan has recently completed a true modern marvel. Japan become the first nation to develop a "solar island" so to speak. Solar panel covered plateau offers clean and efficient power to more than 40,000 homes in Suburban Japan. With this large public works project completed the island nation is now officially pushing for more clean use of energy rather than fossil fuels. This marks the beginning of what could be the start of a clean future for Japan and may well result in other nations taking a similar initiative to provide for clean and efficient alternative energy options to grid users.

http://gizmodo.com/after-two-years-of-nuclear-crises-japan-opens-its-bigg-1467411405

These New Graphene Supercapacitors Could Finally Power An Electric Car

Scientists in North Korea might just have invented the greatest invention since the electric car! It is the new Graphene Supercapacitor! Just one gram of this newly refined product has the equivalent surface area to a basketball! Unlike the current lithium-ion batteries commonly used by car companies in their electric vehicles these new graphing super capacitor batteries are capable of charging as little as 16 seconds! A rate that would make typical lithium ion batteries a thing of the past. With a growing market for electric cars a discovery like this not only means that the world will have more efficient electric cars, but it opens pandoras box to a world of wannabe inventors and as such we are likely only a few short years from seeing this technology being integrated into electric cars and maybe even aircraft in the future. So what does this mean for us? We might just have found our way to a completely fossil fuel-free future.

http://gizmodo.com/these-new-graphene-supercapacitors-could-finally-power-1463259679

Playing loud pop music boosts output of solar panels by 40%

According to new research playing pop music as low as 75 dB has been shown to amazingly increase the performance of solar panels by up to 40%. In the study in which both pop music as well as classical music was played in the presence of the series of electronically measured solar panels it was determined that pop music with its higher pitch sounds help the better stimulate the solar panels photovoltaic cells and produce electricity more effectively.

http://www.enn.com/energy/article/46645

Incredible remote world discovered

Australia may be more untaimed then most of us realize. The Dewy rainforest of Austrlias cape Melville has been completely isolated from human touch, that is until a scientist and his team was able to use the power of satellites and expensive helicopter involvement to locate a small group of scientist on the very fringe of this mountainous wilderness. The rainforest is entirely surrounded by a large of house sized boulders that make access to the Melville rainforest impossible. Upon their first voyage to the area they successfully identified more than 20 times of previously unknown species and those previously thought to be extinct.

http://gizmodo.com/incredible-remote-lost-world-discovered-with-never-befo-1453492704

30 Year-Old Dream Comes True With The Construction Of Israel’s Biggest Solar Power Plant

Perhaps one of the finest examples of renewable energy being utilized on a large scale is the Brightsource Heliostat. Breaking ground within the next 12 months, this large scale solar energy project is set to power more than 40,000 israeli homes from its location in the Negev desert of southern Israel. The the company was originally founded in Israel more than 15 years ago and after a multi-million-dollar buyout by a smaller American company, rightsource was formed. Brightsource is currently in the process of undertaking similar smaller scale project in the desert of California, however; the Israeli project crown jewel the company that you can likely that the path for other future solar endeavors.

http://www.enn.com/pollution/article/46559

Without Plants, Earth Would Cook Under Billions of Tons of Additional Carbon

Scientists and botanists alike agree that plants, but more specifically trees, are single handily responsible for helping to keep our planet from growing hot due to build up of carbon in our atmosphere. Starting again in the mid-twentieth century, americans in particular began to concern themselves with conservation and began major initiatives to grow our forests. The growth in forests over the last 70 years has been estimated to have cut down close to 192 billion tons of carbon in our atmosphere that would otherwise be threatening to our global temperatures.


http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2013/10/131016145646.htm

Nitrogen Fixation

Need nitrogen fixing bacteria in places such as panama have begun to decline in their productivity and even existence for as deforestation begins to become more rampant in places such as Panama, the amount of bacteria that is coexisting with the vast root systems of trees native to the regions are beginning to decrease. Without the needed root nitrogen being dissolved the soil will become less furtle  and may become to infertile to support the needs of local vegetation that relies heavily on such abiotic factors.

http://www.enn.com/ecosystems/article/46522

No more Superstorm Sandys expected for a long time

Global warming and major superstorms might well be working against one another. With the climate changing scientists have begun to change their predictions for how hurricanes and tropical storms might affect the northeast United States in coming years. With conditions changing due to atmospheric and oceanic elevated temperatures throughout the region, storms like the infamous "Superstorm Sandy" likely will become even more of a rarity than it was to begin with. Ironically scientists that claim such a theory also account for the storms that will occur as being far more powerful than in the past, but will likely be deflected off into the mid-atlantic rather than make landfall again.

http://www.sciencenews.org/view/generic/id/352923/description/No_more_Superstorm_Sandys_expected_for_a_long_time

Nitrogen growing threat to LI waters

Due to our septic system use, Nitrogen is building up in our Island's Aquferes and is potentially beginning to harm the water supply of Long Island. Between the Long Island Sound and our water cominginto our homes, nitrogen levels over the last 20 years have grown more than 200% and while being a nessesary component to plant life, in such high levels posses a severe threat to the plants of the long island sound.

http://www.newsday.com/news/health/nitrogen-growing-threat-to-li-waters-1.6132749

Solar-powered system used to produce clean water in rural villages

MIT researchers have invented a new system with which they plan to help combat the "undrinkable" water problem. In villages all across the country towns people are unable to afford the costs of clean water and therefore are at risk of contracting water borne diseases such as malaria and dysentery. Thanks to their hard work, small villages will now have access to clean drinking water for less than a peso a day, more than 20 times cheaper than buying bottled water from the distributor that serves the village.

Source(s):
http://www.enn.com/sci-tech/article/46412