Environmental News June 15 to June 24, 2016

Entrepreneurs Fight for the Future of Fish- Starting with the Bottom Line
By: Brian Handwerk, National Geographic
Future of Fish is a nonprofit that is helping entrepreneurs who hope to reinvent the seafood industry by attacking problems throughout the long supply chains used by today's industrialized fisheries.
Read more here.

The Diablo Canyon deal marks the death of nuclear power in the U.S. – or does it?
Date: June 24, 2016
By: Michael Hiltzik, LA Times
What you heard the other day, when Pacific Gas & Electric and a group of environmental organizations and labor unions announced a plan to permanently shutter the Diablo Canyon nuclear plant, was the sound of the door shutting on nuclear power in the United States.
Or was it?
Read more here.

Healthy oceans, healthy people
Date: June 24, 2016
By: Brett Jenks and Andy Sharpless, The Hill
A groundbreaking study released in the journal Nature last week underscored something many of us have long known to be true: around the world, human health is inextricably linked to the health of the oceans.  When the oceans suffer – from threats like climate change and overfishing – people suffer too.
Read more here.

5 United States senators take a stand for sharks today
Date: June 23, 2016
By: Molly Sequin
With declining populations of sharks worldwide, there have been multiple bans on the sale of shark fins in the United States. However, some species are still allowed to be sold in certain states. It is also almost impossible to know if a shark was caught legally or not, Sea Shepherd says, because many markets often lie about the species they have caught and where they caught them.
Today, 5 United States senators are introducing the Shark Fin Trade Elimination Act of 2016.
Read more here.

Ventura oil spill misses the ocean, but damage on land is unclear
Date: June 23, 2016
By: Matt Hamilton, Joseph Serna and Veronica Rocha, LA Times
Before the sun rose Thursday, Kirk Atwater’s wakeup call was a noxious breeze that filled his bedroom with fumes.
He stepped out of his ranch that overlooks an arroyo in the Ventura hills and saw a creek of thick, black goo traveling through the canyon that was dry just the day before.
Read more here.

Falling Behind in Ocean Protection
Date: June 3, 2016
By: Valerie Craig, National Geographic
It’s National Oceans Month and on June 8 we will celebrate World Oceans Day, so it’s a good time to check in on how close we’re getting to the international goal of fully protecting 10% of the world’s ocean. Unfortunately it looks like we have a long way to go, especially right here in North America.
Read more here.

Humans will be extinct in 100 years says eminent scientist
Date: June 23, 2016
By: Lin Edwards, Phys.Org
Eminent Australian scientist Professor Frank Fenner, who helped to wipe out smallpox, predicts humans will probably be extinct within 100 years, because of overpopulation, environmental destruction and climate change.
Read more here.

PG&E to close Diablo Canyon, California’s last nuclear power plant
Date: June 21, 2016
By: Ivan Penn and Samantha Masunaga, LA Times
California’s last nuclear power plant will be phased out by 2025, under a joint proposal announced Tuesday morning by Pacific Gas & Electric Co. and labor and environmental groups.
Read more here.

Joining together for sustainable seafood
Date: June 21, 2016
By: FsVoice, Nation’s Restaurant News
Consumers who favor sustainable seafood want fish to be delicious and for its supplier not to harm the environment. To help meet those goals, restaurateurs increasingly are partnering with providers of premium, all-natural seafood from sustainable sources as well as pursuing relationships with nonprofit organizations.
Read more here.

Coral reefs will continue to suffer during Third Year of Warmer Oceans: NOAA
Date: June 21, 2016
By: Jeanne Rife, NH Voice
The world’s coral reefs are not going to have good days this year. In an announcement on Monday, researchers said coral reefs will suffer this year too due to warmer oceans. Previous two years were also troublesome for reefs because of global bleaching event.
Read more here.

Threats to habitat connectivity as sea waters inundate coastal areas
Date: June 21, 2016
By: Jim Melvin, Environmental News Network
By the year 2100, sea levels might rise as much as 2.5 meters above their current levels, which would seriously threaten coastal cities and other low-lying areas. In turn, this would force animals to migrate farther inland in search of higher ground. But accelerated urbanization, such as the rapidly expanding Piedmont area that stretches from Atlanta to eastern North Carolina, could cut off their escape routes and create climate-induced extinctions.
Read more here.

Outrigger’s conservation initiative seeks to protect coral reef systems worldwide
Date: June 21, 2016
By: Rahim Kanani, The Guam Daily Post
“With over 60 percent of the world’s reefs under immediate threat, Outrigger has made it our mission to work with conservation partners to protect coral reef systems in tropical destinations around the world,” explained David Carey, president and CEO of Outrigger Enterprises Group, a privately-held hospitality company. In an interview tied to World Ocean Day (June 8), we discussed Outrigger’s conservation efforts, impact and ambitions tied to environmental stewardship and sustainability.
Read more here.

Penobscot River Restoration Celebrates Final Milestone
Date: June 20, 2016
By: The Outdoor Wire
Federal, state, local, and tribal representatives, and project partners gathered in Howland, Maine, to mark and celebrate the completion of the last major milestone in the Penobscot River Restoration Project: the newly constructed fish bypass around the dam in Howland.
Read more here.

Fishers, environmentalists join forces in NT debate over impact of fish trawling
Date: June 20, 2016
By: Alyssa Betts, ABC Online
Amateur fishers have banded together with charter operators, environmentalists and some commercial fishers to raise an alarm about the ecological and social impacts of finfish trawling in the Northern Territory.
Read more here.

First Mammal Goes Extinct From Manmade Climate Change
Date: June 17, 2016
By: Kevin Matthews, Environmental News Network
We’ve reached a sad milestone: Climate change has claimed its first mammal species. Scientists have been warning us that a large percentage of species will face extinction thanks to manmade global warming, and the future is unfortunately here.
Read more here.

Mangroves Can Counter Ocean Acidification, Study Reveals
Date: June 17, 2016
By: Elaine Hannah, Science World Report
The researchers discovered that mangrove forests can buffer ocean acidification because they are known to increase the alkalinity of the waters surrounding these ecosystems. The alkaline solutions can counter acidification.
Read more here.

Fossil record shows seas around Britain were once tropical
Date: June 16, 2016
By: University of Bristol, Environmental News Network
Some 210 million years ago, Britain consisted of many islands, surrounded by warm seas. Europe at the time lay farther south, at latitudes equivalent to North Africa today. Much of Europe was hot desert, and at this point was flooded by a great sea – the Rhaetian Transgression.
Read more here.

What Would a Global Warming Increase of 1.5 Degrees Celsius Be Like?
Date: June 16, 2016
By: Fred Pearce, Environmental News Network
How ambitious is the world? The Paris climate conference last December astounded many by pledging not just to keep warming “well below two degrees Celsius,” but also to "pursue efforts" to limit warming to 1.5 degrees C. That raised a hugely important question: What's the difference between a two-degree world and a 1.5-degree world?
Read more here.

How the FAA is Doing its Part to Save Walruses
Date: June 15, 2016
By: Melissa Locker, Travel + Leisure
To understand how the U.S. agency and the giant sea mammals are connected, you need a little backstory.
Walruses in Alaska typically spend their days foraging for food, and then chilling out on ice floes that dot the Chukchi Sea near Point Barrow. However, climate change has caused those ice floes to melt, and that has forced walruses to “haul out” on to land. On the Alaskan peninsula, large groups of walruses—sometimes as many as 6,000—gather on the shore.
Read more here.