The Environment Chronicle

German federal environment minister Norbert Röttgen has lifted a 10-year moratorium on exploratory work at the Gorleben salt dome, a potential repository for Germany's radioactive waste.

The fifteenth Conference of the Parties (CoP15) to the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora (CITES) took place from 13-25 March 2010, in Doha, Qatar. On 25 March the parties to the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora failed to agree on stronger protection for endangered fish species. The proposals submitted by the EU, the United States and other countries did not receive the required majorities. The EU proposal put forward by Germany on the protection of the porbeagle missed the requires two-third majority by one vote. Previously, the proposal on the spiny dogfish had also failed to receive the necessary support. The United States, which submitted proposals for six shark species to be listed in Annex II, suffered the same failure. Equally abortive was the proposal put forward by Monaco on a temporary ban on international trade of the bluefin tuna. However, some amphibian species made it into the CITES Appendices this year: some tree or leaf frog species from Central America, for example, were listed in Appendix II of the Convention and the Luristan newt from Iran even received the strict protection status of Appendix I. Moreover, elephants in Tanzania and Zambia retained their protection status under Appendix I.

On 8 March 2010 police stopped a tractor-trailer transporting a uranium hexafluoride cylinder on the A1 motorway in Bremen. The cylinder was mounted on a flat rack with essential components rusted through. The police ordered the flat rack to be replaced, before the transport would be allowed to continue. The cylinder had arrived in the Hamburg port from the USA and was on the way to Urenco's Gronau enrichment plant.

The United Nations Secretary General and the Chairman of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) announced on 10 March 2010 that they asked the InterAcademy Council (IAC) to conduct an independent review of the IPCC’s processes and procedures to further strengthen the quality of the Panel’s reports on climate change. The IAC is the umbrella organization for various national academies of science from countries around the world. The review will examine every aspect of how the IPCC’s reports are prepared, including the use of non-peer reviewed literature and the reflection of diverse viewpoints. The review will also examine institutional aspects, including management functions as well as the panel’s procedures for communicating its findings with the public.

A section of the Arctic Ocean seafloor that holds vast stores of frozen methane is showing signs of instability and widespread venting of the powerful greenhouse gas, according to the findings of an international research team led by University of Alaska Fairbanks scientists Natalia Shakhova and Igor Semiletov. The research results, published in the March 5, 2010 edition of the journal Science, show that the permafrost under the East Siberian Arctic Shelf, long thought to be an impermeable barrier sealing in methane, is perforated and is starting to leak large amounts of methane into the atmosphere. Shakhova's research results show that the East Siberian Arctic Shelf is already a significant methane source, releasing 7 teragrams of methane yearly, which is as much as is emitted from the rest of the ocean. A teragram is equal to about 1.1 million tons.

More than 155,000 tonnes of what is sometimes hazardous electronic waste are exported annually from Germany to non-European destinations, a volume which includes some 50,000 tonnes of PC and television monitors alone. The latter often contain metals as well as flame-retardant bromide compounds such as hazardous polybrominated diphenyl ether (PentaBDE). Even defective appliances are often re-classified as “functional”, then usually shipped to Asia and Africa where they are only rarely recycled ecologically. These are the findings of a new study commissioned by the Federal Environment Agency (UBA), which was presented at CEBIT in Hannover on 4 March 2010. n their one-and-a-half-year-long study experts from the Hamburg Institute for Environmental Strategies (Ökopol) compiled the most solid information as yet on the origin and volume of exported devices. The equipment came from flea markets, second hand shops or were retrieved from junk yards. From there it is often transported via collection points for export, usually by sea. Besides harmless metallic raw materials, WEEE also houses a host of hazardous materials which must be recycled properly to avoid harming human health and the environment. An old computer contains more than 100 different materials, and conventional monitors contain lamps which must also be disposed of professionally.

On 2 February 2010 the European Commission adopted two decisions concerning the Genetically Modified Amflora potato: the first authorises the cultivation of Amflora in the EU for industrial use, and the second relates to the use of Amflora's starch by-products as feed. After a comprehensive authorisation procedure, which started in 2003, and repeated favourable scientific opinions, the Commission decided to authorise Amflora. This GM potato is to be used for the production of starch that is suitable for industrial applications (e.g. paper production). The decision provides for strict cultivation conditions to prevent the possibility that GM potatoes will remain in the fields after harvest and to ensure that Amflora's seed will not be inadvertently disseminated into the wider environment. A complementary authorisation is taken in order to cover the by-products of the starch extraction when they are used as feed.

Since 1 March 2010, it constitutes an administrative offence inter alia to place batteries on the market without previously registering their presence on the market. The Batteries Act register has been accessible via the UBA website since 1.12.2009.

About one third of the population has voiced problems concerning aircraft noise, according to a representative survey done by the Federal Environment Agency (UBA). Five million people report severe disturbance. The complaints lodged by the population are justified, as also reflected in a new UBA study by Prof. Greiser titled Risikofaktor nächtlicher Fluglärm [ Risk factor night-time aircraft noise]. As concerns cardiovascular diseases, it has been proven that the risk of disease in persons affected by increasing exposure to aircraft noise is higher than in those not exposed at all. For psychiatric disorders there is one consistent result: the incidence of depressive disorders in females is significantly higher.

Marine species of March 2010 in the International Year of Biodiversity is a free-living marine nematode (Nematoda)

The world’s combined global land and ocean surface temperature made last month the warmest March on record, according to NOAA. Taken separately, average ocean temperatures were the warmest for any March and the global land surface was the fourth warmest for any March on record. Additionally, the planet has seen the fourth warmest January – March period on record.

On 2 March 2010, the European Commission adopted a Green Paper which sets out options for a European Union approach to the protection of forests and to information about forest resources and their condition. Responses to the Green Paper from the public, Member States, EU institutions and other stakeholders will guide the Commission on whether additional action is needed at EU level. The Green Paper 1 sets out the main challenges facing Europe's forests. It presents existing forest information systems and the tools available to protect forests, and raises a series of questions relevant to the development of future policy options. The paper is part of the follow-up to the White Paper 2 on adapting to climate change adopted by the Commission in April 2009. Since competence for forest policy lies primarily with the Member States, the debate should focus on how climate change is modifying forest management and protection in Europe and how EU policy should evolve to enhance its contribution to Member State initiatives.

A census of the world’s largest mountain gorilla population has counted 480 animals, an increase of 100 - more than a quarter - since the last count in 2003. The gorillas surveyed live in Central Africa’s Virunga Massif region, a volcanic mountain ecosystem consisting of three adjacent national parks spanning parts of Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC), Uganda and Rwanda. A fourth park, southwestern Uganda’s Bwindi, is home to an additional 302 mountain gorillas, the only other remaining wild population, which together with four orphaned mountain gorillas in a sanctuary in the DRC brings the wild population to 786. The Virunga census was conducted in March and April 2010 by local authorities with the support of the International Gorilla Conservation Programme (IGCP), a coalition of several conservation organizations, including WWF.

The new Federal Nature Conservation Act and the Federal Water Act will enter into force on 1 March 2010. With this step, a nationwide statutory basis applies which harmonises nature conservation and water legislation at a high level. The previous framework legislation is repealed. Owing to constitutional amendments, these Acts are now the binding basis for action for citizens and the work of the enforcement authorities in the Länder.

Tons of death fish washed up on the shores of a lagoon of an urban area (Lagoa Rodrigo de Freitas) of Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. The official state news service Agencia Brasil said about 100 city employees working full-time cleared nearly 80 tons of fish as of Sunday. There was no immediate estimate of how many died, but several species were involved. Rio's environmental secretary speculates that increased levels of a harmful algae may be the immediate cause of the sudden die-off Friday.

On 26 February 2010 Adventure Ecology founder and environmentalist David de Rothschild unveiled the Plastiki, a pioneering 60ft catamaran made from approximately 12,500 reclaimed plastic bottles and srPET: a fully recyclable material. The Plastiki crew is making final preparations to embark on an adventure taking them 11,000 nautical miles across the Pacific Ocean from San Francisco to Sydney. The Plastiki will be drawing attention to the health of world oceans, and in particular the large amounts of plastic debris, by showcasing waste as a resource and demonstrating real world solutions through the design and construction of the Plastiki.

The Helmholtz Association’s network of Regional Climate Offices has produced a regional climate atlas for Germany showing the possible effects of climate change at the regional level. The climate scenarios for Germany’s federal states are now available to the public for online reference. The Regional Climate Atlas is based on climate calculations resulting from dynamic regional climate calculation models. Climate models used so far include: COSMO-CLM, the regional climate model shared by over 30 international research institutes; REMO, the regional climate model of the Max Planck Institute for Meteorology; and the RCAO regional climate model used by the Swedish weather service. The regional climate models are based on scenarios of varying concentrations of greenhouse gas emissions as calculated by the UN’s IPCC climate panel. In its present form, the Climate Atlas draws on a total of 12 different climate calculations. The spatial resolution of the individual climate calculations currently ranges between 50 and 10 km. Figures for Germany’s federal states are based on calculations for the geographical centre of each state. The Helmholtz Association’s network of four Regional Climate Offices pursues questions of climate change at the regional level. The new Climate Service Center will become the Helmholtz Association’s central service network for national climate issues.

On 25 February 2010 the largest solar-powered boat in the world was unveiled to the press and public in Kiel, Germany. The catamaran-style yacht is nearly 102 feet long, and almost 50 feet wide, has over 5,000 square feet of solar panels covering an arrow shaped deck perched atop two hulls. The goal of this worldwide unique project is to sail around the world in 2011 with a multi hull vessel powered solely by solar energy. The trip will take approximately 140 days at a average speed of 8 knots.

The documentary film Planet Plastic was launched on 25 February 2010 in German cinemas. Werner Boote presents an up-close and personal view of the controversial and fascinating material that has found its way into every facet of our daily lives: plastic. He takes us on a journey around the globe, following plastic through its 100 years of “glorious triumph” and showing us what an unexpected impact plastic has on our world.

Scientists have discovered an area of the North Atlantic Ocean where plastic debris accumulates. The region is said to compare with the well-documented "great Pacific garbage patch". Kara Lavender Law of the Sea Education Association announced the findings of a two-decade-long study at the Ocean Sciences Meeting in Portland, US on 24 February 2010. The work is the conclusion of the longest and most extensive record of plastic marine debris in any ocean basin. Scientists and students from the SEA collected plastic and marine debris in fine mesh nets that were towed behind a research vessel. The researchers carried out 6,100 tows in areas of the Caribbean and the North Atlantic - off the coast of the US. They found a region fairly far north in the Atlantic Ocean where this debris appears to be concentrated and remains over long periods of time. More than 80% of the plastic pieces were found between 22 and 38 degrees north. The maximum "plastic density" was 200,000 pieces of debris per square kilometre.

Diesel fuel and heating oil spilled into the Lambro river near Milan from a storage facility owned by Lombarda Petroli SpA in Monza, Italy. Italian officials said the spill was caused by intentional sabotage at the oil depot.

On 22 February the European Commission proposed that the European Union should press for a ban on international trade in Atlantic bluefin tuna to enter into force within the next year. The Commission is deeply concerned that overfishing of Atlantic bluefin tuna driven largely by international trade is seriously depleting stocks of the species. The proposal will be discussed with Member States in order to reach a common EU position for the next meeting of the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species (CITES), taking place in Doha, Qatar, from 13 to 25 March 2010.

On 21 February 2010, the German premiere of the documentary film "Oceans" took place in Berlin. In the presence of German Environment Minister Norbert Röttgen, director Jacques Perrin and co-author Francois Sarano numerous celebrity guests experienced the impressive film. "Oceans" was created by French director and actor Jacques Perrin and his colleague Jacques Cluzaud. The film allows viewers to get a perspective of the underwater world that had previously been inaccessible. Directors Perrin and Cluzaud spent four years with a team of divers, engineers, and scientists on a voyage of discovery.

There is new evidence that dust storms in the arctic, possibly caused by receding glaciers, may be making deposits in northern Europe and North America, according to Joseph M. Prospero, professor of marine and atmospheric chemistry at the University of Miami Rosenstiel School of Marine & Atmospheric Science, in a February 19 presentation to the American Association for the Advancement of Science. His recent work in Iceland has shown that most of the dust events there are associated with dust emitted from glacial outwash deposits, which may be carried into the northern latitudes and into Europe by synoptic weather events. Satellite data have shown large dust plumes in the arctic, but persistent cloud cover has made finding the origins difficult. The glaciers have been retreating in Iceland for decades, and the trend is expected to continue with the changing climate. Prospero predicts that dust activity from the newly exposed glacial deposits will most likely increase in the future in Iceland and possibly from other glacial terrains in the Arctic.

Mankind’s closest living relatives – the world’s apes, monkeys, lemurs and other primates – are on the brink of extinction and in need of urgent conservation measures according to Primates in Peril: The World’s 25 Most Endangered Primates, 2008–2010. The list includes five primate species from Madagascar, six from Africa, 11 from Asia, and three from Central and South America, all of which are the most in need of urgent conservation action. Almost half (48 percent) of the world’s 634 primate species are classified as threatened with extinction on the IUCN Red List of Threatened Species™. The main threats are habitat destruction, particularly from the burning and clearing of tropical forests (which results in the release of around 16 percent of the global greenhouse gases causing climate change), the hunting of primates for food, and the illegal wildlife trade.

On 17 February 2010 Kenya launched a national largest carnivore conservation and management strategy. The Africa’s first ever such strategies provide a clear roadmap for the conservation of cheetahs, lions, leopards, stripped and spotted hyenas and the African wild dogs. The number of lions in the East African country has dropped to 2,000, from 20,000 about 50 years ago. The cheetah population has plunged to 1,160, compared with 10,000 a half-century ago.

The European Commission has taken a number of decisions to implement the organisational consequences of the allocation of portfolios to Commissioners. Two new Directorates-General have been created: DG Energy (ENER) and DG Climate Action (CLIM). The Energy DG consists of the departments in the former Transport and Energy DG dealing with energy issues and of the Task Force Energy which will be transferred from the External Relations DG. The departments responsible for transport policy will remain in the renamed Mobility and Transport DG (MOVE). The Climate Action DG will be created from the relevant activities in DG Environment, the activities in the External Relations DG related to international negotiations on climate change and the activities in the Enterprise and Industry DG related to climate change.

Ministers and high-level representatives responsible for the water management in the Danube River Basin from Austria, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Bulgaria, Croatia, the Czech Republic, Germany, Hungary, Montenegro, the Republic of Moldova, Romania, Serbia, Slovakia, Slovenia, Ukraine and the European Commission attended a Ministerial Meeting of States Parties to the Danube River Protection Convention, hosted by the ICPDR on 16 February 2010 in Vienna, Austria. The Ministerial Meeting adopted the Danube River Basin Management Plan, which outlines concrete measures to be implemented by the year 2015 to improve the environmental condition of the Danube and its tributaries. The measures include the reduction of organic and nutrient pollution, offsetting environmentally detrimental effects of man-made structural changes to the river, improvements to urban wastewater systems, the introduction of Phosphate-free detergents in all markets and effective risk management of accidental pollution. Further, measures to restore river continuity for fish migration as well as the reconnection of wetlands will be tackled. The plan takes a source-to-sea approach and addresses key requirements of the European Union Water Framework Directive.

On 16 February 2010 US President Barack Obama announced loan guarantees through the Department of Energy to operate two new nuclear reactors at a plant in Burke, Georgia. It will be the first new nuclear power plant in nearly three decades.

The Helsinki Commission (Helcom) has launched together with its partners a new project to curb eutrophication of the Baltic Sea through the promotion of advanced removal of phosphorus from the municipal sewage discharge. This project, named PURE (Project on Urban Reduction of Eutrophication), is part of the strategic HELCOM Baltic Sea Action Plan to radically reduce pollution to the sea and restore the good ecological status of the marine environment by 2021. The plan includes actions to curb eutrophication of the Baltic Sea, caused by excessive inputs of phosphorus and nitrogen loads originating from inadequately cleaned municipal wastewaters and agricultural run-off. PURE will prepare and implement investments that reduce phosphorus loads to the Baltic Sea. The Project targets selected municipalities and their wastewater treatment plants (WWTPs) and supports them in reaching a phosphorus content of 0,5 mg/liter in outgoing wastewaters. Altogether PURE aims at annual reduction of at least 300-500 tonnes of phosphorus from the Baltic Sea via investments in Riga, Jurmala and Brest water utilities. PURE is co-financed by the European Union. The Project has been approved for financing by the Baltic Sea Region Programme (BSRP) 2007-2013 and its total budget amounts to around EUR 3.2 million, with approximately EUR 2.0 million to be allocated as co-financing from the European Regional Development Fund and European Neighbourhood and Partnership Instrument. The Project will last for 42 months, including 36 months of implementation period (2010-2013).

A massive iceberg has just calved from the Mertz Glacier Tongue in East Antarctica. This calving event was detected by a joint French-Australian team working on a project called “CRACICE” (Cooperative Research into Antarctic Calving and Iceberg Evolution). The iceberg has an area of about 2550 square kilometers, an overall length of 78 kilometers, width of 33 to 39 km, and represents about half the length of the glacier tongue. Satellite imagery shows the iceberg separation occurred on 12 / 13 of February 2010.

The iceberg B15-K (fragment of the Ross Ice Shelf) collided with the Ekstrom Ice Shelf in Atka Bay on the 11th February 2010, at 16:42 Universal Time. The iceberg, which is 54 kilometres long, five kilometres wide and 200 metres thick hit the ice shelf in the vicinity of Neumayer Station III of the Alfred Wegener Institute for Polar and Marine Research in the Helmholtz Association. The event has called both logistic experts and scientist on the scene. High-resolution images of the German TerraSAR-X satellite depict the moment of collision between the approximately 400 million-ton B15-K iceberg and the Ekström Ice Shelf. Together with the on site observations by scientists and technicians, they enable the precise analyses of the newly created fissures in the ice shelf. The loud underwater sounds created by the impact and the response of seals and whales was recorded by the acoustic observatory PALAOA. Additional records were obtained from the seismometers of the geophysical observatory at Neumayer Station III. Together, the data are used to reconstruct an overall picture of the processes: The impact of multiple collisions, within 9 hours, dislodged a 300-meter wide and 700-meter long chunk of ice from ice shelf. The energy of each impact was equivalent to that released by between about five to ten tons of explosives. A unique interdisciplinary compilation of data obtained from remote sensing, geophysics, meteorology, oceanography and ocean acoustics now provides new insights into the mechanics of the ice and crack propagation in the ice shelf.

On 8 February 2010 scientists at the Centre of Scientific Diving of the Biological Institute Helgoland start a project that is unique thus far for the North Sea: “MarGate”, an innovative underwater experimental field. In future, scientists want to acquire marine biology data with a high resolution in terms of time and space there by means of state-of-the-art sensor technologies. These data will then be available online via the Internet. For instance, climatically and anthropogenically induced changes in the hydrography and ecology of the North Sea will be examined in order to gain a better understanding of and be able to model the mechanisms of changes in the ecosystem due to climate change.

On 6 February 2010, while the Finnish-owned vessel Linda was travelling from Rotterdam (Netherlands) to St Petersburg (Russia), three freight containers were lost at sea south of the island of Gotland (Sweden). According to the ship's cargo declaration, one of the containers has dangerous chemicals, as classified by the International Maritime Organisation (IMO)

Germany met its climate protection target under the Kyoto Protocol in 2008. In 2008 greenhouse gas emissions were 22.2 percent lower than in 1990. This corresponds to a reduction of almost 280 million tonnes of greenhouse gases. This detailed data for the year 2008 is included in the National Inventory Report 2010 compiled by the Federal Environment Agency (UBA), which has just been published jointly by the Federal Environment Ministry and UBA. The greatest success in reducing greenhouse gas emissions was achieved in the energy sector. Here the expansion of renewables has had a positive impact. The amount of CO2 released into the atmosphere from energy production was just under 20 million tonnes lower in 2008 than in the previous year. Compared with 1990, the reduction even amounted to 66 million tonnes of CO2. The increase of emissions of private households, as shown in the Inventory, is a statistical effect and can be put down to a decline in fuel oil sales due to the VAT rise in 2007 (pull-forward effect into 2006). Emissions in the other sectors were very close to 2007 levels. The economic crisis, which began in 2008, only had a very limited impact on emissions, but its influence will be much more pronounced in the 2009 statistics.

Marine species of February 2010 in the International Year of Biodiversity is the Sargassum muticum.

On 29 January 2010 Germany submitted the nomination of the outstanding German beech forests for inclusion into the UNESCO World Heritage List. For this ambitious endeavour a comprehensive nomination dossier was elaborated by the Federal Ministry for the Environment, Nature Conservation and Nuclear Safety and the Länder Brandenburg, Hesse, Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania and Thuringia. Expert support came from Federal Agency for Nature Conservation (BfN). Germany's "old beech forests" are to supplement the existing world heritage site "Primeval Beech Forests of the Carpathian in Slovakia and Ukraine". A decision from UNESCO is expected for the summer of 2011. Selected areas in five protected areas in Germany have been proposed for nomination: Jasmund National Park, Serrahn in the Müritz National Park, Grumsin in the Schorfheide-Chorin UNESCO Biosphere Reserve, Hainich National Park and Kellerwald-Edersee National Park. They represent valuable relics of Germany's large-scale semi-natural beech forests and thus supplement in an ideal manner the UNESCO world heritage site Primeval Beech Forests of the Carpathian listed in 2007.

On 29 January the European Union formalised its support for the Copenhagen Accord on climate change and presented its commitments for emission reduction targets. In a joint letter with the Spanish Presidency of the Council, the European Commission has formally notified the EU's willingness to be associated with the Accord and submitted for information the EU's established greenhouse gas emissions reduction targets for 2020. These consist of a unilateral commitment to reduce the EU's overall emissions by 20% of 1990 levels and a conditional offer to increase this cut to 30% provided that other major emitters agree to take on their fair share of a global reduction effort. Under the Accord, notifications are to be submitted by 31 January 2010.

Since 2000, one scientific discipline has chosen to be the topic of a Year of Science. The BMBF together with research organisations and industry has founded Science in Dialog to establish the process of "Public Understanding of Science and Humanities. The eleventh Science Year in 2010 is the Year of the Future of Energy.

Tiger numbers have fallen by more than 70 percent in slightly more than a decade in the Greater Mekong, with the region’s five countries containing only 350 tigers, according to a new World Wildlife Fund (WWF) report released on 25 January 2010.