Alpine lakes reflect climate change

Space Daily via SPX: Increases in temperature as a result of climate change are mirrored in lake waters where temperatures are also on the rise. A new study, by Dr. Martin Dokulil, retired researcher from the Institute for Limnology at the University of Innsbruck in Austria, forecasts surface water temperatures in large Austrian lakes for 2050 and discusses the impact on the lakes' structure, function and water quality. The research is published online in Springer's journal Hydrobiologia.

Austria has a multitude of lakes varying widely in type, size, flushing, altitude and geographic location. Most of these lakes are important ecosystems and are sensitive to environmental changes.

Surface water temperature is directly affected by climate change and is an essential aspect for recreation on the lakes by tourists, particularly during the summer season.

Dokulil analyzed long-term data records for air temperature and surface water temperatures dating back to the mid-1960s from the Austrian Hydrological Yearbooks. The nine large lakes studied, in or bordering Austria, were situated in different climatic zones. From these data, Dokulil was able to project temperature trends for the lakes' surface waters and predict temperatures for 2050....

The Gufelsee in the Austrian Alps, shot by Jensibua, Wikimedia Commons, under the Creative Commons CC0 1.0 Universal Public Domain Dedication

Egypt says ‘all options are open’ in dealing with Ethiopian dam

Al-Arabiya: “All options are open” in dealing with an Ethiopian dam seen by Egypt as a threat to its historic rights to Nile waters, an adviser to Egyptian President Mohammad Mursi warned on Wednesday.

“It is Egypt’s right to defend its interests, and other people have a right to follow their own interests. But there must be assurances the Ethiopian dam will not affect Egypt, otherwise all options are open,” Ayman Ali said, according to Egypt’s media. Pakinam el-Sharkawy, another presidential adviser, told the official MENA news agency that Egypt would demand that Ethiopia cease the construction of the dam, AFP reported.

The presidency considers the dam as a “national security” issue for Egypt, Sharkawy added. “Demanding of Ethiopia to stop construction of the dam it intends to build on the Blue Nile will be our first step,” she said, according to MENA.

During a meeting on Tuesday with President Mursi several politicians proposed plans to carry out covert attacks against Ethiopia, with some suggesting the bombardment of the Renaissance Dam. The politicians made their suggestions not knowing that their meeting with the president was being aired live on television.

Egypt believes more studies are needed on the dam’s impact on its water supply which is almost entirely dependent on the Nile, although far more on the flow down the White Nile from the Great Lakes of East Africa, than that down the Blue Nile from the Ethiopian highlands....

USGS provided this satellite image of the Blue Nile in Sudan

Andrea speeding up southern East Coast

CBS News: After bringing rains, heavy winds and even tornadoes to parts of Florida, Tropical Storm Andrea moved quickly across south Georgia and was speeding through the Carolinas on Friday morning, promising sloppy commutes and waterlogged vacation getaways through the beginning of the weekend.

The first named storm of the Atlantic season lost some intensity after making landfall Thursday in Florida's Big Bend and its winds were down to 45 mph Friday. Ben Nelson, a meteorologist with the National Weather Service in Jacksonville, Fla., said Andrea was "moving at a pretty brisk pace" and could lose its tropical characteristics Friday.

During the morning rush hour in Charleston, S.C., there was little evidence the center of the storm was passing to the northwest beyond a few downed tree branches, gusty winds and some puddles in the street. The sun occasionally peeked through.

Derrec Becker with the South Carolina Emergency Management Division said the storm was moving northeast at nearly 30 mph. Across the state, he said, Andrea has brought nothing more than a severe thunderstorm. No injuries were reported and there had been no reports of significant damage.

The storm was expected to move into North Carolina by midday. The National Weather Service issued flood watches across much of both states, was well as tornado and flash flood watches in several counties. Thousands of power outages were also reported....

Hurricane Andrea's track as of June 4, image by Supportstorm

Small island states told to build wider ocean expertise

Yojana Sharma in SciDev.net: With rising concern about ocean degradation and the sustainable use of ocean resources, small island states must build scientific expertise that goes beyond their national needs and that benefits the oceans generally, a meeting of UN scientific experts has heard.

Small island developing states (SIDS) are the "custodians" of vast ocean spaces that are important for global food security, biodiversity, natural resources and carbon sequestration, and broader sustainable ocean policies will in turn enhance their own economic development, say experts.

Developing such policies will require a new approach to ocean resources that goes beyond the current focus on coastal development and fisheries in individual countries, and will require a significantly higher marine science capacity, the meeting, held last month (14-17 May) in New York, United States, heard.

"Most [small island] states have a territorial focus. More value must be put on the oceans around them," Patrick McConney a senior lecturer in marine resource management planning at the University of the West Indies, tells SciDev.Net. The meeting noted a lack of ocean experts in SIDS, meaning there was insufficient expertise to strengthen their ocean policies.

Venugopalan Ittekkot, former director of the Leibniz Centre for Tropical Marine Ecology in Bremen, Germany, says: "There are still very few SIDS with a national ocean policy, and they need scientific advice to develop that".

Ittekkot carried out a survey on small island states' marine science capacity and marine technology transfer for UN scientific body the Intergovernmental Oceanographic Commission (IOC), which was presented at the New York meeting.  According to Ittekkot, most ocean-related programmes are focused on climate change impacts, but there is also a need for monitoring, mapping and management of ocean and coastal space....

Clipperton Island in the Pacific, image from NOAA

African countries need robust climate change policies

Government of Ghana website: There is the need for African countries to formulate and implement robust policies, to mainstream climate change adaptation and mitigation into national and sub-national development plans.

Dr Lamoudia Thiombiano, Country Representative, Food and Agricultural Organisation (FAO) of the United Nations, who made the call, also said there was the need for these countries to increase public and private investments in agriculture and rural transformation. He was speaking at the ongoing 2nd Climate Change and Population Conference being hosted by the Regional Institute of Population Studies (RIPS), University of Ghana, Accra.

Dr Thiombiano asked African countries to develop database with modeling and early warning and monitoring systems and called on the academia to play major role in helping to identify, promote and disseminate relevant agricultural technologies with ecosystem approaches.

He also called for increased collaboration between development partners, donors and research institutions, adding that these actions would help to address climate change issues that had become so real in most parts of the world, including Africa.

...Dr Thiombiano said the Sahel, the Mediterranean, Southern Africa and parts of Southern Asia were becoming drier, which called for ecosystem approach to capture the synergies and manage the trade-offs among food security, sustainable development, environmental sustainability and climate change....

Climate Justice: Easing the unjust cause and effect of global warming

Catherine Dominguez in Eco Seed:  Climate change is a phenomenon that most people may not take seriously, but it is a significant peril to the global sustainable development and the fight against poverty.

Science suggests that global warming is caused by human activities, particularly the industrialization of the world’s richest countries. Major impacts are being observed and felt over the past years, and it is the poor countries that suffer most from these impacts, aggravating their precarious situations.

“The people that are most responsible for carbon emissions, those in developed and wealthiest countries are not the ones paying for the most brutal price. The people of Mindanao, the people of Africa, the people of Latin America, who are least responsible for carbon emissions are paying for the price of climate change,” said Kumi Naidoo, Greenpeace International Executive Director, during the launch of the photo exhibit entitled Climate Change: Challenges and Solutions in Southeast Asia, last Monday in Manila.

According to the United Nations, it is a global justice concern that those who suffer most from climate change have done the least to cause it.

Given that the historical responsibility for the majority of greenhouse gas emissions lies with the developed nations like the United States and the European countries, they are compelled to take action and to do so more quickly to mitigate their large contribution to the problem of climate change and to move toward a low carbon economy....

"Inequality" image by Frachet, Wikimedia Commons,  under the Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 3.0 Unported license

Higher ed must lead climate change adaptations

PhysOrg: Higher Education institutions play a key role and must be leaders in preparing society to adapt to the needs of a changing climate, according to a new report evaluating education, research, campus sustainability and public outreach.

It boils down to leading by example in working to mitigate the challenges posed to society by a changing climate and creating opportunities in new and more sustainable technologies, said the University of Arizona's Jonathan Overpeck, a member of the national committee that produced the report and one of world's leading experts on climate change and policy.

"So often our society is reactive; we're trying to make it as proactive as we can and position our state and country in the lead in what will become a much bigger driver the world's economy, meeting the climate change challenge," said Overpeck, co-director of the Institute of the Environment and a professor of geosciences and atmospheric sciences.

Published by the American College and University Presidents' Climate Commitment, the report calls on higher education institutions to create campuses that are safe and secure in the face of change, more actively engaged in solving real-world problems and reorganized to better provide the education and research needed to create and maintain a sustainable society.

The UA is cited in the report for its "varied and extensive research in adaptation to climate change," with specifics projects including "developing adaptation-planning frameworks, understanding consumer choices and their collective impact on the adaptive capacities of communities, and conducting experiments on the resilience of forest and rangeland ecosystems to climate changes to help inform adaptive management of natural resources."...

The Wellesley College campus, shot by Jared and Corin, Wikimedia Commons via Flickr,  under the Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 2.0 Generic license

NASA satellites watch the demise of Hurricane Barbara

NASA: NOAA's GOES-14 satellite captured Hurricane Barbara’s landfall in southwestern Mexico and movement across land, northward toward the Gulf of Mexico.

...Hurricane Barbara recently made landfall along the southern Pacific coast of Mexico and NASA’s TRMM and Suomi NPP satellites captured rainfall rates within the storm, and a night-time image of landfall. NOAA’s GOES satellites provided images that were made into an animation showing the landfall and movement across Mexico into the Bay of Campeche on May 31.

According to the National Hurricane Center (NHC), the center of Hurricane Barbara came ashore around 19:50 UTC (12:50 p.m. PDT) on Wednesday, May 29 about 35 km (~20 miles) west of Tonala, Mexico. At landfall, Barbara was a minimal Category 1 hurricane with maximum sustained winds of 75 mph.

The Visible Infrared Imaging Radiometer Suite (VIIRS) instrument aboard the NASA-NOAA Suomi NPP satellite captured a nighttime image of Hurricane Barbara before it made landfall in southwestern Mexico. The image was taken on May 29 at 08:22 UTC (4:22 a.m. EDT). In the image city lights from Mexico City and Coatzacoalcos were seen to the north and east of Barbara’s center....

Hurricane Barbara on May 29, 2013

Climate and land use: Europe's floods raise questions

Seed Daily via AFP: Less than three months after being battered by snow and ice, central Europe now finds itself fighting floods -- and some scientists are pointing the finger at human interference with the climate system. Leading the charge is the Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research (PIK) near Berlin, which says a low-pressure system that dumped the rain was locked into place by a disturbance with a global wind pattern.

"We think it is linked to the current drought conditions in Russia as well," Stefan Rahmstorf, PIK's professor of ocean physics, told AFP. Normally, air moves around the mid-latitudes of the planet in the form of waves, oscillating irregularly between the tropics and the poles, Rahmstorf explained.

The main force behind this movement is the big temperature gap between the frigid Arctic and the warmer southerly latitudes. Like a pump, this differential helps to force air northward or southward. The problem, though, is that the Arctic is steadily warming -- last year, its summer sea ice hit its lowest extent on record -- so the temperature difference is declining.

As a result, according to the theory, the wave movement diminishes. At a certain point, pressure systems stay locked in place, causing a weather pattern that persists wretchedly. "This planetary wave resonance is not a local effect but spread around the whole (northern) hemisphere," said Rahmstorf in an email exchange....

June 4, 2013 in Germany on the Elster, shot by Dirk Bindmann, Wikimedia Commons, under the Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 3.0 Unported license

Rainforests can take the heat

Smithsonian Tropical Research Institute: South American rainforests thrived during three extreme global warming events in the past, say paleontologists at the Smithsonian Tropical Research Institute. No tropical forest in South America currently experiences average yearly temperatures of more than 84 degrees Fahrenheit (29°C). But by the end of this century, average global temperatures are likely to rise by another 1-7 (0.6-4°C) degrees, leading some scientists to predict the demise of the world’s most diverse terrestrial ecosystem.

Carlos Jaramillo, staff scientist, and Andrés Cárdenas, post-doctoral fellow, at the Smithsonian in Panama reviewed almost 6,000 published measurements of ancient temperatures to provide a deep-time perspective for the debate.

"To take the temperature of the past we rely on indirect evidence like oxygen isotope ratios in the fossil shells of marine organisms or from bacteria biomarkers," said Jaramillo.

When intense volcanic activity produced huge quantities of carbon dioxide 120 million years ago in the mid-Cretaceous period, yearly temperatures in the South American tropics rose 9-12 degrees (5-7°C). During the Paleocene-Eocene thermal maximum, 55 million years ago, tropical temperatures rose by 5-9 degrees (3-5°C) in less than 10,000 years. About 53 million years ago, temperatures soared again.

According to the fossil record, rainforests prospered under these hothouse conditions. Diversity increased. Because larger areas of forest generally sustain higher diversity than smaller areas do, higher diversity during warming events could be explained by the expansion of tropical forests into temperate areas. "But to our surprise, rainforests never extended much beyond the modern tropical belt, so something other than temperature must have determined where they were growing," said Jaramillo.

Their report, published in the Annual Review of Earth and Planetary Science, also refers to Smithsonian plant physiologist Klaus Winter’s finding that leaves of some tropical trees tolerate short-term exposure to temperatures up to 122-127 degrees (50-53°C). When carbon dioxide concentrations double, trees use much less water: further evidence that tropical forests may prove resilient to climate change.

Giant tree in Brazil's tropical forest, 1830, by Johann Moritz Rugendas

Food management critical in Guyana's climate change fight

The Guyana Times: The importance of managing food in the fight against global warming was reinforced by national and international diplomats during the Environmental Community Health Organisation’s (ECHO) first National Environmental Youth Convention on Wednesday, which was held to mark World Environment Day.

Schoolchildren marvel at “trees” and a “house“ made of recycled bottles at the World Environment Day observance, organised by the Natural Resources and Environment Ministry

In keeping with the theme “Think. Eat. Save.”, U.S. Ambassador D Brent Hardt, while addressing primary and secondary school students at the Guyana International Convention Centre (GICC), said the close link between food security and climate change cannot go unnoticed.

The evidence of global warming is glaring, the U.S. ambassador said, pointing to an increase in floods, forest fires, hurricanes and other natural disasters. This global phenomena, he said, can be attributed to the increase in land, water and air pollutions.

He said due to lack of effective food management, approximately 1.3 billion tons of food are disposed of annually. “Every year, 1.3 billion tonnes of food are wasted… and one third of everything that is grown in the world is lost or wasted. This is just a huge drain on natural resources.”

Ambassador Hardt explained that during the production and distribution of food across the world, significant amounts of financial and natural resources are utilised to generate food. In the process, 70 per cent of the world’s fresh water is used while deforestation occurs to facilitate food production, although it contributes to global warming....

Stabroek Market in Georgetown, Guyana, shot by Loriski, Wikimedia Commons, under the Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 3.0 Unported license

Climate change evident across Europe, confirming urgent need for adaptation

European Environment Agency: Climate change is affecting all regions in Europe, causing a wide range of impacts on society and the environment. Further impacts are expected in the future, potentially causing high damage costs, according to the latest assessment published by the European Environment Agency today.

The report, ‘Climate change, impacts and vulnerability in Europe 2012’ finds that higher average temperatures have been observed across Europe as well as decreasing precipitation in southern regions and increasing precipitation in northern Europe. The Greenland ice sheet, Arctic sea ice and many glaciers across Europe are melting, snow cover has decreased and most permafrost soils have warmed.

Extreme weather events such as heat waves, floods and droughts have caused rising damage costs across Europe in recent years.  While more evidence is needed to discern the part played by climate change in this trend, growing human activity in hazard-prone areas has been a key factor. Future climate change is expected to add to this vulnerability, as extreme weather events are expected to become more intense and frequent. If European societies do not adapt, damage costs are expected to continue to rise, according to the report.

Some regions will be less able to adapt to climate change than others, in part due to economic disparities across Europe, the report says. The effects of climate change could deepen these inequalities.

Jacqueline McGlade, EEA Executive Director said: “Climate change is a reality around the world, and the extent and speed of change is becoming ever more evident. This means that every part of the economy, including households, needs to adapt as well as reduce emissions.”...

The Ochsenthaler glacier in Switzerland, shot by Vince51, Wikimedia Commons, under the Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 Unported license

China's mega water diversion project begins testing

Jennifer Duggan in the China's Choice blog at the Guardian (UK): When it is completed, it will be one of the world's biggest feats of engineering. China's South-North Water Diversion Project, initially a vision of Mao's, will take water from the south of the country to the arid northern region, including the capital Beijing, which suffers from water shortages.

The ambitious project has been under construction since 2002 and it is expected to take almost 50 years for all sections to be complete. It aims to pump almost 45 billion cubic metres of water a year to the north, equivalent to the water flow in the Yellow River in northern China. The water will be pumped from the Yangtze river and its basin.

Testing started last week on the first phase of the eastern part of the project and according to the state-controlled newspaper China Daily, this part of the project will start operation later this year. This phase will transfer water from Jiangdu in Jiangsu Province which is located on the Yangtze River to Shandong Province along the Beijing-Hangzhou Grand Canal.

It is also planned that there will be a middle route and a western route. The middle route is expected to begin operating next year and will supply water from Hubei province to cities in the north including Beijing and Tianjin. The western route, which is supposed to use water diverted from the upper reaches of the Yangtze to replenish the Yellow River, has been besieged with problems and is still at planning stages.

....Water shortages have become a huge problem for the world's second largest economy. China has 20% of the world's population but only an estimated 7% of its freshwater water reserves. Experts project that China's water supply will not be able to meet with demand by 2030 if it continues with water use at current levels. Some parts of China are comparable to the Middle East in terms of water resources and water scarcity could have a massive impact on the economy as these regions also contribute up to 45% of China's Gross Domestic Product....

The Yellow River at Lanzhou, shot by Colegota (maybe--attribution unclear), Wikimedia Commons,  under the Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 2.5 Spain license

Investigators link poultry contamination on farm and at processing plant

Seed Daily via SPX: Researchers at the University of Georgia, Athens, have identified a strong link between the prevalence and load of certain food-borne pathogens on poultry farms, and later downstream at the processing plant. They report their findings in a manuscript published ahead of print in the journal Applied and Environmental Microbiology.

"This study suggests that reducing foodborne pathogen loads on broiler chicken farms would help to reduce pathogen loads at processing, and may ultimately help to reduce the risk of foodborne illness," says Roy Berghaus, an author on the study.

"This is important because most of our efforts towards reducing foodborne pathogens are currently focused on what happens during processing. Processing interventions are effective but they can only do so much."

Salmonella and Campylobacter bacteria cause an estimated 1.9 million food-borne illnesses in the US annually, and poultry is a major source of both. Earlier studies have linked pathogen prevalence on the farm and at processing, but none has measured the strength of the associations between pathogen loads, according to the report.

In the current study, Salmonella and Campylobacter detected at the processing plant were found in farm samples 96 and 71 percent of the time, respectively....

Cultures of salmonella and e. coli, shot by Cyb-cd, Wikimedia Commons, under the Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 3.0 Unported license

Tiny airplanes and subs from University of Florida laboratory could be next hurricane hunters

University of Florida News: Kamran Mohseni envisions a day when the unmanned vehicles in his laboratory at the University of Florida will swarm over, under and through hurricanes to help predict the strength and path of the storms.

The tiny, autonomous craft — some fly, others dart under the waves — can spy on hurricanes at close range without getting blown willy-nilly, while sensors onboard collect and send in real time the data scientists need to predict the intensity and trajectory of storms: pressure, temperature, humidity, location and time.

Mohseni said people always ask him how the miniature flying machines — just 6 inches long and about the weight of an iPod Nano — can take on one of the monster storms.  “Our vehicles don’t fight the hurricane; we use the hurricane to take us places,” said Mohseni, the W.P. Bushnell Endowed Professor in the department of mechanical and aerospace engineering and the department of electrical and computer engineering.

The aerial and underwater vehicles can be launched with commands from a laptop hundreds of miles from the eye of a hurricane. Mohseni and a team of graduate students use mathematical models to predict regions in the atmosphere and ocean that can give the vehicles a free ride toward their destination. Once in the vicinity, they can be powered off to wait for a particular current of wind or water. When they detect the current they need for navigation, they power back on, slip into the current, then power off again to conserve fuel as the current carries them to a target location. In essence, they can go for a fact-gathering ride on hurricane winds and waters.

The devices are a departure from current technology, which uses hurricane reconnaissance aircraft to punch through a storm’s eye wall and release dropsondes, sensors that free-fall and might or might not collect helpful data. Underwater data are even more difficult to collect today, although just as important, considering that the warm, moist air on the ocean surface provides fuel for hurricanes....

Autonomous flying drones like this one are the result of research by Kamran Mohseni and graduate researchers with the Institute for Networked Autonomous Systems in the department of mechanical and aerospace engineering at the University of Florida. Photo taken May 30, 2013. Photo by Eric Zamora, University of Florida

Human deforestation outweighs climate change for coral reefs

University of Western Australia: Better land use is the key to preventing further damage to the world's coral reefs, according to a study published this week in the online science journal Nature Communications. The study, by an international team including a researcher from The University of Western Australia's Oceans Institute, has important implications for Australia's Great Barrier Reef.

The study authors write that preventing soil erosion and sediment pollution arising from human activities such as deforestation are crucial to reef survival.

The study - ‘Human deforestation outweighs future climate change impacts of sedimentation on coral reefs' - looked at the effects of future climate change on the hydroclimate of Madagascar's reefs and different deforestation scenarios.

"The findings are very relevant for Australia since intense land use and past deforestation have transformed the river catchments tremendously and are seen as a major threat to coral reefs in the Great Barrier Reef and elsewhere," said Dr Jens Zinke, of UWA's Oceans Institute.

"Managing hinterland land use is the major action needed to buy time for corals growing near rivers." Dr Zinke said the study looked at four watersheds near coral reef ecosystems in Madagascar, which has different climate zones that mimic most of the world's coral reef climate and a range of different land uses...

In the Great Barrier Reef, shot by Steve Evans, Wikimedia Commons via Flickr,  under the Creative Commons Attribution 2.0 Generic license

Coping with climate change in Vietnam

VietnamNetBridge: Eighty local and foreign experts in global-warming adaptation are in Can Tho for a regional symposium that involves government partners, non-government organisations (NGOs), donor agencies and corporate partners. Experts at the three-day event are discussing innovative climate-change mitigation models that have been successfully implemented in Southeast Asia.

The goals of the symposium include creating a dialogue between partners in the ASEAN community and designing effective community-based climate-change adaptation models. Two to three possible adaptation measures will be taken back to each partner office to share with the local community in Can Tho. The community partners will then help design the preferred adaptation models.

Based upon the local context in Laos and Viet Nam, the symposium will place a specific focus on climate-change mitigation in agriculture and natural-resource management at the community level.

A low-lying, densely populated area, the Mekong Delta is the heart of rice production in Viet Nam and is one of the world's most vulnerable regions to climate change. "Our side of the project will be based in Can Tho, where 84 per cent of its area is used for agriculture, with more than 90 per cent of it for rice production," said Nguyen Minh The, deputy director of Can Tho's Department of Natural Resources and Environment.

"The average alleviation of the province lies between 0.6 and 0.8 metres above sea level and it is particularly susceptible to river and seawater intrusion," he added. Experts predicted that a possible 30-cm rise in sea levels could destroy the city's rice crops, he added....

Near Can Tho, shot by Bùi Thụy Đào Nguyên, Wikimedia Commons, under the Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 3.0 Unported license

Could climate bonds become a major force in green finance?

Environmental Leader: So-called “green” or “climate” bonds, being issued by a number of financial institutions and state governments as a means of generating funding for sustainable development and clean energy technology, are becoming increasingly popular and could become a major new force in the green investment world, according to the Globe-Net.

The World Bank developed the Green Bond concept in 2007/2008 and simplicity is key to its popularity, according to Globe-Net blog post. The World Bank’s green bonds are triple-A rated and can be traded as easily as other “vanilla” investments, offering investors a high rate of liquidity.

More than $3.3 billion worth of the bonds have been issued by the Word Bank since their creation. Over the past 18 months the  market for these types of investments has doubled, from $5 billion to $9.5 billion, Globe-Net says.

Last month International Finance Corp issued $1 billion of green bonds that will finance climate-friendly projects in the developing world. The bond offering was oversubscribed and was, according to Globe, ”quickly snapped up.” IFC now plans to issue at least $1 billion in green bonds per year, Globe-Net reports.

Last month the European Investment Bank set prices for its first Climate Awareness Bond transaction for 2013 targeted to fixed income investors to support EIB lending for renewable energy and energy efficiency. The state of Massachusetts plans to issue $1.1 billion of binds similar to those issued by the World Bank next month, Globe-Net says.

Such is the growth in interest of such bonds that Globe-Net cites speculation that socially responsible investing could grow from the niche investment technique that it has been for the past few years into a complex array of investments with different risk and reward profiles suited to a much broader set of investors....

Mosquitoes reared in cooler temperatures more susceptible to viruses that can affect human health

EurekAlert via Virginia Tech: Urban epidemics resulting from viral diseases, such as West Nile fever and chikungunya fever, are transmitted by infected mosquitoes. According to Virginia Tech scientists, mosquitoes reared in cooler temperatures have weaker immune systems, making them more susceptible to dangerous viruses and more likely to transmit them to people.

The connection between temperature and the mosquito's immune system, published Friday (May 31, 2013) in PLOS Neglected Tropical Diseases, is significant in light of global climate change, said researchers Kevin Myles and Zach Adelman, associate professors of entomology in the College of Agriculture and Life Sciences, and affiliates of the Fralin Life Science Institute.

"Our data offers a plausible hypothesis for how changes in weather influence the transmission of these diseases and will likely continue to do so in the future," Myles said.

A variety of weather anomalies may occur with global changes in climate. However, predicting what these weather anomalies will be is difficult due to the enormous complexity involved. Nevertheless, the work of Myles and Adelman suggest that it would be unwise to focus solely on warmer temperatures when considering links between climate change and disease transmission.

"Mosquitoes like to breed and lay their eggs in dark, cool places because that means the water will last longer," Adelman said. "They don't lay their eggs in sunny spots because that will dry the water out in a day or two. Although this has been known of some time, we are just learning about its potential affects on the mosquito immune response. Hopefully, this information can be used to build better models that more correctly predict when we'll have disease transmission."

Current computational outbreak models consider such things as meteorological variables and human population indexes but have failed to consider the effect of temperature on mosquito immunity, he added. Specifically, Adelman and Myles found that the mosquito's RNA interference pathway is impaired when reared at cooler temperatures.

The rate of transmission of both diseases has increased with outbreaks occurring in unexpected places, such as the introductions of West Nile virus to New York in 1999, and chikungunya virus to Italy and France in 2007 and 2010....

This image shows green fluorescent protein in the eyes of the mosquito Aedes aegypti when immunocompromised by cooler temperatures (left) compared with an immunocompetent sibling (right). Image from Virginia Tech

UNESCO urged to explore guidelines on 'nano-ethics'

David Dickson in SciDev.net: The UN Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) has been urged to set up an expert group to seek a consensus of both developed and developing countries on how to tackle the ethical aspects of nanotechnology.

The proposal was made by speakers at a workshop in Bratislava, Slovakia, last week (27–29 May) organised by the Slovakian National Commission for UNESCO and the World Commission on the Ethics of Science and Technology (COMEST).

"All countries in the world will become involved in nanotechnology over the next ten or 20 years, and it is important to establish collaboration between North and South in developing an ethical roadmap on how the issues raised by this technology should be handled," said Ali Beitollahi, director of international relations for the Iran Nanotechnology Initiative Council (INIC).

The Bratislava meeting heard that the potential applications of nanotechnology — particularly in water treatment but also in fields such as health, agriculture and energy — could transform prospects for developing countries in ways similar to the wide-scale adoption of mobile phones.

"Nanoscience and nanotechnology are giving us new ways of thinking about development, and can play an important role in helping developing countries move towards sustainability," said COMEST member Abdoulaye Sene, an environmental sociologist at Senegal's Cheikh Anta Diop University....

A nano-whatsis, shot by Aydin4ik, Wikimedia Commons, under the Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 3.0 Unported license

Addis Ababa says Egypt shouldn't worry about Nile dam

AllAfrica.com via Voice of America: Ethiopia says there is no reason for Egypt to worry about the massive hydroelectric dam it is building on the Blue Nile, one of the two main tributaries of the Nile River. Ethiopia began diverting the Blue Nile last week as it moves ahead with construction of the dam, despite concerns from Egypt and Sudan.

Ethiopia's Water Minister Alemayehu Tegenu says construction of the Grand Ethiopian Renaissance Dam poses no threat to Egypt or Sudan, two countries that depend heavily on the Nile for their water supply. "We do not have any plan to harm downstream countries, Sudan and Egypt. If Egypt has some issues to discuss with Ethiopia, we are very ready to discuss," said Alemayehu Tegenu.

There are fears the dam could spark regional tension. Ethiopia's move to divert the Blue Nile sparked protests last week at the Ethiopian embassy in Cairo. Some Egyptians have asked to bring the matter to the International Court of Justice for arbitration. Both countries must accept arbitration before it can take place, but Alemayehu says Ethiopia will not accept such intervention.

"No, there is no point of going to an international court. I do not see any issues that bring the issue to that level," he said.

A committee with experts from Sudan, Egypt and Ethiopia worked on a report for more than a year to study the possible impacts of the dam, including reduced river flow. The report, released to governments on Friday night, concluded that construction of the dam is meeting international standards, but that further assessments are needed on environmental and social issues....

A falls on the Blue Nile, shot by Peter Jeschofnig, Wikimedia Commons, under the Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 3.0 Unported license

Improving 'crop per drop' could boost food and water security

Seed Daily via SPX: Improvements in crop water productivity - the amount of food produced per unit of water consumed - have the potential to improve both food security and water sustainability in many parts of the world, according to a study published online in Environmental Research Letters May 29 by scientists with the University of Minnesota's Institute on the Environment (IonE) and the Institute of Crop Science and Resource Conservation (INRES) at the University of Bonn, Germany.

Led by IonE postdoctoral research scholar Kate A. Brauman, the research team analyzed crop production, water use and crop water productivity by climatic zone for 16 staple food crops: wheat, maize, rice, barley, rye, millet, sorghum, soybean, sunflower, potato, cassava, sugarcane, sugar beet, oil palm, rapeseed (canola) and groundnut (peanut).

Together these crops constitute 56 percent of global crop production by tonnage, 65 percent of crop water consumption, and 68 percent of all cropland by area. The study is the first of its kind to look at water productivity for this many crops at a global scale.

The wide range of variation in crop water productivity in places that have similar climates means that there are lots of opportunities for improving the trade-off between food and water.

And the implications of doing so are substantial: The researchers calculated that in drier regions, bringing up the very lowest performers to just the 20th percentile could increase annual production on rain-fed cropland enough to provide food for an estimated 110 million people without increasing water use or using additional cropland....

An aerial shot of a sprinkler irrigating a field, shot by Martina Nolte, Wikimedia Commons, under the Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 3.0 Germany license

Czech floods force 2,700 from homes, threaten central Prague

Reuters: The worst floods to hit the Czech Republic in a decade forced the evacuation of almost 2,700 people from low-lying areas while the rising water threatened Prague's historic center, forced school closures and disrupted public transport.

Czech police said at least five people had died in the flooding. Firefighters evacuated homes in western regions and in villages outside the capital on Sunday and Monday, rescuing 200 people.

Flooding was also reported in Austria and water levels rose in Germany and Poland after heavy rain in central Europe over the past week swelled rivers. At least one person died and two were missing in Austria near Salzburg.

The subway network in central Prague was halted on Monday due to the weather, for the first time since massive floods submerged the city in 2002 and caused billions of dollars of damage in the Czech Republic.

Czech Prime Minister Petr Necas declared a state of emergency for most of the nation on Sunday and pledged 300 million crowns ($15.11 million) for relief efforts....

June 2, 2013,  in Prague, shot by Juandev, Wikimedia Commons, under the Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 3.0 Unported license 

Floodwaters threaten central Europe

The Guardian (UK) via AP: Raging waters from three rivers poured into the old town of Passau in south-east Germany on Monday, one of the cities worst hit by flooding that has spread across a large area of central Europe. Rescuers used boats to transport residents from flooded parts of the city to dry land as officials warned that water levels – already the highest in 70 years – could rise further.

A spokesman for the city's crisis centre said much of Passau was inaccessible by foot and the electricity supply had been shut down as a precaution. "The situation is extremely dramatic," Herbert Zillinger told the Associated Press.

Water from the Danube, Inn and Ilz rivers rose above markers set in 1954, when the city suffered its worst flooding in living memory. Zillinger said levels would continue to rise throughout the day.

At least six people were reported to have died and seven were missing due to floods in Germany, Austria, Switzerland and the Czech Republic following days of heavy rainfall. Czech authorities were working to erect further protective metal barriers along the Vltava river, which also flows through the capital of Prague.

The interim mayor, Tomas Hudecek, said no major evacuations were planned, but animals from a zoo located by the river had been taken to safety. Parts of the city's subway network had also been shut down because of flooding....

Marking the height of past floods in Passau, shot by Roger Wollstadt, Wikimedia Commons via Flickr, under the Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 2.0 Generic license

South Korea says finds no GMO in initial tests of U.S. wheat

Reuters: South Korea has not detected genetically modified wheat in initial tests of imports of the grain and flour from Oregon, after news last week that a rogue strain of the crop had been discovered in the U.S. state spooked buyers globally.

Korean millers on Friday suspended imports of U.S. wheat until the final results of government tests on shipments from around the United States, now expected on Wednesday.

The wheat found in a northeast Oregon field in late April was developed by biotech giant Monsanto Co more than a decade ago but never put into commercial production.

The discovery of the long-forgotten strain prompted Japan to shun wheat from the Pacific Northwest at its weekly tender on Thursday, while some Asian countries ramped up inspections and the European Union said it would step up testing.

"Although our preliminary test result shows no genetically modified wheat was found, we are aiming to test all samples of wheat and flour imported from the U.S.," said an official at Korea's Ministry of Food and Drugs....

From a 2912 anti-GMO protest, shot by Daniel Goehring, Wikimedia Commons via Flickr, under the Creative Commons Attribution 2.0 Generic license

9 dead after tornadoes, floods strike Oklahoma

Robin Webb and Michael Winter in USA Today: Severe flooding was the big issue Saturday as officials began surveying damage from tornadoes that hit the Oklahoma City metro area Friday, killing 9 and injuring more than 100 people.

The storm, the second fatal one to strike the region in 11 days, spawned several tornadoes, toppled cars and left commuters trapped on an interstate highway during Friday's evening rush. Law enforcement officers and Red Cross workers headed to hard-hit areas after dawn to assess the damage.

The storm also brought heavy rain and hail. Floodwaters topped 4 feet in Oklahoma City early Saturday and were expected to rise as flash flooding continued in parts of the state. Across east and central Oklahoma, repeated rounds of thunderstorms have produced between 4 to 7 inches of rain since midnight Saturday.

Some highways were closed because of downed power lines. The Oklahoma Corporation Commission reported more than 91,800 power outages related to the storms as of Saturday afternoon...

A May 21 image of the damage from a recent Oklahoma tornado, shot by Oklahoma National Guard, Wikimedia Commons via Flickr, under the Creative Commons Attribution 2.0 Generic license

Water projects in Nigeria

Anayo Okolie in AllAfrica.com via This Day (Nigeria): Lagos State governor, Mr. Babatunde Fashola Saturday disclosed that his administration has provided 445 types of water projects in the rural and semi urban areas in the last six years to ensure that residents of Lagos State have access to potable water.

Fashola noted this during the commissioning of a micro water scheme at Igborosun in Badagry Local Government Area. He also stated that his administration is passionate about the provision of potable water for the people especially the rural dweller.

Fashola, who was represented by the Commissioner for Finance, Mr. Adetokunbo Abiru said that his admistration has also approved the construction of additional 28 water projects this year to be provided in the rural & semi urban areas of the state to complement the existing ones.

These water projects, according to Fashola, consist of 10 solar-powered modified Type A water project, 13 modified Type A water projects and 5 Type A water projects.

He promised that the existing water project will be continuously maintained and improved on upon by the government, adding that his administration will continue to do more water projects until every nook and crannies of the state have access to potable water....

Elevated carbon dioxide making arid regions greener

The American Geophysical Union: Scientists have long suspected that a flourishing of green foliage around the globe, observed since the early 1980s in satellite data, springs at least in part from the increasing concentration of carbon dioxide in Earth’s atmosphere. Now, a study of arid regions around the globe finds that a carbon dioxide “fertilization effect” has, indeed, caused a gradual greening from 1982 to 2010.

Focusing on the southwestern corner of North America, Australia’s outback, the Middle East, and some parts of Africa, Randall Donohue of the Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organization (CSIRO) in Canberra, Australia and his colleagues developed and applied a mathematical model to predict the extent of the carbon-dioxide (CO2) fertilization effect. They then tested this prediction by studying satellite imagery and teasing out the influence of carbon dioxide on greening from other factors such as precipitation, air temperature, the amount of light, and land-use changes.

The team’s model predicted that foliage would increase by some 5 to 10 percent given the 14 percent increase in atmospheric CO2 concentration during the study period. The satellite data agreed, showing an 11 percent increase in foliage after adjusting the data for precipitation, yielding “strong support for our hypothesis,” the team reports.

“Lots of papers have shown an average increase in vegetation across the globe, and there is a lot of speculation about what’s causing that,” said Donohue of CSIRO’s Land and Water research division, who is lead author of the new study. “Up until this point, they’ve linked the greening to fairly obvious climatic variables, such as a rise in temperature where it is normally cold or a rise in rainfall where it is normally dry. Lots of those papers speculated about the CO2 effect, but it has been very difficult to prove.”

...In addition to greening dry regions, the CO2 fertilization effect could switch the types of vegetation that dominate in those regions. “Trees are re-invading grass lands, and this could quite possibly be related to the CO2 effect,” Donohue said. “Long lived woody plants are deep rooted and are likely to benefit more than grasses from an increase in CO2.”

“The effect of higher carbon dioxide levels on plant function is an important process that needs greater consideration,” said Donohue. “Even if nothing else in the climate changes as global CO2 levels rise, we will still see significant environmental changes because of the CO2 fertilization effect.”

Photo by Brian Thomas, hereby released into the public domain

Catastrophic climatic events leave corals with a decade-long fight for recovery

University of Plymouth News Centre: Marine conservationists from Plymouth University, and the Universidad Federal da Bahia in Brazil, have spent more than 17 years analysing the diversity and density of coral colonies off the coast of South America.

That coincided with the catastrophic El Niño event of 1997-98, creating an opportunity for the first detailed assessment of the long-term impact a major environmental incident of this nature can have on coral assemblages.

Professor Martin Attrill, Director of Plymouth University’s Marine Institute, said: “Coral reefs are perhaps the most diverse marine ecosystem on Earth, potentially holding 25% of the known marine species. Yet they are under intense threat from a range of local human activities and, in particular, climate change. Any impact on the corals is going to have major knock on effects on the organisms that live on coral reefs, such as the fish, and if climatic events become more frequent, as is suggested, it is likely corals will never be able to fully recover."

...For this study, the research team used their own observations of eight species of scleractinian corals, and data from the Brazilian Meteorological Office, to create a full picture of environmental conditions and species behaviour that resulted.  It showed a significant rise in air and seawater temperatures in 1998, with increased mortality across all species and, in one case, it disappearing completely from the reefs for more than seven years.

The density of the coral in the area also fell after 1998, but then increased continuously until 2007, with recent measurements showing it is now mostly back to pre-1998 levels.  Professor Attrill added: “El Niño events give us an indication of how changing climate affects ecosystems as major changes in the weather patterns within the Pacific impact the whole world. If the reefs can recover quickly, it is probable they can adapt and survive the likely changes in water temperature ahead of us. However, we found it took 13 years for the coral reef system in Brazil to recover, suggesting they may be very vulnerable to regular climate-related impacts. This has major consequences for how we consider climate change impacts on coral reefs.”...

A brain coral off the coast of Belize, shot by Pgbk1987, Wikimedia Commons via Flickr,  under the Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 2.0 Generic license

Asia–Pacific Analysis: Rain harvesting can avert crisis

Crispin Maslog in SciDev.net: The world's next major crisis will be a lack of water for home use, including drinking water, many scientists predict. Humans can survive around 40 days without food, but much less than that without water to drink.

The scarcity of water for domestic use is becoming a critical problem, especially in rural parts of developing countries. Surface water in rivers, streams or lakes, and groundwater, are increasingly becoming contaminated with pollutants from factories, households, farms and mines. Wells dug deeper to extract groundwater are drying up.  To meet the water demands of an exploding population, it is time to look up to the sky for the solution: harvesting rainwater as it falls.

As well as for drinking, rainwater serves various needs. It can be used domestically, for example to wash clothes, flush toilets and to water plants, and in the community, for instance in firefighting or to clean public places such as markets, and for agriculture.

If properly done, "rainwater harvesting appears to be one of the most promising alternatives for supplying freshwater in the face of increasing water scarcity and escalating demand", according to the UN Environment Programme. Water catchments, whether it is just small ponds or large dams, can also be used for flood control.

Harvesting rain for domestic use has age-old roots. Ancient Romans used their villa courtyards to collect rainwater that was then stored in large underground cisterns....

The Cistern of Philoxenos in Istanbul, shot by Neuceu, Wikimedia Commons, under the Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 3.0 Unported license

Ethiopia boosts Nile water dispute with Egypt

Space Daily via UPI: Ethiopia has begun diverting the Blue Nile to build a giant hydroelectric dam, cutting the flow of water to Egypt, Sudan and other downstream states and raising tensions in a long-running dispute with Cairo.

With Egypt in turmoil and financial straits in the lingering aftermath of the 2011 pro-democracy ouster of longtime President Hosni Mubarak, and Sudan gripped by political upheaval following the secession of oil-rich South Sudan in 2012, the long-running Nile issue could turn nasty.

Ethiopia insisted that the flow levels of the world's longest river wouldn't be affected by the 6,000-megawatt, $4.7 billion Grand Renaissance Dam. But Cairo and Khartoum say that once the massive project, one of several dams Addis Ababa is building, is completed, supposedly by 2015, their share of the Nile water will be reduced by 18 billion cubic meters a year.

The Ethiopian dam is to have a reservoir of 63 billion cubic meters of water, one of the largest in Africa. Filling that would immediately cut the water flow to Sudan and Egypt. How bad that will be depends on the rate at which the Ethiopians decide to fill the reservoir....

Bahir Dar near the place where Blue Nile leaves Lake Tana, shot by ZeGhion, public domain

Asia concerns spread due to rogue US wheat

Seed Daily via AFP: Japan and South Korea suspended some imports of US wheat Friday as American regulators investigated the discovery in an Oregon field of rogue wheat genetically engineered to resist Monsanto herbicide.

US regulators insisted that the wheat carries no risks, but the outcome of the probe -- namely finding out whether such wheat is growing elsewhere -- could have a wider impact on world markets, with the US the biggest global exporter of wheat.

"No one wants genetically engineered wheat," said Bill Freese, science policy analyst at the Center for Food Safety, recalling that massive opposition in 2004 led seed giant Monsanto to pull back from its bid to commercialize it.

GE wheat is not approved for commercial sale anywhere in the world, but some herbicide-resistant plants were found in April on an Oregon farm, triggering a government investigation, officials announced on Wednesday....

A wheat field, shot by Maxdrobot, public domain

Damage checks begin after deadly Midwest twisters

Sean Murphy in ABC News: Emergency officials set out Saturday morning to see how much damage a violent burst of thunderstorms and tornadoes caused as it swept across the Midwest overnight, killing at least five and injuring dozens.

The storm toppled cars and left commuters trapped on an interstate highway as it bore down during Friday's evening rush hour near Oklahoma City. The National Weather Service reported "several" tornadoes rolled in from the prairie, terrifying towns along their paths.

The storms brought another tense day for a region still reeling from the recent top-of-the-scale EF5 tornado that struck the Oklahoma City suburb of Moore on May 20, killing 24 and decimating neighborhoods. Many said they took severe weather warnings issued during the day Friday seriously.

...Storm chasers with cameras in their cars transmitted video showing a number of funnels dropping from the supercell thunderstorm as it passed south of El Reno and into Oklahoma City just south of downtown. As the cell advanced, police urged motorists to leave I-40 and seek a safe place.

Violent weather also moved through the St. Louis area. Early aerial images of the storm's damage showed homes with porches ripped away, roofs torn off and piles of splintered wood scattered across the ground for blocks. Officials in St. Charles County also reported that local schools suffered some damage.

...Meteorologists had warned about particularly nasty weather Friday but said the storm's fury didn't match that of the tornado that struck Moore. The Friday storm, however, brought with it much more severe flooding. It dumped around 8 inches of rain on Oklahoma City in the span of a few hours and made the tornado difficult to spot for motorists trying to beat it home, said Bruce Thoren, a meteorologist with National Weather Service in Norman....

The Moore, Oklahoma tornado on May 20, 2013, shot by Ks0stm, der the Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 3.0 Unported license

Dutch authorities to cull poultry after avian influenza outbreak

Reuters: Health authorities will cull 11,000 chickens at a farm in the Netherlands after an outbreak of a mild form of avian influenza, the Dutch Economic Affairs Ministry said on Saturday.

The chickens were believed to have the low pathogenic H7 strain, the ministry said in a statement. They would be culled as a precaution because the strain can mutate into a form that is fatal for poultry.

Authorities imposed a one-kilometer safety perimeter around the farm banning transports of poultry, eggs and other farm products. Testing would also be carried at 11 other farms in the area, it said.

In recent years several cases of the low pathogenic bird flu strain have been reported in the Netherlands....

Financing climate adaptation for smallholder farmers is critical

EnergyBangla: Ahead of the United Nations climate change meeting in Germany, Kanayo F. Nwanze, President of the International Fund for Agricultural Development (IFAD) stresses the climate resilience needs of 500 million smallholder farms.

 With World Environment Day approaching next week, key negotiations within the UN’s climate change talks are to take place in Bonn. IFAD wants to see greater recognition of the climate impacts smallholder farmers have to face and more assistance to meet that challenge.

 “One group of people are really important in all this, but are almost invisible in global discussions on climate change - these are smallholder farmers,” says IFAD President Kanayo Nwanze. “Smallholders are on the front line of climate impacts, so require urgent action to increase their resilience to the climate crisis.”

 Smallholder farmers may not be attending the climate negotiations in Bonn, but they are aware of the impact of climate change on their lives: more droughts, floods, hurricanes, extreme heat and sea level rise. Small farmers and their families across many developing countries are the hardest hit with little capacity to adapt.

“What smallholders need is recognition in global dialogues on climate change of the role they can and must play in the solution,” says Elwyn Grainger-Jones, Director of IFAD’s Environment and Climate Division. “Add to that a major effort at country level to unlock smallholder farmer potential to adapt to the climate crisis while helping them transition from subsistence to profitable and sustainable entrepreneurs.  IFAD will play its part in supporting this effort.”...

Plowing with oxen in Zambia, shot by Amanita Phalloides, Wikimedia Commons, under the Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 3.0 Unported license 

Climate adaptation policy crucial to easing conflict

Charlotte Baskin-Gerwitz at Trust.org (Thomson Reuters Foundation): The international community widely acknowledges that climate change is a pressing issue. U.S. President Barack Obama’s 2010 National Security Strategy recognized that climate change is a national security threat, impacting both the homeland and American interests abroad.

The strategy warns: “The danger from climate change is real, urgent and severe.  The change wrought by a warming planet will lead to new conflicts over refugees and resources; new suffering from drought and famine; catastrophic natural disasters; and the degradation of land across the globe.”

The broader national security policy community has also come to recognise climate change as a “threat multiplier,” increasing the risk of conflict when combined with other factors; however, not enough attention is yet being paid to its importance in conflict prevention and resolution.

Most conflicts in modern times are intrastate, often fuelled or financed by natural resources. The University of Uppsala’s “Armed Conflict, 1946-2011” database shows that 26 of the 27 armed conflicts globally in 2011 were intrastate while the UN Environment Programme’s “From Conflict to Peacebuilding” report approximates that 40 percent of civil wars have been associated with natural resources. ...

A Varanasi woman in India carrying water, shot by Jorge Royan, Wikimedia Commons, under the Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 3.0 Unported license

Hurricane Barbara hits land in Mexico, two dead

Space Daily via AFP: Hurricane Barbara made landfall in Mexico's southern Pacific coast Wednesday, leaving at least two dead, including a 61-year-old US surfer who drowned under the waves, authorities said.

The storm, packing maximum sustained winds of 120 kilometers (75 miles) per hour, hit land in the state of Chiapas, a rural region with archeological sites near the neighboring state of Oaxaca, the US National Hurricane Center said.

...In the state of Guerrero, heavy rains flooded some streets of the resort city of Acapulco, with water levels reaching 52 centimeters (20 inches) and sweeping away at least three cars, an AFP correspondent said.

In Oaxaca, authorities had urged residents to stay home, while the ports of Salina Cruz, Huatulco, Puerto Angel and Puerto Escondido were shut down. Some 200 families were taken to shelters, officials said....

Hurricane Barbara, May 29, 2013, via NASA