PLANET IN PERIL

ScienceNews King penguin chicks, South Georgia. by Butterly austral. It’s unclear what has happened to what was the largest of king penguin colonies in the 1980s .  Story here.

Back in 2001, Michele Merkel worked for the EPA. One of her first cases was with farmers who were suing mega-hog factory farms for polluting the community's air and water.  When the EPA sided with the giant corporations, she quit. Now Michele works at Food & Water Watch, fighting for laws and legislation that force our government and the EPA to protect your water, air and food from factory farms — as they are mandated to do. Check out Michele's TEDx Talk to hear her story and how you can fight with Michele against factory farms.

EcoWatch The  National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration  (NOAA)  released the results  of what it calls the "annual checkup for the planet" Wednesday, and the patient is not doing well. More here.

The Narwhal U.S. officials accused Canada of omitting information on selenium pollution flowing from B.C.’s Elk Valley into Montana waters. Story here.

Yale Environment 360 A new Canadian government-backed pipeline that will triple the amount of thick Alberta tar sands oil flowing to a British Columbia port poses significant risks for a threatened population of killer whales and other coastal marine life. Story here.

The Guardian The most populous region of the biggest polluter on Earth – China’s northern plain – will become uninhabitable in places if climate change is not curbed. Story here.

The Guardian A farm family is isolated by widespread flooding in Saskatchewan, Canada. Circa 2005. PinP photo. Prof Michael Mann declares the impacts of global warming are now ‘playing out in real-time.’   Story here.

Yale Environment 360 Producing charcoal in the rainforest. By User Kelberul on de.wikipedia  A growing body of evidence indicates that the continuing destruction of tropical forests is disrupting the movement of water in the atmosphere, causing major shifts in precipitation that could lead to drought in key agricultural areas in China, India, and the U.S. Midwest. Story here.

CBC news Energy giant TransAlta paid the University of Alberta $54,000 to hand-pick one of its researchers to produce a study and other materials it used to lobby the provincial government to try to protect the coal industry, documents obtained by CBC News reveal. Story here.

EcoWatch Scientists studying the troposphere—the lowest level of the atmosphere—have found "powerful evidence" that  climate change  is altering seasonal temperatures. More here.

Texas A&M University The bad news: Dust from the Sahara Desert in Africa -- totaling a staggering 2 to 9 trillion pounds worldwide -- has been almost a biblical plague on Texas and much of the Southern United States in recent weeks. The good news: the same dust appears to be a severe storm killer. More here.