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Regardless of the decision, Teck Frontier proves the system is still broken

UPDATE: This company has now withdrawn its application for the mine. The Pembina Institute Canada is facing a decision on the biggest oil sands mine proposal in almost a decade. Alberta’s Frontier oil sands mine, proposed by Teck Resources, has gone through a lengthy regulatory process culminating in a recommended approval from a joint federal-provincial review panel and is now under consideration by the federal cabinet. A casual observer might assume that given the potent environmental and economic impacts, this process would have been comprehensive. Yet, the panel's report, which shares the reasoning behind the decision, is remarkably weak on its consideration of climate impacts .   More here.

Climate change to create farmland in the north, but at environmental costs, study reveals

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PHYS ORG High Alpine Tundra in Noatak National Preserve, Alaska.  U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service. In a warming world, Canada's north may become our breadbasket of the future - but this new "farming frontier" also poses environmental threats from increased carbon emissions to degraded water quality, according to the first-ever study involving University of Guelph researchers.   Story here.

Global financial giants swear off funding an especially dirty fuel.

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The New York Times The Alberta tar sands. Source: "Beautiful Destruction." Some of the world's biggest financial institutions have stopped putting money behind oil production in the Canadian province of Alberta, home to one of the world's most extensive and dirtiest, oil reserves.    Story here.  

Why bumble bees are going extinct in time of 'climate chaos'

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PHYS ORG Tricoloured Bumble bees - Bombus ternarius - forage on chives in an organic garden in Manitoba. Circa 2000. A PinP photo. When you were young, were you the type of child who would scour open fields looking for bumble bees? Today, it is much harder for kids to spot them, since bumble bees are drastically declining in North America and in Europe.    More here. RELATED: Plight of the Humble Bee -  Canadian regulators refuse to protect a priceless pollinator from a known toxin. Recent research contradicts a claim by the chemical giant, Bayer, that its newest bug-killer is safe for bees.

This is the age of the megafire – and it’s being fuelled by our leaders

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Tim Flannery  for the Guardian Bushfires spire from Yuraygir National Park, Australia. Photo by European Space Agency. In the face of the climate disaster it helped create, the Australian government has given us only lies and denial.   Story here.

Our warming world turns vast areas of the Arctic green.

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PHYS ORG High Alpine Tundra in Noatak National Preserve, Alaska.  U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service New research techniques are being adopted by scientists tackling the most visible impact of climate change—the so-called greening of Arctic regions. STORY HERE.  

Farming as nature intended. A “dynamic duo” from south of the border, brings a message of hope and radical change to producers on the Canadian prairies.

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by Larry Powell A conventional farm in Manitoba. A  PinP  photo. "You're tilling too much!" That was Ray Archuleta's blunt message to about 50 people at a meeting this week in the small, farming community of Shoal Lake, Manitoba. The brilliant, affable Archuleta operates a small ranch in Missouri. His partner. Gabe Brown, whose "down home" personality has apparently earned him the monicker, "Farmer Brown," runs a big, mixed operation in North Dakota. Both men are on the same mission - convince as many farmers as they can to move away from conventional production. That's how countless producers in Canada, the U.S. and developed countries around the world, have, for decades, practised this predominant style of agriculture. They rely on heavy and expensive "inputs" of fertilizers, pesticides, machinery and "mono-crops," all designed to produce the highest yields possible.  Ray Archuleta conducts a  "slake t

How the power of the pork industry thwarts efforts to protect the public from infectious diseases. A CBS "Sixty-Minutes" video.

RELATED: "In Hogs We Trust" Part 1  Could the Manitoba government’s return to a deregulated hog industry actually contribute to a world health crisis?

Wildfires in Western Canada Created Air Pollution Spikes as Far Away as New York City

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Eco Watch Fires around Ft. MacMurray, Alberta, Canada in 2016. Satellite photo by NASA Earth Observatory. New York City  isn't known  for having the cleanest air, but researchers traced recent  air pollution  spikes there to two surprising sources —  fires  hundreds of miles away in Canada and the southeastern U.S. Story here.

Toxic Tides - The Tragedy of Fish Farming Everywhere

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One of the biggest challenges facing the aquaculture industry everywhere, is  Lepeophtheirus salmonis , the sea-louse (below). It's a parasite which attacks both farmed and wild salmon, causing lesions and infections which stunt their growth. But the costs of de-lousing are high. And so are the losses suffered by the industry in the marketplace. Many lice can actually kill many fish. Sea lice, Lepeophtheirus salmonis, on farmed Atlantic salmon, New Brunswick, CA.  Photo by 7Barrym0re   To fight back, the fish-farmers dump pesticides into the waters (below). But, because they’re released directly into the environment, they not only kill the lice, but place beneficial, “non-target” organisms at risk, too. And several of these live in the open ocean, beyond the confines of the farms. The latest (but not the only) cautionary tale about the wisdom of this practise, has just emerged from Norway.  A team of researchers there exposed (in the lab), an important food source for the

'Live animals are the largest source of infection': dangers of the export trade

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The Guardian Transporting more livestock will increase transmission of diseases, including some that could also threaten humans.   Story here. Pigs being trucked. Photo by Cayce from Malaysia.