Imagine the consequences of 20 years of nuclear waste dumping in the blue waters of the Mediterranean Sea that surround the Italian Peninsula and its islands.

It’s an unfolding crisis that has the international community alarmed, including the fishing interests in Japan.

We’re talking about the coasts of 22 countries in Africa, Europe, the Middle East and Asia, and a pending ecological and public health disaster which is being allegedly swept under the rug by the Italian government.

I only learned about it recently in a Counterpunch post on the nightmare, passed along …

Tags: Africa , Asia , Calabria , cancer , Cetraro , Cunsky , disasters , drums , ecology , Ecomafia , europe , fishermen , Greenpeace , Ilaria Alpi , Italy , Japan , Mediterranean Sea , mercury , Middle East , nuclear waste , radioactive dumping , robot sub , tumors , Tyrrhenian Sea

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I’m totally Swede on the Stockholm-based Jantze Brogard Asshoff studio and the thoughtful, elegant designs these craftswomen are producing for both eco function and beauty.

Founders Moa Jantze, Hanna Brogård and Johanna Asshoff strive to simplify their surroundings to improve everyday life.

“We create sophisticated, useful products with a poetic soul and playful character,” they explain. “Our backgrounds from different parts of Sweden will always be a great source of inspiration. We like to mix modern with traditional, folklore with decadent luxury and regional Swedish handicraft with industrial production.”

The results are …

Tags: compost , containers , decor , Dwell Magazine , eco , ecology , felt , furniture , green , modern , Scandinavian , trash , wool

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As the climate changes, so will the habitats of flora and fauna – changing far faster than natural adaptation can deal with. Mass extinctions are a very real threat. What to do?

One option on the table is a truly startling display of geoengineering. This week, scientists at Britain’s University of York (my home city, and a hotbed of eco-innovation at the moment) have just released the results of an experiment to move a species of butterfly to the limits of …

Tags: ecology , ecosystem , environment , geoengineering , news , science , technology

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Will your years of good green living end with a natural, good green death?

It’s a sensitive topic – so sensitive, many of us can’t embrace it. I cringed some years back when my book group chose to read Mary Roach’s Stiff: Curious Lives of Human Cadavers. The last thing I wanted to do was cuddle up with a read about how to dispose of our bodies: donating organs to eager medical school students, cremation, wrapping remains in biodegradable burial shrouds before returning them to the earth. Still, I …

Tags: biodegradable , burials , carcinogens , chemical-free , death , ecology , funerals

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Geoengineering. Now there’s a word to make you shiver.

We’ve had an unhappy history of manipulating our environment for our own benefit – or rather, successful for us in the short term. The shift from shortsighted plundering of natural resources to informed scientific trials – the exciting new field of applied ecology – has been a painful one, littered with devastating blunders that are still going on. But will it allow us to correct those mistakes?

This week a report from the England’s University of …

Tags: conservation , ecology , environment , environmentalism , science , technology

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We can understand wanting to fill your gas tank with vegetable oil. But washing your hands in it? Amazingly, a way’s been found to do just that – and Treehugger has the details.

Time for a hypothetical scenario. There’s a major company on the brink of having one of its genetically modified crops deregulated, i.e. nothing between it and the environment. Fail-safe? An independent full environmental impact study, designed to weed out any dangers. Except…this study …

Tags: conservation , ecology , environment , fashion , lifestyle , news , sustainable , technology

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You may have heard the buzz: tropical rainforests are repairing themselves far faster than expected. Time for a big party?

Keep the champagne corked for now. It’s true that research by the Carnegie Institution points to some 135,000 square miles of tropical rainforest growing back, but this deserves some context. For a start, that’s less than 2% of the original forest coverage. Also, all this regrowth is an interrupted ecosystem – razed forests that for a time couldn’t perform their vital role as the …

Tags: conservation , ecology , environment , news , rainforests , sustainable

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A year in Lifestyle – from dire rumblings over biofuel to the unprecedented eco-promises of President Elect Obama, from ravaged coral to eco sunscreen, personal sustainability to green careers. It’s been a whirlwind 12 months…and here’s why.

January: we first look at the menaces of urban tumbleweed, plastic hotel toiletries, greenwashing, and pondered the wisdom of using silicone cookware and fuel in place of food.

…

Tags: bamboo , Billion Tree Campaign , Brighter Planet , carbon footprint , carbon neutral , carbon neutral travel , Darfur , eco friendly , eco tourism , ecology , environment , green , green links , green travel , health , lifestyle , natural , news , reclaimed , recycled , recycling , reduce , reuse , Sunshine Coast , sustainable , technology , trend , web

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The Pope has been speaking a great deal of late about the state of the world and pressing issues of morality – and even chiming in on environmental problems. But what exactly did Pope Benedict say that’s surely going to hurt more than help? He mentioned that saving the rainforest is just as important as saving humanity. Now there’s a welcome recognition of true ecology! Not that, then. But wait: he elaborated further to state that humanity needs to be saved from homosexuals. Come again?

I try …

Tags: civil rights , ecology , lifestyle , news , pope , world

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