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Environment, Peak Oil

October 22

Study: Oil output peaked in 2006 and will fall 7% a year

World oil production has already peaked and will fall by half as soon as 2030, according to a report which also warns that extreme shortages of fossil fuels will lead to wars and social breakdown.

The German-based Energy Watch Group will release its study in London today saying that global oil production peaked in 2006 - much earlier than most experts had expected. The report, which predicts that production will now fall by 7% a year, comes after oil prices set new records almost every day last week, on Friday hitting more than $90 (£44) a barrel.

Source: The Guardian  

At the Poles, Melting Occurring at Alarming Rate

For scientists, global warming is a disaster movie, its opening scenes set at the poles of Earth. The epic already has started. And it’s not fiction.

The scenes are playing, at the start, in slow motion: The relentless grip of the Arctic Ocean that defied man for centuries is melting away. The sea ice reaches only half as far as it did 50 years ago. In the summer of 2006, it shrank to a record low; this summer the ice pulled back even more, by an area nearly the size of Alaska.

Source: Washington Post  

Economy/Finance

October 12

Income inequality worst since 1920s, according to IRS data

The superrich are gobbling up an ever larger piece of the economic pie, and the poor are seeing their share of earnings shrink: new IRS data shows the top 1 percent of Americans are claiming a larger share of national income than at any time since before the Great Depression.

The top percentile of wealthy Americans earned 21.2 percent of all income in 2005, up from 19 percent in 2004, according to new Internal Revenue Service data published in the Wall Street Journal Friday.

Source: Raw Story  

Corruption

October 11

More than 2,000 dead in US during arrests in three years: report

More than 2,000 people died in the United States during arrests between 2003 and 2005, according to data published by the Department of Justice for the first time Thursday.

As many as 54 percent were killed by police, 12 percent died because of a drug or alcohol overdose, 11 percent committed suicide, seven percent succumbed to accidents and five percent died due to illnesses or natural causes, according to statistics from 47 US states, and the US federal capital city, released in accordance with a 2000 law.

Source: AFP  

Global warming driving up humidity levels, says study

Man-made global warming is driving up humidity levels, with the risk that rainfall patterns will shift or strengthen, tropical storms intensify and human health may suffer from heat stress, a study released on Wednesday said. ADVERTISEMENT

From 1976 to 2004, when the world’s average surface temperature rose 0.49 degrees Celsius (0.9 degrees Fahrenheit), global levels of atmospheric water vapour rose 2.2 percent, according to the paper by British scientists.

Source: AFP  
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