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Meanwhile, according to The Guardian, a consortium of scientists is urging creation of a US$13.5 million programme to prevent potentially catastrophic wildfires inside the Chernobyl exclusion zone. Fires, they fear, could release clouds of radioactive particles that are now locked in trees, held mainly in the needles and bark of Scots pines.
Protests and legal challenges against shale-gas extraction and the environmental damage it causes are growing in southern France, English barrister Michael Mansfield wrote in The Guardian. Events in France, Mansfield said, offer “supreme lessons” for other parts of Europe – especially the UK, where he urged a similar campaign “before it is too late”.
And even in Texas, the US heart of the oil and gas business, public concern is emerging about the effects of hydraulic fracturing, or fracking, the controversial gas-drilling method now used in more than half of new gas wells in the state, The New York Times reported.
Traditionally poor yet fast-growing countries – from the Gulf states to China – are catching up in both affluence and obesity, according to The Financial Times. In Brazil, where changes in diet and lifestyle are bringing new problems, public-health specialists are fighting to reduce the food industry’s influence on the country’s eating habits.
The BBC cited two studies that found that the extent of CO2 emissions embedded in imported goods is growing. Official data do not include emissions from producing such goods, but the researchers say they should.
The US Environmental Protection Agency launched a year-long campaign to collect photographs from around the world for its State of the Environment Photo Project, the Associated Press said. The EPA urges members of the public to post their best photographs on Flickr.
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