News
August 14, 2013
New class of “Easily Retrievable” Asteroids has been discovered. Astronomers have found 12 near Earth asteroids that could be captured with today’s rocket technology. Asteroids that pass close to Earth have become the focus of increased attention in recent years, partly because of the potential threat they pose to humanity. But they are also a potential boon. For decades, science fiction writers and various space scientists have pointed out that asteroids offer a huge untapped source of valuable resources.
August 13, 2013
Alexey Petrunin and Irina Rogozhina of IceGeoHeat, an international climate research initiative led by the GFZ German Research Centre for Geosciences, are the first to establish a connection between heat transfer from the mantle beneath the world’s ice sheets and the rate of ice sheet melting.
August 12, 2013
The government of Kenya is to form a state-owned company that will hold stakes in mines and establish a sovereign wealth fund to manage revenue from the industry. Mining secretary, Najib Balala, says that the government is repealing a law that required at least 35percent domestic ownership, reducing it to 10percent that will be held by the government. The new legislation, creating what will be known as the National Mining Corporation, is expected to be enacted by November. Balala said the government is waiting for the new bill to be approved by cabinet and parliament.
August 11, 2013
Ghana’s Minister for Lands and Natural Resources, Alhaji Inusah Fuseini, has called for mining contracts negotiated between governments and mining multinationals to be conducted in a spirit of truth and transparency and to ensure a fair and equitable distribution of benefits for all stakeholders.
August 10, 2013
The Ministry of Natural Resources and Environment of the Russian Federation has questioned the list of the most troubled Russian cities on atmospheric contaminations, prepared by RIA Ranking experts and based on the data of the Russian Federal State Statistics Service. In the judgment of ministry officials, used ranging method does not allow an objective assessment of negative impact on the environment. In particular, it ignored such important factors as the contamination area, population density, atmospheric dispersion, motor vehicle emissions, toxic levels.
August 9, 2013
Norilsk located in Russia up in the Krasnoyarsk territory, above the Polar Circle, on the 69th parallel for many years has maintained its status as the dirtiest city in Russia. In August 2013, RIA Ranking experts published a list of the most troubled Russian cities on atmospheric contaminations, based on the data of the Russian Federal State Statistics Service. And Norilsk predictably confirmed his questionable leadership once again.
August 2, 2013
The Arabian Geoscience Union (ArabGU) joins IAGETH as Partner/Related Organization. ArabGU is a nonprofit international association dealing with Earth Sciences in the Arab World. ArabGU is similar in scope to the EGU (European Geosciences Union), AGU (American Geophysical Union), JpGU (Japan Geosciences Union), and AOGS (Asia Oceania Geosciences Society). IAGETH is, from the beginning, one of the supported organizations of ArabGU. Special thanks to Prof.
August 1, 2013
Geologists established fast-rising magmas fuel Costa Rican volcano. If some volcanoes operate on geologic timescales, Costa Rica's Irazú had something of a short fuse. In a new study in the journal Nature, scientists suggest that the 1960s eruption of Costa Rica's largest stratovolcano was triggered by magma rising from the mantle over a few short months, rather than thousands of years or more, as many scientists have thought.
July 29, 2013
Pilot projects bury carbon dioxide in basalt have started. Two experiments test viability of sequestering emissions in porous layers of hard rock. Basalt formations, such as these towers on the Columbia River in Washington state, could be used to trap carbon dioxide. By early August, scientists will have pumped 1,000 tonnes of pure carbon dioxide into porous rock far below the northwestern United States. The goal is to find a permanent home for the carbon dioxide generated by human activities.
July 26, 2013
The head of Russian Ministry of Natural Resources, Sergey Donskoy has sent an appeal to the Minister of the Interior, Vladimir Kolokoltsev with a request to take over the personal control of criminal investigations such as violent crimes and murders of environmental organizations members. "In May-July 2013, in the territory of the Russian Federation heinous crimes have been carried out. Environmentalists have fallen victims to those crimes.