This Week in Water

The world's first Climate Change refugees have been granted residency in New Zealand. Rising sea tides on the Polynesian island nation of Tuvalu has contaminated the drinking water. Some predict that as many as 150 to 300 million people will be displaced by climate change during the first half of this century.

Climate data from 2013 published in the Bulletin of the American Meteorological Society concluded:

"Last year was one of the ten hottest on record. Depending on how scientists slice the numbers, the year ranked second or sixth. Australia experienced its hottest year since recordkeeping began in 1910, as did a research station at the South Pole, whose records date to 1957. 

Average sea levels continue to creep up at consistent rate, of roughly three millimeters per year. Glaciers are losing mass at an accelerating rate. 

Extreme events in 2013 caused significant damage. Typhoon Haiyan was the strongest recorded tropical cyclone at landfall when it crossed the Philippines in November with wind speeds of 170 knots (195 miles per hour). More than 5,700 people died because of the super storm. 

In Canada, heavy rains flooded southern Alberta, resulting in the country’s most expensive natural disaster ever, at more than $US 6 billion."

The Global Ocean Commission has determined that the world's oceans need saving from pollution and overfishing, and urgent action is needed within five years.

A team of scientists has determined that sea level rise in the western tropical Pacific off the coasts of the Philippines and northeastern Australia is a result of human activity and likely will continue unabated.

Scientists have observed methane gas bubbling to the surface from the sea floor in the Arctic Ocean. These plumes could signal a major tipping point for climate change, causing trillions of dollars of damages to the world's economies. Methane, a greenhouse gas, is 20 times more damaging to the atmosphere than carbon dioxide. One climatologist associated with the expedition that discovered this phenomenon tweeted: "If even a small fraction of Arctic sea floor carbon is released to the atmosphere, we're f'd."

The worst environmental disaster in North America in decades? A dam holding waste from Canadian gold and copper mines operated by Imperial Metals around Mount Polley in British Columbia broke, spilling up to 4 billion gallons of toxic slurry and sludge containing things like arsenic, mercury, and sulphur from the tailing pond into the Province's pristine lakes and streams.

A massive red tide algae bloom, some 80 miles by 50 miles, off the Gulf coast of Florida has killed thousands of fish and could cause further damage, including to people, if it washes ashore.

Scientists are reporting a man-made 'dead zone' about the size of Connecticut in size in the Gulf of Mexico off the coast of Louisiana. It is purportedly second in size only to a similar zone in the Baltic Sea around Finland and is a result of agricultural runoff from farms along the Mississippi River.

Pharmaceutical waste from an anxiety medication, Oxazepam, released into a Swedish lake is decreasing Eurasian perch mortality rates. This is not necessarily a good thing.

Engineers at Japan's Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plant are constructing an ice wall to keep contaminated water from the nuclear reactor disaster from polluting ground water.

A mysterious lake, some 30 to 60 feet deep, has appeared in the the Tunisian desert.

Canada wants to map and lay claim to the seabed around the North Pole. So does Russia.

Russia has released "Arctic Sunrise", the Greenpeace ship it seized last year in a protest against its Arctic drilling.

The world's largest naval exercise, RIMPAC 2014, involving militaries from 23 countries, got underway in the Western Pacific.

Also, ebola is spread only by direct contact with bodily fluids from an infected person.