This is not a rainforest!

A story wherein I reveal resistant and deliberate ignorance.

Soil organic matter makes up the bulk of terrestrially bound carbon in our biosphere. Those compounds play an important role, not only for soil fertility and agricultural yields but also for controlling the concentration of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere.

Climatic change can therefore be slowed down or accelerated according to our management of soil resources. A new study sheds some light on the process.

Smoke from Arctic wildfires have been drifting over the Greenland ice sheet, tarnishing the ice with soot and making it more likely to melt under the sun, according to satellite observations.

NASA's Cloud-Aerosol Lidar and Infrared Pathfinder Satellite Observation (CALIPSO) satellite captured smoke from Arctic fires billowing out over Greenland during the summer of 2012. Researchers have long been concerned with how the Greenland landscape is losing its sparkly reflective quality as temperatures rise. The surface is darkening as ice melts away, and, since dark surfaces are less reflective than light ones, the surface captures more heat, which leads to stronger and more prolonged melting.

Rain in Southern Arizona is usually scarce - but on November 29th, 25 miles north of Tucson, the soil was soaked. Spouting from a network of pipes, thousands of gallons of water drizzled down onto the world's only and largest man-made experimental watershed, recently completed at the University of Arizona's Biosphere 2.  You can read articles from original Biosphere 2 scientist Jane Poynter here.

Erosion can bury carbon in the soil, acting as a carbon sin but a new study has found that part of that sink is only temporary.

The researchers estimated that roughly half of the carbon buried in soil by erosion will be re-released into the atmosphere within about 500 years. Their model estimates that climate change could speed the rate of decomposition, aiding the release of the buried carbon.

Perhaps China could use some genetically modified food.  Otherwise, meeting the food demands of 22 percent of the world's population while maintaining their over-reliance on nitrogen-based fertilizer will continue to dramatically increase their emissions of nitrous oxide (N₂O) – the most potent greenhouse gas. 

When visitors arrive at Edmonton International Airport in Alberta, Canada, they are greeted by a 1,440 square foot living wall; a “green wall” arranged like a modern art canvas with 8,000 plants encompassing 32 different species. “It is the largest living wall inside any building in the world,” says Patrick Poiraud, design consultant and principal with Green Over Grey, the designers behind the installation.

Which do you love more, organic food or green energy?  Because you may have to choose.

Oregon is the site of a conflict between food and energy, though it is a state that claims it loves both - but the people who love each primarily do so because it makes them money. You really can't love both anyway, because environmental activists are in a never-ending war against the bulk of society and its bad habits, and also in a war with each other.  They not only love Gaia more than you do, they love Gaia more than other environmentalists.