About 45 percent of India’s land is degraded due to erosion, soil acidity, alkalinity and salinity, waterlogging and wind erosion. Air pollution is increasing in all its cities, it is losing its rare plants and animals more rapidly than before and about one-third of its urban population now lives in slums, says the State of Environment Report India 2009 brought out by the government.

Two hundred and fifty-four proposals to divert 50,818 hectares of protected forest land have been approved by the government since the Forest (Conservation) Act was passed in 1980, parliament was informed on July 20. Minister of State for Environment and Forests Jairam Ramesh informed the Rajya Sabha in response to a question that the maximum amount of protected forest land, 12,579.12 hectares, had been diverted for coal mining in Chhattisgarh, followed by Andhra Pradesh (12,709.62 hectares), Ma...

A high in solar activity impacts the earth in a way that resembles the devastating El Nino, releasing more energy than a million Hiroshima bombs, according to a new study. The study shows that as the sun reaches maximum activity, it heats cloud-free parts of the Pacific Ocean enough to increase evaporation, intensify tropical rainfall and the trade winds, and cool the eastern tropical Pacific.

Seeking to underplay differences with India over climate change, the US says it is “encouraging” that both countries are committed to do whatever they can to reach an agreement on a new UN climate treaty at Copenhagen. “Well, I don’t think so,” Philip J. Crowley, Assistant Secretary of State for Public Affairs, told when asked how sharp differences between India and US on the climate change issue would impact the strategic ties between them.