Nowpublic's Top Ten Environmental Stories of 2008

by amyjudd | December 17, 2008 at 03:23 pm

554 views | 18 Recommendations | 6 comments

2008 has been a busy year in the Environmental World - from the catastrophic earthquake in China to the fireball sighted over Alberta, Canada, the earth has definitely been moving and changing over the past 365 days.

NowPublic counts down its top ten environmental stories from this year - some of the stories were bigger than others, but they are all important.

10) Buy Nothing Day takes place the day after Black Friday and Reverend Billy asks everyone to save the environment, even just a little, and not buy anything for one day - lefty_liberated reported.

9) World Farm Animal Day took place on October 3, but is it really as humane as we all think it is? - Paschen reported.

8) Cyclone Nisha kills 86 people when it rips through Tamil Nadu and Chennai. Thousands were made homeless.

7) At least 10,000 people died in the China earthquake that hit May 12. Thousands of children died in their schools, families were destroyed and even the famous China Pandas were affected by the worst earthquake ever to hit the Sichuan province. - NowPublic staff member Sanjay reported.

6) Severe flooding in Hanoi, Vietnam turn the streets into a river - vnttn reported.

5) Hurricane Norbert hits parts of Mexico and parts of California, wreaking havoc, causing power outages and damage to homes and public property. - patgarcia reported.

4) The Santa Barbara Tea Fires destroys at least 100 homes and took days for fire crews to get under control. - NowPublic staff member Dave Keating reported.

3) A live earthquake report from Chengdu, China, about 100km from the epicenter of the China quake - ryanmin reported.

2) A massive fireball is sighted over Saskatchewan and Alberta, Canada; witnesses say the night sky turned to day when it passed over - Jared Aicher - storm chaser reported.

1) Hurricane Ike leaves a trail of devastation in its wake as it tears across Cuba, before making landfall in Texas and other parts of the southern United States. Thousands of customers were left without power; Ike destroyed buildings, homes and lives. Some communities are still rebuilding now and won't be back to normal for some time. - Vinny reported.

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Milieunet

at 22:28 on December 18th, 2008

Who made this selection? This is no top 10 at all.

At 10: 437 views Hardly anything to do with environment. It is a show.

At 1: Hurricane Ike. That is more a weather issue thean an environment issue.

I'm very disappointed. There are much better stories about environment and i don't mean my stories, but stories of a lot of writers.

This is my selection of Top-stories about environment:

http://my.nowpublic.com/environment/exxon-valdez-spill-site-clean

http://my.nowpublic.com/environment/worst-polluted-places-list-unveiled

http://my.nowpublic.com/environment/obama-appoints-green-team

http://my.nowpublic.com/environment/plastic-bags-and-holidays-no-no-eco-system

http://my.nowpublic.com/environment/ecological-disaster-tourism-worlds-most-polluted-tourist-spots

http://my.nowpublic.com/environment/vatican-opts-green-energy-huge-solar-panel-roof

http://my.nowpublic.com/environment/devastating-toll-south-korean-oil-spill

http://my.nowpublic.com/world/oil-pipeline-explosion-lagos-nigeria

And many, may more. Just took me almost half hout to find these in NP system, channel environment.

So many stories in this channel that have nothing to do with environment.

And finally some of my stories:

http://my.nowpublic.com/world/message-president-elect-barack-obama

http://my.nowpublic.com/environment/chinese-bikini-girls-succeed-olympic-sailing-venue-algae-free

http://my.nowpublic.com/environment/t-boone-pickens-has-plan-renewable-energy-pickens-plan

http://my.nowpublic.com/sports/traffic-jams-smog-and-air-pollution-back-beijing

http://my.nowpublic.com/environment/cartoonists-use-humour-tackle-climate-change

amyjudd

at 00:08 on December 20th, 2008

Wow - I made this selection, hence why there is an opinion flag on it.

Please feel free to make your own post if you disagree with so many of them.....

Paschen

at 05:44 on December 19th, 2008

Those where head line stories and yet some where tragic Stories as well. Thank you for bringing those back up.

Paschen

at 03:13 on December 19th, 2008

I think we need a section for all the top 10 post, summarizing the years stories.

SOLARLIFE

at 02:28 on December 26th, 2008

This is a good example How America can go forward now with Obama on World Environment level.

Cultural Interpretation Environment

US still only disaster oriented

Europe creating clean Environment (Milieunet)

Safe haven the pope of Rome installs Solar PV on the roof of the Vatikan, says we are responsible for planet: Polluter=Sinner

I see that very often the same words have different meanings in different cultures (popular environment US: storm chasing) (popular environment EU stop pollution, make solar cleantech to keep the planet alive)

Definiton from my Blog in French surprise: The word "Environnement" was first time used in France 1964 from the US word environment. But the meaning is totally different. In france it means meanwhile protection of the Environment ecology and to act to keep the planet system alive.

My Proposal Future oriented:

US will join environment protection and creating green Jobs with Obama 2009/10 so somehow Amy could we develop to a channel:

Environment:

Disaster (Hurricanes etc.)
Protection (C02 etc.)
Green jobs (resulting cleantech)

Tell me your Ideas, because change is what brings progress, seeing different world opinions coming together to go ahead, social technology what we missed to develop. Amy I think you started this already with your last report California, Schwarzenegger, we had Dunkelberg saying, wait a minute, that's Texas leader with renewable power. So if you would integrate Renewable energy, green jobs the environment channel finds more attention. You did a hard work to get the channel alive Amyjudd, now next step. The social technology we starting with the comment section on NP creates real progress, we should accept that sometimes shocks happen and communication gets on tension, then progress ahead. Happy holidays for Cleantech environment 2009, let's give Obama a chance. solarlife

My selection best Environment article showing 2009/10 integrating politics , renewables, green jobs and a real alive comment section: points in the future to attracts readers EU/US

California pushes to go green, while other states fall behind byamyjudd

amyjudd

at 13:42 on December 28th, 2008

Thanks so much for your ideas here Solarlife; I do have a hurricane channel already and a weather channel, but I like the idea of a Green jobs channel; that's very interesting. I think there may be a real market for that.

I'll see what research I can find on that.

Thanks!