Author: Reporter

Study finds unprecedented global warming could cause Himalayan glaciers to lose 80% of their volume

Glaciers are melting at unprecedented rates across the Hindu Kush Himalayan mountain ranges and could lose up to 80% of their current volume this century if greenhouse gas emissions are not sharply reduced, according to a new report. The report in June from Kathmandu-based International Centre for Integrated Mountain Development warned that flash floods and avalanches would grow more likely in coming years, and that the availability of fresh water would be affected for nearly 2 billion people who live downstream of 12 rivers that originate in the mountains. Ice and snow in the Hindu Kush Himalayan ranges is...

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First U.S. deep water port in Arctic hosts cruise ships after climate ice melt opens shipping lanes

The cruise ship with about 1,000 passengers anchored off Nome, too big to squeeze into into the tundra city’s tiny port. Its well-heeled tourists had to shimmy into small boats for another ride to shore. It was 2016, and at the time, the cruise ship Serenity was the largest vessel ever to sail through the Northwest Passage. But as the Arctic sea ice relents under the pressures of global warming and opens shipping lanes across the top of the world, more tourists are venturing to Nome — a northwest Alaska destination known better for the Iditarod Trail Sled Dog...

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America’s version of Venice: Study documents risks to New York City from both sinking and rising oceans

If rising oceans are not worry enough, add this to the risks New York City faces: The metropolis is slowly sinking under the weight of its skyscrapers, homes, asphalt, and humanity itself. New research estimates the city’s landmass is sinking at an average rate of 1 to 2 millimeters per year, something referred to as “subsidence.” That natural process happens everywhere as ground is compressed, but the study published in May by the journal Earth’s Future sought to estimate how the massive weight of the city itself is hurrying things along. More than 1 million buildings are spread across...

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Rents on the Rise: Eviction filings in some cities are 50% higher than they were pre-pandemic

Entering court using a walker, a doctor’s note clutched in his hand, 70-year-old Dana Williams, who suffers serious heart problems, hypertension and asthma, pleaded to delay eviction from his two-bedroom apartment in Atlanta. Although sympathetic, the judge said state law required him to evict Williams and his 25-year-old daughter De’mai Williams in April because they owed $8,348 in unpaid rent and fees on their $940-a-month apartment. They have been living in limbo ever since. They moved into a dilapidated Atlanta hotel room with water dripping through the bathroom ceiling, broken furniture and no refrigerator or microwave. But at $275-a-week,...

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Value Decrease: Slowdown in housing sees first annual drop in U.S. homeowner equity since 2012

For the first time in more than a decade, the average U.S. homeowner with a mortgage has less home equity than they did a year earlier. Among the roughly 63% of U.S. homes with a mortgage, average homeowner equity per borrower was $274,070 in the first quarter, down 1.9% from the same quarter last year, according to real estate data tracker CoreLogic. The last time average homeowner equity fell year-over-year was in the first quarter of 2012, when the housing market was still regaining its footing after the mortgage meltdown and ensuing foreclosure crisis that helped trigger the Great...

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Economic Stability: How the “Dollarization” of North Korea has become a potential threat to Kim’s rule

Before fleeing North Korea in 2014, Jeon Jae-hyun kept U.S. dollars as a store of value and used Chinese yuan to make everyday purchases at markets, restaurants, and other places. He used the domestic currency, the won, only occasionally. “There were not many places to use the won, and we actually had little faith in our currency,” Jeon said during a recent interview in Seoul. “Even the quality of North Korean bills was awful as they often ripped when we put them in our pockets.” North Korea has tolerated the widespread use of more stable foreign currencies like U.S....

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