The Climate Change Vulnerability Index, published by UK-based risk analysis and mapping company Maplecroft, was released last week, examining the climate risks and adaptive capacity of 193 nations. A total of 30 countries were classified as being at "extreme risk," with Haiti, Bangladesh, Sierra Leone, Zimbabwe and Madagascar making up the top five most in peril, while India, Pakistan, Indonesia and Thailand all ranked in the top 30. (ENS, Oct. 28; CNN, Oct. 26; Maplecroft, Oct. 21)

Under the slogan "From Tahrir Square to Times Square," the Occupy Wall Street movement reports demonstrations in over 1,500 cities across the globe Oct. 15, including over 100 US cities from coast to coast. In New York, 74 were arrested as police attempted to block thousands of marchers behind barricades in the Times Square area, where the protesters had marched from the Financial District. In the evening, hundreds of protesters converged on Washington Square Park in Greenwich Village, staying until police arrested 14 for violating the park's curfew after midnight. Another 24 were arrested after they entered a nearby Citibank, with the aim of closing their accounts en masse. Management said they called police after the protesters did not respond to a request to leave. (Fox News, Oct. 14; Daily News, New York Post, WSJ, Oct. 15)

Earth's protective ozone layer above the Arctic was pierced by a hole of unprecedented size last winter and spring caused by a long cold period in the stratosphere, according to new research led by scientists at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena and published Oct. 3 in the journal Nature. The hole covered 772,204 square miles (two million square kilometers)—about the size of Mexico—and allowed high levels of harmful ultraviolet radiation to strike northern Canada, Europe and Russia this spring, the report finds. The stratospheric ozone layer, extending from about 10 to 20 miles (15 to 35 kilometers) above the surface, protects life on Earth from the Sun's ultraviolet rays. Intense cold in the upper atmosphere of the Arctic last winter activated ozone-depleting chemicals and produced the first significant ozone hole ever recorded over the high northern regions.

A nuclear power plant that was shut down after an earthquake struck central Virginia Aug. 23 had seismographs removed in the 1990s to save money. Officials said that the North Anna Power Station, which has two reactors, lost offsite power and switched to diesel generators to maintain cooling operations after the 5.9 quake. The North Anna plant, which was near the epicenter of the quake, is reportedly located on a fault line. The US Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) rates the plant as the seventh most likely to receive core damage from a quake, although it says the odds are very low. According to the Virginia Department of Mines, Minerals and Energy (DMME), the Virginia Tech Seismological Observatory (VTSO) removed all seismographs from around the plant in the 1990s due to budget cuts. In February, Dominion Virginia Power announced plans to add a third reactor at the plant. (Raw Story, Aug. 23)

A Shell Oil spokesman in Aberdeen, Scotland, assured that "everything" possible is being done to contain a massive oil spill from a North Sea pipeline. The leak began Aug. 10 on the pipeline system that serves the Gannet Alpha platform in British waters. But UK authorities say that Shell did not report the leak for two days, and by then more than 200 tons of oil had entered the sea. Said company spokesman Glen Cayley: "This is a significant spill in the context of annual amounts of oil spilled in the North Sea. We care about the environment and we regret that the spill happened. We have taken it very seriously and responded promptly to it." However, officials acknowledged that the pipeline is still believed to contain up to 660 tons of oil.

The New Orleans Times-Picayune reports Aug. 19 that BP has denied charges that oil is again leaking from the capped Macondo well that blew out last year, destroying the Deepwater Horizon platform and fouling large stretches of the Gulf of Mexico. Company spokesman Daren Beaudo refuted claims that BP has hired vessels to contain a new "oil sheen" near the site of last year's disaster. The reports fist emerged on the blog of New Orleans lawyer Stuart Smith, who asserted that BP had hired 40 boats to clean a new spill. It should be noted that BP's denial contained some equivocation. From the closing paragraphs of the Times-Picayune story:

Two developments in the news this week that advance the privatization of life and portend the bifurcation of humanity into sub-humans and uber-humans. First, the US Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit ruled in a case brought by the ACLU and others that the company Myriad Genetics is entitled to patents it has claimed for two natural human gene mutations, known as BRCA1 and BRCA2, which are associated with hereditary breast and ovarian cancer. (PHG Foundation, Aug. 5; GEN, July 29) The idea is ostensibly finding ways to fight cancer, but it beats us why a private company should have the right to patent something created by nature—much less a part of the human genetic code! Days earlier, the Daily Mail revealed that scientists in the UK "have created more than 150 human-animal hybrid embryos," which has left critics "warning of a 'Planet of the Apes' scenario."

We sure hope not, but this isn't looking too good. From AP, June 26:

BROWNVILLE, Neb. — A berm holding the flooded Missouri River back from a Nebraska nuclear power station collapsed early Sunday, but federal regulators said they were monitoring the situation and there was no danger.