Mount Everest: Impacts of tourism

"The committee says it brought back 25 tonnes of rubbish from Everest last spring – including 12,000kg of paper and plastic and 11,250kg of human waste."

Useful sources for Edexcel A2 Unit 4 Consuming the Rural Landscape
The Mission to clean up Mount Everest The Guardian
Calls for long term Everest waste management plan - starting with toilets The Guardian

Another mobile phone fact!

Following my earlier post about the changes in mobile phone technology, here's a video with a warning about charging your mobile phones overnight...



Thanks to Alan Parkinson.

GIS Mission: Wind Power Location

For Miss Blackmore's year 8 class...

You were set a homework task to have a go at the GIS zone mission on wind power location in preparation for the Sustainability assessment. I will be asking you three questions about the mission that you will only know the answer to if you have completed the task. Once you finish the wind power mission, why not try some of the others!!

Click here to take you straight to the GIS Missions.

Michael Palin: Around the World in 20 Years

Last night this great documentary from Michael Palin was on BBC1. It is based on his hit documentary series Around the World in 80 Days. He revisits place he went in 1988 and embarks on a new voyage to find people that he met 20 years ago. Catch it on iplayer now!!


The first part is perfect for those of you in Year 7 and Year 9 who will be larning about Fantastic Places this term! Click on the image above to take you to the documentary on BBC iplayer.

Solving global warming

Whilst searching for images on Flickr, I found this great mind map image of ways to solve global warming. Thought it was well worth a post on here...

Click on the image to see the full size version at Flickr. Found using Creative Commons License.
There is another mind map just on global warming and its causes/evidence/solutions here.

The Day After Tomorrow

8x2 have finished their assessment one week before the next rotation, so we are wrapping up the Sustainability unit by looking at the depiction of climate change and the potential effects in the film 'The Day After Tomorrow'. We are ultimately deciding whether it is scientific truth, environmental pressure, or just a disaster movie. Here's the YouTube trailer for the film...



We discussed whether the hailstorm scene in Tokyo is realistic or not. Check out this YouTube video...


Now what do you think?

My sustainable house

Two excellent simulations about sustainable housing. Click on the images to take you to the sites!

Climate change in our World: A new vision of climate change through Google Earth

Explore and learn about the impacts of climate change and find out how you can make a difference with Climate Change in our World. The Met Office Hadley Centre, British Antarctic Survey and UK Government have harnessed Google Earth technology to present you with an interactive animation showing how climate change and global temperature rises could affect our world over the next 100 years.

When you click on the Met Office or DFID icons, a boxes appear providing various information on how people in that place are coping with the effects of climate change.

Find the KML file that will create the layer for Google Earth here. (Make sure you have Google Earth installed on your computer!). This video demonstrates how to use layer.

Smart choices for the carbon conscious...

Brought to you by the BBC

Want to know what actions can have the biggest impact on your carbon emissions? Bloom helps you choose actions tailored to your home and lifestyle, then lets you compare them by how much CO2 they save, how cheap they are or how easy other Bloomers have found them.

Experts at the BBC have studied over 50 things you can do to tackle climate change (with many more to follow soon). Each action is represented by a seed. Their 'gardener' will ask questions to identify which ones suit you best. When you find an action you plan to do, or one you've already done, plant the seed and watch it bloom. Your collection of Blooms shows the progress you've made!

Click on the image to go to their site...perhaps you can could have a go as a household?

Youtube videos on climate change

Year 8 have been studying Sustainability this term. As part of the unit, we looked at various youtube videos connected to climate change.

Here's the most recent Act on CO2 advert...

Here's a couple of your favourites