Farmers' foe: Smog damage to crops costs billions

[deadparrot]

ISPRA, Italy (AFP) - The internal combustion engine contributes massively to global warming, kills around 1.2 million people a year in road accidents and, scientists now warn, is costing billions of dollars in crop damage each year.

The villain is a molecule of oxygen called ozone.

Way up in the stratosphere, the wafer-thin ozone layer exists naturally as a protector of life, filtering out ultra-violet sunlight that would otherwise slice and corrupt human DNA.

At ground level, though, ozone can be dangerous. Formed by a reaction between nitrogen oxides and volatile organic compounds emitted by road traffic, ozone smog can be a life-shortening problem for people with bad respiratory problems.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/afp/environmentpollution

[Vinca]

1. And that's not all.

There's a lack of bees in my garden this year. No bees, no veggies. A bad environment kills everything eventually.

[acmejack]

2. Vampire mites

The 'vampire mite,' is wasting honeybees. Here is a great article from Common Dreams about it. I first heard of the threat from who else? Thom Hartmann!

http://www.commondreams.org/cgi-bin/print.cgi?file=/headlines05/0328-01.htm