This week:

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  • Dr. Lawrence Packer, a Professor of Biology at York University and an expert on Canadian bees, speaks with host Jordan Poppenk about bee myths, the good things bees do for an ecosystem and the collapse in bee populations that was widely reported last year.
  • Jordan Poppenk interviews Senior Environment Canada Climatologist David Phillips about the function of weather trivia, his perspectives on global warming and the financial hardships endured at Environment Canada (originally broadcast on November 2, 2007).

The headlines in brief:

  • Newly released figures from Environment Canada show that Canada’s greenhouse-gas emissions dropped marginally in 2006;
  • Alberta has released a draft land-use policy, although the draft is non-committal on tarsands management;
  • The Western Climate Initiative is set to restrict Albertan oil exports;
  • PEI has canceled an alternative energy program;
  • New federal guidelines will require products labelled “made in canada” to contain Canadian ingredients unless otherwise specified;
  • A report suggests that nanomaterials in food and clothing are more dangerous than suspected;
  • Canadian and U.S. governments have reached agreement over a new Pacific Salmon treaty intended to protect dwindling salmon stocks;
  • NDP and Bloq Quebeqois party leaders have attacked the notion of a carbon tax;
  • Prime Minister Stephen Harper says that he won’t be cutting back federal taxes on gasoline to compensate for high gas prices;
  • Los Angeles plans to cleanse sewage water to increase drinking supplies;
  • Iceland has announced it will resume commercial whaling;
  • The WWF reports that world biodiversity has decreased by nearly a third over the last 35 years.

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