Word: desert
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...carbon, the very carbon that heats up the planet when it's released into the atmosphere. Brazil now ranks fourth in the world in carbon emissions, and most of its emissions come from deforestation. Carter is not a man who gets easily spooked--he led a reconnaissance unit in Desert Storm, and I watched him grab a small anaconda with his bare hands in Brazil--but he can sound downright panicky about the future of the forest. "You can't protect it. There's too much money to be made tearing it down," he says. "Out here on the frontier...
...display in Brazil, where a Rhode Island--size chunk of the Amazon was deforested in the second half of 2007 and even more was degraded by fire. Some scientists believe fires are now altering the local microclimate and could eventually reduce the Amazon to a savanna or even a desert. "It's approaching a tipping point," says ecologist Daniel Nepstad of the Woods Hole Research Center...
...Qaeda have also helped Shi'ites feel more secure - and less dependent on the Mahdi Army's protection. He's betting, too, that he has enough support in parliament to risk Sadr's wrath, counting on Kurdish parties to keep his government afloat in the event Sadr's loyalists desert the coalition. The Prime Minister has also been careful to give himself some political wiggle room. His spokesman has said the operation in Basra is not directed at the Mahdi Army, but against unspecified "armed gangs." This allows Maliki to end the offensive at any time, declare victory against...
...total. (Each state draws a fixed amount according to a deal hammered out in 1922, when the river was at an unusually high level.) Pat Mulroy, the powerful head of the snwa, says Las Vegas has worked hard to conserve water, paying residents to replace thirsty lawns with desert-appropriate landscaping. The city's overall water use has dropped since 2002, even as population and visitor numbers have continued to rise, and Mulroy thinks Las Vegas still has room--and water--to develop smartly. "It's not whether you grow but how you grow," she says...
...give. Still, while Lake Mead has shrunk to just 52% of capacity, the immense reservoir still contains an incredible 9 trillion gal. (35 trillion cu L) of water. But the dry sky above and the rock all around reinforce the inescapable fact that this land was a desert, is a desert and always will be a desert. When the American explorer J.C. Ives visited the present location of the Hoover Dam in 1857, he declared the land "worthless," adding, "There is nothing there to do but leave." Today's residents are hoping there's another choice...