Fault line discovered under New Zealand capital

The fault, referred to informally as the Aotea Fault, ran in a northeasterly direction for about 2 km under the harbor, and scientists said Wednesday it had yet to be identified on land.

They believed at least two significant earthquakes had occurred on the fault in the last 10,000 years.

The Aotea Fault, capable of moderate to large quakes in the order of magnitude 6.3 to 7.1, was part of a series of several dozen geological faults in the Wellington region, according to the government's Institute of Geological and Nuclear Sciences (GNS Science).


The fault did not appreciably increase the overall ground- shaking hazard in the New Zealand capital, GNS scientist Russ Van Dissen said in a statement.

"Any ground-shaking that this fault could produce is already considered in Wellington's seismic hazard calculations. So it is already accounted for in the building code," he said.

The Insurance Council of New Zealand issued a statement saying the discovery was unlikely to have any impact on insurance premiums for homeowners and businesses.
Source:Xinhua -  globaltimes.cn
8/10/14

Climate change threatening New Zealand's glacier tourism industry

Global climate change might put an end to tourist trails over New Zealand's iconic South Island glaciers, a geography researcher warned Friday.

The multimillion-dollar glacier tourism industry was under threat with the two main glaciers, Fox and Franz Josef, in rapid retreat, said University of Canterbury researcher Dr Heather Purdie.

"The current glacial retreat is making access increasingly difficult for guided walks at Fox and Franz Josef glaciers but, simultaneously, an enlarging glacial lake at Tasman Glacier is increasing tourism opportunities," Purdie said in a statement.

Steepening ice slopes, increased debris cover and an increase in rock fall hazards were some of the challenges glacier tourism operators faced.

"The termini of the Fox and Franz Josef glaciers are drawing increasingly close to their previous minimum which, coupled with thinning, indicates that retreat will continue for the near future, " said Purdie.

While helicopters and longer tracks up glacier valleys could ensure continued access, these would be financially and environmentally costly, she said.

Glacier tourism had been a part of the New Zealand experience for a century, but access and viewing points would become increasingly unsatisfactory as glaciers retreated into steeper, more inaccessible terrain.

• Scientists, policy makers and tour operators needed to work together, sharing knowledge, ideas and experience, to find a balance between utilization, safety and conservation, she said.

The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change noted that predicted glacier shrinkage and retreat would reduce visitor numbers in towns like Fox Glacier and Franz Josef, but tourism on New Zealand glaciers was as busy as ever, with up to 400 tourists a day last summer. 
[globaltimes.cn]
9/5/14

New EU support to renewable energy and fighting climate change in the Pacific

European Commission, Press release, Brussels, 22 April 2014:

European Commissioner for Development, Andris Piebalgs, and New Zealand Foreign Minister, Murray McCully, will undertake a joint mission to the Pacific on 23-27 April to further strengthen development cooperation in that region. The visit will focus above all on renewable energy and energy efficiency projects, several of them co-financed by New Zealand and the EU in Samoa, Tuvalu, Kiribati (including Christmas Island) and the Cook Islands. Commissioner Piebalgs will also travel to Papua New Guinea from 28 – 30 April to discuss development challenges with members of the government and will launch two projects worth almost €60 million.

The Pacific islands are victims of the adverse effects of climate change where rising sea levels have an impact upon every aspect of citizens' lives and hamper economic development. The difficulties they face are exacerbated by extremely high fossil fuel costs due to their isolated location and by the lack of access to electricity in outer islands.

Ahead of the trip, European Commissioner for Development, Andris Piebalgs, said: "Renewable energy is something that I am strongly committed to. Energy is crucial for education and healthcare, for growth, tourism and even for the supply of water. In short, renewable energy is a country’s main route towards growth and development.”

New Zealand Foreign Minister Murray McCully said: “New Zealand places great value on our partnership with the EU in the Pacific. Converting the region to renewable energy is critical and it is only happening at such a rapid pace because of our close cooperation with EU.”

Examples of Programmes launched or visited:

• Solar panels to provide renewable electricity in three of Tuvalu's outer islands, which will make reliable clean electricity available for the first time. (€2.5 million)

• The construction of six photovoltaic power plants in the region, including the energy-dependant Cook Islands, co-financed with the Asian Development Bank,

• In Kiribati, a project will provide people with access to an environmentally-safe source of construction material, therefore protecting the vulnerable shores from perturbation caused by aggregate mining (€5.2 million).

• A Health Laboratory in Kiribati will be dedicated to monitoring and responding to environmental diseases, such as vector-borne diseases (vectors are small organisms such as mosquitoes, bugs and freshwater snails that can transmit disease from one person to another). (€500,000)

Development cooperation with Papua New Guinea

The high level visit will also include Papua New Guinea. Despite its fast-growing economy and richness in natural resources and biodiversity, the country is still facing great challenges. Around 80-85% of its population still depends on subsistence agriculture and lives in rural areas, and it is unlikely that any of the Millennium Development Goals will be achieved by 2015.

However, the change of government in 2012 came up with a number of laudable initiatives in health, education, infrastructure development and anti-corruption. During this visit, Commissioner Piebalgs will meet the country authorities and highlight that the EU stands ready to keep up the momentum initiated then.

Two new projects on human resources development (€26 million) and on rural economic development (over €32 million) will also be signed. The first one will focus on providing technical and vocational education to help the country’s labour markets absorb a growing young population and provide them with a skilled workforce adapted to the national needs. The second project will aim to accelerate income generation through infrastructure-related activities such as rural road rehabilitation and maintenance, or by increasing access to financial services for agricultural value chain financing.

Energy Partnership

These projects are the first fruits of the EU-NZ Energy Partnership for the Pacific, an outcome of the Pacific Energy Summit, held in Auckland in March 2013. Its aim was to move Pacific nations closer to achieving 50% of their electricity from renewable means. Around €400 million were secured for Pacific energy projects.

Providing clean and efficient modern energy, is an important step on the Pacific's way to sustainable development. Currently, the Pacific region meets around 80% of its energy needs from imported fossil fuels. This considerably affects health, education and trade opportunities in the region. The Partnership helps to reduce the Pacific's dependence on fossil fuels, thus generating savings.

For the European Union, the Energy Partnership for the Pacific is a concrete proof of its commitment to the UN's Sustainable Energy for All (SE4ALL). Through this initiative, the EU has committed to help developing countries provide 500 million people with access to sustainable energy services by 2030. Commissioner Piebalgs is a member of the SE4ALL Advisory Board.

Background

The Pacific Island Countries and Territories have a total population of 10 million people, scattered across thousands of islands in the Pacific. These islands are very isolated developing countries which have already suffered from regular natural disasters, limited access to infrastructures and high dependence on natural resources. In the worst case scenario, some islands could disappear due to rising sea levels (in Kiribati and Tuvalu, a rise of sea level of merely 60cm will render the majority of these islands inhabitable) and increasing erosion occurring from intense storms. Moreover 80% of the Small Island States' population live in coastal areas which make them particularly prone to changes in the sea level or weather conditions.

[europa.eu]

22/4/14

H Νέα Ζηλανδία υποδέχθηκε το 2014. Ενα σόου με πυροτεχνήματα καλωσόρισε το νέο έτος./Auckland, New Zealand Rings in 2014 [COMPLETE VIDEO]

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Όκλαντ 

Το 2014 υποδέχθηκε η Νέα Ζηλανδία. Στο Όκλαντ ευχές για τη νέα χρονιά και ένα σόου με πυροτεχνήματα καλωσόρισαν το νέο έτος.

Auckland, New Zealand Rings in 2014

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2. Dubai: The annual Burj Khalifa fireworks have quickly earned their place in the league of the world's most popular New Year's Eve celebrations.

Maori monument unveiled in snow-stricken Antarctica (VIDEO, PHOTOS RT)

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Despite being over 2,000 miles from New Zealand’s capital Wellington, the country has decided to unveil a bizarrely placed Maori statue in the depths of Antarctica, celebrating with a present of whisky from a 100-year-old frozen hoard.
Prime Minister John Key and Ngai Tahu tribal leader Sir Mark Solomon both unveiled the Maori artifact as part of celebrations in New Zealand surrounding the 56th anniversary of Antarctic research facility Scott Base.

A rare, century-old bottle of whisky from the lost stash of explorer Ernest Henry Shackleton was also presented as a gift amid the festivities. However, it remained unopened.
The statue, engraved from two west-coast totara  trees, was created by members of the ancient Ngai Tahu tribe, who were thought to have migrated from New Zealand's North Island to the South Island prior to the arrival of European settlers, which resulted in their collective impoverishment.
The sculpture was christened ‘The Navigator of the Heavens’ amid jokes that the native New Zealanders were not laying claim to a chunk of the polar region.

Screenshot from AP video

The leader of the tribe said that the totem represents all Maori and demonstrates their vital place at the heart of New Zealand, and is “about the Maori culture of New Zealand.”
Antarctic-New Zealand symbols are scattered across the carving, such as ocean currents, and whales that navigated the ocean between the two shores. The totara tree wood is thought to be resilient to Antarctica’s difficult climate, despite having already developed some cracks.
Having taken half a year to create, it took a further two weeks to effectively secure the monument in place, facing extreme weather conditions and temperatures that dropped as low as -10⁰C.
The unveiling was accompanied by a similar reveal of two wooden tukutuku (lattice) panels, which the Scott Base staff helped create.  One depicted Maori ancestors alongside their fellow New Zealanders who had died in Antarctica, including those from the 1979 Mount Erebus plane crash. The other honored ongoing scientific investigations in the region.

Screenshot from AP video

The statue was erected next to the New Zealand flagpole that Sir Edmund Hillary put up in 1957 to mark the opening of the base.
Scott Base is named after British Captain Robert Falcon Scott, who led two expeditions to Antarctica in the first 15 years of the 20th century. He and his crew died on the way back from their final journey, after being beaten to the South Pole in January 1912 by a Norwegian expedition unit led by Roald Amundsen.
Celebrations of the facility’s momentous anniversary continued when John Key presented the Antarctic Heritage Trust with a century-old bottle of whisky. The bottle was part of Ernest Henry Shackleton’s 1909 reserve, who had to abandon them on a separate exploration of Antarctica. It was part of a crate discovered under two feet of polar ice beneath Shackleton’s hut in 2007, found to be in perfect condition.

Screenshot from AP video
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.rt.com
20/1/13