Everest ice forest melting due to global warming

theoildrum.com -> environment.guardian.co.uk :

One of the world's most spectacular ice formations - the towering serac forest near Mount Everest's base camp - is rapidly shrinking as a result of global warming, Greenpeace said. Before and after photographs released by the environmental group show how the past 40 years of climate change are transforming the Himalayan landscape as ancient glaciers melt and retreat higher up the slopes.

The first photograph, taken in 1968, shows a long valley filled with white seracs, tilting pinnacles of ice as high as 20 metres, that form on Rongbuk glacier on the northern slopes of Everest. In the second photograph, taken this spring, the ice forest has virtually disappeared. The valley is a grey desert of rocks covering the angular surface of the glacier. The remaining seracs are barely visible on the right of the picture, where they have retreated far up the slopes of Mount Guangming.

The implications are enormous. The plateau is referred to as the world's third pole because it contains the biggest fields of ice outside of the Arctic and Antarctic. Its glaciers are the source of Asia's biggest rivers - Yangtze, Yellow, Indus and Ganges - which provide water for more than a quarter of the planet's population. Last month, a report by the UN's Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change forecast that if current trends continue, 80% of Himalayan glaciers will be gone in 30 years.

(2007-06-15 13:04:47 SGT) [Env] Permalink

Motorola says to cut 4000 more jobs

news.yahoo.com :

Motorola, the world's second-biggest mobile phone maker, said it expects to cut an additional 4,000 jobs, bringing the total to 7,500 this year, as it works to reduce costs to return to profit. Motorola posted a first-quarter loss on weak phone sales. The latest cuts, which will be made by the end of the year, bring the total reductions to more than 11% of Motorola's work force of 66,000 at the end of 2006.

The company, which expects to complete its previously announced 3,500 job cuts by June 30, forecast $600 million in annual cost savings in 2008 as a result of the additional job cuts, other spending controls and site rationalization. Motorola, which has been losing market share to rivals such as market leader Nokia due to a lack of advanced phones and tough price competition, said in April that it would announce additional cost-cutting plans by June.

Dell to lay off 8800 (10%) of workforce

news.com.com :

Dell released preliminary earnings Thursday [31 May 2007] showing positive signs in its servers unit, but announced it would lay off 10% of its workforce over the coming year. With a current worldwide workforce of 88,000, approximately 8,800 employees will be let go over the next year as Dell tries to trim costs.

Dell has been attempting to turn itself around in the last year after losing its lead as the world's largest PC maker to Hewlett-Packard in 2006. It's seen heavy turnover in leadership, including the return of founder Michael Dell as chief executive, replacing Kevin Rollins.

Dell is also in the middle of an SEC investigation into its accounting practices. In its earnings announcement, Dell said it has incurred $46 million in costs related to the federal probe. The investigation is ongoing, preventing the company from filing anything more than preliminary reports for the previous three fiscal quarters.

IBM cutting another 1500 positions

news.yahoo.com :

IBM Corp. laid off 1,570 people Wednesday [30 May 2007], primarily from an ongoing overhaul of operations in its giant technology services unit. IBM carried out a similar level of job cuts at the beginning of the month, for a total of 3,023 in this quarter and 3,720 for the year, according to IBM spokesman Edward Barbini. That amounts to roughly 1% of the company, which employed 355,000 people at the beginning of the year.

Services is IBM's biggest division by revenue, but the advent of lower-cost competition overseas has forced IBM to work harder to improve the unit's profit margins. IBM executives say they expect no more layoffs this quarter. But other shifts like this - IBM calls it "rebalancing" - figure to follow from time to time. That's because IBM's services overhaul not only involves cheaper labor - IBM's work force in India rose from 9,000 in 2003 to 52,000 last year - but also a quest to use less labor. That means rethinking and sometimes automating the ways that services contracts are carried out.