IUCN Media Awards

Reuters Foundation and IUCN (International Union for Conservation of Nature) have launched the 2008 IUCN Media Awards "for Excellence in Environmental Reporting". The web site has full details and application forms.

"All submissions must have been published between 12 September 2006 and 10 June 2008." You have until 15 June 2008 to enter.

An ice breaking competition for science journalists

Here is a Competition for science journalists with a real prize, "a week aboard an Arctic icebreaker". And that includes "transportation from your home country".

In April 2008, you could join "journalists from all over the world for a week aboard the Canadian research icebreaker Amundsen".

The World Federation of Science Journalists—in collaboration with the Canada Foundation for Innovation and the International Polar Year Circumpolar Flaw Lead Project—announces a competition offering science journalists the chance to win one of three week-long trips aboard the Canadian research icebreaker Amundsen. You will fly all the way to Inuvik (Canada), and hop aboard a Twin Otter aircraft to the famous icebreaker, where you will get first hand experience of global warming where it is unfolding the fastest.

The last time I was in Inuvik, a good 20 years ago, it was like the Wild West with snow. But a very interesting church building. That was back when the oil business was booming. And, boy, did the ice need breaking? The oil rigs were miles out to "sea" beneath many feet of ice, which our plane landed on.

The solution solution

It is always interesting to see what crops up in the Cision Media Bulletin. It is where I first discovered that Damian Carrington had defected from New Scientist, where he ran the web team, to take up a similar role at the Financial Times.

It isn't often, though, that the newsletter provokes a chuckle. The latest issue has an item that will appeal to anyone who reads Private Eye and appreciates its "Solutions" column.

Environmental Technology Publications Ltd are due to launch a new title in April 2008 which will be titled Pollution Solutions and covers water and waste water equipment, air clean up, consultancy services, soil remediation and waste handling. The contact for the title is Marcus Pattison the Publisher and he can be contacted on 01727 858840 and info@envirotechpubs.com

As well as raising a smile, it may also offer an outlet for science writers, which is our excuse for passing it on, with all the gory details.

Nominations open for "green book" award

That's an award for books about the environment rather than books printed on recycled paper. The announcement is on Horganism the blog by John Horgan, Director of the Center for Science Writings at Stevens Institute of Technology in Hoboken, New Jersey. Edward O. Wilson, "one of our era’s greatest and most eloquent scientists," received the first Green Book Award for his book The Creation.

It says that "The CSW Green Book Award is an annual prize given to the finest work of science writing that draws attention to issues of environmental responsibility published in the previous year." The entry requirements, or how the thing works, aren't clear. There's an on-line entry form, so there's no harm in plugging your own magnum opus.

tag: environment, awards, science books, books