Environmental journalists worldwide can now use a 3D-environmental Web site launched by the UN Environment Programme (UNEP) and Google Earth to monitor environmental hotspots and the impact of climate change on the planet, and highlight this information in their stories.

The site allows users to look closely at more than 200 sites around the world, including the glaciers of Greenland and Alaska, the once biodiversity-rich forests in Madagascar and the Amazon forests.

“If we are to change the hearts and minds of the global public we need to surprise, to excite and occasionally perhaps to shock. These images, allied to modern computer technology, do all three,” stated Achim Steiner, UN under-secretary general and UNEP executive director, in a press release made available to IJNet.

To access the map, visit http://na.unep.net/digital_atlas2/google.php. For further information, visit http://tinyurl.com/42r32b.