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News Archive 2008 back to archive main page |
Methane gas oozing up from Siberian seabed: Swedish researcher - PhysOrg ![[essential]](../images/redDot.gif) ![[canaries]](../images/canary.gif) Methane, a potent greenhouse gas, is leaking from the permafrost under the Siberian seabed, a researcher on an international expedition in the region told Swedish daily Dagens Nyheter on Saturday. | 31st August 2008 |
Military Analyst Warns of Coming 'Climate Wars' Unless Global Warming is Reversed - ENN ![[food]](../images/food.gif) The prospect of global wars driven by climate change is not something often discussed publicly by our political leaders. But according to one of America's top military analysts, governments in the US and UK are already being briefed by their own military strategists about how to prepare for a world of mass famine, floods of refugees and even nuclear conflicts over resources. In Climate Wars, even the most hopeful scenarios about the impact of climate change have hundreds of millions of people dying of starvation, mass displacement of people and conflict between countries competing for basic resources like water. "India and Pakistan are both nuclear-armed countries. All of the agriculture in Pakistan and all of the agriculture in northern India depend on glacier-fed rivers that come off the Himalayas from the Tibetan plateau. Those glaciers are melting," Dr Dyer said. The real insight into the US study is that the more severe climate change scenario is the one that analysts think is the more likely one. "And it's not just the analysts. I spent the past year doing a very high-speed self-education job on climate change but I think I probably talked to most of the senior people in the field in a dozen countries," Dr Dyer said. "They're scared, they're really frightened. Things are moving far faster than their models predicted." | 31st August 2008 |
| The Myth of the Tragedy of the Commons - Monthly Review Will shared resources always be misused and overused? Is community ownership of land, forests, and fisheries a guaranteed road to ecological disaster? Is privatization the only way to protect the environment and end Third World poverty? Most economists and development planners will answer "yes" -- and for proof they will point to the most influential article ever written on those important questions. Since its publication in Science in December 1968, "The Tragedy of the Commons" has been anthologized in at least 111 books, making it one of the most-reprinted articles ever to appear in any scientific journal. It is also one of the most-quoted: a recent Google search found "about 302,000" results for the phrase "tragedy of the commons." Like most sacred texts, "The Tragedy of the Commons" is more often cited than read. As we will see, although its title sounds authoritative and scientific, it fell far short of science. | 31st August 2008 |
| Scientists close in on mass killer of life on Earth - Miami Herald It was the greatest mass murder of all time - poison everywhere, billions slain - but the killer or killers have never been positively identified. "The end-Permian catastrophe is an extreme version of the consequences of global warming, said Lee Kump, a geoscientist at The Pennsylvania State University. "It reminds us that there are unexpected consequences of CO2 buildup, and these can be quite dire, indeed." While the evidence points to natural processes on Earth as the culprits in the P-T mass extinction, scientists warn that humans may now be contributing to a repeat. "In the late Permian, Earth itself was the villain, but today we've stepped in as the villain." | 31st August 2008 |
| Amazon deforestation on the rise - PhysOrg (AP) -- Amazon deforestation jumped 69 percent in the past 12 months - the first such increase in three years - as rising demand for soy and cattle pushes farmers and ranchers to raze trees, officials said Saturday. | 31st August 2008 |
| For the first time in human history, the North Pole can be circumnavigated - The Independent Open water now stretches all the way round the Arctic, making it possible for the first time in human history to circumnavigate the North Pole, The Independent on Sunday can reveal. New satellite images, taken only two days ago, show that melting ice last week opened up both the fabled North-west and North-east passages, in the most important geographical landmark to date to signal the unexpectedly rapid progress of global warming. See also: North Pole kayak trip to highlight global warming - BBC | 31st August 2008 |
| Gustav grows back into hurricane - Reuters GEORGE TOWN (Reuters) - Gustav strengthened back into a hurricane in the warm Caribbean on Friday as it left flooded Jamaica and churned toward the Cayman Islands, headed for the Gulf of Mexico on the third anniversary of Hurricane Katrina's deadly strike on New Orleans. See also: The storm of the century - so far - Grist Magazine | 31st August 2008 |
| Sea-Ice Melt Imperils Walruses, and Economy Based on Them - Washington Post Walrus need to rest on sea ice no more than 400 feet above the ocean floor so they can dive down to eat shellfish and plants. But sea ice is retreating so far north that the waters are too deep for walrus to feed. This forces them to squeeze onto land, and last summer about 4,000 young walruses were trampled to death by males in the crowded conditions. | 31st August 2008 |
| 'Big Dry' turns farms into deserts - BBC There are puddles of water but they are brown-tinged and unwelcoming. The cows will not drink it. So high is the salt content that it stings and burns their mouths. "This area is on the very brink of environmental collapse". | 31st August 2008 |
Money is no object in battle to save planet - The Northern News ![[hopeful]](../images/greenDot.gif) A MAJOR survey of Australians' views on climate change has found an overwhelming majority think it is happening and they're prepared to pay to address it. The study by University of Technology Sydney found Australians wanted to see cuts in the nation's greenhouse gas emissions irrespective of the actions of other countries. Researchers quizzed 768 people, who were chosen randomly but with a method to ensure the sample was reflective of the Australian population. The key findings include that 83.7 per cent believed global warming was occurring and, of those, 84.9 per cent said Australia should proceed with an emissions trading scheme (ETS) regardless of the international response. | 31st August 2008 |
 Ted Rall: Cartoon - Yahoo"When I'm President, we're going to drill for oil on other planets" | 31st August 2008 |
 Tom Toles: Cartoon - Yahoo"Gas: Actually the price hasn't come down." | 31st August 2008 |
| A Hard Habit to Break, Even With Gas at $10 a Gallon - New York Times Transportation experts say that many Europeans, out of necessity, habit or love, have proved surprisingly willing to bear the extra cost of driving. "It hasn't changed my driving at all - not a bit - I just have to work harder..." | 31st August 2008 |
| Palin denies climate change realities on first day as McCain's running mate What are the ramifications of a US Vice President that is willing to shrug off the scientific realities of global warming? Guess we'll find out if John McCain takes the White House. In an interview with Newsmax today, McCain's vice-presidential running mate Sarah Palin stated that: "A changing environment will affect Alaska more than any other state, because of our location. I'm not one though who would attribute it to being man-made. " I guess Palin spends her time reviewing climate science as reported on Newsmax and other media outlets (read: Fox News) bent on ignoring and confusing the warnings from top scientists at the nation's most prestigious scientific academies, like NASA and the National Academy of Science. See also: Champion For Big Oil - Think Progress | 31st August 2008 |
| Our perceptual filters shape the world - CNews ...we learn to see the world through perceptual lenses formed by heredity, upbringing, personal experiences, religion, socio-economic differences, and so on. Even though we detect our surroundings in the same way through eyes, ears, nose, skin, and tongue, our brains actively filter that incoming information so that it “makes sense” according to our individual values and beliefs. This creates huge dissonance between fossil-fuel executives, environmentalists, and politicians when we discuss an issue like climate change. | 29th August 2008 |
| A Shift in the Debate Over Global Warming - New York Times Emissions caps are not enough, say advocates of radically new technologies. | 29th August 2008 |
| 'Seven years to climate midnight' - Gristmill The uber-centrist Brookings Institution joins the climate | 29th August 2008 |
| Biofuels 200 times more expensive than forest conservation for global warming mitigation - Mongabay.com The British government should end subsidies for biofuels and instead use the funds to slow destruction of rainforests and tropical peatlands argues a new report issued by a U.K.-based think tank. The study, titled "The Root of the Matter" and published by Policy Exchange, says that "avoided deforestation" would be a more cost-effective way to address climate change, since land use change generates more emissions than the entire global transport sector and offers ancillary benefits including important ecosystem services. | 29th August 2008 |
| Europeans Back Tough Car Emission Targets - Poll - Planet Ark BRUSSELS - A majority of Europeans back planned legislation to enforce big cuts in carbon dioxide emissions from new cars, a public opinion poll in the European Union's five biggest countries showed on Thursday. | 29th August 2008 |
| Arctic ice 'is at tipping point' - BBC News The area covered by sea ice in the Arctic is now the second smallest on record, US scientists say. See also: Now you see it, now you don't - nearly as much - Christian Science Monitor | 29th August 2008 |
| As wildfires spread, so does the red ink - The Christian Science Monitor Faced with hundreds of big, hard-to-control blazes, California is struggling with what could be its most expensive wildfire season ever, burning through $285 million in the last six weeks alone and up to $13 million a day. | 29th August 2008 |
| Extreme outlook - Nature Blistering heat waves will become increasingly common sooner than feared, suggests new research. Some of the most serious consequences of climate change, including fatalities, result from extreme events, yet they have received relatively little attention. | 29th August 2008 |
| Hansen's still got it - Gristmill "After all, just 20 years ago scientists were worried about the new Ice Age." This myth is so potent for deniers from Michael Crichton to George Will to Senator James Inhofe that even word guru and strategist Frank "death tax" Luntz made it a recommended line of attack in his super-slimy 2002 memo to conservatives on how best to cast doubt on climate science. Why do deniers love it so? It makes present global-warming fears seem faddish, saying current climate science is nothing more than finger-in-the-wind guessing. This attack appeals especially to conservatives who want to link their attack on climate scientists to their favorite attack against progressive presidential candidates -- that they are flip-floppers. | 29th August 2008 |
| UK minister says energy comes before climate: report - Reuters LONDON (Reuters) - The battle against climate change must not take precedence over the need to guarantee energy security, British industry minister John Hutton was quoted on Thursday as saying in an apparent policy change. [!!!] | 29th August 2008 |
| Climate Reality Eludes the Business Press - AlterNet For the Wall Street Journal's editors, fear of a bigger government outweighs the fear of a warmer planet. | 28th August 2008 |
| Food riots as Indian floods destroy 250000 homes - Swissinfo PATNA, India (Reuters) - Food riots erupted on Wednesday in eastern India, where more than two million people have been forced from their homes and about 250,000 houses destroyed in what officials say are the worst floods in 50 years. Some experts blame the floods on heavier monsoon rains caused by global warming, while others say authorities have failed to take enough preventive measures to improve infrastructure. | 28th August 2008 |
| Transport: Romantics love high speed trains but ministers are reluctant to get on board - Guardian Unlimited They are popular and they are green - but the government is unconvinced | 28th August 2008 |
| Climate Change 101: How the jet stream affects our climate - Ithaca Journal Climate Change 101: How the jet stream affects our climateIthaca Journal, NY. The Paleontological Research Institution (PRI) and its Museum of the Earth's Climate Change 101 series appears monthly in the Life section. | 28th August 2008 |
| Why is Greenland covered in ice? - PhysOrg There have been many reports in the media about the effects of global warming on the Greenland ice-sheet, but there is still great uncertainty as to why there is an ice-sheet there at all. | 28th August 2008 |
| Death and life beneath the sea floor - Nature Viral action identified as key component in carbon cycle. | 28th August 2008 |
| When glaciers disappear, the bugs move in - New Scientist The bare soil left behind by retreating glaciers is soon taken over by bacteria that prepare the ground for life on a larger scale | 28th August 2008 |
| Even "Green" Energy Needs Lower Oil Price - Planet Ark LONDON/LOS ANGELES - As a lengthening economic slowdown bites, the antidote for the renewable energy sector may come as a surprise -- a lower oil price. | 28th August 2008 |
| Why We Need a Revolution - AlterNet Efficiency tweaks won't save us. Even if every car in the world were a hybrid, growing demand would dwarf savings. | 28th August 2008 |
| Carbon Disclosure Project Initiative On Public Sector Supply Chain Greenhouse Gas Emissions - Science Daily The Carbon Disclosure Project, a collaboration of some 385 institutional investors including Merrill Lynch, Goldman Sachs, Barclays and HSBC, has extended its traditional work in the private sector to the public sector where it is actively assisting government and local government organizations to assess greenhouse gas emissions through their supply chains. | 28th August 2008 |
| Research: Hassles, negative feedback affect green actions - San Jose Mercury News As awareness of global warming grows, researchers are looking at what motivates -- and what hinders -- consumer responses. | 28th August 2008 |
| The greatest failure of thought in human history - The Christian Science Monitor To solve climate change, we must overcome "systems blindness." | 27th August 2008 |
| Dispatch from Denver: Making Climate Change the Issue - AlterNet Why we need to make "global warming" the most important issue of the convention. | 27th August 2008 |
| Alpine lakes beginning to show effects of climate change - PhysOrg A recent study forecasts that increased climatic variability poses serious consequence for both the biodiversity and ecosystem function of high-elevation lakes. | 27th August 2008 |
| A view from the North - Alaska's melting glaciers - PhysOrg Welcome to the front lines of global warming in the United States - the Harding Ice Field in Alaska, the biggest icefield in the United States. At the Exit Glacier north of Seward - the only glacier in the Kenai Fjords National Park reachable by foot - the giant cerulean blue ice sheet gives every sign of staying put. But one only has to glance at the many signs along the roadway and footpath to the glacier's edge to mark its retreat - it hit its peak size in 1815 and has been receding ever since. Signs along a footpath leading to the base of the glacier show just how far it has retreated. | 27th August 2008 |
| Not-So-Permafrost: Big Thaw of Arctic Soil May Unleash Runaway Warming - Scientific American "Drunken" trees listing wildly, cracked highways and sinkholes--all are visible signs of thawing Arctic permafrost. When this frozen soil warms, it releases carbon dioxide, methane and other greenhouse gases as microbes start to thrive on the organic material it contains--a potentially potent source of uncontrollable climate change. | 27th August 2008 |
| Scientists Report Further Shrinking of Arctic Ice - Washington Post Arctic sea ice has shrunk to the second-lowest level since record-keeping began three decades ago, a group of international researchers determined yesterday, a revelation underscoring how rapidly climate change is transforming ecosystems in northern latitudes. The extent of Arctic sea ice is now 2 million square miles below the long-term average for Aug. 26, according to the International Arctic Research Center and the Japanese Aerospace Exploration Agency, a figure that is within 400,000 square miles of the all-time record low set in September 2007. This figure is already below the long-term average for September ice cover and because the ice traditionally reaches its minimum level in mid-September, researchers warned that a new low might be recorded within weeks. | 27th August 2008 |
| Scrapping fuel subsidies can help climate: U.N. study ACCRA (Reuters) - Abolishing subsidies on fossil fuels could cut world greenhouse gas emissions by up to 6 percent and also nudge up world economic growth, a U.N. report showed on Tuesday. | 27th August 2008 |
| Public Opinion and Climate: Part I - Columbia Journalism Review Have the media failed to help the people “get” it? Last week, a reader, Jeff Huggins, asked me to address why the media have failed to explain climate change in a way the public “gets.” | 27th August 2008 |
| No-take zones offer no boost for bleached reefs - New Scientist Fishing bans might protect some reef inhabitants, but they don't seem to help corals bounce back from damage caused by global warming | 27th August 2008 |
| Ben Caldecott: Save the forests to stop climate change - Guardian Unlimited Ben Caldecott: If forest and peatland destruction continues unabated, we will never be able to prevent a rise in global temperatures | 26th August 2008 |
| World Bank Increases Fossil-Fuel Funding Despite Pledge - RedOrbit Once the new Tata Ultra Mega power plant in western India is fired up in 2012 and fully operational, it will become one of the world's 50 largest greenhouse-gas emitters. And the World Bank is helping make it possible. | 26th August 2008 |
| Whales lose blubber due to climate change - Telegraph.co.uk Whales are losing weight because of climate change, according to Japanese scientists. | 26th August 2008 |
| Harper Arctic Cabinet Meeting Risks New Russia Cold War for Oil - Bloomberg Global warming is opening the Northwest Passage that sailing ships sought 500 years ago, and some of the world's biggest oil reserves are becoming accessible under the polar sea. Russia, the U.S., Canada, Norway and Denmark are jockeying for territory in moves that could end up in clashing claims. | 26th August 2008 |
| Rising sea buries village - International Herald Tribune TOTOPE, Ghana: The old shore road to Totope is now under the sea. Developers began carving out another road, but it was washed away so often they abandoned it. Now the road to this village is just a track across the sand. On this southern coast of Ghana, the Atlantic Ocean is rising. Every few years, residents of a string of villages leave their homes and build new ones farther back, abandoning them to the encroaching sand and water. | 26th August 2008 |
| Schemes to offset carbon 'overpriced and unfair' Britain's booming carbon offset industry is riddled with inconsistencies and clashes of interest that have caused a "crisis of legitimacy" which threatens to dissuade consumers from contributing to cutting their greenhouse gas emissions, leading academics claim today. | 26th August 2008 |
| New US President Seen Struggling on Climate - Planet Ark ACCRA - The next US president will find it hard to curb greenhouse gas emissions by 2020 enough to satisfy many of America's allies, the chief US climate negotiator said on Monday. | 26th August 2008 |
| 12 States Sue EPA Over Refinery Carbon Emissions - Planet Ark NEW YORK - New York and 11 other states are suing federal environmental regulators over greenhouse gas emissions from oil refineries, the New York attorney general's office said on Monday. | 26th August 2008 |
| Motor industry: Carmakers failing to achieve CO2 cuts - Guardian Unlimited Europe's motor industry is still a long way from meeting EU targets for cutting carbon dioxide emissions from new cars and governments must increase pressure on carmakers to comply, green transport campaigners warned yesterday. Transport Environment (TE), a pan-European lobby group, accused the industry of fighting tooth and nail - with government support - to water down the proposed EU ... See also: Swiss to Vote on SUV Ban - Planet Ark ZURICH - Swiss campaigners launched a bid on Monday to ban off-roaders, SUVs and gas-guzzling executive and sports cars, winning enough support for a referendum. | 26th August 2008 |
| Global warming time bomb trapped in Arctic soil - PhysOrg Climate change could release unexpectedly huge stores of carbon dioxide from Arctic soils, which would in turn fuel a vicious circle of global warming, a new study warned Sunday. | 24th August 2008 |
| Alpine archive - BBC Melting glaciers reveal the lives of ancient humans | 24th August 2008 |
| Beauty spots to be devoured by sea - Guardian Unlimited National Trust warns of losing battle to save much-loved coastal landmarks from rising sea levels and erosion | 24th August 2008 |
| Christians see climate change as moral issue - Reuters Morality should be a spur for stronger action to fight climate change, which threatens food and water supplies for the poorest in Africa, a group of Christian activists said on Saturday during U.N. climate talks. "We hear about climate change as a political issue, an environmental issue and an economic issue. We want to press the point that this is a moral issue," said Marcia Owens, a minister in the Florida branch of the African Methodist Episcopal Church. | 24th August 2008 |
| New CO2 emissions treaty is imminent - The Independent Climate negotiators have made unexpected headway towards a new international treaty to combat global warming, easing a logjam that has held up progress for years. | 24th August 2008 |
| Good vibrations - BBC News The chips which can power themselves | 24th August 2008 |
| Climate change to deplete fisheries' production: FAO - Business Standard India Global warming and the consequent changes in climatic patterns will have strong impact on fisheries with far-reaching consequences for food and livelihood security of a sizeable section of the population. | 24th August 2008 |
| Coming: a bounce or a crash - In-Forum If we don’t change, the momentum that carries us to possible extinction will be too great to overcome. Without change, within 200 years we may perish as a species or a few islands of prosperity and privilege may survive surrounded by a sea of misery and violence. | 24th August 2008 |
| Climate Code Red: The Case for Emergency action - Green Left Weekly Climate Code Red is essential reading for all, a book that will by turns terrify and encourage the new reader to become active in this struggle, and which will re-shape the priorities of experienced activists. | 24th August 2008 |
| Biofuels, food crops straining world water reserves: experts - AFP via Yahoo! News Burgeoning demand for food to feed the world's swelling population, coupled with increased use of biomass as fuel is putting a serious strain on global water reserves, experts said | 24th August 2008 |
| Oil, gas firms step up lobbying effort aimed at Tory government - CNews OTTAWA - The Canadian corporate giants dominating Alberta oil sands extraction and refining lobbied the federal government intensively this summer, federal records show. | 24th August 2008 |
| UK plans for 'dirty coal power' could scupper global deal to cut emissions - Guardian Unlimited Heavy criticism for new coal plants which lack technology to capture and bury large volumes of carbon dioxide | 23rd August 2008 |
| Carbon Lobby Spend Nearly One Half Billion Lobbying and PR Dollars in the First Half of 2008 - DeSmogBlog The Public Campaign Action Fund released a new analysis finding that the oil and coal industries spent $427.2 million so far this year of the year to shift public opinion and to capture the eyes, ears, and support of Congress on critical energy issues. [...now if they'd only spent that on renewables...] | 23rd August 2008 |
| New rays of hope for solar power's future - The Christian Science Monitor High cost of fossil fuel and advanced technology improve this energy source’s prospects. | 23rd August 2008 |
| Energy Independence Within Reach - MarketWatch Buildings are responsible for about half (48%) of all energy consumption and greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions in the US annually, and they use 76% of all the energy produced by the nation's power plants. According to Mazria, "If you are serious about energy independence and climate change, you must tackle the Building Sector." | 23rd August 2008 |
| Climate conference makes progress on key dispute - International Herald Tribune Delegates at a key U.N. climate conference moved forward Friday on a plan to encourage developing countries to regulate carbon emissions by focusing on their largest industries. The so-called "sectoral approach" sidesteps objections from countries like India and China, which refuse to accept national targets for the overall emission of the greenhouse gases blamed for global warming. Under the approach now taking shape, developing countries would set pollution targets for specific industries, like cement production, steel or aluminum. Unlike the industrial countries, they likely would not be punished for missing their targets. | 23rd August 2008 |
| Global warming sign? Major Arctic glacier is cracking - Los Angeles Times In northern Greenland, a part of the Arctic that had seemed immune from global warming, new satellite images show a growing giant crack and an 11-square-mile chunk of ice hemorrhaging off a major glacier, scientists said Thursday. That has led the university professor who spotted the wounds in the massive Petermann glacier to predict disintegration of a major portion of the Northern Hemisphere's largest floating glacier within the year. "As we see this phenomenon occurring further and further north -- and Petermann is as far north as you can get -- it certainly adds to the concern," said Waleed Abdalati, director of the Center for the Study of Earth From Space at the University of Colorado. [Interesting that the element of doubt introduced by the article is based on norms from the 1990's, considering that global warming started showing up in the records some ten years earlier (see diagram). ] | 23rd August 2008 |
| Argentina declares state of emergency in five provinces hit by severe drought - People's Daily Argentine President Cristina Fernandez on Friday declared a state of emergency in five provinces hit by a months-long drought. | 23rd August 2008 |
| George Monbiot: Climate change is not anarchy's football - Guardian Unlimited George Monbiot: In seeking to put politics ahead of action, Ewa Jasiewicz is engaging in magical thinking of the most desperate kind | 23rd August 2008 |
| DEVELOPMENT: Food, Fuel and Water Crises Converging - IPS STOCKHOLM, Aug 22 (IPS) - A spectre is haunting the cities and villages of most developing nations, warns a senior official of a World Bank-affiliated organisation. | 23rd August 2008 |
| India blamed for eight percent of carbon emissions growth - Calcutta News Carbon emissions into the atmosphere from fossil fuel combustion worldwide in 2007 was 22 percent higher than in 2000, says the Worldwatch Institute. India accounted for eight percent of this. | 23rd August 2008 |
| Americans Urge for Climate Change Action - Angus Reid Two-thirds of adults in the United States think their country should tackle global warming regardless of what other countries do, according to a poll by TNS, ABC News, Stanford University and Planet Green. 68 per cent of respondents think their country should start combating climate change even if others do less. | 22nd August 2008 |
| Ewa Jasiewicz: We need a revolution to tackle climate change - Guardian Unlimited Ewa Jasiewicz: There can be no state solutions to climate change: governments won't give up the powers that leads to environmental ruin | 22nd August 2008 |
| Oliver Tickell: We need insurance against climate change for our planet - Guardian Unlimited Oliver Tickell: Spending money now to slow global warming can ensure that ruinous catastrophe never happens | 22nd August 2008 |
| Maybe now's the time to panic - Las Vegas CityLife IT'S amazing how politicians and their corporate bosses make all the right noises when a panic arrives in earnest. And national freak-outs don't come any bigger than the frenzy about looming climate catastrophe. | 22nd August 2008 |
| Multiple Polar Bears Discovered Swimming Many Miles from Alaska Coast - Centre Daily Times An aerial survey by government scientists in Alaska's Chukchi Sea this week found at least nine polar bears swimming in open water - with one at least 60 miles from shore - raising concern among wildlife experts about their survival. | 22nd August 2008 |
| Greenland Glacier Breakup Suggests Imminent Disintegration - LiveScience.com via Yahoo! News New satellite images reveal that a massive ice chunk recently broken away from one of Greenland's glaciers, which researchers say will continue to disintegrate within the next year. Scientists at Ohio State University monitoring daily NASA satellite images of Greenland's glaciers discovered that an 11-square-mile (29-square-kilometer) piece of the Petermann Glacier broke away between July 10 and 24. The chunk was about half the size of Manhattan. | 22nd August 2008 |
| Rapid climate change threatens to thaw icy wonderland of Alaska - The Flint Journal Flint Journal staff writer Elizabeth Shaw was in Alaska for 10 days in August on a fellowship to see firsthand the effects of global warming. "I watched massive chunks of glacial ice breaking off into the sea. I fished for salmon from muddy riverbanks where beavers -- once uncommon near the Arctic Circle -- are ravaging trees and blocking spawning streams. I hiked up mountainsides once white with snow year-round. I walked through white spruce forests devastated by pine bark beetle infestations, and peat wetlands drying up for the first time in 14,000 years. I listened to an Aleut leader lament the loss of his native culture to flooded coastlines and vanishing icebound prey. Now put all that in the context of one stark and simple fact: In those same 10 days, Alaska lost an area of sea ice the size of Texas." | 22nd August 2008 |
| Clash over plan to save tropical forests - Guardian Unlimited Diplomats from more than 100 countries are meeting in Accra, Ghana, to open negotiations on whether tropical forests should join the emerging global carbon market. This would allow countries and companies to earn money from not cutting down their trees. The move, backed strongly by many developing countries and the G8, is expected to greatly increase the financial value of forests. It would encourage governments and corporations to protect them and would potentially transfer hundreds of millions of pounds a year to some of the poorest countries in the world. But human rights and environment groups from three continents are warning that the over-hasty inclusion of forests in the post-Kyoto carbon market could trigger a "land grab" leaving tens of millions of people worse off. According to the groups, which include Friends of the Earth International, the Rainforest Foundation and the Rights and Resources Initiative, a coalition of environment and justice groups from around the world, it would: · Undermine the world price of carbon, damaging the effectiveness of the market · Drive indigenous peoples from the forests · Benefit only a wealthy elite and increase the risk corruption | 22nd August 2008 |
| Warming threatens crucial Himalayan water resources, forum told - TODAYonline This undated handout picture shows a view of Lake Imja Tsho in a valley situated south of Everest in Nepal. Climate change poses a serious threat to essential water resources in the Himalayan region putting the livelihoods of 1.3 billion people at risk, experts said Thursday. | 22nd August 2008 |
| Climate negotiators reconvene this week in Ghana - PhysOrg (AP) -- Negotiators meet in Ghana this week to resume work on a new climate change treaty and discuss ways to prod developing countries to join the fight against global warming. But the latest round of talks comes at an awkward moment, with the world's poor more worried about the immediate cost of food and fuel than the uncertain long-term effects of climate change. | 22nd August 2008 |
| World heading towards cooler 2008 - BBC News Global temperatures recorded so far this year suggest is likely to emerge as the coolest this century, scientists say. "2008 will still be significantly above the long-term average. There's been a strong upward trend in the last few decades, and that's the thing to focus on." | 22nd August 2008 |
| Clock ticking on global warming says UN climate chief - Deutsche Welle The UN's top climate change official says time is running out in the fight against global warming. Speaking at a climate conference in Ghana, Yvo de Boer said warned that industrialised countries need to reach agreement on the rules to cut greenhouse gas emissions. | 22nd August 2008 |
| Summer scorchers outpace global warming - New Scientist Peak temperatures may rise twice as fast as average temperatures as climate change hots up | 21st August 2008 |
| Can't see the forest with the trees - Gristmill The following post is by Ken Levenson, guest blogger at Climate Progress. ----- As deforestation accelerates and grows ever more concentrated the climate change consequences appear even greater than previously thought. As reported in New Scientist: Pristine temperate forest stores three times more carbon than currently estimated by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, and 60% more than plantation forests, according to research in Australia. The study:Mackey and colleagues used remote sensing and direct sampling to study eucalyptus trees at 240 sites across a 14.5-million hectare swathe of natural forest in south-east Australia. | 21st August 2008 |
| Water everywhere, and not a drop to grow - BBC News Water scarcity is a leading cause of food shortages and environmental decline - so why is it ignored? | 21st August 2008 |
| Methane Discharges In The Arctic Pose Threat To Earth's Climate - Bernama VLADIVOSTOK, Aug 20 (Bernama) -- Methane discharges in the permafrost break-up process in the Arctic pose a threat to the entire terrestrial climate, Russian news agency, Itar-Tass, reported. | 21st August 2008 |
| Tibetan meadows emit methane - Nature Field survey confirms that plants can boost levels of the greenhouse gas. | 21st August 2008 |
| Global warming pushes Peru to pick coffee earlier - Reuters Global warming pushes Peru to pick coffee earlierReuters. ... a migrant worker who picks coffee on the steamy, lush, green farms near La Merced in central Peru, might not understand the mechanics of climate change, ... | 21st August 2008 |
| Bloomberg proposes windmills for New York City - PhysOrg Mayor Michael Bloomberg has proposed a renewable energy program for New York city that would include placing windmills on city bridges, solar panels on skyscrapers, and the use of tidal, geothermal and nuclear energy. | 21st August 2008 |
| Republicans Have Handed Democrats a Winning Election Issue - AlterNet But so far, Democrats have been refusing to accept the gift. The gift is the Republicans' continued opposition to extending renewable energy incentives. Eight times since the fall of 2007, a Republican-threatened filibuster has thwarted a vote on extending these incentives. They will expire at the end of this year -- and with that expiration, many believe the solar and wind industries will come to a grinding halt. | 21st August 2008 |
| Whatever floats your boat - Nature Shipping is one of the most fuel-efficient ways to move freight, but the industry still produces significant greenhouse-gas emissions, including more than a quarter of the world's nitrogen oxides emissions. And it also produces more sulphur dioxide emissions than all land transportation combined. In the latest of our Future Transport series, Duncan Graham-Rowe looks at the new wave in shipping. | 21st August 2008 |
| Climate change methadone? - RealClimate Geoengineering is increasingly being discussed (not so sotto voce any more) in many forums. The current wave of interest has been piqued by Paul Crutzen's 2005 editorial and a number of workshops (commentary) and high profile advocacy. But most of the discussion has occurred in almost total ignorance of the consequences of embarking on such a course. A wider range of people have now started to publish relevant studies - showing clearly the value of continued research on the topic - and a key one came out this week in JGR-Atmospheres. Robock et al used a coupled GCM with interactive aerosols to see what would happen if they injected huge amounts of SO2 (the precursor of sulphate aerosols) into the tropical or Arctic stratosphere. | 21st August 2008 |
| Scientists urge U.S. to protect economy from climate - Reuters NEW YORK (Reuters) - Eight scientific organizations urged the next U.S. president to help protect the country from climate change by pushing for increased funding for research and forecasting, saying about $2 trillion of U.S. economic output could be hurt by storms, floods and droughts. | 21st August 2008 |
| Bloggers post Health Canada climate change report on the web - Canada.com Upset about the Conservative government's decision not to post on the Internet a major report warning about the health effects of climate change in Canada, bloggers have taken upon themselves to make it widely available. | 21st August 2008 |
| Desal will add 70,000 tonnes carbon - Perth Now THE Victorian Government's controversial desalination plant will emit over 70,000 tonnes of carbon a year which will not be offset, according to an environmental study. | 21st August 2008 |
| PREVIEW-UN climate talks seek quicker pace, plug 2050 gaps - AlertNet Source: Reuters By Alister Doyle, Environment Correspondent OSLO, Aug 20 (Reuters) - More than 150 nations meet in Ghana from Thursday trying to speed up sluggish talks on a new climate treaty and plug big gaps in ... | 21st August 2008 |
| The doomed fate of climate change legislation - Gristmill Just months ago there was a palpable sense of optimism that no matter who is elected president this November that the U.S. would soon embark on serious climate change legislation. I think recent events have shown that the chances of that happening are slim to none. Let's start with if McCain is elected. Today the senator from Arizona is going to do a photo-op on an oil rig because he has become the biggest champion of increased drilling this side of the Middle East. He wants to extend major tax breaks for oil companies and open up virtually all of America to more drilling. | 20th August 2008 |
| Birds can't keep up with climate change: study - TODAYonline A bird flies over the sea after sunset. The habitats of wild bird species are shifting in response to global warming, but not fast enough to keep pace with rising temperatures, according to a study released Wednesday. | 20th August 2008 |
| Warming Climate Threatens Alaska's Vast Forests - Planet Ark KENAI NATIONAL WILDLIFE REFUGE, Alaska - Here in a 13,700-year-old peat bog, ecologist Ed Berg reaches into the moss and pulls out more evidence of the drastic changes afoot due to the Earth's warming climate. Altogether more than 3 million acres (1.21 million hectares) of spruce have been killed in south-central Alaska since 1992, the biggest recorded outbreak in North American history. | 20th August 2008 |
| Algae could explain dead whales, seals in St. Lawrence - National Post As blue-green algae continues to plague Quebec's lakes, a 500 square kilometre swath of red algae in the St. Lawrence Seaway appears to be causing the deaths of marine animals, including the threatened beluga whale. The "red tide" moved with the current east from Riviere-du-Loup and Tadoussac toward Rimouski, leaving in its wake the carcasses of seven harbour porpoises, nine beluga whales, 35 seals and thousands of seabirds like gulls, loons, ducks and cormorants, said Pierre Beland, a doctor and spokesman for the St. Lawrence National Institute of Ecotoxicology. While patches of red algae are not abnormal in the St. Lawrence Seaway, the severity of the blooms this year could be the result of global warming, Mr. Beland said. "It's not a direct result of human activity, but if climate change is causing more rainfall and higher temperatures, we can expect to see more of these kinds of outbreaks in the future." | 20th August 2008 |
| US environmentalists claim global warming threatens small mammal - Guardian Unlimited Lawsuit claims the American pika should be protected by the US Endangered Species Act | 20th August 2008 |
| Japan to label goods' carbon footprints: official - PhysOrg Japan is planning to label consumer goods to show their carbon footprints in a bid to raise public awareness about global warming, an official said Tuesday. | 20th August 2008 |
| Geothermal Energy May Supply 5% of Australian Power, Group Says - Bloomberg.com Aug. 20 (Bloomberg) -- Geothermal energy could supply as much as 5 percent of Australia's electricity requirements by 2020 with an investment of about A$12 billion ($10.4 billion), helping reduce greenhouse gas emissions, an industry group said. | 20th August 2008 |
| Sending waste to China saves carbon - Guardian Unlimited Environment, science technology: Sending waste for recycling in China produces more carbon savings than landfilling in UK, study says | 20th August 2008 |
| Trial drilling for frozen gas to start in '12 - The Japan Times The government plans to start trial drilling in 2012 to extract frozen methane hydrate buried under the seabed to test if the natural gas is a viable next-generation fuel. The trial will take place in an ocean trench called the Nankai Trough about 50 km off the coast of Honshu, according to a document distributed Tuesday at a Ministry of Economy, | 20th August 2008 |
| How catching cold mountain air could save Europe's glaciers - The Independent A German geography professor has developed a controversial system of mountain "wind-catching" screens which he claims could slow or even halt the dramatic rate at which Europe's glaciers are melting. | 20th August 2008 |
| Revealed: the massive scale of UK's water consumption - Guardian Unlimited The scale of British water consumption and its impact around the world is revealed in a new report today, which warns of the hidden levels needed to produce food and clothing. | 20th August 2008 |
| Australian expert says sea levels to rise four metres - Radio Australia An Australian climate change expert says the world's sea levels could rise by up to four meters this century. Professor Steffen says a record number of polar ice sheets across the northern shelf have disappeared in just 12 months. "The evidence over the past 12 to 18 months suggests that we have underestimated how fast this aspect of the earth's system can change," he said. | 19th August 2008 |
| Harperites' fear-mongering ignores the real threat - TheChronicleHerald.ca THE IRONY does not get much richer. On the front page of the Aug. 14 paper, two articles appeared side by side. The first featured a local hero, independent MP Bill Casey, inspecting the tidal surge damage to critical dike works at the most vulnerable part of our land link to New Brunswick – damage caused by the rising sea level brought on by global warming. In stark juxtaposition appears the fear-mongering of federal Environment Minister John Baird warning that real action to confront the climate crisis would "screw" the people of Nova Scotia. The current debate about green tax-shifting, a policy initially advanced by the Green party and now partially adopted by the federal Liberal party, tends to be conducted along the lines advanced by Mr. Baird. Harperites do not want to discuss the threat of global warming and the warnings of scientists. Nor do they want to discuss the advice of most economists who advance tax-shifting as the most efficient and effective way to send a consistent market signal to end using the global atmosphere as a "free" dumping area for our pollution. Rather, they hope that economic fear-mongering at high decibels can substitute for an honest exchange of views. The impact of accelerating climate change is the real threat – not solutions like the Green Shift which could avert catastrophe. If one looks at the most recent warnings of the International Energy Agency, the need for aggressive action is clear. Unless greenhouse gas levels globally begin to come down by 2015, the planet faces an irreversible course to run-away global warming. It is critical, most scientists say, to avoid allowing global average temperatures to increase to two degrees Celsius above the pre-Industrial Revolution level. Two degrees doesn’t sound like much, but when one considers the average global temperature difference between 2008 and the last ice age was only five degrees Celsius, it is clear that two degrees is a lot. | 19th August 2008 |
| Jeremy Jacquot: Our Oceans' Long Goodbye - HuffingtonPost Let's face it: Our pristine oceans, as we've come to know them, aren't coming back. Besieged on all sides by overfishing, climate change, pollution and habitat destruction, the world's oceans are slowly but inevitably undergoing a long and painful transition -- one that could turn their once lush coral reefs and kelp forests into barren deserts. This chilling assessment, once considered a fringe view, has been brought into the mainstream of scientific discussion by the likes of Jeremy Jackson and Daniel Pauly, leading oceanographers whose groundbreaking research helped elucidate the links between human exploitation of the ocean's resources and its gradual decline. In a disturbing new article published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, Jackson predicts our actions, combined with the synergistic effects of climate change, are laying the groundwork for a mass extinction with unknown consequences for the human race and the planet. | 19th August 2008 |
| Spain sweats amid 'water wars' - BBC News A severe drought makes Spain's environmental debate more heated than ever, Sue Lloyd-Roberts reports. | 19th August 2008 |
| Flooding Hits Ireland After Record August Rainfall - Planet Ark DUBLIN - Ireland faced further flooding on Monday after a second successive weekend of torrential summer rain drove people from their homes, blocked road and rail links and threatened to destroy farmers' crops. | 19th August 2008 |
| Drier, warmer springs in US Southwest stem from human-caused changes in winds Human-driven changes in the westerly winds are bringing hotter and drier springs to the American Southwest, according to new research from The University of Arizona in Tucson. | 19th August 2008 |
| Increased Rainfall Affecting Bees - CCND UK: Torrential summer rains in SW England have destroyed flowers, forcing bees to consume their vital winter food supplies. | 19th August 2008 |
| How Wind Farms May Really Replace Coal Mining - AlterNet One community is attempting to prove that clean energy can beat dirty power -- even in the heart of coal country. | 19th August 2008 |
| Living a Green Dream on Danish Island - Planet Ark SAMSO, Denmark - Concerns about energy security may run high elsewhere in Europe, but on the windswept Danish island of Samso the inhabitants have achieved a decade-long target of self-sufficiency in renewable power. | 19th August 2008 |
| Coal's toxic legacy to the Arctic - BBC News Data from a Greenland ice core indicates that coal burning is the prime source of heavy metal pollution in the Arctic. | 19th August 2008 |
| Extreme Heat Threatens In Climate Forecast - NPR Within the century, afternoon highs may reach temperatures that today are found only in the world's hottest deserts, says a new study. Those least able to deal with the increase in extreme heat waves - the world's poor - will be hit the hardest. | 19th August 2008 |
| Rich Urged to Set Deep Climate Cuts, Without US - Planet Ark OSLO - Rich nations should not wait for the election of a new US president before making progress on agreeing ambitious 2020 greenhouse gas cuts, the chair of a UN committee said on Monday ahead of climate talks in Ghana. | 19th August 2008 |
| Climate forecast: Hot and then even hotter - Gristmill I know we're supposed to be going into a period of cooling, at least according to people who don't believe in the scientific method. For those who do however, NOAA's National Climatic Data Center reports in its "Climate of 2008 July in Historical Perspective": Based on preliminary data, the globally averaged combined land and sea surface temperature was the fifth warmest on record for July and the ninth warmest for the January-July year-to-date period. It is worth noting that El Niño-Southern Oscillation conditions remained in a neutral phase during July. And we're still at a solar minimum. | 19th August 2008 |
| Herbivores eat away at climate-change predictions - New Scientist Current climate simulations predict an increase in shrub-like vegetation in northern regions as the world heats up, and these plants should absorb some of the carbon dioxide from the atmosphere and help buffer further temperature increase. Now it seems that grazers are set to eat this potential carbon sponge. | 19th August 2008 |
| Are geologists different? - RealClimate The International Geological Congress (IGC) is sometimes referred to as the geologists' equivalent of the Olympic Games and is an extremely large gathering of geologists from all over the world, taking place at 4-year intervals. This time, the IGC took place in Lillestrom, a small place just outside Oslo, Norway (August 6-14). The congress was opened by the Norwegian King (before he continued to the real games in Beijing), and was attended by some 6,000 scientists from 113 countries. Even the Danish Minister of Energy & Climate participated in a panel discussion on climate change. | 19th August 2008 |
| Slower Economy Saps Climate Action; Oil a Prop - Planet Ark OSLO - An economic slowdown is sapping enthusiasm for a costly drive to fight climate change but persistently high oil prices are a lifeline for a "green revolution" of renewable energy technology, experts say. | 18th August 2008 |
| Record number of cruise ships in Canadian Arctic this summer - CNews Polar bears and glaciers may be icons of northern climate change but they are also swelling the sails of Nunavut's tourism industry. | 18th August 2008 |
| Ancient tree helps birds survive - BBC News An ancient species of tree is helping Britain's birds survive the effects of climate change, scientists find. | 18th August 2008 |
| Oxfam sees climate change role for E.Africa nomads - Reuters Kenya Pastoralist communities like the Maasai could offer insights into coping with climate change in East Africa, but their political marginalisation means valuable knowledge is not being used, aid agency Oxfam said on Monday. | 18th August 2008 |
| Greens fight to keep renewable energy targets - Australian Broadcasting Corporation The Greens are urging the Federal Government to resist growing calls for it to dump its renewable energy target. | 18th August 2008 |
| Eco-supermarket's green delivery - BBC News A truck which runs on fuel made from rotting waste will leave Bristol en route to a new environmental store in Devon. | 18th August 2008 |
| Welcome to the era of anxiety - Guardian Unlimited Life style: Generalised anxiety disorder is the world's biggest mental health problem. Report by Harriet Green | 17th August 2008 |
| Weird scenes inside the gold mine - Gristmill There is a phenomenon known in financial markets as an "inverted yield curve." Like a stray elephant in Central Park, it is a reliable indicator that something odd is going on. It seldom lasts long, as markets quickly note and adjust to the weirdness. Prices in current electric markets are similarly inverted, especially in the coal belt. Like Manhattan elephants and inverted yield curves, they signal strange goings-on. However, this one shows no signs of correcting itself soon.Shapely yield curves The yield curve is a financial term that describes nothing more than the interest rate paid (typically on federal bonds) as a function of bond length. | 17th August 2008 |
| Drought spreads to cities - Adelaide Now THE drought still holds almost two-thirds of NSW in its grip, with hardworking families now feeling the pinch at the supermarket checkout, NSW Primary Industries Minister Ian Macdonald says. | 17th August 2008 |
| Canada seeks historic shipwrecks - BBC A Canadian team is to search for two ships lost in an 1845 expedition to find the Northwest Passage. Retreating Arctic ice has made the Northwest Passage much more accessible and Canada is also using the search as a way of asserting its sovereignty over the region. | 17th August 2008 |
| Polly Toynbee: Carbon credits tick all the boxes. What's the delay? - Guardian Unlimited Polly Toynbee: Energy use has to be cut soon, so it's odd that this techno-savvy cabinet still shies away from a simple credit system | 17th August 2008 |
| A Push to Increase Icebreakers in the Arctic - New York Times A growing array of military leaders, Arctic experts and lawmakers say the United States is losing its ability to patrol and safeguard Arctic waters. | 17th August 2008 |
| VOICES | Something spectacular is going to happen - Twin Cities Planet "We put a man on the moon eight years after John Kennedy challenged the nation. We can be free of foreign oil and produce 100% of our electricity from renewable energy within 10 years.". | 17th August 2008 |
| Cockroach King reigns as pest-killers discuss climate change - PhysOrg More than 100 of Southeast Asia's hardiest bugs measured up this week in Bangkok, where experts met to discuss new ways of controlling the pests, which they say are a major contributor to global warming. [...cow farts, now insect farts? What next?] | 17th August 2008 |
| A Future of Less - Miller-McCune.com Here's how government can help curb America's seemingly endless appetite for "more." | 16th August 2008 |
| Climate myths: Global warming stopped in 1998 Even if the atmospheric temperature near the earth's surface has become cooler recently, that doesn't mean the planet as a whole isn't heating up | 16th August 2008 |
| Grande Prairie struggles with drought disaster - CBC Edmonton The worst drought in decades has prompted local officials in northwest Alberta to declare an agricultural disaster as hot weather and a lack of rain have left dry, cracked fields and shriveled crops. | 16th August 2008 |
| Squeamish about truth - CNews It was a told-you-so moment Mike Hudema must relish. Lobbying for better fuel efficiency as part of a San Francisco-based environmental group had fallen on the deaf ears of both government and big U.S. automakers. | 16th August 2008 |
| Stone Age mass graves reveal green Sahara - New Scientist One of the driest deserts in the world, the Saharan Tenere Desert, hosted at least two flourishing lakeside populations during the Stone Age, a discovery of the largest graveyard from the era reveals. | 16th August 2008 |
| State begins slow squeeze on emitters - Sydney Morning Herald THE state's top 232 greenhouse polluters, ranging from Bluescope Steel to the Sydney Opera House, will be forced to cut their emissions from this year under new energy-efficiency laws. | 16th August 2008 |
| Climate 'altering UK bird habits' - BBC News Climate change is altering the egg-laying of many UK birds, and numbers visiting the country's shores, a report concludes. | 15th August 2008 |
| Climate Change Is Already Affecting the West's Water - AlterNet By 2020 Glacier National Park will be "Puddles National Park" and the rest of the west won't be much better off. So where's the concern? See also: West bracing for day the wells run dry - The National | 15th August 2008 |
| Bats face dark times ahead - BBC News Europe's bat species are facing threats to their survival from climate change and wind farms, says an expert. | 15th August 2008 |
| It's not you, it's the sea: heat hurts shellfish relationships - Myall Coast Nota OYSTERS, lobsters, mussels, sea urchins and abalone could be wiped off the menu by global warming, an Australian scientist warned yesterday. Jane Williamson, a Macquarie University marine ecologist, made the prediction after discovering that climate change is likely to take a dramatic toll on the ability of sperm from many marine creatures to swim to and fertilise eggs shed in the water. Even if sperm can find and fertilise the eggs, the probability of their surviving long enough to grow into larvae is likely to plunge. | 15th August 2008 |
| I do not think that word means what you think it means - Gristmill This should be obvious, but of course you never hear it mentioned in stories about carbon capture and sequestration (CCS): capturing and sequestering carbon requires lots of energy; thus, plants that do it have to burn more coal to create that extra energy; thus, the other pollutants created by mixing, transporting, and burning coal will increase if CCS is widespread. It follows just based on logic, but if you prefer peer-reviewed scientific studies, here's one for you: Even with this extra burden [of having to generate more power], a CO2-burying plant emits between 71 and 78 percent less CO2 than a normal coal-fired plant for each unit of usable electricity produced, Koornneef and his colleagues report. | 15th August 2008 |
| Study Improves Ability to Predict Aerosols' Effect on Cloud Cover (PhysOrg.com) -- Using a novel theoretical approach, researchers from NASA and other institutions have identified the common thread that determines how aerosols from human activity, like the particles from burning of vegetation and forests, influence cloud cover and ultimately affect climate. The study improves researchers` ability to predict whether aerosols will increase or decrease cloud cover. | 15th August 2008 |
| "Green" Land Grab Could Sow Seeds of New Conflict - Planet Ark LONDON - A race to grab land in developing countries and exploit food supply fears and payments to conserve forests could spark conflicts in areas of land disputes, development and civil rights groups say. | 15th August 2008 |
| Is science still relevant? - It's Getting Hot In Here By continuing to propagate the “science vs. junk science” battle, Hansen and others are ignoring real questions of power, morality, citizen engagement, and the social changes that are needed to build a clean energy future. | 14th August 2008 |
| Free the Planet - History Today (subscription) Jean-François Mouhot traces a link between climate change and slavery, and suggests that reliance on fossil fuels has made slave owners of us all. | 14th August 2008 |
| Scheer determination transforms Germany's energy grid - CNews In 2005, I attended an international conference in Montreal on the Kyoto Protocol. There, I heard a speech by German parliamentarian Hermann Scheer. | 14th August 2008 |
| Climate change: The next ten years - New Scientist What's going to happen over the next decade? looks at the latest forecasts - and whether we can trust them (full text available to subscribers) | 14th August 2008 |
| Global cotton output to be hit by water shortages - Commodity Online Global cotton output to be hit by water shortagesCommodity Online, India. Recently several reports had indicated that global warming could have an impact on agricultural crops in many countries in the coming years. | 14th August 2008 |
| INTERVIEW-Time short for climate pact, draft by mid-09 - UN - Reuters India Time is short to work out a new treaty to fight global warming as planned by the end of 2009 because drafts of a deal must be ready in less than a year, the U.N.'s top climate change official said on Wednesday. | 14th August 2008 |
| WWF advert attacks Shell's environmental claims - Guardian Unlimited The World Wildlife Fund UK has launched an ad campaign attacking Shell's environmental claims. | 14th August 2008 |
| Climate change threatens one in five plant species - PhysOrg Climate change alters growing conditions in many regions of the world. How global warming could affect Germany`s flora researchers have now simulated using computer models. | 14th August 2008 |
| Scorching summer days to sizzle more by 2100: study - Reuters Dangerously hot days are set to become more scorching by 2100 because of climate change with the U.S. Midwest or the Mediterranean region sizzling well above 40 degrees Celsius (104F), Dutch scientists said on Wednesday. They said the likely jump in temperatures on the hottest summer days would far outpace the average of year-round global warming this century projected by the U.N. Climate Panel. Heatwaves can be a big threat to human health. | 14th August 2008 |
| Crackdown on electricity greenwash - Guardian Unlimited Environment, science technology: Dozens of major firms frustrated at prospect of having to report sharp increases in carbon pollution | 14th August 2008 |
| You get the tax code you pay for - Gristmill Here's a little something to keep in mind the next time corporations profess horror at the very idea of a carbon tax: Two-thirds of U.S. corporations paid no federal income taxes between 1998 and 2005, according to a new report from Congress. The study by the Government Accountability Office, expected to be released Tuesday, said about 68 percent of foreign companies doing business in the U.S. avoided corporate taxes over the same period. Collectively, the companies reported trillions of dollars in sales, according to GAO's estimate. | 14th August 2008 |
| Follow the coal money - Gristmill Drop what you're doing and get thee to Follow the Coal Money, a new project from Appalachian Voices and Oil Change International. Modeled on Follow the Oil Money, it allows you to determine exactly how much coal money is going to your legislator (either by name or by zip code). I wouldn't exactly call the results surprising, but they do confirm what you suspect: Coal money buys lots of legislative protection and pork for the coal industry. A few notes: though coal money has shifted somewhat toward Democrats since 2006, the bulk still goes to Republicans. | 14th August 2008 |
| A recipe for saving the world's oceans from an extinction crisis - Physorg Jeremy Jackson, senior scientist emeritus of the Smithsonian Tropical Research Institute and the Scripps Institution of Oceanography, asserts in the Aug. 12 issue of the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, that the following steps, if taken immediately, could reverse the demise of the oceans: Establish marine reserves, enforce fishing regulations, implement aquaculture, remove subsidies on fertilizer use, muster human ingenuity to limit fossil fuel consumption, buy time by establishing local conservation measures. | 14th August 2008 |
| The funny side of global warming - CNN International Comedian Abie Philbin Bowman tackles global warming in his new show. Bowman told CNN it's the over reaction to terrorism and comparative under reaction to global warming that has his central character -- a Bangladeshi environmentalist -- on a mission to join Al Qaeda in an effort to reduce global carbon emissions. "The longer we do nothing, the more radical the action we will ultimately have to take. The most extreme strategy would be to start killing the world's worst polluters -- Westerners -- preferably in a way which discourages others from flying," he said. And so begins the eco-friendly jihad. | 13th August 2008 |
| An environment of repression at climate camp - Guardian Unlimited Richard George: Of course, police taking a hard line with protesters is nothing new; we faced state repression since before the invention of the state. But climate change is not a wishy-washy liberal construct; it's backed up by hard science. We have 100 months to stop runaway global warming, and scientists are now predicting temperature rises of 4 degrees or more in our lifetime. The police are paid to protect capital and corporations; once they see that their children's lives are at risk, will they start to change sides? If not, this week shows that we won't just stand by and let them protect those who would damn us to a future dominated by climate change, rising tides and resource exploitation. Whatever they throw at us, we can, will and must resist. The impact of our failure will be far more severe than anything the state can throw at us. | 13th August 2008 |
| 80% of British biofuels are unsustainable - New Scientist Most biofuel in UK pumps fails to meet basic standards for sustainable production, while some offer scant environmental benefits | 13th August 2008 |
| The Damage Done - University of Melbourne University News A new study reveals that shrinking glaciers, plants blooming earlier across Europe and lakes declining in productivity in Africa can all be linked to human-caused climate change since 1970. | 13th August 2008 |
| Human activity, El Nino warming W. Antarctic-study - Reuters India Human activity and the El Nino weather pattern over the last century have warmed West Antarctica, part of the world's coldest continent, according to a study based on four years of collecting ice core data. The West Antarctic warmed in response to higher temperatures in the tropical Pacific, which itself has been warming due to weather patterns like a major El Nino event from 1939 to 1942 and greenhouse emissions from cars and factories, according to the study. | 13th August 2008 |
| Ice bet - Gristmill The National Snow and Ice Data Center reported Monday that in the first 10 days of August, Arctic sea ice extent declined one million kilometers. Sea ice is now disappearing on a daily basis nearly 50 percent faster than it typically does this time of year. So the race is on again to see whether 2008 can repeat -- or beat -- the record set only last year. The NSIDC explains exactly what is going on in the Arctic this summer:Ice extent has begun to decline sharply. The decline rate surged to -113,000 square kilometers per day on August 7 and as of August 10 was -103,000 square kilometers per day. | 13th August 2008 |
| Australian drought hits vineyards - BBC News Winemakers in Australia predict a fall in the grape harvest as the worst drought in a century worsens. | 13th August 2008 |
| Fertliser crisis sparks civil unrest in developing countries with 500% price hikes - Guardian Unlimited A global fertiliser crisis caused by high oil prices and the US rush to biofuel crops is reducing the harvests of the world's poorest farmers and could lead to millions more people going hungry, according to the UN and global food analysts | 13th August 2008 |
| Alternative energy hits the road - PhysOrg Through asphalt, the researchers are developing a solar collector that could turn roads and parking lots into ubiquitous—and inexpensive–sources of electricity and hot water. | 13th August 2008 |
| Exports Account for One-Third of China's Emissions - Environmental News Network As Chinese manufacturers feed a growing global appetite for cheap goods, these exports account for a rising share of the country's greenhouse gas emissions, a new study reveals. Exports are now responsible for one-third of China's emissions, according to a study that will appear in the journal Energy Policy. | 13th August 2008 |
| McCain Adopts Cheney's Energy Plan Once considered an ally of environmental groups, McCain now has a plan drafted by industry execs pushing more drilling and nuclear power. | 13th August 2008 |
| Galbraith on 'the free market' - Gristmill TPM Cafe is hosting a roundtable on economist James Galbraith's new book The Predator State: How Conservatives Abandoned the Free Market and Why Liberals Should Too. Here's a bit from Galbraith's introductory post: The judicial coup of December 2000 that installed Bush and Cheney brought back some of Reagan's men and his most extreme policies -- tax cuts for the wealthy, big increases in military spending, aggressive deregulation. But it didn't bring back the ideas. Instead, it became clear that Bush and Cheney had no real ideas, no larger public justification. They cut taxes to enrich their supporters. | 13th August 2008 |
| Boris Johnson's call for a new London airport show he's not the green mayor he claimed - Guardian Unlimited Jenny Jones: Boris Johnson's call for a 'green' airport on the Thames estuary flies in the face of his earlier opposition to expansion at Heathrow | 13th August 2008 |
| Can NY Infrastructure Handle Floods, Intense Heat? - WCBS-TV New York Flooded subways, bridges deteriorating in the hot sun, rising seas nipping at the edges of Manhattan -- they are all possible effects of global warming that a panel is considering as it studies how the city's infrastructure will hold up to climate change. | 13th August 2008 |
| Book Review: Climate Code Red- the Case for Emergency Action Book review Climate Code Red - Climate Code Red, by David Spratt and Philip Sutton, Scribe Publications 2008 Spratt and Sutton have written an important book that looks at the current state of climate science, compares the projections for likely catastrophic and irreversible climate change to the policy measures and government reactions so far, and finds the latter seriously lacking. If we carry on with our current targets for cutting greenhouse gas emissions, we will effectively guarantee climate disaster. | 13th August 2008 |
| Bush to relax protected species rules - PhysOrg (AP) -- Interior Secretary Dirk Kempthorne is defending proposed changes to the endangered species law, saying they will ensure the statute is not used as a "back door" to regulate the gases blamed for global warming. See also: US accused of 'sneak attack' on wildlife protection - Guardian Unlimited | 12th August 2008 |
| WorleyParsons' billion-dollar solar plan - Sydney Morning Herald WorleyParsons, Australia's biggest engineering company, is studying the construction of the world's biggest project producing power from the sun's heat, tapping incentives for renewable energy generation.. | 12th August 2008 |
| Brazilian agriculture faces huge losses - France24 Global warming will cause heavy financial losses to Brazil's agricultural sector over the next decade, a government study said Monday. The losses will grow to five billion dollars by 2020 and 14 billion by 2070, according to the joint study by the Brazilian Agricultural Research Center and the University of Campinas. | 12th August 2008 |
| North Pole could lose summer ice - PhysOrg While the summer of 2007 saw record low sea-ice coverage of the Arctic Ocean, a six-year study of the Arctic's sea ice has confirmed its ongoing, massive shrinking and drastic thinning. | 12th August 2008 |
| Climate change caused widespread tree death in California mountain range - PhysOrg Warmer temperatures and longer dry spells have killed thousands of trees and shrubs in a Southern California mountain range, pushing the plants' habitat an average of 213 feet up the mountain over the past 30 years, a UC Irvine study has determined. | 12th August 2008 |
| Thousands rally to mark 'death' of Australian river - PhysOrg Thousands of people rallied in southern Australia Sunday to protest the dwindling water levels in one of the country's greatest rivers, claiming the loss was causing an environmental disaster. | 12th August 2008 |
| U.S. ship heads for Arctic to define territory - Reuters via Yahoo! News A U.S. Coast Guard cutter will embark on an Arctic voyage this week to determine the extent of the continental shelf north of Alaska and map the ocean floor, data that could be used for oil and natural gas exploration. | 12th August 2008 |
| Seals uncover frozen sea secrets - BBC News Scientists use elephant seals to investigate the effects of climate change in the world's iciest waters. | 12th August 2008 |
| The Burning Season - Variety As inspiring as "An Inconvenient Truth" was frightening, Cathy Henkel's energetic docu, "The Burning Season," tackles one aspect of global warming and introduces people trying to make a difference. Heady facts about emission trading schemes threaten to overwhelm the viewer, but pic also packs plenty of genuine emotion, and the presence of altruistic Australian entrepreneur Dorjee Sun in the financial corridors of power gives it the same giddy atmosphere that made "Startup.com" so exhilarating. | 12th August 2008 |
| Alaska Airlines cancels 44 flights over volcanic ash ANCHORAGE, Alaska (Reuters) - Ash from a remote volcano that started erupting last week has scrambled flight schedules for Alaska and may do so for at least a few more days, government and airline officials said on Monday. | 12th August 2008 |
| Calorie clever - BBC News How using the true costs of food could help climate change | 11th August 2008 |
| On a planet 4C hotter, all we can prepare for is extinction - Guardian Unlimited Oliver Tickell: There's no 'adaptation' to such steep warming. We must stop pandering to special interests, and try a new, post-Kyoto strategy | 11th August 2008 |
| Climate change: High street banks face consumer boycott over investment in coal projects - Guardian Unlimited High street banks are funding E.ON and other companies utilising coal, say environmentalists | 11th August 2008 |
| NYC among 21 cities to disclose carbon output - Reuters via Yahoo! News More than 20 U.S. cities, including New York, Las Vegas and Denver, have agreed to measure their carbon footprints, with a system some 1,300 companies have been persuaded to use, in an attempt to find ways to curb emissions blamed for warming the planet. | 11th August 2008 |
| Costa Rica bids to go carbon neutral - BBC News Costa Rica's government has ambitious plans for the country to go carbon neutral by 2021 but it is a big challenge. | 11th August 2008 |
| Kingsnorth protesters vow permanent camp - Guardian Unlimited Climate change campaigners pledged yesterday to set up a permanent protest camp at Kingsnorth, near Rochester in Kent, if the government allows a large new coal-fired power station to be built there. Activists condemn "draconian use of stop and search" by police during week-long event | 11th August 2008 |
| 'Anti-noise' silences wind turbines - PhysOrg In a joint project with colleagues from Schirmer GmbH, ESM Energie- and Schwingungstechnik Mitsch GmbH and the Dr. Ziegler engineering office, IWU researchers have developed an active damping system for wind turbines. "These systems react autonomously to any change in frequency and damp the noise – regardless of how fast the wind generator is turning," says Illgen. The key components of this system are piezo actuators. These devices convert electric current into mechanical motion and generate "negative vibrations", or a kind of anti-noise that precisely counteracts the vibrations of the wind turbine and cancels them out. | 11th August 2008 |
| Warming Effects Already Starting To Snowball - Hartford Courant The impacts of global climate change are upon us. There is little time to mitigate our growing emissions of greenhouse gases. There is even less to adapt to the staggering disruptions already permeating our natural world. | 11th August 2008 |
| Critics Blast Wal-Mart for Lobbying Against Carbon-Offset Guidelines - US News & World Report Despite its own green efforts, the company thinks the FTC should not define carbon offsets. | 11th August 2008 |
| Global warming has its own language - Guardian Unlimited This is an opinion piece. And my trip with Denmark's minister of climate and energy, Connie Hedegaard, to see the effects of climate change on Greenland's ice sheet leaves me with a very strong opinion: our kids are going to be so angry with us one day. We've charged their future on our Visa cards. We've added so many greenhouse gases to the atmosphere for our generation's growth that our kids are likely going to spend a good part of their adulthood, maybe all of it, just dealing with the climate implications of our profligacy. And now our leaders are telling them the way out is 'offshore drilling' for more climate-changing fossil fuels. Madness. Sheer madness. | 10th August 2008 |
| In pictures: Inside the Climate Camp - BBC News Hundreds of people take part in the Climate Camp near Hoo as police increase searches on visitors. | 10th August 2008 |
| Eat kangaroo to 'save the planet' - BBC News Switching from beef to kangaroo burgers could significantly help to reduce greenhouse gas emissions, an Australian scientist says. | 10th August 2008 |
| From the Arctic to the Office: Seeing the "Urgent Truth" of Global Warming - Daily Green A Dispatch from the "Students on Ice" Expedition | 10th August 2008 |
| Scientists dig into Alaska tundra's effect on warming - Anchorage Daily News TOOLIK LAKE -- Ground here that for tens of thousands of years was frozen solid is terra firma no more. | 10th August 2008 |
| Meltdown in the Arctic is speeding up - Guardian Unlimited Environment, science technology: Scientists warn that the North Pole could be free of ice in just five years' time instead of 60 | 10th August 2008 |
| Global warming boosts garden pest - Channel 4 Milder winters caused by climate change are providing a boost to plant-damaging aphids, scientists have warned. Researchers revealed the familiar garden pest was flying earlier and in larger numbers because of warm conditions in winter and spring. | 10th August 2008 |
| Coming clean on climate change - The Age HALF of Australia's biggest companies are risking cost blow-outs, an increased regulatory burden and reputational damage from climate change, according to an international report. | 10th August 2008 |
| Pacific shellfish ready to invade Atlantic - 7thSpace Interactive As the Arctic Ocean warms this century, shellfish, snails and other animals from the Pacific Ocean will resume an invasion of the northern Atlantic that was interrupted by cooling conditions three million years ago. | 10th August 2008 |
| Bush Declared 422 Major Disasters - New York Times During his seven and a half years in office, President Bush has declared 11 percent more disasters than President Bill Clinton 130 percent more than President Ronald Reagan. | 10th August 2008 |
| Scientists stumble upon 'carbon-capture' farming - CNN.com RIO VISTA, Calif. (AP) -- On one side of the gravel road are hundreds of acres of corn. On the other is a much different crop that scientists hope will enable farmers to rebuild sinking islands in California's Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta, combat global warming and make a profit at the same time. | 10th August 2008 |
| How coal came back into fashion - Guardian Unlimited The protest at Kingsnorth may appear to be a battle over a coal-fired power station in an obscure corner of Kent, but it represents part of the frontline in a global rush for coal. There are now over 100 similar schemes in various stages of design, planning or construction around the world and foreign governments are watching closely to see what decision is taken in the UK. In particular, they want to know whether a government that has talked tough at climate summit debates will allow power generator E.ON to build the Kingsnorth station with or without carbon capture and storage (CCS) technology that could hold a key to "clean coal" and the fight against global warming. | 9th August 2008 |
| Capitalism as a threat to the environment - Irish Times "Contemporary capitalism and a habitable planet cannot coexist." So runs the editorial summary of a book by James Gustave Speth, dean of the Yale School of Forestry and Environmental Studies. "Today's system of political economy, referred to here as modern capitalism, is destructive of the environment, and not in a minor way but in a way that threatens the planet," he writes in The Bridge at the Edge of the World: Capitalism, the Environment, and Crossing from Crisis to Sustainability (Yale 2008). It is an important message from such an influential and mainstream figure in the environmental movement, who served with the Carter and Clinton administrations and was head of the United Nations Development Programme from 1993 to 1999. He believes we must change the very nature of corporations so that they become legally accountable to society at large and not just to themselves and their shareholders - striking a blow against the embedded "externalities" sacred to orthodox economics which allows firms to pass on environmental costs. | 9th August 2008 |
| Americans can't afford to buy the myths that Big Oil is selling - Statesman Journal reating and selling urban myths has become a highly successful cottage industry in the United States. Take the latest Big Myth created and spread by Big Oil that says we will get a price break at the gas pump if we just let the industry drill anywhere and everywhere. Selling the Big Myth has been so successful that now a majority of Americans believe Big Oil actually wants us to pay less for its product. | 9th August 2008 |
| Study: Newspaper science coverage declining - Christian Science Monitor An analysis of 250 American newspapers by the Project for Excellence in Journalism sees a decline in science and foreign affairs coverage. It also notes that stories covering gradual developments are disappearing. These are changes that could spell trouble for coverage of global climate change. | 9th August 2008 |
| Hope dries with water in Murray's lower lake - The Australian With publicly controlled water reserves in the Murray-Darling plunging to a new low, the despondency of communities on the dying lower lakes deepened yesterday as river managers warned there was no chance of transferring water within the basin. See also: Australia's Biggest River to Become a Lake - MWC News | 9th August 2008 |
| Scientists Flee Landlocked Polar Bear at Arctic Camp - LiveScience.com via Yahoo! News Five scientists had to evacuate a remote research camp in northern Alaska last week to escape a new threat: a polar bear stuck on the land because of the warmer global climate. | 9th August 2008 |
| Words of warming - Guardian Unlimited Culture: As the world hots up, so does the market for books about climate change. Tim Flannery looks at the latest works on the crisis and sizes up their solutions | 9th August 2008 |
| Do city ‘congestion taxes' really help the environment? - The Christian Science Monitor Singapore, Stockholm, and London tinker with variable toll pricing. New York wants to join the club. But does it work? | 9th August 2008 |
| New mayor 'backtracking' on London's environmental progress - Guardian Unlimited Boris Johnson is making long-term decisions that are in danger of making London less green, environmental and social campaigners say, as the new mayor reaches 100 days in office | 9th August 2008 |
| Acid Rain Reduces Methane Emissions From Rice Paddies - Science Daily Acid rain from atmospheric pollution can reduce methane emissions from rice paddies by up to 24 per cent according to new research. “Acid rain is one of several pollution problems in Asia that need solving in the coming decades but we need to appreciate the potential consequences of that clean up, one of which could be an increase in methane emissions as the effect of the acid rain wears off.” | 9th August 2008 |
| American Indians strike coal deal - BBC News An American Indian tribe strikes a 50-year deal with an Australian company to build a $7bn (£3.6bn) plant to convert coal into liquid fuel. | 9th August 2008 |
| Climate protesters arrested after gluing themselves to bank - Guardian Unlimited Demonstrators held banner outside Royal Bank of Scotland that read: 'RBS - cashing in on coal' | 9th August 2008 |
| Prepare for global temperature rise of 4C, warns top scientist - Guardian Unlimited Lunatic report from Defra's chief adviser implies that adaption to a 4C global temperature rise is possible, overlooking the probablility that by that time all the world's major carbon sinks will have been destroyed... See also: Why we must heed Bob Watson's climate change warning - Guardian Unlimited | 8th August 2008 |
| MPs raise climate camp 'liberty' fears - BBC News An MEP says an extension of police powers to stop and search anyone near the Kent climate camp is undermining civil liberties. | 8th August 2008 |
| Cement from CO2: A Concrete Cure for Global Warming? - Scientific American A new technique could turn cement from a source of climate changing greenhouse gases into a way to remove them from the air. The Calera process essentially mimics marine cement, which is produced by coral when making their shells and reefs, taking the calcium and magnesium in seawater and using it to form carbonates at normal temperatures and pressures. "We are turning CO2 into carbonic acid and then making carbonate," Constantz says. "All we need is water and pollution." | 8th August 2008 |
| Kites could provide electricity for 100,000 homes - PhysOrg High-flying kites tethered to generators could supply as much as 100 megawatts of electricity, enough to power 100,000 homes, according to researchers from the Delft University of Technology in The Netherlands. | 8th August 2008 |
| Can Communities Generate Their Own Power? - AlterNet People embrace the buying of local food; has the time come for local energy co-operatives, too? | 8th August 2008 |
| Hypocrites Unite! - George Monbiot At least we have some ideals to fall short of. | 8th August 2008 |
| The Problem Is Simple: Too Many People, Too Much Stuff - AlterNet An equitable and humane solution to overpopulation and overconsumption may actually be possible. | 8th August 2008 |
| Climate Change Equals Stronger Rains - Scientific American As the globe continues to warm, the rainiest parts of the world are very likely to get wetter, according to a new study in Science. Desert dwellers, however, are likely to see what little rain they receive dry up, as the rain becomes even more concentrated in high-precipitation areas. | 8th August 2008 |
| Why do Oragutans care about global warming? - DeSmogBlog The very events that are driving the Orangutan to extinction are the same that threaten our planet's climate. In the name of business, specifically, palm oil and mining, thousand of miles of peat swamp forest are burned in Borneo and many other regions throughout the world every year. Sadly, these forests also contain vast amounts of carbon, which when burned is released into the atmosphere, making Borneo, a small an non-industrial island, one of the largest emitters of greenhouse gas in the world. | 8th August 2008 |
| Climate Change in Action in Greenland - Time Magazine Global warming is a slow, almost imperceptible process. On a tour of Greenland's glaciers, a TIME reporter sees it happening | 6th August 2008 |
| George Monbiot: The stakes could not be higher. Everything hinges on stopping coal - Guardian Unlimited George Monbiot: The climate camp must succeed. In the absence of political backbone, our only hope is an avalanche of public revulsion | 6th August 2008 |
| Police block food supplies to power station protesters - Guardian Unlimited Hundreds of riot police pushed back protesters at the Kingsnorth coal power station "climate camp" in Kent yesterday, as officers raided the site and made eight arrests. | 6th August 2008 |
| Follow your money - Gristmill Record Big Oil profits from record oil prices and taxpayer subsidies -- where does all your money go? With ExxonMobil's report of a $11.68 billion haul in the second quarter of 2008, the world's top five oil companies are now on track for more than $160 billion in profits this year ... I know what you are thinking: Surely, Big Oil will take those staggeringly immense and almost immoral profits from the suspiciously fast rise in oil prices -- along with the $33 billion in taxpayer-funded subsidies you're going to give those politically powerful and remarkably greedy companies over the next five years (see here) -- and invest in both new drilling and new energy technology. | 6th August 2008 |
| Primates 'face extinction crisis' - BBC Almost half of the world's primate species are facing extinction, a major global assessment warns, with habitat loss the main threat. | 6th August 2008 |
| Climate change and species distributions - PhysOrg Scientists have long pointed to physical changes in the Earth and its atmosphere, such as melting polar ice caps, sea level rise and violent storms, as indicators of global climate change. But changes in climate can wreak havoc in more subtle ways, such as the loss of habitat for plant and animal species. In a series of talks at the Ecological Society of America (ESA) 93rd Annual Meeting, climate change scientists will discuss how temperature-induced habitat loss can spell disaster for many living things. | 5th August 2008 |
| The crises of our time and the need for a paradigm shift - mehrnews.com TEHRAN, Aug. 4 (MNA) -- For the first time in history, the human family as a single entity is faced with multiple global crises, each of which has far-reaching implications for the future of our species. | 5th August 2008 |
| Dirty tactics to defend a dirty industry - Guardian Unlimited Caroline Lucas: Aggressive policing at this year's climate camp in Kingsnorth has exposed the UK authorities' contempt for peaceful protest | 5th August 2008 |
| Heavy rains batter North Korea, damage crops - AP via Yahoo! News Heavy rains that battered North Korea in recent weeks have heavily damaged crops, state media said Monday, dealing a further blow to the impoverished country as it struggles to avert a food crisis. | 5th August 2008 |
| Indonesia reports more than 500 fire hot spots in Sumatra - AlertNet More than 500 hot spots have been spotted across Indonesia's Sumatra island, signalling the annual dry-season forest fires and the haze it sometimes carries, a Forestry Ministry official said on Monday. Forestry ministry official fear the number of hot spots could exceed last year's record as the current dry season will be marked by less rain than usual, Sonny Partono, the director of forest fire control, told Reuters. | 5th August 2008 |
| Indian Ocean Tuna Catch Drops, Experts Differ on Why - Planet Ark VICTORIA, the Seychelles - Tuna catches across the Indian Ocean have fallen sharply in the last two years but experts are split over what is threatening the region's US$6 billion industry. | 5th August 2008 |
| Porpoise Deaths Unexplained Off California Waters - Planet Ark SAN FRANCISCO - A wave of porpoise deaths in Northern California has puzzled scientists and more of the dead mammals may wash ashore onto beaches in August, animal researchers said on Sunday. | 5th August 2008 |
| Untouched forests store 3 times more carbon- study - AlertNet Untouched natural forests store three times more carbon dioxide than previously estimated and 60 percent more than plantation forests, said a new Australian study of "green carbon" and its role in climate change. Green carbon occurs in natural forests, brown carbon is found in industrialised forests or plantations, grey carbon in fossil fuels and blue carbon in oceans. Australian National University (ANU) scientists said that the role of untouched forests, and their biomass of green carbon, had been underestimated in the fight against global warming. | 5th August 2008 |
| Paying lip service to cap-and-trade - Guardian Unlimited Barack Obama and John McCain both propose to reduce carbon emissions, but their plans face a sceptical American public | 5th August 2008 |
| Denver reels under record heat - BBC News A number of states across south east USA have been reeling under intense heat, which has broken a number of records. | 4th August 2008 |
| Global warming shows itself as trees die out, flowers, glaciers fade - Modesto Bee But while some flowers are suffering, other vegetation is expanding, including desert dwelling sagebrush and Russian thistle, a noxious, heat-loving weed. | 4th August 2008 |
| Climate of fear as ice vanishes - Sydney Morning Herald Scientists warn that the Arctic could be ice free as early as 2013. "The Arctic really can feed back into the global climate system," said Dr Macdonald, who has worked with the UN's peak scientific body, the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change. "You know what happens when you get feedbacks - you get surprises and we don't like surprises." | 4th August 2008 |
| Organic food becomes latest casualty of the credit crunch - Independent Dairy farmers are turning their backs on Britain's organic milk market as economic pessimism dents consumers' previously buoyant demand for organic produce. The organic goods market at large is being "credit crunched", particularly among new products like organic ready meals and home-delivery vegetable boxes. | 4th August 2008 |
| Raising tax on dirty cars ‘won't cut CO2 - Times Online Plans to raise vehicle excise duty for the most polluting cars will not cut carbon dioxide emissions as much as hoped, a cross-party committee of MPs will say today. Reforms should be more ambitious, says report. See also: 'Pay to scrap gas-guzzlers' | 4th August 2008 |
| Climate Chill Came Exactly 12,679 Years Ago - Study - Planet Ark OSLO - A drastic cooling of the climate in western Europe happened exactly 12,679 years ago, apparently after a shift to icy winds over the Atlantic, scientists said on Friday, giving a hint of how abruptly the climate can change. | 4th August 2008 |
| Anger at police raid on green camp - Guardian Unlimited Environment, science technology: Around 200 officers seize hundreds of items they claim could be used to break law | 4th August 2008 |
| Yosemite weather to drastically change, scientists say - The Monterey County Herald YOSEMITE NATIONAL PARK - Scientists predict that climate change will mean more rainfall and less snow in Yosemite in the next 50 years. | 4th August 2008 |
| Climate change could cost N.J. billions - Philly.com Climate change will wallop New Jersey by 2100, endangering lives and causing tens of billions of dollars in losses, according to a recent report issued by the University of Maryland. | 4th August 2008 |
| If Socialism Fails: The Spectre of 21st Century Barbarism - Monthly Review As capitalism continues with business as usual, climate change is fast expanding the gap between rich and poor between and within nations, and imposing unparalleled suffering on those least able to protect themselves. That is the reality of 21st Century Barbarism. No society that permits that to happen can be called civilized. No social order that causes it to happen deserves to survive.. | 3rd August 2008 |
| Arctic ice continues to thin - New Scientist Christian Haas of the Alfred Wegener Institute for Polar and Marine Research in Bremerhaven, Germany, and his team estimated the thickness of late summer ice at the North Pole in 2001, 2004 and 2007. They found that the ice was on average 1.3 metres thick at the end of the summer in 2007. By contrast, its depth was 2.3 metres in 2001 and 2.6 metres in 2004. Study links melting ice to increased carbon pollution - Vancouver Sun | 3rd August 2008 |
| Best of Times, Worst of Times: Tony Kirkham - Times Online Tony Kirkham, 50, has worked at Kew Gardens for 30 years, and has been head of the arboretum since 2001. He describes the anguish he feels witnessing the dramatic effects of climate change, which is eradicating native British trees | 3rd August 2008 |
| Flames engulf woodlands in Turkey's tourist region - Guardian Unlimited Firefighters battle to control major forest fire that has devastated 10,000 acres of woodland in Antalya | 3rd August 2008 |
| Giant kites to tap into wind power - Guardian Unlimited Environment, science technology: Experiments show that the power generated could provide electricity for 100,000 homes | 3rd August 2008 |
| Brazil launches rainforest fund - BBC News Brazil launches an international fund to protect the Amazon rainforest but warns against foreign interference in its policy. | 3rd August 2008 |
| Expert report questions Tory greenhouse-gas claims - CNews OTTAWA - The Harper government might be overestimating how much its climate-change plan will lower greenhouse gases, says a federal advisory panel. | 3rd August 2008 |
| Climate protesters prepare for jail - Guardian Unlimited Group of environmental campaigners risk jail by joining thousands of activists at climate camp | 3rd August 2008 |
| Bridging the divides - RealClimate We often discuss the issues that arise in doing interdisciplinary work in climate science, and Liz Moyer and I have a commentary on that just out in Nature Reports Climate Change. Normally I don't mention these kinds of pieces on the blog, but in this case the editors commissioned a nice cartoon (from Mark Roberts) illustrating our point. I liked the cartoon a lot, and so it deserves as wide an audience as possible. A bit of context is probably useful. The three main protagonists are representative of the somewhat different foci of paleo-climatologists, climate modellers and economists. Very broadly speaking, paleo-climate science is built around the analysis of single location time series (often from holes that are drilled). | 3rd August 2008 |
| UK in 'delusion' over emissions - BBC News The UK has been living under a delusion over its claim to be cutting greenhouse gases, according to two reports. | 2nd August 2008 |
| Hot, hot heat - Gristmill Sure glacier melt, sea level rise, extreme drought, and species loss get all the media attention -- they are the Britney Spears, Paris Hilton, and Barack Obama of climate impacts. But what about good old-fashioned sweltering heat? How bad will that be? Two little-noticed studies -- one new, one old -- spell out the grim news. Bottom line: By century's end, extreme temperatures of up to 122°F would threaten most of the central, southern, and western U.S. Even worse, Houston and Washington, D.C. could experience temperatures exceeding 98°F for some 60 days a year. | 2nd August 2008 |
| 100 months to save the world? - Guardian Unlimited Environment, science technology: Time is running out to stop irreversible climate change. Andrew Simms: explains why we must act now | 2nd August 2008 |
| Chris Davies: Why I'm going to climate camp - Guardian Unlimited Chris Davies: As a parliamentarian, it's my job to make the law, but climate change is too important to ignore. That's why I'm going to Kingsnorth | 2nd August 2008 |
| Could China lead the green revolution? - New Scientist A new report claims China is poised to take the lead in the global effort to go green See also: China's 'rapid renewables surge' - BBC News | 2nd August 2008 |
| Arctic tourists evacuated because of global warming - The Province Arctic tourists evacuated because of global warmingThe Province, Canada. Geologists and ice experts will assess what appear to be the latest dramatic effects of climate change in Canada's Arctic. | 2nd August 2008 |
| Who is behind climate change deniers? - The Age The tide slowly turned on tobacco denial and the science was accepted in the end. But climate is different. There are no "smoke-free areas" on the planet. Climate denial may turn out to be the world's most deadly PR campaign. | 2nd August 2008 |
| Massive Profits, High Gas Prices and $33 billion in Taxpayer Giveaways to Big Oil - DeSmogBlog Over the next 5 years oil companies will receive $33 billion in taxpayer funded giveaways.According to the report set to be released tomorrow morning by the Friends of the Earth, (pdf) the $33 billion in taxpayer dollars will come to Big Oil through tax loopholes, royalty rollbacks and research and development subsidies."This is a tremendous sum for taxpayers to be doling out to the oil and gas industry," said Friends of the Earth's Erich Pica, who authored the analysis. "The corporate fat cats at these big oil companies are already earning record profits-they don't need our tax dollars too. | 1st August 2008 |
| Leo Hickman's guide to Climate Camp - Guardian Unlimited Leo Hickman on how to enjoy fighting for a cause See also: Activists occupy power station site - Guardian Unlimited | 1st August 2008 |
| Grass ceiling: How corporate culture is going green - Independent In central London there is a lawn of luscious green, in which insects merrily scurry. Feeding on them are birds, which can nest nearby in specially installed wooden boxes. They are observed by office workers eight storeys above ground level, where a view of Saint Paul's Cathedral matches any vista in the capital. | 1st August 2008 |
| Single cell algae to produce 'green crude' that will help in the battle against climate change - Guardian Unlimited A company in San Diego claims to have developed a sustainable version of oil it calls 'green crude' | 1st August 2008 |
| Alternative energy technique to split hydrogen from water could lead to clean fuel - Guardian Unlimited Scientists have found an inexpensive way to produce hydrogen from water, a discovery that could lead to a plentiful source of environmentally friendly fuel | 1st August 2008 |
| More acidic ocean could spell trouble for marine life's earliest stages Increasingly acidic conditions in the ocean brought on as a direct result of rising carbon dioxide levels in the atmosphere could spell trouble for the earliest stages of marine life, according to a new report in the August 5th issue of Current Biology, a publication of Cell Press. Levels of acidification predicted by the year 2100 could slash the fertilization success of sea urchins by an estimated 25 percent, the study shows. | 1st August 2008 |
| ENERGY: Accidents Make N-Questions Bigger PARIS, Jul 31 (IPS) - The recent proliferation of accidents at nuclear power plants in France, Germany, Spain, Sweden, Slovenia and elsewhere in Europe has made calls for greater reliance on nuclear energy questionable, experts say. | 1st August 2008 |
| Global Warming Will Pump More Raw Sewage Into the Ocean - Vancouver Sun Public health and safety threats are escalating in Metro Vancouver because an aging sewage handling and treatment system will fail more often as a result of climate change, according to a federal report uncovered by The Vancouver Sun. | 1st August 2008 |
| Wind Overtakes Water in Britain's Green Energy Mix - Planet Ark LONDON - Wind supplied more of Britain's electricity that water for the first time last year, while power generators preferred gas to coal and nuclear output continued to decline, according to new government data. | 1st August 2008 |
| Humanity At crossroads: Attitudes And Climate Change - CounterCurrents.org The huge commotion, wide ranging research and intellectual discussions about the collapse of the civilization due to climate change has created apprehension and confusion about the directions humanity should take to overcome the challenges to its existence. The variety of solutions recommended range from technological fantasies to pessimistic resignation about the complete destruction of humanity. The solutions also include invading new planets, as well as constructing polar cities and Noah's model of ark, to sustain life on earth. Most of the solutions are based on the assumption of total collapse, along with the end of civilization and human existence. Despite these thought-provoking discussions about the influence of climate change on human existence and the solutions to tackle it, we are nearing, as time passes, the verge of a major disaster and the options for solutions are declining. The increasing natural calamities, the concern about the tipping points due to further carbon emissions and its effects on the habitability on earth have created great concerns. | 31st July 2008 |
| Arctic ice continues to thin - New Scientist The North Pole could soon be ice-free during summer, as studies show that the ice cover at the end of last summer was at its thinnest ever | 31st July 2008 |
| Birds fly north in climate change vanguard: study - stv.tv Birds have been moving north in Europe over the past 25 years because of climate change in the vanguard of likely huge shifts in the ranges of plants and animals, scientists said on Wednesday. | 31st July 2008 |
| New turbine to harness wave power A turbine designed to be the forerunner of the UK's first commercial wave power station is switched on. | 31st July 2008 |
| Coal protesters at power station - BBC News Up to 100 activists arrive at a power station where a climate camp is planned next week. | 31st July 2008 |
| Spain slows drivers to cut oil use - Guardian Unlimited Government launches plan to cut speed limits to 50mph and hand out millions of low-energy lightbulbs | 31st July 2008 |
| Plan for third Heathrow runway is white elephant, professor warns - Guardian Unlimited Former chief scientific adviser brands proposals short-sighted and economically unsound | 31st July 2008 |
| Fish with temperature-dependent sex determination face global warming - EurekAlert! In vertebrates with separate sexes, sex determination can be genotypic (GSD) or temperature-dependent (TSD). TSD is very common in reptiles, where the ambient temperature during sensitive periods of early development irreversibly determines whether an individual will be male or female. The number of males and females in a population is the sex ratio, a key demographic parameter crucial for population viability. This study shows that TSD in fish is far less widespread than currently believed, suggesting that TSD is clearly the exception in fish sex-determination. Thus, the scientists suggest that the evolution of sex-determining mechanisms in lower vertebrates, as is currently understood, needs to be revised. Further, species with TSD exhibit only one general change in sex ratio in response to temperature increase (leading to many males and few females). In many species, females determine the number of offspring for the next generation and so the viability of some fish populations with TSD can be compromised through alterations in their sex ratios due to temperature fluctuations of the magnitude predicted by climate change.. | 31st July 2008 |
| Climate change could hit Lebanon's dwindling cedars - Reuters via Yahoo! UK & Ireland News Sturdy cedars perched high in the mountains stand for many Lebanese as symbols of their fractured land's survival. | 31st July 2008 |
| Antarctic waters were 'once warm' - BBC News Research of cliff fossils shows the climate of Antarctica 40 millions years ago was once so warm there was once no ice. | 31st July 2008 |
| US environmental agency silences employees on climate change - Guardian Unlimited Democratic senators to hold press conference about leaked email that reveals EPA gagged staff from speaking on issue | 30th July 2008 |
| Huge chunk snaps off storied Arctic ice shelf - Globe and Mail A four-square-kilometre chunk has broken off Ward Hunt Ice Shelf - the largest remaining ice shelf in the Arctic - threatening the future of the giant frozen mass that northern explorers have used for years as the starting point for their treks. Scientists say the break, the largest on record since 2005, is the latest indication that climate change is forcing the drastic reshaping of the Arctic coastline, where 9,000 square kilometres of ice have been whittled down to less than 1,000 over the past century, and are only showing signs of decreasing further. | 30th July 2008 |
| The Last Continent: One hot doc - National Post Although The Last Continent opens with shots of stark, almost lunar beauty, the film also chronicles the effects of one of the region's mildest winters on the crew. Warm temperatures threatened to ruin their food supplies, which they had planned to bury in the ice. Worse, floating ice around the ship prevented most of their mainland expeditions, since boats couldn't navigate the berg-filled waters but sleds were useless without pack ice. | 30th July 2008 |
| Forest Service burns through its budgets - SitNews The Forest Service has struggled for years to pay for fighting fires that last year alone scorched almost 10 million acres, mainly in the West. As fire seasons grow longer and the blazes more intense in forests stressed by global warming, the agency's funding woes mount. The Forest Service has already spent roughly $900 million this year, almost 75 percent of its fire-suppression budget, and the season is just nearing its peak. | 30th July 2008 |
| Eaten up - Guardian Unlimited Ed Pilkington talks to the soothsayer of agro-economics, Raj Patel, about what will happen when the food finally runs out | 30th July 2008 |
| Turbines are beautiful says boss - BBC News A wind farm company boss says its 330ft turbines planned for Cornwall will be "graceful and beautiful". | 30th July 2008 |
| Australians strongly back carbon trade scheme-poll - AlertNet Australians overwhelmingly back government plans to introduce one of the world's biggest carbon trading schemes, a poll found on Tuesday, despite a lack of detail about how much it will cost and how it will work. More than eight in 10 people supported carbon trading, with 60 percent backing the introduction of a scheme even if other major polluting countries refused to cut their emissions, a Newspoll in The Australian newspaper showed. | 30th July 2008 |
| Sunscreen for crops - CNN.com FRESNO, California (AP) -- Sunscreen for fruits and vegetables? It's already being tested in Australia and Chile. | 30th July 2008 |
| For the Liberals, the last nine million tonnes will be the toughest - Vancouver Sun Canada, BC: - Though the carbon tax has drawn most of the fire over the government effort to reduce greenhouse gas emissions, it is not the biggest item in the recently released climate action plan. | 30th July 2008 |
| US blacks face harsher climate change impact - Reuters AlertNet American blacks are likely to suffer disproportionately from climate change and they are willing to pay to combat it, a commission aimed at raising awareness about global warming said on Tuesday. | 30th July 2008 |
| Union pushes carbon tariff - The Age Australia should impose a "carbon tariff" on goods imported from countries that refuse to sign up to an international agreement on climate change, the Australian Manufacturing Workers Union says. | 29th July 2008 |
| Electric dreams - BBC News As part of Can I Afford to Fill Up? a Panorama programme looking at how high fuel prices are affecting people across the UK, reporter Jane Corbin took to the road in an electric G-Wiz car to see just how easy it is to join the green revolution. | 29th July 2008 |
| Paying To Save Tropical Forests Could Be A Way To Reduce Global Carbon Emissions - Science Daily Wealthy nations willing to collectively spend about $1 billion annually could prevent the emission of roughly half a billion metric tons of carbon dioxide per year for the next 25 years, new research suggests. It would take about that much money to put an end to a tenth of the tropical deforestation in the world, one of the top contributors to greenhouse gas emissions, researchers estimate. | 29th July 2008 |
| Law Suit a Tar Sands Stopper? - TheTyee.ca Jack Woodward and the Beaver Lake Cree aim to change Canadian law -- and their success likely would throw a huge wrench into Alberta's tar-sands oil production. The suit pits the Beaver Lake Cree band against the governments of Canada and Alberta, asking the court to rule invalid the government authorization for thousands of petroleum projects on the band's core territory. | 29th July 2008 |
| Obama's biofuels policy tension - BBC News Senator Obama has been a big supporter of corn subsidies for American farmers to produce the plant-fuel ethanol. But a new report from his own green adviser warns of the many problems associated with the biofuel. | 29th July 2008 |
| Valuable Seagrasses Face Global Warming Threat - Planet Ark GENEVA - Seagrass meadows, which are vital for the survival of much marine life and a source of household materials in Europe and Africa, face a mounting threat from global warming, a report said on Friday. | 29th July 2008 |
| Scientists worry as once frozen tundra thaws in Alaska - McClatchy Washington Bureau TOOLIK LAKE, Alaska — Ground here that for tens of thousands of years was frozen solid is terra firma no more. Across the tundra and coast of the Arctic Ocean, land is caving in. Soils loosed by freshly thawed earth set off a new era of rot, and of bloom — dumping a bonanza of nutrients into a top-of-the-world environment that swirls from months of midnight sun to deep-freeze dark. | 29th July 2008 |
| As Ocean Warms, Coral Loses Anchor in Acidic Waters - Scientific American Coral reefs can't find a strong purchase in the eastern tropical Pacific thanks to more acidic waters--a potential precursor of what the ocean will be like under global warming | 29th July 2008 |
| Orkney seabirds may be victims of Global warming - stv.tv For almost 60 years, scientists have been visiting the uninhabited island of Eynhallow in Orkney to study a seabird called the Fulmar. Their long running research is showing that the birds may well be the victims of climate change. | 29th July 2008 |
| Snapshot of past climate reveals no ice in Antarctica millions of years ago A snapshot of New Zealand's climate 40 million years ago reveals a greenhouse Earth, with warmer seas and little or no ice in Antarctica, according to research published this week in the journal Geology. | 29th July 2008 |
| Climate change Dungeons and Dragons - Nature.com Today the participants woke up in the year 2015, and the outlook on global warming is significantly worse than it was just seven years earlier. ... | 29th July 2008 |
| 33% of China's carbon footprint blamed on exports - New Scientist Economists now say that one-third of China's carbon dioxide emissions come from the manufacture of exported goods – many of them destined for developed countries | 29th July 2008 |
| FACTBOX - Nuclear Projects in Central and Southeast Europe - Planet Ark A number of countries in central, eastern and southeastern Europe plan to build new nuclear power reactors or extend the life of existing ones to meet growing domestic demand and replace ageing power capacity. | 29th July 2008 |
| THE END OF FOOD - New York Times Book Review: THE END OF FOOD. A contributor to Harper’s and other magazines, Roberts sketches a dire present and ponders a bleak future. Readers with a sci-fi bent might, upon completing this book, decide that the 1973 film “Soylent Green” should no longer be viewed as merely a schlocky doomsday vehicle for Charlton Heston, but as an almost plausible peek at the year 2022, when global warming and overpopulation have rendered the earth inhospitable to most plants and animals, and steak and strawberries are black market goods consumed only by the super-rich. | 27th July 2008 |
| Mystery of tumbling puffin population - Independent Numbers of puffins at England's largest colony, on the Farne Islands off the Northumberland coast, have mysteriously tumbled by a third in the past five years. "this dramatic drop in numbers would suggest there is something happening at sea during the winter, for example, an intensification of storms as a result of our changing climate which could affect the ability of puffins to find food." | 27th July 2008 |
| Video: China's melting glacier - Guardian Unlimited Jonathan Watts visits the Tian Mountains in western China, where the glaciers are melting because of global warming | 27th July 2008 |
| Airport protesters plan next move - BBC News Protesters opposing plans to expand Heathrow Airport hold a strategy conference. | 27th July 2008 |
| UK scientists hit out at new coal station plans - Guardian Unlimited Power plants to be built without technology to cut emissions will accelerate global warming, experts claim | 27th July 2008 |
| EPA chief won't explain climate choices - Journal Inquirer WASHINGTON - Environmental Protection Agency chief Stephen Johnson has declined to explain before Congress how a conclusion he made last year that global warming put the public in danger could lead to a decision not to regulate greenhouse gases. | 27th July 2008 |
| 'Burn Up' makes our climate crisis into a drama - Guardian Unlimited Jeremy Leggett: You may think Burn Up was far-fetched. Believe me, having witnessed climate negotiations myself, it was anything but | 27th July 2008 |
| Robin McKie: Actions speak louder than a lot of government hot air - Guardian Unlimited Robin McKie: Melt our ice-caps and you release forces you cannot control [but CCS is probably not the answer...] | 27th July 2008 |
| Developed nations should get serious on emissions cut: Pachauri - Outlook India Developed nations should pull up their socks and get "serious" about reducing carbon emissions before it was "too late", R K Pachauri, Chairman of the UN's Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), said today. | 27th July 2008 |
| ENVIRONMENT-BURKINA FASO: Winning People Over to Fight Deforestation OUAGADOUGOU, Jul 26 (IPS) - In the West African nation of Burkina Faso, millions of trees are planted every year to reverse desertification. However the growing socio-economic needs of local populations pose a constant threat to these efforts. | 27th July 2008 |
| Traded Away - George Monbiot A cunning new loophole has wrecked the government's Climate Change Bill. | 25th July 2008 |
| AFRICA: Link Between Crop Failure and Climate Change Often Missed - IPS CAPE TOWN, Jul 24 (IPS) - Climate change has a profound effect on food security in Africa, as increasing temperatures and shifting rain patterns reduce access to food across the continent. | 25th July 2008 |
| Invasion Of The Floating Stingers - SkyNews via Yahoo! UK & Ireland News - A giant swarm of jellyfish packing a nasty sting has invaded the Mediterranean, threatening to ruin holidays along the coasts of France, Spain and Italy. | 25th July 2008 |
| ENERGY: Solar Thermal Power Coming to a Boil - IPS WASHINGTON, Jul 23 (IPS) - After emerging in 2006 from 15 years of hibernation, the solar thermal power industry experienced a surge in 2007, with 100 megawatts of new capacity coming online worldwide. | 25th July 2008 |
| Better than new: Give your home an eco facelift - Independent Soon after I decided to leave mainstream politics – I was the deputy chair of the Liberal Democrat Party – and concentrate on becoming an eco-auditor and writer, I looked around my home and realised that, like many a politician's property, it had suffered from years of neglect and now badly needed repairing and redecorating. Knowing that more than 72 million tons of waste is produced each year by the UK construction industry and that huge resources and CO2 emissions are involved in producing new building materials, I resolved that the refurbishment should be as eco-friendly as possible. | 25th July 2008 |
| 'It's the Three Gorges of the sky' - Guardian Unlimited Environment, science technology: Jonathan Watts reports from Dabancheng on a changing landscape for China's energy policy | 25th July 2008 |
| Scandinavia's lateral thinkers - Guardian Unlimited Business money: How Sweden's entrepreneurial approach to tackling climate change is blazing a trail in Europe | 25th July 2008 |
| Canadian elections likely to focus on carbon tax - Reuters via Yahoo! News Elections to fill three seats in Canada's House of Commons will be held on September 8 with the major issue likely to be the opposition Liberal Party's proposal to introduce a carbon tax. | 25th July 2008 |
| Population policy needed for the UK in order to combat climate change - PhysOrg The biggest contribution UK couples can make to combating climate change would be to have only two children or at least have one less than they first intended, argues an editorial published on BMJ.com today. | 25th July 2008 |
| Renewables mandate 'undermined' - BBC Green groups accuse the UK government of trying to sabotage Europe's rules on renewable energy. | 25th July 2008 |
| For more news, click here >> News from previous days is below | |
| Speech of the Week - Gore's Energy Challenge: 'The Future of Human Civilization Is at Stake' I challenge our nation to commit to producing 100 percent of our electricity from renewable energy and clean carbon-free sources within 10 years. | 23rd July 2008 |
| Population time bomb ticking on emissions - Sydney Morning Herald A TWO-THIRDS cut in household greenhouse gas emissions would still not achieve Federal Government carbon targets because the population is growing too fast, a study into immigration policy and climate change contends. | 23rd July 2008 |
| Saharan sun could power European supergrid - Guardian Unlimited Vast farms of solar panels in the Sahara desert could provide clean electricity for the whole of Europe, according to EU scientists working on a plan to pool the region's renewable energy. | 23rd July 2008 |
| A Mighty Wind Awaits on Coal River Mountain - RedOrbit Something historic is taking place in West Virginia this summer. Faced with an impending proposal to stripmine over 6,600 acres - nearly 10 square miles - in the Coal River Valley, including one of the last great mountains in that range, an extraordinary movement of local residents and coal mining families have come up with a counterproposal for an even more effective wind farm. Mother Jones, the miners' angel, once declared: "Pray for the dead, and fight like hell for the living." Having witnessed the destruction of over 470 mountains and their adjacent communities in Appalachia, the Coal River Valley citizens are doing just that. On the frontlines of one of the most tragic environmental and human rights scandals in modern American history, the community-wide Coal River wind advocates have devised a blueprint to get beyond the divisive regional politics and break the stranglehold of King Coal on the central Appalachian economies. | 23rd July 2008 |
| Is mankind killing penguins washing ashore on Brazil's coast? - McClatchy Washington Bureau NITEROI, Brazil - The discovery of hundreds of young penguins washing up along the Brazilian shoreline over the past month has sparked a scientific mystery over what may have led the birds thousands of miles astray. "It appears the penguins are not finding fish where they normally do, and one reason could be that warming waters and climate change have impacted the fish population." | 23rd July 2008 |
| Smoke From Wildfires May Block Warming of Arctic, Study Says - Bloomberg Smoke spreading across the sky from intense wildfires in North America could act temporarily to blunt the effect of global warming in the Arctic, climate researchers said. The Arctic may cool for weeks or months at a time as smoke from northern wildfires drifts into the region, said researchers at the University of Colorado and the U.S. National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. The cooling effect was observed above the snow-free tundra, and to a greater extent over the darker, ice-free ocean, according to the study which appears this week in the Journal of Geophysical Research. | 23rd July 2008 |
| Nuclear power plants could be built in protected areas - The Independent A new generation of nuclear power stations could be built in flood-risk or "environmentally protected" areas, under proposed rules set out by the Government today. | 23rd July 2008 |
| Opinion: 'Climate swindle' film is dangerous, despite ruling - New Scientist Don't believe anything you see in a TV documentary made in the UK. Documentary makers here have no obligation to be accurate, though factual programmes should present a wide range of views. That is the implication of a series of rulings by Ofcom, the regulatory body for responsible for upholding broadcast standards in the UK, on complaints made about a British TV documentary called The Great Global Warming Swindle. | 23rd July 2008 |
| For more news, click here >> News from previous days is below | |
| The Self-Justifying Myth People love films like The Great Global Warming Swindle, because they tell us what we want to believe. | 22nd July 2008 |
| Friends in High Places - BBC News Panorama investigates allegations that the government has been in cahoots with BAA over the expansion of Heathrow Airport. | 22nd July 2008 |
| Green light for massive wind farm - BBC News Europe's largest onshore wind farm will be built near Abington in South Lanarkshire, it is announced. | 22nd July 2008 |
| Clean deadline call on coal power - BBC News The government should set a deadline for coal power stations to "clean up" or close, a parliamentary committee says. | 22nd July 2008 |
| Amazon powers tropical ocean's carbon sink Nutrients from the Amazon River spread well beyond the continental shelf and drive carbon capture in the deep ocean, according to the authors of a multi-year study. | 22nd July 2008 |
| Climate documentary 'broke rules' - BBC News A controversial Channel 4 film on global warming broke Ofcom rules on impartiality and fairness, the regulator says. | 22nd July 2008 |
| '100 months to save the planet' - BBC News A "Green New Deal" is needed to solve current problems of climate change, energy and finance, a report argues. | 21st July 2008 |
| Wetlands could unleash carbon bomb - Christian Today The worlds wetlands threatened by development dehydration and climate change could release a planetwarming carbon bomb if they are destroyed ecological scientists said on Sunday | 21st July 2008 |
| Don't fiddle as world burns - Sydney Morning Herald AN OVERWHELMING majority of voters support Kevin Rudd's drive to tackle climate change and 77 per cent believe Australia should press ahead and cut its greenhouse gas emissions, regardless of what other countries do. | 21st July 2008 |
| Primary school finds the ultimate sustainable heat source - the pupils' metabolism - BBC Architects claim a new primary will be so energy efficient that the children's body heat will keep it warm. | 21st July 2008 |
| High water - Guardian Unlimited moon. Solar and wind power use established technology but both have their problems: Britain is too cloudy, and wind schemes, although necessary, are unpopular and unpredictable. Could the pale moon, and the tides it causes on earth, help? No country is better placed than Britain to draw energy from the seas. The tidal range here is among the greatest on the planet, and the islands and river mouths of the north and west coasts offer tempting sites where each day vast volumes of water move back and forth on cue (with the Pentland Firth, off Orkney, being described hopefully as "the Saudi Arabia of tidal power"). | 21st July 2008 |
| Greenhouse gases could spark fires in West - San Francisco Chronicle California has been hit by 2,000 fires this year, and climate scientists are predicting that the situation will worsen as temperatures rise. The American West has been warming dramatically during the past 60 years at a rate surpassed only by Alaska. This year has been particularly dry for California, with less snowfall, earlier snowmelt and lower summer river flows. Some of the state's top scientists say the changing water picture is caused by humans producing greenhouse gases, and the U.N. Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change predicts more intense and longer droughts with warmer spring and summer temperatures in the West. That, scientists say, leads to increases in the length of the fire seasons, number of fires, time needed to put out the fire and size of the burned area. | 21st July 2008 |
| NOAA: Eighth Warmest June On Record For Globe - Science Daily The combined average global land and ocean surface temperatures for June 2008 ranked eighth warmest for June since worldwide records began in 1880, according to an analysis by NOAA. Also, globally it was the ninth warmest January to June period on record. | 21st July 2008 |
| Reaching A Stalemate on Solar - TIME If the renewable credits do expire (Congress, jammed in a partisan gridlock, refuses to renew them), they'll save taxpayers a little money — maybe $1 billion, or less than half a week of the Iraq war. But the cost to the economy — not to mention the fight against climate change — will be far greater. Navigant Consulting, an international firm that studies the energy industry, estimates that the expiration of the renewable tax credit would result in approximately $19 billion in lost investment, and 119,000 lost job opportunities in the U.S. That's because renewables, while getting cheaper all the time, still cost more than fossil fuels. Subsidies can help bridge the gap as renewable technology improves — but that will happen only if businesses can produce solar or wind power at scale, which will happen only if investors can be assured that the tax credits won't suddenly disappear, says Rhone Resch, president of the Solar Energy Industries Association. (Hear Resch talk about the renewable tax credits on this week's Greencast.) | 21st July 2008 |
| Adding Lime To Seawater May Cut Carbon Dioxide Levels Back To Pre-industrial Levels - Science Daily A workable way of reducing carbon dioxide levels in the atmosphere by adding lime, found in limestone, to seawater has the potential to dramatically reverse CO2 accumulation. Adding lime to seawater increases alkalinity, boosting seawater's ability to absorb CO2 from air and reducing the tendency to release it back again. | 21st July 2008 |
| Ruling expected on climate film - BBC News Media regulator Ofcom is due to announce whether a Channel 4 climate documentary broke rules on accuracy and fairness. | 21st July 2008 |
| Missing fossils could warn of extreme climate to come - New Scientist Overheated tropics millions of years ago may have wiped out plant life - finding proof could help modellers produce more accurate forecasts | 20th July 2008 |
| Is growth over? - Los Angeles Times California's continuing water crisis may mean the end of the state as we have known it. | 20th July 2008 |
| Octopuses galore for lobster catchers - Guardian Unlimited Creatures from the Mediterranean and Pacific such as skeleton shrimps and red blenny are thriving in the once chilly waters of Scotland | 20th July 2008 |
| Drought threatens drinking water for a million Australians - AFP via Yahoo! News Up to a million people in Australia could face a shortage of drinking water if the country's drought continues, a report on the state of the nation's largest river system revealed Sunday. | 20th July 2008 |
| Channel 4 to be censured over controversial climate film - Guardian Unlimited Channel 4 misrepresented some of the world's leading climate scientists in a controversial documentary that claimed global warming was a conspiracy and a fraud, the UK's media regulator will rule next week. | 20th July 2008 |
| A Green New Deal - Mark Lynas A "war economy" social mobilisation harnessed, this time not towards fighting fascism, but towards heading off ecological crisis See also: Fighting the twin crises | 20th July 2008 |
| Experts call for new conservation tactics - Lepidopterology An international team of conservation scientists from Australia, the United Kingdom and United States, including University of Texas at Austin Professor Camille Parmesan, call for new conservation tactics, such as assisted migration, in the face of the growing threat of climate change. | 20th July 2008 |
| Even oilmen believe our planet is burning up, says Full Monty writer behind terrifying TV drama - Daily Mail Simon Beaufoy says petrochemical chiefs are secretly convinced of global warming. | 20th July 2008 |
| Chemical breakthrough turns sawdust into biofuel - New Scientist Lignin makes up a third of the dry mass of wood, but nobody knew how to convert it into ethanol – until now | 20th July 2008 |
| UN warns on biofuel crop reliance - BBC News UN chief Ban Ki-moon warns the world's leading economies not to invest too heavily in biofuel crops at the expense of food production. | 20th July 2008 |
| Cities at sea - Guardian Unlimited Environment, science technology: Concerns over climate change have got architects considering life on the water | 20th July 2008 |
| Measuring Ice Crystals In Clouds - RedOrbit Scientists have created an instrument designed to help determine the shapes and sizes of tiny ice crystals typical of those found in high-altitude clouds, down to the micron level (comparable to the tiniest cells in the human body), according to a new study in Optics Letters, a journal published by the Optical Society. The data produced using this instrument likely will help improve computer models used to predict climate change. | 20th July 2008 |
| Banking on carbon trading: Can banks stop climate change? - CNN.com Who would think the banks would land the job of sorting out the world's climate change problems? | 20th July 2008 |
| Oil sands boom swamps the Canadian wilderness - Guardian Unlimited Environmentalists want tougher laws to halt the damage, writes Tim Webb | 20th July 2008 |
| Scientists to discuss climate risk posed by wetlands destruction - PhysOrg Moves around the world to drain marshes and other wetlands to make space for farming could be hastening climate change, scientists gathering in Brazil from Monday will be hearing. | 20th July 2008 |
| Gore challenges US to ditch oil - BBC News Nobel Laureate Gore urges Americans to abandon electricity generated by fossil fuels within a decade. | 18th July 2008 |
| Stop being greedy, Pope tells world's youth - Guardian Unlimited The world's natural resources are being squandered because of the 'insatiable' demands of consumers, the Pope warns | 18th July 2008 |
| Why Our Food Waste May Be Our Greatest Asset - AlterNet Composting is key to reducing waste costs, cutting global warming emissions, and increasing urban food security. | 18th July 2008 |
| Mexico City promises to reduce emissions by 12% - CNews MEXICO CITY - The government of notoriously polluted Mexico City is promising to cut harmful greenhouse gas emissions 12 per cent by 2012. | 18th July 2008 |
| Global warming brings new iceberg threat to Antarctic ecosystem - Times Online A new global warming threat to the fragile marine ecosystems of Antarctica has been identified, with the discovery that an increasing number of icebergs are tearing up the sea floor and destroying any life in their way. The shallow habitats of species such as giant sea spiders, Antarctic worms, sea urchins and corals are facing a growing risk from icebergs, according to research that shows more bergs are floating freely in coastal waters as temperatures rise. | 18th July 2008 |
| Ugandan coffee may disappear in 30 years - Oxfam - AlertNet Changing weather patterns in Uganda may lead to the extinction of the east African country's key export, coffee, in coming decades, a report by British charity Oxfam said on Thursday. | 18th July 2008 |
| Drought diary - BBC The south-western US is suffering its eighth consecutive year of drought. There are concerns that the Colorado River, which has sustained life in the area for thousands of years, can no longer meet the needs of the tens of millions of people living in major cities such as Las Vegas and Los Angeles. The BBC's Matthew Price is travelling along the river to investigate the scale of the problem and is sending a series of diary items from there.t | 18th July 2008 |
| IT Carbon Emissions Soar Above Aviation - BIOS In a shocking revelation, the EU commission has stated that CO2 emissions from the Information Technology (IT) sector are comparable to that of the vilified Aviation sector and, it is reportedly considering potentially fierce legislation if the industry fails to ta... See also: Whitehall bid to cut IT emissions - BBC News | 18th July 2008 |
| Measures to help species cope with climate change? - PhysOrg Many species must move to new areas to survive climate change. Often, this seems impossible. Species stranded on mountain tops in southern Europe that are becoming too hot for them, for instance, are unlikely to be able to reach northern Europe unaided. So should WE step in to help? | 18th July 2008 |
| Whole-Earth agency proposed - Nature Whole-Earth agency proposed Nature Reports: Climate Change(2008). doi:10.1038/climate.2008.74 Author: Anna Barnett Two major US science agencies should merge to streamline research on problems such as climate change, say former agency heads. Anna Barnett reports. | 18th July 2008 |
| Carbon emissions accelerating rapidly - People & the Planet Preliminary results show that China's carbon emissions exceeded those of the United Statea for the first time last year (2008). (See our report here). This followed confirmed data for the year 2006 which showed that emissions have been growing by 3.1 per cent since the year 2000 - well above the 2.3 per cent rate projected by scientists for the first decade of this century. Frances C. Moore reports here on the acceleration in carbon emissions. | 18th July 2008 |
| World on the verge of the last great land grab - New Scientist Booming demand for resources as the world's population surges from 6 to 9 billion will put unsustainable demand on the remaining forests | 17th July 2008 |
| US EPA Says Greenhouse Emissions Endanger Health - Planet Ark WASHINGTON - The US Environmental Protection Agency said on Monday that greenhouse gas emissions endanger human health, a critical finding that has languished in bureaucratic limbo since last December. | 17th July 2008 |
| Amory Lovins: Expanding Nuclear Power Makes Climate Change Worse - Democracy Now There’s one issue that President Bush and presidential hopefuls John McCain and Barack Obama all agree on: expanding the use of nuclear power. We speak with Amory Lovins, the co-founder, chairman and chief scientist of Rocky Mountain Institute in Colorado, who has been described as “one of the Western world’s most influential energy thinkers.” [includes rush transcript] | 17th July 2008 |
| Why cap and trade could backfire - The Christian Science Monitor Credits remove stigma – and may increase pollution. | 17th July 2008 |
| OECD: Biofuel subsidies not cutting greenhouse gas - AP via Yahoo! Finance Massive government subsidies for biofuels are not helping to reduce greenhouse gas emissions, according to an OECD report released Wednesday. | 17th July 2008 |
| Bush's stall worked - Contra Costa Times The Bush administration has successfully stalled the issue. We all must now hope that it wasn't at the expense of our survival. | 17th July 2008 |
| Electric cars allowed on some Quebec roads with speed limits under 50 km/h - CNews ST-JEROME, Que. - They're arriving in a trickle, not a flood, but low-speed electric cars are allowed on some Quebec roads as of Thursday. | 17th July 2008 |
| Blackstone to Fund 1 Bln Euro German Wind Farm - Planet Ark BERLIN - Blackstone Group LP will invest in a 1 billion euro (US$1.6 billion) project to build and manage a German offshore wind farm capable of powering half a million homes, the US-based private equity firm said. | 17th July 2008 |
| Shifts in US spring melt 'out by a month' - New Scientist Climate change could mean a two-month shift in the start of the snowmelt by the end of the century, suggests a new model | 17th July 2008 |
| Arctic lakes show warming - The News & Observer UNC-Greensboro researcher Anne Hershey studies melting permafrost in Alaska. | 17th July 2008 |
| Pine beetle threat grows in the West - USA Today The worst pine beetle epidemic in 25 years is killing millions of acres of trees in Colorado, Montana, Wyoming, Oregon, Idaho, Utah and Washington. | 17th July 2008 |
| Global warming leaves Thames facing attack of the alien crabs - This is London Non-native flora and fauna encouraged by climate change could cause the river Thames's ecosystem to collapse, a report by charity WWF warns today. | 17th July 2008 |
| Ocean Acidification: A Global Case of Osteoporosis - Discover Magazine Industrial carbon dioxide is turning the oceans acidic, threatening the foundation of sea life. | 17th July 2008 |
| Patient suffered from 'climate change delusion' - New Scientist Climate change deniers have been having a field day with a recent report of the first known case of a patient diagnosed with "climate change delusion". The 17-year-old man believed that, due to climate change, his own consumption of water could run supplies dry, leading to the deaths of millions of people. He became suicidal, tried to stop drinking, and had been obsessively checking for leaking taps at home to prevent this happening. The case was reported in the Australian and New Zealand Journal of Psychiatry. | 17th July 2008 |
| Wiki-libel: Denier Solomon Tries to Shoot the Messenger Lawrence Solomon - he of the imaginary legion of top scientists who deny climate change - has launched an attack on the credibility of Wikipedia, complaining especially that Wiki has the temerity to acknowledge climate change and to censor unfounded counter arguments.Unfortunately, Solomon pegs his own case to the reputation of the notoriously unreliable Benny Peiser, leaving the Wiki editors looking admirably clever.Solomon's principal complaint appears to be that while Wiki's climate change entry offers a reference to Naomi Oreskes landmark Science article (Beyond the Ivory Tower: the Scientific Consensus on Climate Change), it doesn't accord any attention to the contrarian "research" put forth by Peiser. | 17th July 2008 |
| Satellite cutbacks could leave us blind at the poles - New Scientist If current climate satellites fail, slashed funding mean the next generation of instruments may not be launched in time | 17th July 2008 |
| Obama v McCain: the race to be green - Guardian Unlimited Barack Obama favours regulation to fight global warming, while John McCain looks to the market | 17th July 2008 |
| Will BBC2's new thriller charm us into taking notice of climate change? - Independent The makers of Burn Up knew from the outset that their drama would be a tough sell. The two-part BBC2 thriller by Simon Beaufoy, the writer of The Full Monty, focuses on an oil-industry conspiracy to cover up the full extent of global warming, led by a charismatic and duplicitous American lobbyist called Mack (played by Bradley Whitford, Josh in The West Wing). | 17th July 2008 |
| Bill Chameides: Mitigating Global Warming: The Devil Is in the Pathway - HuffingtonPost A number of people I've spoken with were surprised that such interim targets matter. "What difference does it make," they've asked, "how we get to the reduction, as long as we get there?" Well, it makes a big difference. Here's why. | 17th July 2008 |
| Opportunity for real change goes begging - The Age The green paper on carbon trading operates on a false premise. | 17th July 2008 |
 | 15th July 2008 |
| The Anti-Climate Summit - FPIF Given the massive confusion that the G8 climate communique has created globally, it is worthwhile to deconstruct the position in detail. | 15th July 2008 |
| A Green Crossroads for the Supreme Court - TIME "There are few areas where the battle lines are as clearly drawn between environmentalists and their opponents as the Supreme Court." | 15th July 2008 |
| Natural Disasters Becoming More Frequent - Worldwatch Institute The trend of more frequent global natural disasters continues, due to an onslaught of weather-related crises in the first half of 2008. The total number of disasters as of June 30, 2008 already exceeds the average number of disasters recorded at mid-year over the past decade. Although 2008 is not on pace to eclipse 2007 as registering the most natural disasters ever, an especially active Atlantic hurricane season is expected. | 15th July 2008 |
| Melting ice threatens Arctic foxes - Guardian Unlimited Polar bears may not be the only Arctic wildlife threatened by global warming. Scientists have discovered that Arctic foxes also struggle as the ice disappears because they rely on the frozen seas to survive the bleak winters. | 15th July 2008 |
| Bush lifts offshore drilling ban - BBC News President George W Bush lifts an executive ban on oil drilling in most US coastal waters, and urges Congress to follow suit. | 15th July 2008 |
| Australia considers first new coal port for 25 yrs - Reuters via Yahoo! Malaysia News CANBERRA, July 15 (Reuters) - Australia, the world's biggest per-head greenhouse-gas polluter, is considering its first new coal export port for 25 years, despite official efforts to curb coal-fired carbon emissions to fight climate warming. | 15th July 2008 |
| Video: Exploiting Canada's tar sands - Guardian Unlimited What happens when the world's biggest oil companies target a northern wilderness? John Vidal heads to Canada to ask some tough questions of the oil industry and its intentions in northern Alberta | 14th July 2008 |
| Forests to fall for food and fuel - BBC News Demand for land to grow food and fuel crops is set to outstrip supply, leading to forest destruction, a report warns. See also: Forest funding 'could put billions in wrong hands' - guardian.co.uk | 14th July 2008 |
| Corn, Incorporated: The Ethanol Scam - AlterNet The ethanol scam shows that corporate, market-based "solutions" to global warming and oil dependence are no solution at all. | 14th July 2008 |
| Ontario Sets Plan to Protect Northern Boreal Forest - Planet Ark TORONTO - The government of the Canadian province of Ontario said on Monday it will conserve a huge swath of the province's northern boreal forest to protect polar bears and other wildlife and to help fight climate change. | 14th July 2008 |
| Scenarios for a low carbon, no-nuke future - Gristmill Renewables and efficiency would provide more GDP than fossil fuels. | 14th July 2008 |
| Calif Gov Schwarzenegger Blasts Bush On Greenhouse Gas Inaction - Nasdaq LOS ANGELES (AFP)--California Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger said the Bush administration's decision to delay a decision on regulating greenhouse gases showed that it did not believe in global warming. | 14th July 2008 |
| Environmentalists Block Australia Coal Port - Planet Ark SYDNEY - Environmental protesters in Australia brought the world's biggest coal terminal to a standstill on Sunday by blocking railway lines and chaining themselves to rail cars. | 14th July 2008 |
| MPs criticise government over CO2 - BBC News The government has made "very poor progress" on reaching its own carbon emissions-cutting targets, MPs say. | 14th July 2008 |
| Learning to live globally - The Christian Science Monitor A Christian Science perspective on daily life. | 14th July 2008 |
| Global warming will allow several 'pests' to invade vulnerable Australian Ecosystems - Smash Hits The WWF (Worldwide Fund for Nature) conservation group has warned that global warming will allow several exotic plants and animals, which can be referred to as pests, to invade vulnerable Australian ecosystems. | 14th July 2008 |
| Make your own Exxon gas sign! - DeSmogBlog Ticked off about gas prices? Want people to wake up and sell their SUV's? Have some fund messing around with this cool little program where you can make your own ExxonMobil gas station sign. Here's the sign I made: Click image to enlarge Make your own, send us the weblink and we'll add it to this post. Here's Earth First's ExxonMobil gas sign: Click image to enlarge. exxonmobil make your own gas sign US gas prices | 14th July 2008 |
 Wilkins Ice Shelf hanging by its last thread - ESA News The Wilkins Ice Shelf is experiencing further disintegration that is threatening the collapse of the ice bridge connecting the shelf to Charcot Island. Since the connection to the island in the image centre helps to stabilise the ice shelf, it is likely the break-up of the bridge will put the remainder of the ice shelf at risk. This break-up is puzzling to scientists because it has occurred in the Southern Hemispheric winter. | 13th July 2008 |
| EPA Waffles on Emissions Rules - Washington Post Agency seeks comment on plan to regulate greenhouse gases, then dismisses it as unworkable. See also: Climate change 'too complex' for action - The Mercury | 13th July 2008 |
| Time to Face the Hard Realities of a Global Energy Crisis America needs a comprehensive plan to deal with post-peak oil -- and that is going to involve some serious long-term thinking. | 13th July 2008 |
| Snared in a homemade 'NitroNet' - BBC News Farming and industry are producing too much of a substance we ought to be concerned about, says Mark Sutton; not carbon, but nitrogen. And he would like to hear your ideas on what society should do about it. | 13th July 2008 |
| 'Serious concern' over seabirds - BBC The poor breeding of Scotland's seabirds is giving cause for "serious concern", according to RSPB Scotland. | 13th July 2008 |
| Russian ice camp in rapid shrink - BBC Twenty Russian scientists are to be taken off their ice camp in the Arctic because the melt has set in sooner than expected. | 13th July 2008 |
| Australia drought withers small towns - Los Angeles Times Life is hard for wheat and livestock farmers in the south, as they face a possible third year of nearly no rain. | 13th July 2008 |
| 'Cut not sink' emissions, says expert - Australian Broadcasting Corporation An Australian climate expert says it would be more beneficial for the country to reduce its greenhouse emissions rather than trying to sink them into the sea using ocean fertilisation. | 13th July 2008 |
| Pope To Focus on Climate Change - Time Magazine Pope Benedict XVI began a pilgrimage in Australia Sunday, saying he aims to raise awareness about global warming the crisis of clergy sexual abuse | 13th July 2008 |
| Let's Kick Nuclear Power out of the Climate Change Debate Neither McCain nor Obama are willing to take nuclear energy off the table, but there are two important reasons why they should. | 13th July 2008 |
| Climate expert calls for tornado-tough homes - Edmonton Sun Climate expert calls for tornado-tough homesEdmonton Sun, Canada. McBean said global warming and a jump in the number of heavy rainstorms means a risk of more tornadoes in the years to come. "Unfortunately, all of our ... | 13th July 2008 |
| Alaska volcano erupts; island residents evacuated ANCHORAGE, Alaska (Reuters) - A volcano in Alaska's Aleutian chain erupted on Saturday, sending a cloud of ash 35,000 feet into the air and prompting the evacuation of the 10 people who live on the eastern side of the island, officials said. | 13th July 2008 |
| Australia farmer: 'Our river is dying' - BBC News An Australian farmer describes how they have had to give up work because of the drought in the Murray-Darling river basin. | 11th July 2008 |
| EPA: Smog could get worse with global warming (AP) -- Global warming could worsen smog and stretch what typically is a summer pollution problem into the spring and fall, government scientists predicted Thursday. | 11th July 2008 |
| Dyes increase power by solar panels - BBC News A new solar technology could increase the power generated by solar panels tenfold, a team of scientists show. | 11th July 2008 |
| UN calls for more family planning - BBC News The UN calls for more investment in family planning to reduce poverty and slow population growth. | 11th July 2008 |
| Petrol report a wake-up call: environmentalists - Australian Broadcasting Corporation Environmentalists say a CSIRO report predicting the price of petrol could rise to $8 a litre in 10 years should serve as a wake up call to the public and governments. | 11th July 2008 |
| World must aim for 90pc emissions cut: climate lawyer - Australian Broadcasting Corporation An Australian climate lawyer says the G8 nations' commitment to a 50 per cent cut in global greenhouse gas emissions would require a much bigger reduction target for industrialised nations. | 11th July 2008 |
| Climate campaigners threaten to invade and shut down power plant Green activists are vowing to force their way into one of Britain's biggest power stations next month in what will be the most serious clash yet between the burgeoning climate change protest movement and the authorities. | 11th July 2008 |
| Brilliant Plans to Destroy the Planet: The World Bank Tackles Climate Change The World Bank's new Climate Investment Funds will do nothing to help the climate; they'll just give the bank more clout. | 11th July 2008 |
| Time for Plan B: Cutting Carbon Emissions 80 Percent by 2020 - Earth Police Institute When political leaders look at the need to cut carbon dioxide emissions to curb global warming, they ask the question: How much of a cut is politically feasible? At the Earth Policy Institute we ask a different question: How much of a cut is necessary to avoid the most dangerous effects of climate change? By burning fossil fuels and destroying forests, we are releasing greenhouse gases, importantly carbon dioxide (CO2), into the atmosphere. These heat-trapping gases are warming the planet, setting in motion changes that are taking us outside the climate bounds within which civilization developed. | 10th July 2008 |
| A Different Climate Change Apocalypse Than the One You Were Envisioning - NYT Let’s say you are convinced that climate change is a huge threat and will have catastrophic consequences for humankind in the foreseeable future. How exactly do you envision that catastrophe playing out? | 10th July 2008 |
| Tony Juniper: The developed world must shoulder the burden - Guardian Unlimited Tony Juniper: The G8 pact isn't enough - rich countries have emitted the most CO2, and must take responsibility for the massive cuts needed | 10th July 2008 |
| Coral reef deaths bring bleak outlook - The Age Food supplies will run short, tourism will be hit and coastal communities affected as the world's coral reefs gradually decline under climate change, scientists say. The reefs already were dying at an increasing rate because of global warming and acidification of the oceans, said researchers meeting this week at the International Coral Research Symposium (ICRS) in Fort Lauderdale, Florida. | 10th July 2008 |
| How will the Arctic sea ice cover develop this summer? - PhysOrg The ice cover in the Arctic Ocean at the end of summer 2008 will lie, with almost 100 per cent probability, below that of the year 2005 - the year with the second lowest sea ice extent ever measured. Chances of an equally low value as in the extreme conditions of the year 2007 lie around eight per cent. Climate scientists from the Alfred Wegener Institute for Polar and Marine Research in the Helmholtz Association come to this conclusion in a recent model calculation. | 10th July 2008 |
| Salmon lesson - Gristmill Atlantic Salmon restoration efforts face grim realities. Stocks of wild salmon in the North Pacific are in trouble. That's news. What isn't news is that the spring has passed us by in Massachusetts again without returning more than a handful of wild Atlantic Salmon. The river closest to me, the Connecticut, saw just 132 salmon return. | 10th July 2008 |
| Australia food-bowl drought worsens, rains spare wheat - Khaleej Times CANBERRA - The prolonged drought in Australia's Murray-Darling river system is worsening and the country's main food bowl may forever be changed by accelerating climate warming, government officials said on Thursday. | 10th July 2008 |
| Drought threatens Iraq's crops and water supply - AP via Yahoo! News It's been a year of drought and sand storms across Iraq - a dry spell that has devastated the country's crucial wheat crop and created new worries about the safety of drinking water. | 10th July 2008 |
| The old man who farms with the sea - Los Angeles Times The crop is salicornia. It is nourished by seawater flowing from a man-made canal. And if you believe the American who is farming it, this incongruous swath of green has the potential to feed the world, fuel our vehicles and slow global warming. [Samphire is delicious] | 10th July 2008 |
| Return of the cloud colossi - The Christian Science Monitor Over on the Monitor's Bright Green blog, Eoin O'Carroll writes about my favorite pie-in-the-sky innovation of the week: a dirigible revival. “As fuel prices continue to soar and greenhouse emissions rules tighten, more and more countries are looking into lighter-than-air craft as an alternative to planes and trucks,” he blogs. The basic blimp design has not changed [... let's hope it doesn't get too windy...] | 10th July 2008 |
| The Need for a Better Inventory - Earth Observatory The project evolved as a sideline from Gurney's research on the natural carbon cycle and the mystery of the “missing carbon sink.” The mystery is that atmospheric carbon dioxide levels in the Northern Hemisphere are lower than scientists would expect given the amount of fossil fuels we burn. | 10th July 2008 |
| Ignoring the climate change alarm - Guardian Unlimited Joseph Romm: George Bush's agreement at the G8 to halve carbon emissions by 2050 won't make up for his climate change obstructionism | 10th July 2008 |
| Bush to G8: 'Goodbye from the world's biggest polluter' - The Independent President George Bush signed off with a defiant farewell over his refusal to accept global climate change targets at his last G8 summit. | 10th July 2008 |
| Dion unfazed by carbon-tax objections - Globe and Mail Dion: Western provinces risk losing exports if they ignore oil sands' environmental impact | 10th July 2008 |
| G-8 A worthless gust of hot air - The Independent G-8 Failure to Set Course on Emissions Threatens Climate Fight - Bloomberg.com G8 Climate Deal: Checking the small print - Guardian Unlimited G8 Set for Showdown With Poorer States Over Climate - Planet Ark A Green Let-Down at the G8 Summit - Time Magazine G8 sidestep the issue on climate change - Times Online 100 months to save the Earth - Guardian Unlimited Why G8 climate pledge doesn't go far enough - New Scientist | |
| Cheney's third term - Gristmill John McCain takes the "conserve" out of "conservative." His entire energy efficiency strategy would fit on one side of a very small file card and can be summarized as follows: Ban Porsches, green federal buildings, and applaud homeowners who do stuff on their own! His repackaged new economic plan, "Jobs for America" has precisely three paragraphs that deal with efficiency: CAFE Standards: John McCain has long supported CAFE standards -- the mileage requirements that automobile manufacturers' cars must meet. Some carmakers ignore these standards, pay a small financial penalty, and add it to the price of their cars. | 9th July 2008 |
| Corals Collapsing in More Acid Oceans - IPS FORT LAUDERDALE, U.S., Jul 8 (IPS) - Coral reefs need to be put on "life support" if they are to survive climate change, but their ultimate survival is dependant on major reductions in fossil fuel emissions, say experts. | 9th July 2008 |
| EU includes aviation in CO2 curbs - BBC News The European Parliament backs a law to include aviation in the CO2 Emissions Trading Scheme (ETS) for cutting greenhouse gases. | 9th July 2008 |
| India's climate plan 'right step' - BBC News India's plans to fight climate change can help reduce its dependence on fossil fuels, a leading environmentalist says. | 9th July 2008 |
| Poll: Cdns want firm action on environment - CNews OTTAWA - Most Canadians still want aggressive government action to fight climate change, in spite of skyrocketing fuel costs, a new poll suggests. | 9th July 2008 |
| Global warming will push Russia to destruction: WWF - Reuters Global warming will sow destruction across Russia and ex-Soviet states, a report said on Tuesday after the world's richest countries issued targets on harmful emissions that environmentalists criticized as too soft. | 9th July 2008 |
| Cheney wanted cuts in climate testimony - Chicago Tribune Seeking to play down the effects of global warming, Vice President Dick Cheney's office pushed to delete from congressional testimony references about the consequences of climate change on public health, a former senior EPA official claimed Tuesday. | 9th July 2008 |
| How intense will storms get? New model helps answer question - PhysOrg A new mathematical model indicates that dust devils, water spouts, tornadoes, hurricanes and cyclones are all born of the same mechanism and will intensify as climate change warms the Earth's surface. | 9th July 2008 |
| McCain's Energy Plan Will Drill Us Into a Deeper Crisis Would more permits for oil drilling benefit U.S. consumers? McCain would like you to think so, but there's more to the story than he's telling. | 9th July 2008 |
| Nitrogen excess - BBC Humans are using too much and nature is suffering | 9th July 2008 |
| G8 fails to set climate world alight - BBC News At first sight, the G8 agreement on climate change promises much... "If after a year's work all you have is a "shared vision" instead of "seriously considering", it's pretty pathetic. " See also: G8 statement: Reaction in quotes The agreement G8 officials reached on climate change represents a small step forward - Guardian Unlimited | 8th July 2008 |
| Doubt Is Their Product: An Excerpt - OUPblog Industry has learned that debating the science is much easier and more effective than debating the policy. Take global warming, for example. The vast majority of climate scientists believe there is adequate evidence of global warming to justify immediate intervention to reduce the human contribution. They understand that waiting for absolute certainty is far riskier—and potentially far more expensive—than acting responsibly now to control the causes of climate change. Opponents of action, led by the fossil fuels industry, delayed this policy debate by challenging the science with a classic uncertainty campaign. I need cite only a cynical memo that Republican political consultant Frank Luntz delivered to his clients in early 2003. In ‘‘Winning the Global Warming Debate,’’ Luntz wrote the following: ‘‘Voters believe that there is no consensus about global warming within the scientific community. Should the public come to believe that the scientific issues are settled, their views about global warming will change accordingly. Therefore, you need to continue to make the lack of scientific certainty a primary issue in the debate. . . . The scientific debate is closing [against us] but not yet closed. There is still a window of opportunity to challenge the science’’ (emphasis in original). | 8th July 2008 |
| In the end, climate is not an economic question - On Line opinion There’s one iron law of global warming one can’t avoid: if we keep burning fossils fuels and pouring carbon emissions into the sky for long enough, eventually the climate will run away from the human capacity to control its trajectory. Then life will become unliveable for most people and most species. And that moment is closer than the political elite appear to understand. | 8th July 2008 |
| An Air Conditioner Or Tons Of Fans? Ask Umbra - Gristmill "...my apartment is up to 93 degrees and I have no less than three fans oscillating, am I using more energy than I would if I purchased and used one energy-efficient air conditioner? What's the best choice here?" | 8th July 2008 |
| Bill McGuire: Do believe the hype on climate change - Guardian Unlimited Bill McGuire: When it comes to the science of climate change - if it reads like a disaster novel, then it really is that bad "The bottom line has to be, if it reads like a disaster novel, then it must be a disaster novel. And without immediate and concerted action by the international community to seriously tackle emissions, it will be one in which our children will be leading characters." | 8th July 2008 |
| Acidifying Oceans Add Urgency To CO2 Cuts - PollutionOnline Besides loading the atmosphere with heat-trapping greenhouse gases, human emissions of carbon dioxide have also begun to alter the chemistry of the ocean-often called the cradle of life on Earth | 8th July 2008 |
 Ice dam to break prematurely on Argentine glacier A huge ice dam on Argentina's Perito Moreno glacier will break apart for the first time in the southern hemisphere winter, likely as a result of global warming, scientists and environmentalists said Monday. Watch Video | 8th July 2008 |
| Parasite migration signals climate change - PhysOrg A parasite that thrives on warm conditions has been discovered in Scotland for the first time, supporting theories of climate change. | 8th July 2008 |
| South Australian Crops Need `Significant Rainfall,' Agency Says - Bloomberg.com July 8 (Bloomberg) -- Grain crops in South Australia state, the nation's second-largest wheat grower last harvest, need significant rainfall to maintain growth after dry weather in June, a government agency said. | 8th July 2008 |
| Ruthless drought in West Timor puts children in crisis - CNN.com Maria's labored breath echoes within the walls of her family's mud hut. Her tiny bony hands open and close in slow claw-like motions. | 8th July 2008 |
| Brake on biofuel - BBC Why UK advisors want to slow the green juggernaut | 8th July 2008 |
| NYC to spend billions to cut greenhouse gases - Reuters via Yahoo! News New York City will spend $2.3 billion to cut greenhouse gas emissions from municipal buildings and operations by 30 percent in 30 years, Mayor Michael Bloomberg said on Monday. | 8th July 2008 |
| Brown faces climate change revolt - BBC News Gordon Brown is facing the prospect of another significant backbench rebellion - this time over climate change. More than 80 Labour MPs have signed an amendment to the Climate Change Bill, which would force ministers to promise greater cuts in carbon emissions. See also: UK 'undermining' climate change diplomacy - Politics.co.uk | 8th July 2008 |
| Mission No fossil fuels - The Herald-Mail This is the first article in a two-part series about one teen's struggle to go fossil free for a week. | 8th July 2008 |
| The Energy Superbugs - Forbes Extremophiles create, collect and store power in ways once reserved to the realm of comic book superheroes. Can they teach us how it's done? | 8th July 2008 |
| Seven garden pledges for London - BBC News Gardeners in London are asked to make seven pledges to help reduce the impacts of climate change. | 8th July 2008 |
| What to do? - energy Bulletin Want Cheap Oil? Reduce Demand! Cooling a Fevered Planet; Economics, policy, and vision for fighting global warming Learning from past disasters, preventing future ones | 8th July 2008 |
| The Superstitious Right Fights Good Science on Global Warming - AlterNet In a society devoted like no other to the politics of fear, we have somehow managed to forget the one thing we should probably fear most. | 7th July 2008 |
| 'I don't think we're going to make it' - Gristmill By David Roberts - I don't know how it is that I've never seen this John Doerr talk from TED, but I'm glad I finally did: | 7th July 2008 |
| Groundbreaking lawsuit accuses big oil of conspiracy to deceive public about climate change - Democracy Now Attorney Stephen Susman helped file a groundbreaking lawsuit earlier this year on behalf of 400 Inupiat villagers in the Alaskan town of Kivalina who are being forced to relocate because of flooding caused by global warming. The suit accuses twenty oil, gas and electric companies, including ExxonMobil, Chevron, BP, ConocoPhillips and Peabody, of being responsible for emitting millions of tons of greenhouse gases causing the Arctic ice to melt. | 7th July 2008 |
| Warming may cause rapid plant species loss on Qinghai-Tibet Plateau - China Economic Net Global warming could cause a dramatic decline in plant species diversity on the rangelands of the Qinghai-Tibet Plateau, say Chinese and U.S. scientists. | 7th July 2008 |
| Australia splits on carbon trading - EARTHtimes.org Sydney - Australia's commitment to tackle global warming wavered Monday with the opposition Liberal Party's shock decision to renege on a long-standing promise to introduce a carbon-trading scheme by 2012. | 7th July 2008 |
| White House gases - San Francisco Chronicle It's not enough for the Bush administration to maintain its delusion that climate change can be ignored out of existence. Over and over, it tries to keep the Environmental Protection Agency from addressing greenhouse-gas emissions, too. | 7th July 2008 |
| Gap Fire: A Sign of Global Warming? - Santa Barbara Independent Climatologists talk causes of California's wildfire onslaught. See also: In pictures: California fires - BBC | 6th July 2008 |
| Locusts compound 'drought horror' - News Interactive THE most drought-ravaged areas of NSW have received the cruel double blow of worsening conditions and a looming locust plague. | 6th July 2008 |
| How China's thirst for oil can save the planet - Times Online At the Lotusengineering works in Norfolk, researchers are working on an idea that seems almost too good to be true: a car that runs on CO2 The very gas that comes out of exhausts and poses the threat of climate change could, they believe, be extracted from the atmosphere and used as a source of synthetic fuel. | 6th July 2008 |
| E-jeepneys take over 2 Makati villages' routes - Philippine Daily Inquirer SLEEK, COLORFUL and environment-friendly, the electric powered or “e-jeepney” finally made its commercial debut at the Makati central business district early this month, drawing plaudits from Earth lovers everywhere. | 6th July 2008 |
| Mexico Plants 8 Mln Trees in Latest Green Project - Planet Ark MEXICO CITY - Mexicans went out and planted more than 8 million trees across the country on Saturday as part of a government push to shed its reputation for environmental mismanagement and rampant illegal logging. | 6th July 2008 |
| Now, global warming may spoil India's wheat party: study - Hindu Amid record wheat output estimate, here comes the dampener the country's wheat production may fall by about half a ton per hectare in 10 years if suitable steps are not taken to tackle climate change, says a study. According to a current estimate, the average wheat production in the country stands at 2.6-2.7 ton per hectare. Agronomic impact of climate change is key to mitigate the grave risk of wheat production falling by 0.45 ton per hectare in case the winter temperature rises by a minimum of 0.5 degree celsius, according to the 'Wheat Report 2008: Future Tense', brought out jointly by Assocham and AgriWatch. | 6th July 2008 |
| Climate Change May Cut S Africa Corn Crop Sharply - Planet Ark SAPPORO, Japan - Climate change could cut South Africa's maize crop by 20 percent within 15 to 20 years as the west of the country dries out while the east is afflicted with increasingly severe storms, its environment minister said on Sunday. | 6th July 2008 |
| Climate deadlock seen at G8 despite 'constructive' Bush US President George W. Bush pledged Sunday to play a "constructive" role on climate change at a summit of rich nations, but hopes for a breakthrough were dim as he pressed developing countries. | 6th July 2008 |
| Only seven years left for global warming target: UN panel chief - PhysOrg The head of the UN's Nobel-winning panel of climate scientists on Friday said only seven years remained for stabilising emissions of global-warming gases at a level widely considered safe. Rajendra Pachauri, chairman of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), delivered the bleak warning at a gathering of European Union ministers where he pleaded with the EU to take the lead in global talks on tackling climate change. | 5th July 2008 |
| Strategies to fight climate change - Montreal Gazette The passing into law last month of the federal Climate Change Accountability Act has put pressure on Ottawa to design a national strategy to decrease drastically our greenhouse gas emissions. | 5th July 2008 |
| 2100, a climatic odyssey - Sydney Morning Herald THOUSANDS of deaths each year from heat stress. Hundreds of plant and animal species extinguished. An inland migration to escape rising sea levels and severe storms. And the end of agriculture in most of the Murray-Darling Basin. This is the climatic apocalypse facing Australia by 2100, Ross Garnaut warns. | 5th July 2008 |
| Global trends and ENSO - RealClimate It's long been known that El Niño variability affects the global mean temperature anomalies. 1998 was so warm in part because of the big El Niño event over the winter of 1997-1998 which directly warmed a large part of the Pacific, and indirectly warmed (via the large increase in water vapour) an even larger region. The opposite effect was seen with the La Niña event this last winter. Since the variability associated with these events is large compared to expected global warming trends over a short number of years, the underlying trends might be more clearly seen if the El Niño events (more generally, the El Niño - Southern Oscillation (ENSO)) were taken out of the way. | 5th July 2008 |
| Germany passes law aimed at reducing carbon emissions - International Herald Tribune Germany on Friday passed new measures aimed at reducing carbon dioxide emissions by agreeing to double the amount of power from renewable energy sources. | 5th July 2008 |
| Andrew Simms: The New Green Deal aims to cut fossil fuel use and create green-collar jobs - Guardian Unlimited Andrew Simms: A translation of Roosevelt's 1930s policy aims to tackle climate change, unemployment and the credit crunch | 5th July 2008 |
| AP Interview: Food and global warming are interconnected - International Herald Tribune AP Interview: The global food crisis will only worsen because of climate change, the U.N. climate chief said Friday, urging leaders of the world's richest countries meeting in Japan next week to set goals to reduce carbon emissions within the next dozen years. | 5th July 2008 |
| Carbon dioxide emissions associated with UK consumption increase - PhysOrg Researchers have discovered that carbon dioxide emissions associated with UK consumption increased by 115 million tonnes (18 per cent), between 1992 and 2004. | 5th July 2008 |
| Indigenous peoples blame G-8 for global warming - CNews SAPPORO, Japan - A gathering of indigenous peoples on Friday blamed the Group of Eight's economic agenda for global warming and rising food and fuel prices - the very problems the G-8 leaders plan to tackle at their summit next week. | 5th July 2008 |
| Launching a spiritual war on global warming - Vancouver Sun Does global warming pose a spiritual problem? Those who do not believe in any form of divinity would probably say No. And even some who believe in a transcendent reality might think global warming basically needs to be fought through political, scientific and economic means. But perhaps a spiritual response is also needed to global warming -- to provide the inner strength necessary to face and combat the worst effects that are to come from the Earth's erratically changing climate. | 5th July 2008 |
| Acidifying Oceans Add Urgency To Carbon Dioxide Cuts - Science Daily It's not just about climate change anymore. Besides loading the atmosphere with heat-trapping greenhouse gases, human emissions of carbon dioxide have also begun to alter the chemistry of the ocean. The ecological and economic consequences are difficult to predict but possibly calamitous, warn a team of chemical oceanographers in the July 4 issue of Science, and halting the changes already underway will likely require even steeper cuts in carbon emissions than those currently proposed to curb climate change. | 4th July 2008 |
| UN's climate change guru sees record oil price as a positive - PhysOrg The UN's top climate change official said Thursday that record oil prices, which have surged to 146 dollars a barrel, were positive for the environment. | 4th July 2008 |
| Greenland ice sheet slams the brakes on - New Scientist In a rare "good news" announcement, climatologists now say the ice may not be in such a hurry to throw itself into the water after all. Mother Nature, it seems, has given it brakes. Since 1991, the western edge of Greenland's ice sheet has actually slowed its ocean-bound progress by 10%, say the team, who have studied the longest available record of ice and water flow in the region. | 4th July 2008 |
| Pictured: The floating cities that could one day house climate refugees - Daily Mail At first glance, they look like a couple of giant inflatable garden chairs that have washed out to sea But they are, apparently, the ultimate solution to rapidly rising sea levels. This computer-generated image shows two floating cities, each with enough room for 50,000 inhabitants. | 4th July 2008 |
| CO2 Storage Project Achieves 10,000-Tonne Mark - Scoop.co.nz The first carbon dioxide storage project in the Southern Hemisphere has succeeded in storing its first 10,000 tonnes of carbon dioxide in a depleted natural gas reservoir 2km underground in Victoria, Australia. | 4th July 2008 |
| Food price rises force biofuel U-turn - Independent Soaring world food prices look set to force Gordon Brown into a U-turn over the use of crops such as corn, rapeseed, palm and soya to produce fuel as an alternative to petrol and diesel. | 4th July 2008 |
| Canada ranked 2nd last on WWF G8 Climate Scorecard - CNews BERLIN - A new study suggests Canada ranks second to last among G8 countries when it comes to addressing global warming. Only the United States scores lower on the Group of Eight Climate Scorecard, released Thursday by the World Wildlife Fund. | 4th July 2008 |
| End oil dependency, says chancellor - Guardian Unlimited Alistair Darling says nuclear and green energy can counter 'huge threat' of high oil prices | 4th July 2008 |
| Why Canada is the best haven from climate change A group of islands with the potential to develop into a tourist paradise has been named as the country least equipped to withstand the effects of climate change. At the other end of the scale, Canada is the best place to move to if you want to be a climate change survivor in the decades ahead (although Britain is also a good place to be as a warming atmosphere takes hold). | 4th July 2008 |
| California ballot: Betting on Big Solar - Sacramento News & Review Harnessing the near limitless power of the sun, wind, water and earth could help. But how do we do it? Who is going to pay for the solar panels and wind turbines? And how fast does it have to happen? This November, Californians will have a chance to try to settle some of these questions as they vote on the Solar and Clean Energy Act of 2008. The initiative, Proposition 7, would substantially increase renewable-energy targets. It requires all of California’s electric utilities to generate 20 percent of their energy from clean, renewable sources by 2010. | 4th July 2008 |
| Green groups fear weak climate report - Sydney Morning Herald Conservationists fear the long-awaited Garnaut draft report on climate change to be handed down on Friday could be "Garnaut lite". | 4th July 2008 |
| Climate change: Time for deeds not words to reach emissions target, PwC study warns - Guardian Unlimited If politicians don't act now global carbon emissions from energy use will double by 2050, report warns | 3rd July 2008 |
| White House Covers Up $2 Trillion Global Warming Benefit - DeSmogBlog Given the massive public outcry over gas prices, the public will no doubt be furious to find out that a plan to save energy and money has been kept under wraps by their own government. The White House has been sitting on a document for more than 6 months now that estimates a long term savings in excess of $2 trillion through 2040 if the federal government was to enact tougher greenhouse gas regulations for new automobiles. In the report (you can download Part 1 here and Part 2 here) the Environmental Protection Agency found that: - technology is readily available to achieve significant reductions in light-duty vehicle GHG [greenhouse gas] emissions between now and 2020 (and beyond) ... | 3rd July 2008 |
| World should focus on short-term goals to reduce carbon emissions, says study - New Kerala Washington, July 2 : A new study has called for stronger short-term goals to reduce carbon emissions, as long-term climate change policy is likely to reverse the tide of climate change very slowly. | 3rd July 2008 |
| Hot future shock: Heat wave temperatures to soar - PhysOrg (AP) -- During the European heat wave of 2003 that killed tens of thousands, the temperature in parts of France hit 104 degrees. Nearly 15,000 people died in that country alone. During the Chicago heat wave of 1995, the mercury spiked at 106 and about 600 people died. In a few decades, people will look back at those heat waves "and we will laugh," said Andreas Sterl, author of a new study. "We will find (those temperatures) lovely and cool." Sterl's computer model shows that by the end of the century, high temperatures for once-in-a-generation heat waves will rise twice as fast as everyday average temperatures. Chicago, for example, would reach 115 degrees in such an event by 2100. Paris heat waves could near 109 with Lyon coming closer to 114. | 3rd July 2008 |
| Flatscreen televisions fuel increase in global warming - Telegraph.co.uk The boom in flatscreen television could be fuelling global warming more than official estimates, scientists have warned. Experts in California estimate that production of a powerful greenhouse gas used in their production has hit 4,000 tonnes a year - enough to match the annual carbon dioxide emissions of Austria. Research published in New Scientist estimates that the industrial component - known as "NF3" - is 17,000 times more powerful as a greenhouse gas than carbon dioxide. But it is not covered by the Kyoto protocol because it was only made in tiny amounts when the agreement was signed in 1997. | 3rd July 2008 |
| CO2 emissions up by nearly a fifth in 12 years - Independent Carbon dioxide emissions caused by UK consumers increased by almost a fifth between 1992 and 2004, research revealed today. | 3rd July 2008 |
| Deep trouble - Nature Global warming is forcing North Sea fish to head to greater depths. An increasing number of species are migrating in response to global warming; some alpine organisms are climbing to higher altitudes, others animals are moving towards the poles. A new study suggests that as sea temperatures rise, many fish may be electing to move into deeper, cooler waters, rather than moving to higher latitudes as many theorists had previously predicted. | 3rd July 2008 |
| After 200 million years, all-male future - Times Online The only survivors in the wild of an order of reptiles that scampered with dinosaurs could be wiped out because climate change will turn them all into males. | 3rd July 2008 |
| US Seeks International Deal On Airline CO2 Emissions, EU Plan Not Valid - Nasdaq BRUSSELS -(Dow Jones)- A European Union plan to include airlines in a carbon dioxide emission trading system is inconsistent with international law and instead multilateral guidelines to fight climate change should be agreed, U.S. officials familiar with the situation have said. | 3rd July 2008 |
| G8 alone cant set world climate goal White House - Christian Today The Group of Eight major industrialized countries meeting next week in Japan cannot by themselves set effective longterm world goals on curbing greenhouse gas emissions the White House said on Tuesday | 3rd July 2008 |
| Author says let's talk about sex to save the planet - ABS-CBNNEWS.com BEIJING (Reuters) - We do it about 215 million times a day, so humans need to stop shying away from talking about sex -- and the babies it makes -- to help avert the global climate crisis, environmentalist and author Robert Engelman says. | 3rd July 2008 |
| Don't Hold Your Breath - Newsweek Democracies can't easily make present sacrifices to avoid future menaces. We require (it seems) a clear and present danger, if not a crisis, to stir us to action. This is why we won't soon mobilize against global warming. The politics simply won't compute. To do something effective would require a heavy energy tax or its equivalent. A good round figure for a tax is $100 per ton of carbon; this would raise gasoline prices an estimated 26 cents a gallon and electricity and natural-gas rates by almost 30 percent. The idea would be to dampen energy use and the emission of greenhouse gases (mostly carbon dioxide) from the burning of fossil fuels (oil, coal, gas). To put it mildly, the odds of Congress's passing such a tax are low. | 3rd July 2008 |
| Air travel in the tropics is worse for climate - New Scientist The effect of bright sunlight increases the production of the greenhouse gas ozone from aircraft exhaust fumes | 3rd July 2008 |
| Sea Bacteria Produce Methane [60-Second Science] - Scientific American Scientists thought that only bacteria that live where there's no oxygen produced methane, a greenhouse gas. But new research shows that ocean bacteria also give off the gas. | 3rd July 2008 |
| Which countries would you pick for your climate team? - New Scientist A new map shows which countries are doing the most to combat climate change, with Latvia and Slovakia getting top marks | 3rd July 2008 |
| No words necessary: The cartoonists tackle climate change - Independent Ever since the 1750s, when the writer, satirist, statesman and inventor Benjamin Franklin put political cartooning on the map by publishing the first cartoon of the genre in America, artists have combined their talent, wit and political beliefs to create cartoons that enrage, enlighten or simply engage the viewer. | 3rd July 2008 |
| Cleaned up skies explain surprise rate of warming - New Scientist A decrease in air pollution may account for half of the warming experienced in Europe over the last 30 years | 3rd July 2008 |
| Climate more urgent than economy, say voters - Guardian Unlimited 63% support green taxes but only 30% think the government should be introducing them now, irrespective of the economy | 2nd July 2008 |
| Australia Vows to Resist Pressure for "Carbon Lite" - Planet Ark SYDNEY - Australia vowed on Tuesday to resist pressure to water down plans for an emissions-trading scheme as surveys showed voters were becoming increasingly alarmed at the likely consequence: higher energy prices. | 2nd July 2008 |
| 'Green' energy spending on rise - BBC News Investment in 'green' energy surged in 2007 and early 2008 despite financial market woe, a report says. | 2nd July 2008 |
| Penguins setting off sirens over health of world's oceans - PhysOrg Like the proverbial canary in the coal mine, penguins are sounding the alarm for potentially catastrophic changes in the world's oceans, and the culprit isn't only climate change, says a University of Washington conservation biologist. | 2nd July 2008 |
| At $9 per gallon, British driving habits change - The Christian Science Monitor As more people opt for fewer car trips, carpooling, and public transportation, environmentalists point out that high fuel prices are also leading to reduced carbon emissions. | 2nd July 2008 |
| Rudd's climate target 'will fail' - Canberra Times The Rudd Government's target to cut Australia's greenhouse emissions by 60 per cent by 2050 sets the bar too low to avoid dangerous climate change, a new report says. | 2nd July 2008 |
| Back draft - Gristmill Brad Johnson over at Wonk Room acquired a copy of the EPA's recommendations on regulating greenhouse-gas emissions that the White House has been trying so hard to hide. The documents give you a good idea why: EPA officials concluded that the benefits of new, tougher standards "far outweigh their costs." In fact, if gas prices stay in the range of $3.50 a gallon, "the net benefit to society could be in excess of $2 trillion" through 2040 if fuel efficiency standards for automobiles are raised "well above 35 mpg." This, of course, renders false President George Bush's assertion in April that regulating greenhouse-gases under the Clean Air Act "would have crippling effects on our entire economy." This is the edited version of the EPA's recommendations -- the original, which was sent to the White House in an email ... | 2nd July 2008 |
| Tropical rainforests: From bad to worse - Grist Magazine Satellite images show rapid deforestation in Papua New Guinea and Amazon. Never before has the region experienced the simultaneous impact of large-scale forest loss and degradation, fragmentation, fires, and global warming. | 2nd July 2008 |
| THE DEVIL IS IN THE CLOUDS - Newsweek THE DEVIL IS IN THE CLOUDSNewsweek. Global warming seems to have permanently entered the European psyche. If the public is more aware, though, experts are more confused. ... | 2nd July 2008 |
| Is 450 ppm politically possible? Part 6 - Gristmill No, 450 is not politically possible today. Okay, that was clear before. But the debate over the Climate Security Act made it clear that it won't be politically possible anytime soon, for two reasons: The vast majority of conservatives have not budged an inch on climate science even in the face of now overwhelming direct scientific observation and a much deeper and broader scientific understanding of the dangerous impact of unrestricted human greenhouse gas emissions on the climate. Equally important, conservatives now have a very potent political issue to beat back advocates of an economy-wide cap-and-trade system -- high gasoline prices. | 1st July 2008 |
| George Monbiot: This economic panic is pushing the planet right back down the agenda - Guardian Unlimited George Monbiot: Oil-dependent countries are focused on growth at all costs, and the pale green political consensus looks unlikely to hold | 1st July 2008 |
| Veg-O-Lution - Common Ground Thanks to the twin drivers of personal and planetary health, our hyper-carnivore culture may be taking a left turn. | 1st July 2008 |
| Global Warming's Twin Evil: Wildfires and Drought - Alternet The 850 fires burning in California alone, should be a wake up call that we're unprepared for rapid climate change. | 1st July 2008 |
| Jonathon Porritt: Prudence is a green virtue - Guardian Unlimited Jonathan Porritt: The green squeeze: Will economic woes push environmentalism down the political agenda? Not when being eco-friendly means saving money | 1st July 2008 |
| Democrats Are Blowing Our Best Chance for Clean Energy - Alternet How the Dems sacked one of the most important opportunities to turn around our energy future. | 1st July 2008 |
| Stern optimistic US will act on climate - Reuters UK Climate change expert Nicholas Stern said on Monday he's confident the United States will move to regulate greenhouse gases in the first half of next year, providing leadership that would help the world reach an agreement in late 2009 on slowing climate change. | 1st July 2008 |
| Emissions scheme 'has to hurt' - economist - News Interactive IF an emissions trading scheme doesn't hurt, it won't work, economist Chris Richardson says. | 1st July 2008 |
| Power Needed to Bury CO2 a Coal Issue - Experts - Planet Ark NEW YORK - A big challenge facing electric utilities seeking to burn coal cleanly is providing enough power to capture and bury the carbon dioxide produced, experts said Friday. The process called carbon capture and sequestration requires as much as 20 percent of the electricity a power plant generates. See also: Carbon sequestration: bury the idea, not the CO2 - Low-Tech Magazine | 30th June 2008 |
| The world's will to tackle climate change is irresistible - Guardian Unlimited Environment, science technology: Rajendra Pachauri: Far from stymying the environmental cause, the downturn in the world's economies highlights just how pressing it is | 30th June 2008 |
| Free speech and the fate of humanity - Energy Bulletin We all know that even in the United States the guarantee of free speech has limits. The Supreme Court long ago said that no one has the right to endanger his or her fellow citizens by, for instance, falsely yelling "fire" in a crowded theater. Such acts of speech are said to pose "a clear and present danger." James Hansen, perhaps the most respected climate scientist on the planet, thinks that the fossil fuel lobby and its disinformation campaign about global warming may pose a similar threat. read more | 30th June 2008 |
| Anti-science conservatives must be stopped - Salon Anti-science conservatives must be stoppedSalon. Americans must not allow global warming deniers to block the policies needed to avert catastrophic climate change. Our future is at stake.. | 30th June 2008 |
| Schwarzenegger Says Feeding Oil Addiction No Answer - Planet Ark MIAMI - Republican California Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger said Friday that politicians who suggest that lifting a ban on offshore oil drilling would ease rising fuel prices in the United States were "blowing smoke." "Anyone who tells you that this will bring down our gas prices immediately or any time soon is blowing smoke," he said. "America is so addicted to oil it will take us years to wean ourselves from it and to look for new ways to feed our addiction is not the answer." | 30th June 2008 |
| A Bumper Crop of Green Proposals - BusinessWeek In the 2008 proxy season, more stockholders, including church and investment groups, called on companies to address global warming | 30th June 2008 |
| The trend is for vertical farming, but more kitchen gardens would produce better food - Guardian Unlimited Graham Harvey: Vertical farms may be the hot story, but a network of good old-fashioned kitchen gardens would produce better food | 30th June 2008 |
| Oil Sands: Canada's Next Vacation Wonderland? - Planet Ark CALGARY, Alberta - If it's sand you crave on your vacation, then Greenpeace might have just the travel idea for you.Using Alberta's logo, the site, http://www.travellingalberta.com, invites tourists to laze on black-sand beaches surrounding tailings ponds, hang-glide on "the unique coal bed methane and sour gas updrafts," then ride on one of the gargantuan dump trucks that trundle around the oil sands mines. | 30th June 2008 |
| Whales Set To Chase Shrinking Feed Zones - Science Daily Endangered migratory whales will be faced with shrinking crucial Antarctic foraging zones which will contain less food and will be further away, a new analysis of the impacts of climate change on Southern Ocean whales has found. | 30th June 2008 |
| The CO2 tax -- it's more painful for Premier Campbell than you - Vancouver Sun Oh my, the carbon tax era starts July 1! It's a new kind of Canada Day. | 30th June 2008 |
| India focuses on renewables in new climate plan - Reuters India unveiled on Monday a national plan to deal with the threat of global warming, focusing on renewable energy for sustainable development while refusing to commit to any emission targets that risk slowing economic growth. The National Action Plan identified harnessing renewable energy, such as solar power, and energy efficiency as central to India's fight against global warming and said a climate change fund would be set up to research "green" technologies. | 30th June 2008 |
| The era of oil wars - Guardian Unlimited Growing competition for oil may escalate to something as hot and dangerous as nuclear proliferation. | 29th June 2008 |
| Warming world prompts change - IdahoStatesman.com But not how you'd think. Long-held views aimed at 'saving all the parts' now are being reconsidered. Because if we're trying to sustain the world as it is today, 'it's too late.' | 29th June 2008 |
| Jellyfish outbreaks a sign of nature out of sync, say - Mindanao Times PARIS (AFP) - The dramatic proliferation of jellyfish in oceans around the world, driven by overfishing and climate change, is a sure sign of ecosystems out of kilter, warn experts. | 29th June 2008 |
| US biofuel plants are going bankrupt - Gulf Times NEW YORK: Soaring corn and soy prices on top of rising construction costs and tight credit markets have pushed about a dozen US biofuel plants to file for bankruptcy protection, experts said. | 29th June 2008 |
| GM 'will not solve current food crisis' - Guardian Unlimited Environment, science technology: Head of one of the world's largest agricultural biotech companies says GM not short-term solution | 29th June 2008 |
| Can Weeds Help Solve the Climate Crisis? - New York Times Weedy ancestors of our food crops, Ziska predicts, will cope far better with coming climatic changes than their domesticated descendants. Coping, after all, is what weeds have always done best. As last year’s climate- change panel report, Climate Change 2007, made clear, we have already set in motion far-reaching and unstoppable changes in regional temperatures and precipitation and in the composition of our atmosphere. No matter what actions we take, these changes will continue for decades. If we are to avoid disaster, experts agree, we will need to be tenacious but flexible, ready to identify and exploit any opportunity in what will be a challenging, even hostile situation. In this new world that we have made, weeds, our old adversaries, could be not only tools but mentors. At which point, if Ralph Waldo Emerson is to be believed, weeds by definition will cease to exist. | 29th June 2008 |
| Lawmakers urge CO2 cut targets for rich nations - AlertNet Lawmakers from G8 rich countries and five emerging economies including China agreed on Sunday that developed countries should pledge to cut CO2 emissions by 25-40 percent by 2020. | 29th June 2008 |
| Bush: Solar Plants Threaten Precious Desert Lands - DeSmogBlog Faced with a surge in the number of proposed solar power plants, the federal government has placed a moratorium on new solar projects on public land until it studies their environmental impact, which is expected to take about two years. | 28th June 2008 |
| Green plea at Radiohead concert - BBC News Radiohead ask their fans to back a campaign to tackle climate change by lobbying politicians. | 28th June 2008 |
| Tax-free financing for coal power plants under attack - Reuters USA: Environmental activists and others are opening a new frontier in their fight against coal-fired power plants by questioning the use of tax-exempt bonds to help fund such projects. | 28th June 2008 |
| Miami mayor pushes climate change agenda nationwide as chairman of the US Conference of Mayors - IHT The mayor of Miami, Manny Diaz, is making a name for himself as a strong advocate of measures to battle global warming, a surprising focus in a city that hasn't always been known for it's environmental protections. This week, Diaz, who is in his second term as mayor, was named chairman of the U.S. Conference of Mayors, a high-profile national role that allows him to push the agenda of America's cities in Washington, including how global warming will affect America's cities. | 28th June 2008 |
| Climate change causing significant shift in composition of coastal fish communities - Science Centric A detailed analysis of data from nearly 50 years of weekly fish-trawl surveys in Narragansett Bay and adjacent Rhode Island Sound has revealed a long-term shift in species composition, which scientists attribute primarily to the effects of global warming. | 28th June 2008 |
| North Pole notes - RealClimate I always find it interesting as to why some stories get traction in the mainstream media and why some don't. In online science discussions, the fate of this years summer sea ice has been the focus of a significant betting pool, a test of expert prediction skills, and a week-by-week (almost) running commentary. However, none of these efforts made it on to the Today program. Instead, a rather casual article in the Independent showed the latest thickness data and that quoted Mark Serreze as saying that the area around the North Pole had 50/50 odds of being completely ice free this summer, has taken off across the media. See also: No ice at the North Pole - The Independent | 28th June 2008 |
| New report highlights ties between global warming and US security - The Christian Science Monitor A warming climate would mean less food and more immigration, which could worsen ethnic strife. | 28th June 2008 |
| Living on the Ice Shelf: Humanity's Melt Down - Middle East Online The current ruthless competition between energy and food markets, amplified by international speculation in commodities and agricultural land, is only a modest portent of the chaos that could soon grow exponentially from the convergence of resource depletion, intractable inequality, and climate change, says Mike Davis . | 27th June 2008 |
| Simon Retallack: Nicholas Stern may be underestimating the cost of climate change - Guardian Unlimited Simon Retallack: Nicholas Stern says the cost of climate change is likely to be double his original estimate. The reality could be even worse | 27th June 2008 |
| North Pole May Be Ice-Free This Summer - findingDulcinea "The North Pole may be free of ice for the first time in history," said Canadian climate scientist David Barber to Canwest News Service. "This is a very dramatic change in the High Arctic Climate System." | 27th June 2008 |
| Higher temperatures helped new strain of West Nile virus spread - EurekAlert! "The study shows that the warmer the temperature, the greater the advantage of the new strain. | 27th June 2008 |
| Lion die-offs in Africa linked to global warming - Mongabay.com Scientists have linked climate shifts in East Africa to die-offs in lion populations in 1994 and 2001. | 27th June 2008 |
| HEALTH-KENYA: Malaria Rises to Highland Areas - IPS NAIROBI, Jun 26 (IPS) - The end of June marks the start of the malaria season in East Africa. After the long rains, conditions in lowland swamps and coastal regions are more conducive for mosquito breeding. But in recent years malaria has also appeared in the highland areas where it was previously unheard of. | 27th June 2008 |
| £100bn renewables plan unveiled - Guardian Unlimited Environment, science technology: Thousands of new wind turbines could be built across UK, Gordon Brown announces | 27th June 2008 |
| California unveils ambitious climate plan - U.S. Daily California on Thursday took a major step forward on its global warming fight by unveiling an ambitious plan for clean cars, renewable energy and stringent caps on big polluting industries. The plan, which aims to reduce pollutants by 10 percent from current levels by 2020 while driving investment in energy technologies regulators said will benefit the state's economy, is the most comprehensive yet by any U.S. state. | 27th June 2008 |
| Spending on reducing greenhouse gas fell in '04: StatsCan - CNews OTTAWA - Statistics Canada says industry spending on greenhouse gas reduction dropped to $955 million in 2004 from $1.3 billion in 2002. | 27th June 2008 |
| Climate change to hit harder and faster - Stock & Land Climate change is occurring faster than forecast, and will hit Australian agriculture harder than expected. That's the sobering news delivered by CSIRO at a special forum in Sydney today, when it outlined its latest research on the risks that climate change poses to agriculture, and potential adaptation strategies, at a special forum hosted by the Australian Council of Agricultural Journalists. Dr Mark Howden, whose research has focused on climate change adaptation, said carbon dioxide emissions, global temperature rises and sea level rises are meeting - or exceeding - the worst-case scenarios plotted by the Intergovernment Panel on Climate Change in the 1990s. | 27th June 2008 |
| Bush and McCain Happily Presiding Over Massive Transfer of Wealth to Oil Companies - AlterNet Republicans are funneling billions into the coffers of their oil baron backers; it's no surprise Bush and McCain aren't pushing for renewable energy. | 27th June 2008 |
| Australia's worst polluters must keep records of greenhouse gas emissions - AP via Yahoo! Philippines News Australia's worst air polluters must begin measuring their emissions of "greenhouse" gases blamed for global warming as the nation moves toward an emissions trading scheme in 2010, the climate minister said Thursday. | 27th June 2008 |
| US to plough $1.3bn into carbon capture - vnunet.com The US Department of Energy (DOE) has announced plans to invest up to $1.3bn in carbon capture and storage technology (CCS) over the coming years, as it seeks to develop a solution that will allow it to curb carbon emissions while continuing to exploit the country's huge coal reserves. | 27th June 2008 |
| Winter did not stop pine beetle spread in Alberta - Reuters VANCOUVER, British Columbia (Reuters) - Cold temperatures did not stop the spread of pine beetles in Alberta this winter, and it may be too late to eliminate the tree-killing insects from the province, officials said on Thursday. Cold winter temperatures slowed the growth of the beetle population in parts of the province, but a survey this spring indicates thousands survived in much of southwestern Alberta and in pockets elsewhere. | 27th June 2008 |
| Rising temperatures force many plants higher: study LONDON (Reuters) - Rising temperatures have forced many plants to creep to higher elevations to survive, researchers reported on Thursday. | 27th June 2008 |
| Rescuing reporting in the global South - Nature Rescuing reporting in the global South Nature Reports: Climate Change(2008). doi:10.1038/climate.2008.64 Author: James Fahn Media coverage of climate change lags behind in the countries where it matters most, reports James Fahn. | 27th June 2008 |
| Cost of tackling global climate change has doubled, warns Stern - Guardian Unlimited Inaction will mean far greater economic damage costing much more of global GDP - at least 5% | 25th June 2008 |
| CLIMATE CHANGE: 100-Percent Renewables Not a Pipe Dream - IPS KINGSTON, Ontario, Jun 25 (IPS) - North America's abject failure to meet the challenge of climate change has been "un-American", environmentalist and scientist David Suzuki told delegates Tuesday at the World Wind Energy Conference, the first ever in the region. | 25th June 2008 |
| Scientists make climate plea to Harper - Canada.com More than 100 leading climate scientists have launched a new offensive challenging the federal government's climate change plan and urging Prime Minister Stephen Harper along with other Canadian politicians to accelerate efforts to crack down on human activity linked to global warming. | 25th June 2008 |
| Destruction of greenhouse gases over tropical Atlantic - PhysOrg Large amounts of ozone - around 50% more than predicted by the world's state-of-the-art climate models - are being destroyed in the lower atmosphere over the tropical Atlantic Ocean. Published today (26th June '08) in the scientific journal, Nature, this startling discovery was made by a team of scientists from the UK's National Centre for Atmospheric Science and Universities of York and Leeds. It has particular significance because ozone in the lower atmosphere acts as a greenhouse gas and its destruction also leads to the removal of the third most abundant greenhouse gas; methane. See also: Air travel in the tropics causes more warming | 25th June 2008 |
| ENERGY: U.S. Sees World Use Soaring Despite Rising Costs - IPS WASHINGTON, Jun 25 (IPS) - World energy demand and carbon dioxide emissions will grow by about 50 percent over the next two decades despite soaring oil prices as developing countries outpace rich ones in consumption, the U.S. government predicts. | 25th June 2008 |
| CLIMATE CHANGE: U.S. Intelligence Cites Litany of Dangers - IPS WASHINGTON, Jun 25 (IPS) - While the United States is relatively well placed to cope with the likely consequences of global warming over the next 20 years, many developing countries, especially in Africa, South, Central and East Asia, and Central America, could suffer serious problems, particularly related to water scarcity and migration, according to testimony here Wednesday by a top U.S. intelligence officer. | 25th June 2008 |
| Taking the Food Crisis Personally Corn and wheat used to feed chicken, pigs and other farmed animals is food being diverted from the mouths of the global poor. | 25th June 2008 |
| BANGLADESH: Early monsoon floods "point to climate change" - IRINnews.org BANGLADESH: The monsoon floods have come early to Bangladesh, with thousands of people losing their homes and crops to river erosion, in what specialists say is a clear sign of climate change. | 25th June 2008 |
| White House Refused to Open Pollutants E-Mail - New York Times The White House in December refused to accept the Environmental Protection Agency’s conclusion that greenhouse gases are pollutants that must be controlled, telling agency officials that an e-mail message containing the document would not be opened, senior E.P.A. officials said last week. | 25th June 2008 |
| Floods, droughts make mild diseases deadly: study - Reuters CHICAGO (Reuters) - Extreme floods and droughts brought on by climate change can turn normally harmless infections into significant threats, international researchers said on Tuesday. | 25th June 2008 |
| Carbon-credit schemes fall 30% short of projections, report claims - Guardian Unlimited Scale of problem will fuel criticism that the world cannot rely on carbon markets to tackle climate change | 25th June 2008 |
| Scientist: 'We're toast' without action on global warming - CNN.com WASHINGTON (AP) -- Exactly 20 years after warning America about global warming, a top NASA scientist said the situation has gotten so bad that the world's only hope is drastic action. | 25th June 2008 |
| Branson would pay aviation carbon emissions tax - USA Today Virgin Group chairman Richard Branson said Tuesday he is willing to pay carbon emissions taxes on his aviation business to fight climate change. | 25th June 2008 |
| Taxing time to stabilise climate - BBC News A carbon tax will stop us using the atmosphere as a rubbish dump and will make it cheaper to protect it. | 25th June 2008 |
| Biofuels put bucks over ducks - The Christian Science Monitor via Yahoo! News The massive crop loss from Midwest floods has again laid bare the political power of the corn-ethanol lobby. The US Agriculture Department may soon help keep ethanol plants running by letting farmers plow up land set aside for wildlife. | 25th June 2008 |
| Pyongyang syndrome - Gristmill John Feffer has a good article over at Asia Times Online. It points out the deep danger we're in -- how teetery both the world and America's food and energy systems are. It is well worth a read, particularly because of its clear articulation of the bind we're in -- the strategies we've used in the past to get out of disaster will only accelerate collapse in the long-term.. The tools we're using to get more food out of the ground take food from the future. The analogy that I've been using for some time is the comparison to the seawater used to extract oil in the Ghawar and other aging giant oilfields. | 25th June 2008 |
| Biofuel use 'increasing poverty' - BBC News The rush to use biofuels in rich countries has dragged more than 30 million people worldwide into poverty, an aid agency says. | 25th June 2008 |
| Report warns of more cyclones - Courier Mail Australia:QUEENSLAND's average temperature could increase by five degrees celsius by 2070 - bringing less rainfall and more intense tropical cyclones, a report warns. | 25th June 2008 |
| James Hansen on what he will tell Congress about climate change - Guardian Unlimited NASA's head of the Goddard Institute for Space Studies and Al Gore's science adviser tells Ed Pilkington what he will tell Congress 20 years after he first warned about the dangers of climate change (mp3) | 24th June 2008 |
| George Monbiot: Prosecuting energy chiefs won't solve global warming - Guardian Unlimited George Monbiot: If we fail to stop runaway climate change, it will be largely because of campaigning by oil, coal and electricity companies, and the network of lobbyists, fake experts and thinktanks they have sponsored. | 24th June 2008 |
| Green energy blooms in the desert - Guardian Unlimited USA: Welcome to New Mexico, the Land of Enchantment – now also known as the Clean Energy State. Since giving his state its new nickname four years ago, governor Bill Richardson has helped create at least 37 incentive programmes promoting green power. | 24th June 2008 |
| Carbon standard 'to renew trust' - BBC A certificate scheme that shows which firms have made genuine carbon cuts is launched by the UK's Carbon Trust. | 24th June 2008 |
| Wind Power Outpaces Nuclear, China Outpaces Itself - DeSmogBlog A new report issued by the Worldwatch Institute finds that new wind power installations outpaced new nuclear power plant construction by 10-to-1. Globally, the wind industry added 20,000 MW of new capacity last year, while the nuclear industry added less than 2,000 MW.A big surprise for the author of the report was the massive upswing in wind installations in China:"The biggest surprise is China, which was barely in the wind business three years ago but which in 2007 trailed only the United States and Spain in wind installations and was fifth in total installed capacity. | 24th June 2008 |
| 1988-2008: Climate Then and Now - New York Times Blogs Global warming in 1988 and now. | 24th June 2008 |
| Russia Faces Melting Ice Menace To Northern Approaches - Space War by Martin Sieff Moscow (UPI) Jun 23, 2008 Global warming could deal destructive blows to Russia's defense infrastructure over the next 22 years, a top official said in Moscow last week. | 24th June 2008 |
| Put oil firm chiefs on trial, says leading climate change scientist - Guardian Unlimited James Hansen, one of the world's leading climate scientists, will today call for the chief executives of large fossil fuel companies to be put on trial for high crimes against humanity and nature, accusing them of actively spreading doubt about global warming in the same way that tobacco companies blurred the links between smoking and cancer. | 23rd June 2008 |
| Turning Your Lawn into a Victory Garden Won't Save You -- Fighting the Corporations Will - AlterNet The corporate agriculture industry would like nothing better than to see us spend all of our free time in our gardens and not in political dissent. | 23rd June 2008 |
| UW scientist: Sea level changes a driving force in mass extinctions - The Capital Times Changes in ocean environments related to sea level exert a driving influence on rates of extinction, which animals and plants survive or vanish, and the composition of life in the ocean, he found. "This breakthrough speaks loudly to the future impending modern (oceanic) shelf destruction due to climate change on earth," said National Science Foundation program manager Rich Lane. No matter what the cause of the ebb and flow of the oceans in various eras, the repeated and resultant extinctions must be considered, Lane said. | 23rd June 2008 |
| A hundred miles of mirrors - Gristmill Solar thermal can save us, but it needs public clamor Every day more people are finally hearing about what Joe Romm calls "the solar power you don't hear about" -- solar thermal power, utility-scale arrays of mirrors that create heat (and then electricity) so efficiently that they can do everything a coal plant can do except melt the South Pole. Without any special promotion, solar thermal (concentrating solar power, or CSP) will eventually grow into a major supplier of our electric grid, simply because, according to the California Energy Commission, it is an increasingly economical technology with per kilowatt-hour costs estimated to be 27 percent lower than new integrated gasification combined cycle (IGCC) coal plants with carbon capture-and-storage -- 12.7 cents/kWh for CSP versus 17.3 cents/kwh for IGCC plus CCS. | 23rd June 2008 |
| New climate change study promotes progressive strategy to reduce CO2 emissions while reducing payroll taxes on average ... - PR Newswire via Yahoo! News The U.S. can reduce CO2 emissions and create a path to limit their atmospheric concentrations to levels considered safe for the global climate, by introducing carbon-based taxes and offsetting their costs for most households, according to a study authored by Dr. Robert Shapiro, former Under Secretary of Commerce for Economic Affairs, along with Drs. Nam Pham and Arun Malik. Using the National Energy Modeling System (NEMS), the model also used by the Department of Energy, the study finds that these results can be achieved by applying a charge of up to $50 per-ton of CO2 and returning 90 percent of the revenues in tax relief for the people and businesses using the energy and paying the tax. | 23rd June 2008 |
| Town forces homes to fix solar tiles - Guardian Unlimited Solar panels will soon grace the roofs of the quiet medieval town of Marburg under a controversial new law forcing owners of all new or renovated buildings in its limits to include solar panels, setting a national precedent. | 23rd June 2008 |
| Adverts urge world to axe CO2 to 1980s levels - Reuters The world should cut the level of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere to below that of 20 years ago, more deeply than most government plans, to avoid the worst of climate change, a group of 150 advocates said on Monday. | 23rd June 2008 |
| Most Russians believe global warming real - poll - Russian Information Agency Novosti MOSCOW, June 23 (RIA Novosti) - Most Russians believe global warming is a reality, according to a poll conducted on June 14-15 by the Public Opinion foundation. | 23rd June 2008 |
| Starving fish killing Great Barrier Reef - The New Zealand Herald BRISBANE - Starving fish are killing sections of the Great Barrier Reef already weakened by climate change, an Australian scientist says. And some fish species also face extinction - with potentially serious consequences for commercial fisheries. | 23rd June 2008 |
| Ice diary: Science in the fast-changing Arctic - BBC News Liz Kalaugher reports from the High Arctic as she travels aboard the Amundsen, a Canadian Coast Guard vessel. She has joined an expedition investigating the effects of climate change off Banks Island. | 23rd June 2008 |
| Typhoon destroys crops worth more than half a billion pesos - GMA News MANILA, Philippines - Tropical storm "Frank" has damaged more than half a billion pesos worth of crops, affecting expansion in agriculture, which comprise a fifth of the Philippine economy. | 23rd June 2008 |
| You want costly? Try doing nothing - The Register-Guard Despite the demise of the Lieberman-Warner proposal, governments are certain to debate climate bills for years to come. When considering these proposals, be skeptical of arguments that fail to address the full range of costs. And, remember that the choice appears to be between slower but continued growth — if we act to fix the problem — compared to dramatic reductions in GDP if we don’t. | 23rd June 2008 |
| Jackie Ashley: It's no longer populist to put jobs ahead of the climate - Guardian Unlimited Jackie Ashley: A bill to cut through the planning process for runways, motorways and nuclear power stations faces defeat this week. Are ministers really worried about carbon emissions? If so, why speed up more runways, flights and motorways? Answer: because they care about growth more than they care about climate. That used to be a populist position - wages and jobs first, and let the climate go hang. Cameron thinks the public mood has changed, and the polls suggest he's right. | 23rd June 2008 |
| No major deal in Seoul on G8 climate draft: sources - Environmental News Network Leading economies reached a draft accord on greenhouse gas emissions that will be presented at the G8 summit next month, South Korea said on Monday, but sources at the talks said there were no breakthroughs in the pact. Members of the Group of Eight leading powers, eight other major countries and the European Union met in Seoul at the weekend seeking long-term pledges on cutting greenhouse gases. | 23rd June 2008 |
| Don't rely on the boys with the black stuff, Mr Brown - Guardian Unlimited As the UK Prime Minister visits Saudi Arabia, the lesson of rising oil prices is that green politics matter more than ever | 22nd June 2008 |
| EU CO2 emissions drop 7.7 percent from 1990 levels: EAA Greenhouse gas emissions from the European Union dropped 7.7 percent from 1990 to 2006, even as the use of carbon dioxide-intensive coal increased, the European Environment Agency said Friday. | 22nd June 2008 |
| Electric cars given official green light to boost climate change goals - Guardian Unlimited Vehicles run on renewable energy will have a growing part in Britain's climate change battle | 22nd June 2008 |
| Opposition mounts to clean air change affecting parks - PhysOrg (AP) -- Critics fear the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency will adopt a rule in the waning days of the Bush administration that will make it easier to build coal-fired power plants near national parks. | 22nd June 2008 |
| Emissions documents withheld - The News & Observer The White House on Friday asserted executive privilege in denying a congressional request for documents related to the federal government's rejection of California's efforts to regulate greenhouse-gas emissions. | 22nd June 2008 |
| Canada puts brakes on electric vehicles - PhysOrg Despite increasing local demand for zero-emissions cars and trucks and robust exports of electric vehicles, Canada will not allow them on its roads, lament manufacturers. | 22nd June 2008 |
| Drought turns the whisky stills dry - Guardian Unlimited Distilleries in Scotland's Western Isles are at a standstill as long spell of sunshine puts strain on the lochs. | 22nd June 2008 |
| Brits 'doubt' cause of climate change - Guardian Unlimited UK: A majority of the public is still not convinced climate change is caused by humans, says new survey | 22nd June 2008 |
| The planet will be difficult to save, but do not despair - Financial Times The climate can be stabilised only if everyone moves simultaneously towards a low-carbon economy. If the US is not ready to curb its profligacy and China is unwilling to risk its future growth, what hope is there of a global compact to reduce greenhouse gas emissions by 80 per cent by 2050? The answer is that, yes, it is difficult but, yes too, it is possible. Those who insist otherwise would do well to read a new study by a group of experts led by Nicholas Stern, the UK economist.* Written in the sober style of the original Stern review, this latest short report forsakes magic solutions. Instead it breaks down the challenge into its component parts and offers plausible responses in the form of market mechanisms, technological advances and behavioural changes. Its central conclusion is the antidote to despair: "The challenge is far-reaching, comprehensive, and global; but it is manageable". | 21st June 2008 |
| We must leave the fossil century behind, Mr Brown - Guardian Unlimited George Monbiot: We have begun to glimpse the green holy grail: reliable renewable electricity | 21st June 2008 |
| North Pole Ice May Melt This Summer, Scientists Say - National Geographic The North Pole now contains mostly thin, newly formed ice that is highly vulnerable to the summer heat, according to the latest data from the Arctic. | 21st June 2008 |
| Birds migrate earlier, but some may be left behind as the climate warms rapidly - PhysOrg Many birds are arriving earlier each spring as temperatures warm along the East Coast of the United States. However, the farther those birds journey, the less likely they are to keep pace with the rapidly changing climate. | 21st June 2008 |
| Report on Climate Predicts Extremes - Washington Post As greenhouse-gas emissions rise, North America is likely to experience more droughts and excessive heat in some regions even as intense downpours and hurricanes pound others more often, according to a report issued yesterday by the U.S. Climate Change Science Program. | 21st June 2008 |
| The Trouble With Markets for Carbon - NYTimes.com via Yahoo! Finance As the United States moves toward taking action on global warming, practical experience with carbon markets in the European Union raises the question if such systems ever work. | 21st June 2008 |
| Canadian Carbon Taxes: A lesson in politics overwhelming policy - DeSmogBlog The current Canadian carbon tax debate is a chilling illustration of how easily political spin can overwhelm serious debate on a complex public policy issue.Canadians in two jurisdictions are currently grappling with a carbon tax. In British Columbia, citizens are 10 days away from actually starting to pay a tax imposed by the provincial government - and nationally, Opposition Liberal Party leader Stephane Dion, inset, has just released a wide-ranging climate change policy proposal that includes a carbon tax.The problem, in both instances, is that the facts of the tax - and the underlying policy consideration it was conceived to address - have been lost in a chorus of simplistic political rhetoric. | 21st June 2008 |
| Revealed: UK's blueprint for a green revolution - Guardian Unlimited Government unveils 12-year plan to cut greenhouse gas emissions by 20% | 21st June 2008 |
| 350 or bust - Gristmilll The 350ppm challenge to U.S. environmental organizations and the importance of McKibben's 350.org | 20th June 2008 |
| Cleaning up on carbon - Nature Both national and global climate policy must redirect its focus from setting a price on carbon to promoting the rapid deployment of clean technologies. | 20th June 2008 |
| Kyoto in Court - DeSmogBlog For the first time in history, a national government is being sued by its citizens for failing to live up to its carbon-cutting commitments under the Kyoto Accord. Friends of the Earth, represented by Eco Justice Canada, took to a Toronto courtroom on Wednesday to argue that the Canadian government is in breach of the “Kyoto Protocol Implementation Act ” – a Private Members bill (which Opposition parties passed in Parliament last year) demanding that the Canada fulfill its Kyoto commitments. Illustrating just how determined this government is to ignore its obligations, government lawyers are arguing with a straight face that the court should ignore the "will of Parliament" because this is an “unusual ” law that the government did not expect the court to enforce. | 20th June 2008 |
| Bangladesh is set to disappear under the waves by the end of the century - Independent Bangladesh, the most crowded nation on earth, is set to disappear under the waves by the end of this century – and we will be to blame. Johann Hari took a journey to see for himself how western profligacy and indifference have sealed the fate of 150 million peoplewent to see for himself the spreading misery and destruction as the ocean reclaims the land on which so many millions depend "This spring, I took a month-long road trip across a country that we – you, me and everyone we know – are killing. One day, not long into my journey, I travelled over tiny ridges and groaning bridges on the back of a motorbike to reach the remote village of Munshigonj. The surviving villagers – gaunt, creased people – were sitting by a stagnant pond. They told me, slowly, what we have done to them." | 20th June 2008 |
| Complex connections - Nature Changes in sea surface temperature could play a major role in loss of the Amazon rainforest in the latter half of this century, a new study has found. The research, led by Phil Harris of the Centre for Ecology and Hydrology, United Kingdom, used the atmospheric component of a well-established climate model developed by the UK's Hadley Centre to determine whether changes in sea surface temperature could trigger the disappearance of the Amazon rainforest by 2100. If sea surface temperatures of both the Atlantic and Pacific oceans changed simultaneously up until 2059, annual rainfall in the Amazon basin would be reduced by of more than 20 per cent on average, the authors found. Rainfall could decrease by as much as 48 per cent in the period outside of the South American monsoon season, between May and October. The authors say that the projected reductions in rainfall are influenced by a suite of factors, but that sea surface temperature across the Pacific and Atlantic oceans is the main driver under certain warming scenarios. Such shortages of rain would cut the Amazon's carbon uptake by nearly a third, rendering this socially, economically and biologically critical ecosystem unsustainable. | 20th June 2008 |
| The Real Story Behind the Midwest Floods? Climate Change Scientists acknowledge an uncomfortable fact long ignored by the media: global warming is the real cause of extreme weather like the Midwest floods. See also: Food prices soar in wake of mid-western US floods - Guardian Unlimited | 20th June 2008 |
| Business chiefs urge carbon curbs - BBC News A coalition of 99 companies is asking political leaders to set targets for cutting greenhouse gas emissions and to establish a global carbon market. Their blueprint for tackling climate change is being handed to Japanese Prime Minister Yasuo Fukuda ahead of next month's G8 summit in Japan. Companies involved include Alcoa, British Airways (BA), Deutsche Bank, EDF, Petrobras, Shell and Vattenfall. | 20th June 2008 |
| Economists praise carbon tax - Vancouver Province Canada: "I've never met one (economist) who disagrees (with a carbon tax). They used to disagree with it because they didn't think that the climate risk was serious, and those days seem to be over," said Jaccard. "All the economists who used to sit on the sidelines, while those of us were out there, explaining what you needed to do for the last two decades, seem to be jumping in very rapidly now." See allso: Dion introduces 'green shift' carbon tax plan - CTV Winnipeg | 20th June 2008 |
| Computers, Phones Can Cut CO2 15%, Save $1 Trillion, Study Says - Bloomberg.com Telecommunications and computers can be used to help cut carbon-dioxide emissions and save more than $1 trillion worldwide by reducing electricity and fuel use, the Climate Group said. | 20th June 2008 |
| Heat and power plants could triple their energy output, report says - Guardian Unlimited The energy produced by power plants that provide both heat and electricity could be almost tripled in the UK, according to an analysis of nine industrial sites | 20th June 2008 |
| Catch-22: Feds cut climate research to save fuel (AP) -- They haven't rechristened a ship the Irony, but federal researchers are canceling and cutting back on voyages aimed at studying climate change and ocean ecosystems so they can save money on boat fuel. | 20th June 2008 |
| Paris plans help-yourself green car hire - Guardian Unlimited After popularity of self-service bicycles, Paris introduces 4,00 electric cars to pick up and drop off anywhere in the city | 20th June 2008 |
| Kiribati looks for climate help from Australia - Reuters With climate change threatening his tiny Pacific nation, Kiribati President Anote Tong on Friday asked Australia for help in the battle against rising seas that threaten to erase his atoll home. Kiribati is expected to vanish completely if oceans keep rising. The chain of 33 islands straddling the equator and home to 91,000 people was swamped three years ago by high spring tides that washed away farmland and flooded homes. | 20th June 2008 |
| Whales set to chase shrinking feed zones - WWF International Endangered migratory whales will be faced with shrinking crucial Antarctic foraging zones which will contain less food and will be further away, a new analysis of the impacts of climate change on Southern Ocean whales has found. | 20th June 2008 |
| Ice cores map dynamics of sudden climate changes - PhysOrg New, extremely detailed data from investigations of ice cores from Greenland show that the climate shifted very suddenly and changed fundamentally during quite few years when the ice age ended. Researchers from the Niels Bohr Institute of University of Copenhagen have together with an international team analysed the ice cores from the NorthGRIP drilling through the Greenland ice cap, and the epoch-making new results have been published in the highly esteemed scientific journal Science and in Science Express. | 20th June 2008 |
| Arctic sea ice melt 'even faster' - BBC News After a cold winter, Arctic sea ice has melted quickly, suggesting that summers could be ice-free within five to 10 years. | 19th June 2008 |
| Earthquakes Became Five Times More Energetic - Earthtimes Increase in the annual energy of earthquakes is the strongest symptom yet of planetary overheating. "Unless the problem of global warming (the problem of persistent thermal imbalance of Earth) is addressed urgently and comprehensively -- the rapid increase in global seismic, volcanic and tectonic activity is certain. Consequences of inaction can only be catastrophic. There is no time for half-measures." | 19th June 2008 |
| Ocean temperatures and sea level increases 50 percent higher than previously estimated - PhysOrg New research suggests that ocean temperature and associated sea level increases between 1961 and 2003 were 50 percent larger than estimated in the 2007 Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change report. | 19th June 2008 |
| As Sea Turtles Disappear, Scientists Ponder Climate Change - New America Media A dramatic drop in the nesting population of sea turtles in the Yucatán could be the latest evidence of the domino effect of climate change. The Yucatan Peninsula, home to the largest hawksbill nesting population in the Atlantic, is witnessing a dramatic drop in the nesting population of the hawksbill sea turtle, one of the rarest marine turtles in the world. For more than a month now hundreds of female hawksbill turtles have been arriving to lay their eggs in thousands of nests around the thumb-shaped peninsula. But for unknown reasons, only about one-third of the nests will be laid by the endangered sea creature this year compared to the numbers a decade ago. Almost two decades of conservation efforts - which began in earnest in 1989 after Hurricane Gilbert, the strongest hurricane on record in the area - are now confronting a series of puzzling challenges that suggest the emergence of global warming as a principal factor in declining sea turtle populations. | 19th June 2008 |
| Australian rivers 'face disaster' - BBC News Parts of Australia's Murray-Darling river basin will be beyond recovery unless they receive water soon, scientists warn. | 19th June 2008 |
| A Climate Hero: The Testimony - Worldwatch Institute Worldwatch Institute is partnering with Grist to bring you this three-part series commemorating the 20-year anniversary of NASA scientist James Hansen's groundbreaking testimony on global climate change next week. | 19th June 2008 |
| Catastrophe wouldn't befall Canada if it complied with Kyoto: critics - CNews TORONTO - Catastrophe wouldn't befall the country if the federal government reduced greenhouse gases according to the terms of the Kyoto Protocol, lawyers argued Wednesday in a bid to get Canada to comply with the international agreement. Lawyer Chris Paliare said the government shouldn't be allowed to "pick and choose" which laws it implements and insisted that no "doomsday scenario" would result if Canada cut its greenhouse gases according to Kyoto's targets. | 19th June 2008 |
| Protesters occupy opencast site - BBC News Environmental protesters occupy part of a Derbyshire site that is to become an opencast coal mine. | 19th June 2008 |
| German Climate-Protection Plan Falls Short of Target - Bloomberg.com June 18 (Bloomberg) -- The German government agreed to cut carbon-dioxide emissions by raising energy-consumption standards for buildings and increasing tolls on trucks, steps that still fall short of prior targets on reducing CO2. | 19th June 2008 |
| Activist dismisses oilsands emissions report - CTV.ca A major oilsands producer claims to have reduced its greenhouse gas emissions "intensity" over the past year, but an environmental activist calls that a "shell game." Suncor admits in a report released Wednesday that its absolute emissions rose by 3.6 per cent between 2006 and 2007. | 19th June 2008 |
| Hothouse Earth: Strange tales from the last great warming - New Scientist Once the North Pole was infested with crocodiles, while Antarctica was covered by lush forests. But if the poles were so balmy, what on earth were the tropics like? (full text available to subscribers) | 19th June 2008 |
| Global warming to increase US wildfires - New Scientist The north-western US wilderness is already a tinderbox, but thanks to global warming, the area burned every year could double by 2080 | 19th June 2008 |
| CO2 disposal in the ocean is a dangerous distraction - Guardian Unlimited Bill Hare, Greenpeace adviser and visiting scientist at the Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research, Germany, responds to Wallace Broecker's call for carbon storage experiments in the depths of the Pacific Ocean. The urgency of reducing emissions of CO2 has never been greater. The science of climate change has revealed that the risks are much higher and more imminent than we had estimated only a few years ago. But just as with a deadly emergency in a heavy passenger jet: the crew should never, ever rush into hasty actions that will ultimately make a very bad situation a lot worse. Ocean disposal of CO2 is one such option. A careful, rational and scientific analysis of the option of CO2 disposal in the ocean leads to the conclusion that it is not viable. | 19th June 2008 |
| Lessons from an angry planet - Grist Magazine From the standpoint of global climate change, nature's incredible assault on the American heartland this year can be interpreted in one of two ways. Both offer lessons about the challenges of adapting to the climate we have created. | 18th June 2008 |
| Wheat Rises as Australian Drought May Hurt Newly Planted Crop - Bloomberg.com Australia may produce 8.8 percent less grain than estimated after the driest May on record, the country's Bureau of Agricultural and Resource Economics, or Abare, said in an e- mail. Production in the year starting Oct. 1 may fall to 23.7 million metric tons, the agency said, down from a March estimate of 26 million tons. | 18th June 2008 |
| Dion pitches green plan before it's released - CNews WINNIPEG - A carbon tax would be good for the planet and for Canadians' wallets, Liberal Leader Stephane Dion said Tuesday as he pitched his soon-to-be-released green plan. | 18th June 2008 |
| Let's Create a Positive Climate - TheTyee.ca The rocky start for the carbon tax should give us pause. How can we ensure that lessons learned from this initial victory are used to build consensus around the much more significant emission reduction measures that lie ahead? | 18th June 2008 |
| Bush, World-Bank Pushing Bogus 'Clean Energy' Funds - iNSnet "What they are really proposing is a slightly less dirty technology fund which will include financing of coal plants that are somewhat less polluting than the dirtiest plants out there." | 18th June 2008 |
| Japan PM: G8 Not Forum for Mid-Term CO2 Cut Goals - Planet Ark TOKYO - G8 rich nations won't set a target for cutting CO2 emissions by 2020 or 2030 when their leaders meet next month, Japanese Prime Minister Yasuo Fukuda said on Tuesday, dampening hopes of a step that environmentalists say is key. | 18th June 2008 |
| A way of life is feeling the heat - BBC News Centuries of knowledge needed to survive in the world's drylands are being sacrificed in the name of progress. | 18th June 2008 |
| Los Angeles to fight drought with 'cloud-seeding' - Guardian Unlimited Officials plan to spend $800,000 firing silver iodide particles into the sky in the hope of boosting rainfall by as much as 15% | 18th June 2008 |
| Crunch 'will hit green product sales' - Guardian Unlimited Science environment: UK consumers likely to cut spending on eco-friendly and fair trade items, research says | 18th June 2008 |
| Researchers race to save Alaska's coral gardens - The Christian Science Monitor Unique, vast cold-water corals contain unknown species, tropical hues – and unexploited stocks of fish. | 18th June 2008 |
| Invisible killer threatens oyster farming in US Pacific - Guardian Unlimited Bacterium refuses to leave shoreline risking US$57m oyster industry in US | 18th June 2008 |
| Space cameras to monitor forests - BBC Plans to use high resolution cameras in space to monitor deforestation in the Congo Basin are unveiled. | 18th June 2008 |
| Solutions: New trading funds highlight expanding role of wind in global warming struggle -DeSmogBlog Two new Exchange Traded Funds, filed within days of each other with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission, will focus on companies that provide products and services to the wind-energy industry, such as turbine makers and utilities with wind farms. Wind energy reduces carbon dioxide emissions and cuts natural gas and water use. Of particular interest to investors, wind power is unaffected by price swings in natural gas, coal and uranium - all of which soared this year. The new filings reflect the deepening role of wind in the battle against climate change. U.S. wind-power capacity increased by 46% in 2007, with $9 billion invested in 2007 alone, making the U.S. | 18th June 2008 |
| How biofuels are like drugs - Gristmill By Vinod KhoslaTo my surprise, recently I found myself the subject of an editorial by the Wall Street Journal which characterized me as a strong advocate of subsidies for food-based ethanol, and as a recipient of "federal dole" who ought to "take a vow of embarrassed silence." I have not advocated subsidies for food-based ethanol. In fact, I strongly believe any nascent technology that cannot exist without subsidies beyond an introductory period will not gain market penetration, and is not worth supporting. I do look forward to the WSJ's complaints about oil's subsidy bonanza, from tax breaks for drilling, loopholes that allow royalty-free or below-market offshore oil leases, manufacturing tax breaks, as well as roughly $7 billion in subsidies in the wake of the Katrina disaster. | 18th June 2008 |
| Conflicts fuelled by climate change causing new refugee crisis, warns UN - Guardian Unlimited 'Unprecedented' number of people displaced by conflict and persecution as figure rises by 3m to 37.4m | 17th June 2008 |
| Wired Magazine's Incoherent Truths - RealClimate Many of our tech-savvy friends - the kind of folks who nurse along the beowulf clusters our climate models run on - are scratching their heads over some cheeky shrieking that recently appeared in a WIRED magazine article on Rethinking What it Means to be Green. Crank up the A/C! Kill the Spotted Owl! Keep the SUV! What's all that supposed to be about? Let's take air conditioning for starters. Basically WIRED took a look at the carbon footprint of New England heating vs. Arizona cooling and jumped to the conclusion that air conditioning was intrinsically more efficient than heating. | 17th June 2008 |
| The oil era reaches its desperate endgame - The Independent Saudi Arabia appears ready to cave in to demands from Western governments for the kingdom to make special efforts to increase its production of oil. Analysts forecast that the world's largest producer will shortly raise its output by half a million barrels a day. The United Nations Secretary-General, Ban Ki-Moon, confirmed this impression at the weekend after emerging from talks with the Saudi monarch, King Abdullah. | 17th June 2008 |
| How crops like soya came to dominate our diet - Guardian Unlimited In an extract from her new book, Felicity Lawrence investigates the faceless trading giants who really decide what goes on our plates | 17th June 2008 |
| Corn Jumps to Record as Floods in Midwest Threaten U.S. Crops - Bloomberg.com Corn climbed to a record near $8 a bushel as floods damaged crops in the U.S., the largest producer and exporter, threatening global food supplies. | 17th June 2008 |
| How Do We Go from Empire to Earth Community? - AlterNet The day of reckoning for our reckless human ways that many of us have for decades warned would be coming is here. | 17th June 2008 |
| No justice, no cap - Gristmill By Charles KomanoffCondemning carbon trading as "fraught with uncertainties, lack[ing] transparency and creat[ing] large opportunities for emitting facilities to engage in fraud," a national coalition of environmental justice organizations has called for a federal carbon tax to address "the most critical issue of our time" -- the climate crisis. Photo: Brooke Anderson. The June 2 statement from the Climate Justice Leadership Forum is the latest sign of mounting disaffection with the top-down push for carbon cap-and-trade. It is particularly significant because the 28 signatory organizations, which span the country from Anchorage to New Orleans and from Oakland to New York City, have been the spearhead of a rising movement by communities of color to crack open the historically affluent and white U.S. See also: Who you callin' a carbon tax, buddy | 17th June 2008 |
| Big Oil Gets Sued for Climate Change - DeSmogBlog The Tiny arctic village of Kivalina , Alaska could be the beginning of the end for Big Oil. Two veteran tobacco litigators have joined forces to in a novel court action to sue oil companies for climate-related damage to the remote Inuit village – and for lying to the public about climate change. Kivalina is a native community of less than 400 people on an island in the Bearing Sea that depends on salmon fishing and hunting. The village has been protected for generations by sea ice that shields the area from powerful winter storms. Less ice due to a rapidly changing climate has greatly increased the rate of erosion and storm damage, forcing the community to consider relocating at a cost of more than $400 million. | 17th June 2008 |
| UN Climate Deal Said "Daunting" as Bonn Talks End - Planet Ark BONN - The world faces a daunting task to agree a new deal by the end of 2009 to slow climate change, the United Nations said on Friday as 170-country talks ended with recriminations about scant progress. | 16th June 2008 |
| Save money, save the planet - The Independent It is easy to disparage the recurrent vogue for the frugal life as an indulgence of the middle classes. It is tempting, when people extol their virtue in making their own clothes or growing their own polenta, to think that it is all very well for those who have the time, which is, after all, money. It is a temptation that should be resisted. | 16th June 2008 |
| Polar Cities - the ultimate in long-term real estate speculation - DeSmogBlog On Polar Cities, Andy Revkin at the New York Times says its time for urban planners, to get out their mukluks.Revkin is referring to an interesting "thought project" being conducted by Dan Bloom called Polar Cities. As Bloom describes it: Polar cities are envisioned as safe refuge communities where survivors of global warming can live when worst comes to worst."Bloom, a 60 year old graduate of Tufts University in Boston, has lived in Asia since 1991 and began working on his polar cities project in 2006, and his way-forward thinking is starting to catch on. His thought that by 2500 the only really inhabitable place on Earth will be the polar regions is both novel and actually quite visionary when you consider what contemporary science is telling us. | 16th June 2008 |
| Solar future brightens as oil soars - Guardian Unlimited Science environment: World's biggest producer of panels doubles output as nearly half a million houses now fitted with them | 16th June 2008 |
| Canal boat charts way to greener ships - Guardian Unlimited Zero-emissions hydrogen narrowboat shows vessel efficiency could improve five-fold | 16th June 2008 |
| Green group girds for court showdown with Ottawa over Kyoto law - The Canadian Press via Yahoo! Canada News OTTAWA - An environmental group will argue in court this week that the federal government has run afoul of the law by flouting its obligations to reduce greenhouse gases under the Kyoto Protocol. | 16th June 2008 |
| INTERVIEW-Disaster-prone deltas next climate risk-ecologist - AlertNet Some of the world's most productive and populous places -- river deltas from the Mekong to the Mississippi -- are ripe for disasters made worse by climate change, an ecological catastrophe expert said. In fact, said marine biologist Deborah Brosnan, these disasters are already occurring. | 16th June 2008 |
| Climate change 'to affect coral fish' - The Age Australia: Scientists say coral fish could suffer from climate change just as much as the reefs they live in. Over 400,000 species of fish live in or around coral reefs and the lives of many of them depended on the health of corals, said Dr Philip Munday from the Australian Research Council (ARC) Centre of Excellence for Coral Reef Studies, based at James Cook University in Townsville. "We have already seen episodes of mass die-off of corals as a result of warmer waters associated with global warming," Dr Munday said. | 16th June 2008 |
| 63pc of NSW drought declared - ABC via Yahoo!7 News More than 60 per cent of New South Wales is now in drought, an increase of more than 14 per cent on last month's official figures. | 16th June 2008 |
| Carbon plan taxing for the brain - CNews When the next election comes and Canada's biggest political parties vie for our vote, a key battleground will be the merits of a carbon tax. | 16th June 2008 |
| G8 Statement on Action Plan for Climate Change - Planet Ark 1. Climate Change is one of the most urgent issues for the world to tackle. We, G8 Finance Ministers, recognize that the international community has been making considerable efforts, but that there is still much to do. | 16th June 2008 |
| Ocean changes may trigger US megadrought - New Scientist Global warming could lead to a specific temperature pattern in the Pacific and Atlantic oceans that has triggered extreme droughts in the past.Californians will hope the drought in their state won't last as long as the parched period that afflicted North America from AD 800 to 1250. Even if it passes, global warming may yet hasten another 500-year "megadrought". | 14th June 2008 |
| Climate talks progress 'feeble' - BBC News Progress towards developing a global strategy to cut emissions is too slow, say environmental campaigners. | 14th June 2008 |
| Garrisoning the global gas station - Gristmill Challenging the militarization of U.S. energy policy. This is a guest essay from energy analyst Michael T. Klare. It was originally run on TomDispatch; it is reprinted here with Tom's kind permission. ----- American policymakers have long viewed the protection of overseas oil supplies as an essential matter of "national security," requiring the threat of -- and sometimes the use of -- military force. This is now an unquestioned part of American foreign policy. On this basis, the first Bush administration fought a war against Iraq in 1990-1991 and the second Bush administration invaded Iraq in 2003. | 14th June 2008 |
| Task Force Report - Foreign Relations Against the backdrop of increasing attention to energy and climate change in the presidential campaigns, recent failure of the Senate to advance the Lieberman-Warner climate bill, and preparations for this summer's G8 summit, a CFR-sponsored Independent Task Force recommends an overhaul of U.S. domestic and foreign policy to confront the challenge. | 14th June 2008 |
| Joint statement: On global warming from scientists, politicians and commentators - ASMC Australia: This joint statement is a 'call to arms' from some of the country's leading scientists, plus several commentators and politicians. The statement describes the urgent need for an effective response to global warming. It was written following the 2008 Manning Clark House Conference on Climate Change which concluded on Thursday June 12 in Canberra. | 14th June 2008 |
| China's carbon emissions soaring - Guardian Unlimited Science environment: Country was responsible for two-thirds of total increase in global CO2 emissions in 2007 | 14th June 2008 |
| Even the Antarctic winter cannot protect Wilkins Ice Shelf - PhysOrg Wilkins Ice Shelf has experienced further break-up with an area of about 160 km² breaking off from 30 May to 31 May 2008. ESA's Envisat satellite captured the event - the first ever-documented episode to occur in winter. | 14th June 2008 |
| Seventh warmest spring on record globally - USA Today Planet Earth continues to simmer, with this year's spring the seventh warmest on record. | 14th June 2008 |
| Arctic thaw threatens Siberian permafrost - The Independent The permafrost belt stretching across Siberia to Alaska and Canada could start melting three times faster than expected because of the speed at which Arctic Sea ice is disappearing. | 14th June 2008 |
| Infested fish may bear scars of global warming A new scourge ... - Los Angeles Times The emergence of disease in Alaska's most prized salmon has come as a shock to fishermen and fisheries managers. Alaskan wild salmon has been an uncommon success story among over-exploited fisheries, with healthy runs and robust catches that fetch ever higher prices at fish markets and high-end restaurants in Los Angeles, New York, Tokyo and London. Fishermen and regulators who have cooperated to save species from overfishing and local environmental hazards have been caught unprepared to deal with forces beyond their control: how to manage a fishery for climate change. | 14th June 2008 |
| Climate protest halts coal train - BBC News About 30 climate campaigners have halted a train taking coal to one of Europe's biggest power stations in North Yorkshire. A giant banner reading "Leave it in the ground" has been draped over the train bound for Drax near Selby. | 14th June 2008 |
| Church agency says government is failing on global warming target - Ekklesia UK-based International development agency Christian Aid has accused the government of ‘eviscerating’ the Climate Change Bill by failing to include within it a number of measures crucial to the fight against global warming. | 14th June 2008 |
| The cost of cleaning up fossil fuels - and the price of doing nothing - Guardian Unlimited Ohio based Carbon capture project aims to trap CO2 equivalent of a 20MW power station | 14th June 2008 |
| After Record Growth in 2007, the Future of the U.S. Wind Power Industry At Stake in 2008 - Gather.com Federal production tax credits (PTC) have helped to drive recent investments in wind power. But the current PTC is set to expire at the end of 2008. The DOE warns that the current boom in wind power could quickly turn to bust unless action is taken soon to extend it. | 14th June 2008 |
| U.S. floods wipe out ethanol profits - International Herald Tribune The floods ravaging the corn crop at a time of high global demand have put another roadblock before the U.S. biofuels policy. | 14th June 2008 |
| EUROPE: Getting Allergic to Climate Change - IPS BERLIN, Jun 13 (IPS) - Climate change induced by global warming is provoking health hardships in Europe, especially through new, prolonged allergies, authorities say. | 14th June 2008 |
| Computer models show major climate shift as a result of closing ozone hole - PhysOrg A new study led by Columbia University researchers has found that the closing of the ozone hole, which is projected to occur sometime in the second half of the 21st century, may significantly affect climate change in the Southern Hemisphere, and therefore, the global climate. The study appears in the June 13th issue of Science. | 13th June 2008 |
| More Evidence Points To Greenland Tipping Point - Daily Green Another study adds weight to the conclusion that Greenland's ice sheet is melting faster than predicted by the United Nations, and that sea level could rise faster than predicted around the world. The International Polar Year study, by Sebastian H. Mernild of the University of Alaska-Fairbanks, was published in Hydrological Processes. Mernild's team's model showed a doubling of freshwater runoff, in the form of melting and iceberg calving, from Greenland by the end of this century. That level of melting would result in an annual rise of sea levels 45% greater than previously predicted – 1.6 millimeters a year, rather than 1.1. Another recent study predicted that sea levels would rise two times as fast as previously thought because of the rapid melting of Greenland. Other recent research suggests a total melting of Greenland's ice sheet – which could take hundreds, or even 1,000 years – would make sea levels rise 23 feet. | 13th June 2008 |
| City seeks to be carbon neutral - BBC News A £1.25m grant will be spent trying to make Stirling the first carbon neutral city in the UK. The target is to bring down average annual carbon dioxide levels from 12 tonnes, the average in Scotland, to one tonne per person per year. The funding to get the scheme under way is coming from the Big Lottery Fund and the Scottish Government. | 13th June 2008 |
| Cities take lead in climate change - CNET London, New York, Chicago, and Toronto cast wide net in local response to global warming, touching on efficient buildings, distributed generation, water, and waste. | 13th June 2008 |
| Drought pushes Iran to import wheat - Payvand Iran News Iran has announced it will have to import many grains including wheat this year to combat a drought that has plagued the country. | 13th June 2008 |
| US oyster industry threatened by bacterium - Guardian Unlimited US oyster industry threatened by bacteriumguardian.co.uk, UK. "Is that a connection to global warming? That's the consensus. " | 13th June 2008 |
| Ice Shelf Instability - RealClimate Guest contribution from Mauri S. Pelto Ice shelves are floating platforms of ice fed by mountain glaciers and ice sheets flowing from the land onto the ocean. The ice flows from the grounding line where it becomes floating to the seaward front, where icebergs calve. For a typical glacier when the climate warms the glacier merely retreats, reducing its low elevation, high melting area by increasing its mean elevation. An ice shelf is nearly flat and cannot retreat in this fashion. Ice shelves cannot persist unless the entire ice shelf is an accumulation zone, where snowpack does not completely melt even in the summer. | 13th June 2008 |
| A guide to carbon capture technologies - Guardian Unlimited A guide to carbon capture technologies | 13th June 2008 |
| Burning down the house - CNN International Burning down the houseCNN International. Author of "Carbon Scenarios" compares global warming to a house fire that the world is currently failing to contain. If climate change were a small house fire, current policy in the European Union and the United Kingdom would ensure that it would destroy not just the house but the entire suburb. See also: Mark Lynas: Climate chaos is inevitable. We can only avert oblivion | 12th June 2008 |
| Money changes everything - Gristmill The debate over the Climate Security Act bill has made that clear trillions are at stake in global warming legislation. No surprise, then, that the Senate power brokers don't want Barbara Boxer's (D-Calif.) Environment and Public Works committee to have the only say on who gets what. E&E Daily ($ub. req'd) has the story of how the climate bill is likely to have a much longer and far more tangled journey next year:Next year's Senate climate debate is shaping up to be much different than the one that played out over the last 18 months as powerful committee chairmen express interest in vetting critical pieces of the controversial legislation. | 12th June 2008 |
| Sun's rays alone 'can power Australia by 2030' - Canberra Times Australia could be totally reliant on solar energy by 2030 if the current obstacles of technical inertia, lack of political will and entrenched interests can be overcome, a leading CSIRO scientist says. | 12th June 2008 |
| EU aims for low-carbon economy - Guardian Unlimited European commission calls for fuel summit between the main oil-producing and consuming countries The EU's executive body insisted that the main EU drive should be to wean its citizens off oil-dependence and point them towards a low-carbon economy. The commission warned that fuel prices would remain high in the medium- to long-term because of a structural shift in oil supply and demand in the global economy, with energy demand set to be 50% higher in 2030 than in 2007. This would be mainly met by fossil fuels on unchanged policies which would see EU's import dependence reach 67% by 2030. | 12th June 2008 |
| IEA report, Part 2 - Gristmill Part 1 discussed the basic conclusion of the new International Energy Agency report -- cutting global emissions in half by 2050 is not costly. In fact, the total shift in investment needed to stabilize at 450 ppm is only about 1.1 percent of GDP per year, and that is not a "cost" or hit to GDP, because much of that investment goes toward saving expensive fuel. In this post, I will discuss the basic solution IEA is proposing. I will also start to look at how the report is too pessimistic about renewables, and thus it overestimates costs. | 12th June 2008 |
| Corn prices surge to record high - BBC Corn prices have hit new highs after the US Department of Agriculture forecast that output would fall because of poor weather. | 12th June 2008 |
| Hungry monkeys plunder Indonesian crops - CNN.com JAKARTA, Indonesia (AP) -- Bands of starving monkeys have destroyed crops around Indonesia's famous Borobudur Buddhist temple in search of food their habitat can no longer supply. | 12th June 2008 |
| Tree Leaves Have Built-In Thermostat - LiveScience.com via Yahoo! News Whether in Canada or the Caribbean, tree leaves don't have to worry about the temperature outside - they have their own built-in climate control that always aims to keep them comfortable, a new study finds. The results of the study, funded by the Department of Biology at the University of Pennsylvania and the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation, have implications for how trees in northern climates will react to global warming: They might overheat due to mechanisms they have evolved to "keep warm." | 12th June 2008 |
| Ocean seeding fails the acid test - New Scientist Fertilising the ocean with iron filings to battle global warming also produces a nasty acid lethal to marine life and even humans (full text available to subscribers) In coastal waters, domoic acid is infamous. Shallow water blooms of algae in the genus Pseudo-nitzschia create large quantities of the poison, which can sicken and kill marine mammals, birds and even people who eat contaminated shellfish (New Scientist, 16 June 2007, p 18). This type of alga has rarely been found in the deep ocean - where the iron would be sprinkled - but that's not because it is absent, according to Silver. Instead, she says, deep ocean species of Pseudo-nitzschia are too scarce to be detected in the usual way. "Most seawater samples are tens or hundreds of millilitres, and that's not enough to see them." Silver collected hundreds of litres of water before she found a few Pseudo-nitzschia cells. Even then they contained less acid than their coastal counterparts. However, when Silver seeded the samples with iron, the Pseudo-nitzschia population exploded, and so did domoic acid levels. "They're really the first responders in the iron experiments," says Silver. "And domoic acid is a big reason why." The acid is a "chelator", she explains, binding to iron to make more of it available to the algae. Easy access to this nutrient would allow algae to out-compete other species. | 12th June 2008 |
| Permafrost threatened by rapid retreat of Arctic sea ice, study finds - PhysOrg The rate of climate warming over northern Alaska, Canada, and Russia could more than triple during periods of rapid sea ice loss, according to a new study led by the National Center for Atmospheric Research (NCAR). The findings raise concerns about the thawing of permafrost, or permanently frozen soil, and the potential consequences for sensitive ecosystems, human infrastructure, and the release of additional greenhouse gases. | 11th June 2008 |
| Lieberman-Warner Climate Bill Voted Down by Big Oil - DeSmogBlog A little data-crunching by the folks at Oil Change International finds that Senators who voted against the Lieberman- Warner Climate Security Act have received on average 3 times more oil money than those who voted for the Bill. Avg Oil/Gas Money Per Vote Yea (48) $54,948 Nay (36) $159,288Check out Oil Change International's Follow the Money tool - a great resource for tracking the oil lobby's influence over elected representatives.With such a close vote, do you think Lieberman-Warner would have passed if there was no such thing as an oil lobby in Washington? See also: Why the Climate Bill Failed - Time Magazine | 11th June 2008 |
| Science academies urge 50 pct CO2 cuts by 2050 - AlertNet Major economies should aim to halve world emissions of greenhouse gases by 2050 and work out ways to bury gases in a wider assault on climate change, the science academies of 13 nations said on Tuesday. | 11th June 2008 |
| Canada Passes Major Climate Bill - Government Ignores It - DeSmogBlog You know how Al Gore won the popular vote in 2000, but lost the election?Well, in a way, that's kind of what happened in Canada recently. Last week, a Bill called The Climate Change Accountability Act (Bill C-377) received a majority vote in the House of Commons and if enacted would be the toughest climate legislation passed by any national government in the world. It would also be the first piece of legislation completely in line with the levels of greenhouse gas reductions recommended by the world's scientific institutions in the latest report by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC). | 11th June 2008 |
| Climate change blamed as mango harvest goes sour in India - FreshPlaza The news will send a shiver through fruit aficionados the world over: India's mangoes, revered for millennia for their succulence, are becoming fewer and less sweet as changes in weather patterns affect harvests. Official estimates suggest that three million tonnes of mangoes have been wiped out by a severe winter in India so far this year and the unseasonable deluges that have swept key growing regions in recent days may weigh further on production. | 11th June 2008 |
| Atlas shows vanishing landscape - BBC News A new atlas shows Africa's changing landscape over 30 years including disappearing glaciers and lakes. | 11th June 2008 |
| May 'warmest since records began' - BBC News Last month was the warmest May in Scotland since records began in 1914, according to Met Office data. | 11th June 2008 |
| Protest plan to shut power plant - BBC News Environmental campaigners planning a protest camp in Kent have vowed to close Kingsnorth power station. | 11th June 2008 |
| UK bill to set carbon targets clears first hurdle - Guardian Unlimited The UK government's groundbreaking bill to combat climate change has cleared its first hurdle in the House of Commons | 11th June 2008 |
| Mechanics of climate curbs - BBC News Yvo de Boer: Despite recent criticisms, the Kyoto Protocol's Clean Development Mechanism is delivering the goods. | 11th June 2008 |
| Tory attack on carbon tax is dishonest: economist - CTV.ca A prominent resource economist has pronounced himself disgusted with "dishonest" Conservative attack ads on a Liberal carbon tax proposal that's yet to be unveiled. | 11th June 2008 |
| ENVIRONMENT-EUROPE: France and Germany Dilute the Green - IPS BRUSSELS, Jun 10 (IPS) - The leaders of France and Germany, the European Union's two largest car-producing countries, appeared to take their cue from glossy vehicle advertisements this week. Just as such ads routinely seek to convey the impression that vehicles are ecologically benign, President Nicolas Sarkozy and Chancellor Angela Merkel tried to present an agreement they reached on carbon dioxide (CO2) limits from new cars as a boon for the environment. | 11th June 2008 |
| *No renewal for renewables - Gristmill Senate Republicans block movement on two bills to spur renewable energy investment. | 11th June 2008 |
| The Venus Syndrome - Part Two - Huffington Post Yesterday, Part One reported on the science and politics of global warming. Today, we enter the realm of the unknown, the future. Remember, now, there could be twice as much energy content in methane trapped at the bottom of the ocean than all the known coal, oil and natural gas deposits. | 11th June 2008 |
| Carbon Prices at Two-Year High in Europe - BusinessWeek Skyrocketing oil prices lead power companies to switch to dirtier coal power which, in turn, is blamed for the rise in carbon credit allowances | 11th June 2008 |
| As Energy Costs Soar, US Looks to Solar - Planet Ark BOSTON - Apple Inc is considering harnessing the sun to power its iPod music players. California's Ironwood prison is installing more than 6,000 solar panels, and Boston's Fenway Park is tapping solar power for Red Sox baseball games. See also: German solar sector starting to attract investors | 10th June 2008 |
| Reformed carbon scheme could drive global change, says report - Guardian Unlimited Trading scheme designed to cut Europe's carbon dioxide emissions by setting limits for big polluters | 10th June 2008 |
| Personal carbon trading goes real time - Guardian Unlimited Drivers filling up with fuel will, from today, be able to participate in a trial for the world's first real-time personal carbon trading scheme. Up to 1,000 volunteers will be able to use their Nectar shopping loyalty cards at any BP garage to record how much fuel they have purchased – and, as a result, create an electronic record of how much carbon dioxide they will consequently be emitting into the atmosphere. Each volunteer will be given a monthly allowance of carbon credits which they will then be able to trade with other volunteers using an online trading system dubbed the CarbonDAQ. Volunteers who are thrifty with their credits will, using a virtual currency, be able to sell their spare credits to those needing to drive further than their allowance allows. | 10th June 2008 |
| ENVIRONMENT-CHINA: Banking on Wind Power - IPS MANILA, Jun 9 (IPS) - China plans to triple its wind power capacity over the next two years in line with the central government's goal of promoting clean energy and more sustainable economic development, says a senior policy development official. | 10th June 2008 |
| Millions of U.S. Workers Stand to Gain from Green Industries - Alternet A new report shows that the quickest way to put Americans back to work is through investments in solving global warming. See also: Americans put themselves on the path to green careers 'Green' Job Market Bucks Credit Crunch Gloom | 10th June 2008 |
| Bangor couple want to create off-the-grid 'ecovillage' - Battle Creek Enquirer BANGOR - Maynard Kaufman always has been a step ahead of the environmental movement. He was a generation ahead of today's organic movement, growing organic crops as early as 1973, when many farmers still had fields full of DDT. | 10th June 2008 |
| IEA report, Part 1 - Gristmill Act now with clean energy or face 6 degrees C warming; cost is not high; media blows story. When the normally conservative International Energy Agency (IEA) agrees with both the middle of the road IPCC and more ... progressive voices like mine, it should be time for the world to get very serious, very fast on the clean energy transition. But when the media blows the story, the public and policymakers may miss the key messages of the stunning new IEA report, "Energy Technology Perspectives, 2008" (executive summary here). You may not have paid much attention to this new report once you saw the media's favorite headline for it: "$45 trillion needed to combat warming." That would be too bad, because the real news from the global energy agency is Failing to act very quickly to transform the planet's energy system puts us on a path to catastrophic outcomes. | 10th June 2008 |
| Climate change: Carbon capture from power stations must start soon, say scientists - Guardian Unlimited Burying gas could achieve 1/3 of UK emissions targets but without it, experts say disaster is unavoidable | 10th June 2008 |
| Carbon-capturing technology is stalled by a Catch-22 - International Herald Tribune Cutting carbon dioxide emissions is a fine idea, and a lot of companies would be proud to do it. But they would prefer to be second, if not third or fourth. | 10th June 2008 |
| Elevated Carbon Dioxide Boosts Invasive Nutsedge - Agricultural Research Magazine Elevated levels of carbon dioxide (CO2) could promote the growth of purple and yellow nutsedge-quick-growing invasive weeds that plague farmers and gardeners in many states. | 10th June 2008 |
| Grits blast Tories' attack ads - CNews Canada: New Tory attack ads are "blatant lies" and a desperate ploy to detract from a series of scandals engulfing the Harper government, Liberals charge. See also: Carbon taxes - CTV.ca | 10th June 2008 |
| Brown's fading green credentials - Guardian Unlimited Comment is free: Tony Juniper: A debate on the climate change bill will expose the government's outdated environmental policies but when will ministers listen? | 10th June 2008 |
| Climate change hastens extinction in Madagascar's reptiles and amphibians - PhysOrg.com New research from the American Museum of Natural History provides the first detailed study showing that global warming forces species to move up tropical mountains as their habitats shift upward. Christopher Raxworthy, Associate Curator in the Department of Herpetology, predicts that at least three species of amphibians and reptiles found in Madagascar's mountainous north could go extinct between 2050 and 2100 because of habitat loss associated with rising global temperatures. These species, currently moving upslope to compensate for habitat loss at lower and warmer altitudes, will eventually have no place to move to. | 10th June 2008 |
| A Climate Change Proposal With Cash - US News & World Report "Cap-and-dividend" advocates say to tackle global warming, Uncle Sam will need to hand out money. | 10th June 2008 |
| Patrick Takahashi: The Venus Syndrome - Part One - HuffingtonPost It turns out that there is another greenhouse gas, methane, that shows promise for becoming the doomsday gas. | 10th June 2008 |
| Coal group spent $1.9M for lobbying in 1Q - Daily Report A coal industry-backed group spent nearly $1.9 million lobbying in the first quarter as it fought congressional efforts to combat global warming through mandatory reductions in carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases. The American Coalition for Clean Coal Electricity lobbied against climate change legislation that was blocked last week by Senate Republicans on arguments that it would result in increased energy costs. The group's members include American Electric Power Co., Arch Coal Inc., CSX Corp., Duke Energy, First Energy Corp., Foundation Coal Corp., Peabody Energy Corp., Southern Co. and Union Pacific Corp. | 10th June 2008 |
| Erratic rainfall set to slow down afforestation efforts - Business Daily Africa Erratic rainfall is set to slow down Kenya’s drive to increase forest coverage, forestry officials said. Mr Antony Maina, the deputy director in charge of forest plantation at Kenya Forest Service, said less than 35 per cent of the trees planted this year are expected to survive the looming drought. | 8th June 2008 |
| Geologist sees methane `doomsday' - Inland Valley Daily Bulletin He calls it the Doomsday Scenario. Imagine alligators swimming at the North Pole. It happened once and it could happen again if Martin Kennedy's hypothesis comes true. Related Story: UC Riverside offers program on climate change | 8th June 2008 |
| CO2 Emissions to Double by 2050 Unless Govts Act - IEA - Planet Ark TOKYO - Planet-warming carbon emissions will rise 130 percent and oil demand will rise 70 percent by 2050 under current government policies, the International Energy Agency warned in a report on Friday. | 8th June 2008 |
| Natural lab shows sea's acid path - BBC News Natural CO2 vents on the sea floor show scientists how life will be affected as carbon emissions acidify the oceans. | 8th June 2008 |
| Tories release new campaign attacking Liberal carbon tax plan - CNews OTTAWA - Stephen Harper's Conservative party has released a series of sneering radio ads that portray the Liberal environmental plan as a massive tax grab - even though they haven't seen the blueprint. | 8th June 2008 |
| China Eyes Domestic Emissions Trading Scheme - Planet Ark BEIJING - China's central bank has drawn up a tentative outline for a domestic emissions trading scheme that could cover everything from greenhouse gases to water pollutants, and speed the country's push for greener growth. | 8th June 2008 |
| China Issue to Live on After US Carbon Bill Death - Planet Ark NEW YORK - The US climate bill may be dead but one thorny element of it -- possible tariffs on energy-intensive imports from rapidly developing countries like China -- will fester as lawmakers form new greenhouse legislation. | 8th June 2008 |
| 2050 greenhouse goals will be too late: EPI head - The Japan Times Pitches to cut worldwide greenhouse gas emissions by 80 percent by 2050 are too leisurely and must be brought forward by decades, Lester Brown, president and founder of the Earth Policy Institute in Washington, said Friday at a symposium in Tokyo. "We are going to have to move much, much faster. I think the game will be over long before 2050..." . | 7th June 2008 |
| The People vs. The Powerful - Northwest Progressive Institute Official Blog The People vs. The PowerfulNorthwest Progressive Institute Official Blog, WA. ExxonMobil's position on global warming has not solely been one of denial, however. ExxonMobil has been funding many of the efforts designed to cast doubt ... | 7th June 2008 |
| Britain's climate target 'impossible' - Guardian Unlimited Britain will find it 'impossible' to meet its target as part of the world's battle to ensure temperatures do not rise more than 2C - a key threshold for dangerous climate change, according to a study by a panel of leading experts. The report 'Carbon Scenarios' by the Stockholm Network thinktank says that if existing policies and hopes of international agreement on reducing emissions were implemented, there would still be a 90 per cent chance the temperature rise would reach about 3C, a level that experts fear would provoke 'feedback' of more carbon by melting permafrost, threatening the world's forests. | 7th June 2008 |
| What Does Obama's Victory Mean for Greens? - AlterNet Obama's victory is the best thing that could have happened to greens, but perhaps not for the reasons you think. | 7th June 2008 |
| Putting sea life to the acid test - Flinders News Putting sea life to the acid testFlinders News, Australia. What happens to all this marine life when rising acid levels combine with the rising sea temperatures caused by global warming? ... | 7th June 2008 |
| Dry future well ahead of schedule - The Australian Autumn rains have failed for many farmers and southern rivers are faring even more poorly | 7th June 2008 |
| 'Big Dry' cranks out C02 - Stuff New Zealand: Greenhouse gas emissions are soaring as coal and gas-fired generators run flat out, day and night, to compensate for fast-emptying hydro storage lakes. | 7th June 2008 |
| US on Track to Break Tornado Records This Year - NewsHour "This has nothing to do with global warming. It's just variability in the weather" | 7th June 2008 |
| Biotech giants demand a high price for saving the planet - The Independent Giant biotech companies are privatising the world's protection against climate change by filing hundreds of monopoly patents on genes that help crops resist it, a new investigation has concluded. | 7th June 2008 |
| US sits pretty in global food trade network - Scripps News "When the professional fear mongers try to scare you with America's "oil addiction," remember this: if the world's got us over a barrel on energy, then we've got the world over a bread basket. Moreover, while global climate change will progressively diminish OPEC's importance as we're forced to improve transportation technologies, it'll only strengthen NAFTA's role as the world's preeminent food exporter." [Some interesting statistics undermined by the convenient omission of America's reliance on fossiil fertilisers] | 7th June 2008 |
| US climate change bill is blocked - BBC News A US law that would have introduced a cap on carbon emissions is blocked by senators. See also: ENVIRONMENT-US: As Climate Bill Dies, Greens Express Hope | 7th June 2008 |
| Japan, US say to cooperate on new 'ice' energy - AFP via Yahoo! News Japan and the United States on Saturday agreed to cooperate on research into methane hydrate, known as the "ice that burns" which is seen as a promising future energy source. | 7th June 2008 |
| The World's Greatest Deliberative Body? - Huffington Post Last night Majority Leader Harry Reid read a much shorter (and more interesting) document out loud to the Senate -- it was a leaked copy of a Republican leadership-strategy memo explaining that they had no intention of seriously legislating about climate change, but intended to use the floor time to score political points at the expense of the Democrats. The memo gleefully looked forward to a whole series of votes in which advocates of cleaning up global warming would be portrayed as plotting $8/gallon gasoline prices. See also: Democracy InAction - No Typo - New York Times | 6th June 2008 |
| Environment day calls for end to carbon addiction - International Herald Tribune The United Nations urged the world on Thursday to kick an all-consuming addiction to carbon dioxide and said everyone must take steps to fight climate change. U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-Moon said global warming was becoming the defining issue of the era and will hurt rich and poor alike. "Addiction is a terrible thing. It consumes and controls us, makes us deny important truths and blinds us to the consequences of our actions," he said in the speech to reinforce this year's World Environment Day theme of "CO2 Kick the Habit". | 6th June 2008 |
| Activist not really an optimist - London Free Press For 20 years, Bill Mc-Kibben has been warning people -- including Al Gore, who actually listened -- about the dangers of climate change.. But when it comes to climate change, he adds, it's already too late. "We're not going to stop global warming," "We do still have a window of opportunity to slow it down, but that window is small and it's closing relatively fast. "You've probably read the stories about the way the permafrost in the Canadian and Russian north is beginning to leak methane at a very quick rate. These are not good signs. And they remind us that, really, right now is when we have to do this." "I don't think you change people by preaching at them. I think they change as circumstances change. I think that if we can build the kind of local economic institutions that bring people back together -- things like farmers' markets -- we can change the dynamics of our interactions. And then people begin to change." "We've spent 50 years firmly believing that more is better, especially in the United States. It'll take a while for us to completely shake that notion, but I think it's starting to happen." See also: 350.org | 6th June 2008 |
| Drought declared in California - CNN.com SACRAMENTO, California (AP) -- Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger has declared a statewide drought after two years of below-average rainfall, low snow-melt runoff and a court-ordered restriction on water transfers. | 6th June 2008 |
| Kiribati leader warns that it may already be too late - NZPA via Yahoo!Xtra News Kiribati president Anote Tong says his country may already be doomed by global warming. See also: Paradise lost: climate change forces South Sea islanders to seek sanctuary abroad | 6th June 2008 |
| Possible to slash CO2 emissions by 85 percent by 2050: NGO - AFP via Yahoo! News From biomass plants to burying carbon dioxide, Norwegian environmental group Bellona on Thursday listed a slew of methods it said would enable an 85-percent reduction in global greenhouse gas emissions by 2050. | 6th June 2008 |
| World's biggest solar farm at centre of Portugal's ambitious energy plan - Guardian Unlimited The £250m solar photovoltaic farm is expected to supply enough electrity to power 30,000 homes | 6th June 2008 |
| One percent can save the world, says IEA - Independent Online The International Energy Agency says the world must spend one percent of its economic output every year to halve greenhouse gas emissions by 2050. | 6th June 2008 |
| Mexico City plants lawns on roofs to fight warming - AlertNet Mexico City, one of the world's most polluted capitals, is planting rooftop gardens on public buildings as part of a program launched on Thursday to combat global warming. The smog-choked metropolis plans to replace gas tanks, clothes lines and asphalt on 100,000 square feet (9,300 square metres) of publicly owned roof space each year with grass and bushes that will absorb carbon dioxide. | 6th June 2008 |
| It's lean and mean, but is it green? - Guardian Unlimited Magazines angered by proposal to require warning on climate change impact of cars | 6th June 2008 |
| Urban anger - BBC News How the hungry have become a vocal force See map showing impact of food price rises on trade balances | 6th June 2008 |
| Coasts under threat, fisheries vulnerable-UN study - Planet Ark ROME - High food prices may add pressure for more fishing along coasts where the environment faces threats from pollution and climate change, a UN University report said on Wednesday. | 6th June 2008 |
| Food talks fail to agree on biofuels - Guardian Unlimited World leaders leave unadopted a plan to ensure crops are not produced at expense of world's hungry | 6th June 2008 |
| US should weigh impact of Canada oil sands -report - Planet Ark CALGARY, Alberta - US regulators should weigh the environmental impact of oil sands extraction in Canada before granting permits for pipelines that will carry the rising flood of Canadian crude to refineries in the United States, a green group said Wednesday. | 6th June 2008 |
| Green car tax a global trend - PM - BBC News Gordon Brown says plans for a higher tax on the most polluting cars is part of a "long-term trend" worldwide. See also: Cameron drops support for 'green' road tax | 6th June 2008 |
| 'Spiderman' scales New York Times building - CNews NEW YORK - A French skyscraper climber has been taken into custody after scaling the New York Times building in midtown Manhattan to draw attention to global warming. Watch video | 6th June 2008 |
| Hybrid cars get compliments – why not my bike? - The Christian Science Monitor Going carless may not be cool – but I know it's worth it. | 6th June 2008 |
| Chinese torture - Economist The European Union may find dealing with the Middle Kingdom trickier than it expects A far more substantial falling-out between Europe and China could be in store because of climate change. If terrorism has been seen by some Americans as an existential threat, climate change has arguably acquired the same status in Europe. And as tensions across the Atlantic have shown, people who feel their existence threatened find it hard to forgive others who disagree. The next American president is likely to be far more co-operative over tackling climate change than George Bush. But China's position is ambivalent: it is committed to tackling global warming, amid soaring carbon emissions, but it is also a developing country, with much growing to do. See also: China, India and climate change - Economist | 6th June 2008 |
| Feeding climate change - Gristmill Increasingly, consumers are trying to reduce the environmental impacts of the foods they eat. But it's not so easy to know what to do, in part because of the bewildering array of food choices the market offers, but also because it's hard to know what food choices carry the biggest impact. This nifty study tries to clear away some of the murk by tackling a fairly straightforward question: If you care about the climate, which is more important, what kind of food you eat, or where that food is grown? To summarize the findings ... | 6th June 2008 |
| Wind power supply to be boosted - BBC News The government announces plans for a massive increase in offshore wind power. [..although the infrastructure costs make it much more expensive than onshore wind power] | 5th June 2008 |
| Green plan to help cut fuel bills - BBC News UK - Wales: £2m will be spent to cut fuel bills in low-income households by using green technology. | 5th June 2008 |
| MPs approve climate-change bill - CNews OTTAWA - The House of Commons has given its final approval to a controversial climate-change bill that would require the government to drastically cut greenhouse gases. | 5th June 2008 |
| Cut car, ditch electric toothbrush-UN climate tips - AlertNet Better insulation at home, less use of the car and even giving up an electric toothbrush can help people in rich nations halve emissions of greenhouse gases, a U.N. report said on Thursday. | 5th June 2008 |
| CER prices rise as carbon markets jump - Carbon Positive The prices of Certified Emissions Reductions (CERs) continue to rise into June after a solid upward trend throughout May. New concerns over supply of the Kyoto CDM carbon credits, bullish signals on demand and the rising world oil price have combined to push up the price of issued CERs on the secondary market by almost 20 per cent since April 30. | 5th June 2008 |
| Economic risks imperil climate bill - The Christian Science Monitor In the Senate, opponents focus on pump prices and tax consequences. | 5th June 2008 |
| Q&A: "We're Running the Risk of Unstoppable Climate Change" GIJON, Spain, Jun 4 (IPS) - Warming seawater, melting sea ice and glaciers, sea level rise, storm intensification, changes in ocean currents, growing "dead zones", and ocean acidification are just some of the signs that the oceans that cover 71 percent of our watery planet are changing. | 5th June 2008 |
| Those now feeling the heat watch US climate debate - AlertNet Mina Susana Setra and Nnimmo Bassey are keenly interested in this week's U.S. Senate climate change debate because they say they already live with deadly consequences of global warming. | 5th June 2008 |
| Environment Canada Report Pans Harper Government's Climate Plan - DeSmogBlog A new Environment Canada report "discreetly" posted on the Department website shows that the Canadian government's climate change plan will reduce greenhouse gas by a fraction of what was originally promised. According to an article by Mike de Souza at Canwest News Service: The plan shows that many existing climate change measures such as the transit tax credit, regulations to increase biofuels production and the banning of incandescent light bulbs will result in a fraction of the greenhouse gas emission reductions that they were previously estimated to achieve."The link to the report is down right now, but we will post more details when its back up. | 5th June 2008 |
| Environment 'more vital than economy' - BBC News Tackling climate change is too crucial to be derailed by a temporary economic woes, the OECD head says.. | 4th June 2008 |
| Decline at biggest UK puffin site - BBC Puffin numbers at the UK's biggest single colony are declining, scientists report, amid signs of dwindling food. | 4th June 2008 |
| Climate change could impact vital functions of microbes - EurekAlert! BOSTON, MA -- June 3, 2008 -- Global climate change will not only impact plants and animals but will also affect bacteria, fungi and other microbial populations that perform a myriad of functions important to life on earth. | 4th June 2008 |
| BRAZIL: Climate Change Will Weaken Renewable Energy Sources - IPS RIO DE JANEIRO, Jun 3 (IPS) - To Brazil's credit, 45 percent of its energy comes from renewable sources, three times as much as in industrialised countries, but for that very reason it will be more vulnerable to climate change, according to a new study. | 4th June 2008 |
| Marine leeches provide clues on climate change - Massey News German-born doctoral researcher Juergen Kolb says it is proven that leeches transmit viruses and bacteria into host bodies, and that new strains are currently arriving in Antarctica. “The situation is potentially quite dangerous. If conditions become warmer, we’ll get new types of pathogens being transmitted into fish. Not only can this cause harm or death of individual fish but lead to the collapse of entire fish populations,” says Mr Kolb. “Eventually this could threaten commercial fishing industries and the food sources that humans depend on.” | 4th June 2008 |
| Nukes of hazard - Gristmill The self-limiting future of nuclear power, Part I | 4th June 2008 |
| Carbon Emissions Across the United States - New York Times Electric power production and transportation are the two largest sources of carbon emissions in the United States. But there are big differences in emissions between companies, and from state to state, that may make it harder to reach any agreement on cuts. | 4th June 2008 |
| NASA's own watchdog: Agency misled on global warming (AP) -- NASA's press office "marginalized or mischaracterized" studies on global warming between 2004 and 2006, the agency's own internal watchdog concluded. | 4th June 2008 |
| Slash Global Warming Gases Now Urge 1,700 Scientists, Economists - Environment News Service WASHINGTON, DC , June 2, 2008 (ENS) - Hundreds of the nation's most prominent scientists and economists have issued a first-ever joint statement calling on policymakers to require immediate, deep reductions in heat-trapping emissions that cause global warming. | 4th June 2008 |
| Yale Environment 360 magazine launches online Edited by Roger Cohn, the former editor of Mother Jones and Audubon magazines, Yale Environment 360 aims to become one of the leading Web sites for commentary and reporting on the crucial environmental issues of the day. | 4th June 2008 |
| Climate Change Bill Won't Pass, But May Signal Outlook For '09 - Investor's Business Daily via Yahoo! News This week's Senate debate on capping greenhouse gas emissions is likely just a dress rehearsal for next year. | 4th June 2008 |
| OECD set to tackle climate change - BBC News The world's richest countries meet to discuss climate change and the perilous state of the world economy. | 3rd June 2008 |
| Images reveal 'rapid forest loss' - BBC News Satellite images reveal the "rapid deforestation" of Papua New Guinea's rainforests over the past 30 years. See also: Half of Papua New Guinea's forests gone by 2021 | 3rd June 2008 |
| Lidl stores ration sales of rice - BBC News Supermarket chain Lidl has rationed rice sales in all its UK stores amid worldwide shortages of the food. | 3rd June 2008 |
| Unnatural roots of the food crisis - BBC News As representatives of the world's governments gather to address shortages in major foodstuffs and rising prices, Gonzalo Oviedo counsels them to focus on ecosystems. The modern business-dominated agricultural industry, he argues, promotes the degradation of nature - and that, in turn, means less and worse food. See also: Stuffed and Starved: The Hidden Battle for the World's Food System - AlterNet | 3rd June 2008 |
| Microgeneration 'could rival nuclear' - Guardian Unlimited British buildings equipped with solar, wind and other micro power equipment could generate as much electricity in a year as five nuclear power stations, a government-backed industry report showed today. | 3rd June 2008 |
| Quebec, Ontario stand firm on emissions - Montreal Gazette The federal government will find itself increasing isolated if it fails to sign on to the worldwide trend toward market-based trading systems to cut greenhouse gas emissions, the premier of Quebec said today. | 3rd June 2008 |
| Desert is claiming southeast Spain - International Herald Tribune Southern Spain has long been plagued by cyclical drought, but the current crisis reflects a permanent climate change brought on by global warming and it is a harbinger of a new kind of conflict, climate scientists say. | 3rd June 2008 |
| Trouble with Congress' Green Gambit - Time Magazine Analysis: Senators Joseph Lieberman and John Warner's Climate Security Act is the U.S.'s most serious attempt to reduce greenhouse gas emissions. Is it destined for failure? | 3rd June 2008 |
| Carbon entrapment 'needs cash enticement' - The Age RIO Tinto and US utilities are urging the US Government to spend $US20 billion ($A20.9 billion) on a technology they say has the best chance for eliminating pollution linked to global warming. | 3rd June 2008 |
| Bush criticises Senate emissions reduction bill - Guardian Unlimited Bush warned the bill would impose roughly $6tn in new costs on the American economy | 3rd June 2008 |
| US coal lobbyists unveil nightmarish vision of life after cap-and-trade law - The Independent US businesses have spent tens of millions of dollars trying to kill a proposed law that would introduce European-style "cap-and-trade" rules on carbon emissions - even before the bill hit the floor of the Senate for discussion yesterday. | 3rd June 2008 |
| A captivating remedy - Guardian Unlimited A crude division can be made between two sets of people who both want to fight climate change | 2nd June 2008 |
| Industries Allied to Cap Carbon Differ on the Details - New York Times The difficult bottom line in the negotiations is that dealing with climate change will almost certainly hurt some industries and enrich others. | 2nd June 2008 |
| Lieberman-Warner bill: Why We Need It, Why It's Doomed - Huffington Post Lieberman-Warner bill: Why We Need It, Why It's DoomedHuffington Post, NY. Certainly the right intention is there -- stop major companies, especially oil, from emitting gasses that are major contributors to global warming and ... | 2nd June 2008 |
| Lieberman-Warner gets corporate support - Gristmill A coalition of corporations, green groups, and unions issued a joint statement to senators yesterday declaring their support for the Lieberman-Warner Climate Security Act, which will hit the Senate floor on Monday. Among the endorsers is General Electric, one of the five largest companies in the world -- definitely a big pick-up for the legislation. "This is a very important vote on a bipartisan plan to address climate change," reads the statement. "[T]he bill protects American industry to ease the transition to a cleaner future." "A 'yes' vote for the Climate Security Act represents historic leadership to advance bipartisan solutions to climate change ... | 2nd June 2008 |
| Garnaut target thwarts experts - The Australian Australia: Economists working for the Treasury and Professor Garnaut, using three sophisticated computer models, have struggled to measure the effect on the economy of a 90 per cent reduction in carbon emissions by 2050. The scale of the cuts mooted by Professor Garnaut in an interim report in February overwhelmed the models and work has been delayed until August, barely a month before Professor Garnaut's final report is due. The lack of definitive modelling results means Kevin Rudd may be forced to compromise his hardline election commitments on emission trading to create a scheme with enough flexibility to cope with unexpected problems that emerge after the proposed start date in 2010. | 2nd June 2008 |
| Of buckets and blogs - RealClimate This last week has been an interesting one for observers of how climate change is covered in the media and online. On Wednesday an interesting paper (Thompson et al) was published in Nature, pointing to a clear artifact in the sea surface temperatures in 1945 and associating it with the changing mix of fleets and measurement techniques at the end of World War II. The mainstream media by and large got the story right - puzzling anomaly tracked down, corrections in progress after a little scientific detective work, consequences minor - even though a few headline writers got a little carried away in equating a specific dip in 1945 ocean temperatures with the more gentle 1940s-1970s cooling that is seen in the land measurements. | 2nd June 2008 |
| Small plane missing for 24 years found by canoeists on Texas lake receding because of drought - Minneapolis-St. Paul Star Tribune FRITCH, |
