Another week of GW News, May 30, 2010

Logging the Onset of The Bottleneck Years

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Another week of Climate Instability News

Sipping from the internet firehose...

May 30, 2010

• Chuckles, COP16+, Oslo, IPBES, How do we know?, Reforestation, Science-Beliefs, Oily Excuses
• Bottom Line, Subsidies, Royal Society, Post CRU, Late Comments
• Melting Arctic, Polar Bears, Geopolitics
• Food Crisis, Food vs. Biofuel, Land Grabs, Food Production
• Hurricanes, GHGs, Carbon Cycle, Aerosols, Paleoclimate, ENSO, Solar, Climate Sensitivity, Satellites
• Impacts, Forests, Wacky Weather, Tornadoes, Wildfires, Corals, Acidification, Glaciers, Sea Levels, Floods & Droughts
• Transportation, Buildings, Sequestration, Geoengineering, Adaptation
• Journals, Other Docs , Misc. Science, Curry, Gardner
• Kyoto, UN, Carbon Trade, Carbon Tax, Bank Tax, Optimal Carbon Reduction Strategy
• International Politics: Misc., Security, Law & Activism, Activism, Religioso, Polls, H20 Pol&Biz, SW Tools
• National Politics: America, NAS-ACC, Deforestation, Colorado, Cuccinelli, Addiction
• Adaptation Summit, Obama, USAdmin, Congress, Climate Bill, Lobbyists, Graham, OTA Campaign
• Britain, Europe, Australia, Fraser, New Zealand, India, China, Asia, South America
• Canada, Calderon, Offshore Drilling, G20 Abortion, Arctic Park, Subsidies, Poll
• BC, Tar Sands, Alberta, Ontario, Maritimes, North, Canadiana
• Ecological Economics, Apocalypso, Media, Books, Video, Courts
• Energy, Fracking, Wind, Solar, Coal, Biofuel, Nukes, Peak Oil, Grid, Efficiency, Cars, Energy Storage
• Business, Joe's List, Carbon Lobby, Miscellaneous Climate, Useful Links
• Shameless Self Promotion, .sig

Is funny. Yes?

• 2010/05/24: ClimateP: (cartoon - Luckovich) Wasting away in Petroville
• 2010/05/25: TCoE: Never underestimate the power of farts
  Sometimes, even when the energy and enviro news seems to be particularly bad, some item comes along that makes one think the universe is having a good guffaw at our expense...
• 2010/05/23: TerraDaily: Did megafauna extinction cool the planet?

  Another candidate in the sarcasm and derision testing ofPoe's Law:

• FoGT: Friends of Gin and Tonic -- Self Interest and Climate Change Denial

  Looking ahead to COP16 and future international climate negotiations:

• 2010/05/26: PlanetArk: China All But Dashes Hope Of Climate Deal This Year -- aim to seal a binding global pact on warming by the end of 2011/A>
• 2010/05/26: PlanetArk: UN Urges Rich To Honor $30 Billion Climate Aid Pledge
• 2010/05/25: Reuters: UN urges rich to honour $30 bln climate aid pledge
  $30 billion by 2012 "not an impossible call"--de Boer -- Will help build trust between rich and poor -- Extremely unlikely to reach climate deal in 2010
• 2010/05/26: BizGreen: De Boer confirms plan to integrate Copenhagen Accord in UN climate text
  Outgoing head of UN's climate secretariat outlines agenda for crucial Bonn climate meeting
• 2010/05/25: DeSmogBlog: UN Chief Urges Industrialized Nations to Release Promised Funds To Poor Nations For Climate Change Aid [COP15]
• 2010/05/25: Star(My): China all but dashes hope of climate deal this year
  A senior Chinese climate official said on Tuesday that negotiators aim to seal a binding global pact on warming by the end of 2011, a blow to any lingering hopes the world could reach a deal at talks this year in Mexico. Xie Zhenhua, who led China's delegation to fractious negotiations in Copenhagen last year, said the only target for a December gathering in coastal Cancun city was a "positive result".

The UN sponsored a meeting in Oslo about forests and REDD:

• 2010/05/28: MongaBay: Indonesia announces moratorium on granting new forest concessions
• 2010/05/27: KBC: Kenya supports climate change partneship-PM
  Development partners at the climate and forest conference in Oslo, Norway on Thursday launched a framework of interim partnership dubbed REDD+Partnership with financial pledges of U.S.$ 3.5 billion for the global fight against climate change.
• 2010/05/28: IndiaTimes: India seeks global fund to help Third World expand forest cover
• 2010/05/27: Guardian(UK): Will the UN's forest protection dream [REDD] turn into a nightmare?
• 2010/05/27: Guardian(UK): Countries agree to spend big to save world's forests
  Oslo conference attended by 52 nations produces first concrete sign of global action on climate change since Copenhagen
• 2010/05/27: Yahoo:AFP: Rich countries up deforestation aid to $4bln
• 2010/05/27: PhysOrg: Int'l conference to save forests opens in Oslo
• 2010/05/26: CNN: Indonesia announces plan to protect forests, peatlands
  Indonesia announces two-year moratorium on converting forests and peat lands into plantations - Norway pledges $1 billion to support Indonesian deforestation effort - Announcement comes on eve of climate change and deforestation conference in Oslo, Norway - Indonesia is one of the world's biggest emitters of greenhouse gases due to deforestation
• 2010/05/27: WaPo: Int'l conference to save forests opens in Oslo
  Last December, an international conference on climate change approved global plans prevent deforestation. But those plans have not been implemented, and now a smaller meeting of nations in Oslo will try Thursday to find ways to start to put them in place - even if on a smaller scale.
  [...]
  The program - called REDD Plus, for Reducing Emissions from Deforestation and Degradation - is intended to encourage wealthy nations to voluntarily finance projects that help poor nations protect their forests. It will do so, in part, by creating a central monitoring agency to make the flow of aid more transparent and coordinate and streamline the distribution of aid to avoid redundancy.
• 2010/05/26: EarthTimes: Norway and Indonesia ink billion-dollar deal to protect forests
• 2010/05/26: Guardian(UK): Norway hopes to unlock climate cash to fight tropical deforestation
  Norway has announced $1bn in aid to protect forests in Indonesia and hopes to forge a partnership to fight climate change
• 2010/05/26: BBerg: Germany, Other Donors to Raise Pledge to Save Forests
• 2010/05/27: ABC(Au): Indonesia announces 2-year reprieve for forests
  Indonesian president Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono says he will introduce a two-year moratorium on deforestation, a large source of income for his country which also contributes heavily to global warming.
• 2010/05/26: PhysOrg: Germany, Norway give $1.5B to fight deforestation [REDD funding]
• 2010/05/25: JakartaPost: Indonesia to join REDD partnership in Oslo meeting [Oslo Climate and Forest Conference]

  Busan, Korea is hosting a meeting on Intergovernmental Science-Policy Platform on Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services (IPBES) June 7-11:

• 2010/05/29: UNEP: Final Meeting on Whether to Establish an International Body to Address Decline of World's Nature-Based Assets
  Governments Gather in Busan, Republic of Korea for Third Meeting on an Intergovernmental Science-Policy Platform on Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services Busan, 7-11 June 2010 -The past 50 years have witnessed unprecedented economic growth which has made many people in the world richer and lifted millions out of poverty. But equally it has led to an accelerating decline of the biodiversity and the ecosystems that underpin all life on Earth?ecosystems include forests and freshwaters to soils, coral reefs and even the atmosphere. Currently more than 65 per cent of ecosystems and their multi-trillion dollar services are classed as degraded. According to some estimates, the world is witnessing a sixth wave of extinctions of animals, plants and other organisms which are the building blocks of ecosystems. Between 7 and 11 June, governments, researchers and experts will meet in Busan, Republic of Korea to agree whether to establish an Intergovernmental Science-Policy Platform on Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services (IPBES).

RealClimate asks a good question. Answers:

• 2010/05/26: RealClimate: On attribution -- How do we know what caused climate to change - or even if anything did?

  Here's a counterintuitive paper that will draw comment:

• 2010/05/29: PhysOrg: Study finds reforestation may lower the climate change mitigation potential of forests
  Scientists at the University of Oklahoma and the Fudan University in Shanghai, China, have found that reforestation and afforestation -- the creation of new forests -- may lower the potential of forests for climate change lessening.
• 2010/05/28: Eureka: Study finds reforestation may lower the climate change mitigation potential of forests

  A paper that explores how people deal with cognitive dissonance:

• 2010/05/28: JASP: The Scientific Impotence Excuse: Discounting Belief-Threatening Scientific Abstracts by Geoffrey D. Munro
• 2010/05/27: ArsTechnica: When science clashes with beliefs? Make science impotent
• 2010/05/29: NakedCapitalism: Attacking Science to Defend Beliefs

  Hmmmm. Why does nothing happen?:

• 2010/05/28: Eureka: Canadian research examines effects of scientific claims on oil
  A University of Alberta researcher says people generally do not act on information about the effects fossil fuel-based products are having on the environment. And the reason, says English and film studies researcher Imre Szeman, is because of the way discussions on environmental issues are structured. In a recently published study, Szeman says the main assumption among scientists -- that with knowledge comes behavioural change -- is proving to be an ineffective premise in dealing with environmental problems resulting from oil production and use.

And on the Bottom Line:

• 2010/05/27: Guardian(UK): The real cost of cheap oil
  The Gulf disaster is only unusual for being so near the US. Elsewhere, Big Oil rarely cleans up its mess

Who's getting the subsidies?

• 2010/05/26: PI:CCB: Leaked government document says Canada should end fossil fuel subsidies
• 2010/05/26: PI: Climate Action Network Canada Calls on Finance Minister to Take his Department's Advice and Phase out Fossil Fuel Subsidies
• 2010/05/28: ClimateP: Why do we give oil companies such large subsidies? [video]
• 2010/05/27: CanWest: Stephen Harper dodges questions on oilpatch subsidies -- Flaherty says he won't respond to leaked memo
  Prime Minister Stephen Harper's government sidestepped questions Wednesday about whether it will cancel specific incentives and subsidies that favour oil and gas companies as part of a commitment on the agenda at next month's G-20 economic summit in Toronto.
• 2010/05/26: CanWest: End oilpatch subsidies, secret memo urges
• 2010/05/25: LA Times: Oil companies have a rich history of U.S. subsidies
  Some say the Gulf of Mexico catastrophe can be linked to Congress' policy of oil-friendly tax breaks and financial benefits.
• 2010/05/25: ChronicleHerald: Canada mulls cuts to oil patch subsidies

  The Royal Society is opening its climate statement for review. Details are scarce:

• 2010/05/28: Guardian(UK): UK Royal Society revives confusion as US concludes climate change certainty
  Just as leading US experts give their clearest warning about emissions, 43 UK scientists prompt Royal Society to rethink
• 2010/05/28: NatureN: Nameless fellows attack Royal Society's climate stance
• 2010/05/28: ScienceInsider: Royal Society Fellows Question Body's Climate Change Statements
  For the past several years, the United Kingdom has taken the lead in rallying the world to fight global warming-or at least trying to rally it. While he was U.K. science adviser, for example, David King famously said climate change was a greater global threat than terrorism. But there have been hints, in a BBC poll and this story in The New York Times, that the British public has grown weary or skeptical of such warnings, especially since the failure of the Copenhagen climate talks last year. Now comes news that the Royal Society has set up a panel to review its climate change declarations after 43 of its elected fellows sent a letter protesting that some of the society's statements, including ones in a pamphlet called "Climate Change Controversies" and comments from Robert May, then president of the society, were oversimplified. The Royal Society has not yet released the letter, and the authors of it have not identified themselves publicly.
• 2010/05/27: BBC: Society to review climate message
  The UK's Royal Society is reviewing its public statements on climate change after 43 Fellows complained that it had oversimplified its messages.

Post CRU theft, controversy & inquiry:

• 2010/05/26: IJISH: The identity of the potentially vulnerable CRU computer that was: crua6.cru.uea.ac.uk

  Late Comments on Malaria:

• 2010/05/28: GreenGrok: The Taming of the Mosquito? [malaria]
• 2010/05/26: ABC(Au): Climate change impact on malaria questioned
  A recent study showing climate change is unlikely to cause an increase in the spread of malaria has been criticised by one of Australia's leading tropical disease experts.
• 2010/05/23: ClimateP: The non-hype about climate change (and malaria)

  Late Comment on Hartwell:

• 2010/05/24: C-a-S: Can Climate Policy Change Course?

  The Arctic melt continues to garner a lot of attention:

• 2010/05/28: TCoE: Meanwhile, in Greenland
• 2010/05/28: PlanetArk: Global Floating Ice In "Constant Retreat": Study
  The world's floating ice is in "constant retreat," showing an instability which will increase global sea levels, according to a report published in Geophysical Research Letters on Wednesday. Floating ice had disappeared at a steady rate over the past 10 years, according to the first measurement of its kind. "It's a large number," said Professor Andrew Shepherd of the University of Leeds, lead author of the paper, estimating the net loss of floating sea ice and ice shelves in the last decade at 7,420 cubic kilometers. That is greater than the loss of ice over land from the Greenland and Antarctic ice sheets over the same time period, highlighting the impact of warming oceans on floating ice.
• 2010/05/28: SkeptiSci: Websites to monitor the Arctic Sea Ice
• 2010/05/28: SkeptiSci: Latest GRACE data on Greenland ice mass
• 2010/05/27: SkeptiSci: Why Greenland's ice loss matters
• 2010/05/24: ClimateP: As Arctic sea ice shrinks faster than 2007, NSIDC director Serreze says, "I think it's quite possible" we could "break another record this year."
• 2010/05/25: CO2Art: Arctic Sea Ice Meltdown - Below '07 Record Low
• 2010/05/24: SkeptiSci: Greenland rising faster as ice loss accelerates
• 2010/05/24: MTobis: Eschenbach has Half a Point [Greenland ice]
• 2010/05/23: Stoat: Three views of sea ice

  The charismatic megafauna is back:

• 2010/05/25: BBC: Polar bears face 'tipping point' due to climate change
  Climate change will trigger a dramatic and sudden decline in the number of polar bears, a new study has concluded.
• 2010/05/24: CanWest: Prof warns that Arctic oil spill could spell disaster for polar bears

  As for the geopolitics of Arctic resources:

• 2010/05/26: EnergyDaily: In the Arctic, another oil spill looming
• 2010/05/27: PeakEnergy: BPing the Arctic?
• 2010/05/26: Grist: Will Obama admin allow Shell Oil to do to Arctic waters what BP did to the Gulf?

  The food crisis is ongoing:

• 2010/05/28: WFP: Hunger Crisis Deepens In Africa's Sahel Region
• 2010/05/28: Google:AP: Millions face hunger in arid belt of Africa
• 2010/05/25: FAO: Lack of cash threatens Chad relief effort -- Millions risk hunger in Sahel
• 2010/05/28: PhysOrg: Millions face hunger in arid belt of Africa
• 2010/05/26: SciDaily: Virulent New Strains of Ug99 Stem Rust, a Deadly Wheat Pathogen
• 2010/05/25: MU News: Despite Food Assistance Programs, Many [US] Children Experience Food Insecurity, Hunger
• 2010/05/26: NatureN: Virulent [Ug99 stem rust] wheat fungus invades South Africa -- Mutating and migrating stem rust pathogen could soon spread across the world
• 2010/05/26: Eureka: Scientists identify virulent new strains of Ug99 stem rust

  The conflict between biofuel and food persists:

• 2010/05/26: NewScientist: Biofuels learn to eat less
  The feast is coming to an end for biofuel producers. Their supposedly clean, green fuel has been gobbling up some of the choicest food crops, including corn, rape and soya, leading to controversy and protests around the world. Now the industry increasingly finds itself forced to dine on more meagre fare: the inedible scraps left by other industries. But it is now finding ways to turn these scraps into a hearty dinner - and it could even provide for others, too.

So, are these land grabs Colonialism V2.0?

• 2010/05/27: SeedDaily: Gulf states face food crisis
  The scramble by Saudi Arabia and the Persian Gulf states to secure strategic food supplies by buying up vast tracts of farmland in Africa and Asia won't be enough to stave off a surge of food imports over the next decade, a Saudi bank report says. "The era of cheap food is over," NCB Capital, the investment arm of Saudi Arabia's National Commercial Bank, declared in the report issued several weeks ago. The wholesale investment in arable land in Sudan, Tanzania, Kenya, Ethiopia and other African states won't prevent the level of food imports of the six Gulf Cooperation Council states -- Bahrain, Kuwait, Oman, Qatar, Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates -- from rising sharply over the next decade.

And how are we going to feed 9 billion?

• 2010/05/27: WFP: New Partnership Signed with City of Rome on Global Fight Against Hunger
• 2010/05/25: WFP: Pakistan: Woman Farmer Curbs Hunger Cycle With Food Aid
• 2010/05/29: TreeHugger: Beehive Jacking More Lucrative Than Carjacking?
• 2010/05/28: EurActiv: US back on the 'global food security table'
  The United States is hoping that the EU will support a new multi-donor trust fund launched last month to help improve food security in poor countries. "We are back and proud to be back [on the] "global food security table," said Ertharin Cousin, US Permanent Representative to the UN Agencies in Rome, addressing an event on 'Transatlantic Approaches to Global Food Security' on 26 May in Brussels. Her comments came after the launch of the US government's global hunger and food security initiative, Feed the Future (FTF), earlier this month.
• 2010/05/28: WorldChanging: Sepp Holzer: A Permaculture Worldchanger
• 2010/05/27: AlterNet: Beeline to Extinction: Saving Our Threatened Pollinators Is Key to Global Food Security
• 2010/05/27: CCP: World faces the nightmare possibility of fishless oceans by 2050 without fundamental restructuring of the fishing industry, UN experts said
• 2010/05/27: Eureka: To double spud production, just add a little [Guatemalan potato moth larvae] spit
• 2010/05/26: EnergyBulletin: Accounting for increasing energy use by the US food system
• 2010/05/26: Grist: Thinking outside the phlox -- I eat weeds
• 2010/05/25: Grist: Homeless learn to farm in Santa Cruz
• 2010/05/20: bpa: Cost of Biotech Corn and Soybean Seed Backlash
• 2010/05/19: Hindu: 30,000 ha to come under organic farming in Kerala
  Policy highlights
  Envisages converting all crops into organic farming mode over the next ten years in a phased and compact manner.
  Advocates adopting a compact area group approach
  Every local self-government institution will develop model organic farms in select farmers' fields.
• 2010/05/24: NewScientist: Breakthrough in quest to boost rice yields
• 2010/05/24: PlanetArk: Africa Revives Hardy, Local Rice VS Asian Cousin
• 2010/05/23: SciNow: Genetic Discovery Promises to Boost Rice Yields [10%]

  Tropical storm Agatha zapped Guatemala:

• 2010/05/30: CNN: Deadly storm hits Central America
  Agatha downgraded from tropical storm to tropical depression - All tropical storm warnings have been discontinued - Twelve people killed because of tropical storm in Guatemala, official says - Guatemala already under a 15-day state of calamity because of volcano eruption
• 2010/05/30: EarthTimes: At least 12 dead in Guatemala from tropical storm Agatha
• 2010/05/29: ABC(US): 1st Tropical Storm of Season Forms off Guatemala -- Tropical Storm Agatha, first of season, heads toward Guatemala; 4 dead
• 2010/05/29: BBC: Deadly storm strikes volcano-hit Guatemala
  At least 12 people have died in mudslides and floods caused by tropical storm Agatha, which is moving in from the Pacific Ocean.
• 2010/05/27: Eureka: NASA eyes [90E] low in eastern Pacific for tropical development

  Elsewhere in the hurricane wars, there were a couple of fizzles:

• 2010/05/27: Eureka: NASA sees strong thunderstorms in [93W] potential tropical cyclone near Hong Kong
• 2010/05/25: Wunderground: Little change to 90L
• 2010/05/24: Wunderground: 90L heads for North Carolina, drenches Bermuda; oil spill changing little
• 2010/05/24: Eureka: Bandu begone: Tropical Cyclone 2A fading in Somalia

  As we slide into the hurricane season, the predictions are coming thick & fast:

• 2010/05/27: ClimateP: NOAA expects "active to extremely active" Atlantic hurricane season
• 2010/05/28: PlanetArk: Government Warns Of Worst Hurricane Season Since 2005
• 2010/05/27: CCentral: Batten Down the Hatches: NOAA Predicts Heightened Risk for Hurricanes
• 2010/05/28: EarthTimes: Bad news for Gulf: Forecasters expect many hurricanes
• 2010/05/27: TEC: Batten Down the Hatches: NOAA Predicts Heightened Risk for Hurricanes
• 2010/05/27: CCP: NOAA predicts an active to extremely active Atlantic hurricane season for 2010
• 2010/05/27: PhysOrg: 2010 hurricane season may be worst on record: officials
• 2010/05/27: NOAANews: NOAA Predicts Below Normal Eastern Pacific Hurricane Season
• 2010/05/27: NOAANews: NOAA Expects Busy Atlantic Hurricane Season
• 2010/05/27: Wunderground: NOAA's forecast: a very active, possibly hyperactive Atlantic hurricane season
• 2010/05/27: BBC: US predicts busy hurricane season
  As many as 14 hurricanes could hit the Atlantic basin this year, the top US climate agency says. The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Adminstration (NOAA) forecasts 14 to 23 named storms. Eight to 14 of these could develop into hurricanes, it says. The season could be one of the most active on record, with between three to seven major hurricanes, the NOAA said.
• 2010/05/27: CBC: Hurricane experts predict active season
  The 2010 Atlantic hurricane season is promising to be extremely active, a development that could spell trouble for U.S. states already dealing with the fallout from the BP oil disaster. The Maryland-based National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) released its hurricane outlook Thursday in Washington, D.C., predicting 14 to 23 named storms, meaning ones with winds of 39 mph or higher, eight to 14 hurricanes (winds of 74 mph or higher) and three to seven major hurricanes, which include category 3, 4 or 5 storms, with winds of 111 mph.
• 2010/05/26: DWWSJ: Open Season On Hurricanes (and they may be in a fighting mood.)
• 2010/05/25: BBerg: 'Active' 2010 Atlantic Hurricane Season Forecast
  The 2010 hurricane season in the Atlantic will be "active" and produce 16 tropical storms, including eight hurricanes, four of them intense, Tropical Storm Risk said today. There's a 74 percent chance that more storms than normal will hit the continental U.S., the closely watched U.K. forecaster said in a report issued today.

And some concern about the oils spill and hurricanes arose:

• 2010/05/27: BBC: Hurricanes could damage oil pipelines
  Hurricanes could complicate the clean-up of the oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico and damage other offshore pipelines, US scientists warn.
• 2010/05/26: PhysOrg: Undersea forces from hurricanes may threaten Gulf pipelines
• 2010/05/26: Wunderground: What would a hurricane do to the Deepwater Horizon oil spill?
• 2010/05/26: SciDaily: Major Hurricane Could Devastate Houston

  As for GHGs:

• 2010/05/26: PlanetArk: Global CO2 Emissions To Rise 43 Percent By 2035: EIA
  The world's emissions of carbon dioxide from burning coal, oil, and natural gas should rise 43 percent by 2035 barring global agreements to reduce output of the gases blamed for warming the planet, the top U.S. energy forecaster said on Tuesday. Global emissions of carbon dioxide from the fossil fuel sources should rise from 29.7 billion tonnes in 2007 to 42.4 billion tonnes in 2035, the Energy Information Administration said in its annual long-term energy outlook. Much of the rise will occur in rapidly growing developing countries like China and India where electricity demand is expected to soar.
• 2010/05/25: Guardian(UK): India discloses carbon emissions for first time in more than decade
• 2010/05/25: JKB: Infrared absorption by CO2 [video]

  And in the carbon cycle:

• 2010/05/28: SciDaily: Could Climate Change and Biodiversity of Marine Plankton in North Atlantic Affect Carbon Cycle?
• 2010/05/26: PhysOrg: Researchers calculate the greenhouse gas value of ecosystems
  Researchers at the University of Illinois have developed a new, more accurate method of calculating the change in greenhouse gas emissions that results from changes in land use.
• 2010/05/26: PhysOrg: Phytoplankton Bloom in the North Atlantic

  Aerosols are making their presence felt:

• 2010/05/26: CSU: Discovery by Colorado State University Professor Simplifies Our View of Atmospheric Aerosols, a Factor in Climate Change
• 2010/05/25: Eureka: Pollution dispersion research aids understanding of 2002 break-up of Antarctic ozone hole

  While in the paleoclimate:

• 2010/05/28: SkeptiSci: On temperature and CO2 in the past
• 2010/05/29: NewScientist: Did early hunters cause climate change?
• 2010/05/27: PhysOrg: Scientists detect huge carbon 'burp' that helped end last ice age
  Scientists have found the possible source of a huge carbon dioxide 'burp' that happened some 18,000 years ago and which helped to end the last ice age.
• 2010/05/26: TerraDaily: Link Between 'Climate Footprints' And Mass Mammal Extinction [50 kya]
• 2010/05/24: NewScientist: The history of ice on Earth
• 2010/05/24: NewScientist: Meltdown: Why ice ages don't last forever

  While on the ENSO front:

• 2010/05/24: CSIRO: Global warming's influence on El Niño still unknown
  The climate of the Pacific region will undergo significant changes as atmospheric temperatures rise but scientists can not yet identify the influence it will have on the El Niño-Southern Oscillation (ENSO) weather phenomenon.
• 2010/05/28: TerraDaily: Global Warming Influence On El Nino Still Unknown
• 2010/05/25: PhysOrg: Climate: El Nino weakens, La Nina threatens
  The Pacific weather pattern known as El Nino is all but gone, climate scientists say, while its alter ego, La Nina, might soon appear on the horizon.
• 2010/05/24: ABC(Au): Pacific climate change could drive droughts
  Climate scientists are concerned a rise in temperature in the Pacific region due to climate change, could increase droughts in Australia. New research, published today in Nature Geoscience, has found the region will have significant temperature changes, which will affect the natural El Nino - La Nina weather cycle. One of the report's authors Scott Power says the cycle and temperatures in the Pacific have a direct link to drought conditions in Australia. But Dr Power says current modelling is not advanced enough to predict the extent of the impact.
• 2010/05/24: PhysOrg: Global warming's influence on El Nino still unknown
  The climate of the Pacific region will undergo significant changes as atmospheric temperatures rise but scientists can not yet identify the influence it will have on the El Nino-Southern Oscillation (ENSO) weather phenomenon.

Regarding the solar hypothesis:

• 2010/05/29: SciAm: Solar Scientists Agree That the Sun's Recent Behavior Is Odd, but the Explanation Remains Elusive
  The most recent solar minimum was both long and pronounced. But why?
• 2010/05/26: PhysOrg: Why NASA Keeps a Close Eye on the Sun's Irradiance

  Regarding Climate Sensitivity:

• 2010/05/26: SkeptiSci: Working out climate sensitivity from satellite measurements

  Meanwhile in near earth orbit:

• 2010/05/25: NOAANews: NOAA's GOES-12 Satellite Begins Coverage of South America

  More GW impacts are being seen:

• 2010/05/24: NatureTGB: Study shows conservation helps poverty
• 2010/05/23: NatureN: Fast-breeding mice dominate a warming world -- Past climate change led to lower diversity in the small and furry
• 2010/05/24: DM:NERS: "Weedy" mice dominate a warming world while other small mammals suffer

  And then there are the world's forests:

• 2010/05/27: Yale360: Will REDD Preserve Forests Or Merely Provide a Fig Leaf?
• 2010/05/26: EarthTimes: Laos aims to increase forest coverage [to 65% of its territory by 2015 and 70% by 2020]
• 2010/05/25: Eureka: Saving rainforests may help reduce poverty

  Yes we have no wacky weather, except:

• 2010/05/29: CBC: Severe weather hits southern Manitoba
• 2010/05/28: BostonGlobe: Storm leaves thousands without power in N.E.

  We had tornadoes around the world:

• 2010/05/26: EarthTimes: One dead as thunderstorms, tornado hit Austria
• 2010/05/25: DerSpiegel: 6-Year-Old Girl Killed -- Tornadoes Wreak Havoc in Eastern Germany
• 2010/05/24: Google:AP: Several tornadoes spotted in Midwestern states

  As for heatwaves and wild fires:

• 2010/05/29: CBC: Some Quebec wildfire evacuees return -- Hundreds more wait for danger to abate
• 2010/05/27: Reuters: Dozens die as heat wave bakes India
  Temperatures close to 50 degrees Celsius gripped large swathes of India, killing dozens of people as the country waits for the annual monsoon rains to reach the mainland, media and officials said on Thursday.
• 2010/05/27: CBC: Quebec forest fires force 1,300 from homes
  Forest fires have forced 1,300 people from their homes on the Wemotaci First Nation reserve, located about 300 kilometres north of Trois-Rivières in central Quebec. Four forest fires are burning out of control on the territory, and smoke and burning sparks were starting to affect the village, according to SOPFEU, Quebec's forest fire protection agency.
• 2010/05/26: EarthTimes: Death toll tops 250 as heatwave grips India
  New Delhi - A heatwave across India intensified with temperatures ranging between 46 and 49 degrees Celsius in cities as the death toll this summer season topped 250, news reports and officials said Wednesday. While heavy rains and gales brought on by cyclone Laila over recent days cooled the south and east of the country, the northern, central and western regions were blazing hot, the Indian Meterological Department said.
• 2010/05/25: IndaiExpress: Heat wave: City death toll reaches 34
  Ahmedabad: The heat wave related death toll touched 34 in the city on Monday, the Ahmedabad Municipal Corporation (AMC) Health Department said. Five more heatstroke related deaths were reported from the district today, said officials.

Corals are dying:

• 2010/05/27: ClimateShifts: Could online maps save coral reefs?
• 2010/05/24: ABC(Au): Carbon dioxide affecting coral growth
• 2010/05/24: ClimateShifts: Underwater lab the first to plot impact of climate change on reefs

  Acidification is changing the oceans:

• 2010/05/24: TerraDaily: More Effort Needed In Tackling Rising Ocean Acidity

  Glaciers are melting:

• 2010/05/17: CU:SotP: Our Race Against Time
  Our team is planning to recover and analyze ice cores from glaciers on opposite sides of the tropical Pacific Ocean: Puncak Jaya in Papua-Indonesia (4,884 meters above mean sea level) and Nevado Haulcán, Peru (6,100 meters.).
• 2010/05/20: JakartaPost: RI, US launch climate study of Puncak Jaya glaciers
• 2010/05/28: CU:EI: Scientists to Reap Ice From Indonesia High Peak -- A Grueling Trek, a Fast-Melting Glacier, and Vital Climate Signs
• 2010/05/28: KSJT: Jakarta Post, AAAS Science News: In Papua, Indonesia a tropics glacier melts -- expedition treks -- ice borers ready
• 2010/05/25: Telegraph(UK): Global warming is 'making Mount Everest more dangerous to climb'
  Mount Everest is becoming increasingly dangerous to climb because global warming is melting glacier ice along its slopes, according to a Nepalese Sherpa who has conquered the world's highest summit 20 times.

Sea levels are rising:

• 2010/05/27: EchoNews: Study of sea-level rises
• 2010/05/24: Tamino: Sea Level Rise: What the Data Actually Shows

  As for hydrological cycle disruptions [floods & droughts]:

• 2010/05/25: CleanBreak: Dry winter, spring means water levels on Ontario rivers and lakes at historic lows
• 2010/05/28: DerSpiegel: Dikes Hold -- Damage Limited as Flood Waters Reach Germany
  High flood waters that devastated parts of Poland have now reached Germany. But improvements made to flood control dikes following disastrous floods in 1997 have paid off. So far only one dike has been damaged and officials were able to quickly secure the breech.
• 2010/05/26: EarthTimes: Eastern Germany braces for flood wave from Poland
• 2010/05/26: ClimateP: Stunning NOAA map of Tennessee's 1000-year deluge
• 2010/05/25: Eureka: 20th century one of driest in 9 centuries for northwest Africa
• 2010/05/26: CCurrents: Rajasthan Heading Towards Water Famine
• 2010/05/25: DerSpiegel: 15 Dead in Poland -- Devastating Floods Heading for Germany
  The current flooding in Poland along the Oder and Vistula rivers is heading north towards Germany. At least 15 people have been killed in Poland as the raging waters break levees and flood entire villages and towns. Officials have called the flooding "worse than expected," and many are drawing comparisons to Oder River floods in 1997.
• 2010/05/25: BBC: Flash floods destroy Bangladesh livelihoods
• 2010/05/24: SciAm: A Himalayan Village Builds Artificial Glaciers to Survive Global Warming
  As glaciers disappear in the rain shadow of the Himalayas, one man is helping farmers irrigate their fields by storing water in an innovative way
• 2010/05/24: TerraDaily: Floods kill 15 in Poland as rivers swell to record levels
• 2010/05/24: CBC: St. Lawrence water levels drop
  An unusually warm winter and a mild spring have resulted in a drop in water levels along the Saint Lawrence River, raising concern among those who use it for business and pleasure. Near Montreal's Old Port, the river was 6.19 metres above sea level during April, a metre lower than it was at the same time last year, and that means trouble for cargo ships.
• 2010/05/24: EarthTimes: Flooding overwhelms Polish communities, 14 dead
• 2010/05/24: EarthTimes: Flooding overwhelms 18 Polish communities after dyke break

  As for mitigation, consider transportation & GHG production:

• 2010/05/28: Grist: Hidden health costs of transportation
• 2010/05/29: CalcRisk: ATA Truck Tonnage index increases in April
• 2010/05/28: NBF: China Argues Over Regular High Speed Rail Versus Maglev High Speed Rail Projects
• 2010/05/27: EarthTimes: To combat climate change - travel less, transport conference told
• 2010/05/26: PhysOrg: Air traffic poised to become a major factor in global warming
  The first new projections of future aircraft emissions in 10 years predicts that carbon dioxide and other gases from air traffic will become a significant source of global warming as they double or triple by 2050. The study is in ACS' Environmental Science & Technology.
• 2010/05/24: CalcRisk: DOT: Vehicle Miles Driven increase in March
• 2010/05/24: Guardian(UK): Can we kick our addiction to flying?
• 2010/05/24: TreeHugger: While Car MPG Stagnated, Freight Train Fuel Efficiency Went Up 104% Since 1980!

  While in the endless quest for zero energy, sustainable buildings and practical codes:

• 2010/05/27: PeakEnergy: Commissioning: In Pursuit of the Truly Green Building
• 2010/05/24: BBC: Thermal imaging scheme aims to reducing heating costs
  Infra-red technology is to be used to "photograph" homes across Scotland in a bid to cut CO2 emissions and make properties cheaper to heat.
• 2010/05/24: SolveClimate: China, India Lead the Developing World in Green Building -- South Africa Stands Alone in Africa in Embracing Sustainable Construction, Report Says

  As for carbon sequestration:

• 2010/05/28: CanWest: Norwegian, French giants join carbon capture study
  Major oil firms with international experience in carbon capture and storage are joining a $50-million study of the huge tropical reef formation 1,000 metres deep in an area north of Fort Saskatchewan, says project operator ARC Energy. The Canadian arms of France's Total and Norway's Statoil have signed on, with another international oil firm and a major Canadian firm expected to sign on shortly. The four will pick up a share of the $7-million industrial partnership tab.
• 2010/05/29: SciDaily: Improved Carbon Sponges to Strip Carbon Dioxide from Power Plant Exhausts
• 2010/05/25: TEC: Technologies for coal based hydrogen and electricity co-production power plants with CO2 capture

  Large scale geo-engineering keeps popping up:

• 2010/05/30: DM:CCM: Geoengineering on NPR: "A Bad Idea Whose Time Has Come"
• 2010/05/21: CNN: Climate hacking for profit: a good way to go broke
• 2010/05/24: DM:CCM: Dear Entrepreneurs: There's No Money in Geoengineering

  While on the adaptation front:

• 2010/05/27: OilDrum: Ten Ways to Cut Oil Use
• 2010/05/25: CCP: M. D. Mastrandrea et al., Climatic Change (2010), Bridging the gap: linking climate-impacts research with adaptation planning and management

  Meanwhile in the journals:

• 2010/05/27: AGWObserver: Papers on peatland greenhouse gas emissions
• 2010/05/24: NERC:NORA: Predicting the index flood in ungauged UK catchments: on the link between data-transfer and spatial model error structure by Thomas R. Kjeldsen et al.
• 2010/05/27: NERC:NORA: Lower Mekong Basin. Water balance study. Phase 3 report. Investigation of dry season flows by Chris Green
• 2010/05/28: ACPD: 13-month climatology of the aerosol hygroscopicity at the free tropospheric site Jungfraujoch (3580 m a.s.l.) by L. Kammermann et al.
• 2010/05/28: ACPD: Sensitivity of a global model to the uptake of N2O5 by tropospheric aerosol by H. L. Macintyre & M. J. Evans
• 2010/05/28: ACPD: History of atmospheric SF6 from 1973 to 2008 by M. Rigby et al.
• 2010/05/28: OS: Exchange across the shelf break at high southern latitudes by J. M. Klinck & M. S. Dinniman
• 2010/05/26: OSD: Suspended particles in the Canada Basin from optical and bottle data, 2003-2008 by J. M. Jackson et al.
• 2010/05/28: TC: Brief Communication: Ikaite (CaCO3·6H2O) discovered in Arctic sea ice by G. S. Dieckmann et al.
• 2010/05/28: TC: Spatial and temporal variability of snow depth and ablation rates in a small mountain catchment by T. Grünewald et al.
• 2010/05/28: JASP: The Scientific Impotence Excuse: Discounting Belief-Threatening Scientific Abstracts by Geoffrey D. Munro
• 2010/05/26: CPD: Climate and carbon-cycle variability over the last millennium by J. H. Jungclaus et al.
• 2010/05/26: CPD: Palaeoenvironmental perspectives for sustainable development in East Africa by R. Marchant et al.
• 2010/05/28: Science: (ab$) Global Biodiversity: Indicators of Recent Declines by Stuart H. M. Butchart et multi al.
• 2010/05/27: Science: (ab$) Ventilation of the deep Southern Ocean and deglacial CO2 rise by L. C. Skinner et al.
• 2010/05/27: ACP: Modeling natural emissions in the Community Multiscale Air Quality (CMAQ) Model - I: building an emissions data base by S. N. Smith & S. F. Mueller
• 2010/05/27: ACP: Multi-year (2004-2008) record of nonmethane hydrocarbons and halocarbons in New England: seasonal variations and regional sources by R. S. Russo et al.
• 2010/05/26: ACP: Heterogeneity in pre-monsoon aerosol types over the Arabian Sea deduced from ship-borne measurements of spectral AODs by D. G. Kaskaoutis et al.
• 2010/05/26: ACP: Explaining global surface aerosol number concentrations in terms of primary emissions and particle formation by D. V. Spracklen et al.
• 2010/05/27: ACPD: Mesoscale processes for super heavy rainfall of Typhoon Morakot (2009) over Southern Taiwan by C.-Y. Lin et al.
• 2010/05/26: ACPD: Observations of Saharan dust microphysical and optical properties from the Eastern Atlantic during NAMMA airborne field campaign by G. Chen et al.
• 2010/05/26: ACPD: Characterizing aerosol transport into the Canadian High Arctic using aerosol mass spectrometry and Lagrangian modelling by T. Kuhn et al.
• 2010/05/26: ACPD: Validating the MYSTIC three-dimensional radiative transfer model with observations from the complex topography of Arizona's Meteor Crater by B. Mayer et al.
• 2010/05/26: ACPD: The effects of clouds and aerosols on net ecosystem CO2 exchange over semi-arid Loess Plateau of Northwest China by X. Jing et al.
• 2010/05/25: ACPD: A combined observational and modeling approach to study modern dust transport from the Patagonia desert to East Antarctica by S. Gassó et al.
• 2010/05/25: PNAS: An adaptability limit to climate change due to heat stress by Steven C. Sherwood & Matthew Huber
• 2010/05/25: PNAS: Importance of carbon dioxide physiological forcing to future climate change by Long Cao et al.
• 2010/05/25: PNAS: Climate change: Heat, health, and longer horizons by Anthony J. McMichael & Keith B. G. Dear
• 2010/05/25: PNAS: Reply to Foster et al.: Using a forest to measure trees: Determining which vital rates are responding to climate change by Sean M. McMahon et al.
• 2010/05/25: PNAS: Evidence for a recent increase in forest growth is questionable by Jane R. Foster et al.
• 2010/05/25: PNAS: Ecosystem-based fisheries management requires a change to the selective fishing philosophy by Shijie Zhou et al.
• 2010/05/20: CC: (no abs) Climate change, exponential curves, water resources, and unprecedented threats to humanity by Peter H. Gleick
• 2010/05/23: Nature: (ab$) Small mammal diversity loss in response to late-Pleistocene climatic change by Jessica L. Blois et al.

  And other significant documents:

• 2005/01/31: GreenEcon: [link to 281k pdf] Government Spending on Canada's Oil and Gas Industry: Undermining Canada's Kyoto Commitment
• 2010/05/17: Ceres: [link to 1.7 meg pdf] Canada's Oil Sands Face Significant Financial and Environmental Risks as Great as Those in BP Spill
  Long-Term Growth Plans on Collision Course With New Regulations, Climate Change
• 2010/05/25: TEC: [link to 1.5 meg pdf] Global Integration in the Solar Photovoltaic Industry -- a new WRI working paper

  As for miscellaneous science:

• 2010/05/26: C-a-S: A Trench View of Climate Change
• 2010/05/25: Independent(UK): Tree rings: Chainsaws at dawn
  Tree rings were thought to prove global warming -- now climate-change deniers say they show the reverse. Both views are flawed, says Holly Williams

Judith Curry, redux:

• 2010/05/26: MoD: A climate Team B?
• 2010/05/23: C-a-S: Team B
• 2010/05/23: AFTIC: Judith Curry advocates for a climate change "Team B"
• 2010/05/23: ERabett: The Judith Curry Debunking Room is open
• 2010/05/23: ERabett: Eli can retire Part XIII - Tom Segalstad is an old buddy -- In which the EPA explains to Judith Curry why Tom Segalstad is wrong, wrong, wrong.

  Martin Gardner, In Memoriam:

• 2010/05/24: NewScientist: Magic numbers: A meeting of mathemagical tricksters
• 2010/05/24: NewScientist:Martin Gardner: Exposing fads and fallacies
• 2010/05/24: NatureTGB: RIP Martin Gardner
• 2010/05/22: SciAm: Profile: Martin Gardner, the Mathematical Gamester (1914-2010)

  Meanwhile on the Kyoto front:

• 2010/05/28: PlanetArk: Australia On Track To Meet Kyoto Target: Government
• 2010/05/27: Reuters: Australia on track to meet Kyoto target: government

  While at the UN:

• 2010/05/24: UN: Conference on saving world's fish stocks opens at UN Headquarters
• 2010/05/24: Grist: U.N. study calls for economic changes to save biodiversity

  And on the carbon trading front:

• 2010/05/28: Reuters: Frustrated EU carbon traders play waiting game
  Major changes proposed to the European Union's emissions market could dramatically alter the landscape for traders, who are increasingly frustrated by regulatory uncertainty and political stalemate.
• 2010/05/24: Guardian(UK): Europe's climate chief under pressure over 'missing' emissions traders
  5bn euro fraud investigation centres on Danish carbon registry - Carbon trading abuses suspected last summer - Connie Hedegaard failed to act promptly, allege critics

The idea of a carbon tax is still bouncing around:

• 2010/05/25: SolveClimate: Maryland County Carbon Tax Law Could Set Example for Rest of Country

  The proposed G20 Bank Tax is turning into a tussle:

• 2010/05/26: BBC: Europe seeks new levy on banks to create crisis funds
• 2010/05/26: EmbassyMag: Fighting the bank tax: Political tactic or economics? Some see it as a diversionary tactic. Others say the government is making an important point.

  The debate over the optimal strategy [carbon trading, carbon offsets, auction vs. allocation, and/or a carbon tax] to use in dealing with GHGs continues:

• 2010/05/28: Grist: Prices vs. contracts: Why good CO2 policy needs complex financial markets
• 2010/05/26: TEC: A Carbon Price is a Bet America Needs to Make
• 2010/05/23: BSD: In defense of argument from authority, and when it goes too far

  Meanwhile on the international political front:

• 2010/05/26: Reuters: U.S.-China climate talks "useful" but no new ground
  Talks between the world's top two carbon emitters this week did not cover new ground, U.S. climate envoy Todd Stern said, with Beijing and Washington apparently still struggling to bridge differences blocking a global deal.
• 2010/05/27: Yahoo:AFP: US climate envoy [Todd Stern] urges transparency on China trip
  The US climate change envoy said Wednesday it was crucial that all countries accept outside reviews of their greenhouse gas emissions, speaking during a trip to China, which has rejected such calls. "With respect to the issue of transparency, I think it's hugely important and we do put a lot of emphasis on it," said Todd Stern, who led US negotiators at the Copenhagen climate summit last December.

As for GW, energy & security:

• 2010/05/25: NRDC:SwitchBoard: Climate Change and National Security

  The issue of the law and activism is playing out around the world:

• 2010/05/29: CanWest: Activist files suit against Hill security -- Man forcibly removed from Commons hearing
• 2010/05/28: DemNow: Chevron Has 5 Activists Arrested and Bars Entry to Global Victims of Its Practices at Annual Shareholders' Meeting
• 2010/05/26: BSD: Cutting down protesters and forests in Madagascar
• 2010/05/25: TreeHugger: 7 Greenpeace Activists Charged With Felonies in Anti-Drilling Protest

  What are the activists up to?

• 2010/05/25: Guardian(UK): Young climate campaigners adopt an MP -- Campaign by UK Youth Climate Coalition...

  Among the world's religions:

• 2010/05/27: MuncieStarPress: Christians called to save the planet
  The Bridge Community Church doesn't shy away from topics -- such as politics and human sexuality -- that you might not hear discussed at other churches on Sunday morning. Dr. Matthew Sleeth, author of the book, "Serve God, Save the Planet: A Christian Call to Action," will speak at the church's service at 10:30 a.m. Sunday in Cornerstone Center for the Arts. "We don't want to come across as radical extremists, but at the same time, it's an issue that needs to be talked about: where the world is headed for our kids and our grandkids," said Joshua Cooper, lead teacher of the church. "We're treating the world now as if the resources will be here forever, and that's not the smartest way to handle it."

Polls! We have polls!

• 2010/05/25: CleanBreak: Public wants government to take lead on climate change: PwC
• 2010/05/28: PlanetArk: World Warms As Public Cools To Climate Action
• 2010/05/28: TreeHugger: In Public Poll, Alternative Energy Kicks Offshore Drilling's A$$
• 2010/05/27: Reuters: Global warming "natural" for one in 10 - survey
  Nearly one in 10 people believe global warming is part of a natural cycle of events, and nothing to really worry about, an alarming increase on the figures from two years ago, according to a global poll.
• 2010/05/26: TreeHugger: More Americans Now Oppose Offshore Drilling Than Support It, Poll Finds
• 2010/05/25: TP:WR: Despite Pundit Claims, Offshore Drilling Support is Down Significantly
• 2010/05/25: OSun: Poll: Canadians don't support deep-water oil drilling
• 2010/05/23: Guardian(UK): Climate change concern declines in poll
  Only 62% of Britons interested in subject, down from 80% in 2006, according to YouGov survey

Regarding Water Politics and Business:

• 2010/05/29: AlterNet: Saving Water, the (Really) Old-Fashioned Way
• 2010/05/28: CNet: Wave-powered desalination pump permitted in Gulf
• 2010/05/25: GreenGrok: What's in Your Water? [USGS survey]
• 2010/05/28: TerraDaily: Study Finds High Level Of Bacteria In Bottled Water In Canada
• 2010/05/27: TreeHugger: 'Revolting' Levels of Bacteria Found in Canadian Bottled Water
• 2010/05/25: OpenDem: Egypt and Sudan tussle with Nile basin countries over water rights
• 2010/05/26: AlterNet: Is Your Faucet Making You Sick?
• 2010/05/24: Guardian(UK): Chinese engineers propose world's biggest hydro-electric project in Tibet
  Mega-dam on Yarlung Tsangpo river would save 200m tonnes of CO2 but could spark conflict over downstream water supply
• 2010/05/25: PhysOrg: Love that dirty water: Scientists find low-tech way to recycle H2O
• 2010/05/24: TerraDaily: Egypt, Kenya play down Nile water row
• 2010/05/25: NI:TWMB: Water wars

  As for SW tools:

• 2010/05/30: SkeptiSci: Skeptical Science now a Nokia app

  And on the American political front:

• 2010/05/28: Yahoo:AP: Texas gov. asks Obama to halt expected EPA actions
• 2010/05/30: SolveClimate: When Corporations Rule Federal Agencies
• 2010/05/28: DeSmogBlog: 'Energy Town Hall' Oil Bus Tour Run by GOP Team At American Energy Alliance
• 2010/05/27: Grist: Michigan: Where U.S. clean energy, emissions, efficiency policy really counts
• 2010/05/28: AutoBG: Auto Alliance speaks out against CARB's possible "feebate" program
• 2010/05/28: REA: The Debate That Will Define America's Future
  The Gulf of Mexico oil spill disaster, the Massey, West Virginia coal mine accident, the Tennessee coal ash disaster in 2008, the BP oil refinery disaster in Texas in 2006, and countless other fossil fuel disasters are finally having an effect on public opinion. And the sting of record prices from 2008 is still in the recent memory of American consumers. Fully 2/3 of Americans believe Congress needs to make our country's energy needs a top priority.
• 2010/05/27: ClarionLedger: PSC reverses coal-plant ruling -- More charges OK'd for consumers
  State utility regulators loosened an earlier ruling Wednesday and told Mississippi Power Co. it could charge ratepayers up to an additional $480 million for its unprecedented coal plant project slated for Kemper County. The Public Service Commission's new ruling reverses course in allowing the utility company to pass on financing charges to ratepayers before the plant fires up.
• 2010/05/27: TEC: Michigan: Where U.S. Clean Energy, Emissions, Efficiency Policy Really Counts
• 2010/05/26: SolveClimate: Kansas GOP Measure Could Lead to EPA Takeover of Coal Plant Permits
• 2010/05/26: SolveClimate: How Secure is America's Energy Future? Chamber of Commerce Puts a Number on It
• 2010/05/26: TEC: Missouri the 21st State to Adopt Landmark PACE Program
• 2010/05/26: SF Gate: GOP, Silicon Valley 'disconnect' over green
  As President Obama visits a Fremont solar panel manufacturing plant today to tout green jobs, a huge divide is opening up between the state's top Republican and Democratic candidates over their environmental positions - in particular about how to attract and retain clean-tech business.
• 2010/05/26: AutoBG: Study: highly-efficient semi-trucks lead to 120,000 new jobs by 2030. Say what?
• 2010/05/25: SolveClimate: Maryland County Carbon Tax Law Could Set Example for Rest of Country
• 2010/05/25: SolveClimate: Government Lowballing 'Social Cost of Carbon' in Regulations, [E3] Economists Charge
• 2010/05/25: ClimateP: Study: With $27 trillion global market at stake, it's time for the U.S. to lead in clean technology
• 2010/05/24: NRDC:SwitchBoard: Scientists to Congress & Obama: count the carbon in biomass
• 2010/05/23: CSW: ABC World News: Climate Scientists Claim 'McCarthy-Like Threats'
• 2010/05/23: ABC(US): Climate Scientists Claim 'McCarthy-Like Threats,' Say They Face Intimidation, Ominous E-Mails

  The NAS reports on climate change continue to draw comment:

• America's Climate Choices
• 2010/05/28: Ph&Ph: NRC Report On Global Warming
• 2010/05/25: CSW: NRC: US should act now to cut emissions, develop a national strategy to adapt to inevitable impacts
• 2010/05/25: MoD: US National Academy of Sciences re-confirms that humans are responsible for climate change
• 2010/05/24: NRDC:SwitchBoard: National Academy of Sciences Stress the Impacts of Climate Change & Call for a National Adaptation Actions [ACC]

  A study reports that stopping global deforestation will benefit U.S. Farmers:

• 2010/05/27: SciAm: Earning Billions for U.S. Farmers by Stopping Global Deforestation
  Timber, beef, soy and grain that flood the U.S. market from new fields hewn from forests around the world undercut domestic goods--and speed climate change
• 2010/05/27: Reuters: U.S. farm group sees gains from deforestation halt
  Stopping global deforestation would boost U.S. agricultural revenue by $190 billion to $270 billion through 2030 by cutting unfair competition, a U.S. farm group and a nonprofit focused on climate change argued on Wednesday.
• 2010/05/26: NRDC:SwitchBoard: Securing U.S. Agricultural Competitiveness by Stopping Deforestation: New Report Shows How Protecting Forests Abroad Will Keep Ag State Economies Strong
• 2010/05/26: NRDC:SwitchBoard: Deforestation Reductions Could Save US Farmers, Ranchers, & Foresters $220 Billion
• 2010/05/26: UCSUSA: Report Shows Preserving Tropical Forests Benefits U.S. Agricultural & Timber Interests

  After the Texas textbook fiasco, a Colorado group wants to expunge liberal global warming from their school books:

• 2010/05/25: PRWatch: Don't Even Mention Global Warming to Kids
• 2010/05/28: Guardian(UK): Rightwing group seeks to strip climate change from US classrooms
  Climate change is a 'liberal' cause, argues Colorado-based petitioner [Pugliese], and requires a 'balancing' counterpoint
• 2010/05/28: DeSmogBlog: "Mad Hatter" Throws a Tea Party for Koch and ExxonMobil [Pugliese]
• 2010/05/26: DenverPost: Push to teach "other side" of global warming heats up in Colorado's Mesa County
  A national group that thinks global warming is "junk science" and that teaching it is unnecessarily scaring schoolchildren brought its first petition effort for "balanced education" to Mesa County Schools on Tuesday night. Rose Pugliese, an unsuccessful candidate for a District 51 school board seat in the last election, presented a petition with 700 signatures to the board asking that science teachers stop giving lessons on global warming. Pugliese, a 32-year-old Grand Junction attorney and activist in Tea Party and conservative Republican groups, also presented a petition with 600 signatures demanding Mesa County schools keep political views out of classrooms.

The Cuccinelli subpoena saga rolls on:

• 2010/05/29: ClimateP: University petitions court to quash Cuccinelli subpoena of climate scientist Michael Mann's papers
• 2010/05/28: ERabett: UVa spits back [Cuccinelligata?]
• 2010/05/28: CSW: University petitions court to quash Cuccinelli subpoena of climate scientist Michael Mann's papers
• 2010/05/27: DailyP: UVa files challenge to Cuccinelli demand
• 2010/05/28: ScienceInsider: University of Virginia Fights the State on Scientist Subpoena
• 2010/05/28: DM:BA: UVa will fight climate change attack
• 2010/05/27: UCSUSA: UVa Will Fight Cuccinelli's Misguided Investigation of Climate Scientist
• 2010/05/28: WaPo: U-Va. goes to court to fight Cuccinelli's subpoena of ex-professor's documents
  Virginia's flagship university went to court Thursday to fight an effort by Virginia Attorney Gen. Ken Cuccinelli II (R) to get documents from a former climate scientist at the school, an unusual confrontation that will test the bounds of academic freedom and result in the college facing down its own lawyer in court. In a motion filed in Charlottesville, the University of Virginia argued that Cuccinelli's subpoena for papers and e-mail from global warming researcher Michael Mann exceeds the attorney general's authority under state law and intrudes on the rights of professors to pursue academic inquiry free from political pressure.
• 2010/05/28: MillerMcCune: Criminalizing the Science You Don't Cotton To
  Researchers fear that a lawsuit aimed at the developer of the "hockey stick" temperature map is actually a political salvo at science.
• 2010/05/27: CCP: ERW: AAAS Board of Directors: Virginia Attorney General threatens research with investigation of climate scientist
• 2010/05/26: TerraDaily: Investigation Of Climate Scientist Threatens Research
  The AAAS Board of Directors has asked Virginia Attorney General Kenneth Cuccinelli to either justify his investigation of climate researcher Michael Mann or end it, calling it "an apparently political action" that could have a chilling effect on scientific research.

Speaking of America's addiction:

• 2010/05/25: DerSpiegel: Washington and BP -- 'Like a Junkie Controlling His Dealer'

  I didn't hear much about this:

• 2010/05/24: CSW: National Climate Adaptation Summit, 25-27 May, 2010 -- Washington, DC

  The Obama chatter is nonstop:

• 2010/05/29: ClimateP: Obama: BP's interests may not be aligned with the public interest
• 2010/05/28: TheHill:e2W: [Smokey Joe] Barton, industry groups slam White House oil drilling pullback
• 2010/05/27: CBC: Obama puts freeze on offshore drilling
  Facing backlash over a devastating oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico, U.S. President Barack Obama announced a moratorium on new drilling for oil below the Arctic Ocean
• 2010/05/27: ClimateP: Obama: "Climate change poses a threat to our way of life."
• 2010/05/27: Grist: Obama cans MMS chief
• 2010/05/27: SF Gate: Obama vows U.S. will remain green-tech leader
  President Obama, speaking at a solar panel factory in Fremont, said Wednesday he was "not prepared to cede America's leadership" in green technology or the global economy, and called the devastating Gulf of Mexico oil spill a stark reminder of the need for America to develop alternative energy technologies that create new jobs.
• 2010/05/26: TEC: President Obama Says "Let's Go," Special Interests Conjure Up New Distortions to Say No by Senator John Kerry
• 2010/05/26: Salon:JR: Will eco-disasters destroy Obama's legacy?
  There's a clear link between the BP spill and the global warming bill. Obama needs to explain it to Americans
• 2010/05/26: ClimateP: Obama: BP disaster tells us we must pass a "long-term energy strategy"
• 2010/05/26: ClimateP: Will eco-disasters destroy Obama's legacy?
• 2010/05/26: Grist: Will Obama admin allow Shell Oil to do to Arctic waters what BP did to the Gulf?
• 2010/05/26: NRDC:SwitchBoard: Obama: "I'm going to keep fighting to pass comprehensive energy and climate legislation"
• 2010/05/26: TreeHugger: Willie Nelson Chooses Biodiesel and Hard Rock
• 2010/05/26: UCSUSA: Obama Solar Plant Visit Underscores Need for State, Federal Policies
• 2010/05/26: TreeHugger: Obama (Finally) Starts Talking Clean Energy in Wake of Gulf Spill
• 2010/05/26: AutoBG: Auto industry supports Obama's newly announced long-term mpg standards
• 2010/05/25: DesMoinesRegister: Economist: 'Strategic thinking' lacking on climate
  President Obama has pandered to oil and coal interests while failing to craft a specific plan to wean the world from climate-disrupting fossil fuels, a leading global economist said Monday. "Even if we don't have all the answers yet, we need a sense of direction," Jeffrey Sachs, director of Columbia University's Earth Institute, told The Des Moines Register before his commencement address at Grinnell College. "What we have instead is politics as usual."
• 2010/05/24: AutoBG: Report: Obama kicks off drive to enact tough fuel economy standards through 2025

  The actions of the Obama administration are being watched closely:

• 2010/05/28: CSW: Holdren at Adaptation Summit: We're not serious until we put a price on greenhouse gas emissions
• 2010/05/28: ClimateP: Holdren: "The Administration remains committed to getting comprehensive energy and climate legislation through the Congress this year."
• 2010/05/28: CSW: Text of remarks by Obama science adviser John Holdren to the National Climate Adaptation Summit
• 2010/05/26: Yahoo:AP: Feds announce timber program for Tongass forest
  The U.S. Forest Service on Wednesday announced a program to open up economic opportunities and spare the remaining old-growth trees in the country's largest national forest.
• 2010/05/27: NRDC:SwitchBoard: DOE data shows scale of biomass loophole
• 2010/05/26: CCurrents: BPing The Arctic? Will the Obama Administration Allow Shell Oil to Do to Arctic Waters What BP Did to the Gulf?

  As for what is going on in Congress:

• 2010/05/28: ScienceInsider: Third Time's a Charm for COMPETES Bill
• 2010/05/29: DM:BA: Third time's a charm, Congress passes science act
  After Republicans twice stalled it, the America COMPETES Act was passed by the House of Representatives by a vote of 262-150.
• 2010/05/28: NYT:GW: Sen. Graham Suggests Climate Bill Focused Only on Power Plants
• 2010/05/24: C411: Murkowski's resolution paves the way for a "Do Nothing" climate policy
• 2010/05/27: C411: On Murkowski's "Resolution of Disapproval"
• 2010/05/29: AutoBG: EV bill offers $10M award to developer of battery with 500-mile range
• 2010/05/28: SolveClimate: Green Groups Say Proposed Bill for Advanced Biofuels is Flawed
  Legislation is based on EPA rule that overstates the climate benefits of new-generation biofuels, advocates argue
• 2010/05/28: Grist: Climate bill aside, there are lots of smaller bills that could get us moving
• 2010/05/28: Grist: Now is the time to transform our energy system by Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt)
• 2010/05/28: TheHill: Graham's hopes fade on climate
  Sen. Lindsey Graham warns that President Barack Obama will kill the last hopes for comprehensive energy and climate change legislation if he cracks down on offshore oil drilling.
• 2010/05/27: UCSUSA: Two New Electric Vehicle Bills Introduced in Congress
• 2010/05/26: SF Gate:BBerg: Carbon-Rule Delay Has 'Better Chance' Than Repeal
  Lawmakers should try this year to delay the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency from enforcing greenhouse gas regulations instead of repealing them, Senator Jay Rockefeller, a West Virginia Democrat, said today.
• 2010/05/26: WarmingLaw: Murkowski Resolution Aimed at Stripping EPA of Authority to Regulate GHGs Set for June 10 Vote
• 2010/05/25: FY: US Senate to vote in June to stop EPA carbon rules
  Republican-backed measure is unlikely to become law - Could hurt prospects for climate bill Obama favors - Gulf spill hurts climate change legislation - Graham
• 2010/05/25: LA Times: Oil companies have a rich history of U.S. subsidies
  Some say the Gulf of Mexico catastrophe can be linked to Congress' policy of oil-friendly tax breaks and financial benefits.

Kerry-Boxer, Waxman-Markey, KGL, Cantwell-Collins, the APA or whatever -- the future climate bill -- defines a battleline:

• 2010/05/28: TreeHugger: Major Climate Bill Still a Major Possibility this Summer
• 2010/05/29: TEC: Failure to pass climate bill will benefit natural gas
• 2010/05/28: Reuters: U.S. climate bill seen unlikely in 2010 [says Green Exchange CEO Tom Lewis]
• 2010/05/28: ClimateP: Politico: "Signs of life" for climate bill
• 2010/05/28: ClimateP: Stavins on Senate climate bill: "82% of the value of allowances accrue to consumers and public purposes, and some 18% accrue to covered, private industry."
• 2010/05/26: NRDC:SwitchBoard: The American Power Act Invests in the Future of US Transportation
• 2010/05/24: CBPP: How Low-Income Consumers Would Fare in the Kerry-Lieberman Climate-Change Bill

  What are the lobbyists pushing?

• 2010/05/27: TP:WR: Power Poisons: How Utilities Plan To Continue Evading Toxic Air Pollution Controls

  Graham's behaviour makes it clear he is only interested in obstruction:

• 2010/05/24: ClimateP: Bingaman slams Graham's climate bill incoherence: "I can't keep up with his various conditions."

  Reinstate the OTA?:

• 2010/05/23: CSW: Reinstate the Office of Technology Assessment: Letter to Congress from 90 organizations

  While in the UK:

• 2010/05/28: Guardian(UK): Government's chief scientific adviser hits out at climate sceptics
  Professor John Beddington dismisses 'unreasonable' comments from groups including Nigel Lawson's thinktank, as Royal Society responds to critics with new climate science guide
• 2010/05/28: SolveClimate: UK's Chief Scientific Adviser [Professor John Beddington] Hits Out at Climate Skeptics
  Beddington dismisses 'unreasonable' comments from groups, as Royal Society responds to critics with new climate science guide
• 2010/05/28: Scotsman: Climate change targets 'limited'
• 2010/05/27: TEC: UK Drops Low Carbon Buildings Programme -- Keeps FITS
• 2010/05/27: Guardian(UK): Scottish parliament under pressure over emissions manifesto pledge [UK pol]
• 2010/05/26: NatureTGB: Lord Lester looks to limit libel litigation [UK pol]
  Another attempt to reform England's libel laws will be launched tomorrow, when Anthony Lester introduces his Private Member's Defamation Bill in Parliament. Lester -- also known as Lord Lester of Herne Hill, QC -- says, "The Defamation Bill, prepared with help from expert colleagues, sets out stronger and clearer defences and strikes a fairer balance between private reputation and public information."
• 2010/05/24: NYT: Climate Fears Turn to Doubts Among Britons
• 2010/05/24: Guardian(UK): Industry threats to relocate over carbon targets exposed as 'misleading'
  New report suggest cement and steel industry threats over 'carbon leakage' from EU are misleading
• 2010/05/24: Guardian(UK): New climate solutions could heal the rift over Copenhagen
• 2010/05/24: Guardian(UK): Red light for green discount
  The planned discount on new electric cars could become a casualty of the government's cost-cutting drive
• 2010/05/24: Reuters: UK to miss key 2020 renewable, emissions targets: report
  Britain looks set to miss a European renewable energy target and its goal of a 34 percent cut in greenhouse gas emissions by 2020 as emissions decline more slowly, a report by Cambridge Econometrics said on Monday.
• 2010/05/23: Guardian(UK): Climate change concern declines in poll
  Only 62% of Britons interested in subject, down from 80% in 2006, according to YouGov survey

And in Europe:

• 2010/05/29: EarthTimes: Lufthansa wants to delay emissions-trading after ash-cloud chaos
• 2010/05/27: EUO:SG: Climate system scandal
  Look closely enough at yesterday's European Commission communication on 'moving beyond a 20 percent greenhouse gas reduction' and you will spot a scandal. It's on page 3 and it reads like this: 'With many allowances unused during the crisis, companies will be able to carry over some 5-8% of their allowances from the 2008-2012 period into the third phase of the ETS.' What this means is that during the 2008-2012 period of the EU emissions trading system, companies were given more carbon allowances -- pollution permits -- than they needed.
• 2010/05/27: EurActiv: Hedegaard backtracks on EU climate goals
  EU Climate Action Commissioner Connie Hedegaard yesterday (26 May) presented a paper making the case for moving towards a unilateral 30% cut in EU greenhouse gas emissions by 2020. But she failed to stand behind it, bowing to pressure from France and Germany.
• 2010/05/26: EarthTimes: EU Commission backs off on higher CO2 emission goals
• 2010/05/26: BBC:RB: Europe debates climate 'ambition' [30% or 20%]
• 2010/05/26: Guardian(UK): EU carbon trading scheme failing to cut pollution, campaigners warn
• 2010/05/26: Guardian(UK): The Times' EU climate targets 'exclusive' is gibberish [Monbiot]
  The Times falsely reports that the EU will have the most ambitious emissions targets in the world. I wish it were true
• 2010/05/26: Guardian(UK): EU stops short of recommending 30% cut in emissions by 2020
• 2010/05/26: Guardian(UK): EU climate target analysis bears scars of industry lobbying
• 2010/05/26: EUO: Brussels 'opens debate' on jump to 30% CO2 cuts
• 2010/05/26: EurActiv: Ministers give go-ahead to electric vehicle standardisation
  EU ministers have called for the rapid development of a European standard for electric vehicles to speed up their uptake, with France and Germany leading requests for EU finance to fund pilot projects.
• 2010/05/26: EurActiv: Paris, Berlin signal pause in EU climate efforts
  France and Germany yesterday joined the growing ranks of European countries opposed to making further unilateral moves on climate change, as the European Commission today plans to make the case for raising the EU's greenhouse gas reduction goal from -20% to -30% by 2020.
• 2010/05/26: KSJT: BBC: An analysis of a recession and EU's carbon goals -- with not a jot on that climategate thing
• 2010/05/25: TerraDaily: Paris, Berlin pour cold water on EU climate proposals [30% cut]
• 2010/05/26: EarthTimes: Too early to raise CO2 emission goals, says EU [Climate Action Commissioner, Connie Hedegaard]
• 2010/05/26: EarthTimes: Proposals to raise CO2 emission targets spark controversy in the EU
• 2010/05/25: EurActiv: EU plans tax on bank capital
  The European Commission will propose a European emergency fund paid for by the financial sector to rescue failing banks and fend off future crises. A levy on banks - or in EU speak, a "resolution fund" - has been in the pipeline for a few months and has proven a popular idea with the French, German and British governments.
• 2010/05/25: EurActiv: EU struggles to find voice on environment issues
  The European Union is bogged down in a power struggle over who speaks for the bloc at international meetings, threatening action on environmental issues...
• 2010/05/25: EUO: Break-down of EU member-state climate-finance pledges revealed
  A detailed schedule of pledges of early EU funding for dealing with climate change in the developing world reveals that while the EU is on track to meet promises, there is a lack of co-ordination amongst member states, with countries offering what they can, without any overall strategic approach or mechanism to ensure that the funds are delivered - and only 15 member states have made any commitment at all.
• 2010/05/25: PhysOrg: Europe wants unified system for recharging electric cars in 2011
• 2010/05/25: EarthTimes: Brussels to tell EU states: Cutting CO2 is cheaper than you think

  Meanwhile in Australia:

• 2010/05/29: BNC: Replacing Hazelwood coal-fired power station -- Critique of Environment Victoria report
• 2010/05/28: PlanetArk: Australia On Track To Meet Kyoto Target: Government
• 2010/05/27: ABC(Au): Origin Energy will remove 20 turbines from its plans for a wind farm at Stockyard Hill, west of Ballarat, to help protect [a population of endangered birds] brolgas
• 2010/05/26: ABC(Au): The Cooma-Monaro Shire Council in South East New South Wales has attended a workshop with the Department of Environment, Climate Change and Water on how Local Governments can handle the impacts of climate change
• 2010/05/26: ABC(Au): Liberal implosion thwarted ETS: Hill
  Former environment minister and Liberal Party stalwart Robert Hill says the Government's emissions trading scheme would have become a reality if his party had not "imploded" at the finish line.
• 2010/05/26: ABC(Au): Independent Member for Frome Geoff Brock has briefed South Australian Premier Mike Rann about a desalination proposal that claims to drought-proof the state
• 2010/05/26: ABC(Au): The Victorian Government has granted a licence to Carnegie Wave Energy to investigate potential wave power sites off Portland, Warrnambool and Phillip Island
• 2010/05/24: ABC(Au): Council concerned about sea level plan
  A council in South East New South Wales says Local Governments do not have adequate knowledge to develop plans to deal with rising sea levels. Under a draft Coastal Protection Act, councils will have a year to develop a plan to manage the risks of climate change. But the General Manager of the Bega Valley Shire Council, Peter Teggart, says preliminary work, including flood management studies, could take up to two years. Mr Teggart says he is concerned that councils are being relied upon to devise a plan. "In reality, there is probably not the level of expertise in consultancies and councils to complete that work," he said.
• 2010/05/24: ABC(Au): Australia must do more to curb emissions: report
  A new report commissioned by The Climate Institute says Australia's carbon pollution will continue to soar without price signals to make companies take responsibility for their emissions.
• 2010/05/24: ABC(Au): Wind farm development gains momentum
  Proponents of a 55-turbine wind farm development for the Oberon district say a new substation at Crookwell will make the project viable.
• 2010/05/24: ABC(Au): Councils urged to unite in climate change fight
  Local government bodies from across the New South Wales north coast are being urged to share resources when it comes to coping with climate change.
• 2010/05/24: ABC(Au): Plugs replace pumps at car recharging station
  New South Wales' first public electric car charging station has been opened in Sydney.

Former PM Malcolm Fraser announced he was no longer a member of the Liberal Party this week:

• 2010/05/27: ABC(Au):TDU: Formal decree of divorce
  The biggest part of the surprise for me of Malcolm Fraser's announcement that he had quit the Liberal Party was not his resignation so much as the fact that he had still been a member until now. The reality was that Malcolm Fraser and the party that he once led had parted company and lived separate lives for a couple of decades; this is merely the formal decree of divorce.
• 2010/05/26: ABC(Au): Fraser quits Liberal Party
  The Financial Review newspaper says Mr Fraser quit in December, shortly after Tony Abbott replaced Malcolm Turnbull as Liberal leader, because he believed the party was becoming too conservative.
• 2010/05/26: Crikey: The inside story on Fraser's resignation
• 2010/05/26: SMH: 'Leftie' Fraser leaves party that left him
  In resigning from the Liberal Party, Malcolm Fraser could well invoke the line that Ronald Reagan used to explain why he quit the Democratic Party - "I didn't leave the party, the party left me." Since the end of his prime ministership 27 years ago, the Liberals have moved a long way to the right, leaving Fraser increasingly angry and isolated in the party he once led. The prime minster who was attacked by Labor as being a granite-faced arch-conservative in the 1980s was in January derided by the Liberals' Sophie Mirabella as a "frothing-at-the-mouth leftie."
• 2010/05/26: PeakEnergy: Malcolm Fraser leaves party that left him

  And in New Zealand:

• 2010/05/24: Guide(NZ): ETS "moderate" - John Key
  When New Zealand's emissions trading scheme (ETS) starts in just over a month households will be paying a "modest" $3 a week, Prime Minister John Key says. Petrol prices were expected to rise by three cents a litre and electricity by 5 percent when the ETS starts on July 1. "The question is for a household, are they prepared to pay $3 a week for the insurance premium of our environment and I think the answer to that is yes," he told TVNZ's Breakfast.

While in the Indian subcontinent:

• 2010/05/28: NRDC:SwitchBoard: India Releases Draft of Ambitious Green Mission
• 2010/05/25: BizGreen: India proposes renewable energy certificate scheme

  And China:

• 2010/05/28: GT(Cn): Official: great pressure to attain emission cut targets in 11th Five-Year plan
• 2010/05/28: BBerg: China May Start State-Guided Carbon Market by 2014, Feng [Shengbo, deputy director of the China Clean Development Mechanism Management Center] Says

  Elsewhere in Asia:

• 2010/05/29: Guardian(UK): Maldives president calls for direct action over climate change

  And South America:

• 2010/05/28: BBC: Peru indigenous leader [Alberto] Pizango freed on bail
  A Peruvian indigenous leader who was detained on Wednesday as he returned from almost a year in exile in Nicaragua has been freed on bail. A judge told Alberto Pizango he would still have to face charges of sedition and conspiracy at his upcoming trial. He is accused of inciting protests against planned oil and gas exploration in Peru's rainforest that turned deadly.
• 2010/05/26: TreeHugger: Indigenous Amazonians Prepare For War to Stop Massive Hydroelectric Dam on Xingu River

  In Canada, minority neocon PM Harper, continues his do-nothing policy:

• 2010/05/29: WpgFP: Harper plays wallflower on climate
  Ever since Barack Obama's election, Stephen Harper has set a single goal for Canada's climate policy: "harmonizing" our efforts to cut greenhouse gas pollution with the United States' plans.
• 2010/05/26: Tyee: Tories Seen to Be Gutting Ecological Safeguards -- Environmental assessment rules weakened, advisory group blindsided, say critics.
  Months after proposed changes to Canada's ecological safeguards infuriated green groups across the country, critics are still looking for answers. They wonder why Stephen Harper's Conservative government introduced big revisions to the federal Environmental Assessment (EA) Act right before a seven-year review. And why an independent advisory committee staffed with EA experts was apparently disbanded in 2008 without any notice. The critics -- which include lawyers, green NGOs and federal Liberals -- can only speculate who stood to gain from pending amendments that turn one of Canada's most important green pillars "into hash," as one academic lamented.
• 2010/05/28: CanWest: Canada will help save forests
  [...]
  Although Canada has not yet confirmed its total contribution to the initiative...
• 2010/05/28: ChronicleHerald: Feds lack water data -- report
  The government has only murky information about Canada's water supply and it's putting Canadians' health and the economy at risk, an unpublished federal report warns. The paper, by a group of senior bureaucrats, also says the knowledge gap widens as climate change and development strain the water supply.
• 2010/05/25: G&M: Ottawa puts hefty price tag on vehicle emissions
  Says auto makers, fuel suppliers, motorists face almost $13-billion in added costs from regulations for 2011 to 2016 model years
  Ottawa believes it will cost Canada's auto makers, fuel suppliers and drivers almost $13-billion to meet greenhouse gas emission standards over the next six years. But better fuel economy for drivers will more than make up for the additional cost of the average vehicle by 2016, Environment Canada says in a regulatory impact statement posted on Canada Gazette.

Calderon came to visit. Made Steve say no again:

• 2010/05/27: G&M: Mexico's President pushes Ottawa to act on climate change
  Felipe Calderon breaks diplomatic ranks with host Stephen Harper, says 'we cannot wait' to follow U.S. lead Mexico's president, in Ottawa as Stephen Harper's guest, has taken a whack at his host's wait-for-the-U.S. policies on climate change. Prime Minister Harper has said Canada will wait to see what policies the U.S. adopts to regulate major emitters of greenhouse gases, because the two countries' economies are so closely integrated. But Felipe Calderon, who leads the United States' other border nation and trade-bloc partner, expressed exasperation at waiting for rich countries to step forward. Mr. Calderon said Mexico couldn't wait for rich countries to do something about climate change, as droughts hit his country and Mexico City's water supply shrank, and had to take its own action. "In Mexico, we cannot wait. We cannot wait for the developed countries to make a decision," the Mexican President said at a joint press conference with Mr. Harper. "Some of them, like the U.S., could take another eternity to decide on what they had decided since the Kyoto Protocol."

The issue of offshore and Arctic drilling continues to draw comment, while the Deepwater Horizon gushes:

• 2010/05/29: TStar: Walkom: Threat of oil spill disaster worse in Canada
  For Canada, the lessons from the Gulf of Mexico oil disaster are bleak. The United States may have stumbled into the worst ecological disaster in its history. But we have deliberately chosen to head in the same direction. American regulation of the offshore oil industry has been revealed as a sham. Our regulation of drilling in the far harsher North Atlantic and Arctic is said by experts to be even weaker. And thanks to what is in effect a conspiracy between the governing Conservatives and opposition Liberals to avoid an early election, Canada's environmental rules are about to be further gutted.
• 2010/05/29: CanWest: Canada still inviting offshore drilling bids while U.S. extends moratorium
  The federal government is moving ahead with plans to grant new offshore oil-exploration licences in the Arctic, despite the U.S. government's expanding freeze on offshore drilling in the wake of the Gulf Coast leak. Moreover, any company granted an exploration licence in Canada's portion of the Beaufort Sea will be subjected to less environmental scrutiny than those wishing to explore on the U.S. side, critics say.
• 2010/05/26: CanWest: Arctic oil spill could be 'catastrophic'
  A major oil spill in the Beaufort Sea could have a "catastrophic" impact on Canada's Arctic ecosystem and worsen the effects of climate change, a former senior government scientist has warned. William Adams, a former scientist at Environment Canada, contributed to a decades-old study that simulated an oil spill of roughly 1,000 barrels per day in water about 10 metres deep in the Canadian portion of the Beaufort Sea. It remains the only "comprehensive" study of its kind, Adams said.
• 2010/05/25: CBC: Deepsea drilling regulator grilled by MPs
  Federal MPs raised questions Tuesday about whether an exploratory drill off Newfoundland's east coast is safe. Chevron Canada began work this month on a well north of the Grand Banks, just weeks after the Deepwater Horizon oil blowout that has sent thousands of barrels spewing daily into the Gulf of Mexico.
• 2010/05/25: OSun: Poll: Canadians don't support deep-water oil drilling
• 2010/05/24: CanWest: Prof warns that Arctic oil spill could spell disaster for polar bears
  Canada must prepare for an Arctic oil spill catastrophe "long in advance," says a polar bear expert. Edmonton-based biology Prof. Andrew Derocher said an oil well blowout in Canada's northern Beaufort Sea just before freeze-up could be disastrous to northern animals.

The G8/G20 Abortion issue still dogs the Tories:

• 2010/05/27: CBC: Abortion safety key to maternal health: scientists
  The top scientific groups from the G8 countries say funding for maternal and child health, including initiatives aimed at unsafe abortions, must increase. The Royal Society of Canada and its counterparts in the other G8 countries note that the risk of a woman dying as a result of pregnancy or childbirth is one in seven in the poorest parts of the world and is more than 80 per cent preventable. A statement from the groups says up to 40 per cent of maternal and infant deaths could be averted with improved access to contraception and measures to reduce unsafe abortion.
• 2010/05/26: WpgSun: Tories 'kicking' critics: women's group
  The head of a women's group that lost its government funding says the Tories' messaging is designed to bully people who don't agree with them. Shannon Phillips, chairwoman of Womanspace Resource Centre in Lethbridge, Alta., says groups denied cash after years - in some cases decades - of funding have nothing to lose by speaking out.
• 2010/05/25: BCLSB: CIDA's Advice
• 2010/05/25: CBC: CIDA abortion advice ignored: records
  The Conservative government turned its back on advice from its own civil servants when it excluded abortion funding in its G8 maternal- and child-health initiative, The Canadian Press has learned. Briefing notes prepared in January by the Canadian International Development Agency for International Co-operation Minister Bev Oda suggest access to safe abortion services could save numerous lives in developing countries.
• 2010/05/25: G&M: Ottawa ignored CIDA's advice on abortion, documents reveal
  Briefings sent to Bev Oda said access to safe procedures is crucial to maternal health

Speaking of the G8/G20. there's more than a few pissed that this dog & pony show is going to cost more than a billion dollars:

• 2010/05/27: Impolitical: Harper's billion dollar [G8/G20] boondoggle

  That two-headed Arctic Park story just keeps going on:

• 2010/05/26: CBC: Nunavut weighs Lancaster Sound energy probe
  Nunavut's environment minister will get to decide whether to let federal scientists conduct seismic tests for oil and gas in Lancaster Sound, where the federal government also wants to create a conservation area. The Geological Survey of Canada is proposing its Eastern Canadian Arctic Seismic Experiment this summer to explore for potential oil and gas resources in Lancaster Sound, Jones Sound and eastern Baffin Island.

Leaked documents. Fossil fuel subsidies. BAU:

• 2010/05/26: PI:CCB: Leaked government document says Canada should end fossil fuel subsidies
• 2010/05/26: PI: Climate Action Network Canada Calls on Finance Minister to Take his Department's Advice and Phase out Fossil Fuel Subsidies
• 2010/05/27: CanWest: Stephen Harper dodges questions on oilpatch subsidies -- Flaherty says he won't respond to leaked memo
  Prime Minister Stephen Harper's government sidestepped questions Wednesday about whether it will cancel specific incentives and subsidies that favour oil and gas companies as part of a commitment on the agenda at next month's G-20 economic summit in Toronto.
• 2010/05/26: CanWest: End oilpatch subsidies, secret memo urges
  The Harper government is being urged by its own senior bureaucrats to "lead by example" and deliver on a commitment to phase out subsidies for the oil and gas sector at a global economic summit next month in Toronto. In a secret memorandum sent to Finance Minister Jim Flaherty and obtained by Canwest News Service, the top bureaucrat in his department recommended it was time to end the tax incentives as part of a move toward a balanced federal budget.
• 2010/05/25: ChronicleHerald: Canada mulls cuts to oil patch subsidies
  Canada is contemplating taking the lead on a key G20 pledge by announcing the elimination of some tax breaks for the oil patch prior to the June summit in Toronto, The Canadian Press has learned G20 leaders agreed last September in Pittsburgh they would reduce distorting fossil fuel subsidies over the medium term and pledged to present concrete national plans in Toronto.

Polls for you amusement & confusion:

• 2010/05/25: CleanBreak: Public wants government to take lead on climate change: PwC
  A global survey from PricewaterhouseCoopers has found that 94 per cent of Canadians expect to change the way they do business over the next two or three years in anticipation of climate change policies, and 98 per cent believe regulation is the best way to influence that change. Roughly 60 per cent of Canadian respondents think the government, not the private sector, should have primary responsibility for leading behavioural change. The global average here is 44 per cent, and only 23 per cent in the United States. So is government doing enough? Uh... no -- 70 per cent of Canadian respondents said current government policies -- and I assume they're talking federal policies -- are ineffective.

In BC, wrangling over energy is ongoing:

• 2010/05/27: CBC: B.C. native leaders oppose Clean Energy Act
  The B.C. government is pushing ahead with its Clean Energy Act despite strong objections from First Nations groups, raising the possibility of escalating conflict between the two sides. The proposed act clears the way for dozens of independent power projects as well as the huge Site C dam on the Peace River in northeastern B.C., exempting many from review by the B.C. Utilities Commission. Area farmers, First Nations and environmental groups say the proposed Site C project will destroy prime agricultural land, and many say much of the power from Site C is destined for export.

Meanwhile in that Mechanical Mordor known as the tar sands:

• 2010/05/28: CanWest: Norwegian, French giants join carbon capture study
• 2010/05/28: Rabble: Enbridge wants oil tankers to travel B.C. coast
  Sointula, B.C. - On May 27 Enbridge escalated conflict on the coast when they took steps to break the First Nations ban on tanker traffic by applying to the federal government for approval of their Northern Gateway pipeline.
• 2010/05/17: Ceres: [link to 1.7 meg pdf] Canada's Oil Sands Face Significant Financial and Environmental Risks as Great as Those in BP Spill
  Long-Term Growth Plans on Collision Course With New Regulations, Climate Change
• 2010/05/29: ED: Ava-Tar Sands
• 2010/05/27: CBC: Enbridge bids to pipe oil to B.C. coast -- Greenpeace warns of tanker hazard
  Calgary-based Enbridge Inc. announced Thursday it has filed an application with the National Energy Board to build a $5.5-billion Northern Gateway Pipeline between Edmonton and a terminal on the west coast at Kitimat, B.C. The 1,172-kilometre project is planned as a twin underground pipeline system, with one 90-centimetre diameter pipeline to carry oilsands crude west and a 50-centimetre-wide pipe to bring condensate east.
• 2010/05/28: CanWest: Head in the (tar)sands
  We got a rare glimpse behind the doors of the Harper cabinet this week, through a leaked memo that suggests Environment Minister Jim Prentice is at odds with Finance Minister Jim Flaherty (and, perhaps, the prime minister) on the touchy subject of subsidies to the oil and gas industry. Touchy and timely. The memo, signed by deputy finance minister Michael Horgan, says Canada could take a "leadership role" at the upcoming G20 summit next month, win international plaudits for environmental and economic responsibility and help pay down the deficit by phasing out subsidies to Big Oil that have outlived their usefulness. What the memo, obtained by Canwest reporter Mike De Souza, didn't say was that such a counter-intuitive move would also confound the Harper government's green critics, especially the NDP, which has been clamouring for an end to corporate subsidies. According to the document, Prentice made a similar pitch to Flaherty before this year's budget -- to no avail. Still, it is an arresting optic: the Calgary-based environment minister arguing against (some) subsidies for the oil patch and the Ontario-based, fiscally orthodox finance minister deaf to his colleague's entreaties.
• 2010/05/23: DJID: Trucking Toward Climate Change
• 2010/05/27: CanWest: Oilsands polluting air at record levels: report
  Air quality tests show oilsands companies breached Alberta's air pollution targets more in 2009 than in previous years, an environmental report released Tuesday says. Environmental Defence Canada analyzed air quality data collected by industry-funded monitors over the past six years, and found companies violated the province's air quality standards more than 1,500 times in 2009, up from fewer than 50 times in 2004.

Also in Alberta:

• 2010/05/27: CBC: Alberta fosters new gas wells
  The Alberta government has introduced a new program to encourage energy firms to drill technically challenging wells in the province. Under the new rules, shale gas, coalbed methane and horizontal oil and gas wells will have an initial maximum five per cent royalty rate as of May 1, although that is to be reviewed in 2014.

Ontario has it's Green Energy Act, now comes the implementation:

• 2010/05/25: CleanBreak: Queen's U study says government support for solar manufacturing a no brainer

  In the Maritimes:

• 2010/05/24: CBC: Environmental group relies on corporate funds
  A Prince Edward Island environmental organization will have to rely more on corporate donations to fund their projects as federal contributions continue to be "a big question mark." The Bedeque Bay Environmental Management Association has been asking for more private funding to keep its projects running.
  [...]
  The BBEMA and 16 other similar groups across Atlantic Canada had problems earlier this year getting federal funding. The 16 associations belonging to the Atlantic Coastal Action Program all offer programs, such as water testing, climate change information and best farming practices.
• 2010/05/24: CBC: N.S. coastal policy 'dysfunctional': group
  The Ecology Action Centre is calling Nova Scotia's policy on coastal zones dysfunctional in a report that also urges the creation of a department to enforce new rules in the sensitive areas.

In the North, Nunavut hunters are worried about losing the polar bear hunting market:

• 2010/05/29: ChronicleHerald: Nunavut: Polar bear population is healthy
  Iqaluit, Nunavut - Ottawa should downgrade the protection status that polar bears receive under federal legislation, the Nunavut government said Friday. In a reversal of its previous position, and in defiance of most scientific opinion, territorial environment minister Daniel Shewchuk said bear populations are healthy and should no longer come under the Species At Risk Act. "We do not think bears should be listed," said Shewchuk.
• 2010/05/28: CBC: Polar bears not at risk: Nunavut

  As for miscellaneous Canadiana:

• 2010/05/24: CabWest: Feds to put price on Canada's nature
  A unique research project at Environment Canada could soon offer a new perspective for Canadians on conservation and its economic value, says a director in the federal department. Following a fall report released by the United Nations Environment Programme that concluded natural ecosystems around the world were worth trillions of dollars in the global economy, the Harper government is following up with the development of its own framework to evaluate the economic value of nature in Canada.
• 2010/05/26: PI: Study: Canadian cities need to accelerate green transportation and urban design

  The movement toward a long term ecologically viable economics is glacial:

• 2010/05/27: EnergyBulletin: The World After Abundance [Greer]
• 2010/05/27: EnergyBulletin: Resilient gardening - Part I
• 2010/05/26: EconView: "Towards a New Ethics of Nature"
• 2010/05/25: Yale360: Eyeing the Difficult Path To a Sustainable Future
  Environmentalist David Orr says the easy part of helping the United States live within its ecological limits may be passing laws, such as one that puts a price on carbon. The hard part ... is changing a culture of consumption that causes extensive environmental damage --- and unhappiness.

Apocalypso anyone?

• 2010/05/29: EnergyBulletin: Three Chinese curses
• 2010/05/24: EnergyBulletin: A flock of black swans

  As for how the media handles the science of climatology:

• 2010/05/27: DWWSJ: The Daily Mail Continues It's Record Of NEVER Getting a Story On Science Right
• 2010/05/26: ClimateP: Brulle: "The NY Times doesn't need to go to European conferences to find out why public opinion on climate change has shifted... Just look in the mirror."
• 2010/05/25: Guardian(UK): Mainstream experiments
  Science belongs on TV -- we must reject any idea that primetime always equals dumbing down
• 2010/05/25: ClassM: Editorial misconduct on the climate beat

  While activists search for effective communication techniques:

• 2010/05/27: Eureka: Beyond polar bears? Experts look for a new vision of climate change to combat skepticism
• 2010/05/26: PhysOrg: Beyond polar bears - finding a new way to communicate climate change

  Here is something for your library:

• 2010/05/27: NYRB: [Book Reviews] The Message from the Glaciers
  _Climate Change 2007: The Physical Science Basis_ Working Group I Contribution to the Fourth Assessment Report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change
  _When the Rivers Run Dry: Water - The Defining Crisis of the Twenty-first Century_ by Fred Pearce
  _Too Smart for Our Own Good: The Ecological Predicament of Humankind_ by Craig Dilworth
  _Black Soot and the Survival of Tibetan Glaciers_ by Baiqing Xu, Junji Cao, James Hansen, and others
  _On Avoiding Dangerous Anthropogenic Interference with the Climate System: Formidable Challenges Ahead_ by Veerabhadran Ramanathan and Y. Feng
  _The Great Melt: The Coming Transformation of the Arctic_ by Alun Anderson
• 2008//: SUP: Agnotology: The Making and Unmaking of Ignorance edited by Robert N. Proctor and Londa Schiebinger
• 2010/05/27: Science: [Book Reviews] [link to 85k pdf] The Climate Change Debates
  _Merchants of Doubt: How a Handful of Scientists Obscured the Truth on Issues from Tobacco Smoke to Global Warming_ by Naomi Oreskes and Erik M. Conway
  _Why We Disagree About Climate Change: Understanding Controversy, Inaction and Opportunity_ by Mike Hulme
  _Storms of My Grandchildren: The Truth About the Coming Climate Catastrophe and Our Last Chance to Save Humanity_ by James Hansen
  _Science as a Contact Sport: Inside the Battle to Save Earth's Climate_ by Stephen H. Schneider
  _The Lomborg Deception: Setting the Record Straight About Global Warming_ by Howard Friel
  _The Climate Solutions Consensus_ by David E. Blockstein and Leo Wiegman
  _Climate Change Science and Policy_ Stephen H. Schneider, Armin Rosencranz, Michael D. Mastrandrea, and Kristin KuntzÂDuriseti, Eds.
  _The Politics of Climate Change_ by Anthony Giddens
• 2010/05/28: ClassM: More reading for a hot summer
• 2010/05/26: ClassM: [Book Review] eaarth by Bill McKibben
• 2010/05/25: HotTopic: [Book Review] _In the Shadow of Melting Glaciers: Climate Change and Andean Society_ by Mark Carey

  And for your film & video enjoyment:

• 2010/05/28: ClimateP: Why do we give oil companies such large subsidies? [video]
• 2010/05/27: CCP: Mars Attacks!!! Climate Denial Crock of the Week by Peter Sinclair
• 2010/05/25: JKB: Infrared absorption by CO2 [video]

  Meanwhile among the 'Sue the Bastards!' contingent:

• 2010/05/25: PlanetArk: Chevron Asks Ecuador Court To Dismiss Key Expert
  In a filing to the Lago Agrio court on Friday, Chevron said it was seeking the dismissal of geologist Richard Cabrera as an appointee and the rejection of his work in its entirety. Cabrera has said Chevron should pay $27 billion in compensation for environmental damage stemming from oil pollution in the Amazon rain forest. The lawsuit contends that Texaco, which Chevron bought in 2001, polluted the jungle and damaged the health of local residents by dumping 18 billion gallons (68 billion liters) of contaminated water from 1972 to 1992.
• 2010/05/24: Reuters: Landmark court challenge could force action to curb climate-related flooding
  Climate change activists have taken their fight for flooding mitigation measures to the Philippines' supreme court, in a case that would also test the effectiveness of the world's first ever "writ of kalikasan" (nature).

Developing a new energy infrastructure is a fundamental challenge of the current generation:

• 2010/05/28: DM:DB: Teen's Winning Science Fair Project Could Turn Tire Dumps Into Power Stations
• 2010/05/28: TEC: Methodology for Assessing the Sustainability of Hydrogen Production from Solid Fuels
• 2010/05/28: REA: WFC Grades North American FIT Programs
• 2010/05/27: NewScientist: Sailing ships could harvest fuel from the oceans [by using wind to make H2]
• 2010/05/26: PhysOrg: Students harness vibrations from wind for electricity
• 2010/05/26: PeakEnergy: Japan could be geothermal energy leader
• 2010/05/26: PeakEnergy: Offshore oil vs. offshore wind ... who wins?
• 2010/05/25: CCurrents: How The Global Oil Watchdog Failed Its Mission
• 2010/05/25: Grist: Should we prefer investing in renewable energy to cleaning up the dirty stuff?
• 2010/05/24: TEC: Western States Could Reach 35% Renewable Power by 2017
• 2010/05/25: TEC: Energy Security and Oil Substitution
• 2010/05/23: BBerg: Duke Scouts China's Energy Options as U.S. Climate Bill Stalls
  Duke Energy Corp. is scouting for new clean-energy technologies in China after President Barack Obama's bid to pass U.S. legislation curbing carbon emissions stalled, the company's chief technology officer said.
• 2010/05/19: TPR: The Age of Space-Solar Energy: Innovation in the Public Interest

  Fracking is back:

• 2010/05/29: BBC: Shell buys East Resources natural gas firm
  Oil and gas giant Royal Dutch Shell has agreed to buy US natural gas explorer East Resources for $4.7bn (£3.2bn). The cash offer was made to East Resources and its private equity investor Kohlberg Kravis Roberts (KKR). East Resources holds more than 650,000 acres in the Marcellus shale, a rock formation running from West Virginia to New York, said to have vast amounts of natural gas.
• 2010/05/26: NRDC:SwitchBoard: Talking the talk on hydraulic fracturing chemical disclosure
• 2010/05/25: NRDC:SwitchBoard: Should the public know what chemicals are in hydraulic fracturing fluid?
• 2010/05/24: OilDrum: A Photographic Tour of a Natural Gas Well in the Marcellus Shale

  The answer my friend...:

• 2010/05/29: TreeHugger: Harnessing The Wind's Vibrations For Electricity
• 2010/05/25: StarTelegram: Wind industry executives pessimistic about growth this year
• 2010/05/26: PlanetArk: Colonial First State AMSC, Sinovel Will Jointly Develop Wind Turbines
  American Superconductor Corp, which makes electrical systems for wind farms and turbines, said it would design and jointly develop a range of advanced, multi-megawatt-scale wind turbines with China's Sinovel Wind Group. Sinovel expects to begin volume production of the turbines by the end of 2012 and will purchase core electrical components from AMSC, American Superconductor said.
• 2010/05/25: PhysOrg: Energy answer: Blowing in the wind?
• 2010/05/25: PlanetArk: GE To Supply Wind Turbines For Lake Erie Project
• 2010/05/25: TreeHugger: First Freshwater Offshore Wind Farm in US Planned for Lake Erie

  Meanwhile among the solar aficionados:

• 2010/05/28: CNBC: Community Solar Projects Sprout Up Across US
• 2010/05/29: REA: SolarEdge PV Inverters Set Record CEC Efficiency Rating [97.5%]
• 2010/05/25: CleanBreak: Queen's U study says government support for solar manufacturing a no brainer
• 2010/05/27: DerSpiegel: Developing Desertec -- European Dream of Desert Energy Takes Shape
  Can the Sahara Desert really meet Europe's voracious appetite for energy? The Desertec solar power project aims to do just that, but a host of obstacles remain. Overly optimistic expectations are now being scaled down as the project starts to take shape.
• 2010/05/28: REA: What is the short, mid and long term future for solar development in North Africa and Middle East?
• 2010/05/27: REA: First Duke Solar Power Project in NC Completed
• 2010/05/27: REA: BSW: German Solar Demand Still Booming in 2010
• 2010/05/27: REA: India´s "New Solar Mission" opens doors for fast development for the Concentrated Solar Thermal industry worldwide
• 2010/05/26: EurActiv: Solar firms in 'horse race' for technology leadership
• 2010/05/26: BWeek: Companies set up joint venture for solar projects
  SunEdison, the solar development division of MEMC Electronic Materials, announced a joint venture Tuesday that is authorized to spend as much as $1.5 billion on energy projects.
• 2010/05/25 PhysOrg: Engineers Help Power Solar Use by 'Mapping' the Sun
  As the use of solar power grows in California it will become more important to know exactly how much radiation and energy are generated in regions throughout the state. That's the basis behind an improved solar map for the state created by UC San Diego environmental engineering professor Jan Kleissl and his Ph.D. student Anders Nottrott
• 2010/05/26: REA: S&C To Provide Engineering for 850-MW Stirling Plant [near Barstow, California]
• 2010/05/25: PhysOrg: High-energy project in [California's] high desert [CPV]
• 2010/05/25: PlanetArk: Abengoa 50 MW Solar Plant Goes Online In Spain [CSP]
• 2010/05/24: TEC: French energy giant [Alstom] jumps into solar market [by investing in BrightSource]
• 2010/05/25: REA: Big Q1 for Solar Inverter Makers
• 2010/05/24: PlanetArk: SolarWorld Sees Chance To Expand In U.S.
• 2010/05/24: REA: Spire Produces World's Most Efficient Large Area Concentrator Solar Cell [41.0% at 500x suns]

  On the coal front:

• 2010/05/29: PakTrib: World Bank not to fund Thar coal project: spokesperson -- Pakistani experts shocked
• 2010/05/27: Reuters: Southern Co unit to build Mississippi coal plant -- Mississippi Power accepts revised regulatory order
• 2010/05/27: NRDC:SwitchBoard: A Little Light in These Hard Times -- Michigan coal plant derailed
• 2010/05/27: ClarionLedger: PSC reverses coal-plant ruling -- More charges OK'd for consumers
  State utility regulators loosened an earlier ruling Wednesday and told Mississippi Power Co. it could charge ratepayers up to an additional $480 million for its unprecedented coal plant project slated for Kemper County. The Public Service Commission's new ruling reverses course in allowing the utility company to pass on financing charges to ratepayers before the plant fires up.

Biofuel bickering abounds:

• 2010/05/28: Yahoo:Reuters: Novozymes sees China's commercial cellulosic ethanol in 2013
  The world's top industrial enzymes producer, Novozymes A/S, said on Friday that it expects China to launch its first commercial cellulosic ethanol facility by 2013. The Denmark-based company signed an agreement to provide enzymes for a demonstration plant in China that will produce 3 million gallons of ethanol from corn stalks by the third quarter of 2011, the company said at a briefing in Beijing.
• 2010/05/28: NRDC:SwitchBoard: Memorial Day message: corn ethanol tax credit is bad for your pocket book
• 2010/05/28: AlterNet: How [Palm Oil] an Ingredient Found in Everything from Chocolate to Chips Is Causing Massive Environmental Destruction
• 2010/05/24: bpa: The U.S. Exports More Corn Ethanol
• 2010/05/25: EnergyBulletin: The U.S. Exports More Corn Ethanol
• 2010/05/25: TEC: Final Thoughts on Methanol
• 2010/05/26: G&M: Biofuel makers dispute government study -- Industry says Environment Canada report underestimates benefits to environment, rural development
  Canadian biofuel makers have fired back after a critical Environment Canada analysis suggested the cost of government support for the ethanol and biodiesel industries far exceeds the environmental benefits. The Canadian Renewable Fuels Association released a report Wednesday that calculates the industry is providing $2-billion of economic impacts, over and above the costs that taxpayers and motorists will incur to support it.

The nuclear energy controversy continues:

• 2010/05/30: Yahoo:AP: Radioactive leak found, fixed at Vt. nuke plant
• 2010/05/29: NBF: Carnival of Nuclear Energy 3 - NEI 2009 Stats, Nuclear Renaissance and More
• 2010/05/29: TSun: We need efficient nuclear energy: Oil spill disaster highlights the dangers of deep water drilling
• 2010/05/28: NatureN: Financial meltdown imperils reactor -- Faced with a huge budget shortfall, Europe rethinks future of ITER fusion project
• 2010/05/27: TCoE: Spendy nukes throw a wrench into the renaissance
• 2010/05/27: ScienceInsider: No Solution Yet to ITER's Budget Crunch
• 2010/05/27: ABC(Au):TDU: Can decades old nuclear technology [fast breeder reactor] solve modern energy needs?
• 2010/05/25: Grist: Speaking of terrifying scenarios...By the way, is anyone checking on nuclear-plant safety plans?
• 2010/05/26: DerSpiegel: Spiraling Costs Threaten International Fusion Reactor Project
  The planned ITER fusion reactor in France is supposed to replicate conditions inside the Sun to produce limitless clean energy. But skyrocketing costs are putting the international project at risk. Now Germany's research minister has said Berlin will not write a blank check for the technology.
• 2010/05/20: NatGeo: New Nuclear Energy Grapples With Costs -- Exelon Sees Weak Market, Others Think Climate Concerns Will Propel Industry

  Yes we have a peak oil sighting:

• 2010/05/27: EnergyBulletin: The Peak Oil Crisis: After the Spill

  More people are talking about the electrical grid:

• 2010/05/27: NYT:CW: Texas Makes a New 'Map' to Decipher the Grid's Growing Complexities
• 2010/05/26: SolveClimate: Cisco Rolls Out First 'Connected Grid' Solution in Major Smart Grid Push

  And then there is the matter of efficiency & conservation:

• 2010/05/26: NRDC:SwitchBoard: Energy Efficiency Continues to Save Money and Cut Pollution in California
• 2010/05/27: TEC: DOE Paves The Way For Super Efficient Windows With New Program
• 2010/05/25 PhysOrg: Simple Energy Efficiency Measures Can Eliminate Electricity Shortage in India: Report

  Automakers & lawyers, engineers & activists argue over the future of the car:

• 2010/05/28: AutoBG: China makes us jealous by offering huge incentives to green car buyers
• 2010/05/28: SlashDot: When the US Government Built Ultra-Safe Cars
• 2010/05/28: PlanetArk: Nissan: electric cars could shed government aid in 4 years
• 2010/05/28: NRDC:SwitchBoard: Plug-in Electric Vehicles: Part of the Solution to Cut Oil Dependence and Cool the Planet
• 2010/05/28: Tyee: Out With The Old Engine, In With The New -- How an East Vancouver start-up is transforming gas-guzzlers to pure electric
• 2010/05/27: BBerg: GM to Develop New India Electric Car, Ends Reva Deal
• 2010/05/27: PhysOrg: Electric vehicle travels record-breaking 623 miles on a single charge
  The Japan Electric Vehicle Club broke its own Guinness World Record last weekend by driving an electric vehicle for a distance of 623.76 miles (1,003 kilometers) without recharging. The new distance record nearly doubles the old record of 345 miles (555.6 kilometers) that was set last November.
• 2010/05/27: AutoBG: Report: Toyota and Daimler planning "extensive cooperation" on fuel cell development
• 2010/05/27: AutoBG: Daimler, BYD sign joint venture agreement to bring electric cars to China
• 2010/05/27: AutoBG: Study: 4.7 million EV chargers coming worldwide by 2015
• 2010/05/26: PlanetArk: Electric Cars Can Win 10 Pct Share By 2020: [Royal Academy of Engineering] Report
• 2010/05/24: ABC(Au): Plugs replace pumps at car recharging station
  New South Wales' first public electric car charging station has been opened in Sydney.
• 2010/05/26: TreeHugger: DIY Electric Car Breaks World Record Going 624 Miles on One Charge
• 2010/05/24: PlanetArk: Toyota Gets Tesla Stake, Tesla Gets Toyota Factory
• 2010/05/24: Grist: Electric-car company Tesla gets infusion of cash from Toyota
• 2010/05/24: TEC: What if 25% of the Cars were plug in...How much power is needed?

  As for Energy Storage:

• 2010/05/29: AutoBG: With new plants in China and Europe, EnerDel to triple li-ion production by end of 2011
• 2010/05/28: AutoBG: Magna International invests $400-600 million in battery production
• 2010/05/26: PlanetArk: Honda Eyes China To Develop Car Batteries
• 2010/05/26: PlanetArk: Magna Plans E-Car Battery Factories In EU, U.S.

  The reaction of business to climate change will be critical:

• 2010/05/25: Reuters: Majority of firms will spend more on climate change
  Seventy percent of firms with revenue of $1 billion or more say they plan to increase spending on climate change initiatives in the next two years, a global survey reported on Tuesday.

Joe Romm posts a daily list of top energy and climate stories:

• 2010/05/27: ClimateP: Energy and Global Warming News for May 27...
• 2010/05/26: ClimateP: Energy and Global Warming News for May 26...
• 2010/05/25: ClimateP: Energy and Global Warming News for May 25...
• 2010/05/24: ClimateP: Energy and Global Warming News for May 24...

  Other (weekly) lists:

• 2010/05/26: C411: Blog highlights from the past few days
• 2010/05/27: C411: Yesterday's blog highlights
• 2010/05/27: Grist: A Walk Through the Week's Climate News -- The Climate Post: BP oil spill washes up on Potomac shores

  The carbon lobby are up to the usual:

• 2010/05/30: HotTopic: Whose lie is it anyway? Easterbrook caught red-handed
• 2010/05/29: QuarkSoup: Status of Climate Science
• 2010/05/29: DWWSJ: My Lord! You Hath No Clothes!
• 2010/05/29: RealityCheck: Monckton debunked
• 2010/05/24: Denialism: The New Scientist Debates Denialism
• 2010/05/28: DeSmogBlog: 'Energy Town Hall' Oil Bus Tour Run by GOP Team At American Energy Alliance
• 2010/05/28: CCP: John Abraham of St. Thomas Univ., Minn., produces must hear debunking of the Potty Peer Monckton -- an employee of the Climate Denial Machine
• 2010/05/28: IJISH: "Register of Climate Realists" quietly renamed; deniers sue NASA after cracking into NASA computer
• 2010/05/28: TSoD: The First Law of Thermodynamics Meets the Imaginary Second Law
• 2010/05/28: TreeHugger: Lord 'Climate Activists Are Hitler Youth' Monckton's Skeptic Claims Point-by-Point Debunked
• 2010/05/27: ClimateP: MN professor eviscerates Monckton in must-see video -- TVMOB's talk proves "how easy it is to fabricate data."
• 2010/05/27: TSC: The Dunning-Kruger effect and the climate scum
• 2010/05/27: ClimateShifts: Scientists are skeptics, denialists are ideologues
• 2010/05/27: HotTopic: Cooling-gate: the 100 years of warming [Don] Easterbrook wants you to ignore
• 2010/05/25: DeSmogBlog: Christopher Monckton: Lies, damn lies or staggering incompetence
• 2010/05/25: ClimateShifts: Class Dissection: Lord Christopher Monckton lies exposed.
• 2010/05/25: Stoat: Eric Fnorrd and his Ouija Board?
• 2010/05/25: BCLSB: Your Daily Nazi: Marc Morano Finds New Allies!
• 2010/05/25: HotTopic: Cooling-gate: Easterbrook defends the indefensible
• 2010/05/24: ClimateP: ExxonMobil says we need to destroy our grandchildren's future to save them
• 2010/05/24: NewScientist: Living in denial: The truth is our only weapon [Shermer]
• 2010/05/23: ClimateShifts: Steve Macintyre at the Heartland Institute's "conference"
• 2010/05/23: CSW: ABC World News: Climate Scientists Claim 'McCarthy-Like Threats'
• 2010/05/23: ABC(US): Climate Scientists Claim 'McCarthy-Like Threats,' Say They Face Intimidation, Ominous E-Mails
• 2010/05/23: DM:CCM: ABC News Covers the New War on Climate Research (and on Michael Mann)
• 2010/05/23: TCoE: Deniers on parade: Attacking Michael Mann

  Meanwhile in the 'clean coal' saga:

• 2010/05/28: Grist: What's next for coal ash?
• 2010/05/28: SouthernStudies: 'Dumpsites In Disguise'
  Coal ash isn't just dumped; it's increasingly being recycled into building materials and other uses. But in states like North Carolina, the failure to adequately regulate one so-called "beneficial use" of the toxic-filled waste is putting communities at risk.
• 2010/05/27: SolveClimate: Investigation Shows So-Called 'Beneficial Use' of Coal Ash Putting Communities at Risk
  Case study in North Carolina reveals coal ash fills are damaging groundwater and threatening public health
• 2010/05/26: Grist: Power Politics -- Big energy vs. coal ash regulation
• 2010/05/25: Grist: Spreading the pain to Alabama -- Disaster in east Tennessee
• 2010/05/25: AJC: Southern Co. shareholder vote to address coal ash
• 2010/05/24: Grist: it's time for action on coal ash -- Coal's dirty secret

  As for climate miscellanea:

• 2010/05/30: TSoD: Clouds and Water Vapor -- Part One
• 2010/05/29: ClimateSight: The Energy Budget
• 2010/05/28: BobPark: What's New?
  3. Global warming: National Research Council releases reports.
  4. Hurricanes too? More bad news for the gulf coast.
• 2010/05/28: TreeHugger: Goddamn TreeHuggers: Why Do So Many People Hate Environmentalists?
• 2010/05/26: RRapier: Changing Attitudes on Climate Change
• 2010/05/28: DerSpiegel: Climate Capsules -- What to Do When the Earth Warms Up?
  Given humankind's lackadaisical response to climate change, a museum in Hamburg is presenting fanciful visions of how humans might adapt to disaster. "Climate Capsules," an exhibition starting Friday, imagines people of the future in oceangoing cities and other artificial, self-contained environments.
• 2010/05/28: HotTopic: It's as simple as that
• 2010/05/27: IC: (link to mp3) Irregular Climate Episode 1
• 2010/05/27: Grist: A chat with energy analyst Trevor Houser about how to assess climate legislation
• 2010/05/28: SciNow: Does a Country's Dirt Determine Its Destiny?
• 2010/05/28: TEC: Cozy Financial Relationships Between Environmentalists and Oil and Natural Gas Companies
• 2010/05/24: WaPo: Nature Conservancy faces potential backlash from ties with BP
• 2010/05/27: NASA:JPL: NASA Takes to the Air With New 'Earth Venture' Research Projects
• 2010/05/27: Guardian(UK): A forum to make sense of climate science
  The Science Museum's new gallery aims to deepen the understanding of those who accept man-made global warming and inform those who are unsure
• 2010/05/27: MoD: Quote of the day
• 2010/05/27: ClimateP: Women's role in a warming world
• 2010/05/26: DesmogBlog: Friends of Gin and Tonic: Drunk on Science and Satire
• 2010/05/26: SkeptiSci: Collective Intelligence and climate change
• 2010/05/25: C-a-S: Rewiring the Mind or the Planet?
• 2010/05/21: AlterNet: 'An Edible History of Humanity': How What We Eat Has Changed the World

  And here are a couple of sites you may find interesting and/or useful:

• China Dialogue - China and the world discuss the environment
• Climate Himalaya Initiative
• Feed The Future
• Wiki: Lotka-Volterra equation [the predator-prey equations]
• Wiki: Carrying Capacity
• Wiki: ERoEI
• CCentral: News
• CSIRO: News
• JournalFeeds - Science
• FoGT: Friends of Gin and Tonic -- Self Interest and Climate Change Denial
• Edible Landscape Forum
• bpa: big picture agriculture
• Wiki: Bølling-Allerød
• Ecology Action Centre
• Green Is The New Red
• GWWatch: Global Warming Watch
• BCLSB: BigCityLib Strikes Back (some Canadian GW)
• Wiki: Madden-Julian oscillation

My first novel Water was published in Canada May, 2007. The American release was in October. An Introductionto the novel is available, along with the Unpublished Forewordand the Launch Talk. An overview of my writing is available here.

P.S. Recent postings can be found in the week archive and the ancient postings can be accessed here, which should open to this.

"At first I thought I was fighting to save rubber trees; then I I thought I was fighting to save the Amazon rainforest; now I realize I am fighting for humanity." -Chico Mendes

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