Logging the Onset of The Bottleneck Years
This weekly posting is brought to you courtesy of H. E. Taylor. Happy reading, I hope you enjoy this week's Global Warming news roundup
Another week of Climate Instability News
Information overload is pattern recognition
June 6, 2010
- Chuckles, Bonn, REDD, COP15, COP16+, Oxfam, UNEP, Growing Atolls
- Bottom Line, Carbon Tariffs, Eli-EPA, Commitment, IAC, Post CRU, Royal Revu
- Melting Arctic, Prediction, Antarctica
- Food Crisis, Food vs. Biofuel, Food Production
- Hurricanes, Monsoon, GHGs, Carbon Cycle, Temperatures
- Aerosols, Paleoclimate, ENSO, Solar, Satellites
- Impacts, Forests, Wacky Weather, Extreme Weather, Tornadoes, Wildfires
- Corals, Acidification, Glaciers, Sea Levels, Floods & Droughts
- Transportation, Buildings, Sequestration
- Journals, Other Docs , Galin, Hansen, Pielke
- International Politics: Misc., UN, Bank Tax, Polls, Water Politics & Business
- National Politics: America, Fiorina, Massey, NAS-ACC, Cuccinelli
- Obama, USAdmin, Congress, Climate Bill, Al Gore
- Britain, Europe, Australia, India, China, Japan
- Canada, Emissions, G8/G20, Offshore Drilling, AECL, BC, Alberta, Ontario, Maritimes
- Ecological Economics, IPAT, Apocalypso, Media, Books, Video, Courts
- Energy, Fracking, Wind, Solar, Coal, Biofuel, Nukes, Peak Oil, Grid, Cars, Gee Whiz, Energy Storage
- Business, Greenwashing, Joe's List, Carbon Lobby, Miscellaneous Climate, Useful Links
- Shameless Self Promotion, .sig
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- 2010/06/06: uComics: (cartoon - Toles) Context
- 2010/06/02: XKCD: (cartoon - xkcd) The Worst Case Scenario
- 2010/06/02: TSC: The Climate Scum Want Poor People to Stay Poor!
- 2010/06/02: SolveClimate: Climate Activists Turn to Political Humor, for a Serious Purpose
- 2010/06/02: ClimateP: (cartoon - Toles) Drilling, warming, and Sarah Palin: "Unlike oil spills and climate change, she IS a fraud."
- 2010/06/01: AFTIC: (cartoon - TomTom) The Doomsday Bomb
- 2010/05/31: RealityCheck: (cartoon - Stein) Top Kill
- 2010/05/31: ClimateP: (cartoon - TomTom) What could possibly go wrong?
- 2010/05/31: ERabett: (cartoon -?) Troll of the weak before
UNFCCC talks opened again this week in Bonn:
- 2010/06/05: DeutscheWelle: Bonn climate negotiators drag on with little progress
- 2010/06/04: Reuters: Murky climate finance risks undermining trust at U.N. talks
- 2010/06/04: BizSpectator: A change in climate at Bonn
The United Nations climate change talks have resumed in Bonn with a new sense of urgency and common purpose. The negotiations which began this week are due to run till June 11... - 2010/06/04: RadioAus: Bonn delegates still a long way off climate change text agreement
- 2010/06/02: 3News(NZ): Bonn talks touch on forestry carbon sinks
- 2010/06/03: Antara: Indonesia asks for 2nd developed nations` emission reduction commitment [after their first Kyoto Protocol commitment ends in 2012]
- 2010/06/01: BWeek: False start for Bonn talks as Copenhagen row rumbles on
Small group of Latin American countries refuse to discuss negotiating text containing elements of Copenhagen Accord - 2010/05/31: UNEP: UN Climate Change Talks in Bonn
Second round of Bonn UN Climate Change Talks in 2010 designed to pave way for full implementation of climate change action across the globe - 2010/06/01: PlanetArk: Rich-Poor Rifts Stall Progress At U.N. Climate Talks
- 2010/05/31: ABC(Au): Negotiators face slow grind at climate summit
- 2010/06/01: People's Daily: Second round of climate talks in 2010 starts to pave way for Cancun
- 2010/06/01: IrishTimes: Bonn climate change talks aim to pick up the pieces from Copenhagen
- 2010/05/31: Reuters: Rich-poor rifts stall progress at U.N. climate talks
U.N. climate talks opened on Monday, exposing familiar rifts between rich and poor countries which delegates said were likely to delay a re-start of formal negotiations. The 185-nation Bonn conference, which will run until June 11, is the biggest international meeting on climate change since a summit last December in Copenhagen failed to agree a new pact. Several countries said they could not give a green light to formal negotiations on a new text published in mid-May and which outlines a huge range of options for fighting climate change. - 2010/05/31: EUO: UN climate talks re-start amid widespread pessimism, mistrust
- 2010/05/31: UN: Latest round of UN climate change talks kicks off
Representatives from 182 governments have gathered in Bonn, Germany, today for a fresh round of United Nations talks on climate change, aiming to pick up on issues left unresolved after December's gathering in Copenhagen. - 2010/05/31: ABC(Au): Negotiators face slow grind at climate summit
Environmental groups are urging countries to accelerate action on a new international deal on carbon emission reductions in the first climate change talks since the Copenhagen summit last year. Delegates from around the world have converged on the German city of Bonn as talks begin between representatives from 190 countries. - 2010/05/31: BWeek: Figueres Says UN Will Set 'Pillars' of Climate Deal
- 2010/05/30: Yahoo:AFP: Prudence now the watchword as UN climate talks resume [at Bonn]
- 2010/05/30: Xinhuanet: Breakthrough for climate talks far away amid European debt crisis, U.S. reluctance
- 2010/05/31: EarthTimes: New UN climate change talks pin hopes on Mexico summit
Bonn - Around 5,000 delegates from around the world began talks in Germany on Monday in a renewed attempt to bring the United Nations' climate change negotiations on track, ahead of another summit in Mexico later this year. The beginning of the UN conference, set to last almost two weeks, aims to set a framework for discussions ahead of the November summit in Cancun. - 2010/06/01: BWeek: Forest Plan by Australia, Europe Faces Climate Veto
Papua New Guinea is among developing countries that may veto a plan at United Nations talks by nations including Australia to count carbon dioxide stored in vegetation such as trees as part of their emissions targets. Industrialized countries may overstate projected carbon emissions from logging and land use and then take credit when greenhouse-gas output falls short, said Kevin Conrad, Papua New Guinea's lead climate negotiator. Trees absorb carbon when they grow and release it when they rot or burn. "It's climate fraud," Conrad said in an interview in Bonn where delegates are meeting to lay the framework for a climate treaty later this year. "We'd rather have lower overall emissions cuts than dishonest numbers." - 2010/06/04: TreeHugger: REDD Forest Protection Program Could Threaten Rights of 350 Million People
- 2010/06/03: MongaBay: REDD threatens rights of 350 million local people
- 2010/06/03: MongaBay: Corruption could undermine REDD
- 2010/05/31: SolveClimate: Forestry Loophole in U.N. Climate Text Could Stoke Global Warming
Logging rules for rich could undermine climate talks, must be tossed out in Bonn, advocates warn Rich nations are pushing to lock in a logging loophole at the United Nations climate talks in Bonn that would give them leeway to increase forest carbon emissions -- rather than reduce them -- and not pay a price, a group of advocates warned. - 2010/06/03: NewScientist: Memo reveals Copenhagen climate talks blame game
- 2010/06/01: TCoE: The deadly illusion of Copenhagen
- 2010/05/31: Guardian(UK): Copenhagen climate failure blamed on 'Danish text'
The UN's climate change chief blamed a secret draft treaty, leaked to the Guardian, for the summit failure
Drip by drip, the full story is emerging of last December's global diplomatic debacle in Copenhagen, when instead of setting the world on a new low carbon path and tackling climate change, 130 world leaders ended up with a weak deal and no prospect of a binding agreement for another 18 months. The latest revelations come from the man at the very heart of the debacle, UN climate chief Yvo de Boer. Normally the model of a discreet and guarded international bureaucrat, his confidential letter of explanation to his colleagues, written only days after the meeting ended, displays a mix of bemusement, clarity and exasperation. "How could several years of negotiation and high level diplomacy be allowed to end up this way?", he asks. The letter appears in a new Danish book by journalist Per Meilstrup. His letter puts the blame squarely on Danish PM Lars Løkke Rasmussen and his presidency of the summit. He identifies the war which had been going on between Rasmussen's office and Danish climate chief Connie Hedegaard's team in the energy ministry. Hedegaard stood down halfway through the summit. The key event, he suggests, was Rasmussen's draft text. This, known widely as the "Danish text", was due to be wheeled out just when the talks reached a deadlock, as they were bound to do. The trouble was, implies De Boer, the text was clearly advantageous to the US and the west, would have steamrollered the developing countries... - 2010/05/31: EarthTimes: Too many leaders 'paralysed' Copenhagen climate talks, book claims
Copenhagen - The presence of over 100 world leaders at the Copenhagen climate summit in December paralysed decision-making, the outgoing UN climate chief says in a new Danish book published Monday. The Danish hosts were also partly to blame for the failed outcome at the Copenhagen conference after a draft document was leaked, Danish author Per Meilstrup said, quoting an email from Yvo de Boer, who July 1 is to leave the UN framework convention on climate change (UNFCCC). "[The Danish text] destroyed two years of effort in one fell swoop," de Boer wrote in the email to colleagues after the talks. "All our attempts to prevent the paper happening failed. The meeting at which it was presented was unannounced and the paper unbalanced." The Danish draft was presented to a few countries including the US, China and Russia. It was obtained and published by the British newspaper The Guardian, angering other countries. - 2010/05/31: Guardian(UK): Presence of world leaders 'paralysed' climate summit, UN letter claims
United Nations climate chief says Danish presidency's backing for US also derailed Copenhagen negotiations - 2010/06/04: BizGreen: [EU climate commissioner Connie] Hedegaard insists EU will push for "ambitious outcome" in Mexico
Climate Commissioner hits back at suggestion pessimism is undermining international talks - 2010/06/03: TerraDaily: EU hopes for 'ambitious outcome' at summit: climate chief
- 2010/06/02: Reuters: "Ambitious" Mexico rejects climate progress doubts [Interview - Luis Alfonso de Alba, Mexico's special representative for climate change]
- 2010/06/02: BizGreen: UN climate talks face up to cash flow fears -- Can stalled climate negotiations get any worse?
The already fraught international climate change negotiations are facing a fresh challenge after Yvo de Boer, the outgoing head of the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change, revealed that the secretariat does not have sufficient funds to host two additional meetings ahead of the Cancun summit in November. - 2010/05/31: Scotsman: Climate change cash 'must not be loans'
The annual £69 billion pledged by rich countries to help poor nations deal with climate change must not be given as loans. Oxfam warned yesterday that such a move would simply increase Third World debt. The aid agency also said the amount provided for developing countries to develop without polluting and handle the impacts of rising temperatures needs to double to £137 billion a year. - 2010/05/31: BBC:RB: Climate funds lack clarity
A UNEP report on sustainability picked up a lot of comment:
- 2010/06/01: TreeHugger: [link to 5.5 meg pdf] UNEP Report Shows Green Movement Has Its Priorities Straight (More or Less...)
- 2010/06/03: EurActiv: Go veggie, cut fossil fuels to aid planet, says UN study
An overhaul of world farming and more vegetarianism should be top priorities to protect the environment, along with curbs on fossil fuel use, a UN-backed study said on Wednesday (2 June). - 2010/06/03: Grida: Dead planet, living planet: Biodiversity and ecosystem restoration for sustainable development
Biodiversity and ecosystems deliver crucial services to humankind -- from food security to keeping our waters clean, buffering against extreme weather, providing medicines to recreation and adding to the foundation of human culture. Together these services have been estimated to be worth over 21-72 trillion USD every year -- comparable to the World Gross National Income of 58 trillion USD in 2008. - 2010/06/03: UN: Restoring damaged ecosystems can generate wealth and employment -- UN report
- 2010/06/03: EarthTimes: UN: Restoring damaged ecosystems makes economic sense
- 2010/06/02: Guardian(UK): UN urges global move to meat and dairy-free diet
- 2010/06/02: CBC: UN report calls for changes in diet, fuel use -- More vegetarianism and less energy use called for
- 2010/06/02: UN: Agriculture, energy sectors to shape sustainability of future development - UN
How the world contends with the agriculture and energy sectors will serve as a bellwether for development in the 21st century, largely determining whether growth will be sustainable for billions of people, according to a new United Nations-backed report. With current production and consumption of fossil fuels and food draining freshwater supplies, triggering losses of forests and other ecosystems and raising pollution levels, the study concludes that dramatically reforming, rethinking and redesigning how the planet's people are fed and fueled could spur environmental, social and economic returns. - 2010/06/01: WorldChanging: UNEP's Green Economy Initiative Report Makes the Case for Sustainable Fisheries
- 2010/06/02: Eureka: Fossil-fuel use and feeding world cause greatest environmental impacts: UNEP panel
Coral atolls in the South Pacific may escape sea level rise by growing:
- 2010/06/03: KSJT: New Scientist, AP, lots more: As South Pacific sea level rises, many atoll islands are growing. (Maybe you heard this before?)
- 2010/06/03: CBC: South Pacific islands grow despite rising sea
- 2010/06/02: NewScientist: Shape-shifting islands defy sea-level rise
And on the Bottom Line:
- 2010/06/05: WorldChanging: Roundup: The Economics of Ecosystems and Biodiversity
- 2010/06/03: Grist: World's ecosystems provide services equal to global income
- 2010/06/03: TerraDaily: World's ecosystems provide 'services' equal to global income
- 2010/06/04: BBC:RB: Profiting from nature's portfolio
- 2010/06/03: TerraDaily: Researchers Calculate The Greenhouse Gas Value Of Ecosystems
- 2010/06/03: VoxEU: Green stimulus is not sufficient for a global green recovery by Edward B. Barbier
Nearly one-sixth of the more than $3 trillion in fiscal stimulus spent in 2008 and 2009 was allocated to green spending. But this column argues that without correcting existing market and policy distortions, the "greening" of the world economy will be short-lived. Now more than ever, the world needs a global green New Deal -- and it needs the G20 to lead the way. - 2010/06/04: IndiaTimes: India asks UN to take tough stand against protectionism
India has demanded that the UN prevent any green protectionism by developed countries and include an explicit statement in the opening charter of any new deal to block carbon-based taxes being imposed on exports from developing countries such as India. The statement to the effect was made by the Indian delegation at the start of climate negotiations in Bonn on Tuesday. - 2010/05/31: EarthTimes: EU should impose 'carbon tax' [tariff] on developing countries, study finds
Eli continues to unravel the EPA responses:
- 2010/06/02: ERabett: Eli can retire Part XIV - Death, no taxes -- US EPA responses to comments
Real Climate continues the commitment discussion:
- 2010/06/02: RealClimate: Climate Change Commitment II
Regarding the IPCC review by the IAC panel:
- 2010/06/02: ScienceInsider: [IAC] Panel Seeks Expert Opinions on IPCC Process
Post CRU theft, controversy & inquiry:
- 2010/06/03: SEasterbrook: Reconstructing context from email databases
- 2010/06/05: IJISH: Climategate is dead, long live SwiftHack, er, BPgate, or whatever other shiny news item there is
- 2010/06/03: DeSmogBlog: Putting Conspiracy Theories to Rest: Scholars and Rogues puts 'Climategate' in Context
- 2010/06/03: S&R: How much context is in the Climategate emails?
- 2010/06/03: Deltoid: The context of the stolen CRU emails
- 2010/06/01: MoD: Phil Jones of CRU defended by prominent climate contrarian
Late comment on that Royal Society review:
- 2010/05/29: BBC: Harrabin's Notes: Getting the message
In his regular column, BBC environment analyst Roger Harrabin looks at the fall-out from complaints that some of the Royal Society had oversimplified its messages in public statements on climate change. - 2010/06/05: SciNews: Melting at the microscale -- Studying sea ice close-up may improve climate models
- 2010/06/04: TerraDaily: Earth On The Rocks [Greenland ice]
- 2010/06/04: CSM: Arctic sea ice at lowest point in thousands of years
- 2010/06/04: CanWest: Worst retreat of Arctic sea ice in thousands of years -- study
A major international study of Arctic sea ice has concluded that the recent, record-setting retreat is the worst in thousands of years -- a conclusion that challenges skeptics' claims that the meltdown being witnessed in Canada's North is probably just the latest low ebb in a historical cycle of ice loss and regeneration. The new study, involving 18 scientists from five countries and to be published in the journal Quaternary Science Reviews, includes data from two Canadian co-authors who interpret historic levels of ice cover from ancient whalebones found throughout the polar region. Other evidence marshalled in the bid to reconstruct ancient Arctic climate conditions include patterns of driftwood deposit and chemical signatures in seabed sediments and ice cores. - 2010/06/03: CC&G: Tracking JAXA Arctic Sea Ice Extent Trends
- 2010/06/02: OSU: Arctic ice at low point compared to recent geologic history
- 2010/06/02: SciDaily: Arctic Ice at Low Point Compared to Recent Geologic History
- 2010/06/01: MGS: Sea Ice Estimations
- 2010/06/01: SkeptiSci: On the Question of Diminishing Arctic Ice Extent
- 2010/05/31: ERabett: Ups and downs
Here's something to stick in your pipe:
- 2010/06/03: MGS: When will Arctic ice be gone?
The short answer, before I give you all the qualifiers needed to make sense of it, is 2035, give or take 7 years. - 2010/06/03: SciDaily: Drilling Into the Unknown: First Exploration of a Sub-Glacial Antarctic Lake Is a Major Step Closer
- 2010/06/01: KSJT: WSJournal: In Antarctica, a freezing cold place, researchers seek an explanation in CO2 bubbles for global warmings past
The food crisis is ongoing:
- 2010/06/04: Reuters: Storm to worsen Guatemala food crisis - aid agencies
- 2010/06/03: FAO: International prices of agricultural commodities drop
But high prices of non-cereal products still keep food import bills high, especially in developing countries - 2010/06/03: CDreams: Severe Drought Causes Hunger for 10 Million in West Africa
- 2010/06/02: HindustanTimes: Climate change failed two crop cycles
- 2010/06/03: UN: Global food prices plummet, UN reports
- 2010/06/02: ProMedMail: Wheat stem rust, Ug99 group: new races
- 2010/06/01: Eureka: Uncovering the mystery of a major threat to wheat [stripe rust]
- 2010/05/31: NYT: Virus Ravages Cassava Plants in Africa
[...]
...a new and more damaging virus named brown streak, for the marks it leaves on stems. That newcomer, brown streak, is now ravaging cassava crops in a great swath around Lake Victoria, threatening millions of East Africans who grow the tuber as their staple food.
[...]
The threat could become global. After rice and wheat, cassava is the world's third-largest source of calories. - 2010/05/31: ProMedMail: Stripe rust, wheat - Africa, Asia: new strain
The conflict between biofuel and food persists:
- 2010/06/01: TreeHugger: Cars and People Compete for Grain [Lester Brown]
And how are we going to feed 9 billion?
- 2010/06/02: WFP: "We Can Make Malnutrition History," WFP Head Says
Leading experts on nutrition, gathered in a world-famous museum in the heart of Rome, heard that the world was now at a tipping point where it had the scientific understanding and know-how to come together to make malnutrition history. - 2010/06/01: WFP: Statement by WFP Executive Director Josette Sheeran on Nutrition Forum in Rome
- 2010/06/01: FAO: FAO urges early action on climate change responses -- Agriculture can be part of solutions
- 2010/06/02: FAO: Wheat rust tracking site launched -- FAO launches Rust SPORE to step up global surveillance of Ug99 strain
- 2010/06/04: FAO: Europe beefs up support to global food security -- FAO gets additional 13.2 million euros in EU-funding
- 2010/06/04: PhysOrg: [South Dakota Cooperative Extension Agronomist Thandiwe Nleya]: Monitor winter wheat crop for freeze damage
- 2010/06/03: Grist: Urban farms don't make money --- so what?
- 2010/06/03: ResilienceScience: GMO crops and shifting agricultural food webs
- 2010/06/04: C-a-S: Hold the Revolution? [GMOs]
- 2010/06/04: BBC: Academic quits GM food commitee
A UK academic has resigned from the steering committee of the Food Standards Agency's public dialogue on the use of genetic modification. Professor Brian Wynne from Lancaster University, who was vice-chairman of the group, raised doubts about its impartiality. In a resignation letter, he said he was concerned that the agency operated from a pro-GM policy stance. But the FSA said it was committed to a balanced public dialogue on the issue. Professor Wynne's resignation from the committee comes just a week after that of Dr Helen Wallace, director of UK public interest group GeneWatch. She said the committee's dialogue was "an integral part of the GM industry's public relations strategy". - 2010/06/02: Eureka: Nature cover study provides new standards for reliable fisheries -- Preserving population diversity stabilizes fisheries, ecosystems and the economies that depend upon them
- 2010/06/01: Grist: The fight over salt: Big Food vs. Us
In the Arabian Sea, Tropical Cyclone Phet zapped Oman, then turned NorthEast towards Pakistan:
- 2010/06/05: PhysOrg: Cyclone Phet kills 15 in Oman, 2 missing
- 2010/06/05: EarthTimes: Rain lashes coastal belt as cyclone Phet nears Pakistan
- 2010/06/03: Hindu: Warmer sea turned cyclone Phet ominous
- 2010/06/04: EarthTimes: Cyclone Phet heads towards Pakistan after hitting Oman
- 2010/06/04: EarthTimes: Cyclone Phet hits Oman coast
- 2010/06/04: Eureka: NASA satellites see monster Cyclone Phet slamming northeastern Oman today
- 2010/06/04: BBC: Cyclone Phet moves over Oman toward Pakistan
- 2010/06/03: CBC: Pakistan braces for Cyclone Phet
- 2010/06/04: CBC: Tropical Cyclone Phet kills 2 in Oman
- 2010/06/03: EarthTimes: Thousands evacuated in India, Pakistan ahead of cyclone [Phet]
- 2010/06/03: EarthTimes: Cyclone Phet heads toward Oman
- 2010/06/02: EarthTimes: Arabian Sea cyclone [Phet] heading towards Pakistan, India
- 2010/06/02: Eureka: Tropical Cyclone Phet intensifies, coastal Oman bracing for strong winds, heavy rains
- 2010/06/01: Eureka: Tropical Cyclone Phet threatens the Indian and Pakistani coastlines
In Central America, Tropical Storm Agatha wreaked havoc:
- 2010/06/02: TerraDaily: Guatemalans attempt homecoming as storm leaves 183 dead
- 2010/06/01: EarthTimes: Tropical Storm Agatha death toll rises to 179
- 2010/06/02: Eureka: Like the writer, Agatha was a brief mystery -- Tropical Cyclone Agatha's remnants seen in West Caribbean
- 2010/06/01: Eureka: Agatha drenches Guatemala and El Salvador, remnants now in Caribbean
- 2010/06/01: TerraDaily: Central America reels from Tropical Storm Agatha
- 2010/06/01: CNN: Nearly 150 dead from weekend storm in Central America
Honduras death toll increases to 17 - 123 dead, 90 missing in Guatemala - Guatemala also plagued by volcano - Agatha first named storm of Pacific hurricane season - 2010/06/01: UN: UN prepares to assist Central Americans affected by tropical storm Agatha
- 2010/06/01: PlanetArk: Rescuers Dig After Central America Storm Kills 113
- 2010/06/01: EarthTimes: Tropical Storm Agatha death toll rises to 135
- 2010/06/01: CSM: Tropical Storm Agatha floods kill 150, cause giant sinkhole in Guatemala City
- 2010/06/01: al Jazeera: Death toll from Agatha storm rises
A tropical storm that lashed across three central American countries over the weekend has left at least 144 people dead and tens of thousands homeless, officials have said. - 2010/06/01: BBC: Rescuers search for survivors as Agatha toll tops 150
- 2010/06/01: CBC: Tropical Storm Agatha in Central America kills 150
- 2010/06/01: Guardian(UK): Tropical Storm Agatha blows a hole in Guatemala City
Hundreds dead as torrential rain sweeps Central America. Sinkhole in Guatemala swallows three-storey building - 2010/05/31: CNN: Tropical storm [Agatha] leaves more than 100 dead in Central America
- 2010/05/31: Wunderground: Tropical Storm Agatha one of the top ten deadliest Eastern Pacific storms on record
- 2010/05/31: EarthTimes: Tropical Storm Agatha kills almost 100 in Central America
- 2010/05/31: CBC: Tropical Storm Agatha in Central America kills 99
More than 100,000 people have been evacuated from their homes and at least 99 are dead in Central America after the season's first tropical storm. - 2010/05/31: BBC: Death toll from tropical storm Agatha rises to at least 73 in Central America
While elsewhere in the hurricane wars:
- 2010/06/04: NewScientist: All you need to know about the hurricane season
- 2010/06/04: CSW: NOAA Atlantic Hurricane Season Outlook evasive on climate change
- 2010/06/03: Wunderground: CSU predicts highly active hurricane season; Cyclone Phet approaching Oman
- 2010/06/02: KSJT: Lots of Ink: Atlantic hurricane season could be a corker
- 2010/06/02: AFTIC: 2010 Hurricane season begins
- 2010/06/01: Eureka: FSU scientists use unique model to predict active 2010 hurricane season
- 2010/06/01: PhysOrg: Scientists Use Unique Model to Predict Active 2010 Hurricane Season
- 2010/06/01: ClassM: Back to the story of the hurricane
- 2010/06/01: Wunderground: The hurricane season of 2010 arrives
- 2010/05/30: NYT: Hurricane Season Raises New Fears
As for the Monsoon:
- 2010/06/01: PlanetArk: Monsoon Hits India's Southern Coast: Weather Office
As for GHGs:
- 2010/06/04: SolveClimate: State Department Predicting Increase for U.S. Emissions Through 2020
Report to U.N. says rise in HFCs behind 4 percent emissions increase; conclusions draw ire from advocates - 2010/06/04: G&M: The numbers say it all: Canada is a climate-change miscreant
The annual report required by all signatories to the original Kyoto Protocol is depressing
[...]
According to the government's own numbers, actual emissions will grow in absolute terms in every year from 2009 to 2012. All the government's many and expensive policies will have done is to slow the increase, and then only slightly -- by 10 million tonnes in 2012, against countrywide emissions of more than 700 million tonnes. - 2010/06/03: ABC(Au): New greenhouse gases [NF3 & SO2F2] accumulating 'rapidly'
- 2010/06/03: BBC: EU 'half way to 2020 emissions target'
The EU is more than halfway to its target of cutting emissions by 20% from 1990 levels by 2020, a report shows. The assessment by the European Environment Agency (EEA) reveals that emissions across the 27-nation bloc fell by 11.3% during 2008. However, the EEA adds that the global economic downturn played a key role in the reduction. - 2010/06/01: Google:AP: US projects 4 percent emissions rise by 2012 to UN
- 2010/06/02: TreeHugger: US GHG Emissions Set To Increase Through 2020
- 2010/06/02: EarthTimes: EU emissions fell 2 per cent in 2008, officials confirm
- 2010/06/01: TEC: Coal Use and CO2 Emissions Projected to Rise By More Than 50% By 2035
- 2010/06/01: CBC: U.S. says greenhouses gases to rise by 2020
In its first major climate report to the United Nations in four years, the United States reported Tuesday that its projected climate-warming greenhouse gases will grow by four per cent through 2020. The first such report submitted under the Obama administration includes a 1.5 per cent rise in carbon dioxide emissions, the main gas from fossil fuel burning blamed for global warming. But it's the culpability of hydrofluorocarbons, or HFCs -- promoted worldwide to replace chemicals that harm the globe's ozone layer -- that gets a starring role. - 2010/06/01: CCP: "Super" Greenhouse Gases Responsible for Major Part of Future US Climate Emissions; US Projects More than Doubling by 2020
And in the carbon cycle:
- 2010/06/01: Yale360: The Microbe Factor and Its Role in Our Climate Future
Within the planet's oceans and soils are trillions of bacteria that store and release far more carbon dioxide than all of the Earth's trees and plants. Now, scientists are attempting to understand how the world's bacteria will influence -- and be influenced by -- a warming climate. - 2010/06/03: KSJT: Bloomberg, Brit Press, not much else: NASA (not Hq -- one group) says world's now at record temperature
- 2010/06/03: ClimateP: NASA: The 12-month running mean global temperature has reached a new record in 2010 -- despite recent minimum of solar irradiance
- 2010/06/02: Guardian(UK): 2010 on track to become warmest year ever
Figures from US scientists show Arctic sea ice is at a record low, while land temperatures are likely to hit new highs - 2010/06/01: AFTIC: Oceans Warmed In Recent Decades
- 2010/05/31: JEB: Assessing the consistency between short-term global temperature trends in observations and climate model projections
Aerosols are making their presence felt:
- 2010/06/02: TCoE: Fear of commitment and the aerosols whiplash
- 2010/06/02: PhysOrg: Atmospheric scientists start monthlong air sampling campaign
More than 60 scientists from a dozen institutions have converged on this urban area to study how tiny particles called aerosols affect the climate. Sending airplanes and weather balloons outfitted with instruments up in the air, the team will be sampling aerosols in the Sacramento Valley from June 2-28. - 2010/06/05: NewScientist: Ancient oceans belched stagnant CO2 into the skies
- 2010/06/05: CBC:Q&Q: (mp3) A Mammoth Amount of Methane
- 2010/06/03: Eureka: Early Earth haze likely provided ultraviolet shield for planet, says CU-Boulder study
- 2010/06/01: BBC: Early American colonists 'were hit by severe drought'
- 2010/05/31: ClassM: Megafaunal extinction, methane and monkeying with the climate
While on the ENSO front:
- 2010/06/03: NOAA:NCEP: El Niño/Southern Oscillation (ENSO) Diagnostic Discussion
Synopsis: Conditions are favorable for a transition to La Niña conditions during June - August 2010. - 2010/06/03: JFleck: El Nino "dissipated"
Regarding the solar hypothesis:
- 2010/06/01: TSoD: The Sun and Max Planck Agree
Meanwhile in near earth orbit:
- 2010/04/27: GAO: Environmental Satellites: Strategy Needed to Sustain Critical Climate and Space Weather Measurements
- 2010/06/02: WiredSci: U.S. Climate Satellite Capabilities in Jeopardy
- 2010/06/05: SlashDot: US Climate Satellite Capabilities In Jeopardy
- 2010/06/02: MongaBay: NASA satellite image reveals record low snow for the United States
- 2010/06/01: Eureka: NASA completes critical design review of Landsat data continuity mission
More GW impacts are being seen:
- 2010/06/04: PhysOrg: Climate change forces major vegetation shifts
- 2010/06/04: SF Gate: Warming threatens [California] state's coast, scientists say
- 2010/06/03: Reuters: Climate-linked crime surge hits Rift Valley town
- 2010/06/01: Reuters: Climate change to hurt Egypt farming, tourism
Egypt's farming and tourism sectors could be hurt as climate change takes its toll on the country, fuelling food security concerns in what is already the world's largest wheat importer, an environment official said. - 2010/05/31: Eureka: Warmer climate makes Baltic more salty
And then there are the world's forests:
- 2010/06/01: OSW: Dispatch from the Great Bear Rainforest: On the scene of a battle shaping up to be bigger than Clayoquot Sound
- 2010/06/04: PhysOrg: Study Examines Competing Interests in Maine Forests' Future
- 2010/06/04: PlanetArk: Amazon Up In Smoke, Even When Deforestation Slows
- 2010/06/03: TerraDaily: Poverty an obstacle to saving Liberia's rainforest
- 2010/06/03: TerraDaily: Greenpeace urges Indonesia to broaden forest moratorium
- 2010/06/04: TreeHugger: Hidden From Satellites, Amazon Burning Continues Even As Deforestation Slows
- 2010/06/02: Reuters: Indonesia says won't revoke existing forestry licenses
- 2010/06/02: MongaBay: A total ban on primary forest logging needed to save the world, an interview with activist Glen Barry
- 2010/06/01: PlanetArk: Indonesia Palm Expansion To Halve With Climate Deal
Indonesia's annual oil palm expansion may halve to 50,000 hectares from 2009 levels once a $1 billion climate change deal with Norway comes into effect next year, a top industry official said on Monday. Following a financing deal signed with Norway last week, the Southeast Asian country plans to revoke existing forestry licenses held by palm oil and timber firms to save its vast rainforests and peat lands that are seen as a carbon sink. The government has promised land swaps for cancelling some forest concessions, a process that may take years to fine tune and also prevent the world's No. 1 palm oil producer from achieving its 40 million output target by 2020. - 2010/06/01: CBC: Canada's week of wacky weather
This week in extreme weather:
- 2010/06/05: EarthTimes: Thunderstorm kills 37 as Pakistan awaits tropical cyclone Phet
Tornadoes on opposite sides of the world:
- 2010/06/06: CNN: Tornado touches down in central Illinois
No immediate reports of injuries in Elmwood, Illinois - Streets covered in debris, branches, broken glass - Sever weather reported across much of central Illinois on Saturday - 2010/06/03: TerraDaily: Mini-twister smashes through Australian town
- 2010/06/03: EarthTimes: Tornado ravages east coast Australian town
As for heatwaves and wild fires:
- 2010/06/03: KSJT: San Jose Mercury News: A weather man (and maybe the reporter) air out a pet peeve on wildfire season
- 2010/06/03: Eureka: Fires in Amazon challenge emission reduction program
- 2010/06/02: CBC: Quebec fires under control
Quebec's fire prevention agency said Wednesday that there are no longer any fires out of control in the province, but 1,300 people are still unable to return home. Rainfall on Tuesday and Wednesday helped firefighters put out some of the nearly 60 fires that were burning a few days earlier, bringing the number down to 29 by Wednesday afternoon. - 2010/06/02: MtExpress: Will climate change equal bigger fires? Scientists say a warming Idaho will faced increased risk of longer wildfire seasons
- 2010/06/01: SeedDaily: Forest, agricultural fires threaten the Arctic: report
- 2010/06/02: TreeHugger: Record High May Temperatures in US Continue to Outpace Record Lows
- 2010/06/02: TreeHugger: Hundreds Die in Heatwave as India has Hottest Summer on Record
- 2010/06/02: Wunderground: Asia records its hottest temperature in history; Category 4 Phet threatens Oman
- 2010/06/01: ClimateP: After a blow-out U.S. April, a record-busting May -- India: Hundreds die, death toll expected to rise as record temperatures soar up to 122F
- 2010/06/01: Guardian(UK): Temperatures reach record high in Pakistan
Meteorologists record a temperature of 53.7C (129F) in Mohenjo-daro as heatwave continues across Pakistan and India - 2010/06/01: BostonGlobe: Wildfires in Quebec cast their pall into New England
- 2010/05/30: NewsMiner: Hot, dry conditions spark wildfires throughout Interior Alaska
- 2010/06/01: BBC: Canadian forest fires spark alerts in Quebec and US
Firefighters in Canada are battling more than 50 forest fires that have sparked smog alerts across Quebec and parts of the north-eastern US. - 2010/05/31: CBC: Forest fire smoke drifts over Montreal, Ottawa -- Wildfire smoke smell reported hundreds of kilometres away
- 2010/05/30: Guardian(UK): Hundreds die in Indian heatwave
Death toll expected to rise as India faces record temperatures of up to 122F [50C] in hottest summer on record - 2010/05/31: ClimateShifts: Ecological selection drives genetic divergence in a reef building coral
Acidification is changing the oceans:
- 2010/06/04: SciDaily: Ocean Acidification in the Arctic: What Are the Consequences of Carbon Dioxide Increase on Marine Ecosystems?
Glaciers are melting:
- 2010/06/05: SciDaily: Glaciers in Tibet Were Never Really Large
- 2010/06/04: NatureN: Glaciers' wane not all down to humans -- Natural climate swings have had a major role in eroding Alpine ice
- 2010/06/05: NepalTimes: A weathered people -- People of Khumbu see their future threatened -- language, culture, livelihood, all melting away with the snow on the mountains
- 2010/06/04: G&M: Melting glaciers unearth new challenges -- Roads, buildings, rail lines and airports will cost more to replace as their foundations turn into sludge
At first sight, it seems to stretch forever: a vast river of white ice, rising up into the sky, its edges framed by a translucent blue piping. Sixteen kilometres north of this picturesque Alaskan fishing village, Exit Glacier is rare - the only one in Kenai Fjords National Park that you can reach on foot. A rock-bordered path cuts through an area of recently glaciated terrain, a spur trail lined with indigenous fireweed continuing to the glacier's edge. To stand at its base is to be in awe. The glacier is fed by the enormous Harding Icefield, which accumulates 400 to 800 inches of snow each year. It takes between 30 and 50 years for that snow to compress into glacial ice. Looking around, there are no obvious indications of a glacier in retreat. The evidence, however, lines the path to the glacier's edge. You notice them on the ascent, small wooden signs with numbers: 1921, 1955, 1967. They represent where the front of the glacier existed that year. - 2010/06/02: BBC: Sherpas warn ice melt is making Everest 'dangerous'
- 2010/06/02: ABC(Au): Melting ice making Everest climbs dangerous
Sherpa mountaineers in Nepal say a rise in the rate of snow and ice melt on Mount Everest has exposed bare rock faces and made it dangerous to climb. - 2010/05/30: HimalayanTimes: Cameras to monitor melting Everest
Sea levels are rising:
- 2010/06/05: EarthTimes: Important mangrove forests threatened by rising sea levels
And speaking of floods & droughts:
- 2010/06/05: BizMirror(Ph): Ready for the next deluge?
- 2010/06/05: EarthTimes: Slovakia hit by worst flooding in 1,000 years, says premier
- 2010/06/03: TerraDaily: Austria floods threaten town
- 2010/06/03: TerraDaily: Death toll from China floods and landslides rises to 38
- 2010/06/04: EarthTimes: Poland and Slovakia battle floods, more evacuated
- 2010/06/03: BBC: Floods brings chaos to central Europe
- 2010/06/02: Grist: Tracking surface water on a warming planet
- 2010/06/02: EarthTimes: Thousands evacuated amid fresh flooding [in Hungary, while a smaller number of evacuations were reported Wednesday in Slovakia, the Czech Republic and Croatia]
- 2010/06/02: EarthTimes: Thousands evacuated amid fresh flooding in Hungary
- 2010/06/02: BBC: Drought fears as UK rain falls 'in the wrong place'
Consider transportation & GHG production:
- 2010/05/31: PI:C: The future of transportation will be fought and won - or lost - in the suburbs
- 2010/06/02: CalcRisk: U.S. Light Vehicle Sales 11.6 Million SAAR in May
- 2010/06/02: CalcRisk: General Motors: Sales up 16.6% compared to May 2009
[...]
From Ford: Ford's U.S. May Sales Up 23 Percent
From MarketWatch: Chrysler U.S. May sales rise 33% to 104,819 units (Chrysler was in BK last May).
From MarketWatch: Toyota U.S. May sales up 6.7% - 2010/06/01: CBC: Chrysler, Ford report May sales up [in Canada] -- Toyota, Honda see volumes fall
Ford sales improved by 19 per cent, to 26,122, while Chrysler's rose 53 per cent to 20,887 from 13,657 in the same month a year earlier.
[...]
Toyota Canada's volumes fell 16.1 per cent to 17,879 Toyota and Lexus cars, trucks and SUVs. Honda Canada reported a drop in combined sales by its Honda and Acura divisions to 11,587, a 26 per cent decrease over last year. Hyundai Auto Canada Corp. reported an increase in sales of 13 per cent to 12,620.
[...]
Subaru Canada, Inc. announced a new record for May with sales of 2,436 units, up 25.6 per cent over the same month last year... Kia Canada announced sales of 5,731 vehicles -- an increase of 13.9 per cent over the previous May ... - 2010/06/01: TreeHugger: Quote of the Day: Robert Stern on When All Architecture is Green Architecture
As for carbon sequestration:
- 2010/06/02: Xinhuanet: China's first carbon capture plant to start operation by year-end
- 2010/06/02: Eureka: Going underground to monitor carbon dioxide
A technique originally, applied to monitor the flow of contaminants into shallow groundwater supplies, has been repurposed to monitor carbon dioxide pumped deep underground for storage. Electric Resistance Tomography (ERT) has been installed to track where a plume of injected CO_ moves underground in an oil field (Cranfield Oilfield) near Natchez, Miss. The site is part of the Southeast Regional Carbon Sequestration Partnership (SECARB), a project that eventually will store more than one million tons of CO_ in underground formations. The ERT project at Cranfield is the deepest (10,000 feet) subsurface application of the method to date. - 2010/06/01: NewScientist: Innovation: Methane capture gives more bang for the buck
Meanwhile in the journals:
- 2010/06/03: NERC:NORA: Flooding and subsidence in the Thames Gateway : impact on insurance loss potential by Katherine Royse et al.
- 2010/06/03: AGWObserver: Papers on anthropogenic CO2 emissions
- 2010/06/04: ACP: A trajectory analysis of atmospheric transport of black carbon aerosols to Canadian high Arctic in winter and spring (1990-2005) by L. Huang et al.
- 2010/06/04: ACPD: Black carbon measurements in the boundary layer over western and northern Europe by G. R. McMeeking et al.
- 2010/06/04: ACPD: Sources of light-absorbing aerosol in arctic snow and their seasonal variation by D. A. Hegg et al.
- 2010/06/04: OS: The role of continental shelves in nitrogen and carbon cycling: Northwestern North Atlantic case study by K. Fennel
- 2010/06/01: CP: Water vapour source impacts on oxygen isotope variability in tropical precipitation during Heinrich events by S. C. Lewis et al.
- 2010/06/01: CPD: Climate response to freshwater perturbations in Northern or Southern Hemispheres at the last glacial inception, the last glacial maximum and the present-day by G. Philippon-Berthier et al.
- 2010/06/01: CPD: Past dynamics of the Australian monsoon: precession, phase and links to the global monsoon by L. Beaufort et al.
- 2010/06/04: Science: (ab$) Atmospheric Science: Top-Down Versus Bottom-Up by Euan Nisbet & Ray Weiss
- 2010/06/04: Science: (ab$) Hydrology: Along the Indus River, Saber Rattling Over Water Security by Pallava Bagla
- 2010/06/04: TAN: (ab$) Quantifying Uncertainty in Estimation of Tropical Arthropod Species Richness by Andrew J. Hamilton et al.
- 2007/07/31: PNAS: Our share of the planetary pie by Jonathan A. Foley et al.
- 2007/07/31: PNAS: Quantifying and mapping the human appropriation of net primary production in earth's terrestrial ecosystems by Helmut Haberl et al.
- 2010/05/31: ACP: Aerosol-induced changes of convective cloud anvils produce strong climate warming by I. Koren et al.
- 2010/06/01: ACP: Airborne measurements of aerosol optical properties related to early spring transport of mid-latitude sources into the Arctic by R. A. de Villiers et al.
- 2010/06/01: ACP: Circumpolar measurements of speciated mercury, ozone and carbon monoxide in the boundary layer of the Arctic Ocean by J. Sommar et al.
- 2010/06/01: ACPD: Seven years of measurements of aerosol scattering properties, near the surface, in the southwestern Iberia Peninsula by S. N. Pereira et al.
- 2010/06/01: ACPD: Production, growth and properties of ultrafine atmospheric aerosol particles in an urban environment by I. Salma et al.
- 2010/06/01: PNAS: Protected areas reduced poverty in Costa Rica and Thailand by Kwaw S. Andam et al.
- 2010/06/01: PNAS: Marine biodiversity, ecosystem functioning, and carbon cycles by Grégory Beaugrand et al.
- 2010/06/01: PNAS: Kudzu (Pueraria montana) invasion doubles emissions of nitric oxide and increases ozone pollution by Jonathan E. Hickman et al.
- 2010/06/01: PNAS: End-Devonian extinction and a bottleneck in the early evolution of modern jawed vertebrates by Lauren Cole Sallan & Michael I. Coates
- 2010/06/01: EcoApp: (ab$) Cropland carbon fluxes in the United States: increasing geospatial resolution of inventory-based carbon accounting by Tristram O. West et al.
- 2010/05/31: PTRS-B: (ab$) Warming effects on marine microbial food web processes: how far can we go when it comes to predictions? by Hugo Sarmento et al.
- 2010/05/31: PTRS-B: (ab$) A global comparison of grassland biomass responses to CO2 and nitrogen enrichment by Mark Lee et al.
- 2010/05/31: PTRS-B: (ab$) The potential impact of global warming on the efficacy of field margins sown for the conservation of bumble-bees by Jane Memmott et al.
- 2010/05/31: PTRS-B: (ab$) Predicting the effects of temperature on food web connectance by Owen L. Petchey et al.
- 2010/05/31: PTRS-B: (ab$) Climate change and freshwater ecosystems: impacts across multiple levels of organization by Guy Woodward et al.
- 2010/05/31: PTRS-B: (ab$) Warming alters the metabolic balance of ecosystems by Gabriel Yvon-Durocher et al.
And other significant documents:
- 2010/06/02: TCoE: [several pdf links] Doc alert: Assessing the Environmental Impacts of Consumption and Production
- 2010/06/03: TCoE: [link to 2.7 meg pdf] Doc alert: New NASA temperature paper
- 2010/06/02: EnviroCan: [link to 459k pdf] A Climate Change Plan for the Purposes of the Kyoto Protocol Implementation Act - 2010
- 2010/05/27: DOE:EIA: [many pdf,xls links] International Energy Outlook 2010-Highlights
- 2010/06/01: TreeHugger: [link to 5.5 meg pdf] UNEP Report Shows Green Movement Has Its Priorities Straight (More or Less...)
Natalia Galin wins award:
- 2010/06/06: ABC(Au): Sea ice scientist wins national award
A Tasmanian electrical engineer has developed technology to more accurately measure the thickness of snow on sea ice in Antarctica. 27-year old Natalia Galin has successfully modified a NASA radar for use in helicopters, to monitor changes to the ice. - 2010/06/02: Guardian(UK): NASA scientist James Hansen condemns attacks from 'politicised' media
Climatologist also calls from more openness from researchers because data are 'too useful' to be kept 'under wraps' - 2010/05/31: BuffaloBeast: We-a culpa -- The long overdue story of how Roger Pielke Jr., Alternet & I caused the next holocaust
- 2010/06/01: C-a-S: What Lurks in the Sewer
Meanwhile on the international political front:
- 2010/06/02: Xinhuanet: Clean energy is vital area for U.S., China to cooperate: WWF official
While at the UN:
- 2010/06/06: ABC(Au): Russia proposes global environment fund
Russian president Dmitry Medvedev has called on the world's leading economic powers to consider creating a fund to insure against large-scale environmental disasters like the Gulf of Mexico oil spill. - 2010/06/04: UN: Marking World Environment Day, UN sounds alarm on biodiversity
- 2010/06/02: CBC: UN picks 13 new biosphere reserves
How long until we see an International Environmental Court?
- 2010/06/03: NYT: Prosecuting Crimes Against the Earth
The proposed G20 Bank Tax is turning into a tussle:
- 2010/06/04: CBC: Harper, Sarkozy differ on bank tax
- 2010/06/05: CBC: G20 ministers end push for global bank tax -- 'Most G20 members do not support the concept,' Flaherty says
- 2010/06/03: CBC: Canada, U.K. differ over bank tax
- 2010/06/02: CSM: Coming soon: a 'Robin Hood' bank tax?
Polls! We have polls!
- 2010/05/31: EarthTimes: Australians losing interest in climate change issue
Sydney - Australians are losing interest in global warming, according to an opinion poll released Monday showing less than half of them now consider it a serious problem. The latest annual poll by Sydney's independent Lowy Institute showed 46 per cent of respondents really worried by climate change, compared with 68 per cent four years ago. Thirteen per cent of the more than 1,000 respondents said the science of climate change was still in dispute, up from 7 per cent in 2006 when the poll series started. One-third of respondents in the poll with a 3-per-cent margin of error said they were not prepared to pay anything to address what Prime Minister Kevin Rudd famously called the "greatest moral challenge of our time." That compares with 21 per cent when the same question was asked in 2008. - 2010/06/04: CSM: Egypt, Sudan lock horns with lower Africa over control of Nile River
- 2010/06/04: EnergyBulletin: Water: Will There Be Enough? by Sandra Postel
- 2010/06/01: GreenGrok: Water: The Circle Game or Up the Down Staircase
- 2010/06/02: BBC: First water desalination plant in the UK opened in London
- 2010/06/02: DVoice: Bushmen Take Botswana Government to Court over Water Rights
- 2010/06/01: Guardian(UK): Scottish national park chief raises prospect of water exports
Chairman of Scottish tourism agency says abundant water resources could be sold to England if climate change pushes up cost and supply - 2010/05/31: Reuters: China clean energy goal will require hydro projects: official
China will not achieve its clean energy development targets for 2020 unless it starts building big hydropower projects soon, China's top energy official said, supporting industry calls for fast project approvals. - 2010/05/31: JFleck: River Beat: "This makes 'Chinatown' look like high school."
And on the American political front:
- 2010/06/05: TEC: Smooth Talking Coal King, Establishment Environmental Leaders, Politicians and Cap And Trade Fix
- 2010/06/05: GoogleGroups:CI: More on misleading school children
- 2010/06/04: NYT:CW: Will the Midwest Turn Its Back on Addressing Climate Change?
- 2010/06/05: TreeHugger: New York Times Editorial Page Says Use Spill To Pass Climate Bill, Defeat Attacks On The Clean Air Act
- 2010/06/05: TreeHugger: Hey Congress, How About $4 Billion for High-Speed Rail?
- 2010/06/04: ClassM: Getting in on the ground floor of the U.S. Climate Service
- 2010/06/03: Grist: 'Green' California utility PG&E attacks local renewables
- 2010/06/03: C-a-S: Legacy of an Energy Boom
[...] the legacy of George W. Bush's two terms, in all things related to domestic energy development, from deliberate lax oversight to eye-popping corruption, looms large today. - 2010/06/02: TWM: Misplaced arrogance is hard to ignore
- 2010/06/02: ClimateP: Shill, baby, shill: Sarah Palin to "Extreme Enviros: Drill, Baby, Drill in ANWR -- Now Do You Get It?"
BP's destruction of Gulf Coast "proves" to her we must let Big Oil exploit the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge, too! - 2010/05/31: SolveClimate: Can California Lead the Nation on Feed-In Tariffs? Reviews are mixed, as efforts get underway in the state to pass a somewhat improved FIT bill
- 2010/06/01: SolveClimate: Skeptics Failing to Get Anti-Climate Science Agenda into Texas Classrooms
Teachers are largely ignoring a Board of Ed demand to spread doubt about man-made global warming, a SolveClimate investigation finds - 2010/06/05: ClimateP: The dumbing down of Carly Fiorina
Apparently, you have to pretend to be ignorant of science to win a Republican primary these days - 2010/06/05: TreeHugger: California Senate Hopeful [Fiorina] Mocks Climate Change Threat (Video)
- 2010/06/04: TEC: Shame on you, Carly Fiorina
- 2010/06/03: TWM: [Would-be GOP candidate, Carly] Fiorina Dismisses Global Warming as 'The Weather'
Remember just two weeks ago Blankenship testified safety was Massey's "#1 priority"?:
- 2010/06/03: WVGazette:CT: Massey urges Congress to hold off safety reforms
- 2010/05/21: Grist: Safety '#1 priority,' coal chief Blankenship assures congress
Late comment on the NAS climate change report:
- 2010/06/02: CCP: NAS: Strong evidence on climate change underscores need for actions to reduce emissions and begin adapting to impacts [ACC]
The Cuccinelli saga rolls on:
- 2010/06/01: BSD: University of Virginia shows how many ways Cuccinelli doesn't have a case
- 2010/05/30: AlterNet: Virginia AG and Tea Party Favorite Sues Scientist for Studying Climate Change
The Obama chatter is nonstop:
- 2010/06/03: ScienceInsider: Obama Nominates Suresh to Lead NSF
- 2010/06/04: NatureTGB: MIT's Subra Suresh tapped to lead National Science Foundation
- 2010/06/03: Grist: Obama on the climate bill: "We will get it done"
- 2010/06/03: Grist: Prez pumps up the volume on climate-bill push
- 2010/06/02: TheHill:e2W: Obama: I intend to find the votes on climate 'in the coming months'
The actions of the Obama administration are being watched closely:
- 2010/06/04: SolveClimate: U.S. Geothermal Industry Heats Up as It Sees Most Gov't Support in 25 Years
Thanks to DOE funding and bad news in the oil and coal industries, the geothermal industry is booming - 2010/06/04: SolveClimate: State Department Predicting Increase for U.S. Emissions Through 2020
Report to U.N. says rise in HFCs behind 4 percent emissions increase; conclusions draw ire from advocates - 2010/06/04: PlanetArk: EPA Signs Rule To Cut Smokestack SO2
- 2010/06/03: TreeHugger: US EPA Upgrades SO2 Air Standard For First Time In 40 Years - Asthmatics Have Much To Gain
- 2010/06/01: Grist: Fed investigation fuels White House/BP breakup
- 2010/06/01: NatureN: US prepares for climate burden -- National [Climate Adaptation] summit paves way for concerted action on global warming
As for what is going on in Congress:
- 2010/06/03: TheHill:e2W: Reid pushes to move energy bill in July
- 2010/06/04: ClimateP: [Majority Leader Harry] Reid (D-Nev.) calls for swift, sweeping energy bill
- 2010/06/02: SolveClimate: Electric Car Bills in Congress Seen As Route to Oil Independence
Bipartisan bills introduced in both the House and Senate would electrify half of all U.S. cars and trucks by 2030 - 2010/06/02: Reuters: Sen. Lugar to propose climate bill alternative
- 2010/06/02: AutoBG: Senator [Bernie Sanders (I-Vt)] introduces bill to ban offshore drilling, increase CAFE standards to 55 MPG
Kerry-Boxer, Waxman-Markey, KGL, Cantwell-Collins, the APA or whatever -- the future climate bill -- defines a battleline:
- 2010/06/04: Grist: A closer look at the Clean Air Act provisions preempted by the Senate climate bill
- 2010/06/03: Grist: The Senate climate bill gives EPA authority over both old and new coal plants
- 2010/06/03: NRDC:SwitchBoard: Timing is Everything: The Battle for Comprehensive Energy and Climate Legislation Has Just Begun
- 2010/06/02: Grist: Does the Senate climate bill "gut" the Clean Air Act?
The Gore-apalooza is still bopping along:
- 2010/06/04: HuffPo: New Rule: Al Gore Must Come Out With a Sequel to His Film and Call It "An Inconvenient Truth 2: What the F*ck Is Wrong with You People?"
While in the UK:
- 2010/06/04: Guardian(UK): Climate sceptics and fringe political groups are an unhealthy cocktail
- 2010/06/04: BCLSB: Monckton Gets Political
Swivel-eyed lunatic and AGW denier Viscount Monckton of Brenchley has been appointed joint deputy leader of UKIP (UK Independence Party). - 2010/06/04: BBC: Academic quits GM food commitee
- 2010/06/03: PlanetArk: Q+A: Britain's New Coalition's Energy Policy
- 2010/06/03: PlanetArk: UK Faces $5.8 Billion Nuclear Clean-Up Shortfall: Huhne
- 2010/06/03: TEC: Lib Dem Reveals Nuclear Decommissioning Liability
- 2010/06/01: Guardian(UK): [UK Energy and Climate Change Secretary] Chris Huhne warns of £4bn black hole in nuclear power budget
Energy secretary blames predecessors for avoiding tough decisions in 'classic example of short-termism' - 2010/05/31: Guardian(UK): Government review to examine threat of world resources shortage
Study commissioned following sharp rises in commodity prices on world markets and food riots in some countries
Forest managed for timber near Jokkmokk, Sweden The review will examine a potential shortage of resources including timber. Peter Essick/Aurora/Getty Images Ministers have ordered a review of looming global shortages of resources, from fish and timber to water and precious metals, amid mounting concern that the problem could hit every sector of the economy. The study has been commissioned following sharp rises in many commodity prices on the world markets and recent riots in some countries over food shortages. - 2010/06/04: SwissInfo: Swiss help developing countries go green
Switzerland is allocating $21 million (SFr24 million) to a programme to help promote the use of renewable energy sources in developing countries. - 2010/06/04: EurActiv: Regions build climate alliances with business
Regional governments will work together with businesses to deploy low-carbon technologies even in the absence of a global pact on cutting greenhouse gas emissions, regional leaders told world governments on the sidelines of two-week climate talks in Bonn. - 2010/06/04: EurActiv: 'Guilt card' to force green behaviour on consumers?
With the world's natural resources depleting fast, the European Union and the United Nations are considering imposing limits on the consumption of anything from meat to air travel, plastics and fossil fuels in order to stop waste and pollution. - 2010/06/04: EurActiv: EU to overhaul GM crop approval system
The European Union is to radically overhaul its approval system for genetically modified (GM) crops from next month, opening the way to large-scale GM cultivation in Europe, EU sources said on Friday (4 June) - 2010/06/03: EurActiv: Renewables win exclusion from EU toxic law
The renewable energy sector was in high spirits yesterday (2 June) as MEPs decided to exclude windmills and solar panels from an EU law aimed at curbing the use of toxic chemicals in household electric and electronic goods. - 2010/06/03: BBC: EU 'half way to 2020 emissions target'
- 2010/06/02: EurActiv: EU energy strategies 'overlook heat losses'
EU energy strategies are currently overlooking significant energy savings that could be achieved with an integrated approach that allows the use of waste heat, according to Fiona Riddoch, managing director of Cogen Europe, and Sabine Froning, managing director of Euroheat&Power. They spoke to EurActiv ahead of their joint annual conference today (2 June). - 2010/06/02: EurActiv: EU ministers defiant on farm budget cuts
Agriculture ministers from across the European Union said in Spain on Tuesday (1 June) that they will oppose any cuts to the bloc's 50 billion euro annual farm budget in a planned reform of EU agriculture policy from 2013. - 2010/06/02: EurActiv: Resource-use indicators seen as first step to efficiency
Resource efficiency is one of the flagship initiatives of the 'Europe 2020' strategy for economic growth. Stakeholders stressed the need to establish coherent and clear indicators to evaluate the bloc's use of resources and progress made towards a more eco-efficient economy. - 2010/06/02: PlanetArk:EU Debt Crisis Boosts Chance Of Energy Tax Overhaul
The greenest fuels would become the cheapest under plans for a pan-European energy tax which would also help governments tackle huge debts without raising taxes on workers, draft documents show. The European Union's executive wants to overhaul Europe's 240 billion euro ($294 billion) annual taxation of energy, which varies widely between countries and often creates paradoxical incentives that encourage the biggest polluters. - 2010/06/01: EurActiv: EU starts defining energy strategy for next decade
EU ministers yesterday (31 May) gave their first views on the upcoming EU energy strategy for 2011-2020, agreeing that it should be ready for endorsement by EU leaders in March 2011. - 2010/06/05: ABC(Au): Environment minister hedging her bets on global warming
WA's Environment Minister, Donna Faragher, says she believes humans are partly to blame for climate change. - 2010/06/04: ABC(Au): Is [Water Minister Graham] Jacobs a climate change sceptic?
- 2010/06/04: ABC(Au): $200m revival plan for lower Murray
A 20-year plan backed by a federal funding promise of $200 million has been released to help restore the lower Murray, its lakes and Coorong wetlands region. - 2010/06/03: ABC(Au): [Channel Island] Power station's carbon emissions rise 6pc
The Northern Territory Opposition is blaming the Government for a 6 per cent increase in carbon dioxide emissions from the Territory's main power station. - 2010/06/03: ABC(Au): Irrigation report hits 'raw nerve'
There has been an angry reaction in the Riverina to a report recommending big cuts to irrigation in southern New South Wales. - 2010/06/03: ABC(Au): [WA] Water Minister's climate change stance unclear
The Water Minister Graham Jacobs is facing calls to clarify whether he is a climate change sceptic. - 2010/06/02: ABC(Au): Water scientists urge big Murray-Darling extraction cut
A report on sustainable extraction from the Murray-Darling Basin proposes an almost 40 per cent reduction in water availability. The Wentworth Group of Concerned Scientists has released its report in anticipation of highly-debated sustainable diversion limits that will be set in the Murray-Darling Basin Authority's plan later in the year. The report says about 4,400 gigalitres need to be taken away from irrigators and returned for environmental needs. - 2010/05/31: ABC(Au): Greens leader Bob Brown says the oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico shows the need for better management and tougher scrutiny of oil-drilling corporations
- 2010/05/31: ABC(Au): Power station revamp promises emissions cut
The Queensland Government has announced a $22.5 million upgrade of the Stanwell power station, near Rockhampton, in the state's central region. - 2010/05/31: EarthTimes: Australians losing interest in climate change issue
And in the Indian subcontinent:
- 2010/06/05: HindustanTimes: New hope for old light source [LEDs]
- 2010/06/01: PhysOrg: Algal blooms hit the poor of India hard
While in China:
- 2010/06/04: PlanetArk: China To Spend $1.8 Billion On Green Car Subsidies By 2012
- 2010/06/03: Google:AFP: China 'not very optimistic' on cutting emissions
- 2010/06/02: Xinhuanet: China's first carbon capture plant to start operation by year-end
- 2010/06/01: BWeek: China to Subsidize Alternative Energy Car Purchases
In Japan:
- 2010/06/04: SolveClimate: Hatoyama Resignation Won't Affect Japan's $15 Billion Climate Pledge: Official
Japan has already allocated $5 billion in fast-start climate aid, though very little appears to be "new and additional" money - 2010/05/31: Tyee: Feds Undercut BC's Oil Spill Prevention Panel -- Tories rewriting safety regs with no input from their own expert panel, says member
- 2010/06/04: CanWest: Fish-bearing lakes to be destroyed to become tailings ponds: Council of Canadians to sue federal government over Fisheries Act amendment
More than a dozen fish-bearing lakes across Canada, including one near Williams Lake, could be destroyed because of a legal loophole intended to allow mining companies to use dead lakes for dumping waste, says the Council of Canadians. The organization will launch a legal challenge today seeking to overturn Schedule 2, an amendment to the Fisheries Act that allows mining companies to dump toxic waste in lakes and rivers by reclassifying them as "tailings impoundment areas." That means companies can strip lakes of their normal habitat and use them to stockpile mine tailings, large piles of crushed rock and chemicals left over after metals have been extracted. - 2010/06/03: G&M: Emissions reductions 10 times less than government's projections: report
Critics say results show Harper government failing to reduce Canada's greenhouse gas pollution - 2010/06/03: PI: New federal climate plan admits minimal action on emissions
- 2010/06/04: Hullabaloos: Boiling Frog Syndrome -- The government's fourth annual Kyoto Protocol Implementation Report was issued this week
- 2010/06/04: G&M: The numbers say it all: Canada is a climate-change miscreant
The annual report required by all signatories to the original Kyoto Protocol is depressing
[...]
According to the government's own numbers, actual emissions will grow in absolute terms in every year from 2009 to 2012. All the government's many and expensive policies will have done is to slow the increase, and then only slightly -- by 10 million tonnes in 2012, against countrywide emissions of more than 700 million tonnes. - 2010/06/04: G&M: Emissions reductions 10 times less than government's projections: report
Critics say results show Harper government failing to reduce Canada's greenhouse gas pollution
Environment Canada overestimated by 10 times the amount of emissions reductions that result from government measures when it reported last year on its efforts to meet this country's obligations under the Kyoto protocol. What is more, although Ottawa started handing over the first installments of a five-year $1.5-billion Clean Air and Climate Change Trust fund to the provinces in 2008, the federal government cannot monitor them or verify whether they are being spent for the intended purpose. Those findings are in the fourth instalment of an annual report on the Kyoto Protocol that Environment Canada completed last month. - 2010/06/03: SEasterbrook: Canadians rank global warming as the number 1 priority for the G8/G20 meetings
- 2010/06/05: CBC: G20 ministers end push for global bank tax -- 'Most G20 members do not support the concept,' Flaherty says
- 2010/06/04: CTV: G8 draft communique dodges abortion issue
- 2010/06/04: CBC: G8 to avoid thorny abortion, climate issues
- 2010/06/02: CTV: Critics cite 'punishment' in Conservative aid funding
- 2010/06/02: POGGE: I guess they didn't STFU
- 2010/06/01: Guardian(UK): Progressive Canada is slipping away
Canada has decided to make maternal health in developing nations a priority -- but why is abortion funding not included? - 2010/06/01: CanWest: Another member quits federal fertility agency -- Calls For Review
Another board member has suddenly quit the troubled federal agency meant to police Canada's thriving fertility industry, prompting calls for a public investigation of the organization and its controversial record. Irene Ryll, who runs an Edmonton support group for parents using reproductive technology, handed in her resignation over the weekend, becoming the third director in 2½ months to leave Assisted Human Reproduction Canada (AHRC).
[...]
She [Jocelyn Downie, a bio-ethicist at Dalhousie] noted that the seven remaining directors include Dr. John Hamm, former Conservative premier of Nova Scotia, and three people who have espoused conservative positions on such issues as abortion and embryonic stem-cell research. - 2010/06/03: G&M: As BP disaster grows, Canada's deepwater well faces scrutiny
- 2010/05/31: CBC: Chevron's N.L. spill of drilling mud questioned
A professor of environment studies in Ontario is raising questions about a 2007 spill of drilling mud off the coast of Newfoundland by Chevron Canada Ltd., which is currently drilling a deepwater oil well there. Chevron spilled 74,000 litres of synthetic drilling lubricant -- referred to as drilling mud in the oil industry -- in the Orphan Basin in January 2007. "What happened with that spill? We don't know. We just know that the spill occurred," said Gail Fraser, a professor of environmental studies at York University in Toronto. - 2010/05/31: CBC: Sewage, jet fuel spilled in Arctic
Millions of litres of harmful contaminants -- including sewage and jet fuel -- have been spilled across great swaths of Canada's pristine Arctic in recent years, an analysis by The Canadian Press has found. - 2010/05/31: Yahoo:CP: Spills in North run to millions of litres
Millions of litres of harmful contaminants -- including sewage and jet fuel -- have been spilled across great swaths of Canada's pristine Arctic in recent years, an analysis by The Canadian Press has found. A classified government database reveals the alarming extent to which Canada's North has been an accidental dumping ground for dangerous liquids. And it shows one of the most frequent offenders is the federal government. This never-before released information comes to light as the Harper government reviews its Arctic environmental-protection rules in the wake of a catastrophic oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico. - 2010/05/31: CBC: Layoffs at Chalk River nuclear facility
Atomic Energy of Canada Ltd. is laying off about 50 employees at its Chalk River facility in eastern Ontario, the union that represents government scientists says. The Professional Institute of the Public Service of Canada called the layoffs announced Monday at AECL's research and technology division "poorly timed." The union said that the layoffs, including a dozen people it represents, compromise the future of Canada's nuclear industry. It also said the move will have serious consequences for the availability of medical isotopes. - 2010/05/31: Tyee: BC's Energy Independence? Don't Believe It -- Minister Lekstrom is wrong. Most new energy projects controlled by big firms outside BC.
And in Alberta:
- 2010/06/03: CBC: Alberta pulls armed sheriffs from hearing
Alberta has pulled armed sheriffs from an environmental hearing into a proposed multi-billion-dollar bitumen upgrader northeast of Edmonton. "We've decided to withdraw them. There's no need for them," Solicitor General Frank Oberle said Thursday. - 2010/06/02: CBC: Protesters filmed at Alberta upgrader hearing
Private landowners who protested outside a public hearing into an bitumen upgrader northeast of Edmonton Tuesday were filmed by security guards hired by the project proponent, French energy giant Total S.A., CBC News has learned. "What are they so afraid of?" landowner Anne Brown asked on Wednesday. "Why are they taping us?" The two men videotaped the group as they held a peaceful protest outside the Fort Saskatchewan hotel where the Alberta Energy Resources Conservation Board (ERCB) is holding a hearing into the project. When they were confronted by the landowners, the men identified themselves as security guards and said they would be handing the tape over to their employer, whom they declined to identify. That employer was later revealed to be Total. - 2010/05/31: PI: Pembina Reacts: Environmental Commissioner of Ontario's annual GHG progress report
In the Maritimes:
- 2010/06/03: CBC: AECL confirms more N.B. reactor delays
Atomic Energy of Canada Ltd. is again breaking its own timelines on finishing the $1.4-billion Point Lepreau refurbishment project, the Crown corporation confirmed Thursday. - 2010/06/01: CBC: No time target for Lower Churchill: Williams -- Support of Atlantic premiers sought for regional 'corridor'
The movement toward a long term ecologically viable economics is glacial:
- 2010/06/03: DVoice: The Dark Shadow Of Corporations
- 2010/06/05: DVoice: The Follies of Growth and Climate Denial
- 2010/06/03: EnergyBulletin: Deepwater Horizon and the Addiction to Growth
The Gulf of Mexico oil blowout carries the emotional wallop and learning potential of a near-death experience. First, it certifies that the age of cheap and plentiful oil is over. Second, it reveals that our collective faith in technology to overcome any challenge posed by nature is a dangerous delusion. Third, it may be the event that sets our nation on the path to genuine economic and ecological sustainability. - 2010/06/03: EnergyBulletin: What I Learned in the Charleston Jail
- 2010/06/01: CCurrents: Ask Not What Your Eco-System Can Do For You...
IPAT [Impact = Population * Affluence * Technology] raised its head once again:
- 2010/06/01: SWRWN: The anna project
- 2010/05/31: MoJo: The Last Taboo
What unites the Vatican, lefties, conservatives, environmentalists, and scientists in a conspiracy of silence? Population. - 2010/06/01: Grist: The GINK Chronicles -- Why is India the poster child for the population problem?
- 2010/06/01: NBF: Chinese Hiding 3 Million Babies Each Year to Bypass One Child Policies
Apocalypso anyone?
- 2010/06/05: C-a-S: The Apocalypse Annals
- 2010/06/04: Guardian(UK): Get down off your Dark Mountain: you're making matters worse
- 2010/05/19: ZNet: Converging Crises: Reality, Fear and Hope
As for how the media handles the science:
- 2010/06/05: ClimateShifts: Blogging on climate change -- a job for the brave
- 2010/06/06: Deltoid: Blogging on climate change - a job for the brave
- 2010/06/03: ICS: Rex Murphy still in denial
- 2010/06/02: TWTB: The sad state of our media, BP #oilpocalypse edition
- 2010/06/01: EnergyBulletin: Shale Gas: a review of PBS coverage of "Gasland"
- 2010/05/31: ClimateP: Why has a Newsweek economics editor, Stefan Theil, written "basically a condensed version of the climate denier viewpoint"?
Here is something for your library:
- 2010/06/02: HotTopic: [Book Plug] _Climate Change Adaptation in New Zealand: Future scenarios and some sectoral perspectives_ by NZ Climate Change Centre
And for your film & video enjoyment:
- 2010/06/01: SkeptiSci: Update of Visualisations of Carbon Dioxide [video]
Meanwhile among the 'Sue the Bastards!' contingent:
- 2010/06/02: C-a-S: Katrina & Climate: Case Dismissed?
- 2010/06/02: WarmingLaw: Fifth Circuit Dismisses Katrina Victims' Global Warming "Nuisance" Case without Rehearing; Dissent Calls Move "Shockingly Unwarranted"
- 2010/06/02: DVoice: Bushmen Take Botswana Government to Court over Water Rights
Developing a new energy infrastructure is a fundamental challenge of the current generation:
- 2010/06/04: HotTopic: Ghost riders in the shed
- 2010/06/04: Grist: We don't know how to completely kick oil, but we do know how to get started
- 2010/06/03: Grist: Rethinking our energy infrastructure -- Moving U.S. energy policy to a decentralized grid
- 2010/06/03: TreeHugger: Luna Ring: A Giant Solar Power Plant on the Moon
- 2010/06/03: REA: Ormat's Alaska Geothermal Program To Move Ahead
- 2010/06/02: NBF: Japan's Shimizu Corporation Proposes Solar Power MegaProject for the Moon
- 2010/06/02: PhysOrg: Japanese firm wants to transform the Moon into a giant solar power plant
- 2010/05/27: DOE:EIA: [many pdf,xls links] International Energy Outlook 2010-Highlights
- 2010/06/02: Tyee: Geothermal Just Got Hotter -- Kelowna firm's tech makes it easier for old buildings to tap the Earth for heating and cooling
- 2010/06/01: PlanetArk: Enel Green Arm To Build Guatemala Hydropower Plant
Enel Green Power, Italy's biggest renewable energy company, will build an 84 megawatt hydropower plant in Guatemala as part of its push to expand in renewable energy in Latin America, the company said on Monday. - 2010/05/31: NBF: Water Flooding Will Increase Recovery of Canadian Bakken Oil from 10% to 30% of Oil in Place
- 2010/05/30: CDreams: Nigeria's Agony Dwarfs the Gulf Oil Spill. The US and Europe Ignore It
- 2010/05/31: TreeHugger: Bill Gates Says Large Scale Renewable Projects Are Decades Away
- 2010/05/31: TEC: How We Can End Our Addiction to Oil?
- 2010/05/31: AlterNet: Why Isn't BP Under Criminal Investigation?
Hey! Let's contaminate the aquifer for thousands of years! It'll be a fracking gas!
- 2010/06/04: AlterNet: Meet America's Most Endangered River, Thanks to the Natural Gas Drilling Industry
- 2010/06/05: AlterNet:SE: Natural Gas Well Ruptures in Pennsylvania, Causes Spill and Evacuation
- 2010/06/04: NRDC:SwitchBoard: Another onshore blow-out; one million gallons of hydraulic fracturing fluid spewed into the air
The answer my friend...:
- 2010/06/04: PhysOrg: Airborne wind turbines to generate power from high winds (w/ Video)
- 2010/06/04: PlanetArk: GE, Itochu Tie Up On Wind Power Projects
- 2010/06/04: TEC: Wind Turbine Report Confirms No Health Effects
- 2010/06/04: BBC: £2bn offshore windfarm to go ahead off north Wales
- 2010/06/02: PlanetArk: Spain's Ingeteam Sets Sights On U.S. Wind Market
- 2010/05/31: Reuters: China wind power group in $1.2 billion IPO: sources
China's second-largest wind turbine maker, Xinjiang Goldwind Science & Technology Co Ltd, plans to raise up to $1.2 billion in a Hong Kong initial public offering, sources close to the deal said. - 2010/05/31: ABC(Au): The second stage of a wind farm near Hallett in South Australia's mid-north has been launched in what could become the largest development of its kind in the Southern Hemisphere
Meanwhile among the solar aficionados:
- 2010/06/04: Grist: (Solar) Power to the People -- City brings renewable energy to the little guy
- 2010/06/03: REA: SunEdison Activates 1.1-MW Staples PV Plant
- 2010/06/01: PhysOrg: In solar power, N.J. shines
- 2010/06/01: SciAm: How home solar arrays can help to stabilize the grid, Part 2 of 2
- 2010/06/02: REA: Germany To Raise Solar Target for 2010 & Adjust Tariffs -- New German solar PV target 2,500 to 3,500 MW per year
- 2010/06/01: REA: Belectric Starts Building 3-MW Solar Project [at Pocono Raceway in Pennsylvania]
- 2010/06/01: REA: Opel Solar Inc. CEO says future remains bright for solar power
- 2010/05/31: WaPo: Panasonic aims to be Japan No. 1 in solar business
On the coal front:
- 2010/06/02: BBerg: Sasol, Tata in $10 Billion Coal-to-Motor Fuel Venture
- 2010/06/02: PlanetArk: Coal Of Africa Mine May Harm Environment: South Africa
Biofuel bickering abounds:
- 2010/06/04: CBC: Algae could power new Canadian industry: NRC
- 2010/06/03: E2T: ZeaChem Breaks Ground On Next-Gen Ethanol Plant
- 2010/06/04: BBerg: Exxon $600 Million Algae Investment Makes Khosla See Pipe Dream
The nuclear energy controversy continues:
- 2010/06/05: BNC: Public advocacy on nuclear power and climate change
- 2010/06/02: TEC: Understanding Molten Salt Reactors: 1. How are MSRs Different from [Liquid Fluoride Thorium Reactor] LFTRs?
- 2010/05/31: CanWest: New nuclear plants carry more risk, report finds -- Huge cost overruns, waste management crises predicted
The latest generation of proposed multi-billion dollar Canadian nuclear plants could be up to 158 times more hazardous than their predecessors, opening the door to massive cost overruns and possibly forcing taxpayers to pick up the tab, warns a report released today. The report, The Hazards of Generation III Reactor Fuel Wastes, says the risk is primarily due to uncertainty about what will happen to radioactive uranium fuel after it is used. "Canada's present generation of nuclear plants was built with no prior plan as to how to manage the radioactive wastes it would produce," said the report, prepared by independent consulting firm, Radioactive Waste Management Associates. "Canada is arguably on the cusp of repeating this mistake." - 2010/05/30: WaPo: Radioactive fish near nuclear plant said ordinary
Montpelier, Vt. -- When a fish taken from the Connecticut River recently tested positive for radioactive strontium-90, suspicion focused on the nearby Vermont Yankee nuclear plant as the likely source. Operators of the troubled 38-year-old nuclear plant on the banks of the river, where work is under way to clean up leaking radioactive tritium, revealed this month that it also found soil contaminated with strontium-90, an isotope linked to bone cancer and leukemia. Three days later, officials said a fish caught four miles upstream from the reactor in February had tested positive for strontium-90 in its bones. State officials say they don't believe the contamination came from Vermont Yankee. - 2010/06/04: DVoice: British Government Investigates Resource Shortages
- 2010/06/02: EconBrowser: EIA: Hard Core Peak Oil Forecast
The EIA has gone hard core.
The EIA, the statistics arm of the US Department of Energy, recently released its International Energy Outlook (IEO) for 2010. This is an important document for forecasters, as it represents the EIA's integrated view of the global energy markets in the years to come and contains a long term forecast on the range of energy sources and CO2. Like it or hate it, the IEO is a touchstone for the energy industry and is treated as the authoritative government forecast in the press and in capital raising documents like prospectuses. It influences policy-makers, the media, public opinion and investors. What it says matters.
And what does it say?
That peak oil is all but on us. And that's new. - 2010/06/03: EnergyBulletin: Edible Landscaping: One Transition Step from Peak Oil
- 2010/06/01: MillerMcCune: Peak Wood: Nature Does Impose Limits
Taking the lessons from the multiple experiences of Peak Wood to help today's society learn in addressing global peak oil. - 2010/06/01: EnergyBulletin: Government investigates resource shortages
- 2010/06/01: TCoE: Accounting for world resources
- 2010/05/31: Guardian(UK): Government review to examine threat of world resources shortage
Study commissioned following sharp rises in commodity prices on world markets and food riots in some countries
Forest managed for timber near Jokkmokk, Sweden The review will examine a potential shortage of resources including timber. Peter Essick/Aurora/Getty Images Ministers have ordered a review of looming global shortages of resources, from fish and timber to water and precious metals, amid mounting concern that the problem could hit every sector of the economy. The study has been commissioned following sharp rises in many commodity prices on the world markets and recent riots in some countries over food shortages. - 2010/06/03: SolveClimate: DOE Eye-Opener: Electric Grid Could Accommodate Renewable Energy Goals
Existing power grid could handle 35 percent solar and wind from Western states by 2017, NREL [WWSIS] study shows - 2010/06/03: WaPo: Significant fuel savings possible for cars, SUVs
- 2010/06/04: TreeHugger: Can Electric Cars Survive the Canadian Winter?
- 2010/06/03: TCoE: Natural gas vehicles, yet again
This onging delusion that converting from gasoline (or diesel) powered motor vehicles to ones running on natural gas as a way to dramatically reduce CO2 emissions just won't die. - 2010/06/03: AutoBG: Study: Americans not willing to pay more up front to get gas-free cars
- 2010/05/30: AutoBG: Study: Mass adoption of EVs in China will lead to tremendously higher emissions
This week in the Gee Whiz File:
- 2010/06/02: NewScientist: Green machine: Cars could run on sunlight and CO2
As for Energy Storage:
- 2010/06/04: TEC: EEStor's latest patent: large-scale grid storage for renewables
- 2010/06/04: REA: Waldeck Pumped-Storage Hydro Plant in Germany Begins Operation
The reaction of business to climate change will be critical:
- 2010/06/04: NYT:CW: A 'Green Portfolio' Experiment Makes Money, Trims Waste
- 2010/06/01: Economist: Green-energy blues -- Investors wonder if the renewable-energy boom is over
Meanwhile in the greenwashing chronicles:
- 2010/06/04: CDreams: Greenwashing Corn: Industrial Ag Tries to Bolster Its Tarnished Image
- 2010/06/02: Grist: Notable quotable -- Monbiot on 'Beyond Petroleum,' circa 2006
Joe Romm posts a daily list of top energy and climate stories:
- 2010/06/04: ClimateP: Energy and Global Warming News for June 4...
- 2010/06/03: ClimateP: Energy and Global Warming News for June 3...
- 2010/06/02: ClimateP: Energy and Global Warming News for June 2...
- 2010/06/01: ClimateP: Energy and Global Warming News for June 1...
Other (weekly) lists:
- 2010/06/03: Grist: A Walk Through the Week's Climate News -- The Climate Post: Obama retrieves energy, climate debate from Gulf
The carbon lobby are up to the usual:
- 2010/06/04: QuarkSoup: How Skeptics are Downplaying 2010
Now that it's clear that 2010 is a seriously warm year, skeptics are busy trying to either disprove the data. - 2010/06/04: Guardian(UK): Climate sceptics and fringe political groups are an unhealthy cocktail
- 2010/06/04: TCoE: Climate change deniers on parade
- 2010/05/29: ABC(Au):SS: The Lomborg Deception
- 2010/06/04: Deltoid: The Lomborg Deception
- 2010/06/04: PoI: Naomi Oreskes - Merchants of Doubt
- 2010/06/03: ClassM: Same old same old in the denialsphere
- 2010/06/03: SkeptiSci: Why does Anthony Watts drive an electric car?
- 2010/06/03: ERabett: Flying the flag
- 2010/06/03: TSC: The stratosphere is cooling!
- 2010/06/02: Deltoid: Don Easterbrook's research misconduct
- 2010/06/02: DeSmogBlog: Climate denial activists' parallel to anti-relativity movement of 1920s
- 2010/06/01: Tamino: How Low Can You Go?
- 2010/06/01: C-a-S: The No Fly Zone
- 2010/05/30: QuarkSoup: Skepticism's New Tactic: Futurism
The reverberations of Abraham's debunking of Monckton are spreading:
- 2010/06/05: CCP: The Telegraph steps outside its alternate universe, admits Lord-who-never-sat-in-the-House-of-Lords Monckton is a fraud, salutes John Abraham's debunking; Chivers tells Delingpole to get a clue! LOL!
- 2010/06/05: DeSmogBlog: Monckton launches vitriolic - but harmless - attack on critic [John Abraham]
- 2010/06/04: TCoE: John Abraham dismantles Monckton
- 2010/06/04: BCLSB: Monckton Gets Political
Swivel-eyed lunatic and AGW denier Viscount Monckton of Brenchley has been appointed joint deputy leader of UKIP (UK Independence Party). - 2010/06/04: DeSmogBlog: Christopher Monckton Brings His Brand of Crazy To Bonn Climate Talks
- 2010/06/03: Guardian(UK): Monckton takes scientist to brink of madness at climate change talk
An angry professor who listened to Monckton's speech at a US university demolishes the wild claims made by the climate denier - 2010/06/03: Guardian(UK): Viscount Monckton, another fallen idol of climate denial
Professor John Abraham's withering scrutiny reveals how the gurus of climate scepticism repeat a pattern of manipulation - 2010/06/03: SkeptiSci: Monckton Chronicles Part II -- Here Comes the Sun?
- 2010/06/02: QuarkSoup: The Death of Christopher Monckton
- 2010/06/02: SkeptiSci: Abraham shows Monckton wrong on Arctic sea ice
- 2010/06/01: CCP: John Abraham writes guest post on Skeptical Science: Monckton wrong on Arctic sea ice
- 2010/05/31: Deltoid: "Monckton is wrong"
Meanwhile in the 'clean coal' saga:
- 2010/06/04: CDreams: The Next Great Coal Spill? Massey's Billion Gallon Disaster in Waiting
As for climate miscellanea:
- 2010/05/31: SEasterbrook: Another cognitive bug: Attempting to correct a misperception often reinforces it
- 2010/06/05: TSoD: The Hoover Incident
- 2010/06/04: APSmith: More climate change basics
- 2010/06/03: AlterNet: Can You Be an Environmentalist and Still Eat Meat?
- 2010/06/04: Guardian(UK): What is a carbon footprint?
- 2010/06/04: DWWSJ: As The Oil Slick Spreads, The Ice Keeps Melting and The Temperature Keeps Rising
- 2010/06/04: SkeptiSci: Irregular Climate: a new climate podcast
- 2010/06/03: MoD: Irregular Climate Episode 2
- 2010/06/03: MTobis: Still Going
- 2010/06/03: HotTopic: My white ice cycle
- 2010/06/02: TCoE: Tidbits
- 2010/06/02: ClassM: Matt Ridley and the Holocene Optimum
- 2010/06/02: PhysOrg: ORNL sows seeds with new agricultural carbon accounting tool
- 2010/06/02: C-a-S: A Seaworthy Solution?
- 2010/06/02: BBC:RB: Sustainability: Choices, choices, choices
- 2010/06/01: ERabett: Wisdom of the bunny
- 2010/06/01: Maribo: "I think the sun has come closer to our island"
- 2010/06/01: TreeHugger: Consensus Matters II: Blogging is not Science
- 2010/06/01: GG&G: A critique Robert Pindyck's model to estimate maximum plausible willingness to pay to prevent global warming
- 2010/05/31: Guardian(UK): Hay festival: 'Climate change is a long struggle'
- 2010/05/31: SkeptiSci: Could global brightening be causing global warming?
- 2010/05/31: TEC: Technological Realism Should Replace Optimism
- 2010/05/30: HotTopic: Status of Climate Science
And here are a couple of sites you may find interesting and/or useful:
- CSIRO: ECOS Mag
- FAO: Rust Report
- Grida: FAO Food price index (FFPI)
- NZ Climate Change Centre
- GFN: Footprint Standards
- Wiki: Ecological footprint
- The Anna Project
- Spectrum: Special Report: Water vs Energy
- OzEnergyAnalysis: Open Science
- NSIDC:SOTC: Glaciers
- NSIDC: World Glacier Inventory [information for over 67,000 glaciers worldwide]
- Wiki: Global Nuclear Energy Partnership
- US DOE: GNEP: Global Nuclear Energy Partnership
- Wind-Works by Paul Gipe
- UNFCCC: United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change
- Skeptical Science: Examining Global Warming Skepticism
Happy D-Day:
The fate of the REDD forest plan is in question:
More revelations in the Copenhagen blame game:
Looking ahead to COP16 and future international climate negotiations:
Oxfam had a few pithy comments on the UNFCCC process:
Carbon Tariffs still have people on edge:
The Arctic melt continues to garner a lot of attention:
While in Antarctica:
As for the temperature record:
While in the paleoclimate:
Yes we have no wacky weather, except:
Corals are dying:
While in the endless quest for zero energy, sustainable buildings and practical codes:
More Hansen:
The Pielke fan clubbe, alas:
Regarding Water Politics and Business:
Senate hopeful Carly Fiorina is showing her colours:
And in Europe:
Meanwhile in Australia:
In Canada, minority neocon PM Harper, continues his do-nothing policy:
Environment Canada stealth released a Kyoto report card that didn't look good:
A bank tax, abortion and Tory ideology in the runup to the G8/G20 meetings:
The issue of offshore and Arctic drilling continues to draw comment, while the Deepwater Horizon gushes:
Regarding the privitization of AECL:
BC is still wrangling over energy:
Ontario has it's Green Energy Act, now comes the implementation:
Yes we have peak everything:
More people are talking about the electrical grid:
Automakers & lawyers, engineers & activists argue over the future of the car:
Low Key Plug
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.
<regards>
P.S. Recent postings can be found in the week archive and the ancient postings can be accessed here, which should open to this.
"The new paradigm of power, coupled with its bizarre ideology of limitless progress and impossible happiness, has turned whole nations, including the United States, into monsters. We can march in Copenhagen. We can join Bill McKibben's worldwide day of climate protests. We can compost in our backyards and hang our laundry out to dry. We can write letters to our elected officials and vote for Barack Obama, but the power elite is impervious to the charade of democratic participation. Power is in the hands of moral and intellectual trolls who are ruthlessly creating a system of neo-feudalism and killing the ecosystem that sustains the human species. And appealing to their better nature, or seeking to influence the internal levers of power, will no longer work." - Chris Hedges
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