Logging the Onset of The Bottleneck Years

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Another week of Climate Instability News

Another Week of Global Warming News

Information overload is pattern recognition

August 8, 2010

• Chuckles, Bonn, COP16+, Chutzpah, BASIC, Pacific Island Forum, Phytoplankton, ESA, The Question, Russia, Pakistan
• Bottom Line, Subsidies, Ecuador's Oil, Free Access, Grumbine, Curious, Terminology, Post CRU, Late Comments
• Melting Arctic, Petermann Glacier, Methane, Geopolitics
• Food Crisis, Wheat Market, Food vs. Biofuel, Land Grabs, GMOs, Pavlovsk Fruit Collection, Food Production
• Hurricanes, GHGs, Carbon Cycle, Temperatures, Aerosols, Paleoclimate
• ENSO, Solar, Climate Sensitivity, Abrupt CC, State of the Oceans, Satellites
• Impacts, Forests, Climate Refugees, Wacky Weather, Tornadoes
• Wildfires, Acidification, Glaciers, Sea Levels, Floods & Droughts
• Mitigation, Transportation, Sequestration, Geoengineering, Adaptation
• Journals, Misc. Science, Hansen, Broecker, Pielke, Curry
• UN, Carbon Trade, Bank Tax, Optimal Carbon Reduction Strategy
• International Politics: Law & Activism, Activism, Polls, Water Politics & Business, Software
• National Politics: America, BP Disaster, PACE, Digg, Cuccinelli
• Obama, USAdmin, Congress, Climate Bill, Lobbyists, Bike Plot
• Britain, Australia, Australian Election, New Zealand, China, Japan, Russia, South America
• Canada, G20 Policing, Offshore Drilling, Pipelines, Premiers
• Biofuel Standards, Greens, Tar Sands, Alberta, Ontario, Maritimes
• Ecological Economics, IPAT, Apocalypso, Media, Books, Video, Courts
• Energy, Fracking, Wind, Solar, Coal, Biofuel, Nukes, Peak Oil, Grid, Efficiency, Cars, Gee Whiz, Energy Storage
• Joe's List, Carbon Lobby, Miscellaneous Climate, Useful Links
• Shameless Self Promotion, .sig

More in the black humour vein:

• 2010/08/06: MRC: (cartoon - Roberts) This little light of mine...
• 2010/08/06: MRC: (cartoon - Roberts) Against the Grain

  The UNFCCC talks at Bonn were unproductive:

• 2010/08/06: Yahoo:AFP: UN talks flounder as climate impacts mount, say delegates
• 2010/08/06: BBC: Climate change talks 'backslide' at Bonn
  Global climate change talks have moved backwards since last year, say negotiators from both rich and poor nations at discussions in Germany.
• 2010/08/06: Guardian(UK): Climate talks in danger of unravelling as China and US clash
  Environmentalists fear Copenhagen deal could fall apart over backsliding and changes to demands
  Global climate talks have sunk to a new low after China and the US clashed and rich countries lined up against poor in a refusal to compromise on emission reduction targets. With just six days' negotiating time left before a critical meeting in Cancun, Mexico, some diplomats fear that the fragile deal struck in Copenhagen last December could unravel. Rather than slim down the negotiating text to allow politicians to make choices at Cancun, the US, China and many developing countries all added pages to draft texts in a series of tit-for-tat moves that critics said had sent the talks backwards after a week of meetings.
• 2010/08/06: UN: Top UN climate change official [UNFCCC head, Christiana Figueres] calls for enhanced action after talks wrap up
  While progress has been made in the latest round of international climate change negotiations, governments must now step up action on the issue if they are to reach a lasting deal later this year, a senior United Nations official said today. Christiana Figueres, Executive Secretary of the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC), said that countries must "radically narrow down the choices on the table," ahead of the next conference of parties in Cancun to be held in November.
• 2010/08/05: BBerg: U.S. Companies Lobby for Technology Fix, Not CO2 Limit at Climate Talks
• 2010/08/07: ABC(Au): UN climate talks tasked with curbing the threat of global warming are backsliding, delegates said at the close of a week-long session in Bonn
• 2010/08/06: Reuters: U.N. climate deal retreats as Bonn talks end
  U.N. climate talks have moved backward rather than forward towards a hoped-for deal later this year as nations make slow progress on pledges to cut greenhouse gas emissions and add more proposals to the working document. As talks in Bonn on a new climate treaty draw to an end on Friday, there is still a lot of work to be done at remaining meetings in Tianjin, China and Mexico at the end of the year.
• 2010/08/05: Reuters: U.N. climate pact could be three treaties-Mexico
  Rich nations, poorer nations, U.S. could have own treaties - Mexico wants comprehensive package of decisions in Cancun
• 2010/08/06: BWeek: U.S. Says Countries 'Backtracking' on Copenhagen Pact
  The U.S. is concerned that envoys at United Nations climate talks are "backtracking" on an agreement made in 2009 in Copenhagen, the country's lead negotiator [Jonathan Pershing] at the talks said.
• 2010/08/05: Guardian(UK): UN incineration plans rejected by world's rubbish-dump workers
• 2010/08/05: Guardian(UK): Setback to hopes of Tobin tax to pay for climate aid
  Money needed to compensate poor countries for effects of climate change is more likely to come from carbon trading than from taxes on banks
• 2010/08/04: Reuters: Factbox: Differences at U.N. climate talks [list of positions]
• 2010/08/03: NYT:CW: [U.S. Special Envoy for Climate Change, Todd] Stern Says U.S. Bargaining Position for Cancun Remains Unchanged
• 2010/08/03: BWeek: Climate Pact Loopholes Risk Wiping Out Greenhouse Gas Cuts
  Loopholes in the Kyoto Protocol climate treaty risk wiping out emissions reduction pledges made by developed nations for 2020, an alliance of island nations said at United Nations global warming talks in Bonn.
• 2010/08/02: Reuters: U.N. climate talks need quicker pace for global deal
• 2010/08/02: Google:AP: WWF, Oxfam punished for anti-Saudi act at UN talks
• 2010/08/03: Xinhuanet: Developed nations should not shift responsibility for climate change: Chinese envoy
  The core of the ongoing UN climate talks is that developed countries should take on their historical, legal and moral responsibilities for climate change, China's envoy on climate change negotiation said here Monday. Huang Huikang, who took over Yu Qingtai as special representative for climate change negotiations of China's Foreign Ministry, told Xinhua in an exclusive interview that developed nations should stop shifting focus from their promises and pledges on climate change. "In the past 200 years, developed countries have caused a large accumulation of carbon dioxide due to their mode of production and way of life -- the historical responsibility is quite clear in this regard," he said. Huang, who leads the Chinese delegation under the Ad Hoc Working Group on Further Commitments for Annex I Parties under the Kyoto Protocol (AWG-KP), came to Bonn for the third round of UN climate talks this year, which is scheduled for Aug. 2 to 6.
• 2010/08/02: Xinhuanet: New round of UN climate talks opens in Bonn to discuss negotiating text
• 2010/08/03: TEC: US Climate Envoy [Todd Stern]: Targets Still Good Without Congress [Bonn]
• 2010/08/02: BBC: UN climate talks settle Saudi nameplate affair
• 2010/08/02: UN: New UN climate change chief [Christiana Figueres] rallies governments to step up action
  With the future of humanity at stake, governments must continue building common ground to further progress on climate change, the new United Nations chief on the issue said in the latest round of international negotiations which kicked off in Bonn today. "Whether we succumb to the storms of climate change or work together to reach the far shore is up to us to decide," Christiana Figueres, Executive Secretary of the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC), said, invoking the journey made by Christopher Columbus more than five centuries ago.
• 2010/08/02: BBerg: Figueres Urges Smaller Steps on Climate Change as UN Warming Talks Resume
• 2010/08/02: EarthTimes: New UN climate chief calls on US to act responsibly
  Bonn - The United Nations' new climate chief, Christiana Figueres, on Monday called on the US to "participate in a meaningful way" in climate change negotiations, at the opening of preparatory talks ahead of November's summit in Mexico. "Whether the United States meets the pledge that it put in the Copenhagen accord via legislation or via regulation is an internal domestic affair of the United States and one which they need to solve," Figueres told journalists in the German city of Bonn. At the international level, the head of the UN climate change panel said, "the US needs to participate in a meaningful way, and a way that is commensurate with its responsibility on climate."

Looking ahead to COP16 and future international climate negotiations:

• 2010/08/08: HotTopic: Looking on the dark side
• 2010/08/06: DailyStar(Lb): The climate deadlock reflects a lack of global leadership by Jeffrey D. Sachs
• 2010/08/05: UNDispatch: 'Bonn Voyage' for an International Climate Treaty?
• 2010/08/06: Guardian(UK): Coal: The cheap, dirty and direct route to irreversible climate change
  The global dominance of industrial interests dependant on cheap energy sourced from coal mean climate change is inevitable
• 2010/08/06: EarthTimes: Third round of climate change talks brings Cancun deal no closer
  Bonn - A third round of climate change talks in Bonn has brought little prospect of reaching a new deal at a UN summit in Mexico later this year, as a week of discussions ended on Friday without progress. The UN's new climate change chief, Christiana Figueres, urged governments to "agree to further compromises" in the coming months in order to "deliver clear and unmistakeable progress" in the city of Cancun. From November 29 to December 10, the Mexican resort city is to host the first UN climate change summit after last year's disappointing meeting in Copenhagen.
• 2010/08/04: Guardian(UK): Climate deal loopholes 'make farce' of rich nations' pledges
  New research reveals carbon emissions from rich nations could actually rise under loopholes in the proposed UN climate deal
• 2010/08/02: BBerg: `Clear Proof' Is Needed $30 Billion in Climate Aid Was Disbursed, UN Says
  Developed countries must give "clear proof" they've started disbursing $30 billion of climate aid that they pledged last year to poorer nations, the new United Nations climate chief said. Evidence of payment will be needed at the UN's annual end- of-year climate negotiations in Cancun in November and December, Christiana Figueres said at a briefing today as a week of talks started in Bonn. About $10 billion should be paid out this year, a third of the total which covered the years 2010, 2011 and 2012, she said.
• 2010/08/03: NYT:CW: Overseas Frustration Grows Over U.S. Domestic Impasse on Climate Policy
• 2010/08/01: TreeHugger: Brazil's Climate Chief Dampens Hopes for COP16
• 2010/08/01: Google:AP: US inaction on climate troubles global talks
  The failure of a climate bill in the U.S. Senate is likely to weigh heavily on international negotiations that begin Monday on a new agreement to control global warming.
  [...]
  The withdrawal of the bill to cap U.S. emissions of carbon dioxide, the most prominent gas blamed for global warming, "plays into the same old fault lines," said Kelly Dent, of Oxfam International. It has let down developing countries that had looked to President Barack Obama's administration to seize the leadership in climate negotiations, she said Sunday from Bonn, Germany.

Just to prove that Israel is not the only Middle Eastern country with an excess of chutzpah:

• 2010/08/04: Guardian(UK): Saudi Arabia to seek compensation for climate pact oil losses
  Saudi Arabia and other oil-producing nations stake claim to projected $19bn losses if oil production declines due to global climate deal

After the BASIC Group meeting in Rio:

• 2010/08/06: NRDC:SwitchBoard: The Takeaway from the Fourth BASIC Countries' Meeting

  The Pacific Islands Forum held a meeting in Vanuatu:

• 2010/08/06: ABC(Au): The Pacific Islands Forum has adopted a new resolution on climate change, one that backs away from last year's nomination of a target for temperature rise
• 2010/08/05: Xinhuanet: Increased cooperation vital to tackling climate change in Pacific: UN chief [in a message to the leaders attending the Pacific Islands Forum in Port Vila, Vanuatu]
• 2010/08/04: PlanetArk: Islands Warn Rich Nations' Emissions Pledges Fall Short
• 2010/08/04: FijiTimes: Climate change on agenda
  The secretary general of the Pacific Islands Forum, Neroni Tuiloma Slade, has advised Small Island State (SIS) leaders to not allow the disappointments of Copenhagen to divert their attention from the dangers of climate change.
• 2010/08/03: Reuters: Islands warn rich nations' emissions pledges fall short
  Rich nations' emissions reductions pledges fall dramatically short of what is required to limit global warming to two degrees centigrade, a group of 43 small islands said on Tuesday at U.N. climate talks. This week's 185-nation conference in Bonn is the penultimate step before the next U.N. climate conference in December. Parties are trying to make progress on shaping a successor to the Kyoto Protocol, which expires in 2012.
• 2010/08/03: TerraDaily: Pacific islands want louder voice on climate

  That report on declining phytoplankton has alarmed a lot of people:

• 2010/08/06: CCurrents: A Looming Oxygen Crisis And Its Impact On World's Oceans
• 2010/08/06: EnergyBulletin: Reactions to the phytoplankton crisis
• 2010/08/04: GreenGrok: Why's the Ocean Less Green
• 2010/08/05: EnergyBulletin: A looming oxygen crisis and its impact on world's oceans
• 2010/08/05: KSJT: Yale Env. 360, etc: More rotten news for the oceans
• 2010/08/05: Yale360: A Looming Oxygen Crisis and Its Impact on World's Oceans
  As warming intensifies, scientists warn, the oxygen content of oceans across the planet could be more and more diminished, with serious consequences for the future of fish and other sea life.
• 2010/08/02: ChronicleHerald: Ocean plant life dropping -- PhD student Daniel Boyce part of team studying why phytoplankton has declined by 40% in past century

  The Ecological Society of America had a conference:

• 2010/08/03: USGS: From Drowning Coastal Marshes and Punk Ducks to Soil Crusts -- USGS Research at the Ecological Society of America Conference Focuses on Climate Change
• 2010/08/05: NatureTGB: Why is society not acting on climate change? John Holdren asks ESA [Ecological Society of America] meeting

  With Pakistan's monsoon floods and Russia's wildfires, Michael asks a pointed question:

• 2010/08/08: DWWSJ: Heat South and Smoke North. (Europe is just the opposite!)
• 2010/08/07: ERabett: MT asks a scary question
• 2010/08/07: MTobis: Moscow Doesn't Believe in This
• 2010/08/05: TDB: The Hottest Summer Ever
  You better get used to hot, sticky summers like this one, says climatologist Heidi Cullen, who explains terrifying data of why the weather is only getting hotter and how our infrastructure can't handle it.
• 2010/08/07: CIP: You Ain't Seen Nothin' Yet
• 2010/08/05: ClimateP: Russian President Medvedev: "What is happening now in our central regions is evidence of this global climate change, because we have never in our history faced such weather conditions in the past."
• 2010/08/02: People's Daily: Global warming not confirmed to have caused worldwide heat waves

  The wildfires in Russia are intense:

• 2010/08/08: CNN: Hundreds more wildfires burn in Russia
  Intense smog is grappling Moscow - Smog can form when toxic chemicals mix with pollutants - At least 52 people have died - Hundreds of airline passengers have been stranded
• 2010/08/07: CCP: Jeff Masters: The Great Russian Heat Wave of 2010
• 2010/08/07: CBC: Smog blanket worsens in Moscow -- Toll at 52 as wildfires continue to rage
• 2010/08/07: ClimateP: Global boiling fuels disasters in nuclear nations
  Masters: "The Great Russian Heat Wave of 2010 continues.... Thousands of deaths, severe fires, and the threat of radioactive contamination"
• 2010/08/07: ABC(Au): Toxic smog blankets Moscow as fires rage
• 2010/08/07: EarthTimes: Forest fires rage in Russia's national parks
• 2010/08/06: TP:WR: Global Boiling Fuels Disasters In Nuclear Nations
• 2010/08/06: BBC: Moscow under smog health warning as wildfires burn
  Russian health officials are warning people in Moscow to stay inside and avoid physical exertion as smog from the worst wildfires in modern Russian history smothers the city.
• 2010/08/06: CBC: Wildfires shroud Moscow in dense smog
• 2010/08/06: CNN: Muscovites struggle to breathe as acrid smoke grips city
  Carbon monoxide levels are dangerously high in Moscow - People are encouraged to stay indoors and wear masks - There are no signs of the heat wave abating, and wildfires are still raging in the countryside
• 2010/08/06: EUO: Russia fires pose nuclear threat
  The Russian government warned on Thursday (6 August) that raging wildfires could pose a nuclear threat to neighbouring countries, with the natural disaster already spilling across Russian borders in terms of food markets. Russian emergencies minister Sergei Shoigu said heat from fires in the Bryansk region near the frontier with Belarus and Ukraine, which was contaminated following the Chernobyl disaster in 1986, could release harmful radioactive particles into the atmosphere.
• 2010/08/05: Grist: Russia struggles against heat wave and spreading wildfires
• 2010/08/06: EarthTimes: Death toll in Russian wildfires climbs to 52
• 2010/08/06: BBC: Dense wildfire smog grips Moscow in heatwave
  The thick blanket of smog that has shrouded Moscow as peat fires continue to burn just outside the city has worsened. The smog has disrupted air traffic at two international airports in Moscow - Domodedovo and Vnukovo. Many Russians are wearing masks as the temperature rises close to 40C (104F). On Thursday officials said nearly 600 wildfires were raging across a huge area of central Russia. The emergency has now claimed 50 lives.
• 2010/08/05: EarthTimes: Official number of dead in Russian wildfires rises to 50
• 2010/08/04: EarthTimes: Thousands more soldiers deployed against Russian wildfires
• 2010/08/05: PostMedia: More than 400 wildfires burn across B.C.
  More than 400 wildfires continued to burn across B.C. Wednesday, burning up with them the remainder of the smallest annual forest firefighting budget in B.C. in a decade.
• 2010/08/05: BBC: Russia is still fighting to extinguish nearly 600 wildfires in an emergency that has now claimed 50 lives
• 2010/08/05: CBC: B.C. fires prompt river concerns
  Hundreds of forest fires continue to burn in British Columbia and now there is concern that some of the materials being used to fight them might be turning river water black. Fishermen are pulling their nets from the Bridge River -- near the Fraser River in B.C.'s Interior -- after they discovered the normally pristine waters have turned dark.
• 2010/08/04: PlanetArk: Forest Fire Destroyed 13 Hangars At Base Near Moscow
• 2010/08/03: TerraDaily: Forest fires destroy Moscow military base
• 2010/08/04: EarthTimes: Wildfires rage in parched Russia
• 2010/08/03: CNN: Death toll rises [to 40] as Russian wildfires spread
• 2010/08/04: BBC: Russia's President Dmitry Medvedev has interrupted his holiday to hold emergency talks on wildfires raging across central Russia
• 2010/08/04: BBC: Russia's President Dmitry Medvedev has sacked several top military officials for failing to stop wildfires from destroying a naval base outside Moscow
• 2010/08/04: CBC: Moscow smog thick from Russian wildfires -- Hundreds of fires have killed 48 people in past week
• 2010/08/03: PhysOrg: Image: Smoke over Western Russia
• 2010/08/03: EarthTimes: Wildfires continue to rage in Russia
• 2010/08/03: BBC: Fires still spreading in parched Russia
  Moscow is mobilising more forces to fight hundreds of wildfires raging across a vast area of central Russia amid a record heatwave. At least 40 people have died in fires in the past week, and seven regions are under a state of emergency. Some fires are in danger of getting out of control, the government said.
• 2010/08/03: CBC: Russia wildfires 'out of control'
  Some of the devastating wildfires sweeping western Russia are out of control, Russia's emergency chief said Tuesday, as fears grew there were not enough firefighters to battle them. Tens of thousands of troops and volunteers were helping some 10,000 firefighters battle blazes in more than a dozen western Russian provinces, seven of which were under a state of emergency. Their efforts had saved more than 300 towns and villages from destruction in the last day, Emergencies Minister Sergei Shoigu said, according to Russian media. "But in some places it is getting out of control," Shoigu was quoted as telling President Dmitry Medvedev during a meeting near the southern city of Sochi.
• 2010/08/02: CBC: Russian wildfire death toll rises to 40
• 2010/08/02: BBC: Russian President Dmitry Medvedev has declared a state of emergency in seven Russian regions because of wildfires fuelled by a heatwave. -- The death toll from the fires has risen to 40, the ministry of health said.
• 2010/08/01: CCP: Hundreds of new wildfires break out in Russia

  Pakistan's monsoon floods are epic:

• 2010/08/08: CNN: More rains hit Pakistan as aid agencies boost relief efforts
• 2010/08/08: EarthTimes: 137 dead, more than 400 missing in Indian Kashmir floods
• 2010/08/08: EarthTimes: More rains hamper Pakistan flood relief efforts
• 2010/08/07: CBC: Thousands flee Pakistan floods -- Millions affected
• 2010/08/07: UN: UN scaling up relief operations as floods spread to southern Pakistan
• 2010/08/07: BBC: More heavy rain in Pakistan is frustrating efforts to help about 12 million people affected by severe flooding in much of the country
• 2010/08/05: WFP: WFP Launches Helicopter Relief Operation to Feed More Pakistan Flood Victims
• 2010/08/07: EarthTimes: Floods, landslides kill over 50 as rain lashes Pakistan
• 2010/08/05: CCurrents: Pakistan Hit By Worst Flood In 80 Years
• 2010/08/07: BBC: Pakistan issues flooding 'red alert' for Sindh province
• 2010/08/06: CNN: Pakistan says 12 million people affected by floods
• 2010/08/06: UN: UN issues warning that deadly flooding could soon spread to southern Pakistan
• 2010/08/06: EarthTimes: UN: Pakistan flooding will swell in coming days
• 2010/08/06: EarthTimes: Twelve million affected by floods in Pakistan
• 2010/08/06: EarthTimes: Half a million evacuated as floods hit southern Pakistan
• 2010/08/06: BBC: Pakistan floods 'hit 12m people'
• 2010/08/06: CBC: Pakistan floods affect millions
• 2010/08/04: TerraDaily: Desperate Pakistan flood survivors clamour for aid
• 2010/08/04: TerraDaily: Pakistan survivors claw at debris of flooded homes
• 2010/08/05: EarthTimes: Southern Pakistan braces for flood surge
• 2010/08/05: EarthTimes: UN official: 'Disaster of major proportions' in flooded Pakistan
• 2010/08/05: BBC: Pakistan's worst flooding in nearly a century has now affected more than four million people and left at least 1,600 dead, says the UN
• 2010/08/05: CBC: Pakistan flood surge moving south
• 2010/08/04: BBC: Pakistan floods: Rain brings more misery
• 2010/08/04: UN: UN relief efforts continue in flood-hit Pakistan as scope of disaster comes into focus
• 2010/08/04: PlanetArk: Pakistan Floods Ravage Lives Of Millions: UNICEF
• 2010/08/04: TerraDaily: Pakistan in fresh warning as floods hit 3.2 million
• 2010/08/04: EarthTimes: Pakistan flood victims: From ruins to ruins
• 2010/08/04: CBC: Pakistan floods moving south
• 2010/08/04: WpgSun: Pakistani flood victims face food shortages
• 2010/08/03: BBC: The operation to rescue communities cut off by devastating floods in Pakistan is "almost complete", the army says
• 2010/08/03: Guardian(UK): Pakistan floods: third-largest dam at risk
• 2010/08/03: NewScientist: Will Pakistan floods really trigger disease outbreak?
• 2010/08/03: UN: Disease the new threat as UN agencies ramp up relief efforts in flood-hit Pakistan
• 2010/08/03: EarthTimes: Massive evacuation planned as floods reach central Pakistan
• 2010/08/03: Reuters: Pakistan floods ravage lives of millions: UNICEF
  The worst floods in memory in Pakistan have devastated the lives of more than 3 million people, a U.N. spokesman said on Tuesday, while outrage over the unpopular government's response to its people's plight spreads.
• 2010/08/03: BBC: Pakistan floods: Rescuers aim to reach stranded victims
  Rescue teams in northern Pakistan are battling to reach tens of thousands of people cut off by monsoon flooding. While water is receding in some areas, many communities remain cut off by the region's worst flooding for 80 years. The UN said 3m people had been affected and more than 1,400 had been killed. The government said some 27,000 people remained trapped and awaiting help.
• 2010/08/03: CBC: Pakistani floods leave thousands stranded -- At least 1,500 dead...
• 2010/08/02: Guardian(UK): Pakistan floods: Red Cross says 2.5 million people affected as death toll rises to 1,500
• 2010/08/02: CNN: Officials fear disease outbreak in flood-hit Pakistan
  Up to 1,500 people killed in floods said Information Minister Mian Ifthikar Hussain - Pakistani Red Crescent says 2.5 million people in northwestern Pakistan affected - Officials fear an outbreak of gastro conditions due to lack of drinking water - Destroyed bridges, roads hampering rescue efforts in flood-hit areas
• 2010/08/02: UN: UN rushing food to victims of deadly Pakistan floods
• 2010/08/02: BBC: Up to two-and-a-half million people have been affected by devastating floods in north-west Pakistan, the International Red Cross has said
• 2010/08/02: CBC: Pakistani medical teams go to flood victims
• 2010/08/02: Guardian(UK): Pakistan floods death toll rises to 1,100

  And on the Bottom Line:

• 2010/08/05: QuarkSoup: Cost of Russia's Heat Wave

  Who's getting the subsidies?

• 2010/08/06: TreeHugger: Subsidies for Renewables "Dwarfed" by Fossil Fuel Support
• 2010/08/03: Guardian(UK): Fossil fuel subsidies are 10 times those of renewables, figures show
• 2010/08/04: PeakEnergy: Fossil fuel subsidies are 10 times those of renewables
• 2010/08/03: Grist: Fossil fuels keep getting the breaks

  In what could be a major departure, Ecuador has agreed to preserve part of the Amazon rather than exploit the oil underneath:

• 2010/08/04: ENS: Ecuador Agrees to Keep Amazon Eco-Treasure Free of Oil Drilling
• 2010/08/03: BBC: Ecuador pledges no oil drilling in Amazon reserve
  Ecuador has agreed to refrain from drilling for oil in a pristine Amazon rainforest reserve in return for up to $3.6bn (£2.26bn) in payments from rich countries. Under a pioneering agreement signed with the United Nations, the oilfields under the Yasuni reserve will remain untapped for at least a decade. The money is about half of what Ecuador would make by selling the oil.

Oh Look. Another chance to ride my hobby horse!

• 2010/08/04: ScienceInsider: Free Access to U.S. Research Papers Could Yield $1 Billion in Benefits
• Free Science News
• Free Science Sources

  Rob Grumbine is restarting his gentle education series:

• 2010/08/05: MGS: Climate -- cycles 1

  A climate curiosity exposed:

• 2010/08/06: PhysOrg: Ice age permafrost unearthed in Poland to help clock warming

  If you can't do anything useful, you can always argue about words:

• 2010/08/05: Guardian(UK): Is it time to retire the term 'global warming'?

  Post CRU theft, controversy & inquiry:

• 2010/08/08: IJISH: climategate.com now back as aggregator, owner is "Internet opportunities" entrepreneur Mark Fleming
• 2010/08/07: IJISH: Old IJI blog "suspended"; past findings on FOI2009.zip; UK group Comino Foundation does inactivism

  Late Comments:

• 2010/08/03: RealClimate: Expert Credibility in Climate Change - Responses to Comments -- Guest commentary by William R. L. Anderegg et al.
• 2010/08/03: DM:BA: New study clinches it: the Earth is warming up [SotC]
• 2010/08/01: AlterNet: UN Declares Water a Fundamental Human Right -- U.S. Abstains from Voting on Resolution

  The Arctic melt continues to garner a lot of attention:

• 2010/08/07: CCP: Snowcone Greenland's Jakobhavn's Isbrae breaking up, and note the enormous melt lakes
• 2010/08/06: ASI: Breaking away from the pack
• 2010/08/06: ASI: A webcam with a view [of the North Pole]
• 2010/08/06: CCP: Jakobshavn Isbrae, August 5, 2010
• 2010/08/05: GreenGrok: Thar She Blows: View from the Arctic
• 2010/08/06: ABC(Au): Polar bears face melting chemical cocktail
  Polar bears, the icon of the Arctic, are under threat from the twin challenges of climate change and chemicals that are not breaking down in the region's cold waters.
• 2010/08/05: DWWSJ: Arctic Ocean Ice cover drops to 2nd lowest July level on Record
• 2010/08/04: ClimateP: Second lowest July Arctic sea ice extent. Thickest ice begins melt out...
• 2010/08/05: TreeHugger: Multi-year Arctic Sea Ice Continues Dramatic Declines, Even If No New Record Low Likely
• 2010/08/05: DeSmogBlog: Arctic Sea Ice Taking a Turn for the Worse
• 2010/08/01: ASI: Area vs Extent

  A big chunk of Greenland's Petermann Glacier broke off into the sea:

• 2010/08/07: TreeHugger: Another Crack: Petermann Glacier, Giant Ice Island, Breaks Off Into The Sea
• 2010/08/07: CNN: Massive ice island breaks off Greenland
• 2010/08/07: ABC(Au): Ice island breaks away from Greenland [Petermann Glacier]
  An ice island measuring 260 square kilometres broke off from one of Greenland's two main glaciers, scientists say, the biggest such event in the Arctic in nearly 50 years.
• 2010/08/07: Grist: Massive ice island breaks off Greenland glacier
• 2010/08/07: Guardian(UK): Biggest ice island for 48 years breaks off Greenland glacier
  Scientists say the 100 square mile ice island, 600ft thick, is 'very unusual' and the biggest formation of its kind since 1962
• 2010/08/06: BRitholtz: Greenland Glacier 4X Size of Manhattan Breaks Loose
• 2010/08/06: BBC: Huge ice sheet breaks from Greenland Petermann Glacier
• 2010/08/06: CCP: Petermann Glacier loses the end of its tongue, August 2010, northern coast of Greenland
• 2010/08/06: PhysOrg: Greenland's Petermann Glacier calves island four times the size of Manhattan
• 2010/08/06: UDel: Greenland glacier calves island 4 times the size of Manhattan, UD scientist reports
  A University of Delaware researcher reports that an "ice island" four times the size of Manhattan has calved from Greenland's Petermann Glacier. The last time the Arctic lost such a large chunk of ice was in 1962. "In the early morning hours of August 5, 2010, an ice island four times the size of Manhattan was born in northern Greenland," said Andreas Muenchow...
• 2010/08/05: ASI: Animation 10: Petermann Glacier ice tongue

  That Damoclean sword still hangs overhead:

• 2010/08/06: TerraDaily: Study Finds Permafrost Warming
• 2010/08/05: Science: 'Arctic Armageddon' [CH4] Needs More Science, Less Hype by Richard A. Kerr
• 2010/08/04: NineMSN: Frozen CO2, methane a time bomb: experts
• 2010/08/02: Eureka: Study finds permafrost warming, monitoring improving

  As for the geopolitics of Arctic resources:

• 2010/08/08: ASI: USCGC Healy has entered [the ice pack in the Beaufort Sea]
• 2010/08/06: BBC: In pictures: Discovering the wreck of HMS Investigator
• 2010/08/03: CBC: Arctic seismic tests face legal challenge
  A Nunavut Inuit organization is taking federal scientists to court in an attempt to stop them from conducting seismic tests for potential oil and gas resources in Lancaster Sound. The Qikiqtani Inuit Association says it will file a court injunction with the Nunavut Court of Justice on Wednesday, asking the court to block the Geological Survey of Canada -- which is part of Natural Resources Canada -- from starting its Eastern Canadian Arctic Seismic Experiment this month. The Inuit association, which represents Inuit in Nunavut's Baffin region, has opposed the seismic project on the grounds that it could potentially harm marine wildlife in Lancaster Sound.
• 2010/08/03: CBC: Future of discovered Arctic ship [HMS Investigator] unknown
• 2010/08/03: PlanetArk: U.S.-Canadian Mission Set To Map Arctic Seafloor
• 2010/08/05: PostMedia: Arctic drilling approved with unproven blowout device -- Equipment installed as 'additional precaution'
  The last company to drill for petroleum off Canada's Arctic coast was given the green light by federal regulators to use blowout-prevention equipment that had not been adequately proven, Postmedia News has learned
• 2010/08/03: CBC: Arctic oil and gas joint venture formed -- Regulatory approval needed before exploration begins
  Three major oil companies are teaming up to someday explore for oil and gas in a large area of the Beaufort Sea, where each company has millions of dollars in exploration leases. Imperial Oil Ltd., ExxonMobil Corp. and BP have formed the joint venture to explore offshore areas for which they secured leases in 2007 and 2008.
• 2010/08/02: PlanetArk: U.S.-Canadian Mission Set To Map Arctic Seafloor
• 2010/07/30: BBerg: Exxon, BP, Imperial Oil Form Exploration Venture for Canada's Beaufort Sea
• 2010/08/01: PostMedia: 3 years to cap an Arctic oil spill, officials say -- Regulator Told MPs. Relief well can't be drilled in one ice-free season

  The food crisis is ongoing:

• 2010/08/02: WFP: Rwanda: Terracing Hailed As Key Hunger Solution
• 2010/08/05: WFP: Niger: Herders Struggle For Surival In Wake Of Hard Drought
• 2010/08/04: FAO: Growing poplars for food security - Millions benefit from poplar forests in China
• 2010/08/05: CCurrents: Video: Hunger Stalks Niger Children
• 2010/08/06: CBC: Farmers out $3B from bad weather: BMO
  Farmers in Saskatchewan, Manitoba and Alberta stand to lose up to $3 billion from crop damage due to heavy rain and flooding, analysts from the Bank of Montreal say.
• 2010/08/05: BostonGlobe: Food stamp use hit record 40.8m in May
• 2010/08/04: EarthTimes: Study: EU 2010 harvest to remain stable despite flood and drought
• 2010/08/03: Reuters: Australia agriculture faces climate upheaval -scientist
  Australia's fragile soils vulnerable to climate change - Marginal cropping areas might become pasture lands - Technological changes could offset global warming impacts
• 2010/08/03: EarthTimes: Brussels seeks to tap emergency funds to stave off Sahel starvation
• 2010/08/03: EarthTimes: UN Food Programme warns of millions in need of supplies in Pakistan
• 2010/08/02: CBC: [Western bean cutworm] Pest attacks cornfields in Ont., Quebec
  A minuscule pest has made its way from corn-belt states in the U.S. and is now slowly chewing its way through crops in Canada. Entomologists aren't sure why the western bean cutworm began migrating, but can confirm the critter has popped up in Ontario and Quebec corn fields. "This is the first year we're anticipating a significant problem," said Art Schaafsma, an expert in crop pest management at the University of Guelph in Guelph, Ont. In just one year, there's been a proliferation not only in the insect's numbers but also in the number of regions where it's been found.
• 2010/08/02: ABC(Au): Farmers told to prepare for locust plague
  Federal Agriculture Minister Tony Burke says the worst locust plague in years is set to hit parts of Australia in the coming weeks.
• 2010/08/01: Guardian(UK): Niger's markets are full yet famine shadows the dusty roads

  So, will Russia banning grain exports, put the price of wheat (and other grains) through the roof?

• 2010/08/05: Guardian(UK): Vladimir Putin bans grain exports as drought and wildfires ravage crops
  More than a third of cultivable land in Russia destroyed - Wheat prices hit 23-month high on commodities market
• 2010/08/06: PeakEnergy: Wheat prices soar as Russia curbs exports
• 2010/08/06: CSM: Russian drought: When wheat withers, the world squirms
• 2010/08/05: NYT: Russia Bans Grain Exports Amid Crippling Drought
• 2010/08/06: BBC: Wheat price fears hit shares in brewers and food firms
• 2010/08/05: CSM: Wheat does the Malthusian shuffle
• 2010/08/05: BBC: Russia is to ban the export of grain from 15 August to 31 December after drought and fires devastated crops
• 2010/08/05: CBC: Russia bans grain exports amid drought -- Dry conditions have so far destroyed 20% of crop
• 2010/08/04: FAO: FAO cuts wheat production forecast but considers supplies adequate -- Wheat stocks still high in spite of the jump in prices
• 2010/08/04: Telegraph(UK): Wheat storm will soon blow itself out
  Drought and scorching heat across the Eurasian Steppes have lifted wheat futures by 50pc in a month and ensures a nasty shock for bread lovers, but this is a very different story from the global food crisis two years ago.
• 2010/08/04: BBerg: Wheat Exports From Russia, Ukraine Are `Draining Out,' Flour Miller Says
• 2010/08/03: BBC: Wheat prices reach 22-month high
  Wheat prices have hit a 22-month high after a severe drought and ensuing wildfires in Russia devastated crops. Chicago Board of Trade (CBOT) wheat for September delivery broke through the $7-a-bushel level in US trade for the first time since September 2008, before falling back to $6.93. Prices have risen 50% since late June.

The conflict between biofuel and food persists:

• 2010/08/02: REA: World Bank: Biofuels Didn't Cause Grain Price Booms

  So, are these land grabs Colonialism V2.0?

• 2010/08/02: Monlar: World Bank's Leaked Report on Land Grabs Contradicts its Advice to the Developing Countries
• 2010/08/01: WPB: Global Land Grabs: The New Colonialism?
• 2010/08/02: WWI:NtP: Large Scale Land Investments Do Not Benefit Local Communities
• 2010/08/03: WWI:NtP: Leaked World Bank Report Highlights Extent of Land Grab Problem

  Regarding genetic modification of food plants:

• 2010/08/06: Grist: Canola gone wild! Uh-oh, transgenic plants are escaping and interbreeding
• 2010/08/06: NatureN: GM crop escapes into the American wild -- Transgenic canola found growing freely in North Dakota
• 2010/08/06: Eureka: Scientists find new evidence of genetically modified plants in the wild -- Research on invasive species, pollution and environmental disasters at ESA's Annual Meeting
• 2010/08/06: BBC: GM plants 'established in the wild'
  Researchers in the US have found new evidence that genetically modified crop plants can survive and thrive in the wild, possibly for decades. A University of Arkansas team surveyed countryside in North Dakota for canola. Transgenes were present in 80% of the wild canola plants they found.
• 2010/08/06: CBC: GM canola spread widely outside N.D. farms: study
  Feral canola plants with genetic modifications that make them resistant to herbicides appear widespread along roadsides in North Dakota, a new study has found. Of 406 plants collected along 5,400 interstate, state and county roads in July, 86 per cent tested positive for at least one of two transgenic proteins that make canola resistant to glyphosate herbicides such as Roundup, reported the researchers Friday at the annual meeting of the Ecological Society of America in Pittsburgh.

In Russia, a vital plant field bank faces demolition:

• 2010/08/07: PhysOrg: As crops wither in Russia's severe drought, vital plant field bank faces demolition
  As the fate of Europe's largest collection of fruit and berries hangs in the balance of a Russian court decision, the Global Crop Diversity Trust issued an urgent appeal for the Russian government to embrace its heroic tradition as protector of the world's crop diversity and halt the planned destruction of an incredibly valuable crop collection near St. Petersburg. Pavlovsk Experiment Station is the largest European field genebank for fruits and berries, and is part of the N.I. Vavilov Research Institute of Plant Industry, where Russian scientists famously starved to death rather than eat the seeds under their protection during the 900-day siege of Leningrad during World War II.
• 2010/08/07: Eureka: As crops wither in Russia's severe drought, vital plant field bank faces demolition
  Hearing date is Aug. 11 for Pavlovsk Fruit Collection case; Russian government called on to intervene

And how are we going to feed 9 billion?

• 2010/08/06: PhysOrg: Genes from sweet pepper to fortify African banana against devastating wilt disease
  In a major breakthrough, crop scientists announced today the successful transfer of green pepper genes to bananas, conferring on the popular fruit the means to resist one of the most devastating diseases of bananas in the Great Lakes region of Africa. The Banana Xanthomonas Wilt (BXW) costs banana farmers about half a billion dollars worth of damage every year across East and Central Africa. The leaves of affected crops turn yellow and then wilt, and the fruit ripens unevenly and before its time. Eventually the entire plant withers and rots.
• 2010/08/05: TreeHugger: Food Posters From the Past are Recipes for the Present (Slideshow)
• 2010/08/05: AlterNet: How Junk Food Giant PepsiCo Is Buying Up High-Ranking Experts to Look Like a Leader in Health and Nutrition
• 2010/08/03: Grist: The history of urban agriculture should inspire its future
• 2010/08/03: WorldChanging: Insects: The Future of Protein?
• 2010/08/03: TreeHugger: Jargon Watch: Vertical Gardens vs Vertical Farms vs Living Walls vs Green Façades
• 2010/08/02: CBC: Conventional farming protects atmosphere: study -- Critic says researchers trying to justify industrial agriculture

  In the Atlantic, Tropical Storm Colin was rather weak. Estelle in the North East Pacific was safely out at sea:

• 2010/08/07: Wunderground: Bermuda eyes a weak Colin; new extreme heat record for Belarus
• 2010/08/06: CNN: Tropical Storm Colin driving toward Bermuda
• 2010/08/06: CP: Clustering climate reconstructions by G. Bürger
• 2010/08/06: Wunderground: Colin takes aim at Bermuda; the Great Russian Heat Wave of 2010: 102°F in Moscow
• 2010/08/05: Wunderground: Colin ready to re-form; TSR keeps their Atlantic hurricane forecast numbers high
• 2010/08/03: CBC: Tropical storm Colin loses punch
• 2010/08/03: Wunderground: Colin arrives; extreme heat records fall for Ukraine and 5 U.S. cities
• 2010/08/03: EarthTimes: Tropical storm Colin brewing in Atlantic
• 2010/08/03: Eureka: Tropical Depression 4 now a small tropical storm named Colin -- GOES-13 and NASA's Aqua satellite image the storm
• 2010/08/02: PlanetArk: Tropical Cyclone Expected To Form In Open Atlantic
• 2010/08/02: Wunderground: Tropical Depression Four arrives
• 2010/08/02: Wunderground: 91L near tropical depression status
• 2010/08/01: Wunderground: Lesser Antilles may see a tropical storm late this week

  While elsewhere in the hurricane wars:

• 2010/08/07: SciDaily: NOAA Still Expects Active Atlantic Hurricane Season; La Niña Develops
• 2010/08/06: CCurrents: Katrina Pain Index 2010 New Orleans -- Five Years Later
• 2010/08/06: PhysOrg: NASA's Hurricane Quest Set To Begin -- the Genesis and Rapid Intensification Processes (GRIP) experiment
• 2010/08/05: CSM: Revised 2010 hurricane forecast: 'major hurricanes' ahead
• 2010/08/05: CSM: At height of hurricane season, research teams take on storms
• 2010/08/05: NOAANews: NOAA Still Expects Active Atlantic Hurricane Season; La Niña Develops
• 2010/08/04: CBC: 10 hurricanes forecast [by CSU team] for Atlantic
• 2010/08/04: Wunderground: CSU leaves their hurricane forecast unchanged; 92L and Colin's remains worth watching

  As for GHGs:

• 2010/08/02: Eureka: New carbon dioxide emissions model
  The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) calculated projected temperature changes for various scenarios in 2007 and researchers at the Max Planck Institute for Meteorology in Hamburg have now gone one step further: they have developed a new model that specifies the maximum volumes of carbon dioxide that humans may emit to remain below the critical threshold for climate warming of two degrees Celsius.
• 2010/07/26: UTA: Predictions of Coal, CO2 Production Flawed, Says Latest Research
• 2010/08/02: GreenBang: Clock's ticking: Carbon emissions must peak by 2015
• 2010/08/02: MPG(de): New carbon dioxide emissions model
  Meteorologists have determined exactly how much carbon dioxide humans can emit into the atmosphere while ensuring that the earth does not heat up by more than two degrees

And in the carbon cycle:

• 2010/08/03: UGa: Ice-free Arctic Ocean may not be of much use in soaking up carbon dioxide, a component of global warming, according to new study

  As for the temperature record:

• 2010/08/04: QuarkSoup: RSS: Warmest July in their Records
• 2010/08/03: ClimateP: Hottest July in RSS satellite record, record floods swamp Pakistan, U.S. set 1480 temperature records in past two months, and 2010 breaks 2007 record for most nations setting all-time temperature records
• 2010/08/03: FT:ES: Global warming to exceed 1.5°C, finds report
• 2010/08/03: Eureka: Analysis: July was cool this year (compared to the likely future)
• 2010/08/02: ClimateP: Masters: "2010 is now tied with 2007 as the year with the most national extreme heat records...fifteen"
• 2010/08/02: SkeptiSci: Has Global Warming Stopped? by Alden Griffith

  Aerosols are making their presence felt:

• 2010/08/02: KSJT: Montreal Gazette: Big Stanford study says buy time for the Arctic, stop sooty emissions. Good story, not all that new...
• 2010/08/02: PostMedia: Soot emissions key to climate riddle: study -- Curbing black carbon more effective than cutting CO2

  While in the paleoclimate:

• 2010/08/04: PhysOrg: Kangaroo evolution linked to climatic change

  While on the ENSO front:

• 2010/08/07: NOAA:NCEP: El Niño/Southern Oscillation (ENSO) Diagnostic Discussion
  Synopsis: Synopsis: La Niña conditions are expected to strengthen and last through the Northern Hemisphere winter 2010-11.
• 2010/08/06: DWWSJ: La Nina is Brewing -- It May Be A Strong One

  Regarding the solar hypothesis:

• 2010/08/06: APOD: The Not So Quiet Sun
• 2010/08/02: NASA: Coronal Mass Ejection Headed for Earth
  On August 1st, almost the entire Earth-facing side of the sun erupted in a tumult of activity. There was a C3-class solar flare, a solar tsunami, multiple filaments of magnetism lifting off the stellar surface, large-scale shaking of the solar corona, radio bursts, a coronal mass ejection and more.

Regarding Climate Sensitivity:

• 2010/08/02: ERabett: The way it goes

  Abrupt Climate Change put in an appearance:

• 2010/08/02: Eureka: Ice core drilling effort involving CU-Boulder to help assess abrupt climate change risks
• 2010/08/02: PhysOrg: Ice core drilling effort [NEEM] to help assess abrupt climate change risks

  And the State of the Oceans:

• 2010/08/03: PressEurop: Mediterranean in hot water
  Hundreds of scientists have put together the first comprehensive study of the state of the world's seas, from the Arctic through the tropics to the Antarctic, and come to an alarming verdict: the Mediterranean is the most endangered sea on the planet.
• 2010/08/03: CCurrents: How We Wrecked The Oceans -- Part II
• 2010/08/02: EnergyBulletin: How we wrecked the oceans -- Part II

  Meanwhile in near earth orbit:

• 2010/08/07: SciDaily: NASA Instrument Tracks Pollution from Russian Fires
• 2010/08/05: OSU: First satellite measurement of water volume in Amazon floodplain

  More GW impacts are being seen:

• 2010/08/06: Eureka: The worst impact of climate change may be how humanity reacts to it
• 2010/08/05: ProMedMail: Undiagnosed die-off, fish - USA: (CA)
• 2010/08/05: PhysOrg: A 'crystal ball' for predicting the effects of global climate change
  In trying to predict how species will respond to climate change caused by global warming, researchers and scientists are turning to comparative physiology, a sub-discipline of physiology that studies how different organisms function and adapt to diverse and changing environments. By comparing different species to each other, as well as to members within a species that live in different environments, researchers are learning which physiologic features establish environmental optima and tolerance limits. This approach gives the scientific community a "crystal ball" for predicting the effects of global warming, according to George N. Somero, Associate Director of Stanford University's Hopkins Marine Station.
• 2010/08/05: TerraDaily: Climate Change By Degrees
  Climate change scenarios are usually summed up in terms of expected change by a certain year. Like sea levels will rise by x amount by 2020 and y amount by 2050. Or by parts per million of CO2 in the atmosphere. But because no one really knows what kind of carbon dioxide increases we're facing (that having to do with the CO2 cutting regimen we choose), the whole forecasting effort becomes very ambiguous. That's led some to throw their hands up on achieving greenhouse gas reductions in favor of adaptation planning. A new report issued by the U.S. National Research Council takes a different approach. It orients climate change scenarios to degree increase in temperature to show what each degree gets you in impact.
• 2010/08/05: Eureka: Increased destruction of bird populations are predicted with rise in global temperatures
• 2010/08/03: ABC(Au): Penguin pics track Antarctic changes
• 2010/08/03: SkeptiSci: Grappling With Change: London and the River Thames
• 2010/08/03: TreeHugger: Climate Change Threatens to Devastate Burma
• 2010/08/02: ADN: Climate change prolongs Interior Alaska growing season

  And then there are the world's forests:

• 2010/08/05: TerraDaily: Indonesia 'woefully inadequate' on illegal loggers: probe
• 2010/08/06: TreeHugger: Climate Change Could Destroy 80% of World's Rainforest by 2100
• 2010/08/05: ENS: Two Indonesian [Merbau] Timber Smuggling 'Kingpins' Named [Ricky Gunawan & Hengky Gosal]
• 2010/08/05: Guardian(UK): New gas pipeline prompts fears for Amazon rainforest
• 2010/08/05: MongaBay: 80% of rainforests could adversely impacted by logging, deforestation, climate change by 2100
• 2010/08/05: PhysOrg: Global tropical forests threatened by 2100
  By 2100 only 18% to 45% of the plants and animals making up ecosystems in global, humid tropical forests may remain as we know them today, according to a new study led by Greg Asner at the Carnegie Institution's Department of Global Ecology. The research combined new deforestation and selective logging data with climate-change projections. It is the first study to consider these combined effects for all humid tropical forest ecosystems and can help conservationists pinpoint where their efforts will be most effective. The study is published in the August 5, 2010, issue of Conservation Letters.
• 2010/08/04: TerraDaily: Logging a threat to Europe's last primeval forest: activists
• 2010/08/05: Eureka: Global tropical forests threatened by 2100
• 2010/08/04: PhysOrg: Bali Declaration hopes to save Indonesia's biodiversity from deforestation
• 2010/08/03: BBC: Model shows 'waves of forest degradation'
  An international team of researchers has developed a model that suggests degradation of tropical forests occurs in a series of "waves". High-value trees were felled in the first "wave", followed by a wave that removed mid-value timber before the remaining wood was felled for charcoal. The team hopes the model will help manage forests as vital carbon sinks and limit the loss of biodiversity.
• 2010/08/02: PhysOrg: New study examines effects of drought in the Amazon
  Recent research surrounding the impact of drought in the Amazon has provided contradictory findings as to how tropical forests react to a drier and warmer climate. A new study published in the August 2 Early Edition of the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (PNAS) examines the response of Amazon forests to variations in climate conditions, specifically considering how those changes may influence forest productivity. These findings provide possible context for why previous studies have offered varying conclusions.

Climate refugees are becoming an issue:

• 2010/08/05: ABC(Au): Greens propose visas for climate refugees
• 2010/08/03: EUO: 50% drop in EU irregular migrant border crossings after Italy-Libya pact

  Yes we have no wacky weather, except:

• 2010/08/03: DWWSJ: Vivian, South Dakota Hailstone breaks U.S. Record!

  Further on the odd tornado:

• 2010/08/01: BillingsGazette: Montana twisters are more frequent, powerful in 2010

  As for heatwaves and wild fires:

• 2010/08/07: CCP: Jeff Masters: The Great Russian Heat Wave of 2010
• 2010/08/07: CBC: Smog blanket worsens in Moscow -- Toll at 52 as wildfires continue to rage
• 2010/08/06: BBC: More than 400 wildfires are burning in British Columbia, Canada, as additional emergency teams pour in from across the country and the US
• 2010/08/06: CBC: Forest fire smoke blankets B.C. community -- More than 400 fires burning in B.C.
• 2010/08/05: Maribo: Yes, this is the Environment Canada forecast for Vancouver
• 2010/08/05: BCLSB: Signs O' The Times
  Environment Canada is forced to invent a new symbol to describe the B.C. fire situation
• 2010/08/04: EarthTimes: Lightning storm sparks hundreds of wildfires in western Canada
• 2010/08/04: CBC: B.C. fires burn through budget
  B.C.'s battle against forest fires has already consumed the province's entire $52-million firefighting budget, with hundreds of fires still burning. The province is currently spending upward of $6 million a day as it wrestles with more than 400 wildfires.
• 2010/08/03: EarthTimes: Firefighters contain blaze on Aegean island of Samos
• 2010/08/02: KC: Kansas City [KC] heat wave takes deadly turn
• 2010/08/02: CBC: 1 dead after ignoring B.C. evacuation order -- Wildfires burn throughout province
• 2010/08/03: CBC: Wildfire count in B.C. hits 376
• 2010/08/02: EarthTimes: Greece declares state of emergency on Samos after wildfires
• 2010/08/02: EarthTimes: Death toll rises [to 40] as Russians battle fires
• 2010/08/02: EarthTimes: Medvedev signs emergency decree for fire-hit regions
• 2010/08/02: EarthTimes: Russian battle against fires continues as death toll rises
• 2010/08/02: EarthTimes: Cyprus suffers as record high temperatures soar to 46 degress
• 2010/08/02: EarthTimes: Russian battle against fires continues, further casualties reported

  Acidification is changing the oceans:

• 2010/08/05: Eureka: High levels of carbon dioxide threaten oyster survival

  Glaciers are melting:

• 2010/08/04: OSU: Ancient Hawaiian glaciers reveal clues to global climate impacts

  Sea levels are rising:

• 2010/08/05: NOAANews: NOAA Announces Funding to Model Effects of Sea Level Rise in Northern Gulf of Mexico
• 2010/08/01: EnergyBulletin: Climate change begets delta urbanism

  As for hydrological cycle disruptions [floods & droughts]:

• 2010/08/07: JFleck: River Beat: LaRue and the Question of How Much Water There Really Was
• 2010/08/08: EarthTimes: Landslides kill 127 in north-west China, 2,000 missing
• 2010/08/08: EarthTimes: At least three people die in Czech flash floods
• 2010/08/08: EarthTimes: Two dead in western Poland as rivers rise on Polish-German border
• 2010/08/08: BBC: Dozens killed in landslides in China's Gansu province -- "A wide river of mud has cut a swathe through towns and villages"
  Landslides and floods triggered by torrential rain have engulfed a town in north-west China, killing at least 127 people and leaving 2,000 missing.
• 2010/08/07: EarthTimes: Three people die in German floods
• 2010/08/06: EarthTimes: Death toll tops 100 in floods in Indian Kashmir
• 2010/08/06: EarthTimes: Floods hit North Korea
• 2010/08/06: BBC: China flood fears along North Korea border
• 2010/08/06: CBC: Indian Kashmir hit by deadly floods
  Flash floods in the remote mountainous region of Ladakh in Indian Kashmir have killed 103 people, local officials say. State police chief Kuldeep Khoda said Friday more than 370 others have been injured.
• 2010/08/05: UN: UN deploys helicopters to aid flood-stricken in Pakistan
• 2010/08/05: UN: UN health agency rushing medical help to flood-hit Afghans
• 2010/08/05: JFleck: Chasing Water
• 2010/08/04: MTobis: Kheshgi, Pakistan, Flooded
• 2010/08/04: TerraDaily: Nearly 1,700 dead, missing in China floods
• 2010/08/04: EarthTimes: Record floods hit China's north-east as death toll mounts
• 2010/08/03: PlanetArk: Floods Cut Water Supplies For 300,000 In China
• 2010/08/03: BBerg: China's Worst Floods Since 1998 to Cut Farm Output, Lift Prices
• 2010/08/02: UN: UN agencies respond to flood emergency in Afghanistan
• 2010/08/02: ABC(Au): Rubbish threatens to jam world's largest dam
• 2010/08/01: JFleck: Why I Don't Think We'll Abandon Phoenix
• 2010/08/02: ENS: Pakistan Inundated By Worst Floods in Living Memory

  Elsewhere on the mitigation front:

• 2010/08/06: SciDaily: Cutting Japanese Carbon Dioxide Emissions
• 2010/08/06: Eureka: Planted, unplanted man-made wetlands are similar at year 15, and function as effective carbon sinks
• 2010/08/04: HotTopic: Biochar: looking better all the time
• 2010/08/02: ASA: Is Biochar the Answer for Ag? Long-term study digs up new information on biochar's ability to reduce nitrous oxide emissions from soils

  Consider transportation & GHG production:

• 2010/08/08: PeakEnergy: Modern cargo ships slow to the speed of the sailing clippers
• 2010/08/06: PhysOrg: Southampton researchers find that UK rail travel is often cheaper than the car
  With thousands of British families embarking on their summer holidays, new research by the University of Southampton has found that travelling by train rather than car could provide a more cost-effective travel solution.
• 2010/08/04: Telegraph(UK): Airships: a second age
  They were once the future of travel. Now, more than 70 years after the Hindenburg crash, engineers are designing a new fleet of airships
• 2010/08/04: CalcRisk: BEA: July light vehicle sales rate 11.5 million SAAR
• 2010/08/04: Eureka: Traveling by car increases global temperatures more than by plane, but only in long term
• 2010/08/03: CalcRisk: U.S. Light Vehicle Sales 12.1 Million SAAR in July
• 2010/08/03: PhysOrg: Researchers Measure Diesel Emissions on the Freeway
• 2010/08/03: TreeHugger: How Can Technology Reduce Global Shipping's Fuel Consumption?

  As for carbon sequestration:

• 2010/08/06: ScienceInsider: Why a Less Futuristic 'FutureGen' Coal Plant May Not Be Bad
• 2010/08/05: NYT: U.S. Changes Plan for [FutureGen] Capturing Emissions From Coal
  The Energy Department abruptly shifted course on Thursday on a flagship federal effort to capture and sequester carbon dioxide from coal-fired power plants, saying it would not finance construction of a new plant in Mattoon, Ill. Instead of underwriting that project, which would have turned coal into a hydrocarbon gas, filtered out the carbon and burned the hydrogen, the government said it would contribute $737 million to remake an obsolete oil-burning plant in Meredosia, Ill. In the new design, the plant would be fed pure oxygen and burn coal, and the exhaust gas would consist of almost pure carbon dioxide. That carbon dioxide would then be piped 170 miles east to Mattoon and injected underground, possibly along with contributions from an ethanol plant in Decatur, Ill., and other industrial plants along the way. It is the latest twist for FutureGen, a federally supported venture to demonstrate the most advanced ways to convert coal to a gas, capturing pollutants and burning the gas for power.
• 2010/08/04: SF Gate: Carbon Capture Closer to Profit in Brent Rally: Energy Markets

  Large scale geo-engineering keeps popping up:

• 2010/08/06: SciDevNet: Scientists reject aerosol geoengineering
• 2010/08/04: Techonomy: Geoengineering: The Most Important Technology Nobody's Heard Of
• 2010/08/05: CM: Geoengineering Article
• 2010/08/05: Heiko: An environmentalist's take on geoengineering
• 2010/08/05: SkeptiSci: Three new studies illustrate significant risks and complications with geoengineering climate by Brian Angliss
• 2010/08/02: TStar: The last resort on climate change

  While on the adaptation front:

• 2010/08/03: PhysOrg: Reconciliation ecology: The fun way to adapt to climate change
  A University of Arizona ecologist plans to involve Tucson neighborhoods in a giant test of reconciliation ecology.

Meanwhile in the journals:

• 2010/08/05: NERC:NORA: Validation of a land-surface climate model using snow cover observations by S. Dadson & J. Parajka
• 2010/08/05: NERC:NORA: Estimates of Flood Inundation and Evaporation in the Niger Inland Delta Region using the JULES land-surface model by Ian Ashpole et al.
• 2010/08/06: ACP: Energetic particle precipitation in ECHAM5/MESSy - Part 2: Solar proton events by A. J. G. Baumgaertner et al.
• 2010/08/06: ACP: The importance of aerosol mixing state and size-resolved composition on CCN concentration and the variation of the importance with atmospheric aging of aerosols by J. Wang et al.
• 2010/08/06: ACP: A 6-year global cloud climatology from the Atmospheric InfraRed Sounder AIRS and a statistical analysis in synergy with CALIPSO and CloudSat by C. J. Stubenrauch et al.
• 2010/08/05: OS: Impact of hydrographic data assimilation on the modelled Atlantic meridional overturning circulation by G. C. Smith et al.
• 2010/08/05: Sage:STHV: (ab$) Geoengineering, Ocean Fertilization, and the Problem of Permissible Pollution by Benjamin Hale & Lisa Dilling
• 2010/08/04: ACP: Stratospheric water vapour and high climate sensitivity in a version of the HadSM3 climate model by M. M. Joshi et al.
• 2010/08/03: ACP: Heterogeneous uptake of gaseous hydrogen peroxide by Gobi and Saharan dust aerosols: a potential missing sink for H2O2 in the troposphere by M. Pradhan et al.
• 2010/08/03: ACP: Historical (1850-2000) gridded anthropogenic and biomass burning emissions of reactive gases and aerosols: methodology and application by J.-F. Lamarque et al.
• 2010/08/05: ACPD: Evaluation of various observing systems for the global monitoring of CO2 surface fluxes by K. Hungershoefer et al.
• 2010/08/02: ACPD: Inferring absorbing organic carbon content from AERONET data by A. Arola et al.
• 2010/08/03: ACPD: Solar radiation trend across China in recent decades: a revisit with quality-controlled data by W.-J. Tang et al.
• 2010/08/02: ACPD: Cosmic rays linked to rapid mid-latitude cloud changes by B. A. Laken et al.
• 2010/05/15: Energy(via doi): (ab$) A global coal production forecast with multi-Hubbert cycle analysis by Tadeusz W. Patzeka & Gregory D. Croft
• 2010/07/12: ACS:ES&T: Specific Climate Impact of Passenger and Freight Transport by Jens Borken-Kleefeld et al.
• 2010/07/21: CC: Historical and future anthropogenic emission pathways derived from coupled climate-carbon cycle simulations by Erich Roeckner et al.

  As for miscellaneous science:

• 2010/08/05: JEB: "IPCC Experts" New Clothes
• 2010/08/04: NatureN: World view: Not by experts alone
  More and earlier public involvement is required to steer powerful new technologies wisely, says Daniel Sarewitz. These are the days of miracles and horrors and hubris. The unveiling of the first synthetic living cell in May signalled that synthetic biology had emerged as a new technological frontier. Meanwhile, the Faustian bargain of a past frontier -- using fossil fuels to provide energy -- has come home to roost in the oil-ruined Gulf of Mexico, and in calls to geoengineer the climate.
• 2010/08/02: SkeptiSci: On Consensus by Daniel Bailey

  More Hansen:

• 2010/08/05: HotTopic: Hansen in Norway

  More Broecker:

• 2010/08/04: TP:WR: The Warming World Of Wally Broecker, 35 Years Later

  The Pielke fan clubbe, alas:

• 2010/08/03: MTobis: Roger's Revenge
• 2010/08/01: MTobis: The Honestly Broken
• 2010/08/01: MTobis: And in the end

  Regarding Curry:

• 2010/08/06: D-HW: More context on Curry
• 2010/08/04: C-a-S: Gavin's Perspective
• 2010/08/03: C-a-S: The Curry Agonistes
  "The fundamental mistake made by the climate researchers involved in the hockey stick debate was to mistake McIntyre et al. as merchants of doubt (a la Oreskes and Collins), when instead they were motivated over a concern for public accountability of the research."[J Curry]

While at the UN:

• 2010/08/06: Reuters: Spurned Chinese developers blast U.N. CO2 rulings
  Rejection of China green power projects sparks investor ire - Investors accuse U.N. panel of shifting goalposts - Worries that some wind, hydro projects no longer viable
• 2010/08/04: Reuters: U.N. cuts pre-2012 Kyoto offset estimate by 3 percent
  A United Nations agency cut its forecast on Wednesday for pre-2012 Kyoto Protocol carbon offsets by 3 percent, estimating that only 981 million tonnes will come to market by the end of 2012.
• 2010/08/04: UN: Increased cooperation vital to tackling climate change in Pacific, Ban says
• 2010/08/02: PlanetArk: U.N. Panel To Probe Further Kyoto CO2-Cut Projects
  A United Nations climate panel will ask a working group to investigate further claims that a Kyoto Protocol scheme may be incentivizing participants to emit more greenhouse gases...

And on the carbon trading front:

• 2010/08/02: BBerg: UN Carbon Offsets Rise as Board at CDM Rejects Record Number of Projects

  The proposed Bank Tax/Tobin Tax refuses to die:

• 2010/08/06: PlanetArk: U.N. Climate Finance Group Mulls Tax On Banks
• 2010/08/05: Guardian(UK): Setback to hopes of Tobin tax to pay for climate aid
  Money needed to compensate poor countries for effects of climate change is more likely to come from carbon trading than from taxes on banks
• 2010/08/05: PhysOrg: UN panel: New taxes needed for a climate fund
  British economist Nicholas Stern says a U.N. economic panel is discussing carbon taxes, add-ons to international air fares and a levy on cross-border money transfers as ways to raise $100 billion a year to fight climate change.
• 2010/08/05: PressEurop: Global banking tax -- just a slogan?

  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:

• 2010/08/04: PhysOrg: Financial impacts of 'cap and trade'
  So-called "cap and trade" legislation has often been portrayed as a regressive policy -- one that would hit poor people the hardest. A new MIT study concluded that this is not the case.
• 2010/08/02: TEC: Here we go again: Tax gas or mileage?

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

• 2010/08/04: CDreams: Protesters Charged with Mischief, 'Breaking Out' After Calgary Greenpeace Action

  What are the activists up to?

• 2010/08/07: Grist: An open letter to all people and organizations working to combat global warming
• 2010/08/05: CCurrents: We're Hot As Hell And We're Not Going To Take It Any More [McKibben]
• 2010/08/05: AlterNet: The Temperature Is Getting Hot as Hell and We're Not Going to Take It Any More [McKibben]
• 2010/08/04: CBC: Greenpeace activists charged in Calgary ["Separate Oil and State"] demo
  Nine Greenpeace activists have been charged with criminal offences after an anti-oilsands demonstration on the Calgary Tower. Some of the demonstrators rappelled from the tourist attraction on Tuesday to hang a banner attacking the relationship between the oilsands industry and government.
• 2010/08/04: ABC(Au): Activists stage rooftop protest at Qld Parliament
  There has been a security breach at Parliament House in Brisbane, with protesters getting through security to unfurl a large banner [that read "Don't undermine our farms"]
• 2010/08/04: LA Times: Climate change: It's time to talk, and act, tough [McKibben]
• 2010/08/03: CBC: Anti-oilsands protest unfurled on Calgary Tower
  Five Greenpeace activists are in police custody, hours after two of them rappelled off the Calgary Tower to hang a ["Separate Oil and State"] banner calling for a decreased relationship between the oilsands industry and government.

Polls! We have polls!

• 2010/08/06: REA: Poll: Americans Skeptical about Climate Change

  Regarding Water Politics and Business:

• 2010/08/06: CCurrents: Palestinians Denied Access To Water
• 2010/08/07: AlterNet: It's Time for Water Bottlers to Come Clean About the Source and Quality of Their Products

  As for SW tools:

• 2010/08/06: WorldChanging: Resource: New Mobile App to Combat Climate Skeptics
• 2010/08/06: Guardian(UK): Climate change denial? There's an app for that
  A new iPhone climate change sceptics' app inadvertently reveals the strategies of disinformation and denial they employ
• 2010/08/06: SEasterbrook: AGU 2010 session on Software Engineering for Climate Modeling [in December 2010]
• 2010/08/06: ClimateP: What you need the next time you're talking to a doubter: Skeptical Science's Android or iPhone app
• 2010/08/07: SkeptiSci: Talkin bout the Skeptical Science phone apps

  And on the American political front:

• 2010/08/05: AutoBG: Hollywood totally uncomfortable with a car-free lifestyle
• 2010/08/06: TP: Granholm: Limbaugh's Attack On American-Made Electric Vehicles Are 'Un-American'
• 2010/08/05: TP:WR: PowerPoint Reveals Tesoro Recruiting Other Oil Companies, Including BP, To Repeal CA Clean Energy
• 2010/08/02: AlterNet: Republicans Are Betraying Our Grandchildren
• 2010/08/04: NYT:GW: Texas Defies EPA on Regulation of Greenhouse Gases
  Texas officials warned U.S. EPA this week they won't change or reinterpret their air pollution laws to comply with federal greenhouse gas regulations, arguing that the Obama administration's climate rules are illegal. EPA plans to begin regulating stationary sources of greenhouse gases next January and asked states to inform the agency by this week whether they would need to change state laws or regulations to comply with federal policies. But Texas Commission on Environmental Quality Chairman Bryan Shaw and Texas Attorney General Greg Abbott (R) blasted EPA for unlawfully attempting to force states to "pledge allegiance to its rules." The dispute marks the latest in a series of altercations between the Obama EPA and Texas as federal officials have moved to overhaul the state's air permitting program.
• 2010/08/05: Reuters: NY Senate passes [9-month] gas drilling moratorium
• 2010/08/05: ClimateP: George Shultz challenges CA to lead on clean energy, defeat Proposition 23: Losing "would be a catastrophe."
• 2010/08/04: MLive: Oceana County wind farm meeting turns ugly, former lawmaker forced off stage
  Hart -- In a hot, overflowing middle school auditorium Wednesday, the Lake Michigan offshore wind debate turned ugly. Many of the more than 600 people who packed an Oceana County public information meeting on the Scandia Wind Offshore proposal for a wind farm 4 miles off Pentwater's shoreline shouted one of their own off the stage. Former Oceana elected official and state legislator Bill Bobier of Ferry was unable to complete his presentation at Hart Middle School on behalf of Scandia because of the audience uproar. Bobier is a consultant and lobbyist for the U.S.-Norwegian offshore wind developers. "I'm sorry you, the electorate, can't have civil discourse anymore," a dejected Bobier said, leaving the stage. After asking the audience to be respectful, Bobier said any perceived harm to Lake Michigan from the wind farm proposal must be measured against pollution harming the lake from facilities like coal-powered plants. "You must confront your own form of hypocrisy. We're all guilty," Bobier said of those opposing wind farms but turning a blind eye to other threats to the lake. "The real issue is the need for energy that is polluting the planet." With that, the audience of roughly 75 percent opposed to the Scandia plan would not let Bobier continue
• 2010/08/04: PoliticsInMinn: FarmFest: Walz, Demmer joust over cap-and-trade
• 2010/07/28: Salina: [Nate] Hagens: U.S. addicted to energy, debt
• 2010/08/04: Grist: Can't greens and libertarians just get along on climate?
• 2010/08/02: InformedComment: Take that, Dennis Miller; Climate Change is Real and Dangerous
• 2010/08/03: EnergyBulletin: America's delusions of energy independence
• 2010/08/03: EnergyBulletin: Beyond coal: A resilient new economy for Appalachia
• 2010/08/03: ClimateP: Defeat Proposition 23 to improve the lives of low income and minority Californians
• 2010/08/02: LA Times: George Shultz challenges California to lead -- Voters should defeat Proposition 23 and fight global warming, the former secretary of State says

  The BP disaster in the gulf still has US politics in a vise:

• 2010/08/06: SolveClimate: Gulf Oil Spill: White House Accused of Spinning Report -- Scientists say it is 'just not true' that the vast majority of oil from the BP spill has gone
• 2010/08/06: GreenGrok: Putting BP's Oil Spill Into Context
• 2010/08/06: OilChange: Scientists Attack White House Spin
• 2010/08/04: DemNow: Antonia Juhasz: BP's "Missing Oil" Washes Up in St. Mary's Parish, LA
• 2010/08/04: DemNow: Environmental Activist Jerry Cope on "The Crime of the Century: What BP and US Government Don't Want You to Know"
• 2010/08/05: TP:WR: Three Quarters Of Oil Disaster Unrecovered, Most Still In Gulf
• 2010/08/05: SolveClimate: For Oyster Industry, Gulf Oil Disaster is Far from Over -- 100% mortality reported in some oyster beds as operations assess damage
• 2010/08/05: Grist: So what happens when you dump 2 million gallons of toxic chemicals into the ocean?
• 2010/08/05: NRDC:SwitchBoard: 107 Days After The Gulf Spill Began, Big Oil Hasn't Changed A Bit
• 2010/08/04: EnergyBulletin: Deepwater Horizon: The aftermath
• 2010/08/04: SolveClimate: Dispersants Used in Gulf Under Fire as 'Uncontrolled Experiment' -- Environmental Protection Agency experts expressed concerns to superiors about use of dispersants, says whistleblower group
• 2010/08/04: KSJT: Lots of Ink: Gulf oil spill is fading fast. Impacts to linger, their magnitude uncertain...
• 2010/08/04: NOAANews: Federal Science Report Details Fate of Oil from BP Spill
• 2010/08/04: DeSmogBlog: America's Wetland Foundation dropped as sponsor of Be the One campaign
• 2010/08/03: DeSmogBlog: Wetlands Front Group Funded By Big Oil Wants To Ensure Taxpayers Foot The Bill For BP's Gulf Destruction
• 2010/08/03: ClimateP: Three lessons of BP oil disaster for climate change: worst-case scenarios happen, you can't believe oil companies, prevention is a lot cheaper than 'cure'
• 2010/08/03: NatureTGB: Deepwater Horizon: it's worse than you thought (again) -- part 2
• 2010/08/02: MTobis: Welcome to the Anthropocene
• 2010/08/02: AlterNet: BP's Rosy Predictions Are B.S. -- Scientists Say Gulf Spill Will Have Catastrophic Impact for Generations
• 2010/08/02: ScienceInsider: Five Ways Oil Drops Could Still Be Deadly to Gulf
• 2010/08/02: CSW: Incentivizing risk: the road to the Deepwater Horizon disaster
• 2010/08/02: TP:WR: Science War Room Needed For BP Oil Catastrophe

  Regarding PACE:

• 2010/08/05: Grist: Why won't Team Obama save a clean-energy program from Fannie and Freddie?

  An investigation has turned up the political manipulation of Digg:

• 2010/08/06: TreeHugger: Why Does Digg Hate Global Warming?
• 2010/08/07: AlterNet: AlterNet Investigation on Right-Wing Censorship of Digg Makes Huge Waves on the Internet
• 2010/08/06: AlterNet: Massive Censorship Of Digg Uncovered

  Cuccinelli is definitely a member of the 'permanently uninformed':

• 2010/08/03: UCSUSA: VA Attorney General Continues to Misrepresent Climate Science in His Latest Court Filing Against UVA
• 2010/08/02: UCSUSA: Latest Court Filing from Ken Cuccinelli Continues to Make Basic Scientific Errors

  The Obama chatter is nonstop:

• 2010/08/06: NYT:CW: Obama Gets a Menu of Climate Actions He Can Take Without Congress
• 2010/08/05: Grist: A climate 'Plan B' for team Obama
• 2010/08/05: REA: Who's Running The Ship? What's The End Game?

  The actions of the Obama administration are being watched closely:

• 2010/08/04: USGS: New Chief for USGS National Climate Change and Wildlife Science Center [Doug Beard]
• 2010/08/06: NatureTGB: Obama nominates NOAA chief scientist [Scott Doney]
• 2010/08/06: ScienceInsider: Obama Taps Marrett for No. 2 Job at NSF
• 2010/08/06: ScienceInsider: White House Nominates [Scott Doney] Chief Scientist for NOAA
• 2010/08/06: ScienceInsider: Why a Less Futuristic 'FutureGen' Coal Plant May Not Be Bad
• 2010/08/05: NYT: U.S. Changes Plan for [FutureGen] Capturing Emissions From Coal
• 2010/08/05: ClimateP: Energy Department launches Blog: "The Reality of Solar Panels at 50% Cost"
• 2010/08/04: Reuters: Analysis - Empowered US EPA will not spark energy revolution
  Regulators take up climate after Congress abandons - Expected 2011 toxics rule could shut coal-fired plants - EPA rules could prod utilities to support bill later
  The Obama Administration may yet notch some victories tackling planet-warming emissions but the larger war on climate change will not be won without legislation to kick-start innovation to ease the country's addiction to fossil fuels.
• 2010/08/05: AutoBG: BATT program awards $8.54M for research on lithium battery anodes
• 2010/08/03: Yahoo:AP: EPA undertakes overdue review on oil, gas rules
  The Environmental Protection Agency is reviewing four air emission rules for oil and natural gas operations, albeit many years later than it should have done so. The EPA is supposed to review the standards every eight years under the Clean Air Act, but some of the regulations in question haven't been updated since 1985...
• 2010/08/04: WaPo: EPA left to pick up climate change where Congress dropped the debate
• 2010/08/03: REA: DOE Funding Smart Grid, Advanced Solar Start-ups
• 2010/08/02: Guardian(UK): EPA rejects challenges to labelling carbon emissions a pollutant
• 2010/08/02: Grist: EPA takes center stage on climate action, gears up to battle Big Coal

  As for what is going on in Congress:

• 2010/08/07: BostonGlobe: MA pol: warming skeptics should move to ice island
  Massachusetts Congressman Edward Markey has a suggestion for how to use a giant ice island that recently broke off a glacier in Greenland. He says it's plenty big enough for people he calls "global warming deniers" to start their own country.
• 2010/08/06: WSJ: Methane Monitors at Center of [Massey Energy Co.'s Upper Big Branch] Mine-Explosion Probe
• 2010/08/06: UCSUSA: Too Many Senators are More Concerned about Short-Term Oil and Coal Profits Than Long-Term Public Interest
• 2010/08/05: NYT:CW: Eight House Republicans, After Carrying Climate Effort Last Year, Fend Off Attacks
• 2010/08/04: TheHill:e2W: House Republicans use GAO report to bash climate proposals
• 2010/08/04: NRDC:SwitchBoard: Does Congress Really Want the US Give Up On the Clean Energy Race?
• 2010/08/04: NatureTGB: Republican senators target "wasteful" science spending in stimulus package
• 2010/08/03: SolveClimate: Al Franken and Kit Bond Team Up for Combined Heat and Power -- Their bipartisan measure full of wonky details offers incentives for greater efficiency and renewable energy development
• 2010/08/03: SolveClimate: Are Democrats Fumbling Away a Potent Clean Energy Offense?
• 2010/08/02: NewYorker: The Empty Chamber -- Just how broken is the Senate?

  The future climate bill defines a battleline:

• 2010/08/05: Grist: Why did the climate bill die? Because we still don't have a real climate movement
• 2010/08/05: TEC: Reid Says Broader Climate and Energy Bill Isn't Dead Yet
• 2010/08/03: SF Gate: Senate Dems delay vote on oil spill, energy bill
  Democrats on Tuesday gave up trying to pass even a scaled-back energy bill this summer that would have removed liability ceilings on oil companies, a reaction to the BP oil spill. The bill also would have offered rebates to consumers for home energy efficiency improvements and encouraged federal agencies to buy more electric vehicles and retrofit heavy duty vehicles for natural gas. Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev., said he was unable to find a handful of Republicans to help advance the energy bill before the August recess.
• 2010/08/03: TheHill:e2W: Reid abandons oil-spill, energy legislation until after summer break
• 2010/08/04: NatureTGB: After punting on climate, Senate punts on energy and oil spills
• 2010/08/03: LA Times:GS: Why 2 million (promised) green jobs couldn't sell a climate bill
• 2010/08/04: TWM: Even a watered-down energy bill can't move...
• 2010/08/03: TP:WR: Stymied By Oil-Fueled Opposition, Reid Abandons Spill Bill
• 2010/08/02: Reuters: US Senate Republican leader [McConnell] sees energy bill defeat
• 2010/08/03: Grist: Is cap-and-trade to blame for the death of the climate bill?
• 2010/07/28: UCSUSA: Status of U.S. Comprehensive Climate and Energy Legislation
• 2010/08/02: NPR: Senate Aims To Pass Energy Bill Before Recess
• 2010/08/02: OilDrum: Does Unlimited Liability for Offshore Oil Drilling Make Sense?
• 2010/08/01: TheHill: Senate energy bill missing off top of this week's agenda as recess looms

  What are the lobbyists pushing?

• 2010/08/05: ClimateP: WashPost: Institute for Energy Research's dealings with BP "seemed an awful lot like a shakedown."
• 2010/08/04: Guardian(UK): Breakaway clean energy coalition splits US Chamber of Commerce
  The US Chamber of Commerce is seeking to discredit a new coalition in its ranks, which will push for stronger action on climate change
• 2010/08/03: Grist: Chamber of Commerce goes after climate dissenters in its ranks
• 2010/08/02: ClimateP: Big Oil profits targeted to kill Spill Bill
• 2010/08/02: LA Times: Corporate campaign fundraising picks up speed
  Business and conservative groups see a chance to influence the midterm election because of rising anger at Democratic policies and recent court rulings on political spending.
• 2010/08/02: MoJo: Chamber of Commerce Goes After Climate Dissenters In Its Ranks
  A new split over climate policy is brewing within the ranks of the US Chamber of Commerce as a breakaway group of local chambers is getting ready to publicly split with the business lobby's hardline stance against climate legislation. The new climate coalition, known as the Chambers for Innovation and Clean Energy (CICE), will press Congress to take stronger action on climate and energy issues. It has already signed up about a dozen chambers and will officially launch later this year.

Another ridiculous Republican:

• 2010/08/04: PRWatch: Denver's Insidious Commie Bike Plot
• 2010/08/05: AutoBG: It's a conspiracy! Cycling promotion a UN ruse to steal our freedom
• 2010/08/05: TreeHugger: Velophobia: Fear and Backpedaling in Colorado
• 2010/08/04: Wonkette: Colorado GOP Gov. Candidate Saves America From U.N.-Bicycle Conspiracy
• 2010/08/04: Grist: Colorado gov. candidate: Biking and transit are part of U.N. plot

  While in the UK:

• 2010/08/02: BBC: Climate target 'could cost £8bn'
  The cost to the taxpayer of meeting Scotland's climate change target has been put at about £8bn by 2020. The costs would include changes to energy and transport use by public service workers, and adaptation of public buildings. The figures were given to the Independent Budget Review Panel by the Scottish government.

Meanwhile in Australia:

• 2010/08/06: WtD: How special interests and a incoherent and ill-informed minority spooked the Labor party on climate change
• 2010/08/05: ABC(Au): 'Furious' [Parliamentary Speaker. John] Mickel announces Parliament security review
  There will be a security review at Queensland Parliament after two protesters scaled scaffolding and unfurled a banner from the roof of the House in Brisbane yesterday
• 2010/08/04: ABC(Au): Activists stage rooftop protest at Qld Parliament
  There has been a security breach at Parliament House in Brisbane, with protesters getting through security to unfurl a large banner [that read "Don't undermine our farms"]

The election campaign jolts along:

• 2010/08/08: ABC(Au): Greens propose $5b renewable loans scheme
  The Greens have released a policy to introduce a $5 billion loan guarantee scheme that would complement their target of a zero carbon economy.
• 2010/08/05: ABC(Au):TDU: Rudd's return, the final countdown
• 2010/08/02: ABC(Au):TDU: Demolishing the myths on emissions trading
• 2010/08/05: ABC(Au): Expert rubbishes Abbott's carbon cost claims
  A prominent economist [the University of Queensland's John Quiggin] has criticised Opposition Leader Tony Abbott for saying a $40 tax on carbon would double the price of electricity.
• 2010/08/05: ABC(Au): Greens propose visas for climate refugees
  The Greens are calling for a new visa category for climate change refugees from the Pacific. They have released a policy on the Pacific, saying Australia needs to do more to live up to its responsibilities in the region.
• 2010/08/05: ABC(Au): A debate on water policy between federal Water Minister Penny Wong and the Coalition's water spokesman Barnaby Joyce has gone ahead by telephone on ABC Radio in Adelaide
• 2010/08/05: JQuiggin: Population: Numbers and faces
• 2010/08/05: JQuiggin: More on Abbott and carbon taxes
• 2010/08/04: ABC(Au): Steven Davies representing the Climate Sceptics Party has entered the race for the South Australian seat of Barker in this month's federal election
• 2010/08/04: ABC(Au): Federal Water Minister Penny Wong has challenged her Coalition counterpart Barnaby Joyce to a debate on water policy
• 2010/08/02: WtD: Election 2010 update: Labour keeps dropping the ball, Liberal leader Abbott pushes denier "climate has always changed" line
• 2010/08/01: Reuters: Australia election set for neck-and-neck finish
  Australia's Labor government and the opposition are neck-and-neck ahead of an August 21 election, an opinion poll showed on Monday, prompting a call by Prime Minister Julia Gillard for an aggressive election campaign.
• 2010/08/02: ABC(Au): Gillard questioned on citizens' assembly leak
  Prime Minister Julia Gillard has sidestepped questions over whether she failed to put a key election announcement to Cabinet. In the latest in a series of leaks against the Prime Minister...
• 2010/08/02: ABC(Au): The Prime Minister has challenged Tony Abbott to a debate on the economy, just hours after announcing she would throw away the rule book and show the electorate who she really is
• 2010/08/02: ABC(Au): Gillard disappointed Labor candidate on climate
  Labor's candidate for the marginal electorate of Sturt in Adelaide has criticised Julia Gillard's climate change policy.
• 2010/08/02: JQuiggin: Do the math, Tony
• 2010/08/02: PeakEnergy: Greens out of the blocks but off the rails in wintry Canberra
• 2010/08/02: PeakEnergy: Labor Going Nowhere

  And in New Zealand:

• 2010/08/05: HotTopic: Things to come: adapting to climate change in NZ

  While in China:

• 2010/08/06: GlobalTimes: Future tax could protect environment
  China may launch an environmental protection tax in four provinces, China Business News cited an unidentified environmental planning official as saying Thursday.
• 2010/08/05: Reuters: China may launch environmental tax trial: report
  Three Chinese ministries will soon submit a proposal for an environmental tax on a trial basis, the China Business News reported on Thursday.
• 2010/08/05: PlanetArk: China To Invest $15 Billion Over 10 years For Green Autos: Paper
• 2010/08/03: ScienceInsider: China Launches Center for Combustion Research [to combat pollution & develop sustainable energy sources]

  And in Japan:

• 2010/08/08: Reuters: Japan to subsidise CO2-cut studies-newspaper
• 2010/08/05: AutoBG: Japan's green car subsidy helps boost July sales by 12.9%

  In Russia:

• 2010/08/07: NYT: Russia's Response to Fires Does Little to Calm
• 2010/08/06: DerSpiegel: The World from Berlin -- 'The Kremlin's Central Control Is the Real Disaster'
  Moscow is engulfed in smog, 500 fires are still blazing across Russia and the deadly wildfires could pose a nuclear threat if they spread to an area contaminated by the Chernobyl disaster. The German press on Friday says the overcentralization of power is partly to blame for the disaster.
• 2010/08/05: DerSpiegel: Russia's Wildfire Disaster -- Fury Grows over Moscow's Failures and Mounting Deaths
  Hundreds of forest fires are out of control, oil refineries are in danger and Moscow has been engulfed in smog. Russia is in the midst of a national disaster -- and the authorities are partly to blame. The country's fire departments are understaffed, poorly equipped and the forestry service has been all but dismantled.
• 2010/08/02: Time: Will Russia's Heat Wave End Its Global-Warming Doubts?
• 2010/08/03: Stoat: What does one summer make?

  And South America:

• 2010/08/06: Tyee: Canada Backs Colombia's Growing Embrace of US Military -- Peasants sent packing to pave way for oil, gas and mining investments
• 2010/08/05: PlanetArk: Argentine Glacier Bill On Ice As Debate Fails
  Argentina's lower house failed on Wednesday to debate a bill that would ban mining and oil-drilling on the country's Andean glaciers, angering environmentalists and supporters of the measure. Deputies, who approved the broad outline of the bill last month, were due to vote on the details on Wednesday, but the congressional session had to be abandoned because too many lawmakers were absent from the chamber. The bill has become a political hot potato in Argentina because President Cristina Fernandez vetoed a similar law passed by Congress two years ago.
• 2010/08/04: OpenDem: Industrialism and environmentalism in Brazil's elections
  Environmentalism may be important in the upcoming elections, and not only because the Green Party could sway the election outcome
• 2010/08/02: Guardian(UK): Funding, infighting and forests -- the Brazilian view on climate change

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

• 2010/08/05: PostMedia: Ottawa is overestimating impact of major climate change policies: Report
  The Harper government is overestimating the impact of six out of seven major climate-change policies and programs, says a new report released by the National Round Table on the Environment and the Economy.
• 2010/08/04: EmbassyMag: Canada's high-powered energy advocates -- Too bad it doesn't have a national energy policy yet: former diplomat

  The G20 policing controversy continues:

• 2010/08/06: ST: G20 Arrests Continue

  Questions and debate about offshore and Arctic drilling continue:

• 2010/08/07: PostMedia: Arctic seismic tests not oil related, Germany insists -- Inuit opponents offered spot on vessel
  The German government has weighed in on the dispute over a planned seismic survey in Lancaster Sound, insisting the controversial Arctic seabed probe has nothing to do with oil exploration and offering Inuit opponents of the project a place on the German research ship [Polarstern] now poised to conduct the tests for the Canadian government.
• 2010/08/06: PostMedia: Pegging cost of offshore spill like 'throwing darts'
  There are significant holes in Canada's plans to hold energy companies financially accountable for oil spills off the country's shores, newly released documents show. In fact, one official at the National Energy Board (NEB) likens the process of estimating the cost of cleaning up a spill and plugging a leaking well to "throwing darts at a target."
• 2010/08/07: CBC: Chevron wins Beaufort drilling bid -- Oil giant explores offshore; Calgary-based MGM Energy gets onshore licences
  The oil giant has won an exploration licence for 205,000 hectares of seabed, off Yukon's north coast and about 100 kilometres north of Herschel Island, officials with the federal Indian and Northern Affairs Department announced this week. But the lease does not mean Chevron can start drilling anytime soon, as federal regulators are reviewing Arctic offshore drilling regulations.
• 2010/08/05: CBC: Lancaster Sound seismic tests go to court
  A Nunavut Inuit group is in court Thursday, hoping to halt federal scientists from conducting seismic tests in Lancaster Sound, which is considered an ecologically rich area. The Qikiqtani Inuit Association filed a notice of motion with the Nunavut Court of Justice late Wednesday seeking an injunction to stop the Eastern Canadian Arctic Seismic Experiment from starting this month.
• 2010/08/05: PostMedia: Arctic drilling approved with unproven blowout device -- Equipment installed as 'additional precaution'
  The last company to drill for petroleum off Canada's Arctic coast was given the green light by federal regulators to use blowout-prevention equipment that had not been adequately proven, Postmedia News has learned
• 2010/08/03: CBC: Arctic seismic tests face legal challenge
  A Nunavut Inuit organization is taking federal scientists to court in an attempt to stop them from conducting seismic tests for potential oil and gas resources in Lancaster Sound. The Qikiqtani Inuit Association says it will file a court injunction with the Nunavut Court of Justice on Wednesday, asking the court to block the Geological Survey of Canada -- which is part of Natural Resources Canada -- from starting its Eastern Canadian Arctic Seismic Experiment this month. The Inuit association, which represents Inuit in Nunavut's Baffin region, has opposed the seismic project on the grounds that it could potentially harm marine wildlife in Lancaster Sound.
• 2010/08/03: CBC: Arctic oil and gas joint venture formed -- Regulatory approval needed before exploration begins
  Three major oil companies are teaming up to someday explore for oil and gas in a large area of the Beaufort Sea, where each company has millions of dollars in exploration leases. Imperial Oil Ltd., ExxonMobil Corp. and BP have formed the joint venture to explore offshore areas for which they secured leases in 2007 and 2008.
• 2010/08/01: PostMedia: 3 years to cap an Arctic oil spill, officials say -- Regulator Told MPs. Relief well can't be drilled in one ice-free season

  They're still arguing about pipelines [Keystone XL & Gateway]:

• Enbridge Northern Gateway Project Joint Review Panel
• 2010/08/05: PlanetArk: Refiners Feel Pinch From Enbridge Line Shutdown
• 2010/08/04: KitimatSentinel: Michigan breach causes ripples in Northwest
• 2010/08/04: DeSmogBlog: Want to Talk Northern Gateway Pipeline? Cancel your vacation
• 2010/08/04: CBC: Enbridge offers to buy homes near oil spill
  Enbridge Inc. is offering to buy up to 200 homes along the Kalamazoo River in Michigan where an estimated 3.1 million litres of oil spilled from a leak in one of its pipelines.
• 2010/08/03: CCP: Enbridge Oil Disaster: Tar sands piped from Canada through the heart of America -- 1 million gallons threaten Lake Michigan -- do we need the Keystone XL Project?
• 2010/08/03: ClimateP: Oil company, law enforcement block media access to public sites hit by Michigan oil spill

  The Premiers and Territorial leaders got together in Winnipeg for a chat:

• 2010/08/07: TPL: Like Waiting For Godot...
  [...]
  But wait: I read today in a local newsrag that the provincial premiers are somehow at loggerheads over climate change policy. Seems like EOTAAS (Everyone other than Alberta and Saskatchewan) think there needs to be a cap and trade system set on to limit emissions in Canada. Alberta and Saskatchewan, for some reason, disagree. They think otherwise:
  [...]
  Could it be -- could it be possible that the reason Alberta and Saskatchewan are against mandatory cap and trade legislation is because, well, Alberta and Saskatchewan are the big energy producers in Canada, making mucho dineros off of the petroleum industry in their respective provinces, including filthy coal, shale oil and conventional oil? No -- that couldn't be... Is it really all just down to economics and politics? Could this whole global warming denialism be explained by reference to dollars and power?
• 2010/08/05: PI: Pembina reacts to Stelmach oil sands PR at Council of the Federation -- Strong economic growth does not have to mean more pollution
• 2010/08/07: PostMedia: Premiers differ on climate change -- All say they're keen to tackle the problem, but disagree dramatically on how to do so
  [...]
  While premiers in Winnipeg for the annual Council of the Federation meeting agreed to a pan-Canadian water charter to protect and conserve the resource, they butted heads on how best to reduce greenhouse gas emissions. British Columbia, Ontario, Quebec and Manitoba favour a cap-and-trade emissions reduction program that would compel companies that miss their targets to purchase carbon credits from greener firms.
  [...]
  But Alberta and Saskatchewan argue technology is the key to slashing Canada's carbon footprint, and are committed to costly carbon capture and storage programs. Alberta has pledged $2 billion to four different projects.
  [...]
  Quebec Premier Jean Charest said he wants to see "a national system that will be equitable in terms of reduction of greenhouse gas emissions." Ontario Premier Dalton Mc-Guinty said: "The bigger the plan, the better, and right now we don't have that kind of initiative."

Hands up everyone who thinks the differing standards are a coincidence...:

• 2010/08/04: TStar: Biofuels' impact hard to gauge, report warns
  The biofuels industry leaves behind a hazy ecological footprint because each facility measures its environmental performance differently, says a new report. This makes it difficult for the government to gauge how ethanol and biodiesel affect the environment. A study done for Environment Canada earlier this year found gaps in the way biofuels plants measure greenhouse gases and other pollutants.

The Green convention approaches:

• 2010/08/03: CTV: New Green deputy Laraque wants to 'change the world'

  Meanwhile in that Mechanical Mordor known as the tar sands:

• 2010/08/02: UNDispatch: Arguing Over Tar Sands
• 2010/08/05: OSW: The truth about tailings
• 2010/08/05: NRDC:SwitchBoard: Looking like a public relations ploy: tar sands oil company withdraws its request for a pipeline safety waiver
• 2010/08/04: Tyee:Hook: Oil sands emissions to nearly triple by 2020, Pembina warns
• 2010/08/05: TMoS: Athabasca Emissions Set to Triple by 2020
• 2010/08/05: Economist: Canada's energy industry -- Tarred with the same brush
  The Gulf spill has focused American minds on pollution from Canadian oil producers. But cleaning up the tar sands will not be easy
• 2010/08/04: CBC: Total oil president calls sustainability important -- Green oilsands development isn't possible, Sierra Club says
• 2010/08/04: CanWest: French firm Total rules out carbon capture for Joslyn mine for now
  French energy giant Total confirmed Tuesday it will not use carbon capture technology in the first phase of its Joslyn North Mine project, citing expense as the roadblock. The company suggested in a 2009 report it was considering using carbon capture and storage (CCS) in its oilsands projects in Canada.
• 2010/08/02: Grist: Mammoth trucks en route to Canada's tar sands threaten Montana
• 2010/08/03: NRDC:SwitchBoard: The real story is of rising climate emissions from tar sands
• 2010/08/03: NBF: Grossmont Formation in Alberta Canada With 318 Billion Barrels of Oil in Place Could Start Producing in 2013 to 2015
• 2010/08/03: CBC: Anti-oilsands protest unfurled on Calgary Tower
  Five Greenpeace activists are in police custody, hours after two of them rappelled off the Calgary Tower to hang a ["Separate Oil and State"] banner calling for a decreased relationship between the oilsands industry and government.

Also in Alberta:

• 2010/08/05: OSW: Will Alberta learn from BP's mistakes?
• 2010/08/05: CBC: Alberta defends oilsands in ads
• 2010/08/05: CBC: Support for Alberta energy regulator drops

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

• 2010/08/03: G&M: Green firms see red over Ontario rule changes for power producers
  Province accused of creating instability by cutting rate for input to electricity grid Rob Christie of Cleave Energy Inc. was set to sign a deal with a solar panel manufacturer when, out of the blue, the Ontario government changed the rules for small producers of renewable electricity. Mr. Christie said the panel maker began having second thoughts about opening a plant in Ontario after the government announced that it was slashing the rate it will pay for contributions to the grid by 27 per cent for small-scale solar systems mounted on the ground. The proposed price cut to 58.8 cents a kilowatt hour from 80.2 cents applies to just a tiny segment of the market. But it has rippled beyond homeowners, farmers and small businesses that the microFIT program was designed for, and shaken the confidence of equipment suppliers and investors in the province's nascent green energy sector, industry officials say. "They've created instability," said Kristopher Stevens, executive director of the Ontario Sustainable Energy Association. "Investors are saying, 'Wow, do I really want to put my money in Ontario when they change the rules whenever they want.'"

In the Maritimes:

• 2010/08/06: CBC: Efficient wind energy goal of Maritime group
  A consortium of Maritime electricity companies is planning to team up with customers to make use of wind energy when it is available.
• 2010/08/06: CBC: N.B. nuclear plant another year behind schedule
  Atomic Energy of Canada Ltd. has informed the New Brunswick government and NB Power that the $1.4-billion refurbishment project of the Point Lepreau Nuclear Generating Station is another year behind schedule.

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

• 2010/08/08: PeakEnergy: What collapsing empire looks like
• 2010/08/06: NRDC:SwitchBoard: To 2040 and Beyond: A Burnham Plan for the 21st Century
• 2010/08/05: CCurrents: The End Of Capitalism? What Lies Ahead?
• 2010/08/06: EnergyBulletin: The end of capitalism?: Part 3. Life after capitalism
• 2010/08/03: CCurrents: How A Community-Based Co-Op Economy Might Work
• 2010/08/02: EnergyBulletin: How a community-based co-op economy might work

  IPAT [Impact = Population * Affluence * Technology] raised its head once again:

• 2010/08/03: OpenDem: US foreign policy and unsafe abortion in Africa
  United States foreign policy abortion restrictions have seriously limited African NGOs' efforts to reduce deaths associated with unsafe abortion procedures. A permanent ban of the Global Gag Rule would allow US foreign aid recipients in Africa to invest resources in safe abortion care without fearing a potential change in US foreign policy with each new administration

Apocalypso anyone?

• 2010/08/05: CCurrents: When Truth Is Unbelievable
• 2010/08/06: NBF: Stephen Hawking's Warning: Abandon Earth -- Or Face Extinction
• 2010/08/04: EnergyBulletin: When truth is unbelievable
• 2010/08/02: EnergyBulletin: Terms of dismissal

  As for how the media handles the science of climatology:

• 2010/08/06: DeSmogBlog: Regina Newspaper Calls on Skeptics to Put Their Money Where There Mouth Is
• 2010/08/05: TEC: Climate, Weather and the Media
• 2010/08/05: DeSmogBlog: Clive Crook: Atlantic columnist libels Michael Mann - again
• 2010/08/04: ClimateP: Atlantic shocker: Senior editor Clive Crook fabricates another quote to smear Michael Mann
• 2010/08/03: AntiMatter: Climate change: the tv briefing
• 2010/08/02: PlanetJ: Scientific Opinion versus Media Balance
• 2010/08/02: ClimateP: Washington Post on "The truth about global warming"
• 2010/08/02: WaPo: The truth about global warming
• 2010/08/01: TP:WR: The World Is Burning, And The New York Times Fiddles Inhofe's Tune

  While activists search for effective communication techniques:

• 2010/08/04: SkeptiSci: Communicating climate science in plain English
• 2010/08/02: PhysOrg: Addressing environmental challenges and controversies through science communication

  Regarding the quality of blogospheric discussion:

• 2010/08/02: KSJT: NY Times: Science bloggers 'charged with bigotry,' and 'class-war claptrap.' [Heffernan]

  Here is something for your library:

• 2010/08/08: Guardian(UK): [Book Review] Merchants of Doubt by Naomi Oreskes and Erik M Conway
  This exposé of the coterie of rightwing scientists hell-bent on destroying the cause of environmentalism is outstanding
• 2010/08/07: TreeHugger: [Book Review] _Biodiversity for Low and Zero Carbon Buildings: A Technical Guide for New Build_ by Dr. Carol Williams
• 2010/08/04: TEC: [Book Review] _Climate Cover-Up_ by James Hoggan & Richard Littlemore

  And for your film & video enjoyment:

• 2010/08/06: SkeptiSci: More evidence than you can shake a hockey stick at
• 2010/08/04: AFTIC: YouTube: Is Global Warming True?
• 2010/08/03: ClimateP: Climate Denial Crock of the Week: Heatwave Edition

  Meanwhile among the 'Sue the Bastards!' contingent:

• 2010/08/06: Yahoo:AP: Feds sue Michigan utility over coal-fired plant
  The federal government filed a lawsuit Thursday against DTE Energy Co., accusing the utility of modifying a major coal-fired plant without permits and the best equipment to control pollution. The lawsuit asks a judge to consider shutting down Monroe Unit 2 until it complies with clean-air laws. Fines could be as high as $37,500 a day. In response, the utility said the government is wrong and no new permit was required.
• 2010/08/06: PlanetArk: Chevron Urges Arbitration In $27 Billion Ecuador Case
• 2010/08/05: CBC: Lancaster Sound seismic tests go to court
• 2010/08/04: NYT:GW: Texas Defies EPA on Regulation of Greenhouse Gases
• 2010/08/02: NYT:GW: Enviro Group Sues EPA Over Greenhouse Gas 'Tailoring' Rule
  Environmentalists are suing U.S. EPA over a rule that aims to regulate greenhouse gases from only the largest industrial sources, arguing that the agency exempts too many big polluters. The Center for Biological Diversity is joining a number of industry groups in challenging EPA's "tailoring" rule, which will force large facilities to limit their greenhouse gas emissions starting next January. But while industry groups argue that EPA climate rules will hurt businesses, CBD says the agency is not going far enough. "We want to make sure that there are some lines in the sand that are drawn and that truly the large industrial sources of greenhouse gases are actually regulated," CBD senior counsel Bill Snape said. Today marks the legal deadline for opponents to challenge the rule in the U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia.
• 2010/08/02: Yahoo:AP: Groups seek judge's removal from drilling case
  Several environmental groups have asked a federal appeals court to disqualify a judge from a lawsuit over the Obama administration's initial six-month moratorium on deep-water oil drilling. U.S. District Judge Martin Feldman overturned the temporary drilling ban in June and refused last month to withdraw from the case. In a court filing Thursday, environmental groups supporting the moratorium asked the 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals to remove Feldman from the case because of his investments in several oil and gas companies.
• 2010/08/02: CBC: Enbridge notified of planned spill lawsuit
  A public interest law firm is preparing to sue Calgary-based Enbridge Inc., owners of a pipeline that ruptured in southern Michigan and dumped millions of litres of oil into a Kalamazoo River tributary. The Great Lakes Law Center on Monday sent Enbridge a notice of intent to file suit if a settlement isn't reached within 60 days. The letter accuses the company of violating the U.S. Clean Water Act.

Wrestling over a new energy infrastructure continues unabated:

• 2010/08/07: AutoBG: Ballard will make "clean power" hydrogen from bleach by-product
• 2010/08/06: REA: Eliminating America's addiction to oil -- Can a hydrogen economy be created in a decade?
• 2010/08/04: OPB: Oregon Waters Smoothed For Wave Energy Pioneer
  A company hoping to build the first commercial wave energy project on the West Coast has cleared a major hurdle. The developer has reached a preemptory settlement with concerned parties and government environmental agencies.
• 2010/08/04: WorldChanging: Scaling Up Solar: The Global Implications of a New Study that Says Solar Power Is Cost Competitive with Nuclear Power
• 2010/08/04: REA: Rebalancing the World's Energy Portfolio
• 2010/08/03: EnergyBulletin: America's delusions of energy independence
• 2010/08/03: Eureka: Generating energy from ocean waters off Hawaii [OTEC]
• 2010/08/03: OilDrum: Europe and Natural Gas - Are Tough Choices Ahead?
• 2010/08/03: PeakEnergy: UK Wave Hub Commences Final Commissioning
• 2010/08/01: CDreams: Despite Senate Inaction, Clean Energy Economy Thriving

  Hey! Let's contaminate the aquifer for thousands of years! It'll be a fracking gas!

• 2010/08/06: EnergyBulletin: New York Senate passes temporary ban on hydraulic fracturing
• 2010/08/05: AlterNet: Shocking Negligence: Gas Companies Drilling in Pennsylvania Have Committed Nearly 1,500 Environmental Violations in Just Two Years
• 2010/08/04: Grist: Drilling f-ed the Gulf; now will New York get fracked by drilling too?
• 2010/08/04: NRDC:SwitchBoard: Historic vote in NY: Senate says "Time Out" on new gas drilling
• 2010/08/03: NRDC:SwitchBoard: Shocking new report: PA natural gas industry violating laws
• 2010/08/02: ProPublica: Why Gas Leaks Matter in the Hydraulic Fracturing Debate
• 2010/08/02: SolveClimate: Gas Drilling Ban in NY Still a Possibility in 2010 -- Environmental groups say anti-drilling bill has enough votes to pass New York Legislature this week
• 2010/08/02: NRDC:SwitchBoard: If Fracking Fluids Are Safe, Why Is the Natural Gas Industry Fighting New Disclosure Efforts?
• 2010/08/02: NYT:CW: Fears of Pervasive Air Pollution Stir Up Politics in Texas Shale Gas Country

  The answer my friend...:

• 2010/08/06: NYT: Wind Farm Deal Assures Bigger U.S. Role
• 2010/08/06: WorldChanging: The Fuller Wind Turbine: A New Bladeless Roof Top Micro-Wind Turbine
• 2010/08/05: TreeHugger: Four US States Now Get More Than 10% of Electricity From Wind Power: [LBNL] Report
• 2010/08/05: REA: Dissecting the U.S. Wind Market
• 2010/08/04: REA: Results of Xcel Energy's Wind-to-Battery Project
• 2010/08/02: Grist: How much of a problem is wind-turbine noise?

  Meanwhile among the solar aficionados:

• 2010/08/07: TampaBay: Cloudy times for Florida's solar energy future
• 2010/08/06: REA: IMS: Solar Demand Will Exceed 100 GW in 5 Years
  This week IMS Research released its quarterly global PV demand database indicating that total solar installations will exceed 100 GW by the end of 2014. Annual PV installations are expected to grow steadily, according to the research firm, with a compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of 20% between 2011 and 2014.
• 2010/08/04: SciAm: World's first solar power plant that can work at night [using molten salt]
• 2010/08/04: TEC: Study: Solar power is cheaper than nuclear
• 2010/08/04: PeakEnergy: Nuclear Energy Loses Cost Advantage Over Solar PV
• 2010/08/03: PhysOrg: New inexpensive solar cell design
• 2010/08/03: Eureka: Selenium makes more efficient solar cells
• 2010/08/03: REA: 1 GW of Solar Projects To Be Developed in China
• 2010/08/02: PlanetArk: Analysis: Global Solar Sector Faces Fresh Cell Glut
• 2010/08/02: REA: Abengoa Solar Has 193 MW of CSP in Operation [in Spain]

  On the coal front:

• 2010/08/07: OilDrum: The Chinese Coal Monster - a comment from Jean Laherrere
• 2010/08/06: TEC: Peak coal looming?
• 2010/08/05: TCoE: Coal-powered water woes
• 2010/08/03: EnergyBulletin: Beyond coal: A resilient new economy for Appalachia
• 2010/08/02: NRDC:SwitchBoard: Mission Impossible: Mitigating Mountaintop Removal

  Biofuel bickering abounds:

• 2010/08/04: SolveClimate: ZeaChem CEO: Sound Cellulosic Biofuel Solutions Will Proceed Without U.S. Subsidies -- Five times the yield of ethanol than an acre of corn, company claims
• 2010/08/04: TAMU: Biofuel study looks at cost to wildlife and environmental diversity -- AgriLife scientist: 'Time to take the monoculture blinders off'
• 2010/08/04: Tyee: Breeding Trees to Be Better Biofuel -- Thanks to a gene mapping breakthrough, producing ethanol is going to be cheaper and easier in BC.
• 2010/08/03: TreeHugger: 46,000 Square Miles Of Forest Needed To Supply 120 Planned US Wood-Fired Power Plants

  The nuclear energy controversy continues:

• 2010/08/06: NBF: Taiwan Considers Adding Ten Nuclear Reactors to Reduce Coal Usage and Germany Looks to Extend Nuclear to 2042
• 2010/08/05: ENS: Rocky Flats Nuclear Site Too Hot for Public Access, Citizens Warn
• 2010/08/06: CBC: N.B. nuclear plant another year behind schedule
  Atomic Energy of Canada Ltd. has informed the New Brunswick government and NB Power that the $1.4-billion refurbishment project of the Point Lepreau Nuclear Generating Station is another year behind schedule.

Yes we have peak everything:

• 2010/08/06: EnergyBulletin: Different takes on peak oil, same result -- price spikes predicted
• 2010/08/05: OilDrum: Peak Oil: How Supply Crunch Can Lead to Lower Prices (for a while!)
• 2010/08/05: PeakEnergy: Playing resource roulette
• 2010/08/05: AutoBG: Peak coal could happen by 2011... if we don't start any more mines!
• 2010/08/04: OilDrum: Peak Capital - Our Ultimate Limit?
• 2010/08/03: CCurrents: Policymakers Recognise Peak Oil Threat, Now They Need To Deal With It
• 2010/08/01: EnergyBulletin: What will it take to convince people about the dangers of peak oil?

  More people are talking about the electrical grid:

• 2010/08/07: TEC: Solar Power and the Smart Grid
• 2010/08/06: OilDrum: The US Electric Grid: Will it be Our Undoing? - Revisited
• 2010/08/02: TEC: Reliability and the Smart Grid

  And then there is the matter of efficiency & conservation:

• 2010/08/05: Grist: Introducing ULE 880 -- Sustainability for Manufacturing Organizations
• 2010/08/04: CSM: Home appliances get tough new efficiency standards
  While the US Senate energy bill appears all but dead, a coalition of environmentalist and industry groups forged ahead with an agreement Tuesday that promises to significantly reduce Americans' home energy consumption for decades to come. The plan, if approved and implemented by the US Department of Energy, would hike the efficiency of the nation's biggest home energy hogs: refrigerators, freezers, clothes washers, clothes dryers, room air conditioners, dishwashers. Over the next 30 years, the increase could save enough energy to power 40 percent of American homes for a year. It would also cut greenhouse gas emissions by about 550 million tons -- about the same as taking 100 million cars off the road for a year.
• 2010/08/03: NRDC:SwitchBoard: Big Agreement on Home Appliances Means Big Savings for Consumers

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

• 2010/08/06: PhysOrg: Toyota's Japan hybrid sales top one million
• 2010/08/05: PlanetArk: China To Invest $15 Billion Over 10 years For Green Autos: Paper
• 2010/08/04: PhysOrg: China to invest 15 billion dollars in green cars
• 2010/08/04: AutoBG: Video: White Zombie sets quarter mile record with new lithium pack at Wayland Invitational V
• 2010/08/04: CBC: Toyota reports $2.2B US profit
  Toyota Motor Corp. reported a quarterly profit of $2.2 billion US Wednesday, reversing a loss from a year earlier.
• 2010/08/02: NewScientist: Green machine: Plug-free electric cars' hidden cost
• 2010/08/02: AutoBG: Number of operational gas stations in UK plummets to all-time low [9,013]
• 2010/08/01: AutoBG: Will flex-fuel vehicles survive when CAFE credits dissappear in 2016?

  This week in the Gee Whiz File:

• 2010/08/03: FuturePundit: Solar Process Harnesses Light And Heat [PETE]
• 2010/08/05: TCoE: I want my (fuel cell powered) jet pack!
• 2010/08/02: Stanford: New solar energy conversion process [PETE] discovered by Stanford engineers could revamp solar power production
  A new process that simultaneously combines the light and heat of solar radiation to generate electricity could offer more than double the efficiency of existing solar cell technology, say the Stanford engineers who discovered it and proved that it works. The process, called "photon enhanced thermionic emission," or PETE, could reduce the costs of solar energy production enough for it to compete with oil as an energy source.

As for Energy Storage:

• 2010/08/04: TCoE: It's the batteries, stupid

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

• 2010/08/06: ClimateP: Energy and Global Warming News for August 6...
• 2010/08/05: ClimateP: Energy and Global Warming News for August 5...
• 2010/08/04: ClimateP: Energy and Global Warming News for August 4...
• 2010/08/03: ClimateP: Energy and Global Warming News for August 3...
• 2010/08/02: ClimateP: Energy and Global Warming News for August 2...

  Other (weekly) lists:

• 2010/08/06: Grist: Friday Flashback -- The climate clock ticks faster, a solar campus, butter as biofuel, and 7 more green tales
• 2010/08/05: Grist: A walk through the week's climate news -- The Climate Post: Beating a dead climate horse
• 2010/08/05: NRDC:SwitchBoard: India Climate Change and Energy News - Week of July 27, 2010 to August 2, 2010
• 2010/08/03: CSW: Climate Science Watch Weekly Update
• 2010/08/02: NRDC:SwitchBoard: India Climate Change and Energy News - Week of July 20, 2010 to July 27, 2010

  The carbon lobby are up to the usual:

• 2010/08/08: HotTopic: Looking on the dark side
• 2010/08/07: Far-n-Wide: CRAP From CAPP
• 2010/08/07: BBickmore: The Monckton Files: Cracking the Crackpot Graphs
• 2010/08/07: Deltoid: Engelbeen on CO2
• 2010/08/07: RealClimate: Monckton makes it up
• 2010/08/06: Guardian(UK): Coal: The cheap, dirty and direct route to irreversible climate change
  The global dominance of industrial interests dependant on cheap energy sourced from coal mean climate change is inevitable
• 2010/08/06: BCLSB: Bjrøn Lomborg, Jim Skea Quit E&E Over Global Warming
• 2010/08/06: SMandia: Open Letter to Christopher Monckton
• 2010/08/06: TSoD: Updated CO2 -- An Insignificant Trace Gas -- Part One
• 2010/08/05: FoG&T: The Empire Strikes back: Moncktongate - the End of a Jester?
• 2010/08/06: WtD: The 'orrible pink portcullis: House of Lords not happy with Monckton
• 2010/08/05: BBickmore: The Monckton Files: The Investigation Begins!!!
• 2010/08/05: TreeHugger: The Danger of Armchair Pundits 'Investigating' Climate Science
• 2010/08/05: DeSmogBlog: Monckton Watch: Lordly Phony Threatens Phony Suit
• 2010/08/04: PlanetJ: Global Warming Contrarians Part 7: State of the Climate
• 2010/08/04: Deltoid: Monckton vs Scott Mandia
• 2010/08/04: BCLSB: A Brief Note From The Climate Wars: Klaus Heiss Dies
• 2010/08/03: DeepClimate: What have Wegman and Said done ... lately?
• 2010/08/03: HotTopic: Monckton is a fraud
• 2010/08/03: WtD: Hurricane in a tea cup: Jo Nova misrepresents the science.. again!
• 2010/08/02: BBickmore: The Monckton Files: Threatening Scott Mandia
• 2010/08/02: TCoE: Monckton's at it again
• 2010/08/02: SMandia: Monckton Responds to My Defense of Abraham
• 2010/08/01: EnergyBulletin: Many questions hanging over the oil industry

  As for climate miscellanea:

• 2010/08/08: TSoD: Vanishing Nets
• 2010/08/06: JEB: Wiley Interdisciplinary Reviews: Climate Change
• 2010/08/06: ERabett: Why you should read Rabett Run
• 2010/08/05: MTobis: mt Webinar
• 2010/08/05: Guardian(UK): Do environmentalists hold back sustainable lifestyles?
  Misguided images of sacrifice may be putting people off living more sustainable lifestyles. But reversing that may require new measures of success and happiness, say Tom Levitt and Kara Moses
• 2010/08/05: WtD: The best -- and worst -- of Watching the Deniers -- and coming changes
• 2010/08/05: TSoD: Do Trenberth and Kiehl understand the First Law of Thermodynamics? - Part Two
• 2010/08/04: BBC:RB: NOAA: The right answer to the wrong question?
• 2010/08/04: EnergyBulletin: What the Zapatistas can teach us about the climate crisis
• 2010/08/04: ClimateP: A Way Forward: Climate Hope in a Prison of Despair
• 2010/08/04: PlanetArk: Northeast Headed For Milder Winter: AccuWeather
• 2010/08/04: MTobis: Too Much Emotion? Or Not Enough?
• 2010/08/04: SkeptiSci: Confidence in climate forecasts by Kevin Judd
• 2010/08/03: JEB: Not so hot
• 2010/08/03: SkeptiSci: Why I care about climate change
• 2010/08/02: AFTIC: Nicely said!
• 2010/08/01: CSW: Environmental Conflict and Climate Change: The Grassroots vs 'Big Green'

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

• UNEP Risoe Centre on Energy, Climate and Sustainable Development
• DOE Blog
• Enbridge Northern Gateway Project Joint Review Panel
• WWI: Nourishing the Planet
• RationalWiki: Gish Gallop
• JHU: Global Water Magazine
• ENSEMBLES
• Wiki: Critical thinking
• Wiki: Scientific method
• PCCRC: Purdue Climate Change Research Center
• NOAA News mag
• James Annan's Work Page (with list of publications)
• 2005/06/: AIP: The Discovery of Global Warming - A hypertext history
• 2005/06/: AIP: Basic Radiation Calculations
• EPICA: European Project for Ice Coring in Antarctica

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.

"Mother Nature doesn't do bailouts. One day, Mother Nature shows up and blows out your knee caps." -Denis Hayes

• Global Warming Links
• Global Warming News Archive
• Energy
• Energy News
• Environmental Issues
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• H.E. Taylor (homepage)