Logging the Onset of The Bottleneck Years
This weekly posting is brought to you courtesy of H. E. Taylor. Happy reading, I hope you enjoy this week's Global Warming news roundup
Another week of Climate Instability News
Information is not Knowledge...Knowledge is not Wisdom
November 28, 2010
- Chuckles, COP15, COP16+, WMSoC, Schneider & Hook, CSRRT, Reforestation, GreenPeace, Pakistan
- Carbon Tariffs, Subsidies, UNCFG, Ecuador, GFI, Psych, Year in Review, Cook, Post CRU, IEC
- Melting Arctic, Megafauna, Methane, Geopolitics, Antarctica
- Food Crisis, Food Corps, Food vs. Biofuel, Land Grabs, GMOs, Food Production
- Hurricanes, GHGs, Temperatures, Clouds
- Paleoclimate, Tipping Points, State of the Oceans, Satellites
- Impacts, Forests, Climate Refugees, Desertification, Wacky Weather
- Extreme Weather, Tornadoes, Wildfires, Sea Levels, Floods & Droughts
- Mitigation, REDD, Transportation, Buildings, Sequestration, Geoengineering, Adaptation
- Journals, Other Docs , Misc. Science, DIY Science, Models, Abraham, Hansen, Wegman, Pielke
- Kyoto, Carbon Trade, Carbon Tax
- International Politics: Misc., Rare Earths, Security, Law & Activism, Water Politics & Business, Predictions
- National Politics: America, BP Disaster, Ethanol, Obama, USAdmin, Congress, Climate Bill, Lobbyists, Circus, Al Gore
- Britain, Europe, Australia, Murray-Darling, India, China, Russia
- Canada, Post G20, Offshore Drilling, C-311, Lower Churchill, Lobbying Foreign Govts, Canada & Cancun
- CCGS Amundsen, Renewables Review, BC, Tar Sands, Alberta, Sask, Ontario, Maritimes, North, Canadiana
- Ecological Economics, Transition, Children, IPAT, Apocalypso, Media, Books, Video, Podcasts, Betting
- Energy, Fracking, Wind, Solar, Coal, Biofuel, Nukes, Peak Oil, Grid, Efficiency, Cars, Gee Whiz, Energy Storage
- Business, Greenwashing, Joe's List, Carbon Lobby, Miscellaneous Climate, Useful Links
- Shameless Self Promotion, .sig
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- 2010/11/22: TI:CF: (cartoon - Roberts) Mr Brightside's Modest Proposals
- 2010/11/22: TI:CF: (cartoon - Roberts) Mask
- 2010/11/23: TI:CF: (cartoon - Roberts) Motivational hiatus
- 2010/11/24: TI:CF: (cartoon - Roberts) Illogical Progression
- 2010/11/25: TI:CF: (cartoon - Roberts) Reality checks
- 2010/11/26: TI:CF: (cartoon - Roberts) Coal Hole
- 2010/11/26: TI:CF: (cartoon - Roberts) Normal Service Resumed
- 2010/11/27: TI:CF: (cartoon - Roberts) Half a League Onward
- 2010/11/26: PSinclair: (cartoon - Abstruce Goose) A True Story of Science and Journalism
- 2010/11/25: BVerheggen: (cartoon - Sorenson) Sarcasm alert
- 2010/11/24: AFTIC: (cartoon - Sorenson) Scientists flummoxed by snowstorm
- 2010/11/21: RealClimate: (cartooon - Seitz) The new post-partisan world
And for those interested in exploring the nether reaches of Poe's Law:
- 2010/11/27: TWM: Blurring the satirical line...
- 2010/11/24: ClimateP: Motor Trend slams Limbaugh for attacking the Chevy Volt: "Driving and Oxycontin don't mix"
- 2010/11/23: AFTIC: Study: Researchers discover that they can't stand each other
Looking back at Copenhagen:
- 2010/11/23: Guardian(UK): UN scientists say emission pledges fall well short of halting climate change
- 2010/11/23: UNEP: 5 Gigatonnes - the gap between climate science and current climate cuts after Copenhagen?
- 2010/11/24: ABC(Au): World falling short on Copenhagen targets
The United Nations says national pledges to cut greenhouse gases under the Copenhagen Accord fall short of what is needed to limit a rise in global temperatures of two degrees Celsius. - 2010/11/23: CSM: Copenhagen one year after: Did global warming talks accomplish anything?
- 2010/11/24: OilChange: The 5 Gigatonne Gap
- 2010/11/23: CNN: Bolder climate deal needed to close 'emissions gap,' U.N. says
Governments must set in stone climate pledges made in Copenhagen, Steiner said - Comes as UN releases a report saying government must do more to reduce emissions - Report finds that even if all pledges are met, temperatures will still rise above agreed levels - Negotiators meet in Cancun in late November for COP16 - 2010/11/22: ENS: Rich Nations Fail to Keep Copenhagen Climate Funding Promise
- 2010/11/23: BBC: Climate pledges fall short, says UN
The promises countries have made to control carbon emissions will see temperatures rise by up to 4C during this century, a UN report concludes. - 2010/11/23: CBC: CO2 cuts pledged in Copenhagen not enough: UN
Emissions cuts pledged by countries in a nonbinding climate accord last year fall short of what's needed to avoid the worst consequences of global warming, the United Nations environment agency said Tuesday. The sobering report by the UN Environmental Program comes as climate negotiators prepare for another round of talks next week in Cancun, Mexico. - UNFCCC: The United Nations Climate Change Conference in Cancun, 29 November - 10 December 2010
- COP 16, United Nations Climate Change Conference, Cancún, Quintana Roo
- WMO: WMO at UN Climate Change Conference (Cancun, Mexico)
- 2010/11/28: PhysOrg: India seeks to resolve climate disputes in Cancun
India is making two proposals for the U.N. climate summit in Cancun in hopes of redefining its global image as a constructive negotiator by helping to resolve disputes that have stymied agreement on curbing greenhouse gas emissions. The two proposals, obtained by The Associated Press, address the monitoring of national emissions cuts and sharing of environmentally friendly technologies with poor and developing nations. - 2010/11/28: Independent(UK): Don't let us down: UN climate change talks in Cancun -- As world leaders meet in Mexico, people in poor countries fear little will be done
- 2010/11/27: WaPo: Climate change talks face crucial test
- 2010/11/28: EarthTimes: Governments hope to keep climate talks alive as Cancun opens
- 2010/11/27: NewScientist: Cancún climate talks: what you need to know [Pearce]
- 2010/11/27: Grist: What can climate negotiations achieve in Cancun?
- 2010/11/27: GulfTimes: First step towards future climate treaty
The absence of many world leaders might prove a blessing in disguise for the outcome of the upcoming United Nations climate summit in Cancun, Mexico. - 2010/11/25: CCurrents: UN Issues Severe Climate Warning Ahead Of Summit
- 2010/11/26: Independent(UK): There won't be a bailout for the earth
Why are the world's governments bothering? Why are they jetting to Cancun next week to discuss what to do now about global warming? The vogue has passed. The fad has faded. Global warming is yesterday's apocalypse. Didn't somebody leak an email that showed it was all made up? Doesn't it sometimes snow in the winter? Didn't Al Gore get fat, or something? - 2010/11/24: CJR: From Copenhagen to Cancun -- A challenging year for the climate story
- 2010/11/26: Guardian(UK): Cancún must be about more than climate change
In order to succeed, we need to think holistically and recognise how climate change, poverty and conflict are intertwined - 2010/11/26: ENS: Giant Earth Art Displays Dramatize Climate Urgency
- 2010/11/24: PI:B: Beaches, bargaining and building blocks at the Cancun climate talks
- 2010/11/24: PI: [link to 359k pdf] Briefing note on UN climate negotiations in Cancun, Mexico
- 2010/11/26: Guardian(UK): Cancún climate summit: Rich accused of 'holding humanity hostage'
- 2010/11/26: ABC(Au): Hopes low ahead of Cancun climate talks
- 2010/11/26: PlanetArk: Small Islands Seek 2011 Deadline For Climate Deal
- 2010/11/26: NRDC:SwitchBoard: China stands firm on unconditional climate funding ahead of Cancun talks and other China environmental news
- 2010/11/26: TerraDaily: Climate change: UN in the Last Chance Saloon
- 2010/11/26: TEC: Road to Cancun: UN Says Bigger Emissions Commitments Required; China Admits its the World's Largest Emitter
- 2010/11/25: Guardian(UK): Cancún is indeed a nest of serpents -- sitting in a vast, toxic rubbish dump
Let's hope the UN climate change convention will expose the devastation wreaked on Mexico by its government's negligence - 2010/11/25: Guardian(UK): Youth activists plan co-operation over protest at Cancún climate summit
- 2010/11/25: CBC: Climate deal not expected at Cancun
- 2010/11/24: CBC: Que. environmental group [Ãquiterre] urges progress in Cancun
- 2010/11/24: BBC: Modest hopes for climate summit, as gas levels rise
- 2010/11/24: Guardian(UK): Developing nations 'pay lip service' to climate change -- ex-UN climate chief
Yvo de Boer says poor countries think west is using climate change to keep them poor and maintain status quo - 2010/11/24: SolveClimate: Youth Activists Reveal Toned-Down Strategy for Cancun
- 2010/11/24: NRDC:SwitchBoard: India at Cancun - What The Global Community Should Expect
- 2010/11/24: NatureN: Climate talks focus on lesser goals -- With nations in gridlock over emissions, UN negotiators are concentrating on side deals to revive an ailing process
- 2010/11/23: NRDC:SwitchBoard: Countries aren't Sitting on the Sidelines Waiting for a Final International Climate Agreement Before Taking Action
- 2010/11/23: EarthTimes: Climate summits: From Rio to Cancun
- 2010/11/23: EarthTimes: Key sticking points in Cancun
- 2010/11/23: EarthTimes: 'Wobbly' climate summit could spell end of global talks
- 2010/11/23: OilChange: A Small Window of Opportunity At Cancun
- 2010/11/22: Guardian(UK): 'In Cancún you can make history,' celebrities tell the world's politicians
- 2010/11/22: Guardian(UK): [Letters] Leaders can seize the moment in Cancun
- 2010/11/22: UN: UN official confident of progress at Cancún climate change conference
Looking ahead to the United Nations climate change conference beginning in Cancún next week, a senior official with the world body said today that talks could yield real results but was cautious to keep expectations realistic. Assistant Secretary-General for Policy Planning Robert Orr told journalists at UN Headquarters in New York that he did not expect the conference of parties to the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) to deliver a "final answer" on solving climate change but remained positive about the possibilities. "Significant progress is possible in Cancún," he said. "That is not to say that we expect all issues to be resolved." "We need a package of decisions and outcomes. One or two [agreements] won't an outcome create." - 2010/11/22: KSJT: Early Ink: Cancun climate talks start next week..
- 2010/11/22: MongaBay: Cancún Climate Summit: Time for a New Geopolitical Architecture
- 2010/11/21: Yahoo:Reuters: China feels heat of climate change rifts
- 2010/11/22: KSJT: Reuters, etc: Logging's carbon accounts a key to climate talks
- 2010/11/22: BBerg: Climate Talks Echo 50-Year `Bretton Woods' Process as Clean Energy Slips
- 2010/11/22: EarthTimes: UN urges progress, but no high expectations in Cancun
- 2010/11/22: TEC: Cancun Climate Negotiators No Match For New Energy Alliances
[...]
In short, the Cancun climate summit reflects two opposing theaters of action. In one, climate negotiators are getting tangled up in the soft lines of national distrust and diplomatic nuance. In the other, their governments and domestic energy companies are busier than ever drilling, mining, processing, and producing the dirty power that perpetuates the fossil fuel era. - 2010/11/21: C&C: Cancun: The Battle Lines are Drawn
The World Mayors Summit on Climate went down in Mexico City last weekend:
- 2010/11/23: McClatchyDC: As nations dither on climate change, big cities step up
- 2010/11/23: EurActiv: European cities join global effort on climate
A number of large European cities are promising to reduce their carbon dioxide emissions as part of a major international initiative to tackle climate change. The initiative was launched at a conference in Mexico City on 21 November 2010. Some of Europe's biggest cities are among 138 local governments from around the world that have signed the Global Cities Covenant on Climate, thereby committing themselves to implementing measures that will help to reduce their carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions. Cities that have already signed up to take part in the initiative include Barcelona, Bordeaux, Brussels, Cologne, Copenhagen, Geneva, Lyon, Malmo and Paris. The covenant was presented at a World Mayors Summit on Climate, held in Mexico City on 21 November. The summit was organised in partnership with the World Mayors Council on Climate Change (WMCCC), ICLEI -- Local Governments for Sustainability, and United Cities and Local Governments (UCLG). These umbrella organisations bring together many thousands of local and municipal governments throughout the world. - 2010/11/22: Grist: World mayors sign climate change pact
- 2010/11/21: TerraDaily: World mayors sign climate change pact
Mayors from around the world signed a voluntary pact in Mexico City on Sunday to reduce greenhouse gas emissions at a meeting meant as a precursor to next week's s UN-sponsored talks in Cancun. - 2010/11/24: GRL: (ab$) Space observations of inland water bodies show rapid surface warming since 1985 by Philipp Schneider & Simon J. Hook
- 2010/11/24: KSJT: AP, Science News, etc: Signs that lakes are warming, too. (How could they not be?)
- 2010/11/24: CBC: Lakes warming faster than air
A first-of-its-kind NASA study is finding that cool lakes are heating up --- even faster than air. Two NASA scientists used satellite data to look at 104 large inland lakes around the world and found that on average they have warmed 1.1 degrees (Celsius) since 1985. That's about 2½ times the increase in global temperatures in the same time period. - 2010/11/23: NASA:JPL: NASA Study Finds Earth's Lakes are Warming
- 2010/11/23: PhysOrg: NASA study finds Earth's lakes are warming
In the first comprehensive global survey of temperature trends in major lakes, NASA researchers determined Earth's largest lakes have warmed during the past 25 years in response to climate change. - 2010/11/24: JKB: Climate Science Rapid Responce Team (CSRRT) launched
- 2010/11/23: AFTIC: Announcing the Climate Science Rapid Response Team
- 2010/11/23: JEB: Climate Science Rapid Response Team (CSRRT)
- 2010/11/22: SMandia: Official Launch of the Climate Science Rapid Response Team
- 2010/11/22: ClimateP: Climate Science Rapid Response Team debunks Bjorn Lomborg's Washington Post op-ed
- 2010/11/22: ClimateP: Climate Science Rapid Response Team press release
- 2010/11/22: CCP: John Abraham, Ray Weymann and Scott Mandia launch Climate Science Rapid Response Team (CSRRT) website for inquiries concerning the science of climate change
- 2010/11/22: Guardian(UK): US climate scientists fight back after year of scepticism
Rapid response website to improve public understanding of global warming, while Republicans speak out against party line - 2010/11/22: TreeHugger: Climate Science Rapid Response Team! Assemble!
- 2010/11/22: DeSmogBlog: Scientists throw mainstream media a lifeline
A peculiar effect of reforestation policy and economics:
- 2010/11/23: FuturePundit: Reforestation Boosts Forestry Product Imports
- 2010/11/23: Eureka: Developing countries often outsource deforestation, study finds
In many developing countries, forest restoration at home has led to deforestation abroad, according to a new study in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (PNAS). The authors say their findings could have significant implications for ongoing efforts to protect the world's remaining forests, which are disappearing at an annual rate of more than 32 million acres -- an area roughly the size of England.
[...]
In the study, Lambin and co-authors Patrick Meyfroidt (University of Louvain) and Thomas Rudel (Rutgers University) analyzed the relationship between reforestation at the national scale and the international trade in forest and agricultural products between 1961 and 2007. The researchers focused on six developing countries -- China, Chile, Costa Rica, El Salvador, India and Vietnam -- that underwent a shift from net deforestation to net reforestation during that period. [...] In five of the six countries (with the exception of India), the return of native forests was accompanied by a reduction in timber harvests and new farmland, thus creating a demand for imported wood and agricultural products. - 2010/11/23: SolveClimate: Indonesia Eyeing $1bn Climate Aid to Cut Down Forests, says Greenpeace
Weak legal definitions of "forest" and "degraded land" are allowing logging industry to take advantage of an ambitious UN forest rescue scheme - 2010/11/23: TerraDaily: Indonesia's billion-dollar forest deal in danger: Greenpeace
Greenpeace on Tuesday warned that a billion-dollar deal between Norway and Indonesia to cut carbon emissions from deforestation is in danger of being hijacked by timber and oil palm companies. The environmental group said "notorious industrial rainforest destroyers" such as palm oil and pulp producers intended to manipulate the funds to subsidise further conversion of natural forests to plantations. The allegations came in a new Greenpeace report called "REDD Alert: Protection Money", expressing doubts about Indonesia's plans to use a UN-backed scheme to reduce carbon emissions from deforestation and degradation (REDD). - 2010/11/23: TreeHugger: Indonesia Using $1 Billion in Forest Protection Funds to Cut Down Forests?
- 2010/11/23: Guardian(UK): Indonesia eyeing $1bn climate aid to cut down forests, says Greenpeace
Vague legal definitions may allow Indonesia to class forests as 'degraded' and 'rehabilitate' the land with palm trees and biofuel crops - 2010/11/26: UN: Pakistan: UN addresses gender-based violence against flood victims
Carbon Tariffs still have people on edge:
- 2010/11/23: TreeHugger: If US Doesn't Price Carbon, Could Nations Boycott American Products?
- 2010/11/23: TCoE: Carbon tariffs are coming
Who's getting the subsidies?
- 2010/11/23: Reuters: EU's coal nations win battle in quest for subsidies
Europe's coal-mining countries won a key vote for more subsidies in the European Parliament on Tuesday, a win that adds to their lobbying power but carries little legal clout. - 2010/11/23: EUO: Parliament sides with Berlin and Madrid on coal subsidies
The European Parliament on Tuesday voted in favour of extending until 2018 an EU deadline for closing heavily subsidised coal mines, in line with demands from the German and Spanish governments. The MEP's opinion is consultative, but increases pressure on the European Commission to change its stance. With the two biggest groups -- the centre-right European People's Party and the Socialists and Democrats -- backing the extension until 2018, the resolution passed overwhelmingly with 465 votes in favour, 159 against and 39 abstentions. - 2010/11/22: NBF: World energy is expensive and all of it is subsidized
Regarding the UN Climate Fund:
- 2010/11/05: DECC: The Advisory Group on Long Term Finance (AGF) report launch
- 2010/11/26: OpenDem: The politics of climate finance
A high-level international report on how financial resources can be raised to help developing countries address climate change is a disappointing and politics-free compromise. Simon Maxwell proposes a way beyond it. - 2010/11/23: MongaBay: Oil, indigenous people, and Ecuador's big idea
- 2010/11/15: C&C: ALBA nations declare: Nature has no price!
What are the global financial institutions up to?
- 2010/11/22: TEC: World Bank Loans to Energy Projects--Both Clean and Dirty--Soar
The World Bank's lending for renewable energy and energy efficiency projects increased by 300 percent between fiscal year 2007 and fiscal year 2010, to a record $3.4 billion. But over that same period, lending to fossil fuel projects also jumped 430 percent. - 2010/11/28: ClimateP: Winning climate messages combine dire scientific threat with solutions for a just world
- 2010/11/25: TreeHugger: Too Much Doom & Gloom is Not Why People Stopped Believing in Climate Change
- 2010/11/22: ClimateP: Dire straits: Media blows the story of UC Berkeley study on climate messaging
The "Year in Review" articles have started already:
- 2010/11/26: DeSmogBlog: 2010 In Review: Scientists and Journalists Take Stock and Share Lessons Learned
John Cook and friends continue their counterpoint articles:
- 2010/11/26: SkeptiSci: Renewable Baseload Energy [IV]
- 2010/11/26: SkeptiSci: Climategate: Impeding Information Requests?
- 2010/11/24: SkeptiSci: Climategate: Keeping Skeptics Out of the IPCC?
- 2010/11/24: SkeptiSci: Climategate: Perverting Peer Review?
- 2010/11/22: SkeptiSci: Climategate: Hiding the Decline?
Post CRU theft, controversy & inquiry:
- 2010/11/27: IJISH: Overlaid files and missing files in FOI2009.zip's yamal/ directory
- 2010/11/24: DeSmogBlog: Have We Found the Real "Climategate" Scandal?
- 2010/11/23: PlanetJ: The Fake Scandal of Climategate
- 2010/11/23: BVerheggen: "Climategate": lessons learned
- 2010/11/23: WottsUWT: Climategate?
- 2010/11/22: IJISH: Adam: information from "very well placed source" rules out insider leak; but Mosher still touting it
The criminality of denial keeps coming up:
- 2010/11/26: CCP: Prosecuting Climate Change Criminals
The Arctic melt continues to garner a lot of attention:
- 2010/11/28: Guardian(UK): In a far corner of Greenland, hope is fading with the language and sea ice
Climate change, hunting controls and a new consumerism threaten the way of life of the Polar Eskimos of north-west Greenland. In the second of a series of dispatches, Stephen Pax Leonard reports from a community on the brink - 2010/11/22: OilChange: "We see ice-sheets changing overnight"
As for the charismatic megafauna:
- 2010/11/26: Guardian(UK): US sets aside [187,000 square mile] 'critical habitat' for polar bear in Alaska
- 2010/11/26: NatureTGB: US polar bears mark their territory
- 2010/11/25: Guardian(UK): US creates vast polar bear refuge in Alaska as seas warm and ice melts
Oil and gas companies told to steer clear of protected wildlife habitat, but already they're pushing to carry on drilling - 2010/11/24: Grist: Feds designate 'critical' polar bear habitat in Arctic
- 2010/11/25: BBC: Alaska polar bears given 'critical habitat'
The US has designated a "critical habitat" for polar bears living on Alaska's disappearing sea ice. The area - twice the size of the United Kingdom - has been set aside to help stave off the danger of extinction, the US Fish and Wildlife Service said. The territory includes locations where oil and gas companies want to drill. Environmentalists hope the designation will make it more difficult for companies to get permits to operate in the region. - 2010/11/24: CBC: U.S. creates 'critical habitat' for polar bear
- 2010/11/24: KSJT: Reuters, etc: If the Arctic ice does fade, polar bears will have another big problem. Grizzlies.
- 2010/11/23: UCLA: Biologists report more bad news for polar bears
Climate change will force them south, where they are unsuited for the diet - 2010/11/24: WpgSun: Climate change brings bad news for polar bears
That Damoclean sword still hangs overhead:
- 2010/11/21: ADN: Permafrost thawing rate accelerates, scientist finds -- Methane: Earth belches gas frozen for eons into ice under Arctic lakes
- 2010/11/21: PhysOrg: Leaking Siberian ice raises a tricky climate issue
- 2010/11/21: Yahoo:AP: Leaking Siberian ice raises a tricky climate issue
- 2010/11/21: LA Times: As Siberia's thawing permafrost leaks methane, some see another emerging climate threat
- 2010/11/21: CCP: As Siberia's thawing permafrost leaks methane, some see another emerging climate threat
As for the geopolitics of Arctic resources:
- 2010/11/24: CCurrents: NATO Arctic Security And Canadian Sovereignty In The Far North
- 2010/11/23: CCurrents: Shell's Arctic Drilling Will Destroy Our Homeland And Culture by Rosemary Ahtuangaruak
While in Antarctica:
- 2010/11/28: Guardian(UK): Antarctic ice reveals trapped secrets of climate change
- 2010/11/25: NERC:NORA: Overview of areal changes of the ice shelves on the Antarctic Peninsula over the past 50 years by A.J. Cook et al.
[Abstract Clip] Here we present a new dataset containing up-to-date and consistent area calculations for each of the twelve ice shelves on the AP [Antarctic Peninsula] over the past five decades. The results reveal an overall reduction in total ice-shelf area by over 28 000 km(2) since the beginning of the period. - 2010/11/24: HotTopic: Warming at the walls of the "citadel of ice"
- 2010/11/23: ClimateP: As Antarctica warms, a citadel of ice begins to melt
- 2010/11/22: Yale360: The Warming of Antarctica: A Citadel of Ice Begins to Melt
The fringes of the coldest continent are starting to feel the heat, with the northern Antarctic Peninsula warming faster than virtually any place on Earth. These rapidly rising temperatures represent the first breach in the enormous frozen dome that holds 90 percent of the world's ice. - FAO: World Food Situation - Food Price Indices
- 2010/11/23: AlterNet: How Our Dependence on Cheap Meat Is Helping to Destroy the Fabric of the Country
- 2010/11/24: EPI: Holiday hunger
This Thanksgiving, 42.4 million Americans -- 13.7% of the population -- are receiving benefits from the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance (SNAP) program, more commonly known as Food Stamps. The number is up from 36.2 million last year and has risen by 15 million since the start of the recession in December 2007. - 2010/11/23: UN: Rising food prices highlight need to boost investment in agriculture - UN official
- 2010/11/23: PlanetArk: Dry Weather Forecast For U.S. Winter Wheat, Argentine Soy
- 2010/11/23: G&M: The growing problem: Canada slips from agricultural superpower status
- 2010/11/23: MWatch: Thanksgiving is here, and so is hunger -- A record number of Americans worry about providing food to family
- 2010/11/21: SolveClimate: Ladakh's Farmers Forced to Adapt to Changing Climate
A devastating flood in August destroyed 70% of irrigation network vital to agriculture in dry mountain region - 2010/11/21: WaPo: 5 Myths about hunger in America
On the food corp. front:
- 2010/11/04: BWeek: Phosphate: Morocco's White Gold
Phosphate is used in everything from fertilizer to rechargeable batteries. And Morocco's King Mohammed VI has cornered the market - 2010/11/22: BPA: The Distillers Grains (DDGS) Export Market
So, are these land grabs Colonialism V2.0?
- 2010/11/25: CU: New foreign takeover controls on farms?
Regarding the genetic modification of food:
- 2010/11/23: GreenGrok: Genetically Modified Salmon: The Meta-Question
- 2010/11/26: BBC: Cloned cattle food safe to eat, say scientists
- 2010/11/25: PlanetArk: German Court Upholds GMO Planting Curbs
- 2010/11/24: ScienceInsider: Germany's High Court Preserves Restrictions on GM crops
- 2010/11/23: PhysOrg: Researchers re-sequence six corn varieties, find some genes missing
And how are we going to feed 9 billion?
- 2010/11/25: Reuters: 'Wonder food' spreads to Middle East
A nutritious blue-green algae, known as spirulina, has been added to school meals in Jordan to combat chronic malnutrition and anaemia among children. - 2010/11/23: FAO: Investments in agriculture must grow -- Rise in food prices make structural changes urgent
- 2010/11/23: OnEarth: A Hidden Cost of Farming
- 2010/11/23: KSJT: Sci Dev.net: Two stories (reports really) on climate, crops, and new foods
Again this week, no cyclonic storms, but some chatter:
- 2010/11/22: Maribo: If a hurricane dies at sea, does anybody count it?
- 2010/11/27: BCLSB: 2010 Hurricane Season
- 2010/11/24: TerraDaily: US spared hit during record hurricane season
The 2010 Atlantic storm season was twice as active as normal but what really amazed forecasters was that a record 12 hurricanes formed but never made landfall in the United States. The hurricanes and 19 named tropical storms over the Americas and the Caribbean during the June 1-November 30 season did contribute to some of the worst flooding in decades in Central and Southern America. - 2010/11/24: WMO: [link to 2 meg pdf] Greenhouse Gases Reach Record Levels -- WMO Highlights Concerns about Global Warming and Methane
- 2010/11/27: HotTopic: The gas almost works (more methane)
Atmospheric methane levels continued to increase in 2009, the World Meteorological Organisation's annual Greenhouse Gas Bulletin (summary PDF) confirmed this week. Methane averaged 1803 ppb over the year, up 5 ppb on 2008, and now contributes 18.1% of the radiative forcing caused by current greenhouse gas levels. - 2010/11/25: PlanetArk: Greenhouse Gases At Record Levels: UN Agency [WMO]
- 2010/11/25: NBF: New more complete assessment of climate change emissions contribution
- 2010/11/24: Guardian(UK): UN [WMO]: Greenhouse gases at highest level since pre-industrial times
- 2010/11/24: EurActiv: China to outstrip EU's higher CO2 reduction plans
A European Union proposal to raise the bloc's target for cutting CO2 emissions would have only a limited impact on global warming as any benefit would be easily offset by China's growing emissions, the International Energy Agency's chief economist has said. The EU has already agreed a goal to cut greenhouse gas emissions by at least 20% by 2020 compared with 1990 levels, but the European Commission and some member states have proposed to increase this to 30%. Fatih Birol, chief economist at the IEA, said the gains from the tougher EU reduction target would roughly equal only two weeks of China's emissions. - 2010/11/24: UN: Greenhouse gases reach record levels, could rise further, warns UN agency [WMO]
- 2010/11/23: UNEP: 5 Gigatonnes - the gap between climate science and current climate cuts after Copenhagen?
- 2010/11/24: TCoE: EU improved carbon savings = 2 weeks of China's emissions
- 2010/11/25: ABC(Au): Greenhouse gases at record levels: UN agency
The World Meteorological Organisation (WMO) says concentrations of the main greenhouse gases in the atmosphere have reached their highest level since pre-industrial times. - 2010/11/24: TerraDaily: Greenhouse gases rise to record levels in 2009: WMO
- 2010/11/24: TreeHugger: China Admits It's the World's Largest Greenhouse Gas Emitter
- 2010/11/24: STimes: UN [WMO]: greenhouse gas concentration at record level
- 2010/11/23: Yahoo:AFP: China admits it is the world's biggest [greenhouse gas emitter] polluter
- 2010/11/23: UN: Ahead of climate talks, UN-led report outlines greenhouse gas emissions gap
- 2010/11/23: PlanetArk: Global Impact Of EU 30 Pct Carbon Cut Small:IEA
- 2010/11/23: EarthTimes: Study: World failing to cut greenhouse-gas emissions fast enough
- 2010/11/22: CSM: Global warming: carbon dioxide emissions worldwide fell in 2009
- 2010/11/22: MongaBay: 2009 carbon emissions higher than expected
- 2010/11/22: ABC(Au): Carbon emissions on the way up, scientists say
- 2010/11/22: NewScientist: China bucks recession trend to keep emissions high
- 2010/11/22: TreeHugger: Global CO2 Emissions to Hit Record High After Record Low in 2009
- 2010/11/22: SciDaily: Global Carbon Dioxide Emissions May Reach Record Levels in 2010
- 2010/11/22: CBC: Recession clipped CO2 emissions slightly
- 2010/11/21: BBC: 2009 carbon emissions fall smaller than expected
Carbon emissions fell in 2009 due to the recession - but not by as much as predicted, suggesting the fast upward trend will soon be resumed. Those are the key findings from an analysis of 2009 emissions data issued in the journal Nature Geoscience a week before the UN climate summit opens. Industrialised nations saw big falls in emissions - but major developing countries saw a continued rise. The report suggests emissions will begin rising by 3% per year again. - 2010/11/26: RCS: Met Office to revise global warming data upwards
Global warming has been underestimated due to a bias in measurements made by ocean buoys and ships, the UK Meteorological Office said on 25 November 2010. This could mean that warming may have been as much as 0.03C per decade larger than previously thought, according to Met Office scientist Vicky Pope. - 2010/11/28: AFTIC: Global warming has been underestimated by HadCRU
- 2010/11/26: Reuters: World warmer, short-term trends need study: report
- 2010/11/27: DVoice: January-October 2010: The Warmest Period on Record
- 2010/11/26: Guardian(UK): World is warming quicker than thought in past decade, says Met Office
- 2010/11/26: NewScientist: Ships and buoys made global warming look slower
- 2010/11/26: OilChange: World is Still Warming
- 2010/11/25: BBC: Met Office says 2010 'among hottest on record'
- 2010/11/25: Guardian(UK): 2010 on course to be joint hottest year since 1850
- 2010/11/25: PostMedia: Earth feeling hot, hot, hot -- Trend continues as 2010 in 'dead heat' for warmest year on record
- 2010/11/23: MongaBay: Record number of nations hit all time temperature highs
- 2010/11/23: ClimateShifts: NASA reports 2010 hottest year on record so far
- 2010/11/22: NunatsiaqOnline: Warm temperatures flood the eastern Arctic -- "It could be a record-breaking November"
- 2010/11/23: Wunderground: Bolivia ties its all-time heat record [extreme heat records of 2010]
Clouds are one of the major uncertainties in climate. Much research revolves around them:
- 2010/11/22: Eureka: Study could mean greater anticipated global warming
- 2010/11/23: Eureka: Cloud atlas: Texas A&M scientist maps the meaning of mid-level clouds
- 2010/11/23: ClimateP: Journal of Climate: New cloud feedback results "provide support for the high end of current estimates of global climate sensitivity"
- 2010/11/23: PhysOrg: Cloud atlas: Scientist maps the meaning of mid-level clouds
Clouds play a major role in the climate-change equation, but they are the least-understood variable in the sky, observes a Texas A&M University geoscientist, who says mid-level clouds are especially understudied. The professor, Shaima Nasiri, is making those "in-between" clouds the focus of her research, which is being funded by NASA. - 2010/11/23: JC: (ab$) The Impact of Global Warming on Marine Boundary Layer Clouds over the Eastern Pacific - A Regional Model Study by Axel Lauer et al.
- 2010/11/22: SciDaily: Cloud Study Predicts More Global Warming
[...]
In a paper that has just appeared in the Journal of Climate, researchers from the University of Hawaii Manoa (UHM) have assessed the performance of current global models in simulating clouds and have presented a new approach to determining the expected cloud feedbacks in a warmer climate. - 2010/11/24: SciNow: Giant [Toba] Eruption Cut Down to Size
Peter Gleick has called a tipping point:
- 2010/11/20: HuffPo: Unavoidable Climate Change -- Past the Point of No Return
- 2010/11/22: CCP: Peter Gleick: It's too late. Past the point of no return -- unavoidable climate change
And the State of the Oceans:
- 2010/11/24: PhysOrg: Dead zones in Gulf caused, in part, by farm drainage
The tile drainage systems in upper Mississippi farmlands -- from southwest Minnesota to across Iowa, Illinois, Indiana and Ohio -- are the biggest contributors of nitrogen runoff into the Gulf of Mexico, reports a Cornell/University of Illinois-Urbana study. - 2010/11/24: PhysOrg: [GRACE] Satellites reveal differences in sea level rises
Glaciers are retreating and parts of the ice sheets on Greenland and Antarctica are melting into the ocean. This must result in a rise in sea level, but by how much? A new measurement of the gravity everywhere around the globe with a pair of orbiting satellites provides the first ever map detailing the rises across different parts of the globe. - 2010/11/24: NASA:JPL: NASA's Savory Sea Salt Sensor to Get Cooked, Chilled
The joint U.S. and Argentine Aquarius/SAC-D spacecraft is prepped for thermal vacuum chamber tests at Brazil's National Institute for Space Research.
[...]
Aquarius/SAC-D is an international mission involving NASA and Argentina's space agency, Comisión Nacional de Actividades Espaciales. Aquarius, the JPL-built primary instrument on the mission, is designed to provide monthly global maps of how the concentration of dissolved salt (known as salinity) varies on the ocean surface. Salinity is a key tracer for understanding the ocean's role in Earth's water cycle and tracking and understanding ocean circulation.
[...]
The minimum three-year mission is scheduled to launch in late spring of 2011 from Vandenberg Air Force Base, - 2010/11/23: PhysOrg: ESA's ice mission, CryoSat goes live
With the commissioning of ESA's CryoSat now complete, the mission has been officially transferred to the operations team. This milestone marks the beginning of the satellite's operational life delivering ice-thickness data to understand the impact of climate change on the polar environment. - 2010/11/23: PhysOrg: Glory satellite team overcomes engineering obstacles (w/ Video)
Engineers have faced and overcome a number of unique challenges in recent years while preparing NASA's newest climate-monitoring mission for launch. Yet the engineering has begun to gel, and engineers are now reaching the final stretch of their effort to prepare the Glory spacecraft for launch [no earlier than February 23, 2011] - 2010/11/23: TreeHugger: Breathtaking Satellite Photos Showcase the Fragile Earth as Art (Slideshow)
- 2010/11/23: Eureka: Earth and space science missions have fewer risks if conducted by a single government agency
More GW impacts are being seen:
- 2010/11/28: Independent(UK): Voices from the frontline of global warming
- 2010/11/25: SciDaily: Extinctions Expected to Increase Strongly Over the Century
And then there are the world's forests:
- 2010/11/28: HotTopic: I wish it would rain
- 2010/11/26: ClimateP: Another extreme drought hits the Amazon, raising climate change concerns
- 2010/11/25: PlanetArk: Cancun's Vanishing Mangroves Hold Climate Promise
This famous beach resort, which will next week host international climate change talks, was itself born from the destruction of a potent resource to fight global warming. Thick mangrove forests lined the canals and waterways here before developers dredged the land to make way for the upscale hotels that now draw several million tourists every year. In the 40 years since Cancun was founded, countless acres of mangrove forests up and down Mexico's Caribbean Coast have been lost -- and the destruction continues. - 2010/11/25: SciDaily: Pnline Atlas Shows Climate Change Impact on Forest Distribution Patterns in Iberian Peninsula
Climate refugees are becoming an issue:
- 2010/11/23: YorkshirePost: Climate-change migrants 'could increase city's social problems'
Desertification looms as a threat:
- 2010/11/24: TerraDaily: Rapid action required on desertification: Algerian minister [for agriculture and rural development, Rachid Benaissa]
- 2010/11/23: China(Cn): Warning over desertification
Yes we have no wacky weather, except:
- 2010/11/28: BBC: Temperatures fall to record low
Northern Ireland motorists have been facing further problems as severe weather conditions continue - 2010/11/28: BBC: Mid Wales recorded the lowest temperatures in the UK on Saturday night as bitter cold continued to bite
- 2010/11/28: BBC: Chaos as heavy snow hits Scotland
- 2010/11/23: CBC: Record cold plunges B.C. into deep freeze -- Weather system brings snow, power outages and unseasonably chilly temperatures
This week in extreme weather:
- 2010/11/24: CSW: Ben Santer on the attribution of extreme weather events to climate change
The odd tornado:
- 2010/11/24: CSM: Wisconsin tornadoes: Rare but potent in November
As for heatwaves and wild fires:
- 2010/11/24: CCP: Feng Sheng Hu et al.: Tundra fires increasing in Alaska due to warming
- 2010/11/23: MongaBay: Unprecedented tundra fire likely linked to climate change
Sea levels are rising:
- 2010/11/28: Guardian(UK): A billion people will lose their homes due to climate change, says report -- British scientists will warn Cancún summit that entire nations could be flooded
- 2010/11/25: NYT: Front-Line City in Virginia [Norfolk] Tackles Rise in Sea
[...]
As sea levels rise, tidal flooding is increasingly disrupting life here and all along the East Coast, a development many climate scientists link to global warming. But Norfolk is worse off. Situated just west of the mouth of Chesapeake Bay, it is bordered on three sides by water, including several rivers, like the Lafayette, that are actually long tidal streams that feed into the bay and eventually the ocean. - 2010/11/23: PhysOrg: Predicting sea level rise: Understanding how icebergs form could lead to better forecasts
In an effort to understand how fast sea level could rise as the climate warms, a University of Michigan researcher has developed a new theory to describe how icebergs detach from ice sheets and glaciers. - 2010/11/22: GlobalPost: Pakistan: Climate change threatens financial capital -- Karachi threatened by rising seas and storms as coastal islands succumb to erosion
- 2010/11/22: NewScientist: Weakening ice sheet could protect itself from the sea
As for hydrological cycle disruptions [floods & droughts]:
- 2010/11/22: Wunderground: Colombia rainy season floods kill 136
- 2010/11/22: EarthTimes: Dubrovnik submerged after heavy rainfall
- 2010/11/22: CBC: Flooded Manitoba community in state of emergency
Elsewhere on the mitigation front:
- 2010/11/23: Guardian(UK): UN scientists say emission pledges fall well short of halting climate change
- 2010/11/24: TEC: Dr Tom M. L. Wigley: The effect of cutting CO2 emissions to zero by 2050
Reduced Emissions from Deforestation and Degradation has somehow seemed chimeric:
- 2010/11/23: TerraDaily: Indonesia's billion-dollar forest deal in danger: Greenpeace
Greenpeace on Tuesday warned that a billion-dollar deal between Norway and Indonesia to cut carbon emissions from deforestation is in danger of being hijacked by timber and oil palm companies. The environmental group said "notorious industrial rainforest destroyers" such as palm oil and pulp producers intended to manipulate the funds to subsidise further conversion of natural forests to plantations. The allegations came in a new Greenpeace report called "REDD Alert: Protection Money", expressing doubts about Indonesia's plans to use a UN-backed scheme to reduce carbon emissions from deforestation and degradation (REDD). - 2010/11/24: TreeHugger: Graph of the Day: Comparing Modes of Transport
- 2010/11/24: CalcRisk: ATA: Truck Tonnage Index increases [0.8%] in October
- 2010/11/24: NBF: American high speed rail debacle
- 2010/11/22: UCR: Hybrid Tugboat Cuts Emissions -- UC Riverside scientists study what is believed to be the world's only hybrid electric tugboat at Ports of Los Angeles and Long Beach
- 2010/11/22: AutoBG: Amtrak's B20-fueled train honored by Time Magazine
- 2010/11/17: BBC: Aviation industry 'ditches' hydrogen
While in the endless quest for zero energy, sustainable buildings and practical codes:
- 2010/11/27: PostMedia: Urban planners, architects set to attend green roof conference
[...]
The eighth annual CitiesAlive green roof and wall conference officially gets underway at Vancouver Convention Centre on Tuesday, running from Nov. 30 to Dec. 3. - 2010/11/21: CleanBreak: Plenty of options for energy-efficiency retrofits in buildings, says Wakulat
- 2010/11/24: TreeHugger: How Much Insulation Can You Put Into An Old Building?
- 2010/11/23: Grist: What the green building industry requires (in one paragraph)
- 2010/11/22: EnergyBulletin: Cities, towns, and suburbs: Toward zero-carbon buildings
- 2010/11/22: TreeHugger: Canadian Company Slashes Heating Bill by 91% with Simple Measures
As for carbon sequestration:
- 2010/11/22: STimes: EPA proposes new rules for carbon-dioxide storage
The Obama administration is imposing new rules to protect drinking water and track the amount of carbon dioxide stored underground by "clean-coal"... - 2010/11/22: NRDC:SwitchBoard: Carbon sequestration and groundwater - thoughts on a recent Duke study
Large scale geo-engineering keeps popping up:
- 2010/11/26: AlaskaD: Could a massive dam between Alaska and Russia save the Arctic?
- 2010/11/25: TheState: Global warming fix could threaten food chain -- Researchers say plan could jeopardize oceans by introducing toxins into the food chain
While on the adaptation front:
- 2010/11/22: SciDaily: Norway: Adapting to Climate Change Via Research
Meanwhile in the journals:
- 2010/11/25: NERC:NORA: Overview of areal changes of the ice shelves on the Antarctic Peninsula over the past 50 years by A.J. Cook et al.
[Abstract Clip] Here we present a new dataset containing up-to-date and consistent area calculations for each of the twelve ice shelves on the AP [Antarctic Peninsula] over the past five decades. The results reveal an overall reduction in total ice-shelf area by over 28 000 km(2) since the beginning of the period. - 2010/11/25: NERC:NORA: Deep equatorial ocean circulation induced by a forced- dissipated Yanai beam by François Ascani et al.
- 2010/11/24: GMDD: MADE-IN: a new aerosol microphysics submodel for global simulation of potential atmospheric ice nuclei by V. Aquila et al.
- 2010/11/26: ACP: Modelling deep convection and its impacts on the tropical tropopause layer by J. S. Hosking et al.
- 2010/11/26: ACPD: Space-based evaluation of interactions between pollution plumes and low-level Arctic clouds during the spring and summer of 2008 by K. Tietze et al.
- 2010/11/26: ACPD: Quantifying the uncertainties of a bottom-up emission inventory of anthropogenic atmospheric pollutants in China by Y. Zhao et al.
- 2010/11/24: TCD: Northern Hemisphere spring snow cover variability and change over 1922-2010 including an assessment of uncertainty by R. D. Brown & D. A. Robinson
- 2010/11/25: ACP: Climate impact on airborne particulate matter concentrations in California using seven year analysis periods by A. Mahmud et al.
- 2010/11/25: ACP: Atmospheric pollutant outflow from southern Asia: a review by M. G. Lawrence & J. Lelieveld
- 2010/11/24: ACP: Aerosol-cloud interaction determined by both in situ and satellite data over a northern high-latitude site by H. Lihavainen et al.
- 2010/11/24: ACP: A decadal regional and global trend analysis of the aerosol optical depth using a data-assimilation grade over-water MODIS and Level 2 MISR aerosol products by J. Zhang & J. S. Reid
- 2010/11/24: ACP: Cosmic rays linked to rapid mid-latitude cloud changes by B. A. Laken et al.
- 2010/11/22: ACP: Sources of light-absorbing aerosol in arctic snow and their seasonal variation by Dean A. Hegg et al.
- 2010/11/24: ACPD: The effect of sea ice loss on sea salt aerosol concentrations and the radiative balance in the Arctic by H. Struthers et al.
- 2010/11/23: ACPD: Temperature thresholds for polar stratospheric ozone loss by K. Drdla & R. Müller
- 2010/10/26: Science: (ab$) Scenarios for Global Biodiversity in the 21st Century by Henrique M. Pereira et al.
- 2010/11/25: CC: Contributions of individual countries' emissions to climate change and their uncertainty by Niklas Höhne et al.
- 2010/10/12: GRL: (ab$) Sea-level fingerprint of continental water and ice mass change from GRACE by Riccardo E. M. Riva et al.
- 2010/11/24: Nature: [Comment$] Tar sands need solid science by David Schindler
As Canada exploits its oil sands ever faster, David Schindler calls for industry-independent environmental monitoring to back up better water-quality regulation. - 2010/11/24: AGWObserver: Papers on diurnal temperature range
- 2010/10/05: GRL: (ab$) Tundra burning in Alaska: Linkages to climatic change and sea ice retreat by Feng Sheng Hu et al.
- 2010/11/23: PNAS: [ab$] Climatic warming disrupts recurrent Alpine insect outbreaks by Derek M. Johnson et al.
- 2010/11/23: PNAS: [ab$] Ocean acidification compromises recruitment success of the threatened Caribbean coral Acropora palmata by Rebecca Albright et al.
- 2010/11/23: PNAS: [abs] Geoengineering potential of artificially enhanced silicate weathering of olivine by Peter Köhler et al.
- 2010/11/23: PNAS: [abs] Contribution potential of glaciers to water availability in different climate regimes by Georg Kaser et al.
- 2010/11/23: PNAS: [Letter$] Expert credibility and truth by Jarle Aarstad
- 2010/11/23: PNAS: [Letter$] Reply to Aarstad: Risk management versus "truth" by William R. L. Anderegg et al.
- 2010/11/24: GRL: (ab$) Space observations of inland water bodies show rapid surface warming since 1985 by Philipp Schneider & Simon J. Hook
- 2010/11/23: JC: (ab$) The Impact of Global Warming on Marine Boundary Layer Clouds over the Eastern Pacific - A Regional Model Study by Axel Lauer et al.
- 2010/02/03: GRL: (ab$) Effects of white roofs on urban temperature in a global climate model by K. W. Oleson et al.
- 2010/11/08: ACS:G&P: Sustainable Growth Is An Oxymoron by Rudy M. Baum
- 2010/11/17: Nature: (ab$) Questioning economic growth by Peter Victor
- 2010/11/21: Nature:GeoSci: (ab$) Update on CO2 emissions by P. Friedlingstein et al.
And other significant documents:
- 2010/11/24: PI: [link to 359k pdf] Briefing note on UN climate negotiations in Cancun, Mexico
- 2010/11/24: WMO: [link to 2 meg pdf] Greenhouse Gases Reach Record Levels -- WMO Highlights Concerns about Global Warming and Methane
- 2010/11/24: WMO: [link to 3.4 meg pdf] WMO Greenhouse Gas Bulletin [#6]
As for miscellaneous science:
- 2010/11/24: MGS: Verifying forecasts 1
- 2010/11/22: SkeptiSci: Twice as much Canada, same warming climate by Ned
More DIY science:
- 2010/11/27: Stoat: Citizen science
- 2010/11/22: CC&G: RClimate Tools for Do It Yourself Climate Trend Analysis
What's new in models?:
- 2010/11/27: SEasterbrook: Do Climate Models need Independent Verification and Validation?
- 2010/11/22: SEasterbrook: Getting population dynamics into the models
Regarding John Abraham:
- 2010/11/26: CCP: John Abraham, climate scientist hunk of the month, convinces skeptic talk show host, Jake Judd, of the need to do something about global warming
Regarding Hansen:
- 2010/11/23: CCP: [link to 342k pdf] James Hansen: The Price of Change -- op-ed on the potential of the Chinese leadership to save the planet
Regarding Wegman:
- 2010/11/24: ERabett: Of course, Ed Wegaman is a bad guy
- 2010/11/22: TPMM: Congressional Report Denying Climate Change Was Likely Plagiarized
- 2010/11/23: AFTIC: Experts claim 2006 climate report plagiarized
- 2010/11/23: ERabett: The Hole Widens
- 2010/11/22: ERabett: Ed Wegman Sends a Dispatch
- 2010/11/23: TWM: If climate deniers want to talk about scholarly integrity...
- 2010/11/23: BCLSB: Wegmania: The Links
- 2010/11/22: JEB: Pop quiz on responses to Wegman plagiarism accusations
- 2010/11/22: Stoat: Wegman plagiarised, but there is worse
- 2010/11/22: BCLSB: Wegmania: Experts Say Its Plagiarism
- 2010/11/21: USAToday: Experts claim 2006 [Wegman] climate report plagiarized
- 2010/11/21: ERabett: Vergano Reports
- 2010/11/22: CCP: Experts claim 2006 Wegman report plagiarized
- 2010/11/21: Deltoid: USA Today: Wegman report was plagiarized
- 2010/11/21: ClimateP: Wegman exposed: Experts find "shocking" plagiarism in 2006 climate report requested by Joe Barton (R-TX)
The Pielke fan clubbe alas:
- 2010/11/27: WottsUWT: Pielke Jr. on Trenberth's Book Review
Meanwhile on the Kyoto front:
- 2010/11/25: Reuters: Japan says extending Kyoto pact is "meaningless"
Japan opposes extending the Kyoto Protocol binding only rich nations to limit carbon emissions and will fight for a broader deal even if it finds itself isolated at U.N. talks, a senior official said on Thursday. Nearly 200 nations will gather in Cancun, Mexico, from Nov. 29-Dec. 10 to try to agree on some of the elements of a U.N. deal to combat global warming, although most have given up hope for a new treaty any time soon. - 2010/11/23: EurActiv: Kyoto climate fund set to expand after 2012
The Kyoto Protocol's Adaptation Fund could take on a wider role to manage money destined to help poor countries deal with the consequences of climate change. Farrukh Iqbal Khan, chair of the Adaptation Fund Board, spoke to EurActiv in an interview. - 2010/11/26: EurActiv: Commission proposes ban on industrial gas offsets
The European Commission yesterday (25 November) presented plans to ban the use of controversial international offset credits from certain industrial gas projects in the EU's cap-and-trade system after 2012. The proposal would bar HFC-23, a refrigerant gas with a global warming potential 11,700 times that of CO2, from its emissions trading scheme (EU ETS) from 1 January 2013. - 2010/11/25: EurActiv: EU readies plans to limit CO2 offsets
- 2010/11/25: EUO: Brussels proposes ban on certain emission credits
The European Commission has put forward a proposal to ban the use of certain off-setting credits under the bloc's emissions trading system (ETS). News that firms in developing countries including China and India were netting large windfall profits by intentionally augmenting their production of hydrofluorocarbon (HFC-23) and nitrous oxide (N2O) gases caused a stir over the summer, prompting the commission's move on Thursday (25 November). - 2010/11/25: CPositive: First California carbon trade at $11.50
- 2010/11/25: Reuters: EU plans 2013 ban on disputed HFC carbon offsets
The European Union's executive Commission has proposed banning from 2013 the most common types of carbon offsets, mostly from India and China, to help restore credibility to the disputed system. - 2010/11/25: BBerg: EU Proposes Ban on Some Types of UN Carbon Offsets Starting Jan. 1, 2013
- 2010/11/23: TEC: Chicago's Climate Exchange Shuts Down
- 2010/11/22: PlanetArk: U.N. Panel To Review Chinese CO2 Offset request
The idea of a carbon tax is still bouncing around:
- 2010/11/22: Grist: Attention, cap-and-trade fans: the carbon-tax people are not going away
Meanwhile on the international political front:
- 2010/11/23: EurActiv: EU, Russia seek 'common language' on energy
Officials from Russia and the European Commission yesterday (22 November) marked the 10-year anniversary of EU-Russia energy dialogue and devised ways to overcome the present "lack of trust," as Russian Energy Minister Sergei Shmatko described the state of relations. - 2010/11/23: PlanetArk: Russia Closely Watching EU Shift To Green Energy
This week on the rare earths file:
- 2010/11/26: NakedCapitalism: China Wants Concessions for Mercantilism in Return for Rare Earths
- 2010/11/25: Reuters: China ready for dialogue on rare earths: diplomats
China may be willing to soften the impact of its cuts in exports of rare earth elements on firms around the world that depend on them to make high-tech and defense products, EU-based diplomats said on Thursday. - 2010/11/24: PlanetArk: Egypt Says Amazed By Ethiopia's Nile Remarks
Egypt said it was "amazed" by Ethiopia's suggestion on Tuesday that Cairo might turn to military action in a row over the Nile waters, saying it did not want confrontation and was not backing rebels there. Egypt, Ethiopia and seven other countries through which the river passes have been locked in more than a decade of contentious talks driven by anger over the perceived injustice of a previous Nile water treaty signed in 1929. Ethiopian Prime Minister Meles Zenawi told Reuters on Tuesday that Egypt could not win a war with Ethiopia over the River Nile and that Cairo was supporting rebel groups in an attempt to destabilize the Horn of Africa nation. - 2010/11/25: Guardian(UK): Copenhagen climate activists found guilty
Two Danish protesters are found guilty of organising and instigating violence despite use of controversial evidence
Two Danish activists who took part in the Copenhagen climate demonstrations last December have been found guilty of organising and instigating violence and vandalism, and have both been given four-month suspended sentences. One of the three judges in the case disagreed with the verdict.
Tannie Nyboe and Stine Gry Jonassen were both spokespeople for the Climate Justice Action group, part of the network involved in some of the demonstrations in Copenhagen during the UN's COP15 climate summit. They have been convicted of four charges, including inciting violence against the police, serious disturbance of the police, interfering with police in the course of their work and destruction of property.
The case against them was based, controversially, on evidence gathered by tapping their phones before the conference, and also on video footage taken during the "Reclaim Power" demonstration on 16 December. - 2010/11/25: UNEP: New atlas shows Africa's vulnerable water resources in striking detail
- 2010/11/26: JFleck: River Beat: Drop 2 and the hunt for increasingly marginal water
- 2010/11/25: JFleck: Was Westlands Departure a Good Thing?
- 2010/11/24: ABC(Au): Sydney Water profits rise along with bills
Sydney Water has recorded a major increase in its profits, at a time when water bills are on the rise. A report from the New South Wales auditor-general shows Sydney Water recorded an after tax profit of $445.9 million - an increase of almost $200 million on the previous year. The State Government is also reaping more from Sydney Water by way of dividends and tax. But the increased profits have not prevented an increase in water bills. - 2010/11/24: JFleck: California Bay-Delta -- Doomed to Failure?
Who's making predictions this week?
- 2010/11/24: Wunderground: Forecast for the winter of 2010 - 2011
And on the American political front:
- 2010/11/27: VCStar: Environmental rules could be rolled back NM
- 2010/11/27: AlterNet: Energy Companies' Big Plans to Exploit the American West to Feed China's Insatiable Appetite for Coal
- 2010/11/24: OTCB: A Brief Snapshot of Hardship in America
- 2010/11/24: Grist: For 'the grandchildren,' the deficit isn't like climate at all
- 2010/11/23: NRDC:SwitchBoard: Fact-free op-ed gets it wrong. The truth: Ohio's renewable energy, energy efficiency standards creating jobs, saving money right now
- 2010/11/23: Grist: Why does the American public suddenly believe in climate change less?
- 2010/11/23: DM:CCM: Ronald Reagan, Friend of Environmental Science?
- 2010/11/22: Reuters: California puts Tessera solar plant on temp hold
The California Energy Commission has temporarily withdrawn approval of a controversial solar power plant by NTR's Tessera Solar after opponents protested that the 663.5-megawatt Calico project had been improperly licensed. - 2010/11/23: TreeHugger: Oregon to be Coal-Free by 2020
- 2010/11/23: BostonGlobe: State gives National Grid approval to purchase Cape Wind power
- 2010/11/23: SF Gate: Climate change planning for California urged
- 2010/11/22: WaPo: Retrained for green jobs, but still waiting on work
The BP disaster continues to twist US politics:
- 2010/11/27: EnergyBulletin: Review of National Commission Working Paper #6, "Stopping the Macondo spill"
- 2010/11/24: Guardian(UK): Half of BP oil spill damages claims 'inadequate', says payout chief
Ken Feinberg expects to pay out only $2.3bn in emergency claims over Gulf of Mexico oil spill from $20bn fund - 2010/11/25: PlanetArk: BP Made Risky Decisions Before Spill: Panel Document
- 2010/11/24: NatureN: Peer-reviewed 'oil budget' appeases scientists -- Government agencies release revised account of fate of oil from Deepwater Horizon spill
- 2010/11/23: KSJT: Lots of Ink: The big reports on Gulf oil spill from the heavy weights at the academy and a nat'l commission
- 2010/11/23: NRDC:SwitchBoard: On Thanksgiving, Oil Disaster Victims Hope for the Truth
- 2010/11/22: ScienceInsider: How BP Clashed and Cooperated With Scientists
- 2010/11/23: NOAANews: Federal Interagency Group Issues Peer-Reviewed 'Oil Budget' Technical Documentation
Oil Spill Calculations Released in August Undergo Further Review The Federal Interagency Solutions Group, established at the request of the U.S. Coast Guard and authorized under a directive from the National Incident Commander (NIC), is releasing today a peer-reviewed report that details the scientific calculations of the Deepwater Horizon BP Oil Spill "Oil Budget Calculator" response tool announced last August. - 2010/11/22: CSM: Gulf oil spill: Offshore drilling firms threaten to go abroad
The ethanol subsidy issue remains:
- 2010/11/26: RRapier: Taxpayer Subsidized Ethanol Exports May Bite Industry in the Future
- 2010/11/22: RRapier: Addressing the Ethanol Rhetoric Over the Expiring VEETC [Volumetric Ethanol Excise Tax Credit]
- 2010/11/23: OilDrum: The Ethanol Rhetoric Ramps Up
- 2010/11/23: TWM: 'We need to let the ethanol subsidies expire'...
Following up on an item from two weeks ago, there are two existing ethanol subsidies that are due to expire at the end of the calendar year, which means Congress may have to act during the lame-duck session to save them -- if they're to be saved. The question is what conservative Republicans are prepared to do about it. Greg Sargent reported today that there may be "a new intra-GOP war brewing" over this issue -- by some measures, more intense than the earmark fight... - 2010/11/22: TEC: Addressing the Ethanol Rhetoric Over the Expiring VEETC
The Obama chatter is nonstop:
- 2010/11/27: ClimateP: What should Obama's message be? His current one certainly makes no sense
The actions of the Obama administration are being watched closely:
- 2010/11/26: TheHill:e2W: Alaska Gov. [Sean Parnell (R)]: Interior's climate-change polar bear decision hinders oil drilling
- 2010/11/24: Grist: Feds designate 'critical' polar bear habitat in Arctic
- 2010/11/25: BBC: Alaska polar bears given 'critical habitat'
- 2010/11/23: Reuters: White House clears EPA renewable fuels standard
The White House cleared the way for the Environmental Protection Agency to issue a final rule on how much ethanol and other renewable automobile fuels will be sold next year. The EPA proposed in July that biofuels fuels would account for 7.95 percent of total gasoline sales next year to meet a congressional mandate that at least 13.95 billion gallons of renewable fuels be produced in 2011. The final number, which the agency plans to issue next week, could still be changed. - 2010/11/23: WaPo: Administration wants to speed up process for windmills in Atlantic
The Obama administration Tuesday announced a plan to speed up development of wind energy by searching the Atlantic Coast for the most desirable places to build windmills rather than wait for developers to propose sites that could hurt the environment or sit in the middle of a shipping lane. Under a new initiative called Smart From the Start, the Department of the Interior will identify sites in the Atlantic Outer Continental Shelf with "high wind potential," Interior Secretary Ken Salazar said. Officials said it currently takes up to nine years for an offshore project to get approval to build. Salazar said the policy change is the result of "a lesson learned" from the grueling fight to place wind turbines in Massachusetts' scenic Nantucket Sound. Opponents have delayed construction of the Cape Wind development even though the government gave it a go-ahead in April. - 2010/11/24: Grist: Feds push to speed up wind farms off the East Coast
- 2010/11/24: NRDC:SwitchBoard: EPA issues new rule requiring reporting of greenhouse gas emissions from the oil and gas industry
- 2010/11/24: SpaceDaily: US designates 'critical' polar bear habitat in Arctic
- 2010/11/23: TreeHugger: Obama Admin to Speed Up Offshore Wind Power Development
- 2010/11/23: TEC: America moves a step closer to its first offshore wind farm
- 2010/11/22: STimes: EPA proposes new rules for carbon-dioxide storage
The Obama administration is imposing new rules to protect drinking water and track the amount of carbon dioxide stored underground by "clean-coal"... - 2010/11/22: NRDC:SwitchBoard: Chromium industry pays for "independent" review to delay EPA
- 2010/11/22: AutoBG: EPA delays decision on E15 use in 2001-2006 model-year vehicles
As for what is going on in Congress:
- 2010/11/27: BBickmore: Salt Lake Tribune Op-Ed on Orrin Hatch's "Climate Change 101"
- 2010/11/27: ClimateP: Rep. Inslee attacks anti-innovation GOP: Move to clean energy "or China is going to eat our lunch"
- 2010/11/25: DeseretNews: Global warming consensus matters [Bickmore]
- 2010/11/23: CSW: House Science Committee: one last 'rational' climate science hearing?
The future climate bill defines a battleline:
- 2010/11/23: SolveClimate: In Rubble of Cap-and-Trade, Big Green Taking a Beating
In the search for what's next, a range of options including civil disobedience, state-level action, and continued work on Capitol Hill - 2010/11/21: DesMoinesRegister: Climate bill's death ends carbon credit program
What are the lobbyists pushing?
- 2010/11/24: NYT:GW: Chemical Company Adds Lobbying Muscle for Push on Energy, EPA
Eastman Chemical Co. beefed up lobbying this year as it sought a host of energy priorities including climate legislation rewrites, funding for power conservation work and scuttling U.S. EPA's effort to regulate greenhouse gases. The Kingston, Tenn.-based company spent more than $1.1 million in influence efforts through September, up 37 percent from the first nine months last year, Center for Responsive Politics data show. The company by Sept. 30 already had spent more than it had on lobbying all of last year, which at that time was a high mark of $1.08 million. - 2010/11/26: ClimateP: Beck and FreedomWorks campaign against Fred Upton: "Light bulbs are just the beginning"
- 2010/11/24: TEC: On the Persecution of Michael Mann
The Republican treatment of famed Climate Scientist Michael Mann, goes well beyond rational concern about scientific misconduct, and looks more and more like outright persecution of a scientist who has dared, like Galileo to contradicts the dogmas of the powerful. But Mann, like Galileo is likely to have the last laugh. - 2010/11/23: CCP: Smokey Joe Strikes Out Again? Turns out climate skeptics' favorite report (the Wegman Report) might not be as scientific as Congressman Joe Barton claims
- 2010/11/22: NYT:CW: Republicans Learn the Perils of Being Politically Incorrect on Climate Change
- 2010/11/22: DM:CCM: Will the New Congress Subpoena Climate Scientists?
The Gore-apalooza is still bopping along:
- 2010/11/27: QuarkSoup: Al Gore May Have Just Lost All Relevance
- 2010/11/23: DeSmogBlog: Gore Admits Corn Ethanol Support Was A Mistake
- 2010/11/22: TEC: Gore Now Says Corn Ethanol "Was Not a Good Policy"
While in the UK:
- 2010/11/28: Independent(UK): Cancun: Where's green Dave now?
- 2010/11/28: Guardian(UK): Use the profit motive to fight climate change by David Cameron
- 2010/11/26: TreeHugger: London's Comprehensive Electric Vehicle Plan Takes Shape
- 2010/11/26: BBC: Energy firms facing gas and electricity price review
Ofgem is to investigate recent energy price rises, as it says they have significantly widened suppliers' profit margins. - 2010/11/24: Guardian(UK): Green Deal is not a good deal for all homeowners
A government loan to pay for 'energy efficiency makeovers' to your home sounds like a winner, but the promised savings don't stand up to closer inspection - 2010/11/22: Guardian(UK): Farming Futures faces closure as government funding is cut
Group has played vital role in persuading farmers to invest in green technology such as wind turbines and solar panels - 2010/11/28: EarthTimes: German nuclear extension passes last legislative hurdle
- 2010/11/26: EurActiv: Commission proposes ban on industrial gas offsets
- 2010/11/26: EurActiv: Brussels tables alternative funding plan for ITER
Faced with a deadlock over the EU's 2011 budget, the European Commission will present today (26 November) "an alternative approach" to fund the bloc's multi-billion euro ITER project for nuclear fusion. - 2010/11/25: EurActiv: EU readies plans to limit CO2 offsets
- 2010/11/25: EUO: Brussels proposes ban on certain emission credits
- 2010/11/25: BBerg: EU Proposes Ban on Some Types of UN Carbon Offsets Starting Jan. 1, 2013
- 2010/11/24: TCoE: EU improved carbon savings = 2 weeks of China's emissions
- 2010/11/23: Reuters: EU's coal nations win battle in quest for subsidies
Europe's coal-mining countries won a key vote for more subsidies in the European Parliament on Tuesday, a win that adds to their lobbying power but carries little legal clout. - 2010/11/23: EUO: Parliament sides with Berlin and Madrid on coal subsidies
- 2010/11/23: PlanetArk: Global Impact Of EU 30 Pct Carbon Cut Small:IEA
Meanwhile in Australia:
- 2010/11/26: ABC(Au):TDU: Who's up to the environmental challenges of our time?
- 2010/11/26: ABC(Au): [Federal Treasurer Wayne] Swan says there is consensus on carbon price
- 2010/11/26: ABC(Au): Climate change warning for farmers
Tasmania's agricultural industry has been urged to start taking steps now to prepare for climate change. - 2010/11/26: TEC: Revisiting a carbon price
- 2010/11/25: CU: New foreign takeover controls on farms?
Foreign acquisitions of Australian farms and agricultural companies are the target of a new Bill before Parliament. - 2010/11/25: ABC(Au): Coal seam gas moratorium motion defeated
Both major parties have rejected Queensland independent MP Aidan McLindon's motion to impose a moratorium on new coal seam gas (CSG) projects. - 2010/11/24: ABC(Au): Sydney Water profits rise along with bills
- 2010/11/23: ABC(Au): Council considers carbon price impact
The Latrobe City Council has met the Federal Government to discuss how the region could adjust to a carbon price. - 2010/11/23: ABC(Au): Growing concern over coal seam gas plans
Farmers in southern Queensland are increasingly concerned about the rapid expansion of the state's coal seam gas industry. - 2010/11/22: Reuters: Australia targets farmers in planned CO2 trade market
- 2010/11/22: ABC(Au): Farmers seek more detail on carbon guidelines
Queensland rural lobby group AgForce has cautiously welcomed the Federal Government's release of guidelines for carbon farming opportunities. Landholders will be able to generate carbon credits by planting trees and cutting fertiliser use under a carbon trading scheme for the sector. But AgForce senior policy manager Drew Wagner says farmers are awaiting more details on how far the guidelines will extend. - 2010/11/23: ABC(Au): Study: Support for wind-farms in S-E
The [NSW] state Environment Department says a new study shows overwhelming support for wind-farms in the State's south east. - 2010/11/22: ABC(Au): Farmers to trial carbon credit scheme
Farmers will be rewarded for carbon credits they create through various methods such as reforestation and reducing their fertiliser use, under proposals released by the Federal Government today. - 2010/11/22: ABC(Au): Farmers back planning over coal seam gas bans
NSW Farmers Association believes better planning rather than blanket bans is the best way to address coal seam gas exploration concerns in the Hunter Valley. - 2010/11/21: CBC: Australian city to be drilled for natural gas
Australia's Greens party is warning against a mining company's plan to drill for natural gas in the country's largest city. Exploratory drilling is scheduled to begin in two or three months in the suburb of St. Peters, 15 kilometres west of Sydney's downtown. - 2010/11/24: ABC(Au): Lower Lakes group lobbies for water cuts
Lobbying over the Murray-Darling Basin Plan continues, with a group of South Australians in Canberra to tell the Federal Government that water entitlements must be reduced to return water to the southern system. - 2010/11/24: TreeHugger: India Climate Tribunal Gives Voice to People Affected by Climate Change, Demands Action from Governments
- 2010/11/19: BBC: India temperature rise concerns
Rising temperatures caused by climate change are expected to "adversely impact" water supply, farm output and forests in India by 2030, a new study released by the government says. It has projected a temperature rise of between 1.7C and 2C in India over the next 20 years. The study says India faces increased precipitation and storms and a continuing sea level rise. It also warned of food shortages because of a decline in farm output. - 2010/11/27: HotTopic: China: ready to pay the price
- 2010/11/26: PhysOrg: China launches hourly air quality data index
China has started publishing hourly air-quality information for major cities across the country as the world's top source of greenhouse gas emissions tries to rein in its notorious pollution. - 2010/11/24: ScienceInsider: China Hopes to Boost Basic Research as Overall R&D Spending Soars
- 2010/11/26: PlanetArk: China To Develop Unconventional Gases [shale gas & ?] In 10 Years: Woodmac
- 2010/11/23: China(Cn): China vows to control emissions over next 5 years
- 2010/11/23: QuarkSoup: China is now the Big Dog -- Kinda
- 2010/11/23: CCP: [link to 342k pdf] James Hansen: The Price of Change -- op-ed on the potential of the Chinese leadership to save the planet
- 2010/11/23: PeakEnergy: China's Coal Crisis
- 2010/11/22: BBC: China hints at new climate future
At a recent meeting in Tianjin, there's been intriguing discussion about where the host country, China, is going on climate change. And where it's going is, it seems, towards national legislation to restrict the growth of greenhouse gas emissions. This national law is likely to emerge as part of the next five-year plan. Details are scheduled to be announced in a few months' time. - 2010/11/28: WottsUWT: Despite hellish summer, Russia says "nyet" to AGW
- 2010/11/27: Yahoo:AFP: Horror summer fails to shift Russia climate scepticism
In Canada, minority neocon PM Harper is busy defunding agencies and programs he doesn't like:
- 2010/11/25: 350orBust: One Week After Killing Bill C311, the Harper Government Kills Funding For Canadian Climate Research
- 2010/11/25: PostMedia: Climate-change agency sees end to federal funds -- Foundation supported more than 200 projects
A Canadian climate-change research foundation is celebrating its 10th anniversary, but has already begun winding down its operations after failing to get new funding from the Harper government. The budget crunch at the Canadian Foundation for Climate and Atmospheric Sciences comes on the heels of revelations that the government is leasing out the Amundsen, a coast guard icebreaker equipped to monitor climate change in the North, to a pair of fossil-fuel companies for oil exploration in the region. - 2010/11/23: CBC: Canadian climate research fund drying up
The federal funding that supported most university-based weather and climate research for the past decade has almost run out, and there is no sign it will be renewed. The Ottawa-based Canadian Foundation for Climate and Atmospheric Sciences, launched under prime minister Jean Chrétien's Liberal government in 2000, will have given out $118 million in research grants by the time it runs dry at the end of 2011. "With no monies to hand out, the foundation will cease to exist," said Gordon McBean, chair of the foundation's board in an interview ahead of the foundation's 10th anniversary celebrations on Wednesday. - 2010/11/28: TStar: Justice denied in G20 police brutality cases
- 2010/11/25: PostMedia: Cops accused by G20 protesters cleared of excessive force allegations
A group of police officers accused of using excessive force resulting in broken bones and fractures during last summer's G20 Summit in Toronto was cleared of criminal wrongdoing Thursday by Ontario's Special Investigations Unit. All six separate incidents occurred on June 26 at various locations in the city's downtown core. - 2010/11/26: DtPB: Unidentifiable police can't be charged for G20 police crimes
- 2010/11/26: DawgsBlawg: And speaking of Chris Bentley [Ontario AG]...let's not forget Alex Hundert
- 2010/11/26: CBC: OPP release details of G8/G20 summit costs
The Ontario Provincial Police have released some details of the millions of dollars spent on policing during the G8 and G20 summits. The details released Thursday relate only to items costing more than $5,000, which amounted to $56 million. That amount represents only about half of the $100 million the OPP spent on the summits, held in Huntsville and Toronto the weekend of June 26-27. - 2010/11/25: MrSinister: Shorter SIU
- 2010/11/25: CfC: Cleared? The headline says Police cleared in six G20 incidents but this is certainly a funny way to define "cleared"
- 2010/11/25: MSimon: Now That It's Official:The G20 Never Happened -- And the guilty will never be punished
- 2010/11/25: CBC: No officers charged over civilian G20 injuries: SIU -- Excessive force used against 2 men
A police watchdog is not holding any officers responsible for injuries incurred by six men during this summer's G20 protests in Toronto. The six men in question all complained that law enforcement officers used excessive force against them at various locations across Toronto's downtown on June 26. One man had his arm broken in an interaction with an officer, while another two suffered facial fractures. The province's Special Investigations Unit, which probes incidents where civilians are hurt or killed in an interaction with police officers, said Thursday that it is probable excessive force was used in the case of two men who suffered facial fractures at a June 26 protest at Queen's Park. - 2010/11/26: PostMedia: Canadian Coast Guard unprepared to respond to oil spills: Audit
The Canadian Coast Guard lacks the training, equipment and management systems to fulfil its duties to respond to offshore pollution incidents such as oil spills, an internal audit reveals. The audit paints a sobering picture of an agency that would play a key role in Canada's response to a major oil spill off the world's longest coastline. In the event of a spill leaking from a ship, as occurred in 1989 when the Exxon Valdez ran aground off the coast of Alaska, the Coast Guard would be the lead federal agency in the cleanup efforts. However, the audit found that Coast Guard employees are trained on an "ad hoc, regional basis," with no national training strategy. Meanwhile, the Coast Guard is relying on aging equipment - the operating status of which it is unable to track - and management controls are "either out-of-date, not functioning or not in place." - 2010/11/24: CBC: N.L. oil safety regulator needed: labour group -- Labour group calls for independent safety regulator to oversee N.L.'s offshore oil industry
There is continuing controversy over the Tory Senate axing that climate bill:
- 2010/11/26: G&M: Students bare their dismay at death of climate bill in Senate
- 2010/11/25: 350orBust: One Week After Killing Bill C311, the Harper Government Kills Funding For Canadian Climate Research
- 2010/11/24: PostMedia: Climate change is a real and present danger
With the UN Climate Change Conference set for Cancun later this month, the Senate's decision to kill a private member's climate-change bill is regrettable. This action was expected, given that the federal government has been opposed to meeting Kyoto commitments and did not advocate binding targets on carbon emissions at the last round of talks in Copenhagen. - 2010/11/22: CCP: Canada PM Stephen Harper's head-in-the-tar-sands hypocrisy called "breathtaking": kills Canada's only federal Climate Change Bill, even though two-thirds of the HC voted to pass it twice
The surprise resignation of Danny Williams this week put the Lower Churchill project in a poignant light:
- 2010/11/26: CBC: Lower Churchill will roll ahead: Dexter
The Lower Churchill hydro megaproject in Labrador will steam forward despite the resignation of Danny Williams, says Nova Scotia Premier Darrell Dexter. Williams, 61, who announced Thursday he will step down next week as Newfoundland and Labrador's ninth premier, said that negotiating a deal to develop hydroelectric power on the Lower Churchill was the last goal he wanted to achieve in his political career. - 2010/11/25: DeSmogBlog: Alberta and Canadian Governments Complicit in Killing Climate Policy in EU & U.S. to Support Toxic Tar Sands
- 2010/11/24: CCP: New report reveals Canadian efforts to kill climate change policies in other countries
Canadian Dept. of Foreign Affairs lobbying in California and Europe against clean energy policies with an "Oil Sands Advocacy Strategy" - 2010/11/23: Grist: Canada accused of trying to kill U.S., E.U. clean fuel policies
- 2010/11/23: PostMedia: Tories down play climate change 'con job' -- After files surface concerning oilsands lobbying policy, government claims it's trying to 'work with industry'
- 2010/11/23: PostMedia: Baird defends oilsands lobbying -- Says acting against huge employer would be 'stupid'
The Harper government played down opposition accusations Monday that it was running a "con job" to lobby against climate change policies abroad affecting the oilsands industry. Instead, the government said it is trying to "work with industry." - 2010/11/22: POGGE: "Alberta and Canada have consistently chosen the low road"
- 2010/11/22: CBC: Feds, Alberta fight foreign climate laws: report
- 2010/11/22: CAN: New report reveals Canadian efforts to kill climate change policies in other countries
- 2010/11/22: PhysOrg: Canada accused of trying to kill US, EU clean fuel policies
Environmentalists on Monday accused Canada of attempting to kill proposed US and EU clean energy policies in order to protect its oil exports.
Climate Action Network Canada executive director Graham Saul told a press conference government letters, memos, speeches, and lobbyist reports assembled by the group point to a "coordinated lobbying strategy to kill climate change policies in other countries."
"This systematic effort, is being run out of Foreign Affairs and some of the briefing materials feeding into key discussions was drafted by the oil industry rather than having more neutral versions prepared by civil servants," he said. - 2010/11/22: PostMedia: Canada's oilsands strategy includes lobbying against global-warming measures: documents
- 2010/11/22: PostMedia: Three federal departments worked to put positive spin on 'dirty oil'
Three major departments in the federal government have been actively co-ordinating a communications strategy with Alberta and its fossil-fuel industry to fight international global-warming policies that "target" oilsands production, newly released federal documents reveal. The documents, obtained by Postmedia News, suggest that Environment Canada, Natural Resources Canada as well as the Department of Foreign Affairs and International Trade, have collaborated on an "advocacy strategy" in the U.S. to promote the oilsands and discourage environmental-protection policies. - 2010/11/25: CBC: Climate deal not expected at Cancun
This year's UN climate change conference in Cancun, Mexico, is unlikely to yield a deal that will replace the Kyoto Protocol, which expires in 2012, Canada's negotiator says. Guy Saint-Jacques says he hopes progress can be made on funding for developing countries and on how to monitor emissions, but the Mexican conference won't likely result in a deal. He says it will only lay a foundation for next year's meeting in Durban, South Africa. - 2010/11/24: CBC: Que. environmental group [Ãquiterre] urges progress in Cancun
A Quebec environmental group is calling on delegates to establish some firm "building blocks" at next week's global environmental conference in Cancun, Mexico, which could be used to create a much bigger global climate deal. - 2010/11/23: Reuters: Analysis: Canada goes into climate talks with little to offer
Canada will head into U.N. climate talks in Cancun next week with a part-time environment minister, little chance of meeting its own emissions targets and under broad attack for the development of its oil sands. - 2010/11/23: CBC: Coast guard ship used by oil companies
Questions are being raised over the use of a Canadian Coast Guard icebreaker by two oil companies for research that could help them make a case for drilling in the Arctic. CBC News has learned that for a minimum of $50,000 a day, BP and Imperial Oil paid to use CCGS Amundsen -- Canada's most advanced research ship which is dedicated to the study of climate change -- for a total of six weeks over the past two years. The oil companies want to study the environmental impact of their exploratory oil drilling plans in the Beaufort Sea, in the Arctic Ocean. - 2010/11/22: PostMedia: Tories quietly reviewing support for renewable energy technologies -- Companies say Canada needs to urgently develop a national strategy for clean energy
With Campbell going and James unpopularity, BC politics is spindizzy:
- 2010/11/22: Tyee: Our Most Loved Resource? Water -- British Columbians are keen to protect rivers, lakes, streams, and wetlands, a new poll finds
- 2010/11/24: Tyee: Confused and Deflated: School Carbon Offsets Perplex Administrators -- Educators with tight budgets wonder why money they must pay won't go to greening school facilities
Meanwhile in that Mechanical Mordor known as the tar sands:
- 2010/11/26: Tyee: If the $30 Billion We Give Oil Sands Went to Green Energy -- What could Canada achieve then? Here's the jaw-dropping answer
- 2010/11/25: PI:B: Oilsands, energy security and climate calamity
- 2010/11/26: Rabble: Tar Sands tailings poisons muskeg and nearby First Nations community
- 2010/11/24: DeSmogBlog: Alberta Tar Sands Have Irreversible Impact on Indigenous Culture
- 2010/11/24: Nature: [Comment$] Tar sands need solid science by David Schindler
As Canada exploits its oil sands ever faster, David Schindler calls for industry-independent environmental monitoring to back up better water-quality regulation. - 2010/11/23: CBC: Thai firm buys oilsands stake for $2.28B US
PTT Exploration and Production announced Tuesday it has reached a deal to buy a 40 per cent stake in an oilsands project in northern Alberta for $2.28 billion US. The agreement makes the Thai company a partner in Norwegian oil giant Statoil's project. - 2010/11/27: PostMedia: Alberta prepares case for climate conference -- Province realizes 'it has to step up its game,' Renner says
- 2010/11/25: CBC: Alberta losing billions in oil royalties: report
Regan Boychuk, public policy research manager with the Parkland Institute, says in a new report that Albertans have lost billions of dollars to government mismanagement of the oil and gas royalty regime.Regan Boychuk, public policy research manager with the Parkland Institute, says in a new report that Albertans have lost billions of dollars to government mismanagement of the oil and gas royalty regime. Albertans are losing billions of dollars because of overly generous royalty cuts to the oil and gas industry, a research institute says. Regan Boychuk of the Parkland Institute, a think tank based at the University of Alberta, studied the industry's profits for the past 10 years. In a reported titled Misplaced Generosity, Boychuk says the percentage of profits claimed by the provincial government has steadily declined. "Just the last year we looked at it -- in 2008 -- if the government had met its own targets, that would have meant an additional $14 billion in royalties," Boychuk told CBC News. "That far exceeds any deficit that the province has experienced in the course of a very serious recession." Boychuk, public policy research manager with the Parkland Institute, estimated that the government has lost $69 billion in potential revenue by not meeting royalty targets since 1999. - 2010/11/26: CBC: Western Potash talking to Chinese investors
- 2010/11/22: CBC: Potash One gets $434M takeover bid
Vancouver-based Potash One Inc. announced Monday it has agreed to be taken over by Germany's K+S Aktiengesellschaft in a deal worth $434 million. The firm's board -- which is headed by well-known mining entrepreneur Robert Friedland -- has recommended the deal to shareholders. - 2010/11/26: CleanBreak: Ontario's new long-term power plan good, but demonstrates difficulty in planning
- 2010/11/24: PI:B: An inside look at Ontario's long-term energy plan
- 2010/11/23: Grist: Ontario feed-in tariffs creating solar jobs at the cost of a donut per month
- 2010/11/24: PostMedia: McGuinty's pricey green dreams
- 2010/11/23: PostMedia: Ontario charts (expensive) path for renewable energy -- Closing coal plants in favour of renewables comes with considerable cost
- 2010/11/23: CBC: Ont. power bills to double over 20 years
The average electricity bill will double in Ontario over the next 20 years under an $87-billion plan to modernize the province's electricity system. Ontario's long-term energy plan, released Tuesday, calls for $33 billion in investments by government and the private sector to build two new nuclear reactors at Darlington and to refurbish 10 older units. A wind turbine feeds electricity into the Ontario grid at the CNE grounds in Toronto in February 2007. A wind turbine feeds electricity into the Ontario grid at the CNE grounds in Toronto in February 2007. (J.P. Moczulski/Reuters)It confirms Ontario's intentions to keep getting half of the province's electricity from nuclear and to phase out coal-fired generation by 2014 at the latest, with two coal burning units at Nanticoke set to close next year. The province is forecasting moderate growth in demand for electricity, rising only 15 per cent over the next two decades. Still, the plan calls for the average homeowner's electricity bill to double in that time. The government admitted last week that green energy programs will be responsible for more than half of the expected 46 per cent increase in electricity rates over the next five years. - 2010/11/23: PostMedia: Green energy costs lowballed, task force says -- Fewer new jobs
Ontario's government is overstating the benefits of its Green Energy Act and underestimating hydro rate increases, according to a new report on economic competitiveness set to be released on Tuesday. - 2010/11/24: CBC: P.E.I. Energy Accord could cost $220M
In the North:
- 2010/11/23: CBC: Que. Innu band to defy oil-gas drilling ban -- 'The agreement is not legal': Quebec government
An Innu band on Quebec's North Shore has signed an agreement to begin oil and gas exploration on its reserve despite a provincial moratorium on exploratory drilling in the area. In September the Quebec government announced a freeze on exploratory permits following an environmental impact study on the St. Lawrence estuary. The study, conducted by the provincial Natural Resources Department, indicated drilling would be devastating to fish and other wildlife that live in the estuary, the stretch of the St. Lawrence basin that runs to Anticosti Island from Quebec City. - 2010/11/23: G&M: The growing problem: Canada slips from agricultural superpower status
The movement toward a long term ecologically viable economics is glacial:
- 2010/11/27: EnergyBulletin: Knowledge and change, the intangible and development
- 2010/11/26: DVoice: Rethinking the Global Economy: The Case for Sharing
- 2010/11/26: DemNow: Author and Activist Derrick Jensen: "The Dominant Culture is Killing the Planet...It's Very Important for Us to Start to Build a Culture of Resistance"
- 2010/11/26: DemNow: Chilean Economist Manfred Max-Neef on Barefoot Economics, Poverty and Why The U.S. is Becoming an "Underdeveloping Nation"
- 2010/11/25: EnergyBulletin: Economic Growth: A zero sum game
- 2010/11/23: EH: Comment from William Leiss on Peter Victor's Nature Commentary, "Questioning Economic Growth"
- 2010/11/04: PDI: Yes, there are alternatives
In most countries, there is a dangerous myth that there is no alternative to the past 30 years' path of gearing economies toward the global market. Yet, as financial markets stagnate and food prices swing wildly and the environment come under siege, more and more nations are taking steps to reduce their vulnerability to a volatile global economy. Some are taking steps to encourage more "rooted" alternatives. - 2010/11/08: ACS:G&P: Sustainable Growth Is An Oxymoron by Rudy M. Baum
- 2010/11/17: Nature: (ab$) Questioning economic growth by Peter Victor
And in the Transition movement:
- 2010/11/27: EnergyBulletin: The evolution of Transition in the U.S.
What do we tell the children?
- 2010/11/27: EnergyBulletin: A parent's dilemma: preparing a child for an uncertain future
IPAT [Impact = Population * Affluence * Technology] raised its head once again:
- 2010/11/19: Time: Can Condoms Curb Climate Change?
Apocalypso anyone?
- 2010/11/27: WiC: Nature doesn't do bailouts
- 2010/11/26: EnergyBulletin: Neither apocalypse nor paradise
- 2010/11/24: Independent(UK):B: Avoiding catastrophe
As for how the media handles the science:
- 2010/11/23: TWTB: A test for establishment climate journalists
- 2010/11/23: NRDC:SwitchBoard: The Wall Street Journal Editorial Board Does Not Like Clean Air
- 2010/11/23: REA: Fossil Fuel Factual Fallacies: New York Times Called Out by Renowned Geoscientist
- 2010/11/21: EnergyBulletin: There Will Be Fuel? An Open Letter to the New York Times
While activists search for effective communication techniques:
- 2010/11/23: GL: Communication between top scientists and public representatives
Here is something for your library:
- [Book Site] _Climatopolis_ by Matthew E. Kahn
And for your film & video enjoyment:
- 2010/11/27: PSinclair: Building a Sustainable Society -- Urban Aquaculture
- 2010/11/27: BRitholtz: World Population Change
- 2010/11/25: PSinclair: Arctic Report Card
- 2010/11/24: GreenFyre: Potholer54 climate videos, new and some less so
- 2010/11/22: CCurrents: The Ultimate Roller Coaster Ride: A Brief History of Fossil Fuels
- 2010/11/23: PSinclair: Watts Stung by Climate Crock (Again)
As for podcasts:
- 2010/11/25: Guardian(UK): Podcast: Climate change adaptation
Among the non-members of Gamblers Anonymous:
- 2010/11/22: RealClimate: So how did that global cooling bet work out?
Developing a new energy infrastructure is a fundamental challenge of the current generation:
- 2010/11/26: CleanTechnica: Cap and Trade Works. EU Replaces Coal Power with Wind Energy
- 2010/11/27: IBTimes: Powering Europe, the better way
- 2010/11/26: NBF: Ocean Thermal Energy Conversion (OTEC) funded for a 2013 Ten MW system
- 2010/11/25: EnergyBulletin: How sustainable is renewable energy?
- 2010/11/25: PhysOrg: Firms see tidal energy as wave of future
- 2010/11/24: CCP: Tom Whipple: IEA's newly released "World Energy Outlook 2010": conventional oil production peaked six years ago
- 2010/11/05: KU(Dk): Novel fuel cell catalyst lowers need for precious metal
Fuel cells could create a breakthrough for electric cars, because refuelling them is fast and easy, just like your traditional gas guzzler. But there's an obstacle. Current fuel cells need platinum in order to work. And that's expensive. Now chemists from Copenhagen, Potsdam and Hanau have taken the first step towards producing fuel cells using very little of the precious metal. - 2010/11/22: SolveClimate: Natural Gas, Not a Carbon Price, Spelling Trouble for Coal
- 2010/11/22: TreeHugger: The Downside of Heat Cogeneration at Coal Power Plants
Hey! Let's contaminate the aquifer for thousands of years! It'll be a fracking gas!
- 2010/11/27: TreeHugger: Mayor Bloomberg Warns Against Fracking in Delaware River Basin
- 2010/11/26: PlanetArk: China To Develop Unconventional Gases [shale gas & ?] In 10 Years: Woodmac
- 2010/11/25: ABC(Au): Coal seam gas moratorium motion defeated
Both major parties have rejected Queensland independent MP Aidan McLindon's motion to impose a moratorium on new coal seam gas (CSG) projects. - 2010/11/16: AlterNet: Pittsburgh Bans Fracking (and Corporate Personhood)
- 2010/11/22: DeSmogBlog: Exxon Fracking Fluid Spill In Pennsylvania Dumps Estimated 13,000 Gallons Into Nearby Waterways
- 2010/11/21: CBC: Australian city [Sydney] to be drilled for natural gas
The answer my friend...:
- 2010/11/25: BBC: The world's largest wind farms
With the UN climate conference about to open in Cancun, BBC environment correspondent David Shukman samples opinion in Texas, home to the world's largest wind farms. - 2010/11/24: NBF: Global wind energy outlook - the maximum optimistic view
- 2010/11/23: PhysOrg: Optimizing large wind farms
- 2010/11/22: NRDC:SwitchBoard: Massachusetts OKs Long Term Power Contract for First U.S. Offshore Wind Farm with Major Power Co.
- 2010/11/22: NRDC:SwitchBoard: Cape Wind in Massachusetts Gets Green Light to Plug Clean Energy into National Grid
- 2010/11/22: SciDaily: Enhancing the Efficiency of Wind Turbines
Meanwhile among the solar aficionados:
- 2010/11/28: PeakEnergy: Carter Era Solar Panel Performance Amazes Owner
- 2010/11/26: REA: Solar Inverter Shipments Hit Record 7 GW in Q3
- 2010/11/25: TreeHugger: Europe's Largest PV Solar Farm Opens in Italy
- 2010/11/25: NBF: Boeing subsidiary Spectrolab to mass-produce about 100MW in 2011 of 39.2% efficient solar cells
- 2010/11/24: TreeHugger: Spectrolab is Starting Mass-Production of 39.2% Efficient Concentrating Solar Cell
- 2010/11/23: PhysOrg: Who would benefit most from solar energy? Study ranks states
Americans have become more and more concerned with the idea of using cleaner energy sources and creating new jobs through the use of solar energy. A new study from the W. P. Carey School of Business at Arizona State University takes a closer look at which states might benefit the most both from generating solar energy and from consuming that energy. These are believed to be the first state rankings of their kind. - 2010/11/22: Reuters: California puts Tessera solar plant on temp hold
The California Energy Commission has temporarily withdrawn approval of a controversial solar power plant by NTR's Tessera Solar after opponents protested that the 663.5-megawatt Calico project had been improperly licensed. - 2010/11/22: TEC: Boeing Shatters Solar Power Record with 39.2% Cell Efficiency
- 2010/11/23: TEC: Solar Energy Expansion in South West England
- 2010/11/23: REA: SunEdison Connects 70-MW Solar PV Plant
On the coal front:
- 2010/11/24: EnergyBulletin: Green coal
- 2010/11/24: OilDrum: Future Coal Supplies - More, Not Less!
- 2010/11/23: TreeHugger: Oregon to be Coal-Free by 2020
- 2010/11/23: CSW: "Deep Down": A community battle over proposed mountaintop removal coal mining
- 2010/11/22: PhysOrg: End to cheap coal closer than we thought?
Biofuel bickering abounds:
- 2010/11/25: PhysOrg: A high-yield biomass alternative to petroleum for industrial chemicals
A team of University of Massachusetts Amherst chemical engineers report in today's issue of Science that they have developed a way to produce high-volume chemical feedstocks including benzene, toluene, xylenes and olefins from pyrolytic bio-oils, the cheapest liquid fuels available today derived from biomass. The new process could reduce or eliminate industry's reliance on fossil fuels to make industrial chemicals worth an estimated $400 billion annually. - 2010/11/23: EnergyBulletin: Straight answers to tough questions about wood heat
- 2010/11/23: MSU: Shrubby crops can help fuel Africa's green revolution
- 2010/11/22: SolveClimate: Algae Fuel Inches Toward Price Parity with Oil
With over 100 start-ups hard at work, industry predicts it can deliver success in under a decade if granted production tax credits - 2010/11/28: BNC: Nuclear is the least-cost, low-carbon, baseload power source
Yes we have a peak oil sighting:
- 2010/11/28: PeakEnergy: Aleklett on Peak Oil and Global Warming
- 2010/11/27: EconBrowser: Peak oil in Pennsylvania
- 2010/11/25: CCurrents: The IEA's New Peak
- 2010/11/25: CCurrents: It's Official: The Economy Is Set To Starve
- 2010/11/23: EnergyBulletin: Still dealing with peak oil-denying nonsense
- 2010/11/24: EnergyBulletin: It's official: The economy is set to starve
More people are talking about the electrical grid:
- 2010/11/25: PressDemocrat: SmartMeter revolt persists in Sonoma County [Calif]
- 2010/11/23: BostonGlobe: State gives National Grid approval to purchase Cape Wind power
- 2010/11/23: PeakEnergy: 15,000 smart homes planned for NSW
- 2010/11/22: TreeHugger: 57.9 Million Smart Meters Already Slated for Installation in US
And then there is the matter of efficiency & conservation:
- 2010/11/22: Grist: The messy side of energy efficiency: finance
Automakers & lawyers, engineers & activists argue over the future of the car:
- 2010/11/27: AutoBG: Consumer Reports: Interest in alt-energy vehicles on the rise; buyers deterred by drawbacks
- 2010/11/27: AutoBG: Study: Asia-Pacific plug-in vehicle market to exceed 1.2M by 2015
- 2010/11/26: PlanetArk: Chevy Volt tops Prius In Fuel Economy Rating
- 2010/11/22: ERabett: Pass the Popcorn
- 2010/11/23: TreeHugger: Nissan LEAF Gets 99 MPG-e Rating from EPA
- 2010/11/23: AutoBG: Electrification Coalition releases Fleet Electrification Roadmap, shows how to get to 200,000 plug-ins by 2015
- 2010/11/22: STimes: Utilities thrilled and worried about electric cars
This week in the Gee Whiz File:
- 2010/11/26: NBF: Graphene-Based Supercapacitor with an Ultrahigh Energy Density
As for Energy Storage:
- 2010/11/23: REA: Energy Storage Crucial Step for Renewable Electricity
The reaction of business to climate change will be critical:
- 2010/11/26: ClimateShifts: Would you let Michael O'Leary run your business?
- 2010/11/26: PlanetArk: Cemex Sees Cost Savings As It Goes Green
- 2010/11/23: Guardian(UK): Private sector involvement is no silver bullet to the climate crisis
- 2010/11/22: EurActiv: Businesses 'deploying clean tech' despite slow UN talks
Meanwhile in the greenwashing chronicles:
- 2010/11/23: DeSmogBlog: Had Enough Tar Sands Greenwashing? Join the CAPP Ad-Jam Contest
Joe Romm posts a daily list of top energy and climate stories:
- 2010/11/24: ClimateP: Energy and Global Warming News for November 24...
- 2010/11/23: ClimateP: Energy and Global Warming News for November 23...
- 2010/11/22: ClimateP: Energy and Global Warming News for November 22...
Other (weekly) lists:
- 2010/11/27: IdiotTracker: Around the Interwebs
- 2010/11/26: NRDC:SwitchBoard: India Climate Change and Energy News - Week of November 14 to November 20, 2010
- 2010/11/26: IJISH: Mindless Link Propagation ... obligatory pointless WordArt
The carbon lobby are up to the usual:
- 2010/11/28: BCLSB: By Day They Deny, Part II
- 2010/11/28: ERabett: Ottmar Edenhofer Interview
- 2010/11/27: BBickmore: Salt Lake Tribune Op-Ed on Orrin Hatch's "Climate Change 101"
- 2010/11/26: GWWatch: A professional climate denier replies
- 2010/11/26: WottsUWT: Examination of CRU data suggests no statistically significant warming
- 2010/11/26: CCP: Koch Industries dirty fossil-fuel money linked to right-wing "think" tank CEPOS in Denmark, via the Institute for Energy Research in the U.S., funded by Koch
- 2010/11/26: ClimateShifts: What type of denier are you?
- 2010/11/25: Deltoid: The Australian's War on Science 51: The Chris Mitchell effect
- 2010/11/25: GreenFyre: Another Top International Climate Change Denier Silliness or Two!
- 2010/11/25: DeseretNews: Global warming consensus matters [Bickmore]
- 2010/11/25: MTobis: Lomborg Achieves Boring
- 2010/11/24: WottsUWT: A regional approach to the medieval warm period and the little ice age
- 2010/11/24: WottsUWT: Joe Bastardi's 2011 Arctic Sea Ice Prediction
- 2010/11/24: Tamino: Blowin' in the Wind
- 2010/11/24: PSinclair: Lively Times at WUWT
- 2010/11/23: Guardian(UK): Climate change scepticism is about more than just science
Debate on climate change is dominated by disputes about personal values, regulation and government intervention in our lives - 2010/11/23: BSD: Lomborg misunderstands city subsidence and sea level rise
- 2010/11/23: Eureka: Extending the life of oil reserves -- Greener, cheaper, more efficient oil extraction made possible at ISIS
- 2010/11/22: TPL: Climate Change Policy and the New World Order
- 2010/11/22: GreenFyre: Denier vs Skeptic IV: Get a dictionary!
- 2010/11/22: GreenFyre: "Alarmist": a Freudian slip?
- 2010/11/22: PSinclair: Watts Up with Sea Ice?
How can you tell what's really going on?
- 2010/11/25: PhysOrg: Is the Internet lying to us?
- How's yer crap detector?
As for climate miscellanea:
- 2010/11/27: NewsWeek: A Climate Whodunit -- Science nails the blame game
- 2010/11/27: IdiotTracker: Bad news from GISS
- 2010/11/28: Guardian(UK): Margaret Atwood interview
- 2010/11/27: Stoat: Comments elsewhere
- 2010/10/: NOAA:NCDC: State of the Climate - Global Analysis - October 2010
- 2010/11/27: BBC: [London Science] Museum banks on science, not belief, for climate gallery
- 2010/11/26: Guardian(UK): A climate journey: From the peaks of the Andes to the Amazon's oilfields
- 2010/11/26: CNN: Case for man-made warming increased in 2010, scientists say
Leading UK climate center says case for man-made warming is "overwhelming" - Datasets from land, sea and space all point towards long-term warming - Rate of warming slowed in last decade despite CO2 emissions rising during same period - Aerosol pollution in Asia -- which reflects sunlight -- could be one reason for slowdown - 2010/11/25: ERabett: Something to do
- 2010/11/13: EH: The Ecological Headstand
- 2010/11/24: ITracker: Three dimensions of risk -- Part One: Severity
- 2010/11/24: HotTopic: (2) Degrees of existence
- 2010/11/23: ERabett: Rabett Reads -- So, what is out there in the great blogosphere...
- 2010/11/24: moyhu: New text and file repository
- 2010/11/23: Grist: Behavior change causes changes in beliefs, not vice versa
- 2010/11/23: LongNow: Model & Fix the Climate in [the video game] 'Fate of the World'
- 2010/11/22: moyhu: Woody Guthrie Award - thanks, Science of Doom
- 2010/11/23: Tamino: All that data
- 2010/11/22: TCoE: Sugar coating a kick in the teeth
- 2010/11/22: TSoD: And The Woody Guthrie Award Goes To...
- 2010/11/22: DeSmogBlog: Tom Borelli: Hastening the End of the World
- 2010/11/22: HotTopic: Handle with care
And here are a couple of sites you may find interesting and/or useful:
- CleanTechnica
- UNEP:GRID: Africa Water Atlas - 2010
- [Book Site] _Climatopolis_ by Matthew E. Kahn
- Environmental and Urban Economics
- ClimateSight: Quote Collection
- OnEarth Magazine
- EH: Ecological Headstand
- Idiot Tracker
- NASA: Aquarius Mission Web Site
- GWEC: Global Wind Energy Council
- CFCAS: Canadian Foundation for Climate and Atmospheric Sciences
- NASA: Glory Mission
- GHCNM: Global Historical Climatology Network-Monthly
- The Great Energy Challenge
- GCP: Global Carbon Project
- C&C: Climate and Capitalism -- Ecosocialism or Barbarism: There is no third way
Here's a wee chuckle for ye:
The Cancun crescendo is building:
Schneider & Hook report that lakes around the world are warming significantly:
More on the Climate Science Rapid Responce Team:
GreenPeace is accusing Indonesia of playing fast & loose with climate aid:
Not much news on the Pakistan floods:
About that Ecuadorian proposal...:
About the psychology of gloom & doom:
The food crisis is ongoing:
The conflict between biofuel and food persists:
As for GHGs:
As for the temperature record:
While in the paleoclimate:
Meanwhile in near earth orbit:
Consider transportation & GHG production:
And on the carbon trading front:
As for GW, energy & water security:
The issue of the law and activism is playing out around the world:
Regarding Water Politics and Business:
The circus grinds on...nobody is laughing:
And in Europe:
The Murray-Darling Basin Plan controversy lingers:
While in the Indian subcontinent:
And in China:
And Russia:
The G20 controversy lingers:
Questions and debate about offshore and Arctic drilling continue:
A report that Harper's Tories are lobbying foreign governments to support the oil sands caused a bit of a stir:
As for what Canada takes to Cancun:
Fossil fuel companies using the research ship, CCGS Amundsen, caught some off guard:
More Tory trouble brewing:
Also in Alberta:
In Saskatchewan the question is Potash?
Ontario has it's Green Energy Act, now comes the implementation:
In the Maritimes:
As for miscellaneous Canadiana:
The nuclear energy controversy continues:
Low Key Plug
My first novel Water was published in Canada May, 2007. The American release was in October. An Introductionto the novel is available, along with the Unpublished Forewordand the Launch Talk(which includes some quotations), An overview of my writing is available here.
<regards>
P.S. Recent postings can be found in the week archive and the ancient postings can be accessed here, which should open to this.
"Economists suffer from a deep psychological disorder that I call 'physics envy'. We wish that 99 percent of economic behavior could be captured by three simple laws of nature. In fact, economists have 99 laws that capture 3 percent of behavior. Economics is a uniquely human endeavor ..." Andrew Lo, a professor of finance at MIT
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