The climate change conference suggests scientific peer pressure may have led to gross underestimates of the potential scale of global warming
http://www.newscientist.com/channel/opinion/mg18524863.400
Climate change: Act now, before it is too late
Time is running out, and fast. That was the message from climate experts at an international climate conference in the UK
TIME is running out, and fast. Rising carbon dioxide levels and higher temperatures will soon set in motion potentially catastrophic changes that will take hundreds or even millions of years to reverse.
That was the warning last week from climate scientists attending a conference in Exeter, UK. While sceptics snipe from the sidelines (see "Climate change: Menace or myth?") and politicians prevaricate, researchers highlighted evidence that the danger is more pressing than was thought. "The sleeping giants are being woken," several said.
http://www.newscientist.com/channel/earth/mg18524864.300
"Setting a New Course on Climate Change" by U.S. Senator Chuck Hagel
Delivered at Brookings Institution Briefing on Climate Change Policy, Washington, D.C.
Thank you, David, for inviting me to speak at this Brookings Institution Briefing on Climate Change Policy. I appreciate Brookings’ leadership in bringing nonpartisan, informed and expert analysis to difficult public policy issues, including climate change.
… I believe that greenhouse gas intensity, or the amount of carbon emitted relative to economic output, is the best measurement for dealing with climate change. Greenhouse gas emission intensity is the measurement of how efficiently a nation uses carbon emitting fuels and technology in producing goods and services. It captures the links between energy efficiency, economic development and the environment.
My plan includes three pieces of legislation:
The Climate Change Technology Deployment in Developing Countries Act;
The Climate Change Technology Deployment Act; and,
The Climate Change Technology Tax Incentives Act.
The Climate Change Technology Deployment in Developing Countries Act provides the Secretary of State with new authority for coordinating assistance to developing countries for projects and technologies that reduce greenhouse gas intensity. It supports the development of a U.S. global climate strategy to expand the role of the private sector, develop public-private partnerships, and encourage the deployment of greenhouse gas reducing technologies in developing countries. This bill directs the Secretary of State to engage global climate change as a foreign policy issue. It directs the U.S. Trade Representative to negotiate the removal of trade-related barriers to the export of greenhouse gas intensity reducing technologies, and establishes an inter-agency working group to promote the export of greenhouse gas intensity reducing technologies and practices from the United States. The legislation authorizes fellowship and exchange programs for foreign officials to visit the United States and acquire the expertise and knowledge to reduce greenhouse gas intensity in their countries.
http://www.swnebr.net/newspaper/cgi-bin/articles/articlearchiver.pl?156981
Britain and India to do joint climate change research
T. V. Padma
9 February 2005
Source: SciDev.Net
[NEW DELHI] India and the United Kingdom have announced plans to collaborate on sustainable development projects, including conducting research on climate change together.
http://www.scidev.net/news/index.cfm?fuseaction=readnews&itemid=1916&language=1
Climate change claims another peer
Peter Foster
Financial Post
February 9, 2005
"It is necessary to guard ourselves from thinking that the practice of the scientific method enlarges the powers of the human mind. Nothing is more flatly contradicted by experience than the belief that a man distinguished in one or even more departments of science, is more likely to think sensibly about ordinary affairs than anyone else."
-- Wilfred Trotter
… For most of the past year, he has been non-executive chairman of oil giant Shell Transport & Trading, taking over that post when the company was roiled by a scandal surrounding overstated reserves.
When he retires in April, Lord Oxburgh plans to take up a position with a "climate change charity."
"I would be campaigning for more responsible use of hydrocarbons," he declared, on the basis that unless something is done about climate change, "there will be a disaster."
Like another former Cambridge don turned government science advisor, Sir David King, Lord Oxburgh is firmly convinced that man-made climate change is a terrible threat to mankind. Indeed, so great is his conviction that he eschews a chauffeur-driven limousine when shuttling back and forth between Shell's London headquarters and the House of Lords. Instead he uses a folding bicycle which he keeps in a cupboard in the lobby of Shell HQ.
http://www.canada.com/national/nationalpost/financialpost/story.html?id=92be2636-2183-452a-8a4e-63c4f797361e
Minister Calls for Region to Take Climate Change Action
Government minister Margaret Beckett MP has today called on South West residents to help lead the way in the fight against climate change.
http://news.scotsman.com/latest.cfm?id=4076736
Climate change 'has killed 160,000'
February 02, 2005
MORE than 160,000 people died worldwide last year as a result of climate change and it is time the federal Government addressed the issue with a national summit, a peak environment group has said.
http://www.theaustralian.news.com.au/common/story_page/0,5744,12116859%5E30417,00.html
Record cold thins northern ozone
AP
February 01, 2005
BRUSSELS: Record low temperatures over the North Pole are thinning the protective ozone layer, a condition which could affect human health in northern countries and even central European nations, the European Union warned Monday.
http://www.theaustralian.news.com.au/common/story_page/0,5744,12114359%255E30417,00.html
Glaciers, icefields in retreat
AP
January 31, 2005
CHACALTAYA GLACIER, Bolivia: Up and down the icy spine of South America, the glaciers are melting, the white mantle of the Andes Mountains washing away at an ever faster rate.
http://www.theaustralian.news.com.au/common/story_page/0,5744,12103040%255E30417,00.html
Everest is losing height
January 27, 2005
IT is one of those facts every schoolchild is expected to know: how high is Mount Everest?
Everest's place as the world's highest point above sea level is not in dispute – the mighty mountain towers over its lofty neighbours in the Himalayas. The tribulations and triumphs of its would-be conquerors are well documented. But how high did they actually go?
http://www.theaustralian.news.com.au/common/story_page/0,5744,12060864%255E30417,00.html
'Scary' science finds Earth heating up twice as fast as thought
Leigh Dayton, Science writer
January 27, 2005
THE largest ever climate-change experiment reveals that scientists may have dramatically underestimated the threat of global warming.
http://www.theaustralian.news.com.au/common/story_page/0,5744,12063396%255E30417,00.html
US critics reject our deal on N-waste
Amanda Hodge, Robert Lusetich
January 29, 2005
AUSTRALIANS do not want nuclear waste in their backyards, and many Americans don't want it either - despite an agreement by the US Government to take four shipments of Australian waste in the next decade.
http://www.theaustralian.news.com.au/common/story_page/0,5744,12083484%255E30417,00.html
Blair to highlight environment as world leaders get together
January 27, 2005
BUSINESS, political and social leaders from every continent except Antarctica converged on this plush ski resort yesterday for the start of the World Economic Forum, an annual brainstorming session on global problems, including poverty and climate change.
http://www.theaustralian.news.com.au/common/story_page/0,5744,12062187%255E30417,00.html
State's $26m hurry-up on water reforms
Amanda Hodge
January 26, 2005
NSW could be docked $26 million in national competition payments for failing to provide enough water for rivers and wetlands, in a sign that the federal Government is losing patience over the pace of water reform.
http://www.theaustralian.news.com.au/common/story_page/0,5744,12055001%255E30417,00.html
Indian mangroves 'absorbed' tsunami
AP
January 23, 2005
PICHAVARAM, India: For generations, the Irula tribe in southern India made a living out of skinning snakes. Then a 1972 wildlife law banned such sales and the tribals, who lived in seaside forests, turned to fishing and worked on a government program to restore coastal mangrove swamps damaged by human development.
http://www.theaustralian.news.com.au/common/story_page/0,5744,12025988%255E30417,00.html
Bracing for the next one
The Indian Ocean tsunami has concentrated minds this week at a world conference in Japan, itself the site of terrible natural catastrophes. Tokyo correspondent Peter Alford reports
January 22, 2005
OSAMU Hashida's trial was by flames rather than water but when he first heard news of last month's Indian Ocean tsunami, he shuddered for the survivors: "All my sympathy went out to Sumatra in that awful moment."
http://www.theaustralian.news.com.au/common/story_page/0,5744,12009307%255E30417,00.html
This issue is approached the wrong way. When the IWC was formed there were still seas teeming with whales. That is not the case anymore. Every species of baleen whale including the Minki is grossly endangered, the worst being The Blue Whale, which at maturity is 100 feet long. These mammals because of their life cycle and reproduction and feeding patterns need an aggressive mariculture project to bring them back from extinction.
This isn't that difficult. Every feeding season at the poles a 'seeding ship' blankets swath after swath to produce huge and vital algal blooms. The krill if nothing else will feed on the algae and muliply in large number. IF there aren't enough krill in the seeding area certainly the 'seeding vessels' can simultaneously release NATIVE krill into the 'blanket aglae' area which will then spawn larger populations. The krill alone will serve to consume the algae preventing the harvested carbon dioxide from returning to the troposphere.
I have discussed this casually with The Icelandic Marine Mammal Institute and was hoping this would be initiated there. From what I am hearing from the IWC there is movement in that direction realizing some scientific investigation resulting in scientific and legitimate 'takes' will ensue.
Ocean seeding accompanied by consumtion of algae by krill and baleens will serve two purposes. It will begin to harvest carbon dioxide out of the troposphere while returning large body weight back to these marine mammals providing healthy individuals to high reproductive capacity and a real plan to return these mammals back from extinction.
The IWC was never a conservation organization but it became one with little response from whales in their protection to repopulate. It is time aggressive and immediate mariculture to return these mammals to high populations begin. It can be conducted year round, during summer months in the South and North polar populations while they feed there. Please do this now ! Nothing can hurt at this point and there is every indication it will help.
Ruddock steers clear of whaling court case
Natasha Robinson
January 27, 2005
IN an attempt to avoid a diplomatic row with Japan, the federal Government has refused to support legal action against whaling in Australia's Antarctic whale sanctuary.
http://www.theaustralian.news.com.au/common/story_page/0,5744,12062051%255E30417,00.html
