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News Archive 2009
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Climate crunch: A burden beyond bearing - Nature The climate situation may be even worse than you think. In the first of three features, Richard Monastersky looks at evidence that keeping carbon dioxide beneath dangerous levels is tougher than previously thought. See also: Hit the brakes hard Catastrophic Climate Future: Are We That Stupid?	30th April 2009
Carbon Credits Miss the Point - Fast Company Magazine It may not be a popular thing to say, but all the feel-good talk about carbon emission policies may be obscuring a bigger and more important problem: Our society's long-entrenched habit of rampant over- consumption. When we focus on carbon-emissions, are we postponing a change in consumer behavior that could be more beneficial over a long time? In a world were consumption becomes more calculated, the value of design is critical. Not only must the function of any new object should be validated, its cultural, economic and social impact must be accounted for, whether it has a heavy or shallow carbon footprint. This is the age of consequences and it's about time we broaden the scope of our thought about consumption way beyond carbon.	30th April 2009
Hundreds of miles of ice drop from Antarctic shelf New satellite images from the European Space Agency show massive amounts of ice are breaking away from a shelf on the western side of the Antarctic Peninsula, researchers said today.	30th April 2009
Germany Sees Hottest Weather Ever as 'Climate Train' Speeds Up - Bloomberg April 29 (Bloomberg) -- Germany, Europe's biggest economy, is experiencing the warmest weather since record-keeping began in 1890, the country's weather agency said.	30th April 2009
Tibet experiencing higher temperature - Times of India Hit by global warming, excessive grazing and human activities, temperature in Tibet has risen continuously over the past 48 years, triggering snow melting, glacial shrinking and rising water levels in the fragile Himalayan region. The study, based on data from 38 weather stations under the Tibet Autonomous Regional Meteorological Bureau, indicated that the average temperature in the landlocked region rose 0.32 degree Celsius every 10 years between 1961 to 2008.	30th April 2009
Mercury levels in Arctic seals may be linked to global warming Researchers in Canada are reporting for the first time that high mercury levels in certain Arctic seals appear to be linked to vanishing sea ice caused by global warming. Their study, a new insight into the impact of climate change on Arctic marine life, is scheduled for the May 1 issue of ACS` Environmental Science Technology.	30th April 2009
Climate change menaces Galapagos: scientists WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The unique wildlife of the Galapagos Islands -- penguins, fur seals, swimming iguanas and flightless birds -- is profoundly threatened by climate change, scientists said on Wednesday.	30th April 2009
Canada aims to end traditional coal power: report OTTAWA (Reuters) - The Canadian government plans new regulations that will effectively phase out traditional coal-fired power stations, Environment Minister Jim Prentice said in an interview published on Wednesday.	30th April 2009
European carbon trading scheme will not cut power sector emissions, MPs told The European carbon trading system is a 'failure' and will not help the UK to meet its emission reduction targets, electricity generator EDF warns a committee of UK MPsThe EU carbon trading system has failed and will not help meet government targets on decarbonising the power sector, energy operators told MPs yesterday.Electricity generator EDF warned an environmental audit committee inquiry into carbon markets that government targets to cut the UK's greenhouse gas emissions 80% by 2050 would not be met without certainty that the price of carbon could be raised and sustained. The government's Committee on Climate Change has said that the target would require "almost full decarbonisation" of the power industry by 2030.Asked by MPs on the committee whether the European Emissions Trading scheme was insufficient to meet these targets, Humphrey Cadoux-Hudson, managing director of new nuclear build at EDF, agreed. See also: ETS a 'black hole of uncertainty' - Australian Broadcasting Corporation	30th April 2009
The climate engineers Schemes to reflect sun or absorb CO2 warrant study - to sort the real science from the science fictionEmissions of carbon dioxide are rising even faster than was expected, and if they continue to do so we are on track for global temperatures which are likely to be 4C higher, or even more, by 2100, with disastrous consequences. With no action agreed by the recent G20 meeting, there is still no sign that we are even beginning to control emissions, let alone reduce them by the target of at least 50% by 2050, widely regarded as the minimum necessary to avoid that.	30th April 2009
Do Americans believe they will be affected by climate change? Arguments over the percentage of Americans who think climate change will affect them personally have got it wrong, says Phil McKenna	30th April 2009
Proof of paid-for climate denial comes as no surprise As the Global Climate Coalition has always known, fake controversy makes better copy than the boring scientific consensusThere are three kinds of climate change denier. There are those who simply don't want to accept the evidence, because it is too much to bear, or because it threatens aspects of their lives that they don't want to change. These are by far the most numerous, and account for most of those whose comments will follow this post. I have some sympathy for their position. Denial is most people's first response to something they don't want to hear, whether it is a diagnosis of terminal illness or the threat presented by the rise of the Axis Powers.	30th April 2009
Shell committed to tar sands despite $42m losses Shell vows to press on with projects amid cost cuts and falling profitsShell has pledged to continue with its controversial tar sands projects but has been forced to consider far-reaching cost cuts to keep the operations going after they lost $42m (£28m) in the last three months.Peter Voser, the company's chief executive, said the success of its investment at Athabasca in Canada should be judged over decades, not just a period when crude prices had slumped to $50 a barrel, down from $150 a barrel last year."When we build projects, we take a long-term view.	30th April 2009
Nicholas Stern: We Need a Global Deal on Climate Change - Huffington Post Interview: In a new book, The Global Deal, Stern builds on his earlier work to offer a blueprint for a safer planet, laying out the specific steps that individuals, communities, companies, and nations need to take -- without delay -- to reduce emissions and head off the very worst consequences of catastrophic climate change. As the title suggests, the challenge demands international cooperation on a scale rarely, if ever before, achieved, but he's optimistic a global deal can be reached, if only because the stakes are so high, the alternative so grim, and the prize -- a secure planet on a sustainable path to prosperity -- so great.	30th April 2009

New York-sized ice shelf collapses off Antarctica - Independent An area of an Antarctic ice shelf almost the size of New York City has broken into icebergs this month after the collapse of an ice bridge widely blamed on global warming, a scientist said today.	29th April 2009
Climate change 'hitting entire Arctic' - Guardian Extensive climate change is now affecting every form of life in the Arctic, according to a major new assessment by international polar scientists. In the past four years, air temperatures have increased, sea ice has declined sharply, surface waters in the Arctic ocean have warmed and permafrost is in some areas rapidly thawing. In addition, says the report released today at a Norwegian government seminar, plants and trees are growing more vigorously, snow cover is decreasing 1-2% a year and glaciers are shrinking. Scientists from Norway, Canada, Russia and the US contributed to the Arctic monitoring and assessment programme (Amap) study, which says new factors such as "black carbon" – soot – ozone and methane may now be contributing to global and arctic warming as much as carbon dioxide.	29th April 2009
Anger at plans for nuclear power station to replace wind farm - Guardian • Threatened site is one of the most efficient • Proposed atomic plant backed by governmentOne of the oldest and most efficient wind farms in Britain is to be dismantled and replaced by a nuclear power station under plans drawn up by the German-owned power group RWE.The site at Kirksanton in Cumbria - home to the Haverigg turbines - has just been approved by the government for potential atomic newbuild in a move that has infuriated the wind power industry.Colin Palmer, founder of the Windcluster company, which owns part of the Haverigg wind farm, said he was horrified that such a plan could be considered at a time when Britain risks missing its green energy targets and after reassurance from ministers that nuclear and renewables were not incompatible.	29th April 2009
Creating a Carbon Price Differential Creating a genuine and effective Carbon price differential will be awkward, perhaps impossible. Carbon Taxes will stop working after a few years, and Carbon Caps are already strongly resisted. As for Carbon Trading, the incentive to cheat, the “leakage”, will mean that most exchanges will be measured in “hot air” - virtual Carbon emissions. As the world toys with the idea of giving Carbon a price, and has international gatherings of top leaders, the atmosphere carries on burning. These days, it's quite hard to distinguish between the so-call “developed” nations, and some of the so-called “developing” nations, in terms of the race to emit Greenhouse Gases.	29th April 2009
The Final Heresy - OneWorld.net Saying that we need an economy that fits the shoe size of the planet would seem to be stating the obvious. It’s something so obvious that it shouldn’t really need pointing out. It’s not as if, should the economy outgrow the planet, we can buy a new one, like buying a new pair of shoes. Yet to question the viability of infinite economic growth in the mainstream of debate remains the final heresy. Struggling to emerge from recession, the Business Secretary, Peter Mandelson talks optimistically of the global economy doubling in size. Policy experts lobbying staff at the Department for International Development are told in advance of a consultation process to not even consider questioning growth, because if they do, their comments will be automatically disregarded and ignored. So much, then, for a culture of openness, curiosity and intellectual enquiry. Stranger still, is that criticisms of growth have a long and honourable tradition, and an unanswered fundamental critique.	29th April 2009
The Earth Is a Ponzi Scheme on the Verge of Collapse - Alternet Our model of exponential growth in consumption of energy, natural resources and raw materials cannot last forever.	29th April 2009
Forest dreams - BBC News The world's tropical forests face the double challenge of climate change and deforestation, says Andrew Mitchell. In this week's Green Room, he explains why he is not giving up on the "impossible dream" of convincing governments that these trees are worth more alive than dead. "Paying a premium to prevent the loss of the Amazon could be one of the best insurance policies planet Earth has on offer"	29th April 2009
Climate change to cut rice output–ADB - Inquirer.net MANILA, Philippines—Rice production in the country is forecast to fall by three-fourths from current levels in 10 years if nothing is done to mitigate and adapt to climate change, the Asian Development Bank said Tuesday. Zhuang Juzhong, the ADB assistant chief economist, said rice production could fall from 50 to 70 percent by 2020. He said this decline could continue until the end of this century, “if there is a business-as-usual attitude toward climate change.”	29th April 2009
Ocean power surges forward - The Christian Science Monitor Wave power and tidal power are still experimental, but may be little more than five years away from commercial development.	29th April 2009
Melt from Andes to Arctic may spur U.N. climate pact TROMSOE, Norway (Reuters) - A fast melt of ice from the Andes to the Arctic should be a wake-up call for governments to work out a strong new United Nations treaty this year to fight climate change, Norway said on Tuesday.	29th April 2009
Draft climate proposals reveal split on new pact LONDON (Reuters) - A gulf needs to be bridged if the world is to sign a new climate treaty by a December deadline, according to proposals from more than 30 countries posted on a U.N. website on Tuesday.	29th April 2009
Al Gore calls on world to burn less wood and fuel to curb 'black carbon' Soot from engines, forest fires and partly burned fuel is collecting in Arctic and causing north pole to warm at alarming rateThe world must burn less diesel and wood, Nobel peace prize-winner Al Gore said yesterday, as the soot produced is accelerating the melting of ice in polar and mountainous regions.Gore, backed by government ministers and scientists, said that the soot, also known as "black carbon", from engines, forest fires and partially burned fuel was collecting in the Arctic where it was creating a haze of pollution that absorbs sunlight and warms the air. It was also being deposited on snow, darkening its surface and reducing the snow's ability to reflect sunlight back into space."The principle [climate change] problem is carbon dioxide, but a new understanding is emerging of soot," said Gore.	29th April 2009
Obama emissions plan to cost $1,400 a family: study WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The Obama administration's plan to impose a cap-and-trade system to cut U.S. greenhouse gas emissions would result in 1.9 million job losses and cost the average household $1,400 a year by 2020, according to a new study released on Tuesday.	29th April 2009
U.S. climate talks make progress, with some gaps WASHINGTON (Reuters) - U.S.-hosted climate talks with the world's biggest greenhouse gas polluters concluded on Tuesday with signs of progress but sizable differences as nations work toward a deal this year to fight global warming.	29th April 2009
U.S. Should Aim for 40% Emissions Cuts, India's Envoy Says - Bloomberg April 28 (Bloomberg) -- The U.S. should be “as ambitious as possible” in setting greenhouse-gas emissions limits and seek reductions of almost 40 percent by 2020, India's chief climate negotiator said.	29th April 2009
GOP on offense in fight against Democrats' climate bill - New York Times From demanding more hearings on the House Democrats' climate change and energy bill to asking Al Gore about potential financial gains from renewable energy investments, the GOP is on the offensive and dialing up the rhetoric.	29th April 2009

Testing times - BBC News BBC visits far north scientists watching atmospheric moves See also: Arctic CO2 levels growing at an 'unprecedented rate'	28th April 2009
G20 protesters 'offered cash' by police to spy on environmental groups Fresh evidence has emerged of police efforts to recruit paid spies within environmental groups after the Guardian revealed that police in Scotland are running a network of hundreds of informants inside pressure groups.Anti-nuclear protesters in Scotland said yesterday that military police had offered them cash in exchange for information. One protester said he was offered money on top of his jobseeker's allowance - a move sanctioning benefit fraud - if he gave military police the names of people planning environmental action. One activist from Plane Stupid revealed that members had been given £20 by police.James Woods, 22, an anti-nuclear protester arrested at Faslane, said ... See also: Why spy on peaceful protesters?	28th April 2009
Climate cost models 'unhelpful' - BBC News The government is being misled on the impact of climate change by relying on "unhelpful" economic models, the former UK chief scientific advisor warns.	28th April 2009
Little power price impact seen from U.S. renewable mandate NEW YORK (Reuters) - A proposed federal mandate to force power companies to provide up to 25 percent renewable energy by 2025 is likely to have little impact on electric prices though 2020 and negligible impact after 2030, the Energy Information Administration said in a study Monday.	28th April 2009
Reveal carbon risks, oil firms told Oil giants involved in the exploitation of tar sand fields face calls this week to disclose future carbon liabilities. Co-operative Financial Services (CFS) and environmental charity WWF-UK are launching a campaign for a legal requirement for companies including Shell and BP to include this information in financial reporting. The Co-op says tar sands activities threaten to create a new class of toxic investment that could push the financial system into deeper crisis, while WWF wants the UK to take the lead and make London the centre of green finance. Nearly £40bn of UK pension assets is invested in British-based oil and gas companies.	28th April 2009
Winds of change blow for offshore power operators It's official: it's getting windier down south. This unexpected quirk of climate change has given a much needed boost to offshore wind-farm developers. For those struggling to make the economics of hugely expensive wind farms work, more wind equals more money. Experts said that the waters off the coast of East Anglia and Essex could host many more wind farms as a result. The research, from Atmos Consulting, has found that wind speeds in these areas have been rising so much that wind farms could generate 50% more electricity than envisaged a decade ago.More than 10GW of offshore wind projects - enough to power 10m homes - being planned for the southern part of the North Sea could benefit.Based on information taken from Nasa satellite images, the research found that average annual wind speed in the southern part of the North Sea had increased from about 7. ...	28th April 2009
Galapagos Penguins Need 'Condos' as Shelter From Global Warming - Bloomberg April 27 (Bloomberg) -- The Galapagos Islands, renowned for rare animals that inspired Charles Darwin 's theory of evolution, may have to create special shelters to save species from global warming and rising sea levels.	28th April 2009
Bangladesh feels the heat, clocks 14y highs - Bangladesh News 24 hours Bangladesh feels the heat, clocks 14y highsBangladesh News 24 hours, BangladeshMannan said the mounting temperature was an impact of global warming. "Bangladesh has been witnessing climate change," he said. Records of the Department of Environment's Climate Change Cell from 1985-1998, show average May temperatures to have 'risen' ...	28th April 2009
Hurricanes reduce ability of forests to store carbon - New Scientist The destruction of trees by hurricanes and tropical storms could turn forests into net emitters of carbon dioxide	28th April 2009
The Truth Behind Global Jellyfish Swarms - US News & World Report Large swarms of jellyfish and other gelatinous animals--sometimes covering hundreds of square miles of ocean--have recently been reported in many of the world's prime vacation and fishing destinations.	28th April 2009
Forest fires rage across Nepal - Republica Forest fires rage across NepalRepublica, Nepal... as a direct effect of global warming, the winter months remained extremely dry thereby drying up the moisture content of vegetation and land and leading to widespread forest fires. “From a climate change perspective, this dryness is very natural ...	28th April 2009
Climate Negativity From the Naysayers - Green Grok First the globe was not warming. Then the warming wasn't due to human activities. In a slow, rearguard action, the naysayers now have a new mantra: "It can't be done - it won't work." As Obama launches his Major Economies Forum on Energy, Congress prepares to debate climate legislation, and the Environmental Protection Agency ponders regulating greenhouse gases, two national op-eds (in the New York Times and Washington Post) strike a precautionary chord. Debate is great, but do the arguments hold water?	28th April 2009
The truth about climate change Vested interests have tried to spread misinformation about global warming, but scientific evidence shows urgent action is neededMany people ask how sure we are about the science of climate change. The most definitive examination of the scientific evidence is to be found in the work of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) and its last major report published in 2007. I had the privilege of being chairman or co-chairman of the panel's scientific assessments from 1988 to 2002.Many hundreds of scientists from different countries were involved as contributors and reviewers for these reports, which are probably the most comprehensive and thorough international assessments on any scientific subject ever carried out.	28th April 2009
Global warming threatens economic chaos in SE Asia-ADB MANILA (Reuters) - Southeast Asia is one of the world's most vulnerable regions to climate change and could face conflict over failing rice yields, lack of water and high economic costs, a major Asian Development Bank report shows.	28th April 2009
CLIMATE CHANGE: Burden Lies with Rich Polluters, Native People Say ANCHORAGE, Alaska, Apr 27 (IPS) - Already suffering significant impacts from climate change, indigenous peoples at the close of an international summit here rejected the concept of carbon trading and offsets. Many also called for a moratorium on all new oil and gas exploration in their traditional territories and the eventual phase-out of fossil fuels.	28th April 2009
Offsets and Copenhagen . . . As this year unfolds, most industry groups are turning their mind towards Copenhagen and the position they should take and they are running seminars for their members to help them understand what is happening. In addition, as the US starts to draw up the final (!!??) design of its cap-and-trade system, it cannot be oblivious to the shape of a future international agreement. I was involved directly and indirectly in all such aspects this week. On Thursday I presented the Shell view of the key elements of the design required from Copenhagen to VNO-NCW (The Confederation of Netherlands Industry and Employers), on Friday I was at a meeting of the European Round Table of Industrialists in which the position that organisation should adopt for Copenhagen was discussed.	28th April 2009
A false choice from a familiar skeptic - Grist Magazine A false choice from a familiar skepticGrist Magazine, WAHe claims Americans don't much care about global warming (according to a recent Pew survey) and notes that international negotiations have so far failed at producing emissions cuts-neither of which, we say, is a reason not to devise a better climate ...	28th April 2009
MARKET TALK: 1Q Global Carbon Market Up By Volume, Not Value Study - Nasdaq [Dow Jones] The global carbon market grew 37% in 1Q in tons of carbon emissions traded, but shrunk 16% in value, to $28 billion, according to research and consulting firm New Carbon Finance.	28th April 2009
Science cash 'to beat food riots' Food riots are a real threat unless funds for agricultural research are increased substantially, a leading British scientist says.	28th April 2009

New California fuel rule may violate NAFTA: lawyer - Reuters CALGARY, Alberta (Reuters) - California's new low-carbon fuel rules may be a violation of NAFTA and World Trade Organization provisions because they would unfairly limit exports of crude from Canada's oil sands to the state, a prominent Canadian trade lawyer said on Friday.	26th April 2009
Drilling drives a wedge at climate change summit - PhysOrg (AP) -- To drill or not drill for new oil and gas.	26th April 2009
What Good is the News? - Conde Nast Portfolio Opinions on the shape of the earth differ, but the world is round and warming. Time for journalists to quit falling back in cowardice on the dicta of their profession, stop being played by interests, and tell the audience, as best they can, what's actually happening.	26th April 2009
Assembly green progress 'dismal' - BBC News Sammy Wilson's climate change scepticism is incompatible with his role as environment minister, says Green MLA Brian Wilson.	26th April 2009
Doom Avoidance : Ed Miliband Invites Protest Ed Miliband wants a Climate Change social movement, and it is going to appear in force, but it won't look the way he wants or expects. In the interview article below notice that Ed Miliband is going to publish a Climate Change manifesto shortly, outlining the UK negotiating position for the December United Nations Climate Talks. That means that the UK negotiating position for Copenhagen in December has already been decided. And judging by the various decisions on Energy and Transport over the last few months, that negotiating position will fail to address the full scale of Climate Change. And that means there is no point in a social campaign to urge the Government to act.	26th April 2009

The environment is a spiritual concern - Guardian The Catholic Climate Covenant campaign is a natural step as it links the effects of climate change to the needs of the vulnerableAny climate change campaign is shrouded in an air of guilt and accusation because they are designed to make those of us who live in comfort and plenty feel badly about our lifestyles. The aim of all the climate campaigns is to get people, mainly in the developed northern hemisphere, to reduce the amount of energy we use, change our eating habits and generally use and consume fewer resources so that those living in poverty are not burdened further with the effects of climate change.Of course the message is right.	25th April 2009
Gore: Partisan Row Over Climate Must End - TIME Former Vice President Al Gore, a leading voice on climate change, urged lawmakers Friday to overcome partisan differences and pass legislation to curb greenhouse gases.	25th April 2009
CHILE: Scientist Warns of Threats to Rock Glaciers - IPS SANTIAGO, Apr 24 (IPS) - A new government policy on glaciers adopted by Chile "is a step forward, but it doesn't resolve all of the problems," German geographer Alexander Brenning, who blames mining companies for threats to this South American country's rock glaciers, told IPS.	25th April 2009
Democrats Seek Free Carbon Credits for Utilities - Bloomberg April 24 (Bloomberg) -- A group of Democrats on the House Energy and Commerce Committee want to give utilities free permits for all their existing carbon emissions, according to people familiar with a plan sent to the committee's chairman.	25th April 2009
CO2 Speaker's Corner Makes Atmospheric CO2 Data Accessible The site CO2Now is trying to change that by showing current data for atmospheric CO2 and helping people understand the relationship between current trends of rising CO2 levels and the effects of climate change. “The site puts atmospheric CO2 out in front where it needs to be,” says website founder Michael McGee. “It’s a simple thing that no other website is doing. I started posting atmospheric CO2 data in December 2007 when I realized it was a way I could add value to the climate conversation.”	25th April 2009
Businesses see employment upside with carbon cap - Sacramento Bee Executives of leading corporations, as well as energy entrepreneurs, said that a shift away from dirty fuels offered opportunities.	25th April 2009
Climate Measure Would Stop Regional Trading in U.S., States Say - Bloomberg April 24 (Bloomberg) -- A proposed law to cut U.S. greenhouse gas emissions would shut down the carbon trading program started this year in the Northeast, according to a group that represents state and local environmental regulators.	25th April 2009

Saving the planet by numbers - BBC News A physicist uses maths to work out what does and does not make a difference to fighting climate change	24th April 2009
Forest Fires Largely Overlooked by Climate-Change Modelers - Bloomberg April 24 (Bloomberg) -- Forest fires worsen global warming and make it harder for societies to adapt to drought and higher temperatures, scientists said.	24th April 2009
Time to come clean on coal - Independent It is little wonder that ministers are so attracted by the promise of "clean coal". Carbon capture and storage (CCS) technology fitted to a new generation of coal-fired power stations in this country would answer three of their prayers at once. See also: Clean power? - BBC News Carbon Capture and Storage	24th April 2009
Rich nation greenhouse gas emissions rise in 2007 - Reuters LONDON/OSLO (Reuters) - Greenhouse gas emissions from industrialized nations rose by nearly one percent in 2007, led by strong gains in the United States, official data showed.	24th April 2009
Gone: Mass Extinction and the Hazards of Earth's Vanishing Biodiversity - Mother Jones Gone: By the end of the century, half of all species on Earth may be extinct due to global warming and other causes. Who will survive the world's dwindling biodiversity, and why?	24th April 2009
When Deniers Deny Their Own - DeSmogBlog Who can you trust, if not your own advisers? That is the inconvenient question raised by NYT reporter Andrew C. Revkin in a newly published article that reveals the extent to which the coal and oil industries ignored the advice of their own scientists on the question of climate change. The Global Climate Coalition (how's that for an Orwellian name?), an industry-funded group that spent years vehemently contesting any evidence linking anthropogenic activity to climate change, found itself in the uncomfortable position of rejecting its own experts' recommendations when they reached the inevitable conclusion that the contribution of manmade greenhouse gas emissions to climate change “could not be refuted.”	24th April 2009
CLIMATE CHANGE: Native Peoples Sound Dire Warning - IPS ANCHORAGE, Alaska, Apr 22 (IPS) - Humanity's hot carbon breath is not just melting the planet's polar regions, it is disrupting natural systems and livelihoods around the world, indigenous people reported this week at a global meeting on climate change in Anchorage, Alaska.	24th April 2009
Bolivia: water people of Andes face extinction - Guardian Climate change robs Uru Chipaya of lifeline that had sustained them for millennia. Its members belong to what is thought to be the oldest surviving culture in the Andes, a tribe that has survived for 4,000 years on the barren plains of the Bolivian interior. But the Uru Chipaya, who outlasted the Inca empire and survived the Spanish conquest, are warning that they now face extinction through climate change. The tribal chief, 62-year-old Felix Quispe, 62, says the river that has sustained them for millennia is drying up. His people cannot cope with the dramatic reduction in the Lauca, which has dwindled in recent decades amid erratic rainfall that has turned crops to dust and livestock to skin and bones.	24th April 2009
California adopts landmark low-carbon fuel rule - Reuters SACRAMENTO, California (Reuters) - California on Thursday adopted a first-ever rule to slash carbon emissions in automotive fuels, and spur the market for cleaner gasoline alternatives, after a last-ditch appeal to ethanol advocates who fought the plan.	24th April 2009
£1.4bn package to create low-carbon economy is inadequate, campaigners say - Guardian Chancellor, Alistair Darling has allocated £375m for home energy efficiency, £525m support for offshore wind power and £405m to develop low-carbon technologiesA £1.4bn package to reduce UK carbon emissions and create a low-carbon economy was criticised by environment and business groups as inadequate in delivering the huge greenhouse gas cuts the government embraced in the budget, though they welcomed support for renewable energy.Funding announced by the chancellor, Alistair Darling, included £375m for home energy efficiency, £525m support for offshore wind power and £405m for the development of low-carbon technologies.Initial analysis of actual government spending – rather than support – for green measures suggests it totals £510m over the next two years - 9.6% of the chancellor's total spending commitments.	24th April 2009
The dream of the first eco-city was built on a fiction - Guardian Dongtan in Shanghai was to be a model for the world by 2010, but after lots of grand promises, the old entrenched ways mean little has happened.	24th April 2009
Ice study has good and bad news for planet: scientist - Reuters SINGAPORE (Reuters) - A study of Greenland's icesheet has revealed that a vast store of planet-warming methane appears to be more stable than thought, easing fears of a rapid rise in temperatures, a scientist said on Friday.	24th April 2009
The peak oil crisis: capping carbon What will be the impact of these U.S. efforts to limit emissions on the peak oil crisis?	24th April 2009

Professor says climate change poses 'existential crisis' - The Daily News Transcript For Boston College sociology professor Charles Derber, Earth Day carries a stark, urgent meaning this year: The future of the world is at stake, and time is running out to act. Video: Dedham kids celebrate Earth Day at the Greenlodge School.	23rd April 2009
What does the sun cooling mean? - Guardian Unlimited The sun's activity is winding down, triggering fevered debate among scientists about how low it will go, and what it means for Earth's climate. Nasa recorded no sunspots on 266 days in 2008 - a level of inactivity not seen since 1913 - and 2009 looks set to be even quieter. Solar wind pressure is at a 50-year low and our local star is ever so slightly dimmer than it was 10 years ago. Most scientists believe humans are the main culprit when it comes to global warming, and Weiss is no exception. He points out that the ice remained in Europe long after solar activity picked up from the Maunder minimum. Even if we had another, similar low, he says, it would probably only cause temperatures on Earth to drop by the order of a tenth of a degree Celsius - peanuts compared to recent hikes. So don't pack your suncream away just yet.	23rd April 2009
Canada has fastest rise in greenhouse emissions among G8: report - People's Daily Canada has the biggest emissions climb since 1990 than any other G8 nations, with its 2007 emissions 26 percent above its 1990 level and 33.8 percent above the country's Kyoto target, Environment Canada said in a report it filed recently to the United Nations.	23rd April 2009
Administration Stops Short of Endorsing Climate Bill - New York Times WASHINGTON — Obama administration officials said Wednesday that an ambitious energy and climate-change proposal sponsored by House Democrats could help create jobs and reduce greenhouse gas emissions, but they stopped short of endorsing it.	23rd April 2009
'Clean' coal plants get go-ahead - BBC News A new generation of coal-fired power stations equipped for carbon capture and storage has been signalled by ministers.	23rd April 2009

Green Darling? - BBC UK Budget turns out 'more beige than green' See also: Darling has thrown away £300m UK carbon budget 'a wasted opporunity to lead the world on climate' - Reuters AlertNet First ever carbon budget 'a disappointment', says Christian Aid - Ekklesia	22nd April 2009
Don't believe the fossil-fuel lies - Salon.com Joining oil companies and conservatives, the Breakthrough Institute says we can reduce emissions without raising the cost of carbon pollution. It's a fantasy.	22nd April 2009
SOUTHERN AFRICA: Climate Change to Shrink Agricultural Production by Half DURBAN, Apr 21 (IPS) - Environmental researchers predict Southern Africa will be hit heavily by climate change over the next 70 years. Agricultural production is projected to be halved - a development that will threaten the livelihoods of farmers in a region where 70 percent of the population are smallholder farmers.	22nd April 2009
Owls Getting Redder as Climate Warms - Discovery Channel Like living thermometers, some owls are turning a deep shade of red as the climate warms.	22nd April 2009
Plants could override climate change effects on wildfires - PhysOrg The increase in warmer and drier climates predicted to occur under climate change scenarios has led many scientists to also predict a global increase in the number of wildfires. But a new study in the May issue of Ecological Monographs shows that in some cases, changes in the types of plants growing in an area could override the effects of climate change on wildfire frequency.	22nd April 2009
Fewer in US Blame Humans for Global Warming - Angus Reid Global Monitor Fewer in US Blame Humans for Global WarmingAngus Reid Global Monitor, CanadaIn addition, 62 per cent of respondents say global warming is a very or somewhat serious problem. The term global warming refers to an increase of the Earth's average temperature. Some theories say that climate change might be the result of ...	22nd April 2009
While we talk, Canada's emissions go up, up and up ... - The Globe and Mail jsimpson@globeandmail.com***Up, up and up. Our greenhouse-gas emissions just keep going up, and no government seems able or willing to reverse the trend.From 2004 to 2006, emissions actually declined in Canada, from 741 million tonnes to 718 million, a drop explained by one-off developments and mild winters. But, in 2007, emissions jumped 4 per cent, resuming the upward march that began in 1991.	22nd April 2009
UK Renewables success requires electricity network upgrade, MPs told - Guardian Network operators warn government plans will fail if provision is not made to connect wind projects to an upgraded power gridThe government is at risk of missing its climate change targets if it fails to make substantial investment in the country's electricity network, Britain's energy distributors warned MPs today.The Electricity Networks Strategy Group, headed by the Department for Energy and Climate Change, has estimated that £4.7bn would be needed to upgrade the network and accommodate a further 45GW of power into the system, adding approximately £5 to every household's annual electricity bill.But in evidence to the energy and climate change select committee's inquiry into the future of Britain's electricity networks, Scottish Power which along with National Grid and Scottish Southern own the country's transmission network, has estimated full costs of upgrading at £37bn.On the same day that the chancellor, Alistair Darling, announced an ...	22nd April 2009
Why CEOs want carbon laws - CNN Money What do CEO Bill Ford of Ford Motor, CEO Jim Rogers of Duke Energy and CEO Bruce Usher of carbon trader EcoSecurities have in common? A deep aversion to unpredictability.	22nd April 2009
Obama pushes renewable energy, climate change laws NEWTON, Iowa (Reuters) - President Barack Obama said on Wednesday the United States must lead the world on renewable energy and pressed Congress to set greenhouse gas limits deemed crucial for the success of global talks on climate change.	22nd April 2009
China's plants absorb a third of its carbon emissions - Nature But another study shows vegetation will absorb less carbon dioxide as nations cut pollution.	22nd April 2009

Allies against democracy - Guardian Both the police and the government appear to be taking their instructions from a multinational energy companyThis isn't the first time that the Department for Business and the energy company E.ON have been caught conspiring against the public interest. In 2008, Greenpeace obtained an exchange of emails between the power company and Gary Mohammed, a civil servant at the Department for Business, concerning the department's policy on carbon capture and storage (CCS).The government had told the public that any new coal-burning power station at E.ON's Kingsnorth plant in Kent should be CCS-ready: in other words that it could be retro-fitted with CCS equipment.	21st April 2009
Greenhouse Gases Continue to Climb Despite Economic Slump - NOAA Two of the most important climate change gases increased last year, according to a preliminary analysis for NOAA's annual greenhouse gas index, which tracks data from 60 sites around the world.	21st April 2009
Electric cars 'not enough to meet transport emissions targets' - Guardian Government must encourage motorists to get out of their cars and walk or cycle, say scientistsBritons must reduce their dependency on cars if the UK is to meet its climate targets, scientists warn today. In a new study they said that simply switching wholesale to cleaner or all-electric cars, as announced by the government in its low-carbon car strategy last week, would not be enough for the transport sector to cut its carbon emissions.The report by the UK Energy Research Council (UKERC) said the government had to tackle driver behaviour as well as car technology to reduce transport emissions.	21st April 2009
Nearly $200 million spent on energy ads since Obama’s inauguration - Grist Interest groups and corporations have spent $199.5 million on television ads on energy, the environment, and climate this year.	21st April 2009
As world warms, water levels dropping in major rivers - ScienceBlog.com As world warms, water levels dropping in major riversScienceBlog.com, CAThe research, led by scientists at the National Center for Atmospheric Research (NCAR) in Boulder, Colo., suggests that the reduced flows in many cases are associated with climate change, and could potentially threaten future supplies of food and water.	21st April 2009
Vatican to build Europe's largest solar power plant - Guardian The Vatican plans to spend €500m building a 100-megawatt solar power plant supplying electricity to 40,000 homesThe Vatican is well versed in conversions, but there probably hasn't been something on this scale since its very own St Paul was on his way to Damascus: the world's smallest country has announced it is to spend €500m (£441m) building Europe's largest solar power plant.Once the 100-megawatt plant opens in 2014, the Vatican will become an electricity exporter to Italy supplying enough power for the needs of 40,000 households. It is latest in a string of pronouncements by the Holy See – or should it now be known as the Holy E?	21st April 2009
South Korea lights the way on carbon emissions with its £23bn green deal Seoul's huge financial stimulus package pledges 81% for a swath of environmental projects. But activists fear a wave of construction may increase the country's carbon footprint.	21st April 2009
Shell still plans Chukchi drilling despite ruling - Reuters ANCHORAGE, Alaska (Reuters) - Royal Dutch Shell still plans to start exploration drilling next year in Alaska's potentially oil-rich Chukchi Sea in spite of a new legal setback, a company manager in Alaska said on Monday.	21st April 2009
Solutions & sustainability - Energy Bulletin Is conflict prevention "green"?Lose weight to help the planet, researchers recommendAre the Life-boats SinkingD.C. Area Families Take Green to the ExtremeHow Green Is My Bottle? read more	21st April 2009
Biochar', a new big threat to people, land, and ecosystems - ALAI-América Latina en Movimiento 'Biochar' and agrofuels are closely linked: Charcoal is a byproduct from a type of bioenergy production which can also be used to make second-generation agrofuels, i.e. liquid agrofuels from wood, straw, bagasse, palm kernel residues and other types of solid biomass. Eleven African governments have called for agricultural soils in general and 'biochar' in particular to be included into carbon trading. Their submission indicates that they seek to increase "private sector financing" (and by implication corporate control) over rural areas in the South, and to link this to proposals for including forests in carbon trading (i.e. the mechanisms for Reducing Emissions from Deforestation and Degradation or REDD being negotiated at present). Those REDD proposals have met with opposition on the basis that they commodify forest ecosystems with dire implications for indigenous peoples and biodiversity. The inclusion of soils into those mechanisms would further extend such serious impacts. Proposals for 'climate change mitigation' through large-scale adoption of 'biochar' are a dangerous form of geo-engineering based on unfounded claims. A lobby group (the International Biochar Initiative) made up largely of startup 'biochar' and agrofuel companies and academics, many of them with related commercial interests, are behind the push for 'biochar'. Their extremely bold claims are not founded in scientific understanding. It is not yet known whether charcoal in soil represents a 'carbon sink' at all. Industrial charcoal is very different from Terra Preta, the highly fertile and carbon-rich soils found in Central Amazonia which were created by indigenous peoples hundreds and even thousands of years ago. 'Biochar' companies and researchers have not been able to recreate Terra Preta.	21st April 2009

Why Isn't the Brain Green? - New York Times Decision scientists are trying to figure out why it?s so hard for us to get into a green mind-set. Their answers may be more crucial than any technological advance in combating environmental challenges.	20th April 2009
Did lead cause global cooling? - New Scientist Atmospheric particles containing lead might have offset the Earth's warming in the 20th century	20th April 2009
'World has 6 years to act' on climate change - Australian Broadcasting Corporation The Government's chief scientist wants the country to set the toughest possible targets for reducing greenhouse gas emissions, warning that action must begin now against climate change.	20th April 2009
Deforestation 'lynchpin' in global climate talks - EUActiv With international climate negotiations tending to focus mainly on tackling industrial emissions blamed for global warming, NGOs have warned that the issue of deforestation, which is just as serious, could be overlooked.	20th April 2009
Elizabeth Kolbert: Earth Day isn't what it used to be. - The New Yorker The first celebration of Earth Day, on April 22, 1970, was a raucously exuberant affair. In New York, Fifth Avenue was closed to traffic. People picnicked on the sidewalk; dead fish were dragged through midtown; and Governor Nelson Rockefeller rode a bicycle across Prospect Park. Students in Richmond, Virginia, handed . . .	20th April 2009
Cyclones spurt water into the stratosphere, feeding global warming - Physorg Scientists at Harvard University have found that tropical cyclones readily inject ice far into the stratosphere, possibly feeding global warming.	20th April 2009
Oxfam predicts millions more victims of climate - AFP Hundreds of millions of people will become victims of climate change-related disasters over the next six years, Oxfam said Tuesday, urging governments to change the way they respond to such events. The British-based aid and development charity estimated the number of people affected by climatic disasters would rise by 54 percent to 375 million people a year on average by 2015, based on data on similar disasters since 1980. In a new report, it warned that humanitarian aid spending and the way it was allocated was far from prepared to meet the challenge.	20th April 2009
Police confiscate property of a 'political nature' from a suspected environmental activist - Guardian On Friday 13 June last year, protesters hijacked a coal train on its way to Drax power station in Yorkshire. The next day, the suspected activists' houses were raided by police. This is a video shot and edited by the father of one of those activists	20th April 2009
Aborigine, Inuit tradition can fight climate change - Reuters WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Alaskan Inuits, Australian aborigines and Pygmies from Cameroon have a message for a warming world: native traditions can be a potent weapon against climate change. See also: Indigenous Peoples Demand Greater Role in Climate Debate.	20th April 2009
Congress to pass energy bill this year: White House - Reuters WASHINGTON (Reuters) - U.S. lawmakers will pass major energy legislation, possibly including measures to address climate change, by the end of this year, a top White House official said on Sunday.	20th April 2009
1970s lifestyle protects planet - BBC News Getting back to the slim, trim days of the 1970s would help to cut carbon emissions and tackle climate change, researchers say.	20th April 2009
Solar power companies in plea to maintain green jobs - Guardian Low-carbon companies say government is 'sleepwalking to green tech disaster'Staff are being laid off by British solar power companies weeks after the government promised to create thousands of jobs in the "green" economy.Companies from across the industry will this week accuse ministers and civil servants of damaging their business with funding cuts, "delay and disinterest".More than 20 companies and lobby groups will petition the prime minister just weeks after Gordon Brown launched a strategy that forecast 400,000 new jobs could be created in low-carbon sectors in the next decade.Jeremy Leggett of Solarcentury, a former government adviser who coordinated the petition, said he knew of three companies that had made staff redundant, and another installation business had gone bust.	20th April 2009
China considers setting targets for carbon emissions - u.tv The Chinese government is for the first time considering setting targets for carbon emissions, a significant development that could help negotiations on a Kyoto successor treaty at Copenhagen later this year, the Guardian has learned.	20th April 2009
Increased demand for heating leads to rise in US emissions - The New Zealand Herald United States greenhouse gas emissions rose 1.4 per cent in 2007, compared with the previous year, the US Environmental Protection Agency reported last week. The report also indicates that US emissions of climate-warming gases such as carbon dioxide and methane rose 17.2 per cent from 1990 to 2007. The increase in 2007 was mainly due to a rise in carbon dioxide emissions related to fuel and energy consumption, the environmental agency said. There was more demand for heating fuel and electricity due to cooler winter and warmer summer temperatures, compared with 2006, the report said.	20th April 2009
Climate risk for Yangtze river: Report - China Daily Climate change and major water conservation projects are a major risk to the long-term "health" of the Yangtze River, claimed a report released at the weekend.	20th April 2009
The problem with carbon tariffs: They aren't fair - The Christian Science Monitor Countries need to honestly address the issue of standards.	20th April 2009
In the drought garden - BBC News Why would anyone try to replant a forest in the driest place on earth?	20th April 2009
Why Antarctic ice is growing despite global warming - New Scientist The southern ozone hole has changed weather patterns around Antarctica and cooled the air above the east part of the continent, according to new research	20th April 2009

David Suzuki speaks up personally for the carbon tax - DeSmogBlog "If [BC Liberal Leader Gordon Campbell] goes down because of axe the tax, the repercussions are the carbon tax will be toxic for future politicians. No politician will raise it. That's why environmentalists are so upset." David Suzuki explained why enviromental groups (and the DeSmogBlog) are criticizing the BC New Democratic Party, which is continuing to campaign against the tax. Suzuki also said: "If environmental voters decide they can't stomach voting for the NDP or the Liberals, they have got the Greens. If you vote for the Greens, you are making a statement about the carbon tax and the other things you don't like about the Liberals and the NDP."	19th April 2009
A Lexicon of Disappointment - The Nation All is not well in Obamafanland. It's not clear exactly what accounts for the change of mood. Maybe it was the rancid smell emanating from Treasury's latest bank bailout. Or the news that the president's chief economic adviser, Larry Summers, earned millions from the very Wall Street banks and hedge funds he is protecting from reregulation now. Or perhaps it began earlier, with Obama's silence during Israel's Gaza attack. Whatever the last straw, a growing number of Obama enthusiasts are starting to entertain the possibility that their man is not, in fact, going to save the world if we all just hope really hard.	19th April 2009
Carbon Capture and Storage : Today's Trojan, Tomorrow's Turkey Carbon Capture and Storage (CCS) has been just the wisp or filament of an idea for so long; and never really taken on a bodily form. It’s still ectoplasmic, in the worst of ways. Despite the various attempts around the world to drag it kicking and screaming into a corporeal existence. Yes, you’ll hear about your Sleipner, your Snohvit and your Weyburn and your Salah; your Schwarze Pumpe and even smell the promise of FutureGen waved under your nose several times a year. But none of these projects has the kind of scale required to sequester the Carbon Dioxide emissions from a significant percentage of Coal-burning. Plus, they’re not going to be with us for a while yet. Yet apparently we only have 100 months (or less) to come up with a solution for Climate Change.	19th April 2009
We need an eco-revolution - Green Left Weekly The April 2 G20 summit brought together the leaders of some of the world’s most economically significant countries. They were intent on working out a rescue plan for the capitalist system, the very system that is killing the planet and condemning billions of people to poverty and oppression.	19th April 2009
Congress considers major global warming measure - Forbes Lawmakers this coming week begin hearings on an energy and global warming bill that could revolutionize how the country produces and uses energy. It also could reduce, for the first time, the pollution responsible for heating up the planet. If Congress balks, the Obama administration has signaled a willingness to use decades-old clean air laws to impose tough new regulations for motor vehicles and many industrial plants to limit their release of climate-changing pollution.	19th April 2009
Why we forgot how to grow food - Times Online As a food shortage looms, people are digging for Britain - and their dinner table. John-Paul Flintoff gets back to our roots	19th April 2009
Ed Miliband plans clean coal scheme worth millions • Energy minister hopes to defuse global warming row • Cabinet support for plan, but Treasury balks at costEd Miliband, the climate change and energy secretary, is pushing an ambitious plan to spend billions of pounds on cleaning up pollution from dirty coal plants.He is said to have cabinet support for the proposal which could help to head off controversy about global warming pollution and the UK's future energy security. Ministers are still discussing how to fund the expensive and unproven carbon capture and storage technology, including a possible levy on customer bills.Miliband is said to favour developing "clusters" of carbon capture and storage (CCS), fitted on both coal- and gas-fired power stations, and a "national grid" for transporting and storing the polluting emissions.	19th April 2009
Leading article: Wanted: a real green stimulus - The Independnet The Prime Minister recently committed Britain to cutting carbon dioxide emissions and told George Bush, pointedly: "This is a demanding target." Only the year was 1990; the Prime Minister was Margaret Thatcher and the American President was George H W Bush.	19th April 2009
What's Your New Beginning? - Rolling with Unprecedented Change At this historic time of transformation both on the Earth and of Earth herself, we humans are playing roles active and passive. Our actions and effects are to date increasingly negative in the aggregate. But there are positive actions and effects as well, unprecedented and serendipitous. Many people even say the crash is good for us.	19th April 2009

Key role of forests 'may be lost' - BBC News The ability of forests to act as massive carbon sinks is under threat as a result of climate change stress, scientists warn.	18th April 2009
Global Warming Study: Nations Need to Cut Emissions by 70 Percent - Environmental News Network The threat of global warming can be significantly lessened if nations cut emissions of heat-trapping greenhouse gases by 70 percent this century, according to a new study.	18th April 2009
Obama to regulate 'pollutant' CO2 - BBC News The US government is to regulate greenhouse gas emissions, having decided they pose a danger to human health and well-being. See also: Obama says greenhouse gases are hurting us - now what?	18th April 2009
Lack of permanent Arctic ice surprises explorers OTTAWA (Reuters) - British explorers walking to the North Pole on a mission to gauge how fast Arctic ice sheets are melting say they are surprised by how little permanent ice they have found so far.	18th April 2009
Polar bears in Russian Far East threatened by extinction - WWF - RIA Novosti The population of polar bears in Russia's Far Eastern republic of Chukotka has dwindled to the point of being vulnerable to extinction, according to research carried out by World Wildlife Fund experts. "In the 1990s large numbers of bears were shot in Chukotka when most villages were on the brink of starvation. Now the bear population faces a negative influence from climate change."	18th April 2009
Swimmers feel sting as jellyfish thrive - San Francisco Chronicle Schools of creepy brownish jellyfish known for their painful stings are lurking in San Francisco Bay waving their long, poisonous tentacles like they own the place.	18th April 2009
EU greenhouse emissions fall - because it's warmer OSLO (Reuters) - European Union emissions of greenhouse gases blamed for stoking global warming fell by 1.2 percent in 2007, paradoxically aided by a mild winter that cut heating demand, EU data showed on Friday.	18th April 2009
PERU: Water Isn't for Everyone - IPS LIMA, Apr 18 (IPS/IFEJ) - The melting of glaciers resulting from climate change and the lack of adequate water management policies seem to be the main causes behind the water shortages that are fuelling conflicts in Peru.	18th April 2009
When Britain's taps run dry - u.tv They could soon be packing up and shipping out of Adelaide. Three years of intense drought on the River Murray, which fills the city's taps, mean the capital of South Australia could run out of water within two years.	18th April 2009
White U.S. evangelicals most skeptical on climate change - Reuters Among U.S. religious groups, white evangelical Protestants are the least likely to believe that human activities are contributing to climate change, according to a new survey by the Pew Forum on Religion & Public Life. You can see the numbers, based on a broader 2008 poll, here. Overall the Pew Forum found that a plurality, or 47 percent, of the adult U.S. population accepts that there is solid evidence that the earth is warming because of human activities. Most scientists have reached the conclusion that the planet's climate is changing because of human-induced factors, notably the emissions from burning of the fossil fuels that drive the global economy.	18th April 2009
Increased Number Think Global Warming Is “Exaggerated” - Gallup While a majority of Americans continue to believe the seriousness of global warming is either correctly portrayed in the news (29 or underestimated (28, a record-high 41now say it is exaggerated. The increased skepticism is seen mainly among Republicans and independents.	18th April 2009
ENVIRONMENT-BRAZIL: Protecting the Jungle Has a Price - IPS RIO DE JANEIRO, Apr 17 (IPS) - Government officials, business leaders and non-governmental organisations agreed in Brazil on the need for rich countries and companies to "pay" the people of the Amazon jungle as "providers of environmental services" for contributing to the fight against climate change by not deforesting.	18th April 2009
Join the Big Fast for the Climate This Monday we're putting our voices where our mouths full of food are. The world appears to be facing climate extinction, and still we're trapped in our economic "reality" and political "hope." But deep down we know that, if we've paid attention, Earth's climate won't wait until we find it convenient to slash emissions and population growth. So we are fasting.	18th April 2009
Increasing CO2 in oceans will make it harder for deep-sea animals to 'breathe' - New Kerala Washington, April 18 : A new study has suggested that increasing carbon dioxide (CO2) and decreasing oxygen in the oceans will make it harder for deep-sea animals to 'breathe'.	18th April 2009
U.N. leader: 'We need a new vision' - The Times of Trenton PRINCETON BOROUGH -- The world landscape has been shattered by the global economic crisis, military conflicts and escalating human needs, and chaos could ensue if leaders do not unite and take action, United Nations Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon told Princeton University students and scholars yesterday.	18th April 2009

Australia's largest river nearly dry - Guardian Murray river level so low that Adelaide, Australia's fifth biggest city, could run out of water in next two years.	17th April 2009
Earth's temperature 8th-warmest on record so far in 2009 - The News-Press The Earth's temperature from January-March 2009 was the 8th-warmest on record, according to data released Thursday from the National Climatic Data Center in Asheville, N.C. The global temperature of 55.04 degrees for the year's first three months was almost a full degree above the 20th-century average of 54.1 degrees.	17th April 2009
Up, up, and away - Guardian Swifts may also be facing problems on their long journey to and from their winter quarters in Africa. Climate change is leading to unpredictable weather patterns across much of that continent, while increased desertification may pose a problem for swifts on their twice-yearly crossing of the Sahara desert, by reducing the insect food available on their journey.	17th April 2009
Stopping climate change - and starvation - San Luis Obispo Tribune Examining 23 global climate models, two leading U.S. climatologists recently determined that there's more than a 90 percent chance that by the end of the century, the average growing season temperatures in the tropics and subtropics will "exceed the most extreme seasonal temperatures recorded from 1900 to 2006." In other words, by 2100 the sweltering heat seen during the summer of 2003 could become a common occurrence - potentially causing food and water shortages for up to half of the world's population.	17th April 2009
Water Fight - TIME Asias population is expected to grow by nearly 500 million people over the next 10 years — combined with climate change will likely mean that far more Asians will be tapping shrinking sources of water. Water wouldn't be a sole trigger for war but rather a "threat multiplier" — a factor that worsens the social instability that can lead to conflict.	17th April 2009
Engineers set to convert carbon dioxide into solid rock - Guardian Icelandic experts hope to dispose of 30,000 tonnes of the greenhouse gas each yearEngineers in Iceland are set to convert carbon dioxide to solid rock as a way to tackle global warming.The experts want to exploit the country's volcanic origins to dispose of up to 30,000 tonnes of the greenhouse gas each year. They expect the gas to react with layers of volcanic rocks deep beneath the surface to form minerals that will lock the carbon pollution away for millions of years."This is a well-known natural process," said Holmfridur Sigurdardottir, project manager. "We are just trying to imitate what nature is doing."The project will take CO2 produced by an Icelandic geothermal energy plant and dissolve it in water under high pressures.	17th April 2009
London's Smoky Outskirts Probed for Moving CO2 to Sea - Bloomberg April 16 (Bloomberg) -- National Grid Plc is investigating piping carbon-dioxide emissions from power plants and refineries near London and in northern England to undersea storage sites so the gas won't add to global warming.	17th April 2009
Why the Spam Carbon Footprint Study is Wrong - PC Magazine via Yahoo! News McAfee just released the details of a new study, conducted and published by ICF International, which seeks to measure the carbon footprint of spam. But it's completely wrong.	17th April 2009
Budget will be last chance to move to low-carbon economy, Tories warn - Guardian George Osborne challenges government to invest in 10 ideas to help cut carbon emissions and create thousands of 'green' jobsNext week's budget will be the last chance for the government to kick-start the investment needed to meet the UK's targets for carbon emission cuts and to establish a sustainable low-carbon economy, the Conservatives claimed today .In a speech to launch their party's green budget, shadow chancellor George Osborne and shadow energy secretary Greg Clark called on the government to invest in 10 ideas that they said would help cut carbon emissions and create thousands of new "green" jobs."The budget is not just an opportunity to help people now, it's also a chance to chart a new course for the future," said Osborne.	17th April 2009
Africa trapped in mega-drought cycle - New Scientist Droughts like that which killed more than 100,000 and shocked the world in the 1970s actually occur on a regular cycle every 50 years – and some may be much worse	17th April 2009
Plight of the penguins - Guardian Already threatened by global warming, harvesting krill to supply omega-3 oil means danger for Antarctica's penguins	17th April 2009
US moves mean Canada needs carbon pricing: panel - Reuters OTTAWA (Reuters) - U.S. efforts to curb emissions of greenhouse gases mean Canada will have to put a price on carbon and set up a national cap-and-trade system, an official panel said on Thursday.	17th April 2009

Carbon trading won't stop climate change - New Scientist Selling permits to emit carbon dioxide is fine in theory, but there's a fatal flaw that means it can never avert climate catastrophe, says Andrew Simms	16th April 2009
'Catastrophic' Sea-Level Rise Possible, Coral Reef Fossils Show - Bloomberg By Jim Efstathiou Jr. April 15 (Bloomberg) -- Fossilized coral reefs formed the last time the Earth was warmer than today show sea levels could rise rapidly by the end of the century if global warming triggers a collapse of ice sheets in Greenland and Antarctica.	16th April 2009
When we rebuild after this disaster, we need to be guided by equality - Johann Hari It's equal societies that thrive - and survive	16th April 2009
Climate Risks: Lessons From The Financial Crisis -Counter Currents By Robin Hahnel Since both the probability of a climatic black swan and the magnitude of the damages are far greater, the rational choice is to pay our precautionary premiums to insure ourselves against climate change. Arguments that the expected value of our insurance policy may be negative are beside the point. There are times to maximize expected value and there are times to buy insurance. Now, as we are deciding how to respond to climate change, is surely a time to buy a life insurance policy for our planet. Haven't we learned our lesson yet?	16th April 2009
Cattle, not soy, drives Amazon deforestation - Reuters BRASILIA (Reuters) - Cattle ranchers are far bigger culprits in Amazon deforestation than soy farmers, a study showed on Tuesday, as the environmental record of Brazil's commodity exporters comes under increasing international scrutiny.	16th April 2009
Government programs paying farms to grow water-thirsty crops - The Durango Herald FRESNO, Calif. - As drought forces families in the West to shorten their showers and let their lawns turn brown, two Depression-era government programs have been paying some of the nation's biggest farms hundreds of millions of dollars to grow water-thirsty crops in what was once desert.	16th April 2009
Changing climate will lead to devastating loss of phosphorus from soil - PhysOrg Crop growth, drinking water and recreational water sports could all be adversely affected if predicted changes in rainfall patterns over the coming years prove true, according to research published this month in Biology and Fertility of Soils.	16th April 2009
Could Bangladesh Become Another Somalia - Media For Freedom One of the very critical effects of climate change is likely to be its impact on the world’s food supply. Scientists are predicting that world harvests will drop 20 to 40 per cent by the end of this century as a result of global warming. So the most crucial issue is: if in the current environment Bangladesh can’t meet its food requirements, how will it tackle the anticipated massive food shortage that would be created by its increases of population and the loss of farmland when world food supply goes down further?	16th April 2009
Arctic food is poisoned as ice melts - New Scientist Mercury levels in seals and beluga whales eaten by the Inuit are reaching unsafe levels – and the problem is likely to get worse	16th April 2009
Tiny warbler at risk from longer African migration - Independent They are some of the world's most remarkable and improbable journeys – vast odysseys across desert, mountain and sea by creatures often no bigger than a Mars bar. But the annual flights of Europe's migratory birds to and from sub-Saharan Africa are set to get even longer. Climate change, shifting the breeding range of many European bird species northwards, is likely to lengthen the migrants' marathon journeys substantially, in some cases by hundreds of miles, a new scientific study predicts. The added distance is likely to make what are already hazardous and chancey long-distance flights even more risky, with possible fatal consequences for many birds.	16th April 2009
New Zealand's Emissions Cuts May Beat Kyoto Target - Update1 - Bloomberg April 15 (Bloomberg) -- New Zealand may exceed its Kyoto Protocol emissions reduction target by 9.6 million tons, the government said today. The estimate covers the period from 2008 through 2012 and compares with a 21.7 million-ton deficit forecast a year earlier.	16th April 2009
India says no to emissions cuts as its largest carmaker says yes to alt-energy models - Scientific American Scientists and policy makers hoping to adopt a new climate change treaty at this December's United Nations' meeting in Copenhagen might have reason to worry about achieving an international accord: A major player, India, home to a sixth of the world's population, may not be on board with limiting its greenhouse emissions.	16th April 2009
Why Obama’s bank bailout could be bad for the environment - Grist The Obama bank bailout presumes a rosy scenario for “toxic” assets. That means the administration is essentially betting a mountain of public cash on a revival of suburbia-at a time of climate change and hair-trigger oil markets.	16th April 2009
UK biofuels target creating more emissions, environmentalists claim - Guardian The government's scheme to introduce biofuels to cut CO2 on roads has actually increased carbon emissions through deforestation, study findsThe government's scheme to introduce biofuels as a way to cut carbon emissions from road transport has led to extra emissions equivalent to putting 500,000 more cars on UK roads, according to environmentalists.A new study shows that producing the amount of biofuels required to meet the government's targets in the past year could have inadvertently doubled the overall emissions of CO2 compared with the standard fossil fuels they have replaced. The extra emissions come from forest destruction tied indirectly to growing energy crops.Biofuels are, in theory, carbon neutral because they only release the carbon dioxide absorbed from the atmosphere by a plant as it grows.	16th April 2009
Possibility of new nuclear power plants in Lake District sparks eco concerns - Guardian Two sites close to Lake District National Park among potential locations for new generation of nuclear power stations	16th April 2009
Aerosol effects and climate, Part II: the role of nucleation and cosmic rays - RealClimate Guest post by Bart Verheggen, Department of Air Quality and Climate Change , Energy research Institute of the Netherlands (ECN) In Part I, I discussed how aerosols nucleate and grow. In this post I'll discuss how changes in nucleation and ionization might impact the net effects. Cosmic rays Galactic cosmic rays (GCR) are energetic particles originating from space entering Earth's atmosphere. They are an important source of ionization in the atmosphere, besides terrestrial radioactivity from e.g. radon (naturally emitted by the Earth's surface). Over the oceans and above 5 km altitude, GCR are the dominant source.	16th April 2009
U.S. greenhouse emissions rose 1.4 percent in 2007: EPA -reuters WASHINGTON (Reuters) - U.S. greenhouse gas emissions rose 1.4 percent in 2007, compared to the previous year, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency reported on Wednesday.	16th April 2009
Future-proof homes for a warmer world- - New Scientist See how architects are trying to future-proof homes against the higher sea levels and more frequent hurricanes our changing climate is bringing our way	16th April 2009
White House and Congress dither over climate - New Scientist A bill to restrict carbon emissions in the US will be debated in a few days, but there may not be the political will to push it through	16th April 2009
Obama wants climate bill mindful of WTO rules - Forbes WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The Obama administration wants to ensure that legislation being crafted by Congress to fight global climate change does not violate international trade rules and backfire on U.S. exports, the top U.S. trade official said in a letter to a Republican lawmaker. The letter from U.S. Trade Representative Ron Kirk, released late Tuesday, was in response to questions Rep. Joe Barton raised about Energy Secretary Stephen Chu's recent suggestion that the United States may need to impose a border tax on Chinese goods.	16th April 2009
Climate change may wake up 'sleeper' weeds - PhysOrg (PhysOrg.com) -- Climate change will cause some of Australia`s potential weeds to move south by up to 1000km, according to a report by scientists at CSIRO`s Climate Adaptation Flagship.	16th April 2009

Wangari Maathai film shows Kenyan tree planting as political subversion - Grist Taking Root has more to say about social change than about forest ecology-I'm not sure it even mentions the types of trees being planted. But it makes abundantly clear the connections between environmental health, human rights, and democracy.	14th April 2009
Risk of EPA move smoothes way for U.S carbon law: Rep - Reuters CAMBRIDGE, Massachusetts (Reuters) - The threat of tougher regulation from the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency should ease industrial opposition to a cap-and-trade market on greenhouse gases, a U.S. lawmaker said on Monday.	14th April 2009
Police arrest 114 alleged environmental protesters - Guardian Activists held in Nottingham over alleged power station action• Campaigners suspect tipoff from informerPolice have carried out what is thought to be the biggest pre-emptive raid on environmental campaigners in UK history, arresting 114 people believed to be planning direct action at a coal-fired power station.The arrests - for conspiracy to commit criminal damage and aggravated trespass - come amid growing concern among campaigners about increased police surveillance and groups being infiltrated by informers.	14th April 2009
World will not meet 2C warming target, climate change experts agree - Guardian Almost nine out of 10 climate scientists do not believe political efforts to restrict global warming to 2C will succeed, a Guardian poll reveals today. An average rise of 4-5C by the end of this century is more likely, they say, given soaring carbon emissions and political constraints. Such a change would disrupt food and water supplies, exterminate thousands of species of plants and animals and trigger massive sea level rises that would swamp the homes of hundreds of millions of people. See also: Even Deep Cuts in Greenhouse Gas Emissions Will Not Stop Global Warming - Scientific American Experts say cap and trade not enough - PhysOrg	14th April 2009
The Dire Fate of Forests in a Warmer World - TIME It's not easy to kill a full-grown tree — especially one like the piñon pine. The hardy evergreen is adapted to life in the hot, parched American Southwest, so it takes more than a little dry spell to affect it. In fact, it requires a once-in-a-century event like the extended drought of the 1950s, which scientists now believe led to widespread tree mortality in the Four Corners area of Utah, Colorado, New Mexico and Arizona. So, when another drought hit the area around 2002, researchers were surprised to see up to 10% of the piñon pines die off, even though that dry spell was much milder than the one before. The difference in 2002 was the five decades of global warming that had transpired since the drought in the 1950s.	14th April 2009
Historic drought in Mexico suggests human influence - Science Centric University of Arkansas researchers and their colleagues have examined recent climate patterns in Mexico and determined that the country underwent severe drought conditions between 1994 and 2008, and that human changes related to land use and global warming may have aggravated the dry, warm conditions.	14th April 2009
A flawed strategy: Why environmental groups should not be chasing carbon dollars - Grist The strategy of using carbon permit auctions to fund the green agenda is deeply mistaken, and it risks pushing serious action against climate change many more years into the future-a delay we earthlings can ill afford.	14th April 2009
Water worries cloud future for U.S. biofuel - Reuters KANSAS CITY, Missouri (Reuters) - It's corn planting time in the U.S. Plains, and that means Kansas corn farmer Merl "Buck" Rexford is worrying about the weather -- and hoping there is enough water.	14th April 2009
Biomass 'worse than fossil fuels' - BBC News Biomass power could become one of the worst emitters of greenhouse gases by 2030, the Environment Agency warns.	14th April 2009
Going closer to the sun for solar power - Reuters Somebody alert Capt. Kirk. California utility PG&E and solar power company Solaren say they have inked a first-of-its-kind deal to produce renewable solar power from space satellites beginning in the year 2016. PG&E, one of the largest electric utilities in the United Sates, says on its in-house blog, Next100, that it is seeking approval from state regulators for a power purchase agreement with Solaren, which it says can provide 200 megawatts of clean, renewable energy - enough to power some 140,000 California homes - over a 15 year period. Solaren says it will generate the power using solar panels on Earth-orbiting satellites, transmit it back to Earth through a radio frequency to a recieving station in Fresno County, then convert it into electricity which would be fed into PG&E's grid.	14th April 2009
Green revolution - BBC News Brazil's green reputation under threat	14th April 2009
Cross Your Fingers and Carry On - Monbiot Why does the government refuse to make contingency plans for peak oil?	14th April 2009
Consumption, Not Population Is Our Main Environmental Threat - Alternet Let's challenge the convenient notion that "over-consumers" in rich countries can blame "over-breeders" in distant lands.	14th April 2009
Eminent scientists on attack over Rudd emissions plan - Sydney Morning Herald Australia: THREE of CSIRO's most eminent climate scientists have told a Senate inquiry that the Prime Minister's targets to cut greenhouse gas emissions will not achieve even a "limited" level of protection against climate change and are "much weaker" than the cuts developed countries need to make.	14th April 2009

Don't Expect Much From The Next Kyoto - Forbes The Copenhagen Climate Convention is months away, but likely DOA already. Here's why.	13th April 2009
Until all the evidence is in - Energy Bulletin We need to recognize the phrase "until all the evidence is in" for what it really is: 1) a stalling technique, 2) a reflection of the ignorance of the speaker about the limits of our knowledge or 3) a colloquialism signaling the desire to wait for more information. read more	13th April 2009
Warming is wearing on Australia - Chicago Tribune Climate scientists say Australia - beset by prolonged drought and deadly bush fires in the south, monsoon flooding and mosquito-borne fevers in the north, widespread wildlife decline, economic collapse in agriculture and killer heat waves-epitomizes the "accelerated climate crisis" that global warming models have forecast	13th April 2009
Retreat of Andean Glaciers Foretells Global Water Woes - AlterNet Bovlia will soon be paying a disproportionately high price from global warming: the rapid loss of glaciers and a decline in vital water supplies.	13th April 2009
How much carbon is in your investment portfolio? - Seattle Times On Wednesday, environmental researcher Trucost published what it says is a first-ever ranking of mutual funds according to their carbon footprints. Trucost's analysis of 91 funds is meant to help investors gauge how emissions laws could affect a fund's holdings.	13th April 2009
Call for carbon tax to fight warming - Stock and Land Australia: Victorian Governor David de Kretser has called for consideration of a carbon tax, to increase the price of goods produced using energy from high-pollution power stations. He has also implicitly criticised the Rudd Government's planned emissions trading scheme, saying many people suggest it will "favour polluting industries and dissuade community actions to move to more renewable energy sources". In a speech to an environmental sustainability conference at Monash University, Professor de Kretser suggested a carbon tax might be a more effective weapon in the fight against global warming, because it would drive high-polluting developing countries towards renewable energy.	13th April 2009
New California homes would have to be energy producers - North County Times SACRAMENTO ---- If state Assemblywoman Lori Saldana has her way, buyers of California homes built a little more than a decade from now would not have to worry about paying big electricity bills. The homes would produce power themselves.	13th April 2009
Aerosol formation and climate, Part I - RealClimate Guest post by Bart Verheggen, Department of Air Quality and Climate Change , Energy research Institute of the Netherlands (ECN) The impacts of aerosols on climate are significant, but also very uncertain. There are several reasons for this, one of which is the uncertainty in how and how fast they are formed in the atmosphere by nucleation. Here, in part I, I'll review some of the basic processes that are important in determining the climate effects of aerosols, focusing in particular on their formation. This is also relevant in order to better understand –and hopefully quantify- the hypothetical climate effects of galactic cosmic rays which I'll discuss in a follow-up post.	13th April 2009
'In the Great Ship Titanic' - Newsweek The Department of Energy is at the center of U.S. efforts to end our dependence on foreign oil, roll back climate change and create new jobs. Fareed Zakaria sat down last week with the department's new head, Nobel physicist Steven Chu, at NEWSWEEK's Energy Independence 2020 Forum Luncheon to talk about smart grids, solar panels and more.	13th April 2009

Poor prognosis for our planet - Sydney Morning Herald The world has about a decade left to sort out the climate-change mess. John Collee sees lessons from his medicine days as parallels for the future of our planet. Advertisement Every patient with an incurable illness will ask how long they have to live. The answer goes something like this: "No one can say how long you may live, because every individual is different, but focus on the changes you observe and be guided by those. When things start changing for the worse, expect these changes to accelerate. So the changes that have occurred over a year may advance by the same degree in a few months, then in weeks. And that is how you can judge when the end is coming."	12th April 2009
Breaking the silence about Spring - RealClimate Did you know that in 1965 the U.S. Department of Agriculture planted a particular variety of lilac in more than seventy locations around the U.S. Northeast, to detect the onset of spring - in turn to be used to determine the appropriate timing of corn planting and the like? The records the USDA have kept show that those same lilacs are blooming as much as two weeks earlier than they did in 1965. April has, in a very real sense, become May. This is one of the interesting facts that you'll read about in Amy Seidl's book, Early Spring, a hot-off-the-press essay about the impacts of climate change on the world immediately around us – the forest, the birds, the butterflies in our backyards.	12th April 2009
Jaccard analysis blunts NDP's carbon tax axe - DeSmogBlog Canada: Simon Fraser University Professor and (Nobel-winning) Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change contributor Mark Jaccard has torn the BC New Democratic Party (NDP) policy document into little tiny shreds in an analysis released yesterday. The NDP's environmental proposals are not just doomed to failure, Jaccard said, they will also chase jobs from B.C. in the tens of thousands. For people not from Canada's coast, the NDP is a traditional coalition of social policy progressives, labor activists and environmentalists. This particular iteration of the NDP, however, appears intent upon carving off its environmental arm in favour of pandering to the libertarian types who just love to scream about government taxation.	12th April 2009

Fire In Ice Exploitng methane hydrate as the fuel of the future will stifle development of clean renewable alternatives and do little to reduce emissions. It will also keep the energy supply in the hands of big oil. See also: Producers testing ways to draw hydrates from Slope - Alaska Journal of Commerce	11th April 2009
How to Profit from Energy Illiteracy - The Business Insider Politics is a painfully slow and inadequate way to go about forming an energy strategy, but it seems to be the only way we have. My study suggests that we will have to live with 25% less energy by around 2025, and 50% less energy by 2050. Starting with peak oil (a flattened peak from 2005-2012), then peak natural gas (around 2010-2020), then peak coal (2020-2030) we are facing the imminent decline of 85% of US primary energy sources. If it takes 25 years for a given primary energy source to reach 1%, and another 100 years to reach 50%, we should be forming our energy policy on at least 50-year time horizons.	11th April 2009
Sin aqua non - Truth about Trade & Technology THE overthrow of Madagascar’s president in mid-March was partly caused by water problems—in South Korea. Worried by the difficulties of increasing food supplies in its water-stressed homeland, Daewoo, a South Korean conglomerate, signed a deal to lease no less than half Madagascar’s arable land to grow grain for South Koreans. Widespread anger at the terms of the deal (the island’s people would have received practically nothing) contributed to the president’s unpopularity. One of the new leader’s first acts was to scrap the agreement. Three weeks before that, on the other side of the world, Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger of California declared a state of emergency. Not for the first time, he threatened water rationing in the state. “It is clear,” says a recent report by the United Nations World Water Assessment Programme, “that urgent action is needed if we are to avoid a global water crisis.” Local water shortages are multiplying. Australia has suffered a decade-long drought. Brazil and South Africa, which depend on hydroelectric power, have suffered repeated brownouts because there is not enough water to drive the turbines properly. So much has been pumped out of the rivers that feed the Aral Sea in Central Asia that it collapsed in the 1980s and has barely begun to recover. Yet local shortages, caused by individual acts of mismanagement or regional problems, are one thing. A global water crisis, which impinges on supplies of food and other goods, or affects rivers and lakes everywhere, is quite another. Does the world really face a global problem? See also: Water and Energy: How Congress Can Solve Two Problems at Once	11th April 2009
Dry Taps in Mexico City: A Water Crisis Gets Worse - Time Magazine Faced with a collapsing delivery system and the likely effects of global warming, the hemisphere's largest city turns off the tap to try to save water	11th April 2009
G8 Document On World Hunger Warns Of Global Instability - CounterCurrents By Hiram Lee A document prepared by the Group of Eight, or G8, countries for its inaugural summit of agricultural ministers entitled The Global Challenge: To Reduce Food Emergency was leaked to the press this week, revealing the G8s concerns of global instability arising from a worldwide food crisis	11th April 2009
Global Warming Will Cost American Corn Growers Billions - DigitalJournal.com Report: Global warming could cost American corn growers $1.4 billion a year, according to a new report by Environment America that is contrary to conventional wisdom that global warming will be good for U.S. agriculture.	11th April 2009
Carbon tax resurfaces in Liberal policy resolutions - CTV.ca Stephane Dion may be gone but his much-maligned carbon tax proposal lingers on among Liberals. The idea was a flop with voters but has popped up again in priority policy resolutions to be debated later this month. See also: NDP pins election hopes on carbon tax stance - CTV British Columbia	11th April 2009
NYT Lends Credibility To The Launch Of Swift Boater’s Latest Pollution-Funded Science-Denying Venture - Think Progress NYIn today’s New York Times, reporter Leslie Kaufman profiles Sen. James Inhofe’s (R-OK) former climate change skeptic spokesman, Marc Morano, and the launch of his latest effort to distort and deny the science of climate change, ClimateDepot.com. Joe Romm responded at Climate Progress, “[T]he paper of record has decided to promote the new disinformation campaign of the least credible global warming denier in the country.”	11th April 2009
An Anglo-Finnish Family's Year without Oil - YLE News Recipes for Disaster. The witty, thought-provoking film portrays Webster's awakening concern over global warming and his decision to put his family on a carbon diet. Not surprisingly, his wife Anu and two young sons are not so enthusiastic about his plans for them to get rid of their car and stop buying anything made of -- or packed in -- plastic. Life in the suburbs of Espoo without petroleum products is no picnic, they find.	11th April 2009
The Worst Giveaway Yet: Another $50 Billion for Rust-Bucket Nukes? The latest demand for a $50 billion taxpayer handout to the nuclear power industry has been sleazed into the Senate budget bill.	11th April 2009
Climate Change and Atmospheric Circulation Will Make for Uneven Ozone Recovery (PhysOrg.com) -- Earth's ozone layer should eventually recover from the unintended destruction brought on by the use of chlorofluorocarbons (CFCs) and similar ozone-depleting chemicals in the 20th century. But new research by NASA scientists suggests the ozone layer of the future is unlikely to look much like the past because greenhouse gases are changing the dynamics of the atmosphere.	11th April 2009
Obama, Who Vowed Rapid Action on Climate Change, Turns More Cautious - New York Times President Obama came to office promising swift and comprehensive action to combat global climate change, and the topic remains a surefire applause line in his speeches here and abroad.Yet the administration has taken a cautious and rather passive role on the issue, proclaiming broad goals while remaining aloof from details of climate legislation now in Congress.	11th April 2009
UK too dependent on rest of world - Guardian Britain is living beyond its environmental means and is increasingly dependent on the rest of the world for its natural resources, a thinktank study has revealed.The recession may have slowed consumption but the New Economics Foundation (Nef) says we are now drawing deep on the cropland, pasture, forests and fisheries of other countries. The research also shows that by tomorrow the country will have used the levels of resources it should consume in an entire year if it were to be ecologically self-sufficient.Andrew Simms, Nef's policy director, said: "We are consuming more and more, and as our ecosystems become more stressed the day in the year on which we effectively go beyond our environmental means, and move into ecological debt, is moving ever earlier in the year.	11th April 2009

Driller thriller: Antarctica's tumultuous past revealed - New Scientist The future of Antarctica's ice is written in stone from 19 million years ago. Douglas Fox meets the geologists drilling into history	10th April 2009
Bill Chameides: Climate Change: What Is Equivalent to 'CO2 Equivalents'? - HuffingtonPost You've probably noticed by now that discussions of greenhouse gases refer to carbon dioxide (CO2) -- and sometimes "CO2 equivalents" and "equivalent CO2." What's that all about?	10th April 2009
Muscle-bound America - OpEdNews To have a meaningful effect on slowing the acceleration of climate change--a huge ice shelf is collapsing far ahead of schedule in the Antarctic as I write this--a lot of very powerful and wealthy oxen will have to be gored: companies like Exxon and Walmart will put up real money to stop policies that would put them at a disadvantage. Exxon's reason is obvious, but Walmart is totally dependent on heavily energy-intensive trade; the contribution of maritime shipping to global warming is considerable, as are those ubiquitous trucks, with their pledge of lower prices slashed down the sides. And of course, both corporations represent many more, whose interests will be disadvantaged by policies responding to climate change, like mandatory cap and trade carbon credits. So, they organize against them. Where are the interests organizing for them?	10th April 2009
Big Ag: give us carbon credit, but don't cap our emissions- Grist As Congress gears up to consider climate legislation, agribusiness is getting sweaty palms-and for good reason.	10th April 2009
More of NSW is now in drought \| Environment \| Lismore Northern Star - Northern Star New drought statistics show more of NSW is desperately in need of rain, with the south and west of the state worst affected. The April figures show the area affected by drought has increased to 59.6 per cent, from 56.5 per cent in March, NSW Primary Industries minister Ian Macdonald says.	10th April 2009
U.S. pressure could alter Canada's greenhouse gas approach - CBC Environment Minister Jim Prentice has indicated that Canada might have to change its strategy for regulating greenhouse gas emissions in order to avoid U.S. tariffs.	10th April 2009
The IEA warns of shortages - "The next oil crisis is coming" - Energy Bulletin "We are concerned, that oil companies are reducing their investment levels. When demand returns a supply shortage could appear. We are even predicting that this shortage could occur in 2013." Said Nobuo Tanaka, head of the IEA. read more	10th April 2009
Blue Dog Democrats growling at climate-change plan - Globe and Mail Party's fiscal conservatives and those elected in mining states could side with GOP to veto Obama's cap-and-trade proposal	10th April 2009
Dissenter on Warming Expands His Campaign - New York Times Blogs Notorious denier Morano’s new Web site is being financed by the Committee for a Constructive Tomorrow, a nonprofit in Washington that advocates for free-market solutions to environmental issues. Craig Rucker, a co-founder of the organization, said the committee got about a third of its money from other foundations. But Mr. Rucker would not identify them or say how much his foundation would pay Mr. Morano. (Mr. Morano says it will be more than the $134,000 he earned annually in the Senate.) Public tax filings for 2003-7 — the last five years for which documents are available — show that the Committee for a Constructive Tomorrow received hundreds of thousands of dollars from the ExxonMobil Foundation and from foundations associated with the billionaire Richard Mellon Scaife, a longtime financer of conservative causes best known for its efforts to have President Bill Clinton impeached. Mr. Rucker said Exxon had not contributed anything last year.	10th April 2009
Are electric cars the answer to Britain's environmental problems? - Independent The Big Question: Will Gordon Brown's plans for green motoring really be greener? See also: Motorists to receive grants to go electric	10th April 2009
'Like a War Zone': Wildfires in Southwest Spark Evacuations - ABC News Dozens of homes destroyed as fires surge across Texas and Oklahoma.	10th April 2009
"Re-Branding" the Alberta Tar Sands - DeSmogBlog It's always nice to get feedback on your work. That's why we were heartened to see a comment from the Alberta Government on our post yesterday about the appointment of a tar sands executive as a "clean energy" envoy to the US: David Sands of the Government of Alberta, here. Mr. Anderson you certainly bring a lot of energy to your writing. While we can't agree with most of your assertions, we certainly applaud you and desmogblog for promoting the discussion. If any of your readers want a quick (12 mins, I think) look at what we are doing to address environmental impacts of oil sands development, we've got a new video.	10th April 2009

Climate change is too big a problem to be left to the environmentalists - Guardian The environmental movement does not have sufficient public support to secure action on the scale needed – charities, churches, schools, the health sector, unions can all play their partIndividual actions matter. But only governments can save us from catastrophic climate change. There is far more that our political leaders could and should do, right now, to accelerate investment in low-carbon energy, housing and transport infrastructure and help individuals to do more to tackle climate change. Our leaders have considerably more power than they choose to acknowledge. But it's abundantly clear that they will not act at the necessary scale and speed without far greater public pressure.	9th April 2009
Father Paul Mayer: The Carbon Tax: A Moral Issue - HuffingtonPost The dramatic moment has come when the human species because it is responsible for most of this damage, must radically reconsider its activity in the name of its own survival.	9th April 2009
The Green Power Illusion - Energy Bulletin America is finally showing leadership on climate change. But unfortunately the Obama Administration and the majority of US climate change activists haven't learned very important lessons from the peak oil debate and look to be leading the world down an illusory path. read more	9th April 2009
Obama looks at climate engineering - PhysOrg (AP) -- The president's new science adviser said Wednesday that global warming is so dire, the Obama administration is discussing radical technologies to cool Earth's air. [No surer sign that climate change is upon us...]	9th April 2009
Half Canada's boreal caribou herds in decline: report - CNews OTTAWA - The federal government plans to release a report Thursday that finds half Canada's boreal caribou herds are in decline and may die out in the next century without changes to their habitats, The Canadian Press has learned.	9th April 2009
Want to save the planet? Tuck in to some jellyfish and chips, squid sausages and algae burgers - Independent In a recently published census of marine life, Canadian scientists predicted that, if the rate of collapse of fish species continues, none of the fish we now pile on our plates will be around in 2050. Which begs the question, what will we eat? Causes include pollution – more than 30 per cent of our estuaries and 15 per cent of coastal waters are at risk from nutrients, pesticides and heavy metals – and climate change. But perhaps the biggest culprit is overfishing.	9th April 2009
A cardboard box cooker wins top prize in an environmental competition - BBC News A solar cooker made from a cardboard bol wins a competition for bright environmental ideas.	9th April 2009
Hemp plan to build green houses - BBC Bristol A team at the University of Bath is researching the use of hemp in carbon-neutral construction materials in the UK.	9th April 2009
Tackling soot could help reduce Arctic ice melt - FT.com Blogs One factor that could help to slow the melting of the Arctic, but which has not yet received serious consideration at an international level, would be to cut the amount of “black carbon” – soot – that we spew into the air. Black carbon darkens ice when it falls, causing it to absorb more heat, and may be responsible for half of the warming effect in the Arctic, according to recent research published in Nature Geoscience. Cutting down on soot would not only remove large amounts of air pollution, but, according to some scientists, could be much quicker and easier than cutting carbon dioxide emissions.	9th April 2009
London mayor – 100,000 electric cars for capital - Guardian Boris Johnson announces commitment to making electric cars 'first choice for Londoners', pledging £20m of the GLA budgetLondon mayor Boris Johnson announced today his intent to make the city the electric car capital of Europe. He said he wanted to introduce 100,000 electric cars to the capital's streets and to build an infrastructure of 25,000 charging points in public streets, car parks and shops.Johnson said he would pay for a third of the £60m plan from the budget of the Greater London Authority (GLA), and challenged the government to fund the rest and make good its enthusiasm for electric vehicles, which Gordon Brown today said would feature in the upcoming budget announcement."The time for simply talking about electric vehicles is over – we need real action on the ground to make the electric vehicle an easy choice for Londoners," said Johnson. See also: On the two great issues of our time, Mayor Boris is a disaster	9th April 2009
Array wind farm developers seek bailout - Guardian European Investment Bank asked to guarantee project to build world's largest offshore wind farm after credit crunch and collapse in energy prices scare off backersThe developers of London Array, the project to build the world's largest offshore wind farm in the Thames estuary, have approached the European Investment Bank for a bailout.The German energy company E.ON and its Danish partner Dong Energy have yet to commit to providing the £3bn they estimate is needed to build the giant wind farm, whose future hangs in the balance.A project of this scale has never been built before. A collapse in electricity prices in the last 12 months means it would generate less cash, while the credit crunch has added to the uncertainty.	9th April 2009
Canada's Prime Minister Installs Tar Sands Exec as "Clean Energy" Envoy to US - DeSmogBlog The Harper Government just sent a clear signal of the real agenda for the so-called “clean energy dialogue” with US government. Under intense questioning from opposition politicians, Ottawa finally fessed up that former tar sands executive Charlie Fisher will represent Canada in these high level negotiations with Obama Administration. Long-time observers of Canada's already pathetic record on dealing with climate change were understandably apoplectic.	9th April 2009
Nations Fail to Offer CO2 Targets at UN Climate Talks - Bloomberg April 8 (Bloomberg) -- The world's wealthiest nations failed to offer more ambitious carbon-dioxide cuts, stalling United Nations climate talks as developing countries called for funding help and technology to combat global warming. See also: UN demands more climate ambition - BBC News	9th April 2009
Green groups want Shell oil sands permits rescinded - Reuters CALGARY, Alberta (Reuters) - Canadian environmental groups asked regulators on Wednesday to rescind approvals for part of a $13.7 billion expansion of Royal Dutch Shell Plc's oil sands project, alleging the company backed off promises to cut greenhouse gas emissions. See also: Shell Abandons Alberta Tar Sands Emissions Cuts - See You In Court	9th April 2009
Money a key element in Bonn adaptation talks - IRINnews.org At the first round of climate change talks in Bonn, Germany, a delegate from the Philippines noted that the Christmas bonus of a Wall Street banker was higher than the amount of money allocated to the Least Developed Countries Fund (LDCF).	9th April 2009

Warming set to exceed EU's "dangerous" threshold - Reuters AlertNet Global warming is likely to overshoot a 2 degrees Celsius (3.6 F) rise seen by the European Union and many developing nations as a trigger for "dangerous" change, a Reuters poll of scientists showed on Tuesday. Ten of 11 experts said it was at best "unlikely" -- or less than a one-third chance -- that the world would manage to limit warming to a 2 degrees Celsius (3.6 Fahrenheit) rise above pre-industrial levels. For poll details, click on [ID:nL7934606] "Scientifically it can be done. But it's unlikely given the level of political will," said Salemeel Huq at the International Institute for Environment and Development in London.	8th April 2009
Bankrupt planet - BBC News Banks are bailed out, but ecological debt rises	8th April 2009
Take green path, US business warned - Financial Times Businesses must not sink money into high-carbon infrastructure unless they are willing to lose their investments within a few years, the US lead negotiator on climate change has warned. In the Obama administration’s starkest rebuke yet to industry over global warming, Todd Stern, special envoy for climate change at the state department, said “high-carbon goods and services will become untenable” as the world negotiates a new agreement to cut carbon emissions. EDITOR’S CHOICE In depth: Climate change - Mar-31 Editorial Comment: Green capitalism - Apr-06 UK ministers urged to act on green investment - Apr-06 Lex: Carbon prices - Mar-24 Cash shortage hinders climate battle - Mar-23 UN fears Brussels rewriting emissions deal - Mar-17 Investors should take note, he warned, that high emissions must be curbed, which would hurt businesses that failed to embark now on a low-carbon path.	8th April 2009
Climate change G20 loser, say greens - Guardian Unlimited The $1.1 trillion stimulus package agreed by G20 leaders yesterday risks locking the world into a high-carbon economy in which greenhouse gas emissions continue to rise, environmental groups have warned.Campaigners agreed that the summit's biggest loser was the fight against climate change, despite a positive response from global financial markets to the announcement of financial aid. At the summit, prime minister Gordon Brown reiterated support for low-carbon economic growth and tackling climate change.	8th April 2009
Climate change cause of mass invert die-offs - environmentalresearchweb Increasing temperatures are causing a higher level of stratification in the coastal waters of the northwest Mediterranean and bringing about mass die-offs of suspension-feeders such as gorgonians and sponges, according to researchers from Spain. The stratification acts to prolong summertime conditions, in which temperature rises and food becomes scarce, leading the invertebrates to go into a state of "summer dormancy".	8th April 2009
Climate Change to Cause Major Shifts in Global Wildfire Patterns - Newswise New research helps scientists predict wildfire hotspots as global warming changes weather patterns.	8th April 2009
UK butterfly numbers plunge after worst year since 1976 - Guardian Wet summers and changes to countryside behind dramatic fall, leaving some species threatened with extinction. Wildlife Minister Huw Irranca-Davies said: "Climate change is having a detrimental effect on a number of our butterfly species and in parts of England we're in danger of losing some species all together.	8th April 2009
Climate Change Leads to Major Decrease in CO2 Storage - Newswise The 'carbon sink' in the North Atlantic is the primary gate for carbon dioxide (CO2) entering the global ocean and stores it for about 1500 years. The oceans have removed nearly 30 per cent of anthropogenic (man-made) emissions over the last 250 years. However, several recent studies show a dramatic decline in the North Atlantic Ocean's carbon sink.	8th April 2009
Climate change in Lake Superior ice - Minneapolis Star Tribune What started as a high school science fair project is the latest piece of evidence that global warming is affecting Lake Superior. Forrest Howk, now a freshman at the University of Wisconsin in Madison, studied 150 years of data in his hometown of Bayfield, Wis., and found that the harbor's frozen season has shrunk from about 120 days to 80 days.	8th April 2009
Cuckoo may soon be on endangered species list as result of global warming - Mirror.co.uk The cuckoo may soon be classed as an endangered species - partly because of global warming. Numbers have dropped by 59 per cent since the late 60s, say experts. And they are now so rare they could be placed on the red list of threatened birds within a month.	8th April 2009
Polar bears and penguins 'just tip of climate change iceberg' - WWF International New evidence from the North and South Poles indicates that time is running out for the world’s leaders to respond to climate change.	8th April 2009
VIDEO: How clouds cloud climate change - Reuters Meteorologists in the Netherlands, who have set up a virtual cloud laboratory to study cloud behaviour, say understanding clouds is key for predicting how climates will change. The researchers focused their lab studies on the lower 'fair-weather' clouds such as cumulus, which reflect sunlight away from the earth and therefore have a cooling effect. They are also investigating theories that there will be fewer fair-weather clouds in warmer temperatures, as warm air can hold more water vapour than cold air, and with fewer clouds around to reflect sunlight, global warming could accelerate.	8th April 2009
Oil Has Peaked: Now Begins the Transition - Alternet We have officially entered the post-oil age in which the transition to lower energy lives is inevitable.	8th April 2009
Amid a sea of troubles, ethanol now has an antibiotics problem - Grist I've been writing for a while now about problems with distillers grains, the leftover mash from the corn-ethanol process. A third of the corn that goes into ethanol winds up as distillers grains. Finding a high-value use for this “coproduct” is absolutely vital to the corn-ethanol project. The industry's strategy-slough it off onto CAFOs (concentrated-animal feedlot operations)-looks increasingly dicey as problems related to antibiotics emerge.	8th April 2009
U.N. climate talks threaten our survival: Saudi Arabia - Reuters BONN, Germany (Reuters) - United Nations climate talks threaten Saudi Arabia's economic survival and the kingdom wants support for any shift from fossil fuels to other energy sources such as solar power, its lead climate negotiator said.	8th April 2009
Plastic bag obsession is carrier for environmental ignorance - Monbiot It's time to refocus; plastic bags are not the scourge of the planet, their biggest evil is to distract us from more pressing causesDo you remember that unspeakably naff designer accessory, I'm Not A Plastic Bag? The "design", by Anya Hindmarch, involved thinking up the gauchest slogan ever contrived then printing it on a white shopping bag of the kind old ladies used in the 1960s. Tens of thousands were sold, at mind-boggling prices. More to the point, does anyone still use one? There still seems to be a small market among collectors – there's one for sale on eBay at the moment for £179.99 – but when did you last see someone shopping with one?	8th April 2009
Carbon bonuses could determine development of a low-carbon economy - Guardian National Grid managers to earn bonuses for hitting carbon and financial targets, an initiative which may spread throughout industry and Whitehall. Bonuses are wrong, right? If our journey over the economic precipice has taught us anything, it is that bonus schemes promote reckless risk taking, create perverse incentives and breed resentment. Your financial reward is your salary, the bonus is keeping your job.Or was it the scale and structure of the turbo-charged bonuses given to incompetent bankers that created the testosterone-fuelled culture that preceded the crash? Modest bonuses paid out when tangible targets are achieved motivate employees and represent a proven mechanism for sharing the rewards of a well-executed strategy.It is hardly news that the resolution of this debate will reshape the financial sector over the next few years, but it could also determine the pace at which a low-carbon economy develops.	8th April 2009
UN Climate Talks Draw to Close in Bonn Over Greenhouse-Gas Cuts - Bloomberg April 8 (Bloomberg) -- Ten days of United Nations climate talks drew to a close today with developing countries saying progress is inching along and that wealthier nations need to make more ambitious pledges to cut greenhouse-gas emissions.	8th April 2009

Satellite data shows Arctic on thinner ice - Reuters LOS ANGELES (Reuters) - Arctic sea ice, a key component of Earth's natural thermostat, has thinned sharply in recent years with the northern polar ice cap shrinking steadily in surface area, government scientists said on Monday.	7th April 2009
Our sick seas - Ottawa Citizen Scientists are documenting drastic, disturbing changes in the oceans.	7th April 2009
The breakthrough technology illusion - Grist Magazine This post will explain why some sort of massive government Apollo program or Manhattan project to develop new breakthrough technologies is not a priority component of the effort to stabilize at 350 to 450 ppm. Put more quantitatively, the question is — What are the chances that multiple (4 to 8+) carbon-free technologies that do not exist today can each deliver the equivalent of 350 Gigawatts baseload power (~2.8 billion Megawatt-hours a year) and/or 160 billion gallons of gasoline cost-effectively by 2050? [Note—that is about half of a stabilization wedge.] For the record, the U.S. consumed about 3.7 billion MW-hrs in 2005 and about 140 billion gallons of motor gasoline. Put that way, the answer to the question is painfully obvious: “two chances — slim and none.” Indeed, I have repeatedly challenged readers and listeners over the years to name even a single technology breakthrough with such an impact in the past three decades, after the huge surge in energy funding that followed the energy shocks of the 1970s. Nobody has ever named a single one that has even come close.	7th April 2009
Poor Government in a Peer-Sensitive World - Jo Abbess Why is the Government in the United Kingdom so poor on Climate Change and Energy ? Why have they signed the Climate Change Act without a clue as to how to implement it, and are delaying any obvious low-cost actions, kicking it all into the long grass ? It's not a mean scheme, it's just the effect of deference between men, who form the large bulk of the governing authorities. Other people find dealing information and advice to the Government akin to knocking their heads against a diamond-studded brick wall, or trying to climb a Teflon-coated pole, and conclude that there is some kind of invisible web of control, perhaps with secret players.	7th April 2009
Heat-Trapping CO2 Cuts May Be 'Catastrophic' - Bloomberg April 6 (Bloomberg) -- Cuts in heat-trapping CO2 emissions proposed by the United States, Canada and the European Union will reduce output of the greenhouse gas less than needed to halt a “climate catastrophe,” Greenpeace said.	7th April 2009
Carbon cap deal "very difficult": U.N. climate chief - Reuters BONN, Germany (Reuters) - It will be hard work getting rich nations to agree cuts in greenhouse gases that are deep enough to satisfy the demands of developing countries at climate talks, U.N.'s climate chief told Reuters on Monday.	7th April 2009
Book Review: A Blueprint for a Safer Planet - Financial Times Climate change is, Lord Nicholas Stern argues, the biggest example of market failure we will ever see. If you thought government bail-outs were giving financiers an easy way out, look at the free ride we have been given over our climate-killing consumption patterns. “When we emit greenhouse gases we damage the prospects for others and, unless appropriate policy is in place, we do not bear the costs of the damage,” Stern writes in his new book, A Blueprint for a Safer Planet. “Markets then fail in the sense that their main co-ordinating mechanism – prices – give the wrong signals.” In a free market, no one gets charged for producing carbon. The resulting costs – catastrophic changes to the earth’s climate – are felt too late for the market to correct the error. Carbon dioxide has a deadly but cumulative effect, changing the climate over many years, irreversibly; already, stocks of emissions entering the atmosphere may mean sea levels will rise in a few decades.	7th April 2009
Bacterium eats electricity, farts biogas - New Scientist With the help of a novel bacterial trick, electricity from power plants can be used to turn CO 2 into methane – it could help solve reliability problems with wind and solar power	7th April 2009
Big Lunch puts the food we eat back high up the environmental menu - Guardian Our dependence on energy and food from overseas makes us vulnerable to political and climatic aggressionIn just three short years, the environment has returned to the front pages with a vengeance, even if the G20 managed to relegate it to the end of their communique.Near the top of the environmental agenda is food and its production. Whether it be at the macro level of food security or the micro, or the way in which we grow it or the health benefits of growing your own, today's focus on food is, for me, qualitatively different to previous lifestyle magazine exhortations to "grow our own".	7th April 2009
Will dams on Amazon tributary wreak global havoc? The Xingu River, the largest tributary of the Amazon, runs wide and swift this time of year. Its turquoise waters are home to some 600 species of fish, including several not found anywhere else on the planet. A thick emerald canopy of trees hugs its banks, except in places where man has carved out pastures for cattle.	7th April 2009
US hosts Arctic-Antarctic summit as melting speeds up - Monsters and Critics.com PREVIEW: The United States will bring together the world's government's for a summit on the state of the North and South Poles on Monday, in what environmentalists have billed as a chance to draw attention to some of the most visible effects of global warming. The nearly two-week gathering, which will be kicked off in Washington by US Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton, includes government representatives and scientists from 47 countries.	7th April 2009
B.C.'s carbon-offset plan doesn't sit well with environmentalists - CBC A plan by the B.C. government to invest in planting trees as a way to offset greenhouse gas emissions is facing criticism from environmentalists.	7th April 2009
UK climate policy not up to scratch, warn business leaders - Guardian Business leaders have delivered a surprise attack on the government's environmental policy, arguing that ministers are not doing enough to cut global warming emissions or make sure the UK does not run out of power.The CBI says billions of pounds of necessary investment will move to the US and China unless the government takes "urgent action".It comes amid widespread disappointment that the G20 heads of state failed to come up with any real push on green issues as part of a $1.1tn (£743bn) financial aid package for the global economy.The warning from the CBI follows a series of announcements by major energy companies, including Shell, BP and Centrica, that they would axe or reconsider investment in "low carbon" energy such as wind and solar power and carbon capture for coal-fired power stations.	7th April 2009
Congress delays Obama's green push - New Scientist The US president has big plans to revitalise his nation by pumping vast amounts of cash into 'green jobs' and reducing carbon emissions, but Congress seems to have other ideas	7th April 2009
Brits move to New Zealand as eco-migrants - GlobalVisas As people grow more concerned about the long-term impact of climate change, some are opting to emigrate to locations considered more ‘green,’ with many opting to move to New Zealand.	7th April 2009
"Cap and trade" is the "Earth Hour" of Climate Policy - dagblog So, you might ask, "If carbon dioxide emissions are contributing to global warming, then shouldn't we reduce them?" My answer is: No. We should cease all industrial emissions of carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases and we should do it yesterday and even if we could do this, we would still be facing a warming Earth.	7th April 2009

An Antarctic ice shelf has disappeared: scientists - Reuters WASHINGTON (Reuters) - One Antarctic ice shelf has quickly vanished, another is disappearing and glaciers are melting faster than anyone thought due to climate change, U.S. and British government researchers reported on Friday.	5th April 2009
Hopes for climate treaty set back by G20's weasel words - Independent It was meant, in Gordon Brown's words, to strike "a global green new deal" to tackle climate change and pull the world out of recession at the same time. In fact, the G20 meeting has sharply put back the chance of an international pact to stop global warming running out of control.	5th April 2009
First quarter cleantech VC funding hits $1 billion — green stimulus funds soar to $400 billion - Grist Clean tech venture capital funding in the first quarter of 2009 hit $1 billion, according to “findings released today by the Cleantech Group in cooperation with Deloitte.”	5th April 2009
Warming takes center stage as Australian drought worsens - Energy Bulletin With record-setting heat waves, bush fires and drought, Australians are increasingly convinced they are facing the early impacts of global warming. Their growing concern about climate change has led to a consensus that the nation must now act boldly to stave off the crisis. read more	5th April 2009
State of the nations III - Environment/Solutions - OpEdNews State of the nations III - Environment/SolutionsOpEdNews, PAClimate change is the big issue, even though it has mostly been pushed aside by the understandable daily worries of people wondering where there next pay cheque might be coming from. Global warming is a direct result of our current lifestyle, ...	5th April 2009
Survey says: Americans concerned about global warming, want policy change, like money A survey that is both heartening with respect to the public perceptions of global warming (and needs for policy response thereto) and frustrating for what they suggest about the policy conversation in Washington.	5th April 2009
Providing the tools to get a strong international climate agreement What do the international provisions in the Waxma/Markey draft bill mean for helping to secure a strong international commitment in Copenhagen this December?	5th April 2009

Did the handling of the G20 protests reveal the future of policing? - Guardian Unlimited This week police used 'kettling' - penning marchers in an area and refusing to let them out - to deal with the G20 demonstrations. Is this really the most sensible way to tackle protests?	4th April 2009
Obama climate plans face long road - Reuters WASHINGTON (Reuters) - A U.S. Senate vote this week rejected an effort to put climate-change legislation on a fast track, making it harder for Congress to put limits on greenhouse gas emissions this year. Democratic leaders and the Obama administration had floated the idea of using the federal budget to move cap-and-trade legislation through Congress. Making the plan part of the budget would enable it to pass with a simple majority. But the Senate on Wednesday voted 67-to-31 in favor of a measure blocking lawmakers from attaching a cap-and-trade bill to the federal budget.	4th April 2009
Climate clock is ticking - The Gazette - Montreal “Some people are saying we have already crossed this threshold (into unstoppable, jarring changes),” Ford, who is also an IPCC contributor, said. “Others are saying … we haven’t crossed it yet, but it’s pretty close. The climate is definitely changing faster than we thought, especially the Arctic. Globally as well. This really caught the scientific community by surprise. In 2002, what was involved was this idea of gradual climate change: We may see dramatic changes but towards the end of the century, not today. “That is now changing, we are now thinking these changes are occurring quite rapidly today. Quite a few people are speculating that we are going to see even more dramatic changes quite soon.”	4th April 2009
Wordie Ice Shelf has disappeared: scientists - Reuters WASHINGTON (Reuters) - One Antarctic ice shelf has quickly vanished, another is disappearing and glaciers are melting faster than anyone thought due to climate change, U.S. and British government researchers reported on Friday. See also: Rising CO2 to trigger ice sheet collapse - BigPond News	4th April 2009
CLIMATE CHANGE: Seals in the Baltic Left without Ice - IPS BERLIN, Apr 3 (Tierramérica) - Ringed seals in the Baltic Sea are finding fewer and fewer ice caves in which to raise their young. Rising global temperatures are the problem, and in turn are depleting the main food source of the giant polar bear, say scientists.	4th April 2009
Last stand - The National Having once covered much of Lebanon’s rugged terrain, the country’s cedar tree, prized throughout history and the unifying emblem of a divided nation, is under threat from a warming world.	4th April 2009
Wind power could meet US needs - Guardian Wind turbines off US coastlines could potentially supply more than enough electricity to meet the country's current electricity demand, the US interior department reported today. Simply harnessing the wind in relatively shallow waters - the most accessible and technically feasible sites for offshore turbines - could produce at least 20% of the power demand for most coastal states, interior secretary Ken Salazar said, unveiling a report by the department's minerals management service that details the potential for oil, gas and renewable development on the Outer Continental Shelf.	4th April 2009
Earth's Atmosphere Tracking Toward A Mid Pliocene* - Like State - CounterCurrents.org Toward the end-20TH and early 21ST century Homo “sapiens” is realizing its carbon emissions, totaling over 300 billion tons (GtC) since 1750, and other forms of interference with the global natural system, are leading to sharp departure from the conditions which allowed its success on the planet, including rapid warming of the atmosphere to near +1.3 degrees C (partly masked by emitted aerosols) above pre-industrial levels and acidification of the oceans (decrease in pH by near-0.1) ( http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:AYool_GLODAP_del_pH.png ), endangering the marine food chain. Human inertia is paramount. Politics-as-usual and economics-as-usual can not argue with the laws of physics and chemistry, nor can they stop the climate from tracking toward increasingly dangerous states, likely approaching a tipping point of no return.	4th April 2009
Climate change biggest loser of G20 summit: campaigners - Guardian The $1.1 trillion stimulus package agreed by G20 leaders yesterday risks locking the world into a high-carbon economy in which greenhouse gas emissions continue to rise, environmental groups have warned.	4th April 2009
Alberta hires consultants to lobby Washington - CBC Edmonton Alberta has hired a team of consultants to improve the province's image in Washington ahead of climate change talks. See also: Alberta Lobbying Hard in Washington on Cap and Trade Bill	4th April 2009
Gore says economic, climate crises share solutions - CNews LAS VEGAS - Former Vice President Al Gore says the economic crisis and the climate crisis can be solved with the same set of solutions.	4th April 2009
Are Insurance Companies the New Climate Ally? - Scientific American Insurance companies might not come to mind as key environmental advocates, but they have a vested interest in climate change: billions--if not trillions--of dollars. As sea levels rise, storms gain force and even as agricultural patterns change, insurance companies will have to shell out more and more cash to cover losses. Hurricane Ike, which struck the Texas coast in 2008, cost insurers in that state $6.6 billion. See also: Insurers seize climate change opportunity with over 600 new products - vnunet.com	4th April 2009

US to be 'pragmatic on climate' - BBC America's lead climate negotiator tells the BBC that the US will only do what is politically and technologically achievable. [The elastic goalposts of politics vs unmovable real ones]	3rd April 2009
G20 forgets the environment - Guardian Climate breakdown, peak oil and resource depletion all dwarf the financial crisis in financial and humanitarian termsHere is the text of the G20 communique, in compressed form. "We, the Leaders of the Group of Twenty, will use every cent we don't possess to rescue corporate capitalism from its contradictions and set the world economy back onto the path of unsustainable growth. We have already spent trillions of dollars of your money on bailing out the banks, so that they can be returned to their proper functions of fleecing the poor and wrecking the Earth's living systems. Now we're going to spend another $1.1 trillion. See also: Environmental groups see snub at G20 summit - Reuters	3rd April 2009
Listen To The Protesters - Johann Hari Two global crises have collided, and we have a chance here, now, to solve them both with one mighty heave – but our leaders are letting this opportunity for greatness leach away	3rd April 2009
Natural mechanism for medieval warming discovered - New Scientist Natural mechanism for medieval warming discoveredNew Scientist, UKThe finding scuppers one of the favourite arguments of climate-change deniers. If Europe had temperature increases before we started emitting large amounts of greenhouse gases, the theory goes, then maybe the current global warming isn't caused by ...	3rd April 2009
Impressions from National Academies Climate Summit - Huffington Post Impressions from National Academies Climate SummitHuffington Post, NY(paraphrased) The real danger of climate change is not that mean temperatures will increase by a few degrees or that average rainfall may increase or decrease a bit. Global warming is really about climate disruption, which will mean an increase in the ...	3rd April 2009
Ice-free Arctic Ocean possible in 30 years, not 90 as previously estimated - UW News A nearly ice-free Arctic Ocean in the summer may happen three times sooner than scientists have estimated. New research says the Artic might lose most of its ice cover in summer in as few as 30 years instead of the end of the century.	3rd April 2009
Small islands urge deep CO2 cuts, fear rising seas - Reuters BONN, Germany (Reuters) - Small island states have sharpened their calls for the rich to make deep cuts in greenhouse gas emissions, saying low-lying atolls risk being washed off the map by rising ocean levels.	3rd April 2009
Global warming forecast says Spain will run dry - Times Online The rain in Spain no longer falls mainly in the plain.	3rd April 2009
A Poem by Danny at Climate Camp in The City	3rd April 2009
Greenhouse gas targets bill passes 2nd reading - CBC A private member's bill that sets medium- and long-term targets for Canadian greenhouse gas emissions passed its second reading in the House of Commons Wednesday.	3rd April 2009
Economic cuts EU's CO2 emissions in '08: institute - AFP via Yahoo! News The economic crisis hitting the European Union caused the bloc's carbon dioxide emissions to drop by six percent last year, the Oslo-based research institute Point Carbon said.	3rd April 2009
World's poor face malnutrition threat - Guardian Unlimited Poor harvests, drought and rising food prices could have serious health implications for people living in developing countries Hellen Apale knows how important it is that her children get a good diet. She knows that at eight months pregnant, she needs to be eating well and eating regularly for the health of her unborn baby. The problem is she has no food. "We had a really bad harvest, there was ...	3rd April 2009
Climate change numpties: Simon Singh's guide for the perplexed - Guardian What is a climate change numpty? What should you do if you come across one? Here are some simple guidelinesHaving been a fan of Franny Armstrong's previous film, McLibel, I was keen to see her latest documentary, The Age of Stupid. While Al Gore's An Inconvenient Truth was a rather dry and semi-academic look at climate change, The Age of Stupid is an emotional attempt to rally the troops. The fact that it preaches largely to the converted is not necessarily a bad thing if it encourages those who believe in climate change to become more vocal and more active.But what about those who still do not believe in climate change?	3rd April 2009
CLIMATE CHANGE: Going Beyond the Carbon Market - IPS MONTEVIDEO, Apr 2 (Tierramérica) - With an incisive report in hand about what awaits Latin America and the Caribbean in the future if action is not taken to fight climate change, economist John Nash defends the role of the World Bank and underscores the need to expand the so-called "clean development mechanism".	3rd April 2009
Fossil Fool's Day Round Up - It's Getting Hot In Here Fossil Fool's Day Round UpIt's Getting Hot In Here, DCProtesters also roped off the office entrance with Global Warming Crime Scene tape. Boston: A lone protester representing “Mannequins for Climate Justice” locked down to the doors of a Bank of America branch in central Boston with the message “Even a ...	3rd April 2009
EPA holds trump card in U.S. emissions debate - New York Times Two years ago today, the Supreme Court ordered U.S. EPA to reconsider its decision not to regulate for greenhouse gas emissio...	3rd April 2009
Final offshore wind rules in months: U.S. Interior - Reuters ARLINGTON, Va (Reuters) - U.S. Interior Secretary Ken Salazar said on Thursday he expects his department to finalize rules for offshore renewable energy in a few months.	3rd April 2009
New climate legislation overlooks a major GHG source: industrial ag - Grist House climate bill completely exempts agriculture and livestock emissions.	3rd April 2009
Bonkers notion of the week: OPEC says oil not to blame for climate change PARIS (Reuters) - OPEC said oil was not to blame for climate change and consuming countries should pay to fight the threat, while the CEO of Royal Dutch Shell said drivers could help by not buying Hummer sports utility vehicles.	3rd April 2009

New clock ticks at sluggish U.N. climate talks - Reuters A curious thing is happening at a U.N. meeting in Bonn this week on a new climate pact – countries least interested in a deal such as OPEC members are doing more and more of the talking. Organisers of the talks have set up a new ”Countdown to Copenhagen” clock in the main hall (above left) to try to spur the sluggish negotiations. It shows 248 days left until the talks in the Danish capital in December. But in many ways it's misleading because, as U.N. climate change chief Yvo de Boer pointed out at the start of the 11-day meeting on March 29, there are only 6 weeks of formal negotiations left to work out a new global response to climate change.	2nd April 2009
Rising permafrost temperatures raise emission of the climate relevant trace gas methane - uniprotokolle Investigations of the Alfred Wegener Institute show that methane producing microorganisms react to climate changes Bremerhaven, March 30th 2009. Higher temperatures in Arctic permafrost soils alter the community of methane producing microorganisms and lead to an increased emission of methane.	2nd April 2009
Our leaders still aren't facing up to the scale of the crisis - Guardian When mass protests exploded on the streets of Seattle in 1999 against the kind of globalisation embodied in the World Trade Organisation, their anti-capitalist message was widely portrayed as utopian. A decade on, as anti-capitalist demonstrators vented their fury yesterday on the social and ecological vandals of the City and prepared to do battle today outside the G20 meeting in the heart of what was once London's docks, it looks more like common sense. See also: Seattle All Over Again? Media Ignores Peaceful Protests at G-20 - AlterNet	2nd April 2009
Oil Companies Sabotaging America's 'Green' Revolution - DeSmogBlog capitol coal.JPG If we act now to implement President Barack Obama's energy plan ' which proposes investment in clean energy (and some badly needed jobs to boot) ' we can avert a future in which the nation's energy costs rise by $420 billion a year over the next five years. That translates to $3,500 for every American family. Obama's plan, which aims to hold energy companies' feet to the fire over global warming gases like carbon dioxide, is now being challenged by these same companies, who charge that the plan's associated “energy taxes” (estimated to exceed $400 billion), will reduce investment in domestic oil and gas at a time when America is just beginning to develop these resources to free itself from dependence on foreign oil.	2nd April 2009
Report calls for shift in climate research - Nature Federal agencies must make climate research more applicable to end-users, says the US National Research Council. The US government's climate research needs a radical refocus to make its results more relevant to policymakers and other stakeholders. That will require more interdisciplinary research and better understanding of the effects of climate change on local scales, says a new report1 released 26 February by the National Research Council (NRC), the policy-advice arm of the US National Academy of Sciences. "Robust and effective responses to climate change demand a vastly improved body of scientific knowledge," says the NRC committee in its report Restructuring Federal Climate Research to Meet the Challenges of Climate Change. The 16-member committee was charged with evaluating the US Climate Change Science Program (CCSP), an umbrella entity that coordinates nearly $2 billion in annual climate change work within US government agencies. See also: No time to retreat - Nature	2nd April 2009
What is the cost of staving off climate change? - Reuters Republicans in the U.S. Congress say they know how much it is going to cost to save the world from the predicted ravages of climate change. But others say their math is way off. "It would cost every family as much as $3,100 a year in additional energy costs and will drive millions of good-paying American jobs overseas," warned House of Representatives Republican leader John Boehner in response to House Democrats unveiling their climate-change bill on Tuesday. There's a problem, though. There’s a problem, though. USA/ The Republicans cite a Massachusetts Institute of Technology study as the basis for their cost estimate. But a lead author of that study complained in a letter to Boehner on Wednesday that the calculation is way off. John Reilly, an economist at MIT’s Sloan School of Management, said the average annual cost to U.S. families for controlling emissions of carbon and other harmful greenhouse gases is actually $340 - $440.	2nd April 2009
New exchange seeks funds for "green" start-ups - Reuters LOS ANGELES (Reuters) - Seeking to breathe life into the bleak fund-raising environment for clean technology companies, a new private exchange wants to make it easier to invest in promising biofuels, solar or other green start-ups.	2nd April 2009
Report presents new research on climate change effects in California - UC Newsroom Scripps contribute to assessment concluding that loss of ag land, increased wildfire risk among potential outcomes.	2nd April 2009
U.S. carbon-market battle begins - UPI By ROSALIE WESTENSKOW UPI Energy Correspondent The U.S. Congress kicked off a long-anticipated battle over climate-change legislation Tuesday, when two Democratic representatives released draft legislation that could dramatically cut emissions -- and raise energy prices, Republicans say.	2nd April 2009
In pictures: Climate Camp demo - BBC News The Climate Camp gathering saw hundreds of people pitch tents on the street in the City of London.	2nd April 2009
Climate change will hit China hard, says UK scientist - China Daily GUANGZHOU: Hundreds of millions of Chinese people are likely to face extreme climate change and shortages of water, food and energy in the next few decades unless the emission of carbon dioxide and other polluting chemicals is checked, the UK's chief scientific adviser said in Guangzhou yesterday.	2nd April 2009
Expert tips - Nature Climatologists believe that continued warming brings a sizeable risk of crossing climate tipping points in the next two centuries, a new poll finds. Because of unknowns in the climate system, scientific reports have expressed uncertainty about whether and when such dramatic changes - for instance, dieback of the Amazon rainforest or loss of the Greenland ice sheet - could be triggered. Elmar Kriegler of the Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research, Germany, and colleagues elicited responses from 43 climatologists on the likelihood of five potential tipping points being reached under three warming scenarios through the year 2200. For each of the five components of the climate system, answers from self-described experts on that topic were pooled and weighted to give a conservative lower estimate of the likely risk of a reaching a threshold that would lead to dramatic change. The responses indicated a 16-per-cent chance of reaching a tipping point in at least one of the five components by 2200 if global temperatures rise 2-4 °C above 2000. This increased to at least 56 per cent at higher temperatures. The authors caution that voluntary participation may have skewed the group toward pessimists, but note that the answers represent a broad range of views.	2nd April 2009
Climate change to bring more whale beachings - AFP Climate change to bring more whale beachingsAFPSYDNEY (AFP) - Experts studying the mass beaching of whales along Australia's coast have warned that such tragedies could become more frequent as global warming brings the mammals' food stocks closer to shore. Almost 90 long-finned pilot whales and ...	2nd April 2009

Take a spin on MIT's greenhouse gas Roulette wheel - Guardian Up and up the temperature goes, where it stops nobody knows. We are all climate gamblers now, and experts at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology have produced a stunning illustration of the risk posed by global warming. Their "greenhouse gamble" wheel of misfortune shows the chances of various temperature rises by the end of the century if carbon pollution continues at current rates.Current favourites are 4-5C and 5-6C, at odds of 3-1, with 6-7C a decent outside bet at 7-1. And what are the chances of a rise of less than 3C, and with it a chance of something near a habitable planet? A shirt-losing 100-1. Meanwhile, the odds of a ruinous 7C or more by 2100 are just 11-1. Gulp.	1st April 2009
Rainforests may pump winds worldwide - New Scientist Without forests to pump moisture around the planet, would the continents turn to desert? A new theory suggests they might	1st April 2009
Earth population 'exceeds limits' - BBC News Science advisor in the US State Department Nina Fedoroff says humans have exceeded the Earth's "limits of sustainability".	1st April 2009
Energy urgency pits tree-huggers against smokestack pluggers - CNews If we want to put the brakes on global warming and reduce our reliance on nonrenewable fossil fuels, we must look to renewable energy such as solar, wind, hydro, and sustainable bioenergy. See also: U.S. groups say vast areas off limits to clean energy	1st April 2009
Exxon vs. Obama - Energy Tribune By refusing to seriously invest in a world beyond oil, Exxon Mobil marks itself not merely as politically incorrect but as a company that seems oddly indifferent to the business risks of its intransigence. It seems increasingly likely that Obama and Congress will slap a price on carbon in coming years that could put oil at a competitive disadvantage to such carbon-free energy sources as wind, solar, and biomass. That could reduce demand for crude, sharply cutting its price.	1st April 2009
Ad features 100 scientists willing to stoke the climate crisis - DeSmogBlog Susan Crockford.jpg Who on earth might have, say, half a million dollars to drop on an advertising campaign aimed at getting Americans to doubt the well-established science of climate change? Well, if you answered "the oil industry," you might be on a good track. The Cato Institute, which sponsored a series of full-page ads in the New York Times, the Washington Post, the Washington Times, the Chicago Tribune and the Los Angeles Times, is famously a paid apologist for organizations like the American Petroleum Institute (API). We know, for example, that the API has been conspiring since the late 1990s, to sow doubt and confusion about climate science.	1st April 2009
Climate change fans Nepal's fires - BBC News Longer and drier seasons, combined with freak precipitation, may point a finger towards a climate impact.	1st April 2009
Costly cuppa - BBC News Tea prices to soar as drought hits major producers	1st April 2009
Climate change fears for deadly virus outbreaks in livestock - PhysOrg Global warming could have chilling consequences for European livestock, warned Professor Peter Mertens from the Institute for Animal Health, at this week's meeting of the Society for General Microbiology in Harrogate.	1st April 2009
Plant Growth Discovery to Impact Crop Production as Climate Change ... - AZoCleantech Dr Kerry Franklin, from the University of Leicester Department of Biology led the study which has identified a single gene responsible for controlling plant growth responses to elevated temperature. Dr Franklin said: "Exposure of plants to high temperature results in the rapid elongation of stems and a dramatic upwards elevation of leaves". "These responses are accompanied by a significant reduction in plant biomass, thereby severely reducing harvest yield."S	1st April 2009
US House CO2 Bill Targets 20% Cut By '20 From 2005 Levels - CNNMoney.com U.S. House lawmakers are targeting a 20% reduction in greenhouse gases from 2005 levels by 2020 in a draft climate bill unveiled Tuesday that promises to raise energy costs for the country, but leaves many of the most important details for later negotiations. The draft document, published by the Energy and Commerce Committee, omitted specifics on the percentage of carbon dioxide credits to be auctioned off versus given freely to industry, a key determinant of how much such a program will cost.	1st April 2009
Simultaneous Policy for Global Problems - Policy Innovations As the shock of the global credit crunch subsides, the next phase inevitably kicks in: steeply rising unemployment and growing domestic political pressure for a return to protectionism. As the global economic hangover hits home, the world's nations, like a bunch of recalcitrant teenagers, sink into their morose, self-centered protectionist sulks. But is greater protectionism the answer, or should free trade and open markets be maintained?	1st April 2009
Scientists shown children's film - BBC News An animated film by Plymouth schoolchildren is premiered in front of more than 100 international scientists and policy makers.	1st April 2009
EU Carbon Trading System Shows Signs of Working - New York Times Europe?s flagship trading system to cut carbon emissions appears to be working, according to preliminary figures released by the European Commission.	1st April 2009

G20

G20 draft adds momentum in climate diplomacy - Reuters LONDON (Reuters) - A draft statement which would confirm G20 leaders' commitment to sign a new climate pact in December and support low-carbon growth drew mixed reactions from green groups and policymakers Tuesday.	1st April 2009
CEOs Want Low CO2 Growth At Heart Of G20 Econ Plans - Nasdaq LONDON -(Dow Jones)- The chief executives of 52 companies Tuesday called on the leaders of the Group of 20 industrialized and developing nations to put low- carbon growth at the heart of economic stimulus measures they will be considering this week.	1st April 2009
G8 leaders agree "substantial" greenhouse gas cuts - Tiscali HEILIGENDAMM, Germany (Reuters) - World leaders agreed on Thursday to pursue substantial but unspecified cuts in greenhouse gases and work with the United Nations to clinch a new deal to fight global warming by 2009.	1st April 2009
Hundreds of protesters set up 'climate camp' - Independent Hundreds of people today set up a "climate camp" in the City of London to protest against economic measures which they say will not tackle climate change.	1st April 2009
G20 governments must share a vision of world's future - Guardian t is time to act on climate change. The science is clear: greenhouse gas emissions must be cut by over 60% below current levels by 2050. And the reductions must start now. The greatest barriers to achieving this reduction are political. This Thursday, world leaders from the G20 countries – representing 85% of the world's economic output – will meet in London to address the global financial crisis.	1st April 2009

Call for action on Broads threat - BBC News The Norfolk Broads face severe damage from climate change unless habitats are given the chance to recover, Natural England says.	1st April 2009
Landscape 'to resemble Portugal' - BBC News Parts of the Dorset landscape will resemble Portugal by the 2080s due to climate change, Natural England say.	1st April 2009
October 24th is Global Climate Action Day - Mother Nature Network Bill McKibben is headlining a worldwide demonstration of the peoples' desire to see progress in the fight against global warming. Plan an action, make the world a better place.	1st April 2009
Green new deal could ease triple crunch in finance, environment and resources - Guardian As the G20 summit approaches, government must understand that leadership means putting the UK on course to climate safetyThe UK economy faces a triple crunch: a recession triggered by a major credit crisis, the looming reality of runaway climate change and critical resource depletion. As a result we face serious challenges to our livelihoods and increasing threats to our fuel and food security.Whatever the mistakes that allowed this situation to arise, there is growing international consensus that the best way out is via a green new deal policy package. Parts of the UK economy are in freefall with unemployment rising rapidly.	1st April 2009
Duck deaths at Syncrude Canada triple initial tally - Reuters CALGARY, Alberta (Reuters) - The death toll among ducks that landed on a toxic waste pond at Syncrude Canada Ltd's oil sands operation last spring was 1,606, more than three times higher than previously made public, Syncrude's chief executive said on Tuesday.	1st April 2009
Decisions, Decisions: "Blind Spot" or "The Great Squeeze"? Always eager to preview Long Emergency, end-of-civilization-oriented documentaries, I recently found myself in a rather blessed quandary. I received review copies of "Blind Spot" from Director Adolfo Doring and Producer Amanda Zakem and "The Great Squeeze" by Director/Producer Christoph Fauchere and Co-Producer, Joyce Johnson, but as I watched both several times, I found it almost impossible to decide which one I preferred. read more	1st April 2009
Europe will suffer despite climate measures: EU - AFP via Yahoo! News Europe must prepare both for more floods and drought caused by climate change, regardless of the measures taken to combat it, EU Environment Commissioner Stavros Dimas warned Wednesday.	1st April 2009
Rich urged to make deeper CO2 cuts - Reuters BONN, Germany (Reuters) - China, India and other developing nations joined forces on Wednesday to urge rich countries to make far deeper cuts in greenhouse gas emissions than planned by 2020 to slow global warming.	1st April 2009
Relocation, relocation, relocation: Math could address climate change population concerns As sea levels rise in the wake of climate change and semi-arid regions turn to desert, people living in those parts of the world are likely to be displaced. A mathematical approach to planned relocation reported in the International Journal of Mathematics and Operational Research.	1st April 2009

Stern: 'Kingsnorth should be shelved' - Independent There is no technology yet to make coal-fired station clean, says climate adviser. Britain's latest coal-fired power station should not be built, according to Lord Stern of Brentford, the economist who led the Government's review into the financial cost of climate change. See also: 'We're the first generation that has had the power to destroy the planet. Ignoring that risk can only be described as reckless' - Guardian	31st March 2009
Brown accused over green spending - BBC News Prime Minister Gordon Brown is accused of failing to harness his economic stimulus for the benefit of the environment.	31st March 2009
Tropical Tree-Saving Credits Will Crash Carbon-Emission Prices - Bloomberg March 30 (Bloomberg) -- Rewarding rain forest nations with tradable credits for not cutting down trees will cause carbon prices to crash and may exacerbate global warming by drawing funds away from renewable energy, an economic study found.	31st March 2009
Obama envoy: Time to act on climate change - Forbes Once booed at international climate talks, the United States won sustained applause Sunday when President Barack Obama's envoy pledged to "make up for lost time" in reaching a global agreement on climate change. Todd Stern also praised efforts by countries like China to reign in their carbon emissions, but said global warming "requires a global response" and that rapidly developing economies like China "must join together" with the industrial world to solve the problem. See also: U.S. to push for UN climate deal but no "magic wand" - Reuters China hails U.S. climate promises, says to act - Reuters	31st March 2009
Green economy 'could create jobs' - BBC News The mayor's plans to cut energy and tackle climate change could create up to 15,000 jobs in London by 2025, a report says.	31st March 2009
Environmentalists say oilsands slowdown perfect time for new legislation - CNews CALGARY - With the pace of oilsands development in Alberta slowed to a trickle, governments are uniquely situated to take a sober second look at environmental policies before another boom sweeps the opportunity away, say environmentalists.	31st March 2009
80% of business people say polluters should pay - Scoop.co.nz A new national survey shows 80% of business people think polluters should pay for their excess greenhouse gas emissions, not taxpayers. Only 7% of business people surveyed think taxpayers should pick up the bill for any emissions in excess of the 2008-2012 Kyoto target New Zealand has committed to.	31st March 2009
Carbon Trust launches new guide to overcoming board resistance - Guardian Step-by-step guide aims to help green executives pitch projects to the board. From BusinessGreen.com, part of Guardian Environment NetworkAnyone who has spent any length of time working as a sustainability exec knows that if a green project is going to die a death it is most likely to do so on the altar of board resistance.Now the Carbon Trust is seeking to aid executives struggling to convince senior management to support green investments with the launch of a new guide detailing how facilities managers, works engineers, and environmental managers should go about making an effective business case for low carbon investments.	31st March 2009
Microbes turn electricity directly to methane without hydrogen generation - EurekAlert! ( Penn State ) A tiny microbe can take electricity and directly convert carbon dioxide and water to methane, producing a portable energy source with a potentially neutral carbon footprint, according to a team of Penn State engineers.	31st March 2009
Living walls and green roofs pave way for biodiversity in new building - Guardian Otters could return to urban rivers, bats could roost under bridges, swifts could flock to office blocks and peregrine falcons soar above cathedrals under recommendations from the UK Green Building CouncilWhat do the Westfield shopping centre, Canary Wharf and a Victorian museum have in common? They are all at the vanguard of a move to encourage biodiversity in buildings that could take on an unprecedented scale if guidelines published today are adopted.Under recommendations from the UK Green Building Council (UKGBC) for developers, planners and policy-makers, Otters could return to urban rivers, bats could roost under bridges, swifts could flock to office blocks and peregrine falcons soar above cathedrals.	31st March 2009
Drought hits sugar output - Bangkok Post - Thailand's English news Thailand may produce at least 3.8% less sugar this year because of drought has cut cane output, a government official said on Monday.	31st March 2009
Canada's winter sports melting away, report warns - Globe and Mail Future winter Olympics may have a hard time finding snow and ice to play on, says a study being released today that details the impact of global warming on winter sports in Canada. "If heat-trapping greenhouse gas emissions are not significantly cut, global warming stands to wipe out more than half of Canada's ski season later this century with few exceptions," states the study by the David Suzuki Foundation, released in conjunction with the 8th World Conference on Sport and the Environment, being held as part of pre-Olympic activities in Vancouver this week.	31st March 2009
The Exploding Squid Population - CBS News It's been said there are not so many fish in the sea as there used to be. However, John Blackstone reports on a proliferation of Humboldt squid that is even more than enough for modern fishing boats to handle:	31st March 2009
Reporters Miss The Boat - Again on Fargo Flood, Fail to Mention It Fits Global Warming Trends - DeSmogBlog fargo-flood-global-warming.jpg In an interview with reporters last week, President Barack Obama correctly raised the point that global warming could lead to more severe flooding events in the future. Although it's impossible to link a specific event to global climate change – as Obama was careful not to do – the record-breaking flooding of the Red River in Fargo, North Dakota is consistent with the trend towards increased frequency and severity of extreme precipitation events predicted by the climate science community.“I actually think the science around climate change is real. It is potentially devastating,” Obama told the reporters.	31st March 2009
A potentially useful book - Lies, Damn lies & Science - RealClimate According to a recent article in Eos (Doran and Zimmermann, 'Examining the Scientific consensus on Climate Change', Volume 90, Number 3, 2009; p. 22-23 - only available for AGU members), about 58% of the general public in the US thinks that human activity is a significant contributing factor in changing the mean global temperature, as opposed to 97% of specialists surveyed. The disproportion between these numbers is a concern, and one possible explanation may be that the science literacy among the general public is low. Perhaps Sherry Seethaler's new book 'Lies, Damn Lies, and Science' can be a useful contribution in raising the science literacy?	31st March 2009
Review: 'Future Scenarios' by David Holmgren - Energy Bulletin Future Scenarios serves as a good introduction to the concept of future energy descent/climate change scenarios.	31st March 2009
CLIMATE CHANGE: G20 Leaders Wrangle Over Kyoto Successor - IPS WASHINGTON, Mar 30 (IPS) - Senior legislators from the G20 bloc of the world's biggest economies launched an international commission in Washington Monday to help lay the political groundwork for a global deal on climate change in Copenhagen this December.	31st March 2009

French government interested in solar because it uses less water than nukes - Gristmill A year or so ago, I spoke at a solar conference in France-a country that produces 78 percent of its electricity with nukes. A couple of folks told me that the government's interest in solar stemmed from the fact that during the previous summer's heat wave, river levels dropped to the point that they didn't have enough water to cool the reactors.	29th March 2009
Mother Nature's Dow - New York Times If Mother Nature had a Dow, you could say that it, too, has been breaking into new (scientific) lows.	29th March 2009
The Population Debate Is Screwed Up - Alternet Debaters on population usually take two sides: either they see it as a huge problem facing humanity, or that it's a non-issue. They're both wrong.	29th March 2009
World switches off to save planet in "Earth Hour" - Reuters SYDNEY (Reuters) - Lights went out at tourism landmarks and homes across the globe on Saturday for Earth Hour 2009, a global event designed to highlight the threat from climate change.	29th March 2009
G20 protesters march in London - BBC News Tens of thousands of people have marched through London demanding action on poverty, climate change and jobs, ahead of next week's G20 summit.	29th March 2009
How to Pay for a Global Climate Deal - Alternet Leaders at the G-20 summit should go in a green direction to jump-start protection of the global climate.	29th March 2009
Leaders to meet in summer for special climate change talks - Independent Leaders attending the G20 meeting in London plan to gather again in the summer for a special summit on tackling climate change, The Independent on Sunday can reveal.	29th March 2009

Human-Made CO2 on Exponential Rise - Discovery Channel Human-produced CO2 has been growing 2.3 percent since recording began in 1958.	28th March 2009
Carbon: How much is enough? - BBC The issue is this: how much carbon dioxide should each person on Earth be "allowed" to emit? Put another way: if emissions of CO2 and other greenhouse gases are to be limited, at some target date, to a figure that science suggests can stave off "dangerous" climate change, then how does that figure break down at the personal level, when shared out among the world's citizens?	28th March 2009
Keep the blades of wind power turning - Guardian Carbon capture and storage may seem attractive, but wind and solar are still key to generating clean, green energy. Wind power in the UK is in a spin. News that the Spanish renewable energy giant Iberdrola Renovables is putting the brakes on its current capital spending programme – starting with a 40% cut to its investment in British wind – certainly does nothing to help Gordon Brown and Ed Miliband's dream of a country drawing 35% of its electricity from renewable sources by 2020. Nor, for that matter, did Shell's announcement last week that it was shifting its clean energy focus toward biofuels and carbon capture and storage (CCS) projects and away from wind and solar.	28th March 2009
FACTBOX-Greenhouse gas goals proposed at UN climate talks - AlertNet Source: Reuters OSLO, March 27 (Reuters) - Following are proposals for greenhouse gas targets to be considered at U.N talks on a new climate treaty in Bonn, Germany, from March 29-April 8.	28th March 2009
Concern over Climate Camp police - BBC News Significant concern about policing of the Kent Climate Camp must be addressed, the police complaints body says.	28th March 2009

God 'will not give happy ending' - BBC God will not intervene to prevent humanity from wreaking disastrous damage to the environment, the Archbishop of Canterbury has warned. In a lecture, Dr Rowan Williams urged a "radical change of heart" to prevent runaway climate change.	27th March 2009
The New Yorker's Mindless Nonsense on Economy vs. Environment - DeSmogBlog The lead article in this week's New Yorker by David Owen is a loony display of dishonest economics and a flagrant mangling of science and reason. Entitled "Economy vs. Environment," (oy, here we go again) the piece presents the false notion that solving the climate crisis will inevitably come at the expense of economic collapse. Owen claims that - should the U.S. follow Obama and the international community toward a global solution to global warming - the economy might never recover, and even if it did, we'd be fools to retain climate "policies that will seem to be nudging us back toward the abyss." Yes, ghastly poverty and economic ruin are the only outcomes of trying to solve climate change, if we listen to David Owen. See also: Paging Elizabeth Kolbert - Grist Magazine	27th March 2009
Recession dampens Obama negotiators' climate debut - Reuters OSLO (Reuters) - President Barack Obama's negotiators make their debut at U.N. climate talks on Sunday but U.S. promises of tougher action are unlikely to brighten prospects for strong treaty now overshadowed by recession.	27th March 2009
Geese decline 'caused by climate' - BBC News A decline in Hampshire's population of brent geese may be due to climate change and predation, the RSPB warns.	27th March 2009
Global warming hits Japan's cherry blossom season - Telegraph.co.uk Global warming hits Japan's cherry blossom seasonTelegraph.co.uk, United KingdomHowever, climate change experts warned that the increasingly early arrival of the cherry blossoms, known as sakura, reflected steadily rising global temperatures. "A rise in temperatures is one of the key elements prompting cherry trees to bloom," said ...	27th March 2009
Clampdown on 'Easy' China Carbon Deals to Cost Firms - Bloomberg March 27 (Bloomberg) -- The European Union, frustrated that its 11,000 factories and power plants are failing to adequately reduce greenhouse-gas pollution, will seek tighter emission rules that may raise the price of burning fossil fuels.	27th March 2009
Ice that burns could be a green fossil fuel - New Scientist Natural gas trapped in water crystals could provide enormous amounts of energy – and if a new technology delivers, it could be even be emissions-free too	27th March 2009
Heathrow third runway plans dealt massive blow - Guardian Planning application cannot be lodged before general election, meaning Tories could scrap schemeThe chances of a third runway being built at Heathrow airport have been dealt a serious blow after a government document warned that BAA cannot lodge a planning application for the project before the next general election.The Conservatives - who are well ahead of Labour in the polls - have pledged to block a new landing strip at the UK's busiest international airport. The admission gives a Tory administration ample time to draft a new aviation policy that will block BAA's plans.According to a presentation by the Department for Transport, seen by the Guardian, BAA is not expected to seek planning permission for a third runway until 2012.	27th March 2009
Tesla unveils the electric 'family car of the future' - Guardian Top-of-the-range Model S will seat seven people and travel 300 miles (483km) on a single chargeTesla Motors yesterday unveiled a pair of prototype all-electric cars that the fledgling automaker hopes will be the family friendly, mid-sized car of the future."Welcome to Model S," said designer Franz von Holzhausen as he pulled the covers off the cars, which will seat seven people and travel 300 miles (483km) on a single charge.Tesla hopes to begin producing the flashy, five-door car at a yet-to-be-disclosed location in Southern California by the final quarter of 2011.Within a year, it wants to turn out as many as 20,000 of the vehicles annually.Von Holzhausen led a team of designers that built the cars at the futuristic SpaceX Rocket Factory, where they were unveiled.Tesla chief executive, Elon Musk, said the ...	27th March 2009
Shell betrays 'new energy future' - Guardian The energy company has sold out on its renewable investments, claiming they are 'not economic'Shell, I have to report, is the new Exxon. The company that back in December was filling this and other newspapers with double-page adverts promoting its conversion to a "new energy future" of wind farms, hydrogen fuels, fuel made from marine algae and much else, has pulled the plug.In the 1990s Royal Dutch Shell set its boffins on finding new green fuels, such as forest plantations to make biofuels. I remember them at the Earth Summit in Rio back in 1992. Not long after, Shell was for a time the world's second largest manufacturer of solar panels.	27th March 2009
Farmers Want Obama to Make Carbon a Cash Crop Under Climate Law - Bloomberg March 26 (Bloomberg) -- Rex Woollen grows corn and soybeans. In 2007, the Wilcox, Nebraska, farmer started cultivating a new commodity: carbon. By not tilling his 800 acres, Woollen by some estimates keeps 470 tons of carbon per year in the ground and out of the atmosphere.	27th March 2009
Last chance to change - The Age Last chance to changeThe Age, AustraliaThe next 20 years are proving to be a crucial period, when scientists believe it is still possible to ward off the worst effects of global warming. Earth Hour organisers aim to send a direct message to the negotiators from more than 180 nations at ...	27th March 2009
G20 summit will test resolve on greener economy - Reuters LONDON (Reuters) - A G20 summit next week will test leading countries' appetite to fight climate change after spending trillions bailing out banks and shoring up the global economy.	27th March 2009
Earth Hour more than a symbolic gesture - Metro Canada - Ottawa Earth Hour more than a symbolic gestureMetro Canada - Ottawa, Canada... all to demand action to combat climate change. From London to Beijing, from Cape Town to New York, in more than a thousand towns and cities, citizens will send a clear signal to the world's leaders that they want to keep the lid on global warming. ...	27th March 2009
Charleaders must cool enthusiasm for settting fire to the planet - Guardian Reactions to my 'biochar' stance got a lot of people fired up, but I was too soft on one champion of so-called developmentWell that got 'em going. So far James Lovelock, Jim Hansen and Pushker Kharecha, Chris Goodall and Peter Read have all responded in the Guardian to my column on biochar. Reading their responses, I realise that it was unfair of me to include James Lovelock and Jim Hansen on the list of those who have been suckered by the charleaders. Their position is more nuanced than I made out. Chris Goodall, to his credit, has accepted that he was too bullish about the technology. See also: This gift of nature is the best way to save us from climate catastrophe	27th March 2009
FACTBOX-Greenhouse gas goals for major nations - AlertNet Source: Reuters March 27 (Reuters) - The following factbox compares goals for curbs on greenhouse gas emissions by major nations ahead of U.N. climate negotiations in Bonn, Germany, from March 29-April 8.	27th March 2009

Arctic meltdown is a threat to humanity New Scientist The Arctic is warming up much more quickly than expected – that's not just a problem for polar bears, it could be catastrophic for us all, says Fred Pearce	26th March 2009
Global warming 37 percent to blame for droughts: scientist - Reuters SINGAPORE (Reuters) - Global warming is more than a third to blame for a major drop in rainfall that includes a decade-long drought in Australia and a lengthy dry spell in the United States, a scientist said on Wednesday.	26th March 2009
'Crunch year' for world's forests - BBC Failure to agree a deal on deforestation in 2009 could critically hamper efforts to halt dangerous climate change, researchers will warn.	26th March 2009
Barack Obama's pledges in peril as Blue Dogs take a bite at budget - Times Online Barack Obama's pledges in peril as Blue Dogs take a bite at budgetTimes Online, UKPresident Obama was huddled in talks yesterday with congressional Democrats over proposals that would pare his $3.6 trillion budget, raising question marks over how he would fund promises on healthcare, climate change and tax cuts. ... See also: Obama may delay signing up to Copenhagen climate deal	26th March 2009
We never said biochar is a miracle cure - Guardian George Monbiot's implication that we believe biochar is a miracle solution to CO2 reduction is grossly misunderstoodIt is unfortunate that George Monbiot has insinuated that one of us (Jim Hansen) is a believer in biochar as a "miracle" solution for the climate crisis. If he is basing this on our published papers, then he has grossly misunderstood them. An attentive reader would know his insinuation is false by simply examining our land use-related assumptions in our recently published peer-reviewed paper, Target atmospheric CO2: Where should humanity aim?Broadly speaking, our climate change mitigation scenarios are strictly illustrative in nature, in other words, they serve to convey the types, magnitude and time frame of mitigation measures needed to reduce atmospheric carbon dioxide amounts. See also: Woodchips With Everything	26th March 2009
State intervention vital if UK to meet targets, says former BP boss - Guardian • Browne says markets need new strategic direction • Consumers will have to pay more for renewablesBritain must revert to greater state control of energy markets to hit ambitious targets on renewable energy and climate change, according to the former head of BP.Lord Browne of Madingley warns that market mechanisms are failing to deliver the necessary growth in clean energy. Crucial offshore wind projects could be cancelled unless there is an urgent rethink of energy policy, he says.In a speech tonight at Cardiff University, Browne will say: "Competition has been the guiding star of UK energy policy since the 1980s and it worked well while there was a surplus of energy infrastructure capacity.	26th March 2009
Green oil may buy us new deal for environment - but at what price? - Guardian Any mass investment in a global programme must not be squandered on saving capitalism from itselfThe question that plagues those of us who support the idea of a green new deal is this: where will the money come from? The proposal seems sound enough: as the world economy contracts, governments create millions of new jobs by investing in environmental measures. We'll need a massive carbon army to insulate and improve houses, build renewable power plants and manufacture energy-efficient devices. In principle it appears to solve two problems at once. But the money that might have funded it has gone: squandered on the banks.	26th March 2009
Top China think tank proposes greenhouse gas plan - Reuters BEIJING (Reuters) - A top Chinese state think tank has proposed a global greenhouse gas trading plan to reflect the different historic emissions of rich and poor nations, indicating deepening discussion in Beijing about climate change policy.	26th March 2009
Sydney summers by 2060 could be deadly: scientist - Reuters SINGAPORE (Reuters) - The forecast for Sydney in summer 2060 is hot, polluted and deadly to the elderly.	26th March 2009
Daddy long legs are latest victims of global warming - Muswell Hill Journal Warm summers are dramatically reducing populations of daddy long legs, which is in turn is having a severe impact on birds that rely on them for food, scientists have shown.	26th March 2009

Woodchips With Everything - Monbiot Here comes the latest utopian catastrophe: the plan to solve climate change with biochar	25th March 2009
The Tipping Points - DeSmogblog As the world dithers, climate scientists are peering into their crystal balls to predict when the next shoe will drop. In a new study published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, a team of international researchers led by Elmar Kriegler of the Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research surveyed 43 leading scientists to estimate the likelihood of a tipping point occurring in the near future. The four tipping points the researchers studied include the restructuring of the Atlantic meridional overturning circulation (also known as the ocean conveyor belt or thermohaline circulation), the complete melting of the Greenland ice sheet, the disintegration of the West Antarctic ice sheet, and the increased frequency of the El Niño Southern Oscillation (ENSO) phenomenon.	25th March 2009
Scientist warns that palm oil development may threaten Amazon - PhysOrg Oil palm cultivation is a significant driver of tropical forest destruction across Southeast Asia. It could easily become a threat to the Amazon rainforest because of a proposed change in Brazil's legislation, new infrastructure and the influence of foreign agro-industrial firms in the region, according to William F. Laurance, senior scientist at the Smithsonian Tropical Research Institute in Panama.	25th March 2009
Europe warned about looming food import surge - EUActiv Former EU Agriculture Commissioner Franz Fischler last week called on Europe to significantly contribute to world food security by fulfilling its "production potential", as the continent moves from being a net exporter of foodstuffs to become a net importer.	25th March 2009
Melting snow prompts border change between Switzerland and Italy - Independent Global warming is dissolving the Alpine glaciers so rapidly that Italy and Switzerland have decided they must re-draw their national borders to take account of the new realities.	25th March 2009
U.S. to move against greenhouse gases - International Herald Tribune The Environmental Protection Agency, about to declare heat-trapping gases to be dangerous pollutants, has embarked on one of the most ambitious regulatory challenges in U.S. history.	25th March 2009
Opposing wind farms should be socially taboo, says minister - Guardian Opposition to wind farms should become as socially unacceptable as failing to wear a seatbelt, Ed Miliband, the climate change secretary, has said.Speaking at a screening in London of the climate change documentary The Age of Stupid, Miliband said the government needed to be stronger in facing down local opposition to wind farms.He said: "The government needs to be saying, 'It is socially unacceptable to be against wind turbines in your area - like not wearing your seatbelt or driving past a zebra crossing'."Wind power is crucial to government attempts to meet an EU target of producing 20% of all energy through renewables by 2020, but plans to build some 4,000 onshore wind turbines are being opposed by more than 200 anti-wind farm groups.	25th March 2009
Deep thought - Energy Bulletin Perfect storm of environmental and economic collapse closer than you think Social effects of inequality have profound implications The Three Bears & The Great Transition Dr Robert Costanza on ecological economics The Next Ten Years: What it Will Look Like?	25th March 2009
U.S. manufacturers seek protection from climate bill - Reuters WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Production of steel, cement, chemicals and other energy-intensive products could move overseas unless a proposed bill to fight global warming gives U.S. manufacturers tax breaks or other subsidies, an industry coalition told lawmakers on Tuesday.	25th March 2009
NOAA's Lubchenco calls for national climate service - Scientific American Jane Lubchenco, the newly confirmed director of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), says she wants to create a national climate service that would predict the effects of global warming on communities, similarly to how the National Weather Service sends out info about the weather. [More]	25th March 2009

White House gets global warming "endangerment" proposal - Reuters WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency proposed an "endangerment finding" that could designate climate-warming greenhouse pollution a threat to human or environmental health, a White House website showed on Monday.	24th March 2009
Build more wind farms, RSPB says - BBC News The UK can significantly increase the number of wind farms built onshore without harming wildlife, the RSPB says.	24th March 2009
Kite power potential soars - Mother Nature Network TED is a yearly conference where some of the smartest (and/or best connected) people around get together and talk about all the cool things they're doing to make the world a better place and what else needs to get done. In this eight minute video, Saul Griffith talks about the amazing potential giant kites have for generating electricity. The gist of his presentation is that a properly designed and built system of high altitude kites could allow us to unlock ourselves from the self imposed coal powered prison we've built ourselves into over the past 100 or so years. Mr. Griffith said that a kite the size of a 747 (~200 feet) can produce 6MW of energy- enough for around 6,000 homes and more than is generated by the largest of conventional turbines. With a few factories pumping out kites and a focused effort Mr. Griffith thinks we could replace be producing most of the nations energy within a decade.	24th March 2009
A Crisis Is a Terrible Thing to Waste - Alternet Let's use this chance to create an economy that links social justice, environmental restoration, and financial sustainability.	24th March 2009
Scientists: The trend is less ice on Great Lakes - Chicago Tribune Scientists at the Great Lakes Environmental Research Laboratory say there has been more than a 30 percent ice decline on the lakes since the 1970s. The drop attributed to global climate change leaves the largest system of freshwater lakes on Earth open to evaporation that can lead to lower lake levels.	24th March 2009
Adam Smith Would Smell a Rat - Huffington Post Members of the Edison Electric Institute -- i.e. the nation's big, private utilities -- have agreed among themselves that they will lobby hard to ensure that 40 percent of any carbon permits issues by the federal government should be given -- for free -- to them as a group. They have also agreed to divide this windfall (assuming they can lay their hands on it) among themselves using a formula in which half of the giveaway emission permits would go to high-carbon utilities relying on coal, like AEP, Southern and Duke, and half to the low-carbon utilities, such as PG&E and Florida Power & Light, that utilize more natural gas, renewables, and efficiency. This proposed cartel is breathtaking in its audacity -- you could call it a conspiracy if it weren't so public and blatant. And, if successful, it will badly damage either the American economy or the global effort to curb climate change -- or both.	24th March 2009
Climate competitiveness, part 2 - Gristmill When the global Ponzi scheme collapses (circa 2030), the only jobs left will be green	24th March 2009
Calculating the costs of an ongoing mass extinction - San Diego Union Tribune “Our analysis indicates how much more varied biodiversity is than we thought and how much bigger our conservation problems are if we're going to maintain the life-support services that we need from biodiversity,” Ehrlich said. He compares nature's biodiversity to the engineered redundancy in an airplane. The “rivet hypothesis” holds that you can lose some rivets in a plane's wing and it will continue to fly, said Ehrlich. At some point, however, the loss of just one more rivet becomes catastrophic. “Even though you don't know the value of each rivet,” said Ehrlich, “you know it's nuttier than hell to keep removing them. There is some redundancy (in nature), but we don't know how much. And facing serious climate disruption, humanity is going to need more redundancy in the little rivets, the species and populations that run the world.”	24th March 2009
World wants tough 2050 climate cuts, split on path - Reuters OSLO (Reuters) - Governments broadly support tough 2050 goals for cuts in greenhouse gas emissions but are split on how to share out the reductions, according to a new guide to negotiators of a new U.N. climate pact.	24th March 2009
Carbon trading 'undermined by boom and bust' - Guardian A shake-up in the way the "boom and bust" carbon markets are working in Europe is being urged ahead of tomorrow's auction of new emission certificates by the UK government.The Carbon Trust, which is funded by government money, and the consultancy PricewaterhouseCoopers argue that some kind of floor price or carbon tax might have to be put in place to prevent the EU's emissions trading scheme (ETS) being discredited by a further collapse in prices, which have already slumped from €30 per tonne to just over €10.As ministers prepare to raise money by selling off more carbon certificates to –polluting companies, Michael Grubb, economist at the Carbon Trust, said the ETS was being badly undermined by volatility and uncertainty as the financial crisis ate into a scheme that was meant to fight global warming.	24th March 2009
'Ice that burns' may yield clean, sustainable bridge to global energy future - EurekAlert In the future, natural gas derived from chunks of ice that workers collect from beneath the ocean floor and beneath the arctic permafrost may fuel cars, heat homes, and power factories. Government researchers are reporting that these so-called "gas hydrates," a frozen form of natural gas that bursts into flames at the touch of a match, show increasing promise as an abundant, untapped source of clean, sustainable energy. The icy chunks could supplement traditional energy sources that are in short supply and which produce large amounts of carbon dioxide linked to global warming, the scientists say.	24th March 2009
The moral challenge of climate change - People & the Planet On Saturday (March 28), many millions of people around the world will join together in 'a vote for the planet'. From New York to Beijing, from Cape Town to Paris, citizens will turn their lights off for sixty minutes to demand action on climate change. Here, Archbishop Desmond Tutu and James Leape, Director General of WWF International, explain why Earth Hours matters.	24th March 2009
Setback for climate technical fix - BBC News The idea of curbing climate change by seeding the seas with iron gets a knock-back from a big Southern Ocean investigation.	24th March 2009
U.S. Big Steel pushes for carbon fees on China NEW YORK (Reuters) - China's steel industry should face fees on its exports into the United States if Washington adopts greenhouse gas cuts and Beijing does not, U.S. steel industry officials and advocates said.	24th March 2009

Nigeria: 'Fishermen Use Chemicals to Catch Fish Out of Desperation' - AllAfrica.com Nigeria: Dr M.I. Ahmed explains how global warming has forced some fishermen to use organophosphorus chemicals to catch fish and the implications of eating this fish by man.	23rd March 2009
Warming to force retreat from coast - The Age The top government scientist leading Australia's efforts to adapt to climate change has warned that some coastal communities will have to be abandoned in a "planned retreat" because of global warming. Dr Andrew Ash, who directs the CSIRO's Climate Adaptation Flagship program, said while some vulnerable coastal communities could be protected by sea walls and levees, "there are going to be areas where that is not physically possible, or it's not cost effective to introduce any engineering solution and planned retreat becomes the only option".	23rd March 2009
It's time to give up our blind faith in economic growth - guardian.co.uk The harsh realities of global warming and financial meltdown have given us an ideal opportunity to look beyond GDP when it comes to assessing how well we're doing	23rd March 2009
As climate changes, is water the new oil? WASHINGTON (Reuters) - If water is the new oil, is blue the new green?	23rd March 2009
Scientists drill deep into Greenland ice for global warming clues from Eemian Period - Times Online Scientists are to dig up ice dating back more than 100,000 years in an attempt to shed light on how global warming will change the world over the next century.	23rd March 2009
City-dwellers emit less CO2 than countryfolk: study LONDON (Reuters) - Major cities are getting a bad rap for the disproportionately high greenhouse gases they emit even though their per capita emissions are often a fraction of the national average, a new report said on Monday.	23rd March 2009

Second Year Of Drought Devastates Iraqi Agriculture - Payvand Iran News A prolonged drought has hit the region extending from Turkey to Afghanistan, and farmers in many areas are losing hope that it will ever end. For two years, the fields of Iraq have been covered in dust, which is whipped up into dust storms on windy days. -Charles Recknagel, RFE	22nd March 2009
Carbon Sinks Losing The Battle With Rising Emissions - Science Daily The stabilizing influence that land and ocean carbon sinks have on rising carbon emissions is gradually weakening, scientists who attended the international Copenhagen Climate Change Conference.	22nd March 2009

Problems this big need more than the state v market stuff - Guardian If climate change is to be tackled, or the financial system rebuilt, we need to move beyond the old, dumb, polarising politicsMarkets have failed and the state is back. How many times do we have to read these words before we acknowledge that they are, if not complete nonsense, then deeply misleading and unhelpful about the kind of real choices that will eventually face the post-recessionary world? Of course there has been massive market failure. And of course the role of the state has become newly important. But markets and the state are not mutually exclusive, as the more simplistic ideologues of left and right each like to pretend.	21st March 2009
Cap and Trade's Economic Impact - Foreign Relations President Obama has pledged to combat climate change and has asked Congress to pass legislation to lower U.S. greenhouse gas emissions. Concerns over economic costs have stymied attempts at federal policy in the past, and during the economic crisis it may prove even harder.	21st March 2009
Why Do Conservatives Hate Your Children? - AlterNet A look at conservatives' willful effort to destroy the health and well-being of your children and grandchildren and the next 50 generations.	21st March 2009
'Hearts and minds' approach needed in green tech drive - New Scientist Technical advances to reduce our impact on the planet can only work if people's mindsets are also taken into account, experts say	21st March 2009
New Yorker Slams U.S. CAP Members for "Donating to the Deniers" - DeSmogBlog Elizabeth Kolbert, author of the 2006 global warming book “Field Notes from a Catastrophe,” has a piece in the New Yorker today titled “Donating to the Deniers,” taking to task the corporate membership of the U.S. Climate Action Partnership for actively undermining the very goals the coalition claims to support. Kolbert’s piece looks at the recent analysis by Clean Air Watch detailing how many of the companies belonging to the U.S. CAP are working feverishly behind the scenes to fight against the very principles the coalition supposedly stands for.	21st March 2009
Clean Coal Opposition Mounting - DeSmogBlog The last month has seen a flurry of activity on the clean coal opposition front and it doesn't seem to be letting up. I thought it would make an interesting post to take some of the best blog post out there on so called "clean coal" and share them with you here on DeSmogBlog. As much as the multi-million dollar coal industry lobbyists want us to think their product is clean, it just ain't so. Celebrate, C'mon! (Seriously, please c'mon) Anti-coal protesters out on Monday: ~2,500 Pro-coal protesters out on Monday: 15 + this guy.	21st March 2009
Sweden to Go Carbon Neutral by 2050 - OneWorld WASHINGTON, Mar 20 (OneWorld.net) - Sweden, set to take over the European Union presidency in July, plans to lead the region on environmental sustainability by becoming carbon neutral by mid-century.	21st March 2009
New lights could reduce emissions - BBC News Converting street lights to a type which can be dimmed would save money and reduce carbon emissions, a council finds.	21st March 2009
The Vanishing Face of Gaia, By James Lovelock He Knew He Was Right - Independent REVIEW: The Vanishing Face of Gaia, By James Lovelock	21st March 2009
Brazilian court ruling backs Amazon reservation - CNews BRASILIA, Brazil - Brazil's Supreme Court sided Thursday with Amazonian natives in a land dispute that some have called critical for determining the future of the rainforest that is the size of Western Europe.	21st March 2009
Lights out: biggest show of climate concern ever? - Reuters ”It promises to be largest demonstration of public concern about climate change ever attempted”, according to U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon. He's not talking about something like an international series of protest marches, a coordinated shift to buying greener goods, nor a boycott of cars in favour of public transport. What he wants is simply for you (and at least a billion other people) to turn out the lights for an “Earth Hour” on Saturday, March 28, from 8.30 p.m. local time. This 60 minutes of darkness has really caught the public imagination - a year ago in the same event an estimated 50 million people worldwide joined in turning off lights after the idea started in Sydney in 2007 when 2.2 million homes and businesses took part.	21st March 2009
Local Hero: Tony Juniper - The Ecologist Local Hero: Tony JuniperThe Ecologist, UKThese are the barriers that have prevented us from getting into the Ecological Age, if you like-the kind of economy and society that can navigate these crunches of global warming and population pressure and resource depletion. ...	21st March 2009
Scilly Isles in sea peril - The Sun ONE of Britain’s most beautiful locations may have to be abandoned due to global warming.	21st March 2009

Climate Battle Spawns More than 2,300 DC Lobbyists - DeSmogBlog If the stage is now set for the climate battle to begin, there is no shortage of combatants. A Center for Public Integrity analysis shows that, by the end of last year, more than 770 companies and interest groups had hired an estimated 2,340 lobbyists to influence federal policy on climate change. That's an increase of more than 300 percent in just five years, and means that Washington can now boast more than four climate lobbyists for every member of Congress.	20th March 2009
Deep thought - Energy Bulletin Time to end the multigenerational Ponzi scheme Rushkoff on the economy: Let it die Bruce Sterling - Prophet and loss In a World of Infinite Energy	20th March 2009
Fish numbers drop as reefs take a bashing - New Scientist The damage suffered by Caribbean coral reefs from human activity and climate change is finally taking its toll on the fish that dwell in them	20th March 2009
Canada forced to to link climate change, polar bears - CNews Canada is conceding that a treaty on polar bears signed 35 years ago is now forcing it into action on climate change.	20th March 2009
Recession leaves Pelamis wave project struggling to stay afloat - Guardian Collapse of Australian-based infrastructure giant Babcock Brown means 77% share in the Aguçadoura wave plant is now up for saleA pioneering wave-energy project in Portugal has fallen victim to the global economic downturn after the collapse of its majority owner, Australian-based infrastructure giant Babcock Brown.Last September, three machines manufactured in Scotland by Pelamis were connected to the grid near Aguçadoura in northern Portugal, becoming the world's first commercial wave-power plant.The devices, shaped like giant articulated snakes and collectively capable of powering more than a thousand homes, were installed at a cost of about £7m.	20th March 2009
Global deal threatened by "climate apartheid" - Guardian Work on a new U.N. deal on global warming is threatened by a "climate apartheid" between rich and poor countries, and emerging economies must do their part by setting emissions targets, Brazil's environment minister said. Carlos Minc told Reuters developing countries such as Brazil, India and China should adopt targets to curb greenhouse gas emissions but that rich countries need to honor their pledges on existing climate targets and the transfer of technology and finance to poor countries.	20th March 2009
EU states in downturn think twice on climate fund - Reuters BRUSSELS (Reuters) - European Union member states hit by the global economic crisis urged the bloc Thursday not to promise the developing world more money to combat climate change than they can afford.	20th March 2009
ENVIRONMENT: Coping in a World of "Peak Water" - IPS UNITED NATIONS, Mar 19 (IPS) - As more than 20,000 people meet in Istanbul for a major week-long conference on future management of the world's water supplies, women's groups are working to ensure that policy decisions about this critical natural resource take their concerns into account.	20th March 2009

Leading NASA climate scientist says 'democracy isn't working' - Guardian Protest and direct action could be the only way to tackle soaring carbon emissions, a leading climate scientist has said.James Hansen, a climate modeller with Nasa, told the Guardian today that corporate lobbying has undermined democratic attempts to curb carbon pollution. "The democratic process doesn't quite seem to be working," he said.Speaking on the eve of joining a protest against the headquarters of power firm E.ON in Coventry, Hansen said: "The first action that people should take is to use the democratic process. What is frustrating people, me included, is that democratic action affects elections but what we get then from political leaders is greenwash."The democratic process is supposed to be one person one vote, but it turns out that money is talking louder than the votes. See also: Nasa man's 'extinction' warning - BBC News	19th March 2009
Global crisis 'to strike by 2030' - BBC News Rising population will create a "perfect storm" of food, energy and water shortages, the UK's chief science adviser says.	19th March 2009
Warming to speed icesheet collapse by 100,000 years: study - SpaceDaily PARIS, March 19 (AFP) Mar 19, 2009 Manmade climate change is set to hasten the disintegration of a massive ice sheet in Antarctica by 100,000 years, boosting sea levels some five metres (16 feet), according to a pair of studies published Thursday.	19th March 2009
The Age of Stupid: New Film Gives Us a Painfully Realistic Look at Life in 2055 The central premise: We would be the first life form to knowingly wipe itself out. What does that say about us? See also: The Age of Stupid - Times Online	19th March 2009
Australian Parliament Committee Urges Deeper Carbon Cuts - Bloomberg March 19 (Bloomberg) -- An Australian parliamentary committee urged the government to commit to deeper cuts in carbon gas pollution as a “matter of urgency.”	19th March 2009
Shift to greener economy seen costing $750 billion: U.N. - Reuters OSLO (Reuters) - Investments of $750 billion could create a "Green New Deal" to revive the world economy and protect the environment, perhaps aided by a tax on oil, the head of the U.N. environment agency said Thursday.	19th March 2009
Greenpeace Plan Cuts CO2 Pollution 85% without Nuclear or Coal - SustainableBusiness.com The United States can meet the energy needs of a growing economy and achieve science-based cuts in global warming pollution without nuclear power or coal, according to a report released last week by U.S. Senator Bernie Sanders (I-VT), Greenpeace, the European Renewable Energy Council (EREC), and Dr. Joseph Romm of the Center for American Progress. The report, commissioned from the German Aerospace Center (the German equivalent of NASA), finds that off-the-shelf clean energy technology can cut U.S. carbon dioxide emissions from fossil fuels by at least 23% from current levels by 2020 and 85% by 2050.	19th March 2009
Europe's energy chiefs aim for carbon-neutral electricity by 2050 - Guardian The heads of 61 power groups in the EU tonight have committed to achieving carbon-neutral electricity within an integrated power market by 2050. Their declaration, handed to Andris Piebalgs, EU energy commissioner, comes as Europe is under attack for lowering its ambitions to combat climate change, handing over leadership to the US and China and reneging on efforts to help the poorest developing countries adapt to a low-carbon economy.	19th March 2009
Americans support action on global warming despite economic crisis - EurekAlert Even in the midst of a growing economic crisis last fall, over 90 percent of Americans said that the United States should act to reduce global warming, according to a national survey released today by researchers at Yale and George Mason Universities. The results included 34 percent who said the United States should make a large-scale effort, even if it has large economic costs. Two-thirds of Americans said that the United States should reduce its emissions of greenhouse gases regardless of what other countries do, while only seven percent said the nation should act only if other industrialized and developing countries reduce their emissions as well. "When you make a mess, you're supposed to clean up after yourself," said Anthony Leiserowitz of Yale University. "We think many Americans view climate change in a similar way. The United States should act to reduce it's own emissions regardless of what other countries do."	19th March 2009
Global warming leaving its mark on polar bears - SpaceDaily TROMSOE, Norway, March 19 (AFP) Mar 19, 2009 Potentially fatal to the polar bear, global warming has already left its mark on the species with smaller, less robust bears that are increasingly showing cannibalistic tendencies.	19th March 2009
Signs of global warming in Iran - Payvand Iran News This winter, temperatures in Iran were much warmer than in previous years, to the point that people sought out the shade to protect themselves from getting sunburns. It's really amazing how warm this past winter has been. People have even begun to turn on their air conditioners in some cities, which they had never before used at this time of the year. -M.A. Saki, MNA	19th March 2009
CLIMATE CHANGE: A Development Mechanism That Cleans Little - IPS BERLIN, Mar 18 (IPS) - The clean development mechanism, the Kyoto Protocol instrument that allows industries in rich countries to earn emission reduction credits by financing environment-friendly projects in developing countries, is a perverse but at the moment necessary tool to fight global warming, says a German environmental expert.	19th March 2009
Beyond stem cells and global warming: Media ignore bush administration's widespread interference with science - Huffington Post Beyond Stem Cells and Global Warming: Media Ignore Bush ...Huffington Post, NY... scientific evidence in areas such as stem cell research and climate change." Similarly, McClatchy Newspapers described Obama as joining "a chorus of critics complaining that the Bush administration ignored science on issues such as global warming. ...	19th March 2009
Internet could become environmental watchdog: study - Reuters OSLO (Reuters) - The Internet could provide an early warning system for environmental damage, imitating an online watchdog that gives alerts about outbreaks of disease, scientists said on Thursday. [..better keep the net free then...}	19th March 2009
Tim Nicholson: A green martyr - Independent An executive sacked from a giant property company can claim he was unfairly dismissed because of his "philosophical belief in climate change", a judge ruled yesterday.	19th March 2009
ENVIRONMENT-NAMIBIA: Ten Dollars for a 200-Year-Old Tree Mile 20, NAMIBIA, Mar 18 (IPS) - Despite the investment of millions of donor dollars, the permit system in Namibia's Community Forests has failed dismally, say biodiversity experts. Illegal logging in the inland Kavango is more alive than ever.	19th March 2009
EU plans puts climate finance at risk: industry - Reuters COPENHAGEN (Reuters) - European Union plans to re-write the rules of a $6 billion scheme that pays developing nations to cut greenhouse gas emissions risks stalling climate investment, policymakers and industry leaders said on Wednesday.	19th March 2009
Soil neglected asset in greenhouse gas fight BEDFORD, England (Reuters) - John Ibbett and pigs go back a long way. "The pig manager pushed me round in a pram," recalls Ibbett, whose family have been farming on the same site since 1939.	19th March 2009
Action on climate to harm Gulf economies: Saudi official VIENNA (Reuters) - Strict measures across the world to act against climate change could seriously affect the economies of Saudi Arabia and other Gulf nations, a Saudi official said on Thursday.	19th March 2009

Conspiracy of silence - Grist Magazine U.S. media largely ignores latest warning from climate scientists.	18th March 2009
Is the EU moving the goalposts on climate change? - Guardian De Boer is clearly worried that the EU is about to break promises made at the Bali climate negotiations in 2007 with regard to providing public money to support developing countries mitigate and adapt to climate change. The two men also appear to hold different views about the best mechanism to get developing countries involved in global efforts to bend the curve in global emissions.
Time to gamble on a post-carbon world - Guardian An economy that promotes quality over quantity will restore the confidence we need to live within our ecological meansThink of the last time you backed away from a gamble. What was it that stopped you placing the bet – a lack of money or a lack of confidence?Climate change represents an unprecedented challenge on so many levels. But beyond the climate science and the political manoeuvring, humanity needs to collectively prepare itself for the single biggest psychological challenge it has ever faced: the transition to a post-carbon society. And that's where the psychological analogy with a poker game comes in.Some suggest that a lack of liquidity spells disaster for the ambitious emissions cuts that are so desperately needed, while others see the ideal opportunity to take a gamble and radically reshuffle the global economy and labour market.	18th March 2009
A crash course in climate change - Mother Nature Network A new seminar gives Londoners all they ever wanted to know about global warming and were afraid to ask.	18th March 2009
How Will Agriculture Adapt To Climatic Change? - MyNews.in Global warming is a modern development problem- complicated involving the entire world tangled up with difficult issues such as poverty, economic development and population growth. Dealing with it will not be easy. Ignoring it will be worse. This is one of several crucial challenges that already impede the progress of agriculture particularly in the vast marginal rainfed farming regions where majority of the Earth’s poor and food insecure reside. This means that addressing the difficulties that farmers already faced in many areas - not only low and erratic rainfall and hot temperature but also inadequate infrastructure, lack of access to markets and credit and other challenges- will contribute to current agricultural development and food security while building resilience to future climate change. Use of Bio technology for development of varieties with enhanced tolerance to biotic and abiotic stress, resource conservation technologies tat use less water and nutrients are some examples of technologies required to tackle the effect of climate change. A new model of development is required to give urgency to copping with climate change. Apparently, successful adaptation will require not only new crop technologies and increased investment in water security but also policy backup to give small-scale subsistence farmers better access to information, credit and market. Understanding these impacts will help clarify the specific adaptation that both policy makers and farmers must make.	18th March 2009
Early spring has its down side - Toronto Star Spring might be celebrated as a new beginning, but when it comes this early, it is the beginning of the end. At least for the wildlife.	18th March 2009
Robot sub in Antarctica finds clues to rising seas - Reuters OSLO (Reuters) - A robot submarine has found clues to rising world sea levels by making trips deep beneath an ice shelf in Antarctica, scientists said on Tuesday.	18th March 2009
'Cap the rich' to keep emissions targets fair - Reuters A proposal to force well-off individuals from any country to follow personal emissions targets offers hope for a fairer climate deal	18th March 2009
U.S. cuts red tape on offshore renewable energy - Reuters WASHINGTON (Reuters) - With the aim of ending a regulatory turf war, U.S. government agencies on Tuesday said they would work together to cut red tape and spur development of offshore renewable energy projects.	18th March 2009
Common myths of the population debate - Energy Bulletin In any debate there are particular key arguments that are used to undermine the opponent. A debate as heated as that over the importance, or not, of population growth is sure to feature these. It should be clear to readers of my essay published last week that I regard population growth as the core issue in any discussion on sustainability. Many of the arguments used by those who wish to dismiss or lessen the importance of population growth are false, misleading or simply mental tricks allowing their advocates the comfort of self-deception. read more	18th March 2009
Climate may heat crises, too, military analysts say - The Christian Science Monitor Competition for resources, 'climate migrants,' failed states are among top concerns.	18th March 2009
Without commercial carbon capture, it's 'game over', E.ON boss tells government - Guardian Chief executive Paul Golby says technology will only be developed with state fundingLeading energy industry executives today called on the government to ensure the development of carbon capture and storage becomes commercially viable.Paul Golby, chief executive of E.ON UK said the commercial development of the technology, which stops the carbon dioxide produced through burning fossil fuels being released into the atmosphere, was vital if the world was to meet the growing demand for energy and still tackle climate change. [This is what we're up against - the perpetual obsession with growth (see also: Why politicians dare not limit economic growth)]	18th March 2009

If we behave as if it's too late, then our prophecy is bound to come true - Guardian However unlikely success might be, we can't afford to abandon efforts to cut emissions - we just don't have any better optionQuietly in public, loudly in private, climate scientists everywhere are saying the same thing: it's over. The years in which more than 2C of global warming could have been prevented have passed, the opportunities squandered by denial and delay. On current trajectories we'll be lucky to get away with 4C. Mitigation (limiting greenhouse gas pollution) has failed; now we must adapt to what nature sends our way. If we can. This, at any rate, was the repeated whisper at the climate change conference in Copenhagen last week.	17th March 2009
Climate change blues: how scientists cope by Marlowe Hood - France24 Climate change blues: how scientists cope by Marlowe HoodFrance24, FranceFrench glaciologist Claude Lorius, one of the first scientists to publish, in 1987, evidence that global warming was real, has despaired of getting the message across. "At first, I thought that we could convince people. But there is a terrible inertia ...	17th March 2009
China wants importers to cover some emission costs - Reuters WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Countries that buy Chinese goods should be held responsible for the carbon dioxide emitted by the factories that make them in any global plan to reduce greenhouse gases, a Chinese official said on Monday.	17th March 2009
Michael McCarthy: Have we seen our final big freeze? - Independent A curious thought keeps nagging at me and will not go away: have we just seen the last cold winter?	17th March 2009
Wind cuts exposure to fuel, carbon swings: lobby - Reuters MARSEILLE (Reuters) - Decision makers comparing wind power prices with apparently cheaper energy sources should take full account of the lower exposure to fuel and carbon price volatility that wind offers, a wind industry group said.	17th March 2009
Biochar: Is the hype justified? - BBC News The green guru James Lovelock claims that the only hope of mitigating catastrophic climate change is through biochar - biomass "cooked" by pyrolysis. There's a flurry of worldwide interest in biochar - but is the hype justified?	17th March 2009
Replacing Social Security With Carbon Taxes - Portfolio.com via Yahoo! Finance Hendrik Hertzberg gets stuck in to the fiscal-policy debate this week, with a proposal to essentially abolish payroll taxes and replace them with various sorts of carbon and consumption taxes.	17th March 2009
Gore upbeat on climate deal prospect - Guardian Unlimited Al Gore, the former US vice-president, delivers an upbeat assessment of the global response to climate change today, saying he believes a "political tipping point" has been reached which will enable leaders to avert environmental catastrophe. In his first newspaper interview since the US election, the Nobel peace prize winner tells the Guardian that Barack Obama's arrival in the White ...	17th March 2009
Economic crisis gives us a chance of repairing climate damage - Guardian Large-scale investment to fix global finances is an opportunity to move quickly to a low-carbon economyThe financial crisis that started in May 2007 is a global catastrophe. As central banks, one after another, reduce interest rates towards zero, they risk the world economy falling into a global liquidity trap in which monetary and fiscal policies become ineffective and regulation becomes the main instrument for recovery. The effect of such a trap is to risk global depression and mass unemployment for years to come.In the background lurks another crisis - the risk of dangerous climate change. Although these changes are slow-moving, increasing concentrations of greenhouse gases will risk more climate catastrophes that will damage human wellbeing and conceivably lead to mass unemployment in the very long run.These two crises are not independent.	17th March 2009

Copenhagen

Pulling the cap on tight at Copenhagen - Guardian Carbon trading permits prices have plummeted, so the EU needs to strip out all the spare permits, or hot air, created by the recessionYesterday was day one of a conference on carbon trading - a phenomenon that will either save the world from rising carbon emissions, or is a "scam" that is part of the problem.One of the selling points of the Carbon Market Insights Conference is that it is taking place in the same venue as the hugely important conference of parties to the UN framework convention on climate change in December. Arriving there by metro in the drizzle this evening, I was confronted by a building site around which you have to walk to the west entrance of the euphemistically named Bella Centre.	17th March 2009
UK carbon targets 'too weak' to prevent dangerous climate change: scientists - Guardian Official advice being used to set Britain's first carbon budget is "naïvely optimistic" and will not stop dangerous climate change, experts from the Tyndall Centre for Climate Change Research sayProposed government carbon targets are too weak to prevent dangerous levels of global warming, according to a new analysis by leading scientists. Ministers are poised to introduce strict limits on UK carbon pollution when they announce Britain's first carbon budget next month. But experts from the Tyndall Centre for Climate Change Research warn today that official advice used to set the budget is "naïvely optimistic" and will not stop dangerous climate change.It comes after scientists at a global warming conference in Copenhagen last week warned that emissions are rising faster than expected, and that climate change could strike harder and faster than predicted.	17th March 2009
Carbon sinks losing the battle with rising emissions - EurekAlert! ( CSIRO Australia ) The stabilizing influence that land and ocean carbon sinks have on rising carbon emissions is gradually weakening, scientists who attended the international Copenhagen Climate Change Conference.	17th March 2009

Children come with a high carbon cost - New Scientist Having one child today could eventually cause many times your own lifetime's carbon emissions	17th March 2009
Film review: The Age of Stupid - New Scientist The latest film on climate change attempts to provide 20/20 hindsight while there is still time to act See also: Postlethwaite may return OBE over Kingsnorth - Guardian	17th March 2009
Are carbon traders lining their pockets or saving the world? - Guardian With the credit crunch and collapse in the price of carbon, even loyal enthusiasts are questioning whether carbon trading can ever enable investors to confidently back emissions saving projectsNext week I will be attending - depending on your perspective - either a gathering of evil capitalists seeking to line their pockets while the world fries or an excellent opportunity to learn about, discuss and plan the future of the most important climate policy in play to date. Last year's Carbon Market Insights Conference, which is aimed at companies and organisations involved in carbon trading, attracted 1,600 delegates from 65 different countries, representing 800 organisations.	17th March 2009
Future of floods - BBC News Anticipating watery climate change in the Netherlands	17th March 2009
Forests 'facing a testing time' - BBC News The world's forests are facing the dual challenge of climate change and economic turmoil, a UN report observes.	17th March 2009
EU calls on farmers to start adapting to climate - Reuters BRUSSELS (Reuters) - Europe's farmers must think how to adapt to climate change in coming decades, altering their practices to cut greenhouse gas emissions, make agriculture more resilient and keep land in use, a European Commission paper said.	17th March 2009
Mighty diatoms: Global climate feedback from microscopic algae - Insciences Organisation Mighty diatoms: Global climate feedback from microscopic algaeInsciences Organisation, SwitzerlandCarbon dioxide buildup, due to a significant extent to burning fossil fuels and deforestation, is identified as the leading cause of climate change. Carbon dioxide is at its highest level in at least 650000 years and rising, according to The National ...	17th March 2009
Climate-related changes on the Antarctic peninsula - PhysOrg Scientists have long established that the Antarctic Peninsula is one of the most rapidly warming spots on Earth. Now, new research using detailed satellite data indicates that the changing climate is affecting not just the penguins at the apex of the food chain, but simultaneously the microscopic life that is the base of the ecosystem.	17th March 2009
No, minister: mandarins frustrate Miliband's green revolution - Independent It was designed as a symbol of the Government's firm commitment to curbing climate change – a new department, with a bright, ambitious Secretary of State, dedicated to planning Britain's energy production around curbing greenhouse emissions and streamlining the fight to save the planet.	17th March 2009
Greenland thaw among feared climate shifts by 2200 - Reuters OSLO (Reuters) - A drastic climate shift such as a thaw of Greenland's ice or death of the Amazon forest is more than 50 percent likely by the year 2200 in cases of strong global warming, according to a survey of experts.	17th March 2009
With urgency, McKibben calls for global action to make 350 the target in climate change - Goshen College Record GOSHEN, Ind. – Bill McKibben hopes that the world is ready to act fast, and aim for 350 – "the most important number in the world." "Anything more than that is not compatible with life on this planet," the environmental author, educator and activist said.	17th March 2009

Scientist: Warming Could Cut Population to 1 Billion - New York Times Hans Joachim Schellnhuber, the director of the Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research in Germany, said that if the buildup of greenhouse gases and its consequences pushed global temperatures 9 degrees Fahrenheit higher than today — well below the upper temperature range that scientists project could occur from global warming — Earth’s population would be devastated. [UPDATED, 6:10 p.m: The preceding line was adjusted to reflect that Dr. Schellnhuber was not describing a worst-case warming projection. h/t to Joe Romm.] “In a very cynical way, it’s a triumph for science because at last we have stabilized something –- namely the estimates for the carrying capacity of the planet, namely below 1 billion people,” said Dr. Schellnhuber, who has advised German Chancellor Angela Merkel on climate policy and is a visiting professor at Oxford.	14th March 2009
Stern attacks politicians over climate 'devastation' - Guardian Politicians have failed to take on board the severe consequences of failing to cut world carbon emissions, according to Nicholas Stern, the economist commissioned by Gordon Brown to analyse the impact of climate change. His stark warning about the potentially "devastating" consequences of global warming came as scientists issued a desperate plea last night for world leaders to curb greenhouse gas emissions or face an ecological and social disaster. More from Copenhagen Act fast or face decades of upheaval and war, climate scientists tell governments - Mail on Sunday Leading article: The outlook for our climate is dark – but hope remains - Independent Alarm at 'weak' greenhouse targets - Sydney Morning Herald	14th March 2009
Paris Hilton and the End of the World - DeSmogBlog Britney Spears is a great artist. Paris Hilton is very talented. It seems the yawning gulf between perception and reality has never been greater. That is truer still for how the public perceives climate science. A new poll shows that 41% of Americans now believe concerns around global warming are exaggerated -the highest level of skepticism in over a decade. This is a shocking figure given the latest scientific findings being reveled, even as we speak, at a gathering of 2,500 of the world's leading researchers on climate change. This chasm of opinion between the scientific community and the public shows how criminally irresponsible many in the mainstream media have been about portraying climate science, and how effective the misinformation campaign by the fossil fuel lobby has been in deceiving the average American.	14th March 2009
Obama Needs to Spark a Global Green Deal to Create a Sustainable Economy - Alternet It would be a crash program to jump-start the transition to a global economy that is climate-friendly and climate-resilient.	14th March 2009
Let's bank on low carbon - Guardian The now-widespread notion of a global green new deal offers truly huge opportunities for government and industry to change history. We could create jobs faster than many think possible, especially in energy efficiency. We could cut emissions faster than many would imagine, especially in buildings – the biggest single source of emissions. We could soften the landing if the energy crisis so many fear materialises. We could engineer a system able to create wealth worth having, and communities worth living in. But we do need just a fraction of the billions being bunged at the banks if we are to have a chance of doing this.	14th March 2009
Plan for huge wind farm moves forward - Reuters BOSTON (Reuters) - A $1 billion proposal to build the first massive U.S. offshore wind-power farm has moved a step closer to overcoming permit requirements in Massachusetts, where it faces opposition from some influential residents.	14th March 2009
The climate is in breakdown - so, what next? - Business Green One study suggested that subsidies of just €10 to €20bn a year would allow the solar and wind energy industry to account for around 40 per cent of the global electricity mix by 2050. Similarly, £50bn could make the ambitious plan to generate Europe's energy from solar farms in the Sahara a reality, while there is growing evidence that such investments would actually deliver a net increase in GDP. The upfront costs might sound large, but they are miniscule compared to the amount governments have spent propping up failing banks. Many of the stimulus packages being rolled out around the world already have a green hue, but if we made them greener still we really could deliver deep cuts in emissions while restoring economic growth. Finally, while the change in the climate might be terrifyingly fast, rapid cultural and economic changes are possible too.	14th March 2009
'Biochar' goes industrial with giant microwaves to lock carbon in charcoal - Guardian Climate expert claims to have developed cleanest way of fixing CO2 in 'biochar' for burial on an industrial scaleGiant microwave ovens that can "cook" wood into charcoal could become our best tool in the fight against global warming, according to a leading British climate scientist.Chris Turney, a professor of geography at the University of Exeter, said that by burying the charcoal produced from microwaved wood, the carbon dioxide absorbed by a tree as it grows can remain safely locked away for thousands of years. The technique could take out billions of tonnes of CO2 from the atmosphere every year.Fast-growing trees such as pine could be "farmed" to act specifically as carbon traps - microwaved, buried and replaced with a fresh crop to do the same thing again.Turney has built a 5m-long prototype of his microwave, which produces a tonne of CO2 for $65.	14th March 2009
High and dry on the California farm - Reuters At lunchtime in California's San Joaquin Valley, farmers meet up at Jack's Prime Time Restaurant, where they can get a good, honest meal … just what one expects from an establishment smack dab in the middle of the most productive farming region in the world. But the mood at Jack's is decidely somber. A few days earlier, the farmers in these parts were told not to expect any federally supplied water this year due to a third year of drought and low levels in the reservoirs. Without water, they can't plant their lettuce and tomatoes, and they may lose parts of their precious almond and pistachio orchards.	14th March 2009
Spring to emerge earlier than ever - Daily Telegraph Spring is likely to arrive ever earlier as a result of climate change a survey by nature watchers suggests after they spotted birds nesting and plants flowering across the UK already.	14th March 2009
Turbine trouble - BBC News The fate of Scotland's wind farms up for debate	14th March 2009
Canada legally bound to protect ecosystem: WWF - CNews The polar bears are on thin ice.	14th March 2009
Forests, Marshes Save Cities Billions of Dollars in Water Costs - Bloomberg Jakarta preserves nearby forests because the trees shield some 60 streams and rivers from evaporation and erosion. That provides cheap drinking water to the Indonesian capital, avoiding about $1.5 billion a year that would be needed to import supplies from distant reservoirs. Protecting local water basins has caught on in cities including Caracas, Venezuela, as a method to reduce new investment in pipes and pumps, according to the International Union for Conservation of Nature, based in Gland, Switzerland.	14th March 2009
Economists fiddle while climate burns - The Age If your greater concern is achieving the desired reduction in emissions then you go for the scheme that gives you control of the quantity of emissions; if your greater concern is minimising the loss of economic growth then you go for the scheme that gives you control of the price of emissions. So if economists tend to favour a carbon tax it may be because they're a lot more concerned about giving up a bit of economic growth than they are about doing insufficient to prevent global warming. Implicitly, they're not convinced climate change constitutes as great a risk as the majority of scientists tell us it is. The hidden logic seems to be that if we find reducing emissions more economically disruptive than we expected we can simply stop raising the rate of the carbon tax and not much harm done. Of course, the weakness in this line of thinking is that if the scientists are right - and the signs so far are that they've understated rather than overstated the size of the problem and the speed at which we're approaching the point of no return - then the ultimate loss of economic growth will far outweigh the loss the economists imagined they were trying to avoid.	14th March 2009
Media Mayhem: Don't trust this man - Mother Nature Network Marc Morano, a Republican operative, has taken denying climate change to a whole new level. Don't say we didn't warn you.	14th March 2009
Sea Level Rise Due to Global Warming Poses Threat to New York City - PhysOrg (PhysOrg.com) -- Global warming is expected to cause the sea level along the northeastern U.S. coast to rise almost twice as fast as global sea levels during this century, putting New York City at greater risk for damage from hurricanes and winter storm surge, according to a new study led by a Florida State University researcher.	14th March 2009
Addressing Climate Change: Breaking Old Models - TechNewsWorld A report from the National Research Council warns that global warming will bring on environmental changes the world is simply not prepared for. Changes to the ways both individuals and organizations approach myriad decisions -- from what sort of air conditioner they use to how engineers build bridges -- will be needed.	14th March 2009

Copenhagen [essential]

Earth warming faster than thought - BBC News International scientists say the worst-case scenarios on climate change envisaged just two years ago are already being realised.	13th March 2009
Europe 'will be hit by severe drought' without urgent action on emissions - Guardian Southern England would be badly affected – while Spain, Portugal, southern Italy, Greece would turn into semi-desertEurope will be struck by a series of severe droughts that will make life "hell" for hundreds of millions of people unless urgent action is taken to reduce carbon emissions, a new study shows.Large swaths of land, from Portugal to Ukraine, will suffer serious droughts at least every other year by the end of the century if average temperatures rise by 4C. Southern England would also be severely affected, with summers as dry as the droughts of 1976 and 1995 expected every other year.	13th March 2009
Severe global warming 'will render half of world's inhabited areas unliveable' - Guardian Parts of China, India and the eastern US could all become too warm in summer for people to lose heat by sweating, expert warnsSevere global warming could make half the world's inhabited areas literally too hot to live in, a US scientist warned today.Parts of China, India and the eastern US could all become too warm in summer for people to lose heat by sweating - rendering such areas effectively uninhabitable.	13th March 2009
Climate change already shaping society - New Scientist Climate change already shaping societyNew Scientist, UKHuman society is already, in small but significant ways, being shaped by global warming. So said a climatologist at the climate change congress in Copenhagen, Denmark, on Thursday. Jean Palutikof of the University of East Anglia, UK, ...	13th March 2009
Replace Kyoto protocol with global carbon tax, says Yale economist - Guardian The world should dump the "inefficient and ineffective" Kyoto protocol and replace it with a global carbon tax, leading economist William Nordhaus said yesterday. "To bet the world's climate system on the Kyoto approach is a reckless gamble", he told the climate change congress in Copenhagen. "Taxation is a proven instrument. Taxes may be unpopular, but they work. The Kyoto model is largely untested and the experience we have tells us it will not meet our objective — to stablise the world climate system." See also: Carbon tax only way to keep planet cool: Hansen - Interview - Petroleumworld.com	13th March 2009
Six ways to save the world: scientists compile list of climate change clinchers - Guardian Scientists at this week's conference in Copenhagen summarise findings for policy makers to discuss at UN summit in DecemberScientists at the international congress in Copenhagen have prepared a summary statement of their findings for policy makers. This was handed today to the Danish prime minister, Anders Fogh Rasmussen. Ahead of the UN Climate Change Conference in December he will formally hand this statement over to officials and heads of state at the conference. The full conclusions from the 2,500 scientific delegates from 80 countries that have attended the three-day meeting this week will be published in full in June 2009.	13th March 2009
Time to change 'climate change' - Monbiot What's clear from Copenhagen is that policymakers have fallen behind the scientists: global warming is already catastrophicThe more we know, the grimmer it gets. Presentations by climate scientists at this week's conference in Copenhagen show that we might have underplayed the impacts of global warming in three important respects: • Partly because the estimates by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) took no account of meltwater from Greenland's glaciers, the rise in sea levels this century could be twice or three times as great as it forecast, with grave implications for coastal cities, farmland and freshwater reserves. • Two degrees of warming in the Arctic (which is heating up much more quickly than the rest of the planet) could trigger a massive bacterial response in the soils there.	13th March 2009

Leading article: When the ice melts, it is too late - Independent On the day-to-day timescale that humans normally deal with, climate change appears to be a slow process that takes place over decades and centuries. This generates a common misconception: if things get really bad, we can quickly change our behaviour and set it all right again. This is a fallacy, rather like the idea that we can alter the course of a supertanker minutes before it collides with an iceberg. The climate responds slowly because it has an in-built resistance to change – which is why 200 years of vast fossil-fuel emissions have taken so long to produce an effect, and why any delay now in curbing carbon dioxide emissions will only store up bigger problems for the future.	13th March 2009
Climate matters - Grist If you take climate change seriously -- really take is seriously -- your hair is on fire. You don't think we have time left to do this in a way that avoids disruption. You think it's time to mobilize, with speed and at a scale commensurate with the preparation for WWII. Probably bigger. According to Saul Griffith and the folks at WattzOn (see here), to get to 450ppm in time we need to build: 100 m² of solar cells every second for the next 25 years. 15% efficiency, good siting. 50 m² of solar thermal mirrors every second for the next 25 years. 30% efficiency, well sited. 12 3MW wind turbines in great locations every hour. Or one 100m diameter turbine every 5 minutes ... 1x 3GW Nuclear plant every week for the next 25 years. 3x 100MW steam turbines every day for next 25 years. 1250 m² or 1 olympic swimming pool of algae every second for the next 25 years. It's industrially possible, but it's going to require huge, urgent, coordinated action, immediately. Some of it can be "market-based," but friendliness to existing market actors is secondary, not primary.	13th March 2009
America unprepared for climate change, say policy advisers - Guardian America is woefully unprepared for climate change, and the government agencies charged with delivering the latest science to decision makers are not up to the task, a new report said today. The National Research Council, a policy advice centre that is part of the US National Academy of Sciences, said that government agencies and political leaders, concerned more than ever about climate change, were not getting the information or the guidance they needed. "Many decision makers are experiencing or anticipating a new climate regime and are asking questions about climate change and potential responses to it that federal agencies are unprepared to answer," the council said in its report, Restructuring Federal Climate Research to Meet the Challenges of Climate Change. See also: Two-Fifths of Americans Think Climate Change Exaggerated - Fox News	13th March 2009
Carbon Dioxide, Methane Rise Sharply in 2007 - NOAA Last year alone global levels of atmospheric carbon dioxide, the primary driver of global climate change, increased by 0.6 percent, or 19 billion tons. Additionally methane rose by 27 million tons after nearly a decade with little or no increase.	13th March 2009
International Scientists Find ‘Acidified' Water on the Continental Shelf from Canada to Mexico - NOAA Evidence of corrosive water caused by the ocean's absorption of carbon dioxide (CO2) was found less than 20 miles off the west coast of North America during a field study from Canada to Mexico last summer. This was the first time “acidified” ocean water has been found on the continental shelf of western North America.	13th March 2009
NOAA: Global Temperature Seventh Warmest for Spring, Eighth Warmest for May - NOAA The combined average global land and ocean surface temperatures for spring (March-May) ranked seventh warmest, while May was the eighth warmest since worldwide records began in 1880 according to an analysis by NOAA's National Climatic Data Center in Asheville, N.C.	13th March 2009
Changing wind patterns linked to global warming alter food chain in Antarctica - CNews WASHINGTON - Scientists say changing wind patterns linked to global warming are altering the food chain in Antarctica and may also lead to further increases in greenhouse gases in the atmosphere.	13th March 2009
"Mad" microplants show Antarctic climate change - Reuters WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Because atmospheric circulation patterns are shifting over the peninsula -- probably due to climate change -- there are now cloudy skies where there used to be sunshine and vice versa, said study co-author Martin Montes-Hugo of Rutgers University. In the southern part of the peninsula, the clouds are decreasing and sunlight is melting the sea ice, freeing up more open water that sunlight can shine through, Montes-Hugo said by telephone. "You have more open water and so you have light penetration, so the phytoplankton is happy in the south," he said, because like most plants, phytoplankton need sunlight for photosynthesis. In the northern part of the peninsula closer to the warm equator there are more clouds, and sea ice is even more reduced than in the south. Changing atmospheric patterns are whipping up increasing winds in the area, churning the ocean water, which enables the phytoplankton to go deeper. At these deeper levels, the little plants can catch less sunshine.	13th March 2009
£50bn of European investment needed to kick-start Saharan solar plan - Guardian Government investment worth £50bn would convince private companies that power from the Sahara solar scheme is feasible and attractive option, expert saysEuropean countries could transform their electricity supplies within a decade by investing in a giant network of solar panels in the Sahara desert, an expert told a global warming conference in Copenhagen today.Dr Anthony Patt of the International Institute for Applied Systems Analysis in Africa said some £50bn of government investment was needed over the next decade to make the scheme a reality. That would convince private companies that power from the Sahara was both feasible and an attractive investment, he said.In the long term, such a plan, combined with strings of windfarms along the north Africa coast, could "supply Europe with all the energy it needs".	13th March 2009
CO2 Reduction Commitment Could Save Cos GBP1 Billion - Nasdaq (Adds CBI comment.) LONDON -(Dow Jones)- The U.K. government's new mandatory Carbon Reduction Commitment scheme could save businesses GBP1 billion by 2020, U.K. Energy and Climate Change Minister Joan Ruddock said Thursday.	13th March 2009
Czech minister slams president over climate change - France24 Czech Environment Minister Martin Bursik on Thursday slammed President Vaclav Klaus over his speech at last week's conference on climate change where he said the planet had been cooling for the past decade. "I am sorry to say that in his public appearances Vaclav Klaus manifests a combination of activism and amateurism," said Green Party chairman Bursik, whose country holds the six-month European Union presidency.	13th March 2009
Climate change affecting agriculture in Karachi - The News International Researchers from the University of Karachi (KU) Department of Geography have discovered the relationship between climate change and increase in the incidence of diseases, and the decrease in agricultural products in and around Karachi.	13th March 2009
California Hydrogen Highway R.I.P. - Grist The false hope of a hydrogen economy is on its death bed	13th March 2009
'Coral lab' offers acidity insight - BBC News An underwater "coral laboratory" in the Red Sea offers an insight to the impacts of future ocean acidification.	13th March 2009
Rapid action needed to save polar bears from climate change: WWF - Space Daily Polar bears are in danger of being wiped out unless urgent measures are taken to combat climate change and rapid warming in the Arctic, environmental group WWF warned Thursday. "No sea ice equates no polar bears. It's really that simple," WWF polar bear expert Geoff York told reporters.	13th March 2009
Prince: 'Climate Crisis Worse Than Recession' - Sky News Prince Charles has warned that the current global financial crisis is "nothing" compared to the impact of climate change.	13th March 2009
Camp protesters 'sleep-deprived' - BBC News Police are accused in a report by the Liberal Democrats of using sleep-deprivation to intimidate climate protesters in Kent.	13th March 2009
Arctic, Antarctic: Poles Apart in Climate Response - NOAA While the Arctic and the Antarctic experience similar greenhouse gas levels and solar radiation, each region responds in a dramatically different way, especially in temperature and loss of sea ice, says an international team of scientists that includes a NOAA oceanographer. While the Arctic is warming, most of Antarctica is not, largely because of the ozone hole, but projections indicate that is likely to change.	13th March 2009
Northern Wildfire Smoke May Cast Shadow on Arctic Warming - NOAA The Arctic may get some temporary relief from global warming if the annual North American wildfire season intensifies, according to a new study by researchers at the University of Colorado and NOAA.	13th March 2009

US carbon cuts could spark 'revolution' - Guardian The head of the UN body charged with leading the fight against climate change has conceded that Barack Obama will face a "revolution" if he commits the US to the deep carbon cuts that scientists and campaigners say are needed.Rajendra Pachauri, head of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), said domestic political constraints made it impossible for the US president to announce ambitious short-term climate targets similar to those set by Europe. And he questioned the value of a new global climate deal without such a US pledge.His words come as scientists at the Copenhagen conference said that modest IPCC estimates of likely sea level rise this century need to be increased.	12th March 2009
Rising seas could cost California more than $100B - Forbes Report: A rising sea level caused by a warming climate could cost California an estimated $100 billion in property loss by the end of the century, two-thirds of which will occur in the San Francisco Bay area, a new state-commissioned study has found.	12th March 2009
Fate of the rainforest is 'irreversible' - Independent The impact of climate change on the Amazon rainforest could be much worse than previously predicted, new research suggests. See also: Climate change transforming rainforests into 'major carbon emitters' - Guardian	12th March 2009
International Trade Rules and Climate Change Policy: Part I - The Globalist The Obama Administration has provided new leadership for tackling climate change. Yet with the limits of international trade rules, how can an effective cap and trade policy be crafted?	12th March 2009
Is the global economy a Ponzi scheme? Part 1 - Grist By Joseph RommYes, homo "sapiens" sapiens have constructed the grandest of Ponzi schemes, whereby current generations have figured out how to live off the wealth of future generations. Yes, we are all in essence Madoffs (many wittingly, most not) or at least his most credulous clients. What comes next will be the subject of a multipart series. I had been planning to write something on this for a while when NYT columnist Tom Friedman interviewed me for "The Inflection Is Near?" which appears in Saturday's New York Times: "We created a way of raising standards of living that we can't possibly pass on to our children," said Joe Romm, a physicist and climate expert who writes the indispensable blog climateprogress.org. See also: Is the global economy a Ponzi scheme? Part 2	12th March 2009
Carbon tax only way to keep planet cool: Hansen - SpaceDaily COPENHAGEN, March 11 (AFP) Mar 11, 2009 Greenhouse gas emissions must be cut more quickly and deeply than thought only two years ago to avoid dire consequences, and a straight-up carbon tax is the only realistic way to do it, top climate scientist James Hansen said in an interview.	12th March 2009
Global warming reaches the Antarctic abyss - New Scientist Even water in the chilly depths of the Southern Ocean is getting warmer, according to results announced at the Copenhagen climate change congress	12th March 2009
Witness a journey to the bottom of an ice sheet - New Scientist Unprecedented video from deep inside Greenland's ice sheet reveals the internal plumbing of glaciers, and how it might help them move	12th March 2009
Climate change reduces nutritional value of algae - PhysOrg Micro-algae are growing faster under the influence of climate change. However, the composition of the algae is changing, as a result of which their nutritional value for other aquatic life is decreasing. And because algae are at the bottom of the food chain, climate change is exerting an effect on underwater life. This is the conclusion of researchers from the Netherlands Institute for Ecology and the Universiteit van Amsterdam.	12th March 2009
The best way to protect auto industry jobs is to stop making cars - Links International Journal of Socialist Renewal Propping up an obsolete technology may seem like it is defending jobs. In the long run, it does nothing of the sort. Tall buildings used to have multiple elevator operators. As push button elevators came in, those jobs were doomed. Demanding that elevator operator positions be maintained could only feed an illusion. It would have been far better to demand, like the OCAW, that elevator operators be guaranteed the transition to a different job. Automobile production is doomed. The last half of the world’s oil will disappear far more rapidly than did the first half. No fantasy of shale oil, tar sands, hydrogen or the like will save the private automobile. The only salvation for the remaining auto jobs is a complete rethinking of what can replace the production of cars. If auto workers are to be retrained, what would their new jobs be?	12th March 2009
Aid needed to boost world's "green" energy - Reuters COPENHAGEN (Reuters) - Wind and solar power could produce 40 percent of the world's electricity by 2050, but only if government subsidies are secured for the next two decades, scientists said on Wednesday.	12th March 2009
Scientists think they are on to a battery that 'charges in seconds' - BBC A simple change to lithium-ion battery manufacturing leads to cheaper, safer, faster-charging batteries.	12th March 2009
From AC to DC: Going green with supergrids - New Scientist Power lines stretching across continents would allow us to ditch fossil fuels for good – and prove Edison right about direct current in the process	12th March 2009
Atmospheric ‘Sunshade' Could Reduce Solar Power Generation - NOAA The concept of delaying global warming by adding particles into the upper atmosphere to cool the climate could unintentionally reduce peak electricity generated by large solar power plants by as much as one-fifth, according to a new NOAA study.	12th March 2009
Are We Breeding Ourselves to Extinction? - Alternet Cutting back on fossil fuels, shutting down our coal plants, and building seas of wind turbines, will be useless unless we nip population growth.	12th March 2009
How to spot climate change deniers - Guardian Denialism blog has identified five tactics for spotting climate deniers that should set pseudo-science alarm bells ringing	12th March 2009
Scientists on the streets - Guardian To get the climate change message across, environmental scientists need better arguments – and more public protestsScientists are taking an increasingly political stance towards action on climate change. In 2005, the science academies of the G8 countries, plus China, India and Brazil, collectively called for governments to place climate change at the top of the international agenda. By 2008 they were calling for a planned transition to a low-carbon economy. Similarly, this week's international climate change conference in Copenhagen, at which I am speaking, is deliberately organised to try to influence the UN conference in December (also in Copenhagen), which will discuss placing global limits on carbon dioxide emissions.	12th March 2009
Climate change means bigger medical, council and property bills -PhysOrg Climate change concerns like melting icecaps, increased desertification, loss of coral reefs and the extinction of species like polar bears can seem a distant concern in our everyday lives. Little attention, however, has been paid to the likelihood of increased bills, through tax and insurance charges, that will be incurred as the UK climate changes.	12th March 2009
Carbon emissions fall as motorists shun gas guzzlers - Daily Telegraph Carbon emissions from new cars have fallen dramatically as motorists shun gas guzzlers and manufacturers bring in new technology.	12th March 2009
Crowd with a silver lining: A new climate change film has found a novel way of raising cash - Independent It was the moment that proved film maker Franny Armstrong's hard work had paid off. A contact of hers, a young professional had sent an email to her friends. Its title was simply: "Why I am kissing goodbye to my cash."	12th March 2009

Rising methane levels in Norway's Arctic - MSNBC Levels of methane in the Norwegian Arctic increased in 2007 possibly because the thawing northern tundra released more of the greenhouse gas into the atmosphere, officials said Monday. See also: Global warming may trigger carbon 'time bomb', scientist warns	11th March 2009
Earth may be entering climate change danger zone - New Scientist Climate experts updating the 2001 "burning embers" diagram, which looked at how risk levels change with a warming planet, find that the planet is being affected faster than expected See also: What Is Science Telling Us About Temperature Rises?	11th March 2009
The challenge facing the world's biggest polluters - Independent The clock is ticking in the race to agree a new treaty to cut the emissions that cause global warming. Michael McCarthy names and shames the offenders who must mend their ways.	11th March 2009
Sea levels rising twice as fast as predicted - Independent Sea levels are predicted to rise twice as fast as was forecast by the United Nations only two years ago, threatening hundreds of millions of people with catastrophe, scientists said yesterday in a dramatic new warning about climate change. Rapidly melting ice sheets in Greenland and Antarctica are likely to push up sea levels by a metre or more by 2100, swamping coastal cities and obliterating the living space of 600 million people who live in deltas, low-lying areas and small island states.	11th March 2009
ENVIRONMENT: Pine Beetle Kill No Longer Just Dead Wood - IPS VANCOUVER, Canada, Mar 10 (IPS/IFEJ) - The sheer magnitude of the devastation left by this tiny beetle is shocking on its own. See also: Canada's carbon sink has sprung a leak - Christian Science Monitor	11th March 2009
Salt surge puts crops in peril - The National KHAJURA, BANGLADESH // In this obscure village perched on the rugged coastline along the Bay of Bengal, climate change exudes a taste – the taste of salt. As recently as five years ago, water from the village well tasted sweet to Mohammed Jehangir. But now a glassful, flecked with tiny white crystals, tastes of brine. Like other paddy farmers in this southern village, Mr Jehangir is baffled by the change. But international scientists are not surprised as global warming causes sea levels to rise.	11th March 2009
Wheat Gains as Drought Persists in U.S. Southern Great Plains - Bloomberg March 10 (Bloomberg) -- Wheat rose for the second time in three sessions on signs that a prolonged drought in the southern Great Plains is damaging winter crops in the U.S., the world's largest exporter of the grain.	11th March 2009
Have we reached peak water? - Canada.com We all know about peak oil, but peak water? Water expert Peter Gleick of the Pacific Institute poses the possibility that, despite the vast amounts of water on "Planet Ocean," we may be running out of sustainably managed water.	11th March 2009
Cities in U.S. Southwest face thirsty times The fast-growing U.S. Southwest has a problem: too many people, not enough water. But then, what do you expect when you build cities like Las Vegas in the middle of a desert? My colleagues Tim Gaynor and Steve Gorman have done a story on this, looking at the water woes of Los Angeles and Las Vegas. You can see their report here and other stories from our water package here. Tim joined the “water warriors” of Las Vegas, city investigators who enforce restrictions on usage; Steve looked at the dire situation in Los Angeles, America's second largest city.	11th March 2009
Solutions & sustainability - Energy Bulletin Creating a Home Graywater System Community as Technology Foodzoning the Foodshed	11th March 2009
EPA Proposes National CO2 Reporting System - CNNMoney.com The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency proposed a national system for reporting carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gas emissions by major emitters Tuesday. The registry, which was originally proposed in a 2007 energy bill and is funded in U.S. President Barack Obama's 2010 Budget outline, would lay the foundation for regulation of CO2 and other gases thought to contribute to global warming.	11th March 2009
US governors picture eco-friendly fuelling stations along western route - Guardian Governors in Washington, Oregon and California are considering a plan to create a 'green freeway'Washington state governor Chris Gregoire and her counterparts in Oregon and California are considering a plan they hope would help transform the Pacific north-west's Interstate 5 from a freeway ruled by gasoline burners to a haven for eco-friendly cars and trucks.The three governors envision a series of alternative fuelling stations stretching from the Canadian border to Mexico, creating what has been dubbed a "green freeway".	11th March 2009
Heatwave deaths will quadruple in cities like London by end of the ... - Daily Mail Global warming will leave city dwellers sweltering and send heat-related deaths soaring, British scientists have warned. A study by researchers at King's College London and the Met Office predicts the number of heat-related deaths will quadruple in cities such as London by 2080.	11th March 2009
David Suzuki: Forests are another piece of the global warming puzzle - Georgia Straight We know that global warming is a reality and that we humans are its primary cause. And we know that carbon dioxide emissions, in large part from burning fossil fuels, are one of the biggest contributors to global warming. But we still have much to learn about the Earth’s mechanisms when it comes to regulating emissions and warming.	11th March 2009

U.S. needs to do more on climate: EU official - Reuters LONDON (Reuters) - The United States must make deeper cuts in greenhouse gas emissions than proposed by President Barack Obama if the world is to stand a chance of avoiding devastating climate change, an EU official said. See also: Obama's shaky trust in science - The Christian Science Monitor On stem cells, he's for the science. But not on climate change ...	10th March 2009
'More bad news' on climate change - BBC News More bad news on climate change is expected as more than 2,000 climate scientists gather in Copenhagen. They will be trying to pull together the latest research on global warming ahead of political negotiations later in the year.	10th March 2009
This scam is nothing but a handout for motor companies, resprayed green - Guardian Paying drivers to scrap their old cars and buy new ones will do nothing to catalyse a low-carbon transport revolutionThe magic numbers spin before our eyes. No one can grasp the scale of the handouts, or understand how public money that didn't exist - could never exist - for hospitals or schools or public toilets begins to flow as soon as bankers fall to their knees. We are punch drunk, reeling, uniquely vulnerable - because none of it makes sense any more - to demands from every species of scrounger. So prepare yourselves, ladies and gentlemen, for the worst scam of all.	10th March 2009
The World of Tomorrow - transcript of filmed talk to Transition Town Kildare - Energy Bulletin Tonight I'm going to assume that you all know the basics of peak oil and climate change, and move past the debate about whether they are real, move past the more apocalyptic and fearful ideas, and think about what kind of futures we might realistically see. read more	10th March 2009
Getting into hot water: Solar water heating pays for itself five times over - Physorg An analysis of the engineering and economics for a solar water-heating system shows it to have a payback period of just two years, according to researchers in India. They report, in the International Journal of Global Energy Issues, on the success of the 1000-liter system operating at a university hostel.	10th March 2009
Sweden Will Raise Taxes on Auto Emissions to Protect Climate - Bloomberg March 10 (Bloomberg) -- Sweden will increase taxes on cars burning fossil fuels and exempt electric vehicles to help meet a national plan to slash greenhouse-gas emissions by 40 percent.	10th March 2009
Carbon emissions creating acidic oceans not seen since dinosaurs - Guardian Chemical change placing 'unprecedented' pressure on marine life and could cause widespread extinctions, warn scientistsHuman pollution is turning the seas into acid so quickly that the coming decades will recreate conditions not seen on Earth since the time of the dinosaurs, scientists will warn today.The rapid acidification is caused by the massive amounts of carbon dioxide belched from chimneys and exhausts that dissolve in the ocean. The chemical change is placing "unprecedented" pressure on marine life such as shellfish and lobsters and could cause widespread extinctions, the experts say.The study, by scientists at Bristol University, will be presented at a special three-day summit of climate scientists in Copenhagen, which opens today.	10th March 2009
Is the U.S. West going the way of parched Australia? - Reuters The drought-induced infernos which ravaged parts of Australia earlier this year may be a harbinger of the water challenges coming to the American West. ”Think of that (Australia) as California's future,” water researcher Heather Cooley of California's Pacific Institute told my colleague Peter Henderson. You can see his report, part one of our series on water scarcity in the U.S. West, here. Plush green golf courses in the desert, verdant boulevards in Los Angeles and fountains that dance 20 stories high in Las Vegas are very much part of today's landscape and life in the American West. See also: Climate change accelerates water hunt in U.S. West	10th March 2009
Who's really destroying the earth - New Statesman Population growth is certainly one of the key problems facing developing countries. Decisive and effective action is necessary to address it, with due respect for the cultural, ethical and religious differences between diverse sectors of humanity. The lack of democratic processes of governance, and the profound social inequalities evident in most developing countries, are part of the array of issues where fundamental changes are required. But the population dilemma should not be isolated from the political and economic context it which it has thrived. The perception of population growth in developing countries as the culprit of worldwide environmental damage is a fallacy that deserves to be eradicated. It is, nevertheless, at the very bottom of foreign policies in most industrial nations, as part of the overall attempt to preserve the established international economic order, regardless of how profoundly unfair it may be to the majority of the human race.	10th March 2009
Deep domestic cuts are need to bring our housing footprint down- Guardian Nationwide programme of eco-refurbishment, cheap finance for home improvements and less concern with aesthetics are vital to reduce the carbon footprint of an average home	10th March 2009
Climate sceptics confuse the public by focusing on short-term fluctuations - Guardian Stefan Rahmstorf: Bjørn Lomborg denies data that sea levels are rising faster than expected with no sign of slowing downAs a lead author of the last IPCC report, I find it gratifying that Bjørn Lomborg sings the praise of the "careful work" of the "hugely respected" IPCC. However, Lomborg misrepresents what we wrote in the report. It did not conclude that sea level will stay within the bounds of 18-59 cm by 2100. Rather, effects of sliding ice will come on top of this, which are too hard to predict to give an upper limit. So the IPCC forecast is 18-59 cm plus an unknown extra rise.The IPCC report also found that during 1961-2003, sea level has risen 50% faster (1.8 mm/year) than projected by models (1.2 mm/year).	10th March 2009
Death by sound bites? The language of the cap-and-trade debate - New York Times Aware of the ability of slogans like "No Child Left Behind" to drive the debate on past topics, policymakers are ramping up their rhetoric about global warming like never before. All sides have opportunities to gain political traction by choosing their words carefully, even if President Obama's opponents appear to have the current edge in the communication war, many analysts say.	10th March 2009
We need it all - Grist When pondering whether we need to invest in energy efficiency, a smart grid, new storage technologies, or transmission to the best renewable energy resource areas, I urge interested parties to first take some time to watch TV. Specifically, this presentation given by Saul Griffith, MacArthur Genius at the Long Now Foundation: He calculated what's needed to, in the eloquent words of James Hansen, keep the world we evolved in. The answer? Cut each individual's carbon footprint to the bone via serious lifestyle choices. Then, dedicate an area the size of Australia to renewable energy production. And do so in the next 25 years.It's not an either/or proposition.	10th March 2009
The carbon-pricing bogeyman: not real - Grist E&E Daily reports ($ub. req'd) today on efforts in the House to try and determine how to minimize the economic pain of CO2 pricing. They note: Government studies conclude that for a new U.S. climate law to work, it must stem the demand for carbon-based energy by increasing prices -- not exactly the most politically popular thing to do during an economic crisis that is being compared to the Great Depression. All the logical failing of our CO2 policy discussion is nested in this paragraph. For climate law to work, it must put a price on CO2 emissions.	10th March 2009
Jessica Wilson: Stephen Harper government chases the wrong climate-change solutions - The Georgia Straight The hope for the under-30 generation is that the urgent threat of climate change will soon be taken seriously by industry and government.	10th March 2009
Advice for a young climate blogger - RealClimate Congratulations! You have taken the first step towards attempting to communicate your expertise and thoughts to the wider world, which remains poorly served by its traditional sources of information when it comes to complex societally relevant issues like climate change. Your aim to clarify the science (or policy options or ethical considerations or simply to explain your views) is a noble endeavor and we wish you luck and wide readership. But do be aware that you are dipping your blog into sometimes treacherous waters. Bad things can happen to good bloggers. So in a spirit of blog-camaraderie, and in light of our own experiences and observations, we offer some advice that may be of some help in navigating the political climate relatively unscathed.	10th March 2009
Coral reefs may start dissolving when atmospheric CO2 doubles - PhysOrg Rising carbon dioxide in the atmosphere and the resulting effects on ocean water are making it increasingly difficult for coral reefs to grow, say scientists.	10th March 2009
Cold reality of global warming efforts - BBC News Setting targets is easy, achieving them is not, so why do we continue to support a framework that has failed to deliver. [pro-nuclear]	10th March 2009

'Low carbon diet' a healthy option for Earth - Contra Costa Times With 18 percent of the world's greenhouse gases emitted by livestock raised for meat and dairy products -- more than cars, trucks, ships and planes combined, according to a United Nations report -- more food purveyors are launching initiatives to lower their "food carbon footprint."	9th March 2009
Carbon cuts 'only give 50/50 chance of saving planet' - Independent The world's best efforts at combating climate change are likely to offer no more than a 50-50 chance of keeping temperature rises below the threshold of disaster, according to research from the UK Met Office.	9th March 2009
Chances of climate change accord 'are sinking' - Times Online Two leading climate scientists have broken ranks with their peers to declare that hopes of getting a meaningful deal on halting global warming this year are already lost.	9th March 2009
Deep thought - Energy Bulletin Thomas L. Friedman questions growthThis is not youthful rebellion. We see the catastrophe aheadTom Hayden: Rage is good read more	9th March 2009
Carbon trade wrong, says Lord Browne - Guardian Lord Browne, the former chief executive of BP and one of the earliest proponents of carbon trading to tackle climate change, has conceded his enthusiasm was misplaced.Speaking to the Observer at the government's low carbon industrial strategy summit last week, he said: "My view has shifted over time. Pinning all your hopes on the European Union ETS [emissions trading scheme] and carbon trading is wrong."Until recently, energy companies and governments all around the world - particularly Britain's - argued that carbon trading was the best way of reducing global emissions. Under the EU scheme - the first of its kind in the world - companies are awarded carbon credits.	9th March 2009
Ranchers sell up as pampas turn to dust - Guardian Ranchers are being forced to sell their cattle as a drought converts much of the Argentinian pampas into a dry and desolate wasteland.The sweeping grasslands are a key part of Argentinian identity, stretching for 1 million sq km. It was once one of the most productive agricultural regions in the world. But as a result of the drought an estimated 1.5 million cattle have died. Many farmers are simply giving up on cattle altogether, and switching to growing wheat or soy."I've sold my entire herd," said Hector Gómez, a sixth-generation cattle farmer. "Next year I will plant soy." It's a sad end for a country that was built on the cattle trade.	9th March 2009
US climate activists lead by example - Guardian For British climate activists, it was emboldening to see Americans leading the charge for a forever-renewable energy economy with the biggest protest against environmental damage ever seen in the USThe organisers of the Capitol Climate Action last week had made it quite clear that they were prepared to be arrested, with a decent number visibly determined to be taken into custody. But most of the 2,000 people leaving the largest civil disobedience demonstration on climate in US history were left wondering what else the Washington DC police might let them get away with. No arrests, no fines, no nothing.Seasoned activists Vandana Shiva, Robert Kennedy, and the father of American environmentalism, Wendell Berry, were all out in sub-zero temperatures to protest outside the coal plant that directly delivers energy to Congress.	9th March 2009

Stark warning over dramatic new sea level figures - Guardian Rising sea levels pose a far bigger eco threat than previously thought. This week's climate change conference in Copenhagen will sound an alarm over new floodings - enough to swamp Bangladesh, Florida, the Norfolk Broads and the Thames estuaryScientists will warn this week that rising sea levels, triggered by global warming, pose a far greater danger to the planet than previously estimated. There is now a major risk that many coastal areas around the world will be inundated by the end of the century because Antarctic and Greenland ice sheets are melting faster than previously estimated. Low-lying areas including Bangladesh, Florida, the Maldives and the Netherlands face catastrophic flooding, while, in Britain, large areas of the Norfolk Broads and the Thames estuary are likely to disappear by 2100.	8th March 2009
Conservationists deciding which species to survive - New Scientist With too little time and money, and many species to save, conservationists are starting to apply economic formulas to decide which to save from climate change	8th March 2009
Proof on the Half Shell: A More Acid Ocean Corrodes Sea Life - Scientific American The shells of tiny ocean animals known as foraminifera--specifically Globigerina bulloides--are shrinking as a result of the slowly acidifying waters of the Southern Ocean near Antarctica. The reason behind the rising acidity: Higher carbon dioxide (CO2) levels in the atmosphere, making these shells more proof that climate change is making life tougher for the seas' shell-builders.	8th March 2009
Adapting to climate change in Archangel - BBC News Warmer winters worry those in Russia's far north	8th March 2009
China to plough extra 20% into agricultural production on fear that climate change will spark food crisis - Guardian China will increase spending on agricultural production by 20% this year amid warnings that climate change could spark a future food crisis . Prime minister Wen Jiabao's announcement of an extra 121 billion yuan (£13bn) to boost farm yields and raise rural incomes was a central part of his annual budget speech at the Great Hall of the People.	8th March 2009
Calls for 'floor price' on carbon - Guardian Unlimited The steep drop in the price of carbon under the European Emissions Trading Scheme (ETS) - from about €30 (£26.75) a tonne last summer to €8 (£7.13) last month - has recently prompted calls for a "floor" price. Today, Lord Turner, the chairman of the Committee on Climate Change, added an influential voice to calls for the move to be considered, though the committee said more evidence was needed to be sure if current low prices would continue. The recent prices compare poorly to an projected price of £40 per tonne of carbon dioxide in a report by Turner's committee last year, which led to the UK committing to cut greenhouse gas emissions by 80% by 2050.	8th March 2009
California And Detroit Go To War Over Gas Mileage - Time Magazine California's quest to regulate auto emissions may soon succeed, and that could lead to big changes in the cars we drive	8th March 2009
Crisis offers new chance for climate: Clinton - Reuters BRUSSELS (Reuters) - The financial crisis offers a new chance to rebuild economies based on a greener model with less dependence on unreliable overseas energy imports, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton said on Friday.	8th March 2009
Countries that block climate change deal 'risk isolation' - Guardian Climate minister says Obama's commitment to environment has raised prospects of global agreement at UN summit in DecemberCountries that stand in the way of a global warming treaty now risk international isolation because of the US's new commitment under Barack Obama to reaching a deal, the climate change secretary, Ed Miliband has said.Miliband, who was in Washington this week, meeting members of Obama's green team, said the change in the administration had dramatically improved the prospects for reaching an agreement at a UN summit in Copenhagen in December."There is a real important point about the change that Obama creates and that is that nobody really wants to be the country that wrecks this global deal," Miliband said.Obama campaigned on a promise to commit America to a climate change treaty and to create new green jobs.	8th March 2009
Eco:nomics: Not Bjorn yesterday - Grist I forgot to mention: the one "newsworthy" event at today's conference was the fact that Al Gore was directly confronted by Bjorn Lomborg and refused to debate him.Lomborg, as you know, has a shtick: we have to prioritize our social spending, and we should prioritize by what gets the most social benefit per dollar. Spending on climate change, Lomborg and his Copenhagen Consensus pals claim, ranks toward the bottom of the list by that metric. Not enough bang for the buck! This is an intuitively plausible and seemingly hard-headed way of thinking about things -- I've seen it seduce more than one business type at conferences like this.	8th March 2009
Tough odds facing bill to impose carbon tax - International Herald Tribune Representative John Larson has embarked again on his lonely quest to enact a national tax on carbon dioxide emissions.	8th March 2009

Amazon's 2005 drought created huge CO2 emissions - Reuters A 2005 drought in the Amazon rainforest killed trees and released more greenhouse gas than the annual emissions of Europe and Japan, an international study showed on Thursday. The experts estimated that the forest had been absorbing 2 billion tonnes of carbon dioxide a year on average since the 1980s but lost 3 billion in the 2005 drought, which killed trees and slowed growth. See also: Warmer Atlantic Waters Triggered Katrina and Amazonian Drought - Bloomberg	6th March 2009
The world crisis of capitalist globalisation and its impact on China - Links International Journal of Socialist Renewal In addressing capitalism as a failed system I have focused first on the deepening economic crisis. But this is not the worst of the world's problems. The greatest peril is the growing threat of planetary ecological collapse. Here the danger is much greater than in the case of the world economy but the sense of alarm and the call for immediate and massive action is less widespread. As the Swedish Tallberg Foundation stated in its 2008 report, Grasping the Climate Crisis: A Provocation, The world [at present] faces a breakdown of the global financial system. The consequences are staggering, with ripple effects the world over that deliver the severest blows to the poor. Fear is rising. One would have expected somewhat of the same level of anxiety with regard to the looming breakdown of major parts of the Earth system-rapid deforestation, overfishing, freshwater scarcity and the disappearing Arctic sea ice. Reports of such events and processes are abundant, but the level of concern is still conspicuously low.	6th March 2009
Fred Pearce on why how coal industry is trying to hide dirty facts behind clean claims - Guardian The misleading and downright duplicitous ads against clean coal chronicled here are now being contested by – you guessed it – an ad.Last week the Academy-award winning movie producers Joel and Ethan Coen began airing their commercial on cable TV in the US. It is a spoof air freshener advert with a suburban housewife spraying her home with a coal-black aerosol from a can called Clean Coal. Explaining the magic ingredient, the presenter says that "Clean Coal harnesses the awesome power of the word clean".It ends with the caption for anyone with a comedy bypass: "In reality, there is no such thing as clean coal."	6th March 2009
A sleeping giant? - Nature As the planet warms, vast stores of methane - a potent greenhouse gas - could be released from frozen deposits on land and under the ocean. Amanda Leigh Mascarelli reports on the race to understand a ticking time bomb.	6th March 2009
Innovation: A clean start for green power - New Scientist A reliance on toxic or rare and expensive materials means that much of today's renewable energy technology may be a dead end – but at last change is in the air	6th March 2009
Industry denying climate change, says science minister - Guardian Unlimited Senior figures in the manufacturing industry do not accept that human activities are driving global warming or that action needs to be taken to prepare for its effects, the UK government's science minister said today. Lord Drayson said recent discussions with leaders in the car industry and other businesses had left him "shocked" at the number of climate change deniers among senior industrialists. Of those who acknowledged that global temperatures were rising, many blamed it on variations in the sun's activity.	6th March 2009
Arctic summer ice could vanish by 2013, expert says - Reuters OTTAWA (Reuters) - The Arctic is warming up so quickly that the region's sea ice cover in summer could vanish as early as 2013, decades earlier than some had predicted, a leading polar expert said on Thursday.	6th March 2009
Urchins in peril - Nature Ocean warming, but not acidification, could significantly hinder reproduction in purple sea urchins. Previous studies have shown that a decrease in ocean pH could impair shell formation in adult urchins, but few urchin larvae may survive to the adult stage under plausible climate change scenarios, according to a new study.	6th March 2009
Brown calls for 'green new deal' - BBC News Moving the UK to a low-carbon economy will create 400,000 new "green" jobs over the next eight years, the PM will say.	6th March 2009
Interview: Katherine Richardson - Nature A climate congress in March aims to update the assessment of global warming. Olive Heffernan talks to the meeting's chair about the tasks that lie ahead.	6th March 2009
Investors like clean energy, growth dips: survey - Reuters LONDON (Reuters) - Half of institutional investors plan to increase their funding of clean energy compared with 12 months ago, but that will not be enough to drive global growth in the sector this year, a survey published on Wednesday said.	6th March 2009
Climate change won't wait for recession's end - Environmental News Network Delaying measures to reduce emissions is economically unsound. The unprecedented challenges of economic recession, global warming, peak oil and shortages of usable water have all emerged simultaneously. The argument that the problems of recession and rising unemployment are more immediate and, therefore, measures to reduce the national carbon footprint should be put to one side, should be seen for what it is — special pleading by polluters who have apparently gulled a majority of Australian Industries Group members that it is also in their interests.	6th March 2009
Total-auction U.S. climate bill unlikely: lawmaker WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Any climate bill that passes the Senate is unlikely to adhere to an Obama administration plan that the government auction all of the permits to emit greenhouse gases because it would be too harsh on big industry, a key democratic lawmaker said on Thursday.	6th March 2009
Geologists map rocks to soak CO2 from air A new report by scientists at Columbia University's Earth Institute and the US Geological Survey points to an abundant supply of carbon-trapping rock in the US that could be used to help stabilize global warming.	6th March 2009

Experts warn of 'clean energy crunch' - Metro A "clean energy crunch" may come hard on the heels of the credit crunch as the impact of recession hits attempts to hold back global warming, say experts. World economic growth is no longer on track to avert the worst impact of climate change, according to new research. Reduced carbon emissions due to lower economic activity will be outweighed by the negative effect of clean energy funding drying up, said a report from leading clean energy and carbon market analysts New Energy Finance (NEF).	5th March 2009
Drought grips Afghanistan - UPI KABUL, Afghanistan, March 4 (UPI) -- Afghanistan is experiencing its worst drought in a decade and its food crisis is deepening as a result, experts said.	5th March 2009
US Treasury secretary attacks oil, gas tax breaks - Reuters UK U.S. oil and natural gas producing companies should not receive federal subsidies in the form of tax breaks because their businesses contribute to global warming, U.S. Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner told Congress on Wednesday. It was one of the sharpest attacks yet on the oil and gas industry by a top Obama administration official, reinforcing the White House stance that new U.S. energy policy will focus on promoting renewable energy sources like wind and solar power and rely less on traditional fossil fuels like oil as America tackles climate change.	5th March 2009
U.S. Energy Dept to fund $84 million for geothermal energy WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The U.S. Energy Department on Wednesday said it plans to provide up to $84 million in funding for geothermal energy projects.	5th March 2009
Car firms told to halve emissions - BBC News Four leading international agencies urge the car industry to halve CO2 emissions by 2050.	5th March 2009
Rich nations revise up greenhouse gas problem - Reuters UK Industrialized nations have added greenhouse gas emissions equivalent to the annual totals of France or Australia to a 1990 baseline against which cuts required by U.N. climate treaties are measured. Emissions reported by 34 nations for the 1990 base year that underpins U.N. efforts to rein in global warming have risen 3.5 percent overall to 17.6 billion tons in the most recent annual data from 17.0 billion in the first U.N. compilation in 1996, a Reuters survey showed on Wednesday.	5th March 2009
Emissions exchange trading volumes soar in 2009 - Reuters LONDON (Reuters) - Exchange-traded volumes for European Union emissions permits and Kyoto Protocol carbon offsets traded so far in 2009 are double last year's average, data from the exchanges showed.	5th March 2009
New Research: 18- to 34-Year-Olds Key to Green Economy - istockAnalyst.com New research conducted by EnviroMedia Social Marketing indicates young Americans, an estimated audience of 76 million people, will power the new green economy and are the key to future economic growth. This national opinion poll reveals a clear generation gap in understanding the cause of climate change — and marketing experts say businesses that pay attention may find new growth strategies.	5th March 2009
Science shows that climate change is a certain threat - CNews Why does the public often pay more attention to climate change deniers than climate scientists?	5th March 2009

Research warns two degree rise will halve rainforest carbon sink - Business Green Research warns two degree rise will halve rainforest "carbon sink"Business Green, UK... conference in Copenhagen where the world's leading climate scientists are to provide political and business leaders with an update on the latest global warming research, and recommendations on how to mitigate the risks presented by climate change.	4th March 2009
Lead US Climate Negotiator: '09 Climate Law 'Tall Order' - Nasdaq WASHINGTON -(Dow Jones)- The U.S.'s lead international negotiator for climate change policy, Todd Stern, said Tuesday that although he would like to have a law that cuts greenhouse gases signed in time for international climate change negotiations in Denmark this December, he didn't think it likely or necessary.	4th March 2009
Obama 'must pass climate laws ahead of Copenhagen' - Guardian The US needs to set an example to developing countries if significant progress is to be made at the Copenhagen summit, Denmark's climate minister warnsAmerican leadership on climate change will be undermined if the Obama administration does not swiftly pass laws to reduce carbon pollution, according to Denmark's minister for climate and energy.Connie Hedegaard said Obama must move from promises to action and push through global warming legislation ahead of the climate change summit in Copenhagen this December. Without that she said it would be hard for the US to exercise a credible leadership role at the summit."We can postpone anything but we have been postponing things for many years.	4th March 2009
Climate 'hitting Europe's birds' - BBC News Climate change is already having an impact on European bird species, according to British scientists.	4th March 2009
Plans for green MOTs for UK's buildings • Proposal to cover commercial and public buildings• Successful trial could see plans extended to UK homesEvery building in the UK could be required to undergo a green "MOT" of its energy efficiency, water use and the waste it generates, following plans published today by an influential group of businesses and environmental organisations.A proposal for every commercial and public building – from the village hall to vast City towers – to have a "building MOT" is part of a report published by the Green Building Council, at an event attended by the cabinet minister for housing and planning, Margaret Beckett.If successful, the MOTs, modelled on the compulsory annual checks for motor vehicles which are named after the old Ministry of Transport, could in future be extended to homes, said Paul King, the council's chief executive, who recommends a maximum of five years between checks.A report on the ...	4th March 2009
Upping the anti Honoured at home for his fight against an Amazon soya port, Father Edilberto Sena is calling on British consumers to take a stand"I would like to say two things to European consumers with a conscience: first, you should know that the meat you eat is fed by our Amazon rainforest, so eat less of it; second, put pressure on your government to tackle the big soya exporters." Father Edilberto Sena, a priest from Brazil, has been in the UK this week hoping to mobilise Christian and political networks - by changing their personal habits and by lobbying for change - to act against the destruction that our way of life is causing in his area of the Amazon.	4th March 2009
Breathing problems spike on hot days - Reuters Breathing problems spike on hot daysReutersNEW YORK (Reuters Health) - Hospitalizations for respiratory problems rise on hot, humid days -- foretelling what global warming may bring -- a study of 12 European cities suggests. The study, which tracked weather data and hospital admissions over ...	4th March 2009
Create jobs and save the planet - Socialistworker.co.uk Create jobs and save the planetSocialistworker.co.uk, UKJonathan Neale is the author of Stop Global Warming – Change The World, available for £10 from Bookmarks, the socialist bookshop, phone 020 7637 1848 » www.bookmarksbookshop.co.uk. The Campaign Against Climate Change trade union conference takes place ...	4th March 2009
Europeans urge Obama to adopt medium-term climate targets - New York Times Europeans urge Obama to adopt medium-term climate targetsNew York Times, United StatesBy JEAN-MARIE MACABREY, ClimateWire BRUSSELS -- While pleased with "encouraging signs" from Washington on global warming, the European Union is urging the Obama administration to adopt midterm targets for greenhouse gas reductions. A blog about energy, ...	4th March 2009
Gas, Coal, Oil based industries have no future: Minister - Daily Mirror Gas, Coal, Oil based industries have no future: MinisterDaily Mirror, Sri LankaBy Dianne Silva The Minister of Environment and Natural Resources Patalie Champika Ranawake speaking at a seminar on global warming yesterday warned that there was no future for industries based on gas, coal or oil and that development based on these ...	4th March 2009
Unstaining Al Gore's good name, part 2 I will examine here the February 24 New York Times article by Andy Revkin to show that Al Gore is not "guilty of inaccuracies and overstatements," as he was accused. Part 1 detailed how Roger Pielke, Jr. started all this by repeatedly misstating what Gore had said in his AAAS talk (video here). These indefensible charges would have died on the gossip grapevine of the blogosphere, had they not been picked up by Revkin. I have written multiple emails to Andy in an effort to get him to clear Gore's name in print, and he refuses.	4th March 2009
Airlines that break emission rules could have planes seized The Environment Agency is to be given powers to seize planes from airlines which break the rules of a new scheme to limit flights' carbon emissions.The transport secretary, Geoff Hoon, and the climate change secretary, Ed Miliband, will today announce the government agency's new role, which goes far wider than its regulation of other UK industries.As the official body to enforce the European Emissions Trading Scheme for aviation, the EA will monitor emissions from flying, police companies' buying of credits when they exceed their allocation, impose fines and, as a last resort, have the power to seize assets of offending airlines.	4th March 2009
Environmental doublespeak As global warming threatens the world's most vulnerable people, EU leaders can only spout empty rhetoricPolitical language, George Orwell wrote nearly 60 years ago, is "designed to make lies sound truthful and murder respectable and to give an appearance of solidity to pure wind".It is a pity that Orwell won't be around over the next few weeks to deconstruct the double-speak that passes for the European Union's official discourse on climate change.Whereas the magic of nature was celebrated at spring festivals in Pagan times, an annual gathering of presidents and prime ministers in March is dedicated to crafting an illusion.	4th March 2009
FACTBOX-Rich nations' greenhouse benchmark rises - AlertNet Source: Reuters OSLO, March 4 (Reuters) - Industrialised nations have revised up greenhouse gas emissions used as the starting point for cuts under U.N. treaties by 3.5 percent since the mid-1990s, a Reuters survey ...	4th March 2009

Our Worst Enemies Aren't Terrorists: Rethinking National Security on a Sinking Planet - Alternet The chances of being affected by a terrorist attack are slim, but disruptions to our far-flung supply lines for food, water and energy are a reality.	3rd March 2009
Right Wing think tank sets target on Washington State cap and trade -DeSmogBlog You're forgiven if you haven't heard of the Washington Policy Center (WPC), a right-wing "freemarket" think tank based in Seattle, Washington. Most likely you haven't heard of them because you don't follow State-level politics or because the WPC has changed its name a few times over the last few years. In any event, you should get to know them because they are running some pretty heavy lobbying activities at the Washington State Legislature in an attempt to block plans for a new cap and trade greenhouse gas reduction strategy.	3rd March 2009
Crisp: Other problems beyond the economy - Scripps News The International Panel on Climate Change told lawmakers in Washington that Earth can tolerate about 6 more years of our current rates of carbon dioxide pollution. After that, we're locked into a downward-spiraling future of severe global warming.	3rd March 2009
California snow not enough to overcome drought - Reuters LOS ANGELES (Reuters) - California's mountain snowpack is only at 80 percent of normal, despite recent snowstorms, and is far from enough to ease a prolonged drought, making water conservation measures a necessity, state officials said on Monday.	3rd March 2009
China plans 59 reservoirs to collect meltwater from its shrinking glaciers - Guardian China is planning to build 59 reservoirs to collect water from its shrinking glaciers as the cost of climate change hits home in the world's most populous country. The far western province of Xinjiang, home to many of the planet's highest peaks and widest ice fields, will carry out the 10-year engineering project, which aims to catch and store glacier run-off that might otherwise trickle away into the desert.	3rd March 2009
Global fisheries must brace themselves for climate change - UN News Centre The fishing industry and government authorities must plan ahead to deal with the impact of climate change on fisheries worldwide, according to a new United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) report. Responsible practices must be put into place more widely and management plans should include strategies for dealing with global warming, according to the FAO publication, entitled “The State of World Fisheries and Aquaculture” (SOFIA). Communities that rely heavily on fishing for their income will face serious challenges if fewer fish are available, with developing countries earning almost $25 billion annually in fish exports. The report estimated that more than 500 million people worldwide depend on the fishing sector.	3rd March 2009
Time to emulate Roosevelt's New Deal and create green jobs - Guardian A modern-day Conservation Corps would engage people in their local environment and create jobs – quicklyAs the economic downturn gathers pace, the number of people out of work is increasing also. Some commentators suggest that without remedial action UK unemployment could reach 3 million by the end of the year. Government measures to support businesses are welcome and will undoubtedly make a difference, but although some measures will have a swift effect others may not significantly impact employment figures for some time. So there is a need to take more steps which will help keep unemployment down now - not next year or in five years, but within months. We have plenty of models from history for what can be done.	3rd March 2009
China quake leaves CO2 legacy - Reuters Last year's horrendous China earthquake may have big, lingering effects on the atmosphere. Mudslides after the deadly May 12 quake in Sichuan province are likely to trigger a release of carbon dioxide equal to 2 percent of the world's current carbon emissions from fossil fuel combustion, geophysicists say. “Mudslides wipe away plants and topsoil, depleting terrain of nutrients for plant regrowth and burying swaths of vegetation. Buried vegetable matter decomposes and releases carbon dioxide and other gases to the atmosphere,” according to a statement ahead of a report in American Geophysical Union journal Geophysical Research Letters. The gases, along with nitrous oxide, another major greenhouse gas, should spew into the atmosphere over a number of decades, according to the report due out on March 4.	3rd March 2009
Live from DC: Thousands Converge for Capitol Climate Action Against Dirty Coal - Alternet Today's action in DC shows that there is a new urgency to the climate change movement. Read here for the latest news about the protest.	3rd March 2009
Carbon tax on steroids - Grist James Hansen has again been lecturing Congress on the virtues of tax-and-dividend. I'm no policy expert, but neither is Dr. Hansen, so I'm going to share some of my own amateur observations for the benefit of fellow Grist wonks. Hansen did some calculations and came up with the following dividend estimates for a $115/ton (equivalent to $1/gallon) tax: Single share: $3000/year ($250 per month, deposited monthly in bank account) Family with 2 children: $9000/year ($750 per month, deposited monthly in bank account) Wow! Free money!	3rd March 2009
ENVIRONMENT: ‘‘Climate Change Does Not Wait For Recessions'' - IPS KAMPALA, Mar 3 (IPS) - Lack of money and technical know-how makes it difficult for poor farmers to participate in the Kyoto Protocol's carbon trading mechanism aimed at reversing global warming. Meanwhile, the global economic crisis may further undermine investment in carbon trade in African countries.	3rd March 2009
Physician Declares Global Warming Will Cause Sharp Rise in Kidney ... - Business Media Institute Study predicts that by 2050, global warming-related dehydration will cause up to an additional 2 million kidney stone cases. The solution – a $1 billion increase to ramp up medical service for this one particular ailment.	3rd March 2009

Green shopping: Don't say 'eww,' to thrift stores - The Christian Science Monitor Current shopping: wasteful. The green alternative: repurposing.	2nd March 2009
The road to hell is paved with conservative intentions - Grist Magazine On climate, how should progressives respond to the conservative strategy of 'obstruct and delay'.	2nd March 2009
High-speed trains score well in reducing carbon emissions - Express India Aside from the overriding need to stabilise atmospheric carbon dioxide levels to stabilise climate, there are several other compelling reasons for countries everywhere to restructure their transport systems, including the need to prepare for falling oil production, to alleviate traffic congestion, and to reduce air pollution.	2nd March 2009
How to bury waste, the green way - BBC News A specially constructed environmentally-friendly toilet takes care of calls of nature at an unusual burial ground.	2nd March 2009
The criminalization of seed banking: hidden inside Monsanto "food safety" bills - OpEdNews The We are facing a catastrophe to the environment, to farming, to food, to health, if the bogus "food safety bills" currently in Congress go through. International corporations are intentionally destroying small farmers around the world and aggressively pursuing the take over of food worldwide with what will be devastating impact on the environment and climate change .	2nd March 2009
Texas is bone-dry; drought covers 97 percent of state - CBS 42 Austin Drought conditions in Texas are keeping farmers from planting crops, forcing cattle producers to cull their herds and drying up lakes across the state.	2nd March 2009
Britain's birds facing extinction as climate change leaves them with nowhere to go - Guardian As temperatures rise and European breeds arrive, native species such as the lapwing and Scottish crossbill are being forced out. Soon, say the RSPB and Durham University, many of our rare birds will disappearBritain's birds are being driven northwards to extinction at an accelerating rate because of global warming. Scientists have calculated that the average range of British birds will move 550 kilometres (340 miles) to the north by 2100 as the climate heats up.Birds with ranges in Scotland or in mountain regions will be wiped out - such as the snow bunting, which today survives only on the Cairngorm plateau.	2nd March 2009
Large fish going hungry as supplies of smaller species dwindle: report - CNews HALIFAX, N.S. - Dolphins, sharks and other large marine species around the world are going hungry as they seek out dwindling supplies of the small, overlooked species they feed on, according to a new study that says overfishing is draining their food sources. Climate change is also taking its toll on prey fish, which are more sensitive to warming ocean temperatures than their larger predators. So, if the world's waters continue to warm, scientists worry stocks will have even more difficulty recovering.	2nd March 2009
Hong Kong records warmest February in 125 years - China Economic Net Hong Kong recorded a monthly mean temperature of 20.5 degrees Celsius at the Hong Kong Observatory in February, making it the warmest February in Hong Kong since records of the local temperature began in 1884.	2nd March 2009
Where's Our Global Warming Protest? - TheTyee.ca Americans are marching on their capital today. Canadians, have a donut.	2nd March 2009
Pathways To Resilient Communities - Scoop.co.nz Paul Bruce is a Greater Wellington Regional Councillor. He also works half time as a Meteorologist and is one of the Met Service's lead forecasters.	2nd March 2009
Two leaders, one priority: the economy - Independent While focused on economic recovery, the two leaders are also pushing aggressively for an international climate agreement which they hope will provide a new engine of growth in a global low-carbon economy. Mr Obama says the US will lead the effort to get international agreement on emission limits and he has the political backing to do so provided other countries sign up as well. The fear is that next month's G20 summit in London could degenerate into a disastrous finger-pointing row over trade between older industrialised countries and the new economies of Asia and Latin America, making a climate change treaty even more difficult to achieve at the Copenhagen summit in December. British diplomats were in high-level meetings at the White House last week to discuss climate issues and the US is promising to negotiate a new climate treaty "in a robust way" after all but ignoring the issue for the past decade.	2nd March 2009
New bank rules should reveal emissions from investment, campaigners say - Guardian Environmental campaigners concerned that tax payers are potentially bankrolling highly polluting projectsThe government is under pressure to insert environmental criteria into new UK banking regulations as campaigners and opposition politicians call on it to use the state's 70% stake in the Royal Bank of Scotland to force the failed bank to disclose the carbon emissions of its investments.In the past six months, when RBS received £33bn in consecutive government bail outs, it was also involved in financing loans to coal, oil and gas companies worth nearly £10bn (£9,941m) - over a quarter the amount the bank has received from the tax payers.In November last year, RBS - along with a group of other banks - refreshed the financing for an existing £6.66bn loan to the German energy company E.ON.	2nd March 2009
Police 'over the top' at climate camp - Guardian More than 2,000 'potentially harmful' items were confiscated from protesters by officers - including balloons, crayons and a clown's outfitPolice have been accused of setting a "dangerous precedent" when they confiscated hundreds of items of property - including children's crayons, a clown's outfit and a pensioner's walking stick - from people attending an environmental protest camp at Kingsnorth power station.A list of more than 2,000 possessions taken from protesters, who were repeatedly searched going to and from the camp last August, has been obtained through a freedom of information request by Liberal Democrat justice spokesman David Howarth.It shows that officers took packets of balloon, tents, a clown's outfit, camping equipment, cycle helmets and bike locks, plastic buckets, bin bags, blankets, soap, banners and leaflets, books, party poppers and nail clippers.	2nd March