Logging the Onset of The Bottleneck Years
This weekly posting is brought to you courtesy of H. E. Taylor. Happy reading, I ho8pe you enjoy this week's Global Warming news roundup
Another week of Climate Disruption News
December 6, 2009
- Chuckle, Copenhagen, CPRS, SCAR, Ocean CO2, 4 Degrees, Naughties, CRU Inquiry, Other Hacks, CRU Hack
- Bottom Line, Tim Garrett, Lancet, Copenhagen Diagnosis
- Melting Arctic, Polar Bear, Methane, Geopolitics, Antarctica
- Food Crisis, Food Production
- Hurricanes, GHGs, GHG Pledges, Carbon Cycle, Temperatures, Aerosols, Paleoclimate, ENSO, Ocean Currents, Satellites
- Impacts, Forests, Climate Refugees, Wacky Weather, Wildfires, Corals, Acidification, Glaciers, Sea Levels, Floods & Droughts
- Transportation, Buildings, Sequestration, Geoengineering, Adaptation
- Journals, Other Docs , Misc. Science, Lindzen & Choi, Clive Spash, Hansen, Schellnhuber
- Kyoto, UN, Carbon Trade, Tobin Tax, Optimal Carbon Reduction Strategy
- International Politics, Security, Law & Activism, Religioso, Polls, World Bank
- America, Obama, Congress, Britain, Europe, Australia, New Zealand, India, China, Asia, Africa, Canada
- Ecological Economics, IPAT, Media, Books, Video, Courts
- Energy, Wind, Solar, Coal, Biofuel, Nukes, Peak Oil, Grid, Efficiency, Cars, Business
- Joe's List, Carbon Lobby, Miscellaneous Climate, Useful Links
- Shameless Self Promotion, .sig
- 2009/12/05: Guardian(UK): (cartoon - Rowson) Leaks, Hot Air and the Deluge
- 2009/12/05: TI:CF: (cartoon - Roberts) More Noblesse Oblige again
- 2009/12/05: TI:CF: (cartoon - Roberts) Slamdown - A good clean fight
- 2009/12/05: ClimateP: (cartoon - Bennett) Mankind on Thin Ice
- 2009/12/02: TI:CF: (cartoon - Roberts) xenophibics anonymous
- 2009/11/30: TI:CF: (cartoon - Roberts) Titanic
As the big show gets underway:
- COP15 United Nations Climate Change Conference Copenhagen 2009
- 2009/12/06: BostonGlobe: A silver lining in the climate talks cloud
- 2009/12/04: Guardian(UK): Critic of west dropped before crucial Copenhagen climate summit talks
[...] The Philippine government gave no official reason for dropping Bernarditas Muller, a key negotiator on behalf of the 130 G77 developing countries. But non-governmental groups said it was clearly linked to her long-standing opposition to US and European attempts to abandon the Kyoto protocol... - 2009/12/03: CNN: Why the Copenhagen climate talks matter
- 2009/12/03: UNEP: Hundreds of passengers travel to Copenhagen climate conference on CO2-free Climate Express train
- 2009/12/05: ClimateP: Obama's double Copenhagen stunner: He agrees to global climate assistance fund for developing countries and will go to Denmark on the 18th
- 2009/12/05: ABC(Au): Obama boosts hopes for Copenhagen agreement
US President Barack Obama has altered the timing of his appearance at the Copenhagen climate summit, in order to be there for its climax. - 2009/12/04: Grist: What does it mean that Obama is going to Copenhagen at the end of the climate talks?
- 2009/12/04: Grist: In last-minute stunner, Obama changes plans to attend final day of Copenhagen talks
- 2009/12/05: TreeHugger: Obama Elects to Come to Copenhagen's Conclusion, Not Beginning
- 2009/12/05: TreeHugger: Keep Score of Copenhagen Deals with Climate Scoreboard
- 2009/12/05: EarthTimes: Germany: Obama's schedule change is 'clear signal' for climate talks
- 2009/12/05: EarthTimes: Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh to attend Copenhagen summit
- 2009/12/05: EarthTimes: Denmark welcomes Obama's later arrival to UN climate summit
- 2009/12/05: Reuters: Obama surprises with Copenhagen summit decision
U.S. President Barack Obama will attend the end of the Copenhagen climate change summit, a late change of plan the White House attributed on Friday to growing momentum toward a new global accord. - 2009/12/02: TechRev: Copenhagen's Clean-Tech Dividend -- Climate deal could deliver incentives to grow nascent energy technologies
- 2009/12/04: Rabble: Paying our climate debt
- 2009/12/02: PRWatch: A Roadmap to the Copenhagen Climate Change Conference
- 2009/12/04: DerSpiegel: Gropenhagen Conference -- Prostitutes Offer Free Climate Summit Sex
Copenhagen Mayor Ritt Bjerregaard sent postcards to city hotels warning summit guests not to patronize Danish sex workers during the upcoming conference. Now, the prostitutes have struck back, offering free sex to anyone who produces one of the warnings. - 2009/12/05: BBC: Dylan song adopted for Copenhagen
Bob Dylan has star billing at the climate change summit in Copenhagen... or at least, his music does. The United Nations has adopted one of his songs, A Hard Rain's A Gonna Fall, as its unofficial anthem for the talks. - 2009/12/04: BBC: Get me to the summit on time
The number of politicians flying to a conference to tackle global warming may raise eyebrows, but there are some people choosing unusual methods to get there in order to cut down on emissions. - 2009/12/05: AlterNet: Copenhagen Climate Talks Set to Begin: What's Likely to Happen and What's at Stake
- 2009/12/04: CBC: Polar bear sculpture shapes climate change concern
- 2009/12/04: NatureTGB: Road to Copenhagen round up
- 2009/12/04: NatureCF: Countdown to Copenhagen
- 2009/12/04: ScienceInsider: He Ups the Ante: Obama to visit Copenhagen at _End_ not Beginning of Climate Meeting
- 2009/12/04: GreenGrok: Copenhagen Warm-Ups
- 2009/12/04: PlanetArk: Carbon Pledges, Schemes Pile Up Ahead Of Copenhagen
- 2009/12/04: NRDC:SwitchBoard: Copenhagen Could Generate a Real Commitment to Slow Deforestation
- 2009/12/04: EarthTimes: Small countries call for deep emission cuts, financial support
- 2009/12/04: SolveClimate: UN Climate Chief: Consensus Is Building on Climate Financing for Poor
- 2009/12/06: ABC(Au): UN delegates take train to Copenhagen
A train carrying 450 UN officials, environmental activists and journalists has begun the journey from Brussels to Copenhagen ahead of the international climate conference this week. - 2009/12/06: CanWest: The fight for our future begins -- Evidence of global warming continues to stack up despite a growing cloud of skepticism
On the eve of a pivotal United Nations climate conference that many observers are already describing as a failure, some of the gloomiest climate research data on record has been making its way into the public realm. - 2009/12/05: NYT: Negotiators at Climate Talks Face Deep Set of Fault Lines
- 2009/12/06: EarthTimes: Host Denmark tries to offset impact of UN climate conference
- 2009/12/06: BBC: Landmark climate talks to begin
Officials from 192 countries are gathering in Denmark's capital Copenhagen for talks aimed at reaching a new global deal on climate change. Any agreement is intended to supplant the 1997 Kyoto Protocol, aimed at curbing greenhouse gas emissions. - 2009/12/06: ChronicleHerald: Hoped-for climate change climax may just fizzle out
- 2009/12/05: Guardian(UK): Copenhagen: the African dimension
Africa didn't cause climate change, but it will acutely feel its effects. Copenhagen deals must address developmental issues - 2009/12/03: Guardian(UK): A green industrial revolution calls
- 2009/12/03: Guardian(UK): Climate change Russian roulette
- 2009/12/03: NatureTGB: Road to Copenhagen: In Quotes
- 2009/12/03: PlanetArk: Big Developing States Reject Copenhagen Climate Plan
- 2009/12/03: PlanetArk: Factbox: Cost Of Climate Change, Offers To Pay
- 2009/12/03: NRDC:SwitchBoard: Developing Country Action to Reduce Global Warming Pollution: Copenhagen Part 3
- 2009/12/03: COP15: The rich-poor rift widens only days before the Copenhagen meeting
- 2009/12/03: EarthTimes: Indian team to Copenhagen to include four youngsters
India's official team to the Copenhagen climate talks would include four young people to convey India's seriousness about securing the future for the next generation, federal Environment Minister Jairam Ramesh said Thursday. "By 2030, 2040, 2050, most of us will not be around," Ramesh said while replying to a discussion on the impact of climate change in parliament. "That is why two schoolchildren and two college children, who won an essay competition, would be part of the official delegation," he said. - 2009/12/03: EarthTimes: UN climate conference centre to be Christmas tree-free zone
- 2009/12/03: Eureka: Forest deal at Copenhagen must avoid creating 'carbon refugees'
Forest dwellers must be included in the design of the upcoming forest deal at Copenhagen in order to avoid a humanitarian crisis, according to a scientist at the University of Leeds. - 2009/12/03: BBerg: Copenhagen Failure Defied by $200 Billion in Green Investments
- 2009/12/03: BizGreen: Big business [Over 850 of the world's largest companies] demands strong Copenhagen agreement
- 2009/12/02: Guardian(UK): Enough posturing politics. Time to let the experts lead [Sachs]
- 2009/12/02: EurActiv: Hedegaard: 'Time is up' for climate choices
"We have no alternative. We must handle climate change and we must do it right now. Copenhagen is the deadline. Time is up," writes former Danish Climate and Energy Minister Connie Hedegaard, the EU's commissioner-designate for climate action, in an exclusive op-ed for EurActiv. - 2009/12/02: NatureCF: Can technology save the world?
- 2009/12/02: ABC(Au): Broadcaster and naturalist Sir David Attenborough says he does not expect the Copenhagen climate change conference will achieve as much as he thinks is required to halt global warming
- 2009/12/02: PlanetArk: Most World Leaders To Attend U.N. Climate Summit
- 2009/12/02: PlanetArk: Factbox: Sticking Points For Forest CO2 Scheme [REDD] At Copenhagen
- 2009/12/02: PlanetArk: Forest Carbon Scheme [REDD] Hopes For Green Light In Copenhagen
- 2009/12/01: Grist: Optimistic or pessimistic about the Copenhagen climate talks?
- 2009/12/02: NRDC:SwitchBoard: Developed Country Emissions Reduction Commitments: Copenhagen (Part 2)
- 2009/12/02: COP15: Yvo de Boer: Hope for treaty by June
A new climate treaty can be ready by June 2010, hopes UN's chief climate negotiator Yvo de Boer. A few days before the Copenhagen conference, de Boer is positive that the parties will reach a political agreement on central issues. - 2009/12/01: NYT: Europe Bypassed on Climate Summit
- 2009/12/02: BBerg: Brazil Wants Limits on Tropical Trees for [REDD] CO2 Credits
- 2009/12/02: EarthTimes: Denmark: 98 heads of state and government to UN climate summit
- 2009/12/02: Google:AP: UN official calls for funds for climate change
[...] U.N. climate chief, Yvo de Boer, has told reporters that rich countries "must put at least $10 billion a year on the table." Helen Clark, the administrator of the U.N. Development Program, said though that scientists and others believe that between $75 billion and $100 billion a year is needed to help poor nations cope with climate change. - 2009/12/02: BBC: Climate science, from Bali to Copenhagen
- 2009/12/01: UN: Antarctic fragility a reminder of importance of success in Copenhagen - Ban
- 2009/12/01: NatureCF: Countdown to Copenhagen
- 2009/12/01: MongaBay: World leaders falling over themselves to show up at Copenhagen
- 2009/12/01: ClimateP: The basics on UNFCCC, Kyoto Protocol, Copenhagen
- 2009/12/01: Grist: December 19 -- the day after COP15
- 2009/12/01: COP15: Influx of world leaders in Copenhagen
So far 98 heads of state and government have accepted Danish Prime Minister Lars Løkke Rasmussen's invitation to attend the UN climate conference that begins next week. - 2009/11/30: Yale360: As the World Waits on the U.S., a Sense of Déjà Vu in Denmark?
Twelve years ago in Kyoto, the world was poised to act on a climate treaty but looked for a clear signal from the United States. Now, with the Copenhagen talks set to begin, the outcome once again hinges on what the U.S. is prepared to do. - 2009/12/01: BNC: Copenhagen reality check -- what's really coming
- 2009/12/01: HotTopic: A thread of hope
- 2009/12/01: EarthTimes: India's forest cover now over 23 per cent, may push for incentives at climate talks
- 2009/11/30: Oregonian: The opening bids on climate change
President Obama commits the United States to major carbon reductions, and China offers to slow its emissions, but it's still mostly promises, promises - 2009/11/30: Guardian(UK): Copenhagen conference: The view from America
- 2009/11/30: Guardian(UK): Copenhagen summit: It's money that matters in the backroom talks
- 2009/11/30: Guardian(UK): Barack Obama's road to Copenhagen ends in Oslo for most of the US media
- 2009/11/30: EurActiv: Climate pledges 'not enough for deal', says EU
- 2009/11/29: NatureCF: Countdown to Copenhagen
- 2009/11/30: ClimateP: Countdown to Copenhagen: Foundation for a Low Carbon Future
- 2009/12/01: ABC(Au): Denmark releases draft climate blueprint
- 2009/11/30: NewScientist: Great and good share hopes and fears for Copenhagen
- 2009/11/30: UN: UN to release 'Hard Rain' film with Bob Dylan tune on eve of climate talks
Just a week before the United Nations climate change conference begins in Copenhagen, the UN Environment Programme (UNEP) announced today it will help release a rare live recording of Bob Dylan performing his 1962 song-poem A Hard Rain's A-Gonna Fall set to dramatic photographs of shrunken ice caps, barren landscapes, and devastated lives. Hard Rain: Our Headlong Collision with Nature by photographer Mark Edwards and Mr. Dylan will be released on DVD at the opening of the Hard Rain exhibition in Copenhagen on 6 December -- the eve of the climate conference. The release is being done in partnership with UNEP. - 2009/11/30: NRDC:SwitchBoard: Copenhagen Climate Summit (Part 1): The Expectations
- 2009/11/30: COP15: India dismisses Danish climate proposal
Top Indian officials dismissed a draft climate change proposal by Denmark that expects developing economies to peak their greenhouse gas emissions by 2025, news reports said Monday. - 2009/11/30: Yale360: Danes Propose Emissions Goals
- 2009/11/30: EarthTimes: Analysis: Agreement in Copenhagen could usher in brave new world
- 2009/11/30: LA Times: Copenhagen's missing ingredient: water
Scientists stress water's profound link with climate change, yet delegates at next week's conference have deleted water from the working draft of a binding environmental treaty. - 2009/12/01: ABC(Au): Denmark releases draft climate blueprint
Midterm target: The draft calls for Australia to reduce emissions by 5 per cent below 2000 levels by 2020. The blueprint for the global climate change agreement to be struck in Copenhagen next month has been released. The Danish Government says the world should cut greenhouse gas emissions by 50 per cent by 2050 from 1990 levels, with most of the reduction coming from rich countries. - 2009/11/30: Guardian(UK): Copenhagen conference: The countries to watch [list]
- 2009/11/30: Guardian(UK): Copenhagen climate conference: Emission impossible [N. Stern & Monbiot]
- 2009/11/30: Guardian(UK): Copenhagen climate conference: The key players [list]
- 2009/11/30: Guardian(UK): Copenhagen: The era of climate stability is coming to an end
After 400 generations of stable weather, the world is on the brink of violent climate change. But there is good news too - 2009/12/02: Guardian(UK): Australian Senate defeats carbon trading bill
- 2009/12/02: NatureN: Australia rejects carbon trading -- Labor Party loses crucial vote amid political turmoil
- 2009/12/02: ABC(Au): Senate kills off emissions trade laws
Opposition and crossbench senators have handed the Government a trigger for an early election on climate change by voting down its emissions trading scheme for the second time. - 2009/12/02: PlanetArk: Australia Carbon Laws In Doubt, Election Possible
- 2009/12/02: COP15: Australia's Parliament defeats global warming bill
- 2009/12/02: EarthTimes: Australia dumps carbon-trading plan
The Scientific Committee on Antarctic Research released a major report this week:
- SCAR: Scientific Committee on Antarctic Research
- 2009/11/25: BAS:SCAR: [link to 20 meg pdf] The Antarctic Climate Change and the Environment (ACCE) Report
- 2009/12/01: BBC: Antarctic to feed major sea rise
Sea levels are likely to rise by about 1.4m (4ft 6in) globally by 2100 as polar ice melts, according to a major review of climate change in Antarctica. Conducted by the Scientific Committee on Antarctic Research (SCAR), it says that warming seas are accelerating melting in the west of the continent. - 2009/12/05: HotTopic: Antarctic science review: greening and melting
- 2009/12/01: Guardian(UK): Antarctica may heat up dramatically as ozone hole repairs, warn scientists [SCAR]
- 2009/12/01: NatureTGB: Comprehensive review of Antarctic science released
- 2009/12/01: PhysOrg: First comprehensive review of the state of Antarctica's climate
- 2009/12/03: NCM: The Gift that Keeps on Giving [SCAR]
- 2009/12/01: TreeHugger: Melting Polar Ice Will Raise Sea Levels Over 4.5 ft by 2100 [SCAR]
- 2009/12/01: OilChange: 10% of Population Will be Affected by Sea-Level Rise [SCAR]
- 2009/12/01: CCP: SCAR: First comprehensive review of the state of Antarctica's climate
- 2009/11/30: Eureka: First comprehensive review of the state of Antarctica's climate -- 'Antarctic Climate Change and the Environment'
An interesting study investigated the amount of CO2 being absorbed by the Atlantic:
- CarboOcean -- Marine carbon sources and sinks assessment
- 2009/12/04: BBC: Study measures ocean's CO2 uptake
There are substantial variations in the amount of carbon being absorbed by the North Atlantic Ocean, a study shows. Writing in Science, an international team of researchers said the ocean's uptake of carbon varied by as much as 10% over the space of a few years. The data set, described as the largest of its kind, was gathered by devices fitted to a fleet of commercial ships. - 2009/12/03: NatureN: Ships provide insight into ocean carbon -- Pilot study shows how the seas soak up carbon dioxide
- 2009/12/03: SciNews: Ocean's carbon dioxide uptake varies year to year
Data taken hourly by cargo ships show that how much of the greenhouse gas North Atlantic waters absorb varies more than thought. - 2009/12/03: PhysOrg: New method of measuring ocean CO2 uptake could lead to climate change 'early warning system'
An international team of scientists led by the University of East Anglia (UEA) has developed a new method of measuring the absorption of CO2 by the oceans and mapped for the first time CO2 uptake for the entire North Atlantic. - 2009/12/03: Eureka: New method of measuring ocean CO2 uptake could lead to climate change 'early warning system'
They're still talking about 4 Degrees:
- 2009/12/05: CCP: 4 Degrees and Beyond? Mind the gap
I imagine we will see a lot more of these decadal retrospective stories toward the end of the month:
- 2009/12/01: USNWR: Climate's Lost Decade Now Leads to a 'Last' Decade
UEA has announced an inquiry into the CRU email and data theft:
- 2009/12/04: JEB: CRU enquiry announced
- 2009/12/03: Guardian(UK): Senior civil servant [Muir Russell] to investigate leaked emails between climate scientists
- 2009/12/03: NatureTGB: Update: details of Climatic Research Unit investigation unveiled
- 2009/12/03: BBC: Chair for climate e-mail review
Sir Muir Russell will head an independent review into the e-mails leaked from the Climatic Research Unit (CRU) in Norwich, UK. Sir Muir, a former civil servant, will look into allegations that have arisen from the security breach. The review will examine whether there is evidence of manipulation or suppression of data "at odds with acceptable scientific practice". - 2009/12/03: CBC: University [UEA] to probe possible climate data bias
It appears there have been other hack attempts, which puts the CRU hack in a different perspective:
- 2009/12/06: DeepClimate: The Times: Climate e-mail hackers "aimed to maximise harm to Copenhagen summit"
- 2009/12/06: Guardian(UK): Break-in targets climate scientist -- New incident raises fears of a smear campaign
- 2009/12/05: MoD: Climate hacking in Canada
- 2009/12/04: DeSmogBlog: Hackers attempt to access Canadian government Centre for Climate Modeling and Analysis
- 2009/12/05: ClimateP: Watergate Redux: Break-ins Reported at Another Top Climate Research Center
- 2009/12/04: RawStory: Repeated break-ins point to 'orchestrated campaign' by climate skeptics
- 2009/12/05: DM:CCM: New Climate Change Hacking Event in Canada
- 2009/12/05: Wunderground: Historic snow hits Houston; hackers target Canadian climate scientists
- 2009/12/05: BCLSB: More On The UVIC Break In
- 2009/12/04: TP:WR: Watergate Redux: Break-ins Reported At Another Top Climate Research Center
- 2009/12/03: BCLSB: ClimateHackerGate! CRU First Hacked In October????
- 2009/12/04: CanWest: Attempted breaches show larger effort to discredit climate science: researcher
An alleged series of attempted security breaches at the University of Victoria in the run-up to next week's Copenhagen summit on climate change is evidence of a larger effort to discredit climate science, says a renowned B.C. researcher. Andrew Weaver, a University of Victoria scientist and key contributor to the Nobel prize-winning work of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, says there have been a number of attempted breaches in recent months, including two successful break-ins at his campus office in which a dead computer was stolen and papers were rummaged through. - 2009/12/04: BCLSB: Looks Like There IS An International Climate Conspiracy -- attempts were made to steal documents and computer files from U-of-T and the University of Victoria
- 2009/12/03: BBC: E-mail row 'to affect Copenhagen'
E-mails hacked from a climate research institute suggest climate change does not have a human cause, according to Saudi Arabia's lead climate negotiator. Mohammad Al-Sabban told BBC News that the issue will have a "huge impact" on next week's UN climate summit, with countries unwilling to cut emissions. Other scientists say the e-mails from the University of East Anglia do not alter the picture of man-made warming. - 2009/12/04: DeSmogBlog: IPCC Working Group 1 Responds on Stolen Emails
- 2009/12/04: DeSmogBlog: APS Triflers Using Hacked Emails to Question Science
- 2009/12/04: GreenFyre: CRUde hack, why can't Johnny Denier read?
- 2009/12/04: Guardian(UK): Laboratories' outer limits
In the furore over our leaked emails, remember the climate debate is not decided just by scientists - 2009/12/05: Asymptotia: On Science and Politics [CRU]
- 2009/12/04: Grist: The Glacier and the Email -- 'Climategate' is a diversion
- 2009/12/02: Time: As Climate Summit Nears, Skeptics Gain Traction
- 2009/12/05: TreeHugger: One Last Post on the Hacked Climate Emails: Scientists Speak Out
- 2009/12/05: TreeHugger: Six Things We Learned from 'Climate Gate': Rob Hopkins on the CRU Hack
- 2009/12/04: G&M: Breach in the global-warming bunker rattles climate science at the worst time
Leaked e-mails from Britain's Climatic Research Unit threaten to undermine Copenhagen summit on carbon emissions - 2009/12/04: NatureTGB: Climate scientists stand behind their work, again
- 2009/12/04: ClimateP: [link to flash & partial transcript] Michael Mann, Gavin Schmidt, and Michael Oppenheimer on "Climate Science: Setting the Record Straight"
- 2009/12/04: ABC(Au): UN to probe hacked climate emails
A top UN panel is to probe claims that British scientists sought to suppress data backing climate change sceptics' views, its head said ahead of the the landmark Copenhagen summit. Rajendra Pachauri, head of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, said the claims - which led a top expert to leave his post temporarily this week - were serious and needed to be investigated. - 2009/12/04: NewScientist: Why there's no sign of a climate conspiracy in hacked emails
- 2009/12/04: NRDC:SwitchBoard: Hacked Emails Don't Change Facts on the Ground...or in the Air, or in the Ocean
- 2009/12/04: BSD: My Freedom of Information-type work and relation to the hacked emails
- 2009/12/04: CSW: IPCC statement on stolen emails from the Climatic Research Unit at the University of East Anglia
- 2009/12/03: Stoat: The Upside to the Climatic Research Unit e-mail hacking incident?
- 2009/12/04: DM:SRK: No Escape From "ClimateGate"
- 2009/12/03: BCLSB: ClimateHackerGate! CRU First Hacked In October????
- 2009/12/04: DeSmogBlog: A Review of Michael Mann's Exoneration
- 2009/12/03: DeSmogBlog: The oily echo machine behind "climategate"
- 2009/12/04: DM:BA: Global warming emails: followup
- 2009/12/03: DeSmogBlog: Kevin Trenberth: Standing up for the IPCC Process
- 2009/12/04: UCSUSA: Contrarians Using Hacked E-mails To Try to Fool Public on Climate Science
- 2009/12/04: CCP: Contrarians using hacked e-mails to try to fool public on climate science
- 2009/12/03: Maribo: The Climategate positive feedback loop
- 2009/12/04: IJI: What we know about the CRU attacker, part 3.2: the 3 odd files
- 2009/12/04: TWTB: SwiftHack meme watch: National Review edition
- 2009/12/03: MediaMatters: Fox & Friends coverage of CRU emails disregards facts, context
- 2009/12/03: TWM: The Planet Is Still Warming...
When it comes to governing and public policy, conservatives are painfully, woefully bad. When it comes to seizing on a manufactured controversy, they're extraordinary. - 2009/12/04: MediaMatters: Fox News repeatedly advanced CEI fellow's accusations NASA is "manipulating data on climate change" without noting CEI received millions from oil industry
- 2009/12/06: ABC(Au): UN defends scientists over leaked emails
The United Nations panel on climate change has strongly defended scientists at the University of East Anglia in Britain who are at the centre of a row over the alleged manipulation of data. - 2009/12/05: Stoat: Hulme
- 2009/12/06: DeepClimate: The Times: Climate e-mail hackers "aimed to maximise harm to Copenhagen summit"
- 2009/12/05: TA: War on Science -- the Climate front
- 2009/12/05: DawgsBlawg: The art and craft of climate debate
- 2009/12/05: DeSmogBlog: Canadian Environment Minister Dismisses Stolen Emails
- 2009/12/05: DeSmogBlog: Mainstream media misdirected in stolen email story
- 2009/12/05: Guardian(UK): Met Office to publish climate change data amid fraud claims
- 2009/12/04: BBC: Expert slams 'tabloid' e-mail row
A colleague of the UK professor at the centre of the climate e-mails row says "sceptics" have embarked on a "tabloid-style character assassination". Professor Andrew Watson rallied to the defence of climate scientist Phil Jones, whose e-mail exchanges prompted claims that data had been manipulated. There was no evidence of attempting to mislead people, Professor Watson added. The University of East Anglia has commissioned an independent inquiry into the affair. "Despite the best efforts of the sceptics, there is no instance in these e-mails that anyone has found so far - and there are millions of people looking - that suggests the scientists manipulated their fundamental data," Professor Watson, from the university's School of Environmental Sciences, stated. - 2009/12/04: CBC: UN to probe stolen climate data emails
The United Nations will conduct its own investigation into emails leaked from a leading British climate science centre in addition to the probe by the University of East Anglia, a senior UN climate official said Friday. [...] In an interview with BBC Radio, the chairman of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, Rajendra Pachauri, said the issue raised by the emails was serious and said "we will look into it in detail." "We will certainly go into the whole lot and then we will take a position on it," he said. "We certainly don't want to brush anything under the carpet." - 2009/12/02: ClimateP: Nature editorial: "Nothing in the e-mails undermines the scientific case that global warming is real ... or that human activities are almost certainly the cause."
- 2009/12/02: Grist: Letter from Europe -- Environmental groups unprepared for 'Swift Boating' of climate science
- 2009/12/02: AbqJournal:JF: The Climate Emails
- 2009/12/03: Atlantic:AS: It's The Computer Code, Silly
- 2009/12/03: MTobis: Andrew Sullivan on SwiftHack
- 2009/12/02: MTobis: Best Comment on the UEA Emails
- 2009/12/03: DM:CCM: Congressional Republicans Go Bonkers Over Climate Emails
- 2009/12/03: DM:CCM: Nature Editorial on Climate Emails
- 2009/12/03: DeSmogBlog: Elizabeth May: An Informed Look at the East Anglia Emails
- 2009/12/03: DeSmogBlog: Nature Weighs in on Email Controversy
- 2009/12/02: DeSmogBlog: Ben Santer Savages the CRU Email Thieves
- 2009/12/03: Wunderground: Embattled UK climate scientist steps down
- 2009/12/01: CSW: Ben Santer: Open letter to the climate science community
- 2009/12/03: PeakEnergy: Hot debate demands cool heads
- 2009/12/02: GreenFyre: CRUde hack, and the bleat goes on
- 2009/12/02: OBMB: Climategate -- All You Need To Know
- 2009/12/03: DWWSJ: Get The jab, and learn What a semi-colon means before you accuse scientists of fraud
- 2009/12/02: EnergyBulletin: Six Things We Know For Sure in the Wake of 'Climate Gate'
- 2009/12/02: EnergyBulletin: Climate Changegate: Setting the Record Straight
- 2009/12/02: NatureN: Battle lines drawn over e-mail leak -- Climatologists remain sanguine over incident
- 2009/12/02: NatureCF: Nature comments on emails stolen from CRU
- 2009/12/02: KSJT: Brit Press: Phil Jones, climate man in email scandal, quits; and Popular Mechanics explains what to make of the whole mess
- 2009/12/02: ClimateP: NASA's James Hansen on hacked emails...
- 2009/12/03: Nature: Climatologists under pressure
Stolen e-mails have revealed no scientific conspiracy, but do highlight ways in which climate researchers could be better supported in the face of public scrutiny. - 2009/12/01: ClimateShifts: Searching for the 'smoking gun' in the climate change code
- 2009/12/01: BSD: Do the skeptics have a point about a 300-year typo in the IPCC?
- 2009/12/01: AFTIC: Phil Jones to temporarily step down as head of CRU
- 2009/12/01: AFTIC: Climategate and why Monbiot is wrong
- 2009/12/02: RealClimate: CRU Hack: More context
- 2009/12/02: SciProg: Not so Swift, Hackers: Why the scandal sometimes called 'ClimateGate' is overblown
- 2009/12/02: DM:CCM: CRU Hack: The Latest
- 2009/12/02: DeSmogBlog: IPCC Reviewers Peer Into Moral Abyss of Censorship
- 2009/12/01: DeSmogBlog: CRU Director Phil Jones To Step Down Pending Investigation Into Hacked Emails
- 2009/12/01: WSJ:EnvCap: Climategate Update: Internal Investigations at CRU, Penn State
- 2009/12/02: CCP: Michael Schlesinger, a climatologist at the University of Illinois, explains why he sees the disclosed e-mails as a complete distraction from the body of evidence pointing to a human hand on the planet's thermostat
- 2009/12/01: CCP: Raypierre of RealClimate commenting about Phil Jones' stepping aside, on the Dot Earth blog of the New York Times
- 2009/12/02: MoD: Quotes of the day: The CRU edition
- 2009/12/02: BBC: Harrabin's Notes: Questions for an inquiry
In his regular column, the BBC's environment analyst, Roger Harrabin, looks at the questions which could be asked by an inquiry into stolen climate e-mails from the University of East Anglia. - 2009/12/01: WaPo: Climate scientist at center of e-mail controversy to step down
- 2009/12/01: BBC: Climate data row man steps down
The research director at the centre of a row over climate change data said he would stand down from the post while there is an independent review. Professor Phil Jones, director of the Norwich-based University of East Anglia's (UEA) Climatic Research Unit (CRU), has said he stands by his data. Sceptics claim the e-mails, leaked after a UEA server was hacked into, showed data was being manipulated. The hacking of the computer is being investigated by Norfolk Police. The files stolen from the computer include documents, detailed data and private e-mails exchanged between leading climate scientists. - 2009/12/01: Guardian(UK): Climate research chief Phil Jones stands down pending inquiry into leaked emails
- 2009/12/01: CBC: U.K. climate scientist under investigation
The U.K.'s University of East Anglia says the director of its Climatic Research Unit is stepping down pending an investigation into allegations stemming from the recent publication of his and other climate scientists' private emails. Phil Jones, the director of the global research centre on climate change, announced that he would stand aside until an independent review determined whether he overstated the case for man-made climate change. - 2009/12/01: NatureTGB: Director of East Anglia climate unit steps aside
- 2009/12/01: ScienceInsider: Climate Emailer Phil Jones Has Stepped Down
- 2009/12/01: UEA: CRU Update 1 December
Professor Phil Jones has today announced that he will stand aside as Director of the Climatic Research Unit until the completion of an independent Review resulting from allegations following the hacking and publication of emails from the Unit. - 2009/12/01: ClimateP: "Phil Jones has today announced that he will stand aside as Director of the Climatic Research Unit until the completion of an independent Review" [CRU press release]
- 2009/12/01: Deltoid: Quote mining code
- 2009/11/30: TS:QuarkSoup: A Peculiarity in a CRU email
- 2009/11/30: TS:QuarkSoup: But... (CRU emails)
- 2009/11/30: TS:QuarkSoup: What if there WAS a conspiracy?
- 2009/12/01: BBC: 'Show Your Working': What 'ClimateGate' means
The "ClimateGate" affair - the publication of e-mails and documents hacked or leaked from one of the world's leading climate research institutions - is being intensely debated on the web. But what does it imply for climate science? Here, Mike Hulme and Jerome Ravetz say it shows that we need a more concerted effort to explain and engage the public in understanding the processes and practices of science and scientists. - 2009/11/30: BBC: Harrabin's Notes: Debating the IPCC
In his regular column, the BBC's environment analyst, Roger Harrabin, looks at how the affair of the stolen climate e-mails has sparked debate among some scientists about the body which peer reviews climate science. - 2009/11/30: NatureTGB: More heat, less light in CRU hacking 'scandal'
- 2009/11/30: ScienceInsider: Climate Hack Scandal Roundup
- 2009/11/30: ClimateP: Why are Hadley and CRU withholding vital climate data from the public?
- 2009/11/30: ClimateP: Washington Times: "Obama digs in on global warming" and "stolen e-mails mean less than they seem"
- 2009/11/29: Grist: Spin me baby one more time -- On 'climategate'
- 2009/11/30: ClimateShifts: Google is in on the conspiracy too!
- 2009/11/30: ClimateShifts: You want data? You can't handle the data!
- 2009/11/30: DM:CCM: The Discovery Institute Gets Personal
- 2009/11/30: TreeHugger: Climate Scientists' "Secret" Data Revealed!
- 2009/11/30: TreeHugger: Debunking the Great Global Warming Conspiracy Conspiracy
- 2009/11/30: GreenFyre: CRUde hack, meme and the 'smoking' gun
- 2009/11/30: WSJ:EnvCap: Climategate: The Fallout Continues from CRU Hacking
- 2009/11/26: Serendipity: Open Climate Science or Denial of Service attacks?
- 2009/11/30: JEB: Hudsongate: the mystery deepens -- OK, it seems that the CRU thing isn't going to go away any time soon...
- 2009/11/29: Times(UK): Climate change data dumped
Scientists at the University of East Anglia (UEA) have admitted throwing away much of the raw temperature data on which their predictions of global warming are based. It means that other academics are not able to check basic calculations said to show a long-term rise in temperature over the past 150 years. The UEA's Climatic Research Unit (CRU) was forced to reveal the loss following requests for the data under Freedom of Information legislation. The data were gathered from weather stations around the world and then adjusted to take account of variables in the way they were collected. The revised figures were kept, but the originals -- stored on paper and magnetic tape -- were dumped to save space when the CRU moved to a new building. - 2009/12/05: TreeHugger: Is the Amazon Rainforest Worth an $18 Billion Bailout?
- 2009/12/04: COP15: The Chinese bill is calculated...30 billion dollars a year...
- 2009/12/04: COP15: 700 million dollars to Asian climate investments
New funds to support low carbon energy technologies in Asia via the Asian Development Bank. - 2009/12/04: SolveClimate: 'Climate Principles' Refocuses Banks on Sustainable Behavior
- 2009/12/04: Yahoo:AFP: China's costly climate goals: report
China will need to invest up to 30 billion dollars a year to meet its goal of curbing greenhouse gas emissions, the state press said Friday, citing an academic study. - 2009/12/03: PlanetArk: Green Future Affordable With Deep CO2 Cuts: Study
- 2009/12/02: Times(UK): Global warming measures will cost 'twice as much as predicted' [Nick Stern]
- 2009/12/02: NewScientist: Low-carbon future: We can afford to go green
- 2009/12/02: Grist: How much will we pay to avoid serious harm to our children and grandchildren?
- 2009/12/02: COP15: UN: 75-100 billion US dollars a year is needed to help poor nations
- 2009/12/02: AlterNet: The Recession Is Taking a Bite Out of Meat Consumption
Late coverage of Tim Garrett's theory:
- 2009/11/29: NBF: Theory that Civilization is a Heat Engine
Late Comment on those Lancet Health and Climate Change articles:
- 2009/12/01: ClimateP: The Lancet medical journal: Cutting greenhouse gas emissions has major direct health benefits
Late Comment on the Copenhagen Diagnosis:
- 2009/12/03: CSW: Copenhagen Diagnosis
- 2009/11/24: JapanFocus: The Copenhagen Diagnosis: Sobering Update on the Science
The Arctic melt continues to garner a lot of attention:
- 2009/12/03: CCP: Satellite images of healthy Arctic Sea ice prove to be thin "rotten" ice up close
- 2009/12/02: MGS: Fake ice [Barber]
- 2009/11/24: UofM: Climate change's impact in Arctic worse than thought
Arctic sea ice has duped satellites into reporting thick multiyear sea ice where in fact none exists, a new study by University of Manitoba researcher David Barber has found. In 2008 and 2009 satellite data showed a growth in Arctic sea ice extension leaving some to reckon global warming was reversing. But after sailing an ice breaker to the southern Beaufort Sea this past September Dr. Barber and his colleagues found something unexpected: thin, 'rotten' ice can electromagnetically masquerade as thick, multiyear sea ice. And contrary to what satellites recently suggested, we are actually speeding up the loss of the remaining, healthy, multiyear sea ice. - 2009/11/29: CCurrents: Climate Change's Impact In Arctic Worse Than Thought
A grim tale regarding the polar bear:
- 2009/12/05: ABC(Au): Climate change driving polar bears to cannibalism
Grim evidence of the effects of climate change are emerging in Canada, with scientists reporting more cases of cannibalism among polar bears. - 2009/12/03: CBC: Hungry polar bears resorting to cannibalism
The late formation of Arctic sea ice may be forcing some hungry and desperate polar bears in northern Manitoba to resort to cannibalism. Eight cases of mature male polar bears eating bear cubs have been reported this year among the animals around Churchill, according to scientists. - 2009/11/30: CCP: Methane, the ticking time bomb, will go off!
- 2009/11/30: CCP: Scientific American (December 2009), "Methane -- A Menace Surfaces" by Katey Walter Anthony
As for the geopolitics of Arctic resources:
- 2009/12/04: CanWest: House of Commons approves 'Canadian Northwest Passage' moniker
While in Antarctica:
- 2009/12/03: SciDaily: Rising Antarctic Snowmelt Forcast
The 30-year record low in Antarctic snowmelt that occurred during the 2008-09 austral summer was likely due to concurrent strong positive phases for two main climate drivers, ENSO (El Niño -- Southern Oscillation) and SAM (Southern Hemisphere Annular Mode), according to Dr. Marco Tedesco, Assistant Professor of Earth & Atmospheric Sciences at The City College of New York. - 2009/12/01: PhysOrg: Winds drive icebergs away from New Zealand
Strong westerly winds in the southern Pacific Ocean have driven scores of icebergs originally headed toward New Zealand to the east, away from the country, an oceanographer said Tuesday. - 2009/12/03: COP15: China's agriculture will be severely affected by climate change
- 2009/12/02: Reuters: Global warming threatens China harvests: forecaster
Droughts and floods stoked by global warming threaten to destabilize China's grain production, the nation's top meteorologist has warned, urging bigger grain reserves and strict protection of farmland and water supplies. Extreme weather damage can now cause annual grain output in China, the world's biggest grain producer, to fluctuate by about 10 to 20 percent from longer-term averages. But with global warming intensifying droughts, floods and pests, the band of fluctuation in annual production could widen to between 30 and 50 percent, Zheng Guoguang, head of the China Meteorological Administration, wrote in a new essay. He did not say how long it might be before that could happen. - 2009/11/29: CCurrents: Who Will Feed Our Children?
- 2009/12/02: BBerg: China Grain Output May Drop 37% on Climate Change
China's output of grains could decline as much as 37 percent in the second half of this century if measures to counter the effects of climate change aren't actively implemented, a weather official said. The crops affected would include wheat, corn and rice, Zheng Guoguang, head of the China Meteorological Administration, said in an article published on the agency's Web site yesterday. Research shows that for every degree warmer the atmosphere becomes the key growing period for rice to develop properly will be shortened by an average of 7-8 days and by 17 days for the winter wheat crop, Zheng said. "Yield and quality will drop accordingly," he said. China's long-term food security and social stability may be threatened unless the world's largest grain producer invests more to fight the effects of drought, McKinsey & Co. said in a report Nov. 24. The country's corn harvest, the world's second- largest, plunged by 13 percent to a four-year low this year because of drought, a survey of farmers by Geneva-based SGS SA for Bloomberg showed. - 2009/12/01: FAO: Addressing climate change and food security together -- Opportunities in agriculture should not be missed - FAO publishes policy brief
- 2009/12/05: AlterNet: Author Jonathan Safran Foer on Hunting, PETA, and Disagreeing with Michael Pollan
- 2009/12/04: OilDrum: The Food System and Public Policy
- 2009/12/03: PhysOrg: ARS Explores Ways to Keep Carbon in the Soil
Agricultural Research Service (ARS) scientists are testing out alternative ways of tilling the soil and rotating crops to see if they can help wheat farmers in Oregon sequester more carbon in the soil and reduce greenhouse gas emissions. - 2009/12/03: VAI: VAI Researchers Find Long Awaited Key to Creating Drought Resistant Crops
- 2009/12/01: Grist: The localization of agriculture [Lester Brown]
- 2009/12/02: TreeHugger: America Wastes 40% of It's Food Supply Every Year
- 2009/11/30: UN: Devastating cattle plague [rinderpest] to be purged within 18 months, announces UN agency
- 2009/11/30: MongaBay: Americans throw away enough food every year to feed 200 million adults
- 2009/11/30: Grist: Organic farming has a major part to play in a low-carbon world -- Soil carbon - a blind spot in the debate on carbon
Nida blew out in the Western Pacific, but otherwise it has been quiet:
- 2009/12/03: NASA: NASA's Terra and Aqua Satellites See Nida Fading, and 97W Getting Organized
- 2009/12/02: Eureka: Nida getting knocked by winds, and 97W piquing interest
- 2009/11/30: NASA: Typhoon Nida's Cloud Tops Dropping as it Zigzags in Wind Shear
- 2009/11/30: Eureka: NASA captures Typhoon Nida's clouds from 2 angles
While elsewhere in the hurricane wars:
- 2009/11/30: NOAANews: Slow Atlantic Hurricane Season Comes to a Close
- 2009/11/30: TerraDaily: Mild Atlantic hurricane season comes to an end
- 2009/11/30: Wunderground: Hurricane season draws to a close
As for GHGs:
- 2009/12/04: TreeHugger: Total U.S. Greenhouse Gas Emissions Down 2.2% in 2008, But Let's Not Celebrate Yet
- 2009/12/03: EarthTimes: US emissions dipped 2.2 per cent in 2008
- 2009/12/03: WBCSD: U.S. 2008 greenhouse gas emission fall 2.2% -EIA
- 2009/12/03: SolveClimate: Coke Ices Use of [HFC] 'Super Greenhouse Gases'
- 2009/12/03: Eureka: CO2 levels rising in troposphere over rural areas
- 2009/12/02: GreenGrok: Greenhouse Gas Emissions: A Tale of Two Countries
- 2009/12/01: G&M: Emissions targets fall short, report says
The Pew Center says developed countries are currently meeting only half the reductions scientists believe are necessary -- with Canada among the least ambitious - 2009/12/01: Guardian(UK): Global emissions exceeding 'carbon budget', PwC study finds
- 2009/11/30: PhysOrg: Making sense of greenhouse gas accounting -- methods used to quantify GHG emissions in waste management
- 2009/11/30: EarthTimes: Background: The world's biggest polluters
- 2009/11/29: CCP: E. D. Schulze et al., Nature Geoscience (Nov. 2009), Importance of methane and nitrous oxide for Europe's terrestrial greenhouse-gas balance
We're seeing a variety of GHG reduction pledges leading up to COP15:
- 2009/12/03: UNDispatch: A closer look at the emissions intensity targets of China and India
- 2009/12/03: BBC: India has pledged to cut its "carbon emissions intensity" in the next decade by between 20% and 25%. [from 2005 levels]
- 2009/12/03: NatureTGB: India announces climate target -- 20-25 percent by 2020 from the 2005 level
- 2009/12/03: ABC(Au): India follows China in setting carbon targets
- 2009/12/03: EarthTimes: India announces carbon intensity cuts of 20 to 25 per cent [from 2005 levels] by 2020
- 2009/12/03: BBC: India has pledged to cut its "carbon emissions intensity" in the next decade by between 20% and 25% [from 2005 levels]
- 2009/12/02: Guardian(UK): India to reduce carbon intensity by 24% by 2020
- 2009/12/02: Guardian(UK): India reveals carbon emission targets -- carbon intensity reduction of 24% from 2005 levels by 2020
- 2009/12/02: EurActiv: Europe 'could cut emissions by 40%'
The EU could double its 2020 target for cutting greenhouse gases at a daily cost of 2 euros per person, the Stockholm Environment Institute (SEI), a research group, said yesterday (1 December). - 2009/12/02: NewScientist: US and China emissions pledges won't stop 2 °C warming
- 2009/12/01: COP15: New global carbon account with huge budget deficit
Rich countries are far behind schedule in meeting the CO2 emission reductions they have committed to, a new report shows - 2009/11/30: PlanetArk: Halve World Carbon Emissions By 2050: Danish Text
- 2009/11/30: Maribo: China's emissions pledge depends entirely on economic growth
Funny. I didn't have Stern pegged as one of the rah-rah squad:
- 2009/12/03: EarthTimes: Climate expert Stern:world close to emissions goals target
- 2009/12/03: Guardian(UK): Global emissions only 'few billion tonnes' short of targets, says [Nick] Stern
Leading economist says world leaders are more than halfway towards pledges needed for effective deal at Copenhagen - 2009/12/03: WaPo: As emissions increase, carbon 'sinks' get clogged -- World's oceans, forests becoming less able to absorb CO2
- 2009/12/01: GreenGrok: Tricky Business: Tracking How Much Manmade CO2 Stays in the Atmosphere
As for the temperature record:
- 2009/12/04: NOAANews: North American 2008 Cooling Attributed to Natural Causes -- Cool sea surface temperatures overrode warming
- 2009/12/03: TS:QuarkSoup: Warmest November in 30 years
- 2009/12/02: HotTopic: NZ temps: warming real, record robust, sceptics wrong
- 2009/11/30: CCP: Combined Global Land and Marine Surface Temperatures: 1850-2008, & wrt October 2009
Aerosols are making their presence felt:
- 2009/11/30: SciDaily: Climate Studies to Benefit from 12 Years of Satellite Aerosol Data
While in the paleoclimate:
- 2009/12/05: SciDaily: Undocumented Volcano Contributed to Extremely Cold Decade from 1810-1819
- 2009/12/03: SciDaily: Antarctica Served as Climatic Refuge in Earth's Greatest Extinction Event [250 mya]
- 2009/12/03: Eureka: Carbon and oxygen in tree rings can reveal past climate information -- Isotope analysis provides accurate information
- 2009/12/03: BBC: A journey through the Earth's climate history
- 2009/12/02: PhysOrg: 'Super-river' formed the English Channel
- 2009/12/01: CCP: William Patterson: Younger Dryas began in months, not years, when Lake Agassiz flowed into the Arctic Sea and North Atlantic Ocean
- 2009/11/30: SciDaily: Greening of Sahara Desert Triggered Early Human Migrations out of Africa
- 2009/11/29: ESF: Big freeze plunged Europe into ice age in months
And the ENSO front:
- 2009/12/01: WMO: El Niño/La Niña Update
An El Niño event, which started in June 2009, is well established across the tropical Pacific. El Niño conditions are very likely to continue at least through the remainder of 2009 and into the first quarter of 2010. Some climate patterns typical of El Niño have been observed over the last several months. The expected continued presence of El Niño into early 2010 has implications for many climate patterns around the world over the next several months, keeping in view the fact that, in some regions, impacts typically continue during the decay phase. Decay of the El Niño event to near-neutral conditions across the tropical Pacific during the approximate March-May 2010 period is considered the most likely further development. The possibilities of a second year of El Niño conditions or rapid transition to a La Niña situation are considered unlikely at this time. - 2009/12/02: PlanetArk: El Nino Set To Continue Into First Quarter Of 2010: WMO
- 2009/11/30: ClimateP: NOAA: "A majority of ENSO models indicate El Niño will continue through March-April-May 2010"
As for ocean currents:
- 2009/12/04: SciDaily: Live Saver for the Gulf Stream? Climate Changes Supplies More Saline Waters from Indian Ocean
- 2009/12/04: CCP: Arctic Ocean undersaturated for calcium carbonate (aragonite)
Meanwhile in near earth orbit:
- 2009/12/03: BBC: Deadline extended for Jason funds
European nations have been given a few more weeks to find the money to fund a key Earth observation satellite. The Jason-3 spacecraft must be ordered soon if a remarkable 18-year record of ocean height is to be maintained. Eumetsat, which looks after Europe's weather satellites, needs at least 58m euros ($87m; £53m) from its member states to initiate the programme. Jason-3 would launch in 2013, allowing time to cross-check its data in orbit with the current Jason-2 mission. Only by flying the pair in tandem for a period of months can scientists minimise calibration errors between the two satellites' datasets. The Eumetsat Council has extended the deadline for interested member states to subscribe to Jason-3 through the end of the year into January. - 2009/12/02: NOAANews: NOAA Deactivates GOES-10 after 12 Years of Tracking Storms -- Satellite surpassed planned five-year mission
- 2009/12/02: Eureka: STPSat-1 successfully completes extended mission
- 2009/11/30: Eureka: GOES-14 (O) moving into on-orbit storage around the Earth
More GW impacts are being seen:
- 2009/12/04: KSJT: Minneapolis Trib: CO2 is up, and so are plenty of aspen trees -- by a lot
- 2009/12/03: MongaBay: Extinctions on the rise in the Galapagos: fishing and global warming devastating islands' species
- 2009/12/03: IPSNews: Climate Change: "We Are a Harbinger of What Is to Come"
A small group of indigenous people have travelled here to the historic Copenhagen climate talks to show negotiators dramatic documentary videos they made about the immediate impacts of climate change on their homelands and way of life. - 2009/12/03: CNN: Climate change threatens life in Shishmaref, Alaska
[...] warming is threatening places like Shishmaref, Alaska - One couple in arctic village live at edge of coast that's melting - Their safety, survival of Shishmaref's Inupiat Eskimo culture are in jeopardy - 2009/12/03: TerraDaily: Climate Change In Kuwait Bay
- 2009/12/03: Eureka: Major impacts of climate change expected on mental health
- 2009/12/03: Eureka: Elevated CO2 levels may mitigate losses of biodiversity from nitrogen pollution -- U of Minnesota study involved a 10-year outdoor experiment
- 2009/12/02: NatureTGB: Climate change creates shell-size surprise
- 2009/12/01: MongaBay: Not just the polar bear: ten American species that are feeling the heat from global warming
- 2009/12/01: WHOI: In CO2-rich Environment, Some Ocean Dwellers Increase Shell Production
- 2009/11/30: ClimateP: The times they are a-changin' ... in Denmark, South Africa, Brazil, Japan
- 2009/11/30: Eureka: Climate change in Kuwait Bay
- 2009/11/30: Eureka: How can scientists measure evolutionary responses to climate change?
And then there are the world's forests:
- 2009/12/04: NRDC:SwitchBoard: Stemming Global Deforestation Emissions: Copenhagen (Part 4)
- 2009/12/04: TreeHugger: Carbon Emissions Cause Aspen Forest Explosion
- 2009/12/04: Eureka: Greenhouse gas carbon dioxide ramps up aspen growth
- 2009/12/03: Eureka: The end of deforestation in the Brazilian Amazon?
- 2009/12/03: NatureN: Amazon is best site for forest carbon investments -- Forest Carbon Index maps climate opportunities
- 2009/12/02: MongaBay: Paper provider for fashion gurus drops APP due to deforestation across Indonesia
- 2009/12/03: TerraDaily: World Forest Observatory Needed
- 2009/12/02: BBerg: Brazil Wants Limits on Tropical Trees for [REDD] CO2 Credits
- 2009/12/01: PlanetArk: Criminal Gangs Plunder Madagascar Forests
- 2009/12/01: PlanetArk: Rich World Should Pay Africa To Preserve Forests
- 2009/11/30: Eureka: World forest observatory needed to monitor vital role of forests in climate deal
A new scientific organisation is needed to monitor the commitments that will be made by developing countries at Copenhagen to cut their deforestation rates, according to research at the University of Leeds. - 2009/11/30: NYT: Tree Harvester [APRIL] Offers to Save Indonesian Forest
[...] April, says it wants to create a ring of industrial tree plantations around the peninsula's core to preserve it. What is more, it hopes to receive carbon credits for doing so under ... REDD - 2009/12/04: Guardian(UK): Migration is the only escape from rising tides of climate change in Bangladesh
- 2009/12/04: Guardian(UK): UK should open borders to climate refugees, says Bangladeshi minister
- 2009/12/04: Guardian(UK): Bangladesh's climate migration trail: 'Our village is still underwater'
- 2009/12/03: Eureka: Forest deal at Copenhagen must avoid creating 'carbon refugees'
Forest dwellers must be included in the design of the upcoming forest deal at Copenhagen in order to avoid a humanitarian crisis, according to a scientist at the University of Leeds. - 2009/12/05: Wunderground: Historic snow hits Houston; hackers target Canadian climate scientists
- 2009/12/02: Novosti: Winter temperature record broken in Moscow
- 2009/12/03: ABC(Au): Heatwave puts Moscow's white Christmas on hold
- 2009/12/02: Wunderground: Fierce storm hammers Southeast U.S.
As for heatwaves and wild fires:
- 2009/12/03: TerraDaily: Traditional Indigenous Fire Management Techniques Deployed [in Australia]
- 2009/12/03: BBC: Yosemite learns to love forest fires
- 2009/12/02: BBC: California's fire threat grows -- Fire-proof future? California faces up to year-round forest fires
- 2009/11/30: PlanetArk: Australian Wildfire Scheme Said Model To Cut CO2
Corals are dying:
- 2009/12/02: Eureka: Discovery of the Jekyll-and-Hyde factors in 'coral bleaching'
Acidification is changing the oceans:
- 2009/12/03: ClimateShifts: Marine calcifiers exhibit mixed responses to CO2-induced ocean acidification
- 2009/12/01: SciNow: Acidic Oceans May Be a Boon for Some Marine Dwellers
- 2009/12/02: KSJT: USA Today, etc: A more acid ocean may have some winners among shellfish (but, still, plenty of losers)
- 2009/12/01: PhysOrg: Acid test: Study reveals both losers and winners of CO2-induced ocean acidification
- 2009/12/01: SolveClimate: Increasing Ocean Acidification Is Tipping Fragile Balances within Marine Ecosystems
Glaciers are melting:
- 2009/12/04: Time: The Tragedy of the Himalayas
- 2009/12/05: EarthTimes: Satellite images show Himalayan glacier receded 1.5 km in 30 years
- 2009/12/04: BBC: Glacier threat to Bolivia capital
Fears are growing for the future of water supplies in one of Latin America's fastest-growing urban areas - Bolivia's sprawling capital of La Paz and its twin El Alto. Scientists monitoring the glaciers high in the Andes mountains - a key source of water - say the ice is showing signs of shrinking faster than previously forecast. - 2009/12/01: BBC: Himalayan glaciers' 'mixed picture' -- A scientific debate has been triggered over the state of glaciers in the Himalayas
Sea levels are rising:
- 2009/12/05: CBC:Q&Q: The Rising Seas
- 2009/12/03: PhysOrg: Sea Level Is Rising Along U.S. Atlantic Coast, According to New Data Analysis
- 2009/12/01: Stoat: Major sea level rise likely as Antarctic ice melts?
- 2009/12/02: ChinaDaily: Rising anxiety
[...] Sea levels across the world are rising slowly every year, a fact that is creeping off the pages of numerous science reports and environmental awareness campaign leaflets into people's daily consciousness, particularly those living on the eastern and southern coasts of China. - 2009/12/01: NewScientist: Seas could rise 1.4m, warns Antarctic climate review
- 2009/12/01: COP15: Rapid ice loss in parts of the Antarctic has big impact on sea levels
One man-made environmental impact -- the ozone hole -- has shielded most of Antarctica from another, namely global warming. However, a new study shows that the West Antarctic glaciers are rapidly melting. - 2009/12/01: TerraDaily: Antarctic melt may push sea levels to 1.4 metres: study
- 2009/12/01: CCP: Dimitry Olov: Sea level rise and the future of the U.S. East Coast with Boston as a well-defined example of infrastructure loss
- 2009/12/01: Reuters: West Antarctic melt to have big impact on rising sea
- 2009/11/30: Google:AFP: Antarctic melt to feed global sea rise
- 2009/11/30: MoJo: What Happens When Your Country Drowns? Meet the people of Tuvalu, the world's first climate refugees.
- 2009/11/30: PlanetArk: For Maldives, Climate Deal Is A Survival Issue
- 2009/11/30: EarthTimes: Climate change a challenge for Pacific islands
- 2009/11/29: CCP: Rising sea level poses risk to Qatar, neighbours
As for the hydrological cycle:
- 2009/12/05: BBC: Saudi flood death inquiry opens
Saudi officials have launched an investigation into the handling of last month's flooding in Jeddah that killed at least 150 people. Saudi Arabia's King Abdullah, who ordered the inquiry, has said that those responsible will be punished. There is intense anger in Jeddah over the death and destruction caused by the heavy rainstorm at the end of November. - 2009/12/03: TerraDaily: Water trucked into drought-hit Australian towns
- 2009/12/03: WSJ:EnvCap: Boiling Point: What to Do About Looming Water Shortages?
- 2009/12/02: NatureTGB: Dry times in California
- 2009/12/01: PhysOrg: Researchers look at water-energy impacts of climate change
Climate projections for the next 50 to 100 years forecast increasingly frequent severe droughts and heat waves across the American Southwest, sinking available water levels even as rising mercury drives up demand for it. - 2009/12/02: TreeHugger: Global Warming Could Reduce California's Hydropower Output
- 2009/12/02: Eureka: Strong regional climatic fluctuations in the tropics -- Distinct long-term variations of wet and dry phases in the tropics of East Africa
- 2009/12/01: UN: Another $6 million needed to help Tajikistan's flood victims, UN says
- 2009/12/01: NRDC:SwitchBoard: As California's Drought Continues, so does the Need to Conserve Water
- 2009/12/01: BBC: Saudi Arabia has ordered an inquiry into flash floods last week that killed more than 100 people, according to the state news agency
- 2009/12/01: PlanetArk: The Case For Water Disclosure [CDP Water Disclosure]
- 2009/11/30: LA Times: Copenhagen's missing ingredient: water
Scientists stress water's profound link with climate change, yet delegates at next week's conference have deleted water from the working draft of a binding environmental treaty. - 2009/12/03: PragCap: Rail traffic still negative despite very easy comps -- Total intermodal traffic down 6.4% versus 2008 and down a staggering 32% versus 2007.
- 2009/12/01: PRWatch: The Airline Industry's Global Warming Denial
While in the endless quest for zero energy, sustainable buildings and practical codes:
- 2009/11/30: Guardian(UK): Building an easy answer to climate change
Buildings last for decades, so increasing their green credentials can have a long-term impact on our energy consumption - 2009/11/30: Grist: Making buildings more efficient: It helps to understand human behavior
As for carbon sequestration:
- 2009/12/03: ERabett: Carbon sequestration rears its ugly head again
- 2009/12/01: JEB: Hot air (capture)
- 2009/12/01: Times(UK): Carbon must be sucked from air, says IPCC chief Rajendra Pachauri
- 2009/11/30: TechRev: Carbon Capture with Nanotubes
Startup Porifera is developing membranes to separate greenhouse gases from smokestacks. - 2009/12/01: NatGeo: [Letter] Geopolitics of geoengineering by Philip W. Boyd
And on the adaptation front:
- 2009/12/04: KSJT: AP: Is adaptation, including a Noachian approach to saving some wildlife, the new Plan A (or Plan A- at least) for climate change?
- 2009/12/03: PhysOrg: Global warming may require higher dams, stilts
With the world losing the battle against global warming so far, experts are warning that humans need to follow nature's example: Adapt or die. That means elevating buildings, making taller and stronger dams and seawalls, rerouting water systems, restricting certain developments, changing farming practices and ultimately moving people, plants and animals out of harm's way. - 2009/12/01: NERC:NORA: Importance of methane and nitrous oxide for Europe's terrestrial greenhouse-gas balance by E. D. Schulze et al.
- 2009/12/02: NERC:NORA: The mid Pliocene Warm Period : a test-bed for integrating data and models by A.M. Haywood et al.
- 2009/12/03: NERC:NORA: Terrestrial Umbrella - Effects of eutrophication and acidification on terrestrial ecosystems. Annual Report 2009 by B. Emmett et al.
- 2009/12/04: NERC:NORA: UK Greenhouse Gas Inventory 1990 to 2007: Annual Report for submission under the Framework Convention on Climate Change by J. Jackson et al.
- 2009/12/04: NERC:NORA: Half-precessional dynamics of monsoon rainfall near the East African equator by D. Verschuren et al.
- 2009/12/03: ACP: Increase of upper troposphere/lower stratosphere wave baroclinicity during the second half of the 20th century by J. M. Castanheira et al.
- 2009/12/03: ACP: Retrieval of atmospheric profiles and cloud properties from IASI spectra using super-channels by X. Liu et al.
- 2009/12/04: ACPD: Interpreting the cloud cover - aerosol optical depth relationship found in satellite data using a general circulation model by J. Quaas et al.
- 2009/12/03: ACPD: Aerosol analysis using a Proton-Transfer-Reaction Thermo-Desorption Mass Spectrometer (PTR-TD-MS): a new approach to study processing of organic aerosols by R. Holzinger et al.
- 2009/12/03: CP: Pliocene three-dimensional global ocean temperature reconstruction by H. J. Dowsett et al.
- 2009/12/01: CP: Pollen-based biome reconstructions for Latin America at 0, 6000 and 18 000 radiocarbon years ago by R. Marchant et al.
- 2009/12/01: TC: Mapping glaciers in Jotunheimen, South-Norway, during the "Little Ice Age" maximum by S. Baumann et al.
- 2009/12/02: TCD: Surface melt magnitude retrieval over Ross Ice Shelf, Antarctica using coupled MODIS near-IR and thermal satellite measurements by D. J. Lampkin & C. C. Karmosky
- 2009/12/02: AGWObserver: Papers on global sea surface temperature observations
- 2009/12/02: ACP: Impact of Chinese anthropogenic emissions on submicrometer aerosol concentration at Mt. Tateyama, Japan by K. Osada et al.
- 2009/11/30: ACP: Initial fate of fine ash and sulfur from large volcanic eruptions by U. Niemeier et al.
- 2009/12/01: ACPD: Mexico City aerosol analysis during MILAGRO using high resolution aerosol mass spectrometry at the urban supersite (T0) - Part 2: Analysis of the biomass burning contribution and the modern carbon fraction by A. C. Aiken et al.
- 2009/12/02: ACPD: Solar cycle signals in sea level pressure and sea surface temperature by I. Roy & J. D. Haigh
- 2009/12/01: ACPD: Radiosondes stratospheric temperatures from 1957 to 2008 at Dumont d'Urville (Antarctica): trends and link with Polar Stratospheric Clouds by C. David et al.
- 2009/11/30: ACPD: Total aerosol effect: radiative forcing or radiative flux perturbation? by U. Lohmann et al.
- 2009/12/01: PNAS: Recent unprecedented tree-ring growth in bristlecone pine at the highest elevations and possible causes by Matthew W. Salzer et al.
- 2009/12/01: PNAS: Wet phases in the Sahara/Sahel region and human migration patterns in North Africa by Isla S. Castañeda et al.
- 2009/12/01: PNAS: Two- and three-dimensional folding of thin film single-crystalline silicon for photovoltaic power applications by Xiaoying Guo et al.
And other significant documents:
- 2009/12/03: IMO: [400k pdf] OIF Excerpts from Report of 31st LC/LP meeting
- 2009/12/02: EnergyBulletin: [link to 2.2 meg pdf] Soil Carbon and organic farming (report)
- 2009/11/25: BAS:SCAR: [link to 20 meg pdf] The Antarctic Climate Change and the Environment (ACCE) Report
Before we get into politics, there was some science done:
- 2009/12/05: DWWSJ: Are We Living Through A Notable Moment In Science History??
- 2009/12/04: EarthTimes: Climate change highlighted at alternative Nobel awards ceremony
- 2009/12/03: Guardian(UK): New weapon against climate change on verge of completing first transatlantic voyage
Battery-powered underwater glider known as the Scarlet Knight tracks temperature variations in the most inhospitable locations - 2009/12/03: SciDaily: Drought-Related Shrinking Processes Detected in Living Roots in the Soil for the First Time
On Lindzen & Choi:
- 2009/12/05: AGWObserver: Comments on Lindzen & Choi (2009)
Clive Spash and CSIRO:
- 2009/12/04: NatureN: Researcher [Clive Spash] quits [CSIRO] over science agency interference -- Australian research funding body under fire for ordering major changes to a peer-reviewed paper
- 2009/12/03: ABC(Au): Scientist quits over ETS 'censorship'
A senior CSIRO environmental economist has resigned after saying his criticism of the emissions trading scheme (ETS) was censored. Dr Clive Spash has resigned after three years with CSIRO. For most of this year, he had been in a dispute over the publication of his paper which criticised carbon trading schemes. But the CSIRO has rejected claims he was censored. - 2009/12/03: MongaBay: James Hansen says Copenhagen approach "fundamentally wrong" would be better to "reassess"
- 2009/12/04: ABC(Au): Cap-and-trade criticism [by James Hansen] 'the wrong call' [says Tim Flannery]
- 2009/12/04: ABC(Au): Top climate scientist [James Hansen] hopes Copenhagen fails
- 2009/12/03: OilChange: Flawed Talks Must Fail, Says Hansen
- 2009/12/03: Reuters: Climate talk collapse better for planet: NASA's Hansen
The planet would be better off if the forthcoming Copenhagen climate change talks ended in collapse, according to a leading U.S. scientist who helped alert the world to dangers of global warming. Any agreement likely to emerge from the negotiations would be so deeply flawed, said James Hansen, that it would be better for future generations if we were to start again from scratch. - 2009/12/02: Guardian(UK): Copenhagen climate change talks must fail, says top scientist
World's leading climate change expert [Dr. James Hansen] says summit talks so flawed that deal would be a disaster - 2009/12/02: CCP: James Hansen Newsweek interview by Sharon Begley: "It's Not the Kind of Thing Where You Can Compromise"
- 2009/11/30: CCurrents: Read James Hansen And Act
- 2009/11/29: CCurrents: It's Possible To Avert The Climate Crisis by James Hansen
- 2009/11/30: Grist: Never-give-up fighting spirit: lessons from a grandchild by James Hansen
- 2009/11/30: CCP: James Hansen: Never-Give-Up Fighting Spirit -- Lessons From a Grandchild
Hans Joachim Schellnhuber:
- 2009/12/04: PlanetArk: Top Climate Change Expert [Hans Joachim Schellnhuber] Hopes Science Got It Wrong
Germany's top climate researcher says he hopes he and his fellow scientists around the world have got it all wrong about global warming. Hans Joachim Schellnhuber, head of the Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research, told Reuters he gets no pleasure at all in being a prophet of doom and hopes he and his colleagues have overlooked effects that could still arrest climate change. - 2009/12/04: Grist: The tough task of evaluating Kyoto
- 2009/12/04: COP15: IETA: Clean Development Mechanism needs reforms
- 2009/12/04: Reuters: Copenhagen talks must mandate CDM [Clean Development Mechanism] reform: IETA [International Emissions Trading Association]
- 2009/12/02: COP15: UN suspends approval of [Chinese CDM] wind farms
- 2009/12/01: FTimes: UN halts [CDM] funds to China wind farms
And at the UN:
- 2009/12/05: BBC: UN hits back at climate sceptics
The UN's official panel on climate change has hit back at sceptics' claims that the case for human influence on global warming has been exaggerated. The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) said it was "firmly" standing by findings that a rise in the use of greenhouse gases was a factor. - 2009/12/01: UN: Women are major agents for progress in climate change, development goals - Ban
On the carbon trading front:
- 2009/12/05: SciDaily: Novel Carbon-Trading Scheme [that explicitly incorporates biodiversity values] Could Stop Large-Scale Extinctions
- 2009/12/04: PlanetArk: EU Carbon [price] Up As Banks Buy Ahead Of Summit [EU ETS]
- 2009/12/03: Guardian(UK): Copenhagen summit: Denmark rushes in laws to stop carbon trading [VAT] scam
- 2009/12/03: PlanetArk: Q+A: What Copenhagen Outcome Would Excite CO2 Markets?
- 2009/12/03: Time: The Dirty Secrets of Carbon Trading
- 2009/12/02: FTimes: Climate change strategy rests on reform and US support
The world's carbon trading systems are at a crossroads, facing either decline and failure or a huge explosion of investment. Which way they go will depend on what is decided at the climate change conference starting in Copenhagen next week. [...] The world market in greenhouse gases has grown from nothing in 2005, when the Kyoto protocol came into effect, to about $125bn last year, despite the financial crisis, according to Point Carbon, an analyst company. If the US were to participate in carbon trading, which it does not because it has not ratified the Kyoto protocol, Point Carbon estimates the total value of the market would rapidly rise by several hundred billion dollars, and could reach $3,000bn (1,985bn euros, £1,800bn) by 2020. - 2009/12/02: PlanetArk: Australia Carbon Scheme Immaterial To World Prices
- 2009/12/02: BaltimoreSun: [RGGI] States show that carbon-dioxide curbs aren't scary
- 2009/12/01: EurActiv: CO2 auctioning creates EU stir
The European Commission is leaning towards spot auctioning for emission allowances for the next trading period due to start in 2013, prompting the electricity industry to warn that prices will go up if allowances are not made available early enough. - 2009/11/29: Guardian(UK): Carbon trading could be worth twice that of oil in next decade
Market could be worth $3tn a year but enthusiasm to place it at heart of Copenhagen is matched by growing criticism of concept - 2009/12/02: Guardian(UK): Stopping deforestation with a Tobin tax
The debate over the optimal strategy [carbon trading, carbon offsets, auction vs. allocation, and/or a carbon tax] to use in dealing with GHGs continues:
- 2009/12/05: VoxEU: Why a cap-and-trade system can be bad for your health by Daniel Gros
The purpose of a cap-and-trade system is to help in the fight against global climate change. This column warns that a unilateral approach could increase global emissions by shifting production to more carbon-intensive methods abroad. Acting alone, the EU's Emission Trading Scheme may be doing more harm than good. - 2009/12/04: PlanetArk: Q+A:How Do Carbon Trading Schemes Work, Or Not Work?
- 2009/12/03: NRDC:SwitchBoard: The Dollars and Sense in Trading Carbon
- 2009/12/03: Eureka: Novel carbon-trading scheme could stop large-scale extinctions -- Researchers advocate a biodiversity-focused strategy
- 2009/12/03: Guardian(UK): Carbon trading is not enough to tackle climate change -- Unambitious emissions caps provide no incentive for businesses to cut CO2 output
- 2009/12/02: IoD: The hazards of oversimplifying cap + trade
- 2009/12/01: PlanetArk: CO2 Trade "Pointless" Versus China Growth-Trader
Trade in permits to pollute is "largely pointless" when compared with the scale of growth in greenhouse gases in China and must be scaled up, one of the carbon market's most senior traders said on Monday. Countries and companies in the developed world can buy emissions rights by investing in carbon cuts in developing nations, under a Kyoto scheme called the clean development mechanism (CDM) meant to cut the cost of fighting climate change. But those cuts were tiny compared with rises in the world's top emitter, said Garth Edward, head of emissions trading at Citigroup, and formerly head of trading at Shell. - 2009/12/04: AlterNet: What's Cap and Trade? A New Video Breaks it Down and Reveals the Plan as a Scam
- 2009/12/04: AlterNet: The Story of Cap and Trade: More Scam Than Solution
- 2009/12/03: Guardian(UK): The Story of Cap and Trade [video Annie Leonard]
- 2009/12/02: Grist: Cataloguing the errors in "The Story of Cap-and-Trade"
- 2009/12/01: Grist: Annie Leonard misses the mark in her new video, "The Story of Cap-and-Trade"
- 2009/12/01: TreeHugger: The Story of Cap & Trade - Think It's Not a Financial Racket, Think Again (Video)
A suggestion for a new international forest monitoring body:
- 2009/11/30: Eureka: World forest observatory needed to monitor vital role of forests in climate deal
A new scientific organisation is needed to monitor the commitments that will be made by developing countries at Copenhagen to cut their deforestation rates, according to research at the University of Leeds. - 2009/11/30: LNB: Water wars
- 2009/12/02: DVoice: New Study Asserts Climate Change Will Increase Conflicts in Africa
- 2009/12/03: Reuters: One killed in Mumbai water shortage protests
One man was killed and about a dozen injured in a violent protest on Thursday against water cuts in India's largest city after the worst monsoon in nearly four decades left Mumbai authorities scrambling to ration supplies. Mumbai is facing an estimated water shortfall of about 400 million liters of the 4,300 million liters needed daily. Many parts of the city of 18 million inhabitants only receive water a few hours in the day, forcing residents to buy water at exorbitant rates from touts. Businesses are dealing with a 30 percent cut in supply. India's growing water shortages are seen as a potential dangerous trigger for wider social unrest. The government has been criticized for failing to address water and electricity shortages, both from industry and the 1.1 billion population. - 2009/12/05: CBC: Climate change protesters take to London streets
- 2009/12/05: CBS: Thousands Rally London for Climate Deal -- Police Estimate 20,000 Marchers Took to British Capital in Advance of U.N. Climate Conference
- 2009/12/05: BBC: Climate protests ahead of summit
Demonstrations have been under way around the UK to urge action on climate change ahead of the Copenhagen summit. Organisers Stop Climate Chaos want world leaders to reach a tough new deal on cutting emissions. In London, police say about 20,000 people have been taking part, while about 7,000 turned out in Glasgow. A protest also took place in Belfast. - 2009/12/04: EarthTimes: Danish police brace for UN summit, decline Swedish offer of help
- 2009/12/05: EarthTimes: Over 50,000 in Britain and Ireland take part in climate protest
- 2009/12/03: CBC: Protesters forced out of John Baird's office
Police dispersed climate change protesters occupying federal Transport Minister John Baird's constituency office in Ottawa on Thursday night. [...] Sumeet Tandon, an Ottawa university student taking part in the protest, said it was the fifth in a series of sit-ins targeting high-ranking cabinet ministers across Canada leading up to the international climate change summit that starts Dec. 7 in Copenhagen. - 2009/11/30: CBC: 7 [climate] protesters arrested at Flaherty's office
Police arrested seven climate protesters who occupied federal Finance Minister Jim Flaherty's riding office in Whitby, Ont., on Monday. Durham regional police said the demonstrators were charged with mischief and trespassing. They were released on condition they stay away from Flaherty's office or that of any other elected official. The demonstrators from the group People for Climate Justice are demanding greater action on climate change The group wants a binding climate treaty during negotiations to be held in Copenhagen in December. It also wants Ottawa to commit to reducing greenhouse gas emissions by 2020 to 25 per cent of 1990 levels. - 2009/11/30: Guardian(UK): The activists' circus comes to Copenhagen
Peaceful protest and theatrical stunts are welcome, say police. But 500 activists in panda masks would stop the party - 2009/12/04: Guardian(UK): [Letters] Climate change is a social justice issue
- 2009/11/30: ABC(Au): Dalai Lama issues climate plea
Polls! We have polls!
- 2009/12/06: CanWest: World concerns about climate change dwindle: survey
World concern about climate change has fallen in the past two years, according to an opinion poll on Sunday, the eve of 190-nation talks in Copenhagen meant to agree a U.N. deal to fight global warming. The Nielsen/Oxford University survey showed that 37 percent of more than 27,000 Internet users in 54 countries said they were "very concerned" about climate change, down from 41 percent in a similar poll two years ago. "Global concern for climate change cools off," the Nielsen Co. said of the poll, taken in October. It linked the decline to the world economic slowdown. - 2009/12/04: TP:WR: Right-Wing Pollster Scott Rasmussen Baselessly Accuses Climate Scientists Of 'Data Falsification'
- 2009/12/03: EurActiv: EU, US citizens split over climate change
The overwhelming majority of EU citizens consider climate change as a serious problem and call for more action against global warming. More than one third of Americans say instead that climate change is not an issue, and only a minor percentage think that it is the consequence of human activity, international polls reveal. - 2009/12/03: NYT:CW: Rising Partisanship Sharply Erodes U.S. Public's Belief in Global Warming
- 2009/12/01: ClimateP: GOP-leaning voters support bipartisan action on energy
- 2009/12/01: ChronicleHerald: Climate is No. 1 issue for most, [Cdn.] poll finds
Don't mention the Yanks control the World Bank (by effective veto):
- 2009/12/03: COP15: Proposal: Let the World Bank manage a global climate fund
The US has presented a proposal for a new climate fund under the World Bank that would be the main vehicle to deliver emission reduction and adaptation measures throughout the world. - 2009/12/05: AutoBG: Governors' Biofuels Coalition wants E15 waiver decision sooner rather than later
- 2009/12/05: CCP: James Murdoch: Clean energy conservatives can embrace
- 2009/12/02: CFO: Copenhagen could boost US climate bill, says Pew
- 2009/12/04: ClimateP: Bismarck Tribune editorial: Alternative energy jobs pay green
- 2009/12/04: DM:CCM: Sarah Palin's Ridiculous Spin on "Climate Gate"
- 2009/12/03: TerraDaily: US business leaders counter critics on climate
- 2009/12/04: TreeHugger: Palin Issues Statement Calling for Obama to Boycott Copenhagen, Mocking Environmentalists
- 2009/12/03: TP:WR: The Republican Definition Of 'Fascism': Defending Climate Science From Exxon-Mobil Corruption -- The right-wing swiftboating campaign against climate scientists dubbed "Climategate"...
- 2009/12/03: SolveClimate: Chamber of Commerce: Nixon to China Moment or 'Scopes Monkey Trial'?
- 2009/12/02: NRDC:SwitchBoard: Declaration of Energy Independence
- 2009/12/02: SolveClimate: Military Veterans Seek Inhofe Apology over Global Warming Remark
- 2009/11/30: DeSmogBlog: Who's Killing the Copenhagen Climate Treaty? The Chamber of Commerce
- 2009/11/30: NRDC:SwitchBoard: Aspen Chamber of Commerce Opposes US Chamber's Climate Stance
- 2009/11/30: SolveClimate: Clean Tech Jobs Spring Up as Investment Pours in and Factories are Transformed
- 2009/11/30: TP:WR: How To Create 17 Million Clean Energy Jobs
- 2009/11/29: Belfer: Approaching Copenhagen with a Portfolio of Domestic Commitments
California says it may be necessary to have a Plan B:
- 2009/12/04: KSJT: Christian Science Monitor: One reason why California needs to adapt to climate change
- 2009/12/04: NRDC:SwitchBoard: Water and California's Climate Adaptation Strategy
- 2009/12/03: SF Gate: Governor: Backup plan on global warming needed
California has set an ambitious agenda to combat climate change, but on Wednesday Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger said the state needs to prepare for the worst if human action cannot stop global warming and the rise of sea levels. In an announcement on San Francisco's Treasure Island, Schwarzenegger said he is creating a panel of 23 California leaders to recommend specific actions to prevent the destruction of infrastructure and deal with a depleted snowpack, the spread of disease, intense wildfires and other calamities that would result within the century from climate change. "I normally never make a Plan B because then you start concentrating on that and not really on Plan A," Schwarzenegger said. "But ... I think we have a responsibility to have a Plan B in case we can't stop the global warming." - 2009/12/03: KSJT: SF Chron, LATimes, etc: In California, a Plan B for climate change
The Obama chatter is nonstop:
- 2009/12/04: BBC: Obama to attend climate forum end
US President Barack Obama has changed his plans to attend the UN summit on climate change in Copenhagen next week, the White House has announced. He will arrive later than initially planned, moving his appearance from 9 December to 18 December. - 2009/12/05: Guardian(UK): Obama shifts Copenhagen travel plans to boost climate change deal
- 2009/12/05: ClimateP: Obama's double Copenhagen stunner: He agrees to global climate assistance fund for developing countries and will go to Denmark on the 18th
- 2009/12/04: EarthTimes: Obama weighing second trip to climate summit
- 2009/12/02: Grist: President Obama, give us hope again ... this time in Copenhagen
The actions of the Obama administration are being watched closely:
- 2009/12/05: CSW: Holdren and Lubchenco warn Congress of climate disruption, call for emissions cuts and preparedness
- 2009/12/02: SolveClimate: Climate Science 101: Holdren, Lubchenco Take Congress Back to School
- 2009/12/03: TulsaWorld: EPA rejects Inhofe's call for delay on finding -- He had requested a hearing on what he calls "climategate," involving scientists' e-mails.
- 2009/12/02: ScienceInsider: Holdren, Lubchenco On Defensive About ClimateGate at Hearing
- 2009/12/02: PhysOrg: EPA postpones decision on 15 percent blend for ethanol
- 2009/12/02: TreeHugger: EPA Petitioned to Regulate CO2 Using Clean Air Act, Cap At 350ppm
- 2009/12/01: WSJ:EnvCap: Corn Delay: EPA Puts Off Decision on Upping Ethanol Blend
- 2009/11/30: Reuters: U.S. falling behind in clean-energy race: Chu
The United States is falling behind in the race for clean, renewable energy and risks losing its prominence in high-tech manufacturing, U.S. Energy Secretary Steven Chu said on Monday. "America has the opportunity to lead the world in a new industrial revolution," Chu told business leaders, political leaders and engineers at a Clemson University symposium. But, he said, "The world is passing us by. We are falling behind in the clean energy race. ... China is spending $9 billion a month on clean energy ... China has now passed the United States and Europe in high-tech manufacturing. There is no reason the United States should cede high-tech manufacturing to anyone." - 2009/12/01: AlterNet: Activists Protest Environmental Agency for Collaborating With Polluters
- 2009/11/30: NRDC:SwitchBoard: Secretary Salazar takes on oil and gas
As for what is going on in Congress:
- 2009/12/05: CCP: Robert Byrd, U.S. Senator from West Virginia: Coal Must Embrace The Future
- 2009/12/04: ClimateP: [Senator Lindsey] Graham (R-SC) says Obama has his back on climate bill
- 2009/12/04: PlanetArk: [US] Senate Climate Compromise Nowhere Near Ready
- 2009/12/03: SolveClimate: Sen. Byrd: Rigid Mindsets Pose Greatest Threat to Coal's Future
- 2009/12/03: TP:WR: Byrd Calls Tactics Of 'Fear Mongering' Coal Industry 'Morally Indefensible'
- 2009/12/03: NatureTGB: Climategate emails fuel Republican ire
- 2009/12/03: KSJT: AP:The ruckus over hacked climate e-mails gets louder in Congress as Obama's team says it's no big deal (scientifically, maybe not, anyway..)
- 2009/12/03: ClimateP: Sen. Byrd stunner: "Coal Must Embrace The Future: The truth is that some form of climate legislation will likely become public policy because most American voters want a healthier environment."
- 2009/12/03: DM:CCM: Congressional Republicans Go Bonkers Over Climate Emails
- 2009/12/02: HillHeat: Senate Watch, China: Bingaman, Cantwell, Casey, Dorgan, Klobuchar, Lugar, Murkowski, Rockefeller, Whitehouse
- 2009/12/01: Reuters: Kerry seeks more U.S. climate funds for poor nations
- 2009/11/30: DeSmogBlog: US War Veterans Denounce Senator Inhofe's Indifference
- 2009/11/30: SolveClimate: Focus on '100 New Nuclear Plants' Would Hamper Efforts to Slow Global Warming
Kerry-Boxer aka CEJAPA defines a battleline:
- 2009/12/03: Economist: Cap and tirade -- America struggles with climate-change legislation
- 2009/12/04: EurActiv: US mulls climate finance bill ahead of Copenhagen
While the US Senate seems to be far from reaching a compromise on a climate change bill aimed at reducing greenhouse gas emissions, Senator John Kerry has unveiled a proposal to help developing nations to combat global warming and adapt to climate change. - 2009/12/03: TreeHugger: Senate Climate Bill Progress Report: "Definite Republican Votes," Dems Have New Demands
The Gore-apalooza is still bopping along:
- 2009/12/04: OilChange: Gore Lambasts Copenhagen Targets Too
While in the UK:
- 2009/12/02: FTimes: [UK] Solar industry 'in limbo' as grants dry up
- 2009/12/02: Guardian(UK): Government gives go-ahead to smart meters
Multibillion-pound programme will go to all 26m homes in UK and lay the foundations for a 'smart grid' -- but who will pay? - 2009/11/30: Guardian(UK): Renewable energy 'could provide 6% of UK's needs by 2020'
Friends of the Earth says solar panels and wind turbines could proliferate if government improves the incentive - 2009/12/04: Independent(UK): Cameron hit by Tory backlash on environment
David Davis condemns flagship green policies as senior Tory MPs question climate change consensus - 2009/12/03: Guardian(UK): Ed Miliband attacks Tory climate 'saboteurs'
And in Europe:
- 2009/12/04: UNDispatch: EU's latest stance on financing climate change threatens Copenhagen deal
- 2009/12/03: EnvFin: Bankwatch blasts EIB over fossil fuel lending
- 2009/12/04: DerSpiegel: Zany Vision or Critical Solution? Urban Greenhouses Aim to Help Cities Combat Climate Change
- 2009/12/04: PlanetArk: Ice Statue Chides Berlusconi For Being Cool On CO2
- 2009/12/02: OilChange: EU Stance on Climate Undermined by its Dirty Bank [European Investment Bank (EIB)]
- 2009/11/30: PR Watch: Anti-Immigration Skeptic Heads for Copenhagen
- 2009/12/01: BBC: Europe should impose a unilateral cut in greenhouse gas emissions of 30% by 2020, according to climate economist Sir Nicholas Stern
- 2009/11/30: OilChange: Shame on the EU [Griffin]
Meanwhile in Australia:
- 2009/12/03: ABC(Au): Prime Minister Kevin Rudd has played down prospects of an early election on climate change and pressured moderates in the Liberal Party to defy their new leader Tony Abbott on emissions trading
- 2009/12/03: ABC(Au): The group calling itself the Climate Sceptics Party says it wants the Federal Government to use its time between now and the next vote in the Senate to have an open debate about climate science
- 2009/12/04: ABC(Au): A WA Liberal Senator, Mathias Cormann, is pushing the merits of Australia developing nuclear energy as part of a mix to reduce carbon emissions
- 2009/12/03: ABC(Au): The premier calls for a national Nuclear Authority
- 2009/12/03: ABC(Au): An indigenous development corporation says it wants the Federal Government's Emissions Trading Scheme to recognise indigenous people's native title rights over carbon sinks
- 2009/12/02: ABC(Au): The Federal Government says it is giving the Liberal Party the summer to think about climate change, before it brings its emissions trading legislation back into Parliament in February
- 2009/12/02: ABC(Au): Business leader welcomes Coalition's emissions trading about-face
- 2009/12/02: ABC(Au): Stern attacks Australian climate sceptics
Britain's leading climate change economist, Nicholas Stern, has warned Australian politicians that they are mistaken if they think tackling climate change is too costly. - 2009/12/02: ABC(Au): Abbott 'scaremongering' on emissions scheme
Opposition Leader Tony Abbott's claim that the Government's emissions trading scheme (ETS) is "a great big tax" is a simplistic description designed to scare people, one Liberal senator [Judith Troeth] says. - 2009/12/02: ABC(Au): The mid-west Western Australian Shire of Perenjori is spruiking its appeal as a potential site for the state's first solar generation power station
- 2009/12/02: ABC(Au): Queensland Premier Anna Bligh says it might be possible for the states to agree to their own emissions trading scheme, if a federal agreement cannot be reached
- 2009/12/02: ABC(Au): The Gippsland Trades and Labour Council says the Federal Government must now negotiate with the Greens to try to pass a Carbon Pollution Reduction Scheme (CPRS)
- 2009/12/01: GWWatch: Opposition now opposes Australian people's will
How's that for an election strategy when staring down the barrel of an anytime-now double-dissolution election? - 2009/12/02: ABC(Au): The coal, hard facts on climate policy
So a national climate showdown is looming. But while most of the focus has been on the federal Coalition's contortions over the emissions trading scheme, the Government is also struggling to launch the epic energy revolution necessary to dramatically slash carbon emissions. This is for our kids, Prime Minister Kevin Rudd and his ministers are fond of saying about tackling climate change. That is why, they say, Australia needs an emissions trading scheme, renewable energy and - to sell more coal than ever before. - 2009/12/02: JQuiggin: Dealing with the Greens
- 2009/11/30: JQuiggin: The case for a split
- 2009/12/01: JQuiggin: Will Fielding stay crazy long enough?
- 2009/12/02: Guardian(UK): Australia and climate change: The pitiless blue sky
- 2009/12/01: Guardian(UK): Australia: A nation for heads in the sand
- 2009/12/01: ABC(Au): MP spruiks greener future
Lyne MP Robert Oakeshott says it has been a week of political turmoil surrounding the Government's emissions trading scheme (ETS). The Senate debate on the ETS is expected to run well into today as details of the legislation are thrashed out. Mr Oakeshott says there has been human-based influence on climate change and something has to be done about it. - 2009/12/01: Reuters: Australia carbon laws in doubt, election possible
- 2009/11/30: BBerg: Rudd Carbon Bill Faces Senate Test Before Obama Talks
- 2009/12/01: ABC(Au): Regions plan for drier future
Projects across Victoria's Wimmera-Mallee are sharing in $14 million in funding from the Federal Government to plan for a future with less water. - 2009/12/01: ABC(Au): Floods wipe out wildlife
A leading ecologist says most of the ground animals in the Gulf of Carpentaria in the far north of Queensland have disappeared after massive flooding in the region earlier in the year. - 2009/11/30: CCP: Australian climate row highlights Copenhagen rifts
After a Liberal power struggle, the CPRS [aka Aus ETS] was voted down in the Senate:
- 2009/12/03: ABC(Au): A New South Wales north coast independent politician [Lyne MP Rob Oakeshott] says the defeat of the emissions trading scheme (ETS) in the Senate yesterday is a huge disappointment
- 2009/12/03: PlanetArk: Factbox: Australia's Failed Carbon Trading Scheme
- 2009/12/02: ABC(Au): There has been a mixed reaction from the business community after the Government's emissions trading scheme was again rejected in the Senate
- 2009/12/03: ABC(Au): Resurrected emissions scheme appears doomed
The Federal Government's third attempt at getting its emissions trading scheme through Parliament already appears to be heading for defeat. The Government says it wants to give the Opposition another chance to support the legislation. It plans to reintroduce the scheme in February, even though the Senate yesterday rejected it for a second time. But Opposition Leader Tony Abbott says he expects the Coalition's position to harden over the summer break. - 2009/12/02: EarthTimes: Analysis: Australia risks global vandal tag after climate bill defeat
- 2009/12/02: SMH: Dead ETS to rise again
The Federal Government will make a third attempt at winning Senate approval for its emissions trading scheme when Parliament resumes sitting in February. The Senate today voted down for a second time legislation setting up the carbon pollution reduction scheme. Acting Prime Minister Julia Gillard, flanked by climate change ministers Penny Wong and Greg Combet, said the Government would reintroduce its legislation on February 2. - 2009/12/02: Yahoo:AP: Australia's Parliament defeats global warming bill
- 2009/12/02: ABC(Au): Senate kills off emissions trade laws
Opposition and crossbench senators have handed the Government a trigger for an early election on climate change by voting down its emissions trading scheme for the second time. - 2009/12/02: ABC(Au): Liberals get 'one chance' on climate laws
The Federal Government is keeping up the pressure on the Coalition on climate change, vowing to bring back its amended emissions trading scheme to the Parliament on the first sitting day of next year. - 2009/12/02: BBC: Senate rejects Rudd climate plan
Australia's Senate has rejected a bill on the government's flagship climate change policy for a second time. Two opposition senators crossed the floor but it was not enough to secure passage of the Emissions Trading Scheme (ETS) to reduce greenhouse gases. The vote came a day after the opposition Liberal Party ousted leader Malcolm Turnbull, who had promised to back the bill. Deputy PM Julia Gillard said the bill would be resubmitted next year. - 2009/12/05: Australian: Market will determine the cheapest way of cutting emissions
Tony Abbott and Barnaby Joyce have stormed the policy wonk consensus over using the invisible hand of the market to reduce carbon emissions with least economic disruption. Instead of putting a price on greenhouse gas emissions, an Abbott government would rely on the visible hand of government "direct action" to reduce emissions by 5 per cent on 2000 levels by 2020. - 2009/12/04: ABC(Au): Federal Opposition Leader Tony Abbott says he is not pushing for Australia to have nuclear power because it is not yet economically viable
- 2009/12/03: JQuiggin: Libs left with Chinese model
- 2009/12/02: ABC(Au): Opposition Leader Tony Abbott says an emissions trading scheme will not be part of Coalition policy at the next election and has moved to reopen the debate on nuclear power
- 2009/12/02: ABC(Au): New Opposition Leader Tony Abbott says the Government's election mandate to act on climate change has run out
- 2009/12/02: Crikey: Coalition enters a policy-free zone on carbon
- 2009/12/01: Guardian(UK): Why do climate deniers hold sway in Australia?
- 2009/12/01: Guardian(UK): Australian opposition dumps its leader over carbon trading bill
- 2009/12/01: NatureTGB: Climate tax heat burns Australia's opposition
The leader of Australia's opposition party has been voted out in favour of a replacement who will backtrack on the party's support for government climate change policies - 2009/12/01: ABC(Au): Liberals 'liberated' as ETS heads for defeat
Newly-elected Opposition Leader Tony Abbott says the Liberal Party has been liberated from the Government's emissions trading scheme (ETS). Mr Abbott made the declaration as the Senate moved closer to a vote on the legislation, having dealt with more than 150 amendments to the scheme which is now facing defeat. The ABC understands a vote is likely to be held on Wednesday morning. - 2009/12/01: ABC(Au): 'Extremists' taking over Liberal Party
The Government has attacked Tony Abbott as a climate change sceptic after its hopes of getting the emissions trading scheme (ETS) through the Parliament this year appear to have been dashed by a change in the Liberal leadership. - 2009/12/01: ABC(Au): All aboard the 'People Skills' wild ride
Snap on your Speedos. It is going to be that sort of an election.
After the most wild and disordered week imaginable in conservative politics, the Liberal Party has staggered forth, somewhat to its own surprise, having adopted Tony "People Skills" Abbott as its federal parliamentary leader. The party has turfed Malcolm Turnbull and ignored the public's popular choice in Joe Hockey. Having spent the past two years agonising over the best way to move on from John Howard, the Liberal Party has instead placed itself in the hands of the man who most faithfully represents Mr Howard's legacy in the land of the political living. And Mr Abbott himself, whose last federal election campaign was a tripping, cursing, roundhouse-punch-swinging triumph of political absurdity, now finds himself in charge of the next one. - 2009/12/01: ABC(Au): Abbott's win a blow for environment: Henderson
The Northern Territory Chief Minister says the election of Tony Abbott as federal Opposition Leader is a blow for the environment. Paul Henderson says Mr Abbott's stance on climate change will mean the Country Liberals will slow all action on the issue. "This is a bad day for Australia," he said. - 2009/12/01: ABC(Au): Abbott comes out fighting after leadership coup
New Liberal leader Tony Abbott has promised to take the fight to the Government over emissions trading after wresting the leadership from Malcolm Turnbull by just one vote today. - 2009/12/01: ABC(Au): Turnbull supporters nurse wounds of 'treachery'
The Liberals have taken Tony Abbott as their new leader but some in the party, including backbencher Judi Moylan, have described the campaign against former leader Malcolm Turnbull as treacherous. - 2009/12/01: ABC(Au): Hockey weighs options after leadership snub
Failed Liberal leadership contender Joe Hockey has kept open the option of moving to the backbench after his crushing defeat in this morning's Liberal leadership spill. Standing on a ticket which would have given Liberal MPs a conscience vote on the Government's emissions trading laws, Mr Hockey was eliminated in the first round of leadership voting... - 2009/12/01: ClimateShifts: Apparently in Australia the science is far from settled
- 2009/12/01: JQuiggin: Three At One Stroke -- "Turnbull defeated, Hockey discredited, Abbott doomed."
- 2009/12/01: SMH: Shock result as Abbott wins Liberal leadership by one vote ... ETS dead
The federal Liberal Party has elected Tony Abbott as leader and in an unprecedented secret ballot voted overwhelmingly to defeat the Government's emissions trading scheme. - 2009/12/01: PeakEnergy: The Mad Monk Wins
- 2009/11/30: Reuters: 'Mad Monk' Australia opposition head to fight CO2 laws
Australia's new conservative opposition leader, Tony Abbott, is nicknamed the "Mad Monk" and once flirted with the priesthood, but his crusade against the government's emissions trade plan has been anything but madcap. A pugnacious and socially conservative Catholic who has fought everything from attempts to make Australia a republic to embryonic stem cell research and same-sex marriages, Abbott was elected opposition leader on Tuesday in a surprise win. - 2009/12/02: Australian: New Liberal Leader Tony Abbott to focus on battlers, economy
- 2009/12/01: SMH: Liberals outfox themselves with Boxer Abbott
- 2009/12/01: Crikey: A disastrous day for the Liberal Party and Australian politics
Where to now for the Liberal Party? Certainly electoral success certainly does not lie in the direction Tony Abbott and Nick Minchin are taking it, which is more less back to the middle years of the Howard Government, before even John Howard started to understand that Australians wanted something done about climate change. - 2009/12/01: BBC: New head for Australia opposition
Australia's opposition Liberal Party has elected a new leader, amid a searing row over the government's carbon trading laws. Tony Abbott was chosen to replace Malcolm Turnbull at a Canberra meeting. Mr Turnbull had backed Prime Minister Kevin Rudd's emissions trading scheme (ETS), but Mr Abbott opposes it. The government needs the support of the Liberals to pass the legislation in the Senate. The Liberal revolt throws Mr Rudd's plans into turmoil. Mr Rudd had wanted the legislation to pass the Senate - where his party does not have a majority - by the start of the Copenhagen climate change summit next week. Last week he secured Mr Turnbull's support for the bill, prompting the angry reaction from some Liberal lawmakers that triggered the leadership challenge. - 2009/11/30: Guardian(UK): Climate heats up Australian politics
Australia's Liberal leader is being forced out over emissions trading. The crisis may be a taste of what's to come elsewhere - 2009/12/01: ABC(Au): Shock win for Abbott in leadership vote
Tony Abbott is the new leader of the Liberal Party after ousting Malcolm Turnbull by just one vote in a leadership spill today. Mr Abbott won the final vote against Malcolm Turnbull by 42 votes to 41 after challenger Joe Hockey was knocked out in an earlier vote between all three candidates. Mr Hockey was knocked out in the first round of voting when he got 23 votes to Mr Turnbull's 26 and Mr Abbott's 35. Julie Bishop will stay on as deputy leader, after being unopposed for her position. - 2009/11/30: PeakEnergy: The CPRS set to claim one victim - Malcolm Turnbull
- 2009/11/30: GWWatch: A pox on your house
- 2009/12/01: ABC(Au): Liberals crunch figures ahead of leadership vote
Three-way contest: Joe Hockey, Malcolm Turnbull and Tony Abbott. Days of bitter public feuding within the Federal Opposition will come to a head this morning with Liberal MPs voting in a three-way leadership contest. Tony Abbott says he has decided to contest the spill because he wants the Coalition to block the emissions trading scheme (ETS), while fellow candidate Joe Hockey has told colleagues they will have a free vote on the legislation if he wins. - 2009/11/30: ABC(Au): The Opposition's chief climate change negotiator, Ian Macfarlane, says that if Joe Hockey is successful in a Liberal leadership contest, the Rudd Government's emissions trading scheme bill could still pass the Senate this week
- 2009/11/30: ABC(Au): Abbott throws hat into leadership ring
Liberal frontbencher Tony Abbott has reneged on his offer to withdraw from the leadership contest if fellow frontbencher Joe Hockey nominates. Mr Abbott said after a day of discussions with Mr Hockey, who is in favour of a free vote on the emissions trading scheme (ETS), he had decided to challenge no matter who stands. - 2009/12/03: ABC(Au): New Zealand Prime Minister John Key has decided he will attend climate change talks in Copenhagen after initially labelling them a "photo opportunity"
- 2009/12/03: HotTopic: Imagining 2020: The age of the bloody lucky
While in the Indian subcontinent:
- 2009/12/04: EarthTimes: Fierce debate in India over move to cut carbon intensity by 20-25 percent by 2020
- 2009/12/01: LA Times: Amid droughts and failed crops, a cycle of poverty worsens
India has long been plagued by unscrupulous moneylenders who exploit impoverished farmers. But with crops failing more frequently, farmers are left even more desperate and vulnerable. - 2009/12/01: Yahoo:AFP: India rejects Danish climate proposal
And China:
- 2009/12/01: NatureN: China's climate target: is it achievable? The world's top emitter pledges cuts, but "substantial societal reforms" are needed to make them
Elsewhere in Asia:
- 2009/12/05: PeakEnergy: Pakistan's energy sector and the great game
- 2009/12/04: ABC(Au): Nepalese ministers have held a high-altitude meeting on a remote mountain plateau in the shadow of Mount Everest to highlight the impact of global warming on the Himalayas
- 2009/12/04: TreeHugger: Government of Nepal Meets on Everest to Discuss Climate Change
- 2009/12/04: EarthTimes: Nepal ministers gather at Everest base camp for climate meeting
- 2009/12/04: BBC: Nepalese ministers are preparing to hold a cabinet meeting on Mount Everest to raise awareness of the effects of climate change
While in Africa:
- 2009/12/05: Guardian(UK): Copenhagen: the African dimension
Africa didn't cause climate change, but it will acutely feel its effects. Copenhagen deals must address developmental issues - 2009/12/01: TerraDaily: Climate change may be dire for Nigeria, [John Odey, Environment] minister warns
- 2009/12/02: TreeHugger: Drought Brings New Importance to Kenya's Largest Wind Farm
In Canada, minority neocon PM Harper, continues his do-nothing policy:
- 2009/12/05: G&M: Geographically speaking, what on earth is Canada doing?
The effects of atmospheric warming on our vast territory, immense coastlines and abundance of fresh water are already apparent [...] this piece of geography called Canada is on the front lines of the global warming struggle -- although you wouldn't realize it watching the federal government. - 2009/12/03: CanWest: Ottawa to focus on 'absolute' pollution targets: Prentice
The Harper government signalled a change on Thursday in its approach to tackling climate change by focusing on absolute caps on pollution from industry. Appearing at a parliamentary committee, Environment Minister Jim Prentice said the government's strategy would call for a national cap-and-trade system with "absolute caps" to put a price on carbon, under a harmonized structure with the United States. "We are talking about a cap-and-trade system, a continental cap-and-trade system that involves absolute emission reductions, not intensity targets," said Prentice in response to a question from Bloc Quebecois MP Bernard Bigras. - 2009/12/06: TSun: How Canada can cope in Copenhagen
- 2009/12/03: CBC: Protesters forced out of John Baird's office
Police dispersed climate change protesters occupying federal Transport Minister John Baird's constituency office in Ottawa on Thursday night. [...] Sumeet Tandon, an Ottawa university student taking part in the protest, said it was the fifth in a series of sit-ins targeting high-ranking cabinet ministers across Canada leading up to the international climate change summit that starts Dec. 7 in Copenhagen. - 2009/12/03: TSun: Enviro minister dismisses conspiracy theorists
Environment Minister Jim Prentice dismissed the conspiracy theories attached to the "climategate" allegations, insisting global warming is real and Canada needs to cut emissions. - 2009/11/30: CBC: 7 [climate] protesters arrested at Flaherty's office
Police arrested seven climate protesters who occupied federal Finance Minister Jim Flaherty's riding office in Whitby, Ont., on Monday. Durham regional police said the demonstrators were charged with mischief and trespassing. They were released on condition they stay away from Flaherty's office or that of any other elected official. The demonstrators from the group People for Climate Justice are demanding greater action on climate change The group wants a binding climate treaty during negotiations to be held in Copenhagen in December. It also wants Ottawa to commit to reducing greenhouse gas emissions by 2020 to 25 per cent of 1990 levels. - 2009/11/30: TStar: PM won't 'blue-sky' on climate -- Canada might tweak plan but no big changes coming at Copenhagen summit, Harper says
Scientists are calling for action:
- 2009/12/03: G&M: Scientists press PM on climate change
In advance of UN climate talks next week in Copenhagen, more than 500 of Canada's leading scientists have issued an open letter to Prime Minister Stephen Harper warning that global warming is happening much faster than previously estimated and that government needs much more aggressive targets for reducing greenhouse-gas emissions. - 2009/12/01: DeSmogBlog: Canadian Health Professionals Call for Climate Action
- 2009/12/04: PlanetArk: Do More To Help Climate, Scientists Tell Canada
More than 500 Canadian scientists on Thursday urged the country's government -- portrayed by critics as a laggard in the fight against climate change -- to significantly boost efforts to fight global warming. - 2009/12/03: TStar: Ottawa starves climate critics of cash on eve of eco-summit
The federal government, already facing international criticism as a climate change laggard ahead of next week's Copenhagen summit, has cut funding to a Toronto aid group that helps the world's poorest countries cope with the ravages of global warming. KAIROS, a multi-faith group that has received money from the Canadian International Development Agency for more than three decades, was refused its request for $7.1 million over four years this week. A CIDA official told the organization's director that its programs no longer "fit" with the government agency's priorities, an official with the aid organization said. The group, which also advocates against human rights violations abroad, received no official or detailed explanation from the government spelling out why its application had been turned down. But a peek at its past activities shows it has lined up on behalf of seven religious denominations against Conservative policies on climate change, overseas mining operations, aboriginal rights, immigration and international trade. - 2009/12/04: CBC: Canada to follow U.S. lead at climate summit
- 2009/12/04: TStar: Tories revive discarded climate plan prior to talks
The uncertainty of U.S. climate-change legislation could force Canada to essentially revert to a version of a discarded plan to fight global warming that the Conservative government first presented almost three years ago, Environment Minister Jim Prentice says. Critics say it's another Tory tactic to stall long-promised regulations to limit greenhouse gas emissions on the eve of the global climate-change summit in Copenhagen. The federal government has been waiting for the last year to see U.S. emission reduction targets before presenting its own regulations to clean up Canadian industries. U.S. President Barack Obama presented that figure last week and received in-kind promises to slow emissions growth from China and India, two of the world's dirtiest emerging economies. But Prentice now says it's no sure thing that U.S. legislation to create a market-based cap-and-trade system will become law. Until that happens, Canada's wait-and-see approach will continue, he said. - 2009/12/02: EmbassyMag: Charting Ottawa's coming climate change paradigm shift
- 2009/12/01: TStar: U.S. green scheme beats Canada's -- Though Ottawa says emissions goals on par, analysis shows Obama strategy goes further
George Monbiot told the Tories what they were doing in no uncertain terms:
- 2009/12/02: CleanBreak: George Monbiot slams Canadian government for thuggish ways
- 2009/12/03: CCurrents: Canada Is Now To Climate What Japan Is To Whaling
- 2009/12/02: MongaBay: Has Canada become the new climate villain (yes, that's right, Canada)?
- 2009/12/02: TreeHugger: Canada's Image In Tatters Part II: They Export Asbestos When It Is Banned At Home
- 2009/12/02: AlterNet: The Most Urgent Threat to World Peace is -- Canada
- 2009/12/02: TStar: Green muckraker [Monbiot] targets Harper -- U.K. writer fears Canada will spoil any progress made at next week's summit in Copenhagen
- 2009/12/02: Guardian(UK): It's embarrassing to be Canadian now
George Monbiot is right -- Canada has become a corrupt petro-state most of us are ashamed of. But all is not lost - 2009/12/01: TreeHugger: Monbiot: Canada's Image in Tatters
- 2009/12/01: Section15: Journalist disses Canada and I agree -- Monbiot: Canada's image lies in tatters.
- 2009/11/30: Guardian(UK): Canada's image lies in tatters. It is now to climate what Japan is to whaling
The tar barons have held the nation to ransom. This thuggish petro-state is today the only obstacle to a deal in Copenhagen - 2009/11/29: ClimateSight: The Worst in the World [Canada's CC record]
To the expected reaction:
- 2009/12/04: Guardian(UK): Canada doesn't deserve this criticism of its green record [Prentice]
- 2009/12/01: CD: We are trying dear George but our government is not listening
- 2009/12/03: Guardian(UK): [Letters] Toronto is acting on climate change
Many Canadians share your assessment of our minority government's views on climate change (George Monbiot, 30 November). However, there is significant action on global warming in Canada despite the national government's inactivity. As is common throughout the world, where national governments fail, cities can and are leading. - 2009/12/02: SudburySteve: My Quick Observations on the "Results" of Last Night's Munk Debate
- 2009/12/02: DeSmogBlog: Munk Debates: Good theatre; bad policy
- 2009/12/01: Grist: Lomborg v. Monbiot: liveblogging the Munk debate on climate change
Bill Rees has a proposal:
- 2009/12/02: Tyee: Is Canada Criminally Negligent on Climate Policy?
A leading environmental scientist [William E. Rees] says it is time for the international law to target climate culprit countries like his own, Canada. - 2009/12/04: Tyee: Our Cities Are Hotbeds of Climate Action -- Mike Harcourt on why, and where, big cuts in emissions can be achieved
Ontario has it's Green Energy Act, now comes the implementation:
- 2009/12/01 Yahoo:Reuters: Ontario inches closer to cap and trade plan
The Canadian province of Ontario took steps toward a cap and trade program on Tuesday that will allow the country's manufacturing heartland to cut industrial emissions of carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases. Starting in 2010, Ontario said industrial facilities that release 25,000 tonnes or more of greenhouse gases will have to report their emission data to the government and public. The province said about 200 to 300 facilities will be affected by the rule. They will start reporting their 2010 emissions in 2011. - 2009/12/03: CPI: Canada's About-Face on Climate -- Tar Sands and a Tough Business Lobby Pull Ottawa Far from Copenhagen
- 2009/12/04: G&M: Politically tricky: Holding the temperature rise to two degrees
Carbon sequestration works, but is among the least cost-effective measures - 2009/12/02: AlterNet: The Tar Sands Suck [video]
- 2009/12/02: SolveClimate: Canadian Fund Warns of Sticky Risks in Tar Sands Investment
- 2009/12/01: CBC: Alberta puts $285M toward coal gasification project
As for miscellaneous Canadiana:
- 2009/12/02: Maribo: Huge disparity in emissions targets within Canada
- 2009/12/01: OBMB: Should Canada Be Expelled From The Commonwealth?
The movement toward a long term ecologically viable economics is glacial:
- 2009/12/06: OilDrum: A Shock Doctrine for Sustainability
- 2009/12/03: EnergyBulletin: Cornucopian Man vs. Biophysical Reality
- 2009/11/30: MongaBay: World requires radical new economic models to fight poverty and mitigate global warming
- 2009/11/30: SolveClimate: Report Calls for New Measures of National Development, Beyond GDP
IPAT [Impact = Population * Affluence * Technology] raised its head once again:
- 2009/12/03: Guardian(UK): Indefinite population growth is not an option
- 2009/12/03: Guardian(UK): Population offsetting? Fertile ground for ridicule
- 2009/12/03: BBC: Fund family planning 'to cut CO2'
Meeting the demand for family planning in poor nations is a cheap and effective way to cut CO2 emissions, a new website initiative claims. The UK-based Optimum Population Trust says fast-rising population levels lead to growing emissions. - 2009/11/30: BSD: Romm, Roger wrong; Rabett right
- 2009/11/30: TerraDaily: Once taboo, population enters climate debate
As for how the media handles the science of climatology:
- 2009/12/05: RealClimate: Who you gonna call?
- 2009/12/04: WorldChanging: Resource: New Climate Communication "Tip Sheets" for Scientists and Journalists
- 2009/12/03: CJR: Hacked E-mails and "Journalistic Tribalism" -- Climate coverage is imperfect, but is it ideologically biased?
- 2009/12/04: CJR: Copenhagen's "Climate Pool" -- Eleven international news agencies launch Facebook blog
- 2009/11/20: SciAm: War Is Peace: Can Science Fight Media Disinformation?
In the 24/7 Internet world, people make lots of claims. Science provides a guide for testing them - 2009/12/05: EconView: "Can Science Fight Media Disinformation?" -- Is better science education the answer to our "media disinformation" problem?
- 2009/12/03: MediaMatters: Fox & Friends coverage of CRU emails disregards facts, context
- 2009/12/03: GreenFyre: Fox News praises Jon Stewart for climategate coverage
- 2009/12/04: MediaMatters: Fox News repeatedly advanced CEI fellow's accusations NASA is "manipulating data on climate change" without noting CEI received millions from oil industry
- 2009/12/03: DM:CCM: You, Sir, Are No Galileo
- 2009/12/01: TPMM: [Columnist Howard] Fineman: "I See Nothing Wrong" With Newsweek/Oil Lobby Panel
While activists search for effective communication techniques:
- 2009/12/02: OpenDem: The mass psychology of climate change - scientists need 'attitude'
Here is something for your library:
- 2009/12/03: ClimateSight: [Book Review] _Climate Cover-Up_ by Jim Hoggan & Richard Littlemore
- 2009/12/04: IoD: [Book Review] _Science as a Contact Sport: Inside the battle to save Earth's climate_ by Stephen Schneider
- 2009/12/06: HotTopic: [Book Review] _Climate Change 101: An Educational Resource_ by Andy Reisinger
- 2009/12/02: Grist: The most inspiring climate and energy books of 2009 [list]
- 2009/12/03: TreeHugger: A New Book Confronts the Climate Change Denial Machine [Hogan]
And for your film & video enjoyment:
- 2009/12/03: CCP: Urban Heat Island Effect: Climate Denial Crock of the Week
Meanwhile among the 'Sue the Bastards!' contingent:
- 2009/12/01: WarmingLaw: Supreme Court Case May Affect States' Ability to Protect Beaches from Impacts of Global Warming
Developing a new energy infrastructure is a fundamental challenge of the current generation:
- 2009/12/05: OilDrum: As Refineries Close, New Stresses are Added to the System
- 2009/12/02: TechRev: Copenhagen's Clean-Tech Dividend -- Climate deal could deliver incentives to grow nascent energy technologies
- 2009/12/04: TechRev: A Cheaper Hydrogen Catalyst -- Using nickel as a catalyst rather than platinum could also mean less-expensive fuels cells
- 2009/12/04: PeakEnergy: Turning Heat to Electricity
- 2009/12/04: PeakEnergy: Sodium-Ion Cells for Cheap Energy Storage
- 2009/12/03: CNet: California gives green light for space-based solar
California regulators on Thursday approved an ambitious project to beam solar energy from space starting in 2016. Under a power purchase agreement approved by the California Public Utilities Commission, utility Pacific Gas & Electric will purchase electricity from technology provider Solaren if it successfully deploys its space-based solar collectors, which would be the first of its kind. - 2009/12/06: PeakEnergy: Desertec Asia - A Pan-Asian Energy Infrastructure Proposal
- 2009/12/03: MIT: A greener way to get electricity from natural gas
Proposed system uses solid-oxide fuel cells to produce power without sending greenhouse gases into the atmosphere - 2009/12/03: BBC: Can we go 100% renewable?
The power of the wind and waves is ever-present in the Danish winter. The Copenhagen climate change talks will discuss how to capture the energy from such "renewable" sources. The UK plans to get 15% of all its energy that way within just 10 years. Some experts believe it could provide for all our needs. But the government's advisor is sceptical of just how far we can go. - 2009/12/02: NewScientist: Extreme oil: Scraping the bottom of Earth's barrel
- 2009/12/02: PhysOrg: A light touch: Iron complexes as efficient catalysts for the light-driven extraction of hydrogen from water
- 2009/12/02: WSJ:EnvCap: Is China's Oil and Coal Binge Coming to an End?
- 2009/12/01: WSJ:EnvCap: Exxon [Energy Outlook] Sees Faster Growth for Wind, Solar Today than Year Ago
- 2009/12/01: GWWatch: Ex-CIA director [Woolsey] wants oil to go the way of salt
- 2009/11/30: BBC: Hydro-pioneers -- Welsh streams turned into hydro-power -- How a stream can make money and power 20 homes
- 2009/11/30: Guardian(UK): 84 months and counting ...
The world produces 73m cars and trucks a year. So a few million wind turbines and solar plants shouldn't be a problem - 2009/11/30: NatureCF: Powering a green planet
- 2009/11/30: SciDaily: World's Largest Working Hydro-Electric Wave Energy Device Launched
Queen's University Belfast has helped the global wave energy industry take a major stride forward with the launch of the world's largest working hydro-electric wave energy device by Aquamarine Power Ltd. Known as Oyster, the device has been officially launched by Scotland's First Minister Alex Salmond MP, MSP at the European Marine Energy Centre (EMEC) in Orkney. - 2009/11/30: OilDrum: International Energy Agency calls 'Peak' on OECD Oil Demand
- 2009/12/01: PeakEnergy: Expanding Indonesia's geothermal development
- 2009/11/30: WSJ:EnvCap: U.S. Gas Production (Finally) Falls; Will Prices Now Rebound?
- 2009/11/30: Guardian(UK): Renewable energy 'could provide 6% of UK's needs by 2020'
Friends of the Earth says solar panels and wind turbines could proliferate if government improves the incentive - 2009/12/04: TechRev: A More Durable Wind Turbine -- New design does away with the need for a complex gearbox
- 2009/12/03: TDC: For clean energy, Britain looks out to sea
England has placed a big bet on offshore wind power to cut emissions radically by 2050 and is driving hard to get projects built. - 2009/12/02: LBL: Berkeley Lab Study Finds No Widespread Impact of Wind Power Projects on Surrounding Residential Property Values in the U.S.
- 2009/12/01: ClimateP: Kenya to build huge wind farm as devastating drought curtails hydropower
Meanwhile among the solar aficionados:
- 2009/12/02: FTimes: [UK] Solar industry 'in limbo' as grants dry up
- 2009/12/02: REA: Utility-scale Solar Power -- A few of the key players in the utility-scale renewable energy industry
- 2009/12/03: DerSpiegel: Desertec Dreams -- Can Saharan Solar Power Save Europe?
Some say it's a foolish fantasy, others believe it has the potential to save the world from the effects of climate change. The German-led Desertec initiative to build a massive solar thermal power plant in the Sahara Desert has both advocates and critics. - 2009/12/04: PhysOrg: Taiwan plans massive growth in solar energy
- 2009/12/04: PlanetArk: Canadian Solar Plans 500-Job Plant In Ontario
- 2009/12/06: BNC: TCASE 7: Scaling up Andasol 1 [Europe's first parabolic trough solar thermal power station] to baseload
- 2009/12/03: PhysOrg: China solar panel makers see boost from Copenhagen
- 2009/12/03: TreeHugger: Plastic Solar Breakthrough: Efficiency Record Broken by Solarmer [7.8%]
- 2009/12/02: TreeHugger: Greek Company HelioSphera to Build Thin-Film Solar Factory in Philadelphia
- 2009/12/02: AlterNet: Passive Solar Technique: Let Nature Heat Your Home
- 2009/12/01: NewScientist: Lotus leaf solar cells soak up more power
- 2009/11/30: ERabett: Supply (we got too much) and Demand (ain't got enough) [solar]
- 2009/12/01: PeakEnergy: Germany Faces Solar Power Component Shortage
- 2009/11/30: BBC: Solar panel costs 'set to fall'
The cost of installing and owning solar panels will fall even faster than expected according to new research. Tests show that 90% of existing solar panels last for 30 years, instead of the predicted 20 years. According to the independent EU Energy Institute, this brings down the lifetime cost. - 2009/12/03: SolveClimate: 2 More Utilities Retiring Aging Coal Plants in Wake of Health Report
- 2009/12/02: PhiladelphiaInquirer: Exelon closing two Pa. fossil-fuel plants
- 2009/11/27: BBerg: U.S. Coal Consumption Increased 1.3% Last Week, Genscape Says
[...] Overall consumption to generate electricity was down 11 percent from a year earlier... - 2009/12/02: SolveClimate: Biofuels: Hope or Hype?
- 2009/12/01: PeakEnergy: The Real Costs of Cellulosic Ethanol
The nuclear energy controversy continues:
- 2009/12/03: CNN: In uranium we trust -- For one Colorado rancher, uranium is the key to the future
- 2009/12/03: EnergyBulletin: Is Nuclear Power the Way to Go?
- 2009/12/04: BNC: Clean future in nuclear power
- 2009/12/01: NewScientist: Safety flaws in US next-gen nuclear reactors
- 2009/11/30: EarthTimes: Is nuclear energy heading for a Golden Age or a shutdown?
Yes we have peak everything:
- 2009/12/02: OilDrum: Peak Gold, Easier to Model than Peak Oil? - Part II [Jean Laherrére]
- 2009/12/01: EurActiv: EU starts screening raw materials 'critical list'
An expert group set up by the European Commission has begun screening a list of forty-nine "potentially critical" raw materials whose availability to industry could come under threat as global competition for natural resources intensifies, EurActiv has learned. - 2009/12/01: OilDrum: Uranium supplies are likely to be adequate until 2020
More people are talking about the electrical grid:
- 2009/12/06: PeakEnergy: Al Gore: Super grid is critical to combating the climate crisis
- 2009/12/02: BBC: Plans for smart meters published
Energy suppliers are to be responsible for installing smart meters in all households in the UK by 2020 - 2009/12/01: AutoBG: EnerDel will supply batteries for smart grid project near Tokyo
And then there is the matter of efficiency & conservation:
- 2009/12/02: FuturePundit: Energy Efficient Light Bulb Manufacturing Energy Usage
- 2009/12/03: TechRev: Cheaper Color-Changing Window -- Thin, battery-like films change color when the weather changes
- 2009/12/02: TreeHugger: Osram Life-Cycle Analysis Finds Manufacturing of LED Bulbs Not That Energy-Intensive
- 2009/11/30: NBF: MIT Has Thermeleon Roof Tiles
- 2009/11/30: KSJT: NYTimes: New pricy LED lights are worth it when all life cycle costs add up...
Automakers & lawyers, engineers & activists argue over the future of the car:
- 2009/12/04: CBC: Fuel-efficient vehicles win eco awards
- 2009/12/04: AutoBG: LA 2009: The plug-in Prius makes its North American debut
- 2009/12/05: DallasNews: Power plants' coal smoke tarnishes halo of electric cars
- 2009/12/04: BBC: UK car sales up 57.6% in November
UK car sales rose by 57.6% in November compared with a year earlier, industry figures have shown. There were 158,082 cars registered last month, the Society of Motor Manufacturers and Traders (SMMT) said, up from a "weak" November 2008. So far this year, 1.84 million cars have been sold in the UK, 8.8% lower than at the same point last year. - 2009/12/03: OilDrum: IEA to Japan: Get Your 85 MPG Cars Ready!
- 2009/12/03: BBC: GM shows off technology future
- 2009/12/02: AutoBG: Hyundai tops the list as the most fuel efficient automaker in the U.S.
- 2009/12/02: AutoBG: LA 2009 [Car Show]: GM announces 100-vehicle Volt test fleet for utilities in California
- 2009/12/01: CalcRisk: Light Vehicle Sales 10.9 Million SAAR in November
- 2009/12/01: CalcRisk: Ford: U.S. November Sales Flat
- 2009/11/30: NRDC:SwitchBoard: 42 MPG by 2020 Would Help US to Meet Climate Targets and Automakers Become More Competitive
- 2009/11/30: BBC: India's Tata Group says it is planning to produce hybrid versions of its Nano, billed as the world's cheapest car
The reaction of business to climate change will be critical:
- 2009/12/04: Yale360: Renewable Energy Investments Will Soar to $200 Billion Worldwide in 2010
- 2009/12/03: Economist: The green slump -- Why investors have been deserting clean energy
- 2009/12/03: BBerg: Copenhagen Failure Defied by $200 Billion in Green Investments
- 2009/12/03: BizGreen: Big business [Over 850 of the world's largest companies] demands strong Copenhagen agreement
- 2009/12/01: SolveClimate: Top Financiers, Business Leaders Look Into Clean Tech's Crystal Ball
Joe Romm posts a daily list of top energy and climate stories:
- 2009/12/04: ClimateP: Energy and Global Warming News for December 4...
- 2009/12/03: ClimateP: Energy and Global Warming News for December 3...
- 2009/12/02: ClimateP: Energy and Global Warming News for December 2...
- 2009/12/01: ClimateP: Energy and Global Warming News for December 1...
- 2009/11/30: ClimateP: Energy and Global Warming News for November 30...
The carbon lobby are up to the usual:
- 2009/12/04: Guardian(UK): Climate sceptics: are they gaining any credence?
- 2009/12/04: Guardian(UK): Gordon Brown attacks 'flat-earth' climate change sceptics
- 2009/12/04: Guardian(UK): Coalition of denial: The sceptics who are trying to reshape the climate debate [list]
- 2009/12/04: ERabett: They have a bridge to sell you
- 2009/12/04: ERabett: Dear fellow member of the American Physical Society
- 2009/12/04: Deltoid: Andrew Bolt's mountain of disinformation
- 2009/12/06: BBC: The climate change sceptics -- what are their arguments, and how are they countered by scientists
- 2009/12/02: Grist: Real People Know It's All Baloney...The culture wars become the climate wars
- 2009/12/03: TreeHugger: (Another) Climate Skeptic Group Discovered to Have Extensive Ties to ExxonMobil
- 2009/12/03: DeSmogBlog: Who is Nigel Lawson? And is he a climate change "expert"
- 2009/12/02: DeSmogBlog: When cavemen roamed the earth 3,000 years ago?! [video]
- 2009/12/03: RawStory: Group promoting climate skepticism has extensive ties to Exxon-Mobil
A group promoting skepticism over widely-accredited climate change science has a web of connections to influential oil giant Exxon-Mobil, Raw Story has found. The organization is called the Nongovernmental International Panel on Climate Change (NIPCC), apparently named after the UN coalition International Panel on Climate Change (IPCC). An investigation into the group reveals its numerous links to Exxon-Mobil, a vehement opponent of climate legislation and notorious among scientists for funding global warming skeptics. - 2009/12/02: TheAge: Cold comfort: the psychology of climate denial
- 2009/12/02: Guardian(UK): Climate change denial is the new article of faith for the far right
Despite a complete lack of evidence, the leaked emails hysteria has encouraged more deniers to emerge from the shadows - 2009/12/02: ABC(Au): Stern attacks Australian climate sceptics
Britain's leading climate change economist, Nicholas Stern, has warned Australian politicians that they are mistaken if they think tackling climate change is too costly. - 2009/12/02: DeSmogBlog: Who Is Bankrolling the "Friends of Science"? (Part II)
- 2009/12/02: CCP: I'd rather not know: the psychology of climate denial
- 2009/12/02: DeepClimate: In the beginning: Friends of Science, Talisman Energy and the de Freitas brothers
- 2009/11/30: AlterNet: Tony Kushner: Right-Wing Opposition to Recognizing Climate Change Comes "Entirely From Greed"
- 2009/11/30: APOV: Reloaded: Climate Change, Shlimate Change!
- 2009/11/30: Guardian(UK): Douglas Carswell: How the facts on global warming have changed
- 2009/11/30: SciAm: Seven Answers to Climate Contrarian Nonsense -- Evidence for human interference with Earth's climate continues to accumulate
- 2009/12/01: HotTopic: Mycroft Monckton makes mischief
Meanwhile in the 'clean coal' saga:
- 2009/12/03: TreeHugger: Gloria Reuben on the Dirty Lie of Clean Coal
- 2009/11/30: EarthTimes: Climate saviour or false messiah? 'Clean coal' on trial
As for climate miscellanea:
- 2009/12/05: Guardian(UK): [Letters] Undeniable truths about climate change
- 2009/12/04: KSJT: German Lang. Press: Heroes of Climate (-Reporting class) & More
- 2009/12/04: ABC(Au): Internet giant Google has helped launch a new tool to give people a vote on the outcome of the crucial meeting.
- 2009/12/04: NewScientist: Climate warning system could be scuppered by pirates
- 2009/12/03: ERabett: A radiative transfer brain teaser
- 2009/12/05: ERabett: The answer to the puzzler
- 2009/12/03: RealClimate: Unsettled Science
- 2009/12/04: MGS: Technological progress
- 2009/12/04: MoD: Quote of the Day [wmc]
- 2009/12/03: G&M: Moving the climate change story from coping to hoping
Hopenhagen -- a global ad campaign backed by some of the world's biggest advertisers -- puts the spotlight on Copenhagen without bringing people down - 2009/12/05: Stoat: clearclimatecode.org
- 2009/12/03: ClimateP: Think Again: A Climate of Conspiracy
- 2009/12/03: KSJT: Times (UK) Eureka! Mag all about oceans, not very cheerily either. Plus other climate big-picture stories.
- 2009/12/02: ClimateP: What percentage of global warming is due to human causes vs. natural causes?
- 2009/12/03: ClimateP: Climate scoreboard tracks Copenhagen progress in real time with embeddable widget
- 2009/12/03: EarthTimes: 'Alternative Nobel' winner [David Suzuki] calls for tougher climate deal
- 2009/12/03: OilDrum: Solutions, Mitigation, Adaptation, etc.
- 2009/12/01: CanWest: 'Global warming' chosen as word of decade
"Global warming" is the word of the decade, according to the Global Language Monitor, as the term weighed heavily over both international political discourse and helped popularize the green movement. - 2009/11/30: CCurrents: The Atmosphere Is Not Waiting For Human Decision
- 2009/12/01: ClimateP: Copenhagen target converter
- 2009/11/30: KSJT: LATimes : A correx on a carbon intensity error (on the other hand: a tough piece on Africa's "climate wars")
- 2009/11/30: EarthTimes: Analysis: World without a climate treaty would suffer, but how much?
- 2009/11/29: CC&G: Understanding the Science of CO2's Role in Climate Change: 2 -- Electromagnetic Radiation and Earth's Climate
- 2009/11/30: MGS: Data set reproducibility
- 2009/11/30: IoD: Understatement of the millennium
And here are a couple of sites you may find interesting and/or useful:
- UCB: For scientists: tips on talking with journalists
- WMO: El Niño/La Niña Update
- COP15 United Nations Climate Change Conference Copenhagen 2009
- WCCN: Western Canadian Cryospheric Network
- CCC: Clear Climate Code
- CarboOcean -- Marine carbon sources and sinks assessment
- FCI: Forest Carbon Index
- SJ: Solutions Journal - For a sustainable and desirable future
- Meet the Caveman Energy Caucus
- GHNF: Greenhouse Neutral Foundation
- Timpanogos: Millard Fillmore's Bathtub [Note correction]
- QuarkSoup [note change of address]
- SCAR: Scientific Committee on Antarctic Research
- ESF: European Science Foundation
- Serendipity - Steve Easterbrook
It's supposed to be funny. Laugh, damnit!
The Australian Emissions Trading System [CPRS] was voted down in the Senate [see more here]:
The stolen CRU email blogorrhea rolls on:
And on the Bottom Line:
That spectral Damocles sword still hangs overhead:
The food crisis is ongoing:
And how are we going to feed 9 billion?
And in the carbon cycle:
Climate refugees are becoming an issue:
Yes we have no wacky weather, except:
Consider transportation & GHG production:
Large scale geo-engineering keeps popping up:
Meanwhile in the journals:
Hansen, again:
Meanwhile on the Kyoto front:
And the Tobin tax has had an airing lately:
A video on Cap and Trade triggered strong reactions:
As for GW & security:
The issue of the law and activism is playing out around the world as nations scramble to deal with climate change:
Among the world's religions:
And on the American political front:
So are the UK Tories going to rebel like the Aussie Liberals?
The Liberal power struggle:
And in New Zealand:
Harper seems to really like this ploy:
The Tories are concerned about harmonizing with Washington:
There was a Munk Debate (which I mostly ignored) this week:
As happened in the USA, federal inaction leads to local action:
Meanwhile in that Mechanical Mordor known as the tar sands:
The answer my friend...:
On the coal front:
Biofuel bickering abounds:
Low Key Plug
My first novel Water was published in Canada May, 2007. The American release was in October. An Introductionto the novel is available, along with the Unpublished Forewordand the Launch Talk. An overview of my writing is available here.
<regards>
P.S. Recent postings can be found in the week archive and the ancient postings can be accessed here, which should open to this.
"Evidently due to this e-mail conspiracy, Arctic sea ice is at historically low levels, Australia is on fire, the northern United Kingdom is underwater, and the world's glaciers are disappearing. Oh yeah, and it's the hottest decade in history." -Brad Johnson
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