Sipping from the internet firehose...
This weekly posting is brought to you courtesy of H.E.Taylor. Happy reading, I hope you enjoy this week's Global Warming news roundup
Another week of Climate Disruption News
Sipping from the internet firehose...
March 29, 2009
- Chuckle Top Stories:Red River, Earth Hour, Recession, MEFEC, Changing Borders
- Melting Arctic, Methane, Geopolitics, Antarctica, Particulates, Mt. Redoubt, Chameides, Late Comments
- Food Crisis, Food vs. Biofuel, Food Production
- Hurricanes, GHGs, Carbon Cycle, Satellites
- Impacts, Forests, Corals, Climate Refugees, Wacky Weather, Tornadoes, Wildfires, Floods & Droughts
- Mitigation, Sequestration, Geoengineering, Adaptation
- Journals, Misc. Science, Dyson
- Kyoto, Kyoto-2 & Copenhagen, Carbon Trade, Optimal Carbon Reduction Strategy
- Politics:International, Tariffs, Security, America, Obama, Britain, Europe, Australia, India, China, Japan, Canada
- Ecological Economics, IPAT, Apocalypso, Media, Books, Video
- Energy, Wind, Solar, Coal, Biofuel, Nukes, Peak Oil, Grid, Efficiency, Cars, Greenwashing, Insurance
- Carbon Lobby, Miscellaneous Climate, Useful Links
- Shameless Self Promotion, .sig
- 2009/03/25: TI:CF: (cartoon - Roberts) Technobubble
- 2009/03/24: TI:CF: (cartoon - Roberts) Socially unacceptable
- 2009/03/25: uComics: (cartoon - Toles) No Thanks
- 2009/03/23: TI:CF: (cartoon - Roberts) Bear essentials
- 2009/03/23: ClimateP: (cartoon - Toles) Global warming impact humor from Toles
The Red River is flooding in North Dakota:
- 2009/03/29: CBS: Dike Breached In Fargo, Campus Flooded -- Flood Wall Buckles Near School But Finally Contained; Sandbagging Of Threatening Red River Continues
- 2009/03/29: ABC(US): Red River Retreats, but Fargo Remains Vigilant -- Red River begins to retreat, but Fargo remains vigilant to make sure levees hold up
- 2009/03/28: CNN: Menacing Red River appears to level off
Red River apparently stops rising at 40.7 feet in Fargo, North Dakota - River had been expected to crest Sunday around 42 feet - Temperatures below 10 degrees help keep river from topping dikes - Massive sandbagging operation halted - 2009/03/28: CNN: Flood volunteers relax a little
North Dakota, Minnesota iReporters feel some relief as river stops rising - "We've moved to the vigilant monitoring stage," iReporter's mother says - Finding volunteer opportunities getting difficult, West Fargo man says - Volunteer spirit "not any unique thing up here," he says - 2009/03/28: TerraDaily: 30,000 could be left homeless in North Dakota floods
- 2009/03/28: TP:WonkRoom: Global Boiling: Unprecedented Flooding Of Red River Leaves Fargo 'On The Brink Of Disaster'
- 2009/03/28: CBC: More troops join effort to strengthen Red River levees in North Dakota
- 2009/03/27: BostonGlobe: [30 pictures] Red River flooding
- 2009/03/28: BBC: Flood fear forces US evacuations
Thousands of people have been asked to evacuate their homes in the US Midwest, as the swollen Red River reaches its highest levels for 112 years - 2009/03/27: ABC(US): Fargo Residents Pack Their Bags, Flee City as Water Levels Rise -- North Dakota's Red River May Unleash Biggest Flood Fargo Has Ever Seen
Thousands of Fargo, N.D., residents are fleeing the city as the Red River, now running at more than 45 times its normal volume, continues to rise. During a news conference today, Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano said the department has enough food and water to support 30,000 people for seven days and could bring in more if needed. Fargo expects no more than 100,000 to evacuate in the worst-case scenario. Napolitano said it's estimated that 23 percent of the evacuees will need shelter. This evening the Red River hit 40.67 feet, up from 40.3 feet this morning. The river is more than 22 feet above flood stage, breaking a record set in 1897. Early today the National Weather Service said the river would crest at between 41 and 42 feet on Saturday. The estimate was revised later in the day to as high as 43 feet. Even worse, the river could stay crested for up to one week, forecasters said. - 2009/03/26: CBS: Levees Built, Fargo Awaits Its Fate -- Evacuations Intensify In Two Cities; River Could Crest At 43 Feet, The Same Height As The Dikes
- 2009/03/27: CNN: Red River reaches record level, floods Fargo with uncertainty
Helicopters, active-duty military sent to help prepare for possible flooding - National Weather Service data says river would reach 42 feet on Saturday - Sandbagging continued Friday, although Fargo official says efforts will be shut down - Fargo neighborhood evacuated after cracks found in levee - 2009/03/27: EarthTimes: Evacuations ordered as record flooding overcomes dikes [Fargo, North Dakota]
- 2009/03/25: TerraDaily: Ice-jammed floodwaters, blizzard swamp North Dakota
- 2009/03/27: BemidjiPioneer: President approves federal flood relief
President Barack Obama on Thursday evening declared an emergency for seven northwest Minnesota counties due to flood conditions. - 2009/03/27: CBC: Record-high river prompts more N.D. evacuations
The mandatory evacuation of more than 190 homes, nursing homes, hospitals and a county jail have been ordered in North Dakota as the swollen Red River broke a 112-year-old flood level record on Friday. - 2009/03/27: Yahoo: River reaches record high in Fargo, region braces
- 2009/03/26: Yahoo: New estimate raises ND flood higher than sandbags
- 2009/03/26: CNN: Mayor says Fargo faces 'uncharted territory' with flooding
Fargo, North Dakota, needs about 2,000 volunteers to help fill sandbags - Water from Missouri River receding in Bismarck, North Dakota - Fargo raising dikes to 43 feet after Red River expected to crest at 41 feet - Record-setting crest predicted to hit Saturday on the Red River in Fargo - 2009/03/25: TerraDaily: Blizzard dumps snow on flooded North Dakota
- 2009/03/26: NYT: Fargo Works to Hold Back Rapidly Rising River
- 2009/03/26: CBC: Flood fears rise as water levels surge in Fargo
- 2009/03/25: ABC(US): Flood Fears Rise in Fargo, North Dakota -- Residents Scramble to Strengthen 42-Foot Sandbag Dikes to Withstand Red River's Crest
- 2009/03/25: CNN: Flood warnings issued; N. Dakota braces for record deluge
Bismarck, surrounding areas threatened; snow complicates preparations - Fargo halfway to 2 million-sandbag goal, which may be met Thursday - South of Fargo, town residents rescued after residential dike gives way - City of Fargo facing what could be worst flooding it's ever had - 2009/03/25: Google:AP: ND flooding prompts federal disaster designation
- 2009/03/25: BBC: Floods cause havoc in US Midwest
North Dakota has been declared a federal disaster area by US President Barack Obama because of record spring flooding across the mid-Western state. Floodwaters from the Red River, which is expected to peak later this week, have closed roads and bridges. - 2009/03/25: CBC: North Dakota declared disaster zone amid flooding
- 2009/03/22: Google:AP: ND city scrambles to prepare for record flooding
- 2009/03/23: CNN: Residents race to fill sandbags as flooding threatens North Dakota
City targets having 1.5 million sandbags ready in preparation for flooding - Fargo has already closed a number of bridges over the Red River - Dozens of communities in the Red River basin are threatened by rising water - 2009/03/27: CBC: Fargo crisis won't happen in Manitoba: [Premier Gary] Doer
- 2009/03/28: CBC: Cool weather buys flood fighters a bit more time -- River ice on Red north of Winnipeg still a worry, officials say
- 2009/03/27: CBC: Cold slows flooding in Winnipeg, but warmer days ahead
- 2009/03/26: CBC: State of emergency expanded in communities north of Winnipeg -- Hundreds of homes may need to be evacuated
- 2009/03/26: CBC: New ice jam raising water levels, and fears, north of Winnipeg
- 2009/03/23: CBC: Spring storms add to flooding fears in Manitoba
An interesting comment on US versus Canadian perceptions of government:
- 2009/03/28: MTobis: Government as Them vs Government as Us
- 2009/03/26: StarTrib: Fargo, Moorhead: Little aid after '97 flood -- Cities worst hit in 1997 got help shoring up defenses, but others didn't.
Earth Hour went down this week:
- 2009/03/29: ABC(Au): World landmarks go dark for Earth Hour
- 2009/03/29: JQuiggin: Earth Hour
- 2009/03/28: Maribo: Lights dim around the world for Earth Hour
- 2009/03/28: EarthTimes: Lights dimmed on the Acropolis for Earth Hour
- 2009/03/29: ENN: Lights dim around globe to encourage reductions in carbon emissions
- 2009/03/28: CBC: Canadians douse lights to usher in Earth Hour 2009
- 2009/03/28: BBC: Major cities and global landmarks have been plunged into darkness as millions of people switched off lights for an hour to protest against climate change
- 2009/03/29: SMH: Planet speaks with flick of a switch -- One billion people in 83 countries. Three years on, a small idea has become a global phenomenon...
- 2009/03/29: SMH: Celebrities come out in support of Earth hour
- 2009/03/29: Guardian(UK): Earth Hour: when the world put out the lights
- 2009/03/28: CNN: Lights go out across planet for Earth Hour
- 2009/03/28: ABC(Au): Lights out: Australia plunges into darkness for climate change
- 2009/03/28: ABC(Au): Brisbane switches off for Earth Hour
- 2009/03/28: PhysOrg: Sydney first major city to mark Earth Hour 2009
- 2009/03/27: Google:AFP: Millions to flick the switch for climate change
- 2009/03/28: EarthTimes: Taipei 101 goes dark to observe Earth Hour
- 2009/03/28: EarthTimes: Sydney basks in Earth Hour's global glow
- 2009/03/28: EarthTimes: New Zealand kicks off Earth Hour switch-off
- 2009/03/27: CCurrents: Earth Hour Puts Focus On Climate Change Saturday
- 2009/03/28: CBC: Lights out in several countries for Earth Hour 2009
- 2009/03/28: SMH: Earth [Hour] fever takes hold across globe
- 2009/03/28: Guardian(UK): Big Ben and Houses of Parliament to switch off the lights for Earth Hour
- 2009/03/27: Guardian(UK): Earth Hour: Turning out the lights plays into the hands of our critics
- 2009/03/27: Guardian(UK): Beijing orders scaling back of Earth Hour to celebrate Tibet 'liberation' day
- 2009/03/27: UN: Ban calls on world's citizens to join UN in sending a message on climate change
- 2009/03/27: NatureTGB: Earth's Power Hour
- 2009/03/27: Maribo: Will people participate in Earth Hour?
- 2009/03/27: TreeHugger: No Earth Hour in China; It Conflicts with Serf Liberation Day, AKA Invasion of Tibet Day
- 2009/03/27: EarthTimes: Pyramids to go dark for 'Earth Hour'
- 2009/03/27: ABC(Au): The Mayor of Kalgoorlie-Boulder is urging residents to take part in Earth Hour tomorrow night
- 2009/03/27: IHT: Lights out in 84 countries for Earth Hour 2009
- 2009/03/26: USAToday: Earth Hour hopes to shed light on climate
- 2009/03/25: ABC(Au): Residents urged to power down for Earth Hour
- 2009/03/25: TreeHugger: Earth Hour Getting Traction in the USA
- 2009/03/24: CharlotteObserver: Lights going out Saturday to make a point
- 2009/03/24: CBC: Earth Hour: Making a difference?
- 2009/03/24: SMH: Cyberspace a'twitter in countdown to darkness [Earth Hour]
The recession and the climate:
- 2009/03/28: CCurrents: The Worsening U.S. Failure
- 2009/03/28: Guardian(UK): It should be the environment and the economy, stupid
- 2009/03/25: NatureTGB: Force banks to back green energy, says former BP chief [Brown]
- 2009/03/25: GristMill: A poor strategy for halting climate change -- Reducing emissions isn't an economy killer
- 2009/03/25: APOV: Yet More On The Impact Of Economic Crisis On Climate Change
- 2009/03/25: APOV: The Perfect Storm = Climate Change + Economic Collapse
- 2009/03/23: ClimateP: The one debt we must not leave our children
- 2009/03/23: ABC(Au): Recession could put emissions on hold: Garnaut
Climate change expert Professor Ross Garnaut says greenhouse gas emissions may remain steady for the next three years because of the effect of the global recession on industry. At a conference in Perth, Professor Garnaut said the recession was a good time economically for governments to invest in structural change. - 2009/03/29: ABC(Au): Obama calls major economies to climate forum
US President Barack Obama is launching a Major Economies Forum on Energy and Climate to help facilitate a UN agreement on global warming, the White House says. Leaders from 16 major economies, including Australia, have been invited to a preparatory session on April 27 and 28 in Washington to "help generate the political leadership necessary" to achieve an international pact to cut greenhouse gas emissions later this year, it said in a statement. - 2009/03/29: NYT: White House Announces International Meetings to Address Energy and Climate Issues
- 2009/03/28: Yahoo: Obama starts climate change forum for big economies
- 2009/03/29: Yahoo: Obama launches major economies climate forum
- 2009/03/29: ENN: White House Announces International Meetings to Address Energy and Climate Issues
- 2009/03/28: CBC: Obama to host April climate-change forum -- Aims to get ball rolling for Copenhagen treaty
- 2009/03/29: CanWest: Obama sets up climate forum
U.S. President Barack Obama yesterday stepped into the battle to combat global warming, unveiling an international forum of 17 major economies, including Canada, to speed up work toward a key UN accord. The April 27-28 preparatory talks of the the Major Economics Forum on Energy and Climate will be followed by a summit of the 17 leaders in Italy in July, aiming to help hammer out a new agreement to curb greenhouse gases to replace the Kyoto Protocol when it expires in 2012. - 2009/03/28: BBC: Obama plans climate change summit
US President Barack Obama has invited figures from the world's 16 major economies to Washington for a meeting on climate change at the end of April. The event will be the first meeting of what the White House styles "the Major Economies Forum on Energy and Climate". It will focus on increasing the supply of clean energy and cutting greenhouse gas emissions, the White House said. It was announced as millions worldwide observed Earth Hour, turning off lights in a protest against climate change. The Washington meeting is scheduled to take place on 27-28 April and the sessions will culminate in a July meeting in Italy. - 2009/03/29: ABC(US): Rethinking European Borders as Alpine Ice Melts -- After Climate Change Melted Their Shared Alpine Border, Italy and Switzerland Redraw the Map
- 2009/03/27: NewScientist: Climate changes Europe's borders -- and the world's
- 2009/03/25: CNN: Melting glaciers force Italy, Swiss to redraw border
Melting glaciers in Alps forcing Italy and Switzerland to redraw their borders - Italian Military Geographic Institute blames climate change for melting - Switzerland cooperating with Italians on potential changes - 2009/03/27: BBC: Arctic diary: Explorers' ice quest -- The Northernmost Cafe
- 2009/03/26: Guardian(UK): Bum deal for a birthday and other hazards of the Catlin Arctic Survey by Martin Hartley
- 2009/03/24: DotEarth: More on the Polar Bear's Fate
- 2009/03/24: BBC: Arctic trek team pushes forward -- The British team trying to measure the thickness of Arctic sea-ice as it treks to the North Pole believes the weather is finally turning in its favour
- 2009/03/24: NatureCF: Pancake ice takes over the Arctic
- 2009/03/24: KSJT: AP, Wa.Post, then lots more: EPA circulates its proposal to regulate CO2 as a pollutant, and as a threat to public health, welfare
- 2009/03/23: NatureN: Pancake ice takes over the Arctic -- Researchers work to put changing ice types into climate models
Don't say anything but, there's Damocles sword again:
- 2009/03/25: NewScientist: Arctic meltdown is a threat to humanity
[...] "The permafrost is melting fast all over the Arctic, lakes are forming everywhere and methane is bubbling up out of them." [Katey Walter] - 2009/03/28: ENN: Russia plans military force to patrol Arctic as 'cold rush' intensifies
- 2009/03/27: SpaceDaily: Russia plans to deploy troops in the Arctic: document
- 2009/03/27: BBC: Russia outlines Arctic force plan -- Russia has announced plans to set up a military force to protect its interests in the Arctic
- 2009/03/27: CBC: Canada won't be 'bullied' over Arctic, Cannon tells Russians
- 2009/03/27: Google:AFP: Canada says will defend its Arctic
- 2009/03/28: Guardian(UK): Russia plans military force to patrol Arctic as 'cold rush' intensifies
- 2009/03/27: BBC: Russian 'Arctic military' plan
Russia has announced plans to set up a military force to protect its interests in the Arctic. In a document published on its national security council's website, Moscow says it expects the Arctic to become its main resource base by 2020. While the strategy is thought to have been approved in September, it has only now been made public. Moscow's ambitions are likely to cause concern among other countries with claims to the Arctic. - 2009/03/27: Google:AP: Russia plans to create Arctic military force
- 2009/03/23: DerSpiegel: Cold War in the Arctic? Countries Seek Piece of Pie
As it stands, Arctic policy is already a dense network of legal and political agreements between different national and supranational stakeholders. Now the European Union wants to play a greater role in shaping it. - 2009/03/23: CanWest: Four reserve units to form backbone of new Arctic force -- Soldiers would be available to respond to incidents in North
While in Antarctica:
- 2009/03/24: GreenGrok: Whither the West Antarctic Ice Sheet?
- 2009/03/23: NatureCF: Q&A: Trapped under ice -- Antarctic ice-mapping autosub
Several stories on particulates:
- 2009/03/28: SciDaily: Airborne Acid May Help Soot Turn Into Cloud Seeds
- 2009/03/28: SMH: Scientists follow the dusty trails
- 2009/03/26: NatureCF: Settling of dust warms tropical Atlantic
- 2009/03/26: PhysOrg: Dust plays larger than expected role in determining Atlantic temperature
- 2009/03/26: Eureka: Dust plays larger than expected role in determining Atlantic temperature
Mt. Redoubt erupted in Alaska, which won't affect the climate much, but might disturb the nearby oil terminal:
- 2009/03/25: PhysOrg: Oil terminal a concern as Alaska volcano rumbles
[...] On Monday, 11 people were evacuated by helicopter from the Drift River Terminal, a Chevron-owned facility near the base of the volcano. The terminal has been shut down but oil remains in two of its seven tanks. The Coast Guard is working with the state Department of Environmental Conservation and the Cook Inlet Pipeline Co. to determine if the oil should be removed and how it could be done, said Sara Francis, a Coast Guard spokeswoman. - 2009/03/24: Wunderground: Redoubt volcano unlikely to have a major climate impact
Bill Chameides on climate vs weather:
- 2009/03/27: GreenGrok: Weather Prediction, Climate Prediction. What's the Diff?
Late comment on Kriegler et al.:
- 2009/03/28: DotEarth: 'Tipping Points' and the Climate Challenge
- 2009/03/23: DeSmogBlog: The Tipping Points
Late comment on the Maldives carbon neutral goal:
- 2009/03/26: Guardian(UK): Maldives' carbon neutral plan is not greenwash, just imperfect progress
Late coverage of the World Water Forum:
- 2009/03/23: DemNow: Water Rights Activists Blast Istanbul World Water Forum as "Corporate Trade Show to Promote Privatization"
- 2009/03/22: CBC: Water not recognized as human right in forum statement
A week-long international conference ended Sunday in Istanbul with a statement that recognizes access to safe drinking water as a "basic human need," but not a "human right," as some delegates had proposed. The statement, coinciding with the United Nations' World Water Day, was issued at the end of a three-day ministerial meeting at the 5th annual World Water Forum in the Turkish city. - 2009/03/28: CCurrents: Number Of Chronically Hungry Tops One Billion
- 2009/03/23: UN: UN-backed 2009 summit on world food crisis gains support
The conflict between biofuel and food persists:
- 2009/03/23: PlanetArk: Economic Recovery May Rekindle Food/Fuel Debate
And how are we going to feed 9 billion?
- 2009/03/25: Eureka: New wheat disease could spread faster than expected
- 2009/03/25: OpenLeft: Fedco Seeds: The David To Monsanto's Goliath
[...] The National Gardening Association estimates that some 43 million Americans are gearing up to grow at least some of their own food this spring. - 2009/03/25: AlterNet: The Obamas Kick Off a Victory Garden Movement -- Who Will Join Them?
Izilda & Ilsa blew around the South Indian ocean unreported, while blew around the Jasper SW Pacific equally unreported:
As for GHGs:
- 2009/03/24: CSIRO: Two 'new' greenhouse gases growing
Two new greenhouse gases are accumulating in the atmosphere, according to an international research team led by scientists from the Scripps Institution of Oceanography in the US and CSIRO scientist, Dr Paul Fraser, from the Centre for Australian Weather and Climate Research. Nitrogen trifluoride (NF3) and sulfuryl fluoride (SO2F2) are powerful greenhouse gases that have recently been discovered to be growing quickly in the global background atmosphere. - 2009/03/27: TerraDaily: Wind Shifts May Stir CO2 From Antarctic Depths
While in near earth orbit:
- 2009/03/23: GreenGrok: Are We Flying Blind? The U.S. Earth-observing network is aging rapidly
- 2009/03/23: PhysOrg: New Sun-Watching Instrument to Monitor Sunlight Fluctuations [Total Irradiance Monitor (TIM) on Glory, fall launch]
More GW impacts are being seen:
- 2009/03/28: SciDaily: Climate And Habitat Diversity Affect Variety Of Animal Species In Spain
- 2009/03/26: PhysOrg: Drop in daddy long legs is devastating bird populations
Warm summers are dramatically reducing populations of daddy long legs, which in turn is having a severe impact on the bird populations which rely on them for food. New research by a team of UK scientists spells out for the first time how climate change may affect upland bird species like the golden plover - perhaps pushing it towards local extinction by the end of the century. - 2009/03/26: SciDaily: Climate Change Found To Have Paradoxical Effects In Coastal Wetlands
- 2009/03/25: Reuters: U.N. plans guide to fighting climate-change disasters
A proposed U.N. study of climate extremes will be a practical guide for tackling natural disasters and fill a gap in past reports focused on the gradual effects of global warming, experts said. Floods, mudslides, droughts, heatwaves or storms are often the main causes of destruction and human suffering tied to climate change, rather than the creeping rise in average temperatures blamed on a build-up of greenhouse gases. - 2009/03/23: PhysOrg: Scientists find climate change to have paradoxical effects in coastal wetlands
- 2009/03/22: ClimateP: An introduction to global warming impacts: Hell and High Water
- 2009/03/23: ABC(Au): CSIRO checks vineyard heat stress
A CSIRO study of vineyards and heatwaves has produced important findings for wine grape growers. Findings from a survey of 100 properties in South Australia after a heatwave in February will be presented at the international Greenhouse 09 conference in Perth today. The study found crops can survive heat stress with correct management. - 2009/03/23: NewScientist: City dwellers 'harm climate less'
And then there are the world's forests:
- 2009/03/28: TreeHugger: Report: Japanese Paper Companies Still Lying About Tasmanian Old Growth Forests
- 2009/03/26: MongaBay: Greenpeace accuses Sinar Mas corporation of violence toward its protestors [in Jakarta, Indonesia]
- 2009/03/26: ABC(Au): Logging Tiwi forests a $110 million mistake: professor
Tiwi Islanders have missed out on potentially millions of dollars from carbon trading, an expert from Charles Darwin University says. - 2009/03/25: NatureTGB: Armed men pillage Madagascar's forests
- 2009/03/24: PhysOrg: Scientist warns that palm oil development may threaten Amazon
Oil palm cultivation is a significant driver of tropical forest destruction across Southeast Asia. It could easily become a threat to the Amazon rainforest because of a proposed change in Brazil's legislation, new infrastructure and the influence of foreign agro-industrial firms in the region, according to William F. Laurance, senior scientist at the Smithsonian Tropical Research Institute in Panama. - 2009/03/23: NewScientist: Coral colony as old as the pyramids
- 2009/03/23: Maribo: A new online voice on the coral reef crisis
Climate refugees are becoming an issue:
- 2009/03/23: NYT: A global 'national security' issue lurks at Bangladesh's border [refugees]
Yes we have no wacky weather, except:
- 2009/03/29: CNN: Severe weather wreaks havoc from Plains to Gulf Coast
Strong winds damage Tennessee shopping center - Blizzard drops more than 2 feet of snow, strands travelers in Kansas, Oklahoma - Mobile, Alabama, and Biloxi, Mississippi, regions hardest hit by rain - 2009/03/28: CNN: Severe weather strikes Plains, Gulf Coast -- Plains buried by snow; Gulf Coast inundated with rain
Governors of Kansas, Oklahoma declare disasters in parts of states - Blizzard drops more than 2 feet of snow, cutting power, stranding drivers - Mobile, Alabama, and Biloxi, Mississippi, regions hardest hit by rain - Fifteen to 20 roads around Mobile were closed, flash flooding stranded motorists - 2009/03/27: CBC: More severe weather batters U.S. South
Meanwhile in tornado alley:
- 2009/03/26: CBC: 2 tornadoes hit southern Mississippi
As for heatwaves and wild fires:
- 2009/03/26: TerraDaily: Indian Ocean Temperature Link To [Australian] Bushfires
- 2009/03/26: SMH: Bushfire pollution deaths to rise
Bushfires worsening in south-eastern Australia due to climate change will cause more deaths and illness through air pollution, a CSIRO study has shown. Mick Myers and a team from the Centre for Australian Weather and Climate Research examined air quality data from monitoring stations in Melbourne during the 2006 bushfires and found a big jump in air pollution. On several days it was "going through the roof", Dr Myers told the Herald at the Greenhouse 2009 conference. - 2009/03/26: SMH: More heat-related deaths 'likely'
Australia's big cities need to guard against a surge in heat-related deaths as they suffer more days with temperatures topping 30 degrees, scientists warn. Two independent studies looking at projected atmospheric conditions in Sydney and Melbourne have concluded that deaths of older people from heat stress and air pollution could double. - 2009/03/24: BBC: Kenyan forces deployed for fires
Kenya has mobilised 3,500 security personnel to fight a series of bush fires raging out of control in some of the country's most important forests. The government estimates that more than 4,600 hectares (11,370 acres) of bushland have already been destroyed. - 2009/03/23: EarthTimes: Kenyan wildlife threatened by forest fires
- 2009/03/23: BBC: Wildlife flee Kenyan forest fires
Hundreds of thousands of flamingos and other wildlife are at risk after five forest fires erupted in Kenya on Saturday, say wildlife officials - 2009/03/29: CBS: 100s Thought Dead In Indonesia Dam Burst
91 Are Confirmed Dead But More Than 100 Others Remain Missing After Extensive Searching Following The "Mini-Tsunami" - 2009/03/28: CBC: Death toll rises after flooding from burst Indonesian dam -- More than 100 still missing
- 2009/03/29: BBC: Indonesia crews resume dam rescue
Bodies are still being recovered more than two days after a dam burst near the Indonesian capital, Jakarta, killing at least 93 people - 2009/03/29: Guardian(UK): Search for survivors after [Indonesian] dam disaster
- 2009/03/27: TerraDaily: Rain-soaked southern Africa hit by worst floods in years
- 2009/03/28: TerraDaily: 100 missing, 77 killed by burst Indonesian dam
- 2009/03/28: SMH: 'It sounded like a wave': 58 dead as dam bursts banks
- 2009/03/27: UN: Floods displace thousands in southern Africa, UN says
- 2009/03/27: ClimateP: Why the "never seen before" Fargo flooding is just what you'd expect from global warming, as Obama warns
- 2009/03/26: CBC: Dam bursts outside Indonesian capital, killing at least 50 -- Death toll expected to rise, officials say
- 2009/03/27: CBC: At least 58 die, scores missing after Indonesian dam burst -- Residents waiting on rooftops for rescue
- 2009/03/27: BBC: At least 20 people have died after a dam burst on the outskirts of Jakarta, say Indonesian officials
- 2009/03/25: ENN: Global warming 37 percent to blame for droughts: scientist
- 2009/03/25: BBC: Living with the Zambezi's delta force
- 2009/03/24: NewScientist: 'Wasted' wells fail to solve Africa's water problems
- 2009/03/24: EarthTimes: Red Cross seeks 1.27 million dollars for victims of Namibia floods
- 2009/03/24: ENN: Scientists: Less ice on Great Lakes during winter
- 2009/03/24: Eureka: Ice storms devastating to pecan orchards -- Study shows economic impact of storm damage, recovery efforts
- 2009/03/24: WSJ: Drought Turns Water Into a Cash Crop
As Don Bransford prepares for his spring planting season, he is debating which is worth more: the rice he grows on his 700-acre farm north of Sacramento, or the water he uses to cultivate it. After three years of drought in California, water is now a potential cash crop. Last fall, the state activated its Drought Water Bank program for the first time since 1994. Under the program, farmers can choose to sell some of the water they would usually use to grow their crops to parched cities, counties and agriculture districts. Water -- or the lack of it -- has been costing the state dearly. According to Richard Howitt, a professor at the University of California, Davis, the drought and resulting water restrictions could cost as much as $1.4 billion in lost income and about 53,000 lost jobs, mostly in the agriculture sector. - 2009/03/24: CBC: Less ice on Great Lakes leading to lower water levels
- 2009/03/22: JFleck: It Ain't Rainin' Down In Texas
On the mitigation front, a tussle broke out over biochar:
- 2009/03/28: Guardian(UK): [Letters] Credit and criticism for biochar
- 2009/03/27: Guardian(UK): This gift of nature is the best way to save us from climate catastrophe
Biochar schemes would remove carbon from the atmosphere and increase food supply... - 2009/03/26: PeakEnergy: Biochar Wars
- 2009/03/25: Guardian(UK): We never said biochar is a miracle cure
- 2009/03/24: Guardian(UK): Biochar: Much is unknown but this is no reason to rule it out
- 2009/03/24: Guardian(UK): Biochar: let the Earth remove CO2 for us [James Lovelock]
What we have to do is turn a portion of all the waste of agriculture into charcoal and bury it - 2009/03/24: Guardian(UK): Woodchips with everything. It's the Atkins plan of the low-carbon world
The latest miracle mass fuel cure, biochar, does not stand up; yet many who should know better have been suckered into it - 2009/03/29: ABC(Au): Carbon storage site identified off NT coast
An area off the Northern Territory coast has been identified as a potential underground storage site for greenhouse gas emissions. Scientists say five areas off the coast of the Territory, South Australia and Western Australia contain 10 sites stable enough to store emissions underneath the seabed. - 2009/03/26: EnvFin: Carbon capture policy inadequate in most US states - RAP [Regulator Assistance Project]
- 2009/03/28: SMH: Greenhouse gas burial sites found
Ten underground storage sites have been identified by scientific advisers as suitable for burying greenhouse gas emissions. The Minister for Resources and Energy, Martin Ferguson, said burying greenhouse emissions was "a key component of the Government's response to climate change". Geoscience Australia has confirmed that five areas off the coast of Victoria, South Australia, the Northern Territory and West Australia containing the 10 sites are sufficiently stable to allow emissions to be safely injected and stored below the seabed. Licences for commercial exploration of the sites will be available to companies later this year. Carbon capture and storage, or geosequestration, aims to bury gases, such as carbon dioxide, underground. It is still in the experimental stage but the Government is hoping it will prove to be the technology that allow emissions to continue to be produced but safely stored where they cannot interfere with the atmosphere. - 2009/03/25: NewScientist: Hungry shrimp eat climate change experiment
- 2009/03/28: ENN: Who ate all the algae?
- 2009/03/27: SMH: Ocean seeding fails on carbon but claims a plus for plankton
The most determined attempt yet to make the ocean soak up more greenhouse gas has failed to achieve a significant impact, dealing a blow to the controversial science. Despite an international outcry, the "ocean fertilisation" experiment - seeding the ocean with iron to stimulate the growth of microscopic algae and in turn absorb carbon dioxide - went ahead in the South Atlantic this month. The result surprised chief scientists, who admitted that it sank only a "modest" amount of CO2 - dampening their hopes that the Southern Ocean could artificially cool a warming Earth. It will probably bolster international regulations to restrict further iron fertilisation schemes. - 2009/03/24: NatureCF: Results cast doubt on potential 'climate fix'
- 2009/03/24: TreeHugger: Ocean Iron Fertilization Test Casts Doubt on Ability of Southern Ocean to Soak Up Excess Carbon Dioxide
- 2009/03/23: BBC: Setback for climate technical fix
The biggest ever investigation into "ocean fertilisation" as a climate change fix has brought modest results. The idea is that putting iron filings in the ocean will stimulate growth of algae, which will absorb CO2 from air. But scientists on the Lohafex project, which put six tonnes of iron into the Southern Ocean, said little extra carbon dioxide was taken up. The German environment ministry and campaign groups had tried to stop the project which they called "dangerous". Leaders of the German-Indian expedition said they had gained valuable scientific information, but that their results suggested iron fertilisation could not have a major impact, at least in that region of the oceans. - 2009/03/24: TreeHugger: Bangladesh Tries Working With Nature to Stave Off Sea Level Rise
Meanwhile in the journals:
- 2009/03/14: GRL: (ab$) Possible oceanic feedback in the extratropics in relation to the North Atlantic SST tripole by Takashi Mochizuki et al.
- 2009/03/27: ACPD: First year of upper tropospheric integrated content of CO2 from IASI hyperspectral infrared observations by C. Crevoisier et al.
- 2009/03/27: ACPD: CALIPSO polar stratospheric cloud observations: second-generation detection algorithm and composition discrimination by M. C. Pitts et al.
- 2009/03/27: ACPD: Intercomparison of integrated IASI and AATSR calibrated radiances by S. M. Illingworth et al.
- 2009/03/23: CPD: Sources of holocene variability of oxygen isotopes in paleoclimate archives by A. N. LeGrande & G. A. Schmidt
- 2009/02/24: PNAS: Overcoming systemic roadblocks to sustainability: The evolutionary redesign of worldviews, institutions, and technologies by Rachael Beddoe et al.
- 2009/03/24: ACP: Stratospheric ozone in the post-CFC era by F. Li et al.
- 2009/03/24: ACP: Statistical properties of cloud lifecycles in cloud-resolving models by R. S. Plant
- 2009/03/24: ACP: Update on emissions and environmental impacts from the international fleet of ships: the contribution from major ship types and ports by S. B. Dalsøren et al.
- 2009/03/25: ACPD: Global distributions of nitric acid from IASI/MetOP measurements by C. Wespes et al.
- 2009/03/25: ACPD: IASI temperature and water vapor retrievals -- error assessment and validation by N. Pougatchev et al.
- 2009/03/25: ACPD: The influence of foreign vs. North American emissions on surface ozone in the US by D. R. Reidmiller et al.
- 2009/03/23: ACPD: Characterization of methane retrievals from the IASI space-borne sounder by A. Razavi et al.
- 2009/03/24: PNAS: Revising the nitrogen cycle in the Peruvian oxygen minimum zone by Phyllis Lam et al.
- 2009/03/24: PNAS: Toxicity of atmospheric aerosols on marine phytoplankton by Adina Paytan et al.
- 2009/03/24: PNAS: [Commentary] New twist on nitrogen cycling in oceanic oxygen minimum zones by Jonathan P. Zehr
- 2009/03/03: GRL: (ab$) Vertical mixing at intermediate depths in the Arctic boundary current by Y. D. Lenn et al.
Before we get into politics, there was some science done:
- 2009/03/29: SciDaily: Understanding Sea Temperature-atmospheric Pressure Links In North Atlantic
- 2009/03/27: NatureTGB: Volcanoes, tornadoes, disasters are all the same...[mesocyclones]
- 2009/03/25: EarthTimes: Thai, Chinese scientists launch climate change research
- 2009/03/23: PhysOrg: Linking Climate Change in Siberia and Britain [via ocean currents]
Here's another one of those papers needing verification:
- 2009/03/27: CBC: New theory blames cosmic rays for helping CFCs deplete ozone -- Fellow scientists say Waterloo professor's hypothesis needs more study
The hole in the Earth's protective ozone layer above Antarctica will be very big this year -- and it will be big again in 2020 -- contrary to previous predictions, argues a Canadian researcher. Qing-Bin Lu, a professor of physics and astronomy at the University of Waterloo, says his research suggests the long-held theory about how ultraviolet light combines with man-made chemicals to destroy the Earth's ozone layer is incorrect. His results, published in the latest issue of Physical Review Letters, back up a new theory, he says, and call into question predictions about when the ozone layer will recover. They also suggest some ozone-depleting chemicals might need to be re-evaluated. - 2009/03/29: MTobis: Slicin' and Dicin' with Dyson and Bryson
- 2009/03/26: BSD: Dyson isn't a right wing hack, but he'd rather be contrary than right
- 2009/03/25: DotEarth: Some Inconvenient Thinkers
- 2009/03/26: DiscoverMag:I: New York Times Magazine on Freeman Dyson, Climate Change "Skeptic"
- 2009/03/25: ClimateP: NYT magazine profiles climate crackpot, Freeman Dyson, and lets him slander James Hansen
Meanwhile on the Kyoto front:
- 2009/03/23: CarbonPositive: Mixed verdict on CDM technology transfer
And on the Kyoto-2 front, Copenhagen talk is picking up:
- 2009/03/29: ABC(Au): 'Double worry': UN concerned ahead of Copenhagen talks [cheap oil & recession]
The UN's top climate official [UNFCCC head, Yvo de Boer] has acknowledged there are serious concerns about reaching an international agreement at climate change talks in Copenhagen in December - 2009/03/28: DeutscheWelle: Bonn Climate Talks Give Obama's Green Team First Chance to Impress
The Obama administration will enter the complex world of global climate talks this weekend in Bonn amid a furious domestic debate about whether the US should be placing limits on the pollutants that cause global warming. - 2009/03/28: ABC(Au): [Climate Change Minister Penny] Wong wants rainforest CO2 trade in Copenhagen pact
Penny Wong backs a plan in which developing nations could earn billions of dollars from selling carbon credits in return for saving their forests. (AAP: Alan Porritt) Australia has submitted a proposal to UN climate negotiators that outlines a scheme to use carbon credits to protect rainforests. The submission will be circulated to negotiators meeting next week in Bonn, Germany, to discuss a new UN climate treaty that world leaders hope to agree to in Copenhagen in December. - 2009/03/28: IHT: New approach for US in global climate change talks
- 2009/03/27: Google:AP: US hopes to avoid repeat of Kyoto Protocol
- 2009/03/27: Reuters: Australia wants forest CO2 trade in Copenhagen pact
- 2009/03/26: TerraDaily: Can Obama rev up climate talks?
- 2009/03/28: EarthTimes: Obama team joins global climate talks amid domestic doubts
- 2009/03/23: CJR: Catastrophe in Context -- Coverage of Copenhagen climate summit offers a teaching moment
- 2009/03/26: PhysOrg: Climate change aims need to be better integrated [PEER]
- 2009/03/25: Xinhuanet: Economic crisis has limited impact on climate change talks
- 2009/03/25: Yahoo: Top China think tank proposes greenhouse gas plan
A top Chinese state think tank has proposed a global greenhouse gas trading plan to reflect the different historic emissions of rich and poor nations, indicating deepening discussion in Beijing about climate change policy. Researchers from the State Council Development Research Center, which advises China's leaders, laid out the plan in the March issue of the Economic Research Journal, a Chinese-language journal published on March 20 that reached subscribers this week. [...] The Beijing think tank's plan seeks a solution to the divide between developed nations, with high per capita accumulations of greenhouse gas emissions, and developing nations, including China, with low levels of per capita emissions that are set to rise in coming decades. China's 1.3 billion people currently emit about 4 tons per person in greenhouse gases, compared with the United States at about 20 tons per person. The answer, the think tank says, is to set emissions rights for each country, based on historic accumulation, and then let nations trade portions of those rights in an international market. - 2009/03/26: Eureka: Climate change aims need to be better integrated
Specific measures to tackle climate change, such as emissions trading, will only be successful if they are coherently supported by other government policies addressing economic and social issues, says a report published today by the Partnership for European Environmental Research (PEER) - 2009/03/25: BBC: 'Crunch year' for world's forests
Efforts to mitigate climate change could be hampered if nations do not agree to protect the world's forests by the end of the year, warn researchers. Earthwatch says it is vital for leaders attending a key UN summit in December to find a way to halt deforestation. Deforestation accounts for about 20% of the greenhouse gas emissions resulting from human activities, UN data shows. - 2009/03/25: Guardian(UK): Barack Obama may delay signing up to Copenhagen climate change deal [because of the scale of opposition in the US Congress]
- 2009/03/25: Guardian(UK): Why the Copenhagen climate change cliffhanger could drag on a little longer
Wrangling between China and US threatens to put back December deadline - 2009/03/25: NewKerala: India asks US to lead in evolving 'fair' climate change regime
- 2009/03/24: McKinseyQuarterly: Prospects for a global deal on climate change: Three European views [Economists Nicholas Stern and Michael Grubb & European Commissioner Janez Potocnik]
Will governments negotiate an agreement on reducing carbon emissions at the December 2009 UN Climate Change Conference? - 2009/03/23: Reuters: World wants tough 2050 climate cuts, split on path
Governments broadly support tough 2050 goals for cuts in greenhouse gas emissions but are split on how to share out the reductions, according to a new guide to negotiators of a new U.N. climate pact. A document to be presented to U.N. climate talks in Bonn from March 29-April 8 narrows down a list of ideas for fighting global warming in a new treaty due to be agreed in December to about 30 pages from 120 in a text late last year. "It shows that there's an awful lot still to be done. And it also shows what needs to be done," Yvo de Boer, head of the U.N. Climate Change Secretariat, told Reuters on Monday of the text by Michael Zammit Cutajar, chairman of a U.N. negotiating group. - 2009/03/23: ENN: World wants tough 2050 climate cuts, split on path
And on the carbon trading front:
- 2009/03/26: Reuters: Japan to float trial carbon market with 202 users
- 2009/03/25: BBerg: Japan Close to Sealing Carbon-Credit Deal With Czechs
- 2009/03/23: CarbonPositive: RGGI carbon prices buoyant after auction
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:
- 2009/03/26: CommonTragedies: Offsets and Algae
After spending a lunch seminar listening to a number of knowledgeable Europeans talk about the ETS, I feel a bit overwhelmed by how many potential strange side effects there might be in a huge cap and trade system. These might not be preplanned nor malicious, but I have a feeling there will be some unintended consequences. - 2009/03/27: EnvEcon: Shock*: Pricing carbon will cause economic adjustments
- 2009/03/25: ABC(Au): Households should be given carbon reduction permits: economist
A leading climate change economist has told a parliamentary hearing that households should be given a central role in the Government's carbon pollution reduction scheme. Professor Warrick McKibbon says all households should be allocated permits that they could trade in an open market. The Government's scheme only gives permits to corporations and allows Treasury to hold some in reserve. Professor McKibbon says his plan would make the scheme more robust and ensure the public understands and is involved in reducing greenhouse gases. - 2009/03/25: GristMill: Would you pay $2,000 per ton for your carbon footprint? Cap-and-rebate is more robust in the face of carbon high prices
- 2009/03/23: ClimateP: Chicago shocker: Tries to meet 20% renewables commitment with 20-year-old rip-offsets
Meanwhile on the international political front:
- 2009/03/27: EurActiv: Dimas: Europe awaits details of US climate bill
Stavros Dimas, the EU's environment commissioner, says Europe is looking forward to seeing the details of US climate change legislation in order to assess whether it meets the "comparability test" with the EU. He spoke to EurActiv on the sidelines of this week's European Business Summit in Brussels. - 2009/03/26: DailyIIJ: De Boer Admit Crisis Change World Commitment on Climate Change
- 2009/03/26: Guardian(UK): Don't hold the US to climate standards it cannot achieve
By trying to impose unrealistic obligations on the US, Europe risks undermining international progress on global warming - 2009/03/26: EurActiv: IEA chief [Nobuo Tanaka] calls for 'clean energy new deal'
- 2009/03/25: CBC: N.B., Maine pitch international renewable energy corridor -- Irving Oil studies natural gas-fired power plant, transmission line, wind generation
- 2009/03/25: CanWest: Jamaica to push Canada on climate issue
There is a tussle over biofuel tariffs going on between Europe, Brazil & the USA:
- 2009/03/22: IR^2: Trying to Make Sense of Ethanol Tariffs
- 2009/03/23: IR^2: Tariff Turnabout -- European tariffs stun U.S. biodiesel industry
- 2009/03/25: BioEnergyBiz: US Senators try to cut ethanol import tariffs
And just for fun, there is the possibility of a carbon tariff:
- 2009/03/26: Reuters: CO2 treaty must not spark "trade war"-US lawmaker [Rep. Ed Markey (D-Mass)]
- 2009/03/26: BBerg: [U.S. Trade Representative Ron] Kirk Asked to Explain Obama's Position on U.S. Climate Tariffs
- 2009/03/24: SMH: Climate deal failure could cause tariff war: Garnaut
The head of the Federal Government's climate change review, Ross Garnaut, warned that Australia was likely to face a world tariff war driven by Europe and the US over greenhouse gas emissions unless there was a strong global agreement to prevent climate change. "We've had the Energy Secretary in the United States speaking favourably about additional import duties on products from countries that aren't doing enough on climate change. That echoes a very strong sentiment from the US Congress," said Professor Garnaut at the Greenhouse 2009 conference in Perth yesterday. - 2009/03/25: TreeHugger: China Builds Dam on Indus, Doesn't Tell Pakistan
And on the American political front:
- 2009/03/27: ClimateP: What exactly is the power industry's position on cap and trade?
- 2009/03/27: ENN: Report calls for shift in climate research
The US government's climate research needs a radical refocus to make its results more relevant to policymakers and other stakeholders. That will require more interdisciplinary research and better understanding of the effects of climate change on local scales, says a new report released 26 February by the National Research Council (NRC), the policy-advice arm of the US National Academy of Sciences. - 2009/03/26: GristMill: Mountaintop removal blow-back -- Coal mining industry fights back with deceptions about jobs and the economy
- 2009/03/26: Eureka: Federal funding gap cited for research on human health impacts due to climate change
- 2009/03/25: GreenGrok: The U.S. Climate Policy Race: Legislate or Regulate
- 2009/03/25: ClimateP: UCS: Renewable electricity standard will create jobs and lower consumer energy bills
- 2009/03/25: WSJ:EnvCap: Houston Mayor [Bill White]: Fixing America's Energy Mess Through Efficiency -- and Science
- 2009/03/22 Olympian: Potential changes to initiative alarm supporters of clean energy
The clean-energy initiative approved by voters in 2006 has taken a beating in the 2009 state Legislature. The state Senate passed Engrossed Substitute Senate Bill 5840, which would roll back the requirement in Initiative 937 that utilities with at least 25,000 customers secure 15 percent of their energy by 2020 from new renewable resources such as wind and solar power and through energy conservation. "We're in danger of making Washington the first state in the country to go backward on clean energy," said Joan Crooks, executive director of the Washington Environmental Council - 2009/03/25: AlterNet: Just What Is a "Green Job" Anyway?
- 2009/03/24: Guardian(UK): Serving 22 years: the environmentalist who fell victim to US anti-terror laws
'The government is trying to send a message,' Marie Mason tells the Guardian in her first interview since she was sentenced She is, in the eyes of the law, America's most dangerous eco-terrorist: a self-confessed serial arsonist who resorted to fire and destruction to register her opposition to the fur industry and genetically modified crops. But to those who know her and to some legal experts, the 22-year jail term handed to Marie Mason, 47, is a consequence of America's preoccupation with terrorism in the post-9/11 world. - 2009/03/24: Guardian(UK): US to review global warming health threat
- 2009/03/24: GristMill: Everybody cool it -- Regional climate policy is still moving forward in the Northwest
- 2009/03/23: AbqJournal: State to Try Again on Cap and Trade
- 2009/03/23: NYT: Energy Secretary [Steven Chu] Serves Under a Microscope
- 2009/03/23: ClimateP: Does Sen. Feinstein get global warming, desertification, and California's looming demise?
- 2009/03/23: KSJT: AP, East County Mag, etc: Big Fight! Solar power versus Desert Protection
The Obama chatter is nonstop:
- 2009/03/28: ClimateP: And Obama gives the best clean energy and global warming solutions job to...
- 2009/03/28: DotEarth: Obama Creates Forum on Energy, Climate
- 2009/03/26: TreeHugger: Obama on Climate Bill: "We Will Get It Done. And I Will Sign It."
- 2009/03/24: ClimateP: Obama says his energy plan and cap-and-trade "will be authorized" even if it's not in the budget "and I will sign it" -- Washington Post confused
- 2009/03/24: GristMill: 'We'll get it done' -- At prime time presser, Obama says an energy plan will pass
- 2009/03/25: NEN: Obama energy plan brings work
Summary - Recruiters and industry insiders report the job market in the New Energy sectors is holding up in spite of the cascading economy and associated rising unemployment - 2009/03/25: WSJ:EnvCap: Fake Punt: Obama's Energy Plans Mean Climate Plans, Too
- 2009/03/24: BBerg: Obama Says 'Cap and Trade' Must Protect Against Cost Spikes
- 2009/03/23: ClimateP: Obama: "We can remain the world's leading importer of foreign oil or ... become the world's leading exporter of renewable energy. We can allow climate change to wreak unnatural havoc or we can create jobs preventing its worst effects."
- 2009/03/23: DotEarth: Obama and Energy Chief Push Innovation
- 2009/03/24: PhysOrg: Barack Obama Announces Another $1.2 billion for Energy R&D
- 2009/03/23: GristMill: Pep squad -- Obama hypes the green aspects of his budget plan
- 2009/03/24: WaPo: Obama Lays Out Clean-Energy Plans
President Obama yesterday outlined plans to spend about $59 billion in economic stimulus funds and $150 billion from the federal budget to promote what he calls America's "clean-energy future." "We will attack the problems that have held us back for too long," including dependence on foreign oil, Obama told a gathering of clean-energy entrepreneurs and leading researchers at the Eisenhower Executive Office Building. He said his plan to invest $59 billion from the economic stimulus package in clean-energy projects and tax incentives would ultimately help create more than 300,000 jobs and double the nation's supply of renewable energy. - 2009/03/23: DickinsonPress: Obama: 'Cap-and-trade' policy won't cripple power industries
- 2009/03/23: Guardian(UK): Obama pledges billions for renewable energy projects
President says $129bn that has been allocated for environmental plans is off limits to Congress - 2009/03/23: ClimateP: Obama picks climate, oil expert David Sandalow to oversee U.S. energy policy
- 2009/03/23: SciAm: Obama's Climate Challenge: Winning the Carbon Game
How Obama and his team can pass climate legislation and reach an international accord by December 2009 - 2009/03/28: TreeHugger: Gore's Green Group Loses CEO Cathy Zoi to the Obama Administration
- 2009/03/26: EnvFin: US DOE guarantees first loan to solar energy firm
- 2009/03/27: CNN: Tougher fuel economy rules announced -- National fuel economy target increased by 2 mpg overall for the 2011 model year
- 2009/03/27: TreeHugger: Obama Sets Disappointing Fuel Economy Standard for 2011
- 2009/03/27: SF Gate: U.S. to raise vehicle fuel standards for 2011
The Obama administration plans to raise fuel efficiency standards by 2 miles per gallon to an average 27.3 mpg for new cars and trucks in the 2011 model year, marking the first increase in passenger car standards in more than two decades. - 2009/03/26: DotEarth: Energy Chief Seeks Global Flow of Ideas
- 2009/03/26: WorldChanging: EPA Stops Coal Companies From Destroying Hundreds of Mountaintops and Streams With High Explosives
- 2009/03/26: WSJ: Obama Administration Revives Tax Battle With Oil Industry
The Obama administration's push to raise taxes on the oil industry is reigniting a battle the industry fought and won last year. Under pressure to narrow projected deficits, President Barack Obama's 2010 budget proposal calls for raising more than $31 billion over the next decade by eliminating the oil and gas industry's eligibility for various tax breaks. - 2009/03/26: Reuters: Idled U.S. farmland may be large carbon sink: USDA
- 2009/03/25: KSJT: WSJournal, wires, NYTimes, etc: Mountaintop-flattening coal mines may face EPA roadblocks
- 2009/03/25: ClimateP: EPA stops coal companies from destroying hundreds of mountaintops and streams with high explosives
- 2009/03/24: GristMill: What we meant to say...EPA issues clarification on mountaintop removal notice
- 2009/03/24: CSW: White House OMB should not be allowed to undermine EPA Clean Air Act regulation of greenhouse gases
- 2009/03/25: LA Times: EPA to review coal-mining permits
The agency puts hundreds of mountaintop mining requests on hold so it can study impacts of dumping debris into waterways. - 2009/03/24: ThinkP: EPA blocks mountaintop removal
- 2009/03/25: Kentucky: EPA signals mining crackdown -- Agency targets mountaintop removal
- 2009/03/24: NatureN: Q&A: Jane Lubchenco, The new head of NOAA talks priorities.
- 2009/03/24: NatureN: NOAA chief ready to tackle climate -- Jane Lubchenco takes the helm at oceanic and atmospheric agency
- 2009/03/24: NatureCF: New head of US oceans agency [NOAA head, Jane Lubchenco] speaks out
- 2009/03/24: MongaBay: EPA takes first step towards regulating global warming emissions
- 2009/03/24: ClimateP: EPA makes landmark finding: Global warming threatens public health and welfare
- 2009/03/24: ClimateP: WRI's [Dr. Jonathan] Pershing named deputy climate negotiator for Clinton
- 2009/03/23: PhysOrg: EPA closer to global warming warning
- 2009/03/23: GristMill: Endangerment ahead -- EPA tells White House that greenhouse gases are threat to public welfare
- 2009/03/23: Yahoo: EPA says global warming a public danger
- 2009/03/24: WaPo: EPA Presses Obama To Regulate Warming Under Clean Air Act
- 2009/03/24: PlanetArk: White House Gets Global Warming 'Endangerment' Proposal [from EPA]
- 2009/03/24: ENN: EPA Presses Obama To Regulate Warming Under Clean Air Act
- 2009/03/24: LA Times: The price of greenhouse gases
As White House officials weigh issuing a finding that climate change endangers public health, foes of greenhouse gas regulations are ignoring the cost of doing nothing. - 2009/03/23: CBC: Global warming endangers public, U.S. agency rules -- First step to regulating greenhouse gas emissons
- 2009/03/23: KSJT: Washington Post: With vote finally done, the new NOAA boss talks
- 2009/03/23: WarmingLaw: Thank you, Ms. Jackson: EPA Tells White House that Global Warming Endangers Public Health
- 2009/03/23: OilChange: "If we don't spend this money wisely, we will have failed" [US Energy Secretary, Steven Chu]
- 2009/03/23: TWTB: EPA sends CO2 endangerment finding to White House
- 2009/03/23: TP:WonkRoom: EPA Sends Greenhouse Endangerment Finding To White House
As for what is going on in Congress:
- 2009/03/26: TP:WonkRoom: On Cap And Trade, [Senator] Evan Bayh (D-IN) Follows Smokey Joe Barton's And Rupert Murdoch's Agenda
- 2009/03/26: ClimateP: Rep. [Smokey Joe] Barton (R-Tx): Climate change is 'natural,' humans should just 'get shade' -- invites 'expert' TVMOB (!) to testify
- 2009/03/25: GristMill: [Rep. Smokey] Joe Barton (R-Tx) is dumber than you thought possible
- 2009/03/25: GristMill: Bills, bills, bills -- A veritable flood of climate and energy bills in Congress
- 2009/03/26: DeSmogBlog: [Rep. [Smokey"] Joe Barton (R-TX) Added to the Official Moron Registry
- 2009/03/26: ThinkP: Rep. ['Smokey' Joe] Barton (R-Tx): Climate change is 'natural,' humans should just 'get shade.'
- 2009/03/24: GristMill: CSSing you in all the old familiar places -- Boucher bill would put billions into carbon-capture-and-sequestration technologies
- 2009/03/24: TreeHugger: Michele Bachmann Tells Citizens to Get "Armed And Dangerous" About Climate Change Laws
- 2009/03/24: DeSmogBlog: Republican Rep. Michele Bachmann's Over-the-Top Nonsense
- 2009/03/23: ThinkP: [Rep. Michele] Bachmann (R-MN): 'I Want People...Armed And Dangerous On This Issue' Of Cap And Trade
What can one say about such misinformation, besides how do these guys get elected?
- 2009/03/28: ThinkP: Rep. [John] Shimkus (R-Il): Capping CO2 emissions will take away too much 'plant food from the atmosphere.'
The Gore-apalooza is still bopping along:
- 2009/03/25: ABC(Au): Gore pens new book on climate change
- 2009/03/24: ThinkP: Al Gore to rally action around climate change with new book
While in the UK:
- 2009/03/29: Guardian(UK): Water meters in all homes by 2030 to ease shortages -- Report calls for strict controls as climate change threatens to dry up British rivers
- 2009/03/29: Guardian(UK): Scotland 'ahead of the game' on renewables
Plans to make Scotland 50% reliant on renewable energy sources are ahead of schedule, new figures released by the Scottish Parliament today suggest. Current targets are to meet half the country's electricity demand from renewables by 2020 with an interim target of 31% by 2011. - 2009/03/26: EnvFin: UK renewables held up by government policy - Aldersgate Group
- 2009/03/26: Reuters: Iberdrola Renovables says stands by UK wind power
- 2009/03/25: Guardian(UK): Taking the wind out of [UK climate change secretary, Ed] Miliband's sails
There are legitimate arguments against turbines, the issue is not as simple as the climate change secretary would have us believe - 2009/03/24: Telegraph(UK): Ed Miliband says opposing windfarms is 'socially unacceptable'
Ed Miliband, the climate change minister, has angered rurual campaigners by saying opposition to windfarms is as socially unacceptable as failing to stop at a zebra crossing. - 2009/03/25: PhysOrg: North West tidal barrages could provide five percent of UK's electricity
- 2009/03/24: Guardian(UK): The children protesting to improve their futures
Climate group We Can has brought its children to parliament dressed as animals to convey its message to the government - 2009/03/25: Guardian(UK): Eco Soundings: UK fossil fuel dependence is growing not shrinking
- 2009/03/24: BBC: RSPB calls for more UK wind farms
There should be a significant increase in the number of wind farms built onshore in the UK, the RSPB has said. It called for an end to the "needless delays" that beset wind farm projects, after a study said more turbines could be built without harming wildlife. It would be "disastrous" if the vast potential of wind power in the UK was wasted, the charity added. - 2009/03/23: BBC: Plea for 'clean coal' investment
A former Wales Office minister says the 1984-5 miners' strike "generation" will be "betrayed" if the UK government fails to restore the coal industry. Islwyn MP Don Touhig says technology developed in Wales provides an opportunity to use coal while minimising carbon dioxide emissions. - 2009/03/25: BBC: 'Too popular' green scheme closed
Environmental campaigners say they are astonished at the government's decision to suspend a scheme which gave grants to schools, hospitals and other public buildings to switch to renewable energy. The Low Carbon Buildings Programme has apparently been too popular - particularly with those hoping to install solar panels. - 2009/03/27: AutoBG: Amsterdam wants to be all-electric by 2040
- 2009/03/26: EurActiv: Refiners turn to cogeneration to fulfil climate obligations
With energy representing up to 50% of operational costs, oil refineries are increasingly looking for opportunities to invest in energy efficiency, with combined heat and power production representing an important part of the solution. - 2009/03/24: EUO: EU consumers to have smart energy meters by 2020
- 2009/03/23: EurActiv: EU summit postpones climate decision until June
Green activists strongly criticised heads of state and government for failing to put concrete sums on the table to help developing countries combat climate change at their meeting last week (19-20 March). As anticipated, European leaders postponed until June a decision on the EU's position for global climate talks, which are scheduled to conclude in Copenhagen in December. - 2009/03/22: FTimes: Cash shortage hinders climate battle
Meanwhile in Australia:
- 2009/03/28: SMH: Climate action rises above hot air
Those accusing the Government of scaremongering on climate change show signs of being a tad frightened themselves, writes Marian Wilkinson. An earnest young scientist this week stood at the podium of the nation's most important climate change conference, flicking through a presentation of rising temperatures off Australia's north-west. She then moved on to global predictions out to 2060 showing the temperature rising steadily and dangerously. The scientist was no academic, CSIRO boffin or environmentalist. Elena Mavrofridis is a chemical engineer with Woodside Energy, the company that recently went toe-to-toe with the Climate Change Minister, Penny Wong, in a political battle to water down the Federal Government's Carbon Pollution Reduction Scheme. - 2009/03/28: SMH: Financial storm delays climate solution: PM
- 2009/03/27: ABC(Au): Forum focuses on climate change agricultural impact
A major conference is being held in Perth this week to address the impact of global warming on Western Australia's agricultural industry. The Department of Agriculture and Food is hosting the Climate 21 Conference, which will feature WA Scientist of the Year Jorg Imberger as keynote speaker. - 2009/03/27: ABC(Au): Prime Minister Kevin Rudd says the economic crisis makes it much harder to reach agreement on how to combat climate change
- 2009/03/27: ABC(Au): Climate change could make Sydney deadly by 2060: scientist -- The forecast for Sydney in summer 2060 is hot, polluted and deadly to the elderly
- 2009/03/27: SMH: PM to meet Gore on climate -- Kevin Rudd is scheduled to have a meeting with Al Gore before leaving the US for Britain this weekend
- 2009/03/26: ABC(Au): Rudd gives emissions trading advice in US
- 2009/03/26: ABC(Au): Climate change expert highlights need for coastal planning care
A climate change expert is warning councils to stay away from the sea when considering future developments. Andrew Ash from the CSIRO says local government will have to make hard decisions about funding infrastructure in low-lying areas. - 2009/03/26: ABC(Au): The ACT Greens say the Government needs to put an auditing regime in place to ensure the Territory's energy efficiency ratings system is effective
- 2009/03/26: ABC(Au): Greens urge mandatory renewable energy rules
Greens MP Mark Parnell says use of electricity from renewable resources should be mandatory for South Australian households. - 2009/03/25: KSJT: Reuters: Climate forecast for Sydney, 2060.
- 2009/03/25: ABC(Au): More climate change support urged for coastal councils
- 2009/03/25: NineMSN: Australia's climate reputation 'damaged'
Australia will be a minor player in international climate change talks unless it lifts its own carbon reduction targets, a parliamentary inquiry has been told. The Rudd government has proposed a five per cent reduction target by 2020, with an option to lift the targets if other nations follow suit. Professor Clive Hamilton, from the Centre for Applied Philosophy and Public Ethics, says the government's planned emissions trading scheme has damaged Australia's reputation on climate change. - 2009/03/23: ABC(Au): Plan to curb savanna wildfire carbon emissions
The Federal Government is providing $10 million for research into how Indigenous communities can reduce carbon emissions by controlling fires on savannas in northern Australia. - 2009/03/23: SMH: Companies miss ethanol target
Not one fuel company had met the NSW Government's mandatory target of 2 per cent of all petrol being ethanol-blended by the end of last year, new figures reveal. - 2009/03/28: ABC(Au): Opposition says Govt not serious about environmental issues -- The Federal Opposition is using tonight's Earth Hour to attack the Government's stance on solar power
- 2009/03/28: ABC(Au): Climate change protesters march against emissions scheme
The Climate Emergency Action Network of South Australia says the Federal Carbon Pollution Reduction Scheme needs to be altered to cut carbon emissions further. - 2009/03/27: ABC(Au): Turnbull backs Gippsland ETS job loss fears
Federal Opposition Leader Malcolm Turnbull is backing a report saying Gippsland will suffer big job losses, under the Government's emissions trading scheme (ETS) - 2009/03/27: ABC(Au): Cattle industry 'can't sustain' ETS costs
The new president of the Northern Territory Cattlemen's Association [Rohan Sullivan] says he will be fighting to stop carbon trading schemes from sending the beef industry into the red - 2009/03/26: ABC(Au): Opposition, [Independent Senator, Nick] Xenophon seize on [Frontier Economics] ETS report
- 2009/03/26: ABC(Au): Report shows flaws in ETS: Oppn
The Federal Opposition says a report into the effects of the Government's emissions trading scheme is proof the scheme has serious flaws. The report by Frontier Economics shows the scheme will cost the national economy $2 trillion over the next 40 years, with the worst effects to be felt in regional Australia. - 2009/03/24: ABC(Au): Carbon trading must balance environmental, economic and legal needs
- 2009/03/23: SMH: Vic carbon cuts 'no help to targets'
The Victorian government's policies to cut carbon emissions will make no difference in achieving national greenhouse targets, a confidential ministerial brief reveals. The leaked brief, obtained by The Age newspaper, says the government must rethink policies including subsidising solar farms and buying hybrid cars for its fleet because they will not assist in meeting targets in the proposed federal Carbon Pollution Reduction Scheme (CPRS) - 2009/03/23: JQuiggin: The uselessness of additional action under the CPRS [Aus-ETS]
While in India:
- 2009/03/23: ENN: India Joins International Renewable Energy Agency [IRENA]
And in China:
- 2009/03/27: TreeHugger: China Announces New Solar Power Subsidizes, Details To Come
- 2009/03/25: Yahoo: Top China think tank proposes greenhouse gas plan
A top Chinese state think tank has proposed a global greenhouse gas trading plan to reflect the different historic emissions of rich and poor nations, indicating deepening discussion in Beijing about climate change policy. Researchers from the State Council Development Research Center, which advises China's leaders, laid out the plan in the March issue of the Economic Research Journal, a Chinese-language journal published on March 20 that reached subscribers this week. [...] The Beijing think tank's plan seeks a solution to the divide between developed nations, with high per capita accumulations of greenhouse gas emissions, and developing nations, including China, with low levels of per capita emissions that are set to rise in coming decades. China's 1.3 billion people currently emit about 4 tons per person in greenhouse gases, compared with the United States at about 20 tons per person. The answer, the think tank says, is to set emissions rights for each country, based on historic accumulation, and then let nations trade portions of those rights in an international market. - 2009/03/22: NEN: China calls for stop to emissions renditions
And Japan:
- 2009/03/24: Reuters: Japan election may bring tougher climate policies
Japan will adopt greener climate policies if the opposition, ahead in voter polls, wins an election this year and sticks to promises for greater use of renewable energy and bold cuts in greenhouse gas emissions. The main opposition Democratic Party, which could oust the long-ruling Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) in an election due by October, has pushed for a boost to investment in clean energy projects and the launch of an emissions trading system. - 2009/03/27: CBC: Feds fund 8 carbon capture projects in Western Canada
The Harper government has given the green light to eight projects in Alberta, B.C. and Saskatchewan aimed at developing carbon capture and storage technologies. Funding was announced last April, but it took the Natural Resources Department a year to choose from almost 40 proposals it received. - 2009/03/22: CTV: Green building program tangled in red tape
A pair of federal programs aimed at making buildings more environmentally friendly were so tangled in red tape that companies complained applying to them wasn't worth the hassle, documents show. - 2009/03/27: CBC: Canada won't be 'bullied' over Arctic, Cannon tells Russians
- 2009/03/27: Google:AFP: Canada says will defend its Arctic
- 2009/03/23: CanWest: Four reserve units to form backbone of new Arctic force -- Soldiers would be available to respond to incidents in North
In BC, the coming election looms large:
- 2009/03/25: CCPA: Tallying the Legacy of Waste in BC's Logging Industry -- thousands of potential jobs, sharply higher CO2 emissions
- 2009/03/23: CanWest: 'Green' energy threatens B.C. rivers, report warns -- Run-of-river power proposals that divert streams feared a significant impact on wildlife habitat
Ontario is still wrestling with its energy policy:
- 2009/03/22: NEN: Feed-in tariff sparks Ontario solar boom
- 2009/03/23: CBC: Red tape slows Toronto solar water heaters project: environmentalists
Meanwhile in that Mechanical Mordor known as the tar sands:
- 2009/03/27: Tyee: Tar sands: Environment trumps economic concerns, finds poll
- 2009/03/27: OilChange: A Marriage Made for Mordor [Suncor & Petro-Can]
- 2009/03/26: Upstream: EnCana files for tar sands expansion
- 2009/03/25: CBC: Syncrude duck charges held over until June 10
A judge in Fort McMurray granted oilsands giant Syncrude more time Wednesday to review documents related to the death of about 500 ducks in a tailings pond last year. The company appeared in court to answer to two charges related to the April 2008 incident. The judge put over the case until June 10. Syncrude faces one charge under the Alberta Environmental Protection and Enhancement Act and one charge under the federal Migratory Birds Convention Act. - 2009/03/25: OilChange: 20 Years On --- A Lesson for Tar Sands
As for miscellaneous Canadiana:
- 2009/03/24: TStar: 'We have hours' to prevent climate disaster
Green party leader [Elizabeth May] says Earth Hour a good way to begin to reverse damage from greenhouse gases - 2009/03/27: SMH: Hidden costs of fossil-fuel power
- 2009/03/25: UVM: It's the Ecology, Stupid
The most obvious fact about ecological economics is that, well, ecology comes before economics. "For example," says Joshua Farley, an economist at the University of Vermont, "without healthy ecosystems to regulate climate and rainfall and provide habitat for pollinators, agriculture would collapse." Which makes it tough to sell cars. - 2009/03/26: EconView: "Goodbye, Homo Economicus"
- 2009/03/26: Guardian(UK): Once beaten for stating the obvious, our time has come
Ten years ago, the anticapitalist movement predicted this recession. Now it must envisage an alternative global future - 2009/03/25: CCurrents: Toward A New Sustainable Economy
- 2009/03/25: NewInt:TEB: This could be our last chance [ecoecon]
IPAT [Impact = Population * Affluence * Technology] raised its head once again:
- 2009/03/28: AlterNet: The Population Debate Is Screwed Up
- 2009/03/22: Times(UK): UK population must fall to 30m, says Porritt
Jonathon Porritt, one of Gordon Brown's leading green advisers, is to warn that Britain must drastically reduce its population if it is to build a sustainable society. Porritt's call will come at this week's annual conference of the Optimum Population Trust (OPT), of which he is patron. The trust will release research suggesting UK population must be cut to 30m if the country wants to feed itself sustainably. - 2009/03/27: WorldChanging: Collapse Forward
- 2009/03/23: Guardian(UK): Perfect storm of environmental and economic collapse closer than you think
Green measures have to be at the heart of any financial rescue packages if we are to avoid catastrophe A "perfect storm" of food shortages, scarce water and high-cost energy will hit the global economy before 2030, said the government's chief scientific adviser, John Beddington, last week. Factor in accelerating climate change and this lethal cocktail leads to public unrest, cross-border conflict and mass migration - in other words, an economic and political collapse that will make today's economic recession seem very tame indeed. But though I totally agree with John Beddington's analysis, I think he's got the timing wrong. This "perfect storm" will hit much closer to 2020 than 2030. - 2009/03/27: KSJT: New Scientist: A tale of woe over misleading headlines
- 2009/03/27: NewScientist: Media distortion damages both science and journalism
- 2009/03/26: ClimateP: Is science journalism dead? Can blogging replace it?
- 2009/03/26: DeSmogBlog: The New Yorker's Mindless Nonsense on Economy vs. Environment
- 2009/03/26: TP:WonkRoom: Top Papers Assign Golf, Baseball, And Culture Writers To The Climate Policy Beat
- 2009/03/25: ClimateP: Paging Elizabeth Kolbert: The New Yorker (!) parrots right-wing talking points
- 2009/03/24: TP:WonkRoom: Washington Post Obeys Right Wing Talking Points, Calls Cap And Trade System A 'Tax'
Here is something for your library:
- 2009/03/28: JFleck: [Book Plug] _The Tree Rings Tale: Understanding Our Changing Climate_ by John Fleck
- 2009/03/24: ClimateP: Al Gore to release new book, "Our Choice," a "blueprint for solving the climate crisis"
And for your film & video enjoyment:
- 2009/03/24: Guardian(UK): Eco Soundings: Spiked! lays into Age of Stupid (surprise!)
While everyone else praises documentary Age of Stupid, the online offshoot of Living Marxism has made an unsurprising attack on the film - 2009/03/25: BSD: Mark Campbell gives 33% chance that IPCC is right, and no betting will happen
Developing a new energy infrastructure is a fundamental challenge of the current generation:
- 2009/03/27: RigZone: Russia Capable of Becoming China's Biggest Energy Supplier
- 2009/03/26: NYT:GreenInc: Seeds of Revival in Wind and Solar?
- 2009/03/26: DerSpiegel: Hydrogen Hopes -- Hamburg Speeds Up Preparation for Fuel-Cell Cars
- 2009/03/27: Guardian(UK): Keep the blades of wind power turning
Carbon capture and storage may seem attractive, but wind and solar are still key to generating clean, green energy - 2009/03/27: SMH: Hidden costs of fossil-fuel power
- 2009/03/26: ClimateP: Stimulus and venture capital sow seeds for cleantech industry's "revival"
- 2009/03/26: NewScientist: Ice that burns could be a green fossil fuel
- 2009/03/25: ClimateP: UCS: Renewable electricity standard will create jobs and lower consumer energy bills
- 2009/03/24: Eureka: New possibilities for hydrogen-producing algae
- 2009/03/24: KSJT: Christ. Science Monitor: Our need for monster batteries, explained
- 2009/03/24: PhysOrg: Researchers create catalysts for use in hydrogen storage materials
- 2009/03/24: PhysOrg: New possibilities for hydrogen-producing algae
- 2009/03/24: PeakEnergy: Shale oil hopefuls grabbing water rights in Colorado
- 2009/03/23: Eureka: 'Ice that burns' may yield clean, sustainable bridge to global energy future
- 2009/03/23: ENN: India Joins International Renewable Energy Agency [IRENA]
The answer my friend...:
- 2009/03/28: KCS: Future sunny for wind turbine technicians
- 2009/03/24: NEN: Wind faces challenges, finds solutions
- 2009/03/23: WSJ:EnvCap: Doldrums: Siemens' New Wind Turbine Tackles Low-Wind Areas
Meanwhile among the solar aficionados:
- 2009/03/26: CleanBreak: Everbrite Solar to build 150MW thin-film manufacturing plant in Ontario
- 2009/03/27: ClimateP: World's second* largest solar plant to be built in Florida
- 2009/03/27: TreeHugger: Largest Solar Array by an Electric Cooperative to be Installed in New Mexico
- 2009/03/26: TreeHugger: Let the Large-Scale Solar Power Backlash Begin: Objections to California Solar Plans Mounting?
- 2009/03/24: PhysOrg: Self-cleaning, low-reflectivity treatment boosts efficiency for photovoltaic cells
- 2009/03/23: GristMill: Solar blogging -- This post brought to you via clean solar electricity
- 2009/03/24: NEN: Sun still hot
Summary - Installed solar energy electricity generating capacity in the U.S. grew 17% (1,265 megawatts) in 2008 to 8,775 megawatts... - 2009/03/26: WiredSci: Bad News: Scientists Make Cheap Gas From Coal [C2L]
- 2009/03/26: Nation: The Dirt on Clean Coal
- 2009/03/27: DeSmogBlog: The Nation's Must-Read Article "The Dirt on Clean Coal"
- 2009/03/20: WSJ: Coal Hard Facts: Cleaning It Won't Be Dirt Cheap
The Technology to Scrub Out Carbon Dioxide Is Within Reach, but It Costs Too Much Money and Consumes Too Much Energy - 2009/03/27: BBC: Vale in Mozambique coal project
Brazilian mining company Vale has launched a $1.3bn (£908.5m) coal mining project in Mozambique. The new plant is expected to produce 11 million tonnes of coal a year, to be exported to Brazil, Europe, Asia and the Middle East. It is thought Mozambique will now become the continent's second-largest coal producer behind South Africa, which holds most of Africa's reserves - 2009/03/25: DeSmogBlog: Busting the Abundant Coal Reserves Myth
- 2009/03/23: APOV: The End Of The Coal Era?
Biofuel bickering abounds:
- 2009/03/28: MTobis: Corn Ethanol Disaster
- 2009/03/26: MTobis: Avant Garde Biofuels
- 2009/03/25: TreeHugger: Should Jatropha Really Be Called the "Blunder Crop"? Biofuels Digest Thinks So
The nuclear energy controversy continues:
- 2009/03/27: Scitizen: Is Thorium an Energy Alchemist's Dream?
- 2009/03/27: ClimateP: "Three Mile Island still haunts U.S. reactor industry" on 30th anniversary of partial meltdown
- 2009/03/27: EarthTimes: Lithuanian president says work on nuclear plant to begin 2009
- 2009/03/27: OLJ: France's nuke power poster child has a money melt-down
The myth of a successful nuclear power industry in France has melted into financial chaos. With it dies the corporate-hyped poster child for a "nuclear renaissance" of new reactor construction that is drowning in red ink and radioactive waste. Areva, France's nationally-owned corporate atomic facade, has plunged into a deep financial crisis led by a devastating shortage of cash. - 2009/03/23: NewScientist: Neutron tracks revive hopes for cold fusion
- 2009/03/23: Eureka: 'Cold fusion' rebirth? New evidence for existence of controversial energy source
- 2009/03/22: BNC: Fast Reactor Radio
- 2009/03/23: AlterNet: The French Nuclear Industry Is Bad Enough in France; Let's Not Expand It to the U.S.
Yes we have a multiple peaks...:
- 2009/03/28: IndiaTimes: Oil scarcity will spell end of globalisation: Economist
The world may no longer be flat very soon. Contrary to what Thomas Friedman told us after his analysis of globalisation, the world will indeed become a "whole lot smaller'' very soon, if a top Canadian economist is to be believed. Jeff Rubin, who quit as chief economist of Canadian Imperial Bank of Commerce (CIBC) here Friday to promote his book 'Why Your World Is About to Get a Whole Lot Smaller,' said the coming oil scarcity will change the world more profoundly than any other crisis. - 2009/03/26: EnergyBulletin: The peak oil crisis: pondering the near future
- 2009/03/25: OilDrum: Where we are headed: Peak oil and the financial crisis
More people are talking about the electrical grid:
- 2009/03/24: REA: Why Don't We Bury More Power Lines?
And then there is the matter of efficiency & conservation:
- 2009/03/27: NEN: More evidence of how efficient efficiency is
- 2009/03/26: SlashDot: Companies Waste $2.8 Billion Per Year Powering Unused PCs
- 2009/03/25: SciDaily: Device Provides Household Energy Savings of 12% -- Device disconnects electronic appliances in stand-by mode and reduces their power consumption to zero
- 2009/03/23: TreeHugger: $168 Billion Could be Saved by Federal Energy Efficiency Resource Standard
Automakers & lawyers, engineers & activists argue over the future of the car:
- 2009/03/28: AutoBG: Honda Insight hitting U.S. dealerships now
- 2009/03/26: KCS: Kansas City picked to get all-electric van plant
- 2009/03/26: CNN: Tesla rolls out new sedan
Tesla says manufacturing plant will be in California; hundreds of jobs possible - The all-electric Model S sedan will go for a base price of about $50,000 - Tesla's challenge: Will consumers pay that much for a car in recessionary times? - The company hopes to make 20,000 Model S sedans a year - 2009/03/27: AutoBG: Amsterdam wants to be all-electric by 2040
- 2009/03/26: PeakEnergy: Electric Trucks Make Their Move
- 2009/03/26: PeakEnergy: Learning to Live With Electric Cars
- 2009/03/25: KSJT: Detroit News: In new administration hydrogen is out (for cars), electricity is in
- 2009/03/24: ClimateP: Good news or bad news? Tata Motors launches "Nano": 55 mpg, $2000 car "People's Car"
- 2009/03/24: TreeHugger: Electric Cars: A Definitive Guide from HybridCars
- 2009/03/23: ABC(Au): World's cheapest car goes on sale
- 2009/03/23: PeakEnergy: Wheel Motors to Drive Dutch Buses
- 2009/03/23: BBC: World's cheapest car [Tata Nano] is launched
The Tata Nano, the world's cheapest car, has been launched in India. Costing just 100,000 rupees ($1,979; £1,366), the Nano will now go on sale across India next month, with deliveries starting in July. - 2009/03/23: CBC: Tata's ultra-cheap Nano car finally goes on sale after long delays
Meanwhile in the greenwashing chronicles:
- 2009/03/24: PRWatch: Overburn by a Coal Industry Front Group
- 2009/03/26: Maribo: Best "greenwashing" of the year?
- 2009/03/26: Guardian(UK): Greenwash: Shell betrays 'new energy future' promises
Insurance and re-insurance companies are feeling the heat:
- 2009/03/24: ClimateP: Insurers must disclose climate-change exposure
The carbon lobby are up to the usual:
- 2009/03/28: QuarkSoup: Sour
- 2009/03/27: Guardian(UK): Climate denial in one pithy 428-word sentence thanks to Viscount Monckton
- 2009/03/27: CSW: Viscount Monckton of Brenchley, [aka VMoB] global warming denialist du jour on Capitol Hill
- 2009/03/26: RealClimate: Michaels' new graph
- 2009/03/27: WorldChanging: The only way a reporter ought to look at a climate skeptic is down
- 2009/03/26: ABC(Au): US Congress told 'climate change is not real' [by VMoB]
- 2009/03/25: Deltoid: David Bellamy rejects peer-reviewed journals
- 2009/03/26: DeSmogBlog: Death to the CBC! [Gunter]
- 2009/03/20: EmpireBurlesque: Shell Oil to Planet Earth: Drop Dead
- 2009/03/25: ClimateP: New study quoted by Cato Institute deniers concludes "warming over the 21st century may well be larger than that predicted by the current generation of models"
- 2009/03/25: DotEarth: Cato's Climate Ad Campaign
- 2009/03/25: JQuiggin: The earth shape controversy revived...
- 2009/03/24: DeSmogBlog: Saying Sorry is Hard to Do (Maybe We Can Help) [Gunter]
- 2009/03/24: CCurrents: Climate "Skeptics" Renew War Against Science While Rome Burns
- 2009/03/24: DeSmogBlog: Czech Government Topples, Leaving Global Warming Denier President Vaclav Klaus Stranded
- 2009/03/25: Guardian(UK): Response: The Czech president's climate change denial is irrelevant
- 2009/03/25: TP:WonkRoom: In 'Green Jobs Myths,' Pollution Industry Economists Claim A Sustainable Economy Is A 'Ponzi Scheme'
- 2009/03/24: ClimateP: Mything in action: Why conservatives hate green jobs
- 2009/03/24: Deltoid: Global Warming Alarmists Propose Limiting Population ... to the Point of Extinction
- 2009/03/24: RealClimate: With all due respect...
Late coverage of the Will nonsense:
- 2009/03/25: AFTIC: Washington Post runs Mooney's Answer to George Will
- 2009/03/23: TP:WonkRoom: George Will's Lies Live On
- 2009/03/22: JFleck: Elephant Diaries: Connecting the Dots on the George Will Affair
- 2009/03/22: Maribo: A mea culpa by the Washington Post, or not
- 2009/03/23: BCLSB: On Publishing Crap
- 2009/03/23: PeakEnergy: George Will's War On Science
- 2009/03/23: CrTimber: The earth shape controversy revived [Will]
Eli has been having fun with G&T:
- 2009/03/29: ERabett: Fred says...Memetic Disease: Greenhouse Effect Denialism
- 2009/03/27: ERabett: In closing??
- 2009/03/26: ERabett: The Rabett is fisky
- 2009/03/24: ERabett: Ethon extends to Snack another opportunity for horror and shock or is that shock and horror?
- 2009/03/23: ERabett: Chris Colose suggests
- 2009/03/22: ERabett: The mystical planet problem
As for climate miscellanea:
- 2009/03/27: QuarkSoup: McKibben's Exaggerations
- 2009/03/28: BNC: Some new climate and energy blogs and resources
- 2009/03/28: CCurrents: When The Lights Go Out
- 2009/03/28: TP:WonkRoom: Global Boiling Roulette: The Margin For Error Is Gone
- 2009/03/28: Guardian(UK): Green aims in the Amazon by Brazilian President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva
Brazil is showing how developing countries can complement the rich in tackling climate change - 2009/03/26: ClimateP: How the world can (and will) stabilize at 350 to 450 ppm: The full global warming solution
- 2009/03/26: EnvEcon: The Truth Squad's in the House
- 2009/03/27: CCP: Jason Lowe, Met Office Hadley Centre: Even for very large reductions in CO2 emissions, temperature reduction is likely to occur at a low rate
- 2009/03/26: CCP: NASA's Earth Observatory: Sunspots at Solar Maximum and Minimum (another Maunder Minimum unlikely)
- 2009/03/27: SMH: We saved the ozone layer; now it's time to save the climate
- 2009/03/26: NatureTGB: Climate change round up: Copenhagen, cap and trade, and more
- 2009/03/25: MTobis: The Problem and the Problem with the Problem
- 2009/03/25: QuarkSoup: 50 Years of Global Warming
- 2009/03/26: BNC: Six degrees of separation
- 2009/03/23: ClimateP: George Stephanopoulos, Nate Silver, and Marc Ambinder all seem confused about global warming and budget politics
- 2009/03/22: CSW: Politicians, journalists, and readers: On thinking with scientific integrity about climate
And here are a couple of sites you may find interesting and/or useful:
- EDF: Operation Climate Vote Truth Squad
- CBC: Flood 2009
- Greenhouse 2009 -- March 23-26
- HybridCars: Electric Cars: A Definitive Guide
- Intersection [Note COA]
- StephenSchneider: Climate Change
- StephenSchneider: An Overview of the Climate Change Problem
- European Environment Agency on Climate Change
- NOAA: Real-time, global, sea surface temperature (RTG_SST) analysis
- NOAA: Gulf Stream Finder Project
- New Scientist
- Nature Science Update
- Science Daily
- Eureka Alert
- CDIAC CO2 Info Analysis Centre
- Real Climate
- Wikipedia: Global warming
- WGMS: World Glacier Monitoring Service
- BAS: The British Antarctic Survey
For the latest in black humour:
The Red River is also causing problems north of the border in Manitoba:
I imagine we will hear a lot about this in the coming weeks:
Melting glaciers are changing the border between Italy and Switzerland:
The Arctic melt continues to garner a lot of attention:
As for the geopolitics of Arctic resources:
The food crisis is ongoing:
And in the carbon cycle:
As for corals:
As for hydrological cycle disruptions [floods & droughts]:
As for carbon sequestration:
A surprising result from the Southern Ocean iron fertilization experiment:
While on the adaptation front:
More Dyson:
As for GW & security:
The actions of the Obama administration are being watched closely:
Now this kind of phuque-up takes real talent:
And in Europe:
They're still fighting over the ETS:
In Canada, minority neocon PM Harper, continues his do-nothing policy:
Posturing over the Arctic:
The movement toward a long term ecologically viable economics is glacial:
Apocalypso anyone?
As for how the media handles the science of climatology:
Among the non-members of Gamblers Anonymous:
The arithmetic of coal carbon is striking home:
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.
"A Nobel scientist is more likely to figure out Washington than a career politician is to figure out how to deal with carbon sequestration." -Dan Leistikow, DOE PR flack on Steven Chu
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Raivo Pommer-estonia-www.google.ee
raimo1@hot.ee
Weltbank warnte
Der Präsident der Weltbank, Robert Zoellick, warnte vor einem dramatischen Rückgang des Welthandels in diesem Jahr. Der globale Handel in Gütern und Dienstleistungen werde angesichts der ersten Rezession der Weltwirtschaft seit dem Zweiten Weltkrieg um 6 Prozent schrumpfen. Das würde den stärkste Einbruch des Welthandels in den vergangenen 80 Jahren bedeuten. Zoellick kündigte ein neues Liquiditätsprogramm der Weltbank zur Unterstützung des Welthandels über insgesamt 50 Milliarden Dollar an. Er mahnte, auf dem Londoner Gipfel auch über Hilfen für die armen Länder zu reden. Zoellick kritisierte Amerika und China, die globale Ungleichgewichte zementierten, die auf Dauer unhaltbar seien. In den Vereinigten Staaten werde der Konsum angekurbelt und in China investiert. Zoellick sagte mit Blick auf den chinesischen Vorschlag, eine neue globale Reservewährung zu schaffen: âDer Dollar wird die wichtigste Reservewährung der Welt bleiben, und ein starker Dollar ist wichtig, um die Welt aus dieser Krise zu ziehen.â Mit der Zeit werde es jedoch Diskussionen über die Rolle des Dollar geben.