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Mark Scott
Europe Looks to Africa for Solar Power
The New York Times,
By TOM ZELLER Jr.
Australia home to world forest carbon winner
Media Release, ANU College of Medicine Biology and Environment, Environment, Science
Tuesday 16 June 2009
Climate change to claim 600,000 lives a year
CLIMATE change kills about 315,000 people a year through hunger, sickness and weather disasters, and the annual death toll is expected to rise to half a million by 2030.
A study commissioned by the Geneva-based Global Humanitarian Forum, estimates that climate change seriously affects 325 million people every year, a number that will more than double in 20 years to 10 per cent of the world's population (now about 6.7 billion).
Debate over: droughts and floods on the rise
Amanda Gearing, The Age
May 24, 2009
CLIMATE change has already claimed the lives of many thousands of people - and millions more are at risk - as severe weather events rage around the world and staple food crops are wiped out, meteorologists have told a world climate conference.
God 'will not give happy ending'
From: http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/7964880.stmGod will not intervene to prevent humanity from wreaking disastrous damage to the environment, the Archbishop of Canterbury has warned.
In a lecture, Dr Rowan Williams urged a "radical change of heart" to prevent runaway climate change.
At York Minster he said humanity should turn away from the selfishness and greed that leads it to ignore its interdependence with the natural world.
And God would not guarantee a "happy ending", he warned.
Plimer "heaven+earth" book: a good lesson for climate change sceptics
By J.E.N. Veron, Former Chief Scientist, Australian Institute of Marine Science, Author of "A Reef in Time: the Great Barrier Reef from beginning to end".
In his book "heaven+earth Global Warming: the Missing Science", Ian Plimer has been very careful to keep facts from spoiling a good story. No upsetting corrections from peer reviewers for him. And judging from his acknowledgements, there were few comments from specialists either - not even from a climate change expert in his own department. Even the book's back cover is science-free. So how has he done all this on his lonesome? After all, the book is 493 pages long and has over 2000 cited references - that's impressive!
As I read it, I feel like I'm in a climate change courtroom, except that I keep hearing one side of the case and never the other. Sometimes this bias is so extreme that any reader will see it, at other times only a scientist would. Mostly the general public is left in blissful ignorance - as the author presumably intended.
Antarctic ice shelf near final collapse
A thin ice bridge between two islands that has held the giant Wilkins ice shelf in place on the Antarctic peninsula for centuries appears to be near final collapse.In a development that has shocked climate scientists, the 40 kilometre-long bridge is showing new rifts along its length and its imminent break-up could release thousands of square kilometres of ice behind it.
This would mark a new milestone for one of the most rapidly warming regions on Earth.
Which country has the greenest bail-out?
The proposed round of government spending in economies across the world represents a unique opportunity for green businesses. The increased investment could pull energy consumers towards using more renewables, create millions of new jobs in green industries and help to create a more efficient, low-carbon future.However, proponents of a green stimulus also claim that there will be serious consequences if the money is misspent. Using this funding to continue with the sorts of infrastructure that we already have could mean that countries are committed to a path which has already led to a growth in greenhouse gas emissions.
The white bubbles below represent the total size of each county's fiscal stimulus package, while the green bubbles inside are equivalent to the country's allocation towards environmental initiatives. Click on each bubble to see a breakdown of the county's spending and an analysis of where the funding is being targeted
World leaders told to act on climate before it's too late
The world is on the brink of dangerous climate change and immediate action is needed to avert it, scientists said yesterday, issuing one of the bleakest assessments yet of the state of the planet.A strongly worded communiqué marking the end of a specially convened conference in Copenhagen concluded that climate change and its impacts match or exceed the worst fears expressed by the Nobel prize-winning Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change two years ago.
The statement, issued on behalf of 2,500 scientists from 80 countries, will be passed to world leaders in the coming months. Their summary of what global warming is doing to the planet warned policymakers: "There is no excuse for inaction."The demands and alerts contained in the statement were described as a defining moment in scientists' relations with political leaders, represening a shift away from their traditional role of merely offering advice to telling politicians to act.