Clipmarks | tabsey's 'climate' clips

Pearse warns of 'greenhouse mafia' influence

Thu, 17 Jul 2008 10:52:33 GMT

clipped by: tabsey
clipper's remarks: Lobbyists have well developed consciences so all should be well. The shareholders behind the companies will put the planet before profits.

Clip Source: www.abc.net.au

A speechwriter for the former government says Labor's Green Paper on climate change shows Australia's big polluters are still influencing policy.

Guy Pearse first documented his account of greenhouse policy under the Howard government in his recently published book, High and Dry, drawing on experiences as a speechwriter for then environment minister Robert Hill.

He coined the term "greenhouse mafia" as a catch-all phrase to describe the country's biggest polluters.

He says they basically ran policy under the old regime and he is now saying that the Labor Government has shown in its Green Paper that they're still influencing policy now.

Mr Pearse told The World Today's Emma Alberici John Howard and Kevin Rudd have seen different political advantages in climate change.

Tags: no, one, thinks, long, term

Alarm on carbon trading scheme

Tue, 15 Jul 2008 10:47:46 GMT

clipped by: tabsey
clipper's remarks: Sounds reasonable. We all read episodes nightly that make us wonder at the amount of greed and corruption that occurs.

Clip Source: www.theage.com.au

ONE of the world's best-known economists, Jeffrey Sachs, has warned Australia against using an emissions trading scheme to tackle climate change, saying it would never win global support.

On the eve of the Rudd Government releasing its blueprint for emissions trading, Professor Sachs said the concept was "highly disliked" by China and other developing countries, and they would never agree to it.

Professor Sachs, economic adviser to United Nations secretary-general Ban Ki-Moon, and author of the best-seller The End of Poverty, made the warning yesterday at a conference at the Australian National University. Standing alongside the Government's climate change adviser Ross Garnaut, who wants Australia to adopt emissions trading, Professor Sachs declared that:

â– There would never be a global agreement to introduce emissions trading or carbon taxes to tackle climate change.

Tags: less, rort, prone, the, better

Sceptic Pell backs Pope's climate call

Mon, 14 Jul 2008 11:36:33 GMT

clipped by: tabsey
clipper's remarks: Been a bad time for this George too. Caught out protecting paedophiles just before the visit, it seems George forgot to consult the same people as the Pope spoke to.

Clip Source: www.abc.net.au

Sydney Catholic Archbishop George Pell says his scepticism towards climate change is not incompatible with the Pope's decision to set the issue as the theme for his visit to Australia.

Pope Benedict used a press conference on his 20-hour flight to Sydney yesterday to highlight the issue ahead of this week's World Youth Day celebrations.

He told reporters, "We have to give impulse to rediscovering our responsibility and to finding an ethical way to change our way of life."

He said politicians and experts must be "capable of responding to the great ecological challenge and to be up to the task of this challenge".

Cardinal Pell welcomed the Pope's statement this morning.

"We have an obligation to care for our environment, a moral obligation," he said.

"We also very clearly have a moral obligation not to damage or destroy or ruthlessly use the environment at the expense of future generations."

Tags: religion - better, than, british, comedy

Cheney Aides Altered CDC Testimony, Agency Official Says

Wed, 09 Jul 2008 12:43:56 GMT

clipped by: tabsey
clipper's remarks: The official would have done it off his own bat, dick wouldn't be involved in such silly behaviour.

Clip Source: www.truthout.org

Ex-administrator says official from vice president's office edited out six pages.

Members of Vice President's Dick Cheney's staff censored congressional testimony by a top federal official on the health threats posed by global warming, a former Environmental Protection Agency official said today.

In a letter to Sen. Barbara Boxer (D-Calif.), who chairs the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee, former EPA deputy associate administrator Jason K. Burnett said an official from Cheney's office edited out six pages from the testimony of Julie Gerberding, director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, last October.

Several media outlets, including The Washington Post, reported at the time that Gerberding had planned to say that "CDC considers climate change a serious public health concern," among other passages.

Tags: dick, sucks

Japan waits on US for CO2 targets

Mon, 07 Jul 2008 16:42:49 GMT

clipped by: tabsey
clipper's remarks: And George is stalling them beautifully for his masters, the corporations.

Clip Source: news.bbc.co.uk

Japan says that it will not negotiate new targets on CO2 emissions until it sees what the new US President has to offer on climate change.

A senior Japanese official also told the BBC his country would continue to try to re-negotiate the baseline date against which CO2 targets are measured.

Japan’s emissions are more than 6% above the 1990 Kyoto Protocol baseline.

World leaders are starting the three-day G8 summit in Toyako, on Japan's northern Hokkaido island.

Mr Jun Arima, chief negotiator for the powerful industry ministry METI, promised that Japan would meet its promised 6% CO2 cut by purchasing pollution credits from developing countries.

He also said Japan was hopeful of gathering support at the G8 for its plan for sectoral efficiency targets for industry.

He said the UK had been supportive of the idea, which would oblige the major industrial sectors which account for 40% of global emissions to adopt the best possible technologies.

Tags: fiddle, while, the, world, dies

Hopes For Climate Solutions Dim At G-8 Summit

Mon, 07 Jul 2008 15:48:38 GMT

clipped by: tabsey
clipper's remarks: I thought the President of the US was a world leader, and Bush wants to stall until everyone else is toeing the line. Also gives his masters more time to make money before they are forced to make (probably belated) changes.

Clip Source: www.npr.org

Listen Now [4 min 17 sec] add to playlist

Morning Edition, July 7, 2008 · The G-8 meeting in Japan this week was supposed to be a major milestone for talks on global warming. Instead, the process has bogged down. The Bush administration won't commit to major steps without participation by China and India. And those nations won't move until the U.S. does. Strategists expect little of substance from the meeting in Japan and are trying to figure out whether it will be possible to negotiate a new climate treaty by the end of 2009, as the U.N. has planned.

Tags: bush, fiddled, and, zzzzzzzzzzz

Acidifying Oceans Add Urgency To Carbon Dioxide Cuts

Sun, 06 Jul 2008 12:29:48 GMT

clipped by: tabsey
clipper's remarks: Interesting article. The list of effected aspects of our planet is lengthening.

Clip Source: www.sciencedaily.com

ScienceDaily (July 6, 2008) — It's not just about climate change anymore. Besides loading the atmosphere with heat-trapping greenhouse gases, human emissions of carbon dioxide have also begun to alter the chemistry of the ocean--often called the cradle of life on Earth.

The ecological and economic consequences are difficult to predict but possibly calamitous, warn a team of chemical oceanographers in the July 4 issue of Science, and halting the changes already underway will likely require even steeper cuts in carbon emissions than those currently proposed to curb climate change.

Tags: we'll, all, be, ruined, cried, hanrahan

qld, nrl Print Email Add to My Stories 'Disturbing' drought report released

Sun, 06 Jul 2008 10:12:02 GMT

clipped by: tabsey
clipper's remarks: Are we the only ones with drought? I don't think so, but I see little about drought in other continents, except Africa.

Clip Source: www.abc.net.au

The Federal Government has released a report into the link between drought and climate change, which it says will trigger major review of drought policy.

The report is by the Bureau of Meteorology and the CSIRO and is the first of three commissioned by the Government.

The report warns that extreme conditions previously thought to occur once in every 20 to 25 years, could become as frequent as every one or two years.

Prime Minister Kevin Rudd has told ABC1's Insiders the report paints a very disturbing picture about the future of droughts in Australia.

"When it comes to exceptional or extreme drought, exceptionally high temperatures, the historical assumption that this occurred once every 20 years has now been revised down to between every one and two years," he said.

"Exceptional circumstances drought conditions ... will occur twice as often and with twice the area of droughted parts of Australia included.

"Now this is a serious revision of the impact of climate change on drought."

Tags: drought, can, be, effected, by, climate, change

Protests ahead of Japan G8 summit

Sat, 05 Jul 2008 13:44:23 GMT

clipped by: tabsey
clipper's remarks: Rattle those pots and pans.

Clip Source: news.bbc.co.uk

Protests have begun on the northern Japanese island of Hokkaido ahead of Monday's summit of the Group of Eight (G8) developed nations.

Protesters are demonstrating against rising food prices and climate change.

Farmers and activists concerned about soaring food prices and global warming are gathering for a demonstration in Hokkaido's main city of Sapporo.

The summit venue in a remote lakeside resort has been sealed off by thousands of police.

Previous G8 summits have been marred by clashes between police and protesters.

To protect the leaders from the G8 - Britain, Canada, France, Germany, Italy, Japan, Russia and the US - about 21,000 police have been deployed.

Summit organisers are keeping protesters and journalists well away from the summit itself, in the resort of Toyako.

Some people hoping to attend the summit, including activists, academics and independent journalists, have complained that they were questioned at length on entering Japan.

Tags: nice, holiday, we, hope, .....not

Carbon Capture Plans Get Reality Check

Fri, 04 Jul 2008 14:12:43 GMT

clipped by: tabsey
clipper's remarks: Some sollutions won't get off the drawing board. So many shysters who couldn't give a stuff about the planet, that careful checks of effectiveness will be needed. Closer surveillance than an Iranian nuclear facility.

Clip Source: dsc.discovery.com

July 2, 2008 -- Carbon capture and storage (CSS) is fast becoming the oil industry's favorite solution to the climate crisis, but the seductive simplicity of the idea masks a series of doubts about its viability.

One Way to Do It

In its simplest form, CSS consists of capturing carbon dioxide (CO2) as it is released into the atmosphere, compressing it and then pumping it back into depleted oil and gas fields or other safe underground chambers.

But ask an expert when the technique could be deployed on a large enough commercial scale to make a significant reduction in global CO2 emissions, and the response is often less than confident.

"That's a very difficult question," said Olav Kaarstad, a leading expert and special advisor to front-running Norwegian energy group StatoilHydro.

He said the technology exists, with the capture part being the most expensive and underdeveloped. Statoil buries about a million tons of CO2 a year at a site in the North Sea that has been operating for 11 years.

Tags: will, we, do, it?

Parched Cyprus awaits water ships

Mon, 30 Jun 2008 14:14:14 GMT

clipped by: tabsey
clipper's remarks: Water shortages right through southern Europe.

Clip Source: news.bbc.co.uk

Ships containing drinking water are expected to start arriving in Cyprus in an effort to relieve the island's chronic water shortage.

A pipeline has been installed to carry water from the ships inland

The water is being supplied by Greece, in a project costing the Cypriot government more than 38m euros (£30m).

Every day for the next six months two tankers will leave the port of Elefsina near Athens, bound for Cyprus.

After four years with no substantial winter rainfall, Cypriot water reserves are at their lowest since 1908.

Desperate times

The ships will dock on Monday at an offshore pumping station near the port of Limassol.

An undersea pipeline will then transport the water as far as the island's distribution network.

It will then be distributed, but only to the southern, mainly Greek-speaking part of the divided island.

An additional 16m cubic metres (half a billion cubic feet) are needed to bring Cyprus' supplies up to acceptable levels.

Tags: climate

No Ice at the North Pole

Sat, 28 Jun 2008 14:39:09 GMT

clipped by: tabsey
clipper's remarks: The drilling rigs are being refurbished, as we read.

Clip Source: www.truthout.org

A ship navigates through Arctic Ocean ice.
(Photo: Reuters)

Polar scientists reveal dramatic new evidence of climate change.

It seems unthinkable, but for the first time in human history, ice is on course to disappear entirely from the North Pole this year.

The disappearance of the Arctic sea ice, making it possible to reach the Pole sailing in a boat through open water, would be one of the most dramatic - and worrying - examples of the impact of global warming on the planet. Scientists say the ice at 90 degrees north may well have melted away by the summer.

"From the viewpoint of science, the North Pole is just another point on the globe, but symbolically it is hugely important. There is supposed to be ice at the North Pole, not open water," said Mark Serreze of the US National Snow and Ice Data Centre in Colorado.

Tags: warming?, nah

Put oil firm chiefs on trial, says leading climate change scientist

Mon, 23 Jun 2008 13:38:13 GMT

clipped by: tabsey
clipper's remarks: Why is he picking on oil chiefs? They just want to make a quid. Tyhe lying, greedy, corrupt so-and-so's who are now being seen for what they are; and the contempt they hold for the planet/people/nature.

Clip Source: www.democraticunderground.com

James Hansen, one of the world's leading climate scientists, will today call for the chief executives of large fossil fuel companies to be put on trial for high crimes against humanity and nature, accusing them of actively spreading doubt about global warming in the same way that tobacco companies blurred the links between smoking and cancer.

Hansen will use the symbolically charged 20th anniversary of his groundbreaking speech to the US Congress - in which he was among the first to sound the alarm over the reality of global warming - to argue that radical steps need to be taken immediately if the "perfect storm" of irreversible climate change is not to become inevitable.

Speaking before Congress again, he will accuse the chief executive officers of companies such as ExxonMobil and Peabody Energy of being fully aware of the disinformation about climate change they are spreading.

Tags: greed, corruption

Key ocean mission goes into orbit

Sun, 22 Jun 2008 11:04:37 GMT

clipped by: tabsey

Clip Source: news.bbc.co.uk

A space mission that will be critical to our understanding of climate change has launched from California.

The Jason-2 satellite will become the primary means of measuring the shape of the world's oceans, taking readings with an accuracy of better than 4cm.

Its data will track not only sea level rise but reveal how the great mass of waters are moving around the globe.

This information will be fundamental in helping weather and climate agencies make better forecasts.

Jason-2 will provide a topographic map of 95% of the Earth's ice-free oceans every 10 days. Although we think of our seas as being flat, they are actually marked by "hills" and "valleys", where the highs and lows may be as much as two metres apart.

How Jason-2 will probe the oceans

Elevation is a key parameter for oceanographers. Just as surface air pressure reveals what the atmosphere is doing above, so ocean height will betray details about the behaviour of water down below.

Tags: oceans, rise, for, air

Jellyfish Booms Signal Ecosystems Out of Whack

Thu, 19 Jun 2008 14:15:04 GMT

clipped by: tabsey
clipper's remarks: Prophets of doom appearing as jellyfish. Glad it isn't fleas.

Clip Source: dsc.discovery.com

Jellyfish Swarms Spell Trouble

June 18, 2008 -- The dramatic proliferation of jellyfish in oceans around the world, driven by overfishing and climate change, is a sure sign of ecosystems out of kilter, warn experts.

"Jellyfish are an excellent bellwether for the environment," explains Jacqueline Goy, of the Oceanographic Institute of Paris. "The more jellyfish, the stronger the signal that something has changed."

Brainless creatures composed almost entirely of water, the primitive animals have quietly filled a vacuum created by the voracious human appetite for fish.

Dislodging them will be difficult, marine biologists say.

"Jellyfish have come to occupy the place of many other species," notes Ricardo Aguilar, research director for Oceana, a international conservation organization.

Nowhere is the sting of these poorly understood invertebrates felt more sharply than the Mediterranean basin, where their exploding numbers have devastated native marine species and threaten seaside tourism.

Tags: harbingers, of, "out-of-whack".