Category: Climate chaos

The atmosphere is to the earth as a layer of varnish is to a desktop globe. It is thin, fragile and essential for preserving the items on the surface.150 years of burning fossil fuel have overloaded the atmosphere to the point where the earth is ill. It now has a fever. Read the detailed article, Soothing Gaia’s Fever for an evocative account of that analogy. The items listed here detail progress on coordinating 6.5 billion people in the most critical project undertaken by humanity. 

Carbon-neutral Hydrogen on the Horizon

admin /29 November, 2007

University Park, Pennsylvania [RenewableEnergyAccess.com]

Hydrogen as an everyday, environmentally friendly fuel source may be closer than we think, say Penn State researchers.

"The energy focus is currently on ethanol as a fuel, but economical ethanol from cellulose is 10 years down the road," says Bruce E. Logan, the Kappe professor of environmental engineering. "First you need to break cellulose down to sugars and then bacteria can convert them to ethanol."

Logan and Shaoan Cheng, research associate, have recently demonstrated a method based on microbial fuel cells to convert cellulose and other biodegradable organic materials directly into hydrogen.

UN chief calls for Antarctic action

admin /9 November, 2007

By Juan Jose Lagorio in Antarctica

Article from: Reuters

WITH prehistoric Antarctic ice sheets melting beneath his feet, UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon called for urgent political action to tackle global warming.

Antarctica has warmed faster than anywhere else on Earth in the last 50 years, making it a fitting destination for Ban, who has made climate change a priority since he took office earlier this year.

"I need a political answer. This is an emergency and for emergency situations we need emergency action," he said during yesterday’s visit to three scientific bases on the barren continent, where temperatures are their highest in about 1800 years.

Post Carbon Professionals – Accredited Training in Byron Bay

admin /1 November, 2007

The Permaforest Trust – Centre for Sustainability Education, in partnership with National Environment Centre campus of the Riverina Institute of TAFE, is now offering accredited, specialist sustainability training for transition to a low carbon future from its Byron Bay campus in northern NSW, Australia. Learn permaculture skills, relocalisation strategies and systems thinking to proactively meet Continue Reading →

Antarctic melt blows climate models

admin /27 October, 2007

Dangerous aspirations - WWF report In Dangerous Aspiration: Beyond 3ºC Warming in Australia, author Dr A. Barrie Pittock said that the West Antarctic Ice Sheet (WAIS) held ice equivalent to 5 or 6 metres of global sea level.

Ice sheet likely to disintegrate: As it was largely grounded below present sea level it was considered more likely to disintegrate than the rest of Antarctica. This was because, as global sea level rose, more of the ice would float, reducing resistance to outflow from the interior. Moreover, recent rapid disintegration of floating ice shelves along the Antarctic Peninsula had shown that these ice shelves held back outlet glaciers. The glaciers had subsequently increased their flow rates.

Rapid beak-up mechanism: The rapid disintegration of the ice shelves was caused by a mechanism not presently included in glacial models. Surface meltwater in summer penetrated into crevasses, leading to the crevasses opening up and splitting off long thin icebergs unlike those that normally broke off ice shelves. This process was clearly visible from satellite photos taken by NASA. It raised the possibility that a rapid break-up mechanism might operate in the future on the much larger Ross and Filchner-Ronne Ice Shelves, which presently held back the large outlet glaciers from the WAIS.

Read the report online

Companies calculate cost of carbon tax

admin /27 October, 2007

Assuming a carbon price of $10 a tonne, the cost of BlueScope’s emissions would have been worth about 17 per cent of the company’s earnings before interest, tax, depreciation and amortisation (EBITDA), wrote John Breusch in The Australian Financial Review (24/10/2007, p. 7).

Other companies similarly affected: OneSteel would have been the next most affected company, with emissions costing about 8 per cent of EBITDA, followed by Alumina at 7 per cent and Qantas at 6 per cent. In the resources sector, BHP Billiton’s emissions would have been worth about 2.5 per cent of EBITDA, compared with about 2 per cent for Rio Tinto

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