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. 

‘Cheap’ solar geoengineering plans may have unintended consequences

admin /13 August, 2010

‘Cheap’ solar geoengineering plans may have unintended consequences

Ecologist

12th August, 2010

Researchers warn that individual countries looking to go it alone with ‘cheap’ solutions to regional climate change could inflict negative impacts on the rest of world

Large-scale ‘geoengineering’ interventions to alter the climate, such as increasing cloud cover to deflect solar radiation, may not work on a global scale, a new study has warned.

As climate change predictions worsen and international negotiations prove slow and unambitious, ‘quick, techno-fix’ solutions to alter the world’s climate are gaining support.

Biggest ice island for 48 years breaks off Greenland glacier

admin /7 August, 2010

Biggest ice island for 48 years breaks off Greenland glacier

Scientists say the 100 square mile ice island, 600ft thick, is ‘very unusual’ and the biggest formation of its kind since 1962

 

A melting iceberg An ice island 100 square miles in area has broken off Petermann Glacier in Greenland, and is thought to be the biggest formation of its kind for 48 years. Photograph: AP

An ice island with an area of 100 square miles has broken off from one of Greenland‘s two main glaciers in what scientists say is the biggest such event in the Arctic in nearly 50 years.

The huge chunk of ice, which is 600ft thick, broke off the Petermann Glacier, located about 620 miles south of the North Pole, on Thursday.

It is now drifting in a remote area called the Nares Strait between Greenland and Canada.

Climate talks losing ground, say negotiators.

admin /6 August, 2010

Climate talks losing ground, say negotiators

Posted 6 hours 37 minutes ago

UN climate talks tasked with curbing the threat of global warming are backsliding, delegates said at the close of a week-long session in Bonn.

Record global temperatures, forest fires in Russia, lethal floods in Pakistan “are all consistent with the kind of changes we could expect from climate change, and they will get worse if we don’t act quickly,” said US negotiator Jonathan Pershing.

Climate deal loopholes ‘Make farce’ of rich nations’ pledges

admin /4 August, 2010

Climate deal loopholes ‘make farce’ of rich nations’ pledges

New research reveals carbon emissions from rich nations could actually rise under loopholes in the proposed UN climate deal

 

A hut in Riau, Indonesia, where palm oil plantations are a major cause of deforestation. A hut in Riau, Indonesia. A loophole exists in the land use, land use change and forestry rules that could mean more emissions. Photograph: Ahmad Zamroni/Getty Images

Rich countries have been put on the back foot after new research showed that current pledges to cut greenhouse gas emissions could be wiped out by gaping loopholes in the UN climate change treaty put forward in Copenhagen last year.

Developing countries have argued strongly for minimum 40% emission cuts from industrialised nations by 2020. But new analysis from the Stockholm Environment Institute and Third World Network (TWN), released at the latest UN climate talks in Bonn, showed that current pledges amounted to only 12-18% reductions below 1990 levels without loopholes. When all loopholes were taken into account, emissions could be allowed to rise by 9%.

Global warming pushes 2010 temperature to record highs

admin /30 July, 2010

Global warming pushes 2010 temperatures to record highs

Scientists from two leading climate research centres publish ‘best evidence yet’ of rising long-term global temperatures

• Jeffrey Sachs: Obama must take a lead on climate change

 

A Pakistani boy cools off in a park in Multan A Pakistani boy cools off as temperatures reached 51C in a heatwave last month. Photograph: MK Chaudhry/EPA

Global temperatures in the first half of the year were the hottest since records began more than a century ago, according to two of the world’s leading climate research centres.

 

 

Scientists have also released what they described as the “best evidence yet” of rising long-term temperatures. The report is the first to collate 11 different indicators – from air and sea temperatures to melting ice – each one based on between three and seven data sets, dating back to between 1850 and the 1970s.

The newly released data follows months of scrutiny of climate science after sceptics claimed leaked emails from the University of East Anglia (UEA) suggested temperature records had been manipulated – a charge rejected by three inquiries.

Publishing the newly collated data in London, Peter Stott, the head of climate modelling at the UK Met Office, said despite variations between individual years, the evidence was unequivocal: “When you follow those decade-to-decade trends then you see clearly and unmistakably signs of a warming world”.

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