EcoRadio

Category: News

Add your news
You can add news from your networks or groups through the website by becoming an author. Simply register as a member of the Generator, and then email Giovanni asking to become an author. He will then work with you to integrate your content into the site as effectively as possible.
Listen to the Generator News online

 
The Generator news service publishes articles on sustainable development, agriculture and energy as well as observations on current affairs. The news service is used on the weekly radio show, The Generator, as well as by a number of monthly and quarterly magazines. A podcast of the Generator news is also available.
As well as Giovanni’s articles it picks up the most pertinent articles from a range of other news services. You can publish the news feed on your website using RSS, free of charge.
 

  • Climate change toll is crucial evidence

     

    These numbers are vitally important, because they provide a direct evidence-based link between culpability – those responsible for the emissions driving climate change – and victimhood, those who are suffering the consequences, including losing their lives. And notably, the victims and the perpetrators are very different people in very different parts of the world.

    Almost all the deaths counted in these two reports occur in developing countries, where the lack of healthcare and vulnerability to poor harvests leaves people uniquely vulnerable to droughts and spreading disease. The report also highlights the fact that those countries considered least vulnerable to climate change – both geographically and economically – tend to be in the rich world: those who have largely caused the problem.

    Despite this overall big picture, it should not be forgotten that the single largest climate disaster struck not in the third world, but in the heart of Europe – the 2003 heatwave during which 35,000 people died, particularly in France and Germany. During one awful night in Paris, on 10 August 2003, 2,000 people – mainly elderly – were carried out of their apartments in body bags. So climate change can and will affect us all eventually.

    Attaching real-world numbers to climate impacts is enormously important, because for most people the problem still seems remote and far-off, something for others to worry about at some future time. With the estimated death toll quantified, international law can be invoked, and the perpetrators – whether oil companies, coal-burning power stations or perhaps entire nations – can be punished, or at least forced to pay massive damages.

    Coincidentally, 300,000 is also the population of the Maldives – one of the nations most vulnerable to climate change, which will be swamped by the rising oceans unless emissions are dramatically scaled back soon. The Maldivian president Mohamed Nasheed announced in March that he would seek to make his country the first carbon-neutral nation in world – achieving the goal within 10 years.

    Today at the Hay festival a competition is being held, where a British child will name a new Maldivian coral reef – a living structure which, if global warming is eventually controlled, may one day form the basis of a new island. The offer is characteristic of the generosity of these island people, who say they are less interested in pinning blame than in being part of the solution.

    But the numbers are increasingly clear, and responsibilities cannot be evaded for ever. The legal implications are analogous to those faced by the tobacco industry once evidence solidified about the links between smoking and cancer. Shareholders and investors in fossil fuels need to be aware that they now face a liability that will amount to hundreds of billions of dollars – their products are killing people, and it is only a matter of time before the wheels of international justice begin to turn.

  • Analysis Finds Elevated Risk Risk From Soot Particles in the Air

     

    A variety of sources produce fine particles, and they include diesel engines, automobile tires, coal-fired power plants and oil refineries.

    Comparing exposure within the New York and the Los Angeles metropolitan areas, the study found that the risks were evenly distributed in the vicinity of New York while some areas around Los Angeles, including neighborhoods near the Ports of Los Angeles and Long Beach, had elevated health risks.

    The extended epidemiological analysis, which draws on data gathered from 350,000 people over 18 years, and an additional 150,000 people in more recent years, was conducted for the Health Effects Institute by scientists at the University of Ottawa.

    The institute was created by the Environmental Protection Agency and the industries that it regulates with the goal of obtaining unbiased studies.

    The link between fine particles, the diameter of which is smaller than a 30th of a human hair, and cardiopulmonary disease has been established for two decades, and the E.P.A. has regulated such emissions since 1997. In 2006, despite mounting evidence that the particles were deadlier than first thought, the agency declined to lower chronic exposure limits.

    The United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit declared that decision inadequate, and the Obama administration is now considering what level is appropriate.

  • Big business ‘ failing to disclose climate risks ‘to investors

     

     

    Fifty-nine of the 100 leading global firms surveyed made no mention of greenhouse gas emissions at all. Twenty eight did not discuss potential risks from rising sea levels or other aspects of climate change. Fifty-two provided no information on what steps they are taking to adapt to climate change.

     

    “These findings are strong evidence that investors are not getting the infromation they need … even from industries facing clear, immediate risks from climate change,” the report said. Only a handful of the companies provided an adequate account of the potential costs, it found – despite growing demands from financial regulators to disclose the risks of climate change.

     

    The study by the Corporate Library analysis firm was based on information provided by the firms to the US regulatory authority, the Securities and Exchange Commission, in the first three months of 2008.

     

    The lack of disclosure was most striking in the insurance industry, the report found. Despite evidence of the increasing severity of tropical storms – and the huge spike in claims following Hurricane Katrina in 2005 – 18 of the 27 firms made no mention of climate change or related risk in their financial disclosure forms.

     

    Twenty-four of the 27 companies failed to mention any actions taken to address global warming — even though the report said they were now opportunities for insurance policies that factor in climate change.

     

    Oil and gas companies did not even provide the bare minimum of information on climate risk, the study found. All but one of the 23 firms surveyed received only a “poor” or “limited” grade in disclosing climate risks. Seventeen of the companies gave no information on their emissions or their positions on climate change. The report singled out Exxon Mobile, Apache and Anadarko for weak disclosure.

     

    Electricity firms did only slightly better. Even so, only three of the 26 firms surveyed gave an adequate assessment of the risks posed by climate change. Two provided information about their attempts to address climate change.

  • NSW Premier Nathan Rees approves Australia’s largest wind farm

    Mr Rees said the wind farm would create 700 jobs in the Broken Hill area during the five-year construction period and 120 jobs when up and running.

    The renewable energy group Epuron, part of the Macquarie Group, proposed the wind farm in 2007.

    The first stage of construction was approved on the conditions Epuron adhere to noise guidelines, maintain visual amenity and limit environmental impacts.

    Stage one will involve erecting 282 wind turbines, with the number increasing to 598 by the final stage.

    NSW had approved 14 wind farms with a total capacity output of 2,486 megawatts since 2005, Mr Rees said.

    “When all of these wind farms are up and running they will save more than six million tonnes of greenhouse gas emissions annually,” he said.

    “This is the same as taking over one million cars off the road and will have capacity to power approximately 800,000 houses.”

  • Carbon scheme ‘ like a GST from hell’

     

    The scheme is currently being debated in the House of Representatives.

    Mr Carmody has been at the centre of many policy reforms in Australia, including the long battle to introduce the GST.

    Now a private economic consultant, Mr Carmody has turned his attention to greenhouse gases and believes that without a big rethink, the push for a global agreement will be unsuccessful.

    Mr Carmody told Jim Middleton from ABC’s Australia Network that emissions should be measured and restricted not at the point of production but at the point of consumption.

    He believes the West should pay for the emissions embedded in products or services it buys from China and he says the only economic system that will work to cut emissions world-wide is a system based on “global consumption”.

    In other words, carbon produced in the manufacture of a television set in China should be paid for by the consumer or consumers in the country where that television is purchased.

    “I accept the science. My main concern is that we have a policy model that actually works, a policy model that maximises chances of getting a global deal where all countries do their bit to slow climate change,” Mr Carmody said.

    “In the Australian context the CPRS is very much like the GST from hell.

    “What I mean by that is it taxes our exports but not the exports of our trading partners; it taxes our import competing products but not our imports.

    “It is not a big deal to fix it. If you look overseas, all other countries are looking at this too.”

    ‘Trade neutral’

     

    China’s Department of Climate Change has argued that with up to a quarter of all Chinese emissions coming from the manufacture of products the country exports to the West, receiving countries should be responsible for dealing with those emissions.

    Mr Carmody says “they are dead right”.

    “If China keeps exporting emissions to the West by exporting goods and services to the rest of the world, it is incumbent on the rest of the world to deal with those exports and those emissions,” he said.

    “It is up to other countries to do what China said they should do, that is, if they are importing products from China or from any country, they should be applying a tax adjustment to reflect the emissions in those imports.

    “If every country did that we get back to the conventional version of the GST. This is a GST that doesn’t apply to our exports [but] it does apply to our imports and our import competing products.”

    Mr Carmody says such a scheme would be trade neutral.

    “Because it is trade neutral, every country that wants to act can do so without fear that all they are going to do is undermine their own competitiveness and cost jobs,” he said.

    “A consumption-based approach for a carbon price or a carbon tax is protection neutral.

    “It doesn’t give a country a competitive advantage; it doesn’t give a country’s trading partners a competitive advantage.

    “The plan would be in line with requirements of the World Trade Organisation because exports would not be touched but imports would be taxed at the same rate as corresponding locally produced substitutes.”

    Last month Mr Carmody gave evidence to the Senate inquiry into CPRS legislation.

  • City birds sing higher than country cousins, scientists find

     

    Male great tits are territorial birds and they sing to defend their patch – usually around 100m sq – against other males. They also use the songs to attract mates.

    In their research, published today in the journal Proceedings of the Royal Society B, Marshall’s team recorded the songs they heard in city centres and also in the nearby rural areas. They found that, on average, the city songs were higher pitched than the countryside songs.

    Marshall’s team also went a step further. “We played back the songs we’d recorded in the cities to the birds in the rural areas and vice versa. And we also played the city birds other city bird songs and the same in the countryside. We found that they responded much more strongly to the songs of the birds form the same area, birds with a similar noise background.”

    This inability to recognise songs from members of its own species could lead to problems, said the researchers. If a city bird moves to a new area to attract mates or find food, its song may not be attractive to mates, nor would it be a warning to local males to stay away from its territory. “We know that great tit songs are largely determined by what they hear in the first year of their life and only small changes are known to occur after this stage,” said Marshall. Great tits do move their territories over the years, so those at the edges of towns might be most at risk.

    Previous research on birds in continental Europe has suggested a difference in song pitch between rural and city birds. In 2006, scientists at Leiden University in the Netherlands recorded the songs of great tits in 10 European cities including London, Prague, Paris and Amsterdam and compared the songs with birds of the same species in nearby forests. They found that not only was the pitch of city songs higher but also the urban birds sang faster, shorter, songs.

    Marshall’s study is the first to show that birds of a single species respond differently to the different songs. He said the next stage of the research would be aimed at working out whether female great tits also responded differently to the songs of males from different areas.

    The changes in song could mark the first step in an evolutionary process called speciation – when an organism splits into two or more different species because of the differing environmental pressures facing different populations. But, given that such an evolutionary change would take many generations to occur, it is impossible to be certain whether great tits were already heading down this path.

    • Listen to the urban great tit song here and the rural song here.