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James Hansen: No New Coal
-- Adam -- 02/27/2007
Honored NASA climate scientist James Hansen, director of NASA’s Goddard Institute for Space Studies, called for a moratorium on the construction of any new coal-fired power plants on Monday before the National Press Club, the AP reports. He said that coal burning constituted "the big amount" of carbon emissions contributing to global warming today. Further, he said that, by the middle part of this century, plants that do not have ways to sequester carbon dioxide "must eventually be bulldozed". He offered increased efficiency as the way to compensate for the subsequent reductions in electricity supply.
NH’s Concord Monitor features on Gore, Global Warming
-- brucebc -- 02/27/2007
In today's Concord Monitor, the lead editorial discusses the recent Oscar win of An Inconvenient Truth, Vice-President Gore's long-term leadership on Global Warming, and the Vice-President's seemingly Gump-like ability to be present when history is made. In other "Gore News" in the Concord Monitor, the paper ran a feature story entitled "What's Next for Gore" that discusses the infatuation with questions of whether he'll run, people's feelings about him, and most importantly spends a great deal of time on his recent and upcoming efforts to elevate the issue of Global Warming throughout the nation. The Monitor's decision to run these pieces helps illustrate, once again, how big an issue Global Warming is in NH.
Bugs Get a Warm Welcome
-- Adam -- 02/26/2007
The LA Times reported yesterday on how climate change is spreading the distribution of many harmful diseases around the globe, providing examples of what has already occurred and looking forward. "Incremental temperature changes have begun to redraw the distribution of bacteria, insects and plants, exposing new populations to diseases that they have never seen before." For one example, a species of seafood bacteria is shown to has expanded its territory in Alaskan waters previously too cold to support it and sickened many consumers of local oysters. Also, ticks carrying encephalitis are now being recorded at higher elevations and latitudes in Europe than ever before, in a shift scientists say is clear secondary evidence of warming. Many shifts of malignant species such as these have collectively made the forecast for disease into the future significantly worse. Within 2000 alone, the World Health Organization pegged the number of people killed by warming-caused outbreaks and shifts at roughly 154,000.
And the Oscar Goes to…
-- Mike -- 02/26/2007
Anyone reading this blog is probably already aware of this, but it's still worth acknowledging...
Congratulations to former Vice President Al Gore and the rest of the "An Inconvenient Truth" team on winning an Academy Award for Best Documentary Film. As we've said before, no one has done more to turn up the heat on our need to cool down the planet than Al Gore.
And, if by some chance you have not seen (!) "An Inconvenient Truth" yet, then by all means please stop by the video store on your way home today and rent it.
Cheney Still in Denial
-- Mike -- 02/26/2007
Despite the fact that a panel of international scientists recently issued a report, edited by representatives of 113 governments, that said human activity is "very likely" the cause of global warming, Vice President Cheney continues to deny the inconvenient truth about global climate change. Note this exchange during the vice president's recent interview with ABC News (emphasis added):
Question: But what's your sense, where is the science on this? Is global warming a fact? And is it human activity that is causing global warming?
Cheney: Those are the two key questions. I think there's an emerging consensus that we do have global warming. You can look at the data on that, and I think clearly we're in a period of warming. Where there does not appear to be a consensus, where it begins to break down, is the extent to which that's part of a normal cycle versus the extent to which it's caused by man, greenhouse gases, et cetera.
This is yet another reminder of the need to use the 2008 presidential nomination process as an opportunity to cultivate new national leadership on the issue of global warming.
Oceans Out of Balance
-- Adam -- 02/23/2007
Two Canadian news stories today highlight the shifts ocean ecosystems are experiencing due to increasing average temperatures. The Vancouver Sun article explores the relationship with increases in dead zones. Warmer water causes the metabolic rate of fish to increase and decreases the amount of oxygen that can be absorbed into solution. The report notes that seasonal dead zones appear along the Pacific Coast during warmer months and may become more numerous as temperatures continue to rise. Meanwhile, according to CBC News, the Atlantic coastal waters are now subject to warming-induced decreases in salinity and shifts in currents. The result there has been explosions of species lower in the food chain, even as predatory populations decline. These "secondary" ocean impacts haven't received quite the attention as other related problems, but as both pieces demonstrate they still constitute major ecological shifts beyond what we have observed before.
Romney Issues Statement on ‘Current Environmental Debate’
-- Mike -- 02/23/2007
Keying off a editorial on climate change from South Carolina Governor Mark Sanford in today's Washington Post, Mitt Romney issued the following statement:
"Governor Mark Sanford is right. Unfortunately, some in the Republican Party are embracing the radical environmental ideas of the liberal left. As governor, I found that thoughtful environmentalism need not be anti-growth and anti-jobs. But Kyoto-style sweeping mandates, imposed unilaterally in the United States, would kill jobs, depress growth and shift manufacturing to the dirtiest developing nations.
"Republicans should never abandon pro-growth conservative principles in an effort to embrace the ideas of Al Gore. Instead of sweeping mandates, we must use America's power of innovation to develop alternative sources of energy and new technologies that use energy more efficiently."
It's good that the candidates are engaged in a debate about climate change and the issues central to finding solutions to it, such as energy efficient, job-growing technologies. I look forward to hearing more details about Governor Romney's plan to address global warming.
Reporters Continue to Recognize the Importance of Global Warming
-- Mike -- 02/23/2007
John McCain's recent appearance with Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger highlighting California's efforts to curb greenhouse gases certainly is a worthwhile news story, but the lead paragraph to Newsweek's article on it is worth noting not so much for what the reporter writes about McCain, but for what she writes about the issue of global warming (emphasis added):
Sen. John McCain got a little lost in the shuffle Wednesday. His appearance in California with Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger was all but eclipsed by the hissing match between Democratic presidential hopefuls Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton. True, the reason for McCain's appearance-to call for a nationwide low-carbon fuel standard, similar to the one Schwarzenegger imposed in California earlier this year-isn't quite as sexy as a fight over the affections of Hollywood mogul and Democratic moneyman David Geffen, or McCain's own spat with Vice President Cheney. But the few dozen reporters willing to don ridiculous-looking neon orange safety smocks to join McCain and Schwarzenegger at a loading dock at the Port of Long Beach were on to a story far more significant to the 2008 presidential campaign-and beyond. How will the United States adapt its energy policies to cope with the potentially catastrophic economic consequences of climate change? "No matter who runs for president," said McCain, who has yet to officially announce his candidacy, "this will be a very, very big issue."
‘It Makes Good Economic Sense to Reduce Emissions’
-- Mike -- 02/23/2007
Foster's Daily Democrat reported yesterday on a global warming panel discussion at the University of New Hampshire earlier this week. Lots of interesting stuff, but I think this is particularly worth highlighting:
Tom Kelly, director of the university's Office of Sustainability, said the university is hard at work on reducing emissions on campus. UNH has been identified as a "climate protection campus," and interim president J. Bonnie Newman recently joined 67 other schools in signing the University President's Climate Commitment, which asks colleges and universities to identify their greenhouse gas output and develop a plan to reduce those emissions over the next three years.
"It makes good economic sense to reduce emissions. It also makes good ecological sense and good public health sense," Kelly said.
Flow Woes on the Colorado
-- Adam -- 02/22/2007
A National Research Council panel released a report yesterday that predicts dire impacts to the Colorado River from global warming, Rocky Mountain News reports. Competition over its water has been intense over several decades and the report indicates that issue will get only more heated as climate change brings significant flow reductions. "Regional drying and reduced stream flows" mean that less water will make it to growing urban centers and commercial farms. The article cites a 2005 study that projects a 20 percent decline from current flow levels. All of this is expected to have crippling effects on the economies of the seven user states and regional agricultural production.
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