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Archive for November 16th, 2011
Thirsty Power Plants Threaten Watersheds
Posted by Washington Post: Juliet Eilperin on November 16th, 2011
New York Times: The first chapter of a new report on the effect of power plants on freshwater systems has the feel of a documentary film. Imagine a camera panning the dessicated Texas landscape as a voice intones statistics from the brutal 2011 drought - a dried-up Brazos River, 80 days of 100-degree-plus temperatures, and so on.
And then the punch line: "An energy-water collision wasn`t far behind."
Cut to a close-up: "One plant had to curtail nighttime operations because the drought had reduced the amount...
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Climate change driving world towards food crunch
Posted by Washington Post: Juliet Eilperin on November 16th, 2011
Agence France-Presse: Surging population growth and climate change are driving the planet towards episodes of worsening hunger which only an overhaul of the food system will fix, a panel of experts said on Wednesday.
"In the 21st century, as we are now we've got a major set of converging threats,' said John Beddington, a British professor who chaired a 13-member nine-month probe.
"There's population growth, unsustainable resource use and big pressures on humanity to transform the way that we use food,'...
Large differences in the climate impact of biofuels, Swedish research finds
Posted by Washington Post: Juliet Eilperin on November 16th, 2011
ScienceDaily: When biomass is combusted the carbon that once was bound in the growing tree is released into the atmosphere. For this reason, bioenergy is often considered carbon dioxide neutral. Research at the University of Gothenburg, Sweden, however, shows that this is a simplification. The use of bioenergy may affect ecosystem carbon stocks, and it can take anything from 2 to 100 years for different biofuels to achieve carbon dioxide neutrality.
"Using a tree as biofuel creates a carbon dioxide debt that...
Conservationists call for urgent restoration of UK peatlands
Posted by Washington Post: Juliet Eilperin on November 16th, 2011
Guardian: Conservationists have called for urgent action to restore vast areas of peatland across the UK after an inquiry warned that their fate will have severe implications for the climate.
The report by the International Union for the Conservation of Nature (IUCN) has estimated that the UK's peatlands and peatbogs lock in about 3bn tonnes of CO2, and are a far more significant carbon store than the country's forests. But they are being damaged so seriously that they are putting the UK's climate targets...
Climate change threatens Nile, Limpopo rivers: Study
Posted by Washington Post: Juliet Eilperin on November 16th, 2011
Agence France-Presse: The study raised the greatest concerns for the Limpopo River Basin, including parts of Botswana, South Africa, Mozambique and Zimbabwe, and running through a region already chronically dry. Rising global temperatures and shifting rainfall patterns could affect water flows on Africa's mighty Nile and Limpopo rivers, an agricultural research group said Monday. The Consultative Group on International Agricultural Research, a global think-tank, warned the changes could have major effects for countries...
Erratic, Extreme Weather Puts Climate Change In New Light
Posted by Washington Post: Juliet Eilperin on November 16th, 2011
redOrbit: The first climate study to focus on variations in daily weather conditions has found that day-to-day weather has grown increasingly erratic and extreme, with significant fluctuations in sunshine and rainfall affecting more than a third of the planet.
Princeton University researchers recently reported in the Journal of Climate that extremely sunny or cloudy days are more common than in the early 1980s, and that swings from thunderstorms to dry days rose considerably since the late 1990s. These...
A burger a day won’t keep climate change away
Posted by Washington Post: Juliet Eilperin on November 16th, 2011
New Scientist: Meat is bad: bad for you, bad for the environment. At least, that's the usual argument. Each year, the doors to the UN climate negotiations, which kick off again in Durban, South Africa, on 28 November, are assailed by demonstrators brandishing pro-vegetarian placards. The fact is that livestock farming accounts for a whopping 15 per cent of all greenhouse gas emissions. We can't all go veggie, so just how much meat is it OK for an eco-citizen to eat?
It's not just the demonstrators who are concerned...
Climate change will lead to human exodus, extreme costs
Posted by Deutsche Presse-Agentur: None Given on November 16th, 2011
Deutsche Presse-Agentur: Ten days before UN talks on climate change open in South Africa, the UN's top climate panel is slated to release Friday a report on extreme weather events.
The report, from the scientific Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), is expected to focus on how global weather patterns are supposed to change if nothing is done to lower carbon emissions blamed for global warming, said Mojib Latif, a climate scientist at the University of Kiel.
'The poor countries will be especially hit,'...
Global firms failing to account for looming water risk
Posted by Washington Post: Juliet Eilperin on November 16th, 2011
Business Green: The corporate response to climate change is significantly more advanced than efforts to address water-related risks, despite the fact that flooding and drought are likely to have a major near-term impact on many firms' operations.
That is the conclusion of a major new report from the Carbon Disclosure Project (CDP), which found that only 57 per cent of 190 listed companies have board-level water strategies in place. Moreover, 40 per cent of the Global 500 companies that were approached to provide...
UN chief uses Thai floods to press for movement on climate change
Posted by Deutsche Presse-Agentur: None Given on November 16th, 2011
Deutsche Presse-Agentur: United Nations Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon on Wednesday used Thailand's current flood crisis to press world leaders to commit to climate change initiatives at an upcoming conference in South Africa.
'I am urging the leaders to address these matters with a sense of urgency,' Ban said after meeting with Thai Prime Minister Yingluck Shinawatra, whose government has been struggling to contain the country's worst floods in five decades.
'We do not have any time to waste,' Ban said before visiting...