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Chances of Copenhagen climate talks ‘rematch’ unlikely, say experts
Damian Carrington, Suzanne Goldenberg in Washington, Juliette Jowit, Jonathan Watts in Beijing, Alok Jha, James Randerson, David Smith in Johannesburg, David Adam, Tom Hennigan in Sao Paolo, The Guardian
In the tense run-up to the Copenhagen climate change summit in December, a senior British diplomat warned the Guardian: “We can go into extra time, but we can’t afford a replay.” At the end of the chaotic summit, that replay — in Mexico in November — was seen as a good result, given how close the entire show came to collapsing.
But now, just six weeks since the summit reached its dramatic but disappointing conclusion, senior figures around the world do not even believe the rematch is likely to be played.
Dozens of politicians, diplomats, economists, scientists and campaigners contacted by the Guardian agreed that while a global, legally binding treaty remains by far the best way to prevent global warming wreaking havoc on our civilisation, the chances of that treaty being achieved in 2010 are almost nil.
The energy has gone out of the negotiations, said some, with the momentum that drew well over 100 global leaders to the Danish capital in search of a deal now lost. The UN Framework Convention on Climate Change, which runs the negotiations has drifted into a procedural vacuum and its head, Yvo de Boer, has lost all credibility, said others…
(1 Feb 2010)
Pine Island glacier loss must force another look at sea-level forecasts
David Spratt, climatecodered.blogspot
New research suggest that just two collapsing West Antarctic glaciers could add another half a metre to sea levels this century
The Victorian and Queensland governments decisions to stick to an “upper boundary” sea-level rise estimate of 0.8 metres by 2100 (and NSW at 0.9 metre) for planning purposes needs urgent revision, with new modelling showing two West Antarctic glaciers are past their tipping points.
The 0.8 metre estimate for sea-level rises to 2100 is already obsolete:
-The Copenhagen climate science congress of March 2009 estimated a sea-level rise of 0.75–1.9 metres by 2100
-The federal Department of Climate Change’s November 2009 climate update reports estimates of a 0.5–2 metre rise by 2100
-A study published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences in December found that global average sea levels are likely to rise by between 75cm and190cm by the end of the century…
(24 Jan 2010)
NASA Makes it Official: 2000-2009 Was Hottest Decade on Record
Matthew McDermott, treehugger
NASA has just announced that the period from January 2000 through December 2009 has been the hottest decade since record-keeping began in 1880. Furthermore, 2009 was the second-hottest year on record for the planet as a whole and in the southern hemisphere, the hottest. Last year was only a fraction of a degree cooler than the hottest year, 2005.
Focus on Long-Term Trend, Not Just Yearly Records
But don’t fixate on yearly data–which year is hottest, or second hottest–says Goddard Institute for Space Studies director Dr. James Hansen. Doing so “usually misses the point.” In short, it’s the long-term trend not the year-to-year variability that we should be focusing on.
Hansen points out that while there’s always interest in that record, “There’s substantial year-to-year variability of global temperature caused by the tropical El Niño-La Niña cycle. But when we average temperature over five or ten years to minimize that variability, we find that global warming is continuing unabated.”…
(22 Jan 2010)
Simulated volcanoes and man-made ‘sun blocks’ can rescue the planet
Steve Connor, The Independent
It would be 100 times cheaper to shield the Earth from sunlight with a man-made “sun block” than to cut emissions of greenhouse gases. This is one of the reasons why the world needs an international project to investigate ways of safely manipulating the global climate in addition to cutting greenhouse gases, scientists have said.
Simulating a volcanic eruption by putting man-made aerosol particles into the atmosphere to reflect the Sun’s heat would rapidly lower global temperatures and could provide a vital respite from global warming until cuts in carbon dioxide emissions begin to have the desired effect, they added.
It is important to start tests in “geoengineering” now rather than leave it until a full-blown emergency, according to three environmental scientists who argue that governments should establish a multimillion-pound fund to pay for research into solar-radiation management – techniques for shielding the Earth against sunlight…
(28 Jan 2010)
CU study: Asia causes U.S. ozone increases
Joe Rubino, Daily Camera
The United States’ ability to comply with Clean Air Act standards may be affected by ozone pollution originating in Asia and traveling east over the Pacific Ocean, according to a University of Colorado study.
The international study indicates that springtime ozone levels over North America have been steadily increasing since 1984. There has been a substantial increase –14 percent of springtime ozone pollution — between 1995 to 2008 alone.
“In springtime, pollution from across the hemisphere, not nearby sources, contributes to the ozone increases above western North America,” said lead study author Owen R. Cooper, with CIRES, the Cooperative Institute for Research in Environmental Science at CU. “When air is transported from a broad region of south and east Asia, the trend is largest.”..
The study was published online Wednesday in the journal Nature…
(21 Jan 2010)
‘Climate emails hacked by spies’
Steve Connor, The Independent
A highly sophisticated hacking operation that led to the leaking of hundreds of emails from the Climatic Research Unit in East Anglia was probably carried out by a foreign intelligence agency, according to the Government’s former chief scientist. Sir David King, who was Tony Blair’s chief scientific adviser for seven years until 2007, said that the hacking and selective leaking of the unit’s emails, going back 13 years, bore all the hallmarks of a co-ordinated intelligence operation – especially given their release just before the Copenhagen climate conference in December.
The emails were stolen from a backup computer server used by the University of East Anglia. They contained private discussions between climate scientists that have embarrassed those involved, particularly Professor Phil Jones, who has stepped down from his post as head of the unit pending an independent inquiry into whether there is any evidence of scientific misconduct. He is not implicated in the hacking.
In an interview with The Independent, Sir David suggested the email leaks were deliberately designed to destabilise Copenhagen and he dismissed the idea that it was a run-of-the-mill hacking. It was carried out by a team of skilled professionals, either on behalf of a foreign government or at the behest of anti-climate change lobbyists in the United States, he said…
(1 Feb 2010)
related: Leaked climate change emails scientist ‘hid’ data flaws
