Showing posts with label carbon emissions. Show all posts
Showing posts with label carbon emissions. Show all posts
12/18/2009
12/16/2009
Copenhagen Via Democracynow
Indigenous Peoples of Canada March on Canadian Embassy in Copenhagen to Protest Tar Sands
Canada is the largest supplier of oil to the United States, and most of it comes from the Alberta tar sands. Described as the world's biggest single industrial source of carbon emissions, the tar sands have drawn widespread protest and civil disobedience from environmentalists. On Tuesday, as climate delegates met across town at the Bella Center, a protest led by indigenous peoples of Canada was held outside the Canadian embassy. Democracy Now!'s John Hamilton files a report.
http://www.democracynow.org/2009/12/15/indigenous_peoples_of_canada_march_on
Cap & Trade: A Critical Look at Carbon Trading
Will the expansion of carbon emissions trading help stop global warming or just create a new market for Wall Street to make billions? We air excerpts of Annie Leonard's The Story of Cap and Trade and speak with Larry Lohmann and Frank Ackerman.
http://www.democracynow.org/2009/12/15/cap_trade_a_critical_look_at
Canada is the largest supplier of oil to the United States, and most of it comes from the Alberta tar sands. Described as the world's biggest single industrial source of carbon emissions, the tar sands have drawn widespread protest and civil disobedience from environmentalists. On Tuesday, as climate delegates met across town at the Bella Center, a protest led by indigenous peoples of Canada was held outside the Canadian embassy. Democracy Now!'s John Hamilton files a report.
http://www.democracynow.org/2009/12/15/indigenous_peoples_of_canada_march_on
Cap & Trade: A Critical Look at Carbon Trading
Will the expansion of carbon emissions trading help stop global warming or just create a new market for Wall Street to make billions? We air excerpts of Annie Leonard's The Story of Cap and Trade and speak with Larry Lohmann and Frank Ackerman.
http://www.democracynow.org/2009/12/15/cap_trade_a_critical_look_at
12/10/2009
9/24/2009
In-depth Article on Peak Oil
http://www.truthout.org/092209W?n describes current energy sources and their continuing scarcity; meanwhile, alternative energies lag far behind. A recipe for more environmental degradation and global energy wars. Please insist that our local governments are discussing these issues and developing some sensible plans to get us thru the next very difficult decades.
9/23/2009
Kilowatt Ours Links Up with Whole Foods
[from the makers of the movie, Kilowatt Ours]
Pssst... The Kilowatt Ours DVD is now on sale at Whole Body/Whole Foods in Nashville. For readers not in Nashville, I have this to share: My dream is that Whole Foods Market will carry Kilowatt Ours in all stores nationwide, and you can help. Currently WFM is testing the Kilowatt Ours DVD in selected stores. If you and all your friends purchase the DVD and/or request a copy and the DVDs fly off the shelves, Whole Foods will likely continue promoting it --getting the conservation message out to new audiences and financially supporting our work.
Please visit your local Whole Foods Market (find a store at: http://clicks.aweber.com/y/ct/?l=Dwhah&m=1dQiDS5ryTuyw5&b=P0Nlbh1Z45xasxuSiU8KIA) and ask if they carry KO. If they don't, please request it.
If they do carry KO, make a purchase--it is still a great gift for friends and family. And encourage your friends to pick up their copy too! THANK YOU!
**ENERGY SAVING TIP** As the cooling season draws to a close, please remember to change the filter in your HVAC intake vent. This will improve your indoor air quality and cut energy usage as we move into the heating season.
Pssst... The Kilowatt Ours DVD is now on sale at Whole Body/Whole Foods in Nashville. For readers not in Nashville, I have this to share: My dream is that Whole Foods Market will carry Kilowatt Ours in all stores nationwide, and you can help. Currently WFM is testing the Kilowatt Ours DVD in selected stores. If you and all your friends purchase the DVD and/or request a copy and the DVDs fly off the shelves, Whole Foods will likely continue promoting it --getting the conservation message out to new audiences and financially supporting our work.
Please visit your local Whole Foods Market (find a store at: http://clicks.aweber.com/y/ct/?l=Dwhah&m=1dQiDS5ryTuyw5&b=P0Nlbh1Z45xasxuSiU8KIA) and ask if they carry KO. If they don't, please request it.
If they do carry KO, make a purchase--it is still a great gift for friends and family. And encourage your friends to pick up their copy too! THANK YOU!
**ENERGY SAVING TIP** As the cooling season draws to a close, please remember to change the filter in your HVAC intake vent. This will improve your indoor air quality and cut energy usage as we move into the heating season.
Progress on Global Warming
UN chief praises climate summit
UN chief Ban Ki-moon says a one-day summit in New York has given fresh impetus to efforts to tackle global warming.
UN chief Ban Ki-moon says a one-day summit in New York has given fresh impetus to efforts to tackle global warming.
9/16/2009
Rich Countries' Carbon Emissions
Bank urges climate 'action now'
Rich countries must lift climate change spending and accept responsibility for their historical emissions, says the World Bank.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/go/em/-/2/hi/science/nature/8256961.stm
Rich countries must lift climate change spending and accept responsibility for their historical emissions, says the World Bank.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/go/em/-/2/hi/science/nature/8256961.stm
World Health Catastrophe
Doctors warn on climate failure
Failure to agree a new UN climate deal in December will usher in a "global health catastrophe", according to medical leaders.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/go/em/-/2/hi/science/nature/8257766.stm
Failure to agree a new UN climate deal in December will usher in a "global health catastrophe", according to medical leaders.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/go/em/-/2/hi/science/nature/8257766.stm
8/19/2009
Dow's New Pesticide
Dow Chemicals is pitching a new pesticide that also happens to be an extraordinarily potent greenhouse gas, 4,780 times more potent than carbon dioxide. A group of scientists and advocates have organized to attempt to block the request from Dow AgroSciences to use the pesticide sulfuryl fluoride on farm fields in four states.
http://www.greenmuze.com/climate/heat/1302-dows-potent-ghg-pesticide-.html
http://www.greenmuze.com/climate/heat/1302-dows-potent-ghg-pesticide-.html
7/08/2009
The G8 and Climate Change
http://www.opendemocracy.net/article/the-g8-and-climate-change-towards-copenhagen
7/06/2009
6/29/2009
Betraying the Planet
Betraying the Planet
By PAUL KRUGMAN
So the House passed the Waxman-Markey climate-change bill. In political terms, it was a remarkable achievement.
But 212 representatives voted no. A handful of these no votes came from representatives who considered the bill too weak, but most rejected the bill because they rejected the whole notion that we have to do something about greenhouse gases.
And as I watched the deniers make their arguments, I couldn’t help thinking that I was watching a form of treason — treason against the planet.
To fully appreciate the irresponsibility and immorality of climate-change denial, you need to know about the grim turn taken by the latest climate research.
The fact is that the planet is changing faster than even pessimists expected: ice caps are shrinking, arid zones spreading, at a terrifying rate. And according to a number of recent studies, catastrophe — a rise in temperature so large as to be almost unthinkable — can no longer be considered a mere possibility. It is, instead, the most likely outcome if we continue along our present course.
Thus researchers at M.I.T., who were previously predicting a temperature rise of a little more than 4 degrees by the end of this century, are now predicting a rise of more than 9 degrees. Why? Global greenhouse gas emissions are rising faster than expected; some mitigating factors, like absorption of carbon dioxide by the oceans, are turning out to be weaker than hoped; and there’s growing evidence that climate change is self-reinforcing — that, for example, rising temperatures will cause some arctic tundra to defrost, releasing even more carbon dioxide into the atmosphere.
Temperature increases on the scale predicted by the M.I.T. researchers and others would create huge disruptions in our lives and our economy. As a recent authoritative U.S. government report points out, by the end of this century New Hampshire may well have the climate of North Carolina today, Illinois may have the climate of East Texas, and across the country extreme, deadly heat waves — the kind that traditionally occur only once in a generation — may become annual or biannual events.
In other words, we’re facing a clear and present danger to our way of life, perhaps even to civilization itself. How can anyone justify failing to act?
Well, sometimes even the most authoritative analyses get things wrong. And if dissenting opinion-makers and politicians based their dissent on hard work and hard thinking — if they had carefully studied the issue, consulted with experts and concluded that the overwhelming scientific consensus was misguided — they could at least claim to be acting responsibly.
But if you watched the debate on Friday, you didn’t see people who’ve thought hard about a crucial issue, and are trying to do the right thing. What you saw, instead, were people who show no sign of being interested in the truth. They don’t like the political and policy implications of climate change, so they’ve decided not to believe in it — and they’ll grab any argument, no matter how disreputable, that feeds their denial.
Indeed, if there was a defining moment in Friday’s debate, it was the declaration by Representative Paul Broun of Georgia that climate change is nothing but a “hoax” that has been “perpetrated out of the scientific community.” I’d call this a crazy conspiracy theory, but doing so would actually be unfair to crazy conspiracy theorists. After all, to believe that global warming is a hoax you have to believe in a vast cabal consisting of thousands of scientists — a cabal so powerful that it has managed to create false records on everything from global temperatures to Arctic sea ice.
Yet Mr. Broun’s declaration was met with applause.
Given this contempt for hard science, I’m almost reluctant to mention the deniers’ dishonesty on matters economic. But in addition to rejecting climate science, the opponents of the climate bill made a point of misrepresenting the results of studies of the bill’s economic impact, which all suggest that the cost will be relatively low.
Still, is it fair to call climate denial a form of treason? Isn’t it politics as usual?
Yes, it is — and that’s why it’s unforgivable.
Do you remember the days when Bush administration officials claimed that terrorism posed an “existential threat” to America, a threat in whose face normal rules no longer applied? That was hyperbole — but the existential threat from climate change is all too real.
Yet the deniers are choosing, willfully, to ignore that threat, placing future generations of Americans in grave danger, simply because it’s in their political interest to pretend that there’s nothing to worry about. If that’s not betrayal, I don’t know what is.
By PAUL KRUGMAN
So the House passed the Waxman-Markey climate-change bill. In political terms, it was a remarkable achievement.
But 212 representatives voted no. A handful of these no votes came from representatives who considered the bill too weak, but most rejected the bill because they rejected the whole notion that we have to do something about greenhouse gases.
And as I watched the deniers make their arguments, I couldn’t help thinking that I was watching a form of treason — treason against the planet.
To fully appreciate the irresponsibility and immorality of climate-change denial, you need to know about the grim turn taken by the latest climate research.
The fact is that the planet is changing faster than even pessimists expected: ice caps are shrinking, arid zones spreading, at a terrifying rate. And according to a number of recent studies, catastrophe — a rise in temperature so large as to be almost unthinkable — can no longer be considered a mere possibility. It is, instead, the most likely outcome if we continue along our present course.
Thus researchers at M.I.T., who were previously predicting a temperature rise of a little more than 4 degrees by the end of this century, are now predicting a rise of more than 9 degrees. Why? Global greenhouse gas emissions are rising faster than expected; some mitigating factors, like absorption of carbon dioxide by the oceans, are turning out to be weaker than hoped; and there’s growing evidence that climate change is self-reinforcing — that, for example, rising temperatures will cause some arctic tundra to defrost, releasing even more carbon dioxide into the atmosphere.
Temperature increases on the scale predicted by the M.I.T. researchers and others would create huge disruptions in our lives and our economy. As a recent authoritative U.S. government report points out, by the end of this century New Hampshire may well have the climate of North Carolina today, Illinois may have the climate of East Texas, and across the country extreme, deadly heat waves — the kind that traditionally occur only once in a generation — may become annual or biannual events.
In other words, we’re facing a clear and present danger to our way of life, perhaps even to civilization itself. How can anyone justify failing to act?
Well, sometimes even the most authoritative analyses get things wrong. And if dissenting opinion-makers and politicians based their dissent on hard work and hard thinking — if they had carefully studied the issue, consulted with experts and concluded that the overwhelming scientific consensus was misguided — they could at least claim to be acting responsibly.
But if you watched the debate on Friday, you didn’t see people who’ve thought hard about a crucial issue, and are trying to do the right thing. What you saw, instead, were people who show no sign of being interested in the truth. They don’t like the political and policy implications of climate change, so they’ve decided not to believe in it — and they’ll grab any argument, no matter how disreputable, that feeds their denial.
Indeed, if there was a defining moment in Friday’s debate, it was the declaration by Representative Paul Broun of Georgia that climate change is nothing but a “hoax” that has been “perpetrated out of the scientific community.” I’d call this a crazy conspiracy theory, but doing so would actually be unfair to crazy conspiracy theorists. After all, to believe that global warming is a hoax you have to believe in a vast cabal consisting of thousands of scientists — a cabal so powerful that it has managed to create false records on everything from global temperatures to Arctic sea ice.
Yet Mr. Broun’s declaration was met with applause.
Given this contempt for hard science, I’m almost reluctant to mention the deniers’ dishonesty on matters economic. But in addition to rejecting climate science, the opponents of the climate bill made a point of misrepresenting the results of studies of the bill’s economic impact, which all suggest that the cost will be relatively low.
Still, is it fair to call climate denial a form of treason? Isn’t it politics as usual?
Yes, it is — and that’s why it’s unforgivable.
Do you remember the days when Bush administration officials claimed that terrorism posed an “existential threat” to America, a threat in whose face normal rules no longer applied? That was hyperbole — but the existential threat from climate change is all too real.
Yet the deniers are choosing, willfully, to ignore that threat, placing future generations of Americans in grave danger, simply because it’s in their political interest to pretend that there’s nothing to worry about. If that’s not betrayal, I don’t know what is.
6/25/2009
Learn About Solar Hot Water
http://greenhomesamerica.wordpress.com/2009/06/03/solar-hot-water-video/
6/23/2009
6/12/2009
Waxman-Markey to Pelosi
http://www.1sky.org/pressroom/2009/06/1sky-and-allies-send-letter-to-speaker-pelosi-asking-for-opportunities-to-strength
6/09/2009
6/04/2009
5/27/2009
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)