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Tiempo Climate Newswatch

News Archive 2005

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Action point

Jim Salinger

Jim Salinger describes his priority for action on global warming. You can play the low bandwidth or the high bandwidth version

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Featured sites

Plan B, from the Earth Policy Institute, details how to rescue a planet under stress by cutting carbon emissions 80 per cent by 2020.

The e-newsletter from the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change Secretariat provides a comprehensive overview of major news and announcements regarding the climate negotiations.

The OzoneAction Education Pack provides primary school teachers with practical, hands-on and entertaining curricula material to educate their students about ozone depletion.

The Youth Climate Pledge is a collaborative plan of action that young people can sign on to and get others to commit to.

And finally,

The United Nations Paint for the Planet exhibition features paintings by child artists on the theme of climate change.

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About Newswatch

Tiempo Climate Newswatch is a weekly on-line magazine with news, features and comment on global warming, climate change, sea-level rise and development issues. It is edited by Mick Kelly and Sarah Granich and maintained by Mick Kelly and Mike Salmon. The cartoons are created by Lawrence Moore.

The news stories carried by Newswatch are updated weekly. Comment, features, interviews and other sections of the magazine are updated on a weekly to monthly basis.

Newswatch automatically scans a number of news sites once an hour, searching for a set of keyphrases. The raw news feed can be accessed in standard or PDA format.

Part of the Tiempo Climate Cyberlibrary, Tiempo Climate Newswatch is hosted by the Climatic Research Unit, School of Environmental Sciences, University of East Anglia.

The Tiempo Climate Cyberlibrary is a co-production of the Stockholm Environment Institute and the International Institute for Environment and Development, sponsored by the Swedish International Development Cooperation Agency.

While every effort is made to ensure that information on this site, and on other sites that are referenced here, is accurate, no liability for loss or damage resulting from use of this information can be accepted.

Week ending December 25th 2005

Richard Sandbrook

It is with a great sense of personal and professional sadness that we report the death of Richard Sandbrook. Richard died of cancer on Sunday December 11th 2005.
We first discussed with Richard the vision that became the Tiempo Programme in 1989 and continued our collaboration with him as co-editors of the bulletin through the 1990s. His vision of a global climate information project that would serve the diverse interests of the developing world and promote global dialogue and understanding has guided the Tiempo Programme's development over the past 15 years.
We will miss Richard's inspiration, his wisdom, his integrity and his mischievous and irreverent sense of humour. Most of all, we will miss a valued friend.

Mick Kelly and Sarah Granich

2005 will be the second warmest year since 1860 according to the provisional global surface air temperature estimate for the year released by the UK Met Office and the University of East Anglia (UEA) in the United Kingdom. 1998 remains the warmest year on record. Eight of the ten warmest years have occurred within the past ten years. Over the Northern Hemisphere, the year has been the warmest since 1860. "The data also show that the sea surface temperature in the Northern Hemisphere Atlantic is the highest since 1880," said David Viner of the UEA Climatic Research Unit.

Adam Scaife at the Met Office Hadley Centre reckons that "these figures show that global warming is continuing and are consistent with what we expect to occur from our research into greenhouse gas emissions." Fred Singer from the Science & Environmental Policy Project, Washington DC, United States, disagrees. "If indeed 2005 is the warmest Northern Hemisphere year since 1860, all this proves is that 2005 is the warmest Northern Hemisphere year since 1860. It doesn't prove anything else, and certainly cannot be used by itself to prove that the cause of warming is the emission of greenhouse gases. It requires a more subtle examination to know how much of warming is due to man-made causes - there must be some - and how much is down to natural causes."

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The United Nations has established a US$500 million emergency relief fund aimed at providing rapid assistance following natural disasters. The Central Emergency Response Fund is ten times larger than the existing facility. "The difference is that we will have a larger fund, but also that it will be more flexible," according to United Nations General Assembly President Jan Eliasson. In the past, he continued, "we had to wait for commitments before we could really start massive operations. Now we will be able to do that from the beginning, and not have to wait for individual commitments."

Meanwhile, Dieter Schiessl, World Weather Watch director, has warned that an early warning system for the Indian Ocean nations aimed purely at forecasting tsunamis, rather than a broader range of hazards, would not be financially sustainable in the long run. Speaking at a United Nations conference on a tsunami warming and mitigation system in Hyderabad, India, he said that "if we have to establish a warning infrastructure that will only be tested in very rare occurrences such as tsunamis it is simply inviting operational problems. We need to have a system that is more frequently used and that means the system should address several natural hazards and the most frequent ones such as tropical storms and flooding."

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Land-cover change in the Amazon caused by human activity could generate about the same amount of warming in the region as greenhouse gas increases, according to a recent model simulation. In middle latitudes, the effect of local land-use changes might be to significantly reduce greenhouse warming. The study was the first projection of 21st century climate change to couple interactive ocean and atmosphere models with a land surface model in order to incorporate changes in land cover caused by agriculture, deforestation and other human activities.

"The choices humans make about future land use could have a significant impact on regional and seasonal climates," said project leader Johannes Feddema of the University of Kansas. Deforestation warms the tropics by replacing forests with less productive pasture, whereas midlatitude cropland acts as a cooling influence as the crops reflect more sunlight and release more moisture into the air. "Compared to global warming, land use is a relatively small influence. However, there are regions where it's really important," Feddema concludes.

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Week ending December 18th 2005

Canadian Prime Minister Paul Martin challenged the United States to participate fully in the climate treaty process as he opened the ministerial segment of the 11th Conference of the Parties (COP11) to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change in Montreal, Canada. "Climate change is a global challenge that demands a global response. Yet there are nations that resist, voices that attempt to diminish the urgency or dismiss the science, or declare, either in word or indifference, that this is not our problem to solve. Well, let me tell you, it is our problem to solve," he said. He singled out the United States by name at a later press conference.

After a considerable amount of grandstanding, the ministerial meeting reached agreement on the way forward, although it did take an extra day of negotiations. "This has been one of the most productive UN climate change conferences ever. Our success in implementing the Kyoto Protocol, improving the Convention and Kyoto, and innovating for tomorrow led to an agreement on a variety of issues. This plan sets the course for future action on climate change," concluded Richard Kinley, acting head of the climate treaty secretariat. The major agreement reached in Montreal concerned the signatories to the Kyoto Protocol alone. This gives the Kyoto members seven years to negotiate and ratify accords on the post-2012 phase, extending the current emissions control commitments.

Following a parallel track, a broader group of nations, including the United States, has agreed to non-binding talks on future cooperation. This will be a global "dialogue", not restricted to the industrialized nations. Negotiations leading to new emissions control commitments are explicitly ruled out. According to the COP-11 Decision, the dialogue should, amongst other things, "identify approaches which would support, and provide the enabling conditions for, actions put forward voluntarily by developing countries that promote local sustainable development and mitigate climate change in a manner appropriate to national circumstances, including concrete actions to enable countries, in particular developing countries, to manage and adapt to climate change."

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According to George Mkondiwa, of the Ministry of Lands, Housing, Physical Planning and Surveys of Malawi, the time when Malawians were able to feed themselves, after independence in 1964, is long gone. "As I speak, some five million Malawians, nearly half of the entire population, face starvation and require food aid," said Mkondiwa. "The more vulnerable sections of the population are subsisting on unpalatable wild foods." Mkondiwa was addressing a Development and Adaptation Days event, held alongside the climate convention sessions in Montreal, Canada.

Last year, Mkondiwa said, farmers in Malawi who planted during the first rains watched their plants scorch as the rains were interrupted for long periods. "Everyone is asking such questions as, 'Is this due to climate change or not… and what proof do you have?', he continued. "I can assure you that everyone that is experiencing these adverse effects first hand, that indeed the patterns and trends in climate have changed in the last decades. While local scientists have not yet published their findings in the journal Science, we don’t think there is any doubt that this is due to climate change. Malawi does not have the luxury to wait, for instance, for scientific research to prove some indelible link between climate change and recent droughts, because people are dying now."

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One hundred villagers from Lateu, in northern Vanuatu, have been forced to move to higher ground by recurrent flooding, with the coastline eroding two to three metres a year. According to Taito Nakalevu of the Pacific Regional Environment Programme, "We are seeing king tides across the region flooding islands. These are normal events, but it is the frequency that is abnormal and a threat to livelihoods. People are being forced to build sea walls and other defenses not just to defend their homes, but to defend agricultural land." The United Nations Environment Programme considers that the village "has become one of, if not the first, to be formally moved out of harm's way as a result of climate change."

The news of the relocation was announced at a meeting aimed at building bridges between two vulnerable groups - Arctic peoples and those living in small island developing states - held alongside the climate treaty sessions in Montreal, Canada. "What is at stake here is not just the extinction of animals," said Sheila Watt Cloutier, of the Inuit Circumpolar Conference, "but the extinction of Inuit as a hunting culture. Climate change in the Arctic is a human issue, a family issue, a community issue, and an issue of cultural survival. The joining of circumpolar peoples with Pacific Island and Caribbean States is surely part of the answer in addressing these issues. Many small voices can make a loud noise."

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Background

Week ending December 11th 2005

The rules for limiting greenhouse gas emissions under the Kyoto Protocol have been adopted. The agreement took place at the First Meeting of the Parties to the Kyoto Protocol, which began on November 28th 2005, alongside the 11th Conference of the Parties to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change. The meetings are being held in Montreal, Canada. The Kyoto rules cover greenhouse gas accounting, investment in developing countries, emissions trading and other operational details.

Saudi Arabia attempted to block agreement on the provision on compliance with the Protocol commitments, arguing that implementing the compliance provision through an amendment to the Protocol itself would strengthen the compliance mechanism. Others considered the move an attempt to delay agreement on the deal and postpone the discussions on what do after the end of the Kyoto period in 2012. "They're trying to stop any discussion of what to do after 2012," accused Jennifer Morgan of WWF International. There was confidence, though, that agreement would be reached by the end of the meeting. The compliance system stipulates that any country that misses its target will have to make up the shortfall, and an additional 30 per cent penalty, during the next period. Emissions trading rights may be affected.

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The Atlantic hurricane season of 2005 drew to an official close on Wednesday November 30th, though activity continued with the formation of Tropical Storm Epsilon following Tropical Storm Delta's eastward progress towards Morocco. The season as a whole broke a number of records. Twenty-six tropical storms formed, compared to the previous high of 21 back in 1933. Thirteen developed into hurricanes, beating the old record of 12 in 1969. Four major hurricanes made landfall in the United States, a new record. A record five storms formed in July. Hurricane Dennis was the most powerful July storm recorded. Three hurricanes reached Category Five status, another record. Hurricane Vince became the first known tropical storm to hit Spain and Portugal. Hurricane Wilma was the most powerful hurricane known to have formed in the Atlantic Basin.

Hurricane Katrina proved the most costly natural disaster to hit the United States, with damage estimated at US$80 billion and an estimated 1300 fatalities. "Within all the record-breaking statistics of the season, there are epic human impacts... suffering on a very large scale," commented Max Mayfield, director of the United States National Hurricane Center (NHC). Forecasters had warned that activity would be high during 2005 because of high ocean temperatures in the tropical Atlantic. High-level wind conditions also played a part. Many storms formed closer to land and developed more rapidly than usual due to the extra energy picked up from the warm water. According to NHC forecaster Stacy Stewart, "Wilma went from a tropical storm to Category Five in 24 hours. That's unprecedented!"

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A new study predicts that the Sahel region of north Africa will become drier as global warming develops. "Our model predicts an extremely dry Sahel in the future," reports Isaac Held of the United States National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. "If we compare it against the drought in the 1970s and 80s, the late 21st century looks even drier - a 30 per cent reduction in rainfall from the average for the last century."

The result contradicts the findings of a recent assessment of Sahel predictions. Held reckons that this may be because of differences in the simulation of clouds and recommends the use of multiple models to reduce the effects of uncertainties on the predictions. The modelling attributes the 20th century drought in the Sahel to a combination of anthropogenic factors, aerosol pollution and rising greenhouse gas concentrations, and natural climate variability.

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Background

Week ending December 4th 2005

The First Meeting of the Parties to the Kyoto Protocol is taking place from November 28th to 9th December 2005 in Montreal, Canada, alongside the 11th Conference of the Parties (COP-11) to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change. COP-11 will see the launch of a five-year work programme on adaptation. "A certain degree of climate change is no longer avoidable", said Halldor Thorgeirsson, coordinator of the Climate Change Secretariat’s Methods, Inventories and Science Programme. "All countries need to adapt to the inevitable impacts. Developing countries will be hardest hit by those impacts and need the necessary assistance."

Other issues for discussion at the meetings include technology (particularly carbon capture and storage), and strengthening the Clean Development Mechanism. The post-Kyoto regime will also be on the agenda. "It will be very complex," said Elliot Diringer of the Pew Center on Global Climate Change. "Any agreement has to be more flexible than Kyoto but at the same time has to deliver real cuts in emissions and the Bush administration is adamantly opposed to any process aimed at widening Kyoto." Jennifer Morgan of WWF International proposes that "developed countries should continue after 2012 with Kyoto-type commitments with ever deeper cuts, but developing countries should start with less strict goals." "The United States wants to block this process from starting," according to David Doniger of the Natural Resources Defense Council. "Look for the United States to use a variety of strategies to try to veto consensus," he said, such as lining up Middle Eastern OPEC countries and India in favour of voluntary approaches.

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Levels of carbon dioxide and methane in the atmosphere are higher than at any time in the past 650,000 years, according to a study of Antarctic ice cores published in the journal Science. "We find that carbon dioxide is about 30 per cent higher than at any time, and methane 130 per cent higher than at any time; and the rates of increase are absolutely exceptional: for carbon dioxide, two hundred times faster than at any time in the last 650,000 years," reported project leader Thomas Stocker from the University of Bern, Switzerland.

In the same journal, an analysis of ocean sediment cores has revealed that global warming has already doubled the historic rate of sea-level rise. Over the past 5,000 years, evidence from the sediment cores shows that sea levels have risen on average at about 1mm each year, but since the mid 19th century the rate has been 2mm a year. "The main thing that has happened since the 19th century and the beginning of the modern observation has been the widespread increase in fossil fuel use and more greenhouse gases," said lead author of the study Kenneth Miller of Rutgers University in the United States.

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Jan Egeland, emergency relief coordinator for the United Nations, has called for more effective disaster prevention and preparedness systems. "If we had had good early warning systems, much fewer would have died in the Indian Ocean tsunami. If we had had earthquake-safe schools, hospitals and housing in Northern Pakistan, tens of thousands would not have lost their lives. If we had had better levees in New Orleans, those who lived in the lower lying parts of the city would not have had to see their lives devastated," he told a news conference during a meeting of the International Task Force for Disaster Prevention in Geneva, Switzerland.

Egeland noted that 95 per cent of all deaths associated with natural disasters occur in the developing world, though disasters were evenly distributed around the world. "This is one of the biggest challenges of our time and age, the need to make vulnerable people living in developing nations more resilient to natural hazards," he said. The United Nations wants a central fund for emergency relief, rather than having to request funds after disaster strikes.

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Week ending November 27th 2005

In the run-up to the First Meeting of the Parties to the Kyoto Protocol, India has announced that it is unlikely to accept any restriction on emissions. "There is no way that anybody can expect countries like India to cap their emissions for the next 20-25 years," said S K Joshi from India's environment ministry. "We welcome the talks among the parties for the second commitment period strictly in accordance with the requirements of the Kyoto Protocol. The issue of entitlements has to be addressed and the countries that have agreed to take on commitments under the Protocol have to show demonstrable progress."

Greenhouse gas emissions from the richer nations have fallen overall since 1990, largely as a result of the collapse of Soviet-era industries. By 2003, total emissions from forty developed nations had dropped by 5.9 per cent below the 1990 level, surpassing the Kyoto Protocol target of a 5.2 per cent reduction by 2008-2012. "Further efforts are required to sustain these reductions and to cut the emissions further," warned the Secretariat of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change. "Greenhouse gas projections indicate the possibility of emission growth by 2010. It means that ensuring sustained and deeper emission reductions remains a challenge for developed countries," said Richard Kinley, acting head of the Secretariat.

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People living in sub-Saharan Africa and along the coasts of the Indian and Pacific Oceans are likely to be amongst the most seriously affected by the health impacts of climate change. The finding results from a new study led by Jonathan Patz of the University of Wisconsin-Madison, in the United States. "Many of the most important diseases in poor countries, such as diarrhoea and malnutrition, are highly sensitive to climate," said co-author Diarmid Campbell-Lendrum of the World Health Organization. "The health sector is already struggling to control these diseases and climate change threatens to undermine these efforts."

Patz and colleagues argue that climate change poses a "global ethical challenge", with those most at risk being least responsible for the problem. "The United States is the number one emitter of greenhouse gases, and as a developed nation must take a leadership role," to deal with these health problems, concludes Patz. "Our energy-consumptive lifestyles are having lethal impacts on other people around the world, especially the poor." But, he continues, China, the second largest emitter, must adopt strategies to reduce its emissions too, despite their per capita emissions being a fraction of the United States.

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In its Global Forest Resources Assessment, the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) reports that around 13 million hectares of forests, an area the size of Greece, are destroyed each year. The net rate of loss is, however, decreasing - down from 8.9 million hectares a year during the 1990s to 7.3 million hectares a year since the turn of the century. This improvement is largely the result of new plantations. "There are reasons to be very optimistic about what is happening," said Hosny El-Lakany, FAO assistant director general for forestry.

Environmental groups responded with a warning against complacency. "FAO continues to emphasize the net forest loss number. This is misleading because most of the world's most valuable forests, especially in the tropics, are vanishing as fast as ever," said Simon Counsell of the Rainforest Foundation. Counsell also challenged the FAO methodology, arguing that the definition of forest - ten per cent ground cover by tree canopy - was not stringent enough. "These figures are the main basis for global decision making on the world's most important ecosystems. We fear that bad decisions are going to made on the basis of bad data."

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Background

Week ending November 20th 2005

National positions on any post-Kyoto climate agreement are emerging as the First Meeting of the Parties to the Kyoto Protocol approaches. Australia has ruled out post-Kyoto limits, with environment minister Ian Campbell describing any attempt to negotiate new emissions levels as a "terrible waste of time." Japan, while struggling to meet its own emissions reduction targets, has stressed the importance of including all nations in a post-2012 agreement. "Climate change is not something that can be tackled only by Japan or only by Europe," said environment minister Yuriko Koike. "It's essential for the whole world to cut emissions." Japan is particularly concerned that its neighbour China act to limit growth in all forms of atmospheric pollution. Both Japan and China are members of the new Asia Pacific Partnership for Clean Development and Climate, intended to complement the Kyoto Protocol.

In Europe, the business think-tank, the International Council for Capital Formation (ICCF), has warned that compliance with the Kyoto Protocol could cost hundreds of thousands of jobs by the year 2010. The ICCF estimates that compliance could result in average increases of 26 per cent in electricity prices and 41 per cent in gas prices by that year. "The findings of our research suggest that an alternative approach [to climate change] is urgently needed for both the developing and developed world," reported Margo Thorning, ICCF managing director. British Prime Minister Tony Blair appeared to downplay chances of a targets-based, agreement post 2012, when speaking at a G8 meeting of energy and environment ministers recently.

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Two hundred million people in Africa are now considered under-nourished, according to research conducted by the International Food Policy Research Institute (IFPRI). The figure has risen by 20 per cent over the past 10 years. The IFPRI authors state that "up to 40 million Africans annually face acute hunger that requires concerted international efforts to prevent widespread starvation. Another 160 million also suffer from hunger and malnutrition, but in a less dramatic manner. For many of them such under-nourishment is a permanent characteristic of their lives."

Currently, more than a third of African children suffer stunted growth, with the highest prevalence occurring in countries in East and Central Africa, affected by civil conflict, flood, drought and economic downturns. Lack of vitamin A, iron, zinc and iodine are the main micronutrient deficiencies. Between 15,000 and 20,000 African woman die each year as a result of severe iron-deficiency anaemia. IFPRI considers that the percentage of malnourished children under five years old in East Africa could be cut by half by 2015.

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Liquid carbon dioxide would have to be injected at least 800m deep in the ocean, and possibly as much as 3000m deep, to prevent it escaping. The conclusion results from an ocean model experiment undertaken by Youxue Zhang at the University of Michigan. There is concern that the carbon dioxide droplets, if injected closer to the surface, may vent to the atmosphere having risen to the level (the liquid-gas transition depth, about 300m deep) where it becomes a gas. If this occurs suddenly, the gas can erupt, with potentially catastrophic consequences.

"Droplets injected to a depth of 800 metres will rise, but if they are small enough they should dissolve completely before reaching the liquid-gas transition depth - assuming everything works perfectly," said Zhang. "An even safer injection scheme would be to inject into a depth of more than 3000 metres, where carbon dioxide liquid is denser than seawater and would sink and dissolve." Zhang notes that there are also potential environmental consequences to be considered before deciding whether or not ocean injection is a viable means of disposing of carbon from power plants.

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Background

Week ending November 13th 2005

British Prime Minister Tony Blair appeared to downplay chances of targets-based, Kyoto-style agreement post 2012, speaking at a G8 meeting of energy and environment ministers in London, United Kingdom, on climate change last week. "The blunt truth about the politics of climate change is that no country will want to sacrifice its economy in order to meet this challenge," he warned. "But all economies know that the only sensible, long-term way to develop is to do it on a sustainable basis." "People fear some external force is going to impose some internal target on you which is going to restrict your economic growth," he continued. "I think in the world after 2012 we need to find a better, more sensitive set of mechanisms to deal with this problem."

Opposition politicians and environmentalists expressed serious concern at what appeared to be a marked shift in policy. Tony Juniper of Friends of the Earth called for clarification: "We need to understand what this means. It's seismic in climate change politics and threatens 15 years' worth of negotiations." Liberal Democrat environment spokesman Norman Baker said: "It is all very well for the government to trumpet the merits of technology in reducing carbon emissions, but it simply isn't enough; we need robust, measurable targets, not just vague aspirations." Environment Secretary Margaret Beckett warned that Blair's comments had been "grossly over-interpreted."

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African ministers, banking officials and development partners met in Nairobi, Kenya, October 26th to discuss how funds resulting from debt cancellation could be used to protect the environment. The poorer countries could save US$1.5 billion in debt repayments each year. "Targeted investments in 'natural capital' such as forests, water and land can be cost effective in helping countries meet internationally agreed goals," such as Millennium Development Goals, argued Klaus Toepfer, Executive Director of the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP).

The G8 decision made in Gleneagles, Scotland, earlier this year would cancel US$40 billion of debt owed by poor countries to the International Monetary Fund, the World Bank and the African Development Bank. UNEP has proposed a number of ways in which environmental protection could support socio-economic development, for example, with clean water supplies increasing school attendance, malaria rates reduced by declining deforestation and improvements in agriculture as a result of slowing land degradation.

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Urgent action is needed to protect the world's coral reefs, warns the World Conservation Union (IUCN) in a new report. "Twenty per cent of the Earth’s coral reefs, arguably the richest of all marine ecosystems, have been effectively destroyed today," reports Carl Gustaf Lundin of IUCN's Global Marine Programme. "Another 30 per cent will become seriously depleted if no action is taken within the next 20-40 years, with climate change being a major factor for their loss." Higher sea temperatures stress the reef system and cause coral bleaching, as the tiny plants that colour the white coral skeleton are ejected, and, if persistent, this process can result in the death of the coral.

The report, Coral Reef Resilience and Resistance to Bleaching, concludes that marine protected areas are key to ensuring the survival of these "underwater rainforests". "For a global marine protected areas network, we need to take climate change into consideration. Some marine ecosystems become more valuable, others less so, which influences our decisions on which site should be included in the global network," argues Lundin.

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Background

Week ending November 6th 2005

The United Nations has launched a multi-billion dollar partnership, TerrAfrica, to combat desertification in Africa. The aim of the new initiative, which involves, governmental, intergovermental and non-governmental organizations, is to increase the scale, efficiency and effectiveness of investments towards sustainable land management. "It promises to be a real shot in the arm to restoring the health of the continent's fragile lands and overcoming the seemingly relentless slide," said Klaus Toepfer, executive director of the United Nations Environment Programme. He referred to estimates that every dollar invested in anti-land degradation measures can garner a $US3 return.

Sixty-six per cent of the African continent is classed as desert or drylands and 46 per cent is at risk from desertification. Community involvement in fighting desertification will be a priority. "The challenge is to not only mobilize the communities on this issue, but to include them so they become part of the elements of change," according to Kenya's deputy environment minister Wangari Maathai. TerrAfrica was launched during the annual meeting of the United Nations Convention to Combat Desertification in Nairobi, Kenya.

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Background

Rising ocean temperatures around Antarctica are threatening populations of penguins, whales and seals, according to new data from British scientists. Commenting on the findings, Lloyd Peck of the British Antarctic Survey (BAS) said that "the sea temperature is going up in a way that wasn't predicted and this makes me more worried for the marine animals. The evidence we've got and the models we've been looking at said sea temperature was not likely to change much in the Antarctic. A one degree increase puts us into the region where the animals are pushed to one end of their biological, physiological and ecological capabilities."

BAS scientists Michael Meredith and John King found that sea temperatures west of the Antarctic Peninsula have risen 1.2 degrees Celsius during the summer months since 1955. Salinity in the surface layers of the ocean has also increased, affecting the formation of sea ice. "Both the temperature and salinity trends are in a direction that will act to reduce future sea ice production. Since a reduction in ice cover was important in the instigation of these trends, they constitute positive feedbacks," they report in Geophysical Research Letters.

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The government of Indonesia has launched a National Commission for the Clean Development Mechanism to promote emissions reduction projects. The Environment Ministry has estimated that the country could reduce carbon dioxide emissions from 300 million to 125 million tons by 2012. "Imagine how much a company could earn if one ton of emission reduction is worth US$5. It's good for the businesses, our environment and the stability of the world's climate," said State Minister for the Environment Rachmat Witoelar.

A partnership between the South African government and Business Unity South Africa (BUSA) that will address the threat of climate change has been announced. The partnership between business and government will draft national guidelines for the collection and management of national greenhouse gas emissions data. BUSA President Patrice Motsepe said that his organization "understands the importance of economic growth that does not mortgage our future for the sake of short-term profit, and we will work with Government to ensure that we address the challenges of climate change together."

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Week ending October 30th 2005

Deputy President Phumzile Mlambo-Ngcuka of South Africa has called for "desperate measures to be put in place as these are desperate times" at a national consultative conference on climate change. Agriculture and Land Affairs Minister Thoko Didiza said that climate change is a "serious" risk to poverty reduction, threatening decades of development. "South Africa's climate is highly variable and vulnerable to climate change as farming depends entirely on the quality of the rainy season," she continued. Given the link between food insecurity and the prevailing climate, "any long or short term changes thereof are paramount to our ability to feed the nation with high quality affordable staple foods."

The conference launched plans for a national research and development strategy, as part of the National Climate Change Response Strategy. South Africa is the African continent's largest greenhouse gas emitter. Marthinus van Schalkwyk, Environmental Affairs and Tourism Minister, argued that it was "much too early" for countries such as South Africa to limit greenhouse gas emissions, "but while we put pressure on the developed world, we must put our own house in order." "We stand ready to do more to decarbonize our development," he said. There was some criticism that the conference organizers had neglected South Africa expertise. In a letter to the Cape Times, Philip Lloyd of the University of Cape Town claimed that the meeting "did not represent the climate change debate in South Africa."

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Hurricane Wilma approached Belize and Mexico's Yucatán Peninsula Friday October 21st, forcing residents and tourists to flee or take shelter. Weakening to Category 3 as it hit land, the slow-moving storm generated a 3m storm surge causing flooding in the resort of Cancún. Heavy rains and high winds also affected Playa del Carmen and the resort island of Cozumel. Ten people died in mudslides on Haiti earlier in the week.

Cuba evacuated over 600,000 people in preparation for the storm, with six-metre waves pounding parts of the southern coast of the Isle of Youth. The storm made landfall in southern Florida Monday October 24th. At least six people lost their lives and three million homes and businesses were left without power.

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"The severity of the impacts of extreme events will increase in concert with global warming," according to a report delivered to the annual assembly of the International Council for Science (ICSU). The report marks the announcement of a new ICSU research programme to reduce the threats posed by natural and human-induced disasters. "It's time to change the mindset of governments, who tend to plan too little for natural disasters," concludes the study's leader, Gordon McBean of the Institute of Catastrophic Loss Reduction at the University of Western Ontario. According to the report, there are now 2,800 natural disasters per decade and, last year, natural disasters were estimated to have cost $US140 billion.

"Around the globe, population growth in hazardous areas means more and more people are at risk," the report observes, and human activity is increasing that risk. "Destruction of mangroves increases the susceptibility of coastal areas to storm damage, and emissions of pollutants and greenhouse gases can increase the frequency of extreme weather events." Calling for politicians to be better informed and for more interaction between policy makers and scientists, the study's authors report that "we have found ample evidence to suggest that policy makers may at times act in ignorance or disregard of the relevant scientific information and thereby significantly exacerbate damage resulting from natural hazards."

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Week ending October 23rd 2005

Several cities in the Brazilian state of Amazonas have been declared disaster areas as the worst drought in 40 years continues to affect the region. Thousands of people are reported to be without food, water or medicine. About one-fifth of the 1.3 million cattle in the state have died. At the port of Santarém, in the state of Pará, the Amazon River is about 2m lower than the average depth of 20m during the dry season.

There is speculation that the unusually warm waters of the North Atlantic Ocean may be responsible for the drought. As well as diverting storms towards the Caribbean, resulting in the devastating impact of recent hurricanes, warm Atlantic waters can create high pressure to the south over Amazonia, suppressing rainfall. "There is no rain here because the air is descending, which prevents the formation of clouds," said Ricardo Dellarosa of the Amazon Protection Organization.

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The Institute for Environment and Human Security (UNU-EHS) in Bonn, Germany, has called on the international community to urgently define, recognize and extend support for environmental refugees in a statement marking the International Day for Disaster Reduction on October 12th 2005. "There are well-founded fears that the number of people fleeing untenable environmental conditions may grow exponentially as the world experiences the effects of climate change and other phenomena," said Janos Bogardi, UNU-EHS director. "This new category of refugee needs to find a place in international agreements. We need to better anticipate support requirements, similar to those of people fleeing other unviable situations."

Tony Oliver-Smith, UNU-EHS Munich Re Foundation chair holder designate, warns of a "disaster-in-waiting in coastal areas, where "vulnerability is on the increase due to the rapid development of megacities." "Many cities are overwhelmed," he continues, incapable of handling with any degree of effectiveness the demands of a burgeoning number of people, many of whom take up shelter in flimsy shanties." Some progress has been made. New Zealand has agreed to take the 11,600 citizens of low-lying Pacific state of Tuvalu should rising sea levels inundate the nation.

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The leaders of over twenty world cities met in London, United Kingdom, in the first week of October at the World Cities Leadership Climate Change Summit to exchange ideas on dealing with the challenge of climate change. "Climate change is the biggest problem facing us, and cities have special issues such as the heat island effect and flash floods," reported Nicky Gavron, London's deputy mayor. "Everyone has a handful of good examples of dealing with impact and reducing greenhouse gas emissions." The mayor of London, Ken Livingstone, reckons that it is "at the city level that innovation and progress on climate change action are most likely to be achieved."

A Climate Group report, issued just before the Summit, describes 15 case studies of cities that have responded to the climate threat. Three-quarters of new buildings in Berlin have to include solar panels in their design. In Mexico City, 80,000 taxis are to be replaced with low-emissions vehicles by 2008. Chicago is encouraging the use of roof-top gardens to cool down buildings. The congestion charge scheme in London has reduced carbon dioxide emissions by 19 per cent.

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Week ending October 16th 2005

A new report from the World Health Organization (WHO), Preventing Chronic Diseases, calls for a two per cent annual reduction in deaths due to chronic diseases such as heart disease, stroke and cancer. "We can stop this global epidemic of chronic diseases if we take preventative action now," according to Robert Beaglehole, Chronic Diseases and Health Promotion director. "We estimate that 388 million people in the world are expected to die from chronic diseases... in the next 10 years, and everywhere the poor are the hardest hit."

The annual review, Environment Matters, from the World Bank was also released this past week. This year, it features health and the environment. Kerstin Leitner of the WHO writes that "climate change has begun to affect people’s health through changes in environmental factors: weather-related disasters, temperature extremes, changing habitats for disease vectors, and so on." The WHO has reported that the effects of climate change since the mid-1970s may have caused over 150,000 deaths in the year 2000. In his overview to the World Bank report, James Warren Evans, director of the World Bank Environment Department, identifies three challenges for the coming period: integrating environmental management in poverty reduction; bridging the global-national-local divides; and building on the Millennium Ecosystem Assessment.

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Hurricane Stan battered Central America and southern Mexico during the first week in October, bringing over five days of heavy rains to some areas. Guatemala was worst hit, with the official death toll topping 600 and many hundreds reported missing. There are fears that 1,400 people may have been lost in mudslides affecting two Guatemalan villages. Lives have also been lost or infrastructure damaged in southern Mexico, El Salvador, Belize, Haiti, Honduras and Nicaragua.

Hurricane Stan reached Category One strength before making landfall on the Mexican coast, with winds at 130km/hour, but it is the flooding and landslides accompanying the storm that have had the major impact. "The emergency is bigger than the rescue capacity, we have floods everywhere, bridges about to collapse, landslides and dozens of roads blocked by mudslides," said a spokesman for the Salvadoran Red Cross.

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According to the Red Cross, tens of thousands who died in the Asian tsunami of December 2004 could have been saved had there been quicker warnings. A quarter of a million people died during natural disasters during 2004, of which 225,000 perished in the tsunami. The Red Cross also concludes that a lack of coordination during the early stages of the relief effort delayed aid and assistance.

In the World Disasters Report for 2004, the Red Cross also criticizes the international community for ignoring warnings that Niger faced food shortages during 2005. "There were enough early warning signs to say that the situation could be quite severe in 2005," said Hisham Kigali, head of disaster response. "What, as a humanitarian community, we didn't do well enough is give out enough repeated messages saying that, particularly to donors."

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Week ending October 9th 2005

The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change launched a landmark report on the capture and storage of carbon dioxide this past week. "This essentially will be a textbook on carbon dioxide capture and storage, the first to bring it all together," commented John Bradshaw of Geoscience Australia, one of the report's lead authors. "It is vital that we exploit every available option for reducing their impact on the global climate. Carbon dioxide capture and storage can clearly play a supporting role, said Secretary-General Michel Jarraud of the World Meteorological Organization.

It has been calculated that carbon dioxide capture and storage could reduce the costs of emissions reduction by 30 per cent or more over the next 100 years. Carbon dioxide capture in the power generation sector has the greatest potential. Storage could be underground or at depth in the oceans. At present, storage in geological formations represents the most economical option, resting on considerable experience within the oil and gas industry. As far as injecting captured carbon dioxide into the oceans is concerned, "there are concerns regarding the impact such technologies could have on ocean life and it is known that marine organisms could be harmed" warns the IPCC.

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Arctic sea ice extent reached a record low in September 2005, with summer ice melt above average for the past four years. "Having four years in a row with such low ice extents has never been seen before in the satellite record. It clearly indicates a downward trend, not just a short-term anomaly," said Walt Meier of the United States National Snow and Ice Data Centre (NSIDC) in Colorado.

The spring melting of the Arctic ice began 17 days early this year. The Northwest Passage, through the Canadian Arctic from Europe to Asia, has been completely open this summer, apart from a 60 mile stretch with scattered ice floes. Ted Scambos at NSIDC warns that "feedbacks in the system are starting to take hold. We could see changes in Arctic ice happening much sooner than we thought and that is important because without the ice cover over the Arctic Ocean we have to expect big changes in Earth's weather."

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Sixty-one per cent of American adults, responding to a recent Harris Interactive Poll, believe that they will feel the effects of global warming within their lifetime. Of those, close to three-quarters reckon they are seeing effects already, amounting to about 44 per cent of the adult population of the United States.

Opinions are mixed regarding the quality of information on climate change. About a third said that they considered the quality to be excellent or good, a third reported the quality as fair, and 28 per cent considered the quality to be poor or terrible. The poll was commissioned by the Oak Ridge Center for Advanced Studies.

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Week ending October 2nd 2005

As Hurricane Rita weakened before making landfall on the Gulf Coast of the United States, heavy rain and high seas breached the newly-repaired levees of New Orleans, flooding parts of the city once more. Only 500 people remained in the city as Rita approached.

Mass evacuation along threatened sections of the Gulf Coast occurred well in advance of Rita's landfall, causing lengthy traffic jams. "I don't think they would have made this big deal about it before but Katrina has made everybody want to get out," resident Karen Mclinjoy told Reuters. In the event, Rita's impact failed to match the fears of another Katrina-scale catastrophe. Widespread structural damage, flooding and power failures occurred, but no fatalities were reported in the immediate aftermath. Hurricane Katrina is now believed to have caused over 1,000 deaths.

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Up to 10,000 people a year in the Asia-Pacific region could be dying as a result of impacts related to global warming, according to a World Health Organization (WHO) expert, and the number could increase over the next 50 to 100 years. Hisashi Ogawa, regional environmental adviser to the WHO, warned that "we need to adapt ourselves or our way of living... to the changing climate."

"The number of deaths due to various natural disasters - droughts, floods, storms - has increased [by] about 30 to 40 per cent" between the early 1980s and late 1990s, said Ogawa. Though it was not possible to identify the precise cause of this trend, the region's increasingly aged population was more vulnerable to stress. Rising temperature could also be affecting water quality and the spread of disease. Ogawa was speaking during a WHO regional meeting in Noumea, New Caledonia.

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Kofi Annan, United Nations Secretary-General, described the outcome of the 2005 World Summit as a "remarkable expression of world unity on a wide range of issues." He made particular note of the agreement on the precise steps to be taken in reaching the Millennium Development Goals. The lack of agreement on nuclear proliferation, "the most alarming threat we face in the immediate future," was the biggest gap in the outcome document.

The outcome document received mixed reviews. Catherine Pearce of Friends of the Earth International criticized the Summit outcome for not acknowledging fully the potential for renewable energy to reduce poverty and improve sustainable development in developing countries. "World leaders have clearly failed to face up to the urgent need to take action on climate change. This Summit was a golden opportunity for the United Nations to commit resources to and support some of the world's poorest countries that will face the harshest impacts of the world's changing climate," she said. Thoraya Ahmed Obaid, of the United Nations Population Fund, praised parts of the agreement. "Five years after the Millennium Declaration, the world has reaffirmed the need to keep gender equality, HIV/AIDS and reproductive health at the top of its agenda," she said. "This outcome is a success for millions of women, men and young people all over the world, whose appeals have been heard."

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Week ending September 25th 2005

United States President George Bush has accepted responsibility for failures in the response to Hurricane Katrina. "This government will learn the lessons of Hurricane Katrina," he said. Head of the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) Michael Brown resigned earlier in the week "to avoid further distraction from the ongoing mission of FEMA."

Some 40 per cent of the city of New Orleans is still flooded. Louisiana governor Kathleen Blanco, reporting that bodies had been decomposing in the city for two weeks, said that the dead "deserve more respect than they have received." The official death toll stands at 795 as of 16th September. It is believed that earlier reports of fatalities reaching ten thousand will prove unfounded.

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The United Nations has launched an urgent appeal for US$88 million to assist over 4 million people threatened by food shortages in Malawi. Maize production this year stands at little more than half that needed, with the central and southern regions most at risk. The World Food Programme (WFP) has warned that funding shortfalls mean that only a fraction of those needing aid in countries such as Malawi, Mozambique, Zambia and Zimbabwe will receive it.

"The warning signs are already clear," said Mike Sackett, WFP Southern Africa director. "Massive international assistance is needed," he continued, "but we simply cannot respond in time unless we get immediate donations. By raising the alarm now, we are hoping that the international community will help us to reach millions of the hungry - before they become the continent's next group of starving."

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A new study shows a worldwide trend towards a greater number of the most powerful hurricanes and typhoons and claims that this might be the result of global warming. "What I think we can say is that the increase in intensity is probably accounted for by the increase in sea surface temperature and I think probably the sea surface temperature increase is a manifestation of global warming," reported project leader Peter Webster of the Georgia Institute of Technology, Atlanta, in the United States.

There has been no rise in the total number of storms, but the proportion of hurricanes reaching categories 4 or 5 (wind speeds above 56 metres per second) increased from 20 per cent in the 1970s to 35 per cent over the past decade. "This trend has lasted for more than 30 years now. So the chances of it being natural are fairly remote," concludes Greg Holland of the National Center for Atmospheric Research, Boulder, Colorado.

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