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~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Brought to you by the Environmental and Energy Study Institute British/French Nuclear Deal Sparks Debate On March 27, British Prime Minister Gordon Brown and French President Nicolas Sarkozy met in London and agreed to cooperate on constructing a new generation of nuclear power stations and export the technology around the world in an effort to combat climate change. The leaders agreed to streamline the development of projects by getting French and British nuclear regulators to work more closely on nuclear safety, security, waste management and reactor licensing, and to increase the exchange of nuclear technicians and expertise. On March 26, John Hutton, Britain's Secretary of State for Business, Enterprise and Regulatory Reform, said Britain's nuclear program should go beyond replacing the existing stock of 23 reactors, which provide 3.8 percent of the country's energy, and should instead contribute "a significantly higher proportion" of the nation's energy needs in the years ahead. Hutton added, "Britain has the potential to become a gateway to a new nuclear renaissance across Europe." Luis Echavarri, director-general of the OECD's Nuclear Energy Agency, said, "The UK is the only country in Europe that could soon be setting up a new nuclear program with lots of reactors." Antony Froggatt, an energy analyst with Chatham House, said, "The price of steel is going up, the price of heavy equipment is going up--and that's a problem across the board, whether people are building nuclear or coal-fired plants. We only have a few nuclear reactors being built in Europe.[The furthest advanced], Olkiluoto 3 in Finland, has been in construction for two and half years, and it's already two years behind schedule and 30 percent over budget." Environmental groups argue that Britain is wrong to believe that nuclear power can solve its energy problems. They say a new nuclear fleet would arrive too late and contribute too little to provide a meaningful constraint on climate change. In addition, it would be a dangerous distraction from developing renewables and leave a legacy of toxic waste. Friends of the Earth campaigner Neil Crumpton said, "The idea of selling nuclear power around the world as a solution to climate change is just nonsense. Nuclear power is limited, dangerous and requires a lot of hi-tech skills to deal with the waste. By far the better technology is renewables." Click on the following links for more information: Climate Change Could Radically Change Lake Tahoe in 10 Years Lake Tahoe water mixes, on average, every four years. The study showed that, if greenhouse gas emissions continue at current levels, mixing could become less frequent and less deep--even stop altogether as soon as 2019. UC Davis Tahoe Environmental Research Center Director Geoffrey Schladow said, "If mixing shuts down, then no new oxygen gets to the bottom of the lake, and creatures that need it, such as lake trout, will have a large part of their range excluded." When the oxygen is gone, phosphorus that is currently locked up in the lake-floor sediments will be released to fuel algal growth on the lake's surface. Algae blooms can cause many problems, including reduced lake clarity, unpleasant odors and bad-tasting drinking water. Click on the following links for more information:
Three Oregon environmental groups are calling on state transportation and land-use commissions to set goals and adopt policies that will reduce greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions by cutting back on car and truck travel in the state. 1000 Friends of Oregon, the Oregon Environmental Council and Environment Oregon recommend increased funding for transit, rail and bicycle transportation. In January, the Governor’s Climate Change Integration Group (CCIG) issued its final report, "A Framework for Addressing Rapid Climate Change." In the 116-page report, the task force of top state scientists and business leaders said Oregon should rapidly try to become a "low-carbon economy" that is environmentally sustainable and globally competitive. According to the report, transportation accounts for 34 percent of Oregon's GHG emissions. CCIG and the three environmental groups specifically recommended that the state's Oregon Task Force on Land Use Planning include climate change as a core issue in land-use planning. Jeremiah Baumann, program director of Environment Oregon, said land-use patterns are crucial to the success of light rail and other transit options, which in turn reduce car and truck traffic. More densely developed housing, for example, provides ridership for light-rail systems. Vehicle miles traveled (VMT) are unlikely to drop unless patterns of suburban sprawl change. "It's harder to reduce VMT if you don't do anything about land use," Baumann said. Click on the following links for more information:
A report published by Greenpeace March 25 estimates that 125 million people could be displaced in South East Asia by the end of the century if global temperatures were to rise by between 4-5°C. The report, "Blue Alert – Climate Migrants in South Asia: Estimates and Solutions," warns that millions could be displaced by the impacts of climate change, including rising sea levels, and droughts associated with shrinking water supplies and changes to the monsoon season. "More than 120 million people from India and Bangladesh alone will become homeless by the end of this century," the report says. On average, the region known as the Low Coastal Elevation Zone covering India, Pakistan and Bangladesh is 10 meters below sea level and is home to 130 million people. In related news, at the March 25 Bangladesh-UK Climate Change Conference, Bangladesh Adviser for Foreign Affairs Dr. Iftekhar Ahmed Chowdhury said, "For Bangladesh, the adverse impact of global warming is not a distant reality. It is an imminent threat and our survival as a nation is at stake. We cannot afford procrastination. If we collectively fail to reverse the trends in global warming, as much as one-fifth of Bangladesh will disappear in the Bay of Bengal." Click on the following links for more information: UN Calls Asia-Pacific Warming Impacts "Vast" On March 27, the United Nations Economic and Social Commission (UNESCAP) published its "2008 Economic and Social Report for Asia and the Pacific" which found that the impact of climate change in the Asian region of the Pacific could be "vast" if the region does not undertake any measures to reduce greenhouse gas emissions. The report said an increase in temperature can cause "a rise in the sea level, the melting of glaciers, land erosion, forest fires and devastating diseases, especially for the poorest populaces." According to UNESCAP, a new regional framework for managing climate change should include measures to promote eco-efficiency, expand carbon trading, support technology transfers and manage waste efficiently. The report recommends eliminating fossil energy subsidies because "this would reduce the consumption of primary energy sources and CO2 emissions considerably." To promote "green development", the report also recommends taxation of older, more polluting vehicles, tax incentives for companies that invest in cleaner technologies and the reduction of taxes for energy-efficient light bulbs. Click on the following links for more information:
A report released March 25 by the Pacific Fisheries Resource Conservation Council finds that pine beetle infestations in British Columbia (BC) are impacting salmon runs. The beetles, which are spreading with warming climates, have chewed through interior pine forests covering an area four-times the size of Vancouver Island, affecting 60 percent of the Fraser River watershed. Loss of forest cover over salmon streams has led to numerous impacts that "significantly alter the watershed's ecology, threatening already stressed salmon runs." Because the pine forests are dead or dying, the tree boughs don't intercept snow and rain, or shade the forest floor to slow the spring snow-melt. More rapid snow-melts lead to flash flooding and higher peak stream flows that erode streams, and rapid runoffs mean more summer droughts, combined with higher summer water temperatures that hurt the salmon. The report, entitled “Mountain Pine Beetle: Salmon are Suffering Too, “ estimates that by 2014, 80 percent of BC’s pine forests will be gone due to mountain pine beetle infestation, with enormous economic, environmental and social consequences. Projections of the total cost range to over $170 billion—-more than the province’s annual Gross Domestic Product. In 2007, the BC Forest Practices Board cited a need for new government policy and strategies to protect drinking water and fish habitat in watersheds attacked by the mountain pine beetle. In addition, a scientific review released March 27 entitled "A Great Wave Rising" offers federal managers a set of strategic global warming solutions necessary for the recovery of endangered Columbia and Snake river salmon and steelhead and the communities and industries that depend on them. Report co-author Patty Glick, senior policy specialist with the National Wildlife Federation, said, "Solutions are not only available; they can and must be implemented now." Click on the following links for more information: Climate Change Affecting Trees, Streams in the West According to a 55-page analysis of the most recent temperature data from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), the American West is warming nearly twice as fast as the rest of the world. The Rocky Mountain Climate Organization (RMCO) found that for the five-year period 2003-2007, the average temperature in the Colorado River Basin was 2.2°F hotter than the historical average for the 20th Century. The temperature rise was more than twice the global average increase of 1.0°F during the same period. The average temperature increased 1.7°F in the entire 11-state western region. In Yellowstone National Park, aerial photographs show vast orange-needled forests of whitebark pine that were green just three years ago. Colorado has started losing its lodgepole pine forests to a pine bark beetle infestation. Rocky Mountain snowpacks are melting earlier in spring, leaving warmer trout streams and less water for summer irrigation. As recently reported in EESI's Climate Change News, Lake Powell and Lake Mead reservoirs are half-empty. RMCO report author Stephen Saunders said, “We are seeing signs of the economic impacts throughout the West. Since 2000 we have seen $2.7 billion in crop loss claims due to drought. Global warming is harming valuable commercial salmon fisheries, reducing hunting activity and revenues, and threatening shorter and less profitable seasons for ski resorts.” RMCO is a coalition of local governments, businesses and others working to protect the climate. The Natural Resources Defense Council (NRDC) funded and helped compile the report, entitled "Hotter and Drier: The West's Changed Climate." Click on the following links for more information:
Recent research shows the Himalayan glaciers are melting and will soon deprive the major Chinese and Indian rivers, the Ganges, the Yellow River and the Yangtze River basins, of the water they need during the dry summer seasons to irrigate the rice and wheat crops on which hundreds of millions of people depend. As reported in a paper released this week by Lester Brown, President of the Earth Policy Institute, China and India together produce more than half the world's wheat and rice, and those three river basins supply much of it. The Gangotri Glacier in the Himalayas alone supplies 70% of the flow of the Ganges in the dry season. Brown said, the “world has never faced such a predictably massive threat to food production as that posed by the melting mountain glaciers of Asia.” The rest of the grain of China and India is fed by water that for years has been pumped from underground aquifers faster than it can be replaced. Brown reports that the water tables under both the North China Plain and the Punjab, the main grain-growing regions irrigated this way, are sinking. Losing both sources of irrigation, Brown says, “could lead to politically unmanageable food shortages. . . At issue is not just the future of mountain glaciers, but the future of world grain harvests. The alternative to this civilization-threatening scenario is to abandon business-as-usual energy policies and move to cut carbon emissions 80 percent—not by 2050 as many political leaders suggest, because that will be too late, but by 2020.” Click on the following links for more information:
On March 25, scientists said a 160 square mile chunk of ice in western Antarctica, about seven times the size of Manhattan, suddenly collapsed, putting an even greater portion of glacial ice at risk. The ice shelf, which started its break February 28, was the edge of the Wilkins ice shelf, an area of 5,600 square miles, and has been there for hundreds, possibly 1,500 years. The rest of the Wilkins ice shelf, which is about the size of Connecticut, is now protected by just a thin thread of ice between two islands. Scientists worry that it too may collapse. Such occurrences are “more indicative of a tipping point or trigger in the climate system,” said Sarah Das, a scientist at the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institute. British Antarctic Survey scientist David Vaughan said, “Wilkins is the largest ice shelf on the Antarctic peninsula yet to be threatened. I didn't expect to see things happen this quickly. We predicted it would happen, but it's happened twice as fast as we predicted. . . It's bigger than any ice shelf we've seen retreating before, and in the long term it could be a taste of other things to come. It is another indication of the impact that climate change is having on the region.” Click on the following links for more information: Report Shows Soot as Major Player in Global Warming In the March 23 Nature Geoscience article, “Global and Regional Climate Changes Due to Black Carbon,” it was reported that soot and other forms of black carbon from biomass and forest burning has 60 percent of the current global warming effect of carbon dioxide (CO2), more than that of any greenhouse gas (GHG) besides CO2. The authors of the report, Veerabhadran Ramanathan of the Scripps Institute in San Diego, California, and Greg Carmichael of the University of Iowa, said black carbon, a form of particulate air pollution most often produced from biomass burning, cooking with solid fuels and diesel exhaust, has a warming effect in the atmosphere three to four times greater than prevailing estimates. The researchers noted that unlike CO2, which lingers in the atmosphere for 100 years after it is released, black carbon has an atmospheric life cycle of approximately one week—therefore mitigation would have immediate benefits in addition to the long-term effect of reducing GHG emissions. In the paper, the two scientists integrated observed data from satellites, aircraft and surface instruments about the warming effect of black carbon and found that its forcing, or warming effect in the atmosphere, is about 0.9 watts per meter squared. That compares to estimates of between 0.2 watts per meter squared and 0.4 watts per meter squared that were agreed upon as a consensus estimate in a report released last year by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change. Ramanathan and Carmichael said the conservative estimates are based on widely used computer model simulations that do not take into account the amplification of black carbon’s warming effect when mixed with other aerosols such as sulfates. The models also do not adequately represent the full range of altitudes at which the warming effect occurs. Click on the following links for more information:
On March 24, Ernst & Young, a global leader in assurance, tax, transaction and advisory services, released a list outlining the challenges insurers face, ranking climate change as the greatest strategic threat facing the insurance industry. The top ten risks on the list, acquired through Ernst & Young’s collaboration with Oxford Analytica, resulted from discussions between the company’s global analysts and from leaders in more than 20 disciplines. The analysis stated that climate change causes changes in weather patterns and shifts the underlying probability of insured loss from floods, wind storms and other natural phenomena. Insurers may be forced to scrutinize their insurability criteria. It was reported that climate change also affects pricing structures, reserving policies, solvency and corporate viability, as well as more gradual consequences like increased health problems. Leonard Sharman, a spokesman with The Co-operators in Guelph, Ontario, said premiums are directly related to the costs insurers incur and that those costs have doubled every five to seven years for several decades. He said, “Yeah, I do think consumers in home and business insurance will end up paying more.” In a March 24 interview, Mark Yakabuski, president and CEO of the Insurance Bureau of Canada, said “There's no doubt that going forward that climate change is indeed the single biggest risk faced by the property and casualty insurance industry. The carbon dioxide and other pollutants that are already in the environment as a result of greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions will be in our environment for at least 50 years. They will motor the forces of climate change in a way that will give rise inevitably to more frequent, severe weather. That is one of the inevitable by-products of a warming planet.” Click on the following links for more information: $300 Million Climate Change Marketing Campaign to Launch in United States The Alliance for Climate Protection is preparing to launch the most ambitious US marketing campaign ever on climate change, at a cost of more than $100 million a year for three years, to focus on the urgency of the problem and solutions. Mike Hughes, president and creative director of the Martin Agency, is developing the ad campaign for the Alliance. It is due out in the next few months. With its primary aim being to point voters to public policy solutions for the looming climate crisis, they are hoping to make climate change a major issue in the upcoming presidential race. Hughes said, “Even though people think climate change is important, it’s not one of the top three issues that people cite when talking about their choices for President.” Public policy isn’t the only focus of the ad campaign. The Alliance will buy ads and partner with grass-roots groups to spread the word on how to cut greenhouse gases. They are hoping that in conjunction with what it’s calling “community partners” across the nation, it can inspire significant changes in Americans’ environmental behavior: in the ways they drive; heat, light, and cool their homes; wash laundry; and buy food. Americans are aware of global warming, “but they don't get the urgency of it and that this is solvable,” said Cathy Zoi, CEO of the Alliance. Hughes said, “We have incredible numbers of people in the United States who say global warming is an important problem that needs to be fixed. But most people think there’s nothing they can do about it—or that someone should do something about it, but that someone isn’t them.” Click on the following links for more information: Climate Change May Cost Germany $1.23 Trillion by 2050 A study released March 26 by the German Institute for Economic Research (DIW) at the 3rd Extreme Weather Congress in Hamburg finds that the financial costs of climate change could be as high as 800 billion euros ($1.23 trillion) by 2050. Dr. Claudia Kemfert, chief energy expert at DIW, said the effects of climate change will differ from region to region. Northern Germany will see warmer average temperatures that could revive tourism at the Baltic and North Sea coasts; in central and southwestern Germany, extreme rainfalls and thunderstorms will become the norm, while southern and eastern Germany will be hit by drought periods. By 2050, skiing in the German Alps will probably be impossible. Rising temperatures could also lead to problems with energy supply as nuclear power plants, for example, might run out of cooling water, the report said. Click on the following links for more information: New England Not Meeting Climate Targets A report released March 26 by the Environment New Hampshire Research & Policy Center, the Clean Water Fund and the New England Climate Coalition finds that New England is not on track to meet the targets for greenhouse gas (GHG) pollution reductions set by the New England governors in 2001. To fulfill its commitment under the Climate Change Action Plan, signed by the Conference of New England Governors and Eastern Canadian Premiers, New England must reduce emissions to 1990 levels by 2010 and to 10 percent below 1990 levels by 2020. The report, "Falling Behind: New England Must Act Now to Reduce Global Warming Pollution," says the emission reduction target of the Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative (RGGI)--10 percent below projected 2009 levels by 2019--is inadequate to address New England's GHG emissions and should be strengthened. The report found GHG emissions increased in five of the six New England states from 2001 to 2005. New Hampshire had the greatest increase in emissions at 26 percent, largely due to new power plants coming on line that serve the New England electric grid. Rhode Island was the only state to show a drop in emissions, a 7 percent reduction. The bulk of the drop was due to reductions in power production and transportation emissions. The study suggested adopting mandatory caps on global warming pollution from all sectors of the economy, strengthening environmental and energy policies, and building a more sustainable transportation system that would reduce emissions by investing in rail and encouraging downtown redevelopment in a pedestrian-friendly way. Click on the following links for more information: Arctic Seals Candidates for Endangered Species List On March 26, the National Marine Fisheries Service accepted a petition seeking threatened or endangered status for ribbon, ringed, spotted and bearded seals. The seals have been losing habitat as Arctic sea ice recedes. Doug Mecum, acting administrator for the Alaska Region, said, "While the four species of ice seals in Alaska all utilize various types of sea ice habitats, they use the ice in different ways. Therefore, careful status reviews of each species are warranted." Shaye Wolf, a biologist with the Center for Biological Diversity and the lead author of the listing petition, said "The science is really clear that all of the seals are threatened by global warming by the loss of sea ice, and they all need protection." In related news, the US Fish and Wildlife Service is two and a half months overdue on a final decision to list polar bears as threatened or endangered. In September, US Geological Survey predicted that as much as two-thirds of the polar bear population could disappear by mid-century because of the loss of summer sea ice attributed to climate change. Listing a species would trigger a recovery plan that could address US causes of global warming or other activity that could hurt the seals or polar bears, such as offshore oil and gas development. Click on the following links for more information: Events April 1, 2008 Briefing: Climate Change and International Security The German Advisory Council on Global Change (BGU) is hosting a Congressional briefing on "Climate Change as a Security Risk" that will examine how climate change may overstretch many societies’ adaptive capacities, resulting in destabilization and violence and jeopardizing national and international security. It will also discuss how climate change efforts could unite the international community if it recognizes global warming as a threat to humankind and adopts a dynamic and globally coordinated climate policy. The briefing will be held on Tuesday, April 1, from 3:00-4:30 p.m. in Room 2255 of the Rayburn House Office Building, Washington, DC. For more information contact Mario-Ingo Soos at wi-2@wash.diplo.de or see http://www.wbgu.de/wbgu_jg2007_engl.html
Senators Amy Klobuchar (D-MN) and Richard Lugar (R-IN), in collaboration with the World Resources Institute, are holding a briefing entitled "Climate Change and the Midwest" which will discuss the impacts of climate change on Midwestern states. The briefing will be held Wednesday, April 2, at 3:30pm in Room 410 Senate Dirkesen Office Building, Washington DC. For more information please contact Mark Wilson in Senator Klobuchar’s office (202-224-3244) or Aaron Whitesel in Senator Lugar’s office (202-224-4814). Quick Links SUBSCRIBE to our newsletters and other products ARCHIVE: Past issues of the newsletter are posted on our website under "publications" SUPPORT EESI: This newsletter and EESI's other valuable work in energy, climate change, agriculture, transportation and smart growth are made possible through financial support from people like you. Please donate now. Fredric Beck This EESI publication is a free, weekly electronic newsletter intended to inform interested parties, particularly the policymaker community, of the latest climate change-related news. Permission for reproduction of this newsletter is granted provided that EESI is properly acknowledged as the source. The Environmental and Energy Study Institute is a non-profit organization established in 1984 by a bipartisan, bicameral group of members of Congress to provide timely information on energy and environmental policy issues to policymakers and stakeholders and develop innovative policy solutions that set us on a cleaner, more secure and sustainable energy path. |
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