NewsRack: 'Greenhouse Gases' news in 'Climate Change' topic for user Genecampaign

Climate change art exhibition opens in Beijing \| Jennifer Duggan	25.5.2013	Guardian: Environment
Exhibition, called Unfold, aims to merge culture and science to provoke climate debate in China With its greenhouse gas emissions continuing to soar and environmental concerns a hot topic, China is perhaps the perfect venue for a different way of looking at the issue of climate change – through art. A climate-themed art exhibition is to open in Beijing today and will look at themes and debates provoked by climate science. The exhibition, called Unfold is being staged by not-for-profit climate change arts organisation Cape Farewell which aims to prompt what it calls a cultural response to climate change. The exhibition has travelled to a number of cities, starting in Vienna, and has also been shown in New York, London and Chicago. It includes the work of more than 20 artists, all of whom have travelled on and been inspired by expeditions to the Arctic and the Andes. "All of the artists in the show have travelled on one of the three voyages [organised by Cape Farewell]. So they have all had ...
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Don't delay on renewable energy, government told	23.5.2013	The Guardian -- Front Page
Committee on Climate Change says the sooner the UK invests in low-carbon power generation the cheaper it will be Investing in new renewable power generation, rather than a "dash for gas", will be the lower-cost option for keeping the lights on while cutting greenhouse gas emissions, the government's climate change watchdog has said. The sooner the UK makes large investments in low-carbon generation – including offshore and onshore wind, nuclear power and energy from waste – the cheaper it will be, according to David Kennedy, chief executive of the Committee on Climate Change (CCC), the statutory body that advises ministers on meeting emissions targets. The conclusions are likely to be controversial, as many MPs on the right of the Tory party have been clamouring for an end to onshore windfarms and reductions in renewable subsidies. They would prefer to see a new "dash for gas" that would require the UK to massively expand shale gas drilling and import tens of billions of pounds worth ...
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Fossil fuel divestment campaign's victory in Australia will be a moral one \| Alexander White	22.5.2013	Guardian: Environment
Global climate divestment campaigns led by 350.org and Bill McKibben will have a larger moral impact than financial one Journalist and climate activist Bill McKibben is in Australia in June on his epic Do The Math tour , which aims to highlight the danger of fossil fuel company oil and coal reserves and encourage divestment. The tour was kick started by McKibben's Rolling Stone article, Global Warming's Terrifying New Math , which argued that in order to stay below the 2C warming limit, the global economy has a budget of less than 565 gigatons of carbon dioxide. Unfortunately, fossil fuel companies have reserves of carbon from oil, coal and gas of almost 3000 gigatons — far exceeding the climate's safe limit if it were to all be burned. This "math" has been known for some years before McKibben's article. The Potsdam Institute wrote about humanity's carbon budget back in 2009 , noting that even if we stayed within budget, we still had a 25% chance of going over 2 degrees warming. ...
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Climate change meltdown unlikely but human disaster looms, claims new research	19.5.2013	Guardian: Environment
But forecast global temperature rise of 4C heralds disaster for large swaths of planet with oceans absorbing most global warming Some of the most extreme predictions of global warming are unlikely to materialise, new scientific research has suggested, but the world is still likely to be in for a temperature rise of double that regarded as safe. The researchers said that warming was most likely to reach about 4C above pre-industrial levels if the past decade's readings were taken into account. That would still lead to catastrophe across large swaths of the Earth, causing droughts, storms, floods and heatwaves and with drastic effects on agricultural productivity leading to secondary effects such as mass migration. Some climate change sceptics have suggested that because the highest global average temperature yet recorded was in 1998, climate change has stalled. The new study, which is published in the journal Nature Geoscience , shows a much longer "pause" would be needed to suggest ...
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Obama's Arctic strategy sets off a climate time bomb \| Nafeez Ahmed	17.5.2013	Guardian: Science
US National Strategy for the Arctic Region prioritises corporate 'economic opportunities' at the expense of everyone else One week ago, the Obama administration launched its National Strategy for the Arctic Region , outlining the government's strategic priorities over the next 10 years. The release of the strategy came about a week after the Office of Science and Technology Policy within the Executive Office of the President at the White House Complex hosted a briefing with international Arctic scientists . Despite giving lip service to the values of environmental conservation, the new document focuses on how the US can manage the exploitation of the region's vast untapped oil, gas and mineral resources in cooperation with other Arctic powers. US hinges success of Arctic strategy on diminishing sea ice At the heart of the White House's new Arctic strategy is an elementary but devastating contradiction between what President Obama, in the document's preamble, describes as seeking "to ...
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Global warming has not stalled, insists world's best-known climate scientist	17.5.2013	Guardian: Environment
Prof James Hansen warns public not to be fooled by 'diversionary tactic' from deniers Suggestions that global warming has stalled are a "diversionary tactic" from "deniers" who want the public to be confused over climate change, according to the world's best-known climate scientist. Prof James Hansen, who first alerted the world to climate change in 1988, said on Friday: "It is not true that the temperature has not changed in the two decades." Since 1998, when the Niño climate phenomenon caused global temperatures to soar, the rate of increase in warming has slowed, causing some sceptics to suggest climate change has stopped or that the effect of rising carbon dioxide levels on climate is not as great as previously thought. Prof Hansen, speaking to BBC Radio 4's Today programme, rejected both arguments. "In the last decade it has warmed only a tenth of a degree compared to two-tenths of a degree in the preceeding decade, but that's just natural variability. There is no reason to be ...
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Population growth and climate change explained by Hans Rosling – video	17.5.2013	Guardian: Environment
Han Rosling demonstrates the dynamics of population growth, child mortality and carbon dioxide emissions Claire Provost Claudine Spera
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Column: Carbon threshold crossed (Cached)	14.5.2013	Rediff: Business
While long term solution depends on each one of us altering our consumption patterns, the future depends on next generation technologists and entrepreneurs creating business models that naturally reduce the green house gas emissions.
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UN highlights potential for generating clean energy in Africa (Cached)	14.5.2013	New Kerala: World News
New York, May 14 : Less than 1 per cent of all patent applications relating to clean energy technology (CET) have been filed in Africa, according to a new United Nations study, which also highlights the opportunity for the continent to leapfrog existing fossil-fuel energy sources and, in the process, cut greenhouse gas emissions and improve public health.
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UN urges coordinated response to CO2 'danger zone' (Cached)	14.5.2013	New Kerala: World News
New York, May 14 : In the face of "clear and present danger," the United Nations climate change body is warning that a stepped-up coordinated response is needed to fend off the impacts of climate change after the world's carbon-dioxide concentrations surpassed their highest level in 4 million years.
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India must develop own climate model: US expert (Cached)	13.5.2013	New Kerala: India News
By Richa Sharma, New Delhi, May 13 : India is amongst the countries most vulnerable to climate change and must develop its own model to study changes at the regional level and take necessary mitigation measures, a senior US scientist of Indian origin said.
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One-third of animal species will be hit by climate change, scientists warn	13.5.2013	The Guardian -- World Latest
Plant and animal species could see dramatic losses as habitats become unsuitable and ecosystems collapse One-third of common land animals could see dramatic losses this century because of climate change, scientists predict. More than half of plants could be hit the same way as habitats become unsuitable for numerous species. The collapse of ecosystems would have major economic impacts on agriculture, air quality, clean water access, and tourism. Global temperatures are set to rise 4C above preindustrial levels by 2100 if nothing is done to stem greenhouse gas emissions. This could have a hugely destructive effect on thousands of common as well as rare and endangered species around the world, according to the researchers. An estimated 57% of plants and 34% of animals were likely to lose half or more of their habitat range. But the damage would be greatly reduced if emissions were scaled down in time, the study shows. Losses are reduced by 60% if global warming is cut to 2% ...
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Climate change could leave hundreds of millions homeless (Cached)	13.5.2013	New Kerala: Andhra Pradesh
London, May 12 : It is increasingly likely that hundreds of millions of people will be displaced from their homelands in the near future as a result of global warming, according to an expert.
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Climate change 'will make hundreds of millions homeless'	12.5.2013	The Guardian -- World Latest
Carbon dioxide levels indicate rise in temperatures that could lead agriculture to fail on entire continents It is increasingly likely that hundreds of millions of people will be displaced from their homelands in the near future as a result of global warming. That is the stark warning of economist and climate change expert Lord Stern following the news last week that concentrations of carbon dioxide in our atmosphere had reached a level of 400 parts per million (ppm). Massive movements of people are likely to occur over the rest of the century because global temperatures are likely to rise to by up to 5C because carbon dioxide levels have risen unabated for 50 years, said Stern, who is head of the Grantham Research Institute on Climate Change. "When temperatures rise to that level, we will have disrupted weather patterns and spreading deserts," he said. "Hundreds of millions of people will be forced to leave their homelands because their crops and animals will have died. The trouble will ...
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Climate change: swift political action can avert a carbon dioxide crisis \| Observer editorial	12.5.2013	The Guardian -- World Latest
Carbon dioxide levels have reached an all-time high. But there is some hope if governments take the figures seriously The news that concentrations of carbon dioxide in our atmosphere reached a level of 400 parts per million last week might not appear to have immediate significance. The level is only a couple of units higher than last year, after all. Yet the development has undoubted importance. With the realisation that carbon dioxide levels have achieved that symbolic 400ppm figure, it is now clear that two decades of warnings from scientists have fallen on deaf ears and that our leaders have failed completely to curtail rising outputs of greenhouse gases across the world. Indeed, they have allowed them to accelerate. In the 1960s, levels rose at 0.7ppm a year. Today, they rise at 2.1ppm, as more and more nations become industrialised and increase outputs from their factories and power plants. As a result, the most conservative of scientific calculations suggest Earth now faces a 50-50 ...
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Global carbon dioxide in atmosphere passes milestone level	10.5.2013	The Guardian -- World Latest
Climate warming greenhouse gas reaches 400 parts per million for the first time in human history For the first time in human history, the concentration of climate-warming carbon dioxide in the atmosphere has passed the milestone level of 400 parts per million (ppm). The last time so much greenhouse gas was in the air was several million years ago, when the Arctic was ice-free, savannah spread across the Sahara desert and sea level was up to 40 metres higher than today. These conditions are expected to return in time, with devastating consequences for civilisation, unless emissions of CO2 from the burning of coal, gas and oil are rapidly curtailed. But despite increasingly severe warnings from scientists and a major economic recession, global emissions have continued to soar unchecked . "It is symbolic, a point to pause and think about where we have been and where we are going," said Professor Ralph Keeling, who oversees the measurements on a Hawaian volcano, which were begun by his father ...
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Meteorite crater reveals future of a globally warmed world	9.5.2013	Guardian: Environment
Lake sediments recorded the climate of the Arctic during the last period when CO2 levels were as high as today The future of a globally warmed world has been revealed in a remote meteorite crater in Siberia, where lake sediments recorded the strikingly balmy climate of the Arctic during the last period when greenhouse gas levels were as high as today. Unchecked burning of fossil fuels has driven carbon dioxide to levels not seen for 3m years when, the sediments show, temperatures were 8C higher than today, lush forests covered the tundra and sea levels were up to 40m higher than today. "It's like deja vu," said Prof Julie Brigham-Grette, at the University of Massachusetts Amherst, who led the new research analysing a core of sediment to see what temperatures in the region were between 3.6 and 2.2m years ago. "We have seen these warm periods before. Many people now agree this is where we are heading." "It shows a huge warming – unprecedented in human history," said Prof Scott Elias, at ...
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Academics warn Canada against further tar sands production	9.5.2013	The Guardian -- World Latest
Letter urges natural resources minister Joe Oliver to consider consequences of his support for controversial policy The Canadian government's promotion of the tar sands industry is setting the world on a course of catastrophic climate change, a group of climate scientists and economists have warned. In a letter made available to the Guardian, the academics urged Canada's natural resources minister, Joe Oliver, to consider the consequences of his support for expanding Alberta's tar sands production. Oliver has in recent months emerged as the main proponent for the Keystone XL pipeline in Washington and other capitals. He is due in London this week. The project would pump crude from the tar sands directly to refineries on the Texas Gulf coast, and so provide a much-needed outlet for Canada's crude. But the academics warned that unlocking Alberta's tar sands, which are thought to hold some 170bn barrels of recoverable oil, would put a dangerous amount of carbon into the atmosphere. ...
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'Emissions plan could energise climate talks'	8.5.2013	Guardian: Environment
The proposal for a climate deal by 2015 based on national 'contributions' gained traction UN talks in Germany last week The United States' proposal to let countries draft their own emissions reduction plans rather than working toward a common target can unlock languishing UN climate negotiations , the US climate change envoy said on Tuesday. The proposal that a global climate deal by 2015 should be based on national "contributions" gained traction at last week's round of UN talks in Germany , although China, the world's biggest carbon emitter, said it wanted far more binding commitments by wealthy countries. In the first public US statements on the plan, Todd Stern, the US State Department's special envoy on climate change, told reporters on Tuesday that the US approach was designed to bring as many countries as possible to the table through a form of peer pressure and break the impasse over a successor to the 1997 Kyoto protocol . "Countries, knowing that they will be subject to the ...
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Carbon emissions 'rapidly acidifying' Arctic Ocean (Cached)	7.5.2013	New Kerala: Andhra Pradesh
London, May 7 : Global warming is making the Arctic Ocean acidic, according to a new report by the Arctic Monitoring and Assessment Programme (AMAP).
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