Green Options

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For those who fervently follow global warming to the secret labyrinths of the White House, we all know what the professional spinners did with that email attachment from the Environmental Protection Agency about how greenhouse gasses were polluting the environment and should be checked.

Instead of acting upon it or even printing copies to president George Bush and his handlers, they tossed it in a cyber trash bin called Spam folder as if that was the only green thing to do.

Many months after Scott McClellan quit spinning for Dubya, climate watchers are crying foul that he never ever touched the seemingly hot subject in his recently released book, What Happened. But in his famous spins, he had blamed human activity - you and me - as responsible for global warming on more than one occasion.

Spin can be clever tomfoolery sometimes but the White House stance on global warming is well known and George W. Bush has never disappointed with his public statements that smack verily of official ignorance or pretense on the subject as an inconvenient truth.

The proliferation of voluntary carbon offset programs seems like a great way for individuals to help fight climate change. But do carbon offset programs really work? That’s the question for Bill Stanley, Science Lead for Carbon Strategies, Climate Change Team at The Nature Conservancy.

A new study suggests that geysers, like Old Faithful, are affected by climate conditions, such as droughts. Shaul Hurwitz, a researcher with the U.S. Geological Survey, Ashish Kumar, a Stanford University statistician, and two National Park Service scientists have discovered that changes in the supply of underground water to a geyser can influence the amount of time between eruptions.  “Coupled with this decrease in precipitation, we see an increase in eruption [...]

Over the past year we’ve reported about the continuing changes taking place in our planets climate. A very US-centric view will point to a number of shifts in various patterns that have caused alarm. A new report released yesterday by the US Climate Change Science Program has shown that these changes are affecting the US with such speed and frequency, that they are unable to keep up.

We spend a lot of our time looking at research and studies that focuses on one particular aspect of the planet. Rarely does anyone spend the time to look at a multitude of aspects, to acquire a look at the overall picture. It seems like science is all about proving the big picture by proving a small portion of that big picture.

However critics will be the first to tell us that the small picture does not necessarily reflect the big picture. Just like a jigsaw of the planet Earth, you might think that the whole planet is blue if they are the only pieces of the puzzle you saw, but look at it in total, and you’ll find a few solid bits as well!

So that is why a new study has assembled information never before gathered together in one spot. The study looked at a vast array of physical and biological systems across our planet, and looked at if and how they were being affected by global warming. The study appears in the May 15 issue of the journal Nature.

“When you look in detail at the science behind the recent Arctic changes it becomes painfully clear how our understanding of climate impacts lags behind the changes that we are already seeing in the Arctic,” warned Martin Sommerkorn, one of the authors of a new report from conservation group the World Wildlife Fund (WWF).

This report adds weight to a growing number of reports and findings that are pointing to 2008’s summer as a turning point for the Arctic region; one where there could be no sea-ice at all.

I’m really looking forward to summer, and not just because I’m the warm-weather type. This past winter’s snow and cold — and yes, we’ve had some unseasonably cool weather even in Florida, where I live — has filled the global warming deniers with more hot air than you’ll find in Bill O’Reilly’s sauna, and it’s time for the silliness to end.

There’s so much glee and gloating in the deniers’ headlines: “Central Plank of Global Warming Alarmism Discredited” (referring to MIT researcher Kerry Emanuel’s recent finding that climate change might not result in more and stronger hurricanes), “Uncommon Cold is an Antidote to Warming Fears” (it’s been cold this winter, hasn’t it?), “Global Warming Gets the Cold Freeze” (ditto). Yup, a budget crunch for snow-removal in Chicago and cold iguanas falling from trees in Florida sure proves all those hundreds of silly IPCC scientists wrong.

Straight up, I’ll say that the heading is supposed to be “alarmist.” But the fact remains that, unless we do something now, the future is far too unpredictable to depend upon.

A report published in Nature by authors Roger Pielke Jr., Tom Wigley and Christopher Green, has described the IPCC’s assumptions that the bulk of the challenge of reducing future emissions will occur in the absence of climate policies as “…optimistic at best and unachievable at worst…”

In a press conference on Thursday, Lester Brown, president of the Earth Policy Institute, shared his concern that greenhouse gas emissions in the atmosphere will lead to grain and water shortages in India and China as well as rising grain prices in the United States.

“The world has never faced such a massively predictable potential reduction in grain harvest as we are now looking at with the melting of the glaciers in the Himalayas and the Tibetan Plateau,” said Mr. Brown. “Keep in mind, this is not based off of a climate model with somewhat theoretical projections. This analysis is based on what is already happening–on a trend that’s very well established in both India and in China.”

I played around for a few minutes with a heading that said something along the lines of “Scientists alert us to the Obvious… etc” for this story. It seems to me that I am dealing more and more with people who simply intend to live their lives with their heads buried in the sand.

That isn’t to say that [...]

Korea’s rapid industrialization can be felt everywhere, from the coastal landscapes, which are dotted with factories, to the large cities–Seoul, Busan, and Daegu–which often have air quality so poor that skylines are swallowed in smog.

Now, the outgoing government of Korea has passed new legislation to combat this pollution and join in the international battle against climate change.

The aptly named “Act on Climate Change” will establish an emissions trading market, raise the bar for renewable energy, assist in reducing industrial, home, and vehicle emissions, and increase carbon capture.