Climate Climate & Energy

Utility will pay for solar on Habitat for Humanity houses in California

Recognizing that solar electricity is a good investment in the long run but a bit spendy up front, utility Pacific Gas and Electric has agreed to pay for solar power on some 65 houses built by Habitat for Humanity in northern and central California next year. PG&E will donate about $1.2 million for panels and […]

Arctic sea ice continues to melt at alarming rate

A chunk of Arctic sea ice roughly the size of Florida melted in just six days, according to scientists who warn that ice in the region continues to melt at an alarming rate.

Reports are already surfacing of the detrimental effects such rapid habitat loss is having on marine mammals, such as polar bears, which use the ice to hunt and migrate. Most recently scientists have said polar bear populations could drop by 66 percent by mid-century.

Virtually every day there is news about the impacts of climate change on the oceans, from whale deaths due to lack of food, to potential coral destruction; from rising temperatures and increased ocean acidity, to the disappearance of cold water species because of warming ocean temperatures.

The oceans are suffering from climate change. More than ever we all need to do our part to step up and protect them.

Urban growth rates in Qatar and China leave Friedman skeptical about climate change mitigation

First the good news from The New York Times:

We have ended TimesSelect. All of our Op-Ed and news columns are now available free of charge. Additionally, The New York Times Archive is available free back to 1987.

Good for them. Interestingly, even though I had paid my money to get TimesSelect, I pretty much stopped reading the stuff behind the barrier because I couldn't connect readers (i.e., you) to the material. The NYT had basically taken some of their best columnists out of the global discussion. Now they are back.

Friedman has a new piece titled "Doha and Dalian" -- "Doha [top] is the capital of Qatar, a tiny state east of Saudi Arabia. Dalian [bottom] is in northeast China and is one of China's Silicon Valley." Their growth rates have surprised even itinerant Tom:

New book praising biofuels has an unexpected author

There are combinations that are just too weird: chocolate cake and grape juice (to steal from an old Dick Van Dyke show), or hearing the Rolling Stones' music used to market chastity belts and abstinence pledges. Or like seeing the Worldwatch Institute's name on a book praising biofuels ... the very fuels Les Brown, WWI's founder, is crusading against.

The gist of the book seems to be, "We need a completely different kind of biofuels than we have or are likely to ever see, but if that better, fairer system came along, it might be good for the poor." In other words, the Les-Brown-less WWI is now providing cover for people who don't give two burps about the poor, but sho' do love them some subsidies. And for people who will be throwing this book around the way Bush threw around Colin Powell's notorious UN speech on Saddam's "weapons of mass destruction."

New membrane technology for capturing CO2

Well, here's hoping ...

Thursday event in D.C. seeks carbon questions

Gear up your brains and flex those diatribe muscles, carbon offset nerds -- the offset debate is coming to the Capitol, and you're all invited to participate.

Institute of Ecosystem Studies Dr. William Schlesinger is going to be speaking at 6:00 pm this Thursday on Capitol Hill in Washington, D.C., about his recent work on the interaction between forests and climate -- and its implications for how and whether carbon offsets should be allowed. I'm on the board of the American Lands Alliance, the organization sponsoring the event, and we'd like to get some hot questions to fire at Schlesinger -- which is where Gristmill's offset nerd legions come in. If you're an outside-the-Beltway climate nerd, feel free to ask questions in the comments section below. If you're an inside the Beltway climate nerd, you should just come.

Schlesinger, a member of the National Academy of Sciences, is one of the top authorities on this topic -- and he's shown a rare willingness, for a scientist, to venture into the policy and political arena. In 2005, for instance, he endorsed a carbon tax, calling it "potentially the most effective means to improve our energy-use efficiency and reduce carbon dioxide emissions." He also serves on the board of TerraPass, a company that provides offsets to people and corporations that pollute.

American Lands invited Schlesinger because we're very concerned about the impact a massive expansion in biofuels production could have on wildlands, in national forests and elsewhere. If we're cutting down ancient forests to grow woody biomass tree farms, it will be neither climate nor ecosystem friendly. But we're also intrigued by the possibility of allowing polluters to get carbon credits for protecting intact ancient forests. Conceivably, it could radically alter the financial incentives in national forests and elsewhere so that timber companies and others could make more money by helping restore forests than logging them. But, if not carefully managed, there's also potential for abuse. Such a system is largely dependent on having a robust cap-and-trade or cap-and-auction system in place as well; if we adopt a carbon tax, does that mean that forests and other native ecosystems won't benefit from the massive investments in tackling the climate crisis?

Notable quotable

Nate Tyler, organizer of Lights Out San Francisco: If we don’t do something, by 2050, all the polar bears will be gone. That’s where Santa Claus lives, man. That’s a bummer.

Mercury moves from coal plant to fish dinner as fast as its name implies

A Scientificblogging post explains that it only takes three years for mercury emitted by coal-fired plants to travel up the food chain into fish that we eat:

"Before this study, no one had directly linked atmospheric deposition (mercury emissions) and mercury in fish," says study co-author Vincent St. Louis of the University of Alberta.

The experiment filled a major gap in scientists' understanding of how mercury moves from the atmosphere through forests, soils, lakes and into the fish that people eat.

It's immediate value is that it provides undeniable proof of a direct link, said St. Louis, who specializes in what is called whole-ecosystem experimentation.

He said it should spur policy-makers to enact regulations for more rapid reductions in mercury emissions by industry.

Yesterday

We had a lot of great stuff on the blog yesterday — so much that it was difficult to keep up. If you have time, go back and check out: Bill McKibben’s review of two new books on climate change politics, one by Bjorn Lomborg, on from Shellenberger & Nordhaus. Sierra Club head honcho Carl […]

Another positive feedback loop

Scientificblogging reports on the link between atmospheric water vapor and greenhouse gases:

The water vapor feedback mechanism works in the following way: as the atmosphere warms due to human-caused increases in carbon dioxide, methane, nitrous oxide, and chlorofluorocarbons, water vapor increases, trapping more heat in the atmosphere, which in turn causes a further increase in water vapor.

Basic theory, observations and climate model results all show that the increase in water vapor is roughly 6 percent to 7.5 percent per degree Celsius warming of the lower atmosphere.

The authors note that their findings, when taken together with similar studies of continental-scale river runoff, zonal-mean rainfall, and surface specific humidity, point toward an emerging human-caused signal in the cycling of moisture between the atmosphere, land and ocean.

"This new work shows that the climate system is telling us a consistent story," Santer said. "The observed changes in temperature, moisture, and atmospheric circulation fit together in an internally- and physically-consistent way."