GREENHOUSE WARMING NEWS - IPCC REPORT NEWS, FEB '07

GREENHOUSE WARMING NEWS - IPCC REPORT NEWS, FEB '07 IPCC REPORT NEWS, FEB '07
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Dec 17, 07: Delegates at a U.N. climate conference have agreed to include forest conservation in any future discussions about a new global warming pact, paving the way for billions of dollars in new spending to attack illegal logging, officials said.
. . With deforestation making up 20% of global emissions, world governments are desperate to find a solution to a problem that has been fueled by rising demand for timber and palm oil, widespread corruption and endemic poverty.
. . The program, Reducing Emissions From Deforestation and Degradation, aims to pay mostly developing tropical countries enough money to keep their trees in the ground —-and thus continue to absorb CO2-— rather than allowing them to be chopped down for a profit.
. . The agreement will be part of negotiations for a successor accord to the Kyoto Protocol when it expires in 2012 and is "a good balance between different countries views", EU Environment Commissioner Stavros Dimas said.
. . About 32 million acres of forest —-or twice the size of Panama-— are lost each year to logging, agriculture and other activities, according to the World Bank. Brazil and Indonesia —-where 80% of CO2 emissions come from deforestation-— are the worst effected due to rampant illegal logging and the growing demand for biofuels and other commodities like soybeans.

Dec 17, 07: Behind the millions of words at the Bali climate conference, in documents, speeches and slick brochures, lay a set of simple numbers: 2 and 445 and "25 to 40."
. . That's 2 degrees Celsius, 445 parts per million of CO2, and a 25-to-40% reduction in global-warming gases —-a formula, some say, to save the planet from climate change's severest consequences.
. . In the end, at U.S. insistence, none of those numbers appeared in the U.N. conference's key final document. But in the coming two years of crucial climate negotiations, as authorized at Bali, those simple numbers are sure to become chips in the high-stakes diplomatic, political and economic bargaining of almost 190 nations involved.
. . To keep the cumulative rise to 2 degrees Celsius, the panel concluded, heat-trapping greenhouse gases in the atmosphere should be kept below 445 parts per million in CO2 or its equivalent in other gases. The concentration is now estimated at below 400, after subtracting offsetting heat-shielding effects.
. . Early in the Bali conference, more than 200 scientists, many of them U.N. report authors, made a rare foray into politics and diplomacy with a petition calling on the U.N. climate treaty nations to adopt, as a "minimum requirement", those 2-degree and 445-ppm ceilings. The European Union and many other nations had already done so, endorsing the goal.
. . Alone among major industrial nations, the US rejects the relatively modest cuts of the 1997 Kyoto Protocol, which expires in 2012. The task the rest of the world has now taken on, with the upcoming "Bali Roadmap" negotiations, is to try to bring the Americans into a new, post-2012 regime of deep and mandatory reductions in greenhouse emissions.

Dec 13, 07: Delegates at the U.N. climate conference extended closed-door talks into an extra day Saturday, nearing resolution of a dispute over how far future negotiations should go in trying to cut emissions of greenhouse gases.
. . U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon was arriving Saturday morning, either to announce the successful launching of the "Bali Roadmap" negotiations or to help break any lingering impasse.
. . For years, the rest of the world has sought to bring the Americans into the framework of international mandates. At this point, however, many seem resigned to waiting for a change in White House leadership after next November's U.S. election.
. . "The US in particular is behaving like passengers in first class in a jumbo jet, thinking a catastrophe in economy class won't affect them", said Tony Juniper, a spokesman for a coalition of environmentalists the conference. "If we go down, we go down together, and the United States needs to realize that very quickly."
. . "People are negotiating, they are posturing, and not rising above entrenched national positions", said Angus Friday, Grenada's Ambassador to the U.N. and chair of the Alliance of Small Island states. "We are just very disappointed at this stage. We are ending up with something so watered down there was no need for 12,000 people to gather here in Bali to have a watered down text. We could have done that by email", he said.
. . The preamble includes a reference to findings by the Nobel Prize-winning U.N. Climate Panel, which said emissions by rich nations would have to be cut by 25 to 40% by 2020 to avert the worst effects of warming.

Dec 13, 07: The U.S. and Europe headed toward a compromise solution at the U.N. climate conference, breaking a deadlock over how ambitious the goal should be in negotiating future cutbacks in global warming gases, the German environment minister said. The outcome may help determine how high the planet's temperatures rise for decades to come.
. . In the final day of the two-week conference, delegates sparred over the wording of a conference final document until 2:30 a.m.. Drafters then retired to craft new formulations in contentious passages — most notably the European Union's suggestion of a goal of emissions reductions from 25% to 40% below 1990 levels by 2020.
. . The U.N. climate chief, Yvo de Boer, told reporters the mid-range 25-to-40% was implicit —-"an inevitable stop on that road"-— in the 50% goal for midcentury. Witoelar's proposal gave the two sides room to work out the long-expected compromise, producing a relatively vague mandate for two years of negotiations.
. . Developing nations said they would resist "pressure and even threats" from some rich countries to step up the fight against climate change, as talks on a global climate pact went to the wire on Friday. The G77 comprises about 150 developing countries.
. . Rich countries should continue to take the lead, Akram said, identifying the United States as the most reluctant among developed nations to do their fair share under a new pact.
. . The talks had earlier on Friday received new impetus as the European Union toned down a clash with the US over 2020 emissions goals for rich countries, raising hopes of a deal to start negotiations on a new treaty. Indonesia suggested dropping an EU-backed ambition for rich nations to cut emissions by between 25 and 40% by 2020 in a bid to overcome Washington's opposition. But it was still not clear if the United States and Europe would agree to the text.
. . The agreement would launch pilot projects to tackle deforestation and forest degradation, and contribute to harder proposals in a broader climate pact in 2009, European Environment Commissioner Stavros Dimas told reporters.
. . Activists danced conga-style around the main hall where negotiators met, singing "hot, hot, hot", after awarding their "fossil of the year award" to the United States and Canada for contributing least to the talks.

Dec 13, 07: Former U.S. Vice President Al Gore drew cheers at 190-nation talks by saying the US was the main block to launching negotiations in Bali on a new global climate treaty. Gore told them that the next U.S. president will likely be more supportive of international caps on polluting gases.
. . For Al Gore, it was time to utter a new inconvenient truth that diplomatic niceties precluded others from telling: "My own country, the US, is principally responsible for obstructing progress here," he told a packed audience at the U.N. climate change summit in Bali. "We all know that."
. . De Boer, as a U.N. official, couldn't be so blunt as to name the culprit, but there were no such restraints on Gore. The Nobel laureate, in fact, urged delegates to push ahead despite U.S. opposition, even to the point of drafting a negotiating document with blank spaces where American participation should be. But while Gore's public criticism of his own country's delegation --and implicitly, of the President who controls it-- electrified his audience, what he said next was even more important. "Over the next two years, the US is going to be somewhere it is not right now," said Gore. "We are going to change in the U.S."
. . Carl Pope, president of the Sierra Club, called the U.S. performance "the most explicitly irresponsible action that any American Administration has taken in any of our lifetimes."
. . But the purpose of the shadow U.S. delegation here --spiritually led by Gore and including the likes of Sen. John Kerry, New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg and dozens of officials from California (Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger had planned to attend, but budget negotiations kept him at home) --is to signal the world that the Bush Administration no longer represents the views of most Americans on climate change. They point to the fact that U.S. cities, states and, now, the Congress have taken steps to combat global warming, and that next year's election will likely accelerate that momentum.
. . Observers here say the U.S. obstructive role has been more egregious, stymieing attempts to craft meaningful action on everything from deforestation to measures to help developing nations manage their CO2 output. "The U.S. has been fingered as the problem here --and they really are", says John Coequyt, climate adviser for Greenpeace.
. . The Administration's intransigence is all the more glaring in contrast to the positions of the climate progressives from the Senate and the states who've come to Bali. "People everywhere recognize the time for discussion about whether global warming exists has passed", said Bloomberg, who has called for the implementation of a carbon tax. "Now it's time for action." And Bloomberg could point to the fact that over 700 U.S. cities have signed up to meet Kyoto Protocol-style carbon cuts, while California has mandated a 25% reduction in greenhouse gases by 2020.
. . "I wanted to make certain that those folks who are involved in the negotiations understand that they are not alone in dealing with this", says Kerry. "The Administration is isolated in its own country." Kerry, Maine Republican Senator Olympia Snowe and 50 other members of Congress sent a protest letter y'day to President Bush calling for U.S. negotiators to drop their opposition to emission targets.

Dec 13, 07: U.N. climate chief Yvo de Boer said he was worried the U.S.-EU deadlock could derail the process and that a final "Bali roadmap" would contain an agreement to negotiate a new climate deal by 2009, but may not include specific targets for emission reductions. "I'm very concerned about the pace of things", he said. "If we don't get wording on the future, then the whole house of cards falls to pieces."

Dec 13, 07: European nations threatened to boycott U.S.-led climate talks next month unless Washington accepts a range of numbers for negotiating deep reductions of global-warming emissions.

Dec 12, 07: The newly-elected Australian Prime Minister Kevin Rudd handed documents to Mr Ban confirming his government's ratification of the Kyoto Protocol. "The community of nations must reach agreement", he told delegates. "There is no plan B; there is no other planet any of us can escape to." In Niger, farmers have seen a rainy season shrink from three months each year to just six weeks.

Dec 11, 07: Braving the sultry tropical heat of Bali, two dancing penguins made an appeal to a UN conference on climate change, warning that rising temperatures were putting the majestic Antarctic birds at risk.

Dec 11, 07: Delegates at the U.N. climate conference struggled to agree today on whether they will call on rich nations to cut greenhouse gas emissions by specific amounts, and the U.N. chief warned that the human race faces oblivion if it fails to confront global warming.
. . Ban said the time to act was now. "The situation is so desperately serious that any delay could push us past the tipping point, beyond which the ecological, financial and human costs would increase dramatically", the U.N. secretary-general told delegates. "We are at a crossroad", he added. "One path leads to a comprehensive climate change agreement, the other to oblivion. The choice is clear."

Dec 10, 07: With U.S. policy at the center of debate at a Bali climate change meeting, Democrats in Congress said that the White House manipulated science for years to cast doubt on reality of global warming.
. . "The Bush administration has engaged in a systematic effort to manipulate climate change science and mislead policymakers and the public about the dangers of global warming", the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform said.
. . The Democrats reported that the council exerted "unusual control over what federal scientists could say publicly about climate change, and that it was standard practice for the council to decide whether or not U.S. scientists could give interviews to the media.
. . This became more apparent after Hurricane Katrina hit the U.S. Gulf Coast in 2005, when the White House and the Commerce Department steered press queries away from government scientists who linked climate change and more intense hurricanes. "There was a systematic White House effort to minimize the significance of climate change by editing climate change reports", they wrote.
. . They said council staff edited the administration's "Strategic Plan of the Climate Change Science Program" to exaggerate scientific uncertainties or to diminish the importance of the human role in global warming. The draft text suggested that rich countries like the US should aim to cut emissions of climate-warming gases by between 25 and 40% below 1990 levels by 2020.

Dec 7, 07: Climate Action Network Canada, a coalition of Canadian environmental groups, said Canadian negotiators in Bali have been told to "demand that poorer nations accept the same binding absolute emission reduction targets as developed nations."
. . The chief U.N. climate scientist, Rajendra Pachauri, said it was next to impossible to expect the developing world to agree to cuts when their per capita emissions are so much less than the West.
. . Angus Friday, chairman of the Alliance of Small Island States, many of which are threatened by sea level rises, said developed countries had a "moral responsibility" to show leadership on the issue and act first to tackle global warming since they have contributed far more to the problem than poor countries. "The danger in the developed world is that the culture of entitlement is not being matched by the culture of responsibility", he said.

Dec 7, 07: Slimy, green and unsightly, seaweed and algae are among the humblest plants on earth. A group of scientists at a climate conference in Bali say they could also be a potent weapon against global warming, capable of sucking damaging CO2 out of the atmosphere at rates comparable to the mightiest rain forests.
. . "The ocean's role is neglected because we can't see the vegetation", said Chung Ik-kyo, a South Korean environmental scientist. "But under the sea, there is a lot of seaweed and sea grass that can take up CO2."
. . The seaweed research, backed by scientists in 12 countries, is part of a broad effort to calculate how much CO2 is being absorbed from the atmosphere by plants, and figure out ways to increase that through reforestation and other steps.
. . That solution is a largely Asian one and it's not without complications. China is by far the world's largest producer of seaweed, followed by South Korea and Japan. The Asia-Pacific —-where seaweed is used in soups, sushi and salads-— accounts for 80% of global production.
. . Proponents say seaweed and algae's rapid rate of photosynthesis, the process of turning CO2 and sunlight into energy and oxygen, is a top factor in its effectiveness in CO2 absorption. Some types of seaweed can grow three or four meters long in only three months. Lee Jae-young, with South Korea's fisheries ministry, said some seaweeds can absorb five times more CO2 than terrestrial plants.
. . Last year, Seoul approved a US$1.5 million (euro1 million) a year project to investigate the possibilities. The Japanese government and a group of companies are also looking into setting up a huge cultivation area in the waters off the country's western coast.
. . In a presentation on the sidelines of the Bali conference, Beardall argued that more efficient cultivation methods could greatly boost production in nations with long coastlines, such as the Philippines.
. . In addition to storing CO2, seaweed can be used to produce clean-burning biofuels, thereby making sure that the CO2 isn't simply recycled back into the air. "Feeding algae to people will only release the CO2 back into the atmosphere again", said Beardall. "It's not CO2 sequestration."
. . The concept, however, has problems. Skeptics, for instance, say that trees are effective for CO2 storage because they can last for many years, while seaweed is cultivated and harvested in cycles of only months, meaning the storage will be hard to measure or control.
. . Some critics wonder if removing sea water from the seaweed as it's converted to fuel would require a large amount of energy that reduces its environmental benefits, though supporters say sun-drying could be used.
. . The environmental impact of rapid expansion of seaweed farms has also not been thought out, scientists concede. Huge floating farms could complicate fishing, shipping and other maritime activities.

Dec 7, 07: China insisted the U.S. and other wealthy nations should bear the burden of curbing global warming, saying the problem was created by their lavish way of life. It rejected mandatory emission cuts for its own developing industries.
. . Environmental activists, meanwhile, labeled the US and Saudi Arabia the worst "climate sinners", accusing them of having inadequate polices for climate problems while letting greenhouse gas emissions rise. But the activists also said no country is doing enough.
. . America's emissions per person are six times higher than in China.
. . The environmental watchdog Germanwatch said Beijing has enacted policies promoting renewable energy, including mandates that solar, wind and hydroelectric systems provide 10% of China's power by 2010. It also ordered key industries to reduce energy consumption by 20%, the group said.
. . Saudi Arabia was listed as last among the 56 nations, right below the US. The group said Saudi Arabia, the world's largest oil exporter, was the biggest "climate sinner" for the second year in a row because its emissions are rising and it has no firm policies to address that.
. . Sweden was ranked as doing the best job, followed by Germany, Iceland and Mexico. A news release from Germanwatch praised Mexico for making progress in reducing emissions and adopting a "constructive international and national climate policy."

Dec 6, 07: American climate negotiators refused to back down in their opposition to mandatory cuts in greenhouse gas emissions, even as a U.S. Senate panel endorsed sharp reductions in pollution blamed for global warming.
. . The Senate Environment and Public Works Committee passed a bill y'day to cut U.S. emissions by 70% by 2050 from electric power plants, manufacturing and transportation. The bill now goes to the full Senate.
. . U.S. climate negotiator Harlan Watson, however, said that would not impact Washington's position at the international gathering in Bali.
. . It was the first bill calling for mandatory U.S. limit on greenhouse gases to be taken up in Congress since global warming emerged as an environmental issue more than two decades ago.

Dec 6, 07: Scientists say the world must act quickly to slash greenhouse gas emissions and limit the rise in global temperatures or risk triggering devastating droughts and flooding, strangling world food production and killing off animal species.
. . Washington's isolation in Bali has increased following Australia's announcement that it has reversed its opposition to the Kyoto pact and started the ratification process —-winning applause at the conference's opening session. That left the U.S. as the only industrialized nation to oppose the agreement.
. . "This is a very welcome development", Alden Meyer of the Union of Concerned Scientists said of the Senate measure. "It shows the increasing isolation of the Bush administration.
. . "We have to start reducing greenhouse gas emissions as soon as we possibly can", said Australian climatologist Matthew England, a group spokesman. "It needs action. We're talking about now."

Dec 6, 07: The UN praised a step by a U.S. Senate committee to cut greenhouse gas emissions in the world's top CO2 emitter even as Washington reaffirmed opposition to caps. "That's a very encouraging sign from the US", Yvo de Boer, head of the U.N. Climate Change Secretariat, said. His comments rubbed in the isolation of President George W. Bush's administration.
. . Australian Prime Minister Kevin Rudd has also offered to act as a bridge on climate change between China and the West. Getting China, which is already pursuing energy efficiency targets for its booming economy, to join a broader climate pact is regarded as crucial by Bali delegates as nations prepare for rising seas, melting glaciers, severe storms and water shortages.
. . In Washington, the Senate committee voted 11-8 y'day for legislation outlining a cap-and-trade system for industry, power generators and transport. The bill is headed for debate in the full Senate.
. . Bush wants 17 big emitters, accounting for more than 80 percent of world greenhouse gases, to agree to new climate goals by the end of 2008 --just before Bush leaves office-- and feed into a new U.N. pact meant to be agreed by the end of 2009.
. . Delegates in Bali are seeking ways to bind all nations more tightly into a fight against climate change. But China, India and other developing nations say rich countries must commit to deep emissions cuts first.
. . Underscoring the financial risk of global warming, the International Monetary Fund said in Washington it would spell out the economic implications of climate change in research and discussions set for early 2008.
. . Delegates are also discussing a scheme that would allow poorer countries to earn money from preserving their tropical forests, which soak up vast amounts of CO2. About 13 million hectares of forests are cut down every year, U.N. data shows. The WWF conservation group said 55% of the Amazon rainforest could be wiped out or severely damaged by 2030 by a "vicious feedback loop of climate change and deforestation." It said the effects of warming could cut rainfall and aggravate current trends in farming, fires, droughts and logging in the world's largest tropical forest.

Dec 5, 07: "It's clear to a number of us that the U.S. would like nothing more than for nothing to happen on the Kyoto track", said Canadian Steven Guilbeault, a leading environmentalist spokesman here. "They will let their Japanese colleagues do that."
. . Chief U.S. climate negotiator Harlan Watson told AP that the Japanese are acting "on their own." But, he added, "we see a lot of elements in the Japanese proposal that are very much in our thinking."
. . In an opening gambit, Japan has proposed that the Bali climate conference pursue a broad "least common denominator" approach to negotiating new controls on global-warming gases. Environmentalists couldn't think less of it. The proposal says nothing about making future targets for emission reductions legally binding.

Dec 5, 07: Australian Prime Minister Kevin Rudd urged the US to follow his country's lead and ratify the Kyoto Protocol, while rich and poor nations appeared divided Wednesday over what a future climate change pact should look like.
. . Rudd signed documents this week to formally adopt the accord that caps greenhouse gas emissions, reversing a decade of Australian resistance. "And therefore we do need to see the US as a full ratification state", he said. His comments put further pressure on the US.

Dec 6, 07: For the first time, more than 200 of the world's leading climate scientists, losing their patience, urged government leaders to take radical action to slow global warming because "there is no time to lose."
. . A petition from at least 215 climate scientists calls for the world to cut in half greenhouse gas emissions by 2050. The appeal from scientists follows a petition last week from more than 150 global business leaders also demanding the 50" cut in greenhouse gases. That is the estimate that scientists calculate would hold future global warming to a little more than a 3-degree Fahrenheit increase and is in line with what the European Union has adopted.
. . In the past, many of these scientists have avoided calls for action, leaving that to environmental advocacy groups. That dispassionate stance was taken during the release this year of four separate reports by the Nobel Prize-winning Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change.
. . But no more. "It's a grave crisis, and we need to do something real fast", said petition signer Jeff Severinghaus, a geosciences professor at the Scripps Institution of Oceanography in La Jolla, Calif. "I think the stakes are way way too high to be playing around."
. . The unprecedented petition includes scientists from more than 25 countries and shows that "the climate science community is essentially fed up", said signer Andrew Weaver of the U of Victoria in Canada.
. . "A lot of us scientists think the problem needs a lot more serious attention than it's getting and the remedies have to be a lot more radical", said Richard Seager, a scientist at Columbia U.
. . "Action needs to be taken and needs to be taken now", said Marika Holland, a scientist at the National Center for Atmospheric Research who signed on. "The longer we wait, the worse it's going to become."
. . NASA scientist Gavin Schmidt, who signed the petition, said "the time for half-measures and the time for voluntary agreements and the time for arguing about 1% here and 1% there —-those things are no longer relevant." Schmidt noted while scientists have been dismissed by some as unrealistic, the call for a 50 percent emissions cut by business leaders "helps give credence to the idea that it's achievable."
. . What's happening is people are agreeing "that the cost of inaction is on the high side and the cost of action is affordable", said Joseph Romm, a policy analyst at the liberal think-tank Center for American Progress, energy business consultant and trained physicist.

Dec 3, 07: Australia won an ovation at the start of U.N.-led climate change talks in Bali by agreeing to ratify the Kyoto Protocol, isolating the US as the only developed nation outside the pact.
. . Soon after an Australian delegate promised immediate action on Kyoto, new Australian Prime Minister Kevin Rudd took the oath of office and signed documents to ratify, ending his country's long-held opposition to the global climate agreement. "I think I can speak for all present here by expressing a sigh of relief", conference host and Indonesian Environment Minister Rachmat Witoelar told the conference opening session.
. . Australia, the world's top coal exporter and among the world's highest per-capita greenhouse gas polluters, has been criticized for years for refusing the ratify Kyoto.
. . The move leaves the U.S. —-the world's top emitter of greenhouse gases-— as the sole industrial power not to have joined. "The eyes of the world are upon you. There is a huge responsibility for Bali to deliver", said Yvo de Boer, the executive secretary of the conference. "The world now expects a quantum leap forward."
. . The American delegation was clearly on the defensive, presenting a statement detailing the ways the U.S. is fighting global warming without submitting to mandatory emissions targets.
. . Even critics of the Bush administration pointed out that many individual states, such as California, were on the forefront of cutting emissions. "Despite the failure of the current president to take serious action on global warming, the political landscape in the US is shifting dramatically in favor of mandatory limits on global warming pollution", said Alden Meyer of the Union of Concerned Scientists, citing upcoming action in the U.S. Congress.
. . About 190 nations are in Bali seeking a breakthrough for a new global pact to fight climate change by 2009 to avert droughts, heatwaves and rising seas that will hit the poor hardest. "The world is watching closely", Witoelar told delegates at the December 3-14 meeting. "Climate change is unequivocal and accelerating", he told the opening ceremony.

Dec 2, 07: World powers meeting at a U.N. climate change conference in Indonesia this week won't be able to craft a meaningful plan to address global warming without cooperation from the US, the top emitter of greenhouse gases, the U.N.'s climate chief said.
. . Delegates from 190 nations will gather on the resort island of Bali for one of the largest global warming conferences ever, bringing together about 10,000 people including Hollywood luminaries, former Vice President Al Gore, fishermen and drought-stricken farmers for two weeks of marathon discussions.
. . But now the US finds itself isolated at the conference, given that Australian Prime Minister-elect Kevin Rudd, whose party swept to power in general elections just one week ago, immediately put signing the Kyoto pact at the top of his international agenda.
. . President Bush, trying to fend off charges that America is not doing enough, said this week that a final Energy Department report showed American emissions of CO2, a leading greenhouse gas, declined by 1.5% last year while the U.S. economy grew.
. . At best, analysts believe, Bali could lead to an agreement in about two years time with the US under a new administration, the Europeans and other industrial nations committing to deepening blanket emissions cuts. And they say major developing countries could agree to enshrine some national policies —-China's auto emission standards, for example, or energy-efficiency targets for power plants-— as international obligations.
. . The trick is to find the magic formula that gets every nation on board, from the biggest emitters such as the US and China to the smallest and most vulnerable, such as tropical island states or sub-Saharan African nations.
. . Over the past years, climate change talks have been bogged down by arguments over who's going to pay the bill for cleaner technology and how to share out the burden of emissions curbs between rich and poor nations. The bottom line is no nation at the Bali talks wants its economy to suffer by implementing strict emissions curbs. But climate scientists say time is running out.
. . "We're already seeing many of the impacts of climate change", said Yvo de Boer, head of the U.N. Climate Change Secretariat, referring to melting glaciers, droughts and rising seas. "We are on a very dangerous path", he told a news conference. WWF said weather records were being broken around the world, from a melting Arctic to Australian droughts.

Nov 30, 07: Some of the world's top business leaders are demanding that international diplomats meeting next week come up with drastic and urgent measures to cut greenhouse gas pollution at least in half by 2050.
. . Officials from more than 150 global companies —-worth nearly $4 trillion in market capitalization-— have signed a petition urging "strong, early action on climate change" when political leaders meet in Indonesia.
. . The hastily prepared petition drive, coordinated through the environmental office of Britain's Prince Charles, is signed by leaders from mainstream powerhouse companies such as Shell UK, GE International, Coca-Cola, Dupont, United Technologies Corp., Rolls Royce, Nestle SA, Unilever, British Airways and Volkswagen.
. . The petition is aimed at the United Nations conference in Bali, convened to draft a new environmental treaty to replace the Kyoto accord, which expires in 2012.
. . Contrary to the argument that mandatory pollution cuts would harm the economy, the business leaders' petition says ambitious emissions reductions would "create significant business opportunities."
. . Their communique refers to a recent international report on climate change, which said a 50% cut in emissions by 2050 is needed to prevent catastrophic global warming. Barrington said "that's the minimum order of what we're looking for."

Nov 27, 07: Unless the international community agrees to cut CO2 emissions by half over the next generation, climate change is likely to cause large-scale human and economic setbacks and irreversible ecological catastrophes, a UN report says.
. . The U.N. Human Development Report issues one of the strongest warnings yet of the lasting impact of climate change on living standards and a strong call for urgent collective action. "We could be on the verge of seeing human development reverse for the first time in 30 years."
. . The report, to be presented in Brasilia today, sets targets and a road map to reduce CO2 emissions before a U.N. climate summit next month in Bali, Indonesia.
. . Dangerous climate change will be unavoidable if in the next 15 years emissions follow the same trend as the past 15 years, the report says. To avoid catastrophic impact, the rise in global temperature must be limited to 2 degrees C. But CO2 emissions from cars, power plants and deforestation in Brazil, Indonesia and elsewhere, are twice the level needed to meet that target, the U.N. authors say.
. . Climate change threatens to condemn millions of people to poverty, the UNDP says. Climate disasters between 2000 and 2004 affected 262 million people, 98% of them in the developing world. The poor are often forced to sell productive assets or save on food, health, and education, creating "life-long cycles of disadvantage."
. . A temperature rise of between 3 and 4 degrees C would displace 340 million people through flooding, droughts would diminish farm output, and retreating glaciers would cut off drinking water from as many as 1.8 billion people, the report says.
. . Ethiopia emits 0.1 metric tons of CO2 per capita, compared to 20 metric tons in Canada. U.S. per capita emissions are over 15 times those of India's.
. . The world needs to spend 1.6% of global economic output annually through 2030 to stabilize the CO2 stock and meet the 3.6-degree Fahrenheit temperature target. Rich countries, the biggest CO2 emitters, should lead the way and cut emissions at least 30% by 2020 and 80% by 2050. Developing nations should cut emissions 20% by 2050, the UNDP says.
. . "When people in an American city turn on their air-conditioning or people in Europe drive their cars, their actions have consequences ... linking them to rural communities in Bangladesh, farmers in Ethiopia and slum dwellers in Haiti", the report says.

Nov 27, 07: A U.N. climate change conference in Indonesia may produce a roadmap for countries to reduce their global-warming emissions after the Kyoto protocol expires in 2012, a scientist said. Pachauri did not offer specific details but said that he had reason to believe that no country would be "obstructionist" when negotiating. "There is an unprecedented level of awareness about climate change among people and leaders worldwide", he said.
. . U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon has made climate change a top priority and that should help, he added.

Nov 26, 07: Australia's Prime Minister-elect Kevin Rudd took advice on how to ratify the Kyoto Protocol on cutting greenhouse gas emissions. This puts him at odds with key ally Washington on two crucial policy issues --Iraq and global warming.
. . After declaring victory, Rudd held meetings with government officials about the mechanics of signing the Kyoto pact on global warming, an issue he made his top priority during the election campaign. Rudd, a Chinese-speaking former diplomat, accepted Indonesian President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono's invitation to attend a December U.N. meeting in Bali to map out the world's next steps against climate change.
. . At his first news conference, Rudd promised "action, and action now" on climate change. Deputy Labor leader Julia Gillard said that Rudd would act quickly on signing Kyoto, paving the way for Australia to play a greater role at the Bali meeting.

Nov 23, 07: Two of the most important Greenhouse gases in the Earth's atmosphere reached a record high in 2006, and measurements show that one —-CO2-— is playing an increasingly important role in global warming, the U.N. weather agency said.
. . The global average concentrations of CO2, or CO2, and nitrous oxide, or N2O, in the atmosphere were higher than ever in measurements coordinated by the World Meteorological Organization. Methane, the third of the three important greenhouse gases, remained stable between 2005 and 2006.
. . CO2 contributed 87% to the warming effect over the last decade, but in the last five years alone, its contribution was 91%. The concentration of CO2 in the atmosphere rose by about .5% last year to reach 381.2 parts per million, according to the agency. Nitrous oxide totaled 320.1 parts per billion, which is .25% higher than in 2005.
. . Studies have shown that human-produced CO2 emissions heat the Earth's surface and cause greater water evaporation. That leads to more water vapor in the air, which contributes to higher air temperatures. CO2, methane and N2O are the most common greenhouse gases after water vapor.
. . There is 36.1% more CO2 in the atmosphere than there was in the late 18th century, primarily because of combustion of fossil fuels, the World Meteorological Organization bulletin said.
. . A report presented by a U.N. expert panel said last week that average temperatures have risen 1.3 degrees F in the last 100 years, and that 11 of the last 12 years have been among the warmest since 1850. Global Warming also led to a sea level increase by an average seven-hundredths of an inch per year since 1961, according to the U.N. Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change.
. . The panel's report, which said human activity is largely responsible for global warming, noted that the concentration of CO2 in the atmosphere is far higher than the natural range over the last 650,000 years.
. . The U.N. Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change forecast that by 2020, 75 million to 250 million people in Africa will suffer water shortages, residents of Asia's large cities will be at great risk of river and coastal flooding, Europeans can expect extensive species loss, and North Americans will experience longer and hotter heat waves and greater competition for water.

Nov 16, 07: Delegates from more than 140 countries agreed today on a scientific "instant guide" for policy makers, stating more forcefully than ever that climate change has begun and threatens to irreversibly alter the planet. Climate change may bring "abrupt and irreversible" impacts.
. . The document, summarizing the scientific consensus on human-induced climate change, will be distributed to delegates at a crucial meeting in Indonesia next month that is intended to launch a political process on international cooperation to control global warming.
. . Five days of sometimes tense negotiations ended before dawn with the approval of a 20-page summary of thousands of pages of data and computer projections compiled over the last six years by the Nobel Peace prize-winning Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change.
. . It is important because it is adopted by consensus [100% agreement], meaning those countries accept the underlying science and cannot disavow its conclusions. It provides a common scientific base line for the political talks.
. . "Warming of the climate system is unequivocal", the summary begins. In a startling and much-debated conclusion, the document warns that human activity risks causing "abrupt or irreversible changes" on Earth, including the widespread extinction of species and a dramatic rise in sea levels before the end of this century.
. . Delegates said the talks this week were difficult, and sometimes bogged down for hours over a brief phrase. The meeting in the Indonesian resort of Bali starting Dec. 3 will discuss the next step in combating climate change after the measures adopted in the Kyoto Protocol expire in five years.

Nov 13, 07: They are seen as the gurus of global warming, and their reports are accepted almost as the gospel of climate science. Esteem for the panel of scientists was immortalized when it shared this year's Nobel Peace prize. But experts and the scientists themselves acknowledge the reports are conservative and have a poor track record of predictions.
. . As the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change meets in this Mediterranean coastal city to finish its fourth report in two decades, it must decide whether it will produce a fifth.
. . In its assessment this year, the IPCC has reported with near certainty that human activity is causing temperatures to rise and changing weather patterns. Sea levels are rising, storms are growing more fierce, deserts are spreading and glaciers are melting, it said. The panel predicts that millions of poor people will suffer from hunger, thirst, floods and disease unless drastic action is taken. But it also says the tools are available, or soon will be, to greatly slow global warming, soften the impact and help nations adapt to changing conditions.
. . As grim as that may look, the reality may be much worse. "We need to understand that the worst impacts in the report may not in fact be the worst that will happen, or the worst that appear possible. What's in the report now is scary enough. But in most of the predictions the IPCC has made, just about everything is happening faster and more intensely than we thought", he said. "This issue is not being overstated. If anything, it is being understated."
. . A joint report this month by two U.S. security institutes said they compared predictions of climate change by the panel and other researchers in the last two decades with changes that actually occurred, and found the scientists had consistently fallen short.
. . "Climate change is going faster than our worst-case scenarios of five or six years ago", said WWF's climate specialist Hans Verolme. Still, he said, it would be difficult for the panel to issue more frequent reports to try to keep pace with the research without sacrificing its scientific integrity. "I wouldn't know how to speed up the process", he said.

Nov 11, 07: The U.N.'s top climate official challenged world policymakers to map out a path to curb climate change, charging that to ignore the urgency of global warming would be "nothing less than criminally irresponsible."

Nov 9, 07: If there's one document on global warming policymakers might put in their briefcase, this would be it. On Monday, scientists and government officials gather in Valencia, Spain to put together the fourth and last U.N. report on the state of global warming and what it will mean to hundreds of millions of people whose lives are being dramatically altered.
. . Unlike the past three tomes, this one will have little new data. Instead, it will distill the previous work into a compact guide of roughly 30 pages that summarizes complex science into language politicians and bureaucrats can understand.
. . It will be the first point of reference for negotiators meeting next month in Bali, Indonesia, to decide the future course of the worldwide push to curb greenhouse gas emissions after the 2012 expiration of the first phase of the Kyoto Protocol.
. . The consequences for mankind are legion: while some people will go thirsty from lack of rain, millions more will suffer devastating floods; diseases will proliferate; the food supply may at first increase in some areas, but will plummet later; countries that are now poor will grow still poorer.
. . The scientists set out a basket of technological options to keep the temperature rise to the minimum, with investments amounting to about 3% of the world's gross domestic product —-far less than what the IPCC said it would cost later to fix the damage caused by higher temperature increases.
. . Campaigners are looking for the final "synthesis report" to emphasize the action governments can take, the consequences of inaction and the brief time remaining to put that action into gear. "We would want to emphasize the urgency which comes from the science", said Stephanie Tunmore of the Greenpeace environmental group. "We know what's happening, we know what's causing it, and we know what we have to do about it."
. . Each line must be adopted by consensus (100% agreement) —-and sometimes the use of a single word can be heatedly contested.
. . The final document is due to be released 11-10-07. U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon's presence at the unveiling is meant to underscore its importance.

Oct 29, 07: The leading international body responsible for formulating policy on climate change has dramatically upped the ante by announcing that climate crisis is looming several decades earlier than previously thought, requiring major infrastructure changes immediately.
. . Even if global warming is limited to the EU’s ‘difficult'’ target of a 2C rise, the world will still have to adapt to major consequences of climate change, the scientists warned yesterday, as they accused politicians of attempting to water down their findings.
. . Experts from the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) said the effects of climate change were happening faster than expected and many were already apparent. “We are all used to talking about these impacts coming in the lifetimes of our children and grandchildren. Now we know that it’s us”, said Professor Martin Parry, a scientist with the British Met Office.
. . He added politicians had wasted a decade by focusing only on ways to cut emissions, and had only recently woken up to the need to adapt. “Mitigation has got all the attention, but we cannot mitigate out of this problem. We now have a choice between a future with a damaged world or a severely damaged world.”
. . Professor Parry, chairman of the Working Group, said adaptation to the changing world --which has been ignored over the past decade by policy makers in favour of mitigating rising CO2 emissions-- was crucial. Adaptation measures could include irrigation schemes, growing of drought resistant crops and water management, as long as infrastructure changes.
. . Prof Parry said of limiting global temperature rises to 2C: ‘It will be difficult to achieve, and even if it is achieved there will still be major impacts.'’
. . Scientists were outlining the report’s assessment of the challenges the world faces at a meeting at the Royal Geographical Society in London. In response to the warnings, Ben Ayliffe of Greenpeace’s climate campaign, said: ‘It’s critical that the EU meets its 2C target because the climate is approaching a tipping point. Go past this and the most catastrophic effects become almost inevitable. This means massive damage to ecosystems like tropical rainforests, melting ice sheets, sea level rise, disease, famine and further misery for sub-Saharan Africa.'’
. . He added: ‘The EU needs to adopt a science-based cap on emissions, ditch plans for new dirty coal plants and nuclear power stations that will give tiny emission cuts at enormous and dangerous cost, end aviation expansion and ban wasteful products like incandescent lightbulbs, whilst massively upping investment in energy efficiency and renewables as part of a super-efficient decentralised energy system.'’

Sept 9, 07: Asia-Pacific leaders meeting in Sydney have agreed an "aspirational" goal to restrain the rise of greenhouse gas emissions to tackle climate change. China and the US --two of the world's biggest polluters-- are among the 21 nations that have signed the statement, which contains no firm commitments. Australian Prime Minister John Howard called it "a very important milestone" towards an international deal.
. . The Sydney declaration also included China's and other developing nations' calls for global warming negotiations to take place under United Nations auspices.
. . Environmentalists said the declaration was symbolic rather than concrete. The UN climate convention is scheduled to host talks in December on the Indonesian island of Bali.
. . Apec's 21 members, which also include Russia and Japan, together account for about 60% of annual greenhouse gas emissions.

Aug 4, 07: Nearly 100 countries speaking at the first U.N. General Assembly meeting on climate change signaled strong support for negotiations on a new international deal to tackle global warming.

July 31, 07: The first U.N. special session on climate change focused on the world's rich countries today, as policy-makers urged long-standing polluters to shoulder much of the burden for cutting greenhouse gases.
. . British economist Nicholas Stern said poor and developing countries also need to participate in a "global deal" to curb the human-made emissions. He said the global target for reducing greenhouse gases --notably the CO2 released by coal-fired electric plants and petroleum-powered vehicles-- should be a cut of 50% by 2050. "Because of reasons of past responsibility and better access to resources, the rich countries should take much bigger objectives than that 50%", he said. "They should be looking for around 75% cuts."
. . That responsibility could extend to financing cuts in emissions in other countries, said Stern, formerly head of the British government's economic service and now at the London School of Economics. British Prime Minister Gordon Brown sounded a similar note in earlier remarks at the United Nations.

May 22, 07: A meeting of rich nations next month in Germany will be a "litmus test" of how the US plans to help the world fight climate change, the head of the U.N. Environment Program (UNEP) said.

May 18, 07: Deadlock over how to bring the US and big developing nations to the climate negotiating table frustrated U.N.-hosted talks this week, meant to lay the groundwork for a conference in Indonesia in December.

May 9, 07: Industrialized nations played a major role in generating polluting emissions and must now take the lead in reversing the problem, a U.N. climate change official said.
. . Gro Harlem Brundtland, a former prime minister of Norway, said the seriousness of global warming is no longer under debate and the moment for rapid action has arrived. "We, the industrialized nations, must assume the largest responsibility", she said. "We are the ones who have filled up the atmosphere. We must carry the greatest responsibility for reducing emissions."
. . Brundtland, who is one of three new special envoys appointed by Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon, spoke at a conference on sustainable development at U.N. headquarters in New York. More than 1,000 diplomats began working on a new accord to succeed the Kyoto Protocol which expires in 2012 at a meeting this week in Bonn, Germany. The ideas will be put before a larger meeting of the U.N. Framework Convention on Climate Change in December in Bali, Indonesia, when U.N. officials hope to launch formal negotiations on a post-Kyoto treaty.

May 7, 07: Birds, whales and other migratory creatures are suffering from global warming that puts them in the wrong place at the wrong time, a U.N. official told 166-nation climate talks.
. . A warmer climate disrupts the biological clocks of migratory species including bats, dolphins, antelopes or turtles, said Lahcen el Kabiri, deputy head of the U.N.'s Bonn-based Convention on Migratory Species. "They are the most visible warning signs --indicators signaling the dramatic changes to our ecosystems caused in part by climate change."
. . Many creatures are mistiming their migrations, or failing to bother as changes between seasons become less clear. The shifts make them vulnerable to heatwaves, droughts or cold snaps.
. . Among birds, for instance, cranes are starting to spend the winter in Germany rather than fly south to Spain or Portugal. "A harsh winter could decimate the population", he said. [10% is not so bad...] Migratory species are particularly vulnerable because they need separate breeding, wintering and stop-over sites. Changes to any one of the habitats can put them at risk.
. . Global warming, blamed by almost all experts on a build-up of gases from burning fossil fuels, adds stresses for migratory species such as pollution, overfishing or destruction of habitats on land for farming, roads or towns.
. . Whales were sometimes in the wrong place to feed on fish and plankton which were thriving closer to the poles because of warmer oceans. In the Arctic, forests could take over from tundra, complicating life for many birds that nest on the ground and have to fly from Africa to find sites with few predators. Warmer weather could bring predators north.
. . Rises in sea levels could swamp habitats for many shore birds. Birds are sometimes hatching early in a warmer climate, but sometimes insect food can flourish even earlier. Pied flycatcher birds in Europe, for instance, have suffered from a lack of caterpillars for their chicks.

May 7, 07: Diplomats said a U.N. proposal was aimed at upping pressure for action. "Countries opposed to doing much on global warming don't want the reports at Bali because it would highlight how little they're doing", one European diplomat said.

May 5, 07: The biggest heat-trapping gas, CO2, is currently measured at over 380 parts per million in the atmosphere. It's sometimes trickier to measure the impact of methane and other greenhouse gases produced by industry, transport and agriculture, but they're estimated to bring the total up to about 430 ppm of "CO2 equivalent."
. . "While it might take centuries", he said, the melting of Greenland's ice "would give us five to six meters of sea-level rise", submerging island nations and much of the U.S. eastern shore, one-third of Florida and all of New Orleans.
. . The assessment by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change builds on reports by two other IPCC working groups issued earlier this year, which said unabated emissions from power plants, auto exhausts and other sources could drive global temperatures up as much as 11 degrees Fahrenheit by 2100
. . The Working Group III study looks in detail at the most promising technologies for reining in the heat-trapping gases and at policies, such as taxes or quotas on CO2 emissions, that might encourage development of those technologies. It also looks how much that might cost economies.
. . It estimates the world must stabilize the amount of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere by 2015 at 445 parts per million to keep global temperatures from rising 3.6 degrees Fahrenheit above preindustrial levels. Scientists fear temperatures higher than that might cause severe damage. Current atmospheric concentrations are believed to have passed 400 parts per million.

May 4, 07: The world nuclear power industry welcomed the tacit backing given to their technology by some of the world's top scientists and economists in the latest analysis of the climate change crisis.
. . The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) meeting in Bangkok said tackling global warming was both technologically and financially feasible as long as action was taken promptly, and that nuclear power could be in the arsenal. "It is common sense. What else is there for most of electricity generation that is CO2 free", Ian Hore-Lacy of the World Nuclear Association said. Nuclear proponents say their technology is CO2 free, although opponents challenge that saying mining, refining and transport all generate CO2 emissions.
. . The IPCC report noted that nuclear power provides about 16% of the world's electricity and said that figure could rise to 18% by 2030. But the head of Austria's climate change unit at the Bangkok talks said the figure had been contentious. "It could give the impression that the IPCC is projecting a significant increase in the contribution of nuclear power", said Klaus Radunksy. "This was politicizing the IPCC and that in our view, is not appropriate."
. . Bert Metz, co-chair of the IPCC group that wrote the report, stressed that it was not an endorsement of nuclear power. "It is absolutely a technical review. We are not making policy recommendations", he said.
. . Humans need to make sweeping cuts in greenhouse gas emissions in the next 50 years to keep global warming in check, but it need only cost a tiny fraction of world economic output, a major U.N. climate report said. The IPCC, in the third of a series of reports, said keeping the rise in temperatures to within 2 degrees C would cost only 0.12% of annual gross domestic product.
. . To keep within the 2-degree limit that scientists and the European Union say is needed to stave off disastrous climate changes, emissions of CO2 need to fall 50 to 85% by 2050, the report said. However, technological advances --particularly in more efficient energy use and production-- meant such targets were within reach, the report said.
. . It stressed the use of nuclear, solar and wind power, more energy-efficient buildings and lighting, as well as capturing and storing CO2 spewed from coal-fired power stations and oil and gas rigs.
. . A U.S. environmental official noted the broad range of options detailed in the report and rejected those that came at a high cost to the economy. "There are measures (for reducing greenhouse gas emissions) that come currently at an extremely high cost because of the lack of available technology", said James Connaughton, head of the White House Council on Environmental Quality. These expensive scenarios, he said, would bring cuts in world gross domestic product of as much as 3%.
. . China, expected to soon overtake the US as the world's biggest greenhouse gas producer, said rich countries must not keep clean energy technologies to themselves. "It is something the developing countries have been asking for many years, but up till now it has not happened", said Zhou Dadi, director of China's Energy Research Institute and a co-author of the report.
. . The panel also said for the first time that lifestyle changes could help fight global warming, without giving examples. IPCC chairman Rajendra Pachauri said these could include turning down the thermostat and eating less red meat, which could cut animal methane emissions.
. . The message was clear --the ball was now in government courts and delays were no longer acceptable. "There is no excuse for waiting", European Environment Commissioner Stavros Dimas said.
. . In some cases, the panel said, technology could bring major benefits, such as cutting health costs by tackling pollution. Even changing planting times for rice or managing livestock herds better could cut emissions of methane, another powerful greenhouse gas.
. . A new study by the National Academy of Sciences found that wind energy could reduce the energy sector's CO2 emissions by 4.5% by 2020. But federal and state governments should take environmental impacts of wind energy more seriously as part of the planning, locating and regulating turbines, it said.
. . It said the percentage of birds killed by collisions with the towers and spinning blades of turbines were few compared with kills from vehicles and buildings. But wind turbines could begin to threaten local populations of some bat and bird species, especially along migration corridors, if wind power grows rapidly over the next 20 years, it said.
. . Audubon supports wind power, believing it reduces global-warming pollution and that any climate change resulting from fossil fuel emissions would kill more birds than wind turbines would. The group cautions, however, that industry-wide safeguards should be developed to minimize bird harm.
. . Bird kills could peak, however, during spring migrations when cool fronts from the North bring late-night storms. "Like any airline, bad weather at night makes it hard for birds to fly, and they use the lights on turbines as beacons in bad weather." North and South Dakota are also areas of potential risk because much of the U.S. water fowl population breeds in an area known as the Prairie Pothole region. "It's basically the duck factory of the country", said Daulton.
. . Delegates said the approval of the report should conclusively debunk arguments by skeptics that combatting global warming was too costly, that it would stifle development in poorer countries, or that the temperature rise had gone too far to change. "If we continue doing what we are doing now, we are in deep trouble", said Ogunlade Davidson, the co-chair of group responsible for finalizing the report this week.
. . The U.N.'s top climate change official, Yvo de Boer, said the report "clearly rebuts fears that economic development and wealth conflict with active protection of the climate."
. . The report follows two studies by the IPCC earlier this year warning that unabated greenhouse gas emissions could drive global temperatures up as much as 11 degrees by 2100, triggering a surge in ocean levels, destruction of vast numbers of species, economic devastation in tropical zones and mass human migrations.
. . Even the most stringent efforts outlined in the report, however, would not prevent suffering. An increase in temperatures to 3.6 degrees could still subject up to 2 billion people to water shortages by 2050 and threaten extinction for 20% to 30% of the world's species, the IPCC said.

May 4, 07: Environmentalists fear that a key climate report to be published this week is using outdated science, and will lead to dangerous climate change. Campaigners say the IPCC's economics report has based its recommendations on the safe limit of atmospheric CO2 being 550 parts per million (ppm). But more recent scientific studies now put that figure at 450ppm, they argue.
. . Attempts by the report's authors to amend the findings to reflect the new data have been resisted by the Chinese. The current trend of China's emissions would drive global CO2 to much more than 550ppm unless developed nations start making much more radical cuts than they have offered so far. China is said to be prepared to block any such changes to the report.
. . The Chinese are also negotiating hard to ensure that the document does not imply any necessity for developing nations to tackle climate change. The original UN agreement, the United National Framework Convention on Climate Change, made it clear that rich nations had to cut emissions first. China is angry that the US is blaming it for pollution when its per capita emissions are six times higher than China's, yet the Chinese are manufacturing goods for the rest of the world. Brazil and India are said to be supportive of the stance adopted by the Chinese on this issue.

May 3, 07: Consensus was eventually reached on a report by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, a U.N. network of 2,000 scientists and delegates from more than 120 nations. "It's all done", said Peter Lukey, a member of the South Africa delegation. "Everything we wanted to see was there and more. The message is: We have to do something now."
. . A draft of the report proposed the world limit concentrations of greenhouse gases to between 445 parts per million and 650 parts per million, but China sought to strike the lower range over fears it would hinder its booming economy. China's efforts failed to remove the lower emission target from the report. Beijing campaigned for wording that would clearly blame the top industrialized countries in North America and Europe for global warming and give them the responsibility for solving it, rather than latecomers like China and India.
. . China is facing increasing international pressure as its economy expands — it posted 11.1% growth in the first quarter.
. . The U.S. delegation was vocal over the role nuclear power could play in efforts to reduce greenhouse gasses. European nations reminded policymakers not to forget the security risks that could be associated with that.

May 3, 07: The US and China want to amend a major report by U.N.-sponsored climate researchers to play down its conclusion that quick, affordable action can limit the worst effects of global warming, according to documents.
. . "The key thing is whatever they decide here, it cannot be ignored anymore that climate change is happening in a big way", said Stephan Singer, head of the WWF's Climate Change Policy Unit. "It's happening much faster. We have more solutions out there than before and it's not as costly as some people want us to believe it is", he added.

Apr 28, 07: As the world warms and scientists' warnings grow urgent, climate negotiators are counting down toward make-or-break talks later this year, hoping for progress on a long-term deal to sharply reduce greenhouse-gas emissions.
. . Experts are beginning to fear, however, that as time runs down, the best that can be hoped for may be an extension of the relatively weak Kyoto Protocol, due to expire in 2012. The alternative is a world without any CO2-reduction rules at all.
. . The year's bad news on climate change is coming in installments. In the third installment, coming in a week in Bangkok, Thailand, the authoritative panel is expected to say the world could still head off severe damage if all countries act urgently, with the best policies and technology, to rein in CO2 and other heat-trapping emissions — an improbable scenario.
. . There are signs of movement. In March, the European Union formally committed to at least a 20% cut in emissions, below 1990 levels, by 2020. The Democrats newly in control of Congress are pushing for mandatory caps on U.S. emissions. China is talking more seriously about controls. The key complication is a "you first" standoff between the United States, on one side, and China and the developing world on the other.
. . China, meanwhile, isn't expected to submit to an international regime unless the U.S. takes on a major commitment. It points to the fact that its per-capita emissions of CO2, byproduct of power plants, automobiles and other fossil fuel-burning sources, has stood at less than one-sixth the American per-person emissions. "Prematurely" committing to mandatory cutbacks could keep China from climbing out of its poverty, the Beijing government said.
. . The Kyoto pact, a 1997 annex to a 1992 U.N. climate treaty, requires 35 industrialized nations to reduce greenhouse-gas emissions by, on average, 5% below 1990 levels by 2012. But specialists say 50% reductions will be needed to stabilize the global-warming gases.
. . In a discussion forum that's a sidebar to the conference, government delegates have been talking about narrower, innovative ways for fast-developing countries like China to contribute without committing to blanket, quantified reductions. "They could commit to a certain share of renewables", that is, a higher proportion of wind, solar or other non-CO2 power sources in their energy mix, said Hermann E. Ott of Germany's Wuppertal Institute, which has conducted in-depth studies of post-Kyoto paths. "You could also think of efficiency standards for electrical appliances", Ott said, "or measures for certain sectors —-for the steel industry, for example."

Apr 10, 07: Fighting global warming will be inexpensive but governments have little time left to avert big, damaging temperature rises, a draft UN report shows. The draft, due for release in Bangkok on May 4, indicates warming is on track to exceed a 2 C rise over pre-industrial times, regarded by the European Union as a threshold for "dangerous" change to nature.
. . Two scenarios highlighted in the report, the third in a U.N. series in 2007 that will guide policymakers, say the costs of limiting emissions of greenhouse gases could mean a loss of 0.2 or 0.6% of global gross domestic product (GDP) in 2030. The most stringent scenario assessed, demanding that governments ensure that global greenhouse gas emissions start falling within 15 years, would cost 3% of GDP by 2030.
. . The conclusions broadly support those in a report last year by former World Bank chief economist Nicholas Stern, who estimated that costs of acting now to slow global warming were about 1% of global output, against a far larger 5 to 20% if the world delayed action.
. . The IPCC draft says easily achieved curbs include better use of fossil fuels, shifts to energies such as wind, solar or nuclear power and better management of forestry and farming. Economic benefits in addition to energy savings include better health from less pollution, less damage to agriculture from acid rain and greater energy security by cutting imports.
. . The report, "Mitigation of Climate Change" and drawing on the work of 2,500 scientists, says time is running out. "Mitigation efforts over the next two to three decades will determine to a large extent the long-term global mean temperature increase and the corresponding climate change impacts that can be avoided", it said.
. . The most stringent scenario, costing 3% of GDP, would limit greenhouse gases to 445-535 ppm by 2030, inside a range likely to bring a 2-2.4 C rise.
. . Greenhouse gas emissions have risen by 70% between 1970 and 2004, and are expected to rise by a further 25 to 90% by 2030 from 2000 without new restraints, driven mainly by growth in developing nations such as China and India.

There were other disputes where scientists lost out:
. . _Instead of saying "hundreds of millions" would be vulnerable to flooding under certain scenarios, the final document says "many millions."
. . _Instead of suggesting up to 120 million people are at risk of hunger because of global warming, the revised report refers to negative effects on subsidence farmers and fishers.

Often it was the U.S. delegation who stood with scientists and helped reach compromise, said Stanford University scientist Stephen Schneider, a frequent critic of the Bush administration's global warming policies.
. . British scientist Neil Adger said he and others were disappointed that government officials deleted parts of a chart that highlights the devastating effects of climate change with every rise of 1.8 degrees in temperature.
. . Some scientists bitterly vowed never to take part in the process again. Still, Adger and other scientists and even environmental groups hailed the final report as the strongest ever. "This is a glimpse into an apocalyptic future", the Greenpeace environmental group said of the final report.
. . "Don't be poor in a hot country, don't live in hurricane alley, watch out about being on the coasts or in the Arctic, and it's a bad idea to be on high mountains with glaciers melting", said Schneider, the Stanford scientist who was one of the study authors.
. . Africa by 2020 is looking at an additional 75 million to 250 million people going thirsty because of climate change, the report said. Deadly diarrheal diseases associated with floods and droughts will increase in Asia because of global warming, the report said.
. . The first few degrees increase in global temperature will actually raise global food supply, but then it will plummet, according to the report. "The poorest of the poor in the world —-and this includes poor people in prosperous societies-— are going to be the worst hit", said Rajendra Pachauri, chairman.
. . Schneider said a main message isn't just what will happen, but what already has started: melting glaciers, stronger hurricanes, deadlier heat waves, and disappearing or moving species. It all can be traced directly to greenhouse gases from the burning of fossil fuels, according to the report.
. . Martin Parry, who conducted the tough closed-door negotiations, said that with 29,000 sets of data from every continent include Antarctica, the report firmly and finally established "a man-made climate signal coming through on plants, water and ice."
. . "There are things that can be done now, but it's much better if it can be done now rather than later," said David Karoly of the University of Oklahoma, one of the report authors. "We can fix this," Schneider said.

Apr 6, 07: More than 100 nations in the U.N. climate panel agreed a final text after all-night talks during which some scientists accused governments of watering down conclusions that climate change was already under way and damaging nature.
. . The IPCC, which groups 2,500 scientists and is the world authority on climate change, said all regions of the planet would suffer from a sharp warming. Its findings are approved unanimously by governments and will guide policy on issues such as extending the U.N.'s Kyoto Protocol, the main U.N. plan for capping greenhouse gas emissions, beyond 2012.
. . A senior Democratic lawmaker said the report was further evidence that the U.S. had to act quickly on global warming. "This Congress must rise to the challenge of transitioning from energy sources that threaten the planet and preparing for the damage we can no longer avoid", said Rep. Edward Markey, who heads a special committee on energy independence and global warming in the House of Representatives.
. . "This further underlines both how urgent it is to reach global agreement on reducing greenhouse gas emissions and how important it is for us all to adapt to the climate change that is already under way", said European Environment Commissioner Stavros Dimas.
. . "The urgency of this report...should be matched with an equally urgent response by governments", said Hans Verolme of the WWF conservation group. Other participants said the US, which cited high costs when it pulled out of Kyoto, had opposed a suggested text that said parts of North America could suffer "severe economic damage" from climate change.
. . "It looks like very blatant vested interests are trying to stop particular messages getting out", said Neil Adger from Britain's Tyndall Center for Climate Change Research. "We give our best to provide the best scientific assessment, but when the wording of that is then changed ... we get very upset. It's three years' work." He said delegates had also tried to weaken the link between greenhouse gas emissions caused by humans and the impacts of global warming worldwide.
. . Cynthia Rosenzweig of the NASA Goddard Institute for Space Studies submitted a letter of protest to the IPCC chairman after Chinese delegates insisted on cutting a reference to 'very high confidence' that climate change was already affecting natural systems on all continents and in some oceans, she said. "I did make a statement that the authors strongly felt that the 'very high confidence' level was right", she told reporters. Although Rosenzweig said she was happy with the compromise, many scientists felt the summary was not as sound as the larger report that they are preparing.
. . "There is some residual frustration amongst the scientists. There's no question about that", said Kevin Hennessy, senior research scientist at the Climate Impact Group in Australia and another lead author.

It is the second in a series of IPCC reports coming out this year, together making up its fourth global climate assessment. The first element, on the science of climate change, released in February, concluded it was at least 90% likely that human activities are principally responsible for the warming observed since 1950. The third part, due in May, will focus on ways of curbing the rise in greenhouse gas concentrations and temperature. A fourth report, in November, will sum up all the findings.

Apr 6, 07: Top climate experts issued today their bleakest forecasts yet about global warming, ranging from hunger in Africa to a thaw of Himalayan glaciers. China, Russia and Saudi Arabia had raised most objections during the night. Other participants also said the United States had toned down some passages. Delegates sharpened other sections, including adding a warning that some African nations might have to spend 5 to 10% of gross domestic product on adapting to climate change.
. . Overall, the report is the strongest U.N. assessment yet of the threat of climate change, predicting water shortages that could affect billions of people and a rise in ocean levels that could go on for centuries.
. . Friday's study also says climate change could cause hunger for millions with a sharp fall in crop yields in Africa. It could rapidly thaw of Himalayan glaciers that feed rivers from India to China and bring heat waves for Europe and North America. U.S. delegates rejected suggested wording that parts of North America may suffer "severe economic damage" from warming.
. . But it toughened some sections by saying "significant loss of biodiversity" was possible in parts of Australia such as the Great Barrier Reef by 2020. The IPCC report said climate change is no longer a vague, distant threat. "The whole of climate change is something actually here and now rather than something for the future", said Neil Adger, a British lead author of the report.

Apr 5, 07: The U.N. Security Council put climate change on its agenda for the first time, warning global warming could be a catalyst for new conflict around the world. The council said it would hold a high-level meeting later this month on how changing weather patterns could threaten international security. "The traditional triggers for conflict which exist out there are likely to be exacerbated by the effect of climate change", Britain's U.N. Ambassador Emyr Jones Parry, the council president, said.
. . Jones Parry said he expects a summit on climate change next year, likely in September 2008. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon has not committed to a summit, but he has said he would discuss how best to confront the climate change problem with world leaders at a meeting of the Group of Eight industrialized countries in June.

Apr 1, 07: A key element of the second major report on climate change being released Friday in Belgium is a chart that maps out the effects of global warming, most of them bad, with every degree of temperature rise. There's one bright spot: A minimal heat rise means more food production in northern regions of the world.
. . However, the number of species going extinct rises with the heat, as does the number of people who may starve, or face water shortages, or floods. While humanity will survive, hundreds of millions, maybe billions of people may not, according to the chart —-if the worst scenarios happen.
. . But as the world's average temperature warms from 1990 levels, the projections get more dire. Add 1 degree C, and between 400 million and 1.7 billion extra people can't get enough water, some infectious diseases and allergenic pollens rise, and some amphibians go extinct. But the world's food supply, especially in northern areas, could increase. That's the likely outcome around 2020, according to the draft.
. . Add another 1.8 degrees, and as many as 2 billion people could be without water and about 20% to 30% of the world's species near extinction. Also, more people start dying because of malnutrition, disease, heat waves, floods and droughts — all caused by global warming. That would happen around 2050, depending on the level of greenhouse gases from the burning of fossil fuels.
. . At the extreme end of the projections, a 7- to 9-degree average temp increase, the chart predicts: "Up to one-fifth of the world population affected by increased flood events ... "1.1 to 3.2 billion people with increased water scarcity" ..."major extinctions around the globe."
. . Despite that dire outlook, several scientists involved in the process say they are optimistic that such a drastic temperature rise won't happen because people will reduce CO2 emissions that cause global warming. "The worst stuff is not going to happen because we can't be that stupid", said Harvard U oceanographer James McCarthy, who was a top author of the 2001 version of this report. "Not that I think the projections aren't that good, but because we can't be that stupid." [hmm....]
. . Among the gloomy forecasts, the report predicts that glaciers in the Himalayas, the world's highest mountain range, will melt away, affecting hundreds of millions of people. "If current warming rates are maintained, Himalayan glaciers could decay at very rapid rates, shrinking from the present 500,000 square kilometers to 100,000 square km by 2030s."

Apr 1, 07: From the micro to the macro, from plankton in the oceans to polar bears in the far north and seals in the far south, global warming has begun changing life on Earth, international scientists of the IPCC will report next Friday. "Changes in climate are now affecting physical and biological systems on every continent", says a draft.
. . Animal and plant life in the Arctic and Antarctic is undergoing substantial change, scientists say. Rising sea levels elsewhere are damaging coastal wetlands. Warmer waters are bleaching and killing coral reefs, pushing marine species toward the poles, reducing fish populations in African lakes
. . The IPCC draft estimates that if temperatures rise approximately 2 to 4 degrees F more, one-third of species will be lost from their current range, either moved elsewhere or vanished.

Mar 13, 07: Global warming could cause severe food and water shortages for millions of people by 2100 and trigger a melt of polar ice that could keep ocean levels rising for centuries, a draft U.N. report shows. It said the poor were most at risk, for instance in sub-Saharan Africa and around deltas of major rivers in Asia.
. . The survey by the world's top climate scientists, is due for release in Brussels on April 6. The draft, detailing likely impacts and ways to adapt to climate change, is the second of four studies this year based on the work of 2,500 climate experts in the U.N.'s Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC).
. . Hundreds of millions of people would suffer from water scarcity even with a small rise in temperatures. Between 1.1 to 3.2 billion might suffer if temperatures jumped by more than 4 C, at the higher end of forecasts. Water scarcity could damage semi-arid regions such as the Mediterranean basin, the western US, southern Africa, northeastern Brazil, southern and eastern Australia.
. . It said that about 20-30% of species could be at risk of extinction with a moderate temperature rise.

Feb 27, 07: Declaring the global warming debate over, an international team of scientists urged the world's nations to act now to keep climate change from becoming a catastrophe.
. . The international community needs to take stronger steps to cut the pace of global warming, adapt to the climate changes that have already taken place and ensure development can be sustained throughout the process, the scientists said in a report released at the UN. "We make the argument that it is essential that we get started now: not next year, not next decade, but now", said John Holdren, a professor of environmental policy at Harvard U and member of the scientific panel that crafted the report.
. . The scientists considered nuclear power as a CO2-free option, but said this energy source must address the problem of disposal of radioactive waste and break the link between nuclear technology and weapons proliferation.

Feb 28, 07: To head off the worst of climate change, governments must pour tens of billions of dollars more than they are into clean-energy research and enforce sharp rollbacks in fossil-fuel emissions, an expert scientific panel reported to the UN. The U.N. itself must better prepare to help tens of millions of "environmental refugees", the group said, and authorities everywhere should discourage new building on land less than one meter above sea level.
. . The 166-page report, two years in the making, forecasts a turbulent 21st century of rising seas, spreading drought and disease, weather extremes, and damage to farming, forests, fisheries and other economic areas. "The challenge of halting climate change is one to which civilization must rise", said the panel of 18 scientists from 11 nations, whose work was conducted at U.N. request and sponsored by the private United Nations Foundation and the Sigma Xi Scientific Research Society.
. . Specialists say governments particularly should step up research into CO2 capture and sequestration —-technology to capture CO2 in power-plant emissions and store it underground or underwater. In fact, the experts panel urged governments to immediately ban all new coal-fired power plants except those designed for eventual retrofitting of sequestration technology.
. . Among its wide-ranging list of recommendations, the report also called on U.N. agencies to study the need for an internationally accepted definition of "environmental refugee", since treaties recognize only political refugees as eligible for aid from the U.N. refugee agency.
. . The report expressed "special concern" that international capacity could be overwhelmed by coastal refugees fleeing seas rising as they expand from heat and melted land ice. Scientists estimate a sea-level rise of one meter by 2100 —-conceivable in IPCC projections-— would displace roughly 130 million people worldwide.

Feb 7, 07: While a U.N. report last week left little doubt that scientists think humans are heating the planet, it did nothing to settle the question of whether they are partly responsible for more intense hurricanes.
. . Nonetheless, weather experts said the report by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change could help convince politicians, regulators and insurers that climate change is here to stay.
. . The report warned that human activities are contributing to global warming and the result could be more heat waves, droughts and rising seas. But its conclusion on hurricanes was more vague. The panel said it was "more likely than not" that humans contribute to a trend of increasingly intense hurricanes.
. . Kerry Emanuel, an MIT professor whose research *has linked warming to hurricane intensity, said rising property damage from hurricanes is *partly due to government policies that influence coastal construction, including regulation of insurance markets, federal flood insurance programs that undercharge property owners and disaster relief after storms.
. . Hugh Willoughby, a tropical meteorologist at Florida International U, said "The message is that it's a game of chance. What global warming does is make it a higher-stakes game of chance", he said. "It's making all hurricanes a little bit stronger, and that means when we have bad luck it's going to be worse and when we have good luck it's not going to be as good."
. . Jeff Masters, the founder of weather Web site Weather Underground, said the report did not break any new ground. "But we do expect there to be an increase in the future in intense hurricanes."

Feb 5, 07: The world's poor, who are the least responsible for global warming, will suffer the most from climate change, U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon told environment ministers from around the world at the start of a major week-long gathering in the Kenyan capital Nairobi. "The degradation of the global environment continues unabated ... and the effects of climate change are being felt across the globe", Ban said in a statement after last week's toughest warning yet mankind is to blame for global warming.
. . Desertification round the Sahara and the shrinking of Mount Kilimanjaro's snow-cap have become potent symbols in Africa of the global environment crisis.

Feb 4, 07: BOSTON GLOBE EDITORIAL: The UN report understates the effects that carbon emissions will have. Because of the report's lengthy review process by both scientists and representatives of 113 governments, the most recent evidence of ice melting in Greenland and elsewhere could not be fully included in the final document. Nor could the report include the latest evidence that melting permafrost in Siberia and elsewhere is causing the release of large amounts of methane, a far more damaging greenhouse gas than carbon dioxide.
. . The scientists who wrote the report emphasize that global warming cannot be stopped, only slowed. But doing so will reduce the cost of adapting to it, they argue, and limit its impact in lives lost and habitats destroyed.
. . The US government has had plenty of warning that emissions from its cars, factories, and power plants would have a greenhouse effect. "This generation has altered the composition of the atmosphere on a global scale through . . . a steady increase in carbon dioxide from the burning of fossil fuels", a president once told Congress. That was Lyndon B. Johnson in February of 1965. Forty-two years later, Congress must overcome the current president's intransigence and make the United States a leader in creating an agreement on carbon limits that will enlist both the industrial and the developing worlds.

Feb 3, 07: The head of the Senate's Environment Committee called on the White House to hold a summit grouping the 12 largest greenhouse-gas emitting nations.
. . Sen. Barbara Boxer: "I'm calling on the federal government of the United States of America to be a model of energy efficiency", said Boxer, who was at the UN for a briefing on the IPCC report and the conflict in Sudan's Darfur region.
. . "I'm calling on the president to convene a summit at the White House of the 12 largest global warming emitters." She added that she would bring over some of the scientists who issued the report to brief the Senate. Boxer, whose Environment and Public Works Committee deals with climate legislation, said it was time for Bush to show "real leadership" on the issue, a challenge that could put her on a collision course with an administration that has been criticized for its environmental record.
. . Boxer said cutting emissions was a question of political will, holding up her state as a model for the country. California has enacted a number of measures aimed at cutting emissions of heat-trapping gasses.
. . China is expected to surpass the U.S. as the world's largest emitter of greenhouse gases in the next decade.

Feb 3, 07: Forty-five nations answered France's call today for a new environmental body to slow inevitable global warming and protect the planet, perhaps with policing powers to punish violators. Absent were the world's heavyweight polluter, the United States, and booming nations on the same path as the U.S. — China and India.
. . Without naming the United States —-producer of about one-quarter of the world's greenhouse gases-— Chirac expressed frustration that "some large, rich countries still must be convinced." They are "refusing to accept the consequences of their acts", he said.
. . So far, it is mostly European nations that agreed to pursue plans for the new organization, and to hold their first meeting in Morocco this spring.
. . Former Vice President Al Gore, whose Oscar-nominated documentary on the perils of global warming has garnered worldwide attention, cheered Chirac's efforts. "We are at a tipping point", Gore told the conference by videophone. "We must act, and act swiftly ... Such action requires international cooperation."
. . The world's scientists and other international leaders also said now that the science is so well-documented, action is clearly the next step. "It is time now to hear from the world's policymakers", Tim Wirth, president of the UN Foundation, said Friday. "The so-called and long-overstated 'debate' about global warming is now over."
. . Jason Grumet, head of U.S. bipartisan advocacy group, the National Commission on Energy Policy, said: "The debate has clearly shifted from a battle over the science to fighting over the scope and design of the solution."
. . However, many questions remain about Chirac's proposed new environmental body, including whether it would have the power to enforce global climate accords. Chirac's appeal says only that the group should "evaluate ecological damage" and "support the implementation of environmental decisions."
. . Despite White House resistance to carbon-cutting measures with teeth, de Boer and Carnegie Mellon professor Morgan said they see movement in the US anyway. "We are certainly building critical mass among opinion leaders and nontechnical folks", Morgan said from Pittsburgh, citing recent calls to action by corporate CEOs, even in the energy industry. "We are at the point over the next three to five years where the U.S. is going to get quite serious about it."
. . And in May, the same international panel that wrote Friday's report will wrap up a new document spelling out the benefits and costs of slowing global warming, setting up a buffet of choices for policymakers.
. . For now, scientists are energized that the world is finally listening to them.

Feb 3, 07: Studying the climate reveals new, little-understood, mechanisms: as temperatures warm, they set off feedback effects that may increase, or decrease, warming. So predictions may become less, rather than more, certain. Thus the IPCC’s range of predictions of the rise in the temperature by 2100 has increased from 1.4-5.8C in the 2001 report to 1.1-6.4C in this report.

Feb 2, 07: Time mag: Perhaps the scariest thing about the IPCC report is that is, by the nature of its composition, probably conservative. Only the most-solidly backed facts —-and often the least-controversial ones-— survived the winnowing process. (The IPCC set a December 2005 cutoff date for the submission of scientific research to the new assessment.) A paper published in Science yesterday argued that sea levels today are already rising faster than the 2001 IPCC assessment predicted.
. . But it would be a mistake, as skeptics have done, to point to the remaining disputes as evidence that a broad consensus still hasn't been reached on the science behind climate change. The new IPCC assessment is that consensus.
. . Whatever happens over the next century, we can't say we weren't warned.

Feb 2, 07: The bleak outlook of a major new report on climate change shifted the onus onto governments, even mankind, to take action, with dire warnings Friday from around the world that drastic, rapid change is needed — not least from the United States.
. . Officials in Indonesia and the Maldives, two archipelagos threatened by rising sea levels, said they feared for the future of their lands. Others said the threat was not simply to the environment, but to international peace, prosperity and development. It will be difficult for governments to ignore, because it was agreed by all UN members, including the US and China.
. . South Africa's Environmental Affairs Minister Marthinus van Schalkwyk said failure to act would be "indefensible." "We are now beyond a critical turning point in the debate: those who continue to ignore the threat and its causes, or invoke half-baked arguments to confuse and obstruct, will be doing the greatest disservice imaginable to current and future generations." The South African minister said the report "is a wake-up call to the world's largest emitter, the United States."
. . "The more we know, the more precarious the future looks", said Stephanie Tunmore, of Greenpeace. "There's a clear message to governments here, and the window for action is narrowing fast."
. . Italy's environment minister, Alfonso Pecoraro Scanio, called for a global tax on carbon emissions and a "strong" UN organization for the environment.
. . The Indonesian environment minister, Rachmat Witoelar, has predicted that some 2,000 of Indonesia's estimated 18,000 islands would be swallowed by the sea within three decades because of man-made climate change. He called on developing to commit to cutting emissions by 40 to 60%.
. . Ahmed Saeed, foreign minister of the Maldives, an archipelago of 1,190 low-lying coral islands off southern India, expressed similar fears. "If the sea level rises permanently it will submerge the whole country forever."
. . They tried to warn of dire risks without scaring people so much they'd do nothing — inaction that would lead to the worst possible scenarios.
. . The worst could mean more than 1 million dead and hundreds of billions of dollars in costs by 2100, said Kevin Trenberth of the National Center for Atmospheric Research in Colorado, one of many study co-authors. He said that adapting will mean living with more extreme weather such as severe droughts, more hurricanes and wildfires.
. . "It's later than we think", said panel co-chair Susan Solomon, the U.S. National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration scientist who helped push through the document's strong language. Solomon, who remains optimistic about the future, said it's close to too late to alter the future for her children — but maybe it's not too late for her grandchildren.
. . Sea level rise could get worse after that. By 2100, if nothing is done to curb emissions, the melting of Greenland's ice sheet would be inevitable and the world's seas would eventually rise by more than 20 feet, Bindoff said.
. . "While climate changes run like a rabbit, world politics move like a snail: Either we accelerate or we risk a disaster", said Italy's environment minister, Alfonso Pecoraro Scanio.
. . Temperatures will spike higher near the poles, according to the report. Within 22 years — whether greenhouse gases are controlled or not — most of the Northern Hemisphere will see more high temperature extremes, the report showed. Places like Northern Africa will get even less rainfall.
. . This climate change "is just not something you can stop", said Trenberth. "We're just going to have to live with it. If you were to come up back in 100 years time, we'll have a different climate."
. . People experience the harshest effects of global warming through extreme weather — heat waves, droughts, floods, and hurricanes — said study co-author Philip Jones of Britain's University of East Anglia. Those have increased significantly in the past decade and will get even worse in the future, he said.
. . Given all the dire predictions, why are scientists nearly all optimistic? They think their message is finally getting through to the people in charge. [...with 2 exceptions...]
. . "The signal that we received from the science is crystal clear", said Yvo de Boer, the executive secretary of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change, a multi-national body that tries to change policy to fight global warming. "That makes it imperative that the political response that comes from this crystal-clear science is as crystal-clear as well."

Feb 2, 07: The European Union has to look at what science is saying about climate change and tailor its policies accordingly, the EU's environment chief said. Achim Steiner, head of the United Nations Environment Program, said the EU goal of limiting temperature rises to 2 degrees Celsius above pre-industrial levels was "almost redundant" after the findings of the report.
. . Dimas issued a statement today calling for an "urgent start" to international talks on an agreement that would carry on after the first period of the Kyoto Protocol concludes at the end of 2012. "It is now more urgent than ever that the international community gets down to serious negotiations on a comprehensive new worldwide agreement to stop global warming", he said in the statement. The EU is expected to push developed nations, including the US, to sign up to a 30% emissions cut by 2020 as part of those talks.

Feb 2, 07: Mankind is to blame for global warming, the world's top climate scientists said today, sending governments a "crystal clear" warning they must take urgent action to avert severe and irreversible damage. The UN panel, which groups 2,500 scientists from more than 130 nations, predicted more droughts, heatwaves and a slow gain in sea levels that could last for more than 1,000 years even if greenhouse gas emissions were capped.
. . "Faced with this emergency, now is not the time for half measures. It is the time for a revolution, in the true sense of the term", French President Jacques Chirac said. "We are in truth on the historical doorstep of the irreversible."

Feb 1, 07: Sea levels are rising faster than predicted amid global warming, a group of scientists said today in a challenge to the U.N.'s climate panel which is set to issue a report toning down the threat of rising oceans, outpacing computer projections, Stefan Ramstorf of Germany's Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research and co-authors wrote.
. . Sea levels rose 17 cm in the 20th century. The 1993-2006 rate, if it lasted a century, would work out at 33 cm but many models project a quickening pace because of a buildup of greenhouse gases. "Previous projections, as summarized by the IPCC, have not exaggerated but may in some respects even have underestimated the change, in particular for sea level", the scientists wrote.
. . Rahmstorf declined give his best estimate of how far sea levels would rise --he wrote a report in December saying that observations of past data indicated that seas could rise by 50-140 centimeters by 2100, far higher than IPCC projections. One of the study's many co-authors, Andrew Weaver of the University of Victoria said the report was based on science that is rock-solid, peer-reviewed, conservative and consensus: "It's very conservative. Scientists by their nature are skeptics."
. . The scientists wrote the report, based on years of peer-reviewed research; government officials edited it with an eye toward the required unanimous approval by world governments.
. . The panel quickly agreed on two of the most contentious issues: attributing global warming to man-made burning of fossil fuels and connecting it to a recent increase in stronger hurricanes. Negotiations over a final third difficult issue —-how much sea level rise is predicted by 2100-— went into the night Thursday with a deadline approaching for the report.
. . It is by nature relatively cautious because it relies on hundreds of scientists, including skeptics.

Jan 30, 07: The top U.N. official for the environment asked Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon today to convene an emergency international summit to combat global climate change, an official said, joining a growing chorus of world leaders and scientists calling for urgent action to cut greenhouse gases. Kenya has agreed to host a possible summit, which could be held between July and December.
Jan 30, 07: U.S. scientists felt pressured to tailor their writings on global warming to fit the Bush administration's skepticism, in some cases at the behest of an ex-oil industry lobbyist, a congressional committee heard today.
. . "Our investigations found high-quality science struggling to get out", Francesca Grifo of the watchdog group Union of Concerned Scientists told members of the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee.
. . A survey by the group found that 150 climate scientists personally experienced political interference in the past five years, for a total of at least 435 incidents.
. . Rick Piltz, a former U.S. government scientist who said he resigned in 2005 after pressure to soft-pedal findings on global warming, told the committee in prepared testimony that former White House official Phil Cooney took an active role in casting doubt on the consequences of global climate change.
. . Cooney, who was a lobbyist for the American Petroleum Institute before becoming chief of staff at the White House Council on Environmental Quality, resigned in 2005 to work for oil giant ExxonMobil.
. . Documents on global climate change required Cooney's review and approval, Piltz said. "His edits of program reports, which had been drafted and approved by career science program managers, had the cumulative effect of adding an enhanced sense of scientific uncertainty about global warming and minimizing its likely consequences", Piltz said.
. . One participant, who asked not to be identified because the talks are confidential, said there was a noticeable change in the U.S. delegation, which some accused of hanging up the 2001 talks: "The U.S. is much more constructive."
Jan 30, 07: The Democratic chairman of a House panel examining the government's response to climate change said today there is evidence that senior Bush administration officials sought repeatedly "to mislead the public by injecting doubt into the science of global warming."
. . Rep. Henry Waxman, D-Cal., said he and the top Republican on his oversight committee, Rep. Tom Davis of Virginia, have sought documents from the administration on climate policy, but repeatedly been rebuffed.
. . "The committee isn't trying to obtain state secrets or documents that could affect our immediate national security", said Waxman, opening the hearing. "We are simply seeking answers to whether the White House's political staff is inappropriately censoring impartial government scientists."
. . "We know that the White House possesses documents that contain evidence of an attempt by senior administration officials to mislead the public by injecting doubt into the science of global warming and minimize the potential danger", Waxman said. Waxman said his committee had not received documents it requested from the White House and other agencies, and that a handful of papers received on the eve of the hearing "add nothing to our inquiry."
. . Sen. Barbara Boxer opened a meeting where senators were to express their views on global warming in advance of a broader set of hearings on the issue. Among those scheduled to make comments were two presidential hopefuls —-Sens. John McCain, R-Ariz., and Barack Obama, D-Ill. Both lawmakers favor mandatory reductions in greenhouse gas emissions, something opposed by President Bush.

Jan 29, 07: World governments should take heed of the most wide-ranging scientific assessment so far of a human link to global warming and agree prompt action to slow the trend, the chairman of a U.N. climate report said. "I hope policies and action will be formed to address the problem", Rajendra Pachauri, the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) chairman told reporters. "I think based on the awareness that is growing very rapidly in every part of the globe, you will see a certain political resolve developing."
. . Many top scientists reject the new figures as not new *enough: They do not include the recent melting of big ice sheets in two crucial locations —-Greenland and Antarctica.[AND, of course, *not including release of methane from clathrates & permafrost!]
. . While critics call the panel overly alarmist, it is by nature relatively *cautious because it relies on input from hundreds of scientists, including skeptics and industry researchers. And its reports must be unanimous, approved by 154 governments —-including the US and oil-rich countries such as Saudi Arabia.
. . Early versions of the new report predict that by 2100 the sea level would rise between 5 and 23 inches, while a rise of 20 to 55 inches is forecast by 2100 in a study published in the peer-reviewed journal Science this month. Other climate experts, including NASA's James Hansen, predict *even *bigger sea level rises.
. . Indonesia's environment minister warned Monday that rising sea levels stand to inundate some 2,000 of his country's more than 18,000 islands by 2030.
. . This week's meetings do not address how to *tackle global warming, the subject of a report later this year by the IPCC.

Jan 28, 07: Later this week in Paris, climate scientists will issue a dire forecast for the planet that warns of slowly rising sea levels and higher temperatures. But that may be the sugarcoated version.
. . Early and changeable drafts of their upcoming authoritative report on climate change foresee smaller sea level rises than were projected in 2001 in the last report. Many top U.S. scientists reject these rosier numbers. Those calculations don't include the recent, and dramatic, melt-off of big ice sheets in two crucial locations: They "don't take into account the gorillas —-Greenland and Antarctica", said Ohio State U earth sciences professor Lonnie Thompson, a polar ice specialist. "I think there are unpleasant surprises as we move into the 21st century."
. . Michael MacCracken, who until 2001 coordinated the official U.S. government reviews of the international climate report on global warming, has fired off a letter of protest over the omission. The melting ice sheets in Greenland and Antarctica are a fairly recent development that has taken scientists by surprise. They don't know how to predict its effects in their computer models. But many fear it will mean the world's coastlines are swamped much earlier than most predict.
. . The early versions of the report predict that by 2100, the sea level will rise anywhere between 5 and 23 inches. That's far lower than the 20 to 55 inches forecast by 2100 in a study published in the peer-review journal Science this month. Other climate experts, including NASA's James Hansen, predict sea level rise that can be measured by feet more than inches.
. . The report is also expected to include some kind of proviso that says things could be much worse if ice sheets continue to melt.
. . The prediction being considered this week by the IPCC is "obviously not the full story because ice sheet decay is something we cannot model right now, but we know it's happening", said Stefan Rahmstorf, a climate panel lead author from Germany who made the larger prediction of up to 55 inches of sea level rise. "A document like that tends to underestimate the risk", he said.
. . In the past, the climate change panel didn't figure there would be large melt of ice in west Antarctica and Greenland this century and didn't factor it into the predictions. Those forecasts were based only on the sea level rise from melting glaciers (which are different from ice sheets) and the physical expansion of water as it warms.
. . But in 2002, Antarctica's 1,255-square-mile Larsen B ice shelf broke off and disappeared in just 35 days. And recent NASA data shows that Greenland is losing 53 cubic miles of ice each year —-twice the rate it was losing in 1996.
. . Those scientists who say sea level will rise even more are battling a consensus-building structure that routinely issues scientifically cautious global warming reports, scientists say. The IPCC reports have to be unanimous, approved by 154 governments —-including the US and oil-rich countries such as Saudi Arabia-— and already published peer-reviewed research done before mid-2006. [so predictions will be very conservative...]
. . Rahmstorf, a physics and oceanography professor at Potsdam University in Germany, says, "In a way, it is one of the strengths of the IPCC to be very conservative and cautious and not overstate any climate change risk."

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