Explore Our Planet

Between the 9th of November and the 14th of December 2007, TNS Opinion & Social, carried out wave 68.2 of the EUROBAROMETER, on request of the EUROPEAN COMMISSION, Directorate-General for Communication, “Research and Political Analysis”.

Report: 127 pages, including fieldwork details, questionaire, data tables, technical specifications

Conclusion:

96% of Europeans say that protecting the environment is important for them personally. For two-thirds of this group it is even very important.

Uploaded by: WSBTVdotcom, March 15, 2008; 4:19min

A severe weather system moved into Georgia March 14 resulting in numerous injuries and major destruction and damage to areas of Atlanta and Fulton County, Ga.

The system produced one tornado, injuring at least 20 people and damaging dozens of homes and businesses, according to Georgia Gov. Sonny Purdue.

G20 is officially referred to as “The 4th Ministerial Meeting of G8 Gleneagles Dialogue on Climate Change, Clean Energy and Sustainable Development”, and was set up as a result of an agreement at the Gleneagles G8 Summit held in the United Kingdom in 2005.

At G20, issues such as global warming and climate change will be discussed by environment and energy ministers of the world’s 20 major greenhouse gas emitting nations as well as representatives from relevant international organizations, industries, NGOs and NPOs.

Chart Credit: Ministry of the Environment based on the Handbook of Energy & Economic Statistics in Japan (partially supplemented by UNFCCC data)

via: Hug-Lies and A Beautiful Lie

Nice collection of tips from abeautifullie.org helpful to reduce energy consumption.

1. Slow down to cut costs and cut carbon! Slowing down from 75 mph to 65 mph will drop your highway gasoline consumption 15 percent.

2. If everyone took 30 seconds to inflate their tires to the proper pressure we would save 200,000 barrels of oil a day!

3. Bring Your Own Bag: You’ll save one mile’s worth of petroleum for every 14 plastic bags you don’t use. Not to mention cut down on pollution-we throw away over 30 billion one time use bags each year. (more…)

Though the eleven year solor cycle as well as the Southern Oscillation hit their minimum 2007 is recorded as second warmth year in the period of instrumental data.

More:
Wikipedia: Solar Cycle
Marshall Space Flight Center: NASA Satellites Capture Start of New Solar Cycle
Goddard Institute for Space Studies : Global Temperature Trends: 2007 Summation

… If Germany halted construction of coal-fired power plants that do not capture and sequester the CO2, it could be a tipping point for the world.

Leaders in Great Britain are advocating a moratorium on new coal-fired power plants; U.S. citizens are blocking one coal plant after another and a potentially course-changing election is nearing.

But time to find the tipping point is running out. I hope that you will give these considerations the urgent attention they deserve in setting your national policies. You have the potential to influence the future of the planet. …

Jim Hanson, Perspective of a Younger Generation

When thinking changes your mind, that’s philosophy.
When God changes your mind, that’s faith.
When facts change your mind, that’s science.
The Edge Annual Question — 2008

How to convince people of the importance to tackle Climate Change? Is it OK to spread subliminal messages when facts does not help? The topic is complex and not everybody has learned to deal with that many facts and prefers other strategies of decision making. Are we equipped to solve problems of this scope?

via Quantinger

Picture Credit goes to Karen Montgomer

Just for reference: not only carbon dioxyde has the capabilitiy to heat up our planet. E.g. a massive amount of Methane reside frozen in the oceans and the siberian permafrost soil.

via Australian Institute of Energy

Finally in a dramatic session the participating countries agreed on the ‘Bali Action Plan’. What do you expect when representatives from over 180 countries come to a conclusion? Would searching the least common denominator lead to a powerless settlement? Will single states block all reasonable steps pretending imbalanced economic consequences?

However, finally the US left their isolated position and US Under Secretary of State Paula Dobriansky took the floor again, said the US wanted a roadmap and wanted to be part of the roadmap.

“We are very committed to long-term greenhouse gas emission reductions,” and she said the US would work with other large emitters to halve global emissions by 2050. And then she said the US “will go forward and join the consensus,” which was followed by a thunderous ovation.

Two results are remarkable: the implemenation of a ‘Ad Hoc Working Group on Long-term Cooperative Action under the Convention’ with the mission to collect the input from all parties and present the result at the fourteenth session of the conference of the Parties (Dec. 2008) and last but not least the conference accepted the stabilization scenarios developed by the Working Group III.

You may bring up that’s only a footnote, well it is, but it is written down, it is agreed and is states that an emission reduction of 50 up to 85% is indispensable to stabilize global mean temperature at 2 - 2.4°C above pre-industrial levels.

More:
AR4: Technical Summary of Working Group III / Mitigation of Climate Change
AR4: Chapter 13: Policies, instruments, and co-operative arrangements
Videos: germanwatch@youtube

Australia’s new Prime Minister Kevin Rudd used the opportunity to target Australia’s ratification of the Kyoto Protocol. In opposite to former PM Howard - he claimed the emissions intensive economy will suffer from tackling Climate Change - the Labor Party sets up a strong billion dollar plan to boost renewable energy, clean business, energy innovation and clean coal.

This impressive change now isolates the United States as the only developed nation not having Kyoto signed.

More: Labor’s Clean Energy Plan