Archive by date | October 2009

Still an “uphill battle” to Copenhagen

Still an “uphill battle” to Copenhagen

Getting a climate deal agreed in December will require an ‘uphill battle’ said UK energy and climate change Secretary Ed Miliband in London yesterday, despite incremental progress from the world’s largest economies on agreeing the way forward.  Read more

Superfreakonomists spout off about global cooling

Superfreakonomists spout off about global cooling

The authors of the bestselling Freakonomics, which was largely an attempt to make sense and fun of economics for those who don’t think they care about such things, are now back with a title that sounds like a bigger and better version of the original: Superfreakonomics. Exploring the topics of global cooling, patriotic prostitutes, and why suicide bombers should buy life insurance, economist Steven Levitt and New York Times journalist Stephen Dubner are again unabashedly aiming for mass appeal.  Read more

Soros commits $1bn to clean-tech

Soros commits $1bn to clean-tech

Cross-posted from The Great Beyond US billionaire George Soros, founder of the hedge fund Soros Fund Management, has announced plans to invest $1 billion in clean-energy technologies to help stave off global warming. Speaking at a climate conference in Copenhagen on 12 October, Soros also said he plans to establish – with $100 million of his own money – a new environmental policy group called Climate Policy Initiative. “I want to apply rather stringent criteria to the investments,” Soros told Bloomberg in an email. “They should be profitable but should also actually make a contribution to solving the problem.” Soros  … Read more

IMarEST launches position statement on climate change

IMarEST launches position statement on climate change

The Institute of Marine Engineering, Science and Technology – an international body that traditionally has represented marine industry and more recently, scientists too – today released its position statement on climate change.  Read more

Cutting non-CO2 climate agents

International climate policy is largely focused on reducing emissions of carbon dioxide. But even if we reduce emissions now, a proportion of CO2 will stay in the atmosphere for millennia. A faster-acting strategy is needed if we’re to avoid dangerous climate change in the short term. That’s the message from a team of experts writing in the latest issue of PNAS.  Read more

The Two-Degree Target

As promised, Nature’s film on climate change went online last week on October 1. You can view the film in full on nature.com (it lasts about twenty minutes in total). It will also be on YouTube next week, at which stage I’ll embed it here.  Read more

Injecting sulphates into the stratosphere: pros and cons

In 2006, Nobel laureate Paul Crutzen suggested that we might need to start deliberately engineering the climate if no progress could be made on curbing our emissions. Since then, atmospheric concentrations of CO2 have continued to rise. So it’s perhaps no surprise that what once seemed like a outlandish idea has recently become a subject of serious scientific endeavour.  Read more

Bangkok negotiations: US concedes on funding as accusations fly

At the ongoing pre-Copenhagen climate talks in Bangkok, the US has made a step towards resolving the deal-breaker issue of funds to help developing countries respond to climate change. The Guardian’s all over it, perhaps thirsting for some good news to break up the drumbeat of doubt we’ve heard lately on the climate policy front.  Read more