The Great Beyond

Just in case you think that the IPCC/climate-gate story has petered out in the last few days…

Phil Jones, the University of East Anglia scientist whose stolen emails caused the worldwide ‘climate-gate’ kerfuffle, has told The Sunday Times he contemplated killing himself.

“I did think about it, yes. About suicide,” he says. “I thought about it several times, but I think I’ve got past that stage now.”

Jones also told the paper he is now on beta blockers and taking sleeping pills in the aftermath of the email theft. He continues to receive death threats.

The issue of how climate researchers deal with freedom of information requests has become a big part of ‘climate-gate’. Now the Daily Telegraph has opened a new front in this campaign, attacking the Met Office for refusing to release correspondence between its director of climate science and colleagues on the IPCC.

It says the Met Office initially claimed the correspondence had been deleted and then later said they existed but could not be disclosed.

Continue reading "Climate-gate, scepticism, and Pachauri’s potboiler" »

Posted by Daniel Cressey on February 08, 2010
Categories: Earth, environment & ecology | Permalink | Comments (1) | TrackBacks (0)

Russia has been accused of dumping radioactive waste into the heavily-polluted Baltic Sea in the early 1990s. The reports come from Sweden's national TV broadcast network, SVT, who quote military intelligence documents. The network says a prosecutor, Mats Palm, is looking into the case and that a preliminary analysis started back in spring 2009.

"Radioactive material from a military base in Latvia is thought to have been thrown into Swedish waters. For many the biggest shock is that the Swedish government may have known at the time and done nothing about it," the BBC says.

A former commander of the Russian navy's Baltic fleet today denied the reports. "This is complete nonsense and a clear provocation, propagated at an international level," Admiral Vladimir Yegorov told the Interfax news agency (AFP).

The Baltic Sea at Darłowo/wikimedia commons

Posted by Richard Van Noorden on February 05, 2010
Categories: Earth, environment & ecology | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

Cross-posted from Climate Feedback.

Indian Premier Manmohan Singh has backed the work of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) and its chairman, Rajendra Pachauri, who has come under fire for his dealing with a recently discovered error and a number of other alleged inaccuracies in the last IPCC report.

The IPCC had mistakenly stated in its 2007 report that all Himalayan glaciers are likely to melt away by 2035 as a result of global warming. The error, and allegations of conflict of interest against Pachauri, who also acts as director of The Energy Research Institute (TERI) in Delhi, have resulted in calls for Pachauri to resign as chairman of the IPCC.

Addressing a TERI-hosted meeting in Delhi on sustainable development Singh acknowledged that "some aspects of science reflected in the work of the IPCC have faced criticism".
But he said that "India has full confidence in the IPCC process and its leadership and will support it in every way."
Pachauri conceded last month that the IPCC's Himalayan estimates were wrong, but asserts that he was not personally responsible for the error.

Posted on behalf of Quirin Schiermeier

Posted by Mark Peplow on February 05, 2010
Categories: Earth, environment & ecology | Permalink | Comments (1) | TrackBacks (0)

Pennsylvania State University has cleared its faculty member, prominent climate scientist Michael Mann, of allegations of research misconduct.

In 1998, Mann published in Nature the first version of the now famous ‘hockey stick’ graph of Northern Hemisphere temperatures over the last millennium.

He was also the author or recipient of around 300 of more than 1,000 emails which had leaked in November from the University of East Anglia’s Climate Research Unit (CRU) in Britain. A further 79 emails deal specifically with Mann’s work without him having been copied in. Critics of his work, which involves analysis of tree-ring data, have claimed that some of the leaked emails include hints of fundamental flaws in his studies.

In the wake of the affair, Penn State University officials were flooded with inquiries – from media, US federal and state politicians, and University alumni – concerning Mann’s integrity as a researcher.

The University launched an examination into the matter on 24 November 2009, just two days after the emails had been exposed. The inquiry committee trawled through the entire correspondence, but focused on 47 emails that seemed relevant in connection with various accusations of misconduct brought forward against Mann. Its report, released yesterday, clears Mann of all allegations of wrongdoing, but says that his compliance to sound academic procedures requires further examination.

The inquiry committee - comprised of Henry Foley, Penn State’s vice director for research, Alan Scaroni, associate dean for graduate education, and Candice Yekel, director of the office for research protection - condensed the accusations against Mann to four questions, which it asked Mann to address:

1) Did [Mann] engage in, or participate in, directly or indirectly, any actions with the intent to suppress or falsify data?

2) Did [Mann] engage in, or participate in, directly or indirectly, any actions with the intent to delete, conceal or otherwise destroy emails, information and/or data, related to [the 2007 report by the International Panel on Climate Change] , as suggested by [then CRU director] Phil Jones?

3) Did [Mann] engage in, or participate in, directly or indirectly, any misuse of privileged or confidential information available to [him] in [his] capacity as an academic scholar?

4) Did [Mann] engage in, or participate in, directly or indirectly, any actions that seriously deviated from accepted practices within the academic community for proposing, conducting, or reporting research or other scholarly activities?

By 18 January, Mann had produced all relevant information and additional evidence required by the committee, including a number of previously deleted emails and a supplemental written response to a personal interview with the inquiry committee on 12 January.

The committee concludes, in short, that “there exists no credible evidence” that Mann has done any of the things outlined in questions 1 to 3. There is “no substance to [these] allegations, and “no basis for further examination”, it finds.

The committee was unable to come to a definitive conclusion concerning the fourth allegation, and concluded that further consideration is needed. It finds that:

“In sum, the overriding sentiment of this committee, which is composed of University administrators, is that allegation #4 revolves around the question of accepted faculty conduct surrounding scientific discourse and thus merits a review by a committee of faculty scientists. Only with such a review will the academic community and other interested parties likely feel that Penn State has discharged it responsibility on this matter.”

The committee stressed that the fourth allegation deals with research conduct, as opposed to research misconduct.

In a statement, Mann says:

“I'm very pleased that, after a thorough review, the independent Penn State committee found no evidence to support any of the allegations against me. Three of the four allegations have been dismissed completely. Even though no evidence to substantiate the fourth allegation was found, the University administrators thought it best to convene a separate committee of distinguished scientists to resolve any remaining questions about academic procedures. This is very much the vindication I expected since I am confident I have done nothing wrong. I fully support the additional inquiry which may be the best way to remove any lingering doubts. I intend to cooperate fully in this matter – as I have since the beginning of the process.”

The Cambridge, Massachusetts-based Union of Concerned Scientists (UCS) expressed relief about the outcome of the inquiry.

“This is a step in the right direction that should help us move past the manufactured controversy over the stolen emails … The contents of the emails have no bearing on climate science. They must not distract us from the need to swiftly and dramatically reduce emissions,” said Peter Frumhoff, director of science and policy with UCS.

Francesca Grifo, director of UCS’s Scientific Integrity Program, added:

“The review shows that the scientific community takes accusations of misconduct seriously and has systems in place to hold researchers accountable… Dr. Mann made his research and communications available to the committee, and the committee promptly exonerated him of any wrongdoing. The University of East Anglia should follow suit.”

Posted on behalf of Quirin Schiermeier

Posted by Mark Peplow on February 04, 2010
Categories: Earth, environment & ecology | Permalink | Comments (1) | TrackBacks (0)

The White House rolled out a long-anticipated biofuels rule on Wednesday, issuing revised estimates for greenhouse gas emissions that - just barely - qualify corn ethanol as a potential source of relatively clean renewable energy (NYT, WSJ).

Agriculture and corn lobbies pushed hard for such an outcome, but there are provisos. EPA's numbers assume advances in crop yields over the coming decade and deployment of the most efficient ethanol plants powered by natural gas. Combining those assumptions with a new calculation suggesting fewer indirect emissions due to rising crop prices and deforestation overseas, EPA found that corn ethanol would come in 20 percent cleaner than petrol.

As it happens, that's the magic number for qualifying as a "renewable fuel" under the biofuels mandate enacted by Congress in 2007, and it is considerably more optimistic than other analyses by many scientists and even the state of California. I emailed Timothy Searchinger at Princeton University, whose 2008 paper in Science suggested that corn ethanol could double near-term emissions compared to gasoline due to conversion far-away forests. He was still poring over the documents but offered this quick assessment: "Let's just say that their numbers are inconsistent with the numbers almost everybody else is generating."

The news followed President Barack Obama's meeting with a number of state governors, where he discussed goals on energy and global warming. A day earlier he acknowledged what many in the Senate have been saying for some time: comprehensive climate legislation could give way to a paired-down clean energy bill this year.

Continue reading "Obama pushes forward on biofuels, coal" »

Posted by Jeff Tollefson on February 03, 2010
Categories: Earth, environment & ecology, Energy, Policy | Permalink | Comments (1) | TrackBacks (0)

Posted for Quirin Schiermeier

New Scientist reporter Fred Pearce – of fame for first having spread the story that all Himalayan glaciers might melt away by 2035 – is now doing his own investigation into emails leaked in November from the University of Norwich’s Climate Research Unit.

In the first instalment, which appeared today in the Guardian, Pearce claims to have revealed a potential case of scientific fraud.

“The Guardian has learned that crucial data obtained by American scientists from Chinese collaborators cannot be verified because documents containing them no longer exist. And what data is available suggests that the findings are fundamentally flawed,” the piece reads.

The study in question is a 1990 Nature paper on the effects of urbanization on surface temperature measurements in China. The study, led by former CRU director Phil Jones, found little evidence of a so-called urban heat island effect.

What Pearce says only towards the end of his article is that allegations of fraud stem from a 2007 article published in Energy & Environment, a journal edited by self-proclaimed climate skeptic Sonja Boehmer-Christiansen, a retired geography lecturer formerly at the University of Hull in the UK.

Continue reading "The Guardian's re-hash of 'climategate'" »

Posted by Daniel Cressey on February 02, 2010
Categories: Earth, environment & ecology | Permalink | Comments (4) | TrackBacks (0)

The initial 'soft" deadline has come and gone, and the United Nations reports that 55 countries have signed on to the Copenhagen climate accord. Not much in the way of surprises, and well short of 193 countries that are party to the climate convention, but those 55 countries account for 78 percent of global greenhouse gas emissions.

As the L.A. Times reported, major environmental groups in the United States offered up a cautiously optimistic assessment. The accord might not be a treaty. It might not even be a global agreement, as it was never endorsed by all nations in Copenhagen. Worst of all, perhaps, the emissions commitments currently on the table leave something to be desired.

But it's a start. For the first time, emerging economies have formally registered verifiable climate commitments, and bringing down emissions among developing nations will be critical given that they wil be responsible for virtually all of the emissions growth going forward. In exchange, developed countries have agreed to help with financing.

Whether the deal will hold, let alone gather momentum and become the foundation of a treaty, remains to be seen. The accord will face its next formal hurdle when the United Nations holds its annual climate convention in Mexico later this year.

Posted by Jeff Tollefson on February 02, 2010
Categories: Earth, environment & ecology, Policy | Permalink | Comments (1) | TrackBacks (0)

Just how volcanoes managed to wipe out much of the life in the oceans some 94.5 million years ago has been teased out by a new paper in Nature Geoscience.

The Cretaceous period saw a number of bouts of very low oxygen levels in the world’s oceans, with obvious negative consequences for animals dwelling in those oceans. Previous work has pegged magma as responsible for one of these ‘anoxic events’ and now Matthew Hurtgen and colleagues at Northwestern University in Illinois suggest exactly why what the volcanoes were doing created the problem.

They looked at sulphur in sediments from around the time of the Oceanic Anoxic Event 2 and found a huge increase in sulphate at the start of this event, levels then fell off as the event continued. Their conclusion is that volcanoes released a huge amount of sulphate into the Cretaceous seas, where levels of this element may have been very low compared with today.

More sulphate enhanced the recycling of nutrients in the oceans and enabled more life to grow in surface waters. Then the bodies of these animals drifted down to the depths, feeding further life in the depths. This deep living beastie bloom couldn’t last though: the animals used up all the oxygen and the anoxic event was upon them.

“Sulphates help the ocean hang on to its phosphorous,” Hurtgen told the Times. “Along with nitrogen and iron, phosphorous is a key limiting nutrient in the ocean. Without it phytoplankton cannot grow. But when massive volcanism delivered more, it changed the amount of phosphorus available, and drove these anoxic events.”

Posted by Daniel Cressey on February 01, 2010
Categories: Earth, environment & ecology | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

A new dinosaur species discovered in western China is helping scientists understand how one group of “terrifying lizards” came to look like birds—independent of birds.

George Washington University paleontologist Jonah Choiniere describes the new species Haplocheirus sollers, or “simple, skillful hand,” in today’s Science. The 160-million-year-old specimen is a member of the bird-like Alvarezsauridae family, which was previously thought to be a flightless derivative of ancient birds due to their skeletal similarities.

“What Haplocheirus definitively shows is that alvarezsauroids aren’t birds,” said Choiniere (Scientific American). The earliest diverging member of Alvarezsauridae, Haplocheirus evolved in parallel to birds, confirming their “extreme morphological convergence”.

The new species shows some of the earliest evolutionary stages in the development of a short, powerful arm with a single functional claw typical of alvarezsauroids, but its arms are longer and the claw is a little shorter than the later, Cretaceous species. “Haplocheirus is a transitional fossil, because it shows an early evolutionary step in how the bizarre hands of later alvarezsaurs evolved from earlier predatory dinosaurs,” Choiniere said (news release).

Haplocheirus is 10 million years older than what is believed to be the world’s first known bird, Archaeopteryx. The find also extends the fossil record of its group by 63 million years. Until now, there has been no direct evidence that these types of dinosaurs lived during the Late Jurassic. “It’s like finding a great, great grandfather in your family which doubles the age of your family tree,” Choiniere said (BBC News).

In 2004, the international expedition found the ten-foot long, nearly complete 3D skeleton in orange mudstone beds in a region known for its fossils from the Late Jurassic—likely the period when birds evolved from the three-toed theropod, or bird-footed, dinosaurs.

But scientists are still trying to pin down exactly when birds first emerged. “Many dinosaurs are very bird-like and early birds are dinosaur-like,” co-author Xing Xu told Discovery News. “It is more or less depending on what you call a bird a bird, which is somewhat an arbitrary procedure.”

Posted by Janet Fang on January 29, 2010
Categories: Earth, environment & ecology | Permalink | Comments (1) | TrackBacks (0)

There has been no respite for the UN’s climate change body this week. Critics continue to circle following the admission by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change that it was wrong to claim Himalayan glaciers could vanish by 2035.

The IPCC hit back at the Sunday Times this week, after the paper published an article claiming it was guilty of “wrongly linking global warming to an increase in the number and severity of natural disasters”. Such a claim is “misleading and baseless” it said in a statement.

According to the IPCC, its influential Fourth Assessment Report actually “clearly makes the point that one study detected an increase in economic losses, corrected for values at risk, but that other studies have not detected such a trend”.

Still, the row about IPCC claims regarding natural disasters clearly has legs.

Continue reading "IPCC under fire round up" »

Posted by Daniel Cressey on January 29, 2010
Categories: Earth, environment & ecology | Permalink | Comments (1) | TrackBacks (0)

Cross posted from Nature Climate Feedback.

The world’s most wanted terrorist has blamed the west for not doing enough to fight climate change. In an audio tape Al Jazeera says it has obtained from Osama bin Laden, the Al-Qaeda leader says climate change is real, and calls it the result of economic globalization.

"This is a message to the whole world about those responsible for climate change and its repercussions - whether intentionally or unintentionally - and about the action we must take," says bin Laden.

"Speaking about climate change is not a matter of intellectual luxury - the phenomenon is an actual fact."

Bin Laden blames all western economies for doing too little to curb greenhouse gas emissions, but in particular condemns former US president George W. Bush for not having ratified the Kyoto Protocol.

“George Bush junior, preceded by [the US] congress, dismissed the agreement to placate giant corporations. And they are themselves standing behind speculation, monopoly and soaring living,” Bin Laden says.

The message contains no direct threats of terror acts. Intelligence analysts have not yet confirmed the authenticity of the tape.

Quirin Schiermeier

Image: Osama bin Laden propaganda poster / Wikipedia

Posted by Daniel Cressey on January 29, 2010
Categories: Earth, environment & ecology | Permalink | Comments (1) | TrackBacks (0)

Micronesia has successfully forced an independent review of plans for a power plant in the Czech Republic, many thousands of kilometres away from its own borders.

The Czech Republic bowed to demands from the Federated States of Micronesia for an international audit of plans to upgrade a coal-fired power plant in the city of Prunerov. Micronesia launched its challenge last year on the grounds that the Prunerov plant is already a huge emitter of carbon dioxide and thus is part of the cause of increased sea level rise that threatens its islands.

Czech Environment Minister Jan Dusik yesterday announced an independent review will make up part of the environmental impact assessment on which a decision on the plant’s future will be based.

“I want to liberate the environmental impact assessment process from political and economic pressures,” he said (Reuters). “I believe that the assessment by an independent international team will help make the whole process more objective.”

Utility company CEZ, which own the Prunerov plant, says that its plans to modernize the plant will actually cut carbon emissions and use the latest available technology. Micronesia argues that CEZ AS has not taken all possible steps to potentially minimise the impact of any modernization.

The Wall Street Journal notes:

The Czech bow to Micronesia's pressure may serve as precedent for similar claims against other power plant operators in the EU seeking to refurbish their existing coal-fired power plants, including those currently in use in Poland and Germany, some industry analysts and insiders have said.

Image: Prunerov Power Station photo by ‘sludgegulper’ via Flickr under creative commons.

Posted by Daniel Cressey on January 28, 2010
Categories: Earth, environment & ecology, Policy | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

The University of East Anglia broke the law when dealing with requests for climate data, according to the UK Information Commissioner’s Office.

A statement from the office says emails leaked or stolen from the university’s Climatic Research Unit reveal that Freedom of Information requests “were not dealt with as they should have been under the legislation”.

Despite it being an offence under the UK’s freedom of information laws to intentionally prevent the disclosure of requested information, any misdeeds occurred too long ago for the commissioner to take action. “The legislation requires action within six months of the offence taking place, so by the time the action taken came to light the opportunity to consider a prosecution was long gone,” says the statement.

Both the university and Parliament’s science select committee have announced inquires into the so-called ‘Climate-gate’ emails. A major aspect of these is the suggestion that the emails reveal a deliberate attempt by researchers to resist FOI requests and prevent the release of data.

Phil Jones, the director of the Climatic Research Unit at the time of the emails, has always denied wrongdoing. Jones has stepped down from his CRU post while the university inquiry takes place.

David Holland, the man who submitted many of the requests and complained to the Information Commissioner, told the Times, “There is an apparent Catch-22 here. The prosecution has to be initiated within six months but you have to exhaust the university’s complaints procedure before the commission will look at your complaint. That process can take longer than six months.”

The Information Commissioner’s Office says it is gathering evidence to push for a change in the law on time-barred cases.

A statement from the university is expected shortly. UPDATE: Edward Acton, vice-chancellor of UEA, said in a statement, “The ICO’s opinion that we had breached the terms of Section 77 is a source of grave concern to the University as we would always seek to comply with the terms of the Act. During this case we have sought the advice of the ICO and responded fully to any requests for information.

“Sir Muir Russell is currently conducting an Independent Review of the issues surrounding what has become known as ‘Climategate’ and we very deliberately made our handling of FOI requests part of the terms of reference. I look forward to receiving his report and as I have said before it will be published and I will act accordingly if he finds there is indeed substance in these allegations.”

Posted by Daniel Cressey on January 28, 2010
Categories: Earth, environment & ecology | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

The UK government’s failure to fund the nation’s public agricultural science base over the past decade has led to a “catastrophic” drop in British scientists’ ability to assist in international development, parliamentarians have said.

In a report on global food security published today, the All Party Parliamentary Group on Agriculture and Food for Development, says, it is an “embarrassing failure” that in 2009, world hunger increased for the first time in a decade given the level of resources, skills and scientific know-how at the disposal of the international community.

The report criticises the Department for International Development’s neglect of agriculture over the past decade and expresses concern that experts with a background in agricultural science in the department are now “severely underrepresented”. Andree Carter, Director of the UK Collaborative on Development Sciences, a partnership of research funders and policy-makers, estimates that the UK needs 500-1000 new agriculture science staff by 2020.

Continue reading "Agricultural science key to food security " »

Posted by Natasha Gilbert on January 27, 2010
Categories: Earth, environment & ecology, Policy | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

The row over an erroneous claim by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change that Himalayan glaciers could vanish by 2035 shows no sign of abating. Soon we’ll be calling it ‘2035-gate’.

“I am not going to stand down, I am going to stand up.”
Rajendra Pachauri, head of the IPCC, tells the BBC he will not quit.

“The IPCC’s shortfalls are illustrated with the behaviour of Pachauri, its chair since 2002. ... Without significant institutional reform, the IPCC, and climate science as a whole, risks more than just bad press. It risks losing its credibility and trust.”
Climate researchers Richard Tol, Roger Pielke and Hans von Storch demand the resignation Pachauri and wholesale reform of the IPCC in an opinion piece in Spiegel.

“We knew the WWF report with the 2035 date was “grey literature”. But it was never picked up by any of the authors in our working group, nor by any of the more than 500 external reviewers, by the governments to which it was sent, or by the final IPCC review editors.”
Murari Lal, a lead author of the IPCC report’s Asia section, discusses the 2035 claim (Mail on Sunday).

“It has to be accepted, it was a mistake, it was embarrassing, and the IPCC has to do better. The good thing is that people point to it and it’s uncovered.”
Hans Joachim Schellnhuber, founding director of the Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research and an author of previous IPCC reports, tells the Dot Earth blog that lessons can be learned from ‘2035-gate’.

Posted by Daniel Cressey on January 26, 2010
Categories: Earth, environment & ecology, Quotes of the day | Permalink | Comments (2) | TrackBacks (0)

Bill Gates has expressed concern that focusing aid money on climate change at the expense of health could lead to hundreds of thousands of deaths.

In the 2010 annual letter from his charitable foundation, Gates notes that the Copenhagen Summit talked of pushing for $10 billion per year for the next three years to help developing countries deal with climate change, with a $100 billion per year by 2020 goal.

“I am concerned that some of this money will come from reducing other categories of foreign aid, especially health,” he writes. “If just 1 percent of the $100 billion goal came from vaccine funding, then 700,000 more children could die from preventable diseases.”

Gates warns that the financial crisis and many countries’ budget deficits mean there is a real risk of aid budgets either being cut or not increasing. He singles out the Italian government for criticism for their recent scaling back of foreign aid

The letter goes on to say Gates is spending a lot of personal time on energy and climate and that it is vital that governments supply “large amounts” of funding for basic research as the world attempts to develop sources of cheap, low-carbon electricity.

“I am surprised that the climate debate hasn’t focused more on encouraging R&D since it is critical to getting to zero emissions,” says Gates. “Still, I think it is likely that out of the many possible approaches, at least one scalable innovation will emerge in the next 20 years and be installed widely in the 20 years after that.”

The Gates Foundation itself has not invested in this area, he says, as it concentrates its funding where there is not a large potential market.

Posted by Daniel Cressey on January 25, 2010
Categories: Earth, environment & ecology, Health and medicine, Policy | Permalink | Comments (1) | TrackBacks (0)

More pressure has been heaped on the UN’s climate change body in recent days, adding to that caused by the admission that it had allowed an erroneous claim on glacier melting into its influential reports.

Last week the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change apologised for the “poorly substantiated estimates of rate of recession and date for the Himalayan glaciers”, after widespread questioning over claims these glaciers could vanish by 2035.

Today a number of newspapers are claiming that the 2035 claim was used in grant applications that netted thousands of dollars for the New Delhi-based Energy and Resources Institute, which is run by IPCC chairman Rajendra Pachauri. The charge is being led by the Sunday Times, which also notes that, “In India questions are also being asked about Pachauri's links with GloriOil, a Houston, Texas-based oil technology company that specialises in recovering extra oil from declining oil fields”.

Speaking to the media last week Pachauri said, “Rational people see the larger picture and are not going to be distracted by this one error.” (Financial Times.)

However, another alleged error is also crawling into the limelight, with questions being asked about IPCC claims regarding extreme weather damage and global warming.

Climate blogger Roger Pielke Jr has been hammering this point for a while. Last year he outlined his issues under the headline, “systematic misrepresentation of the science of disasters and climate change”. His blog highlights his reasons for claiming this and discusses the latest re-heating of this issue.

Posted by Daniel Cressey on January 25, 2010
Categories: Earth, environment & ecology | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

An intriguing story in today’s Times points out that a company owned by the UK government’s own chief scientific advisor is lobbying against the creation of a massive marine reserve proposed by … err … the UK government. What exactly is going on here?

Well last year the Foreign Secretary, David Miliband launched a consultation on the possibility of making the Chagos Archipelago (also known at the British Indian Ocean Territory or BIOT) a huge marine protected area. “This is a remarkable opportunity for Britain to create one of the world’s largest marine protected areas, and to double the global coverage of the world’s oceans that benefit from full protection,” said Miliband. (It’s also an opportunity to get some much needed good PR over Chagos, but that is another story entirely.)

Miliband outlined three options identified by the government: no fishing anywhere in the area, fishing only in certain zones at certain times for certain fish, only protecting ‘high value’ waters such as reefs.

At this point it is probably worth noting that a scientific workshop in Southampton cited “sufficient scientific information to make a very convincing case” for making the BIOT a marine protected area.

So where does chief scientific advisor John Beddington fit into all this?

Continue reading "Beddington’s BIOT business brouhaha" »

Posted by Daniel Cressey on January 22, 2010
Categories: Earth, environment & ecology, Policy | Permalink | Comments (2) | TrackBacks (0)

Aftershocks in Haiti can be expected for months if not years following the recent devastating earthquake, the United States Geological Survey warned yesterday.

On 20 January a 6.0 magnitude aftershock struck, following the 7.0 initial quake last week.

Now the USGS assessment of ongoing hazards indicates a 25% chance of one or more magnitude 6 quakes during the 30 days following 21 January. The chance of a quake of magnitude 7 or higher is less than 3% but the assessment warns that two or three quakes of 5 or greater should be expected in the next month.

“Any aftershock above magnitude 5.0 will be widely felt and has the potential to cause additional damage, particularly to vulnerable, already damaged structures,” warns the USGS.

The new assessment also warns that the Enriquillo fault zone responsible for this seismic activity also stores significant amounts of strain that could – if released suddenly – cause another large and damaging earthquake during the lifetime of any building erected in the current reconstruction of Haiti.

“It is essential that the rebuilding effort in Haiti take into account the potential for, indeed the inevitability of, future strong earthquakes,” it notes.

See also
Geologists to evaluate future Haiti risks
The Haiti earthquake in depth

Image: still from the USGS Google map of Haiti aftershocks. Full map here.

Posted by Daniel Cressey on January 22, 2010
Categories: Earth, environment & ecology | Permalink | Comments (1) | TrackBacks (0)

It's certainly interesting that UN climate chief Yvo de Boer called the Copenhagen accord's first deadline "soft" in a news conference on Wednesday. We won't know until 31 January how many countries elect to sign onto the accord, but statements downplaying the significance of the date itself would seem to suggest that the number may be on the low side.

That said, it's not at all clear that the accord itself "lay in tatters," as the Financial Times described it, or that an important deadline has been formally "dropped," as the Guardian suggests. The deadline might well represent a vote of confidence, but on another level de Boer was simply stating the truth - and reiterating a message delivered in Copenhagen - that the accord is not a legal document and therefore has no legal deadlines.

Clearly the situation would be dire were a member of the "BASIC" group - Brazil, South Africa, India, China - to abstain, given that they were the principal authors of the accord along with the United States. Alarm bells might ring if two-dozen or so other countries that blessed the agreement prior to its release in Copenhagen elected to wait. But nobody I've talked to has a clear and convincing interpretation of the significance of a decision to hold off - or join - on the part of everybody else.

Continue reading "Interpreting Copenhagen accord's 'soft' deadline" »

Posted by Jeff Tollefson on January 21, 2010
Categories: Earth, environment & ecology | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

Posted for Quirin Schiermeier

The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) has conceded an error when stating in its last report, released 2007, that Himalayan glaciers are likely to melt by 2035. The claim has been criticized by numerous glaciologists for being highly implausible (see Glacier estimate is on thin ice).

In a statement, released on 20 January, the IPCC apologises for the “poorly substantiated estimates of rate of recession and date for the Himalayan glaciers”.

The IPCC’s working group on impacts, of climate change had taken the date‚ 2035, from an un-refereed report from the conservation group WWF.

“In drafting the paragraph in question, the clear and well-established standards of evidence, required by the IPCC procedures were not applied properly,” the chair and vice-chairs of the IPCC, and the co-chairs of the IPCC Working Groups said in their joint statement.

The panel stresses the validity of its overall conclusion that glacier mass losses, including in the Himalayas, are likely to accelerate throughout the 21st century, reducing water availability in regions supplied by melt water from mountain glaciers and snow packs.

“This conclusion is robust, appropriate, and entirely consistent with the underlying science and the broader IPCC assessment,” it says.

Image: Glacier trails in the Ladokh and Zaskar Ranges of the Himalayas / NASA

Posted by Daniel Cressey on January 21, 2010
Categories: Earth, environment & ecology | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

North America’s attempts to control ozone levels are being hampered by pollution from Asia, according to a new study in Nature.

Owen Cooper, of the University of Colorado at Boulder, and his colleagues looked at nearly 100,000 ozone measurements collected by commercial and government aircraft in the troposphere – the lowest level of the atmosphere. They found that ozone concentrations over the Western part of the continent increased significantly between 1995 and 2008. In addition, increases were highest when air was brought over from south and east Asia, although they did not quantify exactly how much of the increase in ozone was down to Asian emissions.

“In springtime, pollution from across the hemisphere, not nearby sources, contributes to the ozone increases above western North America,” says Cooper (press release).

It is not ozone itself which is being emitted in Asia and carried over the Pacific, but pollutants such as nitrogen oxides and carbon monoxide. Chemical reactions then turn these into ozone in the troposphere.

In the troposphere ozone is a potent greenhouse gas. At ground level it can harm human health.

“We still don’t know how much [ozone] is coming down to the surface,” says Cooper (Washington Post). “If the surface ozone is increasing along with the free tropospheric ozone, that could make it more difficult for the U.S. to meet its ozone air quality standard.”

David Tarasick, paper co-author and atmospheric scientist with Environment Canada, says similar things about Canada meeting its own pollution standards (Canwest News).

In a News and Views article published alongside the paper in nature, Kathy Law of UPMC Universite de Paris 06 notes that the new work provides “the most conclusive evidence so far of increasing ozone levels in the free troposphere over western North America”. Previous studies have suggested either small or no increases.

Law argues that the paper is more evidence of the need for strong international agreements on air-pollution.

This story is also discussed on this week’s Nature Podcast.

Image: aircraft such as these were involved in collecting data for this study / NOAA

Posted by Daniel Cressey on January 21, 2010
Categories: Earth, environment & ecology | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

An earthquake of magnitude 6.1 has struck Haiti, the largest aftershock yet following the 7.0 quake of last week.

The epicentre of the new event – which struck at 11:03 UTC – was 35 kilometres from Port Au Prince.

The previous quake was closer at 25 kilometres and the logarithmic nature of earthquake magnitude scales means this latest movement is much weaker than the initial quake. There have been no immediate reports of casualties or damage but there is a risk that buildings damaged in the previous earthquake could have been further weakened by the latest bout of shaking.

Below are two ‘shakemaps’ from the USGS, showing the difference in power of these two events.

Maps: USGS

Posted by Daniel Cressey on January 20, 2010
Categories: Earth, environment & ecology | Permalink | Comments (1) | TrackBacks (0)

A biodiversity assessment published today in the online journal PLoS ONE tries to bolster the case for protecting Ecuador's Yasuni National Park, even as the government's proposal for doing so has hit its rockiest stretch.

Ecuador unveiled the Yasuni-ITT initiative in 2007, offering to spare a block of the Amazon from oil development in exchange for cash from the international community. The proposal had been rumbling along, slowly picking up support from the international community, until Ecuadorian President Rafael Correa criticized the terms being sought by international donors. Now the initiative is floundering.

Foreign Minister Fander Falconi and other officials working on the project have resigned in protest. On Monday, the Wall Street Journal quoted Correa indicating that he plans to appoint a new team and continue with the initiative, but how that might affect existing negotiations with potential donor countries is unclear.

Headed by Margo Bass of Finding Species and Matt Finer of Save America’s Forests, two US non-profit organizations, the PLoS ONE study integrates data from multiple sources - published and otherwise - to provide a comprehensive picture of biodiversity in Yasuni. Estimating species richness isn't easy, but their results suggest that Yasuni competes with other hotspots in the western Amazon, ranking in the top two locations around the globe for amphibian and reptile biodiversity and within the top nine for vascular plants; Yasuni also performs well in terms of birds, mammals and fish.

The paper doesn't specifically endorse the Yasuni-ITT initiative, but it doesn't shy away from environmental advocacy, either. Maintaining the area as a biological refuge should be a "global conservation priority of the first order," the authors write. "If the world's most diverse forests cannot be protected in Yasuní, it seems unlikely that they can be protected anywhere else."

Posted by Jeff Tollefson on January 19, 2010
Categories: Earth, environment & ecology | Permalink | Comments (1) | TrackBacks (0)

Although it might not seem like it to those in the northern hemisphere who still haven’t warmed up following the recent cold snap, 2009 was a pretty warm year according to the latest figures.

The US National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration recently announced that global land and ocean temperatures for last year tied with 2006 as the fifth warmest year on record. NOAA puts the year at 0.56°C above the 20th century average.

Meanwhile, James Hansen and colleagues have put out their draft assessment of surface temperatures from the Goddard Institute for Space Studies, under the title If It’s That Warm, How Come It’s So Damned Cold?

“There is a contradiction between the observed continued warming trend and popular perceptions about climate trends. Frequent statements include: ‘There has been global cooling over the past decade’, ‘Global warming stopped in 1998’, ‘1998 is the warmest year in the record’,” write the team.

“Such statements have been repeated so often that most of the public seems to accept them as being true. However, based on our data, such statements are not correct.”

That analysis puts 2009 as the joint second warmest year “in the 130 years of global instrumental temperature records”. The preliminary GISS data puts the past year at 0.57°C warmer than the 1951‐1980 base period.

Differences between the two groups are likely down to how they extrapolate to cover areas with little data and how they compensate for local anthropogenic “urban warming”.

Image: NOAA top ten warm years

Posted by Daniel Cressey on January 18, 2010
Categories: Earth, environment & ecology | Permalink | Comments (3) | TrackBacks (0)

Proposed standards for nutrient pollution in Florida waterways have delighted environmentalists and horrified businesses.

Last week the US Environmental Protection Agency released proposed water quality standards for the Sunshine State which would set limits on phosphorous and nitrogen levels in rivers, streams and canals. These are the first such standards proposed for any state and are the result of legal action by environmental groups, which led the EPA to agree to draw up these proposals.

“Florida has led the way with rigorous scientific analysis and data collection needed to address nutrient pollution. By relying on the best science, we can set standards that protect people’s health and preserve waterbodies,” says Peter Silva, assistant administrator for EPA’s Office of Water (press release).

According to the EPA, a Florida Department of Environmental Protection report in 2008 found 16% of the state's river and stream miles exceeded state nutrient levels, where this had been assessed.

Environmentalists at Earthjustice are among those pleased about the move. David Guest, an attorney with the group, says the standards “aren’t as stringent as we need, but they are a major improvement”.

However many business groups are not best pleased. As much of the phosphorous and nitrogen that is now likely to be controlled comes from fertilizer and animal waste, farmers are particularly fearful.

The Don’t Tax Florida coalition of businesses called the EPA proposals “a de facto water tax from Washington”. A statement from the group also claims the standards could mean many pristine streams are ruled to be polluted.

“Florida’s watershed based process of establishing numeric nutrient criteria is far superior to EPA’s generalized and fundamentally flawed approach, which does not take into account the unique characteristics of Florida’s many thousands of rivers, streams and estuaries,” says Douglas Durbin, of ENTRIX environmental consulting – part of the coalition.

These proposals were produced by court action, it seems a fair bet there will be more lawyers involved before they make it into the rulebooks.

Image: by Riverbanksoutdoorstore via Flickr under creative commons

Posted by Daniel Cressey on January 18, 2010
Categories: Earth, environment & ecology | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

Intriguingly, the researchers say the frogs do not produce tadpoles, but lay eggs in trees which hatch into miniature version of their parents. Of the 30 potential new species, 14 live atop one mountain: Cerro Pata de Pajaro.

As is always the case when animals are discovered in this fashion, these species are imminent danger due to loss of habitat.

“There is obviously a great concern that these species will disappear as soon as, or even before, they are formally described by science”, says Paul Hamilton of Reptile and Amphibian Ecology International, which led the expedition that discovered them (press release).

As well as deforestation and the ongoing crisis in the amphibian world, climate change may also make their mountain home less pleasant for them.

Also found on this trip (pictured right):

That slug-sucker, which has a blunt snout “made just perfectly for jamming into the hole of a snail shell and providing that suction to suck the snail right out of there” (Daily Mail, Guardian).

A gecko small enough to sit on a pencil.

More frogs!

Images: Paul S. Hamilton/RAEI.org

Posted by Daniel Cressey on January 15, 2010
Categories: Earth, environment & ecology | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

A magnitude-7.0 earthquake, followed by a magnitude-5.9 aftershock, has struck just 15 kilometers from the 3 million people in Port-au-Prince, Haiti.

A local tsunami watch has gone out covering Haiti, Cuba, the Bahamas and the Dominican Republic, but the greatest threat may be construction practices on the land. Building collapse historically claims the greatest number of lives in such a disaster, particularly in overpopulated areas with shoddy construction. An estimated map of ground shaking from the US Geological Survey is available here; a map of previously known seismic risk is here. A collection of USGS overview material, including historical quakes in the Caribbean, is here.

According to this blogger's first rough map checking, the quake apparently struck along the Enriquillo fault. For a bit of regional context, this USGS site looks at earthquake risk near Puerto Rico, which experienced a number of quakes on the order of magnitude 7 in the past century.

The Caribbean does not have a dedicated tsunami warning system; alerts in the Caribbean are handled by the Pacific Tsunami Warning Center in Hawaii, other than Puerto Rico and the US Virgin Islands which are handled by the West Coast/Alaska center.

Image: USGS

Posted by Alex Witze on January 12, 2010
Categories: Earth, environment & ecology | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

It’s an animal research smorgasbord today. First up, Claire Micheneau of the University of La Réunion reports observing crickets pollinate an orchid.

Now this might not seem like big news but actually it is the first time any insects of the Orthoptera order have been seen acting as pollinators, they report in Annals of Botany. Micheneau, a PhD student affiliated with the Royal Botanic Gardens at Kew in London, and her colleagues observed an unknown species of raspy cricket climbing up leaves of the Angraecum cadetii orchid and jumping across from neighbouring plants to reach the flowers of this plant (pictured right), which is endemic species to the islands of Mauritius and Reunion.

“We knew from monitoring pollen content in the flowers that pollination was taking place. However, we did not observe it during the day. That’s why we rigged up a night camera and caught this raspy cricket in action. Watching the footage for the first time, and realising that we had filmed a truly surprising shift in the pollination of Angraecum, a genus that is mainly specialised for moth pollination, was thrilling,” says Micheneau (press release).

Meanwhile another team reports in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences that they have confirmed that the Arctic tern (Sterna paradisaea) has the longest migration of any animal. Carsten Egevang, of the Greenland Institute of Natural Resources, and colleagues fitted 11 terns with tracking devices to follow them as they flew more than 80,000 km annually in some cases.

They also identified a previously unknown stopover point for the birds in the North Atlantic.

“They paused in their southward migration to spend time in highly productive waters in the middle of the Atlantic Ocean. Compared to this stop-over site, the marine area immediately to the south is lower in productivity,” says Richard Phillips, paper co-author and British Antarctic Survey researcher (press release).

“The indirect ‘S-shaped’ return journey in spring indicates that Arctic terns take full advantage of the prevailing global wind systems to reduce energetic costs on their long flight north.”

Finally, researchers at the University of Haifa in Israel have discovered a new species of spider, which can reach up to 14 cm in leg-span (pictured left). Named Cerbalus aravensis, the spider is underthreat as the sand dune on which it was discovered has been reduced from its former 7 square kilometre range to under 3 sq km, says the university.

Image top: raspy cricket carrying pollen on its head / Michenau and Fournel
Image lower: photo by Yael Olek, courtesy of the University of Haifa

Posted by Daniel Cressey on January 12, 2010
Categories: Earth, environment & ecology | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

The cold snap in Britain – seen here in this NEODAAS/University of Dundee image – has triggered a rash of ‘global warming isn’t real’ comments.

“It comes as a surprise to me that people would try to use my statements to try to dispute the nature of global warming. I believe in manmade global warming,” he told the Guardian. “I have said that if my name was not Mojib Latif it would be global warming.”

So why is he so peeved? Well, in case you’re pushed for time, the bottom line is ‘Move along, nothing to see here’.

On Sunday the Daily Mail reported that “The bitter winter afflicting much of the Northern Hemisphere is only the start of a global trend towards cooler weather that is likely to last for 20 or 30 years”. The newspaper went on to cite Latif’s work as showing a new cooling trend from measurements of deep ocean temperatures.

“For the time being, global warming has paused, and there may well be some cooling,” it quoted him saying.

Part of the basis for the Mail’s claims appears to be Latif et al’s 2008 Nature paper, Advancing decadal-scale climate prediction in the North Atlantic sector. This concludes that global surface temperature may not increase in the next decade as natural variations may “temporarily offset the projected anthropogenic warming”.

This paper did not pass without comment at the time. The influential Real Climate blog offered a bet to the Nature paper’s authors that their forecast was wrong.

The Mail also cites a talk Latif gave to a Geneva conference. But does the work really “challenge some of the global warming orthodoxy’s most deeply cherished beliefs”, as the Mail would have it?

Here’s what Nature Reports Climate Change’s review of 2009 said:

In September, the issue of cooling resurfaced following an address by Mojib Latif to the World Climate Conference in Geneva. Latif, a climatologist at the Leibniz Institute of Marine Sciences at Kiel University in Germany, was speaking of the need for greater accuracy in predicting climate change on a decade-by-decade scale. He noted that because of natural variability in the climate, it is theoretically possible that we could see “a decade, or maybe even two, when the temperature cools relative to the present level”.

Some news accounts reported that Latif had predicted global cooling, and climate change deniers echoed the claims. Lost in the ensuing game of telephone was the fact that in both cases the researchers accept that overall warming is occurring and will continue in the long run.

So the Daily Mail report is basically a slightly sensationalist spin on science from last year that has already been analysed (in a rather more nuanced fashion) half to death elsewhere.

Move along, nothing to see here.

Posted by Daniel Cressey on January 12, 2010
Categories: Earth, environment & ecology | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

A Fox News story has caused an eruption among volcanic bloggers (eruption – volcanoes – geddit?), described by one as an “aneurysm-inducing travesty”.

The Knight Science Journalism Tracker says the Fox story’s mistake is “just one, big, staring-like-the-socket-of-an-old-skull scary boner of an error”.

The story is based on a paper that came out in the journal Environmental Science and Technology suggesting that the reason why Xuan Wei County, Yunnan Province, China has unusually high rates of lung cancer in non-smokers is because of the mining of coal that formed in the upper Permian – around 300 to 250 million years ago. This coal contains an unusually high amount of quartz, which holds within it small grains of silica that have been associated with lung cancer when they combine with volatile organic matter.

So what exactly did Fox get wrong to deserve such riticism? Their story’s headline “Cataclysm That Killed Dinos Still Taking Lives Today,” explains part of it: The Fox story claims that the dinosaurs were roaming the planet some time before they’d actually evolved (dinosaurs didn’t arrive until after the Permian, and were probably made extinct in the Cretaceous- Tertiarty mass extinction event). And those dinos were killed off by coal-erupting volcanoes.

Cue heavy snorting from volcanologists here, here and here.

Image: Alamy

Posted by Katharine Sanderson on January 11, 2010
Categories: Earth, environment & ecology | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

A high-tech speedboat owned by the controversial Sea Shepherd anti-whaling group has apparently sunk after a collision with one of the Japanese whaling fleet in the Southern Ocean.

The collision happened earlier this week when the Ady Gil, a high-tech catamaran originally built to break round the world sailing records, collided with the whaling vessel Shonan Maru No. 2. Both sides blamed each other for the smash, which sliced off the front of the Ady Gil (see: Sea Shepherd ship ‘sinking’ after collision with whaling vessel).

In a statement posted today on its website under the headline ‘Rammed Vessel Ady Gil Sinks’, Sea Shepherd says it has reported the last known position of the Ady Gill after a rope it was using to tow the partially submerged craft snapped. The crew of the ship had already been evacuated along with, according to the group, “all fuel and lubricants”.

Of course the Japanese Institute for Cetacean Research don’t agree with the Sea Shepherd version of events. They have accused the group of abandoning the vessel. In a statement also released today they say the hulk of the Ady Gill is now drifting and “an oily substance thought to be fuel is leaking from the Ady Gil and continues to spread over the sea surface”.

Image: the Ady Gill / Institute for Cetacean Research

Posted by Daniel Cressey on January 08, 2010
Categories: Earth, environment & ecology | Permalink | Comments (1) | TrackBacks (0)

Female toads can discourage unwanted suitors by inflating their bodies, thereby making it difficult for males to cling on during copulation and allowing rivals to knock them off, researchers have discovered.

Male frogs and toads frequently advertise for women with loud calls but females approaching vocal males can be intercepted by nefarious hijackers who won’t take no for an answer. Frog fights may ensue when multiple individuals attempt to mate with a female.

Now Benjamin Phillips, of Vrije University in Amsterdam, and his colleagues show that the female cane toad (Bufo marinus) has a previously unnoticed method of picking her man: blowing up.

“Why has it remained undetected?” they ask in Biology Letters. “We suspect that inflation by the female during male–male rivalry has been interpreted as a simple response to being pushed, kicked and occasionally flipped over by amorous suitors. Here we show that such a defensive response can be co-opted by selection for mate choice.”

They surgically prevented nine females from inflating and placed them in an ‘arena’ with three males. Initially, they allowed the smallest male to mount the female and then the competition was on. Smaller males were never successfully displaced from un-inflatable females by their larger rivals, but females that could inflate often shrugged off their weedy first dates for a buffer option.

Phillips and colleagues also measured the force needed to remove a male from inflated and un-inflated females with a spot of induced necrophilia. First they killed four females frogs and replaced their insides with balloons. Then they allowed males to mount these models and tested how much force was required to pull them off when the balloons were inflated and un-inflated. Males were much more easily detached from inflated females.

This demonstrates not only a new method of toad mate choice but also suggests there may be a wider trend of females co-opting defensive manoeuvres into sexual selection.

Image: inflated female with (presumably unwanted) male mate / Royal Society

Posted by Daniel Cressey on January 07, 2010
Categories: Biology & Biotechnology, Earth, environment & ecology | Permalink | Comments (2) | TrackBacks (0)

As early as this Friday, the US Supreme Court could force Illinois to close two locks in order to prevent the Asian carp from spreading to Lake Michigan, reports the Chicago Tribune.

First introduced to clean algae from catfish ponds along the lower Mississippi River in the 1970s, two Asian carp species made their way up to the Illinois River following major floods in the 1990s. To stop them from crossing Chicago-area locks and threatening the $7 billion Great Lakes fishery and ecosystem, state and federal agencies installed an electric barrier along the waterway.

But earlier this fall Lindsay Chadderton of The Nature Conservancy and the University of Notre Dame used a new technique to identify bighead carp DNA beyond the barrier and along the Cal Sag branch of the canal, a finding which set off an intensive netting and poisoning operation and Michigan’s request for a Supreme Court injunction. Wisconsin, Minnesota, Ohio, and New York have since joined the lawsuit.

Closing the locks could destroy a $1.5 billion shipping economy and threaten the city with floods. The Illinois Department of Natural Resources, the Metropolitan Water Reclamation District, and the Army Corps of Engineers argue that Asian carp are not as big a problem as some contend. The Obama administration has also sided with Illinois.(AP)

"We think that this issue about Asian carp destroying the ecology and the economy of the Great Lakes is just overblown and just fraught with a lot of emotion," Water District Executive Director Dick Lanyon told the Chicago Tribune.

While most ecologists would dismiss Lanyon's sentiment outright, the US EPA contends that Asian carp are a "significant threat" to the Great Lakes. Nature correspondent Emma Marris has written about Mark Davis of Macalester College in St. Paul, Minnesota, and other invasive species doubters in the ecology community.

Image: bighead carp courtesy US Geological Survey

Posted by Brendan Borrell on January 06, 2010
Categories: Earth, environment & ecology | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

Much of the northern hemisphere is feeling the impact of some seriously cold weather at the moment.

Andrew Revkin has a nice post on the Dot Earth blog explaining how much of the cold weather is down to a pattern of atmospheric pressure called the Arctic Oscillation, which is similar to the El Nino / La Nina cycle in the Pacific. This year, he says, there has been an “an extraordinary negative plunge” in the ocsilation’s index “taking it below any such reading since at least 1950”.

As Revkin points out, many commentators are trying to link the weather to climate change, with little in the way of evidence to back them up.

The question has even appeared in the UK’s parliament, with Labour politician Ed Miliband asked by Conservative John Redwood, who is not entirely convinced by the science, which climate model had predicted the current very cold winter. Miliband responded, “I can hardly believe that question … The weather fluctuates, as anyone knows, and the notion that a cold spell in Britain disproves the science of climate change is something that I believe not even [Redwood] believes.”

Leo Hickman and George Monbiot are also taking climate change sceptics to task over their reporting of the weather, asking “why is there a national outpouring of idiocy [in the UK] every time some snow falls?”

Finally, the Times has a nice photo of a boy walking his yak in the snow in India.

Image: a snowman near Barnsley recently / K. Sanderson

Posted by Daniel Cressey on January 06, 2010
Categories: Earth, environment & ecology | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

In a sadly predictable turn of events, plans by a controversial anti-whaling group to disrupt Japanese cetacean hunting with a high-tech carbon fibre boat have not gone well.

A collision between the Sea Shepherd group’s catamaran Ady Gill and the Japanese vessel Shonan Maru No. 2 has resulted in what Sea Shepherd says is “catastrophic damage” to their vessel. Its crew have been taken onboard another Sea Shepherd ship and the Japanese vessel was not damaged.

“The Ady Gil is believed to be sinking and chances of salvage are very grim,” says a statement on the anti-whaling group’s website.

Continue reading "Sea Shepherd ship ‘sinking’ after collision with whaling vessel" »

Posted by Daniel Cressey on January 06, 2010
Categories: Earth, environment & ecology | Permalink | Comments (1) | TrackBacks (0)

China says a fuel spill into a tributary of the Yellow River has reached an important reservoir, raising fears that the drinking water of millions of people may become contaminated.

According to state news service Xinhua, diesel spilled from a broken pipeline into the Weihe River has reached the Sanmenxia reservoir on the Yellow River. Dams on this reservoir have been closed since 3 January in an attempt to stop the pollution reaching the Xiaolangdi Reservoir which supplies drinking water to the cities Kaifeng and Zhengzhou.

Earlier, reports suggested that the 150 cubic meters of diesel that leaked from a China National Petroleum Corporation pipeline were under control.

Xinhua says Zhengzhou city is home to 2.4 million people. If the diesel spill makes the Yellow River supply undrinkable other reservoirs can provide the city with water for 50 days, say officials.

Posted by Daniel Cressey on January 05, 2010
Categories: Earth, environment & ecology | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

Chaz Firestone, a student at Brown University in Providence, Rhode Island, will be in Antarctica in early January 2010 on a media trip sponsored by the US National Science Foundation. His dispatches for Nature from The Ice will be appearing on our In The Field blog.

He has a jam-packed schedule touring some of the continent’s top US science facilities, and the lucky beggar also promises to make those of us stuck in the office jealous with regular photographs of “pristine landscapes, highly specialized scientific equipment and the inhabitants of the continent”.

Why not ask him a question about his trip?

Posted by Daniel Cressey on January 05, 2010
Categories: Earth, environment & ecology | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

The major eruption of Mayon volcano that was expected in the Phillipines hasn’t happened, but other volcanoes are causing chaos elsewhere.

Hundreds of people living near Mayon were evacuated, but the volcano failed to produce the big eruption feared. Although things haven’t completely quietened down yet.

Meanwhile, in the Congo Mount Nyamulagira erupted, prompting the UN to step in to monitor lava flow from the air. The worry about the mountain is not that it will affect the people of the town Goma, some 40 kilometres away, who seem to be safe so far, but the more pressing threat of damaging the Virunga national park and its wildlife (BBC).

The volcano also lies near to another, Mount Nyiragongo which threatens to disturb a lake full of dangerous gasses if it erupts (see “A lakeful of trouble”).

And over in Colombia the volcano Galeras has erupted magnificently spewing ash reportedly 12 kilometres high. Some 8000 people living in the vicinity have been evacuated. The alert level in the area has been brought down to orange from red since the eruption on Saturday.

The excellent blog Eruptions has regular updates on all the volcanoes, highly recommended reading.

Image: Mayon on December 15 2009, from NASA

Posted by Katharine Sanderson on January 04, 2010
Categories: Earth, environment & ecology | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

Our scientific understanding of dolphin intelligence may make their capture increasingly morally indefensible, suggest talks to be given to the huge AAAS conference next month.

The meeting – kicking off on 18 February in San Diego – is hosting a session on the ethical and policy implications of dolphin intelligence (initially noted yesterday by the Sunday Times).

In the abstract of her presentation, Lori Marino of Emory University notes that the animals possess a “complex intelligence”. It may be that this should preclude their capture and use in marine park shows and swimming-with-dolphins operations.

“Our current knowledge of dolphin brain complexity and intelligence suggests that these practices are potentially psychologically harmful to dolphins and present a misinformed picture of their natural intellectual capacities,” says Marino.

Another speaker at the meeting, Diana Reiss of Hunter College of the City University of New York, focuses on drive hunts in Japan. “Scientists are making the argument on the basis of the scientific evidence that the drive hunts are unjustifiable and indefensible in that they inflict pain and suffering on animals that are intelligent, sentient, socially complex and have capacity to experience pain and suffering,” says Reiss.

A way forward in our dealings with dolphins is suggested by Thomas White, of Loyola Marymount University. He calls for the development of an “interspecies ethic” for governing relations between people and the “non-human people” that are dolphins.

“Accomplishing this will require considerably more scientific research that demonstrates the cognitive and affective sophistication of dolphins and that uncovers more about the basic conditions that foster the welfare of both individual dolphins and their communities. Yet developing such an ethic could mark a significant turning point in the relationship between humans and other intelligent beings on the planet,” he writes.

Image: NOAA NMFS

Posted by Daniel Cressey on January 04, 2010
Categories: Earth, environment & ecology, Policy | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

Ecosystems will need to shift by about a quarter-mile per year to keep up with climate change in the future, says a Nature paper published today.

Many studies have looked at how plants and animals will need to shift location in order to adapt to changing temperatures, for example moving northward in the northern hemisphere as things get toastier closer to the equator. But the new work examines the speed at which critters will shift across various temperature gradients. "Things are on the move, faster than we anticipated," team member Healy Hamilton, of the California Academy of Sciences, told Reuters.

As one might expect, topography turns out to play a big role in how far animals must move. Rugged areas such as mountain ranges have many microclimates that can be entered just by shifting a little up or down in elevation. Flatter areas such as valleys mean more miles need to be covered.

"How far do you have to go from a given point to change your climate? On a mountain, it's not very far,” lead author Scott Loarie of the Carnegie Institution for Science in California told Discovery News. “But if you're in the middle of the Amazon basin, you have to go very far to change your climate."

The bottom line? Conservationists looking to preserve habitats might need to look at larger areas to save in flatter areas than in mountainous ones.

Posted by Alex Witze on December 24, 2009
Categories: Earth, environment & ecology | Permalink | Comments (2) | TrackBacks (0)

On a hill overlooking southern California suburbia, researchers have discovered an oak bush that has weathered 13,000 years of climate change.

“This literally appears to be the last living remnant of a vanished woody vegetation that occupied the inland valleys at the height of the last ice age,” Andrew Saunders of the University of California at Riverside told The Independent.

The oak bush is a Palmer’s oak, which typically inhabits higher, wetter elevations today in contrast to the dry chaparral of the Jurupa Hills where this hardy specimen was discovered. Since its nearest potential mate is 50 kilometers away, the oak has been repeatedly cloning itself and now sprawls across a 200 square meter area tucked between two boulders. The researchers reported their findings this week in PLoS One.

Although the Los Angeles Times claims the bush may hold the record as the oldest living plant in California, that’s only if you’re counting clones. Clonal colonies share their root system, but no individual part of the colony remains alive throughout its lifespan. Pando, a colony of Quaking aspen in Utah, for instance, has been dated to 80,000 years. The oldest living non-clonal plant in California – and probably the world – is still Methuselah, the 4,700 year-old Great Basin Bristlecone Pine.

Image: Jurupa Oak courtesy Dan May

Posted by Alex Witze on December 23, 2009
Categories: Earth, environment & ecology | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

A bird-like dinosaur used venom to kill its prey, paleontologists say.

Larry Martin and David Burnham of the University of Kansas in Lawrence were examining the fossil of Sinornithosaurus one day when they noticed a depression in the maxilla and a groove that led into the razor-sharp teeth. "We just looked at each other that day," Martin told the Wichita Eagle. "And I said, 'David, you do realize what this means?' We knew at that moment, 'Oh my gosh, this was a venomous animal.'”

The fossil, described in the early edition of Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, marks the first discovery of a potentially venomous dinosaur. Sinornithosaurus was about the size of turkey and had feathers on both its front and back legs. It likely fed on small birds in the forests of Cretaceous-era China, 128 million years ago. The fangs would only be able to penetrate 4 to 6 millimeters into the skin, allowing the poison to enter the bloodstream.

The venom would not necessarily kill the prey, but as in modern day Gila monsters and some rear-fanged snakes, it would induce “a state of shock.” (National Geographic)

"You wouldn't have seen it coming," Burnham told The Guardian. "It would have swooped down behind you from a low-hanging tree branch and attacked."

Of course, not everyone is sold on the story. Brian Switek of the Dinosaur Tracking blog at Smithsonian.com writes, “The new study, while interesting, does not include compelling evidence that Sinornithosaurus or any other dinosaur was venomous.”

Image: David A. Burnham, University of Kansas Biodiversity Institute

Posted by Brendan Borrell on December 22, 2009
Categories: Earth, environment & ecology | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

In the year of its 250th anniversary and just prior to the International Year of Biodiversity in 2010, Kew Gardens has announced that it discovered nearly 300 new species over the last 12 months.

Kew, the Royal Botanic Gardens based in London, has produced a rather nice interactive map so you can check out the plants for yourself.

They range from rare 40+ metre trees in Cameroon to passionflowers with “edible egg-shaped fruits” from Brazil to palm trees in Papua New Guinea. Although discovery sites cropped up from Fiji to Iran, the biggest bunch of botanical beauties came from Borneo, where 86 new species were discovered.

“It is not widely known that 2,000 new plant species are discovered worldwide each year,” says Stephen Hopper, director of the gardens (press release). “These new discoveries highlight the fact that there is so much of the plant world yet to be discovered and documented.”

Image: (clockwise from top left) Berlinia korupensis, Lecomtedoxa plumosa, Carapichea lucida, Talbotiella velutina, Eucalyptus brandiana, Cyrtostachys bakeri / all photos courtesy of Kew.

Posted by Daniel Cressey on December 22, 2009
Categories: Earth, environment & ecology | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

Thanks to a hoarder who held on to a scuba diving tank for 41 years, the record of air samples from the southern hemisphere has been extended by over 8 years.

A 76-year old scuba diver from Beaumaris, Australia, who also claims to be a climate sceptic according to ABC news, handed over his air tank, which he last filled in 1968 but never used, to the CSIRO Marine and Atmospheric Research labs in Melbourne.

“They said that they had the oldest air and I thought, no they haven't, I've got the oldest air," John Allport, the tank’s owner told ABC.

The air archive maintained by CSIRO started in 1978, and contains samples of clean air from a station at Cape Grim, Tasmania. It’s the oldest such archive in the world. Now with Allport’s tank, last used in 1970, the record has been extended further.

The air contained traces of propellants, refrigerants and emissions form aluminium smelters. Paul Fraser, who leads CSIRO’s greenhouse gas research team says that the scuba tank is going to be really useful: “If tanks were filled in a clean coastal environment their usefulness in measuring greenhouse gases such as carbon dioxide, methane, nitrous oxide and chloro-flurocarbons (CFCs) is much broader,” he says (press release).

The old air means that ice-core data can be cross-checked. It also feeds into better predictions of future atmospheric compositions.

ABC seems to be the only outlet covering this neat story. Their report includes some interesting quotes from Allport and his wife, Marg. Allport doesn’t seem too enamoured with the UN climate change conference in Copenhagen, saying it is “A lot of hot air I think, I don't believe what they say, I think the world's just rolling around and it changes in big seasons, but the seasons are like a hundred years apart.”

Marg seems to think that there might be something in it all, but doesn’t sound all that convinced to me: "We're not complete sceptics though really are we?" she said.
"We know something has to be done."

Image: CSIRO's Paul Fraser with SCUBA tanks last filled in 1968

Posted by Katharine Sanderson on December 18, 2009
Categories: Earth, environment & ecology | Permalink | Comments (2) | TrackBacks (0)

A major eruption is expected at the increasingly restless Mayon Volcano, in the Philippines, famed for its picturesque cone shape and general propensity to spew lava. It is the most active of 22 volcanoes in the country, having erupted 47 times in the past 323 years, most recently in 2006 (Reuters, Bloomberg).

It seems like authorities are well prepared: media are reporting that a 4-5 mile no-go zone has been imposed, as boiling mud and rocks flows from the crater summit down the volcano’s southeastern slopes. Almost 50,000 people have been evacuated, but farmers are creeping back to take care of their crops and cattle (AFP) .

"There is nothing we can do except to keep taking them out when we find them in the danger zone," AFP reports Joey Salceda, governor of Albay province where Mayon is located.

The Mayon volcano in 2006/Tomas Tam (via wikipedia)

Posted by Richard Van Noorden on December 18, 2009
Categories: Earth, environment & ecology | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

The British Antarctic Survey has released a plethora of pictures from the recent cruise one of its research ships took through the icy waters of the Antarctic.

The ship – the James Clark Ross – was taking part in an international biodiversity study.

“Few people realise just how rich in biodiversity the Southern Ocean is – even a single trawl can reveal a fascinating array of weird and wonderful creatures as would be seen on a coral reef,” says David Barnes, the cruise leader (press release).

“These animals are potentially very good indicators of environmental change as many occur in the shallows, which are changing fast, but also in deeper water which will warm much less quickly.”

See all the photos on the BAS website.

Young Icefish (Chaenocephalus aceratus)

Posed photo of basket star, (Gorganocephalus sp.)	Sea Pig (sea cucumber / Holothuroid)	Octopus (likely Pareledone sp.)

Posted by Daniel Cressey on December 17, 2009
Categories: Earth, environment & ecology | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

In all the excitement over Copenhagen, you may not have noticed that there’s another important meeting going on at the moment: the 2009 fall American Geophysical Union. Here’s what Nature’s reporters there have noticed so far and written about on our In the Field and Climate Feedback blogs.

Day of the tsunami

The morning of September 29, 2009, was one Mase Akapo will never forget. Akapo is a meteorologist with the National Weather Service in Pago Pago, American Samoa, and one of his jobs is to help prepare the islands for natural disasters. At 6:48 a.m. that day, he felt the ground shaking stronger than he’d ever felt before. When you’re an emergency manager, that means just one thing: get to work.

Arctic vegetation changes amplify warming

Chalk up another piece of dire news for the Arctic in a globally warmed future. Researchers have identified a previously unknown climate feedback effect suggesting that, as vegetation creeps northward, it will accelerate warming trends already in place.

California droughtin'

The GRACE gravity-hunting satellites have nailed another significant observation: Groundwater levels in California’s agriculturally rich Central Valley have dropped dramatically since 2003.

Capeless superheroes and rumbling shorelines

I started Fall Meeting bright and early Monday in the vast poster display hall, almost a city block long. The posters, like the oral sessions, cover a couple dozen broad areas of science, but climate change pops up in many of them: ocean science, environmental change, atmospheric science, and others. No one can cover it all, so a reporter depends a little on serendipity, that is, just stumbling onto the right presentation.

Looking for a future

Change is in the air this year at the fall American Geophysical Union meeting, and not just because of the gossip in the hallways about what might happen at the climate negotiations in Copenhagen this week. No, the AGU changes are far more navel-gazing and concern the future of the 50,000-member society itself.

Food for thought

If it’s December, it’s the Fall Meeting of the American Geophysical Union. For the 42nd consecutive year, AGU has returned here, and each year more scientists participate, descending on the city from all around the world. It is the must meeting for researchers in Earth and space science, and especially for those studying climate change.

Posted by Daniel Cressey on December 16, 2009
Categories: Earth, environment & ecology, Physics & Mathematics | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

Petitions have been filed in a US federal court as the latest round of the great Alaskan drilling fight gets underway.

Tribal governments, native whalers and environmental groups have filed two separate petitions at the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals in an attempt to block Shell from drilling in the Beaufort Sea. The petitions argue that the US Minerals Management Service did not properly assess the impact on wildlife and subsistence hunting when approving the drilling (AP, Reuters).

Shell has already seen its plans for drilling in the Chukchi Sea delayed and later restarted. Earlier this year it withdrew ambitious drilling plans for the Beaufort sea and said it would table more modest proposals.

The decision to allow oil exploration in the Beaufort Sea in October was swiftly followed by a proposal to designate over 200,000 square miles (520,000 sq km) of Alaskan territory as ‘critical habitat’ for polar bears, further complicating the issue.

Continue reading "Whales at centre of new Arctic drilling row" »

Posted by Daniel Cressey on December 16, 2009
Categories: Earth, environment & ecology | Permalink | Comments (1) | TrackBacks (0)

Researchers are claiming to have discovered the first documented case of an invertebrate using tools. But while tool use makes primates look more human and birds look intelligent, it succeeds only in making the veined octopus (Amphioctopus marginatu) look utterly ridiculous.

In the latest issue of Current Biology, researchers report observing octopuses/octopi carrying around halved coconut shells and later using them as shelters. While many species of octopus will shelter inside objects, these animals specifically carry them around for future use and manipulate them.

The researchers note that while ants have been seen to use leaves or pellets of sand to collect and transport food, these and other examples of potential invertebrate tool use have been seen only in response to specific stimuli. To be considered ‘tool use’, they say, the tool in question should not be in continuous use but should be of no benefit until used for its specific purpose.

This is what was observed off the coast of Northern Sulawesi and Bali in Indonesia.

“To carry one or more shells, this octopus manipulates and arranges the shells so that the concave surfaces are uppermost, then extends its arms around the outside and walks using the arms as rigid limbs,” write the researchers.

“We describe this lumbering octopedal gait as ‘stilt walking’. This unique and previously un-described form of locomotion is ungainly and clearly less efficient than unencumbered locomotion.”

The resulting movement is so bizarre one of the scientists who discovered it almost died laughing.

“I almost drowned laughing when I saw this the first time,” Julian Finn, from Australia’s Museum Victoria, told BBC News. “I could tell it was going to do something, but I didn’t expect this - I didn't expect it would pick up the shell and run away with it.”

See the behaviour that almost doomed Finn at around the minute mark in the embedded video. It's surely only a matter of time before someone sets this to the Benny Hill theme music.

Posted by Daniel Cressey on December 15, 2009
Categories: Earth, environment & ecology | Permalink | Comments (3) | TrackBacks (0)

US conservation scientists are again demanding that the government rescind a legal ruling which they say severely limits the protection afforded by the Endangered Species Act.

Yesterday 129 researchers wrote to Ken Salazar, the US Interior Secretary, and asked him to change the Bush-era rule (letter pdf). The ruling from 2007 relates to the area over which protection is offered to an animal protected under the act. Specifically, it defines the phrase ‘significant portion of its range’ as related to current range, not historic range.

“This policy is limiting protections for some of the nation’s most endangered species, including the gray wolf, Colorado River cutthroat trout, and others,” says John Vucetich, of Michigan Tech University (press release). “The Endangered Species Act’s definition of endangered species clearly indicates that the purpose of the Act is to restore species to large portions of their former range.”

This issue was also addressed in a Nature News story from November, which noted that this letter was in the offing. The first analysis of the impact of the 2007 ruling – published earlier this year in Conservation Biology – suggested that five Endangered Species Act rulings “substantively relied” on the 2007 legal opinion. In one case it prevented the listing of a species and in four others it was used to “sharply limit protection”.

More
US habitat rule threatens species – Nature News, 3 November 2009

Image: US FWS

Posted by Daniel Cressey on December 11, 2009
Categories: Earth, environment & ecology | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

The Consultative Group on International Agriculture Research (CGIAR) voted for wide-reaching organizational changes yesterday, establishing thematic scientific programs across 15 research centers and empowering a single trust fund to manage $500 million in annual donations. The changes prompted The Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, which has donated to individual projects in the past, to announce a commitment to provide is already committed to providing $80 million per year for the next 5 years and will assume a seat on the newly established Fund Council [Corrected 10/12].

“A new chapter has opened in the history of the CGIAR,” says Joachim von Braun, director general of the International Food Policy Research Institute in Washington, DC, and head of CGIAR’s strategy committee. “The system is focusing on solid science and results, and getting ready to double in size by 2015.”

First established in 1971, CGIAR supports 8,000 scientists and staff in 100 countries throughout the world through partnerships with private businesses, government agencies, and non-profit organizations. Its 15 international centers were previously only loosely integrated with one another, leaving them competing for scarce resources, says Rudy Rabbinge an entomologist at Wageningen University in The Netherlands and the chair of CGIAR’s science council. The new system will establish seven thematic megaprograms, which can be funded across various centers and will cover such topics as genomics or climate change.

Although CGIAR will retain its goal of increasing crop yields in developing countries, the group will now set explicit goals for hunger reduction, which von Braun says can be better managed with its new, systemwide outlook. The Fund Council also gives developing countries a larger voice in shaping research priorities.

“For many of the donors, the simple fact that we created the new CGIAR, makes them more willing to increase their sponsorship,” Rabbinge says.

Posted on behalf of Brendan Borrell.

Posted by Mark Peplow on December 09, 2009
Categories: Earth, environment & ecology | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

Parties to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) are now meeting in Copenhagen to wrangle over the details of a new global climate deal — a potential successor to the Kyoto Protocol. See Nature’s Road to Copenhagen special for more coverage.

As world leaders sweat in Copenhagen and climate sceptics continue to crow over stolen emails, the World Meteorological Organization has announced that 2009 is likely to be one of the 10 warmest years since records began in 1850.

Although the temperatures for November and December are not in yet, the WMO says the combined sea surface and land surface air temperature for 2009 is currently estimated at 0.44 degrees C above the 1961-1999 average of 14.00 degrees.

“The current nominal ranking of 2009, which does not account for uncertainties in the annual averages, places it as the fifth-warmest year,” says a statement from the UN agency. “The decade of the 2000s was warmer than the decade spanning the 1990s, which in turn was warmer than the 1980s.”

Some of the data behind these figures comes from the Climatic Research Unit at the University of East Anglia, which was the source of the ‘Climategate’ emails obtained by hackers. So the usual suspects are making the obvious conclusion: that climate change is a big con.

Back slightly closer to the real world, the politicking in Copenhagen is heating up already. Leaked documents originally published by the Guardian newspaper yesterday appeared to show that developed countries wanted to ditch the Kyoto agreement in favour of a totally new deal.

According to many papers this did not go down well with developing nations, who would like to stick with Kyoto (not least because it puts more weight on developed nations reducing emissions whilst leaving developing countries largely out of the picture).

However the Danish Government has apparently denied that the Guardian’s text is an official Danish proposal and in a widely-quoted statement UNFCCC executive secretary Yvo de Boer stated, “This was an informal paper ahead of the conference given to a number of people for the purposes of consultations. The only formal texts in the UN process are the ones tabled by the Chairs of this Copenhagen conference at the behest of the Parties.”

Other notable Copenhagen stories

Day one also saw rifts appear in the G77, the largest bloc consisting of 130 developing countries.
- UN Dispatch

At a press conference Tuesday, the Deputy Head of the Chinese delegation, Su Wei, said neither the US, the EU, nor Japan had offered sufficient cuts in their greenhouse gas emissions by 2020.
- UN COP15 website

Republican lawmakers critical of efforts to battle climate change said they would fly next week to the Copenhagen summit to undercut President Barack Obama's promises of strong US action.
- AFP

Image: graph from the UK’s Met Office

Posted by Daniel Cressey on December 09, 2009
Categories: Earth, environment & ecology, Policy, Road to Copenhagen | Permalink | Comments (3) | TrackBacks (0)

A marine glider has become the first craft of its kind to cross the Atlantic. Released off the coast of the USA and recovered last week off the coast of Spain, the ‘Scarlet Knight’ took 221 days to cover 7,389 kilometres.

Such gliders are already widely used in oceanography but this new feat of endurance could lead to a huge increase in their abilty to gather data on ocean processes and climate change.

“They swim like dolphins. We can put them into storms and places not safe for human beings,” Scott Glenn, of Rutgers University in New Jersey, told the Guardian just before the craft was recovered.

“The vision is of omnipresence, of being able to be all over the ocean by having lots of inexpensive robots tweeting back messages.”

The glider changes it density in order to rise or sink, and its wings turn this up and down movement into a forward glide. The Scarlet Knight – which is yellow and not scarlet – has some barnacles and other marine gunk growing on it. But, says researcher Tina Haskins, “she is still mostly yellow”.

Image: Rutgers

Posted by Daniel Cressey on December 07, 2009
Categories: Earth, environment & ecology | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

Three prominent US climate scientists addressed the controversy over climate emails leaked from the University of East Anglia's Climate Research Unit on Friday, suggesting that the episode might provide a peak at the messy reality behind the curtain of science but does not change the results that have been presented to the public.

The call was organized by the Center for American Progress, a liberal think-tank, and hosted by Joseph Romm, who edits the centre's Climate Progress blog. For more on that, see Roger Pielke Jr.'s blog. Featured speakers were Michael Mann of Pennsylvania State University, of hockey-stick-graph fame, Gavin Schmidt NASA's Goddard Institute for Space Studies and Michael Oppenheimer of Princeton University.

The scientists said very little that hasn't been said before regarding the CRU affair (which I refuse to label according to popular nomenclature dating back nearly four decades to a certain scandal involving Richard Nixon and an odd Washington apartment complex). Indeed, many of the journalists on the call appeared to be more interested in the unrelated political questions about the upcoming United Nations climate summit in Copenhagen and climate legislation moving through the United States Senate.

Maybe more stories will follow, but the wires hardly lit up with news of the press conference. The National Journal posted a summary here, while the Washington Times - the Washington Post's smaller, more conservative cross-town rival - focused on Mann. But that's about it so far.

That said, the story isn't going to end anytime soon. On Friday, Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change chairman Rajendra Pachauri weighed in with an interview on BBC, saying the IPCC would investigate the matter. Regardless of the outcome, those opposing action on global warming will use the affair as ammunition in the weeks and months to come. Perhaps it's notable that the Christian Science Monitor posted its latest report in the political section.

Posted by Jeff Tollefson on December 04, 2009
Categories: Earth, environment & ecology, Policy, Road to Copenhagen | Permalink | Comments (5) | TrackBacks (0)

A recently-retired atmospheric scientist at NASA has been fined $10,000 and sentenced to one year’s probation for directing tens of thousands of dollars in NASA contracts to his wife’s company (Washington Examiner).

Mark Schoeberl was chief scientist for NASA’s Earth Sciences Division, and, according to the right-leaning Examiner’s lead, “one of the scientific world’s most cited authorities on the human effect on Earth’s atmosphere”. He retired on 17 September from the agency, and two weeks later pled guilty to steering no-bid contracts to his wife’s firm, Animated Earth LLC. In 2007, his financial disclosure form omitted any interest in the company, even though it earned $50,000-plus that year in NASA contracts.

Between 2006 and 2008, NASA awarded more than $190,000 to Animated Earth without competition, although prosecutors said the government didn’t end up losing money because the company completed the contracted work (GovExec.com).

The relationship between Schoeberl and Animated Earth, which develops plasma-screen kiosks with near real-time satellite images of Earth’s atmosphere, was well-known at NASA. More than 50 scientists submitted letters to the court praising Schoeberl's character and credentials, and three addressed the court to request leniency (GovExec.com).

Image: NASA.gov

Posted by Lizzie Buchen on December 03, 2009
Categories: Earth, environment & ecology | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

Four days ahead of the Copenhagen climate meeting (see our Road to Copenhagen special), India has announced that it will reduce its carbon intensity - carbon emissions per unit of gross domestic product (GDP) - by 20-25 percent by 2020 from the 2005 level.

Last week, China's State Council announced that the country will cut its carbon intensity by 40–45% from 2005 levels by 2020 (see China's climate target: is it achievable?).

Environment Minister Jairam Ramesh told the parliament today that the country's stand was worked out in concert with other developing countries, including China. He added that "India will not accept a legally-binding emission reduction cut, and it will not accept a peaking date on its emissions."

That means that any emission reduction actions that India took would not be open to international review. However, "depending on concessions we can get from western countries, and in consultation with China, Brazil, South Africa and other countries in the G77, we can consider opening to international review all our mitigation actions supported by international finances".

Ramesh said the 20-25 percent emissions intensity cut had been worked out on the basis of a low-carbon growth strategy from 2012. The strategy consists of:

* Mandatory fuel efficiency standards for all vehicles
* A building code that encouraged energy conservation,
* legislation to reduce energy intensity of industrial activities;
* Regular monitoring of the state of the forests,
* clean coal technologies

Posted on behalf of K. S. Jayaraman

Posted by Mark Peplow on December 03, 2009
Categories: Earth, environment & ecology | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

At a hearing on Capitol Hill yesterday, Republican senators hammered White House science officials about the emails leaked from prominent climate scientists two weeks ago.

“These e-mails show a pattern of suppression, manipulation and secrecy that was inspired by ideology, condescension and profit,” said Jim Sensenbrenner (Rep., Wis.) at a hearing of the House of Representatives’ Select Committee on Energy Independence and Global Warming. He quoted from eight of the emails in his opening statement, and charged that they read more like “scientific fascism than the scientific process”. (AP)

But John Holdren, the presidential science adviser, and Jane Lubchenco, the head of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), said that the affair did nothing to undermine the strong scientific consensus that the earth was warming, largely as a result of human activity.

Some Republicans called for a congressional enquiry into the dispute over the integrity of climate science (Wall Street Journal), but Holdren said that wasn’t needed, as the scientific community had its own process for investigating the legitimacy of data (ScienceInsider).

The debate also included a few science experiments performed by Lubchenco to demonstrate the acidification of the oceans. The hearing was supposed to focus on the latest in global warming findings, but as AP writes, Lubchenco’s “bubble-inducing experiments were ignored in favour of the more explosive emails”.

"These emails are an embarrassment on the brink of Copenhagen," added Candice Miller (Rep., Mich.) ( WSJ).

Posted by Richard Van Noorden on December 03, 2009
Categories: Earth, environment & ecology | Permalink | Comments (8) | TrackBacks (0)

The University of East Anglia, UK, today released details about the investigation into the alleged hacking of e-mails from its Climatic Research Unit (CRU), which has sparked worldwide fury, lamentation, gnashing of teeth - and a robust editorial in this week's Nature.

According to a statement, the university has commissioned an independent review to:

Determine whether there is any evidence of the manipulation or suppression of data which is at odds with acceptable scientific practice and may therefore call into question any of the research outcomes.

Review CRU’s policies and practices for acquiring, assembling, subjecting to peer review and disseminating data and research findings, and their compliance or otherwise with best scientific practice.

Review CRU’s compliance or otherwise with the University’s policies and practices regarding requests under the Freedom of Information Act (‘the FOIA’) and the Environmental Information Regulations (‘the EIR’) for the release of data.

Review and make recommendations as to the appropriate management, governance and security structures for CRU and the security, integrity and release of the data it holds.

The review will be led by Sir Muir Russell, a former civil servant and former Principal and Vice-Chancellor of the University of Glasgow. He's also Chairman of the Judicial Appointments Board for Scotland.

Posted by Mark Peplow on December 03, 2009
Categories: Earth, environment & ecology | Permalink | Comments (1) | TrackBacks (0)

The Smithsonian Institute is throwing a four-day party to celebrate the 50th anniversary of the Antarctic Treaty. The summit includes talks by leading Antarctic researchers like ozone hole pioneer Susan Solomon, US science czar John Holdren and Prince Albert II of Monaco, the most recent country to sign the treaty.

The treaty was signed in 1959 as countries bumped heads over how to divide the continent, turning Antarctica into a zone of peace and establishing it as the world’s largest conservation area. The treaty now has 47 signatories and is often viewed as shining example of international collaboration.

But a lot can happen in 50 years, including global warming, eco-tourism and worldwide craving for oil and fish, and the treaty system is trying to make sure scientific research and other activities are aligned with environmental issues on the tundra. The original treaty made hardly any mention of the environment.

To deal with these modern problems, the signatories agreed to establish the Convention on the Conservation of Antarctic Marine Living Resources (CCAMLR), which went into force in 1982. Then in 1991 a new environmental agreement was signed, which prohibited any mining indefinitely and established the Committee for Environmental Protection (CEP) to advise the treaty members on environmental issues.

Continue reading "Antarctic treaty at 50" »

Posted by Lizzie Buchen on December 02, 2009
Categories: Earth, environment & ecology | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

California’s Department of Water Resources estimates it can supply only 5% of the water requested by the state’s cities and farms in 2010. The allocation is the lowest since the department was created in 1967. (SF Chronicle)

The announcement comes a month after Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger and the state legislature approved a $40 billion project to overhaul the state’s water system, including building new dams, restoring a crucial river delta and improving groundwater monitoring (NY Times).

The state system provides drinking water for some 23 million California residents, from San Francisco to southern California, and irrigates 755,000 acres of farms. The rest of the state — about 13 million residents — relies on independent water systems.

In previous years, the amount of water supplied tended to be substantially higher than the initial estimate. The water agency based their 5% estimate on current weather conditions and the fact that the state is about to hit its wetter season — but with cities in northern California meeting record highs last week, the severe, 3-year drought shows no signs of abating. The agency hopes a "moderate" El Niño will soon bring heavy rains (SF Chronicle).

Image: California's second largest reservoir, Lake Oroville (California Department of Water Resources)

Posted by Lizzie Buchen on December 02, 2009
Categories: Earth, environment & ecology | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

Tomorrow is the 25th anniversary of the Bhopal disaster, where an accident at a Union Carbide pesticide plant in the Indian city released a poisonous gas that killed thousands.

“Twenty five years ago, the country woke up to a terrible tragedy in Bhopal,” said Indian prime minister Manmohan Singh in a statement.

“I share the grief of those affected by this horrible incident. I reaffirm our Government's commitment to resolving issues of safe drinking water, expeditious clean up of the site, continuation of medical research, and any other outstanding issues connected with the Bhopal Gas Tragedy.”

Continue reading "Bhopal 25 years on" »

Posted by Daniel Cressey on December 02, 2009
Categories: Earth, environment & ecology | Permalink | Comments (1) | TrackBacks (0)

Increasing levels of carbon dioxide will mean an increase in the ocean's acidity, which could make it harder for animals that use calcium carbonate to build their shells. But Justin Ries, of the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, found that some animals actually build more shell when levels of carbon dioxide are higher.

“Shelled marine organisms need carbonate ions to build their shells that protect them from the intense predation that defines everyday life on the shallow sea floor,” says Ries (UNC press release).

“The organisms that responded positively to higher carbon dioxide levels are apparently more adept at converting the elevated dissolved inorganic carbon in the seawater, which results from elevated atmospheric carbon dioxide, back into a form that they can use directly in their calcification. The others, however, appear to be less adept at manipulating dissolved inorganic carbon.”

Ries and colleagues from Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution grew 18 different species in tanks with differing levels of carbon dioxide. They found seven species had more shell under higher carbon dioxide: crabs, lobsters, shrimp, red and green calcifying algae, limpets and temperate urchins (image top – larger animal grew under higher carbon dioxide).

Another 10 species did worse: oysters, scallops, temperate corals, tube worms, hard and soft clams, conchs, periwinkles, whelks and tropical urchins (image lower – smaller animal grew under higher carbon dioxide). Only one species was unaffected, the humble mussel, they report in Geology.

“We were surprised that some organisms didn’t behave in the way we expected under elevated carbon dioxide,” says study author Anne Cohen of WHOI (WHOI press release). “We can’t assume that elevated carbon dioxide causes a proportionate decline in calcification of all calcifying organisms.”

One crucial piece of information is missing however – do the animals experiencing climate-related gigantism still taste good?

If you want to learn more about ocean acidification, Sigourney Weaver is on hand to help. The Alien actress has narrated a film on the subject entitled Acid Test for the Natural Resources Defense Council.

Image top: Justin Ries, UNC-Chapel Hill
Image lower: Tom Kleindinst, Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution

Posted by Daniel Cressey on December 02, 2009
Categories: Earth, environment & ecology | Permalink | Comments (2) | TrackBacks (0)

Phil Jones, the embattled director of the Climatic Research Unit (CRU) at the University of East Anglia, stepped aside today from his post. It is the highest-profile fallout yet from the flap over leaked e-mails among prominent climate researchers, including Jones.

The university's statement quotes Jones as saying: "What is most important is that CRU continues its world-leading research with as little interruption and diversion as possible. After a good deal of consideration I have decided that the best way to achieve this is by stepping aside from the director's role" while the university conducts an independent review of data security and its responses to Freedom of Information requests.

Peter Liss will become acting director for the CRU.

Posted by Alex Witze on December 01, 2009
Categories: Earth, environment & ecology | Permalink | Comments (2) | TrackBacks (0)

China has approved multiple genetically modified crops.

Reuters reported last week that China had approved its first strain of GM rice, following on from the approval of a type of GM corn a week earlier. Now Bloomberg says “several corn and rice varieties” have been approved.

“This approval signals a big step forward in China’s progress in endorsing genetically modified technology,” Li Qiang, managing director at Shanghai JC Intelligence Co, told Bloomberg.

The Wall Street Journal agrees, saying the approval is a “major step toward endorsing the use of biotechnology in the staple food crop of billions of people in Asia”.

However, while Reuters says the rice has been approved for “for commercial production” the WSJ says it has been deemed “safe to produce and consume” and “further approvals are required before the strains can be grown on a commercial scale”.

Posted by Daniel Cressey on December 01, 2009
Categories: Earth, environment & ecology, Policy | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

UPDATE 2/12: Australia's government has failed to pass laws to create a carbon-trading scheme, ahead of next week's United Nations Climate Change Conference in Copenhagen, after the country's Senate rejected proposed legislation for the second time. [More at Nature News.]

Former Liberal leader Malcolm Turnbull had made a deal with Prime Minister Kevin Rudd to get cap and trade legislation passed in Australia’s Senate (see: Climate change induces meltdown in Australian opposition party). However the deal has backfired badly, with Turnbull ousted and the legislation stalled.

Tony Abbott, who ousted Turnbull by 42 votes to 41, said today, “Now this Emissions Trading Scheme legislation, which is really an energy taxation scheme, does deserve the most rigorous scrutiny by this Parliament. This is a $120b tax on the Australian public and that is just for starters.”

He added that is would be “grossly irresponsible of us to wave this through the Parliament”, so the under-new-management Liberal Party will attempt to refer the bill to committee for more debate, pushing it back into next year. If this doesn’t prove possible they will oppose the legislation in the Senate.

As noted previously, this will likely mean the bill falls and as it has already been rejected once by the Senate this will allow Rudd to call a general election. Some previous suggestions have been that Rudd would cruise to victory on a platform of dealing aggressively with climate change.

Abbott says this does not concern him. “I am not frightened of an election and I am not frightened of an election on this issue,” he said.

Media reaction below the fold.

Continue reading "Climate tax heat burns Australia’s opposition" »

Posted by Daniel Cressey on December 01, 2009
Categories: Earth, environment & ecology, Road to Copenhagen | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

What is being billed as the first comprehensive review of the science of the Antarctic climate is again focusing attention on both the impact our actions will have on this continent and the vastly complicated nature of the Earth’s atmosphere.

Produced by the Scientific Committee on Antarctic Research, the headline figure from the report is that sea levels could rise by 1.4 metres due to loss of ice from the West Antarctic ice sheet, with annual ice loss contributing tens of centimetres a year up to 2100. (See also: the recent Nature Geoscience paper on the eastern ice sheet.)

Another finding which is getting play in the press is that the hole in the ozone layer has shielded Antarctica from much of the impact of global warming. This is because the loss of stratospheric ozone has strengthened a ring of winds around the South Pole, altering weather patterns. (For more on the complex interplay of ozone and climate see the recent Nature feature: Fixing the sky).

The top ten findings of the report are:

1. The hole in the ozone layer has shielded most of Antarctica from global warming.
2. Warming of the Southern Ocean will cause changes in the Antarctic ecosystem.
3. There has been a rapid increase in plant communities across the Antarctic Peninsula due to warming along the western part and introduction of alien organisms.
4. Ice loss in parts of the Antarctic has been rapid, particularly around the Amundsen Sea Embayment, but the bulk of the Antarctic ice sheet has shown little change.
5. There has been a 10% increase in sea ice around the Antarctic, likely due to stronger winds around the continent. Regional sea ice has decreased west of the Antarctic Peninsula.
6. Carbon dioxide levels are increasing at the fastest pace in 800,000 years.
7. Sea ice loss is directly impacting krill levels and penguin colonisation.
8. Antarctica is likely to warm by around 3 degrees C over this century.
9. West Antarctic ice loss could contribute to 1.4 metres of sea level rise.
10. Improved modelling of polar processes is required for accurate predictions.

Posted by Daniel Cressey on December 01, 2009
Categories: Earth, environment & ecology | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

The fallout from the hacking of the Climatic Research Unit at the University of East Anglia continues this week, with huge attention still focused on the controversial content of leaked emails between leading climate scientists.

The university said on Saturday that 95% of the CRU climate data set concerning land surface temperatures has been made available to the public for “several years” and that all data will be released as soon as they are clear of non-publication agreements. A key complaint of climate change sceptics is that the unit has been withholding information and the leaked emails show a conspiracy to keep raw data hidden.

Another twist on this complaint appeared yesterday in the Sunday Times.

Continue reading "More heat, less light in CRU hacking ‘scandal’" »

Posted by Daniel Cressey on November 30, 2009
Categories: Earth, environment & ecology | Permalink | Comments (9) | TrackBacks (0)

In December this year, parties to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) will descend on Copenhagen to wrangle over the details of a new global climate deal — a potential successor to the Kyoto Protocol. See Nature’s Road to Copenhagen special for more coverage.

Australian prime minister Kevin Rudd has been dealt a blow in his attempts to push through a cap and trade bill to limit carbon emissions before the Copenhagen meeting, but he may profit in the longer term.

The opposition Liberal Party, which had already partially disembowelled itself debating whether or not to support the bill, has now gone into meltdown. Its leader Malcolm Turnbull had made a deal with Rudd to get the legislation passed in Australia’s Senate, where Rudd’s ruling Labor Party does not have a majority.

Yesterday 10 politicians quit the Liberal Party in protest at the bill and opponents successfully prevented any vote in the Senate with some old school filibustering tactics.

Turnbull insisted he would not back down in his support for the bill.

“I will not take a backward step. There is too much at stake. It's not just the credibility of the party,” he told the Seven Network (via AFP).

The opposition party also has some political incentive to pass the bill when the Senate debates it again on Monday. The Senate has already rejected the plans once before, in August, if it rejects them again Rudd can choose to call a general election early next year.

Opinion polls suggest he would increase his party’s majority, says Reuters.

“The people that are opposing me within the party do not believe in climate change at all. They are turning back the clock and Australians will punish us very, very severely at the next election if these guys have their way and we go to the election as the ‘do nothing on climate change’ party,” Turnbull warned (Seven Network via AP).

Posted by Daniel Cressey on November 27, 2009
Categories: Earth, environment & ecology, Road to Copenhagen | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

In an exclusive interview published today on Nature Reports Climate Change, climate scientist James Hansen talks about his forthcoming book, Storms of My Grandchildren. You can read the full interview here [free access].

Arguably the world’s most famous climate scientist, and Director of NASA’s Goddard Institute of Space Studies in New York, Hansen’s conviction that a climate catastrophe is looming has led him, in recent years, to increasingly take on the role of advocate, sending numerous pleading letters to world leaders and CEOs, and attending well-publicized protests against coal plants.

It’s also prompted him, at the age of 68, to write his first book, which looks at the dangerous climatic events that will greet the next generation if the fossil fuel use continues unabated.

Due out in December, Storms of My Grandchildren is the silver lining of Hansen’s recent fight with prostate cancer, which afforded him a six-week recuperative period during which he finished his book. In an interview with Keith Kloor, Hansen discusses the climate problem and potential solutions, his personal carbon footprint and his frustration with political ‘greenwashing’.

"I am sorry to say", he writes in his book, "that most of what politicians are doing on the climate front is greenwashing — their proposals sound good, but they are deceiving you and themselves at the same time."

Hansen tells Kloor that former US Vice President Al Gore is among those deceiving themselves that we are on track to solving the climate problem. "I saw him on Larry King last night," says Hansen, "and what really worries me is that he sounds optimistic that we're now on a track to solve this problem." He lets out an incredulous chuckle. "We're not, however, on a track, and that's clear."

The self-deception extends to advocates of cap-and-trade legislation currently under review by the US Senate, he says. Hansen opposes the bill, in large part because of the offsets system that would allow polluters to continue spewing emissions, but also because political horse-trading has brought in provisions that will enable aging coal plants to stay in operation. “There’s a huge gap between their public position and the realities of their policies. That’s the situation we have now in Congress,” says Hansen.

This item is cross posted from Nature’s Climate Feedback blog. Image by Arnold Adler.

Posted by Daniel Cressey on November 26, 2009
Categories: Earth, environment & ecology | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

Siberian tiger numbers are down 40% on their 12-year average, according to a new report from the Wildlife Conservation Society.

WCS scientists recorded only 56 tigers at their 16 monitoring sites, these cover 15–18% of existing tiger habitat in Russia. The total number of Siberian tigers across the entire range was estimated at 500 in 2005, says the WCS, but there has been a four year decline in numbers.

“The sobering results are a wake-up call that current conservation efforts are not going far enough to protect Siberian tigers,” says Dale Miquelle, of the WCS Russian Far East Program (press release).

Not everyone agrees with the numbers though, partly because heavy snow may have reduced the movements of some of the big cats.

“It is absolutely incorrect,” says Vladimir Krever, of the World Wildlife Fund (AP). “There’s possibly been a decrease in the last two years, but definitely not 40 percent.”

The animal is listed as endangered - but not critically endangered - by the IUCN's Red List, which says "according to a comprehensive 2005 population census, there are 331-393 adult-subadult Amur tigers in the Russian Far East".

In other Siberian tiger news, a spokesman for Russian prime minister Vladimir Putin has stated that one of the giant cats that Putin helped fit with a radio collar earlier this year is alive and well. Earlier reports stated the tiger had ‘vanished’.

Image: ‘Lutka’, photographed in Russia / Dale Miquelle/Wildlife Conservation Society

Posted by Daniel Cressey on November 26, 2009
Categories: Earth, environment & ecology | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

Taking time off from officially pardoning a giant turkey, US President Barack Obama today announced that not only will he be going to Copenhagen on 9 December for the climate talks, he’ll also be taking with him a gift.

“The President is prepared to put on the table a US emissions reduction target in the range of 17% below 2005 levels in 2020,” the White House announced today.

There is a catch, however: the offer will eventually have to be agreed by the notoriously fractious US Congress, so there is a caveat: “… and ultimately in line with final US energy and climate legislation”.

Not everyone is pleased with Obama’s announcement.

“The Copenhagen climate summit is not about a photo opportunity, it's about getting a global agreement to stop climate chaos,” says Kyle Ash, Greenpeace USA climate policy advisor. “President Obama needs to be there at the same time as all the other world leaders – December 18. This is when he is needed to get the right agreement.”

Obama may have saved the turkey; it remains to be seen if he can save the Copenhagen talks too.

Posted by Daniel Cressey on November 25, 2009
Categories: Earth, environment & ecology, Road to Copenhagen | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

In December this year, parties to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) will descend on Copenhagen to wrangle over the details of a new global climate deal — a potential successor to the Kyoto Protocol. See Nature’s Road to Copenhagen special for more coverage.

“Copenhagen will be judged on the social justice embodied in it, and within a financial framework. I am looking forward to that debate, but I hope that I will have the key to the door so that I do not let the buggers out until they have done a deal.”
John Prescott, UK politician and Rapporteur for Climate Change for the Council of Europe, presents his unique approach to the forthcoming talks to Parliament.

“We will try to make the summit successful and we will not accept that it ends with an empty and so-called political declaration.”
Li Gao, Chinese government climate change negotiator, says China wants a meaningful result from Copenhagen (Xinhua).

“Some of the numbers being banded around seem worryingly low given China’s weight of economic growth but we remain confident that China will ultimately offer us an emissions reduction target that represents a significant reduction from business as usual.”
An unnamed European diplomat expresses some concern about what China might bring to the table (Guardian).

“It is significant that Australia – a country with significant coal resources, dependence on coal for electricity generation, and great sensitivity of its energy-intensive industries to international competition with Asian countries – would move forward with a climate policy.”
Robert Stavins, director of Harvard University’s environmental economics program, comments on the Rudd government getting ever closer to passing a climate bill bringing in a cap and trade system (Bloomberg).

Posted by Daniel Cressey on November 25, 2009
Categories: Earth, environment & ecology, Road to Copenhagen | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

The almighty row resulting from the alleged hacking of computers at the University of East Anglia’s Climatic Research Unit continues today.

Climate sceptics are continuing to claim emails obtained and released by hackers show CRU scientists behaving badly. Their ideological friends in the US political system are also stirring.

Republican senator James Inhofe has announced he will launch an investigation into what is, with huge predictability, being called Climategate (see Storm clouds gather over leaked climate e-mails for background).

“I certainly don’t condone the manner in which these emails were released,” he said. “However, now that they are in the public domain, lawmakers have an obligation to determine the extent to which the so-called ‘consensus’ of global warming, formed with billions of taxpayer dollars, was contrived in the biased minds of the world’s leading climate scientists.”

The scientists involved have been hitting back though, denying any wrongdoing.

Phil Jones, head of the Climatic Research Unit and centre of the storm, suggested yesterday that the leak of his emails may have been designed to derail the forthcoming Copenhagen talks, where a potential successor to the Kyoto agreement will be discussed. He also insisted there was “no need” for anyone to manipulate climate data as evidence for global warming comes from multiple sources.

He does say he regrets sending some of the emails though.

“My colleagues and I accept that some of the published emails do not read well. I regret any upset or confusion caused as a result. Some were clearly written in the heat of the moment, others use colloquialisms frequently used between close colleagues,” he said in a CRU statement.

“We are, and have always been, scrupulous in ensuring that our science publications are robust and honest.”

More reaction below the fold.

Continue reading "Climate hacking update" »

Posted by Daniel Cressey on November 25, 2009
Categories: Earth, environment & ecology | Permalink | Comments (3) | TrackBacks (0)

New species are discovered all the time, but it’s not quite so frequent for them to fall out of the mouths of snakes.

Andrew Marshall, of the University of York, was surveying monkeys in the Magombera Forest in Tanzania when he surprised a twig snake having dinner (or perhaps breakfast). The poor snake dropped the chameleon it was attempting to ingest and our story begins.

“It saw me and fled, and as it did so spat out a chameleon,” says Marshall (Daily Telegraph). “I took photos and showed them to a local herpetologist, who instantly recognised that it was a new species.”

That first example didn’t survive its encounter with the snake but another was later found and they have both now been named as Kinyongia magomberae – the Magombera chameleon – and reported in the African Journal of Herpetology (press release).

Unfortunately, as always seems to be the case with new species these days, the habitat of this critter is already under threat.

Marshall told the Guardian, “The thing is, if you work in an area of conservation importance and you can give a species the name of that area it can really highlight that area. By giving it the name Magombera it raises the importance of the forest.”

Personally though, I would have preferred him to name it something more related to its discovery, Kinyongia serpens-cibus perhaps? (Apologies in advance to Latin-scholars for that one.)

Image: Andrew Marshall / African Journal of Herpetology

Posted by Daniel Cressey on November 24, 2009
Categories: Earth, environment & ecology | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

The ice sheet covering east Antarctica may have been melting since 2006, according to new research, contradicting previous suggestions that it has remained stable or even grown in mass.

Using measurements for 2002 to 2009 from a twin pair of satellites, researchers at the University of Texas at Austin in Austin, Texas, say east Antarctica is losing mass at about 58 gigatonnes a year. Most of the loss appears to be from coastal regions and to stem from increased ice loss post 2006.

Previous studies have generally used satellites to measure elevation or movement of ice. The new study - published in Nature Geoscience - instead looks at the Earth’s gravity field and uses that to work out how much ice is there. It also suggests that 132 Gt of the total annual ice loss of 190 Gt per year is coming from the west.

Although there are uncertainties in the data, the new estimates of ice loss are on average consistent with previous calculations, “but, in contrast to previous estimates, they indicate that as a whole, Antarctica may soon be contributing significantly more to global sea-level rise”, the researchers write in their paper.

The finding is significant because the east of the continent has traditionally been seen as the more stable half. It is also the bigger half so if it is melting it could contribute more to sea level rise.

“We felt surprised to see this change in east Antarctica,” says study author Jianli Chen (BBC, Guardian). “If the current trend continues or gets worse, Antarctica could become the largest contributor to sea level rises in the world. It could start to lose more ice than Greenland within a few years.”

Jonathan Bamber, of the University of Bristol, told Bloomberg he was also surprised, as those previous studies have suggested the East Antarctic Ice Sheet really wasn’t changing that much.

“This result really confirms that there are very substantial inconsistencies between different estimates,” he says. “The margins of error are so large that it can be difficult to draw strong conclusions.”

Image: Antarctic continent surrounded by sea ice / NASA/Goddard Space Flight Center / Scientific Visualization Studio, Canadian Space Agency, RADARSAT International Inc.

Posted by Daniel Cressey on November 23, 2009
Categories: Earth, environment & ecology | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

The jumbo dumbo (Photo courtesy of Mike Vecchione)

New species of 'dumbo' (Photo courtesy of David Shale)

In total, five deep-sea projects will have undertaken 210 expeditions when the census has been completed.

“There is both a great lack of information about the ‘abyss’ and substantial misinformation,” says Robert Carney, of Louisiana State University. “Many species live there. However, the abyss has long been viewed as a desert. Worse, it was viewed as a wasteland where few to no environmental impacts could be of any concern.”

Now that they have stared into the abyss, says Carney, the census scientists are concerned. Here are some of the critters they are concerned about.

Collected between 1,000 to 3,000 meters deep, was a very large example of a finned octopod, normally called a dumbo due to its endearing habit of swimming by flapping a pair of large fins that look like ears.

This jumbo example was nearly two metres long and 6 kg heavy, the largest ever collected. In total nine species were found on the mid-Atlantic ridge, including one new to science.

Later a huge catch of corals, sea cucumbers and sea urchins was pulled up from the ridge. Researchers described it as “indescribable”. “It’s hard to believe that such exuberance of life exists a kilometre deep into the ocean,” says the census.

The team also pulled up a Neocyema, the strange orange thing pictured below, only the fifth example of this fish ever caught.

Perhaps the strangest find though was a Lamellibranchia tubeworm. When a robot arm lifted the worm clear of the sea floor, crude oil started leaking from the hole it had left behind. Apparently the worm had been feasting on the oil.

More photos below the fold...

Continue reading "Weird beasts from the abyss" »

Posted by Daniel Cressey on November 22, 2009
Categories: Earth, environment & ecology | Permalink | Comments (1) | TrackBacks (0)

An endangered fish is actually two even more endangered fish, according to new research.

Although it is already listed as ‘critically endangered’ the poor old European common skate may be in an even worse state than we thought. A new paper published in Aquatic Conservation says what we thought was the skate Dipturus batis is actually two different animals.

“Morphology, genetics, and life history reveal that two distinct species have been erroneously confused since the 1920s under the single scientific name D. batis,” write Samuel Iglésias, of the French National Museum of Natural History, and colleagues.

Iglésias says the ‘common skate’ species should be split into the blue skate (provisionally D. cf. flossada) and the flapper skate (D. cf. intermedia). This is not just of academic importance.

“Revisions of incorrect synonymizations - called species resurrections - are common works for systematists, but in the present case the resurrection of D. cf. intermedia is of great conservation significance,” the authors note.

The problem is that the not-quite-so-bad state of blue skate populations has been masking the really, really bad state of the flapper. And the old ‘common skate’ is already noted as the first fish brought to the brink of extinction by commercial fishing and this confusion of blue and flapper has hamstrung those trying to conserve the species – both of which deserve independent ‘critically endangered status’ says the paper.

“The risk of extinction of these depleted species is higher than previously assessed and appears unavoidable without immediate and incisive conservation action,” Iglésias concludes.

Posted by Daniel Cressey on November 19, 2009
Categories: Earth, environment & ecology | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

The world’s carbon dioxide ‘sinks’ are not able to keep up with the amount of the greenhouse gas being produced, according to a paper published in Nature Geoscience.

Reviewing the recent literature Corinne Le Quéré, of the University of East Anglia, and colleagues report that between 1959 and 2008 43% of each year’s carbon dioxide emissions have remained in the atmosphere with the rest being absorbed by land and ocean sinks. However in the last 50 years they suggest that the fraction remaining in the atmosphere has increased from about 40% to 45%.

They also found that a 29% rise in carbon emissions between 2000 and 2008 can be attributed to a large extent to burning coal and the growth of the so-called ‘emerging economies’.

“The Earth’s carbon sinks are complex and there are some gaps in our understanding, particularly in our ability to link human-induced CO2 emissions to atmospheric CO2 concentrations on a year-to-year basis,” says Le Quéré (press release). “But, if we can reduce the uncertainty about the carbon sinks, our data could be used to verify the effectiveness of climate mitigations policies.”

Uncertainties in this area are huge. Another recent paper in Geophysical Research Letters suggested there has been no decline in the fraction absorbed by sinks.

The author of that paper, Wolfgang Knorr of the University of Bristol, says, “We are just at the very edge of being able to detect a trend in the airborne fraction. Our apparently conflicting results demonstrate what doing real science is like and just how difficult it is to accurately quantify such data.” (Press release.)

One thing the authors can apparently agree on: if global warming is going to be stopped emissions are going to have to be reduced drastically.

Posted by Daniel Cressey on November 18, 2009
Categories: Earth, environment & ecology | Permalink | Comments (3) | TrackBacks (0)

In 1835, Darwin and his shipmates collected specimens of the Floreana mockingbird in the Galapagos Islands. Now those same specimens may help conservationists re-establish the species to the island that gives them their name.

Although they died out on the isle of Floreana some 50 years after the famous naturalist’s visit, two populations of Mimus trifasciatus still exist on nearby rocks.

In the Royal Society Journal Biology Letters, Paquita Hoeck and colleagues report that genetic analysis shows that one of these populations is highly inbred but comparison with the specimens collected by Darwin reveals that both have unique alleles found in the original Floreana population. For this reason birds from both populations should be used in the forthcoming attempt to reintroduce the animals to the main island, they say.

“Though Darwin knew nothing of DNA, the specimens he and [Beagle captain Robert] FitzRoy collected have, after 170 years of safe-keeping in collections, yielded genetic clues to suggest a path for conservation of this critically endangered and historically important species,” says paper author Karen James, a researcher at the Natural History Museum where the specimens are kept (press release).

Two others authors on the paper may be familiar to Nature News readers: Peter and Rosemary Grant.

See also: Nature's Darwin 200 special.

Image: Natural History Museum

Posted by Daniel Cressey on November 18, 2009
Categories: Biology & Biotechnology, Earth, environment & ecology | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

Over 60 of the world’s leading agricultural scientists have issued a statement warning that December’s negotiations on climate change in Copenhagen must not ignore agriculture and the need for crop adaptation to ensure the world’s future food supplies.

The statement says, “The negative impact of climate change on agriculture, and thus on the production of food, could well place at risk all other efforts to mitigate and adapt to new climate conditions.”

The scientists say that farmers will encounter problems they have never before encountered, including higher than average temperatures, and shorter growing seasons. There is no single characteristic that will ensure crops will retain, or increase their productivity in new climates. Efforts to adapt will be required crop by crop. But crop diversity, which holds the key to future adaptation, is being lost.

“We urge countries at the Copenhagen conference to give due attention to crop diversity conservation and use as an essential element of the commitments they will make for climate change adaptation,” the statement says.

Continue reading "Climate change agreement must not ignore agriculture " »

Posted by Natasha Gilbert on November 18, 2009
Categories: Earth, environment & ecology, Policy, Road to Copenhagen | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

In December this year, parties to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) will descend on Copenhagen to wrangle over the details of a new global climate deal — a potential successor to the Kyoto Protocol. See Nature’s Road to Copenhagen special for more coverage.

Confusing reports abound today about Obama’s stance on the upcoming Copenhagen climate talks.

Wall Street Journal says that Copenhagen is going to be a flop, which follows reports that Obama said at a meeting in Singapore over the weekend that a legally binding deal at Copenhagen was unlikely.

Since then Obama has met with the Chinese president Hu Jintao, and again climate was high on the mind of the world’s reporters. The AP’s shorter-than-short story, and Reuters both report what has now spread far and wide: Obama and Hu have agreed to take “significant” action to mitigate carbon emissions.

The reports do seem contradictory, but it probably depends on your views on Copenhagen in the first place. For someone who will only be happy with a legally binding agreement out of Copenhagen, the news seems bleak. But for others the fact that China and the US have come to some sort of agreement could signal a pang of optimism.

CNN for one is filled with that optimism, running their story that says “China and the United States, the largest producers of greenhouse gases, will team up to fight climate change and create clean energy, their leaders said Tuesday.” And the Deutsche Welle says that Obama and Hu want to “reinvigorate” climate talks.

Look elsewhere and the focus on the lack of a binding agreement at Copenhagen won’t go away: FT, WSJ blog.

It seems too important an issue to leave hanging, but it looks like we’re just going to have to wait and see.

Posted by Katharine Sanderson on November 17, 2009
Categories: Earth, environment & ecology, Road to Copenhagen | Permalink | Comments (1) | TrackBacks (0)

A UN summit on food security opens today in Rome, Italy, where world leaders are gathering to discuss how to feed the world’s billion hungry people.

Ban Ki-moon, UN secretary general, called for nations to agree a single global vision to address the problem, which he said must recognise the links between food and climate security.

"There can be no food security without climate security," he said.

“By 2050 our planet may be the home of 9.1 billion people... by 2050 we know we will need to grow 70 percent more food, yet weather is becoming more extreme and more unpredictable," he added.

Anti-poverty campaigners lamented the absence of leaders from the world’s riches countries at the summit.

“Sixty leaders are coming from around the world to this important UN summit, but where are the leaders from all the G8 countries?" asked ActionAid. "This doesn’t signal they are serious about finding global solutions to hunger," said Francisco Sarmento, ActionAid’s food rights coordinator.

At a pre-summit meeting yesterday, scientists from a leading Brazilian university agreed to work with the UN’s Food and Agricultural Organisation to help build agricultural development programmes in Latin American and African countries. Under a Memorandum of Understanding, Brazil’s Universidade Federal de Viçosa (UFV), which specialises in food and agricultural studies and research, will also open its doors to students from developing countries.

Posted by Natasha Gilbert on November 16, 2009
Categories: Earth, environment & ecology, Policy | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

Posted for Quirin Schiermeier

Rising temperatures cause melting and retreat of large ice sheets, sea ice, and mountain glaciers – that’s pretty much common knowledge by now, as are implications on sea level, ecosystems, water supply and natural hazard risk. But a couple of news stories this week may cause confusion.

That the Greenland ice sheet is losing ice, and that mass loss has further accelerated in recent years, comes as no particular surprise. Using ground observations and satellite gravity measurements, a team led by Michiel van den Broeke from Utrecht University in the Netherlands, estimates that some 1,500 gigatonnes – roughly 1,500 cubic kilometers – have been lost from 2000-2008, equivalent to about 0.46 millimeters of global sea level rise.

Melting rates have accelerated since 2006, with mass loss reaching 273 gigatons of mass per year, equivalent to 0.75 millimeters of sea level rise. Without the moderating effects of increased snowfall, post 1996 mass losses would have been 100% higher, the team writes in a paper in this week’s issue of Science [subscription].

But the cryosphere – those parts of the globe that are permanently or seasonally covered by ice – does have surprises in store. Or so it seems.

Continue reading "Greenland ice and Himalayan glaciers: What’s going on?" »

Posted by Daniel Cressey on November 13, 2009
Categories: Earth, environment & ecology | Permalink | Comments (4) | TrackBacks (0)

The American Physical Society (APS) has overwhelmingly rejected a petition by a group of physicists asking the organization to reverse its position on climate change.

The petition was signed by 160 physicists including Nobel laureate Ivar Giaever. If you don't feel like reading the thing, it essentially says that there has been a lot of natural variation in climate change over the past centuries, and that natural variation can explain the recent rise in global temperatures. The statement also points out what it calls the "beneficial effects of increased levels of carbon dioxide for both plants and animals."

The group has been bullish on the hopes of changing the APS's minds. They even wrote us a letter in July, noting that they had prompted an APS review of its climate change position. "We hope it will lead to meaningful change," they said in the letter.

But no such luck. The society review, lead by nuclear physicist Daniel Kleppner from MIT, recommended that no changes be made, and on 10 November, the council accepted their recommendation.

As interesting as the petition is, there's an equally fascinating analysis of the signers that's doing the rounds. John Mashey, a computer scientist and APS member, has done a thorough analysis of who was involved. It's not the easiest to read, but it starts getting interesting around section 4 or 5. Mashey breaks down the signers by age, political contributions and geographic area. He also does some network analysis to show who was involved with the petition at different stages.

He finds that the signers tend to be predominately older and big contributors to the Republican and Libertarian parties. More interestingly the supporters seem to be centered around the Northeast, particularly Princeton University's department. Again, not surprising considering that one of the main organizersis Will Happer, a well-respected Princeton physicist and long-time climate change sceptic who, in 1993, was pushed out of his position at the Department of Energy after rowing with then vice president Al Gore over the significance of the ozone hole (see our rival for a little background).

The petition wasn't a total flop, the APS says its Panel on Public Affairs should "examine the statement for possible improvements in clarity and tone." Happer called the decision a "big victory" for the petitioners.

Posted by Geoff Brumfiel on November 12, 2009
Categories: Earth, environment & ecology, Physics & Mathematics, Policy | Permalink | Comments (9) | TrackBacks (0)

The brown pelican has been officially declared recovered by the US government, and the species will no longer be listed under the Endangered Species Act.

Pelecanus occidentalis was devastated by DDT use in the 1940s and 50s. Yesterday though the US Fish and Wildlife Service removed the animal’s endangered status, announcing there are now over 650,000 brown pelicans in the US, the Caribbean and Latin America.

“At a time when so many species of wildlife are threatened, we once in a while have an opportunity to celebrate an amazing success story,” says Secretary of the Interior Ken Salazar (press release). “Today is such a day. The brown pelican is back!”

The FWS notes that pelicans have survived not only DDT – as famously described by Rachel Carson in Silent Spring – but also a 19th century craze for using their feathers in women’s hats and slaughter by fishermen who accused them of taking their fish.

The Service also reminds us of Dixon Lanier Merritt’s poem:

A wonderful bird is the pelican,
His bill will hold more than his belly can,
He can take in his beak
Enough food for a week,
But I’m damned if I see how the hell he can.

Image: FWS

Posted by Daniel Cressey on November 12, 2009
Categories: Earth, environment & ecology | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

Over at the New York Times is an interesting story about solar panels and the European Parliament. I kid you not.

The story tells us about some proposals, proposed by the Swedish EU presidency government in the summer, that would see solar panel manufacturers subject to European hazardous waste legislation, that previously they were exempt from.

The problem is cadmium, a toxic metal that is used to make some photovoltaic cells.

The NYT story also mentions a mysterious European Parliament committee that is “expected in coming days to propose a way of keeping pressure on solar companies to come up with alternatives to cadmium telluride.”

This is interesting news indeed, and Greentech Media has picked up on it, although details are still sparse about the committee and its proposals. But the message seems to be that First Solar, seen as a success in the solar arena, will be in serious trouble if cadmium is banned in Europe.

I remember a while ago talking to quantum dot manufacturers Nanoco, spun out of Manchester University, who are trying to turn away from cadmium – but there the question is one of knowing the markets: in Japan, where quantum dots are likely to be used for TV screens and other display applications, cadmium is a big no-no. Mining in Japan led to long term cadmium release into water causing itai-itai disease, symptoms of which include brittle bones.

So, while a cadmium ban may be bad for solar panel makers in Europe, this might signal a need for electronics manufacturers world wide to try and turn away from making products that contain these toxic elements in the first place.

Image: Getty

Posted by Katharine Sanderson on November 11, 2009
Categories: Earth, environment & ecology, Neat technologies, Policy | Permalink | Comments (1) | TrackBacks (0)

The fossils of whales and plesiosaurs may contain evidence allowing modern scientists to understand the evolution of one of the strangest creatures in the sea.

Osedax worms live by burrowing into the bones of mammals that sink down to the bottom of the sea. Once ensconced on a nice decomposing whale or seal the worms mature into sexual females and acquire a harem of microscope males that live in the gelatinous tubes that surround them.

In a new paper in BMC Biology Robert Vrijenhoek, of the Monterey Bay Aquarium Research Institute in the United States, and his colleagues say there are at least 17 different species of Osedax, not just the five previously described.

While the team's genetic and morphological analysis has teased out more about the evolutionary relationships between these worms, a big question remains: when did Osedax appear on the global bone-devouring scene?

One possibility is that they split from their worm ancestors about 45 million years ago when ancient whales appeared. Another theory posits they appeared at least 20 million years before the appearance of large marine mammals.

Osedax are soft bodied, so they do not generally leave decent fossils. However if they were around back in the day they may well have bored distinctive holes into the bones of ancient creatures in much the same way as modern Osedax put holes in modern carcasses.

“Consequently, we have distributed whalebones containing Osedax to several paleontologists who are also examining the taphonomy of fossilized bones from plesiosaurs and cetaceans,” write Vrijenhoek and co. “It is to be hoped that these efforts will help us to narrow the age of this remarkable genus of bone-eating worms.”

Vrijenhoek tells Nature that one palaeontologist is already CT scanning some cow bones with Osedax holes in the hope of developing tools to detect traces in fossil whalebones. Other researchers – including those working on Cretaceous plesiosaurs – are also being enlisted in the great historical worm hunt.

Image: Greg Rouse

Posted by Daniel Cressey on November 11, 2009
Categories: Biology & Biotechnology, Earth, environment & ecology | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

Following up on some initial results released last month, the International Energy Agency released 700 pages of statistical goodness on global energy markets and greenhouse gas emissions on Tuesday.

Perhaps the most significant numbers in the World Energy Outlook, at least in terms of the current policy and the international climate negotiations, pertain to China. Indeed, the IEA suggests that if China actually follows through on all of the goals and targets it has announced (for renewables, nuclear power, energy efficiency and the like), it alone could account for 25 percent of the reductions that the world needs to make by 2020 in order to remain on track for limiting global warming to 2 degrees Celsius. Put another way, China would be doing more to address global than either the United States or Europe.

These are remarkable statistics, and they should get some attention when climate negotiators meet in Copenhagen next month. China represents the fastest growing source of emissions, and everybody wants to see them put some kind of numbers on the table, along with existing commitments. Those who look at the issue tend to come up with big numbers (see here and here). That said, the IEA's analysis would be the most significant to date, and will likely serve as a baseline for assessments of what China is doing from here on out. Who knows, perhaps China will be inspired to come up with its own numbers.

Continue reading "IEA: something for everybody in the 2009 outlook" »

Posted by Jeff Tollefson on November 10, 2009
Categories: Earth, environment & ecology, Energy, Policy | Permalink | Comments (1) | TrackBacks (0)

Conservationists are again pushing for Australia’s iconic koalas to be listed as endangered by the country’s government, as new and controversial estimates of their numbers prompt renewed fears over the cuddly critters’ future.

Concerned that the government will not list the koala, the Australian Koala Foundation has launched a media blitz, warming of a drastic decline in the animal’s numbers.

“There could be as few as 43,000 and no more than 80,000 koalas left on the mainland of Australia. We know this because we have the science, and the koala habitat is just not there,” says the foundation CEO, Deborah Tabart (press release pdf). “Previous estimates were around 100,000, but the data is now more accurate.”

Tabart says her researchers have been measuring the loveable things at 1,800 field sites in Australia to come up with their numbers.

The Threatened Species Scientific Committee meets today to begin deliberations on whether or not Phascolarctos cinereus is officially endangered, a process which continues into next year. Bob Beeton, committee chairman, told the Sydney Morning Herald, “the onus is on the science” but not everyone agrees on the numbers.

David Phalen, director of the Wildlife Health and Conservation Centre at Sydney University, told the paper, “We do know that koalas are threatened by habitat loss in Queensland and northern NSW but numbers elsewhere are increasing or stable. There’s a real degree of uncertainty around the numbers.”

Internationally there are also some differing opinions over the koala. While populations on the mainland may be in decline, elsewhere the animals seem to be doing fine.

The United States has classified koalas as ‘threatened’ under its endangered species act but the international ‘Red List’ classifies it as ‘least concern’, noting:

Listed as Least Concern in view of its wide distribution, presumed large population, and because it is unlikely to be declining at nearly the rate required to qualify for listing in a threatened category.

Image: Quartl via Wikipedia under creative commons

Posted by Daniel Cressey on November 10, 2009
Categories: Earth, environment & ecology | Permalink | Comments (2) | TrackBacks (0)

Update:

In December this year, parties to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) will descend on Copenhagen to wrangle over the details of a new global climate deal — a potential successor to the Kyoto Protocol. See Nature’s Road to Copenhagen special for more coverage.

International delegates to the Montreal Protocol wrapped up their meeting in Port Ghalib, Egypt, over the weekend without taking formal action to curb hydrofluorocarbons, modern refrigerants that are also poised to become a major contributor to global warming.

Some 41 countries joined in a declaration in support of regulating HFCs as greenhouse gases under the Montreal Protocol (not under the Kyoto Protocol, as indicated in an initial post; that is of course where they currently reside). This according to the Institute for Governance and Sustainable Development and the Environmental Investigation Agency. This is in addition to support in North America and Europe as well as Micronesia and Mauritius, which have led the proposal.

Ozone-friendly HFCs represent the culmination of the Montreal Protocol's original mission; regulating them as greenhouse gases would require an amendment expanding the protocol's regulatory umbrella. In Egypt, Montreal delegates called on a technical committee to analyze alternatives to the chemicals in advance of a potential decision next year. For background, see our previous coverage here and here.

Posted by Jeff Tollefson on November 09, 2009
Categories: Earth, environment & ecology, Policy | Permalink | Comments (1) | TrackBacks (0)

Japanese electronics giant Panasonic is about to get even bigger, by offering to buy the majority of another Japanese electronics company, Sanyo for $4.5 billion. So what? I hear you cry.

This take over will mean that Panasonic is more than plasma-screen TVs, the company will have swiftly catapulted itself into the greentech big leagues. According to Greentech Media the deal, if it is successful (and according to the Guardian it will be) then Panasonic’s green tech portfolio becomes much more impressive.

The company will now have Sanyo’s solar panel capability and both companies’ combined lithium-ion battery arsenal will make the joint venture responsible for 30% of that market, says the Wall Street Journal. And we all know how hot lithium ion batteries are right now. The two companies, also according to that WSJ blog, will together account for most of the current battery market for hybrid cars, including the Toyota Prius and the Tesla cars.

To check out the rest of Panasonic’s green portfolio I recommend a closer look at that Greentech Media piece. It outlines the green credentials of Panasonic’s light bulbs, efficient TVs and even recycling schemes.

Image: Getty

Posted by Katharine Sanderson on November 06, 2009
Categories: Earth, environment & ecology | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

The US Congress is finally taking on the controversial idea of geoengineering — large-scale, deliberate manipulation of the climate system to counteract climate change.

The concept has slowly been creeping into public awareness, including a casual — and much overblown — mention by Obama's science advisor John Holdren in his first interview with the Associated Press.

Yesterday the House committee on science and technology heard testimony from five scientists, including big-name geoengineering proponents people who have called for government support of geoengineering research, including Lee Lane, codirector of the American Enterprise Institute's geoengineering project, Ken Caldeira of Stanford University and John Shepherd of the University of Southampton. Shepherd recently chaired a Royal Society working group, which also included Caldeira and which released a report on geoengineering in September.

In his opening statement, committee chair Bart Gordon emphasized that there are many uncertainties about geoengineering, including the potential for catastrophic side-effects. But, he said, “the climate is changing”, so “we should accept the possibility that certain climate engineering proposals may merit consideration”.

Gordon announced that this hearing would be the first of three or four hearings to explore geoengineering over the next eight months, and that the committee planned to work with the UK House of Commons Science and Technology Committee. The chairman of the Commons committee will testify before the House committee this spring, Gordon said.

Continue reading "Geoengineering in the House" »

Posted by Lizzie Buchen on November 06, 2009
Categories: Earth, environment & ecology, Policy | Permalink | Comments (2) | TrackBacks (0)

Nature reporter Jeff Tollefson is at the United Nations climate summit from 2-6 November 2009 in Barcelona, Spain. It is the last negotiating period before the seminal climate summit in Copenhagen in December. You can read his full reports over at our In the Field blog.

Big heads of state

I arrived at the conference this morning only to encounter global leaders with unusually large heads pulling funny money out of one box labelled "aid" and putting it into another labelled "climate change." It was a short stunt by Oxfam - and just one of many put on by various activist groups each day - intended to raise awareness of the danger that rich countries will simply reduce development aid as they increase funding for adaptation and mitigation. Developing countries have made this a central part of their platform going into Copenhagen - any climate financing must be in addition to existing development aid. ...more...

Safeguarding primary forests under REDD

And now back to the case of the missing 10-word phrase, which says that any payments for reduced deforestation should include "safeguards against the conversion of natural forests to forest plantations." Just for amusement, here's the gist in UN climate speak: It was in "Non-paper No. 11" but was left out of "Non-paper No.18" when negotiators gathered for a final session before departing Bangkok last month. ...more...

Nature Geo stirs things up with deforestation analysis

This afternoon has been all about deforestation. Environmentalists are busy tracking the debate about an 10-word phrase - mysteriously deleted at the last talks in Bangkok - that is designed to prevent natural forests from being converted into plantations. But I'll deal with that issue in my next post and move on to a Nature Geoscience commentary that has caused quite a buzz here in Barcelona by downgrading the relative contribution of carbon emissions from deforestation. ...more...

Afternoon updates from the Africans, EU

Following up on yesterday's agreement, the leader of the African Group said during an afternoon press conference he is "guardedly optimistic" about the talks going forward. But Sudan's Lumumba Di-Aping refused to give any ground on developing countries' demands that rich countries curb emissions by 40 percent by 2020. ...more...

Posted by Daniel Cressey on November 05, 2009
Categories: Earth, environment & ecology, Road to Copenhagen | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

The US House of Representatives yesterday passed legislation condemning the destruction of Madagascar’s forests.

Resolution 839 was passed by 409 votes to five. The resolution calls for Madagascar to restore a constitutional government after the political strife earlier this year; to cease illegal extraction of wood, mining and smuggling of wild animals; and for importing countries to intensify inspection and monitoring to identify illegally sourced wood from the country.

“The House is sending a firm signal that the devastating and illegal destruction of Madagascar’s natural resources will not be tolerated,” says Democrat Earl Blumenauer who introduced the legislation.

“Illegal logging not only does irreparable harm to the environment, but it destroys livelihoods. While Madagascar’s de facto government continues to use its endangered resources to boost its regime, Congress today joined the administration in calling for an immediate end to these practices.”

Earlier this year Nature’s Anjali Nayar visited a pioneering project in Madagascar that is attempting to protect one of the country's few remaining forests.

Félix Ratelolahy, an ecologist with the Wildlife Conservation Society, explained how subsistence farmers have slashed and burned away the margins of the forest to grow rice while gangs have pillaged rosewood, ebony and quartz.

“It looks as though bombs have fallen on the place,” he said.

For more, you can watch a Nature Video piece on her trip and read her feature, How to save a forest.

Image: Anjali Nayar

Posted by Daniel Cressey on November 05, 2009
Categories: Earth, environment & ecology | Permalink | Comments (2) | TrackBacks (0)

A man who claims he was sacked because of his views on climate change has been told he can take his former employers to an industrial tribunal.

A judge ruled that Tim Nicholson could pursue his claim against Granger under the Employment Equality (Religion and Belief) Regulations 2003, which apply to “any religion, religious belief, or philosophical belief” (BBC).

Nicholson, formerly head of sustainability, was made redundant by Granger in 2008.

The company had challenged a March ruling allowing a claim under the 2003 regulations, on the basis that views on climate change were not religious or philosophical. John Bowers, representing Grainger, has claimed that climate change opinions should not be protected because it is “a scientific view rather than a philosophical one” and “philosophy deals with matters that are not capable of scientific proof” (Daily Telegraph). Granger also says letting Nicholson go was a normal redundancy.

However, a judge has ruled the claim can go ahead.

Continue reading "Global warming views ‘are philosophical belief’ for UK law" »

Posted by Daniel Cressey on November 04, 2009
Categories: Earth, environment & ecology | Permalink | Comments (1) | TrackBacks (0)

In December this year, parties to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) will descend on Copenhagen to wrangle over the details of a new global climate deal — a potential successor to the Kyoto Protocol. See Nature’s Road to Copenhagen special for more coverage.

“Icebergs are melting in the Arctic. In Africa, people become refugees because their environment has been destroyed. We need an agreement on one objective: Global warming must not exceed 2 degrees Celsius.”
German Chancellor Angela Merkel urges Congress to act on climate change during a visit to Washington (CNN).

“All of us agreed that it is imperative for us to redouble our efforts in the weeks between now and the Copenhagen meeting to assure that we create a framework for progress in dealing with potential ecological disaster.”
US President Barack Obama comments after meeting Merkel (AFP).

“None whatsoever.”
James Inhofe, Republican Senator and global warming skeptic, comments on what impact Merkel’s speech might have on the US debate (AFP).

“With the strong leadership of the United States we can indeed make an agreement.”
Jose Manuel Barroso, European Commission President, says a meeting with US President Barack Obama has filled him with confidence (BBC).

Posted by Daniel Cressey on November 04, 2009
Categories: Earth, environment & ecology, Quotes of the day, Road to Copenhagen | Permalink | Comments (1) | TrackBacks (0)

Nature reporter Jeff Tollefson is at the climate negotiations in Barcelona. This is his first blog post from the pre-Copenhagen meeting, cross posted from In the Field.

I arrived at the United Nations climate conference today - late, on the second day, after a red-eye flight over the Atlantic and an all-too-brief nap at the hotel – and encountered drama much sooner than expected. I registered, oriented myself at the conference centre, gathered the requisite daily briefing documents and then found a bathroom to deploy a newly purchased toothbrush.

It was there, after bumping into a colleague, that I learned the African Group had announced at the opening session on Monday that it would boycott the Kyoto Protocol talks until developed countries get serious about their climate commitments.

Continue reading "Barcelona climate: A rough start, tinged with hope" »

Posted by Daniel Cressey on November 04, 2009
Categories: Earth, environment & ecology, Policy, Road to Copenhagen | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

Another year, another dire assessment of the world’s endangered species.

This year’s update of the the IUCN’s ‘Red List’ of threatened species says 17,291 species out of the 47,677 assessed are officially threatened. That’s about 36%.

Admittedly, that’s a slight improvement on last year, when only 38% of species assessed were classified as threatened. However that’s because 16,928 species out of 44,828 were threatened, so there are actually an extra 363 species in trouble*.

“The scientific evidence of a serious extinction crisis is mounting,” says Jane Smart, director of IUCN’s Biodiversity Conservation Group (press release).

New entries in this year’s list include the Panay Monitor Lizard (Varanus mabitang) which comes in as ‘endangered’ and the Eastern Voalavo (Voalavo antsahabensis), also in the endangered category.

And spare a thought for the Kihansi Spray Toad (Nectophrynoides asperginis) now ‘Extinct in the Wild’.

The full, depressing statistics:

Global figures for 2009 IUCN Red List of Threatened Species:
Total species assessed = 47,677
Total Extinct or Extinct in the Wild = 875 (2%) [Extinct = 809; Extinct in the Wild = 66].
Total threatened = 17,291 (36%) [Critically Endangered = 3,325; Endangered = 4,891; Vulnerable = 9,075].
Total Near Threatened = 3,650 (8%).
Total Lower Risk/conservation dependent = 281 (<1%) [this is an old category that is gradually being phased out of the Red List]
Total Data Deficient = 6,557 (14%)
Total Least Concern = 19,023 (40%)
Global figures for 2008 IUCN Red List of Threatened Species:
Total assessed = 44,838
Total Extinct or Extinct in the Wild = 869 (2%) [Extinct = 804 ; Extinct in the Wild = 65]
Total threatened = 16,928 (38%) [Critically Endangered = 3,246; Endangered = 4,770; Vulnerable = 8,912]
Total Near Threatened = 3,513 (8%)
Total Lower Risk/conservation dependent = 283 (<1%) [this is an old category that is gradually being phased out of the Red List]
Total Data Deficient = 5,570 (12%)
Total Least Concern = 17,675 (39%)

*And if you want to play the percentages, in 2000 69% of assessed species were endangered (11,406 out of 16,507).

Posted by Daniel Cressey on November 03, 2009
Categories: Earth, environment & ecology | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

Climate negotiators are in Barcelona, Spain, this week for the last bout of negotiating prior to the two-week Copenhagen meeting. In December this year, parties to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) will descend on Copenhagen to wrangle over the details of a new global climate deal — a potential successor to the Kyoto Protocol. See Nature’s Road to Copenhagen special for more coverage.

“The clock has almost ticked down to zero and, as always, time will fly. These last five days are critical on the road to success to Copenhagen. They need to be used wisely.”
Yvo de Boer, executive secretary of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change, tells the meeting to make progress (AFP).

“A good deal for the climate is still possible. All that is missing is political will, not least from the US, which under President Obama has fallen far behind the rest of the world, and is threatening to undermine a planet-saving agreement in Copenhagen.”
Damon Moglen, of Greenpeace US, comments after his organisation stormed the town’s Sagrada Familia to unveil banners (AFP).

“I feel it [is] very hard to imagine how the US president can receive the Nobel peace prize on December 10 in Oslo only a few hundred kilometres [from Copenhagen] if he has sent an American delegation to Copenhagen with no offer.”
Connie Hedegaard, Denmark’s environment minister, takes aim at America (Guardian).

“Climate change is a ticking time bomb. Global leaders need to act now to stop the needless deaths of millions of children.”
David Mepham, Save the Children’s policy director, says climate change could kill 250,000 children in 2010 and over 400,000 by 2030 (Daily Telegraph).

Posted by Daniel Cressey on November 02, 2009
Categories: Earth, environment & ecology, Quotes of the day, Road to Copenhagen | Permalink | Comments (1) | TrackBacks (0)

Posted for Rex Dalton

A US project to more precisely chart geological time scales is releasing a new initiative to educate students on deep time in order to challenge religious groups who argue life was divinely made about 10,000 years ago.

Earthtime’s program – downloadable at earth-time.org and available in DVD and CD format – explains the ages back billions of years. It includes teaching methods in math and physics to explain how researchers date sediments through atomic decay.

Sam Bowring, a geochronologist from Massachusetts Institute of Technology in Boston and an Earthtime leader, described the educational drive last week to the annual meeting of the Geological Society of America.

“I will never forget Kirk Johnson of the Denver Museum of Science and Technology leaning into the camera, saying: ‘Go home and tell your parents the world is 4.567 billion years old’,” says Bowring.

In Denver, Colorado, and Boston, Massachusetts, Earthtime scientists have provided educational material to a total of hundreds of students and teachers. Denver scientists also conduct dialogues with students over district video networks.

In a planned next grant from the US National Science Foundation that previously has funded Earthtime with $1 million, scientists hope to expand the educational outreach.

One major Earthtime science project is to precisely date the Cretaceous-Tertiary boundary about 65 million years ago, when most life forms were wiped out by a worldwide catastrophic event. Bowring, Johnson and other researchers are using sediments of the K-T boundary debris outside Denver for the more exact date.

Posted by Daniel Cressey on October 29, 2009
Categories: Earth, environment & ecology, Policy | Permalink | Comments (7) | TrackBacks (0)

The El Niño triggers declines in primates in the New World, suggesting an increase in these events caused by global warming could be devastating.

Ruscena Wideerholf and Eric Post, of Penn State University, looked at how El Niño influences the populations of muriqui (Brachyteles hypoxanthus), woolly monkey (Lagothrix lagotricha), Geoffroy’s spider monkey (Ateles geoffroyi), and red howlers (Alouatta seniculus). In Biology Letters, they report that all four experienced either intimidate or one year lagged negative impacts on their populations.

“Our results indicate that global climate change and increased El Niño events could pose a serious threat to ateline primates” they write. “Given that the status of many primate species is already precarious, in the face of continued global change, further studies to quantity the effects of climate and environmental variability on primate species are needed.”

The El Niño Southern Oscillation (ENSO) is a change in sea surface temperatures in the Pacific.

“El Niño events are expected to increase in frequency with global warming,” says Post (press release). “This study suggests that the consequences of such intensification of ENSO could be devastating for several species of New World monkeys.”

Image: critically endangered northern muriqui / Carla B. Possamai / K.B. Strier

Posted by Daniel Cressey on October 28, 2009
Categories: Earth, environment & ecology | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

Months after the House of Representatives passed its historic global warming legislation, the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee is finally poised to begin moving its own bill. But first, three days of non-stop testimony from dozens of experts representing the Obama administration, academics, environmental groups and business representatives.

Today was reserved for Senator John Kerry, a Massachusetts Democrat who partnered up with California Democrat and committee chairwoman Barbara Boxer, to write the bill, as well as a suite of administration officials led by Energy Secretary Steven Chu and EPA Administrator Lisa Jackson.

Despite a steady stream of testimony underscoring the many benefits that could flow from 900-plus page bill, the debate seems to be stuck on basic questions about whether protecting the climate by deploying clean energy will bankrupt the nation. As the New York Times points out, even Democrats who come from energy producing states have reservations.

Chu tried to address the question by pointing out that China "has already made its choice" and is now spending $9 billion per month on clean energy. He went on to talk about how the United States has lost its lead in clean energy manufacturing and must now make up for lost time if it wants to remain competitive.

"When the starting gun sounded on the clean energy race, the United States stumbled," he said in his written testimony, available here. "But I remain confident that we can make up the ground."

Continue reading "US Senate begins climate proceedings " »

Posted by Jeff Tollefson on October 27, 2009
Categories: Earth, environment & ecology, Energy, Policy | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

Posted for Quirin Schiermeier

Russia has postponed for another year plans to drill into sub-glacial Lake Vostok in Antarctica. Entry into the uniquely pristine lake 3,750 metres below the Antarctic ice sheet is now planned for the 2010-2011 drilling season, Valery Lukin, director of the Russian Antarctic Expedition, told Nature in an email.

During the 2008-2009 drilling season the Russian crew made an unsuccessful attempt to recover from the borehole bottom at 3,367 metres a drill that had been damaged during an accident in October 2007 (see: Russia delays Lake Vostok drill, 16 July 2008).

“All attempts to extract the drill have failed,” says Lukin. “On 20 January 2009 our drillers have made a decision to change the direction of drilling beginning from a depth of 3,590 metres.”

Seasonal operations at Russia’s Vostok station in East Antarctica will resume in late November, and continue until around early February when temperatures usually drop below levels at which aircraft can safely operate. The Russian drillers hope to reach a depth of around 3,680 metres by the end of the season.

Image: Lake Vostok / NASA/Goddard Space Flight Center/Canadian Space Agency/RADARSAT International Inc.

Posted by Daniel Cressey on October 27, 2009
Categories: Earth, environment & ecology | Permalink | Comments (4) | TrackBacks (0)

Lord Stern, who authored the UK report “The Economics of Climate Change” in 2006 and has long been a climate change stalwart in that country, is upset about the coverage his latest remarks have received.

The Times is running a story under the headline “Climate chief Lord Stern: give up meat to save the planet” . Stern was interviewed by the Times and said some things about meat that those pesky reporters decided was the best quote going, and slapped on their front page. “Meat is a wasteful use of water and creates a lot of greenhouse gases,” he says. In future people will treat eating meat differently, more like smoking or drinking, the article continues. And of course, the point has been picked up in the Brit press (Evening Standard, Spectator, Telegraph).

Farmers are cross. Jonathan Scurlock, stepped up from the National Farmers Union. “Farmers in this country are interested in evidence-based policymaking. We don’t have a methane-free cow or pig available to us,” he says in the same piece.

It seems that Stern was trying to make the point that there is poor understanding of the real consequences of not changing behaviour to try and mitigate climate change. And he might have a point. Stern this morning issued a press release saying that his remarks about meat were given “undue prominence”.

“The debate about climate change should not be dumbed down to a single slogan, such as ‘give up meat to save the planet’. Climate change has broad and profound implications for us and we need a sensible public discussion about the choices and decisions we face,” the statement continues. Stern has arranged a symposium in parliament this afternoon for MPs and members of the House of Lords to “discuss these issues and to encourage them to engage the public about them.”

It does seem, from reading the rest of the interview with Stern later in the paper, that he said a whole lot more than a few comments about meat. Such as calling for president Obama to attend the Copenhagen climate summit in December. But perhaps Stern was naive to think that any threat to the British Sunday roast would be allowed to pass without a furore.

Image: Getty

Posted by Katharine Sanderson on October 27, 2009
Categories: Earth, environment & ecology | Permalink | Comments (4) | TrackBacks (0)

Australia’s government has been told to invest more in research on the impact climate change will have on its coastlines.

The House of Representatives committee on climate change warned that “the time to act is now” in its new report on climate and coasts. As well as more research, there is a need for more clarity on legal and insurance issues for those living on the coast and better emergency management arrangements, it says.

“This is an issue of national significance. Some 80% of the Australian population live in the coastal zone, and the concentration of Australia’s population and infrastructure along the coast makes us particularly vulnerable to climate change impacts, including sea level rise,” says Jennie George, the committee chairwoman (press release).

The committee wants more investment in research on sea level rise, ice sheet dynamics, ocean acidification, erosion and wave climate, and the impact climate change will have on diseases.

Below the fold: media coverage.

Continue reading "Australia frets over coastal impact of climate change" »

Posted by Daniel Cressey on October 27, 2009
Categories: Earth, environment & ecology | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

A paper published in Nature Geoscience this week is causing consternation for other geologists.

The news, already reported on earlier this year when presented at a conference, comes from Graham Hill, at GNS Science in Wellington, New Zealand, and his colleagues.

Hill is claiming that underneath Mount St Helens Mount Adams, and possibly Mount Rainier in the Cascades – a mountain range in Washington State in the US – lurks a giant magma chamber. The initial news story in New Scientist, based on the AGU meeting in June this year, suggested that this meant a supervolcano was waiting to erupt in this region.

Hill’s work, now published, is based on measurements of electrical conductivity in the rocks under the northern Cascades. This, according to Hill confirmed a widespread layer of high conductivity material under the range. The reason they infer a large molten magma chamber is because molten rock has different conductivity than solid rock. This large magma chamber could link Mt St Helens, Mt Adams and Mt Rainier, leading to the supervolcano links.

Cue ruffled feathers: the volcano blog Eruptions wasn’t pleased, nor was the Oregonian. And now the aforementioned paper based on this presentation has been published, they’re at it again.

What was the cause of their displeasure? The author of Eruptions disputes that the magma chambers under this mountain range could all be linked, and he says that the magma down there is not molten, or at least not much of it is. Judging by the comments thread at that blog, others are similarly sceptical.

In the Miami Herald Seth Moran, a volcano seismologist with the USGS Cascades Volcano Observatory in Vancouver, Washington is quoted as saying. "Other geophysical studies don't support this theory."

“Moran said the most telling evidence that the theory was wrong was the lack of any surface evidence, such as geothermal vents or hot springs, among the mountains that would indicate the presence of a super-heated underground magma pool,” the piece reads.

Ah, but the Miami Herald piece also asserts that Hill is making no claims about a supervolcano at all. And taking a look at the press release that accompanied the paper, no such bold claims are actually made. It reads: “If confirmed by additional methods, this could be one of most widespread magma-bearing areas of continental crust discovered thus far.”

Over at the Seattle Times, another geologist, George Bergantz from the University of Washington, says that this study is the best yet, and calls the study “provocative” but nevertheless something that warrants further work.

Who is right? I don't know. But I will definitley be keeping an eye out for responses to the paper.

The paper’s conclusions state that their work “raises the possibility that the entire SWCC [Southern Washington Cascades Conductor, a conductive zone known in this region] marks a single laterally extensive zone of partial melt in the mid-crust.” And ends by saying that more work is needed to prove the point. Well, at least on that point I’m sure everyone will agree.

Image: Mount St Helens, by Steve Schilling, USGS

Posted by Katharine Sanderson on October 26, 2009
Categories: Earth, environment & ecology | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

Two papers in Science yesterday have poured cold water on the promise of second generation biofuels.

Biofuels derived from the cellulosic, woody parts of plants are not having their greenhouse gas emissions properly accounted for, says Jerry Melillo from the Marine Biological Laboratory at Woods Hole. Melillo’s study suggests that changes in the way land is used, as a consequence of growing crops for biofuels, is not taken into account, and if it were then those biofuels would be shown to actually cause more greenhouse gases to be released than fossil fuels. Nitrous oxide emissions from increased use of fertilisers are a big part of the problem.

"The problem is, we have a finite amount of land where new crops could be grown. Melillo and colleagues now report that if biofuel crops replace food crops on current farmlands, then the clearing of forested land for additional food crops will release more carbon from the soil there than in the areas where the biofuel crops themselves are being grown," says the press release.

In a related policy forum article, Timothy Searchinger from Princeton University and a bunch of colleagues point out flaws in the ways that carbon emissions are counted for cap-and-trade schemes in both Europe and the US.

They say that the assertion that fuels made from biomass can be counted as carbon neutral is wrong. “Harvesting existing forests for electricity adds net carbon to the air,” the report says. “If bioenergy crops displace forest or grassland, the carbon released from soild and vegetation, plus lost future sequestration, generates carbon debt, which counts against the carbon the crops absorb.”

"In the near-term I think, irrespective of how you go about the cellulosic biofuels program, you're going to have greenhouse gas emissions exacerbating the climate change problem," Melillo is reported as saying in Reuters.

Energy efficiency news says the report is damning for biofuels.

More bad news comes from a UNEP report, highlighted by the New York Times. The report calls for greater debate about biofuels before ploughing headlong into a completely biofuel-powered society, although it focuses mainly on first generation fuels, unlike the Science papers.

Image: Chris Neill, MBL

Posted by Katharine Sanderson on October 23, 2009
Categories: Earth, environment & ecology | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

Over 200,000 square miles (520,000 sq km) of Alaskan territory could be designated ‘critical habitat’ for polar bears, under new proposals from the US Fish and Wildlife Service. This is the largest area ever proposed for such a designation by the FWS

If the land is designated as critical habitat any “destruction or adverse modification” of it will be prohibited under the Endangered Species Act. This would apply to oil and gas exploration activities which are currently underway in the area says the FWS.

“This Administration is fully committed to the protection and recovery of the polar bear,” says Tom Strickland, Interior Assistant Secretary for Fish, Wildlife and Parks (press release pdf). “Proposing critical habitat for this iconic species is one step in the right direction to help this species stave off extinction, recognizing that the greatest threat to the polar bear is the melting of Arctic sea ice caused by climate change.”

The proposed area covers land where bears construct dens and sea ice where bears feed. It is the latest move in ongoing wrangling over protection for the animals, which was a major issue for environmentalists under the Bush administration (see Interior revokes Bush rule on endangered species and Obama backs Bush on polar bear).

The proposal was welcomed by the Center for Biological Diversity, but Brendan Cummings, the CBD’s senior attorney, accused the Interior Department of being “schizophrenic” as earlier this week its Minerals Management Service approved plans for oil exploration in the Beaufort Sea.

Image top: FWS

Posted by Daniel Cressey on October 23, 2009
Categories: Earth, environment & ecology | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

Nature reporter Anjali Nayar hiked for 21 days in Northern Bhutan to find out how this tiny Himalayan nation is dealing with rapidly melting glaciers. Read Anjali's full report: When the ice melts.

Posted by Daniel Cressey on October 22, 2009
Categories: Earth, environment & ecology, Road to Copenhagen | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

UPDATE: according to media reports, this photo was shot with a model animal and the photographer has been stripped of his prize.

Sometimes I think I’m going to get bored of environmental photography competitions. There are, after all, only so many shots of a penguin looking cute or a deer framed against the sky it is possible to take.

Then someone takes a photograph like this. A photograph that makes you say “that can’t be real”.

However José Luis Rodríguez swears this shot isn’t faked and that he took this picture of an Iberian wolf in Spain. You have to feel sorry for the other entrants in this year’s Veolia Environnement Wildlife Photographer of the Year competition; one imagines that the judges saw Rodríguez's shot and that was it, no one else had a chance. (And that’s not a misspelling, the competition sponsor is called Veolia Environnement.)

That’s not to say the other entries aren’t great. The two shown below are Fergus Gill’s Clash of the Yellowhammers and Thomas Haney’s ‘The lone fir’.

There are even some nice photos of a deer framed against the sky and a cute penguin. But seriously, can this photo of the wolf be real? Really?

See all the images in the online gallery.

The Veolia Environnement Wildlife Photographer of the Year competition is owned by the Natural History Museum and BBC Wildlife Magazine. All images are credit of the photographer and Veolia Environnement Wildlife Photographer of the Year 2009.

Posted by Daniel Cressey on October 22, 2009
Categories: Earth, environment & ecology | Permalink | Comments (1) | TrackBacks (0)

The world’s largest orb weaver spider has been discovered, lurking malevolently in the jungles of Africa.

Matjaž Kuntner and Jonathan Coddington, of the Slovenian Academy of Sciences and Arts and the Smithsonian Institution respectively, describe the giant beastie in PLOS One and name it Nephila komaci. The bodies of females average 3.8 cm while the legs are 10 cm long each. Webs from the spider are likely to be over a metre across, capable of trapping bats, birds and even small humans (maybe).

“The genus Nephila already contained the largest orbweaving spiders, but N. komaci now becomes the largest Nephila species known,” they write.

The animal is named after Kuntner's late friend Andrej Komac.

A specimen of this huge spider was first collected in 1978 from Sodwana Bay in South Africa but two subsequent expeditions to find more were unsuccessful, leading scientists to conclude that either the animal was a hybrid or it had become extinct. Then a second animal, originally hailing from Madagascar, was discovered in a museum in 2003. A search of museums again turned up nothing, adding weight to the extinction theory.

Then something wonderful happened (unless you’re an arachnophobe, in which case something terrible happened): in the authors’ words “two additional females and a male were recently collected in Tembe Elephant Park by South African colleagues, and it is now clear that N. komaci is a valid, new extant Nephila species”.

However Kunter and Coddington appear to have made one shocking error. They don’t have any photos of the animal…

Image: this is acutally Nephila inaurata, not Nephila komaci / M. Kuntner

Posted by Daniel Cressey on October 21, 2009
Categories: Earth, environment & ecology | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

NASA’s Operation Ice Bridge got underway in the Southern Hemisphere on Friday last week, with a DC-8 plane flying the first of a series of missions to measure Antarctic ice.

Although ice can and is measured from satellites there will be a gap in NASA’s measurements after ICESat-I comes to the end of its life this year and before the start of ICESat-II in 2014. To plug this gap the space agency is stepping up with a six-year programme of ice-measuring plane flights.

“The DC-8 flew two parallel tracks along the coast, one just offshore over the floating ice shelf, and one just inland. By measuring on either side of the “grounding line” between the floating ice and the ice on land, scientists can determine the rate at which this near-shore part of the ice shelf is melting,” says NASA.

The plane is too large for Antarctic runways so it launched from Chile at 9:11 local time and flew south to the Getz Ice Shelf.

Although Friday’s flight is being reported as the start of Operation Ice Bridge, the very first OIB flights were actually made in April in the Northern Hemisphere.

Image top: OIB logo.
Image lower: view from the plane.

Posted by Daniel Cressey on October 19, 2009
Categories: Earth, environment & ecology, Neat technologies | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

The UK must grow GM crops to avoid food shortages in the future, a report from the Royal Society, the UK’s national academy of sciences, is expected to say (Telegraph).

The study was commission in July 2008 in response to a prediction from the United Nations that world food production would need to double by 2050 to sustain a global population expected to reach nine billion.

Previous plans to grow GM crops commercially in the UK were withdrawn at the beginning of the decade after protests from green groups and consumers’ rejection of the technology.

The Telegraph says that the report, which is due to be published this week, examines several options to increase crops yields in the UK and around the world, including growing GM crops.

A source told the Sunday Telegraph, “The report will say the right GM crops should be used in the future to alleviate food shortages. This study is going to move the debate forward. The government will have to take notice of this.”

But opponents of GM crops told the Telegraph, “There is no scientific evidence that GM produces huge yields.”

Posted by Natasha Gilbert on October 19, 2009
Categories: Biology & Biotechnology, Earth, environment & ecology, Policy | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

In December this year, parties to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) will descend on Copenhagen to wrangle over the details of a new global climate deal — a potential successor to the Kyoto Protocol. See Nature’s Road to Copenhagen special for more coverage.

“We must frankly face the plain fact that our negotiators are not getting to agreement quickly enough. So I believe that leaders must engage directly to break the impasse. … We cannot compromise with the catastrophe of unchecked climate change; so we must compromise with one another.”
UK prime minister Gordon Brown tries to chivvy along world leaders in the run up to Copenhagen (Daily Telegraph).

“Canada will undertake efforts to meet our global responsibilities in a way that balances environmental protection and economic prosperity for Canadians, and is comparable to the level of effort of other industrialized countries.”
Sujata Raisinghani, spokeswoman for Environment Minister Jim Prentice, says Canada hopes to set itself up as an environmental leader at the Copenhagen talks (AFP).

“We should come out of Copenhagen with a deal that will ensure that everyone will survive.”
Maldivian President Mohamed Nasheed comments on the negotiations after emerging from the world’s first underwater cabinet meeting, held on the seafloor to highlight the threat of sea level rise (AFP).

“I am 99.9% sure there will be no harmful creatures. I’m sure there won't be any sharks. The nastiest thing would be a moray eel, but we have checked the reef.”
Nasheed again, with some more immediate concerns before his cabinet meeting (BBC).

“Strong progress has been made in the past few weeks, with Japan, for example, announcing that it will cut its emissions of carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases by 25% by 2020 relative to levels in 1990. But there are still major obstacles and some doubt whether a strong global deal can be hammered out in time for the United Nations’s conference on climate change in Copenhagen, now just seven weeks away.”
Nicholas Stern, author of the Stern Review, writes in the Observer.

Posted by Daniel Cressey on October 19, 2009
Categories: Earth, environment & ecology, Quotes of the day, Road to Copenhagen | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

China’s Premier Wen Jiabao today issued an apology. For making a basic error in his geology.

When visiting a classroom earlier this month Wen referred to the three types of rock as “sedimentary, magmatic and volcanic”. This is a schoolboy error, as he has now acknowledged in a letter to state news agency Xinhua, which reported his original comments.

“The three main types of rocks should be sedimentary rocks, magmatic rocks (also called igneous rocks) and metamorphic rocks. Please correct my mistake and send my apology to all readers,” he wrote.

The Danwei website notes:

Needless to say, the apology burnishes the established reputation of Wen as a humble, down-to-earth, grandfatherly leader, even if, as a graduate of the Beijing Institute of Geology, he really ought to have known such basic information.

Another reason, perhaps a more important one, is that for the Communist Party, which has been touting "scientific" as its top claim to power (as in "the scientific concept of development" associated with president Hu Jintao), scientific rigor is definitely a quality it would like to be associated with.

The Times says Wen’s “unprecedented” apology has “caused a sensation”.

Xinhua quotes Wang Wei, of the National School of Administration, who says, “Everybody makes mistakes. My respect for our premier is stronger after this.” The news service also notes that “Wen has gained a reputation as a man of the people over the years.”

Headline watch
With apology, China's Premier wins praise as rock of responsibility – Xinhua
Premier's candor on rock error rocks China – China Daily

Posted by Daniel Cressey on October 16, 2009
Categories: Earth, environment & ecology | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

China’s got ample space underground to store the carbon dioxide it pumps into the sky, according to a recently publicised study by Chinese and US researchers (Dahowski et al, Energy Procedia 1, 2009; doi:10.1016/j.egypro.2009.02.058). It has 2,300 Gt/CO2 of theoretical capacity spread generally across the country, and not too far from the powerplants that are large point sources of the greenhouse gas – meaning that transport and storage costs can be kept down to less than $10 per ton of CO¬2, the study finds.

Lump this in with other capacity estimates, such as the US Department of Energy’s Carbon Sequestration Atlas, and it’s clear that the world is generally not short of space, and could likely store hundreds of years of carbon dioxide output.

The IEA has more capacity estimates in its CCS roadmap [pdf], released on Tuesday to coincide with political support for carbon capture and storage (see Nature’s news story, ‘Urgency’ needed on carbon capture).

But (there’s always a but).

Continue reading "Carbon storage: searching for space" »

Posted by Richard Van Noorden on October 15, 2009
Categories: Earth, environment & ecology | Permalink | Comments (1) | TrackBacks (0)

Posted for Rex Dalton

A new front in the environmental battle over bluefin tuna was opened yesterday to try to protect the dwindling populations facing commercial wipe out in the Atlantic Ocean and Mediterranean Sea.

On the last day possible before a conference next year, Monaco nominated Atlantic bluefin tuna to be added to the list of species that can’t be traded internationally under CITES, the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species and Wild Fauna and Flora. This sets the stage for a high-stakes battle in March, when the next Conference of the Parties to the convention will meet to consider nominations.

Environmental groups criticized the Obama Administration for failing to formally endorse Monaco’s nomination. In response US National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administrator Jane Lubchenco issued a statement saying the administration “strongly supports” Monaco’s nomination but wants an 11th hour-attempt to work within another international conservation framework to reduce fishing quotas and improve regulation.

Continue reading "Monaco continues push for bluefin fishing ban" »

Posted by Daniel Cressey on October 15, 2009
Categories: Earth, environment & ecology | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

The US Geological Survey today warned that introduced species of gigantic snake “constitute an exceptional threat to the integrity of native ecosystems”.

A new report from the USGS also warns that the largest examples of these animals are “probably capable of killing an adult human”. Luckily, “most seem disinclined to do so”.

More likely the snakes will end up – as we have already seen – in face offs with native wildlife. “Large alligators and panthers would be capable of eating the occasional giant constrictor, but large constrictors will likely eat alligators and panthers,” warns the report.

The report says the “overall organism risk potential” – the sum of the likelihood a snake population could be established and the consequences if it did – is high for the Indian or Burmese Python, Northern African Python, Southern African Python, Boa Constrictor, and the Yellow Anaconda.

The risk potential was deemed medium for the Reticulated Python, Green Anaconda, DeSchauensee’s Anaconda, and Beni Anaconda. At the moment only three species are known to be reproducing in the US: the Burmese Python, the Northern African Python, and the Boa Constrictor.

Don’t think that these snakes are nasty though, the authors of the report (Robert Reed and Gordon Rodda) are at pains to point out this is not the case. They write:

We can testify to these snakes’ attraction personally, as we both have kept pet giant constrictors. We can attest to these snakes’ beauty, companionability, and educational value. The love of nature is often originally fostered in one’s own arms, where close contact with living things engenders a connection not otherwise possible. And size does impress.

Image: Skip Snow of the National Park Service measures a Burmese python captured in the Everglades / photo by Lori Oberhofer, NPS.

Posted by Daniel Cressey on October 14, 2009
Categories: Earth, environment & ecology | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

“Fire up the B-movietron!” exlaims University of Portsmouth paleontologist Mark Whitton, musing on the discovery of fossils of a weird flying reptile (which he’s also pictured in action, below). The fossils were found in northeastern China, and have been christened Darwinopterus, in honour of the great man’s multiple anniversaries this year.

Why so weird? Well, as Junchang Lu and colleagues report in Proceedings of the Royal Society B (doi: 10.1098/rspb.2009.1603) the crow-sized fossil is a kind of pterosaur (or pterodactyl), one of the flying reptiles that cruised around the sky 220-65 million years ago. It’s a transitional fossil, but transitional in a strangely disjointed way: its head and neck look like they belong to advanced, short-tailed pterosaurs, and the rest of the skeleton is similar to more primitive forms.

“It’s as if someone said, ‘Let’s nail these two together and make a sort of chimera, that’ll really confuse everybody,’” says Dave Unwin of the University of Leicester in England [Science News].

Unwin adds (press release): “The head and neck evolved first, followed later by the body, tail, wings and legs. It seems that natural selection was acting on and changing entire modules and not, as would normally be expected, just on single features such as the shape of the snout, or the form of a tooth. This supports the controversial idea of a relatively rapid "modular" form of evolution.”

Darren Naish fills in all the gory details at Tetrapod Zoology.

Posted by Richard Van Noorden on October 14, 2009
Categories: Earth, environment & ecology | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

Apparently black bears, soccer moms and Chief Justice John Roberts have something in common: a preference for minivans.

As with most pudgy animals, black bears are committed to energy efficiency, eating only the fattiest portions of their prey (the skins, eggs and brains) and even selecting the plumpest ants. A new analysis published in the Journal of Mammalogy reveals that this dedication even translates to their anthroprogenic food sources.

A group from the U.S. Department of Agriculture's Wildlife Service took a close look at the bear-jack records at Yosemite National Park. They found that between 2004 and 2005, bears chose to break into minivans 29% of the time, even though the only made up 7% of the cars. And while 28% of the cars in the parking lot were sedans, bears were only tempted by them 14% of the time.

Every year between 2001 and 2007, minivas were either the most or second most popular cars, according to the black bears.

Continue reading "Choosy Bears Choose Minivans" »

Posted by Lizzie Buchen on October 14, 2009
Categories: Earth, environment & ecology | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

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 – estimated to be worth $11 million billion by Forbes – said to reporters in Copenhagen that he lacked scientific expertise, but “the one thing I have is the ability to put money to work” (Guardian).

The Climate Policy Initiative will be headed up by Stanford University Law School professor Thomas Heller, says Bloomberg.

In December this year, parties to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) will descend on Copenhagen to wrangle over the details of a new global climate deal — a potential successor to the Kyoto Protocol. See Nature’s Road to Copenhagen special for more coverage.

Posted by Daniel Cressey on October 13, 2009
Categories: Earth, environment & ecology, Energy, Road to Copenhagen | Permalink | Comments (2) | TrackBacks (0)

Given that they occupy a position on the scientific credibility spectrum that could charitably be characterised as ‘fringe’, it is no surprise that those who deny climate change have to take their victories where they find them.

Hence the glee following the BBC’s recent story ‘What happened to global warming?’

The BBC quotes Piers Corbyn from weather forecasting company Weatheraction and Don Easterbrook of Western Washington University. Both cast doubt on the widely held consensus view that human activity is driving changes in climate.

Corbyn and Easterbrook are both global warming deniers / sceptics and both have been publicising their doubts for some time (see the references on their Wikipedia entries for more). Without commenting on the merits of their arguments, it is clear that it is slightly disingenuous to use the views of these two men to claim as the BBC does that “It seems the debate about what is causing global warming is far from over. Indeed some would say it is hotting up.”

Nevertheless, the anti-global warming movement is celebrating. Leading the charge is the Daily Telegraph which has a news story and an opinion piece from Damian Thompson which says:

I think the BBC wanted to slip this one out quietly, but a Matt Drudge link put paid to that. The climate change correspondent of BBC News has admitted that global warming stopped in 1998 – and he reports that leading scientists believe that the earth’s cooling-off may last for decades.

Many in the blog-world have followed up with similar items.

To summarise then: two scientists who have previously said they didn’t believe in global warming still don’t believe in global warming.

The main scientific point of the BBC article – that “for the last 11 years we have not observed any increase in global temperatures” – is discussed in detail on this blog post at Real Climate.

If you don’t wish to follow the link here are a couple of extracts:

Even under conditions of anthropogenic global warming (which would contribute a temperature rise of about 0.2 ºC over this period) a flat period or even cooling trend over such a short time span is nothing special and has happened repeatedly before (see 1987-1996).
…
It is highly questionable whether this “pause” is even real.

UPDATE - See also, 'Nature' attacks the BBC for its U-turn over climate change, Daily Telegraph, 12 October.

Posted by Daniel Cressey on October 12, 2009
Categories: Earth, environment & ecology | Permalink | Comments (28) | TrackBacks (0)

The UK government has decided to convince us all that climate change is real. To this end it is spending £6 million on a prime time advertising campaign featuring a father reading a bedtime story about the evil carbon dioxide monster created by grown ups which is making rabbits cry.

In perhaps the worst advert for stopping climate change I’ve ever seen, the cringe worthy short has the father telling his child how scientists found that global warming “was being caused by too much CO2, and it was the children of the land who’d have to live with the horrible consequences” (transcript).

When the child asks plaintively “is there a happy ending?” a disembodied voice proclaims, “It’s up to us how the story ends.”

Well in that case I want Al Gore to ride in on an IPCC dragon and slay the carbon monster with his sword of Inconvenient Truth.

The UK’s Department of Energy and Climate Change says a recent poll found less than 20% of citizens think climate change will impact their children. “The survey results show that people don’t realise that climate change is already under way and could have very severe consequences for their children's lives,” says climate change minister Joan Ruddock (Reuters).

It’s a worthy cause, but an awful advert.

Posted by Daniel Cressey on October 09, 2009
Categories: Earth, environment & ecology | Permalink | Comments (33) | TrackBacks (0)

The US Chamber of Commerce has hit back at Apple, after the computer company joined the list of members who have left the group over its views on climate change.

In a letter to Apple, the chamber’s president Thomas Donohue writes:

It is unfortunate that your company didn’t take the time to understand the Chamber’s position on climate and forfeited the opportunity to advance a 21st century approach to climate change.
…
While we do support legislation to address climate change, we oppose legislation such as the Waxman-Markey bill that numerous studies show will cause Americans to lose their jobs and shift greenhouse gas emissions overseas, negating potential climate benefits.
(Full letter on Under the Influence blog.)

Earlier this week Apple said it was leaving the chamber, with VP Catherine Novelli saying, “Apple supports regulating greenhouse gas emissions, and it is frustrating to find the Chamber at odds with us in this effort.” (Various sources, eg ARS Technica.)

Earlier this month the not-insignificant energy companies Exelon, the Public Service Company and Pacific Gas and Electric also left the chamber over climate change differences. In August the chamber called for a public trial of climate change.

Image: Thomas Donohue. Photo by Ian Wagreich / © U.S. Chamber of Commerce

Posted by Daniel Cressey on October 08, 2009
Categories: Earth, environment & ecology, Energy, Road to Copenhagen | Permalink | Comments (2) | TrackBacks (0)

The European Commission has proposed investing an additional €50 billion into a new research and development programme for low-carbon energy over the next decade, ramping up annual investments from the current €3 billion to €8 billion annually.

The proposal lays out funding goals in six sectors - wind, solar, nuclear, bio-energy, electricity grids and carbon capture and storage, while creating a new "Smart Cities Initiative" focusing on urban energy efficiency. Solar came out on top with €16 billion, followed by CCS at €13 billion. For a quick summary of investments, check Reuters.

The plan sounds good but is missing one thing: Money. The commission readily acknowledges that it can't foot the entire bill itself, meaning "public and private sectors at national and EU level" will need to step up to make it a reality. Indeed, the Wall Street Journal reports EU Commissioner Janez Potocnik saying that most of the money will need to come from the private sector.

Response to the plan has generally been positive, despite some questions about priorities. The European Wind Energy Association wonders why CCS and nuclear received more money than wind, which is ready to go. Along similar lines, the European Photovoltaic Industry Association suggests the commission would be wise to put more resources into clean energy deployment.

Policymakers, researchers and business representatives will discuss the proposal later this month at the European Energy Technology Summit in Stockholm.

Posted by Jeff Tollefson on October 07, 2009
Categories: Earth, environment & ecology, Energy, Policy | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

Mere hours after a Nobel Prize was awarded for an invention that allowed the modern digital camera to come into being, a tiny example of this technology has flown into the news on the back of an albatross.

Writing in Plos One, Akinori Takahashi, of Japan’s National Institute of Polar Research, and colleagues report the first recordings of the birds using killer whales as unwitting food providers.

Using data from cameras and depth gages mounted on the backs of black-browed albatrosses (Thalassarche melanophrys) the researchers report that the birds appear to follow Orcinus orca and probably scavenge from the scraps they leave behind

“A close association with foraging killer whales would help albatrosses to find food more efficiently in the apparently ‘featureless’ sea, especially in a year when the availability of aggregative prey species, such as Antarctic krill in South Georgia, is low,” they write.

Richard Phillips, of the British Antarctic Survey, suggests that the whales may also be driving prey to the surface where they are easier for the birds to catch. Phillips was not involved in the research but another BAS researcher was (press release).

You may not think the photo to the right is that impressive, but keep in mind it was recorded in the open ocean on a device the size of a lipstick.

Image: BAS

Posted by Daniel Cressey on October 07, 2009
Categories: Earth, environment & ecology | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

Last night Cambridge’s clown school gave the world’s best and brightest the awards they deserved. Harvard University hosted its 19th First Annual Ig Nobel Prize Ceremony, where its Annals of Improbable Research recognized the usual combination of mad scientists and asinine leaders.

Pulling in the biology prize was a Japanese team that discovered pandas are more than just cuddly tax dollar vacuums — their poop packs a potent punch. The group isolated bacteria in panda feces that can reduce kitchen waste by more than 90 percent in mass. Good news, given that pandas produce about 40 pounds of poop a day — and as one might expect, it doesn’t stink.

The Ig Nobel prizes also continued their fascination with skivvies. Back in 2001 the biology prize went to the inventor of panties that filter out flatulence with a replaceable charcoal filter, and this year the public health prize went to the inventors of a bra that can be “quickly converted into a pair of gas masks, one for the brassiere wearer and one to be given to some needy bystander” — in this case that needy bystander was Wolfgang Ketterle, 2001 winner of the Nobel Prize in Physics.

Continue reading "Panda poop, panties and more at the Ig Nobels" »

Posted by Lizzie Buchen on October 02, 2009
Categories: Biology & Biotechnology, Chemistry, Earth, environment & ecology, Financial Crisis, Health and medicine, Physics & Mathematics | Permalink | Comments (2) | TrackBacks (0)

Yesterday’s earthquakes in the Pacific and Indian Ocean have caused death and destruction in Samoa and Indonesia. In Samoa, a tsunami triggered by a magnitude 8.3 quake off Tonga killed at least 114 people and left thousands homeless. The death toll of the magnitude 7.6 earthquake which hit just a few hours later off the western coast of the Indonesian province of Sumatra may exceed 4,000, local authorities fear. Nature asks whether the double disaster was coincidence.

Is there a link between the Tonga and Sumatra quakes?

Although both quakes occurred on the boundaries of the Australian Plate, there is no known causal link between the two events. Normal physical interaction between earthquake zones doesn’t apply at that range. The ruptures also had quite different seismic characteristics, which is why the Tonga quake generated a tsunami but the Sumatra quake luckily didn’t.

However, a paper in Nature today suggests that seismic waves from earthquakes might indeed have an effect on distant fault lines, increasing the risk of earthquakes far away. Whether this long distance-effect was involved in yesterday’s events is not known.

Continue reading "Briefing: Earthquakes in Sumatra and Samoa" »

Posted by Ananyo Bhattacharya on October 01, 2009
Categories: Earth, environment & ecology | Permalink | Comments (3) | TrackBacks (0)

An earthquake in Indonesia has killed at least 75 people and trapped several thousand under collapsed buildings.

The United States Geological Survey recorded a 7.6 magnitude quake at 10:16 UTC, followed by a 5.5 magnitude quake at 10:38 UTC.

The epicentre of the first was 45 km west-northwest of Padang in Indonesia while the second was 40 km northwest of Padang says the USGS.

“This is a high-scale disaster, more powerful than the earthquake in Yogyakarta in 2006 when more than 3,000 people died,” says the country’s health minister Siti Fadilah Supari (MetroTV via AP).

A number of news sources say 75 people have died and more deaths are expected to be reported as thousands are missing in collapsed buildings.

A tsunami warning for the earthquake has been cancelled.

Image: USGS shake map, key below.

Posted by Daniel Cressey on September 30, 2009
Categories: Earth, environment & ecology | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

First, the good news: A new report cataloguing all the known plants and animals boosts the number of species known to science to 1.9 million — a rise of 114,000 compared to a study published three years ago.

Now, the bad news: A new report cataloguing all the known plants and animals found that almost 10% of all mammals, birds, reptiles, amphibians and fish are at risk of extinction.

The publication, Numbers of Living Species in Australia and the World released by the Australian Biological Resources Study, was part of a major project to document the entire planet's biodiversity.

Continue reading "Mo' species mo' problems" »

Posted by Elie Dolgin on September 30, 2009
Categories: Earth, environment & ecology | Permalink | Comments (1) | TrackBacks (0)

Posted for Quirin Schiermeier and David Cyranoski

A massive earthquake triggered a tsunami that has devastated Samoa and American Samoa killing dozens and perhaps hundreds.

The earthquake, which the Japanese Meteorological Agency measured as a magnitude 8.3, struck at 6:48 local time at a reported depth of 32 kilometres and a distance of 190 kilometres from the Samoan islands. But most of the damage came with the tsunami waves, measuring up to 6 metres in American Samoa, that hit shore shortly afterwards.

Residents in Samoa complained of having little or no warning, some saying they only had 3 minutes. Tide gage records indicate the waves arrived in Pago Pago 8 minutes after the initial warning was issued and in Apia 28 minutes after the warning was issued.

“Clearly, there was very little time for evacuations,” says Costas Synolakis, a tsunami specialist at the University of South California in Los Angeles.

“What is abundantly clear once again is how important public education is for communities at risk, that strong ground shaking IS the warning to evacuate to high ground. The shaking lasted for at least 3 minutes.

“Our mantra is to evacuate if on the coast and if feeling an earthquake that lasts more than 30 seconds, only it is very, very hard to convince local officials to implement public education campaigns, particularly if there hasn’t been a strong event in living memory. With self-evacuation without waiting for warnings, many lives would had been spared.”

Continue reading "Hundreds feared dead after Pacific tsunami" »

Posted by Daniel Cressey on September 30, 2009
Categories: Earth, environment & ecology | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

In December this year, parties to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) will descend on Copenhagen to wrangle over the details of a new global climate deal — a potential successor to the Kyoto Protocol. See Nature’s Road to Copenhagen special for more coverage.

The head of the UN’s climate change body has attempted to light a fire under international negotiators ahead of the Copenhagen summit.

Yvo de Boer, executive secretary of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change, told those at a meeting in Bangkok, Thailand they would have to speed up the current “painfully slow” negotiations.

“Time is not just pressing. It has almost run out,” he said (Reuters, AP).

The meeting is one of a number scheduled to attempt to thrash out a new international deal to replay the Kyoto treaty, in advance of Copenhagen. Tove Ryding of Greenpeace has a solution to slow progress, as told to Reuters: “What we need to see is late nights and fights. We need to see them sit there, that’s what these people do for a living, they need to smell like sweat and coffee. If they don’t do that, they’re not actually at work.”

Meanwhile, UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon said world leaders had made progress on climate change at a recent meeting in New York. “All leaders said they wanted a deal and are prepared to work for it. This gives the negotiations vital political impetus,” he said (press release).

Posted by Daniel Cressey on September 29, 2009
Categories: Earth, environment & ecology, Road to Copenhagen | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

A massive earthquake that killed tens of thousands in the Chinese province of Sichuan last year was a “once in 4,000 years” event, according to a paper published in Nature Geoscience.

The Wenchuan quake in May 2008 “took the local population as well as scientists by surprise”, write Zheng-Kang Shen, of the State Key Laboratory of Earthquake Dynamics, and colleagues. “Although the Longmen Shan fault zone—which includes the fault segments along which this earthquake nucleated—was well known, geologic and geodetic data indicate relatively low deformation rates.”

However, by analysing GPS and radar data the researchers found that three different rock structures between different segments of the fault all failed one after another. “These connecting structures may represent barriers that rarely fail, and would fail only when high stress has accumulated after multiple rounds of smaller events broke the adjoining individual segments,” they write.

These three barrier regions corresponded to the areas of maximum damage at the towns of Yingxiu, Beichuan and Nanba. Such failures should only occur every 4,000 years, the team estimates.

“You really have to accumulate enough elastic energy to have them rupture through – but once rupture starts, it would rupture a series of barriers to get a cascade style,” lead author Shen told AP.

For more on the Sichuan quake, see Nature’s May 2009 news feature: The sleeping dragon.

Image: Alex Witze

Posted by Daniel Cressey on September 28, 2009
Categories: Earth, environment & ecology | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

A newly launched series of Google Earth tours will map out the projected impacts of climate change worldwide and look at mitigation and adaptation options. Here's a brief intro, narrated in the light Tennessee drawl of Al Gore:

The full length intro is here, with more tours to come. Google is also inviting netizens to talk back about climate change on a new YouTube channel.

While you're playing with climate science layers on Google Earth, you may want to check out our interactive map of polar ice coring sites where researchers have extracted hundreds of millennia of climatic history.

By Anna Barnett, cross posted from Nature's Climate Feedback blog.

Posted by Daniel Cressey on September 25, 2009
Categories: Earth, environment & ecology, Road to Copenhagen | Permalink | Comments (2) | TrackBacks (0)

A European court injected a fair bit of doubt and confusion into carbon markets Wednesday, ruling that the European Commission exceeded its authority when it imposed tighter caps for greenhouse gas emissions in Poland and Estonia (Reuters, The Times)

At first glance, the ruling could be interpreted to curtail the commission's authority to impose a European cap, which would threaten the integrity of the entire multi-national system and fuel existing tensions among countries. But analysts say the ruling is actually limited to the second commitment period, which runs from 2008 to 2012. The commission's authority moving forward does not appear to be in any danger, which means the impacts, whatever they turn out to be, will likely be temporary.

Milo Sjardin, an expert on carbon markets for the consultancy New Energy Finance in New York, said he isn't expecting any major changes in the overall European cap, in part because the recession has already significantly reduced pressure on European industries. NEF's latest estimates indicate that covered emissions (which include power and major industrial sources) are likely to drop by a whopping 10 percent in 2009 alone.

The result is a 50 percent reduction in the cost of curbing emissions by 20 percent by 2020. In fact, NEF now says it will be cheaper to curb emissions by 30 percent (an EU pledge that is contingent on action by the rest of the world) than original forecast for the 20 percent target, Sjardin says.

For his part, EU Environment Commissioner Stavros Dimas made it clear that the commission isn't about to back down (AFP).

Regardless, the price of carbon allowances in Europe dropped on the news as traders weighed the possibility of the commission losing its battle and granting additional allowances, not only to Poland and Estonia but six other countries that have appealed their caps. That would make compliance easier and thus decrease the likelihood that companies would need to buy additional allowances to cover their emissions.

If all eight countries were to return to their originally proposed CAP, NEF says allowances would increase by 15 percent. And because companies can carry their allowances forward into the third trading period, which runs from 2013 to 2020, such a scenario could theoretically depress prices for years to come. That would be good news for traditional industries, although it might make clean energy technologies less competitive.

"But we regard that as a very unlikely scenario," Sjardin says. "There’s likely to be a compromise somewhere down the road."

Posted by Jeff Tollefson on September 24, 2009
Categories: Earth, environment & ecology, Energy, Policy, Road to Copenhagen | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

The edges of ice sheets in Greenland and the Antarctic are thinning faster than we’d thought, thanks to a surprisingly extensive network of fast-flowing and accelerating glaciers, new satellite measurements show (Nature, doi:10.1038/nature08471).

"We were surprised to see such a strong pattern of thinning glaciers across such large areas of coastline – it's widespread and in some cases thinning extends hundreds of kilometres inland. We think that warm ocean currents reaching the coast and melting the glacier front is the most likely cause of faster glacier flow. This kind of ice loss is so poorly understood that it remains the most unpredictable part of future sea level rise," said Hamish Pritchard, of the British Antarctic Survey [press release].

"This report provides a much more ominous picture than we have had, and a depressing prospect of the potential for sea level rise," Inez Fung, an atmospheric scientist at UC Berkeley, told the San Francisco Chronicle. "It's very much a cause for worry."

Pritchard and other researchers analysed some 50 million laser readings from Nasa’s ICESat (Ice, Cloud and land Elevation Satellite) between 2003 and 2007. 81 of 111 Greenland glaciers surveyed are thinning at an accelerating, self-feeding pace, AP highlights. While in parts of Antarctica, ice sheets have been losing 30 feet a year in thickness since 2003 (though there’s plenty of ice to get through – some of these areas are a mile thick). “To some extent, it’s a runaway effect. The question is, how far will it run?” Pritchard tells them.

That’s what everyone wants to know, and the scientists were careful to point out that it was “too early to determine whether the thinning was a sign that sea level rise would accelerate” (Reuters).

Image credit: British Antarctic Survey

Posted by Richard Van Noorden on September 24, 2009
Categories: Earth, environment & ecology | Permalink | Comments (3) | TrackBacks (0)

European spacecraft Gravity field and steady-state Ocean Circulation Explorer (Goce) begins its finely tuned gravitational measurements this week.

The BBC explains that the mission will track ocean movement and should improve on existing measurements of the Earth's surface and its gravitational field--known as the geoid. Low solar activity and a calm upper atmosphere this week mean that the ion-powered spacecraft can fly just about 254.75 kilometres above the surface, plus or minus 50 metres, even lower than the 268 kilometres mission planners hoped for. The lower it flies, the more sensitive its measurements, which can detect changes in gravity as small as one 10-trillionth of gravity at the surface.

For Nature's previous coverage, see Gravity mission to launch (Nature News, 11 March 2009) and on GOCE is Go! (The Great Beyond, 17 March 2009) from the time of Goce's launch from Plesetsk Cosmodrome in Russia. In case the science proves overwhelming, the European Space Agency has provided a helpful visual demonstration that Goce, (spacecraft, right) will map the gravity (represented here by apples, center) of the Earth (bottom).

Continue reading "Goce tunes in to geoid" »

Posted by Lucas Laursen on September 23, 2009
Categories: Earth, environment & ecology, Space and astronomy | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

The US Environmental Protection Agency announced an emissions reporting rule today which will require producers of more than 25,000 metric tonnes of greenhouse gases a year to submit an annual report to the EPA. While the EPA already tracks big emitters this lowers the threshold and should account for about 85% of US greenhouse gas emissions, writes Mother Jones.

Other emissions-related fights are also burbling this week...

Continue reading "To report, or not to report: EPA emissions reporting up in the air" »

Posted by Lucas Laursen on September 23, 2009
Categories: Earth, environment & ecology | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

Sydney has been hit by a dust storm the likes of which it has not seen in decades. Thunderstorms from the Indian and
Southern Oceans have gathered dust and debris from southern and eastern Australia at up to 100 kilometres per hour on their way to Sydney, according to Reuters. Other impressive dust storms date to a 1983 El Niño year, when droughts made topsoil vulnerable.

Many, many videos on The Guardian's website.

Photo: Andy Tyler via Flickr

Posted by Lucas Laursen on September 23, 2009
Categories: Earth, environment & ecology | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

This giant squid, found by National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration and the Interior Department's Minerals Management Service scientists during a sperm whale diet study on 30 July, measured 5.9 metres and weighed in at 46.7 kg according to a Reuters report.

See the full post for another photo...

Continue reading "One that didn't get away: giant squid found in Gulf of Mexico" »

Posted by Lucas Laursen on September 22, 2009
Categories: Biology & Biotechnology, Earth, environment & ecology | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

All eyes are now on tomorrow's UN Summit on Climate Change in New York and the G20 meeting in Pittsburgh later this week, although it's not yet clear whether either of these meetings is going to produce any meaningful breakthroughs.

Indeed, if last week's US-sponsored Major Economies Forum is any indication, the outlook isn't particularly good. The meeting ended as quietly as it began, leaving the United States' top climate envoy, Todd Stern, with little to say except that there was a "narrowing of differences" among the globe's top 17 greenhouse gas emitters. Combine that with increasing skepticism that the US Senate is going to be able to squeeze a climate bill out before the UN global warming talks in Copenhagen in December, and things begin to look positively gloomy.

Nonetheless, there are signs of movement at the highest levels, which is what people at the lower levels have been saying was needed for some time. Chinese President Hu Jintao will discuss his country's climate policies during a much-anticipated address on Tuesday. US President Barack Obama plans to do the same, although it's not clear how far he will be able to go given that his hands are tied by Congress.

British Prime Minister Gordon Brown has announced that he would be willing to personally attend the talks in Copenhagen if it comes down to that, and The Associated Press has reported that Obama might attend as well. This would certainly qualify as an important gesture of goodwill if the US delegation is unable to sign on to any significant commitments due to slow-moving domestic politics.

And just for kicks, Conservation International reports that out that Guyana President Bharrat Jagdeo and Harrison Ford (who does not lead a country but has appeared in some cool films) will attend an "extraordinary origami event" in New York, calling for the inclusion of tropical forest conservation an eventual climate change pact. Pictures aren't yet available, but keep an eye out for "life-size origami trees and wildlife."

Continue reading "Mixed signals as 'Climate Week' kicks off" »

Posted by Jeff Tollefson on September 21, 2009
Categories: Earth, environment & ecology, Energy, Policy, Road to Copenhagen | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

The Interagency Ocean Policy Task Force released an interim report on Thursday, calling for a comprehensive national approach to managing oceans, what goes into them and pretty much anything that they contain or affect.

It is both an honorable goal and an enormous challenge. Achieving it would mean seamless management of everything from freshwater resources, stormwater runoff and coastal ecosystems to fisheries, aquaculture, commercial shipping, offshore energy, military activities and global warming (not to mention coordination with state and local governments).

Perhaps the biggest initiative would be the creation of a National Ocean Council to coordinate federal policy, although it's not entirely clear what kind of authority that council might have. Administration officials largely offered up broad statements without going into details about how the new policy, once finalized, might actually impact these activities.

"For the first time, we as a nation say loudly and clearly that healthy oceans matter," said Jane Lubchenco, Administrator of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. "Today as never before, we better comprehend the connections between healthy oceans and people."

Appointed by President Barack Obama in June, the task force includes representatives from the full suite of federal agencies and departments. Its interium report will be available for public comment for 30 days, and a final report will be issued in December.

Just as a reminder, this is actually the second major ocean policy review in as many administrations, although the last one was not limited to federal agencies. As directed by Congress, President George W. Bush appointed 16 people to the US Commission on Ocean Policy, which finalized its report and closed up shop in 2004.

Posted by Jeff Tollefson on September 17, 2009
Categories: Earth, environment & ecology, Policy | Permalink | Comments (1) | TrackBacks (0)

Oil trading company Trafigura announced a potential settlement of a legal case brought by 31,000 residents of Ivory Coast, who alleged the firm caused environmental and health damage by paying a contractors to dispose of oil byproducts in Abidjan. In a compensation claim led by UK lawyer Martyn Day of Leigh Day & Company, residents said the sludge caused diarrhea, nosebleeds, stomach pain, vomiting, and headaches. Trafigura sued the BBC for libel after a programme on the compensation claims in May, writing in a statement that "Trafigura has always denied that the slops caused the deaths and serious health consequences presented by the BBC."

Continue reading "Why clean up when you can cover up?" »

Posted by Lucas Laursen on September 17, 2009
Categories: Earth, environment & ecology | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

"The peculiar demands of our granting system have favoured an upper class of skilled scientists who know how to raise money for a big group. They have mastered a glass bead game that rewards not only quality and honesty, but also salesmanship and networking."
Cambridge researcher Peter A. Lawrence, in PLoS Biology, on the costs of funding science in fits and starting grants.

"The higher incidence is mainly because diagnostic techniques and monitoring capability have improved, as well as more and more women are delaying having children."
Anonymous Beijing health officer, quoted in Beijing Daily story on the doubling birth defect rates in the last decade in China.

"The government must find these other two ships."
Silvestro Greco, the head of Calabria's environment agency on the next step in an Italian investigation that revealed a sunken ship containing toxic waste, buried at sea by the Mafia (Al Jazeera).

Posted by Lucas Laursen on September 16, 2009
Categories: Earth, environment & ecology, Quotes of the day | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

Norman Borlaug, the U.S. agricultural scientist who won the 1970 Nobel peace prize for his role in tackling world hunger has died on Saturday at the age of 95. (Texas A&M University, Reuters, Washington Post, Guardian)

Borlaug developed high-yielding, disease-resistant wheat kick-starting the “green revolution” in the 1960’s that dramatically increased food production in the developing world.

Borlaug served as a distinguished professor of international agriculture at Texas A&M University, in College Station, Texas.

Continue reading "Nobel-winning agricultural scientist dies" »

Posted by Natasha Gilbert on September 14, 2009
Categories: Earth, environment & ecology | Permalink | Comments (2) | TrackBacks (0)

The United States' climate envoy, Todd Stern, appeared on Capitol Hill Thursday to deliver what has become a depressingly familiar update. Yes, the chasm between the developed and developing worlds remains wide and deep; yes, talks are progressing with key players like China and India; yes, all sides are taking the issue seriously; no, there are no details to report; but yes, yes, of course, there is hope.

For more detail, check Bloomberg and Reuters, but suffice it to say that reporters in the room were generally left scratching their heads as to why Stern had been called to testify in the first place. And perhaps lawmakers felt the same way: Only seven members of the House Select Committee for Energy Independence and Global Warming showed up; three stuck it out for the duration.

Indeed, there's no particular reason why anyone would expect Stern to have any major progress to report at this point. The most likely venues for breaking news come later this month, when the United Nations holds its Summit on Climate Change in New York and the G20 convenes on Pittsburgh. Moreover, Congress has just returned to town after a lengthy August recess, and pretty much everybody, including President Barack Obama, is talking about health care, not climate.

Continue reading "Stern talks; Congress flounders; EPA gears up?" »

Posted by Jeff Tollefson on September 10, 2009
Categories: Earth, environment & ecology, Energy, Policy | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

The European Commission is expected to publish a proposal today that would offer €15 billion a year in aid to developing nations so that they can combat climate change. The Financial Times has a nice piece outlining the promise and problems with the plan. The good news is that it may help to bridge the gap between developed and developing nations at the upcoming Copenhagen talks in December. The bad news is that the proposal's is based on an estimated need of just €100 billion between now and 2020, a third of China's estimated cost for controlling just its own emissions over that same period. The plan would also allow the EU to repurpose development money for climate, something aid groups aren't too happy about.

Meanwhile, in the United Kingdom (which is part of Europe as far as everyone but the UK is concerned) a series of reports is calling for more action on climate change. The first, by the government's independent advisory Committee on Climate Change calls for caps on global air travel to cut aviation-related emissions. A second report by the Institute for Public Policy Research looks at a scheme known as personal carbon trading that would allocate a carbon cap to individual citizens. The conclusion is that personal carbon trading is "politically risky", but may be necessary if other policies fail.

All these proposals come at a time of great uncertainty for the future of a global climate agreement. At a press luncheon yesterday, David Milliband, the UK's Foreign Secretary, warned that there was about a 50/50 chance that the Copenhagen talks would reach any sort of reasonable conclusion. You can see more of his fairly dire predictions by watching the video at right (courtesy of ITV).

Posted by Geoff Brumfiel on September 09, 2009
Categories: Earth, environment & ecology, Policy | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

The British Science Festival is on this week at the University of Surrey. The festival provides an opportunity for British researchers to show their stuff. And it gives the media something to write about. Here's what's grabbed headlines today:

1. Conservationists are reintroducing short-haired bumble bees (Bombus subterraneus) to the British countryside. The bees were once commonplace in some parts of the UK, but none have been spotted since 1988. Now researchers are going to bring the bees back from New Zealand, where they were introduced in the 1800s to pollinate clover. Plenty of coverage to read here.

2. Chimpanzee babies are less whiny than human ones, according to a study out of the University of Portsmouth. Baby chimps apparently only cry when they have something to complain about, and they stop crying when their problem is dealt with. Actually it's more about a new way of understanding chimp facial expressions. But you can read the feed here.

3. Finally, there was plenty of coverage of a new, green Formula 3 car being developed at the University of Warwick. The car uses recycled carbon fiber and a steering wheel made of carrot bits. A lot of outlets picked up on the fact that the car ran on old wine and chocolate (aka biodiesel). You can read all about it from this Wawrick press release (from May).

Credit: D. Goulson/Bee Conservation Trust

Posted by Geoff Brumfiel on September 08, 2009
Categories: Earth, environment & ecology, Energy | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

The UK news sites are reporting that a French truck (lorry) driver may have been the first human casualty of Ulva lactuca, otherwise known as sea lettuce.

Let me explain. For years lactuca has been growing along the coastline of Brittany in France. Researchers suspect that nitrogen-rich runoff from farms and untreated sewage are fueling the explosive growth. The seaweed washes ashore, where it decays and releases hydrogen sulfide, the gas that makes rotten eggs stink.

Normally the mess is smelly. This year, however, it's turned deadly. A study of one beach by France's National Institute for Environmental Technology and Hazards (Ineris) revealed hydrogen sulfide concentrations of up to 1,000 parts per million—enough to kill in minutes.

The concentrations were strong enough to kill a horse and incapacitate its rider. Now it's emerged that hydrogen sulfide may have also killed the 48-year-old truck trucker. The driver had been carrying truckloads of the seaweed off the beach in July, when he fell unconscious and swerved into a wall. Initially medical examiners ruled that a heart attack was the likely cause of death, but now the local prosecutor wants a more thorough investigation.

The driver's family has so far refused to allow an autopsy.

Credit: K. Peters/Wikipedia

Posted by Geoff Brumfiel on September 08, 2009
Categories: Earth, environment & ecology | Permalink | Comments (1) | TrackBacks (0)

A giant rat of a species previously unknown-to-science has been captured on an extinct volcano in Papua New Guinea.

Found by a tracker from a local tribe, the Bosavi Wooly Rat is 82 cm from the tip of its nose to the end of its tail and it weighs in at a 1.5 kilos. And of course it has a lot of fur, hence ‘wooly’ (pictured right).

“I had a cat and it was about the same size of this rat,” says wildlife cameraman Gordon Buchanan (press release). “This rat was incredibly tame. It just sat next to me nibbling on a piece of leaf.”

The question I really want answered is who would win in a face-off between the new giant rat and the recently discovered rat eating plant.

Buchanan was part of a BBC team filming on Mount Bosavi for TV programme ‘Lost Land of the Volcano’. The team have found around 40 possible new species in addition to the rat, including a subspecies of the strange marsupial cuscuses.

Continue reading "Giant rat found in extinct volcano" »

Posted by Daniel Cressey on September 07, 2009
Categories: Earth, environment & ecology | Permalink | Comments (3) | TrackBacks (0)

The Mote Marine Laboratory has lost its robotic submarine, Waldo. The sub was on a routine patrol in the Gulf of Mexico for "red tide," a periodic algal bloom that can devastate local fish populations. For five days it scanned the seas, reporting back every two hours to the scientists running the lab.

Then, without warning, the sub vanished. Researchers aren't quite sure what happened: Waldo may have sprung a leak, or been picked up by an unsuspecting boater. Regardless, Mote would like it back, says Gary Kirkpatrick, a scientist at the lab. "We're hoping that if anyone has seen Waldo, they will call and let us know so we can pick it up," Kirkpatrick said in a press statement.

The laboratory is offering a US$500 no-questions-asked reward for anyone with information leading to the capture of the missing sub. Given the fact the subs cost over $100,000 each, you'd think Mote could pony up a little more cash.

Predictably, the press are having a field day with "Where's Waldo?" references. But the Florida Sun Sentinel blog wins hands down for corny headlines with:

Missing: Where in the world is a yellow submarine named Waldo?

Not only do they hit Waldo, but they manage to work in a Beatles reference and a completely gratuitous nod to Carmen Sandiego ! This one's for you guys:

credit: NOAA

Posted by Geoff Brumfiel on September 07, 2009
Categories: Earth, environment & ecology | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

African leaders are threatening to boycott the global warming summit in Copenhagen this December if negotiations come up short. Of course it's not yet clear whether they have the collective will to do so, at least as a unified block, but the message came through in no uncertain terms.

Speaking at a meeting of the Africa Partnership Forum in Addis Ababa, Ethiopian Prime Minister Meles Zenawi declared that African leaders are prepared to "walk out of any negotiations that threaten to be another rape of our continent.”

Though least responsible and most at risk due, Meles said, Africans have largely been locked out of the already small transfer of wealth created to help poor nations cope and develop along a cleaner path. "But we have no intention to a free ride," he added, suggesting that Africa is prepared to protect and expand forests and remains a "green field" for clean energy investments.

African has been trying to formulate a unified position since making a decision to negotiate as a block earlier this year. Environment ministers were able to collectively call on industrialized nations to reduce emissions by a whopping 25-40 percent by 2020 earlier this summer, but many details were left unresolved. This week's meeting represented the latest attempt to consolidate positions.

Press reports indicate that they made some progress, although verifying details proved difficult. More than one story (see here and here) suggested that Africans planned to call on developing nations to provide some $200 billion, presumably annually, to developing countries by 2020, although it was not clear what that money would cover.

Lim Li Lin, who works on developing country issues for the Third World Network, says Africa has always more or less negotiated as a group. The question moving forward, she says, is whether leaders will be able to settle on a concrete position and then stick to it in the negotiations. "What is clear is that all this has not impacted the negotiations yet," she says.

Posted by Jeff Tollefson on September 04, 2009
Categories: Earth, environment & ecology, Policy | Permalink | Comments (1) | TrackBacks (0)

Greenhouse gas emissions have helped reverse the Arctic's 2,000-year (at least) cooling streak, suggests a new report in Science.

The authors reconstructed the past two millennia of Arctic temperatures based on records from lake sediments, ice cores and tree rings, and found that the Arctic had been cooling throughout the data set — until this century, when the trend halted and reversed. Four of the five warmest decades in the past 2,000 years between 1950 and 2000, with the most recent decade the hottest of them all. The Arctic had been cooling due to a wobble in its orbit, causing less summer sunshine to hit its surface.

According to first author Darrell Kaufman, "the 20th century stands out in strong contrast to the cooling that should have continued. The last half-century was the warmest of the 2,000-year temperature record, and the last 10 years have been especially dramatic." (BBC)

The authors' model shows that the Arctic temperatures should have kept cooling for another 4,000 years before the trend reversed — had greenhouse gas emissions in the latter half of the 20th century not overwhelmed the natural cycle (MongaBay).

Current Arctic temperatures are about 1.4 degrees Celsius higher than they would have been had the 2,000-year cooling trend continued, leading to the suggestion that "this era really is the Anthropocene — a geological period of our own making, either by accident or design" (NY Times Dot Earth blog). The blog also quotes climate scientist Thomas Crowley, who notes that this "strengthens the argument that humans are now capable of preventing the onset of a future ice age". That quote prompted an update on the blog, where the author noted the concern that these implications "might be abused by folks fighting restrictions on greenhouse gases".

Other coverage:
Arctic reverses trend, is warmest in two millennia - AP
Warmest Arctic temperatures for 2,000 years, says new study - CNN
Abrupt reversal detected in Arctic cooling trend - SF Chronicle
Arctic Warming Overtakes 2,000 Years of Natural Cooling - NCAR press release

Posted by Lizzie Buchen on September 04, 2009
Categories: Earth, environment & ecology | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

Turkey has indicated it may be willing to allow Iraq and Syria to have more water from the Tigris and Euphrates rivers, after both nations complained they were not being given their fair share.

“We have only received eight billion cubic meters of water from the Euphrates between August 2008 and August 2009. That means a decrease of 30 percent,” Latif Rashid, Iraq’s water minister said earlier this week (AFP).

“The situation in Iraq has never been as dire as it has been in the past two years. Iraq needs more water from both Syria and Turkey.”

Before a meeting on Thursday Turkey said it could not increase the rivers’ flow. But on Thursday environment minister Veysel Eroglu said attempts would be made to release more water.

“There is a serious water crisis in Iraq, we are taking this into account,” he said (AP). “But our own capabilities are limited.”

More
Turkey, Syria, Iraq discuss water resource of Euphrates, Tigris rivers - Xinhua
Turkey, Iraq and Syria in water crisis summit - CNN

Posted by Daniel Cressey on September 04, 2009
Categories: Earth, environment & ecology | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

In December this year, parties to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) will descend on Copenhagen to wrangle over the details of a new global climate deal — a potential successor to the Kyoto Protocol. See Nature’s Road to Copenhagen special for more coverage.

Japan’s new ruling party has warned that its election pledges on climate change are contingent on other countries’ moves.

Before the recent election in Japan, the Democratic Party of Japan was calling for a cut in greenhouse-gas emissions to more than 25% below 1990 levels by 2020 (see: Japan election sparks science pledges).

Now Katsuya Okada, the party’s secretary-general, has told Reuters, “This is not something Japan will do on its own. The premise is an agreement that includes other countries such as China and India.”

Okada dodged the question of whether the DJP would change its target if an international agreement couldn’t be reached. “We are trying to reach an agreement so we are not discussing what to do in the absence of an agreement,” he said.

Japan’s largest business group, Keidanren, has already come out against the 25% target (Yomiuri Shimbun, via Reuters).

Okada’s caveat of the party’s target may also deflate some of the hopes about the DJP’s climate stance, which was noticeably tougher than their rival Liberal Democratic Party.

Earlier this week – after the election but before the Reuters interview – Andreas Carlgren, Sweden’s environment minister said of the target, “That could create momentum in the climate-change negotiations. That is very close to the European ambitions.” (Bloomberg.)

Posted by Daniel Cressey on September 04, 2009
Categories: Earth, environment & ecology | Permalink | Comments (1) | TrackBacks (0)

BP announced on Wednesday it had struck a ‘giant’ oil-field nearly 11 kilometres under the waters of the Gulf of Mexico, a region of increasing importance in the oil world. The find underlines the impressive – or, as you could see it, desperate – depths to which oil producers are now drilling to find black gold.

Continue reading "How deep is your well?" »

Posted by Richard Van Noorden on September 03, 2009
Categories: Earth, environment & ecology | Permalink | Comments (1) | TrackBacks (0)

Climate activists in the UK had a day of protests at their week-long Camp for Climate Action, but didn’t meet with the aggressive police tactics seen at last year’s event and at the G20 meeting in May.

On Tuesday, activists stripped off to protest inside the front window of Edelman (a PR company whose clients include energy firm E.ON, which is planning a new coal-fired power station in the country). Others superglued themselves together on the trading floor of the Royal Bank of Scotland, in objection to its investment in fossil fuel projects. Groups also marched towards the head offices of BP and Shell, against the mining of tar sands in Canada – led by indigenous Canadian activists chanting: “When I say ‘BP’, you say ‘criminal’” (BBC).

The government was a target too: on Wednesday, fifteen be-goggled and arm-banded activists sat in kayaks at the headquarters of the UK’s department for energy and climate change, highlighting rising sea levels, they said, and protesting against carbon trading and carbon capture and storage technology (The Guardian).

Media reports characterize the camp in Blackheath, London – where a thousand or so have gathered for the week – as good-natured, chilled-out and, with environmental workshops, quite educational. With the watching police in equally relaxed mode (there has been only one arrest), media attention is turning to the next promised direct action: the 'great climate swoop', an attempt to shut down the UK’s second-largest coal-fired power station, Ratcliffe-on-Soar in Nottinghamshire, on 17th and 18th October.

Image: The Blackheath camp/SallyB2, Creative Commons Attribution 3.0

Posted by Richard Van Noorden on September 02, 2009
Categories: Earth, environment & ecology | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

Yesterday the Royal Society, Britain's premier scientific body, delivered its official view on geoengineering. Scientists analyzed a dozen different approaches and weighed their pros and cons. Then, being scientists, they plotted their results in a bizarre phase space that nobody could understand. Many a reporter, myself included, were scratching our heads when co-author Ken Caldeira popped this little gem up onto the screen:

(Note: error bars are purely symbolic. Huh?)

Now I want to be fair, the Royal Society report is actually very well written and it contains a lot of good information about the geoengineering proposals out there. But it's a nuanced take on a complex issue. So it's not surprising that you saw a range of headlines. The most inaccurate enthusiastic one by far, came from those lovely folks at the Register:

Boffins: Give up on CO₂ cuts, only geoengineering can work

The Financial Times landed on the other end of the spectrum:

Hopes dashed for geo-engineering solutions

And in between came everybody else:

Study says 'geoengineering' to flight climate likely, but risky (USA Today)

Royal Society warns climate engineering 'could cause disaster' (the Times)

World must plan for climate emergency-report (Reuters)

Investment in geo-engineering needed immediately, says Royal Society (the Guardian)

These headlines make the report look like a Kurosawa film, but most of the actual stories are pretty accurate in my opinion. The bottom line is that the Royal Society felt that the only sure way to save the planet is to reduce greenhouse gas emissions. But in the event of a global climate emergency, we should at least know the consequences of geoengineering.

You can read our coverage here.

Update: I've included the updated diagram off the Royal Society website.

Posted by Geoff Brumfiel on September 02, 2009
Categories: Earth, environment & ecology, Neat technologies, Policy | Permalink | Comments (10) | TrackBacks (0)

Brazilian President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva has staked out a larger government claim on newly discovered offshore oil reserves, promising to funnel proceeds into poverty reduction, education, science and technology.

Located off Brazil's southeast coast near Rio de Janeiro, the deep-water fields (the blue area in the Petrobras map) represent some of the biggest discoveries in the world in recent decades. The "pre-salts" are technically challenging, trapped below a thick layer of salt several thousand metres below the sea, but they could thrust Brazil into the major leagues of oil production - albeit at a time when the world is desperately seeking cleaner alternatives.

The plan has been on ice for more than a year (Nature), due in part to the global economic crisis. In making the announcement on Monday, Lula proclaimed an "independence day" of sorts. It stops well short of the kind of nationalization that has been seen in places like Venezuela and Bolivia, but many see it as a step in that direction.

Continue reading "Lula reasserts Brazilian control over new oilfield " »

Posted by Jeff Tollefson on September 01, 2009
Categories: Earth, environment & ecology, Energy | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

The Wildlife Conservation Society has released this camera trap photograph of an endangered snow leopard, photographed in the Sast Valley in Afghanistan.

“WCS researchers are conducting ongoing wildlife surveys in this remote area with the goal of establishing a protected area,” says the group. “They found this endangered cat … willing to strike a pose or two.”

Snow leopards (Panthera uncia) are classified as endangered on the IUCN’s Red List.

The conflict in Afghanistan has opened up a new market for products from the animals, says the IUCN, which are also threatened by habitat degradation, shortages of prey animals and killing by farmers worried about their impact on livestock.

Posted by Daniel Cressey on August 28, 2009
Categories: Earth, environment & ecology | Permalink | Comments (1) | TrackBacks (0)

Geo-engineering has been all the rage recently, and yesterday the UK-based Institution of Mechanical Engineers weighed in with their recommendations for how best to engineer the environment.

The report was a mix of the very specific and very vague. On the specific side, the panel recommended three technologies, which they believed represent the cheapest, quickest form of geo-engineering:

*Reflective roofs on buildings in order to cool urban areas (although the panel noted that this, technically doesn't count as geoengineering, since it doesn't actually involve changing the climate).

*Putting algae tanks on the side of buildings. The idea is that this algae would soak up carbon and could then be charred and sequestered.

*Finally came the suggestion that grabbed most of the headlines—fake trees. The trees are basically just carbon dioxide filters that are thousands of times more efficient than the real thing. 100,000 such trees would be able to remove all carbon from transport related CO2 emissions in the UK.

But the engineers were much more vague about how much such proposals might cost, or what their overall influence on carbon dioxide levels could be. This report is more a "case study of what needs to be done," it says. Follow-up work could be done with £10-20 million from a UK contribution to an international research programme. The report comes just days ahead of a second, more comprehensive study by the Royal Society.

Posted by Geoff Brumfiel on August 27, 2009
Categories: Earth, environment & ecology, Policy | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

A newly released satellite image from NASA shows that nearly nothing remains of one part of the once proud Aral Sea.

Irrigation projects started by the Soviet Union in the 1960s led to the sea shrinking hugely, eventually splitting into northern and southern halves. The latter later split again into an eastern and a western body of water.

Now this 16 August shot from the NASA’s Terra satellite shows that “virtually nothing” is left of the southern sea’s eastern lobe.

“Although the Northern Aral Sea still appears healthy, the Southern Aral Sea consists of two isolated water bodies: an irregular oval shape directly southwest of the Northern Aral Sea, and the long, thin remainder of the Southern Aral Sea’s far western lobe,” says NASA. “Although the faintest glimmers of blue-green appear in the eastern lobe, earth tones predominate, surrounded by a ghostly film of pale beige.”

NASA’s Earth Observatory also has a rather sad video of the shrinking of the Aral sea.

Image: Jesse Allen / NASA

Posted by Daniel Cressey on August 27, 2009
Categories: Earth, environment & ecology | Permalink | Comments (1) | TrackBacks (0)

Rajendra Pachauri, chairman of the policy-neutral Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, has never been shy of speaking his mind on climate policy.

“I feel I have responsibility far beyond being a spokesman for the IPCC. If I feel there are certain actions that can help us meet this challenge, I feel I should articulate them,” he told Nature two years ago (Nature, 450, 1150-1155; 2007; subscription required).

He’s just articulated them again, calling for atmospheric carbon dioxide concentrations to be kept below 350 parts per million. (Current levels are around 387 ppm, and in its 2007 report, the IPCC took 450 ppm as a key target):

"As chairman of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, I cannot take a position because we do not make recommendations. But as a human being I am fully supportive of that goal. What is happening, and what is likely to happen, convinces me that the world must be really ambitious and very determined at moving toward a 350 target." (AFP)

The statement was music to the ears of environmental writer Bill McKibben, the founder of 350.org, whose url explains its mission. In a Guardian blog, he called it "amazing news".

Nature features editor Rich Monastersky wrote in an April 2009 article (Nature 458, 1091-1094; 2009, subscription required): "The difference between 350 and 450 is not just one of degree. It's one of direction. A CO₂ concentration of 450 p.p.m. awaits the world at some point in the future that might conceivably, though with difficulty, be averted. But 350 p.p.m. can be seen only in the rear-view mirror."

Here’s McKibben making his point again on the Colbert Report a fortnight ago:

Posted by Richard Van Noorden on August 26, 2009
Categories: Earth, environment & ecology | Permalink | Comments (1) | TrackBacks (0)

The U.S. Chamber of Commerce, which represents 3 million large and small businesses, wants to put the science of climate change on trial, reports the Los Angeles Times.

The chamber is pushing for the Environmental Protection Agency to hold a public hearing -- with witnesses, cross-examinations and a judge to rule on whether humans are causing global warming, the Los Angeles Times reports.

Continue reading "Industry wants to try climate change " »

Posted by Natasha Gilbert on August 25, 2009
Categories: Earth, environment & ecology, Policy | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

In December this year, parties to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) will descend on Copenhagen to wrangle over the details of a new global climate deal — a potential successor to the Kyoto Protocol. See Nature’s Road to Copenhagen special for more coverage.

“One single country will not solve its environmental problems on its own, it will need partners and that's why it's very important that there's that unified common position. The development of Africa should not go alongside the same mistakes that the developed world already made - to have these high emissions that are now affecting the whole world.”
Alice Kaudia, Kenya’s environment secretary, explains why ten African countries are meeting in Ethiopia to reach a common position before the Copenhagen meeting (BBC).

“We need to get an agreement that sets the world on a new path of sustainable consumption without getting obsessed with precise percentages.”
Former UK Prime Minister Tony Blair says that the important thing is to reach a “realistic and practical” deal (Daily Telegraph).

“Being highly responsible for the survival and long-term development of mankind.”
Xie Zhenhua, China’s vice minister in charge of the National Development and Reform Commission, sets out his country’s negotiating attitude (Xinhua).

“China in the meantime firmly opposes any form of trade protectionism disguised as tackling climate change.”
Xie Zhenhua again.

“Rich nations cannot continue as before, emerging industrial countries must leave the old industrial-based path to prosperity, and the rest of the world may not even embark upon it. Yet the negotiations on emissions limits with each of the 192 signatory countries in the run-up to the UN climate change summit in Copenhagen in December 2009 have so far given no indication of so radical a change.”
Claus Leggewie, director of the Institute for Advanced Study in the Humanities in Essen, doesn’t think much of progress to date along the road (Guardian).

Posted by Daniel Cressey on August 24, 2009
Categories: Earth, environment & ecology | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

Gigantic jets flow upwards from clouds towards the outer reaches of the atmosphere, rather than down to the ground. They have been captured on film only five times since 2001, says the US National Science Foundation.

Now Steven Cummer, of Duke University in North Carolina, and his colleagues have managed to work out just how much charge these jets transfer from storms to the ionosphere.

“Our measurements show that gigantic jets are capable of transferring a substantial electrical charge to the lower ionosphere,” he says (NSF press release).

“They are essentially upward lightning from thunderclouds that deliver charge just like conventional cloud-to-ground lightning. What struck us was the size of this event.”

In their paper in Nature Geoscience the team reports that the jet carries a current of 730 A and is around 75 km long. The researchers also show that gigantic jets do make contact with the upper atmosphere.

“What we were able to conclusively show is that these are not just sparks that come out of the thunderstorm and travel upward and tickle the upper atmosphere,” says Cummer (BBC). “They actually deliver to the upper atmosphere as much electric charge as the very strong lightning strokes to ground.”

Images: Steven Cummer

Posted by Daniel Cressey on August 24, 2009
Categories: Earth, environment & ecology | Permalink | Comments (3) | TrackBacks (0)

Woah! Worms at the bottom of the sea are carrying bombs. Glowing bombs.

Seven new species of deep sea worm have been discovered by Karen Osborn of the Scripps Institution of Oceanography in San Diego, California and her colleagues. All strong swimmers, five of these critters have attached to their bodies little balloon structures.

As soon as the worms start to get hassled by predators these balloons are released. Bombs away! And as the bombs are dropped they start to glow.

This has to be the coolest discovery of a new species for a long time. I almost don’t care what’s in the bombs and why, or how they evolved them, they’re so weird.

However, that is not the scientific way as well we all know. Osborn says that the bombs glow for around a minute after release and act to distract predators. The bombs are kind of modified gills, and once released the chemicals held in there come together and react, creating the glow.

The worms have been named Swima bombiviridis and have picked up quite some attention. And quite right too.

(New York Times, National Geographic, MSNBC, AP).

Oh, and if worms with bombs sounds familiar to you, you’re right.

More pictures below the fold for your viewing pleasure...

Continue reading "Worms wiggling with weapons way down beneath the waves" »

Posted by Katharine Sanderson on August 21, 2009
Categories: Earth, environment & ecology | Permalink | Comments (1) | TrackBacks (0)

Marina Silva has quit Brazil’s ruling party in what is being widely seen as the start of her bid for the country’s presidency in 2010 under a Green Party banner.

Silva previously resigned as environment minister in 2008, saying that “growing resistance ... in important sectors of the government and society” made it impossible for her to protect the Amazon (see: Concern after Brazil loses environment minister - May 15, 2008)

“I am now in talks with the Green Party in this period of transition,” says Silva. Jose Maria Cardoso da Silva, of Conservation International, told Reuters that this would lead to “a real debate about sustainable development”.

On the on the Brazil Political Comment blog, John Fitzpatrick notes:

The fact that Silva, a former environment minister, has no chance of winning is less important than the effect of her announcement This has stirred life into what looked like a two-horse race between President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva´s candidate, Dilma Rousseff, and the likely PSDB candidate, Jose Serra, the governor of São Paulo. It also increases the chances of other candidates, like Ciro Gomes of the PSB, standing and means there is now a greater chance of the election going into a second round.

Posted by Daniel Cressey on August 20, 2009
Categories: Earth, environment & ecology | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

Posted for Mico Tatalovic

Every single fish sampled from 291 streams across the United States between 1998-2005 was contaminated with mercury, according to the US Geological Survey.

A quarter of the sampled fish contained levels of mercury higher than those deemed safe for human consumption and more than two thirds contained levels exceeding the Environmental Protection Agency’s level of concern for the protection of fish-eating mammals, says a new report from the USGS.

“This study shows just how widespread mercury pollution has become in our air, watersheds, and many of our fish in freshwater streams,” says Ken Salazar, Secretary of the US Department of the Interior (press release).

Most of the mercury that reaches waterways in the US comes from emissions by coal- power plants. Once in the atmosphere the metal gets precipitated down, and then converted to the more toxic form, methyl mercury, This is easily taken up by fish and other aquatic organisms.

Continue reading "America’s quicksilver fish" »

Posted by Daniel Cressey on August 20, 2009
Categories: Earth, environment & ecology | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

Global ocean surface temperatures last month were the warmest since records began in 1880, according to data released by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration last Friday. July's update hasn't received much coverage (perhaps because an identical temperature high was seen in June), but the New York Times noted the trend.

In both June and July ocean surface temperatures were measured at 16.99°C, 0.59°C above the 20th century average. The combined global land and ocean surface temperature for July 2009 was the fifth warmest on record, said officials at NOAA's National Climatic Data Center in Asheville, North Carolina.

Not all regions felt the heat. Across the eastern US, central Canada and southern South America, conditions were 2-4°C cooler than average, while parts of Asia also dipped below par. (See map).

If El Niño conditions continue to mature, as now projected, global temperatures are likely to exceed previous record highs, NOAA added.

Image: NCDC/NOAA/NESDIS

Posted by Richard Van Noorden on August 19, 2009
Categories: Earth, environment & ecology | Permalink | Comments (1) | TrackBacks (0)

The Financial Times is reporting with excitement that senior Chinese climate change officials have set a date for emissions cuts: 2050.

Let's hope that's not what was meant in statements by Su Wei, director general of the National Development and Reform Commission's climate change division, because experts are hoping for much sooner cuts than that.

FT quotes Su as saying: "China's emissions will not continue to rise beyond 2050."

Judging from a report released this week, 2050 China Energy and CO2 Emissions Report, Su's comments are a throw-away. The report, co-authored by China's top climate think tanks, the Energy Research Institute of the National Development and Reform Commission and the State Council's Development Research Centre, gives 3 scenarios for emissions. Even in the "business as usual" scenario, in which economic gain continues to dominate, China's carbon emissions peak in 2040.(Reuters)

So China's emission will likely fall before 2050. The question is when.

In international climate change debates, China continues to balk at suggestions that it put a time table on its emissions peak date and play hardball with the rich western countries. (Business Green)

But the Energy Research Institute report indicates that a more amenable position is emerging. They highlight an "enhanced low carbon" scenario" which shows emissions leveling off after 2020 and dropping after 2030. By 2050, they hit 1.4 billion tonnes of carbon - China's 2005 emission levels. This would be "difficult but doable," according to Jiang Kejun of the Environment Research Institute.

The report notes impact scenarios and discusses what emissions control measures would be needed to hit the enhanced low carbon targets. These targets still wouldn't be enough for China to hit the "2 degrees by 2050" goal that experts have advanced as a tolerable level of warming - that might require China to peak in 2015 or 2020. But it proves that, however much it refuses to acknowledge emissions targets at international meetings, at home, China is thinking hard about these matters.

In December this year, parties to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) will descend on Copenhagen to wrangle over the details of a new global climate deal — a potential successor to the Kyoto Protocol. See Nature’s Road to Copenhagen special for more coverage.

Published on behalf of David Cyranoski

Posted by Mark Peplow on August 18, 2009
Categories: Earth, environment & ecology | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

Another standoff between climate scientists and those who are trying to use freedom of information laws to access their data has emerged.

Last week Nature reported on attempts by Steve McIntyre, editor of the Climate Audit blog, to obtain monthly global surface temperature data from Phil Jones, director of the Climatic Research Unit at the University of East Anglia in the UK. In the course of a month, Jones and his unit have received 58 freedom of information requests from Climate Audit.

Now Douglas Keenan has written about his attempts to obtain tree-ring data from Queen’s University Belfast, on the Watts Up With That blog.

“Some people have asked why QUB does not want to release the data. In fact, most tree-ring laboratories do not make their data available: it is not just QUB and Gothenburg that have been reluctant,” writes Keenan. “… [E]ven if the research and the researcher’s salary are fully paid for by the public—as is the case at QUB—the researcher still regards the data as his or her personal property.”

On his website, Keenan writes “I used to do mathematical research and financial trading on Wall Street and in the City of London; I now study independently.” Keenan has previously been praised on the Climate Audit blog for his work, including his criticism of research published in Nature.

In a statement to Nature, Queen’s said, “The University’s decisions on this matter have been upheld by the Information Commissioner’s Office. Freedom of Information requests for raw data from University researchers are dealt with on their merits in accordance with the provisions of the FoI Act.”

Image: photo by lawmurray via Flickr under creative commons

Posted by Daniel Cressey on August 17, 2009
Categories: Earth, environment & ecology | Permalink | Comments (6) | TrackBacks (0)

The UK’s Natural History Museum has been targeted by thieves after an unusual prize: tropical bird skins.

It is not clear exactly when or how the bird remains were removed. Some reports say a branch of the museum in Tring was burglarised in June but the removal of nearly 300 skins was apparently not noticed for over a month. There are also suggestions the birds could have been stolen in batches by someone with legitimate reasons to access the collection.

“The birds that were stolen formed part of the nation’s natural history collection, painstakingly assembled over the last 350 years,” says Richard Lane, Director of Science at the Museum (press release). “It is very distressing that we should have been deliberately targeted in this manner.”

Those responsible for the crime are unlikely to have been motivated by the skins’ potential use in biodiversity, evolution or anatomy research. Speculation as to their purpose involves breaking up the specimens for use in jewellery, clothing or fly-fishing lures.

Let us hope the miscreants behind this outrage are swiftly caught and spend some time doing bird.

Anyone offered some dodgy bird skins should call Detective Inspector Fraser Wylie on 0845 33 00 222, citing crime reference number D3/09/450.

Image: Natural History Museum

Posted by Daniel Cressey on August 14, 2009
Categories: Earth, environment & ecology | Permalink | Comments (2) | TrackBacks (0)

A study in this week’s Natureshows that mountain height is limited by climate, rather than just by plate tectonics and the strength of the underlying crust. The study shows that when mountains reach heights where it is cold enough for the snow to form permanently, further growth is capped by the moving glaciers.

"Glaciers are very effective at destroying mountains," said David Engholm, a researcher at Aarhus University in Denmark and lead author of the study. (AFP)

Researchers used radar images of Earth’s surface at different latitudes and found that mountains generally do not rise more than 1,500 metres above the snowline. "So once plate tectonics pushes the surface of the Earth above the snowline altitude, a glacier starts to accumulate, and then basically you reach sort of a steady state where the mountains really do not get any higher," Egholm told LiveScience.

The idea that moving ice can shaves off layers from a mountain is not new – but this study claims to be the first to demonstrate this is in a single model containing data from all the world's major mountain ranges. The model shows that “differences in the height of mountain ranges mainly reflect variations in local climate rather than tectonic forces” say the researchers.

This also explains why mountain ranges tend to be higher in the low latitudes closer to the equator, than they are closer to the poles. At lower latitudes, warmer climate means that the snow line is higher, allowing the mountains to grow taller before they start getting eroded. "So we've basically explained why there is a link between the presence of glaciers, climate, and the height of mountains," says Egholm.

High-latitude mountains also tend to have flatter tops than the low altitude ones. “What you see there is that glaciers have basically completely removed the part of the mountains that were above the snowline," Egholm explains.

Posted for Mico Tatalovic

Image: David Lundbek Egholm

Posted by Mark Peplow on August 13, 2009
Categories: Earth, environment & ecology | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

As widely expected, Australia's carbon emissions trading scheme was defeated in the Senate (the parliament's upper house) on Thursday.

Though Rudd has diluted the bill significantly from its initial introduction in March - the scheme will now be phased in from July 2011 (rather than 2010) and will not have a ‘cap’ on total emissions introduced until July 2012 - it has been subject to fierce criticism from opposition mindful of its effect on the cost of coal and other energy-intensive exports.

“The government should now put this damaging bill in the deep freeze and wait until after we see the outcome of the Copenhagen conference and the US Senate debate on emissions trading before resurrecting its discredited legislation," said Nick Minchin, leader of the Senate's Liberal party which has the largest voting bloc in the chamber (FT).

In the end, the legislation went down 42 votes to 30. So Rudd needs to find a swing of seven votes to get the legislation passed. And his team have gone straight back on the offensive.

"This bill may be going down today, but this is not the end. We will bring this bill back before the end of the year because if we don't, this nation goes to Copenhagen with no means to deliver our targets," climate change minister Penny Wong told the senate (The Telegraph).

Continue reading "Australia carbon trading blocked: what next?" »

Posted by Richard Van Noorden on August 13, 2009
Categories: Earth, environment & ecology | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

A deep sea photography machine built by undergraduates for £1,800 is the star of today’s image, the winner of Cambridge University’s Department of Engineering photo competition.

Shown here is ‘Project Pebble’ undergoing tests in a swimming pool. The idea was to use relatively cheap off the shelf parts to build a vessel capable of carrying a camera and some bait to the bottom of the sea and find some deep sea beasties.

Sadly, things did not end well for the intrepid craft when it was put into the sea in May.

“Unfortunately, Pebble was accidentally picked up by a passing fishing vessel during deployment, and could not be recovered,” says the project team. The search for Pebble was formally abandoned in June.

Pebble may live on though. Future undergraduates at Cambridge will try to improve the design and bring the cost down to under £1,000.

See all entries in the photo competition here.

Posted by Daniel Cressey on August 13, 2009
Categories: Earth, environment & ecology | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

The Australian government has announced AUS$19 million (£9.5 million) in funding for a mass cull of the country’s wild camels, most likely done by chasing and shooting the beasts from helicopters. The announcement has caused a stir, with people objecting to the waste of leaving shot camels to rot in the outback and others calling it inhumane (The Guardian).

Camels were introduced to Australia in the 19th century to help transport heavy goods to the remote interior of the country, but since being released into the wild they have since become a major pest (New Zealand Herald).

“The scientific evidence suggests they'll eat anything up to 80 per cent of the plants available," Murray McGregor, research general manager of Desert Knowledge Cooperative Research Centre, which is involved in planning the cull, told the Sydney Morning Herald.

Jan Ferguson, managing director of the Desert Knowledge Cooperative Research Centre, says there are more than a million camels in desert regions. "Australia has long accepted that we've got a problem with rabbits,” she says, “because they are in everybody's country. Camels tend to be isolated in the bush, so they're not so visible." The population is doubling in size every nine years.

But camel exporter Paddy McHugh might have a point when he says, "What happens in 15 years when the numbers come back again? Do we waste another AUS$20 million?" He suggests catching and exporting the animals for entertainment and food. Animal Liberation New South Wales animal welfare group instead proposed providing the camels with birth control

Australian Prime Minister Kevin Rudd also got it in the neck from Erin Burnett, a newsreader on CNBC. She said during a broadcast: "There is a serial killer in Australia and we are going to put a picture up so we can see who it is.” A photo of Rudd appeared on the screen. "That would be the Prime Minister of Australia, Kevin Rudd," Burnett told viewers. "Okay, well do you know what he is doing? He has launched air strikes - air strikes - against camels in the outback." Burnett later called her announcement a “deadpan joke”.

Posted for Mico Tatalovic

Image: Wikimedia Commons

Posted by Mark Peplow on August 12, 2009
Categories: Earth, environment & ecology | Permalink | Comments (2) | TrackBacks (0)