Jennifer Marohasy

a forum for the discussion of issues concerning the natural environment

Archives for April 2008

In The Dark – A Few Nights Late

By

There has been some criticism of the administrators of this blog for not posting something on Earth Hour. Apparently the contribution from Art Raiche wasn’t enough.

Anyway, by popular demand, here is a piece by Rex Murphy in Canada entitled ‘The darkness that is Earth Hour’:

“Tonight, in cities across the country and, indeed, such is the contagion of ostentatious and cost-free do-goodism, in cities around the world, there will be celebrated – if that’s the word for so twilight an exercise – something called Earth Hour.

The central action of all these Earth Hours is pulling out the plugs on every “needless” electrical appliance and turning out a whole lot of lights. Toronto puts the goal most succinctly: “to make the city as dark as possible for one full hour.” Does this mean, I wonder, a night session of City Council? As a shortcut to utter bleakness, the idea is unassailable.

Between 8 p.m. and 9 p.m., there’s going to be a jamboree at Nathan Phillips Square that the very agreeable Nelly Furtado will be highlighting, or perhaps lowlighting in this case. Ms. Furtado, I gather, is an Earth Hour ambassador, and it is a tribute to the seriousness with which she takes that appointment that this global-touring artist will give a “primarily unplugged” performance.

I wonder what “primarily” means here. Will there be – gasp! – electrical cables, microphones and giant display screens at Earth Hour’s ground zero? Is this the electrical bulldozer in Earth Hour’s Amish barn?

I see from the news reports that Toronto’s yoga crowd is really into going dark. Any number of them are going to be holding classes by candlelight, which, it is certain, will mightily stay the rising of the waters and the melting of the polar caps that are the imminent dread of all thinking people everywhere. I don’t know if the fatal combination of light bulbs and yoga made it into the great list of free association cautions of An Inconvenient Truth, but they should have if they didn’t.

Read more here: http://ago.mobile.globeandmail.com/generated/archive/RTGAM/html/20080328/wcorex29.html

There was a letter in the local Blue Mountains Gazette on March 19 from a Paris Portingale, suggesting, “In preparation I have bought thiry or so torches, the big ones, which I will be tying to the light fittings.”

And a friend of mine said he drove about Brisbane, presumably with his headlights on, taking photographs of the event.

Phase Out Coal-Fired Power Plants: Open Letter from James Hansen

By

27 March 2008,
The Hon Kevin Rudd, MP,
Prime Minister of Australia,
Australian Parliament,
Canberra, Australian Capital Territory, 2600.

Dear Prime Minister,

Your leadership is needed on a matter concerning coal-fired power plants and carbon dioxide emission rates in your country, a matter with ramifications for life on our planet, including all species. Prospects for today’s children, and especially the world’s poor, hinge upon our success in stabilizing climate.

For the sake of identification, I am a United States citizen, director of the NASA Goddard Institute for Space Studies and Adjunct Professor at the Columbia University Earth Institute. I am a member of our National Academy of Sciences, have testified before our Senate and House of Representatives on many occasions, have advised our Vice President and Cabinet members on climate change and its relation to energy requirements, and have received numerous awards including the World Wildlife Fund’s Duke of Edinburgh Conservation Medal from Prince Philip.

I write, however, as a private citizen, a resident of Kintnersville, Pennsylvania, USA. I was assisted in composing this letter by colleagues, including Australians, Americans, and Europeans, who commented upon a draft letter. Because of the urgency of the matter, I have not collected signatures, but your advisors will verify the authenticity of the science discussion.

I recognize that for years you have been a strong supporter of aggressive forward-looking actions to mitigate dangerous climate change. Also, since your election as Prime Minister of Australia, your government has been active in pressing the international community to take appropriate actions.
We are now at a point that bold leadership is needed, leadership that could change the course of human history.

I have read and commend the Interim Report of Professor Ross Garnaut, submitted to your government. The conclusion that net carbon emissions must be cut to a fraction of current emissions must be stunning and sobering to policy-makers. Yet the science is unambiguous: if we burn most of the fossil fuels, releasing the CO2 to the air, we will assuredly destroy much of the fabric of life on the planet. Achievement of required near-zero net emissions by mid-century implies a track with substantial cuts of emissions by 2020. Aggressive near-term fostering of energy efficiency and climate friendly technologies is an imperative for mitigation of the looming climate crisis and optimization of the economic pathway to the eventual clean-energy world.

Global climate is near critical tipping points that could lead to loss of all summer sea ice in the Arctic with detrimental effects on wildlife, initiation of ice sheet disintegration in West Antarctica and Greenland with progressive, unstoppable global sea level rise, shifting of climatic zones with extermination of many animal and plant species, reduction of freshwater supplies for hundreds of millions of people, and a more intense hydrologic cycle with stronger droughts and forest fires, but also heavier rains and floods, and stronger storms driven by latent heat, including tropical storms, tornados and thunderstorms.

Feasible actions now could still point the world onto a course that minimizes climate change. Coal clearly emerges as central to the climate problem from the facts summarized in the attached Fossil Fuel Facts. [See note below] Coal caused fully half of the fossil fuel increase of carbon dioxide (CO2) in the air today, and on the long run coal has the potential to be an even greater source of CO2. Due to the dominant role of coal, solution to global warming must include phase-out of coal except for uses where the CO2 is captured and sequestered. Failing that, we cannot avoid large climate change, because a substantial fraction of the emitted CO2 will stay in the air more than 1000 years.

Yet there are plans for continuing mining of coal, export of coal, and construction of new coal-fired power plants around the world, including in Australia, plants that would have a lifetime of half a century or more. Your leadership in halting these plans could seed a transition that is needed to solve the global warming problem.

Choices among alternative energy sources – renewable energies, energy efficiency, nuclear power, fossil fuels with carbon capture – these are local matters. But decision to phase out coal use unless the CO2 is captured is a global imperative, if we are to preserve the wonders of nature, our coastlines, and our social and economic well being.

Although coal is the dominant issue, there are many important subsidiary ramifications, including the need for rapid transition from oil-fired energy utilities, industrial facilities and transport systems, to clean (solar, hydrogen, gas, wind, geothermal, hot rocks, tide) energy sources, as well as removal of barriers to increased energy efficiency.

If the West makes a firm commitment to this course, discussion with developing countries can be prompt. Given the potential of technology assistance, realization of adverse impacts of climate change, and leverage and increasing interdependence from global trade, success in cooperation of developed and developing worlds is feasible.

The western world has contributed most to fossil fuel CO2 in the air today, on a per capita basis. This is not an attempt to cast blame. It only recognizes the reality of the early industrial development in these countries, and points to a responsibility to lead in finding a solution to global warming.

A firm choice to halt building of coal-fired power plants that do not capture CO2 would be a major step toward solution of the global warming problem. Australia has strong interest in solving the climate problem.
Citizens in the United States are stepping up to block one coal plant after another, and major changes can be anticipated after the upcoming national election.

If Australia halted construction of coal-fired power plants that do not capture and sequester the CO2, it could be a tipping point for the world.
There is still time to find that tipping point, but just barely. I hope that you will give these considerations your attention in setting your national policies. You have the potential to influence the future of the planet.
Prime Minister Rudd, we cannot avert our eyes from the basic fossil fuel facts, or the consequences for life on our planet of ignoring these fossil fuel facts. If we continue to build coal-fired power plants without carbon capture, we will lock in future climate disasters associated with passing climate tipping points. We must solve the coal problem now.

For your information, I plan to send a similar letter to the Australian States Premiers.

I commend to you the following Australian climate, paleoclimate and Earth scientists to provide further elaboration of the science reported in my attached paper (Hansen et al., 2008):

Professor Barry Brook, Professor of climate change, University of Adelaide Dr Andrew Glikson, Australian National University Professor Janette Lindesay, Australian National University Dr Graeme Pearman, Monash University Dr Barrie Pittock, CSIRO Dr Michael Raupach CSIRO Professor Will Steffen, Australian National University

Sincerely,

James E. Hansen
Kintnersville, Pennsylvania
United States of America

To see letter with attachments click here:
www.aussmc.org.au/documents/Hansen2008LetterToKevinRudd.pdf

Zebras to Lose Stripes

By

ALL three surviving species of African zebras could lose their stripes in as little as 50-70 years as global warming threatens their habitat and way of life, Greenpeace UK reveals.

Zebras, horses and wild asses are all equids: long-lived animals that move quickly for their large size. Their teeth have evolved to crop and grind grass. Zebras have horse-like bodies, similar to stocky ponies. The most noticeable difference between zebras and horses for now is the zebra’s distinctive striped coats, making them one of the most instantly-recognizable of Africa’s ruminants, and a particular favourite with children.

The most numerous and widespread species in East Africa is the common or Burchell’s zebra. Grevy’s zebra, chiefly found in northern Kenya, was named for Jules Grevy, a president of France in the 1880s who received one from Ethiopia as a gift. The mountain zebra, Equus zebra, is, found in southern and southwestern Africa.

The zebra’s coat can vary greatly in pattern, number and width of stripes. The stripes’ disruptive coloration breaks up the outline of the body. At twilight, when their predators are most active, zebras appear indistinct.
Zebras’ shiny coats dissipate over 70% of incoming heat. In one of the strange coincidences of science, the albedo or reflectance of a typical zebra’s coat at around 31% – is identical to that of the entire planet Earth as seen from space. Sir John Houghton, the first chair of the IPCC’s science working group, says albedo is a scientific measure of the percentage of radiant energy incident upon a surface that is reflected off that surface rather than transmitted through it or absorbed and emitted by it.

But this uncanny coincidence will not last long. As the Earth warms and polar or glacial ice melts, the planetary albedo is set to fall, causing a temperature feedback that will amplify global warming. Zebras, however, according to Dr. Ieuan ap Rhyl of the African Union’s new International Zoological Survey Division, are responding to increasingly warmer ambient temperatures by a progressive reduction in the breadth of the black stripes on their coats. In each new generation, the mean thickness of each stripe is reduced by up to 6%, so that more of the zebra’s coat will be able to reflect the sun’s rays, helping to keep the zebra cool. In 50-70 years, says Dr. Ap Rhyl, the zebras’ coats will appear very similar to grey horses’ coats. The stripes will be gone.

Al Gore has spoke up for the zebras: This is another wake-up call for the planet. How much more hard evidence do our leaders need before they act to protect the Earth’s most precious creatures from the selfishness and greed of humankind? Political will, unlike zebra stripes, is a renewable resource.

Greenpeace stands for positive change through action. We defend the natural world and promote peace. We investigate, expose and confront environmental abuse by governments and corporations throughout the world. We champion environmentally responsible and socially just solutions, including scientific innovation. Our goal is to ensure the ability of the earth to nurture life in all its diversity. We have been working with the Zoological Survey of the African Union on this and other projects to save the continent’s threatened wildlife

April Fools!

Via Lord Monckton, 3rd Viscount Monckton of Brenchley
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Christopher_Monckton,_3rd_Viscount_Monckton_of_Brenchley