A cold weather emergency response plan to tackle disasters after record cold and snow brought down power lines and paralyzed much of the usually mild south earlier this year… was activated in China on Wednesday. Read more here.
News
Eating Reindeer
Around 70 per cent of Swedish reindeer slaughtered are calves, which means they die without seeing snow, claims the animal welfare group Viva!. Read more here.
Wind Turbine Showers Ice
“Residents were left fearing for their safety after shards of melting ice fell on homes and gardens from the blades of a giant wind turbine.” Read more here.
Australian Parliamentarian, and Sceptic, Banned Prevented from Tabling Climate Data
DR Dennis Jensen BAppSc (RMIT), MSc (Melb), PhD (Monash) is the only member of the Australian Parliament with any training in science a PhD in a science discipline.
[As correctly pointed out in the comments following this posting, my brother Jim Turnour, also a member of the Federal Parliament, has a Batchelor of Agricultural Science. Other members with science and science-related degrees are listed in a comment in the following thread.]
Yesterday Dr Jensen suggested in the Australian Parliament that many of the current problems facing the Murray Darling Basin are the result of low runoff as a consequence of changed land management practices (including more plantations in the top of catchments), catchment-wide drainage management plans (place in the 1980s and 1990s to lower water tables) and more efficient water use (resulting in less leakage).
He explained that it was wrong to blame climate change for the low levels in the dams, because there had been no long term decline in rainfall in the Basin.
Dr Jensen also explained that many of the climate models used to predict regional rainfall, including the CSIRO models (relied upon by Ross Garnaut in his report on climate change to the Australian government), are unreliable and unduly pessimistic.
When Dr Jensen asked to table supporting information in the Parliament by way of charts and tables, the request was denied.
Much of the information that Dr Jensen was banned from tabling can be found in a recent publication from the IPA entitled ‘What’s Happening to the Murray River?’.
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The picture of Dr Jensen is from his parliamentary website.
New International Court for The Environment
The first role of the new body would be to enforce international agreements on cutting greenhouse gas emissions set to be agreed next year. Read more here.
Improving Prophecy
Since the dawn of thought, people have been using various methods to foretell the future. Forecasting is now big business and many large businesses have been made smaller through incorrect forecasts.
In Australia we have suffered long enough from bad forecasts. It is time to do something to improve forecasting standards.
Jennifer Marohasy BSc PhD has worked in industry and government. She is currently researching a novel technique for long-range weather forecasting funded by the B. Macfie Family Foundation.