China, Saudi Arabia and Russia made " an act of scientific vandialism by withdrawing key facts from the report" said Jean-Luc Roux
Brussels, Belgium — The new report was agreed after almost a week of negotiations, at the end of a tense 24-hour marathon session which became increasingly political. The second of a series of four to be released throughout 2007, this report documents the widespread effects that rising temperatures are already having on ecosystems and human activities and assesses the changes projected from human induced climate change over the next century.
"This is a glimpse into an apocalyptic future. The earth will be transformed by human induced climate change, unless action is taken soon and fast," said Stephanie Tunmore, Greenpeace International Climate and Energy Campaigner. "What this report shows is that we are simply running out of time."
Some of the reports key findings:
It is likely that climate change will induce mass extinction of species within 60-70 years. We have already seen the climate linked extinction of some frog species but this is just the tip of the iceberg. The scale of risk is larger than most of the five major extinction events that have occurred in the earth's history.
Over the next decades the number of people at risk of water scarcity is likely to rise from tens of millions to billions. Steadily decreasing water availability is projected for India and other parts of South Asia and Africa: whilst the poorest parts of the world are going to the hardest hit, wealthy countries such as Australia and nations in Southern Europe are also on the front line.
Reductions in food production capacity in the poorest parts of the world are projected, bringing more hunger and misery and undermining achievement of the millennium development goals. Within a few decades it is likely that we will see climate change induced wheat, maize and rice production drops in India and China.
Increased drought and water scarcity are likely to lead to growing problems of hunger and human dislocation in Africa in coming decades.
The loss of glaciers in Asia, Latin America and Europe are set to cause major water supply problems for a large fraction of the world's population, as well as a massive increase in glacial lake outburst floods and other risks for those living in the glaciated mountains.
Huge numbers of people will be at risk due to sea level rise, storm surge and river flooding in the Asian Megadeltas such as the Ganges-Brahmaputra (Bangladesh) and the Zhujiang (Pearl River).
Warming of more than another degree could commit the world to multi-metre sea level rise over several centuries from the partial or total loss of the Greenland and West Antarctic ice sheets. Huge coastal dislocation would result and could be triggered by emissions made in the next several decades.
Politicians watering down the threat?
Monday, 9 April 2007
Green computer : Greenpeace ranking
"China give us a good lesson by being the top green computer company" said Jean-Luc Roux
Greenpeace today announced the results of their electronics company rating. The ranking is based on how the companies work with removing dangerous chemicals and their recycling programs. Nokia and Dell scored OK, but all companies have more work to do until Greenpeace will call them "green".
Tuesday, 3 April 2007
Smoke alarm: EU shows carbon trading is not cutting emissions
WHEN THE MARKET IS NOT AS PROMISING AS SOME CLASSIC ECONOMIST WAS EXPECTING TO CUT CO2 EMISSIONS!
SAID JEAN-LUC ROUX
Some US states want their own 'cap and trade' scheme but the evidence is proving that permits are so generous they fail to curb industry
David Gow in Brussels
Tuesday April 3, 2007
Guardian
Brussels lambasted the US and Australia yesterday for their inaction in cutting carbon dioxide emissions and stressed Europe's leading role in the battle against global warming. "Only EU leadership can break this impasse on a global agreement [post-Kyoto] to overcome climate change," Stavros Dimas, the EU's environment commissioner, told scientists from the UN's intergovernmental panel on climate change. The body is due to publish a report this week in Brussels on the impact of global warming.
What Mr Dimas knew - but did not tell the scientists, apparently - is that the EU's programme for cutting carbon, its two-year-old emissions trading scheme (ETS), remains in disarray.
The Democrats, who are now the majority party in the US Congress, and California's Republican governor, Arnold Schwarzenegger, are drafting plans for an American version of the carbon "cap-and-trade" scheme.
However, preliminary data on the scheme's performance last year - its second year of operation - showed that 93%, or about 9,000 of the 10,000 heavy industrial plants covered by the EU's trading scheme, emitted less carbon than their quota of free permits. The resulting 1%-1.5% rise in emissions was not as great as in 2005 but the spot price of a tonne of carbon fell by about a quarter to €1 (68p), at one point collapsing to just 92 cents.
Only a handful of countries shored up the market by issuing fewer emissions quotas than industry wanted. These included: Britain - where Drax, Europe's biggest coal-fired power plant, emitted 5m tonnes more than its 15.5m tonnes permit - Denmark, Ireland, Italy and Spain. The trading mechanism is designed to create scarcity, forcing up the price of carbon and prompting industries such as steel and power generation to invest in cleaner, greener technologies, such as renewable, carbon-free energy and, eventually, carbon capture and storage. So far, it is manifestly not working as planned.
Debacle
Mr Dimas and his officials deliberately released the raw data early - without analysis or interpretation - to avoid last year's debacle, when premature release of national statistics brought a disorderly collapse of the market. This year the full, sifted figures will be released on May 15.
The 2005 data showed that industry emitted 66m tonnes less carbon than allowed, prompting allegations that, in Germany alone, the four big power producers had enjoyed windfall profits of up to €8bn by cashing in their excess free carbon permits. In Britain, despite the tighter cap, generators are estimated to have made £1bn.
In 2006, industry emitted about 30m tonnes less than permitted. German emissions rose 0.6% while overall EU emissions went up by 1%-1.5% because of resumed growth in the eurozone.
Mr Dimas's officials readily admit that the first phase of the scheme has been a botched experiment because of the generous over-allocation of permits. But they now insist that the second phase will be much more successful because of tighter controls on quotas. Many EU governments have significantly reduced the number of carbon permits they will grant to polluters. Poland has cut its permit total by 26% and Latvia and Lithuania by half.
Brussels believes that the second phase of the trading scheme is crucial because it coincides with the key stage of the Kyoto protocol from 2008 to 2012. Brussels is pressing the US, other developed countries and emerging economies to agree on a global emissions trading scheme to be introduced after 2012, at UN talks starting in Bali in December. The EU has endorsed a unilateral 20% cut in greenhouse gases by 2020 and wants the developed world to sign up to a 30% cut, with countries such as China and India joining in.
"The whole idea of the second phase is to squeeze allocations, push up the carbon price by creating scarcity and encourage companies to invest in future, green technologies," one of Mr Dimas's aides said, pointing to a forward price for carbon in 2008 at close to €17 a tonne. They are delighted that the squeeze on national carbon caps for this second phase has prompted squealing from several big companies.
Cemex, the Mexican cement producer which owns the UK's RMC, is suing the European commission over the British permit plan while US Steel is similarly taking legal action over the Slovakian allocation plan. Three German companies have also launched legal action in the European court of justice.
Mahi Sideridou, EU climate policy director at Greenpeace, said yesterday's data strengthened Mr Dimas's hand in ruling on the second phase of the trading scheme. "In the first phase the commission didn't have any data and governments could freely submit; now it can compare reality to how many permits are given out," she said, suggesting that the commissioner would be emboldened to revise the scheme in time for the second phase.
Mr Dimas wants to include civil aviation in the ETS by 2011 despite the threat of legal action from the US and others. He insisted that the original EU-15 countries were still on course to meet their Kyoto target of an 8% cut in greenhouse gas emissions by 2012, despite mounting signs that Europe is still falling woefully short of this goal on its policies. California, which said last week it planned to link its own ETS to the EU's with four other western US states, and Washington will undoubtedly need more persuasive evidence.
MORE : http://environment.guardian.co.uk/print/0,,329766627-121568,00.html
SAID JEAN-LUC ROUX
Some US states want their own 'cap and trade' scheme but the evidence is proving that permits are so generous they fail to curb industry
David Gow in Brussels
Tuesday April 3, 2007
Guardian
Brussels lambasted the US and Australia yesterday for their inaction in cutting carbon dioxide emissions and stressed Europe's leading role in the battle against global warming. "Only EU leadership can break this impasse on a global agreement [post-Kyoto] to overcome climate change," Stavros Dimas, the EU's environment commissioner, told scientists from the UN's intergovernmental panel on climate change. The body is due to publish a report this week in Brussels on the impact of global warming.
What Mr Dimas knew - but did not tell the scientists, apparently - is that the EU's programme for cutting carbon, its two-year-old emissions trading scheme (ETS), remains in disarray.
The Democrats, who are now the majority party in the US Congress, and California's Republican governor, Arnold Schwarzenegger, are drafting plans for an American version of the carbon "cap-and-trade" scheme.
However, preliminary data on the scheme's performance last year - its second year of operation - showed that 93%, or about 9,000 of the 10,000 heavy industrial plants covered by the EU's trading scheme, emitted less carbon than their quota of free permits. The resulting 1%-1.5% rise in emissions was not as great as in 2005 but the spot price of a tonne of carbon fell by about a quarter to €1 (68p), at one point collapsing to just 92 cents.
Only a handful of countries shored up the market by issuing fewer emissions quotas than industry wanted. These included: Britain - where Drax, Europe's biggest coal-fired power plant, emitted 5m tonnes more than its 15.5m tonnes permit - Denmark, Ireland, Italy and Spain. The trading mechanism is designed to create scarcity, forcing up the price of carbon and prompting industries such as steel and power generation to invest in cleaner, greener technologies, such as renewable, carbon-free energy and, eventually, carbon capture and storage. So far, it is manifestly not working as planned.
Debacle
Mr Dimas and his officials deliberately released the raw data early - without analysis or interpretation - to avoid last year's debacle, when premature release of national statistics brought a disorderly collapse of the market. This year the full, sifted figures will be released on May 15.
The 2005 data showed that industry emitted 66m tonnes less carbon than allowed, prompting allegations that, in Germany alone, the four big power producers had enjoyed windfall profits of up to €8bn by cashing in their excess free carbon permits. In Britain, despite the tighter cap, generators are estimated to have made £1bn.
In 2006, industry emitted about 30m tonnes less than permitted. German emissions rose 0.6% while overall EU emissions went up by 1%-1.5% because of resumed growth in the eurozone.
Mr Dimas's officials readily admit that the first phase of the scheme has been a botched experiment because of the generous over-allocation of permits. But they now insist that the second phase will be much more successful because of tighter controls on quotas. Many EU governments have significantly reduced the number of carbon permits they will grant to polluters. Poland has cut its permit total by 26% and Latvia and Lithuania by half.
Brussels believes that the second phase of the trading scheme is crucial because it coincides with the key stage of the Kyoto protocol from 2008 to 2012. Brussels is pressing the US, other developed countries and emerging economies to agree on a global emissions trading scheme to be introduced after 2012, at UN talks starting in Bali in December. The EU has endorsed a unilateral 20% cut in greenhouse gases by 2020 and wants the developed world to sign up to a 30% cut, with countries such as China and India joining in.
"The whole idea of the second phase is to squeeze allocations, push up the carbon price by creating scarcity and encourage companies to invest in future, green technologies," one of Mr Dimas's aides said, pointing to a forward price for carbon in 2008 at close to €17 a tonne. They are delighted that the squeeze on national carbon caps for this second phase has prompted squealing from several big companies.
Cemex, the Mexican cement producer which owns the UK's RMC, is suing the European commission over the British permit plan while US Steel is similarly taking legal action over the Slovakian allocation plan. Three German companies have also launched legal action in the European court of justice.
Mahi Sideridou, EU climate policy director at Greenpeace, said yesterday's data strengthened Mr Dimas's hand in ruling on the second phase of the trading scheme. "In the first phase the commission didn't have any data and governments could freely submit; now it can compare reality to how many permits are given out," she said, suggesting that the commissioner would be emboldened to revise the scheme in time for the second phase.
Mr Dimas wants to include civil aviation in the ETS by 2011 despite the threat of legal action from the US and others. He insisted that the original EU-15 countries were still on course to meet their Kyoto target of an 8% cut in greenhouse gas emissions by 2012, despite mounting signs that Europe is still falling woefully short of this goal on its policies. California, which said last week it planned to link its own ETS to the EU's with four other western US states, and Washington will undoubtedly need more persuasive evidence.
MORE : http://environment.guardian.co.uk/print/0,,329766627-121568,00.html
US Supreme Court recognises that Co2 should be treated as air pollution
BIG VICOTRY!
Ewen MacAskill in Washington
Tuesday April 3, 2007
The Guardian
The US supreme court yesterday issued a landmark ruling in favour of environmentalists and against George Bush's stance on global warming. The court judged that the federal Environmental Protection Agency had the power through a clean air law to restrict exhaust emissions, and told the agency to re-examine the issue.
The ruling was in response to a lawsuit filed by 12 states and 13 environmental groups frustrated with the Bush administration's lack of action. Individual states, led by California, have been imposing regulations of their own. Car makers, public utilities, and others responsible for carbon dioxide emissions opposed the lawsuit. The decision opens the way for a new president in 2009 to curb emissions - all the Democratic and Republican candidates have made climate change a major part of their platforms.
Ewen MacAskill in Washington
Tuesday April 3, 2007
The Guardian
The US supreme court yesterday issued a landmark ruling in favour of environmentalists and against George Bush's stance on global warming. The court judged that the federal Environmental Protection Agency had the power through a clean air law to restrict exhaust emissions, and told the agency to re-examine the issue.
The ruling was in response to a lawsuit filed by 12 states and 13 environmental groups frustrated with the Bush administration's lack of action. Individual states, led by California, have been imposing regulations of their own. Car makers, public utilities, and others responsible for carbon dioxide emissions opposed the lawsuit. The decision opens the way for a new president in 2009 to curb emissions - all the Democratic and Republican candidates have made climate change a major part of their platforms.
Urban air pollution 'more dangerous than Chernobyl'
Study rates risks of city life as greater than radiation
· Passive smoking worse than living in blast zone
Ian Sample, science correspondent
Tuesday April 3, 2007
Guardian
Air pollution in major cities may be more damaging to health than the radiation exposure suffered by survivors of the 1986 Chernobyl disaster, according to a report published today.
The study suggests high levels of urban air pollution cut short life expectancy more than the radiation exposure of emergency workers who were sent into the 19-mile exclusion zone around the site straight after the accident.
Two explosions at the Chernobyl reactor killed three people immediately and more than 30 died from acute radiation poisoning, but the radioactive plume released from the reactor spread over most of Europe and is estimated to have caused up to 16,000 deaths.
The latest study follows a report last month from the Royal Commission on Environmental Pollution which said air pollution was responsible for 24,000 premature deaths in Britain every year.
Sir John Lawton, chairman of the commission, said the government had consistently failed to tackle rising levels of chemicals in the atmosphere in cities.
Other findings this year showed that women living in areas of high air pollution were at greater risk of heart disease and death, while children living within 500m of motorways suffered more permanent lung damage and lower life expectancy, probably because of their greater exposure to pollutants in vehicle fumes.
Jim Smith, a scientist at the government's Centre for Ecology and Hydrology in Dorchester, assessed the health risks faced by emergency workers at Chernobyl directly after the explosion and those who unofficially set up home in the exclusion zone afterwards. He compared them with the more familiar risks of air pollution, obesity, and passive and active smoking. He concluded that the Chernobyl group received doses of radiation equivalent to more than 12,000 chest x-rays and likely to cause one extra death in a hundred by increasing the risk of cancer.
The health risks associated with air pollution and passive smoking appear more severe. Pollution in central London increases mortality due to heart and lung disease by 2.8% compared with Inverness, Britain's least polluted city, while living with a smoker increases mortality by 1.7%, the study found.
In the journal BMC Public Health, Dr Smith writes: "Populations still living unofficially in the abandoned lands around Chernobyl may actually have a lower health risk from radiation than they would have if they were exposed to air pollution in a large city, such as nearby Kiev."
Dr Smith also calculated long-term mortality rates among survivors of the Hiroshima and Nagasaki bombings and compared them with obesity and active smoking. "The immediate effects of the Hiroshima and Nagasaki atomic bombs led to approximately 210,000 deaths in the two cities. However, radiation exposures experienced by the most exposed group of survivors led to an average loss of life expectancy significantly lower than that caused by severe obesity or active smoking," the report states.
Dr Smith said the aim of the report was to put health risks from radiation in context with more familiar threats. "We can all face such risks just going about our ordinary daily lives," he said.
"One of my reasons for comparing everyday risks with those of radiation contamination was the way in which contaminated Chernobyl refugees felt rejected by society. Our understandable fear of radiation needs to be placed in the context of other risks we encounter in our daily lives if we are to properly understand, and respond to, the potential impacts of any future radiation incidents."
Guardian Unlimited © Guardian News and Media Limited 2007
· Passive smoking worse than living in blast zone
Ian Sample, science correspondent
Tuesday April 3, 2007
Guardian
Air pollution in major cities may be more damaging to health than the radiation exposure suffered by survivors of the 1986 Chernobyl disaster, according to a report published today.
The study suggests high levels of urban air pollution cut short life expectancy more than the radiation exposure of emergency workers who were sent into the 19-mile exclusion zone around the site straight after the accident.
Two explosions at the Chernobyl reactor killed three people immediately and more than 30 died from acute radiation poisoning, but the radioactive plume released from the reactor spread over most of Europe and is estimated to have caused up to 16,000 deaths.
The latest study follows a report last month from the Royal Commission on Environmental Pollution which said air pollution was responsible for 24,000 premature deaths in Britain every year.
Sir John Lawton, chairman of the commission, said the government had consistently failed to tackle rising levels of chemicals in the atmosphere in cities.
Other findings this year showed that women living in areas of high air pollution were at greater risk of heart disease and death, while children living within 500m of motorways suffered more permanent lung damage and lower life expectancy, probably because of their greater exposure to pollutants in vehicle fumes.
Jim Smith, a scientist at the government's Centre for Ecology and Hydrology in Dorchester, assessed the health risks faced by emergency workers at Chernobyl directly after the explosion and those who unofficially set up home in the exclusion zone afterwards. He compared them with the more familiar risks of air pollution, obesity, and passive and active smoking. He concluded that the Chernobyl group received doses of radiation equivalent to more than 12,000 chest x-rays and likely to cause one extra death in a hundred by increasing the risk of cancer.
The health risks associated with air pollution and passive smoking appear more severe. Pollution in central London increases mortality due to heart and lung disease by 2.8% compared with Inverness, Britain's least polluted city, while living with a smoker increases mortality by 1.7%, the study found.
In the journal BMC Public Health, Dr Smith writes: "Populations still living unofficially in the abandoned lands around Chernobyl may actually have a lower health risk from radiation than they would have if they were exposed to air pollution in a large city, such as nearby Kiev."
Dr Smith also calculated long-term mortality rates among survivors of the Hiroshima and Nagasaki bombings and compared them with obesity and active smoking. "The immediate effects of the Hiroshima and Nagasaki atomic bombs led to approximately 210,000 deaths in the two cities. However, radiation exposures experienced by the most exposed group of survivors led to an average loss of life expectancy significantly lower than that caused by severe obesity or active smoking," the report states.
Dr Smith said the aim of the report was to put health risks from radiation in context with more familiar threats. "We can all face such risks just going about our ordinary daily lives," he said.
"One of my reasons for comparing everyday risks with those of radiation contamination was the way in which contaminated Chernobyl refugees felt rejected by society. Our understandable fear of radiation needs to be placed in the context of other risks we encounter in our daily lives if we are to properly understand, and respond to, the potential impacts of any future radiation incidents."
Guardian Unlimited © Guardian News and Media Limited 2007
Sunday, 1 April 2007
What Now For Our Feverish Planet?
"We do not have time to play around with this."
It was probably always too much to believe that human beings would be responsible stewards of the planet. We may be the smartest of all the animals, endowed with exponentially greater powers of insight and abstraction, but we're animals all the same. That means that we can also be shortsighted and brutish, hungry for food, resources, land--and heedless of the mess we leave behind trying to get them.
And make a mess we have. If droughts and wildfires, floods and crop failures, collapsing climate-sensitive species and the images of drowning polar bears didn't quiet most of the remaining global-warming doubters, the hurricane-driven destruction of New Orleans did. Dismissing a scientist's temperature chart is one thing. Dismissing the death of a major American city is something else entirely. What's more, the heat is only continuing to rise. This past year was the hottest on record in the U.S. The deceptively normal average temperature this winter masked record-breaking highs in December and record-breaking lows in February. That's the sign not of a planet keeping an even strain but of one thrashing through the alternating chills and night sweats of a serious illness.
The U.N.'s Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change issued a report on the state of planetary warming in February that was surprising only in its utter lack of hedging. "Warming of the climate system is unequivocal," the report stated. What's more, there is "very high confidence" that human activities since 1750 have played a significant role by overloading the atmosphere with carbon dioxide hence retaining solar heat that would otherwise radiate away. The report concludes that while the long-term solution is to reduce the levels of CO2 in the atmosphere, for now we're going to have to dig in and prepare, building better levees, moving to higher ground, abandoning vulnerable floodplains altogether. When former Vice President Al Gore made his triumphant return to Capitol Hill on March 21 to testify before Congress on climate change, he issued an uncompromising warning: "We do not have time to play around with this."
The Global Warming Survival Guide
GLOBAL WARMING
51 Things We Can Do
Can one person slow global warming? Actually, yes. You—along with scientists, businesses and governments—can create paths to cut carbon emissions. Here is our guide to some of the planet's best ideas, with an assessment of their impact and feel—good factor.
Tuesday, 6 March 2007
Just a lot of hot air
"The UK as many others Member states is developing fake measures to fight against climate change designed to make public feel better about thereselves, without political pain:
Car voluntary agreement with the EU and Tax looks morelike incientive than anything else! The other big fake measure is the biofuel: 1. A study conducted last year by Sarasin, a Swiss bank placed "the present limit for the environmentally and socially responsible use of biofuels at roughly 5% of current petrol and diesel consumption in the EU and US" 2. A study by the Dutch scientific consultancy Delft Hydraulics found that the production of every tonne of palm oil causes 33 tonnes of carbon dioxide emissions. This makes oil palm 10 times worse than petroleumJust a lot of hot air" JLR
Tony Blair talks the talk on climate change. But a new investigation reveals that the government's strategies for cutting carbon dioxide emissions are little more than a sham. By George Monbiot
George Monbiot
Monday March 5, 2007
Guardian
'If we do not motivate ourselves to take the decisions commensurate with the gravity of the threat that we face," said Tony Blair at the launch of the Bill Clinton's climate initiative last year, "we will betray in the most irresponsible way the generations to come. That is not something I want on my conscience as a political leader."
Well, it looks as if he is going to have to live with it. Blair has had 10 years in which to tackle Britain's contribution to global climate change, and he has blown it. His bold initiatives and stirring speeches now look like little more than greenwash. For the first time, we have the figures to prove it.
With Channel 4's series Dispatches, I commissioned a team of environmental scientists at University College, London, to conduct a peer-reviewed audit of the government's planned greenhouse gas reductions. The scientists, led by Professor Mark Maslin, estimated the real impact of its carbon-cutting policies. Nothing quite like this has ever been done before. The results are staggering.
The government has two formal targets for reducing Britain's climate-changing gases. The first is the one set by the Kyoto protocol, which commits the UK to a 12.5% reduction by 2012. The second is its long-term goal of a 60% cut in carbon dioxide by 2050. This target will be made legally binding later this year.
Last year the government's Energy Review found that to show "real progress" towards the 2050 target, by 2020 the UK's greenhouse gas emissions would need to be reduced to between 143 and 149m tonnes a year. This means a cut of 29 to 31% on 1990 levels. We asked Maslin's team to assess the policies that are supposed to deliver it.
For an audit, the 2020 aim is more useful than the 2050 target. If we are to have a realistic chance of hitting it, the necessary policies must already be in place or in development. While the Blair government would be only partly responsible if we fail to make 60% by 2050, it will carry almost all the blame if we do not reach its milestone in 2020.
Our audit reveals that the government's assessment of its own policies is wildly optimistic. Instead of a 29-31% cut by 2020, it is on course to deliver a reduction of between 12% and 17%. At this rate the UK will not meet its 2020 milestone until 2050. This result suggests that the government's claim to be "leading the world on tackling climate change" is simply another product of the Downing Street spin machine. Its carbon-cutting policies are little more than a sham. Take transport, for example. The government expects that national transport emissions (not counting international flights) will rise by 4m tonnes between 1990 and 2020. Maslin's team discovered that the real increase will be between 7 and 13m tonnes.
Faced with a vocal and powerful motoring lobby, Blair's government has sought to cut emissions in three ways, all of which are failing. The first is a voluntary agreement, struck in Brussels with the major motor manufacturers. In 1998, the car makers promised they would reduce the average emissions from new cars from 190 to 140 grams per kilometre in 10 years. The deadline is next year, and they will miss their target by half: the real figure is likely to be 164 grams.
The second mechanism is the tax we pay to put a car on the road - vehicle excise duty (VED). In 2001, the government replaced the flat rate for VED with a graduated tax. Owners of the most fuel-hungry cars would have to pay more than owners of efficient models. Seven bands were introduced, starting with A (for cars that produce less than 100 grams per kilometre) and rising to G (for those producing more than 225 grams).
A survey carried out by the Department for Transport found that to encourage most drivers to switch to a less polluting model, you would need a difference between the bands of at least £150. The government's Sustainable Development Commission went further: if the tax were to be really effective, the top whack should be £1,800. But the government's top rate is £215, and the average difference between the bands £35. When you are shelling out £65,000 for a Range Rover, is that really going to make a difference?
The third policy is to encourage us to switch to biofuels - diesel or alcohol made from plants. By 2010, the government wants 5% of all our transport fuels to be made this way. By 2020, the EU wants to raise this to 20%. But there are two massive problems, which the government consistently refuses to address. The first is that beyond a certain point, the production of fuel begins to compete directly with the production of food. A study conducted last year by Sarasin, a Swiss bank placed "the present limit for the environmentally and socially responsible use of biofuels at roughly 5% of current petrol and diesel consumption in the EU and US". Already, when only a tiny fraction of our transport fuel comes from plants, the UN's Food and Agriculture Organisation reports that the demand for biofuels has helped to cause a "surge in the prices of cereals" to "levels not seen for a decade". All over the world, the poor are feeling the effect.
The second problem is that the new market has stimulated a massive expansion of destructive plantations, especially of oil palm. Palm oil planting is the major cause of tropical deforestation in both Malaysia and Indonesia. As the forests are cut down, the carbon in both the trees and the peat they grow on turns into carbon dioxide. A study by the Dutch scientific consultancy Delft Hydraulics found that the production of every tonne of palm oil causes 33 tonnes of carbon dioxide emissions. This makes oil palm 10 times worse than petroleum. Already nine new palm oil refineries are being built, in Malaysia, Singapore and Rotterdam, specifically to meet the growing demand from the European biofuel market.
The government urges us not to worry - a "second generation" of biofuels will eventually become available, made from straw, wood and waste. But there is no guarantee that these will out-compete their cheap but destructive rivals, or that they will be ready before the last rain-forests in south-east Asia have been felled.
In every sector the audit found similar oversights, elisions and deceptions. In housing, for example, the government has loudly proclaimed its intention to use better building regulations to make new houses more energy efficient - by 2016, it says, every new home in the country will be "zero carbon". But since the energy efficiency regulations were first introduced in 1985 there has not been a single prosecution for non-compliance. Building inspectors treat the energy rules as a joke - in one recent survey they dismissed them as "trivial" and "not life threatening". A study by the Building Research Establishment of new houses passed by the inspectors found that 43% of them did not meet satisfactory energy standards.
But the biggest greenwash of all involves flying. Under the Kyoto protocol, the pollution from international flights does not count towards a country's emissions. The government has taken this as a licence to ignore flying even when setting its own targets. The emissions simply do not appear on the balance sheet. Otherwise it could not justify its instruction to the UK's airports to double their capacity between now and 2030.
Because they were assessing the government's own programme, the auditors didn't produce figures for aviation. But even the government proposes that carbon emissions from planes will rise by 10.5m tonnes between 1990 and 2020. Had it been incorporated into the audit, this figure would have reduced the cuts for the whole economy by 2020 to between 8 and 13%.
But the government's figure is almost certainly a wild underestimate. It counts only half the emissions from planes flying to and from our airports, on the grounds that only half the passengers belong to this country. In reality, 67% are UK citizens. It also ignores the other greenhouse gases - especially high-level water vapour - that flying produces. If increases in international flights were counted in the national total, they could wipe out all the cuts in the UK's emissions between 1990 and 2020.
What makes these failures most shocking is that Blair's government took office in 1997 with a massive head start. When John Major left office, the UK was one of the few nations on course to meet its Kyoto commitments, with plenty of emissions to spare. That advantage has already been squandered. Today the UK is turning out slightly more carbon dioxide than it was in 1997 (though other greenhouse gases have declined) and we will just scrape in beneath the 2012 Kyoto bar, while on course for dramatically missing our 2020 and 2050 targets.
Instead of real action to deal with the greatest menace of the 21st century, the government has sold us a set of fake policies, designed to make us feel better about ourselves, without political pain. Next time Blair gives a heart-rending speech about his legacy to future generations, don't believe a word of it.
· George Monbiot will present Dispatches: Greenwash on Channel 4 at 8pm tonight. www.monbiot.com
Guardian Unlimited © Guardian News and Media Limited 2007
Car voluntary agreement with the EU and Tax looks morelike incientive than anything else! The other big fake measure is the biofuel: 1. A study conducted last year by Sarasin, a Swiss bank placed "the present limit for the environmentally and socially responsible use of biofuels at roughly 5% of current petrol and diesel consumption in the EU and US" 2. A study by the Dutch scientific consultancy Delft Hydraulics found that the production of every tonne of palm oil causes 33 tonnes of carbon dioxide emissions. This makes oil palm 10 times worse than petroleumJust a lot of hot air" JLR
Tony Blair talks the talk on climate change. But a new investigation reveals that the government's strategies for cutting carbon dioxide emissions are little more than a sham. By George Monbiot
George Monbiot
Monday March 5, 2007
Guardian
'If we do not motivate ourselves to take the decisions commensurate with the gravity of the threat that we face," said Tony Blair at the launch of the Bill Clinton's climate initiative last year, "we will betray in the most irresponsible way the generations to come. That is not something I want on my conscience as a political leader."
Well, it looks as if he is going to have to live with it. Blair has had 10 years in which to tackle Britain's contribution to global climate change, and he has blown it. His bold initiatives and stirring speeches now look like little more than greenwash. For the first time, we have the figures to prove it.
With Channel 4's series Dispatches, I commissioned a team of environmental scientists at University College, London, to conduct a peer-reviewed audit of the government's planned greenhouse gas reductions. The scientists, led by Professor Mark Maslin, estimated the real impact of its carbon-cutting policies. Nothing quite like this has ever been done before. The results are staggering.
The government has two formal targets for reducing Britain's climate-changing gases. The first is the one set by the Kyoto protocol, which commits the UK to a 12.5% reduction by 2012. The second is its long-term goal of a 60% cut in carbon dioxide by 2050. This target will be made legally binding later this year.
Last year the government's Energy Review found that to show "real progress" towards the 2050 target, by 2020 the UK's greenhouse gas emissions would need to be reduced to between 143 and 149m tonnes a year. This means a cut of 29 to 31% on 1990 levels. We asked Maslin's team to assess the policies that are supposed to deliver it.
For an audit, the 2020 aim is more useful than the 2050 target. If we are to have a realistic chance of hitting it, the necessary policies must already be in place or in development. While the Blair government would be only partly responsible if we fail to make 60% by 2050, it will carry almost all the blame if we do not reach its milestone in 2020.
Our audit reveals that the government's assessment of its own policies is wildly optimistic. Instead of a 29-31% cut by 2020, it is on course to deliver a reduction of between 12% and 17%. At this rate the UK will not meet its 2020 milestone until 2050. This result suggests that the government's claim to be "leading the world on tackling climate change" is simply another product of the Downing Street spin machine. Its carbon-cutting policies are little more than a sham. Take transport, for example. The government expects that national transport emissions (not counting international flights) will rise by 4m tonnes between 1990 and 2020. Maslin's team discovered that the real increase will be between 7 and 13m tonnes.
Faced with a vocal and powerful motoring lobby, Blair's government has sought to cut emissions in three ways, all of which are failing. The first is a voluntary agreement, struck in Brussels with the major motor manufacturers. In 1998, the car makers promised they would reduce the average emissions from new cars from 190 to 140 grams per kilometre in 10 years. The deadline is next year, and they will miss their target by half: the real figure is likely to be 164 grams.
The second mechanism is the tax we pay to put a car on the road - vehicle excise duty (VED). In 2001, the government replaced the flat rate for VED with a graduated tax. Owners of the most fuel-hungry cars would have to pay more than owners of efficient models. Seven bands were introduced, starting with A (for cars that produce less than 100 grams per kilometre) and rising to G (for those producing more than 225 grams).
A survey carried out by the Department for Transport found that to encourage most drivers to switch to a less polluting model, you would need a difference between the bands of at least £150. The government's Sustainable Development Commission went further: if the tax were to be really effective, the top whack should be £1,800. But the government's top rate is £215, and the average difference between the bands £35. When you are shelling out £65,000 for a Range Rover, is that really going to make a difference?
The third policy is to encourage us to switch to biofuels - diesel or alcohol made from plants. By 2010, the government wants 5% of all our transport fuels to be made this way. By 2020, the EU wants to raise this to 20%. But there are two massive problems, which the government consistently refuses to address. The first is that beyond a certain point, the production of fuel begins to compete directly with the production of food. A study conducted last year by Sarasin, a Swiss bank placed "the present limit for the environmentally and socially responsible use of biofuels at roughly 5% of current petrol and diesel consumption in the EU and US". Already, when only a tiny fraction of our transport fuel comes from plants, the UN's Food and Agriculture Organisation reports that the demand for biofuels has helped to cause a "surge in the prices of cereals" to "levels not seen for a decade". All over the world, the poor are feeling the effect.
The second problem is that the new market has stimulated a massive expansion of destructive plantations, especially of oil palm. Palm oil planting is the major cause of tropical deforestation in both Malaysia and Indonesia. As the forests are cut down, the carbon in both the trees and the peat they grow on turns into carbon dioxide. A study by the Dutch scientific consultancy Delft Hydraulics found that the production of every tonne of palm oil causes 33 tonnes of carbon dioxide emissions. This makes oil palm 10 times worse than petroleum. Already nine new palm oil refineries are being built, in Malaysia, Singapore and Rotterdam, specifically to meet the growing demand from the European biofuel market.
The government urges us not to worry - a "second generation" of biofuels will eventually become available, made from straw, wood and waste. But there is no guarantee that these will out-compete their cheap but destructive rivals, or that they will be ready before the last rain-forests in south-east Asia have been felled.
In every sector the audit found similar oversights, elisions and deceptions. In housing, for example, the government has loudly proclaimed its intention to use better building regulations to make new houses more energy efficient - by 2016, it says, every new home in the country will be "zero carbon". But since the energy efficiency regulations were first introduced in 1985 there has not been a single prosecution for non-compliance. Building inspectors treat the energy rules as a joke - in one recent survey they dismissed them as "trivial" and "not life threatening". A study by the Building Research Establishment of new houses passed by the inspectors found that 43% of them did not meet satisfactory energy standards.
But the biggest greenwash of all involves flying. Under the Kyoto protocol, the pollution from international flights does not count towards a country's emissions. The government has taken this as a licence to ignore flying even when setting its own targets. The emissions simply do not appear on the balance sheet. Otherwise it could not justify its instruction to the UK's airports to double their capacity between now and 2030.
Because they were assessing the government's own programme, the auditors didn't produce figures for aviation. But even the government proposes that carbon emissions from planes will rise by 10.5m tonnes between 1990 and 2020. Had it been incorporated into the audit, this figure would have reduced the cuts for the whole economy by 2020 to between 8 and 13%.
But the government's figure is almost certainly a wild underestimate. It counts only half the emissions from planes flying to and from our airports, on the grounds that only half the passengers belong to this country. In reality, 67% are UK citizens. It also ignores the other greenhouse gases - especially high-level water vapour - that flying produces. If increases in international flights were counted in the national total, they could wipe out all the cuts in the UK's emissions between 1990 and 2020.
What makes these failures most shocking is that Blair's government took office in 1997 with a massive head start. When John Major left office, the UK was one of the few nations on course to meet its Kyoto commitments, with plenty of emissions to spare. That advantage has already been squandered. Today the UK is turning out slightly more carbon dioxide than it was in 1997 (though other greenhouse gases have declined) and we will just scrape in beneath the 2012 Kyoto bar, while on course for dramatically missing our 2020 and 2050 targets.
Instead of real action to deal with the greatest menace of the 21st century, the government has sold us a set of fake policies, designed to make us feel better about ourselves, without political pain. Next time Blair gives a heart-rending speech about his legacy to future generations, don't believe a word of it.
· George Monbiot will present Dispatches: Greenwash on Channel 4 at 8pm tonight. www.monbiot.com
Guardian Unlimited © Guardian News and Media Limited 2007
Official report says US CO2 to rise by 20%
Official report says US CO2 to rise by 20%
· Publication delayed for more than a year
· Authors argue president's efforts 'are working'
Ed Pilkington in New York
Monday March 5, 2007
Guardian
A draft report prepared by the Bush administration admits that emissions of greenhouse gases by the United States will rise by 2020 to 20% above 2000 levels, flying in the face of warnings from scientists that drastic action to cut emissions is needed if environmental catastrophe is to be averted.
The internal administration report, which has been obtained by the Associated Press, should have been handed to the United Nations more than a year ago as part of the world body's monitoring of climate change, but its publication has been delayed. The draft estimates that US emissions of so-called greenhouse gases, largely from the burning of oil, coil and natural gas, will rise from 7.7bn tons in 2000 to 9.2bn tons in 2020 - an increase of 19.5%.
The growth is in line with expectations, but underlines how out of kilter the US government is with world opinion and efforts to tackle climate change. The Kyoto protocol, which the Bush administration has refused to ratify partly on the grounds that it would damage the US economy, demands of most developed countries that they reduce their 1990 emissions levels by 5% by 2012.
The US produces about a quarter of the world's carbon dioxide and other gases believed responsible for warming the world's atmosphere. Environmentalists and green groups say that if irreversible global warming is to be avoided far more stringent targets should be set than even those proposed under the Kyoto protocol, which came into force two years ago. On April 14 campaigners will be demonstrating in cities across the US to call for 80% cuts by 2050.
The draft report obtained by AP says that how much the administration can do to cut emissions beyond merely slowing the rate of increase will become clear "as the science justifies".
It does, however, predict what may happen to the country were global warming allowed to gather pace, including a sharp reduction in spring snow coverings in the north-west of the country, which could exacerbate summer water shortages throughout that region.
The White House council on environmental quality, which is responsible for the draft report, told AP that its final version will "show that the president's portfolio of actions and his financial commitment to addressing climate change are working".
The report's confirmation of the scale of pollution projected for the US comes a month after climatologists issued their strongest warning to date of the devastation that global warming could cause on the planet.
The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, written by hundreds of the most respected climate scientists from around the world, said that human activity was "very likely" to be behind the phenomenon.
Average temperatures could rise by over 6C (11F) by the end of the century, the panel said.
The stated policy of the Bush administration is to reduce emissions, but so far it has set only voluntary targets. In the absence of binding commitments from the federal government, individual states have moved independently.
California has led the field by aiming to cut its emissions to 1990 levels by 2020 and to meet the target of 80% below 1990 levels by 2050.
· Publication delayed for more than a year
· Authors argue president's efforts 'are working'
Ed Pilkington in New York
Monday March 5, 2007
Guardian
A draft report prepared by the Bush administration admits that emissions of greenhouse gases by the United States will rise by 2020 to 20% above 2000 levels, flying in the face of warnings from scientists that drastic action to cut emissions is needed if environmental catastrophe is to be averted.
The internal administration report, which has been obtained by the Associated Press, should have been handed to the United Nations more than a year ago as part of the world body's monitoring of climate change, but its publication has been delayed. The draft estimates that US emissions of so-called greenhouse gases, largely from the burning of oil, coil and natural gas, will rise from 7.7bn tons in 2000 to 9.2bn tons in 2020 - an increase of 19.5%.
The growth is in line with expectations, but underlines how out of kilter the US government is with world opinion and efforts to tackle climate change. The Kyoto protocol, which the Bush administration has refused to ratify partly on the grounds that it would damage the US economy, demands of most developed countries that they reduce their 1990 emissions levels by 5% by 2012.
The US produces about a quarter of the world's carbon dioxide and other gases believed responsible for warming the world's atmosphere. Environmentalists and green groups say that if irreversible global warming is to be avoided far more stringent targets should be set than even those proposed under the Kyoto protocol, which came into force two years ago. On April 14 campaigners will be demonstrating in cities across the US to call for 80% cuts by 2050.
The draft report obtained by AP says that how much the administration can do to cut emissions beyond merely slowing the rate of increase will become clear "as the science justifies".
It does, however, predict what may happen to the country were global warming allowed to gather pace, including a sharp reduction in spring snow coverings in the north-west of the country, which could exacerbate summer water shortages throughout that region.
The White House council on environmental quality, which is responsible for the draft report, told AP that its final version will "show that the president's portfolio of actions and his financial commitment to addressing climate change are working".
The report's confirmation of the scale of pollution projected for the US comes a month after climatologists issued their strongest warning to date of the devastation that global warming could cause on the planet.
The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, written by hundreds of the most respected climate scientists from around the world, said that human activity was "very likely" to be behind the phenomenon.
Average temperatures could rise by over 6C (11F) by the end of the century, the panel said.
The stated policy of the Bush administration is to reduce emissions, but so far it has set only voluntary targets. In the absence of binding commitments from the federal government, individual states have moved independently.
California has led the field by aiming to cut its emissions to 1990 levels by 2020 and to meet the target of 80% below 1990 levels by 2050.
Monday, 5 March 2007
A switch to biofuels will not save the planet
A switch to biofuels will not save the planet
Published: 05 March 2007
On the face of it, it's most encouraging that biofuels will be at the top of the agenda when George Bush touches down in Sao Paolo on Thursday to meet his Brazilian counterpart, Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva. For years, environmentalists have complained of the industrialised world's "addiction to oil", to use Mr Bush's own words. The US President has now clearly grasped the message that his gas-guzzling compatriots need to wean themselves off fossil fuels - and not simply because the oil-rich Hugo Chavez of Venezuela is so hostile to America. Mr Bush understands that, with or without Mr Chavez, to continue consuming fossil fuels at the present breakneck speed is not an option.
Hence the biofuel "summit" in Sao Paolo, where the two countries that make the bulk of the world's ethanol - from sugar cane in Brazil and corn in the US - are likely to seal an "ethanol alliance". The terms of this accord will probably be aimed at boosting sugar-cane production in Latin America to meet a rising demand for ethanol in the US that America's farmers can't meet.
It's not just Mr Bush who is eyeing the potential for a world energy revolution in the endless fields of sugar cane surrounding Sao Paolo. Businesses are already excited, and are pumping huge sums into the development of renewable alternatives to oil, which include soybean-based biodiesel and other ethanol variants made from wood chips. In short, the ethanol business is booming. Moreover, the ambitious targets the US has set for ethanol production mean the boom has only just begun. Mr Bush has ordered a five-fold increase in American use of biofuels by 2017, which means a target of 35 billion gallons a year.
It's an exciting, almost dizzying thought, that the humble corn stalk or sugar cane may hold the solution to the looming energy crisis.
So what's the catch? This is the hard part. Of course it's good that the leader of America, a Texas Republican to boot, has finally understood that the US, as the world's biggest single consumer of energy, has got to change its energy source.
The problem is that many Americans, and Europeans for that matter, seem to think it is just a matter of flicking a switch: one moment fossil fuel, the next moment, sugar cane-plus-corn. Lifestyle - unaltered.
Sadly, that's not enough. Ethanol may sound like the kind of "friendly" energy the world has been waiting for. But for ethanol production to rise to the levels Mr Bush is hoping for, huge amounts of the world's remaining forests will have to be cut down and turned over to corn or sugar cane.
The existing hectarage devoted to agriculture will not be remotely large enough to produce the quantity of fuel needed. In other words, paradoxically, a growing reliance of renewable energy may accelerate the destruction of the rainforests we so desperately need to moderate the planet's temperature. Besides, according to the World Conservation Union, growing corn uses far more energy than the finished fuel produces.
There is another downside to the ethanol boom. As demand rises, the price of the cereals from which it is partly made soars as well. Tortilla prices in Mexico are already surging as a result of ethanol demand in America. This threatens the precarious livelihoods of many of the world's poorest people.
To simply shift from fossil fuel use to ethanol is not going to get us out of our dilemma. It's not going to "save the planet", or not alone. That will require a sharp reduction in fuel consumption, too. The question is whether Mr Bush, other world leaders, or the public, for that matter, have taken this fact on board.
The Big Green Fuel Lie
How long will the American and European government sail the idea that the biofuel is a solution to climate change? This is mainly untrue ... Jean-Luc Roux
The Big Green Fuel Lie
George Bush says that ethanol will save the world. But there is evidence that biofuels may bring new problems for the planet
By Daniel Howden in Sao Paolo
Published: 05 March 2007
The ethanol boom is coming. The twin threats of climate change and energy security are creating an unprecedented thirst for alternative energy with ethanol leading the way.
That process is set to reach a landmark on Thursday when the US President, George Bush, arrives in Brazil to kick-start the creation of an international market for ethanol that could one day rival oil as a global commodity. The expected creation of an "Opec for ethanol" replicating the cartel of major oil producers has spurred frenzied investment in biofuels across the Americas.
But a growing number of economists, scientists and environmentalists are calling for a "time out" and warning that the headlong rush into massive ethanol production is creating more problems than it is solving.
To its advocates, ethanol, which can be made from corn, barley, wheat, sugar cane or beet is a green panacea - a clean-burning, renewable energy source that will see us switch from dwindling oil wells to boundless fields of crops to satisfy our energy needs.
Dr Plinio Mario Nastari, one of Brazil's leading economists and an expert in biofuels, sees a bright future for an energy sector in which his country is the acknowledged world leader: "We are on the brink of a new era, ethanol is changing a lot of things but in a positive sense."
In its first major acknowledgment of the dangers of climate change, the White House this year committed itself to substituting 20 per cent of the petroleum it uses for ethanol by 2017.
In Brazil, that switch is more advanced than anywhere in the world and it has already substituted 40 per cent of its gasoline usage.
Ethanol is nothing new in Brazil. It has been used as fuel since 1925. But the real boom came after the oil crisis of 1973 spurred the military dictatorship to lessen the country's reliance on foreign imports of fossil fuels. The generals poured public subsidies and incentives into the sugar industry to produce ethanol.
Today, the congested streets of Sao Paolo are packed with flex-fuel cars that run off a growing menu of bio and fossil fuel mixtures, and all filling stations offer "alcohol" and "gas" at the pump, with the latter at roughly twice the price by volume.
But there is a darker side to this green revolution, which argues for a cautious assessment of how big a role ethanol can play in filling the developed world's fuel tank. The prospect of a sudden surge in demand for ethanol is causing serious concerns even in Brazil.
The ethanol industry has been linked with air and water pollution on an epic scale, along with deforestation in both the Amazon and Atlantic rainforests, as well as the wholesale destruction of Brazil's unique savannah land.
Fabio Feldman, a leading Brazilian environmentalist and former member of Congress who helped to pass the law mandating a 23 per cent mix of ethanol to be added to all petroleum supplies in the country, believes that Brazil's trailblazing switch has had serious side effects.
"Some of the cane plantations are the size of European states, these vast monocultures have replaced important eco-systems," he said. "If you see the size of the plantations in the state of Sao Paolo they are oceans of sugar cane. In order to harvest you must burn the plantations which creates a serious air pollution problem in the city."
Despite its leading role in biofuels, Brazil remains the fourth largest producer of carbon emissions in the world due to deforestation. Dr Nastarti rejects any linkage between deforestation and ethanol and argues that cane production accounts for little more than 10 per cent of Brazil's farmland.
However, Dr Nastari is calling for new legislation in Brazil to ensure that mushrooming sugar plantations do not directly or indirectly contribute to the destruction of vital forest preserves.
Sceptics, however, point out that existing legislation is unenforceable and agri-business from banned GM cotton to soy beans has been able to ignore legislation.
"In large areas of Brazil there is a total absence of the state and no respect for environmental legislation," said Mr Feldman.
"Ethanol can be a good alternative in the fight against global warming but at the same time we must make sure we are not creating a worse problem than the one we are trying to solve."
The conditions for a true nightmare scenario are being created not in Brazil, despite its environment concerns, but in the US's own domestic ethanol industry.
While Brazil's tropical climate allows it to source alcohol from its sugar crop, the US has turned to its industrialised corn belt for the raw material to substitute oil. The American economist Lester R Brown, from the Earth Policy Institute, is leading the warning voices: "The competition for grain between the world's 800 million motorists who want to maintain their mobility and its two billion poorest people who are simply trying to stay alive is emerging as an epic issue."
Speaking in Sao Paolo, where the ethanol boom is expected to take off with a US-Brazil trade deal this Thursday, Fabio Feldman, said: "We must stop and take a breath and consider the consequences."
Biofuel costs
When Rudolph Diesel unveiled his new engine at the 1900 World's Fair, he made a point of demonstrating that it could be run on peanut oil. "Such oils may become, in the course of time, as important as petroleum and the coal tar products of the present time," he said.
And so it has come to pass that US President George Bush has decreed that America must wean itself off oil with the help of biofuels made from corn, sugar cane and other suitable crops.
At its simplest, the argument for biofuels is this: By growing crops to produce organic compounds that can be burnt in an engine, you are not adding to the overall levels of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere.
The amount of CO2 that the fuel produces when burnt should balance the amount absorbed during the growth of the plants.
However, many biofuel crops, such as corn, are grown with the help of fossil fuels in the form of fertilisers, pesticides and the petrol for farm equipment.
One estimate is that corn needs 30 per cent more energy than the finished fuel it produces.
Another problem is the land required to produce it. One estimate is that the grain needed to fill the petrol tank of a 4X4 with ethanol is sufficient to feed a person for a year.
The Big Green Fuel Lie
George Bush says that ethanol will save the world. But there is evidence that biofuels may bring new problems for the planet
By Daniel Howden in Sao Paolo
Published: 05 March 2007
The ethanol boom is coming. The twin threats of climate change and energy security are creating an unprecedented thirst for alternative energy with ethanol leading the way.
That process is set to reach a landmark on Thursday when the US President, George Bush, arrives in Brazil to kick-start the creation of an international market for ethanol that could one day rival oil as a global commodity. The expected creation of an "Opec for ethanol" replicating the cartel of major oil producers has spurred frenzied investment in biofuels across the Americas.
But a growing number of economists, scientists and environmentalists are calling for a "time out" and warning that the headlong rush into massive ethanol production is creating more problems than it is solving.
To its advocates, ethanol, which can be made from corn, barley, wheat, sugar cane or beet is a green panacea - a clean-burning, renewable energy source that will see us switch from dwindling oil wells to boundless fields of crops to satisfy our energy needs.
Dr Plinio Mario Nastari, one of Brazil's leading economists and an expert in biofuels, sees a bright future for an energy sector in which his country is the acknowledged world leader: "We are on the brink of a new era, ethanol is changing a lot of things but in a positive sense."
In its first major acknowledgment of the dangers of climate change, the White House this year committed itself to substituting 20 per cent of the petroleum it uses for ethanol by 2017.
In Brazil, that switch is more advanced than anywhere in the world and it has already substituted 40 per cent of its gasoline usage.
Ethanol is nothing new in Brazil. It has been used as fuel since 1925. But the real boom came after the oil crisis of 1973 spurred the military dictatorship to lessen the country's reliance on foreign imports of fossil fuels. The generals poured public subsidies and incentives into the sugar industry to produce ethanol.
Today, the congested streets of Sao Paolo are packed with flex-fuel cars that run off a growing menu of bio and fossil fuel mixtures, and all filling stations offer "alcohol" and "gas" at the pump, with the latter at roughly twice the price by volume.
But there is a darker side to this green revolution, which argues for a cautious assessment of how big a role ethanol can play in filling the developed world's fuel tank. The prospect of a sudden surge in demand for ethanol is causing serious concerns even in Brazil.
The ethanol industry has been linked with air and water pollution on an epic scale, along with deforestation in both the Amazon and Atlantic rainforests, as well as the wholesale destruction of Brazil's unique savannah land.
Fabio Feldman, a leading Brazilian environmentalist and former member of Congress who helped to pass the law mandating a 23 per cent mix of ethanol to be added to all petroleum supplies in the country, believes that Brazil's trailblazing switch has had serious side effects.
"Some of the cane plantations are the size of European states, these vast monocultures have replaced important eco-systems," he said. "If you see the size of the plantations in the state of Sao Paolo they are oceans of sugar cane. In order to harvest you must burn the plantations which creates a serious air pollution problem in the city."
Despite its leading role in biofuels, Brazil remains the fourth largest producer of carbon emissions in the world due to deforestation. Dr Nastarti rejects any linkage between deforestation and ethanol and argues that cane production accounts for little more than 10 per cent of Brazil's farmland.
However, Dr Nastari is calling for new legislation in Brazil to ensure that mushrooming sugar plantations do not directly or indirectly contribute to the destruction of vital forest preserves.
Sceptics, however, point out that existing legislation is unenforceable and agri-business from banned GM cotton to soy beans has been able to ignore legislation.
"In large areas of Brazil there is a total absence of the state and no respect for environmental legislation," said Mr Feldman.
"Ethanol can be a good alternative in the fight against global warming but at the same time we must make sure we are not creating a worse problem than the one we are trying to solve."
The conditions for a true nightmare scenario are being created not in Brazil, despite its environment concerns, but in the US's own domestic ethanol industry.
While Brazil's tropical climate allows it to source alcohol from its sugar crop, the US has turned to its industrialised corn belt for the raw material to substitute oil. The American economist Lester R Brown, from the Earth Policy Institute, is leading the warning voices: "The competition for grain between the world's 800 million motorists who want to maintain their mobility and its two billion poorest people who are simply trying to stay alive is emerging as an epic issue."
Speaking in Sao Paolo, where the ethanol boom is expected to take off with a US-Brazil trade deal this Thursday, Fabio Feldman, said: "We must stop and take a breath and consider the consequences."
Biofuel costs
When Rudolph Diesel unveiled his new engine at the 1900 World's Fair, he made a point of demonstrating that it could be run on peanut oil. "Such oils may become, in the course of time, as important as petroleum and the coal tar products of the present time," he said.
And so it has come to pass that US President George Bush has decreed that America must wean itself off oil with the help of biofuels made from corn, sugar cane and other suitable crops.
At its simplest, the argument for biofuels is this: By growing crops to produce organic compounds that can be burnt in an engine, you are not adding to the overall levels of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere.
The amount of CO2 that the fuel produces when burnt should balance the amount absorbed during the growth of the plants.
However, many biofuel crops, such as corn, are grown with the help of fossil fuels in the form of fertilisers, pesticides and the petrol for farm equipment.
One estimate is that corn needs 30 per cent more energy than the finished fuel it produces.
Another problem is the land required to produce it. One estimate is that the grain needed to fill the petrol tank of a 4X4 with ethanol is sufficient to feed a person for a year.
Tuesday, 27 February 2007
Is compressed air powered cars a solution? YES Tata the biggest industrial group in India is going to build it!
India's Tata Motors and France's MDI sign agreement to build compressed air-powered cars
Posted Feb 8th 2007 11:01AM by Sebastian Blanco
Filed under: Emerging Technologies, Natural Gas
India's largest automaker, Tata Motors, announced this week it will partner up with MDI of France, a technology invention company, to develop engines powered by compressed air. Tata says the agreement "envisages Tata's supporting further development and refinement of the technology, and its application and licensing for India." MDI is the company behind The Air Car.
The way the Air Car's CAT (compressed air technology) works is that an "innovative system" - MDI isn't releasing true technical details because of corporate secrecy - controls the movement of four two-stage pistons (giving eight compression/expansion chambers) and a single crankshaft. A 5kW electric moto-alternator compresses air, recharges the battery, serves as an electric moderator/brake and as a temporary power supply (e.g. for parking).
That sounds positive, but reader Fabio Alemagna says the key problem for MDI's technology is the fundamental problem that the "fuel" conducts freeze thanks to the subzero temperature of the compressed air.
Tata is also working on engines powered by Hithane, a mix of hydrogen and compressed natural gas. For its part, MDI is not limiting itself to India or Tata. MDI president Guy Negre said his company was happy to work with Tata but, "We are continuing the development with our own business concept of licensing car manufacturers in other parts of the world where the production is located close to the markets."
Related:
India mixing hydrogen and compressed natural gas
Tata Considering Entry into China
Old video of air-powered car making the rounds at YouTube
Posted Feb 8th 2007 11:01AM by Sebastian Blanco
Filed under: Emerging Technologies, Natural Gas
India's largest automaker, Tata Motors, announced this week it will partner up with MDI of France, a technology invention company, to develop engines powered by compressed air. Tata says the agreement "envisages Tata's supporting further development and refinement of the technology, and its application and licensing for India." MDI is the company behind The Air Car.
The way the Air Car's CAT (compressed air technology) works is that an "innovative system" - MDI isn't releasing true technical details because of corporate secrecy - controls the movement of four two-stage pistons (giving eight compression/expansion chambers) and a single crankshaft. A 5kW electric moto-alternator compresses air, recharges the battery, serves as an electric moderator/brake and as a temporary power supply (e.g. for parking).
That sounds positive, but reader Fabio Alemagna says the key problem for MDI's technology is the fundamental problem that the "fuel" conducts freeze thanks to the subzero temperature of the compressed air.
Tata is also working on engines powered by Hithane, a mix of hydrogen and compressed natural gas. For its part, MDI is not limiting itself to India or Tata. MDI president Guy Negre said his company was happy to work with Tata but, "We are continuing the development with our own business concept of licensing car manufacturers in other parts of the world where the production is located close to the markets."
Related:
India mixing hydrogen and compressed natural gas
Tata Considering Entry into China
Old video of air-powered car making the rounds at YouTube
Tuesday, 13 February 2007
Monsanto dumped toxic waste in UK
PCBs, Agent Orange derivatives, dioxins dumped by Monsanto in the environment 30 years ago. Shall we wait 30 years to condemned the obvious contamination impact of the GMO? J-L Roux
Inquiry after chemicals found at site 30 years after their disposal
John Vidal, environment editor
Monday February 12, 2007
Guardian
Evidence has emerged that the Monsanto chemical company paid contractors to dump thousands of tonnes of highly toxic waste in British landfill sites, knowing that their chemicals were liable to contaminate wildlife and people. Yesterday the Environment Agency said it had launched an inquiry after the chemicals were found to be polluting underground water supplies and the atmosphere 30 years after they were dumped.
According to the agency it could cost up to £100m to clean up a site in south Wales that has been called "one of the most contaminated" in the country.
A previously unseen government report read by the Guardian shows that 67 chemicals, including Agent Orange derivatives, dioxins and PCBs which could have been made only by Monsanto, are leaking from one unlined porous quarry that was not authorised to take chemical wastes.
The Brofiscin quarry on the edge of the village of Groesfaen, near Cardiff, erupted in 2003, spilling fumes over the surrounding area, but the community has been told little about the real condition of what is in the pit. Yesterday the government was criticised for failing to publish information about the scale and exact nature of this contamination.
Douglas Gowan, a pollution consultant who produced the first official report into the Brofiscin quarry in 1972 after nine cows on a local farm died of poisoning, said: "The authorities have known about the situation for years, but have done nothing. There is evidence of not only negligence and utter incompetence, but cover-up, and the problem has grown unchecked."
Much of the new information about Monsanto's activities in Britain in the 1960s and early 1970s has emerged from court papers filed in the US and previously unseen internal company documents. They show how the company knew from 1965 onwards that the PCBs - polychlorinated biphenyls used mainly as flame retardants and insulaters - manufactured in the US and at its plant in Newport, south Wales, under the trade name Aroclor, were accumulating in human milk, rivers, fish and seafood, wildlife and plants.
The documents show that in 1953, company chemists tested the PCB chemicals on rats and found that they killed more than 50% with medium-level doses. However, it continued to manufacture PCBs and dispose of the wastes in south Wales until 1977, more than a decade after evidence of widespread contamination of humans and the environment was beyond doubt.
A high-level committee within the company was given the task in 1968 of assessing Monsanto's options and reported contamination in human milk, fish, birds and wildlife from around the world, including Britain. "In the case of PCBs the company is faced with a barrage of adverse publicity ... it will be impossible to deny the presence and persistence of Aroclors. The public and legal pressures to eliminate or prevent global contamination are inevitable and probably cannot be contained successfully," the committee reported.
The report, which was shown to only 12 people, said: "The alternatives are [to] say and do nothing; create a smokescreen; immediately discontinue the manufacture of Aroclors; respond responsibly, admitting growing evidence of environmental contamination ..." A scrawled note at the end of the document says: "The Big Question! What do we tell our customers ... try to stay in business or help customer's clean up their use?"
Monsanto stopped producing PCBs in the US in 1971, but the UK government, which knew of the dangers of PCBs in the environment in the 1960s, allowed their production in Wales until 1977.
Yesterday Monsanto, which has split into several corporate entities since 1997, said in a statement: "On behalf of [former parent company] Pharmacia Corp, Monsanto is handling issues related to the historical manufacture of PCBs in Wales. We continue to work with the Wales Department of Environment and other regulatory bodies to resolve these issues. A thorough review ... will show that Pharmacia did inform its contractors of the nature of wastes prior to disposal, and that Pharmacia did not dump wastes from its own vehicles."
Solutia, the spin-off from Monsanto which now owns the Newport site, said it was giving Monsanto and the regulatory agencies "information as requested".
The Environment Agency Wales said it was investigating the contents of the site: "This is one of the most contaminated sites in Wales and it is a priority to remediate because it is so close to habitations," said John Harrison, the agency's manager of the Taff/Ely region. "There is ground water pollution, but we do not think at present there is any danger to human health. We have spent about £800,000 so far investigating the tip. Our legal team is gathering all the evidence and we are trying to apportion costs."
Monday, 5 February 2007
Is industrial poultry a non sense?
Nobel prizewinners and campaigners called for the elimination of large scale intensive livestock farming
Some figures and facts
( see The Guardian click on the title)
- Britain's £3.4bn poultry industry, which produces 800 million birds a year
- UK produce 16 million chickens a week in this country and some 500,000 are not wanted
- UK is preparing very, very seriously and thoroughly for the possibility of a pandemic flu. It is a very remote risk, but if it did happen it could be very serious indeed.
- Nothing has given us any indication whatever that this event is linked directly to wild birds," said Lawrence Woodward, director of the Elm Farm Research Centre, who sits on the Defra committee of avian flu stakeholders. "The idea that a solitary bird carrying H5N1 is flying around East Anglia out of the migratory season and then falls down a ventilation shaft of the biggest poultry farm in Britain is just not viable," he said.
- The UN senior coordinator for avian flu and human influenza, David Nabarro, said in Indonesia that he expected an increase in bird flu around the world: "At the moment there are rather a lot of [cases] ... that is why everybody needs to be a little anxious about what is happening."
- In a letter to the Guardian, Nobel prizewinners and campaigners, including Noam Chomsky and Naomi Klein called for the elimination of large-scale intensive livestock farming which they argue is "accelerating the development of new pandemic diseases".
Some figures and facts
( see The Guardian click on the title)
- Britain's £3.4bn poultry industry, which produces 800 million birds a year
- UK produce 16 million chickens a week in this country and some 500,000 are not wanted
- UK is preparing very, very seriously and thoroughly for the possibility of a pandemic flu. It is a very remote risk, but if it did happen it could be very serious indeed.
- Nothing has given us any indication whatever that this event is linked directly to wild birds," said Lawrence Woodward, director of the Elm Farm Research Centre, who sits on the Defra committee of avian flu stakeholders. "The idea that a solitary bird carrying H5N1 is flying around East Anglia out of the migratory season and then falls down a ventilation shaft of the biggest poultry farm in Britain is just not viable," he said.
- The UN senior coordinator for avian flu and human influenza, David Nabarro, said in Indonesia that he expected an increase in bird flu around the world: "At the moment there are rather a lot of [cases] ... that is why everybody needs to be a little anxious about what is happening."
- In a letter to the Guardian, Nobel prizewinners and campaigners, including Noam Chomsky and Naomi Klein called for the elimination of large-scale intensive livestock farming which they argue is "accelerating the development of new pandemic diseases".
Sunday, 4 February 2007
We cannot let the Kyoto debacle happen again
Some key cote of Sir King Charles - Chief scientific advisor of of Tony Blair
"
The message for policy-makers is clear: climate change is not a passing fancy for environmentalists. It represents a challenge on a scale that will affect societies and economies across the world."
"It is important to remember that, beyond the next two decades or so, the future severity of climate change and its impacts lies in our hands. We have the knowledge, technologies and capability to transform our economies, if we have the commitment to do so."
"it is not only governments that should hear these messages. As individuals, we can make adjustments that together can have a big impact. As consumers, we can transform markets through our purchasing choices. And as concerned citizens, we can encourage governments, nationally and locally, to show leadership."
"The IPCC's work is vital in providing a solid foundation of evidence on which these crucial decisions can be made. We have lost 17 years since Kyoto. Now we have to act."
Climate change: In graphics
It is "very likely" that human activity is the cause for climate change, scientists from over 130 countries have concluded. The graphics below illustrate their predictions on just how much global temperatures may rise over the next century.
The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change predicts that temperatures are most likely to rise by 1.8C-4C by 2100. But the possible range is much greater; 1.1C-6.4C. The maps above show how a range of three different scenarios will affect different parts of the planet.
The emissions scenarios, A1B, A2, B1, used to create the maps above, are based on a range of detailed economic and technological data. These versions of the future consider different population increases, fossil and alternative fuel use, and consequent CO2 increases. The broad range of outcomes they show is displayed in the charts below.
Carbon dioxide is the main greenhouse gas, its rise since the industrial revolution is clear. Burning coal, using oil and deforestation all place CO2 into the atmosphere.
The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change predicts that temperatures are most likely to rise by 1.8C-4C by 2100. But the possible range is much greater; 1.1C-6.4C. The maps above show how a range of three different scenarios will affect different parts of the planet.
The emissions scenarios, A1B, A2, B1, used to create the maps above, are based on a range of detailed economic and technological data. These versions of the future consider different population increases, fossil and alternative fuel use, and consequent CO2 increases. The broad range of outcomes they show is displayed in the charts below.
Carbon dioxide is the main greenhouse gas, its rise since the industrial revolution is clear. Burning coal, using oil and deforestation all place CO2 into the atmosphere.
Saturday, 3 February 2007
Humans blamed for climate change
IPCC IVth Report Assessment: humans blamed for climate.
Even if the IVth report of the International Panel of Climate Change experts seems to be strong their is other scientist voices saying that the report seems below the thruth so a study published on the eve of the IPCC report suggested that the international body's previous reports may have actually been too conservative.
Writing in the journal Science, an international group of scientists concluded that temperatures and sea levels had been rising at or above the maximum rates proposed in the last report, which was published in 2001.
The paper compared the 2001 projections on temperature and sea level change report with what has actually happened.
The models had forecasted a temperature rise between about 0.15C-0.35C (0.27-0.63F) over this period. The actual rise of 0.33C (0.59F) was very close to the top of the IPCC's range.
A more dramatic picture emerged from the sea level comparison. The actual average level, measured by tide gauges and satellites, had risen faster than the intergovernmental panel of scientists predicted it would.
The IPCC's full climate science report will be released later in the year, as will other chapters looking at the probable impacts of climate change, options for adapting to those impacts, and possible routes to reducing emissions of greenhouse gases.
If you want to read the IPCC report go to this link : http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/shared/bsp/hi/pdfs/02_02_07_climatereport.pdf
Saturday, 20 January 2007
INEQUALTY INCREASES IN THE WORLD
"Inequality growth is fare more important to solve than poverty if the world want to keep peace" said Jean-luc Roux
January 04, 2007
Picturing Global Inequality: Some Preliminary Figures
Posted by Todd Moss at 06:28 PM
Thanks to our friend Nick Seaver for posting on the Huffington Post one of the figures we created after playing around with some of the available stats on global income inequality. The idea was to get a very rough sense of what global income distribution looks like: Is it a bell curve? Where might an average American fit?
Ideally, we would have wanted income information on every person on the planet and then just line them up and see what it looks like. Of course, no such figures exist. The best we have is average income, plus some distribution data for large countries. So we took every country that was at least 1% of global population and disaggregated average incomes by decile (Iran and Japan by quintile), then added in every other country with their total population at the national average. This is far from perfect, we realize. But this may be less of a problem than it first appears because of the dramatic scale difference among countries: Given the relative enormity of China and India and the other big countries, counting all the middle class or millionaires in Togo (or, for that matter, in the UK) has almost no visual effect. Given those caveats, the picture here is one way to see what the figures look like. You can also view the graph (pdf) with the axes flipped in a normal histogram, plus a fuller explanation on what we did with the data. For a more thorough discussion of some of these issues, we recommend the work of economist Branko Milanovic (see, e.g., his figure on p 17 of this paper [pdf]) and the 2005 WIDER Lecture by CGD president Nancy Birdsall, The World is not Flat: Inequality and Injustice in our Global Economy (.pdf).
January 04, 2007
Picturing Global Inequality: Some Preliminary Figures
Posted by Todd Moss at 06:28 PM
Thanks to our friend Nick Seaver for posting on the Huffington Post one of the figures we created after playing around with some of the available stats on global income inequality. The idea was to get a very rough sense of what global income distribution looks like: Is it a bell curve? Where might an average American fit?
Ideally, we would have wanted income information on every person on the planet and then just line them up and see what it looks like. Of course, no such figures exist. The best we have is average income, plus some distribution data for large countries. So we took every country that was at least 1% of global population and disaggregated average incomes by decile (Iran and Japan by quintile), then added in every other country with their total population at the national average. This is far from perfect, we realize. But this may be less of a problem than it first appears because of the dramatic scale difference among countries: Given the relative enormity of China and India and the other big countries, counting all the middle class or millionaires in Togo (or, for that matter, in the UK) has almost no visual effect. Given those caveats, the picture here is one way to see what the figures look like. You can also view the graph (pdf) with the axes flipped in a normal histogram, plus a fuller explanation on what we did with the data. For a more thorough discussion of some of these issues, we recommend the work of economist Branko Milanovic (see, e.g., his figure on p 17 of this paper [pdf]) and the 2005 WIDER Lecture by CGD president Nancy Birdsall, The World is not Flat: Inequality and Injustice in our Global Economy (.pdf).
CO2 growth in 2006 was still higher than average and four of the last five years have been higher than average.
"Co2 emission speed up and scale up. We do not have more time to change our lifestyle and economical model' said Jean-Luc Roux
UPDATE: The US National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (Noaa) has now told us that the story below is based on preliminary data for December, which it should not have published. It has withdrawn the data pending further analysis. As a result, the provisional annual growth rate for 2006 displayed on the Noaa website now does not include December, which means it is now lower than the 2.6ppm we reported. Pieter Tans, the scientist in charge of the data, said: "It doesn't affect the trend, there is definitely something there. CO2 growth in 2006 was still higher than average and four of the last five years have been higher than average."
Article continues
Carbon dioxide is accumulating in the atmosphere much faster than scientists expected, raising fears that humankind may have less time to tackle climate change than previously thought.
New figures from dozens of measuring stations across the world reveal that concentrations of CO2, the main greenhouse gas, rose at record levels during 2006 - the fourth year in the last five to show a sharp increase. Experts are puzzled because the spike, which follows decades of more modest annual rises, does not appear to match the pattern of steady increases in human emissions.
To read more please click on the title of this article
Supermarket giant to introduce Carbon emission labels
"This is a real and key first step to reduce the consummer co2 budget and make it concrete" said Jean-Luc Roux
You've checked the price and calorie count, now here's the carbon cost
· Supermarket giant to introduce emission labels
· Tesco promises 'green consumption revolution'
Julia Finch and John Vidal
Friday January 19, 2007
The Guardian
Supermarket chain Tesco pledged last night to revolutionise its business to become "a leader in helping to create a low-carbon economy" with a raft of new measures to help combat climate change.
In the most significant step announced yesterday, the UK's biggest retailer, which produces 2m tonnes of carbon a year in the UK, said it would put new labels on every one of the 70,000 products it sells so that shoppers can compare carbon costs in the same way they can compare salt content and calorie counts.
Article continues
The company also pledged to cut the emissions produced by its stores and distribution centres by 50% by 2020 and slash by 50% within five years the amount of CO2 used in its distribution network to deliver each case of goods.
To get more click on the title of this article
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