The distribution of wildlife on Earth is changing with the climate, making conditions more favorable to odd species such as trumpeter swans, beetles, marmots, albatross, killer whales and white-tailed deer. Imagine a planet where jellyfish rule the seas, giant rodents roam the mountains and swarms of insects blur everything in sight. It may sound far-fetched, [...]
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Sciencedaily; Global warming has forced alpine chipmunks in Yosemite to higher ground, prompting a startling decline in the species’ genetic diversity, according to a new study by researchers at the University of California, Berkeley. The study, appearing Feb. 19, in the advance online publication of the journal Nature Climate Change, is one of the first [...]
Skeptical Science has done what it does so well this week and taken an opportunity to look into a scientific matter related to a current hot topic, the Heartland Institute leak. Dana Nuccitelli, in the piece reposted in full below, discusses the “climate-skeptic” NIPCC report and how it differs from the Nobel-prize-winning IPCC’s widely cited [...]
Understanding real-world complexity and anticipating change are the key to global and local governance in the 21st century: Shyam Sharan, India The issue of global governance has acquired increasing salience in recent years. With the process of globalisation and the increasing interconnectedness of economies, issues that transcend national and regional boundaries have become progressively more [...]
AN expert from the Food and Agriculture Office (FAO) is pitching calls for the adoption of “climate-smart agriculture” to address the twin challenges of achieving food security and climate change. Hideki Kanamaru of the Climate, Energy and Tenure Division (NRC) of the FAO told participants of the APEC Symposium on Climate Change held at the [...]
Discovery: What to do when adults persist in believing that the burning of fossil fuels is causing climate change? You know, on account of that pesky overwhelming scientific evidence and stuff? Simple. Target kids instead, and try to convince them, as early as possible, that it’s all a crock – or at least that it’s [...]
Michael Mann reveals his account of attacks by entrenched interests seeking to undermine his ‘hockey stick’ graph. It is almost possible to dismiss Michael Mann’s account of a vast conspiracy by the fossil fuel industry to harrass scientists and befuddle the public. His story of that campaign, and his own journey from naive computer geek [...]
This year marks the twentieth anniversary of the Earth Summit held in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil in June 1992, where a number of seminal agreements were signed by heads of state from all the countries of the world. These included the Rio Declaration, United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC), Convention on Biodiversity (CBD) [...]
It is no secret that developing countries like India are finding it difficult to balance economic growth and its development and environment agendas. But at the same time, they have also begun to realise that the impact of unsustainable growth will be a costly affair. For example, to tackle the impact of climate change on [...]
MIT: With climate change, today’s ’100-year floods’ may happen every three to 20 years, according to new research. Last August, Hurricane Irene spun through the Caribbean and parts of the eastern United States, leaving widespread wreckage in its wake. The Category 3 storm whipped up water levels, generating storm surges that swept over seawalls and [...]
The Durban climate deal reached in December 2011 marked an important milestone in the design of a system to measure, report, and verify (MRV) countries’ greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions and their actions to reduce them. The deal succeeded in making the MRV system operational. However, the text still falls short on several important issues that [...]
Climate Policy in India: What Shapes International, National and State Policy? :At the international level, India is emerging as a key actor in climate negotiations, while at the national and sub-national levels, the climate policy landscape is becoming more active and more ambitious. It is essential to unravel this complex landscape if we are to [...]
In the first comprehensive satellite study of its kind, a University of Colorado at Boulder-led team used NASA data to calculate how much Earth’s melting land ice is adding to global sea level rise. Using satellite measurements from the NASA/German Aerospace Center Gravity Recovery and Climate Experiment (GRACE), the researchers measured ice loss in all [...]
Research showing that the Himalayas and nearby peaks have lost no ice in past 10 years has been met with relief and surprise – but scientists warn against jumping to simplistic conclusions. The rivers and glaciers that descend from the steep slopes of the Himalaya mountain range help to provide water for the 1.4 billion [...]
GIZ: The Indo-German project Climate Change Adaptation in Rural Areas of India (CCA RAI, www.ccarai.org) is pleased to announce the launch of the book “Adaptation to Climate Change with a Focus on Rural Areas and India“. The publication provides an overview of the main issues in current adaptation discussions and suggests adaptation options in six [...]
The paradigm shift towards sustainable development envisaged in the historic Agenda 21 adopted at the first Rio conference in 1992 and confirmed in the 2002 Johannesburg Plan of Implementation is missing in the “zero draft outcome document” for June’s U.N. Conference on Sustainable Development, popularly known as the Rio+20 summit. In effect the document now [...]
The Chairman of the UN’s Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) R K Pachauri invited Himachal Pradesh government in India, to join the Global Union of Mountain States to form a ‘common voice’ on issues of sustainable development and fighting climate change. While advocating immediate need to formulate new strategies and take collective measures to [...]
Rio de Janeiro in Brazil will have a different kind of carnival this year. From June 20 to 22, the city will host the United Nations Conference on Sustainable Development, which is expected to bring together heads of states, ministers, senior officials, representatives from international organisations, civil society leaders and environmentalists. Since the conference is [...]
Climate Change Study Center in Islamabad: Pakistan is situated in one of the most vulnerable regions to the impacts of climate change. Better governance system with sufficient policy interventions coupled with support from the international community can help minimize the adverse impacts of climate change. In Pakistan the policy responses to climate change in some [...]
NRDC: Think fast. What’s the first thought that comes into your mind when you see “climate change”? What’s the first thought that comes into your mind when you see “car crash”? If you are like me, “climate change” conjures a vague image of melting ice and perhaps an image of a forlorn polar bear on [...]
Improved integrated water management practices could increase agricultural production, protect natural systems and improve regional food security A major new survey of the likely effects of climate change on India’s water resources identifies huge challenges to maintaining adequate supplies in the next few decades, but argues that these can be overcome with an integrated, multi-sectorial [...]
Climate change has impacts on forests, fields, rivers – and thereby on humans that breathe, eat and drink. To assess these impacts more accurately, a comprehensive comparison of computer-based simulations from all over the world will start this week. For the first time, sectors ranging from ecosystems to agriculture to water supplies and health will [...]
National Geographic: We have the knowledge that can contribute to finding solutions to the crisis of climate change. But if you’re not prepared to listen, how can we communicate this to you? — Marcos Terena, Xané leader, Brazil. The precipitous rise in the world’s human population and humankind’s ever-increasing dependence on fossil fuel-based ways of living [...]
Adaptive Capacity The combination of the strengths, attributes, and resources available to an individual, community, society, or organization that can be used to prepare for and undertake actions to reduce adverse impacts, moderate harm, or exploit beneficial opportunities (IPCC, SREX, 2012) Climate Climate defined as the average weather, or as the statistical description in [...]
30,000-year-old bison bones help scientists unravel mystery of animals adaptations to environmental change. Thirty-thousand-year-old bison bones discovered in permafrost at a Canadian goldmine are helping scientists unravel the mystery about how animals adapt to rapid environmental change. The bones play a key role in a world-first study, led by University of Adelaide researchers, which analyses [...]
Deccan Chronical: Praful Bidwai’s book The Politics of Climate Change and the Global Crisis: Mortgaging Our Future is written at a time of deep diplomatic despondency. It is brutally honest about what is at risk if no action is taken at the national and international level. It exposes the false solution offered by India in [...]
IISD: The World Economic Forum (WEF) held its annual meeting in Davos, Switzerland, from 25-29 January 2012, gathering industry, business, government and other world leaders to discuss current issues. UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon participated in two panels, on ending energy poverty and on the perspectives for the UN Conference on Sustainable Development (UNCSD, or Rio+20), warning “we [...]
Improved integrated water management practices could increase agricultural production, protect natural systems and be a ‘game changer’ for national food security A major new survey of the likely effects of climate change on India’s water resources published today identifies huge challenges to maintaining adequate supplies in the next few decades, but argues that these can [...]
Natural disasters in Asia in 2011 could well prove to be the costliest ever, experts say. “Never before has this world suffered so much economic loss due to natural disaster, most of which has been in Asia and the Pacific,” Sanjay Srivastava, UN regional adviser for disaster risk reduction, told IRIN in Bangkok. Of the [...]
A 30,000-year-old bison bone plucked from the thawed permafrost inside a Yukon gold mine has helped a team of Australian scientists make a potentially groundbreaking discovery about the way animals adapt to climate change. A study published in the latest issue of the journal PLoS One describes the Canadian specimen — a bone from the [...]
Sustainable. That word is everywhere these days. So is Rajendra Pachauri, the discredited chairman of the discredited Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC). This week he’s in India for the 12th Delhi Sustainable Development Summit, which begins on Thursday. The summit is organized by TERI, an institute led by Pachauri. In other words, he isn’t [...]
Yesterday I wrote about the 3-day sustainability summit being held at an opulent 5-star hotel, over which Rajendra Pachauri will preside later this week. Since then Hilary Ostrov has dug a bit deeper into the program for that event. You can read about her findings here. The website for this annual summit tells us a [...]
Publication: How can disaster risk reduction and climate change adaptation be integrated? This paper reviews the extent of convergence between disaster risk reduction (DRR) and climate change adaptation (CCA) at a number of scales. It also examines what is at stake if the two agendas do not converge. The authors present updated evidence of where [...]
A recent article in Science Magazine demonstrates how controlling methane and soot can have positive effects in a relatively short time on global warming, the Arctic, human health and agricultural productivity. It should be mandatory reading for all of the Republican presidential hopefuls and for President Barack Obama. If the next president refocuses international climate [...]
This year, the elites in Davos – debating the future of capitalism – faced a little more self-doubt than usual as to whether they have the best ideas to run the world, not least in the face of the intractable euro crisis. But the future of capitalism is just one big global challenge among many [...]
Prime Minister Yousuf Raza Gilani Thursday called for a global approach to respond to climate risks in view of vulnerability and inability of developing nation to cope with the challenge. Participating in an interactive Session on “Adapting to Climate Risk” that focused on how the communities, companies and countries were adapting to the risks posed [...]
The significant negative impacts of climate change have become an interest shared not only on an international and national level but also on a local community level. Farmers in rural areas face the negative impacts of climate change in the form of harvest failure, the reduction of farming production and also the degradation of the [...]
If public interest in climate change can be measured by political speeches, the issue has fallen on hard times haunted by uncertainty in the science and a continuing economic downturn which demands attention. In his 7,000-word, annual State of the Union address, U.S. President Barack Obama on Tuesday mentioned the words “climate change” once, while [...]
Guardian: Leading experts lend support to Freedom of Information request concerning climate sceptic foundation chaired by Lord Lawson. Leading climate scientists have given their support to a Freedom of Information request seeking to disclose who is funding the Global Warming Policy Foundation, a London-based climate sceptic thinktank chaired by the former Conservative chancellor Lord Lawson. [...]
APN: The adverse effects of climate change and natural climate variability pose a significant threat to humanity, with the poorest communities being the most vulnerable. Scientific understanding of our climate is advancing at a significant rate, with new information emerging about the likely impacts of climate change, the options to adapt to these changes, and [...]
Through Climate Change community of UN Solution Exchange India the Earth Day Network has floated query on Women and the Green Economy for its Campaign (http://www.earthday.org/wage) to increase the opportunities for women’s leadership in designing and advancing the new Green Economy. It finds that there is limited participation of women in the discussions, planning, and leadership of the newly [...]
Scientists should increasingly make critical contributions to ensure food security and environmental sustainability, Council for Scientific and Industrial Research (CSIR) systems ecologist Dr Bob Scholes said on Friday, adding that there was a need to better understand the link between climate change and food production. More attention should be given to developing agricultural practices that [...]
The National Atmospheric Research Laboratory (NARL) attached to the Department of Space, government of India, is planning to set up a network of LIDAR (Laser Radar System) with the help of indigenously developed sensor tools in ten locations across the country in the first phase to study the aerosol distribution over India. This was disclosed [...]
Scientific American Blog: Kanchha, our Sherpa guide, took off at an unexpectedly fast pace along what seemed little more than a dry and dusty yak track. We chased after him as best we could, affected as we were by the combination of altitude and the large lunch we had just consumed at the teahouse at [...]
Voice of America: A team of scientists is urging that agriculture be a top priority in climate change negotiations, saying it’s vital for global food security and for reducing carbon emissions. The recommendations appear in the January 20th issue of Science magazine. The international team was led by Sir John Beddington, Britain’s chief scientific advisor. [...]
UPSC Portal: 1. Overview India is faced with the challenge of sustaining its rapid economic growth while dealing with the global threat of climate change. This threat emanates from accumulated greenhouse gas emissions in the atmosphere, anthropogenically generated through long-term and intensive industrial growth and high consumption lifestyles in developed countries. While engaged with the [...]
NASA: Hubble Solves Mystery on Source of Supernova in Nearby Galaxy 01.12.12 Using NASA’s Hubble Space Telescope, astronomers have solved a longstanding mystery on the type of star, or so-called progenitor, which caused a supernova seen in a nearby galaxy. The finding yields new observational data for pinpointing one of several scenarios that trigger [...]
Reducing Soot and Methane Would Bring Fast Results, Says Study A study by a large international team of scientists says that relatively cheap, simple measures to cut two common pollutants could substantially reduce global warming and improve human health and agriculture in coming decades. Instead of focusing on carbon dioxide—the main culprit in climate change–they [...]
Guardian: The “climate problem” suffers from a more powerful and enduring force: economic stagnation. These days, dormant climate policy in Washington DC is like Mitt Romney’s coiffure: seemingly no prospects for change. And, with the 2012 US presidential election on the horizon, it seems there’ll be little federal action for at least another year. In [...]
India has reacted sharply to the latest human development report released by the undp, which recommends that developing nations should undertake mandatory emission cuts. “Any multilateral agreement without quantitative commitments from developing countries will lack credibility in terms of climate change mitigation,” is one of the key conclusions of the report titled Fighting climate change: [...]
Scientific American: Global warming threatens China’s march to prosperity by cutting crops, shrinking rivers and unleashing more droughts and floods, says the government’s latest assessment of climate change, projecting big shifts in how the nation feeds itself. Global warming threatens China’s march to prosperity by cutting crops, shrinking rivers and unleashing more droughts and floods, [...]
Dawn: PAKISTAN’S climate change policy whose draft took more than a year to be readied is now under print and may be presented to the federal cabinet for approval in a few weeks. The draft will unveil an action plan to mitigate adverse effects of extreme weather events as witnessed in 2010 and again in [...]
RECOFTC: At Durban’s Forest Day 5, the resounding message was that REDD+ will not work if people are hungry. How can we expect the poor to conserve forest resources if their food security – their very survival – rests on the use or consumption of those resources? Part of the problem is a perceived trade-off [...]
Washingtontimes: Climate change subscribers say the fight against global warming will require younger soldiers. On Monday, the National Center for Science Education, a nonprofit group that denounces intelligent design and supports an evolution-only curriculum in the classroom, will expand its mission. The organization of scientists, anthropologists and others is turning its attention to climate change, [...]
DowntoEarth: IPRs are blocking access to mitigation and adaptation technologies. India offers a way out. Debate on the rights and wrongs of intellectual property rights (IPRs) always gets stuck on a fundamental question. Would there be any incentive to invent and create without the incentive of IPRs such as patents and copyright? The conventional view [...]
Alertnet: Risks from extreme weather are growing quickly in some unexpected places around the world as the planet heads towards temperature rises at least double what scientists consider safe, authors of a German climate risk index said on Tuesday. Pakistan, Guatemala and Colombia ranked highest on the Germanwatch 2010 risk index, which looks at deaths [...]
RTCC: Scientists offered stark warnings in 2011 about what the world would experience if climate change ran out of control. As people ready themselves for a new year full of new promise, RTCC asks what lessons can be learnt from last year’s key research findings. Greenhouse gas emissions One of the clearest warnings in 2011 [...]
Climate change in the form of reduced snowfall in mountains is causing powerful and cascading shifts in mountainous plant and bird communities through the increased ability of elk to stay at high elevations over winter and consume plants, according to a groundbreaking study in Nature Climate Change. The U.S. Geological Survey and University of Montana [...]
Over the next few weeks, ClimateEthics will take a deeper look at what has been referred to as the “climate change disinformation campaign” through an ethical lens. Although ClimateEthics has examined these issues briefly before, see: An Ethical Analysis of the Climate Change Disinformation Campaign: Is This A New Kind of Assault on Humanity?, this [...]
