19 April 2008
From New Scientist
Most coal today comes from opencast workings. Emissions, primarily of methane, CO2 and carbon monoxide, start as soon as the overburden above the coal seams is stripped away. Conservative estimates suggest that these gases alone account for about twice the emissions of the burning of the coal mined.
July 27, 2007
From UNESCO
This is not directly about climate change but about the same attitudes that have gone into causing climate change. This is a story about the slaughter of the a dwindling population of Mountain Gorillas. Seven have been killed this year. This is about pure human selfishness
From New Scientist:
The animals were not killed for their meat. Conservationists describe the killings as "executions - bullets to the head". One theory is that the gorillas are victims of a conflict between those locals who see them as the basis for a tourist trade, and others who want them gone so they can use the forests to fuel a booming trade in charcoal.
18 January 2007
NewScientist.com news service
Kate Ravilious
Think back to the hottest summer you can remember. Now imagine a summer like that every year. For those of us who are still around by the end of the 21st century, this is what we can expect, according to a new index that maps the different ways that climate change will hit different parts of the world. The map reveals how much more frequent extreme climate events, such as heatwaves and floods, will be by 2100 compared with the late 20th century. It is the first to show how global warming will combine with natural variations in the climate to affect our planet.
"We hope it will help policy-makers gain a quick overview of the scientific facts without getting lost in the detail," says Michèle Bättig of the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology in Zurich, who created the index with colleagues after talking to delegates at the 2005 UN Climate Change Conference in Montreal, Canada. The index allows anyone to compare the severity of the predicted effect of climate change on a chunk of the Amazon rainforest, for example, with its effect on a corner of Antarctica.
The results are presented on a global map (see top image), in which the areas experiencing the greatest changes are shown in the darkest shades. Swathes of the tropics and high latitudes are coloured a foreboding brown, signifying the most marked changes.
Perhaps the most startling feature is how few areas remain unscathed. "This reinforces what much of the piecemeal climate science is telling us - that many places will face severe challenges," says Neil Adger of the UK's Tyndall Centre for Climate Change Research at the University of East Anglia in Norwich, Norfolk. In the coming decades people in these areas could find it difficult or impossible to adapt to the changed conditions, he adds.
For many parts of the world it seems this trend is already under way. Climate scientists announced last week that 2006 has been the hottest year on record for the US, topping nine years of almost continuous rises. Meanwhile, Europe experienced severe heatwaves in both 2003 and 2006, and for the UK 2006 was the warmest year since records began. Nor does it look as if the mercury is going to stop rising. In an energy technology outlook study published last week, the European Commission warns of stark changes for EU countries over the coming century, including shrinking forests, floods, drought and the drying out of fertile land - unless radical steps are taken to combat climate change.
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