Year: 2008

Published on Friday, October 17, 2008 by The Guardian/UK

In Echo of Kingsnorth Six, US Climate Change Activists Go On Trial Eleven face
criminal charges after blockading $1.8bn plant • James Hansen offers to lend support
by Elana Schor

WASHINGTON – Eleven climate change activists are due in court today on criminal
charges after they blockaded a planned $1.8bn coal-fired power plant, providing an
American echo of the Kingsnorth Six trial.

The blockade lasted for about four hours and resulted in the arrest of the ten
activists who locked down and one other activist who was acting as a police liason.
Charged with unlawful assembly and obstruction of justice, the group has been dubbed
the Dominion 11 in homage to Kingsnorth. Dr James Hansen, the leading US climate
change scientist, has followed his testimony on behalf of the Kingsnorth protesters
with an offer of help to the Virginia activists. (Photo: mountainjustice.org)The
activists were arrested last month in rural Wise County, Virginia, at the gates of a
power plant being built by Dominion, the No 2 utility in the US. The 11 chained
themselves to steel barrels that held aloft a banner, lit by solar panels,
challenging the utility to provide cleaner energy for a region ravaged by abusive
coal mining.

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I don’t like market-based views either-but it’s still an interesting article.

ASW

The single biggest problem for Life on Earth is
that there are so many problems all at once.
Lance

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“Bees can’t pollinate, nor can trees store carbon, if they have all died.”

“Business as usual is simply not an option,” she says. But that is the option many
governments seem to be choosing.
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The Economist October 16, 2008

Fewer creatures great and small

Nature needs a bail-out, say those who fear that
a poorer, hotter world will bode ill for life’s
infinite variety

GREEN-MINDED folk of many shades came to Spain
this month, to talk about the need to save from
human recklessness as much as possible of
nature’s bounty of genes, habitats and species.
They brought bad tidings. Common birds are in
decline across the world. Almost one in four
species of mammals is in danger of extinction. If
current trends continue until 2050, fisheries
will be exhausted. As it is, deforestation costs
the world more each year than the current
financial crisis has cost in total, one economist
argued.

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Autumn Arctic Air Temperatures at Record High Levels

Arctic air temperatures climb to record levels
Thu Oct 16, 2008 6:01pm EDT 

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – Fall air temperatures have climbed to record levels in the
Arctic due to major losses of sea ice as the region suffers more effects from a
warming trend dating back decades, a report released on Thursday showed.

The annual report issued by researchers at the U.S. National Oceanic and Atmospheric
Administration and other experts is the latest to paint a dire picture of the impact
of climate change in the Arctic.

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