Category: RT Newswire

” The essence of “Climate Code Red” ( http://www.climatecodered.net/)
is that the World is facing a Climate Emergency and a Sustainability
Emergency because we have passed crucial atmospheric CO2 “tipping
points”, “Climate Code red” further declares that, as demanded by Dr
James Hansen, we need not “CO2 emissions reduction targets” or
“zero CO2 emissions” but NEGATIVE CO2 EMISSIONS to return the
Planet to a safe, sustainable 300-350 ppm CO2.

“At this Melbourne Climate Convergence meeting various activist
groups decided to form a Climate Emergency Coalition to urgently
spread the message and to lobby for a Declaration of a State of
Emergency in Australia and the World to meet the Sustainability
Emergency. As Dr Hansen has said (see above), we urgently need a
lowering of atmospheric CO2 to about 300-350 ppm and a major step now
must be an immediate moratorium on coal power – we must keep fossil
fuels in the ground to save Humanity and the Biosphere.”

Excerpts from: http://mwcnews.net/content/view/20133&Itemid=1

“Thus data from 2 independent sources (see: “Recent CO2 rises exceed
worst case scenarios”, New Scientist, 2007) reveal that actual rates
of carbon dioxide (CO2) emission are the same or worse than in the
worst case IPCC scenario A1F1 that, according to the 2007 IPCC
Summary, will lead to catastrophic, long-term stabilization at (upper
estimates) 790 ppm CO2, and a 6 degree centigrade higher temperature
and 3.7 meter sea level rise relative to pre-industrial levels;
i.e., CO2 catastrophically at twice today’s level of 385 ppm ,
temperatures 4-5 degrees Centigrade above today’s and sea level
0.8-3.5 metres above today’s.

The latest scientific findings are that the IPCC 2007 Report has
greatly under-estimated the rate of melting of Arctic Ice, including
that of Greenland – water from melted ice is lubricating and speeding
up the movement of glaciers to the sea; the so-called “albedo flip”
involving converting light-reflecting, white ice to light-absorbing,
dark sea is dramatically speeding up loss of Arctic sea ice; and the
consequent increase in temperature in the Arctic provides a positive
feedback to increase sea ice and Greenland ice sheet melting (for
analysis and dramatic images of Arctic ice melting.”
Full discussion at ; http://mwcnews.net/content/view/20133&Itemid=1

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“The greatest disturbances of which we are aware are
those now being introduced by man himself. Since his
tampering with the biological and geochemical balances
may ultimately prove injurious — even fatal — to himself,
he must understand them better than today.”

Bert Bolin. “The Carbon Cycle.”
Scientific American, September 1970
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NATURE
Vol 451
7 February 2008

OBITUARY
Bert Bolin (1925-2008)
Pioneering climate scientist and communicator.

As the first chair of the Intergovernmental Panel
on Climate Change (IPCC), and one of the first
scientists to understand the environmental impact
of carbon dioxide produced by human activities,
Bert Bolin left an indelible mark. A pioneer of
climate science, he died in Stockholm on 30
December 2007, aged 82.

Bolin was born in Nyköping, Sweden, on 15 May
1925. He completed his PhD at the University of
Stockholm in 1956, and was within five years
professor of meteorology there – a post he held
until his retirement in 1990. During that time,
he published more than 160 papers related to the
meteorology and chemistry of the atmosphere,
contributing to an improved understanding of
numerical weather models and acid deposition.

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Science / www.sciencexpress.org / 7 February 2008 /

Use of U.S. Croplands for Biofuels Increases Greenhouse Gases Through
Emissions from Land Use Change
Timothy Searchinger, Ralph Heimlich, R. A. Houghton, Fengxia Dong,
Amani Elobeid, Jacinto Fabiosa, Simla Tokgoz,Dermot Hayes, Tun-Hsiang
Yu

Abstract
Most prior studies have found that substituting biofuels for gasoline
will reduce greenhouse gases because biofuels sequester carbon
through the growth of the feedstock. These analyses have failed to
count the carbon emissions that occur as farmers worldwide respond to
higher prices and convert forest and grassland to new cropland to
replace the grain (or cropland) diverted to biofuels. Using a
worldwide agricultural model to estimate emissions from land use
change, we found that corn-based ethanol, instead of producing a 20%
savings, nearly doubles greenhouse emissions over 30 years and
increases greenhouse gases for 167 years. Biofuels from switchgrass,
if grown on U.S. corn lands, increase emissions by 50%. This result
raises concerns about large biofuel mandates
and highlights the value of using waste products.

Land Clearing and the Biofuel Carbon Debt
Joseph Fargione, Jason Hill, David Tilman, Stephen Polasky, Peter Hawthorne

Abstract
Increasing energy use, climate change, and carbon dioxide (CO2)
emissions from fossil fuels make switching to low-carbon fuels a high
priority. Biofuels are a potential low-carbon energy source, but
whether biofuels offer carbon savings depends on how they are
produced. Converting rainforests, peatlands, savannas, or grasslands
to produce food-based biofuels in Brazil, Southeast Asia, and the
United States creates a ‘biofuel carbon debt’ by releasing 17 to 420
times more CO2 than the annual greenhouse gas (GHG) reductions these
biofuels provide by displacing fossil fuels. In contrast, biofuels
made from waste biomass or from biomass grown on abandoned
agricultural lands planted with perennials incur little or no carbon
debt and offer immediate and sustained GHG advantages.

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Western Shoshone Defense Project

So-Ho-Bi (South Fork) office:

775-744-2565 (fax and phone)

Main office:

P.O. Box 211308

Crescent Valley, NV  89821

Newe Sogobi

775-468-0230

775-468-0237 (fax)

Uranium Exploration Near Grand Canyon

By FELICITY BARRINGER
<http://topics.nytimes.com/top/reference/timestopics/people/b/felicity_barri
nger/index.html?inline=nyt-per>

Published: February 7, 2008

With minimal public notice and no formal environmental review, the Forest
Service has approved a permit allowing a British mining company to explore
for uranium just outside Grand Canyon National Park, less than three miles
from a popular lookout over the canyon’s southern rim.

If the exploration finds rich uranium deposits, it could lead to the first
mines near the canyon since the price of uranium ore plummeted nearly two
decades ago. A sharp increase in uranium prices over the past three years
has led individuals to stake thousands of mining claims in the Southwest,
including more than 1,000 in the Kaibab National Forest, near the Grand
Canyon.

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