Tag: climate change

Hoodwinked in the Hothouse: False Solutions to Climate Change – Available now!

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coverFrom Rising Tide North America and Carbon Trade Watch: the 2nd edition of Hoodwinked in the Hothouse: False Solutions to Climate Change.

This 28-page booklet provides a close-to-comprehensive overview of false solutions to climate change. Fifteen concise articles—complete with photos and illustrations—cover more than 20 false solutions to climate change, from Clean Coal to Biomass incineration, providing an easy-to-read introduction to the ever expanding market place of climate crisis technofixes.

With the incredible pace of the climate policy debate, the 2nd edition provides key updates to crucial topics like REDD (a major new commodification of forests and lands), which was just emerging at the time of initial publication.

Equally important, the booklet expands to more technologies that are being branded as “green” despite the grave dangers associated with them, such as waste incineration, biochar, and genetically engineered “carbon sucking” trees. We’ve also included much more information on real solutions and positive steps communities can we can take to stop the climate crisis.

The booklet includes contributions from ETC Group, the Indigenous Environmental Network, Movement Generation, the Global Alliance for Incinerator Alternatives, and International Rivers as well as art and photography from across the movement for climate justice.

We invite you to download Hoodwinked from the Hothouse today! Also available in it’s entirety in Spanish here!

You can order these booklets *FREE* from Rising Tide.

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Manhattan floods, Chicago heatwaves and withering Californian vines: how scientists see the US in 75 years

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Hard-hitting report describes how America will be affected region by region if no action is taken on climate change

It provides the most detailed picture to date of the impacts on the US in the worst case scenarios, when no action is taken to cut emissions. Examples include: floods in lower Manhattan; a quadrupling of heatwave deaths in Chicago; withering on the vineyards of California; the disappearance of wildflowers from the slopes of the Rockies; the extinction of Alaska’s wild polar bears in the next 75 years.

What lies ahead by region

North-east

The winter snow season could be cut in half in southern New York, Vermont, New Hampshire and Maine — maybe as short as a week or two, under the higher emissions scenario. This would destroy winter traditions like skiing and skating and outdoor ponds. Native cranberries and blueberries would disappear; dairy herds, the biggest agricultural industry, would decline under the higher emissions scenario.

South-east

Summer temperatures in Florida could rise by 4.1C (10.5F), with the heat effect multipled by decreased rainfall under the higher emissions scenario. There would be increased hurricane intensity and rising sea levels leads to loss of wetlands and coastal areas. It would lead to a severe decline in quality of life.

Mid-west

Frequent, severe and longer lasting heatwaves in cities – as many as three a year in Chicago under the higher emissions scenario.

Water levels in the Great Lakes could fall by up to two feet by the end of the century under the higher emissions scenario.

South-west

Continued strong warming will threaten flow of Colorado river.

Alaska

Has been warming at twice the rate of the rest of the US over last 50 years.

Temperatures could rise up to a further 5.4C (13F) under the higher emissions scenario. The region should be prepared for drought and increased risk of wildfire.

North-west

Declining snowpack is already threatening agriculture. Many salmon species are already threatened

Costs

Human health: Rise in deaths due to heatwaves, decline in health because of poor air quality and increase in water borne and insect borne diseases.

Agriculture: Although some crops will benefit from the longer growing season, heavy downpours could wreak havoc on others. Farmers will be forced to use more pesticides and weed killers against invasive plants. Poison ivy will bcome more abundant and more toxic. Higher emissions scenario would cause a 10% decline in dairy herd in Appalachia.

Energy: Rising heat index will increase demand on electricity for air conditioning. But water shortages could restrict electricity generation.

Oil infrastructure, along coast of Louisiana and Florida, is also vulnerable to rising sea levels and intensifying hurricanes.

Transport: Storm surges and rising sea levels could block the use of ports and coastal airports, roads and rail lines. Six of the top 10 freight gateways are threatened by rising sea levels. Entire road networks on the Gulf Coast could be at risk.

Ecosystems: Large-scale shifts in species likely to continue. Deserts will become hotter and drier, oceans more acidic. Salmon and trout populations will contract.

BREAKING NEWS: Activists Risk Arrest, Ascend Dragline to Stop Mountaintop Removal

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FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE (Thursday June 18th, 2009):

Big John Dragline

Hi-Res Photos, B-roll and Video will be available, www.mountainaction.org.

Activists Risk Arrest to Stop Mountaintop Removal

Activists scaled 20-storey tall mining machinery this morning to call attention to nation’s worst form of coal mining; This is the first time a dragline has been scaled on a mountaintop removal site

COAL RIVER VALLEY, W. VA.—Moments ago, four concerned citizens entered onto Massey Energy’s mountaintop removal mine site near Twilight WV and have begun to scale a150-foot dragline machine to drop a banner that says, ‘stop mountaintop removal mining.’ The climbers plan to stay on the enormous dragline, a massive piece of equipment that removes house-sized chunks of blasted rock and earth to expose coal, until police arrest them. Equipped with satellites phones and a web camera, the climbers will be available for interviews.

This is the first time a dragline has been scaled on a mountaintop removal site, and marks the latest in a string of increasingly dramatic protests in West Virginia by residents and allies from across the country. This act of protest against mountaintop removal comes just days after the Obama Administration announced a plan to reform, but not abolish, the aggressive strip mining practice. Continue reading

A Call to Action: THE MOBILIZATION FOR CLIMATE JUSTICE

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WE STAND AT A CROSSROADS.

Emissions

Confront Copenhagen at Home

www.ACTFORCLIMATEJUSTICE.org

read and pass on the Mobilization’s
Open Letter to the Grassroots

The facts are clear. Global climate change, caused by human activities, is happening, threatening the lives and livelihoods of billions of people and the existence of millions of species. Social movements, environmental groups, and scientists from all over the world are calling for urgent and radical action on climate change.

On the 6 December, 2009 the governments of the world will come to Copenhagen for the fifteenth UN Climate Conference (COP-15). This will be the biggest summit on climate change ever to have taken place. Yet, previous meetings have produced nothing more than business as usual.

There are alternatives to the current course that is emphasizing false solutions such as market-based approaches and agrofuels. If we put humanity before profit and solidarity above competition we can live amazing lives without destroying our planet.

For a just transition to a low carbon future we must invest in community-controlled renewable energy and leave fossil fuels in the ground. We must stop over-production for over-consumption. All should have equal access to the global commons through community control and local sovereignty over energy, forests, land and water. We must acknowledge the historical responsibility of the global elite and rich Global North for causing this crisis. Equity between all peoples in the North and South through reparations of this ecological debt is essential to climate justice.

Climate change is already impacting people, particularly, indigenous and forest-dependent peoples, women, small farmers, workers, marginalized communities and impoverished neighbourhoods who are all calling for action on climate- and social-justice.

We call on all peoples around the planet to mobilize and take action against the root causes of climate change and the key agents responsible, both in Copenhagen and around the world.

This mobilization has already begun but is still in the planning stages. We have time to collectively decide what these mobilizations will look like, and to begin to visualize what our future can be. It is now time to take the power back!

We encourage everyone to start mobilizing today in your own neighbourhoods and communities.

Please get involved and take action for climate justice.

Hope is not just a feeling, it is also about taking action.

To read the Mobilization’s Open Letter to the Grassroots Continue reading