person:alex kirby

European power is slipping away from King Coal - Climate News Network

▻http://www.climatenewsnetwork.net/european-power-is-slipping-away-from-king-coal

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By Alex Kirby

Analysis of falling demand for electricity within the EU sends a stark warning to investors in new coal plants that their assets could be left stranded.

LONDON, 10 June, 2015 − Coal, the muscle that for two centuries powered Europe’s economic dominance of the world, is steadily losing its grip as cleaner fuels take its place and energy efficiency cuts electricity consumption, according to new analysis.

The European Union’s electricity demand fell by 3.3% from 2008 to 2013 − even though GDP grew by 4.1% − and the analysts say changing market conditions for utilities leaves new coal plants failing to generate positive cash-flows even in the most optimistic scenario.

#climat #charbon

Forests can soak up a third of carbon emissions - Climate News Network

▻http://www.climatenewsnetwork.net/forests-can-soak-up-a-third-of-carbon-emissions

Forests can soak up a third of carbon emissions

By Alex Kirby

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Report commissioned by Prince Charles’s charity says protecting tropical forests could enable them to absorb billions of tonnes of the Earth’s emissions of carbon.

LONDON, 11 April, 2015 − Looking after the world’s tropical forests would be worthwhile in its own right, for the sake of their human and animal inhabitants and their wider effects on the natural world.

But researchers say it would also have a significant bonus. Properly cared for, the forests could cancel out between a quarter and a third of the planet’s carbon emissions.

#forêt #co2_emissions #climat

Pollution poses long-range danger to Borneo’s forests - Climate News Network

▻http://www.climatenewsnetwork.net/pollution-poses-long-range-danger-to-borneos-forests

By Alex Kirby

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Air quality in Borneo’s rainforests is being affected by pollution from human activities far off in East Asia – with possible consequences for the ozone layer.

LONDON, 1 April, 2015 – New evidence has been found of the long distances that airborne pollution can be transported, and of its potential impacts far from its point of origin.

Researchers from the UK and Malaysia have detected a human fingerprint deep in the Borneo rainforest in south-east Asia − and it has implications for air quality in the region, and for the ozone layer.

The research, published in European Geosciences Union journal Atmospheric Chemistry and Physics, shows that cold winds from the north carry industrial pollutants from East Asia towards the equator. The air quality in Borneo depends very much on which way the wind blows.

#indonésie #bornéo #forêt #pollution

Climate is now main worry for conservation group - Climate News Network

▻http://www.climatenewsnetwork.net/climate-is-now-main-worry-for-conservation-group

By Alex Kirby

The devastating effects of a changing climate have become the biggest challenge faced by a leading protector of the UK countryside.

LONDON, 24 March, 2015 − The head of one of the UK’s best-known conservation groups says the greatest threat to its work is now climate change.

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Dame Helen Ghosh, director-general of the National Trust, told BBC Radio that there is devastation of wild Britain and the creatures that live there. “Who would have thought that the house sparrow and hedgehog were going to become rare?” she said.

#climat #biodiversité

Climate change is likely factor in Syria’s conflict - Climate News Network

▻http://www.climatenewsnetwork.net/climate-change-likely-factor-syrias-conflict

Voilà une perspective un peu “différente”

By Alex Kirby

Researchers say climate change probably caused the savage drought that affected Syria nearly a decade ago − and helped to spark the country’s current civil war.

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LONDON, 2 March, 2015 – In a dire chain of cause and effect, the drought that devastated parts of Syria from 2006 to 2010 was probably the result of climate change driven by human activities, a new study says.

And the study’s authors think that the drought may also have contributed to the outbreak of Syria’s uprising in 2011.

The drought, which was the worst ever recorded in the region, ravaged agriculture in the breadbasket region of northern Syria, driving dispossessed farmers to the cities where poverty, government mismanagement and other factors created the unrest that exploded four years ago. The conflict has left at least 200,000 people dead, and has displaced millions of others.

#syrie

Energy giant’s bleak outlook is 25% rise in CO2 - Climate News Network

▻http://www.climatenewsnetwork.net/energy-giants-bleak-outlook-25-rise-co2

By Alex Kirby

The British-based oil and gas “supermajor” BP says it expects global emissions of carbon dioxide to rise by a quarter in the next 20 years.

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LONDON, 24 February, 2015 − It may come as a shock, as governments ponder how to tackle climate change, to learn that the world is moving rapidly in the wrong direction.

But BP, one of the world’s six biggest oil and gas companies, says it thinks that, on present trends, emissions of CO2 will be 25% greater within two decades than they are today.

The prediction is published in BP’s Energy Outlook 2035, which it says is its best effort “to describe a ‘most likely’ trajectory of the global energy system”.

Arctic melting opens sea route to more pollution - Climate News Network

▻http://www.climatenewsnetwork.net/arctic-melting-opens-sea-route-pollution

By Alex Kirby

Increasing loss of Arctic sea ice is likely soon to mean more ships being able to use the polar passage – affecting climate, health and air quality.

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LONDON, 14 February, 2015 − As Arctic sea ice continues to melt at an alarming rate, maritime traffic is set to increase − and with it the pollution emitted by ships’ engines.

A paper published by the International Council on Clean Transportation (ICCT) says emissions of pollutants from vessels in the US area of the high Arctic could increase by between 150% and 600% by 2025.

Ships typically burn bunker fuel with a high sulphur content. As well as various greenhouse gases (GHGs), the engines also emit soot, or black carbon. And when this covers snow and ice, it reduces their ability to reflect sunlight away from the Earth, and so raises temperatures.

#arctic #transport_maritime #pollution #air

Climate data shows clear signs of warming | Climate News Network

▻http://www.climatenewsnetwork.net/2014/07/climate-data-shows-clear-signs-of-warming

By Alex Kirby

Hundreds of scientists from 57 countries have fed evidence into a new report that provides a clear picture of how patterns, changes, and trends of the global climate system show that our planet is becoming a warmer place.

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LONDON, 24 July, 2014 − However you view the evidence, whatever set of measurements you examine, the picture that emerges is consistent: the Earth is heating up.

The US National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) reports: “In 2013, the vast majority of worldwide climate indicators − greenhouse gases, sea levels, global temperatures, etc − continued to reflect trends of a warmer planet.”

Critics refute assets claim by ‘Orwellian’ Shell | Climate News Network

▻http://www.climatenewsnetwork.net/2014/07/critics-refute-assets-claim-by-orwellian-shell

By Alex Kirby

The world’s biggest oil company has been accused of ‘doublethink’ in claiming that its fossil fuel assets will continue to be highly profitable and in demand, while recognising the need for decisive action on climate change.

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London, 9 July 2014 − Is investment in fossil fuels a prudent bet? For some time, critics have been warning major oil and gas companies that their reserves could soon be worthless if the world acts decisively on climate change.

The world’s biggest oil company, Shell, recently insisted that its reserves would remain in demand and would continue to sell at a profit, and that no global climate agreement would damage its profits.

#shell #climat #énergie_fossile

Atlases reveal climate and weather impacts | Climate News Network

▻http://www.climatenewsnetwork.net/2014/07/atlases-reveal-climate-and-weather-impacts

By Alex Kirby

Two new atlases provide clear visual evidence of the effect climate change and extreme weather can have on people and property.

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LONDON, 12 July 2014 – For people who find it hard to believe the Earth really is warming, new visual evidence will soon be available – two atlases, one showing graphically the retreat of Arctic ice, the other the human and economic price exacted by extreme weather.

The 10th edition of the National Geographic Atlas of the World is to be published on 30 September. The publication’s geographer, Juan José Valdés, says the reduction in multi-year ice – ice that has survived for two summers – is so noticeable compared with previous editions that it is the biggest visible change since the breakup of the USSR.

#arctique #climat

Climate worries insurers and military | Climate News Network

▻http://www.climatenewsnetwork.net/2014/05/climate-worries-insurers-and-military

By Alex Kirby

Powerful voices in finance and the armed forces raise concerns about the risks of increasingly extreme weather events causing billions of dollars of damage and potentially igniting humanitarian disasters and regional conflicts

LONDON, 15 May − The risks associated with climate change have got some very important people worried − the people who pick up the bills, and those who clear up the mess or try to prevent it happening.

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The world’s biggest and oldest insurance market, Lloyd’s of London, has published a report that urges insurers to include climate risks in their models. It says: “Scientific research points conclusively to the existence of climate change driven by human activity.

“Nevertheless, significant uncertainty remains on the nature and extent of the changes to our climate and the specific impacts this will generate. Many of the effects will become apparent over the coming decades and anticipating them will require forward projections, not solely historical data.”

Quoting the Munich Re insurance group , the World Bank says damage and weather-related losses around the world have increased from an annual average of $50bn in the 1980s to nearly $200bn over the last decade.

#climat #impact #armée #armement

E. Antarctic ice basin ‘may be at risk’ | Climate News Network

▻http://www.climatenewsnetwork.net/2014/05/e-antarctic-ice-basin-may-be-at-risk

By Alex Kirby

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The East Antarctic ice sheet is thought by most scientists to be stable. But a German team says it has found how part of it could in time melt unstoppably.

LONDON, 4 May – Part of the East Antarctic ice sheet may be less stable than anyone had realised, researchers based in Germany have found.

Writing in Nature Climate Change, two scientists from the Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research (PIK) say the melting of quite a small volume of ice on the East Antarctic shore could ultimately trigger a discharge of ice into the ocean which would result in unstoppable sea-level rise for thousands of years ahead. www.nature.com/nclimate/journal/vaop/ncurrent/full/nclimate2226.html

#pôles #antarctique #climat

Wetland emissions mean more methane | Climate News Network

▻http://www.climatenewsnetwork.net/2014/05/wetland-emissions-mean-more-methane

By Alex Kirby

Methane emissions are rising globally because wetlands – especially in northern latitudes – are releasing more than anyone had realised, a team of researchers based in Canada says.

LONDON, 1 May – The bad news is that global emissions of methane appear to be rising. The worse news is that scientists believe there’s much more to come in the form of releases from many of the world’s wetlands.

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Methane is emitted from agriculture and fossil fuel use, as well as natural sources such as microbes in saturated wetland soils. It is a powerful greenhouse gas, and in the short term it does much more damage than the far more abundant carbon dioxide.

IPCC tries a gamble with shale gas | Climate News Network

▻http://www.climatenewsnetwork.net/2014/04/ipcc-tries-a-gamble-with-shale-gas

By Alex Kirby

The latest IPCC report urges a dash for gas to allow us to reduce the burning of coal. And it accepts the use of shale gas, which threatens to be far more polluting than originally thought.

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LONDON, 14 April – If you support fracking, you should be pleased with the latest report from the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (the IPCC). It’s given the green light to the use of shale gas as a short-term way to slow climate change.

#climat #énergie #gaz_de-schiste

Climate change ‘makes violence likelier’ | Climate News Network

▻http://www.climatenewsnetwork.net/2014/03/climate-change-makes-violence-likelier

By Alex Kirby

Scientists say there is a direct link between changing climate and an increase in violence, reinforcing a key finding of the latest IPCC report.

LONDON, 31 March – US scientists say there is evidence that a warming climate is closely related to political and social instability and a higher risk of conflict.

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Professor Solomon Hsiang and colleagues described in the journal Nature in 2011 how they had investigated whether anything linked “planetary-scale climate changes with global patterns of civil conflict”.

#guerre #conflits #climat #violence

‘Forget the cost – tackle climate anyway’ | Climate News Network

▻http://www.climatenewsnetwork.net/2014/04/forget-the-cost-tackle-climate-anyway

By Alex Kirby

Forget the cost of mitigating climate change, say two researchers. It’s impossible to work out how much it will be – and whatever it is, we should do it anyway.

LONDON, 3 April – Two researchers who tried to work out the economics of reducing global climate change to a tolerable level have come up with a perhaps surprising answer: essentially, we do not and cannot know what it would cost.

Even more surprising, probably, is their conclusion: not knowing is no excuse for not acting. “Mitigating climate change must proceed regardless of long-run economic analyses”, they conclude, “or risk making the world uninhabitable.”

#climat

AAAS : Climate risks irreversible change | Climate News Network

▻http://www.climatenewsnetwork.net/2014/03/aaas-climate-risks-irreversible-change

By Alex Kirby

In a highly unusual intervention in the debate over climate policy, US scientists say the evidence that the world is warming is as conclusive as that which links smoking and lung cancer.

LONDON, 18 March – The American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS) says there is a “small but real” chance that a warming climate will cause sudden and possibly unalterable changes to the planet.

This echoes the words used in its 2007 report by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), which said climate change might bring “abrupt and irreversible” impacts.
A child with kwasiorkor, caused by evere protein deficiency: Child malnutrition may rise by about a fifth Image: Dr Lyle Conrad via Wikimedia Commons

In a report, What We Know, the AAAS makes an infrequent foray into the climate debate. The report’s significance lies not in what it says, which covers familiar ground, but in who is saying it: the world’s largest general scientific body, and one of its most knowledgeable.

#climat

Drought ‘makes Amazonia emit carbon’ | Climate News Network

▻http://www.climatenewsnetwork.net/2014/03/drought-makes-amazon-emit-carbon

From « sink » to « emitter »...

By Alex Kirby

Drought and fire can dry the Amazon forest to the point where instead of storing carbon it releases it to the atmosphere, several studies suggest.

LONDON, 5 March – Scientists think there is growing evidence to show that the Amazon forest is less effective at absorbing carbon dioxide than previously thought. Instead, they say, it may often be releasing huge quantities of CO2 to the atmosphere, acting not as a carbon sink but as a source.

Their reasons for this potentially significant rethink were published in two reports in the journal Nature. The first describes the results of researchers who sampled the amount of carbon in the air at four points over the Amazon, to build up a more comprehensive picture of the forest’s response to both light and water.

#climat #amazonie #co2_emissions

Biofuels from waste ‘need EU backing’ | Climate News Network

▻http://www.climatenewsnetwork.net/2014/03/biofuels-from-waste-need-eu-backing

By Alex Kirby

The countries of the European Union could slash their greenhouse gas emissions and save significant amounts of oil by making fuel from waste, researchers say. But they think policymakers should give a lead.

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LONDON, 3 March – Europe has the technology and the raw material to make a big cut in the amount of oil its transport uses, researchers say. But it will fail to reap the benefits on offer unless the European Union comes up with more radical policies.

A report, Wasted: Europe’s Untapped Resource, says the continent has significant unexploited potential to convert waste from farming, forestry, industry and households into advanced low-carbon biofuels, saving more than a sixth of the EU’s expected total fuel consumption for road transport 16 years from now.

#climat #agro-carburants #biofiul

Arctic ‘is set to reach 13°C by 2100′ | Climate News Network

▻http://www.climatenewsnetwork.net/2014/02/arctic-is-set-to-reach-13c-by-2100

By Alex Kirby

There is wide political agreement that global average temperatures should not rise more than 2°C above their level several centuries ago. The rise some scientists expect in the Arctic by 2100 is more than six times as great.

LONDON, 20 February – US scientists say that by the end of this century temperatures in the Arctic may for part of each year reach 13°C above pre-industrial levels. Global average temperatures have already risen by about 0.8°C over the level they were at in around 1750.

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The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change said in its 2013 Fifth Assessment Report that it thought the probable global temperature rise by 2100 would be between 1.5 and 4°C under most scenarios. Most of the world’s governments have agreed the global rise should not be allowed to exceed a “safety level” of 2°C.

#arctique #climat #réchauffement_global

US urges fishing ban in melting Arctic | Climate News Network

▻http://www.climatenewsnetwork.net/2014/02/us-urges-fishing-ban-in-melting-arctic

By Alex Kirby

Washington is urging countries that share the Arctic to ban commercial fishing in the offshore Arctic Ocean, something that will soon be possible for the first time in human history as the ice melts.

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LONDON, 24 February – The countries that ring the Arctic Ocean will soon face a dilemma: can they risk commercial fishing fleets shooting their nets in those soon-to-be-ice-free seas?

Before long – quite possibly before mid-century – the Arctic Ocean will be free of ice during part of each summer, scientists are now saying confidently. For better or worse that will open up huge opportunities for shipping and hydrocarbon exploitation. And for the first time in recorded history it will allow the fishing boats access to whatever has lived undisturbed until now beneath the ice.

A three-day meeting began today in Nuuk, the capital of Greenland, where US officials are hoping to persuade the other nations which border the Arctic Ocean to introduce a moratorium on high seas fishing there (the other members of the group are Canada, Russia and Norway).

#climat #arctique #pêche

Forest peoples urge land rights action | Climate News Network

▻http://www.climatenewsnetwork.net/2014/02/forest-peoples-urge-land-rights-action

By Alex Kirby

There’s plenty of talk at the United Nations and in the corridors of international conferences on making land rights a realiy for forest people. But campaigners say there’s not much action to match.

LONDON, 23 February – Forest people’s groups say many governments are failing to protect their right to their ancestral lands, and argue that this neglect is damaging efforts to slow climate change.

Their argument is supported by campaigners. Research by the Rights and Resources Initiative (RRI) says the pace of provision of new legal protection for indigenous communities has fallen, despite an increase in professions of support by industry, governments and international initiatives like REDD+ and the UN’s Sustainable Development Goals.

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#climat #forêt

Carbon output ‘will climb 29% by 2035′ | Climate News Network

▻http://www.climatenewsnetwork.net/2014/02/carbon-output-will-climb-29-by-2035

By Alex Kirby

Climate scientists agree that global carbon dioxide emissions need to be sharply cut. A prominent player in the energy industry predicts they will go in the opposite direction.

LONDON, 7 February – The good news, from the climate’s standpoint, is that while global demand for energy is continuing to grow, the growth is slowing. The bad news is that one energy giant predicts global carbon dioxide emissions will probably rise by almost a third in the next 20 years.

The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change says greenhouse gas emissions need to peak by 2020 and then decline if the world is to hope to avoid global average temperatures rising by more than 2°C over pre-industrial levels. Beyond 2°C, it says, climate change could become dangerously unmanageable.

But BP’s Energy Outlook 2035 says CO2 emissions are likely to increase by 29% in the next two decades because of growing energy demand from the developing world.

#climat #carbone

Fracking won’t avert energy crisis, Davos is told | Climate News Network

▻http://www.climatenewsnetwork.net/2014/01/fracking-wont-avert-energy-crisis-davos-is-told

By Alex Kirby

Some of the planet’s richest nations, meeting at the World Economic Forum in Switzerland, are to hear a warning that a global oil crisis could happen as early as next year.

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LONDON, 24 January – A British businessman will tell world leaders meeting in Switzerland today that it is dangerous to argue that fracking for shale oil and gas can help to avert a global energy crisis.

Jeremy Leggett, a former Greenpeace staff member who founded a successful solar energy company, has been invited to the annual World Economic Forum meeting in Davos from 22 to 25 January. The theme of the meeting is The Reshaping of the World: Consequences for Society, Politics and Business.

Leggett told the Climate News Network: “The WEF likes to deal in big ideas, and last year one of its ideas was to argue that the world can frack its way to prosperity. There are large numbers of would-be frackers in Davos.

#gaz_de_schiste #énergie #climat

World went on warming in 2013 | Climate News Network

▻http://www.climatenewsnetwork.net/2014/01/world-went-on-warming-in-2013

By Alex Kirby

British climate scientists think 2013 will prove to have been one of the warmest recorded, and they expect 2014 to continue the trend.

LONDON, 3 January – The global average temperature in 2014 is expected to make it one of the warmest years on record, according to the UK Met Office.

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It says in its annual global temperature forecast that 2014 will probably be between 0.43°C and 0.71°C warmer than the long-term (1961-1990) average of 14.0°C, with a central estimate of 0.57°C.

#climat