In little more than a decade the world should be meeting 10% of its total energy needs from solar power, two British scientists say, despite the technological problems to be overcome. Hard on the heels of the latest UN report on climate change, two UK scientists have proposed an ambitious plan to tackle the problem it graphically describes.
New data visualizations from the NASA Center for Climate Simulation and NASA's Scientific Visualization Studio show how climate models - those used in the new report from the United Nations' Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) - estimate how temperature and precipitation patterns could change throughout the 21st century.
Climate News Network has prepared this very abbreviated version of the first instalment of the IPCC’s Fifth Assessment Report (AR5) to serve as an objective guide to some of the headline issues it covers. It is in no sense an evaluation of what the Summary says: the wording is that of the IPCC authors themselves, except for a few cases where we have added headings.
The polar icecaps are melting faster than we thought they would; seas are rising faster than we thought they would; extreme weather events are increasing. Have a nice day! That’s a less than scientifically rigorous summary of the findings of the Fifth Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) report released this morning in Stockholm.
- By Robert Reich
Widening inequality thereby ignites what the historian Richard Hofstadter called the “paranoid style in American politics.” It animated the Know-Nothing and Anti-Masonic movements before the Civil War, the populist agitators of the Progressive Era and the John Birch Society
Researchers in the US say that millions of lives could be saved by the end of the century if greenhouse gas emissions were reduced. If the world does take concerted action to reduce greenhouse gas emissions, then by 2100 between 1.4 million and three million people a year will be conspicuously better off: they won’t be dead.
The extent of sea ice in the Arctic appears to have reached its lowest point for 2013 – more than last year, but well below the long term average.Scientists say the sea ice which covers much of the Arctic Ocean appears to have reached its minimum extent for this year.
- By Robert Reich
Boehner ushers a bill through the House that continues to fund the government after September 30 but doesn’t fund the Affordable Care Act. Anyone with half a brain knows Senate Democrats and the President won’t accept this — which means, if House Republicans stick to their guns, a government shut-down.
When it comes to solving the climate crisis, the world can't afford to ignore women's voices. Women's equality goes hand-in-hand with finding real solutions to climate change. Here are three reasons why.
How farmers care for peatlands can influence how welll they soak up greenhouse gases, because the plants that grow there are crucial to their effectiveness as carbon sinks. Such areas can also act as important flood plains, soaking up excess water. The trouble is that in many parts of the world peatlands are being destroyed or are under threat.
With our country facing tough choices about Syria, Moyers & Company’s John Light had a great piece on Friday: “Drought Helped Spark Syria’s Civil War — Is it One of Many Climate Wars to Come?” He interviewed one of our favorites, Francesco Femia, co-founder of the Center for Climate and Security, which has an advisory board of retired military commanders and foreign-policy experts.
There was a time when power generation belong to the public. This is a grassroots David and Goliath campaign to create a landmark model for how communities can take control of their energy future.
- By Robert Reich
Congress will reconvene shortly. That means more battles over taxes and spending, regulations and safety nets, and how to get the economy out of first gear. Which means more gridlock and continual showdowns over budget resolutions and the debt ceiling.
The forest fires raging through states in the western US are among the worst on record, but latest research indicates that they will get even worse in future as temperatures rise. As fire crews battle to control the forest fires that have been devastating areas of the western US.
- By Jan Rocha
How did the people who lived in the Amazon forest millennia ago manage to survive in harmony with their surroundings? What happened to the forest when conditions were very dry? What will be the effect of global warming on the Amazon rainforest?
The way we make and use stuff is harming the world—and ourselves. To create a system that works, we can't just use our purchasing power. We must turn it into citizen power. Since I released "The Story of Stuff" six years ago, the most frequent snarky remark I get from people trying to take me down a notch is about my own stuff.
Climatologists are puzzled that greenhouse gas emissions continue unabated, while the atmosphere is warming more slowly than they expected. Now two scientists in the US think they know why. hey say cooling waters in the tropical Pacific Ocean have played a large part in slowing recent warming, a finding which challenges those who argue that the slowdown means climate change is not as serious a problem as most climate scientists are convinced it is.
Climate change is only one of the risks that coral larvae have to face – but those which do survive its effects can improve the prospects for mature reefs. Scientists in the UK and the US have found that coral larvae are capable of travelling very long distances before becoming part of a reef.
A war on climate change is a war on materialism, plain and simple. The carbon pollution spewing out of our power plants and tail pipes is a natural byproduct of the monstrous engine of economic growth we have built, an engine that exists solely to satisfy the demand our materialism creates.
The highly radioactive water leaking from the wrecked Fukushima plant is part of a problem that Japan will take decades to resolve and which will blight many thousands of lives. The discovery at the plant of a leak of radioactive caesium eight times more dangerous than the levels immediately after the Fukushima accident in March 2011 has aroused international concern that Japan is incapable of containing the aftermath of the accident.
Studies into how we use air conditioning technology suggest that our attempts to keep cool are in fact adding to rising temperatures.As the world swelters, so will energy demand rise: the heat extremes generated by climate change are likely to raise the global demand for air conditioning by 72%. So people will generate more heat and release more carbon dioxide just to stay cool as the thermometer soars.
By making 360-degree panoramic underwater vision available to anyone who has a computer, scientists hope to alert many more people to the plight of the world’s coral reefs. Scientists have hit on a way to harness 360-degree panoramas from Google’s underwater street-view format in order to let anyone with access to a computer see reefs in real time.