Keystone XL clears hurdle in Senate despite Obama veto threat
Climate and energy news
Prepare for rising migration driven by climatechange, governments told
A new study suggests rising sea levels, heatwaves, floods anddroughts linked to global warming are likely to force millions ofpeople to move out of harm’s way. The report by the InternalDisplacement Monitoring Centre suggests 22 million people weredisplaced by extreme weather events in 2013, with numbers expectedto rise as climate change exacerbates the issue.
U.S. Clean Power RulesDelayed
ClimateWire via ScientificAmerican
The US Environmental Protection Agency is delaying the finalrollout of its new rules aimed at lowering the power sector’sgreenhouse gas emissions by 30 percent by 2030. The agency insiststhe delays are aimed at helping states develop compliance plans.However, observers say the moves could help shield the efforts fromlegal and congressional challenges.
EPA Moves to Count Methane Emissions fromFracking
Climate Central via ScientificAmerican
The US Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) is considering anew rule to require fracking companies to disclose the greenhousegas emissions associated with all their activities. The EPAcurrently only requires companies to report emissions from projectsthat flare – or burn off – surplus methane from the drillingprocess. Meanwhile, a group of campaigners is suing the EPA to tryand attain information about all the chemicals used in the frackingprocess, Bloombergreports.
Climate change bears down on haplesspandas
It may be necessary to move giant Pandas to nature reservesif they are to survive the impacts of climate change, new researchsuggests. Global warming of just one degree celsius could halve thepandas’ habitat by 2070, the study suggests. The changing environscould also cut panda populations off from one another, limitingbreeding opportunities.
Oil price slump taking a toll on US alternativefuels
While the falling oil price is having little impact onrenewable electricity, it is hurting the economic prospects ofalternative transport fuels. Biodiesel suppliers are having toslash prices to try and stay competitive with cheap petrol. TheWilderHill Clean Energy index, which tracks everything fromrenewable power producers to solar panel makers, is down 36 percentafter hitting a three-year high last March, Reuters reports.
Arctic oil “unburnable” in 2C world -study
None of the Arctic’s oil can be burned if the world wants toprevent temperatures rising by more than two degrees abovepre-industrial levels, new research shows. The news comes as Shellconsiders another attempt to drill in the Arctic this summer,having already spent some $6 billion without striking oil.
Climate sceptics gain platform at Indian ScienceCongress
Humans’ impact on climate change was briefly called intoquestion at an annual meeting of scientists in Mumbai this week.Climate campaigners condemned the comments, saying, “[t]he issue ofclimate change is directly linked with survival, equal access toopportunities.”
Climate change advisers to probe Treasury’splanned fossil fuel spendingboom
The government is set to undertake a review of the UK’sability to meet its carbon budget commitments, after it wasrevealed that fossil fuel investment is set to rise. Analysis bythe Green Alliance think tank of the latest Treasury InfrastructurePipeline, recently revealed the government is expecting to mobilisenearly £50 billion of spending on fossil fuel infrastructure in thesecond half of this decade.
Climate and energy comment
Climate change scaremongering won’t trouble oiljunkies
Andrew Critchlow, the Telegraph’s commodities editor, usesthis week’s “controversial paper” by University College London,which concluded that a majority of the world’s fossil fuelsreserves must stay in the ground to avoid dangerous climate change,to argue that “scaremongering people into conserving energy won’twork”. He adds: “The only real solution to reducing emissions overthe long term is to invest heavily to refine and developtechnologies such as hydrogen and hybrid cars, which will removeoil from our daily lives.”
International law is coming up short in itsresponse to climate change
Guardian SustainableBusiness Blog
Mary Robinson, the former Irish president, notes that theInternational Bar Association, the global voice of the legalprofession, has released a detailed report on the role ofinternational law in addressing climate change. Its assessment is”frankly shocking”. She says: “climate change touches on every areaof international law – human rights, trade, investment, migration -and everywhere the law is coming up short.”
New Climate Science
The refreezing of melt ponds on Arctic seaice
Journal of Geophysical Research: Oceans
Arctic sea ice models may be overestimating ice coverage byas much as a quarter, a new study suggests. The researchinvestigates how melt ponds on the surface of sea ice suppresseswinter re-freezing of sea ice. Only minimal ice growth at the baseof the underlying sea ice can occur before a pond freezescompletely, the authors say, and the heat and salt content of themelt ponds delays their re-freezing.
On a tropical island, fossils reveal thepast and possible future of polarice
Global mean sea level before the last ice age peakedat 20 to 30 feet above current levels, a study of fossil corals inthe Seychelles suggests. Although global average temperature125,000 years ago was only slightly warmer than it is now, rapidretreat of an unstable part of the Antarctic ice sheet was a majorcontributor to sea level rise, the researchers conclude.