eCarbon News

March 2008

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This issue:

• Australian news
• World news
  • Emissions, Kyoto and policy
  • Agriculture and Natural Resource Management
  • Economics and business
  • Energy
  • Sequestration
  • Climate and climate change
  • Trading and tax
  • Conferences

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Australian news

Market will resolve problems - Garnaut

Labor's chief adviser on climate change policy believes the market will resolve most problems arising from the introduction of an emissions trading scheme, while power companies claim market forces are likely to cause the greatest disruption. Presenting his blueprint for an emission trading scheme from 2010 to 800 business representatives, Ross Garnaut said he favoured a simple and transparent system with minimal intervention from government.
27 March The Australian article
Link to Garnaut Climate Change Review discussion papers and reports

Trading 'centrepiece of Australian policy'

“An emissions trading scheme will be the centrepiece of Australia’s climate change policy,” Professor Garnaut said, launching a discussion paper on the topic. “If we get the design right, it will help build a more resilient economy for the long term.”
20 March The Australian article
21 March The Age article
20 March media statement
Executive Summary of the discussion paper
Download the discussion paper (477KB pdf)

Australia's emissions trading system will begin in 2010 and the market will determine the price, Climate Change Minister Penny Wong said.
17 March Bloomberg article
17 March ABC News article

Auctioning of Australian carbon

Australia's farmers, coal miners and power generators should have to bid at auction for carbon permits when carbon trading starts in 2010, the government's top climate adviser, Ross Garnaut said.
25 March Reuters article through Planet Ark

Renewable energy target criticised

The Federal Government plan to increase mandatory minimum levels of renewable energy will cost the economy $1.5 billion and drive up electricity bills by 6 per cent, according to analysis conducted for the Australian Petroleum Production and Exploration Association, which represents the gas industry. The Association claims an emissions trading scheme due to start in 2010 could on its own deliver the same greenhouse gas cuts, but at a lower cost.
19 March The Australian article   

Australia to speak up

The Prime Minister has declared that Australia will adopt an ambitious new "activist" stance on international issues where it believes it can make a difference. Kevin Rudd said that Australia's voice had been "too quiet for too long across the various councils of the world".
27 March The Age article

Climate change tough decisions

Climate change will be one of the issues that define the Rudd Government. It is an issue of tough choices, of clashing values and objectives, in which decisions will have to be made in a fog of uncertainty about how serious the problem is, and what is the best way out of it.
25 March The Age opinion by Tim Colebatch

Australia's Prime Minister seeks commitment

Kevin Rudd embarks on the most extensive world tour of any Australian prime minister in a generation this week in pursuit of deeper economic ties with Asia and a commitment from world leaders to combat global warming.
25 March Bloomberg article

Vulnerable species face extinction

Some of Australia's most vulnerable native animals could die out as climate change take its toll on their already fragile existence, warns a report that catalogues the risks facing 11 species from the impact of rising temperatures and rainfall decline. The report was produced by environment group WWF and a research team from Macquarie University.
25 March The Age article

Climate change hitting Australian wine industry

Australian grape growers reckon they are the canary in the coalmine of global warming, as a long drought forces winemakers to rethink the styles of wine they can produce and the regions in which they can grow.
25 March Reuters article through Environmental News Network

Joint venture tries to capture carbon market

Pacific Hydro and the Snowy Mountains Engineering Corporation have formed a carbon services joint venture called Perenia seeking to capture the market before Australia's emissions trading scheme starts.
24 March The Age article

Victoria offers rebates on solar hot water

The Victorian Government will spend $33 million helping households in regional and rural Victoria switch to solar hot water.
21 March The Age article

Australia needs to commit to be taken seriously

Australia has been told it must commit to a 25 per cent cut in carbon dioxide emissions by 2020 if it is to be taken seriously by other members of the Kyoto club.
13 March ABC News article

Carbon-free funerals

An Australian cemetery has unveiled plans to take the carbon out of cremations by offering new green funerals to help combat global warming. On the day Australia's formal ratification of the Kyoto Protocol comes into force, the Centennial Park cemetery in the South Australian state capital of Adelaide said it had studied the carbon impact of burials and cremations.
11 March Reuters article through Environmental News Network

Australia's ratification of the Kyoto Protocol formalised

Australia's ratification of the Kyoto Protocol came into force, leaving the United States as the only major developed country rejecting the accord. Prime Minister Kevin Rudd said Australia now had a "seat at the table'' on global efforts to tackle climate change.
11 March Sydney Morning Herald article
11 March Bloomberg article

A stern word for critics

Nicholas Stern, the author of a major global report on the cost of climate change, has hit back at Australian criticism of his findings, claiming it was wrong and careless. The former World Bank chief economist has co-authored a detailed letter in reply to a working paper issued by Australia's Productivity Commission, which in January accused him of inflating estimates of the cost of climate change and making value judgments to support his report released in 2006.
7 March The Australian article

Tropical fish going deaf

Going deaf is not a problem that most of us would automatically associate with global warming. For coral reef fish, however, hotter seas could pose a real threat. Young coral reef fish with misshapen ear bones are more likely to get lost and die, and exposure to warmer waters makes the problem worse, according to a study of fish living around Lizard Island on Australia's the Great Barrier Reef.
6 March New Scientist article

Australian and Papua New Guinea sign forest pacts

Australia and Papua New Guinea have announced a joint Australia-PNG forest carbon partnership that tackles climate change issues associated with deforestation.
6 March The Age article

Climate change to curb economy

New modelling suggests climate change would knock five per cent off Australia's economic output by 2100 if nothing is done to reduce greenhouse gas emissions. Early findings of the modelling being produced jointly by CSIRO and ABARE forecast a rise in Australia's average temperature of 3.5 degrees celsius under the same scenario.
5 March Sydney Morning Herald article

World news

Emissions, Kyoto and policy

Climate change 'threatens human rights'

The 47-nation Human Rights Council said in a document adopted by consensus that it is "concerned that climate change poses an immediate and far-reaching threat to people and communities around the world and has implications for the full enjoyment of human rights."
28 March CNN article
29 March AFP article
28 March Associated Press article through International Herald Tribune

A Greenpeace report on climate change says that if greenhouse gas emissions grow at their present rate, South Asia could face a major human crisis. "More than 120 million people from India and Bangladesh alone will become homeless by the end of this century," the report says.
25 March BBC News article

Progress 'too slow'

International progress on fighting climate change is too slow, Australian Prime Minister Kevin Rudd and United Nations Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon have agreed. Mr Rudd emerged from a half-hour meeting with the UN head in New York promising to support Mr Ban's moves to speed up work ahead of next year's Copenhagen climate change conference.
30 March News article

The United Nations' climate chief, Yvo de Boer, has praised Australia for its leadership on climate change since ratifying the Kyoto Protocol but warned he is worried about the pace of negotiations to cut a new deal to reduce carbon emissions.
12 March The Age article

'Developed world must act' on accelerating climate change

The growth of developing economies in Africa, Asia and South America has accelerated global warming far beyond official predictions and it is developed nations that must act to halt the potentially catastrophic consequences, according to a new study from temporary power supplier Aggreko.
23 March The Observer article

Carbon neutral required

If the world is going to sharply reduce the amount of carbon dioxide pumped into the atmosphere by mid-century, then many businesses will have to go carbon neutral, bringing their net emissions of the greenhouse gas to zero.
26 March The New York Times article

New England 'not on track for targets'

New England in the United States is not on track to meet its targets for global warming pollution reductions -- a commitment made back in 2001, according to a report issued by a coalition of environmental groups.
26 March Boston Globe article 

South Korea to cap emissions

South Korea would become the first nation not already obligated by the Kyoto Protocol to commit to capping greenhouse gas emissions under a plan put forward by the environment ministry of the country’s incoming government.
25 March Carbonpositive article

The new government of South Korea, among the world’s largest emitters of greenhouse gases, plans to cap emissions at 2005 levels for the next five years despite its exemption from cuts under the Kyoto Protocol.
21 March Financial Times article

Japan 'can make deep cuts'

Japan can cut greenhouse gas emissions by 11 per cent below 2005 levels by 2020, a trade ministry study said. It could achieve the cuts through an overhaul of energy supply including installing solar panels on 70 per cent of new homes and a jump in nuclear power-generated electricity to 45 per cent of supply from 30 percent currently, as well as a 15 per cent improvement in auto fuel efficiency.
19 March Reuters article

Greenhouse gas emissions soar from United States power plants

The biggest single-year increase in greenhouse gas emissions from United States power plants in nine years occurred in 2007, finds a new analysis by the non-profit, non-partisan Environmental Integrity Project. The finding of a 2.9 percent rise in carbon dioxide emissions over 2006 is based on an analysis of data from the United States Environmental Protection Agency.
18 March Environment News Service article

Targets need to be defined to fight climate change

A senior European Commission official, Jos Delbeke called again for numerical targets to effectively fight climate change.
18 March Reuters article

Clashes between rich and poor nations at climate talks

Disagreements between rich and developing countries came into the open as the world's top 20 greenhouse gas emitters worked to lay the groundwork for a new deal on climate change.
15 March AFP article

China - a major player in carbon emissions

China is producing far more carbon dioxide than previous estimates and this will frustrate global aims to stabilise atmospheric greenhouse gases. China is recognised as the world's second-largest emitter of carbon dioxide and some studies suggest it might already have overtaken the United States last year.
13 March Reuters article through Environmental News Network

Developing nations required to do more on climate change

The European Union's Executive Commission wants developing countries to make more effort to cut their ballooning greenhouse gas emissions rather than rely on carbon offset schemes. The Kyoto Protocol allows rich countries to meet binding targets on greenhouse gas emissions by funding cuts in developing nations, spawning a multi-billion dollar trade in carbon offsets.
12 March Reuters article through Planet Ark

China tells developed world to diet

The developed world should go on a climate change diet rather than lecture China over its rising greenhouse gas emissions, Chinese Foreign Minister Yang Jiechi said. Yang said China's per capita emissions of greenhouse gases remained less than one third the average in developed countries. "It's like there is one person who eats three slices of bread for breakfast, and there are three people, each of whom eats only one slice. Who should be on a diet?" he said.
12 March AFP article

$300 million campaign on climate

The Alliance for Climate Protection is to launch a three- year $300 million marketing campaign in the United States on the urgency of the climate change problem and solutions>
24 March USA Today article

Cities darken for Earth Hour

From Rome's Colosseum to the Sydney Opera House, floodlit icons of civilisation went dark on 29 March for Earth Hour, a worldwide campaign to highlight the waste of electricity and the threat of climate change.
30 March CNN article
30 March News article

Biofuel emissions

The compulsory use of biofuels to partially power every vehicle in Britain could cause higher levels of greenhouse gas emissions, the Government's top environment scientist warned. Professor Robert Watson called for the move - designed to cut harmful carbon emissions - to be postponed while a review of the impact of biofuels is carried out.
24 March Press Association article

Clean coal?

While it appears the United State's green groups are united in the fight against global warming, they remain divided on which technologies would best create a carbon-free economy. This division may cause major roadblocks as Congress prepares to debate several climate change policies that could lead to sweeping changes.
22 March Worldwatch Institute article through Environmental News Network

Barriers to building energy-efficiency identified

Financial barriers, including high initial cost barriers and an inadequacy of traditional financing instruments, are a key element preventing private actors from engaging further towards making the residential building sector more energy efficient, according to a study from the International Energy Agency.
21 March EurActiv brief 

Maryland Senate weakens bill

The Senate of the United States of America state of Maryland approved an amendment that environmentalists and the Government say would significantly weaken a bill designed to reduce global warming pollution. The Global Warming Solutions Act would require a 25 per cent cut in carbon dioxide emissions from Maryland businesses by 2020. But under the amendment, the state's environmental agency would have to get the General Assembly's approval each time it issued rules to cut the pollution.
21 March Baltimore Sun article

Blair takes on climate role

Former British Prime Minister Tony Blair will meet Indian political and business leaders to urge them to cut greenhouse gas emissions. Blair, now a consultant to The Climate Group, will launch 'Breaking the Climate Deadlock' initiative to reduce emissions.
19 March The Economic Times article

Tony Blair urged the world's heaviest polluters including the United States, China and India to agree to binding emissions cuts, saying failure to act on global warming would be "unforgivably irresponsible."
15 March AFP article

Former British Prime Minister Tony Blair, who has already taken on an international role as a Middle East envoy, is now tackling climate change with a plan for the world to halve greenhouse gas emissions by 2050.
14 March Reuters article through Environmental News Network
14 March Guardian article 
14 March Times article
13 March AFP article

Japan to host climate change summit

Global warming is at the top of the agenda for the G8 summit and host country Japan is inviting the leaders of Australia, Brazil, China, India, Indonesia, South Korea, South Africa and Mexico to attend an expanded gathering on the topic on 9 July, Chief Cabinet Secretary Nobutaka Machimura told a news conference.
18 March Reuters article through Environmental News Network

Europe agrees schedule for new laws

Europe’s leaders have pledged to find agreement on controversial carbon dioxide reduction and renewable energy laws before the end of the year, in a bid to maintain a strong position in international climate change negotiations. Energy-intensive industries were given assurances that the measures would safeguard their competitiveness.
17 March EurActiv brief

British Government emission figures may be incorrect

Britain's climate change emissions may be 12 per cent higher than officially stated, according to a National Audit Office investigation which has strongly criticised the government for using two different carbon accounting systems. There is "insufficient consistency and coordination" in the government's approach, the NAO said.
17 March The Guardian article

Russia takes defensive stance on Kyoto projects

Foreign firms seeking to make money in Russia under the Kyoto Protocol will not have an easy time getting approval from the Russian state, the official in charge of Kyoto implementation in Russia said.
14 March Reuters article through Planet Ark

Green construction

"Green" construction could cut North America's climate-warming emissions faster and more cheaply than any other measure, environmental experts from Canada, Mexico and the United States reported. Besides energy efficiency and a reduction in greenhouse gas emissions, environmentally-conscious buildings are healthier for the people who use them.
14 March Reuters article through Environmental News Network

Southern Baptists split on climate

A group of more than 40 leading Southern Baptists has widened the divisions within the powerful American evangelical movement over global warming, denouncing the denomination's stance as "too timid" and warning that its cautious response to the environment is seen around the world as "uncaring, reckless and ill-informed".
11 March Guardian article

Warm winter curbs German carbon pollution

A warm winter cut demand for heating oil and gas sending German carbon dioxide emissions in 2007 down by 2.7 per cent to almost 857 million tons.
10 March Reuters article through Environmental News Network

Carbon cutting a difficult task

The task of cutting greenhouse gas emissions enough to avert a dangerous rise in global temperatures may be far more difficult than previous research suggested, say scientists who have just published studies indicating that it would require the world to cease carbon emissions altogether within a matter of decades.
10 March The Washington Post article

Japan proposes sector-based emission targets

Japan has proposed that major emitters of greenhouse gases assign near-term emissions targets for each industrial sector, which combined would then form a national target, a foreign ministry official said.
10 March Reuters article

A new bill introduced assisting California limit emissions

A bill was introduced in the House of Representatives that would overturn the Environmental Protection Agency's decision to prevent California from limiting the amount of greenhouse gas emissions spewed by cars.
7 March Reuters article through Environmental News Network

Greenhouse gas emissions overlooked

The regulatory panel that cleared Imperial Oil Ltd's C$8 billion Kearl oil sands project needs to explain why it approved measures that the company proposed to manage greenhouse gas emissions, Canada's Federal Court ruled.
6 March Reuters article through Environmental News Network

Tough legislation for carbon dioxide emissions in Europe

As part of an effort to cut emissions linked to global warming, the European Commission has drafted tough legislation to reduce carbon dioxide emissions from cars, with steep fines on manufacturers that fail to comply.
5 March Reuters article through Environmental News Network

Japan improving technologies to combat global warming

Japan plans to focus on its efforts to improve 21 technologies to help the world halve greenhouse gases by 2050, a trade ministry official said. The technologies include coal-fired power generation, power generation using natural gas, solar power, vehicles powered by fuel cells or biofuels, and hydrogen-based steelmaking.
5 March Reuters article through Environmental News Network

Battlelines on car emissions

European Union countries that make heavy cars, led by Germany, clashed with makers of smaller ones such as France over tough measures to force automobile manufacturers to cut carbon dioxide emissions.
4 March Reuters article through Environmental News Network

More sophisticated information required to fight climate change

Governments, businesses and the general public need more sophisticated information from their national weather services if they are to prepare adequately against natural disasters and better adapt to the threats posed by climate change, the head of the United Nations meteorological agency says.
4 March UN News Centre article

Al Gore roasted by climate sceptics

Al Gore, who won the Nobel Peace Prize and an Oscar for his environmental advocacy, was the main target at a conference of dissident scientists sceptical of his views on global warming.
4 March Reuters article through Environmental News Network

Caribbean a victim in climate change 

The Caribbean is a victim of climate change caused by larger countries and yet no attempt is made to compensate the area for the damage being done to it by the profligate emissions of harmful gases by larger countries.
2 March Antigua Sun article

Waiver formally blocked for Californian emissions

The Bush administration formally rejected California's bid for a waiver from United States law to set its own tailpipe emissions standard to reduce global warming. The Environmental Protection Agency released a regulatory notice cancelling California's plans to impose a state law that would have forced automakers to reduce emissions by making cars that achieve sharply higher gas mileage beginning next year.
1 March Reuters article through Environmental News Network

Agriculture and Natural Resource Management

South Africa's biofuel plans costly 

A South African state plan to target unused agricultural land in former homelands for development fo feed the fledgling biofuels industry will present formidable cost challenges.
27 March Business Day article

Food crops for fuel 'outrageous'

Indian Finance Minister P Chidambaram has said that it is "outrageous" that developed countries are turning food crops into biofuels.
26 March BBC article

Europe signals possible retreat on biofuels

A European Union-wide target to boost the use of biofuels in European transport could be revised due to fears of intolerable hikes in food prices, mass deforestation and water shortages, it emerged from statements made after the Spring Summit.
14 March EurActiv brief

Biofuels threaten global food production

The rush towards biofuels is threatening world food production and the lives of billions of people, the British Government's Chief Scientific Adviser warned. British ministers have committed to large increases in the use of biofuels over coming decades.
8 March The Australian article

Corn is becoming a growing problem

Corn is a key element of the United States food supply. It is what dairy cows eat to make milk and hens consume to lay eggs. It fattens cattle, hogs and chickens before slaughter. It makes soda sweet. As the building block of ethanol, it is now also a major component of auto fuel. And that may signal trouble ahead.
8 March Organic Consumers Association article through Environmental News Network

Food crisis will become bigger problem than climate change

"There is progress on climate change. But out there is another major problem. It is very hard to imagine how we can see a world growing enough crops to produce renewable energy and at the same time meet the enormous increase in the demand for food which is quite properly going to happen as we alleviate poverty." according to the government's new chief scientific adviser, Professor John Beddington.
7 March The Guardian article

Plants and crops at risk

A destructive spring freeze that chilled the eastern United States almost a year ago illustrates the threat a warming climate poses to plants and crops.
6 March DOE/Oak Ridge National Laboratory article through Environmental News Network

Farmers at risk in Amazon

A six-year study of Amazonian small farmers and their responses to climate change shows the farmers are vulnerable to natural catastrophes and risky land use practices, say Indiana University Bloomington anthropologists Eduardo Brondizio and Emilio Moran.
26 March Indiana University article through Environmental News Network

China explores methods to meet energy demands

In the middle of the Shandong countryside farmers are being asked to do something new. After harvesting the cotton they usually burn off the rest of the plant. But now they are being invited to cut the foliage and transport it by bicycle or tractor to collection points. There, it is weighed and they are paid cash on the spot. The foliage is then compacted and taken off - to be burned as ever, but this time in a boiler. The power generated is used to produce electricity.
18 March The Australian article

Cows a target in fight on emissions

They have put catalytic converters on cars to mop up emissions from gas guzzlers and now they want to do the same with grass guzzlers. Cows produce 5 per cent of all greenhouse gas emissions. In breaking down plant fibres they produce enormous quantities of gas, mostly methane, as bacteria process the food in their stomachs. Methane captures about 22 times more atmospheric heat than carbon dioxide.
11 March Independent Ireland article

Agriculture in danger as climate change takes place

Climate change is likely to cause agricultural losses in the Middle East and North Africa, threatening the food security of many countries.
10 March Science and Development Network article through the Environmental News Network

Changing palettes and global warming

Global warming and changing tastes are putting the squeeze on Europe's traditional vineyards. If even a few of the alarming predictions made by experts at the second World Conference on Global Warming and Wine prove accurate, many of the world's most famous wines may either simply cease to exist or be altered beyond recognition over the next 50 years.
4 March The Guardian article

Middle East to suffer from climate change

Climate change is likely to reduce agricultural production and exacerbate water shortages in the Middle East, threatening the region's poor, the United Nations Food and Agricultural Organisation warned. Many countries in the Middle East already suffer from a shortage of arable land and limited access to water necessary to irrigate crops. But climate change could bring higher temperatures, droughts, floods and soil degradation, according to a new report released by the agency.
3 March Associated Press article

Yemen's water nightmare

Yemen relies on groundwater, which nature cannot recharge fast enough to keep pace with a population of 22.4 million expanding by more than 3 percent a year. More water is being consumed than resupplied to 19 of the impoverished country's 21 aquifers.
1 March Reuters article through Environmental News Network

Economics and business

Climate seen as biggest business risk

A survey of more than 150 major European companies found that climate change as threat to business continuity scored ahead of terrorism, pandemic flu, flooding, the credit crunch, government red-tape, outsourcing and offshoring.
28 March CRN article

Oil drilling will increase as Arctic ice melts

More than half of the Arctic Ocean was covered in year-round ice in the mid-1980s. Today, the ice cap is much smaller. Alarming evidence of this warming trend was released. In the eyes of oil and gas companies these open waters are potential treasure chests.
27 March Worldwatch Institute article through Environmental News Network

Sharp to invest in new solar cell plant

Consumer electronics maker Sharp Corp said it would build a new solar cell plant in Sakai, western Japan. Solar companies are expanding to meet growing demand for green energy to counter global warming.
27 March Reuters article through Environmental News Network

IPCC warns on climate tariffs

Unilateral sanctions against major polluters by countries applying stricter environmental standards would create serious political problems, warned Rajendra Pachauri, chair of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change.
26 March Associated Press article through International Herald Tribune

America and China face trade protection measures from Europe if they fail to join a global climate deal to replace the Kyoto Protocol, European Union leaders will caution. Nations that refuse to curb greenhouse gases will be told that they face “appropriate measures” — code for trade sanctions — if they try to gain a competitive advantage by continuing to allow cheap, high-pollution production.
13 March The Times article
14 March Associated Press article

Germany estimates financial costs

The financial costs of climate change in Germany could come to as much as 800 billion euros ($1.23 trillion) over the next half century, according to a study by the German Institute for Economic Research.
26 March Deutsche Welle article

Global emissions index launched by Merrill Lynch

The research arm of United States bank Merrill Lynch launched a global carbon index to track the international carbon markets, which were worth some $60 billion last year.
26 March Reuters article through Environmental News Network

Arctic more attractive for oil firms

Winter sea ice around a Norwegian Arctic island has thinned to less than one metre since the 1960s, according to a study of a region that may be more attractive to oil firms because of climate change.
26 March Reuters article through Environmental News Network

Green collar jobs

Presidential candidates talk about the promise of “green collar” jobs — an economy with millions of workers installing solar panels, weatherising homes, brewing biofuels, building hybrid cars and erecting giant wind turbines. And environmentalists say they are crucial to combating climate change.
26 March The New York Times article

Green homes in demand

There hasn’t been a lot of good news in the United States of America economy lately from a complete collapse of sub-prime mortgage loans, to slumping property values and crashing stock markets. However green builders are forecasting increased orders through 2008.
20 March Triple Pundit article through Environmental News Network

Business groups oppose climate bill change

Energy companies and other business interests have launched a nationwide campaign to undermine climate change legislation pending in the United States Congress, saying it could cost millions of jobs, drive gasoline prices sharply higher and suck thousands of dollars from household incomes.
19 March Associated Press article through The Boston Globe

HSBC funding for renewable energy

Renewable energy projects in the public sector in Britain received a significant boost with more than £100m of new funding from HSBC. Hospitals, council buildings and universities are all expected to benefit after the banking company's environmental arm announced a funding deal with renewables company Partnership for Renewables.
19 March Guardian online article

Water becoming increasingly popular for investors

As liquidity is drained from credit and money markets and pours into oil and gold, another asset class that could offer long-term returns to the discerning investor is water.
19 March Reuters article through Environmental News Network

Corporate thinking on climate change

There is a complete change in the way climate change is being perceived by managements in the last 12-18 months. It is entirely out of the corporate social responsibility bucket, and has truly arrived as a strategic topic. People understand climate change is about the long-term viability of their business.
18 March The Economic Times article

Carbon is big business

It’s not just states or regions that are rushing ahead of Washington, D.C. to get their mitts on the business of carbon. The New York Mercantile Exchange dove headfirst into the market for carbon emissions—something that is traded only voluntarily so far in the United States, but which is huge business in Europe.
17 March The Wall Street Journal article

Green energy is avoiding recession

So far the industry sector that includes clean, renewable and efficient energy has been holding up well under continuing bad news from just about every other segment of the United States economy. Green energy stands out as a bright spot in an otherwise cloudy economic picture.
17 March Green Energy News article through Environmental News Network

Europe fears loss of jobs

Climate change topped the agenda of the Tripartite Social Summit yesterday, with social partners insisting that incentives must be offered to prevent potentially polluting industries from relocating and withdrawing jobs from Europe. Addressing the Tripartite Summit, which he chaired, European Commission President José Manuel Barroso said employers' organisations and trade unions must "make an active contribution to the new low-carbon economy". "Our industries must not leave Europe to go pollute elsewhere, taking jobs."
14 March EurActiv brief 

"Green" industries not caring for the environment

As people worldwide increasingly feel the heat of climate change, many are applauding the skyrocketing growth of China’s fledging solar-cell industry. A recent Washington Post article, however, has revealed that China’s booming solar industry is not as green as one might expect. Many of the solar panels that now adorn European and American rooftops have left behind a legacy of toxic pollution in Chinese villages and farmlands.
14 March Worldwatch Institute article through Environmental News Network

Europe commits €100 million for energy fund

More than €100 million are set to flow into a new Global Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy Fund, which the European Commission hopes will generate up to €1 billion in risk capital for green energy projects in developing states.
14 March EurActiv brief 

"Green Passport" for travellers

Green travel tips for the world's growing number of international tourists were launched by the United Nations Environment Programme. The internet-based campaign, "Green Passport", aims to raise tourists' awareness of their potential to contribute to sustainable development by making responsible holiday choices.
11 March UNEP article through Environmental News Network

Socially responsible mutual fund

China's Industrial Fund Management Co Ltd is planning to launch a fund investing in shares of "socially responsible" Chinese listed firms, the first mutual fund product of its kind in the country. Analysts expect it to target companies engaged in environmentally friendly projects.
11 March Reuters article through Environmental News Network

British retailer maintains green plan despite tough times

British retailer Marks &Spencer has received public attention for a comprehensive corporate strategy towards sustainable business practices which started last year. The plan includes "five pillars" of focus: climate change, waste, sustainable raw materials, health, and being a "fair partner."
7 March Triple Pundit article through Environmental News Network

Private sector required to fix climate change

The private sector must be encouraged to help developing countries combat climate change now, before it becomes too severe to handle, according to United Nations Development Program head Kermal Dervis. 
7 March Reuters article through Environmental News Network

Greening of CeBIT fails to gain attention

Europe's biggest information technology fair went green this year. The problem was that there weren't many people around to notice.
6 March Reuters article through Environmental News Network

Action is affordable to combat climate change

Tackling climate change, pollution and other environmental hazards is affordable and urgent action is needed to avoid irreversible damage, the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development said.
5 March Reuters article through Environmental News Network

European Union energy firms canning projects

European energy companies have dropped investment projects worth billions of euros, because of European Commission plans to make them buy greenhouse gas emissions permits from 2013, a senior energy executive said.
4 March Budapest Business Journal article

Microsoft calls for carbon reduction

Microsoft called for the IT industry to reduce its carbon footprint as CeBIT, the world's largest tech fair, kicked off in Germany with a focus on climate change.
3 March AFP article

CeBIT goes green

With efforts to fight climate change growing apace around the world, the IT industry is also doing its bit, as the world's largest technology fair in Germany aims to show. CeBIT brings together 5,500 tech firms all keen to show off gadgets that are innovative, cutting edge and cool -- and this year also green.
1 March AFP article

Energy

California cuts requirement for zero-emission cars

In the United States, California regulators have drastically cut the number of zero-emission vehicles required to be sold in the state by the year 2014, a decision that frustrated environmentalists but came as a relief to auto manufacturers. The new rules put the number of electric and hydrogen fuel-cell vehicles that automakers sell in California at 7,500 by 2014, a 70 per cent reduction from the previous target.
28 March CNN article

Hydro-electric project fails to meet criteria

British Columbia dealt a potential death blow to a proposed hydro-electric project that highlighted the environmental costs of going green.
27 March Reuters article through Environmental News Network

New solar projects in California

Solar energy is getting a big boost in Southern California in the United States with the unveiling of two projects that will be capable of generating a total of 500 megawatts of electricity, enough to serve more than 300,000 homes.
27 March Los Angeles Times article

Solar building will generate excess power

The Masdar Headquarters building will produce more power than it needs (an energy positive building). In fact, the solar roof (one of the largest in the world) will be constructed first, and it will power the construction of the rest of the building.
17 March MetaEfficient article through Environmental News Network

The reality of renewables

The very name renewable has great appeal, as it promises unlimited sources of relatively clean energy daily, such as sunlight or a breeze. But today, when we need them to greatly reduce greenhouse gas emissions, they are not ready because they were never able to overcome the marketplace muscle of cheap coal and oil.
21 March The World Business Council for Sustainable Development article through Environmental News Network

Steelcase makes wind farm possible

Steelcase Inc., a global office furniture company, has become the first Renewable Energy Credit buyer to sponsor a commercial-scale wind farm by making the first known long-term purchase of all the RECs during a wind farm project’s financing stage. Steelcase is, in effect, building a wind farm to offset a portion of its energy needs to carbon-free renewable energy.
20 March Green Energy News article through Environmental News Network

Sri Lanka facing tough target

Sri Lanka has set a difficult target to increase non-conventional, renewable energy to 10 per cent from current level of four by 2017, said Power and Energy Minister W.D.J. Senevirathne. "Our renewed pledge on renewable energy stems out from the unbearable cost of fossil fuel burdening my country at present," the Minister said. He added that this is valid for all countrymen around the globe.
26 March Daily News article

Innovative wind tower

The “Clean Technology Tower” is a highly efficient building which will be constructed in Chicago. The tower will have wind turbines positioned at the corners of the building, to capture wind at its highest velocity as it accelerates around the tower.
21 March MetaEfficient article through Environmental News Network

Potential of wind energy

Researchers at the Endowed Chair of Wind Energy of the University of Stuttgart are working together with researchers from the University of Oldenburg and other project partners on an alternative remote sensing technique. LIDAR technology is being developed and tested for wind energy applications.
11 March University of Stuttgart article through Environmental News Network

Wind transmission lines and independent wind farms set for California 

Construction on the biggest United States transmission project largely for wind energy has begun. If the full project is finished by 2013 as planned, it will be capable of carrying 4,500 megawatts of electricity, much of it from turbines in the windy Tehachapi area of northern Los Angeles County and eastern Kern County.
7 March Reuters article through Environmental News Network

New Zealand to build geothermal plant

State-owned electricity generator Mighty River Power said it planned to build a 132 megawatt geothermal power station to meet growing demand.
6 March Reuters article through Environmental News Network

Portugal's rush towards renewable energy

Broad fields of giant solar panels as big as houses tilt toward the sun in this torrid patch of the Iberian peninsula. Arranged in tidy rows, like the vineyards and olive groves that quilt the typical Portuguese landscape, the panels belong to a solar power plant that comes on line this month and is due to be the world's largest when it is completed later this year.
11 March Associated Press article through International Herald Tribune

BMW to launch emission-savvy car

BMW, the world's leading premium car-maker, may launch an all-electric car as part of its strategy to cut greenhouse gas emissions and combat growing restrictions on urban traffic within big cities.
19 March The Guardian article

Shake up of world energy supply

Two tiny projects to mix sea and river water, one by the fjord south of Oslo, the other at a Dutch seaside lake, are due on stream this year and may point to a new source of clean energy in estuaries from the Mississippi to the Yangtze.
18 March Reuters article through Environmental News Network

Record attempt by wave-powered boat

Japanese sailor Ken-ichi Horie, 69 years of age, will attempt to captain the world’s most advanced wave-powered boat 4,350 miles from Hawaii to Japan. If all goes as planned, he will set the first Guinness world record for the longest distance travelled by a wave-powered boat and show off the greenest nautical propulsion system since the sail.
13 March MetaEfficient article through Environmental News Network

Japan urges nations to cooperate on green energy technologies

Japan plans to urge the Group of Eight industrialised nations, China and India to combat climate change by cooperating on advanced nuclear plants and electric vehicles, a government official said.
13 March Bloomberg article

United States needs to quicken the pace of clean energy

The United States is in danger of falling behind other nations in reducing greenhouse gas emissions if both the federal government and Corporate America do not move quickly to support sources of clean energy, General Electric Co Chief Executive Jeffrey Immelt said.
13 March Reuters article through Environmental News Network

Arctic ice may hold substantial mineral wealth

With oil above $100 a barrel and Arctic ice melting faster than ever, some of the world's most powerful countries, including the United States and Russia, are looking north to a possible energy bonanza.
9 March Reuters article through Environmental News Network

Renewable energy law approved for Chile

Chile's Congress voted to require electric utilities to invest in and supply non-conventional energy sources as part of the government's drive to diversify current tight energy supplies.
6 March Reuters article through Environmental News Network

Sweden to increase its renewable energy resources 

Sweden will aim to get nearly half its energy from renewable sources by 2020 as part of a European Union-wide plan. Sweden has been tasked with increasing its share of renewable energy to 49 per cent from a current 40 per cent as part of binding targets set by the EU.
6 March Reuters article through Environmental News Network
6 March The Age article

Controversial pipeline defeated

The World Wildlife Fund in the United Kingdom is celebrating the successful culmination of four years of campaigning, after Sakhalin Energy announced the withdrawal of its request for government backing for its controversial oil and gas project in the Russian Far East.
5 March World Wildlife Fund article through Environmental News Network

Cows to produce power

On a dairy farm in California's agricultural heartland, utility PG&E Corp began producing natural gas derived from manure, in what it hopes will be a new way to power homes with renewable, if not entirely clean, energy. As cow manure decomposes, it produces methane, a greenhouse gas more potent than carbon dioxide. Scientists say controlling methane emissions from animals such as cows would be a major step in addressing climate change.
5 March Reuters article through Environmental News Network

United States supports renewable energy

Top crude oil consumer the United States said it is "imperative" to expand the use of renewable energy such as wind power and biofuels to reduce its dependence on foreign oil and slow global warming.
4 March AFP article

Major improvement required in nuclear power efficiency

Nuclear energy production must increase by more than 10 per cent each year from 2010 to 2050 to meet all future energy demands and replace fossil fuels, but this is an unsustainable prospect.
4 March Inderscience Publishers article through Environmental News Network

Potential Energy

Concerns about climate change and greenhouse gas emissions are instilling a new dynamism —and fuelling something of a renaissance - in alternative energy research and development.
3 March Triple Pundit article through Environmental News Network

Solar technology inspired by leaves

While the future of solar technology seems to rest on nanotechnological innovation, GROW panels by SMIT are fairly remarkable. Inspired by leaves, these tiny generators do one better than their biological counterparts, drawing power from the sun, but also capturing energy from the wind as they are jostled by the breeze.
2 March ENN article through Environmental News Network

Japan investing in renewable energy

Japan is planning to invest up to $1.93 billion in an international fund aimed at encouraging the use of renewable energy technology in developing countries. By investing in technologies such as wind and solar power in less developed countries, participating governments hope to encourage private finance to follow suit.
1 March Reuters article through Environmental News Network

Coconut oil to fuel airlines

Virgin Airlines founder Richard Branson has been publicly promoting his commitment to invest profits from his transport empire into biofuel production. Critics dispute the green benefits of biofuels however, claiming that biofuels damage developing countries by driving up food prices and harm the environment by encouraging deforestation.
1 March Triple Pundit article through Environmental News Network

Sequestration

Transpirational Regenerative Emissions Extractor launched

Partly in response to Richard Branson's Virgin Earth Challenge to find "a commercially viable design which results in the removal of anthropogenic, atmospheric greenhouse gases so as to contribute materially to the stability of Earth's climate", Professor Tony Richardson, Director of The Urban Transport Institute and TreeSmart Australia, has launched the Transpirational Regenerative Emissions Extractor which can be rolled out on a large scale to remove huge quantities of carbon dioxide from the atmosphere. This technology extracts carbon dioxide emissions from the atmosphere after they have been created from a wide range of anthropogenic sources, such as electricity generation and transport systems.
1 April TreeSmart Australia article 

Guyanese rainforest to gain some respect  

A deal has been agreed that will place a financial value on rainforests – paying, for the first time, for their upkeep as "utilities" that provide vital services such as rainfall generation, carbon storage and climate regulation.
27 March The Independent article

Asia must act quickly

Parts of Asia are losing more than 28,000 square kilometres of forest every year, a trend that must to be reversed immediately to fight climate change, a United Nations report said.
27 March Reuters article through Environmental News Network

Call for funds to increase forest cover

A group of developing countries has called for financial incentives for increase in forest cover, conservation and sustainable management with a view to combat climate change.
10 March The Financial Express article

Exploration for Australian emission storage sites

Australia plans to allow greenhouse gas emissions to be stored in the ocean floor around the island continent, with exploration for suitable sites possibly starting in 2008.
20 March Reuters article through The China Post

Norway not on track for carbon burial race

Norway may fall short of its goal of being first to develop technology for burying greenhouse gases from power plants, a drive Oslo has likened to the 1960s space race, Environment Minister Erik Solheim said.
14 March Reuters article

Geosequestration required for Canadian oil sands projects

Canada has announced new rules to reduce greenhouse gas emissions, targeting future oil sands facilities and power plants, in a plan immediately derided by environmentalists as too little, too late. Oil sands facilities that go into operation starting in 2012 will be required to capture and store the bulk of their emissions of carbon dioxide.
11 March Sydney Morning Herald article

Norwegian oil and gas group StatoilHydro said it was ready to work with new Canadian rules on carbon dioxide emissions at its planned oil sands venture in Alberta. According to new regulations, oil sands facilities that go into operation starting from 2012 will be required to capture and geologically store the bulk of their emissions of carbon dioxide.
12 March Reuters article through Environmental News Network

New British coal plants must capture carbon

The British government is preparing to make carbon capture readiness mandatory for all new fossil fuel power plants to help combat climate change, Business Minister John Hutton said. The announcement, which conforms to European Union plans to boost clean coal technology, was part of a speech Hutton gave backing the use of coal to help keep the country's lights on.
10 March Reuters article

Cost-effective method of capturing carbon dioxide

Researchers have developed a new, low-cost material for capturing carbon dioxide from the smokestacks of coal-fired power plants and other generators of the greenhouse gas. Produced with a simple one-step chemical process, the new material has a high capacity for absorbing carbon dioxide — and can be reused many times.
7 March Georgia Institute of Technology Research News article through Environmental News Network

Climate and climate change 

Warning of mass migrations 

Blue Alert, Climate Migrants in South Asia, a new Greenpeace report, warns that left unchecked climate change could lead to global temperature increases of 4-5°C, unleashing a barrage of impacts that will drive mass migration in India, Pakistan and Bangladesh. The report warns that impacts will include: "inundation itself, flood and storm damage, erosion, saltwater intrusion, rising water tables and impeded drainage and wetland loss. These will together reduce the ability of these regions to provide their inhabitants access to land itself, in some cases, and to many others their means of cultivation, water resources and fodder, causing severe hardship in terms of livelihood and habitat loss."
28 March Greenpeace article 

Climate change driving migration

The effects of climate change are increasingly driving people in sub-Saharan Africa to migrate in search of better living conditions, according to experts who gathered in the Senegalese capital, Dakar.
20 March Voice of America article 

Europe warned to prepare for conflict

European governments have been told to plan for an era of conflict over energy resources, with global warming likely to trigger a dangerous contest between Russia and the west for the vast mineral riches of the Arctic.
10 March Guardian article

Vietnam 'must upgrade sea defences'  

Vietnam will have to upgrade its sea defences to brace for rising ocean levels and stronger typhoons caused by global warming, according to the Southern Institute of Water Resources director Le Manh Hung. Work is needed on about 520 kilometres of sea dykes and over 320 kilometres of river dykes that are unable to resist flood tides and storms.
28 March AFP article

Ice shelf collapse

An ice shelf of 5,000 square miles in western Antarctica has started to collapse, scientists said. The disintegration of the Wilkins ice sheet, the largest on the Antarctic Peninsula to be threatened, is more evidence of rapid climate change on the continent. The British Antarctic Survey said the ice shelf was "hanging by a thread".
26 March Telegraph article
26 March Reuters article through Environmental News Network
27 March The Times article
25 March Associated Press article through CNN
25 March New Scientist article
26 March The Independent article

Perennial Arctic ice cover diminishing sharply

The amount of long-lasting sea ice in the Arctic - thick enough to survive for as much as a decade - declined sharply in the past year, even though the region had a cold winter and the thinner one-year ice cover grew substantially, United States federal officials said.
19 March Washington Post article
18 March BBC article

From krill to king crabs, the collapse of a 160-square-mile portion of the Wilkins Ice Shelf in Antarctica could mean many changes for wildlife at the bottom of the world.
29 March CNN article 

Shrinking ice

Ice scientists around the world watched with a mixture of alarm and astonishment as the great Arctic Sea ice sheet shrank over the northern summer to its lowest level in memory. The rapid melt exceeded almost every scenario the scientists had modelled.
18 March Brisbane Times article

Glaciers showing record losses  

The world's glaciers are continuing to melt away with the latest official figures showing record losses, the United Nations Environment Programme announced. Data from close to 30 reference glaciers in nine mountain ranges indicate that between the years 2004-2005 and 2005-2006 the average rate of melting and thinning more than doubled.
16 March Guardian article
15 March Associated Press article
15 March AFP article
17 March United Nations Environment Programme article through Environmental News Network

American West 'warming faster'

The American West is heating up faster than any other region of the United States, and more than the Earth as a whole, according to a new analysis of 50 scientific studies. For the five years from 2003 through 2007, the global climate averaged 1 degree Fahrenheit warmer than its 20th century average. During the same period, 11 Western US states averaged 1.7 degrees warmer, the analysis reported.
28 March Los Angeles Times article

Climate changing? Just adapt

The world would be better off adapting to the consequences of climate change rather than trying to fight the causes, according to group of scientists, including Mike Hulme, the founding director of the Tyndall Centre for Climate Change Research at the University of East Anglia. They also believe that climate change may not necessarily be as catastrophic for the planet as has been forecast.
26 March Telegraph article
26 March Los Angeles Times article

Butterflies adapted to prehistoric climate change

Prehistoric cooling in a changing climate caused significant increases in butterfly species numbers, according to new research. The study provides further evidence that while some animals and plants are likely to suffer from global warming, others will adapt and spread.
26 March Telegraph article

Voyage to Antarctica

Scientists set off on a voyage to Antarctica to see if the icesheets at the edge of the vast continent are melting faster and whether the Southern Ocean is soaking up less carbon dioxide.
25 March Reuters article through Planet Ark

Immunological consequences coming with warming

The first two bee sting-related deaths in Fairbanks, Alaska, were reported in the summer of 2006, which researchers suspect was a consequence of global warming; and they predict that this is just the beginning.
25 March Reuters article

Climate at core of election

London's Labour Mayor Ken Livingstone put climate at the core of his re-election campaign.
25 March Reuters article through Environmental News Network

Global warming disturbing lake's ecosystem

A new study predicts water circulation in Lake Tahoe in the United States of America is being dramatically altered by global warming, threatening the lake's delicate ecosystem and famed clear waters.
24 March Associated Press article

Black carbon significant factor in global warming

Black carbon has a warming effect in the atmosphere three to four times greater than prevailing estimates, according to scientists. Scripps Institution of Oceanography at UC San Diego atmospheric scientist V. Ramanathan and University of Iowa chemical engineer Greg Carmichael said that soot and other forms of black carbon could have as much as 60 per cent of the current global warming effect of carbon dioxide.
24 March University of California article through Environmental News Network
24 March The Guardian article

Coral under threat

Over two hundred million humans depend for their subsistence on the fact that coral has an addiction to 'junk food' - and orders its partners, the symbiotic algae, to make it. This curious arrangement is one of nature’s most delicate and complex partnerships — a collaboration now facing grave threats from climate change.
24 March ARC Centre of Excellence for Coral Reef Studies article through Environmental News Network

Cold start to a warm year

Bucking the trend of global warming, the start of 2008 saw icy weather around the world from China to Greece. But despite its chilly start, 2008 is expected to end up among the top 10 warmest years since records began in the 1860s.
19 March Reuters article through Environmental News Network

Global warming playing with the seasons

Pollen is bursting. Critters are stirring. Buds are swelling. Biologists are worrying. "The alarm clock that all the plants and animals are listening to is running too fast," Stanford University biologist Terry Root said. Blame global warming.
19 March Associated Press article

Effects of climate change on Gulf Coast transportation

The United States Department of Transportation released a study of the potential impacts climate change and land subsidence could have on the Gulf Coast region's transportation infrastructure. The report is the first of a three-phase study on a region of particular concern given its geography, ecology and vulnerability, as well as the central role it plays in the nation's oil and gas infrastructure. 
17 March Triple Pundit article through Environmental News Network

A brown Ireland

Climate change could turn Ireland's legendary emerald landscape a dusty tan, with profound effects on its society and culture, a new study reported.
16 March Reuters article through Environmental News Network

Confusion for migrating birds

The swallows' return to British shores each year symbolises the passing of winter and the approach of summer. But in a sign of the blurring of the seasons brought on by climate change, one of the birds has this year shunned migration to Africa and instead spent all winter in Britain.
16 March The Telegraph article

Climate change causing housing problems

The islanders of Tuvalu could lose their homes and much of their land in the coming decades. But the world has yet to figure out how it will deal with them, and millions of others, who may be displaced by climate change.
13 March Reuters article through Environmental News Network

Town planners to beware of rise in sea levels

A rise in sea levels and other changes fuelled by global warming threaten roads, rail lines, ports, airports and other important infrastructure, and policy makers and planners should be acting now to avoid or mitigate their effects, according to new government reports.
12 March The New York Times article

Polar bear protection

The Natural Resources Defense Council, Environmental News Network, the Center for Biological Diversity and Greenpeace sued the Bush administration of the United States of America for missing the legal deadline to issue a final decision on whether to list the polar bear under the Endangered Species Act due to global warming.
11 March NRDC article through Environmental News Network

US transport infrastructure to suffer

While every mode of transportation in the United States will be affected as the climate changes, potentially the greatest impact on transportation systems will be flooding of roads, railways, transit systems, and airport runways in coastal areas because of rising sea levels and surges brought on by more intense storms, says a new report from the National Research Council. Though the impacts of climate change will vary by region, it is certain they will be widespread and costly in human and economic terms, and will require significant changes in the planning, design, construction, operation, and maintenance of transportation systems.
11 March Reuters article
12 March New York Times article
11 March media statement
Report summary
Links to access the full report

Minorities bearing the brunt of climate change

Minorities and indigenous people frequently bear the brunt of the ravages of climate change but also often come last on the aid list because they are on the margins of society. Some are even the victims of efforts to tackle global warming such as clearing tracts of land and forest for growing biofuels, according to State of the World's Minorities 2008 report from Minority Rights Group International.
11 March Reuters article through Environmental News Network

Fish battling rising sea temperatures

Fish that are crucial to Australia's coral reefs are getting lost at sea because climate change is making it difficult for them to navigate open waters and return to their home reefs.
7 March The Australian article

Canada reports on future impacts

The first comprehensive national study in a decade on likely future climate change impacts in Canada finds that humans run the real risk of triggering processes in this century that will inevitably lead to “potentially cataclysmic surprises” in the next and Canadians will experience greater economic and social impacts at the local and regional levels than national or global scale analyses predict.
National Union of Public and General Employees statement
17 March Vancouver Sun article
Link to download the report, From Impacts to Adaptation: Canada in a Changing Climate 2007, in parts

Ocean levels to fall over millions of years

Sea levels are set to fall over millions of years, making the current rise blamed on climate change a brief interruption of an ancient geological trend, according to a report in the journal Science. Oceans are getting deeper and sea levels had fallen by about 170 metres since the Cretaceous period 80 million years ago. Previously, the little-understood fall had been estimated at 40 to 250 metres, according to Bernard Steinberger at the Geological Survey of Norway, one of five authors of the report.
7 March Reuters article through Environmental News Network
Abstract from Science
Article from Science (subscription required, or buy access to article)

Climate change affecting the Arctic tundra

Research from ancient sediment cores indicates that a warming climate could make the world’s Arctic tundra far more susceptible to fires than previously thought.
5 March Public Library of Science article through Environmental News Network
5 March New Scientist article

The bittern at risk

Rising sea levels are threatening the future of an already endangered species of wetland bird, campaigners warned. The bittern could become extinct in Britain if it is not protected from the effects of global warming, the Royal Society for the Protection of Birds claimed.
5 March Telegraph article

Dolphin numbers in decline

A sharp drop in the number Mekong dolphins born in Cambodia has renewed fears for the survival of the rare mammals, wildlife experts said. "A group of 10 full-grown dolphins living in the upper Mekong River had no babies at all this year," he said, blaming a shortage of fish and rising water temperatures which might have affected their reproductive systems.
5 March Reuters article through Environmental News Network

Will global warming increase frost damage to plants?

Rising levels of atmospheric carbon dioxide are believed to reduce the ability of some plants to withstand freezing, and the authors of the BioScience study suggest that global warming could lead to more freeze and thaw fluctuations in future winters. This pattern is potentially dangerous for plants because many species must acclimate to cold over a sustained period.
3 March American Institute of Biological Sciences article through Environmental News Network

Global warming threatens coral atolls and their people

Rising sea levels from global warming will threaten the livelihoods and homes of more than 200,000 people who live on coral atolls in coming generations, the PACNEWS reported. The warning came from Australia's University of Queensland archaeologist and expert on the prehistoric use of coral atolls, Marshall Weisler.
3 March Xinhua article

Eclipse could shed light on global warming

February's lunar eclipse not only treated skygazers to a ruddy view of the Moon – it revealed that Earth's atmosphere contains little light-blocking volcanic dust. Some researchers say the low volcanic dust levels in the atmosphere over the last dozen years could be contributing to global warming, but others dispute the claim.
3 March New Scientist article

Changing methods for habitat conservation

Researchers have examined the impact of climate and land-use changes on networks of biological reserves around the world and contrasted them to four projections of future global warming, agricultural expansion and human population growth from the global Millennium Ecosystem Assessment. They discovered that past human impacts on the land poorly predicted the future impacts of climate change, revealing the inadequacy of current global conservation plans.
2 March University of California article through Environmental News Network

Climate change impacts on the Nile

Experts offer conflicting projections and remain uncertain whether climate change will have such a negative impact on the Nile. Specialists say Egypt is already facing massive water management challenges due to demographic pressures and rising demand for water and electricity, but it is not clear how climate change will affect future Nile flows, and the key vulnerabilities have yet to be assessed. 
2 March IRIN article 

Trading and tax

New online database on CDM rules

Legal firm Baker & McKenzie has launched a CDM Rulebook website to provide a comprehensive online database for the rules surrounding the Clean Development Mechanism under the Kyoto Protocol.
CDM Rulebook website

Cost of climate change more expensive with the exclusion of petrol

Excluding petrol from an Australian emissions trading scheme would only increase the overall cost of moving to a low emissions economy, Professor Ross Garnaut, the Government's chief climate change adviser says.
26 March Herald Sun article

European Union green tax plan

The European Union's environment chief backed a Franco-British proposal to cut sales tax on green products to fight climate change, despite opposition from some countries and within the European Union executive.
25 March Reuters article through Planet Ark

Australia needs to look at trading scheme

Australia should establish an emissions trading scheme to tackle climate change before a comprehensive global agreement on carbon trading is reached, the Federal Government's top climate change adviser Ross Garnaut says.
20 March The Daily Telegraph article

Carbon comparisons

Amid ongoing criticism of the voluntary carbon market, World Wildlife Fund and the Stockholm Environment Institute have released the first detailed comparison of the different emerging accreditation schemes for voluntary offsets.
19 March Carbonpositive article

Belarus eagerly awaiting to reap Kyoto Protocol benefits

The Ministry of Natural Resources and Environmental Protection of Belarus hopes that the European Union will accelerate the ratification of the amendment to the Kyoto Protocol supplement after which Belarus can trade “its emissions quotas”, Minister Alexander Apatsky told a press conference in Minsk.
18 March law.by online article

United States looking towards carbon trading

Several states in the United States, the world's biggest emitter of carbon dioxide, have recently moved to choose carbon trading, instead of carbon taxation, paving the way for Washington to take similar moves.
17 March Reuters article

Carbon trading guarantee launched

The World Bank has launched a new carbon credit trading guarantee that will allow private-sector firms in developing countries to tap the growing 40 billion euro ($63.11 billion) global carbon market, a senior official said.
17 March Reuters article

Presidential race will decide fate of carbon trading

The outcome of the United States presidential race is likely to play a key role in the future of carbon emissions trading because a federal mandate is needed to kick-start the trading of carbon credits, according to an analyst at market researcher TowerGroup. If a president is elected who favours the Kyoto Protocol process, then a push from the federal government will hasten the acceptance of carbon trading in the United States, said Stephen Bruel.
14 March Financial News article

Domestic carbon emissions trading

Energy-intensive businesses in Britain including supermarkets, banks and hotel chains will have to buy pollution permits from 2010 under a new government emissions trading scheme, Environment Secretary Hilary Benn said.
14 March Reuters article through Planet Ark

Greening of Wall Street

On 17 March the first carbon-linked derivatives contracts will begin trading on the Green Exchange, a joint venture between the New York Mercantile Exchange, Evolution Markets, a broker, Morgan Stanley, Merrill Lynch and others. America already has a small emissions-trading market in the Chicago Climate Exchange, run by one of the founding fathers of financial derivatives, Richard Sandor. Nevertheless, the NYMEX venture is seen as America's boldest step yet towards the carbon-trading big league.
13 March The Economist article

Japan seeks to design post-Kyoto program

Japan, one of the world's biggest emitters of greenhouse gases, wants to design an emissions trading program as soon as possible to help it fight climate change after the Kyoto Protocol expires in 2012, the country's Environment Minister, Ichiro Kamoshita said.
11 March Reuters article through International Herald Tribune

Breakthrough in emissions trading

Carbon emissions trading could become the world’s leading derivatives product as businesses in Asia and the United States move to lower their greenhouse gas emissions and competition intensifies between exchanges, according to a senior United States market regulator.
9 March Financial Times article

Leading climate bill to be broadened

A greenhouse emissions business group hopes to shape the United States climate change legislation to include broad use of international carbon offsets, like wind and solar power farms in developing countries that are not currently in the leading climate bill.
6 March Reuters article through Environmental News Network

Nippon Oil Vietnam venture awarded carbon credits

Japan’s Nippon Oil Corp said that its joint Vietnamese oilfield project had been awarded 4.49 million tons of carbon dioxide emission credits by the United Nations Clean Development Mechanism program.
3 March Reuters article through Thanhnien News

Improved carbon markets

A Federal Trade Commission workshop has highlighted concerns about offset quality and consumer information in the fast-growing voluntary carbon market. Carbon Forum America showcases the response of leaders in the carbon market to develop the necessary standards.
3 March The Economic Times article

Russian firm sells Kyoto credits

Russian power producer OGK-6 has sold some 4.5 million Euros ($6.83 million) of emissions reduction credits under the Kyoto Protocol to the United Kingdom-based Clean Planet Group, its parent firm said.
3 March Reuters article

United Nations criticises European Union proposal

Any European Union requirement for imports to meet the same greenhouse gas emission standards as goods made in the 27-nation bloc would be seen as "acting in bad faith," the top UN climate official said.
3 March Bloomberg article

Conferences

Climate protection for communities

The European Climate Conference Climate Protection and Renewable Energy: Medium and Small Communities facing the Challenge, will be held in Rovigo, Italy, from 2 to 4 April 2008.
Details

TransAtlantic Climate Conference

The first TransAtlantic Climate conference, to be held on the Faroe Islands on 7 and 8 April, aims particularly at researchers, business people, civil society representatives and politicians in the North Atlantic region and the Nordic countries. Details

Workshop on trading

CEAG, in partnership with the law firm Piper Alderman, is producing a workshop on emissions trading in Perth , Australia, on 10 April,  coordinating with the Australian Petroleum Production & Exploration Association conference and exhibition.
Details

Clean energy 

The Clean Energy Conference, covering solar, wind, wave, tidal and geothermal energy, will be held in Sydney, Australia, on 14 and 15 April 2008.
Details 

Forests and climate change  

Forest Day: Shaping the Debate on Forests and Climate Change in Central Africa, will be held in Yaoundé, Cameroon, on 24 April 2008.
Details

China-EU CDM conference

The China-EU CDM Business Conference will be held in Cologne, Germany, on 6 May 2008.
Details 

A new global climate deal?

The 2008 Chatham House conference, A New Global Climate Deal? Achieving real collaboration for a low carbon future, will be held on 16 and 17 June.
Details (4.4MB pdf)

Financing for climate change

An international conference on Financing for Climate Change - Challenges and Way Forward, will be held in Dhaka, Bangladesh, on 15 to 17 August 2008.
Details 

Tropical forests and adaptation

A special session on Tropical Forest Management and Climate Change Adaptation will be held as part of IUFRO-FAO-SLU Conference on Adaptation of Forests and Forest Management to Changing Climate with Emphasis on Forest Health: A Review of Science, Policies, and Practices. The Conference will take place from 25 to 28 August 2008 in Umea, Sweden.
Details

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