Environmental Law Prof Blog

Drink Water for Life

This article is written by Denise Olivera, Columbia School of Journalism, about the Drink Water for Life Challenge originated by 1st Congregational Church, U.C.C. of Salem, Oregon.  The article was covered by the Great Reporter newsservice link The congregation pledges to give up some of its lattes, sodas, etc. during Lent and give the money to our Pure Water Fund.  In celebration of Lent, spring, or World Water Day, please chose to follow this lead.

Plug in to NRDC's Blog

There's a little something for everyone here -- but some of the most prominent environmental lawyers in the world are blogging here.  NRDC Blog

Pulitzer Prize Anyone??? Only if you write by March 12th

Well, no prize, but...You can become a Pulitzer Center Citizen Journalist!!! 

• Pick an issue. Issues list   "Should US environmental standards apply when multinational companies develop the petroleum resources of fragile ecosystems such as Peru's Amazon forest?" should be of particular interest. Extraterritorial application of US environmental standards

 

• Read the corresponding coverage at Pulitzer’s website. Your article should draw on information from the Pulitzer Center articles; but you may also include include original reporting of your own or firsthand experiences. The goal is to provide fresh insight in a compellingly written article.

• Share your perspective on the issue and write your best article at Helium by March 12th.

The $ 3 Trillion Dollar War

Nobel Prize-winning economist Joseph Stiglitz estimates the cost of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan  to the United States alone will exceed $ 3 trillion -- yes that is not a typo, that is a "t" trillion.  His new book, “The Three Trillion Dollar War,” co-authored with Harvard University professor Linda Bilmes, will be released tomorrow.  They argue that the cost to America of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan has been vastly underestimated.  Indeed when factors such as interest on debt, future borrowing for war expenses, a continued military presence in Iraq and lifetime health-care and counseling for veterans are counted, the wars’ cost to the United States ranges from $5 - $ 7 trillion.  The book's estimates are the subject of a hearing today by the Joint Economic Committee of Congress.  McClatchy News

Obviously $ 3 trillion dollars is real money -- but what could we have bought for $ 3 trillion dollars?  The entire US government budget for the next year.  Reduction of the national debt by 30%.  Or how about something that would actually expand US influence throughout the world -- providing full funding for the entire cost of meeting the Millenium Development Goal of reducing by half the number of people who lack safe drinking water and sanitation is $ 11.3 billion per year for 10 years.  Perhaps supplying everyone in the world with safe drinking water and sanitation might cost three times that.  So for 10% of the cost of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan we could have saved about 1 million lives per year that are lost to water-borne diseases, provided water for 2 billion people, and sanitation for 4 billion people.  And we worry about the genocide in Darfur, Sudan.....

Election 2008 -- The Candidates Speak in Their Own Words -- Part II:Hillary Clinton

During the last year, Foreign Affairs published a series of pieces on the 2008 presidential election, allowing candidates to frame their foreign policy in their own words. Foreign Affairs Election 2008 I am reviewing those pieces for discussions of global environmental issues, including climate change.  I find this a particularly useful approach because it allows candidates to move beyond sound bites and into the substance of what they believe. 

I expect to look at all of the current candidates: Democratic and Republican. The first candidate I am reviewed was Barack Obama. Today's post is Hillary Clinton.

Here's the foreign policy of Hillary Clinton with respect to the environment (especially global warming) in her own words:

The tragedy of the last six years is that the Bush administration has squandered the respect, trust, and confidence of even our closest allies and friends. At the dawn of the twenty-first century, the United States enjoyed a unique position. Our world leadership was widely accepted and respected, as we strengthened old alliances and built new ones, worked for peace across the globe, advanced nonproliferation, and modernized our military....At the same time, we embarked on an unprecedented course of unilateralism:..Our withdrawal from the Kyoto Protocol and refusal to participate in any international effort to deal with the tremendous challenges of climate change further damaged our international standing....At a moment in history when the world's most pressing problems require unprecedented cooperation, this administration has unilaterally pursued policies that are widely disliked and distrusted....

We need more than vision, however, to achieve the world we want. We must face up to an unprecedented array of challenges in the twenty-first century, threats from states, nonstate actors, and nature itself...Finally, the next president will have to address the looming long-term threats of climate change and a new wave of global health epidemics....

But China's rise is also creating new challenges. The Chinese have finally begun to realize that their rapid economic growth is coming at a tremendous environmental price. The United States should undertake a joint program with China and Japan to develop new clean-energy sources, promote greater energy efficiency, and combat climate change. This program would be part of an overall energy policy that would require a dramatic reduction in U.S. dependence on foreign oil....

We must find additional ways for Australia, India, Japan, and the United States to cooperate on issues of mutual concern, including combating terrorism, cooperating on global climate control, protecting global energy supplies, and deepening global economic development...

As president, I will make the fight against global warming a priority. We cannot solve the climate crisis alone, and the rest of the world cannot solve it without us. The United States must reengage in international climate change negotiations and provide the leadership needed to reach a binding global climate agreement. But we must first restore our own credibility on the issue. Rapidly emerging countries, such as China, will not curb their own carbon emissions until the United States has demonstrated a serious commitment to reducing its own through a market-based cap-and-trade approach.

We must also help developing nations build efficient and environmentally sustainable domestic energy infrastructures. Two-thirds of the growth in energy demand over the next 25 years will come from countries with little existing infrastructure. Many opportunities exist here as well: Mali is electrifying rural communities with solar power, Malawi is developing a biomass energy strategy, and all of Africa can provide carbon credits to the West.

Finally, we must create formal links between the International Energy Agency and China and India and create an "E-8" international forum modeled on the G-8. This group would be comprised of the world's major carbon-emitting nations and hold an annual summit devoted to international ecological and resource issues.

ExxonMobil Deliberately Misled Blogosphere About Funding Global Warming Denialists

Yesterday's post on ExxonMobil (2/17/08)  highlighted that it had funded the Frontiers of Freedom and its Center for Science and Public Policy (CSPP link ) during 2006, contrary to its claim that it was not funding global warming denialists.  You may wonder about the context in which ExxonMobil made this claim.

Remember last year when the IPCC 4th Assessment report came out – the Guardian wrote a story about American Enterprise Institute soliciting result-oriented denialist analyses of the IPCC report and that report included information about ExxonMobil’s funding of AEI. Guardian 2/2/07 Report.  During conversations in late January and early February, 2007 with me and other bloggers, Maria Surma Manka from Green Options [Giant Part I Post; Giant Part II Post], Jesse Jenkins from Watthead [ExxonMobil Posts], Tom Yulsman from Prometheus [Post on earlier conversations -- I can't recall whether Tom participated in the February call, but I believe he did], Stuart Staniford from The Oil Drum [ExxonMobil AEI Post], Ken Cohen, ExxonMobil’s Vice President for Public Affairs had assured us that ExxonMobil was no longer funding controversial denialist groups like Competitive Enterprise Institute and it did not fund AEI with the intent that they engage in denialist analyses.  The first conference call occurred in late January and the second on the same day that the Guardian story and the IPCC report came out.

 

Cohen spent considerable time before the IPCC report came out in January 2007 trying to convince us that ExxonMobil was changing its Neanderthal stripes, truly accepted that anthropogenic global warming was a serious problem, and was ready to take a responsible role in the future discussions of how to reduce GHG emissions. Admittedly Cohen did that in the truly diplomatic way of saying that ExxonMobil had not effectively communicated its position that anthropogenic global warming is real and that GHG emissions need to be reduced.

 

During the February call, Cohen knew that the Guardian’s report about ExxonMobil’s funding of AEI and AEI’s alleged solicitation of result-oriented denialist analyses threatened to undercut public perception of ExxonMobil as a responsible actor. Indeed, those reports ended up on CNN. So, Cohen went out of his way to schedule this call about the Guardian’s allegations.

 

As Maria recounted that discussion:

“We had no knowledge that this was going on,” insisted Cohen. He explained that Exxon funds a lot of different groups, and “when we fund them, we want good analysis." Exxon does not condone what AEI did, but Cohen confirmed that it does continues to fund AEI, although other groups like the Competitive Enterprise Institute are not funded by them anymore.

Cohen assured us that Exxon is “trying to be a constructive player in the policy discussion and not associate [themselves] with those that are marginalized and are not welcome in that discussion.” The IPCC report “is what it is,” and Exxon does not believe in engaging in scientific research that preordains an answer. Cohen:

…that's the issue with AEI: Are they preordaining an answer?…I can understand taking a market approach or a government interventionist approach, but this is not a question of trying to find who’s right or who’s wrong. Let’s let the process work.

But, I asked, how can you grant AEI nearly two million dollars (n.b. slsmith -over the entirety of AEI operations, not annually) and not know what they’re doing with the money? Turns out that Exxon conveniently funds the “general operations” of AEI, not specific programs that would allow them to track how the money is being used. Perhaps Exxon needs to think hard next time before it funds an organization so clearly disinterested in constructive solutions.

Cohen was consistently explicit in Exxon's position that global warming is happening and mainly caused by human activities. If that is true, then how will Exxon fight the huge misperception that it’s still the planet's largest naysayer? Cohen conceded that the company needed to do a better job of communicating its position on global warming, rather than allowing a fact sheet or news release on their website to do the work.

 

Cohen kept telling us that the 2006 contribution report was coming out, but declined to give us any specifics about ExxonMobil’s contributions to AEI or other groups, but he said Competitive Enterprise Institute was no longer funded.  Cohen continued to defend AEI as a responsible, albeit very conservative, think tank doing legitimate policy research. And frankly, I supported him on that score during the calls because at least some of the work done by AEI is just that. And I was not nearly as skeptical as others about ExxonMobil's protestations of innocence.  See my post on the AEI matter ELP Blog Post on AEI

 

Here’s why yesterday I called ExxonMobil’s behavior in early 2007 deliberately misleading. Initial Post on 2006 Funding Report  

 

As the quoted material above indicates, Cohen in early February 2007 led us to believe that ExxonMobil was no longer in the denialist camp and did not condone AEI soliciting denialist analysis (if indeed that’s what they had done). He claimed that ExxonMobil no longer associated with marginalized denialist groups. He suggested that the 2006 report would indicate that ExxonMobily had disassociated itself from the Competitive Enterprise Institute, which brought us the classic, sadly humorous “Carbon dioxide: they call it pollution, we call it life!” TV commercials. You tube link to CEI Energy commercial.

 

From this discussion, it seems clear that Cohen knew precisely which “public information and policy research” organizations that were funded by ExxonMobil during 2006. Yet, while he perhaps sat with the 2006 report in front of him and refused to release its contents, the 2006 contribution report later showed that in 2006 ExxonMobil provided $ 180,000 to Frontiers of Freedom and the CSPP, the policy center it created with ExxonMobil's funding several years ago. P.S. Cohen denied funding CSPP in an e-mail today, but unless my sight is failing: CSPP is reported as the Science and Policy Center under Frontiers of Freedom Download 2006 ExxonMobil's "public information and policy research" contributions If that’s not supporting denialists and associating with marginalized denialist groups, I don’t know what is!

Take a good look at the high quality analysis of global warming that CSPP provides:

 

(1) the amicus curiae brief filed in Mass. v. EPA by lawyers from the Competitive Enterprise Institute

(2) Dr. Ball's The Science Isn't Settled powerpoint presentation - Dr. Ball is the Chairman of the Natural Resources Stewardship Project which describes its first project on understanding climate change as "a proactive grassroots campaign to counter the Kyoto Protocol and other greenhouse gas reduction schemes." NRSP describes Dr. Ball as the "lead participant in a number of recent made-for-TV climate change videos, The Great Global Warming Swindle."

(3) Joe Daleo's Congressional Seminar on global warming in March 2007 devoted to disputing the IPCC's report and arguing that anthropogenic global warming from greenhouse gas emissions are not a real problem.

(4) CSPP's May 2007 rebuttal of Al Gore's testimony, which suggests there is no scientific consensus that CO2 emissions are causing global warming

(5) a nonsensical piece on "Gore's Guru," positing that because Dr. Revelle, who died in 1991, had cautioned in 1988 and 1991 against drawing rash conclusions about global warming might still take that position.  I call it nonsensical because Dr. Revelle suggested that we wait 10-20 years to see if the trends continued.  We've waited and now we've answered that question: between 1998 and 2008 we witnessed incredibly dramatic global warming and the scientific community has spent the last 10-20 years studying whether indeed human-caused GHG emissions are responsible for much of that warming.  We and ExxonMobil know its answer to that question.

Obviously, the blogosphere is not the only group worried about ExxonMobil's funding choices.  Britain's national academy of scientists, The Royal Society,  in September 2006 took ExxonMobil to task about its funding of denialist groups.  Royal Society letter

Well, maybe ExxonMobil finally pulled the plug on FF and its “Science and Policy” center in 2007 (and so Cohen was just tap-dancing around the embarrassing, but not on-going, reality of funding denialists). Although, FF's CSPP might survive: it apparently does have funding from two major tobacco companies!

Maybe ExxonMobil has rethought its policy on funding organizations whose primary contribution to the climate change discussion is to distribute continued attacks on those who conclude that the current state of climate science supports an effective policy to reduce GHG emissions.  I’d like to think so – but we won’t know until ExxonMobil releases its 2007 contributions report. I requested that Cohen release it to me; he declined.

However, even if it had defunded FF and CSPP (and other denialist groups), I’m not sure I’d believe that ExxonMobil hadn’t found new denialist outlets to fund.

 

If the Guardian and other media or the blogosphere produce a big enough stir on this story, perhaps it will. But I am astonished that, just as it was selling itself as a responsible player on global warming, ExxonMobil would act so irresponsibly and so deceptively. And I am deeply embarrassed at my naievete in believing what Ken Cohen and ExxonMobil were selling about ExxonMobil’s born again conversion to a responsible position on anthropogenic global warming.

 

Watch out, though, ExxonMobil knows that the question is no longer whether global warming is real, but what to do about it. You can bet it is smart enough and devious enough to fund a lot of “public information and policy research” that will muddle policy discussions about global warming legislation and may assure that not much is done to regulate GHG emissions from oil and gas and that what is done doesn’t cut hardly at all into ExxonMobil’s astounding profits: $41 billion for 2007 and almost $ 12 billion in the 4th quarter of 2007 alone. ExxonMobil profits post

I have a modest suggestion for ExxonMobil: do not fund organizations whose published information, analysis, and research on global warming or climate change has primarily sought to undercut the conclusions reached by the joint statement published in 2005 by 11 national academies of science, including the United States, Canada, Great Britain, France, Germany, Italy, Japan, Russia, India, Brazil and China .  That statement is linked here:   Joint Science Academies' Statement: Global Response to Climate Change

Unless and until ExxonMobil stops funding the sort of stuff that Center for Science and Public Policy is peddling, I hope that the new President and Congress will not believe a single word that is said about global warming policy by ExxonMobil or any of denialist and anti-regulatory "public information and policy research" organizations it funds.

 

 

 

Foreign Affairs - The Candidates in Their Own Words --

During the last year, Foreign Affairs published a series of pieces on the 2008 presidential election, allowing candidates to frame their foreign policy in their own words. Foreign Affairs Election 2008  I am reviewing those pieces for discussions of global environmental issues, including climate change.  I find this a particularly useful approach because it allows candidates to move beyond sound bites and into the substance of what they believe. 

I expect to look at all of the current candidates: Democratic and Republican. The first candidate I am reviewing is Barack Obama.  I chose Obama first in part because I am torn between Clinton and Obama.  Although I respect John McCain's leadership on climate change, I could not vote for a Republican after the 1994 - 2006 Republican congressional legacy and the debacle of Bush's presidency for virtually every freedom and human need.  I also disagree with McCain's position on Iraq.

In his own words, Barack Obama primarily addresses climate change as a matter of global policy.  He ties the US response to global warming to his overall foreign policy in this way:

Strengthened institutions and invigorated alliances and partnerships are especially crucial if we are to defeat the epochal, man-made threat to the planet: climate change. Without dramatic changes, rising sea levels will flood coastal regions around the world, including much of the eastern seaboard. Warmer temperatures and declining rainfall will reduce crop yields, increasing conflict, famine, disease, and poverty. By 2050, famine could displace more than 250 million people worldwide. That means increased instability in some of the most volatile parts of the world.

As the world's largest producer of greenhouse gases, America has the responsibility to lead. While many of our industrial partners are working hard to reduce their emissions, we are increasing ours at a steady clip -- by more than ten percent per decade. As president, I intend to enact a cap-and-trade system that will dramatically reduce our carbon emissions. And I will work to finally free America of its dependence on foreign oil -- by using energy more efficiently in our cars, factories, and homes, relying more on renewable sources of electricity, and harnessing the potential of biofuels.

Getting our own house in order is only a first step. China will soon replace America as the world's largest emitter of greenhouse gases. Clean energy development must be a central focus in our relationships with major countries in Europe and Asia. I will invest in efficient and clean technologies at home while using our assistance policies and export promotions to help developing countries leapfrog the carbon-energy-intensive stage of development. We need a global response to climate change that includes binding and enforceable commitments to reducing emissions, especially for those that pollute the most: the United States, China, India, the European Union, and Russia. This challenge is massive, but rising to it will also bring new benefits to America. By 2050, global demand for low-carbon energy could create an annual market worth $500 billion. Meeting that demand would open new frontiers for American entrepreneurs and workers.

Candidates Compete for Green Title

After the Bush administration legacy, it is refreshing to see both Democratic and some Republican candidates competing for the title of Mr. or Ms. Green. See the comparison in Grist.

Ruth Norton Smith (Nov 27, 1921 - Oct 14, 2007)

Ruth Norton Smith died peacefully in Boulder, Colorado  on Sunday, October 14, 2007 after enjoying her full measure of life. 

Ruth was born in Oklahoma on November 27, 1921 in a tent in Oklahoma.  She was raised during the Depression years, moving frequently as her family farmed and followed the tunneling, mining, and other work available to her father.  Ultimately, her family settled in southern California.  There Ruth met the love of her life, Herbert Frank Smith, a carpenter and union organizer, whom she married on June 4, 1941. 

In WW II, while her husband served in the Navy in the South Pacific, Ruth became a Rosie the Riveter, building bombers, and then joined the Women’s Army Corps, serving as a nurse.  After the war, they settled in the Los Angeles area, where she became a real estate broker and the mom of two children, Greg in 1948 and Susan in 1953.

In 1955, her family moved to Colorado where she worked side by side with her husband to build two of the largest home-building companies in Colorado, Happy Homes and Fireside Homes, and a prominent real estate firm.  When she left real estate and home-building in the late 1960s, Ruth became a political and market researcher for Research Services, Inc. and later became a researcher for the U.S. Census Bureau, from which she retired in 1989.

Ruth was a life-long Democratic political activist with a passion for peace, civil rights, and all aspects of social justice.  She served in every capacity: running political campaigns, serving as a precinct committee woman, county, congressional district, and state delegate, pollwatcher, and election judge.  She worked with Metro Denver Fair Housing center as a realtor, helping the first African-American families in Jefferson County to find housing.  She volunteered with youth mentoring programs in Four Points and with Metro Denver Urban Coalition, Another Mother for Peace, Meals on Wheels, and countless other organizations. 

Ruth was too busy with her family, volunteer work and career for many hobbies.  She thrived on the stimulating conversations born by inviting friends and guests from all over the world and from every walk of life to dinner.  She also found great pleasure in reading, traveling and attending theatre and opera performances.

Ruth was a warm, intelligent, extroverted vibrant woman who loved and was loved by virtually everyone she met.   Her loss will be sorely missed by the many friends and family she has left behind, including her sister Lorene, her brother Fred, her son Greg, her daughter Susan, and her grandchildren Clint Smith, Brent Smith, Nathanial Smith-Tripp and Sarah Smith-Tripp.  Her family and friends will gather at Mt. Vernon Country Club on Sunday, October 21, 2007 at 10:30 am for a celebration of her life.  The family requests that no flowers be sent and suggests donations to Meals on Wheel or a charity of your choice.

Thank you to Read/Write Web

Read/Write Web has listed Environmental Law Prof Blog prominently in its list of the 35 best environmental blogs. [35 best environmental blogs]  Thanks!

ZERO carbon -- how close could the US come, how soon?

A Sudden Change of State

The Guardian (London)

July 3, 2007
George Monbiot

A  new paper suggests we have been greatly underestimating the impacts of climate change - and the size of the necessary response.
Reading  a  scientific paper on the train this weekend, I found, to my
amazement,  that  my hands were shaking. This has never happened to me before, but nor have I ever read anything like it. Published by a team led by James Hansen at Nasa, it suggests that the grim reports issued by  the Intergovernmental  Panel  on Climate Change could be absurdly optimistic(1).

The  IPCC  predicts that sea levels could rise by as much as 59cm this
century(2).  Hansen's paper argues that the slow melting of ice sheets the panel expects doesn't fit the data. The geological record suggests that ice  at the poles does not melt in a gradual and linear fashion, but flips  suddenly  from  one  state  to  another. When temperatures
increased  to  2-3  degrees above today's level 3.5 million years ago, sea levels  rose  not  by  59  centimetres  but by 25 metres. The ice
responded immediately to changes in temperature(3).

We  now  have  a  pretty  good  idea  of  why ice sheets collapse. The
buttresses  that  prevent  them  from  sliding  into the sea break up;
meltwater  trickles down to their base, causing them suddenly to slip; and pools of water form on the surface, making the ice darker so that it absorbs  more  heat.  These  processes are already taking place in
Greenland and West Antarctica.

Rather  than  taking thousands of years to melt, as the IPCC predicts,
Hansen  and  his  team find it "implausible" that the expected warming before  2100  "would permit a West Antarctic ice sheet of present size to survive  even  for  a  century."  As  well as drowning most of the world's centres  of population, a sudden disintegration could lead to much  higher rises in global temperature, because less ice means less heat  reflected back  into  space.  The  new  paper suggests that the temperature could therefore be twice as sensitive to rising greenhouse gases  than the IPCC assumes. "Civilization developed," Hansen writes, "during  a  period  of unusual  climate  stability, the Holocene, now almost 12,000 years in duration. That period is about to end."(4)

I  looked up from the paper, almost expecting to see crowds stampeding through  the  streets.  I saw people chatting outside a riverside pub. The other  passengers  on  the train snoozed over their newspapers or played on  their  mobile  phones.  Unaware  of the causes of our good fortune, blissfully  detached from their likely termination, we drift into catastrophe.

Or  we  are  led  there.  A  good  source  tells  me  that the British
government  is well aware that its target for cutting carbon emissions - 60%  by  2050  -  is  too  little, too late, but that it will go no
further   for   one  reason:  it  fears  losing  the  support  of  the
Confederation  of  British  Industry. Why this body is allowed to keep
holding  a gun to our heads has never been explained, but Gordon Brown has just  appointed  Digby  Jones,  its former director-general, as a minister in  the  department  responsible  for energy policy. I don't remember voting  for  him.  There could be no clearer signal that the public interest is being drowned by corporate power.

The   government's   energy   programme,   partly   as  a  result,  is
characterised  by  a complete absence of vision. You can see this most
clearly  when  you  examine its plans for renewables. The EU has set a
target  for  20%  of  all  energy  in  the  member states to come from
renewable  sources  by  2020.  This  in  itself  is  pathetic. But the
government refuses to adopt it(5): instead it proposes that 20% of our
electricity  (just  part  of  our  total  energy use) should come from
renewable  power  by  that  date.  Even  this is not a target, just an
"aspiration",  and  it is on course to miss it. Worse still, it has no
idea  what  happens  after  that.  Last  week  I  asked whether it has
commissioned  any  research  to  discover how much more electricity we could generate from renewable sources. It has not(6).

It's  a  critical question, whose answer - if its results were applied
globally  - could determine whether or not the planetary "albedo flip"
that  Hansen  predicts  takes  place. There has been remarkably little
investigation of this issue. Until recently I guessed that the maximum
contribution  from renewables would be something like 50%: beyond that point  the  difficulties of storing electricity and balancing the grid
could  become overwhelming. But three papers now suggest that we could go much further.

Last  year,  the German government published a study of the effects of linking  the  electricity  networks of all the countries in Europe and
connecting  them  to North Africa and Iceland with high voltage direct
current  cables(7).  This  would  open  up  a  much greater variety of
renewable  power  sources.  Every country in the network would then be able  to  rely  on  stable  and  predictable  supplies from elsewhere: hydroelectricity  in  Scandanavia  and  the Alps, geothermal energy in Iceland  and  vast solar thermal farms in the Sahara. By spreading the demand  across  a much wider network, it suggests that 80% of Europe's electricity could be produced from renewable power without any greater risk of blackouts or flickers.

At  about  the  same  time,  Mark Barrett at University College London
published  a  preliminary study looking mainly at ways of altering the
pattern  of  demand  for electricity to match the variable supply from
wind  and  waves and tidal power(8). At about twice the current price, he found  that  we  might  be  able  to produce as much as 95% of our
electricity  from  renewable  sources without causing interruptions in the power supply.

Now  a  new  study by the Centre for Alternative Technology takes this
even  further(9). It is due to be published next week, but I have been
allowed  a preview. It is remarkable in two respects: it suggests that by 2027  we  could produce 100% of our electricity without the use of fossil fuels  or  nuclear power, and that we could do so while almost tripling its  supply: our heating systems (using electricity to drive heat  pumps) and our transport systems could be mostly powered by it. It  relies  on  a great expansion of electricity storage: building new hydroelectric reservoirs   into  which  water  can  be  pumped  when electricity  is abundant,  constructing giant vanadium flow batteries and  linking electric cars up to the grid when they are parked, using their  batteries to  meet  fluctuations  in  demand. It contains some optimistic  technical assumptions,  but  also a very pessimistic one: that  the UK relies entirely on its own energy supplies. If the German proposal  were  to be combined with these ideas, we could begin to see how we might reliably move towards a world without fossil fuels.

If  Hansen  is correct, to avert the meltdown that brings the Holocene to an  end  we  require a response on this scale: a sort of political "albedo flip".  The government must immediately commission studies to discover how  much  of  our  energy  could be produced without fossil fuels,  set that as its target then turn the economy round to meet it. But a power shift like this cannot take place without a power shift of another kind: we need a government which fears planetary meltdown more than it fears the CBI.

George  Monbiot's  book  Heat:  how  to stop the planet burning is now
published in paperback. www.monbiot.com

References:

1.  James  Hansen  et  al,  2007.  Climate  Change  and  Trace  Gases.
Philiosophical  Transactions  of  the  Royal  Society - A. Vol 365, pp
1925-1954. doi: 10.1098/rsta.2007.2052.
http://pubs.giss.nasa.gov/docs/2007/2007_Hansen_etal_2.pdf

2.  Intergovernmental  Panel on Climate Change, February 2007. Climate Change  2007:  The  Physical Science Basis - Summary for Policymakers.  Table SPM-3. http://www.ipcc.ch/SPM2feb07.pdf

3. I am grateful to Marc Hudson for drawing my attention to this paper and giving me a copy.

4. James Hansen et al, ibid.

5.  In  the  Energy  White  Paper  it  says  the  following:  "The 20%
renewables  target  is an ambitious goal representing a large increase in Member  States'  renewables  capacity.  It  will  need to be taken forward in the context of the overall EU greenhouse gas target. Latest data  shows that  the  current  share of renewables in the UK's total energy  mix  is around  2%  and  for  the  EU  as  a whole around 6%. Projections indicate that by 2020, on the basis of existing policies, renewables would contribute around 5% of the UK's consumption and are unlikely to exceed 10% of the EU's." Department of Trade and Industry, May  2007. Meeting the Energy Challenge: A White Paper on Energy, page 23. http://www.dtistats.net/ewp/ewp_full.pdf

6.  Emails  from  David Meechan, press officer, Renewables, Department for Business, Enterprise and Regulatory Reform.

7. German Aerospace Center (DLR) Institute of Technical Thermodynamics Section   Systems  Analysis  and  Technology  Assessment,  June  2006.  Trans-Mediterranean  Interconnection  for  Concentrating  Solar Power. Federal  Ministry for the Environment, Nature Conservation and Nuclear Safety, Germany.
http://www.dlr.de/tt/Portaldata/41/Resources/dokumente/institut/syste...

8.  Mark  Barrett,  April 2006. A Renewable Electricity System for the UK: A  Response  to  the  2006  Energy Review. UCL Bartlett School Of Graduate Studies   -   Complex   Built  Environment  Systems  Group.
http://www.cbes.ucl.ac.uk/projects/energyreview/Bartlett%20Response%20 to%20Energy%20Review%20-%20electricity.pdf

9.    Centre    for    Alternative   Technology,   10th   July   2007.
ZeroCarbonBritain:  an  alternative energy strategy. This will be made
available at www.zerocarbonbritain.com.

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US Fund for UNICEF

Project Description:
For Two Cents We Can Change the World. Four thousand children die needlessly every day from drinking contaminated water. It's a tragedy that hundreds of millions of people obtain their drinking water from polluted sources such as muddy rivers, ponds, and streams. This public health crisis can be addressed today through an innovative and low-cost technology that effectively purifies and cleans water while removing bacteria, viruses, and parasites. Right now millions of people in Africa, Asia, and the Americas are being reached by a not-for-profit project, but millions more are in need. Help us reach a goal of providing 2 billion liters of safe drinking water. For only two pennies a day a child can have safe drinking water. We'd love to hear your thoughts. In fact, Give Us Your Two Cents Worth. Thank you.

Member: gsallgood

About Me:
My mission is to prevent the sickness and death that occur in the developing world from drinking unsafe water. I'm lucky to spend much of my life building partnerships to provide a low-cost technology to purify water. I never get tired of seeing filthy and highly contaminated water miraculously turn into clear and safe water. And, what's most satisfying is to provide children with their first drink of truly clean and purified water. Now we've developed a way for everyone to get involved. We can make, transport, and deliver the technology on a sustainable basis for only pennies per person. In fact, for just two cents we can provide purified drinking water for a person for a day. Two Cents to Change a Life. Please consider joining our project: "Give Your Two Cents Worth.

1.1 billion people around the world do not have access to clean water. As a result, 5,000 children die needlessly every day. In poor, rural communities, the only source of water is often miles away and the grueling task of collecting it often falls to young girls.

In the mountain village of La Horca, Nicaragua, Rosibel Gonzalez, 12, traveled 7.5 miles each day to fetch water for her parents and five siblings. Waking up before dawn, she walked to the creek before school and carried back a bucket of water on her head. She repeated the task after school and again before bed. But because the water she fetched came from the same source used by village livestock, it was dangerous to drink. When Rosibel's little brother, Wilber, was only eight months old, he and other villagers contracted cholera. That's where UNICEF, the United Nations Children's Fund, came in. UNICEF provided a new solar-powered water pump and filtration system to bring clean water directly into La Horca's 35 homes. Now, Rosibel and her entire village have safe water to drink and Rosibel is left with plenty of time to study and play with her little brother.

With a presence in 156 countries, UNICEF is striving to duplicate this success worldwide. By voting for this project, you can help UNICEF save millions of children's lives. We know what needs to be done, we just need your help to do it. Only 2 cents will purchase one water purification tablet to clean 5 liters of water, $48 can purchase a portable latrine and $5,000 can buy a solar water pump, like the one installed in Rosibel's village. UNICEF partners with communities to provide these and other innovative, low-cost and life-saving solutions for the world's most vulnerable children and their families.

Zoellick becomes World Bank president

The Executive Directors of the World Bank yesterday unanimously selected Robert Zoellick as the 11th President of the bank for a five-year term.

The President of the bank is ex-officio President of the International Development Association (IDA) and Chairman of the Board of Directors of the International Finance Corporation (IFC), the Multilateral Investment Guarantee Agency (MIGA), and the Administrative Council of the International Centre of Investment Disputes (ICSID).

This announcement affects every aspect of environmental, energy, and resources law, of course, due to the Bank's pivotal role in financing development -- and thereby setting development policy throughout the world.  So, who is this masked man?

Here's the Bank's bio:

Professional History of Mr. Robert B. Zoellick

Mr. Zoellick, a U.S. national, is currently Vice Chairman, International, of Goldman Sachs Group, and a Managing Director and Chairman of Goldman Sach’s Board of International Advisors. He has served in a number of senior positions in successive US administrations, including as Deputy Secretary, U.S. Department of State, and as U.S. Trade Representative (2001-05). He also served as Deputy Assistant Secretary for Financial Institutions Policy, US Department of Treasury, and Undersecretary for Economic and Agricultural Affairs and Counselor in the U.S. State Department. He was Executive Vice President of Fannie Mae (1993-1997), the large U.S. mortgage finance corporation, as well as Vice President and Assistant to the Chairman and CEO. In addition, he served as Olin Visiting Professor, U.S. Naval Academy, as Senior Advisor, Goldman Sachs, as Research Scholar, Belfer Center, Harvard University, and previously on three corporate boards, as well as numerous research and non-profit boards.

Mr. Zoellick has a J.D., magna cum laude, Harvard Law School, and a M.P.P. (in public management and international issues) from the Kennedy School of Government. In addition, Mr. Zoellick has received numerous distinguished service awards.

Read between the lines: Zoellick is a Bush loyalist and true believer in globalization for the benefit of corporate interests and the wealthy.  Wouldn't it be refreshing sometime for the World Bank to be led by someone who is committed to reducing international poverty and who has on the ground development experience -- rather than ideological theorizing and strategizing experience.

Unfortunately, and I say this as an alumna of both, Zoellick's Kennedy School and HLS credentials just mean he's smart, not moral or committed to the public he is supposed to serve.

It's Too Damned Hot!

Planet Ark link reports that Shanghai, China's largest city, experienced its warmest winter since records began in 1873.   The average temperature over the past three months was 8.1 degrees Celsius (46.6 Fahrenheit), 2.6 degrees warmer than the previous average.  Director of Shanghai's climate centre, attributed the record temperatures to global warming.   

France also recorded its warmest autumn and winter for several centuries. Meteo France said average temperatures from December to February were 2.1 degrees Celsius (35.78 Fahrenheit) above average -- the highest since it began collating "full and reliable" data from 22 French cities in 1950. 

"This remarkably mild winter follows an exceptionally hot 2006 autumn, which has not been seen before in the 1950-2006 period and without doubt even for several centuries," Meteo France said in a statement.

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Shanghai has Warmest Winter on Record

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SHANGHAI - Shanghai, China's largest city, has experienced its warmest winter since records began in 1873, the official Xinhua news agency reported on Thursday.

 

The average temperature over the past three months was 8.1 degrees Celsius (46.6 Fahrenheit), 2.6 degrees warmer than the previous average, Xinhua quoted the Shanghai Meteorological Bureau as saying.

Lei Xiaotu, director of the bureau's climate centre, attributed the record temperatures to global warming.    

The warmer weather cut energy consumption in some parts of Shanghai, home to about 18 million people. It also helped the growth of vegetables, pushing down their prices, Lei said.

The warming trend could also have negative effects on human health and the environment, he said.    

Earlier this week, Shanghai authorities said a particularly serious plague of mosquitoes was expected this summer after the warm winter helped them breed.

The winter was unusually warm for China as a whole, with an average temperature of minus 2.6 degrees, 1.8 degrees higher than normal, Xinhua said. Last year was the country's warmest in more than half a century.

 

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France has Warmest Autumn, Winter for Centuries

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PARIS - France recorded its warmest autumn and winter for several centuries, the meteorological office said on Thursday as the government warned it was worried about water supplies. Meteo France said average temperatures from December to February were 2.1 degrees Celsius (35.78 Fahrenheit) above average -- the highest since it began collating "full and reliable" data from 22 French cities in 1950.

 

"This remarkably mild winter follows an exceptionally hot 2006 autumn, which has not been seen before in the 1950-2006 period and without doubt even for several centuries," Meteo France said in a statement.

It added that northeast France was especially mild, with temperatures almost 3 C above normal in the three winter months. It said the outlook was for a hotter-than-normal spring.

A government committee held a monthly meeting on the water situation in France on Thursday and urged users, especially farmers, to be careful, saying rainfall between September and February was slightly lower-than-average.

"The water situation is worrying and one must remain attentive," Environment Minister Nelly Olin said, adding that water restrictions looked almost certain in some areas.

(Additional reporting by Paule Bonjean)   

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Check out Planet Ark on the web at www.planetark.com

Spirit of the Eagle

This blog is devoted principally to the professional or academic aspects of environmental law, policy, science, and ethics.  But like any blogger, I do have a life.  Anyone interested in the slightly less academic side of me is welcome to visit Spirit of the Eagle, my personal blog.