2050: Climate change will worsen the plight of the poor

Future of agriculture and food security closely linked to climate change

Poorest regions with the highest levels of chronic hunger are likely to be among the worst affected by climate change, according to a discussion paper published today by Food and Agircultural Organisation of the UN. Many developing countries, particularly in Africa, could become increasingly dependent on food imports.

While globally the impact of climate change on food production may be small, at least until 2050, the distribution of production will have severe consequences on food security: developing countries may experience a decline of between 9 and 21 per cent in overall potential agricultural productivity as a result of global warming, the paper estimated.

The paper reported that climate change is among main challenges to agriculture in feeding the world's population, projected to reach 9.1 billion people by 2050.

At the same time, several agriculture-based mitigation options for climate change could generate significant benefits for both food security and climate change adaptation. Increasing soil carbon sequestration through forestry and agro-forestry initiatives and tillage practices, improving efficiency of nutrient management and restoring degraded lands are examples of actions that have large mitigation potential and high co-benefits.

Climate change is expected to affect agriculture and forestry systems through higher temperatures, elevated carbon dioxide concentration, changes in rainfall, increased weeds, pests and diseases. In the short term, the frequency of extreme events such as droughts, heat waves, floods and severe storms is expected to increase.

Emissions from agriculture account for roughly 14 per cent of global greenhouse gas emissions. Seventy-four per cent of emissions from agriculture and most of the technical and economic mitigation potential from agriculture - some 70 per cent - are in developing countries.

The FAO paper notes that a climate change agenda will need to recognise and value agriculture's potential contribution to adaptation and mitigation through options that also safeguard its contribution to food security and development.

Impact on food security

Climate change will affect the four dimensions of food security: availability, accessibility, utilisation and stability, notes the FAO paper.

In terms of availability, increased atmospheric CO2 concentrations are expected to have a positive effect on the yield of many crops, even though the nutritional quality of produce may not increase in line with higher yields.

Climate change will increase the variability of agricultural production across all areas, with increased frequency of extreme climate events. The poorest regions will be exposed to the highest degree of instability of food production.

On average, food prices are expected to rise moderately in line with increases in temperature until 2050. After 2050 and with further increases in temperatures, significant decreases in agricultural production potential in developing countries are projected and prices are expected to rise more substantially.

Climate change is likely to alter the conditions for food safety by increasing the disease pressure from vector, water and food-borne diseases. The result could be a substantial decline in agricultural productivity, including labour productivity, leading to increases in poverty and mortality rates.

Africa especially vulnerable

Agricultural and food production in many developing countries are likely to be adversely affected, especially in countries that have low incomes and a high incidence of hunger and poverty and are already highly vulnerable to drought, flooding and cyclone.

In Africa this could lead to an increased dependency in many countries on food imports. It has been estimated that climate change may reduce African potential agricultural output up to the 2080-2100 period by between 15 and 30 per cent.

The strongest negative impact of climate change on agriculture is expected in sub-Saharan Africa. This means that the poorest and most food insecure region is also expected to suffer the largest contraction of agricultural incomes.

The climate is right

Adaptation of the agricultural sector to climate change will be costly but vital for food security, poverty reduction and maintaining the ecosystem. The current impetus for investing in improved agricultural policies, institutions and technologies to meet both food security and energy goals, provides a unique opportunity to mainstream climate change-related actions into agriculture, the paper notes.

It notes that, until recently, agriculture has largely remained a marginal issue in climate change negotiations, with some exception as regards deforestation and forest degradation mitigation activities. Among the reasons FAO identifies is that the scope of existing financing mechanisms has tended to exclude many agricultural activities, including many soil carbon sequestration activities.

Iceland hits grim historic milestone by killing whales

One hundred and twenty five endangered fin whales and at least 80 minke whales were killed by Iceland during its 2009 whaling season, marking the return of large scale commercial whaling to the northwest Atlantic, and, in a falling global market, raising questions as to who exactly will buy such excessive quantities of whale meat?

The hunt could produce more than 3 million kilograms of whale meat and blubber. With a limited domestic market, the only option for Iceland’s whalers is to export the whale meat and blubber to Japan, despite a ban on the international trade in whale products. However, the market in Japan is saturated due to declining demand for whale meat amongst the Japanese people. As of June 2009, more than 4500 tons of whale meat was in freezer storage in Japan.

This season’s hunt is the largest since the 1980s and was marked by another a bloody milestone. Kristjan Loftsson, the owner of the Hvalur whaling company, the only company licensed to hunt fin whales in Iceland, ‘celebrated’ the death of the 15,000th fin whale killed since the company was started in 1947.
“The whalers don’t care about the conservation status of whale populations, they don’t care about the image of their country, they don’t care about anything other than their own profit”, says Chris Butler-Stroud from WDCS (Whales and Dolphins Conservation Society).

“Millions of kronur have been spent by the Icelandic government to promote whaling at a time when Iceland’s economy was unraveling,” Butler-Stroud continues. “Iceland’s hunt is a haunting reminder of the excesses of the commercial whaling industry, and the reason why the moratorium on whaling needs to remain in place. The world’s governments must do much more to enforce this ban, and it is now up to the EU to stand up to the test, and prove what species conservation means to it”.

Conservationists are calling on the European Union to take a clear position on Iceland during the EU accession negotiation process.

“It is impossible to even think about an EU Member country being allowed to continue whaling,” says Butler-Stroud. WDCS is very concerned that this message might not have been heard yet by the Icelandic government.”

WDCS and other conservation groups also hope that the new US government does its part to shut down Iceland’s escalating whaling. “We call on President Obama to put immediate diplomatic pressure on the Icelandic government, says WDCS’s Kate O’Connell.

“Iceland’s whaling was certified by the previous Bush administration at a time when only a small number of minke whales were being killed, and we believe that the US must invoke the full range of options available to it, including the consideration of economic sanctions,” urges O’Connell.

Adapting to climate change to cost USD 75-100 billion a year

New global estimate for cost of adaptation to climate change in developing countries

The costs of adaptation to climate change in developing countries will be in the order of USD 75-100 billion per year for the period 2010 to 2050 according to preliminary findings in a new global study from The World Bank.

The Economics of Adaptation to Climate Change (EACC) study, funded by the governments of the Netherlands, Switzerland, and the United Kingdom, is the most in-depth analysis of the economics of adaptation to climate change to date and uses a new methodology for assessing these costs.

The new approach involves comparing a future world without climate change with a future world with climate change. The difference between these two worlds entails a series of actions to adapt to the new world conditions. The costs of these additional actions are the costs of adapting to climate change.

In the draft consultation document released, a key part of the overall analysis involved estimating adaptation costs for major economic sectors under two alternative future climate scenarios: “wet” and a “dry”. Under the relatively dryer scenario the adaptation cost is estimated at USD 75 billion per year, while under the scenario that assumes a future wetter climate it is USD 100 billion.

“Roughly the costs of adapting to a 2oC warmer world are of the same order of magnitude as current Overseas Development Assistance” said Katherine Sierra, World Bank Vice President for Sustainable Development. “Faced with the prospect of huge additional infrastructure costs, as well as drought, disease and dramatic reductions in agricultural productivity, developing countries need to be prepared for the potential consequences of unchecked climate change. In this respect, access to necessary financing will be critical.”

“The World Bank study makes plain that taking action in favor of adaptation now can result in future savings and reduce unacceptable risks,” said Bert Koenders, Dutch Minister for Development Cooperation. “At this point, the costs this will entail can still be borne by the international community, to judge by the GDPs of rich countries, but for poor countries they are unacceptably high. More than ever, mitigation, adaptation and development cooperation are needed to make the poor less vulnerable to climate change. International public financial support for adaptation in the poorest developing countries should be new and additional, so as not to jeopardise the Millennium Development Goals.”

The EACC study has two broad objectives. The first is to develop an estimate of the global costs of adaptation in developing countries. The second is to help decision makers in developing countries to better understand and assess the risks posed by climate change and to better design strategies to adapt to climate change, particularly keeping the most vulnerable communities in focus. A second report, based on seven country case studies, will be produced by spring 2010, focusing on the second objective.

The report released today finds that the highest costs will be borne by the East Asia and Pacific Region, followed closely by Latin America and the Caribbean, and Sub-Saharan Africa. The drier scenario requires lower adaptation costs in total in all regions, except South Asia.

“The EACC study provides a range of estimates for a world in which decision makers have perfect foresight,” says Sergio Margulis. “In the real world where decision makers hedge against a range of outcomes, the actual expenditures are potentially higher than this.”

The report stresses that development strategies must maximise flexibility and incorporate knowledge about climate change as it is gained. It also finds that adaptation costs decline as a percentage of GDP over time, suggesting that countries become less vulnerable to climate change as their economies grow.

“Economic growth is the most powerful form of adaptation,” said Warren Evans, Director of the World Bank’s Environment Department. “However, it cannot be ‘business as usual’. Adaptation minimises the impacts of climate change, but it does not address its causes. There is no substitute for mitigation to reduce catastrophic risks,” he said.

In the study, adaptation costs for all developing countries are estimated for the major economic sectors using country-level data sets that have global coverage, including partial assessment of costs of adaptation for ecosystem services. Cost implications of changes in the frequency of extreme weather events are also considered. The study is the first to develop a workable definition of adaptation costs that can set the stage for common understanding of what adaptation entails, what role development plays in adaptation, and what policy changes are needed to facilitate adaptation. It also highlights that many questions remain, and that further work is essential.

Climate change: 25 million children to be malnourished by 2050

Photo:Global Harvest AllianceThe impact of climate change on poor people can be averted with USD7 billion additional annual investments in rural development

Twenty five million more children will be malnourished in 2050 due to effects of climate change, according to a report by the International Food Policy Research Institute (IFPRI). This study, the most comprehensive assessment of the impact of climate change on agriculture to date, compares the number of malnourished children in 2050 with and without climate change.

"This outcome could be averted with seven billion U.S. dollars per year of additional investments in agricultural productivity to help farmers to adapt to the effects of climate change. Investments are needed in agricultural research, improved irrigation, and rural roads to increase market access for poor farmers. Access to safe drinking water and education for girls is also essential," said Gerald Nelson, IFPRI senior research fellow and report lead author.

The study, "Climate Change: Impact on Agriculture and Costs of Adaptation," was prepared by IFPRI for inclusion in two separate reports from the Asian Development Bank and the World Bank, both released today in conjunction with international climate change meetings in Bangkok.

Without new technology and adjustments by farmers, climate change will reduce irrigated wheat yields in 2050 by around 30 per cent in developing countries compared to a no-climate change scenario. Irrigated rice yields will fall by 15 per cent.

Even without climate change, food prices will rise, but climate change makes the problem worse. Without climate change, 2050 wheat prices will increase globally by almost 40 per cent. With climate change, wheat prices will increase by 170 - 194 per cent. Rice is projected to increase 60 per cent without climate change, but it will go up 113 - 121 per cent with climate change. 2050 maize prices will be more than 60 per cent higher without climate change, but they will be 148 - 153 per cent higher with climate change.

The first of its kind, this study combines climate models that project changes in rainfall and temperature and a crop model to capture biophysical effects with IFPRI's economic model of world agriculture. The latter projects changes in the production, consumption and trade of major agricultural commodities.

The modelling does not include the effects of increased variability in weather due to climate change,the loss of agricultural lands due to rising sea levels, climate change-induced increases in pests and diseases and increased variability in river flow as glaciers melt.All these factors could increase the damage of climate change to agriculture.

Developing countries will be hit hardest by climate change and will face bigger declines in crop yields and production than industrialised countries, the study finds. The negative effects of climate change are especially pronounced in Sub-Saharan Africa and South Asia. Compared to the average biophysical effects of climate change on yields in the industrialised world, the developing countries fare worse for almost all crops.

"Agriculture is extremely vulnerable to climate change, because farming is so weather-dependent. Small-scale farmers in developing countries will suffer the most," noted Mark Rosegrant, director of IFPRI's Environment and Production Technology Division and report co-author. "However, our study finds that this scenario of lower yields, higher prices, and increased child malnutrition can be avoided."

In addition to increased funding for rural development, IFPRI recommends more open agricultural trade to ensure that food will reach the poorest populations in times of crises.

"If governments and donors begin now to invest seriously in adaptation for poor farmers, we can avert this bleak future," said Rosegrant.

World's most famous dinosaur was felled by a lowly parasite

An artist's rendering of a T. rex suffering from a trichomonosis-like disease, a single-celled organism that infects the mouth and throat and may have caused the animal to starve to death. The renderings show the infection and how it relates to the lesions found on the mandible of 'Peck's Rex' (Museum of the Rockies). Photo: Chris Glen, University of Queensland

When pondering the demise of a famous dinosaur such as 'Sue,' the mighty Tyrannosaurus rex whose fossilised remains are a star attraction of the Field Museum in Chicago, it is hard to avoid the image of clashing Cretaceous titans engaged in bloody, mortal combat.

It is an image commonly promoted by museums and dinosaur aficionados. Sue's remains, in fact, exhibit holes in her jaw that some believed were battle scars, the result of conflict with another dinosaur, possibly another T. rex. But a new study, published in the online journal Public Library of Science One, provides evidence that Sue, perhaps the most famous dinosaur in the world, was felled in more mundane fashion by a lowly parasite that still afflicts modern birds.

The study, conducted by an international team of researchers led by Ewan D.S. Wolff of the University of Wisconsin-Madison and Steven W. Salisbury of the University of Queensland, Australia, pins the demise of Sue and other tyrannosaurs with similar scars on an avian parasitic infection called trichomonosis, caused by a single-celled parasite that causes similar pathologies on the mandibles of modern birds, raptors in particular.

It is possible the infection in her throat and mouth may have been so acute that the 42-foot-long, 7-ton dinosaur starved to death, says Wolff, a vertebrate paleontologist and a third-year student at the UW-Madison School of Veterinary Medicine. Co-authors of the study include famed paleontologist John R. Horner of the Museum of the Rockies, which funded the study, and David J. Varricchio of Montana State University.

The focus of the new study was a survey of lesions on the jaws of Sue and nine other tyrannosaur specimens. The lesions had previously been attributed to bite wounds or, possibly, a bacterial infection.

"What drew my attention to trichomonosis as a potential candidate for these mysterious lesions on the jaws of tyrannosaurs is the manifestation of the effects of the disease in [bird] raptors," explains Wolff. "When we started looking at trichomonosis in greater depth, there was a story that matched some lines of evidence for transmission of the disease in tyrannosaurs."

In birds, trichomonosis is caused by a protozoan parasite called Trichomonas gallinae. It can be transmitted from birds such as pigeons, which commonly carry the parasite but often suffer few ill effects, to raptors such as falcons and hawks, where it causes serious lesions in the mandibles. The pattern of lesions, says Wolff, closely matches the holes in the jaws of tyrannosaurs and occurs in the same anatomical location.

The scars of combat among tyrannosaurs and other dinosaurs, Wolff notes, are not uncommon, but differ notably from the lesions that are the focus of the current study. The holes caused by trichomonosis tend to be neat and have relatively smooth edges, while bite marks are often messy, and they scar and puncture bone in ways that are not readily comparable.

Tyrannosaurs, notes Wolff, are known to have been gregarious, intermingling, fighting amongst themselves and sometimes eating one another. Transmission of the parasite may have been through salivary contact or cannibalism, he says, noting that there is no known evidence of trichomonosis in other dinosaurs.

"This leads us to suspect that tyrannosaurs might have been the source of the disease and its transmission in its environment," Wolff says.

For the disease to manifest itself in the jaws of Sue and other tyrannosaurs, it would have had to be at an advanced stage as the parasite typically sets up housekeeping as a film in the back of the throat.

"The lesions we observe on Sue suggest a very advanced stage of the disease and may even have been the cause of her demise," says Wolff. "It is a distinct possibility as it would have made feeding incredibly difficult. You have to have a viable pharynx. Without that, you won't make it for very long, no matter how powerful you are."

Smallholder farmers begin to connect with markets

Smallholder farmers in Zambia, where WFP is working with the Agricultural Commodity Exchange to help farmers sell their produce. Photo: Laura Melo/WFP

In the first year of an initiative funded mainly by the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation and the Howard G. Buffett Foundation, 42,000 smallholder farmers all over the world have been involved in selling food to World Food Programme (WFP) through the 'Purchase For Progress' pilot programme.

Faso Jigi, a federation of farmers’ associations in Mali, scored a first this year. Its 2,500 members were finally able to participate and win a tender to sell 600 metric tons (MT) of cereals to WFP.

“This year the sale was quick, they paid us promptly and we made a good profit. If they do the same after the next harvest it will be a good thing,” said 60-year-old Mamadou Traoré, a longtime member of Faso Jigi.

Up to now most farmers in Mali – particularly those with small plots and low incomes – were unable to meet the requirements of WFP tenders. Faso Jigi made its breakthrough largely because of changes in tender procedures brought in by Purchase for Progress (P4P). Under the pilot programme, WFP actively looks for bids from farmers organisations and is willing to purchase small quantities.

Engage in markets

P4P was launched a year ago to improve smallholders’ ability to engage in and benefit from agricultural markets. The starting point is the agency’s purchasing power, part of which can be used to support smallholder farmers as they produce and sell their staple commodities.

Supported by the P4P framework, poor farmers – most of whom are women – can boost their incomes and see how to connect to markets in general. Overall, 21 countries have been selected to pilot this approach over five years.

Since its launch in September 2008, P4P has purchased food commodities from 30 farmers' organisations with some 42,000 members. Overall, in 2009, WFP expects to buy up to 55,000 MT of food from smallholder farmers – either directly from farmer organisations or through other marketing platforms such as warehouse receipts systems or commodity exchanges. More than 5,400 farmers have also been trained in a variety of skills like basic management, farming techniques, quality control and post-harvest handling.

Expertise of partners

WFP is not alone in this enterprise. It relies on the expertise of partners that include governments, international organisations and the private sector. They provide technical skills, training, facilitate access to inputs and credit.

WFP has started to use a range of procurement approaches tailored to benefit smallholder farmers more directly. In Zambia, WFP is working with the Agricultural Commodity Exchange (ZAMACE) to help farmers sell their produce; in Uganda and Tanzania it is buying through warehouse receipts systems; in Guatemala, rather than buying directly from farmers, WFP links them with the manufacturer of Vitacereal, a locally produced and blended food. WFP buys and distributes Vitacereal to its beneficiaries.

With P4P, WFP is turning local procurement into an effective tool to address global hunger. Its vision is that by 2015, agricultural markets will have developed in such a way that many more low-income or smallholder farmers will produce food surpluses, sell them at a fair price and increase their incomes. With this cash, the farmers are then able to purchase services such as education and healthcare that improve their livelihoods.

Canadian Hydro to acquire largest offshore wind operation

Photo: Philipp Hertzog

Canadian Hydro Developers Inc has entered into an agreement to acquire the rights to what it calls the largest offshore wind operation in the world.

The company, which has been fighting a hostile takeover bid from TransAlta for the last several weeks, said it will acquire a 4,400 MW offshore wind prospect in Ontario from Wasatch Wind Inc, a private US-based renewable energy company.

When completed, this facility would be supplying enough renewable energy to power over two million homes. The agreement terms are confidential.

The Offshore Wind Prospect is located approximately five to 30 kilometres offshore in one of the Great Lakes bordering Ontario, near available transmission interconnection. It has an estimated net capacity factor of 40 per cent.

The Offshore Wind Prospect is eligible for the Ontario Green Energy Act’s Feed-In-Tariff 20-year contract at a price of USD190 per MWh, subject to 100 per cent of Ontario consumer price index (“CPI”) inflation from contract signing to commercial operations and 20 per cent of Ontario CPI annually thereafter.

Canadian Hydro anticipates that the Offshore Wind Prospect will be built in stages, with the first 400 to 500 MW to come online by the fourth quarter of 2014. Regulatory and environmental permits and approvals, site release from the Ontario Ministry of Natural Resources, and financing are required prior to proceeding with construction.

CEO Kent Brown said, “Canadian Hydro already owns and operates the two largest wind facilities in Canada. We are leading the way in Ontario by generating 40 per cent of the province’s installed renewable energy capacity, and we are eager to pioneer offshore wind in Ontario and North America.”

US's first ultracapacitor electric buses to be showcased

These vehicles neither consume fossil fuels nor produce tailpipe emissions

Sinautec Automobile Technologies LLC and the American University (AU) will showcase America's first ultracapacitor electric vehicle during a demonstration on October 21, 2009 from 10 AM to 5PM on AU's campus in Washington, DC.

Sinautec will display and demonstrate an eleven-seat minibus, powered by state-of-the-art ultracapacitors, and charged by a 5,000 watt mobile solar unit. Ultracapacitor vehicles consume no fossil fuels, produce no tailpipe emissions, and are cost-competitive compared to similar buses running on conventional fuels.

These buses are powered entirely by electricity, which is stored in ultracapacitors and batteries onboard. When the bus stops at passenger stops, the overhead charger quickly recharges the ultracapacitor onboard to allow the bus to go to its next destination. The battery serves as a back up power and allows the bus to extend its travelling range. The Ultracap Bus has a top speed of 35 miles per hour and has a maximum range of 45 miles between charges.



"With a combination of advanced solar and ultracapacitor technologies, Sinautec seeks to demonstrate the certainty of a zero-carbon future for the US public transportation sector," said Dan Ye, Sinautec's CEO. Unlike battery-powered vehicles, ultracapacitor vehicles can be charged within minutes, and have important applications in municipal and campus transportation, shuttle services, tourism and recreation, he added.

Sinautec is an Arlington, Virginia-based company that develops high energy density ultracapacitors in the transportation and utility energy storage markets. With its research partner, Shanghai Aowei Technology Development Company, Sinautec successfully developed a series of ultracapacitor municipal buses that have been in commercial use in the greater Shanghai area since 2006.
"It is our goal to contribute to the Obama Administration's efforts to improve the environment and to reduce America's reliance on foreign oil," said Ye.

Sinautec is currently working with several major research universities to develop the next generation of nano-scale ultracapacitors.

Ten years of success in saving world’s second largest rainforest

Congo forest

Leaders of the Congo Basin countries and conservation groups are pressing for more attention, funds and technical support to save the world’s second largest rainforest and benefit its population during a Congo Basin Forest Forum and Congressional Hearing.

The leaders, including heads of state and ministers for natural resources, also agree that the 46 billion metric tons of carbon stored in the forests should be recognised as a valuable asset during global climate change talks in Copenhagen this December.

The Forum and Congressional Hearing are aimed at celebrating 10 years since the historic Yaounde Summit, which first brought together heads of state from the countries that share the Congo Basin’s rich rainforests. Since that time, millions of acres of new protected areas have been created, new initiatives on bushmeat and anti-poaching are in place, and sustainable forestry is beginning to take root.
The accomplishments include:

34 protected areas, 61 community-based natural resource management areas, and 34 extractive resource zones have been zoned for conservation management, covering 126 million acres (51 million hectares) or more than a third of the Congo Basin forests.

More than 11.5 million acres of forest have been certified as sustainably harvested by the Forest Stewardship Council (FSC).

More than 5,000 local men and women have been trained in conservation, land use planning and related conservation capacities.

Although logging and forest degradation remain serious problems, the overall rate of deforestation in the Congo Basin is estimated to be a relatively low 0.17 per cent, a third of that of Brazil and a 10th of that of Indonesia.

Studies of landscapes and wildlife have improved conservation planning, exemplified by a census indicating the existence of 125,000 previously unknown western lowland gorillas in Northern Congo.

Indicators for the survival of some endangered species are also improving. Despite years of conflict and poaching, the population of mountain gorillas in Virunga, between the Democratic Republic of Congo, Rwanda and Uganda, is up 17 per cent over a previous census taken 20 years ago.

“Since 2002, the Congo Basin Forest Partnership has been instrumental to the creation of protected areas and national park networks, and in prioritising natural resource management in the region. In fact, throughout the Congo Basin we have seen ‘conservation’ become a household word,” said Michael Fay, conservationist and senior explorer for the Wildlife Conservation Society.

“The investments have paid off handsomely and CBFP can serve as a model to be replicated in other major biomes around the world.”

Challenges

While they are celebrating success, participants in the Forum are aware of the vast challenges facing the Congo Basin.

“The conservation successes of the past 10 years are impressive, but they are tempered by the ongoing challenges of the bushmeat crisis, illegal logging and mining, and climate change,” said Dr. Richard Carroll, Vice President of World Wildlife Fund’s Africa and Madagascar Programs.

Climate change discussions at the Forum highlight the urgent need to assess the impacts of climate change on the Congo Basin, begin devising adaptive strategies to cope with those impacts and recognise the importance of reducing emissions from deforestation and forest degradation.

The Congo Basin is an enormous carbon storehouse, sequestering an estimated 46 billion metric tons of carbon, more than any other forest except the Amazon. However, since its rates of deforestation are relatively low, the countries of the region fear they may be excluded from climate agreements in Copenhagen that address deforestation and degradation.

"The colossal quantities of carbon captured and stored in the forests of the Congo basin are massively significant in global efforts to tackle climate change. The Congo Basin Forest Partnership has shown that forest management can bring increased stability and prosperity to the people of the region,” said Dr Frank Hawkins, head of Conservation International's Africa Programme. “We must ensure that the Copenhagen talks provide financial incentives for these nations to keep their forests standing or we will all suffer the consequences."

"Reducing deforestation in the Congo Basin not only provides opportunities for conserving biodiversity while contributing to people's livelihoods, but also mitigates global climate change," said Dr. Patrick Bergin, CEO of the African Wildlife Foundation.

Other issues discussed at the Forum include resource extraction and the bushmeat trade. Building of roads for industrial extraction of minerals and trees are linked to increases in the bushmeat trade, as these roads provide a conduit to wildlife resources otherwise difficult to access. The bushmeat trade accounts for the majority of wildlife losses in the region, which negatively impacts forest health as key species such as apes, monkeys and elephants play key roles in the regeneration of the forest.

Report on carbon disclosure is out

Allianz, Reckitt Benckiser, Siemens, Boeing and Cisco Systems were among the corporations leading efforts to tackle climate change, according to this year’s Carbon Disclosure Project report.

The results were launched in New York during Climate Week at an event.

This year’s Global 500 Report, produced by PricewaterhouseCoopers, received the highest response rate ever from corporations (409 responses, representing 82 per cent of the Global 500, up from 77 per cent last year), the highest level of disclosed corporate greenhouse gas emissions and a doubling of response rates in the BRIC countries (Brazil, Russia, India, China).

Carbon Disclosure Project also launched its new performance scoring pilot methodology at this year’s Global launch, one of the first events of New York Climate Week. The performance scores measure corporations’ actual performance in responding to and reducing their contribution to climate change and is intended to complement the Carbon Disclosure Leadership Index (CDLI).

The CDLI rates firms according to the level and quality of their disclosure and reporting on greenhouse gas emissions and climate change strategy data. The companies topping the table on carbon disclosure (CDLI ratings) in 2009 are: Bayer, BASF, HSBC Holdings, Walmart and Chevron.

“Incorporating performance into CDP 2009 has been a positive step: it has provided distinction between observing and rewarding good reporting versus positive action,” says Paul Dickinson, CEO of Carbon Disclosure Project. “It will help show where risks are being managed and opportunities maximised, and provide investors with insight into how well companies are preparing to compete in a low carbon environment.”

As the Copenhagen Conference approaches, the report revealed that companies covered by the EU Emissions Trading Scheme (EU ETS) tend to achieve higher scores on both disclosure and performance (20 per cent and 25 per cent higher respectively) which may reflect the organisational rigour imposed by mandatory legislation.
WWF Russia partnered with CDP on promoting the project among 50 largest Russian companies in 2009.

BBC Launches Wildlife Finder

Veteran broadcaster David Attenborough shares his favourite TV wildlife moments with the nation in the largest release of natural history video clips from the BBC's vast archive in a new online site – bbc.co.uk/wildlifefinder.

From Planet Earth's incredible footage of the rare and elusive snow leopard, to tool-using chimps and the moment when a killer whale seizes sea lions from a beach in Trials Of Life, the most iconic and landmark wildlife filming moments are among more than 500 clips from 30 BBC series now available to view.

The website bbc.co.uk/wildlifefinder is the BBC's natural history short form video and audio archive.

It enables wildlife fans to browse through three decades of BBC natural history content and enjoy the natural world, its habitats, its animals and their behaviours when and where they want.

Users can also search by their favourite animals, to find out more about them and the changing world they live in – from great white sharks and birds of paradise to Arctic foxes and the fascinating behaviour of creatures to be found here in the UK.

Plus, it offers up-to-date information about their conservation status, where they live and a range of links to organisations across the wider web to explore the subject even further.

Over time more species, clips and related information will be added.

Introducing the site David, who has filmed many of the most famous natural history moments in TV history, shares his favourite 50 clips.

They include the deadly interaction between chimps and colobus monkeys in Trials Of Life; the courtship display of the male superb bird of paradise in Planet Earth and the spitting cobra in Life In Cold Blood.

David Attenborough says, "I have selected some of my favourite clips. For me they represent not only a walk down memory lane but also a snapshot of the incredible diversity of life on Earth."

George Entwistle, Controller of Knowledge, says, "The BBC has a vast collection of world-class natural history content which we are now making available to viewers online.

"Through Wildlife Finder, we are able to offer viewers a year round on-demand natural history experience."

With technological advances in filming – state-of-the-art high-speed cameras, which can capture lightning-fast action that just can't be perceived by the human eye and, at the other end of the scale, sophisticated time-lapse which speeds up events – filmmakers are now able to discover and reveal more than ever before about the world's species, their habitats and how they've adapted to life on the planet.

By using the incredibly diverse resource of the BBC Bristol's Natural History Unit's archives the BBC's new website will eventually host a page for most creatures the BBC has featured.

These will not only include videos but also recordings of the noises they make and links to further information.

It was commissioned by Lisa Sargood, Multiplatform Commissioning Executive, BBC Vision.

Simon Nelson, Controller, Multi-Platform & Portfolio, BBC Vision, says, "Wildlife Finder is a fantastic example of the magic that can happen when the best TV, radio and new media teams come together.

"It's the world's finest natural history content connected together and made discoverable on the web by the cross-media expertise of the BBC."

Attenborough adds: "It has always been my hope that, through filmmaking, I can bring the wonder of the natural world into people's sitting rooms.

"The web has totally changed how we can link information, connect people and reach new audiences in an on-demand world.

"Wildlife programmes have always proved hugely popular and the appetite for discovery has led the BBC to bring these two worlds together."

As part of the BBC's commitment to natural history in the multiplatform world, it has also recently launched bbc.co.uk/earthexplorers where natural history fans can enjoy the excitement of wildlife filming on location from their armchairs by following production teams working on future series, such as Frozen Planet; and bbc.co.uk/earth news, providing the latest in breaking wildlife stories.

Is talcum powder a dangerous thing?

The dangers of talcum powder are revealed

You've probably used it, or had it sprinkled on you at some time in your life. It's processed from a soft mineral compound of magnesium silicate and is called talcum powder, or just talc.

Talcum powder is manufactured by Johnson & Johnson, among others, and is widely available in drug stores. Women have been persuaded by years of advertisements to dust themselves with talcum powder to mask alleged genital odours.

While the powder has been a symbol of freshness and cleanliness for over five decades, genital talc dusting is a dangerous, but avoidable, cause of ovarian cancer, warns Dr. Samuel S. Epstein, chairman of the Cancer Prevention Coalition.

The first warning of the dangers of genital talc dusting came in a 1971 report on the identification of talc particles in ovarian cancers, a finding sharply contested by Dr. G.Y. Hildick-Smith, who was then Johnson & Johnson's medical director.

A subsequent publication in the prestigious medical journal The Lancet warned that, "The potentially harmful effects of talc ... in the ovary ... should not be ignored." This warning was confirmed in a 1992 article in the journal Obstetrics & Gynecology which reported that a woman's frequent talc use on her genitals increased her risk of ovarian cancer by threefold. The talc in question was simple brand or generic "baby powder."

After the 1992 report, at least a dozen other major scientific articles documenting the link between talc and ovarian cancer appeared in leading medical journals such as Cancer, The Lancet, and Oncology. The capstone of this research against talc came in 2003 when the journal Anticancer Research published a 'meta-analysis,' or large scale review, of 16 previous published studies involving 11,933 women. A 33 per cent increased risk of ovarian cancer was confirmed, Dr. Epstein points out.

"Not surprisingly," says Dr. Epstein, "the mortality of ovarian cancer in women 65 years of age and older has escalated sharply, especially in black women who have a higher rate of talc use than other races." Nearly 16,000 women in the U.S. die from ovarian cancer each year, which means it is the fourth most common fatal cancer in women. By some estimates, one out of five women regularly applies talc to her genitals. This usage occurs either through direct application, or as a result of tampons, sanitary pads and diaphragms that have been dusted with talc, Dr. Epstein points out.

More acknowledgment of talc's dangers emerged, even from the cosmetics industry. The president of the industry's Cosmetic Toiletry and Fragrance Association, Edward Kavanaugh, conceded in 2002 that talc is toxic and "can reach the human ovaries."

Yet, says Dr. Epstein, "inexplicably, talc manufacturers failed to warn women that the product could be dangerous to their health."

Nor has the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) shown even casual concern about the dangers of talc. The closest admission to this effect came in 1993 when the acting associate commissioner for legislative affairs of the Department of Health and Human Services admitted, "We are aware that there have been reports in the medical literature between frequent female perineal talc dusting over a protracted period of years, and an incremental increase in the statistical odds of subsequent development of certain ovarian cancers."

Dr. Epstein says he was amazed when this official went on to say the FDA "is not considering to ban, restrict or require a warning statement on the label of talc containing products." Aware of talc's extreme dangers and alarmed by continued governmental unresponsiveness, in 1994 the Cancer Prevention Coalition, supported by the New York Center for Constitutional Rights, submitted a Citizen's Petition to the FDA.

This petition requested that talc genital dusting powder be labeled with an explicit warning of the major risks of ovarian cancer. However, says Dr. Epstein, the FDA denied the petition. In May 2008, the Cancer Prevention Coalition submitted another Citizen's Petition to the FDA. This one was endorsed by a range of groups including the Organic Consumers Association, the International Association for Humanitarian Medicine, and Dr. Faye Williams of the National Congress of Black Women.

"We cited new scientific evidence on the dangers of talc, and requested the FDA to mandate that all talc products be labeled with this type of warning: "Frequent application of talcum powder in the female genital area substantially increases the risk of ovarian cancer," Dr. Epstein says.

However, Andrew von Eschenbach, M.D., then Commissioner of the FDA, failed to respond to this petition.

It is anticipated that Margaret Hamburg, M.D., the highly respected new FDA Commissioner, will take prompt regulatory action to protect unsuspecting women from the extreme dangers of talc.

Why are you afraid of owls?

White faced scops owl. GarySmith70/FlickrOwls are identified with death and misfortune. It's time to demystify this innocuous bird

The Chitofu family living in Eastlea, Zimbabwe, feared that they had been bewitched by an owl which had haunted them for four months and refused to fly away when approached.

In Zimbabwe’s Shona culture - as in many parts of the world - owls are associated with death and misfortune, mostly because of their nocturnal activity and screeching-type calls.

Worried for their lives, the family called in staff at conservation organisation BirdLife in Zimbabwe who identified the bird as a White-faced Scops-owl Otus leucotis. “The father of the family was very scared and didn't want to go anywhere near the tree where the owl was perched”, said Rueben Njolomole, BirdLife Zimbabwe’s education officer.

Rueben assured the family that the bird was probably just hunting rats found nearby, and this is why it didn't fly away when approached. “The owl didn't want to leave the source of its food, and may have been a domesticated owl which had escaped because it was not scared of humans”.

Rueben explained that having an owl near their house will help to reduce the Chitofu’s rat problem. “Owls can eat thousands of rodents each year, reducing the need for other methods of control”.

Realising the strong negative folklore surrounding owls within the country, BirdLife Zimbabwe staff are now visiting local schools to educate children about the benefits the birds can bring. “At first many pupils indicate that owls are associated with bad luck and witchcraft”, added Rueben. “However, by the end of our lessons the children realise that owls can help to reduce problems caused by rats at home. It’s great to hear that from the kids!”

BirdLife Zimbabwe are also developing a proposal to produce a documentary that will be aired on national television to demystify the owls. “If the proposal gets funding we expect to produce a thirty-minute long documentary before the end of the year”, concluded Reuben.

Tanzania Massai tribes face eviction for UAE firm

Maasai homestead burned down in July 2009 Photo: Survival InternationalTanzanian government is allegedly doing the bidding of a UAE safari hunting firm

Pressure is mounting on the Tanzanian government following the recent violent evictions of Maasai from their land in Loliondo, Northern Tanzania, to make way for the UAE-based safari hunting company, Otterlo Business Corporation (OBC).

Local human rights organisations are filing criminal and civil cases against the Tanzanian government on behalf of the affected Maasai people at the High Court in Arusha. More than 100 witnesses are reportedly willing to testify.

Further pressure comes from diplomats based in Tanzania’s capital, Dar es Salaam. A group from Denmark, Sweden, Ireland and the UK recently visited Loliondo to investigate the evictions and reports of human rights abuses. They were denied entry to the villages in question by local government authorities.

Danish Ambassador, Bjarne Sørensen, called on the Tanzanian government "to be open in its action to secure the rule of law and fundamental human rights for all citizens of Tanzania’ and ‘to launch an independent investigation of the Loliondo case to make sure that unlawful actions are being dealt with by the proper authorities, according to the law."

Around 100 evicted Maasai recently marched to the State House in Dar es Salaam demanding an audience with President Jakaya Kikwete. Their demand was not met.

Following the march, Tanzania’s Minister of Natural Resources and Tourism, Shamsa Mwangunga, announced an investigation into the forced evictions. However, some observers have expressed concern that it will be a whitewash and have called for an independent investigation.

A video (below) recently posted on youtube includes interviews with evicted Maasai. One man says: "We ask that the world hears our cry and convinces the government to give us back the peace we have enjoyed in years past."



Several weeks of evictions of Maasai from their land in Loliondo took place during July and August. Entire villages were burned to the ground and their inhabitants forcibly evicted. UK-based Survival International has received several disturbing reports of brutal beatings and rapes taking place during the operations.

The evictions were carried out by Tanzanian riot police, allegedly to enable the OBC to easily hunt for game in the area.

Thousands of Maasai and their cattle remain destitute, and in urgent need of food, water and shelter. Any Maasai attempting to return to their homes face arrest and possible imprisonment.

Cattle-dependant tribes

For the Maasai, cattle are what make the good life, and milk and meat are the best foods. Their old ideal was to live by their cattle alone – other foods they could get by exchange – but today they also need to grow crops.

Since the colonial period, most of what used to be Maasai land has been taken over, for private farms and ranches, for government projects, wildlife parks or private hunting concessions. Mostly they retain only the driest and least fertile areas.

The stress this causes to their herds has often been aggravated by attempts made by governments to ‘develop’ the Maasai. These are based on the idea that they keep too much cattle for the land.

However, they are in fact very efficient livestock producers and rarely have more animals than they need or the land can carry. These ‘development’ efforts try to change their system of shared access to land.

While this has suited outsiders and some entrepreneurial Maasai who have been able to acquire land for themselves or sell it off, it has often denuded the soil and brought poverty to the majority of Maasai, who are left with too little and only the worst land.

Female orangutans stay in charge of reproduction: study

Photo: Julielangford

Because female orangutans don't get to choose who they mate with, they have instead evolved more subtle strategies to select the father of their offspring, a study published today in Proceedings of the Royal Society B: Biological Sciences reveals.

Near ovulation, females seek out and willingly mate with prime males, those with impressive flanges on the sides of their face, while avoiding lesser males. At times when the risk of conception is low, however, they consent to mate with any male they encounter. This means that even if prime males don't have more sex than other males, they will still have more offspring.

It is thought that this behaviour probably evolved as a result of male orangutans being about twice the size of females, meaning the latter find it hard to say no when it comes to sex. Mothers usually provide all the care for young orangutans and are keen to increase their chances of survival by ensuring they have the strongest genes.

Researchers also suggest that females use sex to protect their young from the risk of infanticide - thought more likely to occur at times when there is instability in a group, such as when a new alpha male takes over. Pregnant females actively solicit sex, especially from prime males, thereby causing confusion about who the baby's father is. It is thought that males are more likely to be protective of, or at least less likely to harm, a young orangutan they think might be theirs.

Results come from a study in Borneo which involved observing the natural behaviour of wild orangutans, as well as collecting urine samples to test the hormone levels of different animals.

Look for lichen and help air survey

Lichen, Cushion Xanthoria.Photo: Natural History MuseumPeople are asked to look for lichen and help scientists find out about England's air quality in a survey launched at the Chelsea Physic Garden.

The Open Air Laboratories (OPAL) national air survey aims to find out more about the impact of air quality all over England. It needs the public to investigate lichens growing on trees in their local area, and to count black ‘tar spots’ on the leaves of sycamore trees.

“We want to find out more about what lichens can tell us about the changes in air quality in our towns and countryside,” says Pat Wolseley of The British Lichen Society.

“Are we seeing more of certain species in certain areas because the air is cleaner today? Or is it because the pollutants have changed?”

“Everyone’s contribution to this survey is valuable; even a result of ‘no lichens’ still tells us something about the air quality in that area.”

The OPAL Air Survey has been developed with experts from the British Lichen Society, Natural History Museum and Imperial College London.

Pollution indicators

Some lichens thrive on air pollution whilst others are highly sensitive to it. This means they can be used to indicate what air quality is like.

The survey results will help build a map of pollution-loving and sensitive lichens all across England.

Plant-like organisms

Lichens are plant-like organisms that form when a fungus and algae develop together.

They can be found all year round in urban areas and the countryside, and on a variety of surfaces from tree bark to park benches and pavements.

Take part

People can download a free survey pack from www.airsurvey.org and then start their lichen search. They then upload their data onto the website and an interactive map will show what other people have found around England.

OPAL is a new nationwide partnership initiative set up to inspire a new generation of nature enthusiasts and has been awarded a grant of GBP11.7 million by the Big Lottery Fund.

23 million drought-hit East Africans face severe hunger

Cattle in SomaliaMore than 23 million people are being pushed towards severe hunger and destitution across East Africa, warns Oxfam.

A severe and persistent five-year drought, deepened by climate change, is now stretching across seven countries in the region and exacting a heavy human toll, made worse by high food prices and violent conflict. The worst affected countries are Kenya, Ethiopia, Somalia and Uganda. Other countries hit are Sudan, Djibouti and Tanzania. Malnutrition is now above emergency levels in some areas and hundreds of thousands of cattle, people’s key source of income, are dying.

This is the worst drought that Kenya has experienced for a decade, and the worst humanitarian situation Somalia has experienced since 1991.

The high numbers of people affected, more than double the number caught up in similar food crisis in 2006, when 11 million were at risk, underline the gravity of the situation and the urgent need for funding to prevent the crisis getting worse.

Paul Smith Lomas, Oxfam’s East Africa Director said: “This is the worst humanitarian crisis Oxfam has seen in East Africa for over ten years. Failed and unpredictable rains are ever more regular across East Africa as raining seasons shorten due to the growing influence of climate change. Droughts have increased from once a decade to every two or three years. In Wajir, northern Kenya, almost 200 dead animals were recently found around one dried-up water source. People are surviving on 2 liters of water a day in some places, less water than a toilet flush. The conditions have never been so harsh or so inhospitable, and people desperately need our help to survive.”

In Kenya , 3.8 million, a tenth of the population, are in need of emergency aid. Food prices have spiraled to 180 per cent above average. Areas such as Rift Valley, which have never previously experienced a drought of this intensity are now affected.

A Somalian farmerConflict over rapidly diminishing resources such as water and pasture for cattle is increasing. Desperate herders are taking their cattle further to look for water and food, sparking tensions with other groups competing for the same resources. Sixty-five people have been killed in Turkana, northern Kenya since June 2009.

One in six children are acutely malnourished in Somalia, and people are trekking for days to find water in the northern regions of the country. Conflict means that people are less able to grow the food, and drought is creating hardship in areas where people have fled. Half of the population – over 3.8 million people - are affected.

In Ethiopia, 13.7 million people are at risk of severe hunger and need assistance. Many are selling their cattle to buy food. In northern Uganda farmers have lost half of their crops and more than 2 million people across the country desperately need aid.

Some 160,000 people mainly around the wild life tourist area of Ngorongoro in north-eastern Tanzania are also at risk. In Djibouti there are worrying levels of increased malnutrition and in South Sudan conflict has put 88,000 people at particular risk.

Oxfam has launched an emergency appeal to raise USD15 million. The aid agency says
the aid response to the crisis needs to rapidly expand, but it is desperately short of funds. The World Food Programme is facing a USD977 million donor shortfall for its work in the Horn of Africa over the next six months. The government of Uganda appealed for donor money to tackle the food crisis, but has so far received only 50 per cent of the funding it needs.

Rains are due in October but are likely to bring scant relief or worse still, deluges that could dramatically worsen the situation. There are genuine fears that the region could be hit by floods as a result of the El Nino phenomenon, which could destroy crops and houses, and increase the spread of water-borne diseases. Even with normal rain, the harvest will not arrive until early 2010. People will still need aid to get them through a long hunger season.

Oxfam staff are on the ground helping those at risk but the organisation is appealing for help from the public to help scale up its efforts. The agency is expanding its aid effort to reach more than 750,000 people but is in desperate need for funds to do this work. Oxfam is supplying emergency clean water and access to food, and also carrying out long-term projects to strengthen people’s ability to cope with future shocks.

To flap, or not to flap? That is the question

Flapping wings can be more efficient than fixed wings, study shows

In the search for better ways to fly, researchers have long pondered the question: Which is a better system – the flapping wings of birds and insects, or the fixed wings of your average 747?

The answer depends on a host of variables, including the size of the object and the type of flight. If manoeuvrability is the goal, birds and insects seem to have the advantage. When it comes to efficiency, most aeronautical engineers would agree that the fixed-wing airplane is the smartest design.

But according to a new Cornell study, an optimised flapping wing could actually require 27 percent less power than its optimal steady-flight counterpart at small scales.

The study, by Jane Wang, professor of theoretical and applied mechanics, and graduate student Umberto Pesavento, is published in the Sept. 11 issue of Physical Review Letters .

To find an optimum combination of motion and wing orientation, the researchers analysed the interactions between a wing and its aerodynamic wake in two dimensions for a group of flapping motions with characteristics similar to those observed in hovering insects, using fruit fly wing dimensions as a model.

Doing such calculations for systems in three dimensions would require many dozens of hours per trial on most computers, which would make it impossible to find an optimum among infinite possibilities, Wang said.

"We wanted to include as much as possible so we don't miss the good solutions, but we can't include everything because it would be impossible," Wang said.

For the fixed-wing scenario, the optimum occurs at a specific angle of attack. Therefore, at first glance, flapping flight would seem less efficient because the wing would necessarily deviate from the optimum condition.

Building on Wang's previous work studying insect flight, the researchers constructed a special family of wing motions that allowed them to optimise a range of parameters, including optimum angle of attack, turning speed, frequency and timing between pitching and flapping for a wing of the same size and with the same amount of weight to support.

The most efficient flapping motion, they found, required significantly less power than the corresponding fixed-wing motion. Unlike a simple sinusoidal, or symmetrical up-and-down flapping motion, which is more commonly studied but much less efficient, the optimised motion holds the wing's angle of attack steady for a longer time near the optimum angle for its fixed counterpart; and also takes advantage of air patterns created as it reverses direction.

Fluid force (Fx and Fy) and vorticity field (w) during one period of optimized wing motion. Image: Cornell

The discovery of one instance in which flapping is more efficient than steady flight, Wang said, shows that our intuition about flight efficiency isn't always right, especially when unsteady aerodynamics is at play.

At a more practical level, the study shows the possibility of substantially improving design of flapping flight, which typically has low efficiency, using a trial-and-error approach. "The trial-and-error approach is particularly ineffective for these problems, where poor solutions dominate the landscape and good solutions are few," Wang said.

The research was supported by the Air Force Office of Scientific Research and the Packard Foundation. Some of the computations were done at Cornell's Centre for Advanced Computing.

Earth Scan Lab tracks cold water upwellings in Gulf

Cold water cyclones may have strong impact on hurricane intensity and activity

Complex interactions between the ocean and overlying atmosphere cause hurricanes to form, and also have a tremendous amount of influence on the path, intensity and duration of a hurricane or tropical weather event. As researchers develop new ways to better understand and predict the nature of individual storms, a largely unstudied phenomenon has caught the attention of scientists at LSU’s Earth Scan Laboratory, or ESL. Cool water upwellings occurring within ocean cyclones following alongside and behind hurricanes are sometimes strong enough to reduce the strength of hurricanes as they cross paths.

“Ocean cyclones are areas of upwelling, meaning that cold water is not far from the surface as compared to the water surrounding it,” said Nan Walker, ESL director. “The Gulf of Mexico is full of ocean cyclones, or cold water eddies, many of which move rapidly around the margin of Gulf’s Loop Current, which is the main source of water for the Gulf Stream.”

While the upwelling is important to Gulf fisheries because it delivers nutrients into the surface waters, causing algal blooms and attracting marine life to the areas, oceanographers have recently begun to realise that these cyclones intensify currents near the surface and along the bottom of the ocean in areas of gas and oil exploration.

“Now,” Walker added, “our research has shown that ocean cyclones also provide temperatures cold enough to reduce the intensity of large Gulf of Mexico hurricanes.”

Walker’s research team has been looking into the upwelling phenomena since 2004, when they were able to use satellite data received at the ESL to view ocean temperatures soon after Hurricane Ivan’s Gulf crossing.

“Clear skies gave us a rare opportunity to really analyse the oceanic conditions surrounding the wake of Ivan,” said Walker. “We saw abnormally low temperatures in two large areas along the storm’s track, where minimum temperatures were well below those required to support a hurricane, about 80 degrees Fahrenheit.” This suggested to Walker that areas of extreme cooling could be providing immediate negative feedback to Gulf hurricanes, decreasing their intensity.

“In Ivan’s case, we found that its wind field increased the counter-clockwise spinning of the ocean cyclones in its path, catapulting cold water to the surface, which in turn reduced the oceanic ‘fuel’ needed for the hurricane to maintain its strength,” said Walker. She observed that Ivan’s intensity decreased as it moved toward the Mississippi/Alabama coast, despite the presence of a large warm eddy, a feature generally known for its potential to increase hurricane strength. Thus, the impact of the cold eddies overwhelmed that of the warm eddy.

“Cool wakes are most beneficial when the storm occurs later in the season because the Gulf doesn’t warm as rapidly in fall and may not have time to warm back up,” said Walker.

The research being conducted at ESL could eventually lead to novel new weather study techniques.

“Our research, in collaboration with Robert Leben at the University of Colorado, is providing an advanced monitoring system so that likely ocean impacts can be assessed in advance of the Gulf crossing,” said Walker. “However, it is important to remember that we don’t predict; we provide valuable information that serves as tools for those in the business of predicting, such as the National Hurricane Center.”

Of course, this is only one facet of the work done at LSU’s ESL. The lab has played a major role in mapping hurricane-related flooding, tracking oil spills and determining causes for the size and location of dead zones in the Gulf of Mexico, along with many other tasks employing satellite imagery.

Is trash the solution to tackling climate change?

Waste-based biofuel could cut global emissions by over 80 per cent

Converting the trash that fills the world's landfills into biofuel may be the answer to both the growing energy crisis and to tackling carbon emissions, claim scientists in Singapore and Switzerland. New research published in Global Change Biology: Bioenergy, reveals how replacing gasoline with biofuel from processed waste could cut global carbon emissions by 80 per cent. Biofuels produced from crops have proven controversial because they require an increase in crop production which has its own severe environmental costs.

However, second-generation biofuels, such as cellulosic ethanol derived from processed urban waste, may offer dramatic emissions savings without the environmental catch.

"Our results suggest that fuel from processed waste biomass, such as paper and cardboard, is a promising clean energy solution," said study author Associate Professor Hugh Tan of the National University of Singapore. "If developed fully this biofuel could simultaneously meet part of the world's energy needs, while also combating carbon emissions and fossil fuel dependency."

The team used the UN's Human Development Index to estimate the generation of waste in 173 countries. This data was then coupled to the Earthtrends database to estimate the amount of gasoline consumed in those same countries.

The team found that 82.93 billion litres of cellulosic ethanol could be produced from the world's landfill waste and that by substituting gasoline with the resulting biofuel, global carbon emissions could be cut by figures ranging from 29.2 per cent to 86.1 per cent for every unit of energy produced.

"If this technology continues to improve and mature these numbers are certain to increase," concluded co-author Dr. Lian Pin Koh from ETH Zürich. "This could make cellulosic ethanol an important component of our renewable energy future."

Air pollutants know no boundaries; they travel far and wide

Emissions within any one country can affect human and ecosystem health in countries far downwind

Plumes of harmful air pollutants can be transported across oceans and continents, from Asia to the US, from the US to Europe, and have a negative impact on air quality far from their original sources, says a new report by the National Research Council.

Although degraded air quality is nearly always dominated by local emissions, the influence of non-domestic pollution sources may grow as emissions from developing countries increase and become relatively more important as a result of tightening environmental protection standards in industrialised countries.

"Air pollution does not recognise national borders; the atmosphere connects distant regions of our planet," said Charles Kolb, chair of the committee that wrote the report and president and chief executive officer of Aerodyne Research Inc. "Emissions within any one country can affect human and ecosystem health in countries far downwind. While it is difficult to quantify these influences, in some cases the impacts are significant from regulatory and public health perspectives."

The report examines four types of air pollutants: ozone; particulate matter such as dust, sulfates, or soot; mercury; and persistent organic pollutants such as DDT. The committee found evidence, including satellite observations, that these four types of pollutants can be transported aloft across the Northern Hemisphere, delivering significant concentrations to downwind continents. Ultimately, most pollutants' impacts depend on how they filter down to the surface.

Current limitations in modeling and observational capabilities make it difficult to determine how global sources of pollution affect air quality and ecosystems in downwind locations and distinguish the domestic and foreign components of observed pollutants. Yet, some pollutant plumes observed in the US can be attributed unambiguously to sources in Asia based on meteorological and chemical analyses, the committee said. For example, one study found that a polluted airmass detected at Mt. Bachelor Observatory in central Oregon took approximately eight days to travel from East Asia.

The health impacts of long-range transport vary by pollutant. For ozone and particulate matter -- which cause respiratory problems and other health effects -- the main concern is direct inhalation. While the amount of ozone and particulate matter transported on international scales is generally quite small compared with domestic sources, neither of these pollutants has a known "threshold," or concentration below which exposure poses no risk for health impacts. Therefore, even small incremental increases in atmospheric concentrations can have negative impacts, the committee said. For instance, modeling studies have estimated that about 500 premature cardiopulmonary deaths could be avoided annually in North America by reducing ozone precursor emissions by 20 percent in the other major industrial regions of the Northern Hemisphere.

For mercury and persistent organic pollutants, the main health concern is that their transport and deposition leads to gradual accumulation on land and in watersheds, creating an increase in human exposure via the food chain. For example, people may consume mercury by eating fish. There is also concern about eventual re-release of "legacy" emissions that have been stored in soils, forests, snowpacks, and other environmental reservoirs.

In addition, the committee said that projected climate change will lead to a warmer climate and shifts in atmospheric circulation, likely affecting the patterns of emission, transport, transformation, and deposition for all types of pollution. However, predicting the net impacts of the potential changes is extremely difficult with present knowledge.

In the coming decades, man-made emissions are expected to rise in East Asia, the report says. These increases could potentially be mitigated by increasingly stringent pollution control efforts and international cooperation in developing and deploying pollution control technology.

To enhance understanding of long-range transport of pollution and its impacts, the committee recommended a variety of research initiatives, such as advancing "fingerprinting" techniques to better identify source-specific pollutant characteristics, and examining how emissions from ships and aircraft affect atmospheric composition and complicate the detection of pollution from land-based sources. The committee emphasised developing an integrated "pollution source-attribution" system that improves capabilities in emissions measurements and estimates; atmospheric chemical and meteorological modeling; long-term, ground-based observations; satellite remote sensing; and process-focused field studies.

Moreover, the committee stressed that the US, as both a source and receptor of long-range pollution, has an interest in remaining actively engaged in air pollutants that travel abroad, including support of more extensive international cooperation in research, assessment, and emissions control efforts.

The report was sponsored by the US Environmental Protection Agency, National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, NASA, and National Science Foundation.

Enjoying Bahamas without hurting environment

Coastal buffer zones and private reserves (especially small wetlands) within the development project are important in protecting the island from the impact of floods and storms. Photo: University of MiamiResearcher helps create the first sustainable tourist project in the Bahamas

It is well known that people from all over the world come to the Bahamas to enjoy the pristine waters, spectacular coral reefs and great fishing. Tourism produces approximately 55 per cent of the gross domestic product and employs up to 60 per cent of the total workforce in the Bahamas. However, building of hotels and facilities that make it possible for visitors to come and enjoy the natural beauty of the islands can also damage the marine environment they come to take pleasure in.

Consequently, researchers from the University of Miami teamed up with developers from Discovery Land Company, to establish the first Bahamian project that employed on-site environmental scientists to guide the construction of a sustainable development called the Baker's Bay Golf and Ocean Club, (BBC) located in the Northeastern Bahamas. This project uses BBC as a case study and documents best practices and construction impacts, especially on the marine environment. The findings were published earlier this year in the Journal of Sustainable Tourism.

The goal of the project was to establish an Environmental Management Programme with realistic environmental goals, explained Kathleen Sullivan-Sealey, associate professor in the Department of Biology at the UM College of Arts and Sciences and principal investigator of the project.

"Working with land-planners, developers and engineers was new and required re-thinking about the important ecological and geological information that this group needed to know for construction on an island," Sullivan-Sealey said. "Information and ideas that ecologists take for granted are not part of the thinking for most developers."

This is an aerial view of the Baker's Bay Golf and Ocean Club, located in the Northeastern Bahamas. Photo: Discovery Land Company
The Bahamas is comprised of 700 low-lying islands and 2,000 small keys, with carbonate limestone banks and limited sources of fresh water.

For that reason, reducing the impact of development on water supply was a priority. Other mitigation measures in the project included creating sustainable sewage and waste management, removal and replacement of invasive, non-native vegetation with native vegetation, and the creation of coastal buffer zones and private ecological preserves to lessen the impact of development on the terrestrial and marine environments.

The work involved following the project from the EIA (Environment Impact Assessment) in the planning stages, through the implementation of the Environmental Management Plan during the four years of construction. The study documents the efforts, costs and resources necessary for the project. Some of the important findings are:

About 15 per cent of the total project budget was necessary for environmental and coastal protection programmes- with long-term benefits.

Tourism development in the Bahamas must look for sustainable alternatives to meet required water demands due to the limited fresh water resources in the islands.

Coastal buffer zones and private reserves (especially small wetlands) within the development project are important in protecting the island from the impact of floods and storms and can help meet environmental goals and reduce costly mitigation projects.

Coastal development setbacks are necessary to reduce beach erosion as well as protect vital wildlife habitats.

Restoring functional landscapes is critical in new developments to maintain minimum population thresholds of local species. Land-base sources of pollution must be reduced to maintain the value of near shore marine resources.

"BBC is the first project in the Bahamas to employ Bahamians with college degrees in environmental science and management and it represents a major step forward for the country to create jobs in environmental management," explained Sullivan-Sealey.

"This opens up new and exciting career options for Bahamians and creates job opportunities in the hotel/ hospitality industry that are dependent on marine and environmental resource management," she said.

Great idea: wind turbines above railway tracks

Wind energy project developer Evelop, part of Eneco, and Dutch rail operator ProRail have signed a joint venture agreement to develop Railwind, a unique concept involving wind turbines above railway tracks. This concept will initially be piloted in the industrial area Sloehaven near Vlissingen.

This project aims to build wind farms in and around existing infrastructure. The joint venture agreement is the first step in realising this innovative concept, in which wind turbines will be constructed over railway tracks on masts designed especially for this project. The project means multiple use can be made of the space available.

Evelop MD Pieter Tavenier said: "We are proud to be embarking on this unique project and are convinced that many more additional locations for wind energy can be developed with similar innovative projects."

ProRail Railway Development director Kees-Jan Dosker said: "We are excited about this idea and view this project as a significant opportunity to contribute to an increasingly sustainable railway sector. During the pilot, we will focus particularly on the aspects safety and railway accessibility."

The project is expected to start in 2011 with construction of the pilot project. The expectation is that electricity will first be generated in 2012. In consultation with municipal and provincial authorities and other stakeholders, an assessment will be conducted to determine how many Railwind turbines can be installed. In addition to the spatial planning considerations, safety will also be thoroughly assessed, as part of which Kema will advise the project management.

The development, construction and operation of the first Railwind project will be thoroughly evaluated. Other potential railway lines to be considered for this sustainable project will in part be determined on the basis of the evaluation results.

The pilot project is currently awaiting the decision regarding an innovation subsidy from Operational Programme ‘South Netherlands’ (OP Zuid), part of the European Regional Development Fund (ERDF).

More corn for biofuels would hurt water

More of the fertilisers and pesticides used to grow corn would find their way into nearby water sources if ethanol demands lead to planting more acres in corn, according to a Purdue University study.

The study of Indiana water sources found that those near fields that practice continuous-corn rotations had higher levels of nitrogen, fungicides and phosphorous than corn-soybean rotations. Results of the study by Indrajeet Chaubey, an associate professor of agricultural and biological engineering, and Bernard Engel, a professor and head of agricultural and biological engineering, were published in the early online version of The Journal of Environmental Engineering.

"When you move from corn-soybean rotations to continuous corn, the sediment losses will be much greater," Chaubey said. "Increased sediment losses allow more fungicide and phosphorous to get into the water because they move with sediment."

Nitrogen and fungicides are more heavily used in corn crops than soybeans, increasing the amounts found in the soil of continuous-corn fields. Sediment losses become more prevalent because tilling is often required in continuous-corn fields, whereas corn-soybean rotations can more easily be no-till fields, Engel said.

"The common practice is there is a lot of tillage to put corn back on top of corn," Engel said. "Any time we see changes in the landscape, there is a potential to see changes in water quality."

Chaubey said there was no significant change in the amount of atrazine detected in water near fields that changed to continuous-corn rotations. The commonly used pesticide sticks to plant material and degrades in sunlight, keeping it from reaching water through runoff or sediment.

U.S. Department of Agriculture data has shown that corn acreage has increased with the demand for ethanol, with 93 million acres in 2007, an increase of 12.1 million acres that year.

"As we look forward here, if corn stover is going to be a preferred bio-feedstock, we would see more corn acreage being planted," Engel said. "We need to know how that will affect water quality."

The USDA and Purdue funded the study. Chaubey and Engel are expanding their research to Iowa, Tennessee and Arkansas. That three-year study will include impacts of various biofeedstock, such as switch grass, and developing management practices to reduce sediment, nutrient and pesticide losses.

UK may cut carbon storage funding

Schematic showing both terrestrial and geological sequestration of carbon dioxide emissions from a coal-fired plant. Rendering by LeJean Hardin and Jamie Payne.

There have been strong reactions in the United Kingdom about reports that the government may cut the level of funding for carbon capture and storage (CCS) projects because of economic pressures.

Treasury officials have reportedly told the government that it may have to scale down proposals for a multibillion euro investment in carbon storage projects in the current economic climate. The U.K. has proposed Europe's most ambitious CCS-implementation scheme to date, pledging funding for up to four large-scale CCS projects to be running by 2015. The country has also told energy companies that permission for new coal-fired plants will be refused unless CCS is part of the planning application.

Commenting on the reports, Luke Warren, International Policy Executive at the Carbon Capture and Storage Association (London), said, if true, the news was 'dismal' and added that the U.K. would lose its position at the forefront of CCS technology development and jeopardise the country's carbon-emissions targets.

Speaking to IIR Europe, a spokeswoman for the Department of Energy and Climate Change (DECC) remained optimistic about the carbon-capture plans the agency has outlined, saying, "We are moving fast to legislate set-up of a levy mechanism to fund up to four CCS demonstration projects, including pre- and post-combustion technologies. The U.K. has set out bold proposals for coal and CCS. They are a world first, and our ambitions remain firm. We're determined to drive the development of CCS as part of the transition to a low-carbon economy."

Doosan Babcock (Crawley, England) has called for urgent action from the government to push forward the development and funding of CCS projects. The company claimed that unless revisions are made to DECC's report, 'Framework for the development of clean coal: consultation document,' there's a risk that DECC will fail to reach targets, and no new coal-fired power plants or CCS demonstrations will be built.

Doosan Babcock has proposed a 'middle way' that should satisfy both electricity companies and NGOs, while delivering the government's carbon objectives. Before the Copenhagen negotiations this year, the company wants a commitment by the government to at least four clean-coal projects – as opposed to 'up to four projects' – that cover at least three capture technologies, and two or three options for storage.

"A more ambitious programme of demonstrations funded by a contract for a different levy scheme could provide almost 5 gigawatts of CCS capacity by 2020," said Iain Miller, CEO of Doosan Babcock Energy Limited. "This would generate reliable, low-carbon electricity at an acceptable cost. The 'Middle Way' is central to achieving the objectives set out in the DECC consultation, and urgent action is needed to ensure plans for CCS for the U.K. to remain on track."

In two weeks, the governments of the U.K. and Norway will host a leading carbon capture and storage event in London. The Carbon Sequestration Leadership Forum will bring together ministers from 23 countries, as well as the European Commission and energy companies, to discuss the G8's ambition to launch 20 CCS demonstration projects globally by 2010.

Energy and Climate Change Secretary Ed Miliband said, "There's enough potential under the North Sea to store more than 100 years worth of CO2 emissions from the U.K.'s power fleet. We are also working closely with Norway and other North Sea Basin countries to ensure the North Sea fulfils its potential in the deployment of CCS in Europe. We want to get the U.K. regulatory framework in place so we can harness that potential and make the North Sea part of the CCS revolution.

"Without CCS there is no solution to climate change. As well as getting things in place in the U.K. and Europe, we need that consensus at the global talks in Copenhagen. The meeting in London will be a pivotal part of moving the discussion on CCS forwards."

Study shatters myth that population drives climate change

Real villain is increasing consumption in rich countries

There is at most a weak link between population growth and rising emissions of the greenhouse gases that cause climate change, says a study published in the journal Environment and Urbanisation.

The paper contradicts growing calls for population growth to be limited as part of the fight against climate change and shows that the real issue is not the growth in the number of people but the growth in the number of consumers and their consumption levels.

Dr David Satterthwaite of the International Institute for Environment and Development analysed changes in population and in greenhouse gas emissions for all the world’s countries found that between 1980 and 2005:

Sub-Saharan Africa had 18.5 per cent of the world’s population growth and just 2.4 per cent of the growth in carbon dioxide emissions

The US had 3.4 per cent of the world’s population growth and 12.6 per cent of the growth in carbon dioxide emissions

China had 15.3 per cent of the world’s population growth and 44.5 per cent of the growth in carbon dioxide emissions. Population growth rates in China have come down very rapidly – but greenhouse gas emissions have increased very rapidly

Low-income nations had 52.1 per cent of the world’s population growth and 12.8 per cent of the growth in carbon dioxide emissions

High-income nations had 7 per cent of the world’s population growth and 29 per cent of the growth in carbon dioxide emissions.

Most of the nations with the highest population growth rates had low growth rates for carbon dioxide emissions while many of the nations with the lowest population growth rates had high growth rates for carbon dioxide emissions

Satterthwaite points out that contraception and sexual/reproductive health services are key contributors to development, health and human rights in poorer nations and communities.

But he adds that these are not a solution to climate change, which is caused predominantly by a minority of the world’s population that has the highest levels of consumption.

“A child born into a very poor African household who during their life never escapes from poverty contributes very little to climate change, especially if they die young, as many do,” says Satterthwaite. “A child born into a wealthy household in North America or Europe and enjoys a full life and a high-consumption lifestyle contributes far more – thousands or even tens of thousands of times more.”

“Of course, not all the world’s greatest consumers are in high income countries,” adds Satterthwaite. “The many millionaires from Mexico, China or South Africa may have just as large and damaging a carbon footprint as millionaires from Europe or North America. But, globally, most of the world’s high-consumers are in Europe and North America.”

The naked truth about Australia

Satellite images near Culcairn in NSW showing the topography with vegetation (left) and without vegetation (right)Image: CSIROAustralia has been stripped bare of vegetation to expose the surface that lies beneath.

Scientists from CSIRO’s Water for a Healthy Country Flagship have removed approximately 90 per cent of Australia’s vegetation cover from satellite images of the continent to produce the most detailed available Digital Elevation Model (DEM) of its topography.

“The DEM will revolutionise geological applications, land-use studies, soil science, and much more,” CSIRO’s Dr John Gallant said in an address today to the Spatial Sciences Conference in Adelaide.

“Produced at a one-second resolution – about 30 metres – the DEM exposes intimate details about Australia’s landscape features. As a result, we can now clearly make out the shape of our landscape and understand how water might move across its surface, how it came to be its present shape and how variable our soil terrains are.”

Since releasing the Digital Surface Model (DSM) last year, the new vegetation removal process has also resulted in a ‘spin-off’ vegetation height map that may be useful for calculating biomass and contributing to carbon accounting.

The DEM will provide a body of information related to water resources and is a key activity within the water information research and development alliance between the Flagship and the Bureau of Meteorology’s ‘Improving Water Information Program’.

The final phase of building the one-second resolution DEM will occur over the next year with the inclusion of Australia’s river network to produce a drainage-enforced DEM that will assist the Bureau to generate water accounts for the continent.

The DEM is based on the Shuttle Radar Topographic Mission (SRTM) satellite data collected by NASA during its Space Shuttle mission in 2000.

The one-second DEM dataset is licensed and managed by project collaborator, Geoscience Australia, and will be available from mid-November to all tiers of Australian government. A three-second version (approximately 90 metres) of the DEM will eventually be available for public use.

WFP, Millennium Villages to fight against hunger, malnutrition

World Food Programme and Millennium Villages project today announced plans to expand joint action to cut hunger and malnutrition across Africa.

At a time when one in six people worldwide don't have enough to eat, the partners will work to establish “undernourishment-free zones” in Millennium Villages and ensure the poorest have access to sufficient, nutritious food. Currently, there are 80 Millennium villages in 10 countries.

"Hunger stands at the core of extreme poverty," said Professor Jeffrey Sachs, director of the Earth Institute at Columbia University and Special Advisor to the UN Secretary General.

"Without enough food, people suffer, die of disease, and too often descend into violence and conflict. Without enough food, a farmer cannot feed her family, much less earn an income and look after the children in the household.”

Sachs said. “The Millennium Villages will carry out the exciting interventions pioneered by WFP, and demonstrate that hunger and under-nutrition can be cut decisively through proven measures in agriculture, school meals, nutritional supplementation, food-for-work programmes to build infrastructure, and other powerful WFP tools."

Global recession and continued high commodity prices across much of the developing world increasingly have put food beyond the reach of the poorest and most vulnerable. Climate change and weather-related disasters threaten to further spread misery and deprivation.

“The G8’s historic USD20 billion commitment to hunger and food security must be followed by concrete actions necessary to ensure the world produces enough food and all people have enough to eat,” said WFP’s executive director Josette Sheeran.

“The hungry and malnourished cannot wait,” Sheeran added. “We must act now to build the partnerships and take the comprehensive steps necessary to win this fight. No one organisation can do it alone, and we will leverage a growing collaboration with the Millennium Villages project to deliver powerful solutions to malnutrition.”

Hunger is the underlying cause of death for 3.5 million children worldwide every year. Africa remains the only region where undernourishment and child mortality rates have increased. Working closely with governments, civil society, the UN and the private sector, the partnership will apply coordinated, science-based, emerging best-practices in nutrition and food security.

Partnership objectives include ensuring universal school meal coverage for children in primary schools within Millennium Village clusters, finding the best way of meeting the nutritional needs of children affected by HIV/AIDS, tuberculosis and other pandemics, and working with smallholder farmers to boost productivity and incomes.