Climate change means review of heating and cooling needed

H&V News (UK): Building services engineers need to start preparing for the impact of climate change according to a new report by the Institute of Mechanical Engineers. Climate Change: Adapting to the Inevitable looks at how approaches to energy, building water, infrastructure and transport should change in response to the expected rise in temperatures.

One of the key arguments is that engineers must review their design parameters: “Resilience to extreme weather events will also need to be reviewed. “The current peak design data used by engineers when designing internal heating, ventilation and cooling solutions for buildings will need to be reviewed to reflect future scenarios.

“The structural design parameters will also need updating regularly to cope with predictions for increased flooding, subsidence, effects of heat on materials and resistance to rain penetration.” Master planning to stop heat building up in urban centres is also an issue. The report said: “Buildings adaptation is perhaps the area where most consideration of future climate change has already been made.

…“The understanding of street layout, building orientation, massing and location is critical in minimising overheating in and around buildings, and reducing risks of flooding. Lessons can be learnt from developments in existing hot climates and recent advances in the understanding of zero-carbon master planning from projects such as Dongtan in China.”

London skyline from the south bank of the Thames . The Swiss Re "gherkin" and the White Tower can be seen in the background. Shot by Italo-Europeo, Wikimedia Commons, under the Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 Unported License

Climate models predicted Australian bushfires

New Scientist: Australia may have just had a horrifying preview of what climate change has in store for its people. Even early warning couldn't stop last weekend's bush fires in Victoria claiming 170 lives and over 700 homes.

Climate models based on figures from the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change predict more frequent - and more extreme - fires for southern Australia over the next few decades. Yet the role of climate change in recent fires has been downplayed, suggests John Handmer of the Bushfire Cooperative Research Centre at RMIT University in Melbourne.

Certainly, last weekend's fires were unprecedented: "We had a record heatwave, the worse fire danger index on record, during a record-breaking drought," says Handmer. The fire danger index takes into account both temperature and humidity. Over 50 is extreme; on Saturday, the index is believed to have been 5 to 6 times higher.

The level of devastation raises questions about whether Australia should, like other fire-prone places such as southern California, evacuate its people rather than let them stay….

February 10, 2009 map of Australia fires, NASA

The tropics on fire: scientist's grim vision of global warming

Guardian (UK): Tropical forests may dry out and become vulnerable to devastating wildfires as global warming accelerates over the coming decades, a senior scientist has warned. Soaring greenhouse gas emissions, driven by a surge in coal use in countries such as China and India, are threatening temperature rises that will turn damp and humid forests into parched tinderboxes, said Dr Chris Field, co-chair of the UN's Nobel prize-winning Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC).

Higher temperatures could see wildfires raging through the tropics and a large scale melting of the Arctic tundra, releasing billions of tonnes of carbon into the atmosphere that will accelerate warming even further, he said.

…Field said that if the tropics became dry enough for fires to break out, tropical forests would pass a "tipping point" from absorbing carbon dioxide from the atmosphere to releasing it.

"Tropical forests are essentially inflammable. You couldn't get a fire to burn there if you tried. But if they dry out just a little, the result can be very large and destructive wildfires. It is increasingly clear that as you produce a warmer world, lots of forested areas that had been acting as carbon sinks could be converted to carbon sources," he said. The result could lead to runaway warming….

Illustration by J.M. Ruendas of the mouth of the Cachoeira River

Mass media often failing in its coverage of global warming, says climate researcher

Science Daily: "Business managers of media organizations, you are screwing up your responsibility by firing science and environment reporters who are frankly the only ones competent to do this," said climate researcher and policy analyst Stephen Schneider, in assessing the current state of media coverage of global warming and related issues.

Schneider, a coordinating lead author of chapter 19 in the report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change published in 2007, is calling for the news media to employ trained reporters in covering global warming. He will be discussing this and other issues in the symposium "Hot and Hotter: Media Coverage of Climate-Change Impacts, Policies, and Politics," on Feb. 13, 2009 at the annual meeting of the American Association for the Advancement of Science in Chicago.

"Science is not politics. You can't just get two opposing viewpoints and think you've done due diligence. You've got to cover the multiple views and the relative credibility of each view," said Schneider, a senior fellow at Stanford's Woods Institute for the Environment. "But that is not usually the problem of the well-trained reporters, who understand what is credible.

"The problem is CNN just fired their science team. Why didn't they fire their economics team or their sports team?" "Why don't they send their general assignment reporters out to cover the Superbowl?" Schneider said. Researchers have to do their part, too, he said, by clearly explaining issues to reporters in succinct terms.

…Telling the developing world they can't use energy resources they have at hand, such as coal and natural gas, won't have any effect unless we offer them alternatives that are cleaner, Schneider said. He said the U.S. has to accelerate the rate at which we are developing green energy sources such as solar and wind.

A four-year-old news boy in Tampa, Florida, 1913

Decisive action needed as warming predictions worsen, says expert

EurekAlert: Greenhouse gases in the atmosphere are rising more rapidly than expected, increasing the danger that without aggressive action to reduce emissions the climate system could cross a critical threshold by the end of the century, warns a leading member of the Nobel Prize-winning Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change. Studies indicate that greenhouse warming could trigger a vicious cycle of feedback, in which carbon dioxide released from thawing tundra and increasingly fire-prone forests drives global temperatures even higher.

Chris Field, director of the Carnegie Institution's Department of Global Ecology and co-chair of the IPCC Working Group 2, will address these issues at a symposium titled "What Is New and Surprising since the IPCC Fourth Assessment?" at the annual meeting of the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS) in Chicago.

…"The data now show that greenhouse gas emissions are accelerating much faster than we thought," says Field. "Over the last decade developing countries such as China and India have increased their electric power generation by burning more coal. Economies in the developing world are becoming more, not less carbon-intensive. We are definitely in unexplored terrain with the trajectory of climate change, in the region with forcing, and very likely impacts, much worse than predicted in the fourth assessment."

New studies are also revealing potentially dangerous feedbacks in the climate system that could convert current carbon sinks into carbon sources. Field points to tropical forests as a prime example. Vast amounts of carbon are stored in the vegetation of moist tropical forests, which are resistant to wildfires because of their wetness. But warming temperatures and shifting rainfall patterns threaten to dry the forests, making them less fireproof.

….Warming in the Arctic is expected to speed up the decay of plant matter that has been in cold storage in permafrost for thousands of years. …"The IPCC fourth assessment didn't consider either the tundra-thawing or tropical forest feedbacks in detail because they weren't yet well understood," he says. "But new studies are now available, so we should be able to assess a wider range of factors and possible climate outcomes. One thing that seems to be certain, however, is that as a society we are facing a climate crisis that is larger and harder to deal with than any of us thought. The sooner we take decisive action, the better our chances are of leaving a sustainable world to future generations."….

Tundra, in Alaska's Arctic National Wildlife Refuge

Center for Biological Diversity declares legal war on global warming

Environment News Service: To fight climate change, the nonprofit Center for Biological Diversity Thursday opened a new law institute in San Francisco and announced the dedication of an initial $17 million to the project. The Climate Law Institute will use existing laws and work to establish new state and federal laws that will eliminate energy generation by the burning of fossil fuels - particularly coal and oil shale.

Burning these materials emits greenhouse gases into the atmosphere that have already raised the planetary temperature, threatening the widespread extinction of species, sea level rise and ocean acidity, food and water scarcity, heatwaves, wildfires and floods. "Global warming is the greatest challenge humanity has ever faced. It is the defining issue of our time," said Kieran Suckling, executive director of the Center.

"To meet the challenge, the Center for Biological Diversity has created the Climate Law Institute to extend the reach of current environmental and human health laws to encompass global warming, pass new climate legislation, and reinvent America's approach to protecting endangered species and public lands," he said.

…Since the early 1990s the Center has used existing laws and advocated for new laws and policies to protect rare and imperiled species, first in the Southwest, and later across the country. With the creation of the Climate Law Institute, the group is reorganizing to integrate global warming into all of its activities….

Polar bear says, "I'm sending my lawyer after you!"

Addressing carbon on land is essential for stabilizing greenhouse gas concentrations

Pacific Northwest National Laboratory: Putting a price tag on carbon dioxide emitted by different land use practices could dramatically change the way that land is used - forests become increasingly valuable for storing carbon and overall carbon emissions reductions become cheaper, according to research presented today at the annual meeting of the American Association for the Advancement of Science.

"Without valuing the carbon in land, we risk losing large swaths of unmanaged ecosystems to agricultural crops and biofuels," said speaker Leon Clarke of the Joint Global Change Research Institute in College Park, Md., a collaboration between the Department of Energy's Pacific Northwest National Laboratory in Richland, Wash., and the University of Maryland.

Most analyses of future global carbon dioxide output mainly consider carbon emissions from fossil fuels and industrial processes, or otherwise include only parts of the global carbon cycle. This could lead to dramatic changes in how people use land as they cut down trees to grow food and bioenergy crops, according to some studies. This study is the first to value carbon in all natural and human systems.

The scientists found that addressing the land-based carbon is essential for stabilizing greenhouse gases at low levels. Overall, land contains 2,000 billion tons of carbon, compared to the 750 billion tons in the atmosphere. In addition, forests hold more carbon than grazing does. Converting land from forest to food or bioenergy crops releases carbon into the atmosphere. Conversely, turning agricultural land back into forests tucks carbon away on land, reducing it in the atmosphere…..

Tenacious drought in Latin America

IPS, via Tierramérica: For months now, yellowed pastures, cracked soil and dead livestock have been the landscape of what otherwise are the most productive farming areas of Argentina, Brazil, Paraguay and Uruguay. Scientists say it is so far impossible to determine if the drought is a manifestation of climate change processes. "Climate change cannot be characterised by one single event, but rather by a series over the long term," University of Buenos Aires climatologist Vicente Barros, member of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), told Tierramérica.

Some experts believe the lack of rain could be related to the influence of La Niña, the cool phase of the cyclical climate event known as El Niño/Southern Oscillation, which changes the surface temperature of equatorial Pacific Ocean currents and affects the region's climate. "La Niña is still very strong and the forecasting models aren't adjusted to reflect the disturbances it causes," agricultural engineer Eduardo Sierra, an Argentina climate expert, finds himself explaining to someone almost daily.

In 2007, the IPCC and former U.S. vice-president Al Gore won the Nobel Peace Prize for their contribution to building knowledge and raising awareness among the public about climate change over the past two decades.…Barros, along with experts José Marengo of Brazil and Madeleine Renom of Uruguay, told Tierramérica that it is impossible to assert that the current drought is an unequivocal manifestation of climate change, because the weather changes must be assessed over the long term.

The three agree that "what can be attributed to climate change is the greater climate variability, like fluctuations in the maximum and minimum rainfall, and the greater frequency, and in some cases the intensity, of extreme phenomena," summarised Renom, meteorologist and professor at the University of the Republic of Uruguay….

A cool-water anomaly known as La Niña occupied the tropical Pacific Ocean throughout 2007 and early 2008. In April 2008, scientists at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory announced that while the La Niña was weakening, the Pacific Decadal Oscillation—a larger-scale, slower-cycling ocean pattern—had shifted to its cool phase. This NASA image shows the sea surface temperature anomaly in the Pacific Ocean from April 14–21, 2008. The anomaly compares the recent temperatures measured by the Advanced Microwave Scanning Radiometer for EOS (AMSR-E) on NASA’s Aqua satellite with an average of data collected by the NOAA Pathfinder satellites from 1985–1997. Places where the Pacific was cooler than normal are blue, places where temperatures were average are white, and places where the ocean was warmer than normal are red.

Farming sector aims to clean up its carbon act

EurActiv: Use of fertiliser usage and other modern agricultural practices can help to reduce greenhouse gases and ensure food security, argued business representatives and experts at a conference yesterday (12 February).

Speaking at the conference, president of the European Fertiliser Manufacturers Association (EFMA) Tor Holba said "emissions can be reduced by 50% with new N2O cleaning technology and energy efficiency, 'tailormade' fertilisers and modern agricultural practices". "Agriculture has a very significant role to play in mitigating greenhouse gases," said Pete Smith, professor of environmental sciences at the University of Aberdeen.

…The use of fertilisers on a global scale is known to emit significant quantities of greenhouse gas into the atmosphere. Emissions come about through the production of fertiliser, which releases methane, nitrous oxide, ammonia and carbon dioxide.

Agriculture and forestry were left out from plans to extend the EU's CO2 emission trading scheme after 2012. The decision was made due to difficulties related to measuring emissions from these sectors accurately....

Statue of the semeur de Grande-Anse, shot by Adqproductions, Wikimedia Commons, nder the terms of the GNU Free Documentation License, Version 1.2

Life or lifestyle, warns fire chief after Victoria bushfires

The Australian: Russell Rees, chief officer of Victoria's Country Fire Authority, yesterday said firefighters could no longer guarantee saving the lives of those who chose to surround themselves with vegetation despite the obvious fire risks. His warnings came as it emerged that Victoria had ignored repeated demands to reduce bushfire hazards and crack down on "tree-changer" housing estates in the years leading up to Saturday's deadly fires, which are believed to have killed more than 200 people and left 7000 homeless.

The state was berated by the federal government in 2007 for ignoring some of the findings of two national bushfire inquiries held after the 2003 Canberra blaze. As shattered communities prepare to rebuild from the ashes, the Australasian Fire Authorities Council yesterday called for more controls over housing development in bushland on the urban fringe.

The CFA's Mr Rees told The Weekend Australian that firefighters were on the "receiving end" of the tree-change trend in which people choose to escape urban living for a bush lifestyle amid dense vegetation on the fringes of major cities. "We've got to choose," he said. 'If we choose to live in this way, then who do we blame? My fear is that people will say the fire service failed (last Saturday) and I will go to my grave saying we fought our guts out….”…

Little Desert, Victoria, Australia, shot by Mussklprozz, Wikimedia Commons, under the Creative Commons Attribution ShareAlike 3.0 License

Britain should prepare for massive loss of landmass, warn engineers

Guardian (UK): Ministers should prepare the British people to "adapt" in the longer term to a landscape devastated by climate change, including the possible abandonment of parts of London and East Anglia, a leading industry body warns today. Action to curb carbon emissions is failing, so the UK should immediately change the way it designs buildings, transport and energy infrastructure in preparation for aworld potentially characterised by extreme heat and high sea levels, argues the Institution of Mechanical Engineers (IMechE) in a new report.

The institute said it wanted its latest research to provoke serious action for future planning "not just for the sake of our planet but also for the human race. Yes, we need to mitigate [emissions] – but the evidence shows this is not working alone." Even with significant global commitment to avert climate change it could be many centuries before average temperatures can be stabilised, says the document, Climate Change: Adapting to the Inevitable?, which was described by environmentalists as a "wake-up call" for government.

IMechE said that sea levels are predicted to rise by 2m by 2250 and 7m by the end of that century. "A seven-metre rise in sea levels would impact on vast areas of the UK, including parts of London which border the Thames,[such as] Canary Wharf, Chelsea and Westminster, all of which would need to be abandoned," the report argues….

"The Pool from London Bridge: Morning" - lithograph by W. Parrott, 1841

Aerosols may have a big impact on Australian rainfall, climate change

Science Daily: Aerosols may have a greater impact on patterns of Australian rainfall and future climate change than previously thought, according to leading atmospheric scientist, CSIRO’s Dr Leon Rotstayn. “We have identified that the extensive pollution haze emanating from Asia may be re-shaping rainfall patterns in northern Australia but we wonder what impact natural and human-generated aerosols are having across the rest of the country,” Dr Rotstayn said.

Aerosols are fine particles suspended in the atmosphere. Sources of human-generated aerosols include industry, motor vehicles and vegetation burning. Natural sources include volcanoes, dust storms and ocean plankton. Human-generated aerosols have long been known to exert a cooling effect on climate. This has partly masked the warming effect of increasing greenhouse gases. As aerosol pollution is predicted to decrease over the next few decades, unmasking of the greenhouse effect may lead to accelerated global warming.

However, in an address February 13 to the International Conference on Southern Hemisphere Meteorology and Oceanography in Melbourne, Dr Rotstayn said aerosols are much more than a 'negative greenhouse gas' because they can actively force changes in winds and ocean currents by altering the distribution of solar heating at the earth’s surface.

“Recent climate modelling at CSIRO shows that there may be important effects on Australian climate due to aerosol pollution from the Northern Hemisphere. These include an increase of rainfall in north-western Australia, and an increase of air pressure over southern Australia, which may have contributed to less rainfall there…..

Rain drops on a window, shot by Frank Vincentz, Wikimedia Commons, under the terms of the GNU Free Documentation License, Version 1.2

Mixed yield outcomes anticipated as African farmers brace for climate impact

Engineering News (South Africa): A new study on the impact of climate change on crop yields and undernutrition in Sub-Saharan Africa (SSA), has shown that while many countries could suffer from lower yields, some countries, including South Africa, Uganda, and Ghana, may experience increased yields. The study, put together by the International Institute for Applied Systems Analysis (IIASA), is in contrast to previous studies, as it did not suggest an overall decrease in crop yields in SSA.

“This is largely accounted for by the incorporation of atmospheric carbon dioxide (CO2) in the analysis, which can have a fertilisation effect on crops,” the study notes. The organization does add, however, that climate change may benefit crop production in SSA in the short-term, but may not in the long-term. Ongoing research by numerous organisations is considering potential impacts to 2100.

“The most important conclusion from this study is that, although overall crop yields may not decline, owing to the projected increase in population and stagnating purchasing power, hunger will remain or even worsen if no drastic adaptation measures are taken,” emphasises IIASA research scholar Dr Steffen Fritz.

“Hunger knows no boundaries or borders, and global change is likely to exacerbate food insecurity in what is already a vulnerable region. It is important that adaptation strategies be developed and implemented soon to avert future hunger. This type of research may assist in the targeting of support for countries as they develop strategies to adapt to climate change and improve global food security,” Fritz adds….

A farm in Mpumalanga, South Africa in 2006. Taken by PZFUN, Wikimedia Commons, under Creative Commons Attribution 2.0 License

Scientists say Antarctic climate evidence too strong to ignore

PhysOrg.com: More than 50 top international polar scientists will meet at Victoria University of Wellington this week to discuss their cutting-edge climate change research. The focus will be establishing models that explain how Antarctica’s ice sheets have behaved in Earth’s recent past and explore how they may change in the future.

For several years, scientists from Italy, Germany, New Zealand and the United States have been studying a 1300 metre-long rock core recovered by the multinational ANDRILL (ANtarctic geological DRILLing) programme from beneath the Ross Ice Shelf, in McMurdo Sound, Antarctica. The core was recovered in 2006 by a team of drillers and engineers from Antarctica New Zealand, who drilled through the ice to a record-setting depth.

The rock core contains valuable evidence of how Antarctica’s ice sheets and climate have changed over time and scientists use this information to learn what is likely to happen to Antarctica’s ice masses in the future and determine how these changes might affect the world’s climate and sea level.

Professor Tim Naish, Director of Victoria’s Antarctic Research Centre, and Professor Ross Powell from Northern Illinois University in the United States are Co-Chief Scientists of the collaborative research project.…[Nash] says Antarctica’s ice sheets have grown and collapsed at least 40 times over the past five million years. “Much of our research has focused on the time interval from three to five million years ago. This period in Earth’s history is extremely relevant as it represents a global climate analogue to that projected for our very near future.”

“So far results from our studies on this extraordinary archive of Antarctica’s environmental history are providing critical new insights into past changes in Antarctica’s most vulnerable element: the West Antarctic Ice Sheet. If this ice mass were to melt, global sea-level would rise up to 5 metres - our world would be a very different place.”…

An Antarctic glacier visible on the flight to McMurdo Sound, shot by Fred Walton, NOAA

Climate change to wallop fisheries

Science Daily: Scientists have for the first time calculated the likely impact of climate change on the distribution of more than 1,000 species of fish around the globe. The new research was carried out by scientists at the University of East Anglia (UEA), the Sea Around Us project at the University of British Columbia (UBC) and Princeton University.

It has long been known that ocean conditions such as temperature and current patterns are changing due to climate change, and that these changes directly affect the numbers and locations of different species of fish. Dr Cheung and his team have developed a new computer model that predicts for the first time exactly what might happen under different climate scenarios to the distribution of commercially important species – including cod, herring, sharks, groupers and prawns.

Current conservation and fisheries management measures do not account for climate-driven species distribution shifts and it is hoped this research will change this. The disturbing results demonstrate for the first time:

• There will be a large-scale re-distribution of species, with most moving towards the Pole
• On average, fish are likely to shift their distribution by more than 40km per decade and there will be an increasing abundance of more southern species
• Developing countries in the tropics will suffer the biggest loss in catch
• Nordic countries such as Norway will gain with increased catch
• In the North Sea, the northward shift of Atlantic Cod may reduce its abundance by more than 20 per cent, while European plaice - a more southerly fish - may increase by more than 10 per cent
• In the US, there may be a 50 per cent reduction in the number of some cod populations on the east coast by 2050
• Some species will face a high risk of extinction, including Striped Rock Cod in the Antarctic and St Paul Rock Lobster in the Southern Ocean
• The invasion and local extinction of species may disrupt marine ecosystems and biodiversity

Caenis and Neptune. Engraving by Johann Ulrich Krauss for a 1690 edition of Ovid's Metamorphoses Book XII, 199-200.

Panel warns climate change poses serious risks to national security, health

TradingMarkets.com: Failure to combat climate change could put the national security of the United States at risk, a panel of experts warned lawmakers Thursday. In a hearing before the House Committee on Energy and Commerce, witnesses warned of potentially catastrophic consequences if carbon emissions are not reduced.

….Retired General Gordon R. Sullivan warned that climate change is a "serious threat" to national security, in addition to being a "threat multiplier." "Many areas of the world that will be the hardest hit by climate change impacts are already being stressed by lack of water, lack of food, and political and social unrest," he said, explaining the meaning of "threat multiplier." "Adding climate change to this mix will only serve to exacerbate the existing instabilities."

In order to combat the rapidly escalating problem of climate change, Sullivan urged the United States to "show leadership on developing energy alternatives that reduce our reliance on fossil fuels from unstable regions of the world, reduce our energy consumption, and improve our nation's energy posture."

He was echoed by Dr. Kristie Ebi, Lead Author of the Public Health Chapter of the 2007 Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change Fourth Assessment Report. The report found, among other things, that the Arctic could be ice free in the summer far sooner than the original 2040 horizon, even within a few years. These rapid changes pose serious health risks, both direct and indirect, Ebi said, as climate change will alter environmental systems on which humans depend.

"Increases in the frequency, intensity, and length of heatwaves, with the highest risks among older adults, those with chronic medical conditions, infants and children, pregnant women, urban and rural poor, and outdoor workers. With limited mitigation or adaptation, heat-related mortality is projected to increase several-fold," she said, citing her report. "Increases in the frequency and intensity of other extreme weather events, including floods, droughts, wildfires, and windstorms, with the risks highest among the poor, pregnant women, those with chronic medical conditions, and those with mobility and cognitive constraints," she continued….

Europe's 2003 heat wave compared to normal temperatures

Greece spends millions over fire damage

Terra Daily via Agence France-Presse: Greece has spent 600 million euros (776 million dollars) to replace homes and livestock lost in devastating forest fires nearly two years ago that killed 77 people, officials said on Wednesday. But authorities overseeing the reconstruction effort admitted that only around 11 percent of homes had been rebuilt thus far.

"Nobody can expect homes to be torn down and be rebuilt in areas that lack the necessary construction crew in two years," public works ministry general secretary Dimosthenis Katsigiannis told a news conference. A state recovery fund which has more than 205 million euros in donations has received 1,425 requests from owners of damaged and destroyed homes mainly in the Peloponnese peninsula, the island of Evia and parts of central and western Greece, fund chairman Petros Molyviatis said….

Satellite view of the recent fires in Greece

Scientists must rein in misleading climate change claims

Dr. Vicky Pope, head of climate change advice at the Met Office Hadley Centre, had a recent comment in the Guardian (UK): News headlines vie for attention and it is easy for scientists to grab this attention by linking climate change to the latest extreme weather event or apocalyptic prediction. But in doing so, the public perception of climate change can be distorted. The reality is that extreme events arise when natural variations in the weather and climate combine with long-term climate change. This message is more difficult to get heard. Scientists and journalists need to find ways to help to make this clear without the wider audience switching off.

Recent headlines have proclaimed that Arctic summer sea ice has decreased so much in the past few years that it has reached a tipping point and will disappear very quickly. The truth is that there is little evidence to support this. Indeed, the record-breaking losses in the past couple of years could easily be due to natural fluctuations in the weather, with summer sea ice increasing again over the next few years. This diverts attention from the real, longer-term issues. For example, recent results from the Met Office do show that there is a detectable human impact in the long-term decline in sea ice over the past 30 years, and all the evidence points to a complete loss of summer sea ice much later this century.

…The most recent example of this sequence of claim and counter-claim focused on the Greenland ice sheet. The melting of ice around south-east Greenland accelerated in the early part of this decade, leading to reports that scientists had underestimated the speed of warming in this region. Recent measurements, reported in Science magazine last week, show that the speed-up has stopped across the region. This has been picked up on the climate sceptics' websites. Again, natural variability has been ignored in order to support a particular point of view, with climate change advocates leaping on the acceleration to further their cause and the climate change sceptics now using the slowing down to their own benefit. Neither group is right and all that is achieved is greater confusion among the public. What is true is that there will always be natural variability in the amount of ice around Greenland and that as our climate continues to warm, the long-term reduction in the ice sheet is inevitable.

For climate scientists, having to continually rein in extraordinary claims that the latest extreme is all due to climate change is, at best, hugely frustrating and, at worst, enormously distracting. Overplaying natural variations in the weather as climate change is just as much a distortion of the science as underplaying them to claim that climate change has stopped or is not happening. Both undermine the basic facts that the implications of climate change are profound and will be severe if greenhouse gas emissions are not cut drastically and swiftly over the coming decades.

When climate scientists like me explain to people what we do for a living we are increasingly asked whether we "believe in climate change". Quite simply it is not a matter of belief. Our concerns about climate change arise from the scientific evidence that humanity's activities are leading to changes in our climate. The scientific evidence is overwhelming.

The last judgement portrayed by Locatelli in a Brazilian church. For those of you who read Portuguese: Juízo Final e cenas do Dies Irae. Teto da Igreja de São Pelegrino, Caxias do Sul, Brasil. Obra de Aldo Locatelli na década de 50-60. Os quadros em volta apresentam ligeiras distorções devido aos ângulos diversos com que foram tomadas as 8 fotos usadas para esta montagem (manual, photoshop). Shot by Ricardo André Frantz (User:Tetraktys), Wikimedia Commons, under the Creative Commons Attribution ShareAlike 3.0 License

Global warming may drive the Amazon rainforest toward seasonal forests rather than savanna

Mongabay: Changes in rainfall resulting from climate change may drive the parts of Amazon rainforest toward seasonal forests rather than savanna, argue researchers writing in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences

Comparing climate simulations by 19 global climate models with observations from the 20th century, Yadvinder Malhi and colleagues found that most projections underestimate rainfall, suggesting the Eastern Amazon will still have enough precipitation to support seasonal forest, rather than savanna. The conclusion contrast to the "dieback" theory — which holds that the southern and eastern Amazon would transition towards savanna with warming — advanced by other researchers.

"The rainfall regime of E. Amazonia is likely to shift over the 21st century in a direction that favors more seasonal forests rather than savanna," write the authors. "Under mid-high-range emissions scenarios, there is a high probability of intensified dry seasons in E. Amazonia and a medium probability that the rainfall regime will shift sufficiently to a climate state where seasonal forest is more viable than rainforest."

However, the authors caution that a die-back is still a "distinct possibility" due to increasing deforestation, forest degradation through logging, and fragmentation, which desiccate forests and increase their risk to fire.

"These seasonal forests may be resilient to seasonal drought but are likely to face intensified water stress caused by higher temperatures and to be vulnerable to fires, which are at present naturally rare in much of Amazonia," they write. "The spread of fire ignition associated with advancing deforestation, logging, and fragmentation may act as nucleation points that trigger the transition of these seasonal forests into fire-dominated, low biomass forests."…

Porto Velho, Rondônia – an aerial view of the Madeira River, shot by Wilson Dias/ABr, Wikimedia Commons via Agência Brasil, a public Brazilian news agency. Their website states: "O conteúdo deste site é publicado sob a licença Creative Commons Atribuição 2.5 Brasil" (The content of this website is published under the Creative Commons License Attribution 2.5 Brazil)

Biodiversity in crops decreases fertilizer damage to rivers and lakes

Science Daily: Researchers have identified a link between the diversity of crops grown in farmlands and the pollution they create in lakes and rivers. In a Frontiers in Ecology and the Environment e-View paper, ecologists show that when the biodiversity of crops is high, less dissolved nitrogen is found exiting the surrounding watersheds.

…Whitney Broussard of the University of Louisiana at Lafayette and R. Eugene Turner of Louisiana State University at Baton Rouge compiled data from the past 100 years on watersheds varying in size from the Illinois Cache River basin (400 square miles) to the Mississippi River Basin (more than a million square miles). The researchers compared this watershed data with land-use practices since the early 1900s.

…Modern farms tend to produce fewer crop varieties; this lower crop biodiversity can negatively impact surrounding watersheds. According to the study, within a given area, a higher biodiversity of crops led to less dissolved nitrogen in surrounding water bodies. The explanation for this phenomenon, Broussard says, is difficult to discern. "Diverse farms tend to have smaller fields with more edges, which can mean there's a greater buffering effect on nitrogen runoff by surrounding grasslands or woodlands," he says.

The researchers' results also showed that since 1906, the average aquatic nitrate concentration increased threefold in the entire U.S. and tenfold in the Iowa, Des Moines, and Minnesota Rivers, all of which fall in heavily tilled agricultural areas.

In areas where farming is scarce or absent, however, the authors found no perceptible change in dissolved nitrogen concentrations since the early 1900s. Broussard thinks this indicates that the impacts might be reversible if policy changes included incentives for farmers to rotate more crops, decrease their field size, increase the edges of fields and sizes of buffering zones, and incorporate more native perennial grasses into farms and in between fields.

A small dairy farm in western Maryland. Photo by Scott Bauer.

Coastal erosion research in Senegal goes unfunded

IRIN: Environmental officials are calling for funds to document the deterioration of Senegal’s coast and take action to save coastal communities. “We need facts and figures about the sea to show people that [the threat of coastal erosion] is not just all talk,” said Sory Diallo, the director of Hydrometeorology and Maritime Meteorology in Senegal’s Ministry of Infrastructure.

The government in 2008 released a strategy to fight coastal erosion, which includes 22 projects. As of February 2009 government officials are still seeking donor funding for 14 of the projects, including research, according to government reports. Researcher Isabelle Niang, a professor at Cheikh Anta Diop University in the capital Dakar, told IRIN there is no money for studies to identify vulnerable areas or the extent of coastal damage.

“There is no research budget at the university; we have to pay for field trips ourselves and it is not easy,” said Niang. “If our scientists are asked for information, they cannot provide it because they cannot carry out the studies.” She said she is worried the Senegalese government has been slow to look for such funding because it does not want to discourage investors from coastal areas, which are popular for tourism projects.

But government officials told IRIN it is in their best interest to halt coastal damage. “The country’s economic and tourist centres and its main inhabited areas are all on the coast,” said Eliman Ba, a government adviser on coastal erosion. “If we find no solution to coastal erosion, a good part of our country will just disappear.”

Senegal’s Environment Ministry estimates that the sea is eroding the West African country’s Atlantic coastline by at least one metre per year on average, but said erosion is up to 10 times worse in vulnerable areas like the coastal town of Saint-Louis, 266km north of Dakar….

Locator map of Senegal by Rei-Artur, Wikimedia Commons, under the Creative Commons Attribution ShareAlike 2.5, Attribution ShareAlike 2.0 and Attribution ShareAlike 1.0 License

Deadly twisters devastate Oklahoma towns

Disaster News Network: At least eight people were killed and dozens were injured late Tuesday as a massive tornado tore through Carter County south of Oklahoma City. Carter County Sheriff Ken Grace said the worst damage was in Lone Grove, a town of approximately 5,000 people, when a tornado approximately a half-mile wide plowed through the center of the town destroying dozens of houses and mobile homes.

Officials warned that the number of fatalities could rise Wednesday as responders resumed a search after dawn. Rescue teams had to suspend search efforts after midnight because there were live power lines in the rubble. The sheriff said early Wendesday that they were trying to find nearly 40 people who had been reported missing.

The Lone Grove tornado was one of at least four tornadoes to strike the state Tuesday. ...A February tornado outbreak in Oklahoma is relatively rare. According to the National Weather Service, just 44 February tornadoes have been reported in the state since 1950. Tuesday's fatalities were the first tornado-related deaths in Oklahoma in almost 35 years....

This is a photograph of the Erick, Oklahoma tornado of 25 April 1989. NOAA

What would Darwin have made of climate change?

Science Daily: Charles Darwin may have been born 200 years ago come Feb. 12, but his theory of evolution remains an everyday touchstone for modern biologists. And while the Origin of Species author might not have known the term “global warming,” he wouldn’t have been surprised that the environment is changing. He would, however, be astonished by the speed at which it’s happening today, researchers believe.

“Every species is under temporary permanence,” says Bill Saidel, an associate professor of biology at Rutgers University’s Camden Campus, where he teaches Animal Behavior and Behavioral Neurobiology. Darwin would have predicted changes in species’ habits and even changes in the environment, but the planet’s facing changes that are both drastic and unpredictable.

Saidel notes some already observed results of global warming today, like changing avian migration patterns and pH levels in oceans. But how would Darwin begin to determine how every species might respond to climate change? Most likely he’d begin by observing those habitats that are uniquely individual and well-defined.

This approach – researching one specialized habitat for insight into a larger understanding of evolution – is how Saidel conducts his own research at Rutgers–Camden. His interest in the exotic African butterfly fish is precisely because it has evolved two retinas in each eye, but only feeds from information derived from one. The fish’s highly specialized adaptations, from retina to brain, serve as a model for discerning the circuitry of feeding in all vertebrae whose visual traits aren’t as clearly segmented.

“This fish has much to teach us. It has adapted extraordinarily to a single unique environment. Yet, the consequences of a highly adapted species is that any change can be dire,” says Saidel.

…The issue of time is crucial to understanding the implications of global warming. Shain calls it “accelerated evolution” and predicts large-scale extinctions that even Darwin couldn’t comprehend. Species that can best adapt to this abrupt change will go on and multiply, leaving the world with less of a variety. “We lose diversity with a rapid change, but always life finds a way. Some kind of life will fill the gap.”

Charles Darwin (1809-1882) in his later years. Photo by J. Cameron, 1869

Fighting malaria by changing the environment

Terra Daily: Modifying the environment by using everything from shovels and plows to plant-derived pesticides may be as important as mosquito nets and vaccinations in the fight against malaria, according to a computerized analysis by MIT researchers.

The researchers have developed a new computer model for analyzing different methods of trying to control the spread of malaria, one of the world's most-devastating diseases. Among their findings using the model is that environmental measures such as leveling the land to eliminate depressions where pools can form can be an important part of the strategy for controlling the disease.

…While most efforts at dealing with malaria have focused on the human side, such as attempts to develop a vaccine, Eltahir said that efforts to control environmental factors --such as working to eliminate the low spots where pools of water collect during the rainy season, or applying locally grown plant materials to limit the growth of mosquitoes - can have a dramatic effect on controlling malaria's spread.

And unlike importing expensive medicines, such an approach can rely on local efforts as simple as having people with shovels fill in the low spots in the terrain. "By using local tools and local labor, our approach relies less on high-technology equipment from outside the region, which tends to make the local people more dependent," he said.

…Eliminating pools of standing water, or increasing drainage so that such pools last less than the seven to 10 days it takes for the mosquitoes to mature, can be an effective strategy, the analysis shows. In addition, it allows comparison of different methods. Filling in the low spots using shovels, it turns out, is as effective at controlling the disease as plowing the land so that water more rapidly percolates down into the soil…..

…"For the first time, we have a detailed computer model" of all the different factors in the disease's spread, Eltahir said. By making it possible to run detailed simulations of a wide variety of strategies, "we can do a lot of things, in this region or elsewhere, that we could never do in the past. It can allow you to do things in a more cost-effective way."…

False-color electron micrograph of the malaria sporozoite, from a Public Library of Science journal. Their website states that the content of all PLoS journals is published under the Creative Commons Attribution 2.5 license.

Scientists uncover a dramatic rise in sea level and its broad ramifications

E!science News: Scientists have found proof in Bermuda that the planet's sea level was once more than 21 meters (70 feet) higher about 400,000 years ago than it is now. Their findings were published in the journal Quaternary Science Reviews Wednesday, Feb. 4. Storrs Olson, research zoologist at the Smithsonian's National Museum of Natural History, and geologist Paul Hearty of the Bald Head Island Conservancy discovered sedimentary and fossil evidence in the walls of a limestone quarry in Bermuda that documents a rise in sea level during an interglacial period of the Middle Pleistocene in excess of 21 meters above its current level. Hearty and colleagues had published preliminary evidence of such a sea-level rise nearly a decade ago, which was met with skepticism among geologists. This marine fossil evidence now provides unequivocal evidence of the timing and extent of this event.

….A rise in sea level to such a height would have ramifications well beyond geology and climate modeling. For the organisms of coastal areas, and particularly for low islands and archipelagos, such a rise would have been catastrophic. The Florida peninsula, for example, would have been reduced to a relatively small archipelago along the higher parts of its central ridge.

…Determining the timing and extent of this global rise in sea level is not only important for interpreting the influence that it may have had on biogeographical patterns and extinctions of organisms on islands and low-lying continental coastal areas, it is also critical for anticipating the possible effects of future climate change. This particular interglacial period is considered by some scientists to be a suitable comparison to our current interglacial period. With future carbon dioxide levels possibly rising higher than any time in the past million years, it is important to consider the potential effects on polar ice sheets…..

Bermuda from space, via NASA

Extreme water shortages predicted for tropical Andes

SciDev.net: Climate change will seriously affect the tropical Andes by the end of this century and could lead to water shortages, say scientists. Their study — a first attempt at determining future climate change in the region — concludes that increases in temperature "will likely lead to severe impacts on socioeconomic activity" and biodiversity.

The researchers simulated two different climate change scenarios for 2071–2100: a low-emission scenario with reduced population growth, and a medium-high emission scenario with high population growth, using regional climate models. The models predict temperature increases of 2–7 degrees Celsius, depending on location and scenario, for the entire tropical South America region.

Most strongly affected will be the tropical Andes, home to 99 per cent of the world's tropical glaciers. These provide the surrounding region with a steady supply of water, retaining much of the precipitation falling at high elevation and eventually — when the snow melts — releasing it to feed river streams. The largest temperature rise at high elevation is projected for the Cordillera Blanca in northern Peru (see Peru mountain glaciers 'receding rapidly'), the highest and most extensively glaciated tropical mountain range in the world.

"A higher temperature in Cordillera Blanca may cause a larger surface of glaciers receiving rain instead of snow, therefore reducing ice accumulation," says co-author Rocío Urrutia, of the University Austral of Chile. "On the other hand, a weakening of the winds providing humidity from the Amazon might also decrease precipitation, reducing even more the water supply for glaciers," she told SciDev.Net….

The Cordillera Blanca and the Cordillera Negra, shot by Ed Pax, Wikimedia Commons, under the terms of the GNU Free Documentation License, Version 1.2

Southern California finds new ways to maximize every drop

Environment News Service: There is 70 percent chance of rain in Los Angeles today, which would bring some relief to the parched area. Even so, the Metropolitan Water District of Southern California is asking that residents find ways to reduce water use at home. To help people understand how dry the area really is, the utility has unveiled a new Internet tool to track Southland water reserve levels.

Metropolitan General Manager Jeffrey Kightlinger said the new tool's debut in January on the district's website, www.mwdh2o.com, helps illustrate the importance and continued need for increased conservation and regional partnerships to help achieve greater water savings. He says wise water use must be a permanent part of everyday life.

"The possibility of mandatory water cutbacks and rationing is quite real should voluntary water-saving efforts not prove enough," Kightlinger said. "We believe that, given the right information and tools, consumers and businesses will respond by taking additional steps to reduce water use. This new tracking gauge for Southland water reserves is one way to help keep our customers and the general public informed."

…In Orange County, a grant program funded by the Metropolitan Water District is helping households find ways to reduce their water consumption at home, while developing methods to also cut down on the amount of water runoff that flows into gutters and down to the ocean. The Low Impact Development Retrofit program, offered through the nonprofit Orange County Coastkeeper, networks interested homeowners with design and installation professionals….

Los Angeles River, looking east, downstream, from the Victory Boulevard bridge. The bridge is the Interstate 5, and the office buildings are in downtown Glendale. This is the only part of the river which does not have a concrete bottom. Released into the public domain by the photographer, en:user:User2004

Role of climate change in disease spread examined

Science Daily: Ever since scientists first proposed that our planet might be experiencing widespread climate change, concerns have been raised about its implications for the spread of arboviruses – viruses carried by arthropods such as mosquitoes, midges and ticks. However, while alterations in temperature and rainfall are important factors in making new territory hospitable to an invading arbovirus, many other forces also play significant parts in new patterns of viral emergence.

That's the message of a paper in the February "Transactions of the Royal Society of Tropical Medicine and Hygiene" by University of Texas Medical Branch at Galveston pathology professor Stephen Higgs and Oxford University professor Ernest A. Gould. In the article, Higgs and Gould examine the relative importance of climate change in the spread of four viruses that have captured headlines in the past 10 years: West Nile virus, Chikungunya virus, Rift Valley fever virus and Bluetongue virus.

"There's no doubt that during the past 50 years or so, patterns of emerging arbovirus diseases have changed significantly," Higgs said. "We picked prominent examples and asked how much is climate change a factor in these emergences?"

Since the viruses in question are carried either by mosquitoes (West Nile, Chikungunya, Rift Valley fever) or midges (Bluetongue), creatures whose activity and population increase in warm, moist environments, one would suspect that a transition to a warmer, wetter climate could have opened the door for their spread to a new region. According to Higgs, though, it's not that simple. "You can't disassociate arbovirus diseases from the climate," Higgs said, "but many other factors affected the spread of these arboviruses."

…Of the four viruses under review, Higgs said, climate change could probably only be given the lion's share of the credit for the spread of Bluetongue virus. The midge-borne virus can cause fatal disease in sheep, goats and cattle and until about 10 years ago was limited to Africa. Then a warmer climate in Europe made it possible for the cold-sensitive Culex imicola midge species responsible for carrying the virus to move north. Today, borne by other midge species, Bluetongue has spread to 12 European countries…..

The bluetongue virus

Australians 'unprepared' for fire's fury

ABC Science (Australia): Australians remain unprepared to deal with bushfires despite a long history of loss and devastation from natural disasters, according to some of the country's leading bushfire researchers. The comments come as Australia deals with the loss of more than 126 lives and 700 homes after devastating bushfires swept the southern state of Victoria.

In the wake of the nation's worst fire in recorded history, other experts are also warning worse may be yet to come with climate change and drought increasing the ferocity and duration of bushfires. Psychology professor Douglas Paton, of the University of Tasmania, says levels of preparedness to deal with bushfires within at-risk communities in Australia are "generally low".

Paton, a researcher with the Bushfire Co-operative Research Centre, says this lack of preparedness for bushfires is a significant public policy issue. It is a problem that has been heightened by the increase in migration of people to semirural areas beyond the edge of cities.

…Paton says one of the main inhibitions in people preparing for the bushfire season is in whether they believe their actions will be effective. "The biggest constraint is these people believe the fires themselves will be too big and catastrophic for their actions to make any difference." He says the media plays a role in this view developing as coverage of bushfires, often focuses on the loss and devastation.

…Bushfire CRC chief executive officer Gary Morgan says the weekend's fires "show that many communities need to rethink the notion of who lives in a bushfire zone and who needs to be educated and prepared". Morgan says climate change, weather and drought are altering the nature, ferocity and duration of bushfires and an ageing and declining volunteer population are challenging the way fire agencies are going to be able to manage these events….

Smoke in the air during a 2007 fire south of Perth, Australia, shot by Gnangarra, Wikimedia Commons, licensed under Creative Commons Attribution 2.5 License

Rockefeller help Vietnamese, Indian cities boost climate change resilience

VietnamNet: The Rockefeller Foundation office in Bangkok has announced a 70 million USD fund to assist Asian cities develop plans to prepare, withstand and recover from the devastating effects of climate change, including six cities in Vietnam and India.

The foundation is currently investing in Da Nang, Can Tho and Quy Nhon cities of Vietnam and Surat, Indore and Gorakphur of India, said the US-non profit organisation in a press release late last month. It said that the “Asian Cities Climate Change Resilience Network” project is designed to build the resilience of communities most likely to be hardest hit by climate change.

Over the next year, project will help develop climate change risk and vulnerability analyses involving multiple local stakeholders and climate and technical experts. This will be followed by the development of resilience-building projects.

Potential projects might include health systems investments to address the spread of dengue, infrastructure improvements to manage flooding, land-use and building-code reform, or the development of catastrophe bonds and new insurance products. After an evaluation of the resilience projects, the Foundation will work with its various partners, prominent among which is the World Bank, to create mechanisms for sharing information and replicating these model projects….

Projects built despite flood risk on increase, warns UK's Environment Agency

Telegraph (UK): The Environment Agency objected to 6,200 planning applications in 2007/08 on the grounds of flood risk, up from 4,750 the previous year. The majority of developers changed plans to minimise flood risk, for example by ensuring better drainage or changing the position of buildings.

However 16 major developments went ahead against the Environment Agency's advice, including six schemes wholly in areas at the highest risk of flooding. The schemes included more than 200 houses and apartments, schools, offices, a business park and plans for a new ferry terminal in Liverpool.

Environmentalists said developers are playing "Russian Roulette" with people's homes while insurers warned the properties will be "uninsurable, unsellable and uninhabitable". Paul Leinster, chief executive of the Environment Agency, was concerned the developments are at risk of flooding. "We're pleased that most councils take our flood risk advice in relation to planning decisions, but are concerned that a minority of decisions go against our advice."…

Merrimack, UK, flooded in 2006, shot by MasterB1021, Wikimedia Commons, under the terms of the GNU Free Documentation License, Version 1.2

Author of 'Limits to Growth' honored for once-ridiculed warnings

Solve Climate: If world leaders had listened to Dennis Meadows when The Limits to Growth was published in 1972, humanity might not be in the climate fix it's in today. Instead, the MIT professor’s warnings about resource depletion and environmental damage were initially ridiculed. Thirty-seven years later, Meadows is being awarded the prestigious Japan Prize by the Science and Technology Foundation of Japan for his efforts to open society's eyes to the threats to sustainability.

….The global growth models that Meadows and his colleagues used to write The Limits to Growth were never intended to be forecasts. They didn’t include all of the powerful self-reinforcing loops that can intensify damage, such as interrelationships between trust and lending in the stability of the financial system, and how the warming atmosphere increases Arctic sea ice melt which increases the temperature, which increases sea ice melt further. Still, they provided a picture of what could happen.

…Jorgen Randers, Meadows’ co-author on all three editions of The Limits to Growth and a professor of Climate Strategy at the Norwegian School of Management, has also watched human society losing its grasp on sustainability. As he puts it: “We have postponed too long pushing the brake in a world system with a very long braking distance. The precipice is getting uncomfortably close.”

We are a decade or two too late at this point to have a problem-free future, Randers said, however he believes that immediate action can pull us back from the edge. If the promises that President Obama has made to fight climate change are put into action, then the period of noticeable climate damage in the middle of this century will be shorter, he said. Still, he said, human society’s sustainability outlook would be much, much better if policymakers had listened back in 1972.....

A path in the woods, shot by Laveol, Wikimedia Commons, under the terms of the GNU Free Documentation License, Version 1.2

Global warming lawsuit settled in Santa Monica, California

The Santa Monica Daily Express reports on what sounds like a precedent-setting case: The federal government on Friday settled a lawsuit in which City Hall and environmental watchdog groups accused two U.S. agencies of financing energy projects overseas without considering impacts on global warming. The Export-Import Bank of the United States (Ex-Im) and the Overseas Private Investment Corp. (OPIC) agreed to provide a combined $500 million in financing for renewable energy projects and take into account greenhouse gas emissions associated with projects each company supports.

Environmentalists said the lawsuit set a precedent by allowing those injured by climate change to sue under the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA), which was approved in 1970. The lawsuit was originally filed in San Francisco federal court in 2002 by Friends of the Earth, Greenpeace and the city of Boulder, Colo. Santa Monica later joined the suit, along with California cities Arcata and Oakland, claiming that fossil fuel projects financed by loans from the Ex-Im and OPIC produced emissions equivalent to nearly eight percent of the world's annual carbon dioxide emissions, or nearly one third of annual U.S. emissions in 2003.

Deputy City Attorney Adam Radinsky of the Consumer Protection Unit argued that Santa Monica is being disproportionately affected by climate change because it is a popular tourist destination that relies heavily on a stable environment.

… The Bush administration had argued that the "alleged impacts of global climate change are too remote and speculative" to require the environmental reviews sought by the plaintiffs. It also argued that the two agencies are exempt from NEPA. The settlement filed Friday was reached after a federal judge rejected those arguments and ordered the parties to negotiate an agreement.

…Under the settlement, the Export-Import Bank, which provides loan guarantees and other financing for overseas projects by U.S. companies, agreed to develop a greenhouse gas policy and start considering carbon dioxide emissions when evaluating fossil fuel projects for investment. The Overseas Private Investment Corp., which supports American investment in developing countries, agreed to set a goal of reducing by 20 percent the greenhouse gas emissions associated with projects it supports over the next 10 years....

An early fossil fuel project in Cambria, Italy