Housing for Nigerian landslide victims

AllAfrica.com via This Day (Nigeria): Victims of landslide disaster in Agwagune Community, Cross River State, will soon have cause to smile, as the National Emergency Management Agency is to relocate them to a safer location where 200 units of semi-detached double housing units will be provided.

The relocation, to be carried out under the agency's pilot project of rehabilitating vulnerable communities in Nigeria, will be in collaboration with the Federal Ministry of Environment, Cross River State and Biase Local governments, to complement short term relief intervention already delivered to the victims.

Minister of Environment, Mr John Odey, disclosed this during a working visit to the agency in Abuja. Odey said in the Agwagune project, the collaborative institutions had been assigned various roles as NEMA provides the housing units; the Federal Ministry of Environment would address the issue of erosion, flood and Effa stream channelisation; Cross River State government would provide access roads, infrastructural facilities and survey of the area, while the Federal Inter Agency Committee would be responsible for Monitoring and Evaluation….

El Nino study challenges global warming intensity link

Reuters: Research showing an El Nino event in 1918 was far stronger than previously thought is challenging the notion climate change is making El Nino episodes more intense, a U.S. scientist said on Tuesday. El Nino causes global climate chaos such as droughts and floods. The events of 1982/83 and 1997/98 were the strongest of the 20th Century, causing loss of life and economic havoc through lost crops and damage to infrastructure.

But Ben Giese of Texas A&M University said complex computer modelling showed the 1918 El Nino event was almost as strong and occurred before there was much global warming caused by the burning of fossil fuels or widespread deforestation.

The outcome of the research was valuable for several reasons, Giese told Reuters from Perth in Western Australia. "It questions the notion that El Ninos have been getting stronger because of global warming," he said ahead of a presentation of his team's research at a major climate change conference in Perth. The 1918 event also coincided with one of India's worst droughts of the 20th century.

…[T]here is limited data about El Ninos prior to the 1950s and that computer models were one way to get a clearer picture of the past. "We cannot rely on what El Nino looks like today to try to understand what El Nino patterns looked like in the past." "It makes it a challenge to talk about El Nino and global warming because we simply don't have a detailed record," he added.

Chart of abnormal ocean surface temperatures [ºC] observed in December 1997 during the last strong El Niño. NOAA

Australians face climate change relocation

VOANews.com: Senior government officials in Victoria are warning residents of towns on the Murray River that they could become the first Australians to be displaced by climate change. The region has suffered at the hands of a long-running drought that many scientists and politicians have blamed on global warming. The very dry conditions have restricted the flow of water into a river that is part of the Murray-Darling Basin, which provides much of Australia's food, prompting dire warnings about the future.

Flows into the once mighty Murray River have fallen significantly, in recent years. Its health is indelibly linked to the prosperity of many large agricultural towns in southeastern Australia. A senior Victorian government official has warned that the Murray River crisis is so severe that those living near its banks are - in his words - "pretty close" to becoming "Australia's first climate-change refugees."

Victoria Premier John Brumby is fighting with neighboring South Australia for the right to extract more water from the Murray, to help beleaguered farmers. Brumby is warning that, if he does not get his way, some towns could wither and die...

The Murray River at Boundary Bend, shot by Scott Davis, Wikimedia Commons, under the terms of the GNU Free Documentation License, Version 1.2

Scientists find climate change to have paradoxical effects in coastal wetlands

EurekAlert: Rising atmospheric carbon dioxide is largely responsible for recent global warming and the rise in sea levels. However, a team of scientists, including two Smithsonian ecologists, have found that this same increase in CO2 may ironically counterbalance some of its negative effects on one of the planet's most valuable ecosystems—wetlands. The team's findings are being published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences the week of March 23.

…. Coastal wetlands must build upward through the accumulation of mineral and organic matter to maintain a constant elevation relative to water levels; otherwise, they will drown and disappear. Climate change, however, is causing acceleration in the rise of sea level, which would seemingly put wetlands at risk of excessive flooding. "Our findings show that elevated CO2 stimulates plant productivity, particularly below ground, thereby boosting marsh surface elevation," said Adam Langley, the paper's lead author. Patrick Megonigal, the paper's corresponding author, added "We found that by stimulating root growth, thus raising a marsh's soil elevation, elevated CO2 may also increase the capacity for coastal wetlands to tolerate relative rises in sea level." Both scientists are ecologists at the Smithsonian Environmental Research Center in Edgewater, Md.

These findings bear particular importance given the threat of accelerating sea-level rise to coastal wetlands worldwide. Some evidence suggests that only a two-millimeter increase in the rate of sea-level rise will threaten and possibly eliminate large portions of mid-Atlantic marshes. And the loss of these wetlands threatens critical services that the ecosystems provide, such as supporting commercially important fisheries, providing wildlife habitat, improving water quality and buffering human populations from oceanic forces.

Okefenokee National Wildlife Refuge

A cool way to monitor water quality

The Transmaterial.net: Developed by David Benjamin and Soo-in Yang, River Glow is a system of floating pods that monitors water quality and displays a variable light signal that is visible from the water or onshore. Each unit consists of an underwater pH probe, super bright LEDs, uncoated fiber-optic strands, and photovoltaics that provide power to rechargeable batteries. When deployed in public waterways, the system creates an ethereal cloud of light hovering above the water’s surface that changes colors according to the condition of the water.

The system is energy self-sufficient, low-cost, modular, and easy to deploy, offering an alternative to expensive and time-consuming testing of water samples in a remote research laboratory. The component system allows for swapping of alternative energy-harvesting devices, water-quality sensors, and low-energy lighting or actuators.

Charon by Gustave Dore. Just because I couldn't find a public domain image of the River Glow monitors

Volunteers prepare for really big flood in North Dakota

Disaster News Network: Rising water along the Cannonball River in southwest North Dakota forced the Saturday evacuation of seven families in Mott, a small town in Hettinger County. The evacuations came as hundreds of volunteers filled sandbags in a number of different communities in the Red River Basin. The families in Mott were last evacuated in 1997 when record flooding hit the region.

Flooding this week in the Red River Basin could rival flooding from 1997, according to the National Weather Service. Minor flooding in some areas has already begun and sand bagging operations have been started in Fargo, N.D. and Moorhead, MN, as community leaders are preparing for the potentially high waters.

An Advance Emergency Response Team of disaster response specialists is being sent from the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) office in Denver Monday to work with state and local officials.

North Dakota's Gov. John Hoeven has requested that the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers provide assistance in preparation for the expected flooding in Devils Lake, Red River of the North and Souris River basins…..

Red River Basin map, public domain, then modified by either Jengod at en.wikipedia or MECU, Wikimedia Commons, used here under Creative Commons Attribution 2.0 License

Environmentalists disappointed by World Water Forum

Edie.net: NGOs have lashed out at what they see as a lack of progress at the World Water Forum in Instanbul last week, saying not enough countries are signing up to an international treaty that could secure water supplies in many parts of the world. According to WWF the only international agreement that offers a real chance of making progress in this area has been gathering dust since it was written up in 1997.

The vast majority of countries voted in favour of the UN Watercourses Convention when it was table 12 years ago, but only 16 have ratified it since, making it ineffectual. WWF welcomed the fact that a further 14 countries had pledged to support the treaty at the Instanbul event but argued more needed to be done.

The UN Watercourses Convention provides a framework for common and cooperative management for the rivers, lakes, wetlands and aquifers crossing or forming international borders. "If fully enacted it would provide a strong basis for sharing and caring for the water draining half the world's land surface and vital to the water supplies of 40% of humanity," said Flavia Loures, WWF international water law and policy senior programme officer.

"It is ironic in the extreme that with a World Water day themed around sharing transboundary waters the ministerial declaration to be issued that day takes great pains to avoid mentioning the only available instrument for global co-operation," Ms Loures said….

Aerosols can poison plankton

Environmental Research Web: For many years, researchers have believed that atmospheric aerosols can dissolve into the oceans and provide phytoplankton with nutrients beneficial to their growth, such as iron and phosphates. But now a team from the US and Israel has found that some aerosols can actually harm the micro-organisms.

"This is the first time that a toxicity effect from aerosols in the ocean is seen and it highlights the complexity of the system – basically we cannot treat aerosols as all being the same and we cannot treat phytoplankton as all responding similarly to aerosol inputs," Adina Paytan of the Univeristy of California, Santa Cruz told environmentalresearchweb. "We will have to think about the balance between the benefits and the negative impacts of aerosols. This is particularly important since it is likely that aerosol deposition amount and composition will change with climate change and increased urbanization."

Paytan and colleagues from Stanford University, Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution, Cornell University, the United States Geological Survey, and the Interuniversity Institute of Marine Sciences in Israel studied phytoplankton in the northern Red Sea. Aerosols from a European air mass boosted phytoplankton growth, whereas aerosols from an air mass from the Sahara Desert decreased the growth of picoeukaryotes and Synechococcus but not Prochlorococcus.

The researchers believe this may be due to increased levels of copper in the African air mass. Copper is present in the atmosphere from both natural sources, such as desert dust, and from industrial sources such as combustion.

"It is a well accepted paradigm in marine sciences that atmospheric input of aerosols to the ocean provides vital nutrients to the ocean but I realized that very little direct evidence showing that exists," said Paytan. "Specifically there were no data regarding what in the aerosols exactly impacts the organisms and how specific organisms in a community respond. I did not expect to see toxicity and indeed in most experiments I saw growth of the phytoplankton except when I decided to look at the response to aersols with a different chemical makeup."…

Phytoplankton swirls in the Arabian Sea

1% of world's wealth could fund global green New Deal

Environment News Service: Investing one percent of global wealth, or around $750 billion, into five key sectors from renewable energy to freshwaters would stimulate a Global Green New Deal, advises a policy brief released today by economists and the United Nations. But in a separate assessment today, the International Monetary Fund projects that global economic activity will shrink by one-half to one percent this year.

Issued in advance of the G20 meeting of world leaders in London on April 2, the UN brief says that mobilizing and refocusing the global economy towards investments in clean technologies and natural infrastructure such as forests and soils is the best bet for real growth, combating climate change and triggering an employment boom. The five recommdned areas of investment are:

• Raising the energy efficiency of old and new buildings
• Renewable energies - wind, solar, geothermal and biomass
• Sustainable transport - hybrid vehicles; high speed rail and bus rapid transit systems
• The planet's ecological infrastructure - freshwaters, forests, soils and coral reefs
• Sustainable agriculture, including organic production

The report details the multiple economic, environmental and social benefits of investing a significant amount of the $3 trillion worth of stimulus packages being provided by most G-20 industrialized and emerging market economies - including the United States, China, Germany, India, Russia, and Saudi Arabia - in these five areas.

Achim Steiner, who heads the UN Environment Programme said, "The G20 meeting needs to be a milestone in terms of focusing investments that address the crises of today and those emerging from climate change, natural resource scarcity and lack of decent employment for close to two billion unemployed or underemployed people over the coming decade."

Philippine government 'needs to do more on climate change’

Business Mirror (Philippines): Despite observations worldwide showing a significant increase in global temperature, developing countries, like the Philippines, are bearing the brunt of high costs of climate change and the majority of Filipinos seem to remain complacent about it.

Dr. Leoncio Amadore, former director of the Philippine Atmospheric Geophysical and Astronomical Services Administration (Pagasa), said unless the government takes urgent action to address climate change, socioeconomic and environmental problems, like in agriculture, food security and health, in the country would be adversely affected. Moreover, Amadore said extreme weather events threaten to destroy the country’s rich natural resources.

While the country is very much involved in policymaking on climate change, the former Pagasa director said much still needs to be done on the national level, particularly by having more basic research on the social dimensions of climate change, like its impact on the different sectors of the society. “Priority attention should also be given to hazard analysis, vulnerability assessment and adaptation measures. The issue of climate change should form a part of all policymakers’ concerns,” he said.

…“The sectors and systems most vulnerable to climate change are agriculture and food security, water resources, coastal and marine resources, and health and human settlements,” he said….

Entrance to a coastal cave in the Philippines, shot by Paul Chin, Wikimedia Commons via Flickr, under Creative Commons Attribution ShareAlike 2.0 License

‘Planetary skin’ tool aims to improve response to climate change

NewsBlaze: Every day, on and above Earth, millions of sensors collect vast amounts of data representing interactions among the planet's systems of land, air, water and life. This is the kind of data needed to address the complexities of climate change or a move to a low-carbon-dioxide world economy, but gathering it is just the first step.

The next steps, barely possible given the state of information technology, involve integrating data from air- and space-borne and terrestrial instruments with computer models of climate, ecosystems and biological systems, then analyzing and reporting results that can be scaled to the needs of nations and communities.

On March 3, at a U.S. Climate Action Symposium in Washington, NASA and Cisco Systems, a $39 billion, U.S.-based designer and seller of networking and communications technology and services, announced a research and development (R&D) collaboration to build such a system.

Over the next several years, according to a Cisco statement, Planetary Skin will provide a common platform for integrating data; scientific, economic and risk models; data processing and communication networks; and visualization and collaboration tools. "We're trying to convert the geophysical and biological data products into information that can be used by policy and management decisionmakers," Steve Hipskind, chief of the NASA Ames Research Center's Earth Science Division in California, told America.gov.

…Under their agreement, NASA and Cisco will develop the Planetary Skin as an online collaborative platform, making the data available to the public, governments and businesses. "When you're talking about a global collaboration in which all nations have to do their part in terms of mitigation and adaptation, you need to be able to monitor and verify [CO2 emissions]," Castilla-Rubio said. Planetary Skin, he said, will be able to help meet that requirement.

Forced retreat from coast

The Age (Australia): The top government scientist leading Australia's efforts to adapt to climate change has warned that some coastal communities will have to be abandoned in a "planned retreat" because of global warming. Dr Andrew Ash, who directs the CSIRO's Climate Adaptation Flagship program, said while some vulnerable coastal communities could be protected by sea walls and levees, "there are going to be areas where that is not physically possible, or it's not cost effective to introduce any engineering solution and planned retreat becomes the only option".

Warning that climate change was accelerating at a much faster rate than predicted, Dr Ash said state and local governments urgently need to identify coastal land unsuitable for new residential development, because rising sea levels together with bigger, more frequent storms would flood them with sea water. Federal and state governments will also need to rule out putting costly new infrastructure such as airport runways and bridges in vulnerable low-lying coastal areas.

"They need to be thinking now about what areas are vulnerable and what areas are likely to be unsuitable in the longer term for new residential developments, because local governments are concerned about future liabilities," he said….

World's longest jetty in Queensland, Australia, shot by Bo-deh, Wikimedia Commons, under the Creative Commons Attribution ShareAlike 2.5 License

Warming affects Antarctic ice sheet stability

Science Daily: A five-nation scientific team has published new evidence that even a slight rise in atmospheric concentrations of carbon dioxide, one of the gases that drives global warming, affects the stability of the West Antarctic Ice Sheet (WAIS). The massive WAIS covers the continent on the Pacific side of the Transantarctic Mountains. Any substantial melting of the ice sheet would cause a rise in global sea levels.

The research, which was published in the March 19 issue of the journal Nature, is based on investigations by a 56-member team of scientists conducted on a 1,280-meter (4,100-foot)-long sedimentary rock core taken from beneath the sea floor under Antarctica's Ross Ice Shelf during the first project of the ANDRILL (ANtarctic geological DRILLing) research program--the McMurdo Ice Shelf (MIS) Project.

"The sedimentary record from the ANDRILL project provides scientists with an important analogue that can be used to help predict how ice shelves and the massive WAIS will respond to future global warming over the next few centuries," said Ross Powell, a professor of geology at Northern Illinois University.

"The sedimentary record indicates that under global warming conditions that were similar to those projected to occur over the next century, protective ice shelves could shrink or even disappear and the WAIS would become vulnerable to melting," Powell said. "If the current warm period persists, the ice sheet could diminish substantially or even disappear over time. This would result in a potentially significant rise in sea levels."

… [Tim Naish, director of Victoria University of Wellington's Antarctic Research Centre, and co-chief scientist of the 2006-2007 ANDRILL project] said the new information gleaned from the core shows that changes in the tilt of Earth's rotational axis has played a major role in ocean warming that has driven repeated cycles of growth and retreat of the WAIS for the period in Earth's history between 3 million and 5 million years ago. "It also appears that when atmospheric carbon dioxide concentrations reached 400 parts per million around four million years ago, the associated global warming amplified the effect of the Earth's axial tilt on the stability of the ice sheet," he said.

Shot of an Antarctic mountain by Andrew MacLeod, Wikimedia Commons, under the Creative Commons Attribution ShareAlike 3.0 License

House approves funding for clean water infrastructure upgrades

Environment News Service: A bill that will help bridge the multi-billion dollar annual gap between wastewater infrastructure needs and available funding is working its way through Congress. The Water Quality Investment Act of 2009 (H.R. 1262), approved Friday by the House, renews the federal government's commitment to clean water by authorizing $19.8 billion over the next five years for wastewater infrastructure and other efforts to improve water quality.

The centerpiece of this legislation is the authorization of $13.8 billion over five years for the Clean Water State Revolving Funds, the principal source of federal funding for meeting the nation's wastewater infrastructure needs. States would use such grants along with their own funds to make low-interest loans to communities and grants to Indian tribes to construct wastewater treatment facilities and related projects.

"Despite the obvious need for clean, potable water, federal funding for Clean Water SRFs has been dramatically cut in recent years, but that is about to change," said Congressman James Oberstar of Minnesota, chairman of the House Committee on Transportation and Infrastructure. "Investing in our wastewater infrastructure is a critical priority, both for Congress and the Obama administration, that will have a significant beneficial impact on the quality of the nation's waters and environment, as well as the protection of public health," he said….

Wastewater treatment plant, shot by Fanghong, Wikimedia Commons, under the terms of the GNU Free Documentation License, Version 1.2

Sacked executive 'discriminated against due to belief in climate change'

Telegraph (UK): In the landmark ruling Tim Nicholson was told he could use employment law to argue that he was discriminated against because of his views on the environment. The head of the tribunal ruled that those views amounted to a philosophical belief under the Employment Equality (Religion and Belief) Regulations, 2003, according to The Independent.

The case is the first of its kind and could open the way for hundreds of future claims to be made in the same fashion, the newspaper reported. Mr Nicholson, 41, was made redundant while head of sustainability at Grainger plc, Britain's biggest residential property investment company, in July last year. He is now suing his former employers for unfair dismissal, arguing that his beliefs on the environment prompted clashes with other senior executives at the firm, and led to his sacking.

Mr Nicholson told the tribunal that he clashed with other executives over the way it adopted its policies on the environment and corporate social responsibility. He said he tried to get the company to act in a more environmentally responsible way, but was obstructed by senior company executives.

The Cornell Law School Library reading room, shot by Claude-Étienne Armingaud - Claudé, Wikimedia Commons, under Creative Commons Attribution 2.5 License

One quarter of the world's population depends on degrading land

When reading this article in Science Daily, I thought of the old farming adage -- everything you put before the soil, you will lose: A new study published in the journal Soil Use and Management attempts for the first time to measure the extent and severity of land degradation across the globe and concludes that 24% of the land area is degrading – often in very productive areas.

Land degradation - the decline in the quality of soil, water and vegetation – is of profound importance but until now there have been no consistent global data by which to assess its extent and severity. For nearly thirty years the world has depended on the Global Assessment of Soil Degradation (GLASOD) based on the subjective judgement of soil scientists who knew the conditions in their countries. GLASOD indicated that 15 per cent of the land area was degraded, but this was a map of perceptions, rather than measurement of land degradation. The new study by Bai et al. measures global land degradation based on a clearly defined and consistent method using remotely sensed imagery. The results are startling. The new assessment indicates that 24 per cent of the land has been degraded over the period 1981-2003 - but there is hardly any overlap with the GLASOD area that recorded the cumulative effects of land degradation up to about 1990.

One of the authors, Dr David Dent of ISRIC - World Soil Information explains: “Degradation is primarily driven by land management and catastrophic natural phenomena. Our study shows the extent and severity of land degradation measured in terms of loss of net primary productivity, making allowance for climatic variability. Overall, a quarter of the world’s population depends directly on these degrading areas. The worst-hit areas are Africa south of the Equator, SE Asia and S China. The worst-affected countries, with more than 50 per cent of territory degrading are, in Africa, the Congo, Zaire, Equatorial Guinea, Gabon, Sierra Leone, Zambia and the most affected (95 per cent degrading) Swaziland; in Asia, Myanmar, Malaysia, Thailand, Laos, Korea and Indonesia. In terms of the rural population affected, the greatest numbers are in China, with nearly half a billion, India, Indonesia, Bangladesh and Brazil. The usual suspects, such as the African Sahel and around the Mediterranean are much less affected.”

The resulting loss of carbon fixation from the atmosphere over the measured period amounts to a thousand million tonnes. At a shadow price of $50 per tonne, the loss of carbon fixed amounts to $50 billion – and the real cost is far greater in terms of emissions to the atmosphere through loss of soil organic carbon….

South Dakota, 1936

World leaders urged to link water to climate negotiations

EurActiv: Business leaders attending this week's World Water Forum called on the international community to acknowledge the link between water, energy and climate change, encouraging them to take these up in global climate negotiations that are expected to be concluded this December in Copenhagen. Launching a new report yesterday (19 March), the World Business Council for Sustainable Development (WBCSD) pointed to the "inextricable link" between water and energy.

Water is indeed used in the energy generation process as a coolant for nuclear power stations, for example, or as vapour to clean up heavy tar sands from which oil is extracted. Likewise, cleaning up water resources for later reuse consumes large amounts of energy. With large greenhouse gas emissions, these industrial activities are important contributors to climate change.

Furthermore, global demand for both resources is on the rise as growing numbers of middle and high-income citizens need water and energy to power lavish lifestyles and particularly transport, swimming pools and green gardens, the report says. However, some regions would feel the impact more intensely than others, it adds, urging world leaders due to meet in Copenhagen in December to agree a successor to the Kyoto protocol, to address water, energy and climate change as an interlinked issue in the UN negotiations.

Business leaders outline recommendations on areas where policymakers, researchers and business can work together to forge a link between water and energy policy. First and foremost, their report stresses that reliable water, energy and climate change data, models and analytical tools are needed to assess the impacts of climate change on water and to put in place better early-warning systems. These measurement tools should be able to account for the trade-off between water and energy efficiency, as they do not always work the same direction, it adds….

A boat passage at a canal in Toulouse, France. Shot by Traumrune, Wikimedia Commons, under the Creative Commons Attribution ShareAlike 3.0, Attribution ShareAlike 2.5, Attribution ShareAlike 2.0 and Attribution ShareAlike 1.0 License

His last breath -- Dr. Donald R. Thomas

My heart isn’t in posting today. My father, Dr. Donald R. Thomas, died in a Cincinnati hospice this morning.

Born in 1925, he lived most of his life in Cincinnati. He attended the University of Cincinnati as an undergraduate and a medical student after serving as a gunnery instructor during World War II.

He married Elizabeth Ann Green in 1954, and they moved briefly to San Mateo, California, where I was born. Soon they returned to Cincinnati, where he and a colleague had a family medicine practice. A second son, my late brother Matt Thomas, was born soon after that, and then my sister, Beth. He later he acquired an industrial medicine practice in downtown Cincinnati, where he served a variety of business and individual clients until he retired in 1998 or so.

Throughout his medical career, he taught at the University of Cincinnati Medical School in various capacities. His students were a constant source of pleasure for him, and he often spoke proudly of the ones who had gone on to successful practices.

He loved medicine and was an excellent doctor, with views that were well in advance of his time. A skilled diagnostician, he thought many people were overmedicated, and that too often doctors prescribed unnecessary tests. He also didn’t believe in prolonging life unnecessarily, and often condemned strenuous measures that ignored the patient’s pain and suffering. With consistency and courage he stuck to this belief at the end of his own life.

He long intended for his body to go to the medical school, and one of his last requests before he went to hospice was make sure the paperwork was in order, something that he planned to do ever since his honeymoon, according to my mother.

He smoked. Two packs a day for decades took a toll on his lungs, and resulted in the emphysema that blighted his later years. Yet his diminishing lung power and coronary bypass surgery did not prevent him from going on a serious post-retirement weight loss and exercise campaign. He was a fixture at the Tri-Health Gym at Kenwood. He had a favorite treadmill.

I trace my lifelong interest in science to his example, even though he was an Ohio Republican who couldn’t believe that global warming was real. As the end approached, he relented somewhat. I told him that doubting the climate science of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change was a rearguard action, similar to the stance of creationists who deny evolution. That seemed to get through.

Goodbye, Dad.

Eden Park in Cincinnati (one of my father's favorite haunts), shot by Lanskeith17

The Red Sea might save the Dead Sea

Douglas Hamilton writes in Reuters: Abundant water from the Red Sea could replenish the shrinking Dead Sea if Jordan, Israel and the Palestinians decide to commission a tunnel north through the Jordanian desert from the Gulf of Aqaba.

The Red Sea-Dead Sea Water Conveyance project would supply the biggest desalination plant in the world, running on its own hydro-electric power and providing Jordan with enough water for the next 40-50 years. Israel and the Palestinian West Bank would also benefit. A decision on whether to go ahead could come by the end of next year and the likely cost would be in the region of 7 billion dollars.

"The idea of linking the Red Sea and the Dead Sea was first suggested by a British military engineer in the 1880s. That was for hydro-power. But the drivers today are water supply and saving the Dead Sea," said engineer David Meehan , who leads the study team for French consultants Coyne et Bellier. "Technically and engineering-wise it was always going to be feasible," he told Reuters. "But there are some major issues that could determine its feasibility ultimately."

… The main concerns are the effects on marine life in the Gulf of Aqaba of the extraction of such large volumes of water, the effects of that water mixing with the Dead Sea, and the funding of the project, said Meehan. In addition, Israel has concerns about potential leakage polluting valuable freshwater aquifers in a desert region where it has developed world-leading techniques for cultivation, and "environmentalists don't like the idea of canals which cut off wildlife migration."

The Palestinians have not even asked formally for a share of the desalinated water, he said, possibly because they do not want to prejudice their existing claims to mountain aquifers" supplying the Israeli-occupied West Bank and the Jordan Valley. "None of these issues can be separated from politics," he said, although both Jordan and Israel say they could go it alone. But that could involve a dispute in international law and funding would become scarce….

Salt covered stones in the Dead Sea, shot by xta11

Major losses of Caribbean reef fish in the last 15 years

Science Daily: By combining data from 48 studies of coral reefs from around the Caribbean, researchers have found that fish densities that have been stable for decades have given way to significant declines since 1995.

"We were most surprised to discover that this decrease is evident for both large-bodied species targeted by fisheries as well as small-bodied species that are not fished," said Michelle Paddack of Simon Fraser University in Canada. "This suggests that overfishing is probably not the only cause."

Rather, they suggest that the recent declines may be explained by drastic losses in coral cover and other changes in coral reef habitats that have occurred in the Caribbean over the past 30 years. Those changes are the result of many factors, including warming ocean temperatures, coral diseases, and a rise in sedimentation and pollution from coastal development. Overfishing has also led to declines of many fish species, and now seems to also be removing those that are important for keeping the reefs free of algae.

…Paddack said her study, which involved a very large team of scientists from around the globe, should serve as a call to action. "If we want to have coral reefs in our future, we must ensure that we reduce damage to these ecosystems," she said. "On a personal level, this may mean not buying wild-caught aquarium fish and corals, not eating reef fish species that are declining, taking care not to anchor on reefs, and reducing our carbon emissions to help control climate change. But importantly, we need to let lawmakers and resource managers know that we care about these ecosystems and we need to push for changes in how they are managed."…

Caribbean reef shark attacked by jackfish, a dramatic shot by Andrejs Jegorovs, Wikimedia Commons, under the terms of the GNU Free Documentation License, Version 1.2

Misgivings linger about government's capacity to avert water crisis

Engineering News (South Africa): While it would be unhelpful to superimpose the energy reality onto the water milieu, it appears that the challenges in South Africa’s water sector are beginning to bear a resemblance to those that sounded the initial alarm bells of the current energy crisis.

Water-management areas face a water deficit, ecosystems and water resources are already being placed under pressure by various users in the sectors, and available resources and appropriate water resources are being affected by decreasing water quality, which, in turn, affects net availability.

Adding to this is the ageing water and wastewater infrastructure, a severe lack of skilled human resources, pollution, climate-change scenarios, as well as the illegal use of water and the inappropriate use of funds by different spheres of local government.

In the past year, significant concerns and issues have been raised in relation to the water sector, as well as the current and future status of water security in the country. Of these, the most controversial relates to the possibility of a water shortage in Gauteng province by 2013.

Initially, the claims of a water shortage were denied by the Department of Water Affairs and Forestry (Dwaf); however, in September last year, Engineering News quoted department director-general Pam Yako, who said that failure to do something about the current growth trends and needs in the province would lead to a water shortage scenario....

Old painting of the South Africa village of Somerset West

Better than even chance of major changes in global climate system, experts predict

Science Daily: An international team of researchers, led by Elmar Kriegler of the Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research (PIK), elicited the opinions of 52 climate scientists about the sensitivity of five so-called tipping elements. Tipping elements are parts of the climate system which, through human interference, can change quickly and irreversibly. In the current study, the sensitivity of the following tipping elements is evaluated: Atlantic thermohaline circulation, El Niño phenomenon, Amazon rainforest, Greenland, and West Antarctic ice sheets.

A total of 43 experts estimated upper and lower bounds for the probability of those elements undergoing dramatic changes, given three different global warming scenarios: a warming by less than 2°C, by 2 – 4°C, or by an extreme of 4 – 8°C until 2200. “Strong global warming of more than 4°C by the year 2200 so far does appear to be a clear possibility,” Kriegler says.

The analysis of the survey is now published in the online version of the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. If temperatures were to increase by 2 – 4°C then, so the scientists estimate, at least one element will tip with a one in six chance. If global temperatures were to increase even further then this probability increases to more than one in two (56%). In such a warming scenario the majority of respondents consider the probability of a complete melting of the Greenland ice sheet and a large-scale die-back of the Amazon rainforest to be particularly high. “The results show that the estimated probabilities increase strongly parallel to the progressive scenarios of future warming” Kriegler summarises the expert survey.

The authors write that expert elicitations have occasionally been criticised for not contributing new scientific information as long as they are not backed by new data, modelling or theories. However, in the context of risk analysis such surveys have proven to be a useful tool to summarise expert knowledge for decision makers. “We do not prescribe society specific climate policy measures,” says Hans Joachim Schellnhuber, director of PIK, and coauthor of the article. “But the results of the survey provide further evidence for the need of ambitious climate protection in order to minimize the risks of far-reaching consequences for our entire planet.”…

A squirrel and the Pacific Ocean, shot by Mila Zinkova, Wikimedia Commons, under the Creative Commons Attribution ShareAlike 2.5, Attribution ShareAlike 2.0 and Attribution ShareAlike 1.0 License

World faces 'perfect storm' of problems by 2030, chief scientist to warn

Guardian (UK): A "perfect storm" of food shortages, scarce water and insufficient energy resources threaten to unleash public unrest, cross-border conflicts and mass migration as people flee from the worst-affected regions, the UK government's chief scientist will warn tomorrow. In a major speech to environmental groups and politicians, Professor John Beddington, who took up the position of chief scientific adviser last year, will say that the world is heading for major upheavals which are due to come to a head in 2030.

He will tell the government's Sustainable Development UK conference in Westminster that the growing population and success in alleviating poverty in developing countries will trigger a surge in demand for food, water and energy over the next two decades, at a time when governments must also make major progress in combating climate change. "We head into a perfect storm in 2030, because all of these things are operating on the same time frame," Beddington told the Guardian.

"If we don't address this, we can expect major destabilisation, an increase in rioting and potentially significant problems with international migration, as people move out to avoid food and water shortages," he added. Food prices for major crops such as wheat and maize have recently settled after a sharp rise last year when production failed to keep up with demand. But according to Beddington, global food reserves are so low – at 14% of annual consumption – a major drought or flood could see prices rapidly escalate again. The majority of the food reserve is grain that is in transit between shipping ports, he said.

"Our food reserves are at a 50-year low, but by 2030 we need to be producing 50% more food. At the same time, we will need 50% more energy, and 30% more fresh water. "There are dramatic problems out there, particularly with water and food, but energy also, and they are all intimately connected," Beddington said. "You can't think about dealing with one without considering the others. We must deal with all of these together."…

Albrecht Durer's "Melancholia"

Warming to speed icesheet collapse by 100,000 years: study

Terra Daily, via Agence France-Presse: Manmade climate change is set to hasten the disintegration of a massive ice sheet in Antarctica by 100,000 years, boosting sea levels some five metres (16 feet), according to a pair of studies published Thursday. The research, which matches new ice core data with a simulation of past and future changes in the West Antarctica Ice Sheet (WAIS), reveals for the first time regular cycles of "catastrophic collapse" and reformation reaching back five million years.

Cycles lasted 40,000 years during the first three-fifths of this period, but have since more than doubled in length, explained David Pollard, a scientist at Pennsylvania State University and lead author of one of the studies. "But with global warming we are cutting short a natural cycle," he told AFP by phone. "The two studies combined show it is really likely that the WAIS will collapse in the next few thousand years. In the absence of human influence, it would probably happen only 100,000 years from now," he said.

…The findings showed a geological metronome of massive change across five million years, and provided the first direct evidence of total collapse. "Before there were hints of it collapsing like that, but we really didn't know until now," said Pollard, a co-author of the study, published in Nature. The new data also confirmed that the cycles of ice destruction and formation are closely linked to shifts in the tilt of Earth's axis as it rotates around the Sun, a process called obliquity.

…In the second study, Pollard and Robert DeConto of the University of Massachusetts in Amherst simulate Antarctic ice sheet variations in a mathematical model over the past five million years in order to track the "grounding line", the shifting border between land and sea ice. "We found that the dominant mechanism attacking the West Antarctic ice has been variations in ocean melting under its large floating ice shelves," rather than changes in temperature or surface melt, Pollard said….

The Bay of Whales, Antarctica, shot by P Bond (Pbkiwi), who has generously released the image into the public domain

Kenya's late rains worsen food security

IRIN: Food insecurity in Kenya, already affecting millions of people, is set to escalate because the long rains are late and unlikely to be sufficient, officials warned. The forecast has contributed to an upward revision of the cost of humanitarian needs in 2009, from US$390 million to $575 million. "Predictions are that the long rains [which normally start in the second week of March] could be poor; this would lead to a more serious drought later in the year," Jeanine Cooper, head of the Kenya division of the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA), told IRIN on 17 March.

Abbas Gullet, secretary-general of the Kenya Red Cross Society (KRCS), told reporters on 17 March that Kenya's humanitarian situation was deteriorating with the failure of the rains. "The situation has not improved; we were expecting rain but it has not started," he said while collecting donations in Nairobi for distribution in the worst-hit areas.

… Aeneas Chuma, the UN Humanitarian Coordinator for Kenya, who presented the humanitarian organisations' plan to support populations affected by climatic shocks, food insecurity and livelihood deterioration, post-election violence and a growing number of refugees, said: "As development partners in Kenya, we recognise the importance of tackling chronic, recurrent and predictable problems with durable and effective solutions."…

Countryside in Kenya. © Sam Stearman, 2004. GFDL permission obtained by Quadell. Found on Wikimedia Commons, and used under the terms of the GNU Free Documentation License, Version 1.2

Selfish use of rivers seen threatening political stability

Reuters: Countries that selfishly use shared rivers threaten political stability at a time when water is scarce and demand is growing, a conservation group warned on Wednesday. Disputes over shared rivers such as the Tigris and the Euphrates could be resolved if nations put borders aside and viewed the entire river basin as a unit instead, they added.

In the past some states have built dams or siphoned water from rivers for irrigation without consulting neighbors downstream -- stirring political tension. "The question countries must face is are they interested only in holding all the water themselves and living in a destabilized region, or do they wish to share the water and cooperate?" said Mark Smith, head of the water program of the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN), a body funded by states, and NGOs.

Rivers shared by more than one country provide about 60 percent of the world's fresh water. There are 260 international river basins in the world, covering half of the Earth's surface and home to 40 percent of the world's population....

The Euphrates River in Iraq, shot by Jayel Aheram, Wikimedia Commons via Flickr, under Creative Commons Attribution ShareAlike 2.0 License

Beavers 'have positive effect' on rivers and wildlife after centuries of extinction

More pro-beaver propaganda from the Guardian (UK): Beavers could be successfully re-introduced to England and could help restore and conserve rivers and floodplains, according to the government's ecological advisers. But convincing landowners and other countryside groups of their benefits could mean it is many years before the furry mammals and their distinctive dams are seen again in the wild. A major scientific study of all English rivers has identified the New Forest in Hampshire, Bodmin Moor in Cornwall, the Peak District, the Forest of Bowland in Lancashire, the Weald of Kent and the Lake District as the six areas with the most suitable habitats. Beavers need 2km lengths of river away from human populations, water at least 60cm deep and ideally, willow and poplar trees on the river bank.

Despite their notoriety for nibbling their way through trees to create their immense dams, according to the report by Natural England and conservation charity People's Trust for Endangered Species, they could have a significant, but largely positive effect on English rivers and wildlife. Studies from all over the world have shown that they can increase the variety of plants, birds, fish, reptiles and amphibians, as well as mammals such as water voles, otters and shrews. Their dam-building habit can also increase flooding, damage crops and may affect some fish populations.

Beavers were a natural part of the British countryside until they were hunted to extinction for their fur and the secretion from their scent glands that was believed to have medicinal properties. They mostly died out in the 16th century although there is evidence some hung on until the 18th century in some northern rivers. Several beavers are to be introduced to a remote part of Scotland in May following a 10-year long battle between conservationists and landowners, and there are plans to reintroduce them in Wales….

A beaver lodge in Canada, shot by Dickbauch, Wikimedia Commons

Drought and urbanization intensified the 2008 Atlanta tornado

Science Daily: On March 14, 2008, a tornado swept through downtown Atlanta, its 130 mile-per-hour winds ripping holes in the roof of the Georgia Dome, blowing out office windows, and trashing parts of Centennial Olympic Park. It was an event so rare in an urban landscape that researchers immediately began to examine NASA satellite data and historical archives to see what weather and climatological ingredients may have combined to brew such a storm. Though hundreds of tornadoes form each year across the United States, records of "downtown tornadic events" are quite rare. The 2008 Atlanta tornado—the first in the city's recorded history—was also unique because it developed during extreme drought conditions.

In a NASA-funded study, researchers from Purdue University in West Lafayette, Ind., and the University of Georgia (UGA) in Athens found that intermittent rain in the days before the storms—though providing temporary drought relief—may have moistened some areas enough to create favorable conditions for severe storms to form and intensify. Additionally, the sprawling urban landscape may have given the storms the extra, turbulent energy needed to spin up a tornado. The researchers reported their findings in January at the annual meeting of the American Meteorological Society.

"The Atlanta tornado, though forecasted well, caught us by surprise because it evolved rapidly under very peculiar conditions during a drought and over a downtown area," said Dev Niyogi, an assistant professor of regional climatology at Purdue and lead author of the modeling study. "We wanted to know why it hit Atlanta during one of the longest, harshest droughts the southeast has experienced. Was it a manifestation of the drought? Does urban development have an effect on such a storm?" Such questions are becoming more relevant as the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, NASA, and other institutions investigate the relationships between extreme water cycle events (such as drought), land cover change, weather, and climate change.

…"A thunderstorm, energized by moist pockets within a drought region, grew into a tornado-causing severe thunderstorm because of weather instabilities it encountered at the rural-urban boundary," Niyogi explained. "Drought and urbanization do not cause the thunderstorms or tornado, but ultimately they added fuel to the fire of an already energized storm," he added. "The variable rain bands created patches of land that were wet and dry, green and not green. The combination created surface boundaries that can destabilize the weather system and energize an approaching storm, providing the one-two punch."

…"With many studies suggesting more potential for urbanization and droughts in our future," Niyogi added, "it will be important to see if this kind of intense storm development could happen more frequently in future climates."

Damage to the Westin Peachtree Plaza Hotel during the 2008 Atlanta tornado. A great shot by Brianga, Wikimedia Commons, under the terms of the GNU Free Documentation License, Version 1.2

European Space Agency launches first Earth Explorer mission GOCE

European Space Agency: This afternoon, the Gravity field and steady-state Ocean Circulation Explorer (GOCE) satellite developed by the European Space Agency (ESA) was lofted into a near-Sun-synchronous, low Earth orbit by a Rockot launcher lifting off from the Plesetsk cosmodrome in northern Russia. With this launch, a new chapter in the history of Earth observation in Europe has begun. GOCE is the first of a new family of ESA satellites designed to study our planet and its environment in order to enhance our knowledge and understanding of Earth-system processes and their evolution, to enable us to address the challenges of global climate change. In particular, GOCE will measure the minute differences in the Earth’s gravity field around the globe.

The Russian Rockot launcher, derived from a converted ballistic missile, lifted off at 15:21 CET (14:21 GMT) and flew northward over the Arctic. About 90 minutes later, after one orbital revolution and two Breeze-KM upper-stage burns, the 1052 kg spacecraft was successfully released into a circular polar orbit at 280 km altitude with 96.7º inclination to the Equator. The launch was procured from Eurockot Launch Services, a German/Russian company based in Bremen, Germany.

…"GOCE is ESA’s first science satellite dedicated to Earth observation since Envisat in 2002. The size has changed, but the rationale remains the same: to provide the best science our technology can deliver for the maximum benefit of the science community and ultimately the citizens of Europe and the world," said Jean-Jacques Dordain, ESA Director General.…For 24 months, GOCE will collect three-dimensional gravity data all over the globe. The raw data will be processed on the ground to produce the most accurate map of the Earth’s gravitational field to date and to refine the geoid: the actual reference shape of our planet. Precise knowledge of the geoid, which can be considered as the surface of an ideal global ocean at rest, will play a very important role in further study of our planet, its oceans and atmosphere. It will serve as the reference model for our measurement and modelling of sea-level change, ocean circulation and polar ice cap dynamics.

The main payload instrument is a state-of-the-art Electrostatic Gravity Gradiometer incorporating six highly sensitive accelerometers, mounted in pairs along three perpendicular axes on an ultra-stable carbon-carbon structure. The mission will measure not gravity itself but the tiny differences in gravity between the accelerometer pairs 50 cm apart....

The GOCE satellite lifts off (image from the ESA website)

US state insurance regulators vote to require insurers to disclose climate change risks

Solve Climate: The people who assess risk for a living are getting worried about climate change. Today, the National Association of Insurance Commissioners – the chief insurance regulators from the 50 states and U.S. territories – voted to require insurance companies to disclose the financial risks they face related to global warming.

In addition, the commissioners are requiring insurers to explain how they are preparing to deal with changing risks that could threaten their financial stability in the future, and what the companies are doing to educate state and federal lawmakers and their own policyholders about climate change. “As regulators, we are concerned about how climate change will impact the financial health of the insurance sector and the availability and affordability of insurance for consumers," explained Pennsylvania Insurance Commissioner Joel Ario, chairman of the NAIC Climate Change and Global Warming Task Force. "This disclosure standard will give regulators the information we need to better understand these risks.”

Insurers rely on intricate risk models when they write insurance policies. Those models, whether addressing risks to property, finances or health, will have to change as global warming influences some important underlying assumptions. Even scientists whose sole focus is climate say their understanding and concerns about of the speed and severity of climate change have increased substantially in just the past few months….

Sea wall construction in Galveston, Texas, between 1909 and 1915

New typhoon categorisation to start

News from the Hong Kong government: New typhoon categorisation will be introduced this year to enhance people's alertness to stronger typhoons, Hong Kong Observatory Director Lam Chiu-ying says. Mr Lam today said 'typhoon' will be further categorised into 'typhoon', 'severe typhoon' and 'super typhoon'. He predicted the number of tropical cyclones affecting Hong Kong this year will be near normal - five or six - while annual rainfall will be below norma

On climate change the observatory has reassessed the trend of rainfall in Hong Kong in the 21st Century based on the latest data from the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change 4th Assessment Report published in 2007. "We forecast rainfall in Hong Kong will rise in the latter half of this century. The number of extremely wet years and extremely dry years will also increase," Mr Lam said. On the observatory's work in 2009 he said it has reviewed its operations during the typhoon season last year and concluded it should improve the delivery of storm surge information....

Cyclone Gafilo Mahajanga.jThe shore of Mahajanga, the morning after tropical cyclone Gafilo. Image by WITTus (Sascha Wittkowski), Wikimedia Commons, under the terms of the GNU Free Documentation License, Version 1.2

Upcoming Copenhagen "Conference of the Parties" crucial for Asia

Xinhua, via China Daily: Asian countries have an important stake in this year's climate change negotiations and, as a result, a critical part to play in the negotiations. Climate change is hitting the Asian continent already and big global decisions will be made this year. An agreement to cut greenhouse gases emissions will hopefully exceed what the Kyoto agreement previously negotiated. The negotiations over the rest of the year will culminate in the new Copenhagen Agreement in Denmark in December 2009 at the 15th conference of the parties (COP 15) on the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC).

The main focus, agreed just over a year ago at the 13th conference of the parties in Bali, Indonesia, consist of four building blocks, of which two - "Mitigation" and "Adaptation" - are considered major. …The most immediate concern for Asia is the issue of Adaptation and funding for it. Estimates of global adaptation funding range from tens to hundreds of billions of dollars a year. These funds will need to come from "new and additional" sources not from previously rolled out development assistance.

A number of proposals to raise such significant sums for adaptation already exist, including a proposal by Bangladesh and formally adopted by the least developed countries (LDC) group at the Poznan meeting to charge an "adaptation levy" on all international air passengers. Estimates put the total figure at more than $10 billion a year. Even if the LDC proposal ultimately falls over, at least it gives the group a strong card to play against other countries. They will need to assure funding in the tens of billions of dollars for adaptation to be acceptable to the LDC group, as well as other vulnerable countries and Africa group.

Asian countries need to use their strong presence within the LDC Group to build bridges and establish a common negotiating position with these other groups of most vulnerable countries, and the African group. The focus on adaptation, however, should not distract us from also paying attention to the other major building block, mitigation, and formulating a clear strategy on the issue….

Sunset at Changi Beach Park, Changi Point, Republic of Singapore, shot by Calvin C Teo, Wikimedia Commons, under the Creative Commons Attribution ShareAlike 2.5 License

Insurance experts set out vision for climate adaptation scheme

Business Green: World leaders are being urged to consider plans for a $5bn (£3.5bn)-a-year global climate change insurance scheme that would provide developing countries with cover against the increased risk of climate change-related droughts and extreme weather events. The proposals were set out by the Munich Climate Insurance Initiative (MCII), a non-profit coalition of insurance firms, NGOs and research bodies, at last week's climate change conference in Copenhagen and are to be presented to negotiators involved in talks to agree a successor to the Kyoto deal on climate change later this year.

Under the proposals, rich countries would use part of the funds they have pledged to help developing nations adapt to climate change to provide them with insurance cover against extreme weather events such as typhoons and floods. Speaking to BusinessGreen.com, Dr Koko Warner of the UN University, who worked on the proposal, said that the insurance sector had the potential to provide a cost-effective means of minimising some of the risks associated with climate change.

"A global climate change insurance pool would allow you to spread the risks faced by all developing countries," she said, adding that taking out reinsurance against the fund would insure its solvency even in years when multiple disasters lead to numerous claims. The MCII estimates that the fund would require rich countries to pay in about $5bn, but would provide developing nations with quicker payouts in the event of disasters than current international aid arrangements, and would also be subject to less corruption.

Warner added that such a scheme would also provide the insurance firms that managed the fund with a financial incentive to help developing nations enhance their risk management expertise and invest in climate-resistant infrastructure. In addition to a global insurance pool, the proposals also set out plans for an expansion of micro-insurance schemes designed to provide businesses and individuals in the developing world with access to insurance cover.

An early form of insurance -- a Roman mosaic of Ulysses lashed to the mast to prevent his ship being lured to destruction by the Sirens, the ancient world's climate change denialists