Summertime 2100, and the living isn't easy
London, May 30 2010 - What will London be like a century from now? Seven degrees warmer, with water-absorbent streets and parched public parks. Marek Kohn paints for the Independent an unnerving picture of metropolitan life in the sweaty grip of a radically changed climate.
> www.independent.co.uk: Summertime 2100, and the living isn't easy

James Lovelock: Humans are too stupid to prevent climate change

(The Guardian), March 29, 2010 — In his first in-depth interview since the theft of UEA emails, the scientist blames inertia and democracy for lack of action.
Humans are too stupid to prevent climate change from radically impacting on our lives over the coming decades. This is the stark conclusion of James Lovelock, the globally respected environmental thinker and independent scientist who developed the Gaia theory.
It follows a tumultuous few months in which public opinion on efforts to tackle climate change has been undermined by events such as the climate scientists' emails leaked from the University of East Anglia (UEA) and the failure of the Copenhagen climate summit.
> www.guardian.co.uk: James Lovelock: Humans are too stupid to prevent climate change
> www.guardian.co.uk: James Lovelock on the value of sceptics and why Copenhagen was doomed
> Lovelock: "Enjoy life while you can" (March 1 2008)

Paleontologist Peter Ward's "Medea hypothesis": Life is out to get you

Scientific American, January 14, 2010 — At a lecture at the American Museum of Natural History in New York City, paleontologist Peter D. Ward laid out the argument that life as we know it serves to make Earth less habitable — a downward spiral that might spell the eventual end of life on the planet.
Ward, a professor at the University of Washington, calls this the Medea hypothesis, named for the murderous mother of Greek mythology.
It is a direct challenge to scientist and futurist James Lovelock's Gaia hypothesis, which asserts that life constantly tweaks the dials on Earth's control systems to keep the planet in a nice, habitable homeostasis.
> www.scientificamerican.com: The Medea Hypothesis
See also:
> 'The Revenge of Gaia' Books & Debate (2006)
> Lovelock: "Enjoy life while you can" (March 1 2008)

Making Good Time: Doomsday Clock Moves 1 Minute Back to 6 from Midnight

Scientific American, January 14, 2010 — The human race can breathe a tiny bit easier (but not too much) now that the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists has moved the hand of its Doomsday Clock one minute farther away from midnight, the time which symbolizes catastrophic destruction and the apocalyptic end of civilization. The clock now reads six minutes from that end-of-days witching hour after it was changed during a press conference Thursday in New York City, citing an increased awareness and interest in stopping key threats to humanity (in particular nuclear conflict and global warming) since U.S. President Barack Obama took office about a year ago.
> www.scientificamerican.com: >Making Good Time: Doomsday Clock Moves 1 Minute Back to 6 from Midnight
> www.thebulletin.org

World on course for catastrophic 6° rise, reveal scientists

November 18, 2009 - The world is now firmly on course for the worst-case scenario in terms of climate change, with average global temperatures rising by up to 6C by the end of the century, leading scientists said yesterday. Such a rise – which would be much higher nearer the poles – would have cataclysmic and irreversible consequences for the Earth, making large parts of the planet uninhabitable and threatening the basis of human civilisation.
We are headed for it, the scientists said, because the carbon dioxide emissions from industry, transport and deforestation which are responsible for warming the atmosphere have increased dramatically since 2002, in a way which no one anticipated, and are now running at treble the annual rate of the 1990s.
This means that the most extreme scenario envisaged in the last report from the UN Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, published in 2007, is now the one for which society is set, according to the 31 researchers from seven countries involved in the Global Carbon Project.
> www.independent.co.uk: World on course for catastrophic 6° rise, reveal scientists
> news.bbc.co.uk: Earth 'heading for 6C' of warming
> www.telegraph.co.uk: Climate change: temperatures to increase 6C by end of century
> www.yahoo.com/afp: Fossil-fuel emissions up 2% in 2008
> www.nature.com: Trends in the sources and sinks of carbon dioxide

Is man on course to cause the sixth extinction?
London, November 8 2009 - At first sight it seems an unlikely topic for a landmark publishing deal: a fee of about half a million dollars for a book about dead animals – or, to be more precise, extinct animals.
The forthcoming book examines the role of humans in the eradication of species, and its findings are not likely to be pleasant.
Nevertheless the subject of eradicated species has become publishing hot property after a bidding battle in the US saw Henry Holt, a publisher, beat its rivals to buy The Sixth Extinction by Elizabeth Kolbert last week. According to the New York Times, a "mid-six-figure advance" has now been agreed between writer and publisher.
> www.guardian.co.uk: Is man on course to cause the sixth extinction?

Is It Too Late to Prevent Catastrophic Climate Change?
Sydney, October 21 2009 - Recent analysis of carbon budgets shows that the timing and scale of emission reductions needed to avert dangerous climate change are well beyond any national policy proposals or anticipated international agreement.
There have been two alarming developments in recent years. First, climate scientists are reporting that the scale of damages associated with warming of 2°C is much worse than previously believed, suggesting that more stringent emission cuts are essential.
Secondly, global growth in greenhouse gas emissions is much higher than anticipated a few years ago and the world is now on a warming path that is worse than the worst-case scenario. Rather than decarbonising, the world is carbonising at an unprecedented rate.
Analysis shows that, under the most optimistic assumptions about the timing and extent of global greenhouse gas emission reductions, cumulative emissions over the next few decades will result in atmospheric concentrations reaching 650 ppm of CO2-e, associated with warming of 4°C or more before the end of the century, a temperature not seen on Earth for 15 million years.
It now seems almost certain that, if it has not occurred already, within the next several years enough warming will be locked into the system to set in train positive feedback processes that will overwhelm any attempts to cut back on carbon emissions. Humans will be powerless to stop the shift to a new climate on Earth, one much less sympathetic to life.
> www.clivehamilton.net.au: Is It Too Late to Prevent Catastrophic Climate Change?

Post-human Earth: How the planet will recover from us

(New Scientist), September 28 2009 - When Nobel prize-winning atmospheric chemist Paul Crutzen coined the word Anthropocene around 10 years ago, he gave birth to a powerful idea: that human activity is now affecting the Earth so profoundly that we are entering a new geological epoch.
The Anthropocene has yet to be accepted as a geological time period, but if it is, it may turn out to be the shortest - and the last. It is not hard to imagine the epoch ending just a few hundred years after it started, in an orgy of global warming and overconsumption.
> www.newscientist.com: Post-human Earth: How the planet will recover from us

Met Office: catastrophic climate change could happen with 50 years

London, September 27 2009 - An average global temperature rise of 7.2F (4C), considered a dangerous tipping point, could happen by 2060, causing droughts around the world, sea level rises and the collapse of important ecosystems, it warns.
> www.telegraph.co.uk: Met Office: catastrophic climate change could happen with 50 years
> Oxford Conference 4 Degrees and Beyond

World heading for abyss on climate change: UN chief

Geneva, September 3, 2009 - U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon called on Thursday for swifter work on a new climate treaty to fend off what he said could be economic disaster with a surge in sea levels of up to 2 meters (6.5 ft) by 2100.
The world is accelerating towards an abyss on climate change, the UN chief Ban Ki-moon warned, urging rapid progress in troubled talks to cut emissions and tackle global warming.
"Our foot is stuck on the accelerator and we are heading towards an abyss," the United Nations Secretary General said in a speech to the World Climate Conference.
"We will pay a high price if we do not act," he told a 155-nation climate conference in Geneva of negotiations on a new United Nations deal to combat global warming that is due to be agreed in December in Copenhagen.
"Unless we fight climate change, unless we stop this trend, we’ll have devastating consequences for humanity."
> www.un.org: From Polar ice rim, Ban issues call for urgent action on climate change
> www.reuters.com: U.N.'s Ban seeks tough climate pact, warns of disaster
> news.yahoo.com: World heading for abyss on climate change: UN chief
> www.google.com: UN's Ban to see climate change effects on North Pole trip (Aug 25)
> blog.norway.com: Video from Ban Ki-moon’s visit to Svalbard

IPCC's Pachauri: World on Track to Meet Worst Climate Change Projections
New York, August 27 2009 - Global greenhouse gas emissions are on an accelerating trend and if left unchecked, could lead to a 6.4 degree C (11.5 degree F) temperature increase by the end of the century, exceeding conservative estimates, Dr. Rajendra Pachauri, Chair of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) told delegates at the UN on 26 August.
> www.un.org: World on Track to Meet Worst Climate Change Projections

UN warns of 'megadisasters' linked to climate change

New York, June 17th, 2009 - Some of the world's biggest cities are at growing risk of "megadisasters", the UN's humanitarian chief said Tuesday, warning that climate change was behind a rising number of natural catastrophes.
The United Nations on Tuesday raised the prospect of "megadisasters" affecting millions of people in some of the world's biggest cities unless more is done to heed the threat of climate change.
www.physorg.com: UN warns of 'megadisasters' linked to climate change

Gaia proponent Lovelock says it’s time to adapt to inevitable global heating

Seattle, June 16 2009 - What is it with Preeminent Thinkers and intensely bleak public lectures? Two weeks ago Earth Institute economist Jeffrey Sachs, in an address at the Asia Society in New York, argued that climate change cannot be averted without massive use of unproven carbon-capture and sequestration technology and that China will provide little to no political help in curbing emissions.
On Monday night at Seattle’s Town Hall, British scientist James Lovelock gave a prediction of the effects of climate change that was even more dire. Efforts to cut greenhouse gas emissions are just fine, he said. They just won’t amount to much.
Our main task, should the earth continue to heat, is to adapt and learn how to survive,” he said. “We’re unlikely to become extinct by global heating, but we may be cut back to one billion people or less.”
www.grist.org: Gaia proponent Lovelock says it’s time to adapt to inevitable global heating
"Gaia" Scientist Lovelock Says Life Doomed By Climate Woes

Postlethwaite lambasts climate deniers on eve of green film premiere
London, March 15 2009 - Actor Pete Postlethwaite yesterday denounced climate change deniers as a "negative force" with their "heads in the sand". Ahead of Sunday's premiere of The Age of Stupid, an environmental doomsday docudrama, he compared those who do not accept that human-induced global warming is occurring with Holocaust deniers, and said the evidence for global change is now beyond doubt.
www.guardian.co.uk: Postlethwaite lambasts climate deniers on eve of green film premiere
www.imdb.com: External reviews for The Age of Stupid

Britain's Prince Charles sees time running out to save planet
Santiago, March 11 2009 - Time is running out to save the world from the ravages of climate change and prevent economic meltdown and a flood of environmental refugees, Britain's Prince Charles has warned on a visit to Chile.
www.reuters.com: Britain's Prince Charles sees time running out to save planet

Climate change disaster film aims to save planet from destruction
London, March 1 2009 - From kidnap threats to stomach-churning helicopter rides, The Age of Stupid team reveal the lengths they went to make the film exclusively at Guardian environment.

Time capsule: What went wrong

Will future generations condemn our sluggish response to climate change? Hindsight is 20/20, and looking back from a global catastrophe ought to make it sharper still. Small comfort for survivors, like The Age of Stupid's narrator. On a ruined Earth in 2055, holed up in the fortress-like Global Archive, the film's fictional guide — played with gravitas by Pete Postlethwaite — trolls back through actual news clips and documentary footage captured 50 years earlier, trying to find out what went wrong.
> www.nature.com: Time capsule: What went wrong

"Gaia" Scientist Lovelock Says Life Doomed By Climate Woes

James Lovelock with Gaia, the godess Mother Earth (Photo: http://www.ecolo.org/lovelock/lovebioen.htm)

London, February 26 2009 - Climate change will wipe out most life on Earth by the end of this century and mankind is too late to avert catastrophe, a leading British climate scientist said.
James Lovelock, 89, famous for his Gaia theory of the Earth being a kind of living organism, said higher temperatures will turn parts of the world into desert and raise sea levels, flooding other regions.
His apocalyptic theory foresees crop failures, drought and death on an unprecedented scale. The population of this hot, barren world could shrink from about seven billion to one billion by 2100 as people compete for ever-scarcer resources.
> planetark.org: "Gaia" Scientist Lovelock Says Life Doomed By Climate Woes
> www.telegraph.co.uk: Britain will become one big city in order to cope with climate change refugees
> www.telegraph.co.uk / James Lovelock: Reducing emissions could speed global warming
> 'The Revenge of Gaia' Books & Debate (2006)
> Lovelock: Enjoy life while you can (March 1 2008)

How to survive the coming century

As deserts encroach on fertile land, as it has near Dunhuang, China, people will be forced to move towards the poles

London, February 25 2009 - Alligators basking off the English coast; a vast Brazilian desert; the mythical lost cities of Saigon, New Orleans, Venice and Mumbai; and 90 per cent of humanity vanished. Welcome to the world warmed by 4 °C."
Clearly this is a vision of the future that no one wants, but it might happen. Fearing that the best efforts to curb greenhouse gas emissions may fail, or that planetary climate feedback mechanisms will accelerate warming, some scientists and economists are considering not only what this world of the future might be like, but how it could sustain a growing human population. They argue that surviving in the kinds of numbers that exist today, or even more, will be possible, but only if we use our uniquely human ingenuity to cooperate as a species to radically reorganise our world.
www.newscientist.com: How to survive the coming century

Risks of global warming have been underestimated
Potsdam , February 23 2009 - The risks of severe climate impacts increase drastically with only small increases in global mean temperature. An international team of researchers has reinvestigated the five “reasons for concern” described first in the Third Assessment Report by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) in 2001, and revised a graphic depiction of their sensitivities to increases in global mean temperature. The diagram shows clearly how the borderline to dangerous climate change could be crossed much earlier than previously thought but also that ambitioned climate policy could minimize the associated risks.
> www.pik-potsdam.de: Risks of global warming have been underestimated

The Vanishing Face of Gaia
London, February 21 2009 - It is now a commonplace that there is a plausible threat to the welfare of our species from the environmental damage caused by us. This notion, with its echoes of the Mutual Assured Destruction of the Cold War, has in recent years evolved rapidly from minority obsession to international political preoccupation. Many eminent scientists have joined in as the debate has rolled on, but only a handful can claim that they were seminal. Prime among the small group of pioneers is James Lovelock.
> timesonline.co.uk: The Vanishing Face of Gaia by James Lovelock

Scientists: Pace of Climate Change Exceeds Estimates
Chicago, February 14 2009 - The pace of global warming is likely to be much faster than recent predictions, because industrial greenhouse gas emissions have increased more quickly than expected and higher temperatures are triggering self-reinforcing feedback mechanisms in global ecosystems.
> www.washingtonpost.com / Scientists: Pace of Climate Change Exceeds Estimates

Global Warming Is Irreversible, Study Says
Washington, February 10 2009 - Climate change is essentially irreversible, according to a sobering new scientific study. As carbon dioxide emissions continue to rise, the world will experience more and more long-term environmental disruption. The damage will persist even when, and if, emissions are brought under control, says study author Susan Solomon, who is among the world's top climate scientists.
> www.npr.org: Global Warming Is Irreversible, Study Says
> www.pnas.org: Irreversible climate change due to carbon dioxide emissions [abstract + Full Text (PDF)]
> www.pnas.org: Irreversible climate change due to carbon dioxide emissions [Full Text (HTML)]

Gore warns US Senate of planetary emergency
Washington, January 28, 2009 - Former Vice President Al Gore warned senators today of dire consequences from global warming, using his famous slide show to urge Congress to force reductions in U.S. greenhouse gas emissions and to call for completion of an international climate treaty by year's end.
stopwarming.eu: Gore warns US Senate of planetary emergency

President 'has four years to save Earth'
London, January 18, 2009 - Barack Obama has only four years to save the world. That is the stark assessment of Nasa scientist and leading climate expert Jim Hansen who last week warned only urgent action by the new president could halt the devastating climate change that now threatens Earth. Crucially, that action will have to be taken within Obama's first administration, he added.
www.guardian.co.uk: President 'has four years to save Earth'

Hansen: 'We have only four years left to act on climate change - America has to lead'
Washington, January 18 2009 - Jim Hansen is the 'grandfather of climate change' and one of the world's leading climatologists. In this rare interview in New York, he explains why President Obama's administration is the last chance to avoid flooded cities, species extinction and climate catastrophe.
www.guardian.co.uk: 'We have only four years left to act on climate change - America has to lead'

100 months to save the world
London, January 1, 2009 - Averting climatic catastrophe is still achievable but we might need to learn from the Victorians about applying ourselves.
From today, based on the best estimates available, we have eight years to head-off potentially uncontrollable climatic upheaval. What can happen in eight years? Quite a lot, actually. A world war can begin, and end. Two, in fact...
www.guardian.com.uk: 100 months to save the world

Beyond borders: the need for strategic global adaptation
London, December 31, 2008 - The ‘adaptation is local’ mantra is no longer valid. Climate impacts are pervasive, inevitably crossing geographic and political boundaries. And they will be severe. Some top scientists now say we should prepare for a rise in global mean surface temperature of 4 °C – even though most impact and adaptation research is based on 2 °C. What will this mean for adaptation? We need to move far beyond measures like National Adaptation Plans of Action. The ramifications of this new scenario are much more than physical and biological: there are significant socioeconomic and geopolitical implications on a par with those of mitigation. Adaptation must be understood, negotiated and financed in that light.
www.iied.org: Beyond borders: the need for strategic global adaptation

400 ppm CO2 = Forested, ice-free Arctic, 24 m higher seas
Quebec (CND) December 16, 2008 - "Three million years ago, when CO2 was estimated to be 400 ppm, new fossil evidence shows forests dominated the Arctic instead the ice, snow and permafrost. Sea levels were 24 meters higher than today, according to the new study by the U.S. Geological Survey."
www.stopwarming.eu: 400 ppm CO2 = Forested, ice-free Arctic, 24 m higher seas
www.ips.net: Chasm Widens Between Science and Policy

One Shot Left
London, November 25, 2008 - (by George Monbiot) - George Bush is behaving like a furious defaulter whose home is about to be repossessed. Smashing the porcelain, ripping the doors off their hinges, he is determined that there will be nothing worth owning by the time the bastards kick him out. His midnight regulations, opening America’s wilderness to logging and mining, trashing pollution controls, tearing up conservation laws, will do almost as much damage in the last 60 days of his presidency as he achieved in the foregoing 3000.
www.monbiot.com: One Shot Left

Climate Disasters a "Significant Possibility," Says Nobel Laureate Steve Chu

Steve Chu

Copenhagen (DK), November 3, 2008 - Since the IPCC report came out in 2007, new data point to even more alarming scenarios. We underestimate the risk and ignore the fact that the planet is threatened with "sudden, unpredictable, and irreversible disaster," says Steve Chu, one of the world's leading climate and energy experts.
www.copenhagenclimatecouncil.com: Climate Disasters a "Significant Possibility," Says Nobel Laureate Steve Chu
www.copenhagenclimatecouncil.com: Clear and Present Danger: A Conversation With Nobel Laureate Steve Chu on the Risks of Climate Change

Global Warming: Beyond the Tipping Point
October 1 2008 - The world's most outspoken climatologist argues that today's carbon dioxide levels are already dangerously too high. What can we do if he is right?
www.sciam.com / Global Warming: Beyond the Tipping Point

Impacts: On the Threshold of Abrupt Climate Changes
Berkeley (CA / US), September 18 2008 - Abrupt climate change is a potential menace that hasn’t received much attention. That’s about to change. Through its Climate Change Prediction Program, the U.S. Department of Energy’s Office of Biological and Environmental Research (OBER) recently launched IMPACTS – Investigation of the Magnitudes and Probabilities of Abrupt Climate Transitions – a program led by William Collins of Berkeley Lab’s Earth Sciences Division (ESD) that brings together six national laboratories to attack the problem of abrupt climate change, or ACC.
newscenter.lbl.gov: IMPACTS: On the Threshold of Abrupt Climate Changes
newscenter.lbl.gov: Catching Up With Climate

'Calm before storm' may foreshadow climatic tipping point
Wageningen / Potsdam (NL), September 17 2008 - Abrupt climate change has occurred on earth many times over the past millions of years. climate scientists hypothesize that these sharp transitions may be caused when the earth system reaches a tipping point, or a critical value, resulting in a change of several degrees. These abrupt transitions have caused, for example, the formation and melting of glaciers throughout the earth, North Africa’s change from savannah to desert 5,000 years ago, and various other changes.
www.physorg.com: 'Calm before storm' may foreshadow climatic tipping point

Warming World in Range of Dangerous Consequences
San Diego (Cal/USA), September 15 2008 - Even if greenhouse gas emissions are fixed at 2005 levels, new analysis shows that irreversible warming will lead to biodiversity loss and substantial glacial melt.
The earth will warm about 2.4° C (4.3° F) above pre-industrial levels even under extremely conservative greenhouse-gas emission scenarios and under the assumption that efforts to clean up particulate pollution continue to be successful, according to a new analysis by a pair of researchers at Scripps Institution of Oceanography at UC San Diego.
That amount of warming falls within what the world's leading climate change authority recently set as the threshold range of temperature increase that would lead to widespread loss of biodiversity, deglaciation and other adverse consequences in nature. The researchers, writing in the online edition of the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, argue that coping with these circumstances will require "transformational research for guiding the path of future energy consumption."
scrippsnews.ucsd.edu: Warming World in Range of Dangerous Consequences

Can engineering the earth save it from catastrophe?
London, September 1 2008 - Fears that the world is not doing enough to cut carbon dioxide emissions are forcing scientists to "think the unthinkable" by taking seriously the idea that humans may have to alter the global climate artificially with mega-engineering projects.
The Royal Society will launch a study later this year aimed at reviewing the possibility of saving the planet by "geoengineering" the climate on the grandest scales imaginable.
www.independent.co.uk: Can engineering the earth save it from catastrophe?
www.guardian.co.uk: Extreme and risky action the only way to tackle global warming, say scientists

Report identifies areas where natural disasters could hit hardest
August 24, 2008 - (source: www.grist.org) - Natural disasters made more severe by climate change will hit especially hard in regions with shaky political, economic, and security situations, says a new report from the United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs and relief agency CARE International. Vulnerable areas include central Africa, the Horn of Africa, and the Sahel region in northern Africa; Afghanistan, the Caspian region, India, Iran, and Pakistan; and Cambodia, Indonesia, Laos, and Myanmar. "The likelihood of floods, violent storms, and droughts resulting in disasters is determined by a number of factors, including timely access to proper equipment, information, and the capacity to exert political influence," says CARE's Charles Ehrhart. More frequent and intense extreme-weather events, he notes, "will not necessarily cause a corresponding rise in disasters if world leaders act now." The report recommends that humanitarian groups help strengthen local disaster preparedness and response capacity and focus beyond short-term aid.
www.alertnet.org: Joint study identifies humanitarian hotspots and warns of dire consequences unless world leaders act now
www.careclimatechange.org: To the report

Scripps Scientist Warns of Mass Extinctions and 'Rise of Slime'
San Diego (US) August 13, 2008 - Human activities are cumulatively driving the health of the world's oceans down a rapid spiral, and only prompt and wholesale changes will slow or perhaps ultimately reverse the catastrophic problems they are facing.
scrippsnews.ucsd.edu: Oceans on the Precipice

Climate change catastrophe by degrees
August 7, 2008 - Bob Watson rightly warns us to prepare for 4C global warming. To avoid that, we must make drastic CO2 cuts now.
Unfortunately, Professor Bob Watson is not speaking out of turn in telling the world to prepare for four degrees of global warming. "Mitigate for two degrees; adapt for four" has long been the catchphrase among climate negotiators and campaigners. Translated, that means: try to reduce emissions to stay below two degrees of warming, but also prepare for the worst.
www.guardian.co.uk: Climate change catastrophe by degrees

Prepare for global temperature rise of 4C, warns top scientist
August 5/11, 2008 - Defra's chief adviser says we need strategy to adapt to potential catastrophic increase. The UK should take active steps to prepare for dangerous climate change of perhaps 4C according to one of the government's chief scientific advisers.
In policy areas such as flood protection, agriculture and coastal erosion Professor Bob Watson said the country should plan for the effects of a 4C global average rise on pre-industrial levels. The EU is committed to limiting emissions globally so that temperatures do not rise more than 2C.
www.guardian.co.uk: Climate change: Prepare for global temperature rise of 4C, warns top scientist
www.guardian.co.uk: On a planet 4C hotter, all we can prepare for is extinction
www.guardian.co.uk: Denial lies at the heart of climate change policy

The final countdown: '100 months' to stop overheating
London, August 1, 2008 - Time is fast running out to stop irreversible climate change, a group of global warming experts warns today. We have only 100 months to avoid disaster. Andrew Simms explains why we must act now - and where to begin.
Rising greenhouse gas emissions could pass a critical tipping point and trigger runaway global warming within the next 100 months, according to a report today.
The estimate from the New Economics Foundation is based on when emissions will reach such high levels that it "is no longer likely" the world will be able to avoid a 2C rise in average temperatures. "We know climate change is a huge problem, but there's a missing ingredient of urgency," said Andrew Simms, policy director at the foundation.
www.guardian.co.uk: The final countdown
www.guardian.co.uk: '100 months' to stop overheating
www.onehundredmonths.org: The final countdown

Extinction looms for many more species
London, 2 July 2008 The study of a beetle has shown that the true number of species at risk of extinction is likely to be many times higher than the official estimate of 16,000.
Endangered species may become extinct 100 times faster than previously thought, scientists warned today, in a bleak re-assessment of the threat to global biodiversity.
Extinction risks for natural populations of endangered species are likely being underestimated because of a mathematical "misdiagnosis," according to a new study led by a University of Colorado at Boulder researcher.
www.telegraph.co.uk: Extinction looms for many more species
www.guardian.co.uk: Wildlife extinction rates 'seriously underestimated'
www.eurekalert.org: Species extinction threat underestimated due to math glitch, says CU-Boulder study

Extreme floods, storms seen increasing in North America
New York, June 20, 2008 - Floods, droughts and severe storms are likely to ravage North America more frequently as emissions of planet-warming gases rise, according to a U.S. government study.
Extreme weather events, "could seriously affect" human health, agricultural production, and the availability and quality of water in the future, according to the report, issued by the Climate Change Science Program on Thursday.
>www.reuters.com: Extreme floods, storms seen increasing in North America
>www.noaanews.noaa.gov: Scientific Assessment Captures Effects of a Changing Climate on Extreme Weather Events in North America
>www.noaanews.noaa.gov: Expected climate change in a nutshell

Climate chaos is inevitable. We can only avert oblivion
London, June 12 2008 - (by Mark Lynas) - At best we will limit the extent of global warming, but Kyoto barely helps. Does humanity have the foresight to save itself?
Sometimes we need to think the unthinkable, particularly when dealing with a problem as dangerous as climate change - there is no room for dogma when considering the future habitability of our planet. It was in this spirit that I and a panel of other specialists in climate, economics and policy-making met under the aegis of the Stockholm Network thinktank to map out future scenarios for how international policy might evolve - and what the eventual impact might be on the earth's climate. We came up with three alternative visions of the future, and asked experts at the Met Office Hadley Centre to run them through its climate models to give each a projected temperature rise. The results were both surprising, and profoundly disturbing.
www.guardian.co.uk: Climate chaos is inevitable
Britain's climate target 'impossible' (June 8)

Apocalyptic Climate and Global Ecological Warnings Justified
Washington, April 23 2008 - Ecological Internet and Climate Change Blog are dedicated to highlighting the severity of global ecological crises, including threatened abrupt climate change, while promoting rigorous and sufficient biocentric responses. Now more main-stream think tanks and environmentalists are catching up with them.
www.climateark.org: Apocalyptic Climate and Global Ecological Warnings Justified
www.climateark.org / New Scientist: Why the demise of civilisation may be inevitable

Nicholas Stern says climate change worse than he thought
London, April 18 2008 - Nicholas Stern, the British economist known for a major report in which he declared that combating climate change would cost less than ignoring it, has announced that he was wrong -- about how bad the problem is. "We badly underestimated the degree of damages and the risks of climate change" in the Oct. 2006 report, he said in a speech Wednesday.
"All of the links in the chain are on average worse than we thought a couple of years ago." Thawing permafrost is releasing methane, oceans are acidifying faster than expected, and carbon sinks are becoming less effective, said Stern.
He urged nations to come up with a stringent global climate treaty taking food production into account, and reiterated that the world should aim to produce zero-carbon electricity by 2050 (he backs carbon sequestration, nuclear power, and renewable energy). "This is about buying down risk," Stern said. "Starting now, that means it requires at least 1 percent of world GDP. That is small relative to a planetary catastrophe." (bron: grist.org)
www.guardian.co.uk: 'The problem is more serious than we thought'
www.planetark.com: Climate Expert Stern Says Underestimated roblem

Coming Ecological Collapse: Failing Ecosystems the Mother of All Bubbles
April 11 2008 - Ecological overshoot whereby humanity exceeds the Earth's carrying capacity is the mother of all "bubbles". Within the current sub-prime mortgage and financial bubbles, and food and energy price increases, we are witnessing the logical and inevitable economic consequences of over-population, resource scarcity, inequitable and unreasonable consumption, and unsustainable economic growth. Growth and livelihoods based upon unreasonable presumptions of continued resource outputs from dwindling ecosystems are a dangerous, unprecedented "ecological bubble" that threatens civilization and mass apocalyptic death.
earthmeanders.blogspot.com: Coming Ecological Collapse: Failing Ecosystems the Mother of All Bubbles

Nobel scientist warns on climate change
Miami, April 5, 2008 - The Nobel Prize-winning scientist who rang the first alarm bells over the ozone hole issued a warming about climate change on Saturday, saying there could be "almost irreversible consequences" if the Earth warmed 2.5 degrees Celsius (4.5 degrees F) above what it ought to be.
www.reuters.com: Nobel scientist warns on climate change

Lovelock: 'Enjoy life while you can'

London, March 1 2008 - Climate science maverick James Lovelock believes catastrophe is inevitable, carbon offsetting is a joke and ethical living a scam. So what would he do?
In 1965 executives at Shell wanted to know what the world would look like in the year 2000. They consulted a range of experts, who speculated about fusion-powered hovercrafts and "all sorts of fanciful technological stuff". When the oil company asked the scientist James Lovelock, he predicted that the main problem in 2000 would be the environment. "It will be worsening then to such an extent that it will seriously affect their business," he said.
"And of course," Lovelock says, with a smile 43 years later, "that's almost exactly what's happened."
www.guardian.co.uk / James Lovelock: 'Enjoy life while you can'
ZN May/July 2006: The Revenge of Gaia, book and debate