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14/05/07, Daniel Howden, Deforestation: The hidden cause of global warming, Source.
04/05/07, Spiegel, The Worst May Be Avoidable, Source.
14/05/07, Daniel Howden, Deforestation: The hidden cause of global warming, (Back).
In the next 24 hours, deforestation will release as much CO2 into the atmosphere as 8 million people flying from London to New York. Stopping the loggers is the fastest and cheapest solution to climate change. So why are global leaders turning a blind eye to this crisis?
The accelerating destruction of the rainforests that form a precious cooling band around the Earth's equator, is now being recognised as one of the main causes of climate change. Carbon emissions from deforestation far outstrip damage caused by planes and automobiles and factories.
The rampant slashing and burning of tropical forests is second only to the energy sector as a source of greenhouses gases according to report published today by the Oxford-based Global Canopy Programme, an alliance of leading rainforest scientists.
Figures from the GCP, summarising the latest findings from the United Nations, and building on estimates contained in the Stern Report, show deforestation accounts for up to 25 per cent of global emissions of heat-trapping gases, while transport and industry account for 14 per cent each; and aviation makes up only 3 per cent of the total.
"Tropical forests are the elephant in the living room of climate change," said Andrew Mitchell, the head of the GCP.
Scientists say one days' deforestation is equivalent to the carbon footprint of eight million people flying to New York. Reducing those catastrophic emissions can be achieved most quickly and most cheaply by halting the destruction in Brazil, Indonesia, the Congo and elsewhere.
No new technology is needed, says the GCP, just the political will and a system of enforcement and incentives that makes the trees worth more to governments and individuals standing than felled. "The focus on technological fixes for the emissions of rich nations while giving no incentive to poorer nations to stop burning the standing forest means we are putting the cart before the horse," said Mr Mitchell.
Most people think of forests only in terms of the CO2 they absorb. The rainforests of the Amazon, the Congo basin and Indonesia are thought of as the lungs of the planet. But the destruction of those forests will in the next four years alone, in the words of Sir Nicholas Stern, pump more CO2 into the atmosphere than every flight in the history of aviation to at least 2025.
Indonesia became the third-largest emitter of greenhouse gases in the world last week. Following close behind is Brazil. Neither nation has heavy industry on a comparable scale with the EU, India or Russia and yet they comfortably outstrip all other countries, except the United States and China.
What both countries do have in common is tropical forest that is being cut and burned with staggering swiftness. Smoke stacks visible from space climb into the sky above both countries, while satellite images capture similar destruction from the Congo basin, across the Democratic Republic of Congo, the Central African Republic and the Republic of Congo.
According to the latest audited figures from 2003, two billion tons of CO2 enters the atmosphere every year from deforestation. That destruction amounts to 50 million acres - or an area the size of England, Wales and Scotland felled annually.
The remaining standing forest is calculated to contain 1,000 billion tons of carbon, or double what is already in the atmosphere.
As the GCP's report concludes: "If we lose forests, we lose the fight against climate change."
Standing forest was not included in the original Kyoto protocols and stands outside the carbon markets that the report from the International Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) pointed to this month as the best hope for halting catastrophic warming.
The landmark Stern Report last year, and the influential McKinsey Report in January agreed that forests offer the "single largest opportunity for cost-effective and immediate reductions of carbon emissions".
International demand has driven intensive agriculture, logging and ranching that has proved an inexorable force for deforestation; conservation has been no match for commerce. The leading rainforest scientists are now calling for the immediate inclusion of standing forests in internationally regulated carbon markets that could provide cash incentives to halt this disastrous process.
Forestry experts and policy makers have been meeting in Bonn, Germany, this week to try to put deforestation on top of the agenda for the UN climate summit in Bali, Indonesia, this year. Papua New Guinea, among the world's poorest nations, last year declared it would have no choice but to continue deforestation unless it was given financial incentives to do otherwise.
Richer nations already recognise the value of uncultivated land. The EU offers €200 (£135) per hectare subsidies for "environmental services" to its farmers to leave their land unused.
And yet there is no agreement on placing a value on the vastly more valuable land in developing countries. More than 50 per cent of the life on Earth is in tropical forests, which cover less than 7 per cent of the planet's surface.
They generate the bulk of rainfall worldwide and act as a thermostat for the Earth. Forests are also home to 1.6 billion of the world's poorest people who rely on them for subsistence. However, forest experts say governments continue to pursue science fiction solutions to the coming climate catastrophe, preferring bio-fuel subsidies, carbon capture schemes and next-generation power stations.
Putting a price on the carbon these vital forests contain is the only way to slow their destruction. Hylton Philipson, a trustee of Rainforest Concern, explained: "In a world where we are witnessing a mounting clash between food security, energy security and environmental security - while there's money to be made from food and energy and no income to be derived from the standing forest, it's obvious that the forest will take the hit."
04/05/07, Spiegel, The Worst May Be Avoidable, (Back).
The worst consequences of climate change can still be avoided -- if humanity acts quickly. The IPCC has determined that doing so would cost just 0.1 percent of world GDP. But the rise in CO2 emissions would have to stop by 2015.
The costs are not the problem -- time is. The UN's Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) is calling for a strict timetable to prevent the worst consequences of global warming. The IPCC issued its report "Mitigation of Climate Change" on Friday in Bangkok.
The goal set by the climate experts is as follows: CO2 emissions need to be reduced by between 50 and 85 percent by 2050. That would require global CO2 emissions to begin sinking in 2015. If that's achieved, the extent of global warming can probably be limited to an average temperature increase of between one and two degrees Celsius (1.8 and 3.6 degrees Fahrenheit) by 2100. The costs would amount to 0.12 percent of the world's total GDP -- a small percentage but an enormous sum. But IPCC argues that investing in mitigation will pays off.
The first two parts of the IPCC's report show that the human contribution to global warming has become very difficult to disprove. Virtually no one doubts the reality of a man-made greenhouse effect any more. The first part of the IPCC report, issued in Paris in February, summarized the scientific foundations of climate research. The second part, published in Brussels before Easter, described the consequences of climate change -- some of which can be observed already.
Preventing the worst
The third part of the report details current knowledge about how the worst consequences can be prevented. The researchers distinguish between short-term (up until 2030) and long-term mitigating measures. The most immediate measures outlined in the report call for the use of biofuels and renewable energy sources, as well as greater energy efficiency.
In an interview with the German news agency DPA, Flensburg-based climate expert Olav Hohmeyer summarized the message of the third part of the report: "First, we don't have much time left to act. The target values for emissions reduction need to be more ambitious. Second, we have all the technologies we need in order to handle the problem in a sustainable way. Third, we have to act and must not wait another 10 years. Fourth, the possibilites for action are worth the price."
THE INTERGOVERNMENTAL PANEL ON CLIMATE CHANGE (IPCC)
The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) was established by the United Nations Environment Program (UNEP) and the World Meteorological Organization (WMO) in 1988. Rajendra Kumar Pachauri, an Indian national, has been the IPCC's chairman since May of 2002.
The role of the IPCC is to explore and assess the scientific, technical and socio-economic information relevant to human-induced climate change in a comprehensive, objective and unbiased manner. The panel, which includes hundreds of scientists from all over the world, is designed to analyze the consequences and risks of climate change and to explore how they can be mitigated or adjusted to.
The IPCC does not carry out its own research projects. It bases its assessment mainly on peer-reviewed and published scientific literature.
The IPCC has produced assessment reports on the findings of climate experts in 1990, 1995, 2001 and 2007. The current report is divided into several parts, some of which still need to be published.
Three work groups are contributing to the assessment report. Working Group I assesses the scientific aspects of climate change. Working Group II assesses the vulnerability of socio-economic and natural systems to climate change, negative and positive consequences of climate change and options for adapting to it. Working Group III assesses options for mitigating climate change.
The IPCC's first assessment report, released in 1990, still spoke of a natural greenhouse effect being intensified by human activity. The 2001 report went much further: It argued that human-caused greenhouse gas emissions are responsible for most global warming. The 2001 report also increasingly referred approvingly to computer simulations designed to predict likely future trends. Governments and industry representatives sometimes reacted with harsh criticism.
The 2001 IPCC report predicted that the average temperature on the Earth's surface would rise by between 1.4 and 5.8 degrees Centigrade (2.52 degrees Fahrenheit to 10.44 degrees Fahrenheit) by 2100. The new report narrows the range to between 2 and 4.5 degrees Centigrade and cites three degrees Centigrade as the most likely figure.
Experts now believe that a temperature increase of less than 2 degrees Centigrade will lead to a marked increase in extreme weather but ultimately remain manageable, whereas a higher temperature increase will lead to catastrophic results.
The 2007 IPCC report is based on the calculations of hundreds of models -- polished computer models, countless studies and measurements. The report's 450 main authors have delivered the most precise description to date of what has caused temperatures to rise from 1800 right up to now. About 2,500 experts worked over the past six years on IPCC's fourth study.
In its summary, the report estimates that temperatures in the next 30 years will rise by 0.7 degrees Celcius. By 2100, temperatures could raise by as much as 6.4 degrees Celcius depending on the amount of greenhouse gases the are released into the atmosphere.
Researches predict the most dramatic changes will take place in the northern-most latitudes. Evidence of the dramatic consequences of climate change can already be seen in the Arctic. But southern oceans and the Atlantic are expected to be less effected.
The delegates had to work through a total of 140 pages and almost 1,000 suggested changes and additions during the past week in order to produce the final version of their document. The politically important "Summary for Policymakers" is 35 pages long.
Political influence
China openly made strong efforts to influence some of the key statements. Their efforts, though, were unsuccessful or only partly successful, according to statements by delegation members who left the negotiations on Friday morning.
Still, Hohmeyer is not entirely pleased with the final version of the report's third part. In his view, the lack of sustainable solutions proposed -- such as nuclear energy or pumping CO2 into underground deposits -- has not been sufficiently taken into account.
Countries such as the United States or France view nuclear energy as a climate-friendly alternative. But the problematic environmental record of nuclear technology has left many researchers skeptical. On Thursday of this week, Germany's Federal Minister of Education and Research, Annette Schavan of the Christian Democrat Party (CDU), said during a climate conference in Hamburg that nuclear technology could be a provisional resort until sufficient renewable technologies and energy efficiency have been achieved.
Schaven believes Germany should become a model country for climate protection. "We need a boost now," she says. The minister has renewed her commitment to make €255 million ($346 million) available for research on climate change during the next three years. Schavan also wants to present a national high-tech strategy for climate protection by mid-October.
Following Friday's publication of the third part of the IPCC report, the complete and final document will be issued in Valencia, Spain in November. The documents produced in 2007 constitute the fourth report issued by the IPCC to date. It will be the basis for negotiations on further policy measures after the expiration of the Kyoto Protocol in 2012. Those negotiations will begin in Bali at the end of this year.
(Back).
04/05/07, Spiegel, The Worst May Be Avoidable, Source.
14/05/07, Daniel Howden, Deforestation: The hidden cause of global warming, (Back).
In the next 24 hours, deforestation will release as much CO2 into the atmosphere as 8 million people flying from London to New York. Stopping the loggers is the fastest and cheapest solution to climate change. So why are global leaders turning a blind eye to this crisis?
The accelerating destruction of the rainforests that form a precious cooling band around the Earth's equator, is now being recognised as one of the main causes of climate change. Carbon emissions from deforestation far outstrip damage caused by planes and automobiles and factories.
The rampant slashing and burning of tropical forests is second only to the energy sector as a source of greenhouses gases according to report published today by the Oxford-based Global Canopy Programme, an alliance of leading rainforest scientists.
Figures from the GCP, summarising the latest findings from the United Nations, and building on estimates contained in the Stern Report, show deforestation accounts for up to 25 per cent of global emissions of heat-trapping gases, while transport and industry account for 14 per cent each; and aviation makes up only 3 per cent of the total.
"Tropical forests are the elephant in the living room of climate change," said Andrew Mitchell, the head of the GCP.
Scientists say one days' deforestation is equivalent to the carbon footprint of eight million people flying to New York. Reducing those catastrophic emissions can be achieved most quickly and most cheaply by halting the destruction in Brazil, Indonesia, the Congo and elsewhere.
No new technology is needed, says the GCP, just the political will and a system of enforcement and incentives that makes the trees worth more to governments and individuals standing than felled. "The focus on technological fixes for the emissions of rich nations while giving no incentive to poorer nations to stop burning the standing forest means we are putting the cart before the horse," said Mr Mitchell.
Most people think of forests only in terms of the CO2 they absorb. The rainforests of the Amazon, the Congo basin and Indonesia are thought of as the lungs of the planet. But the destruction of those forests will in the next four years alone, in the words of Sir Nicholas Stern, pump more CO2 into the atmosphere than every flight in the history of aviation to at least 2025.
Indonesia became the third-largest emitter of greenhouse gases in the world last week. Following close behind is Brazil. Neither nation has heavy industry on a comparable scale with the EU, India or Russia and yet they comfortably outstrip all other countries, except the United States and China.
What both countries do have in common is tropical forest that is being cut and burned with staggering swiftness. Smoke stacks visible from space climb into the sky above both countries, while satellite images capture similar destruction from the Congo basin, across the Democratic Republic of Congo, the Central African Republic and the Republic of Congo.
According to the latest audited figures from 2003, two billion tons of CO2 enters the atmosphere every year from deforestation. That destruction amounts to 50 million acres - or an area the size of England, Wales and Scotland felled annually.
The remaining standing forest is calculated to contain 1,000 billion tons of carbon, or double what is already in the atmosphere.
As the GCP's report concludes: "If we lose forests, we lose the fight against climate change."
Standing forest was not included in the original Kyoto protocols and stands outside the carbon markets that the report from the International Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) pointed to this month as the best hope for halting catastrophic warming.
The landmark Stern Report last year, and the influential McKinsey Report in January agreed that forests offer the "single largest opportunity for cost-effective and immediate reductions of carbon emissions".
International demand has driven intensive agriculture, logging and ranching that has proved an inexorable force for deforestation; conservation has been no match for commerce. The leading rainforest scientists are now calling for the immediate inclusion of standing forests in internationally regulated carbon markets that could provide cash incentives to halt this disastrous process.
Forestry experts and policy makers have been meeting in Bonn, Germany, this week to try to put deforestation on top of the agenda for the UN climate summit in Bali, Indonesia, this year. Papua New Guinea, among the world's poorest nations, last year declared it would have no choice but to continue deforestation unless it was given financial incentives to do otherwise.
Richer nations already recognise the value of uncultivated land. The EU offers €200 (£135) per hectare subsidies for "environmental services" to its farmers to leave their land unused.
And yet there is no agreement on placing a value on the vastly more valuable land in developing countries. More than 50 per cent of the life on Earth is in tropical forests, which cover less than 7 per cent of the planet's surface.
They generate the bulk of rainfall worldwide and act as a thermostat for the Earth. Forests are also home to 1.6 billion of the world's poorest people who rely on them for subsistence. However, forest experts say governments continue to pursue science fiction solutions to the coming climate catastrophe, preferring bio-fuel subsidies, carbon capture schemes and next-generation power stations.
Putting a price on the carbon these vital forests contain is the only way to slow their destruction. Hylton Philipson, a trustee of Rainforest Concern, explained: "In a world where we are witnessing a mounting clash between food security, energy security and environmental security - while there's money to be made from food and energy and no income to be derived from the standing forest, it's obvious that the forest will take the hit."
04/05/07, Spiegel, The Worst May Be Avoidable, (Back).
The worst consequences of climate change can still be avoided -- if humanity acts quickly. The IPCC has determined that doing so would cost just 0.1 percent of world GDP. But the rise in CO2 emissions would have to stop by 2015.
The costs are not the problem -- time is. The UN's Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) is calling for a strict timetable to prevent the worst consequences of global warming. The IPCC issued its report "Mitigation of Climate Change" on Friday in Bangkok.
The goal set by the climate experts is as follows: CO2 emissions need to be reduced by between 50 and 85 percent by 2050. That would require global CO2 emissions to begin sinking in 2015. If that's achieved, the extent of global warming can probably be limited to an average temperature increase of between one and two degrees Celsius (1.8 and 3.6 degrees Fahrenheit) by 2100. The costs would amount to 0.12 percent of the world's total GDP -- a small percentage but an enormous sum. But IPCC argues that investing in mitigation will pays off.
The first two parts of the IPCC's report show that the human contribution to global warming has become very difficult to disprove. Virtually no one doubts the reality of a man-made greenhouse effect any more. The first part of the IPCC report, issued in Paris in February, summarized the scientific foundations of climate research. The second part, published in Brussels before Easter, described the consequences of climate change -- some of which can be observed already.
Preventing the worst
The third part of the report details current knowledge about how the worst consequences can be prevented. The researchers distinguish between short-term (up until 2030) and long-term mitigating measures. The most immediate measures outlined in the report call for the use of biofuels and renewable energy sources, as well as greater energy efficiency.
In an interview with the German news agency DPA, Flensburg-based climate expert Olav Hohmeyer summarized the message of the third part of the report: "First, we don't have much time left to act. The target values for emissions reduction need to be more ambitious. Second, we have all the technologies we need in order to handle the problem in a sustainable way. Third, we have to act and must not wait another 10 years. Fourth, the possibilites for action are worth the price."
THE INTERGOVERNMENTAL PANEL ON CLIMATE CHANGE (IPCC)
The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) was established by the United Nations Environment Program (UNEP) and the World Meteorological Organization (WMO) in 1988. Rajendra Kumar Pachauri, an Indian national, has been the IPCC's chairman since May of 2002.
The role of the IPCC is to explore and assess the scientific, technical and socio-economic information relevant to human-induced climate change in a comprehensive, objective and unbiased manner. The panel, which includes hundreds of scientists from all over the world, is designed to analyze the consequences and risks of climate change and to explore how they can be mitigated or adjusted to.
The IPCC does not carry out its own research projects. It bases its assessment mainly on peer-reviewed and published scientific literature.
The IPCC has produced assessment reports on the findings of climate experts in 1990, 1995, 2001 and 2007. The current report is divided into several parts, some of which still need to be published.
Three work groups are contributing to the assessment report. Working Group I assesses the scientific aspects of climate change. Working Group II assesses the vulnerability of socio-economic and natural systems to climate change, negative and positive consequences of climate change and options for adapting to it. Working Group III assesses options for mitigating climate change.
The IPCC's first assessment report, released in 1990, still spoke of a natural greenhouse effect being intensified by human activity. The 2001 report went much further: It argued that human-caused greenhouse gas emissions are responsible for most global warming. The 2001 report also increasingly referred approvingly to computer simulations designed to predict likely future trends. Governments and industry representatives sometimes reacted with harsh criticism.
The 2001 IPCC report predicted that the average temperature on the Earth's surface would rise by between 1.4 and 5.8 degrees Centigrade (2.52 degrees Fahrenheit to 10.44 degrees Fahrenheit) by 2100. The new report narrows the range to between 2 and 4.5 degrees Centigrade and cites three degrees Centigrade as the most likely figure.
Experts now believe that a temperature increase of less than 2 degrees Centigrade will lead to a marked increase in extreme weather but ultimately remain manageable, whereas a higher temperature increase will lead to catastrophic results.
The 2007 IPCC report is based on the calculations of hundreds of models -- polished computer models, countless studies and measurements. The report's 450 main authors have delivered the most precise description to date of what has caused temperatures to rise from 1800 right up to now. About 2,500 experts worked over the past six years on IPCC's fourth study.
In its summary, the report estimates that temperatures in the next 30 years will rise by 0.7 degrees Celcius. By 2100, temperatures could raise by as much as 6.4 degrees Celcius depending on the amount of greenhouse gases the are released into the atmosphere.
Researches predict the most dramatic changes will take place in the northern-most latitudes. Evidence of the dramatic consequences of climate change can already be seen in the Arctic. But southern oceans and the Atlantic are expected to be less effected.
The delegates had to work through a total of 140 pages and almost 1,000 suggested changes and additions during the past week in order to produce the final version of their document. The politically important "Summary for Policymakers" is 35 pages long.
Political influence
China openly made strong efforts to influence some of the key statements. Their efforts, though, were unsuccessful or only partly successful, according to statements by delegation members who left the negotiations on Friday morning.
Still, Hohmeyer is not entirely pleased with the final version of the report's third part. In his view, the lack of sustainable solutions proposed -- such as nuclear energy or pumping CO2 into underground deposits -- has not been sufficiently taken into account.
Countries such as the United States or France view nuclear energy as a climate-friendly alternative. But the problematic environmental record of nuclear technology has left many researchers skeptical. On Thursday of this week, Germany's Federal Minister of Education and Research, Annette Schavan of the Christian Democrat Party (CDU), said during a climate conference in Hamburg that nuclear technology could be a provisional resort until sufficient renewable technologies and energy efficiency have been achieved.
Schaven believes Germany should become a model country for climate protection. "We need a boost now," she says. The minister has renewed her commitment to make €255 million ($346 million) available for research on climate change during the next three years. Schavan also wants to present a national high-tech strategy for climate protection by mid-October.
Following Friday's publication of the third part of the IPCC report, the complete and final document will be issued in Valencia, Spain in November. The documents produced in 2007 constitute the fourth report issued by the IPCC to date. It will be the basis for negotiations on further policy measures after the expiration of the Kyoto Protocol in 2012. Those negotiations will begin in Bali at the end of this year.
(Back).
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