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OCTOBER 2008

*Special Report: The Presidential Election. The Candidates State Their Positions. (National Wildlife Magazine, October/November 2008. -- First question to John McCain and Barack Obama: "National Wildlife Federation members love spending time in America’s great outdoors, and they are seeing major climate impacts in our forests, rivers, coastal areas and other landscapes. Both you and your opponent have spoken of the need for action to address global warming. As president, what steps will you take through executive action, and what kind of legislation will you seek, to confront global warming?"....

Melting Arctic Ocean Raises Threat of ‘Methane Time Bomb’. By Susan Q. Stranahan, Yale Environment 360, October 30, 2008. -- "Scientists have long believed that thawing permafrost in Arctic soils could release huge amounts of methane, a potent greenhouse gas. Now they are watching with increasing concern as methane begins to bubble up from the bottom of the fast-melting Arctic Ocean."

Troubling toll in Thoreau's backyard. Scientists say species drop amid warming. By Billy Baker, Boston Globe, October 28, 2008. -- "In the 1850s, a few years after he had gone to "live deliberately" in a cabin in the woods at Walden Pond, Henry David Thoreau began to compile detailed records on hundreds of species of plants in his beloved Concord. Those same data now are being used to measure the effect of climate change, and the news is not good, researchers said yesterday. Scientists from Boston University and Harvard reported that 27 percent of the species documented by Thoreau have disappeared, and another 36 percent are in such low numbers that their disappearance is imminent. These findings occur even though most of Concord's natural areas have been protected or undeveloped since Thoreau's time. During that same period, Concord's mean annual temperature climbed by 4 degrees, the researchers said."

Can smoke and mirrors ease global warming? By Alister Doyle. Reuters, October 27, 2008. -- "Oslo -- Backers of extreme technologies to curb global warming advocate dumping iron dust into the seas or placing smoke and mirrors in the sky to dim the sun. But, even though they are seen by some as cheap fixes for climate change when many nations are worried about economic recession, such 'geo-engineering' proposals have to overcome wide criticism that they are fanciful and could have unforeseen side effects...."

Google’s Green Agenda Could Pay Off. By Miguel Helft. Published October 27, 2008, New York Times. -- "San Francisco — Google, the Internet search and advertising giant, is increasingly looking to the energy sector as a potential business opportunity. From its beginning, the company has invested millions of dollars in making its own power-hungry data centers more efficient. Its philanthropic arm has made small investments in clean energy technologies."

It’s time for green stimulus. $100 billion package could go a long way. By Hank Kalet. Published October 26, 2008, Columbia Daily Tribune. -- "We need a green stimulus package. The federal government has placed at least $700 billion on the table to bail out the reckless finance industry. However, it has done little to subsidize the alternative fuel industry, which had nothing to do with the current economic crisis but holds the key to the economy’s - and the environment’s - recovery."

Water-vapor feedback is “strong and positive,” so we face “warming of several degrees Celsius.”Climate Progress, October 26, 2008. -- "A new study in Geophysical Research Letters (subs. req’d), ' Water-vapor climate feedback inferred from climate fluctuations, 2003–2008' analyzed recent variations in surface temperature and 'the response of tropospheric water vapor to these variations.' They concluded that the 'water-vapor feedback implied by these observations is strongly positive' and 'similar to that simulated by climate models.' The analysis concludes: The existence of a strong and positive water-vapor feedback means that projected business-as-usual greenhouse-gas emissions over the next century are virtually guaranteed to produce warming of several degrees Celsius. The only way that will not happen is if a strong, negative, and currently unknown feedback is discovered somewhere in our climate system."

Large solar energy plant opens near Bakersfield. David R. Baker, San Francisco Chronicle, October 24, 2008. -- "California 's big-solar boom is under way. The first of what could be many new, large solar thermal power plants in California opened Thursday north of Bakersfield, on a patch of land surrounded by almond orchards. Designed and built by Palo Alto startup Ausra, the plant's long rows of mirrors will generate as much as 5 megawatts of electricity, enough for 3,750 homes. The mirrors focus sunlight on tubes filled with water, generating steam that then turns a turbine to produce electricity. It is the first large solar thermal plant built in California in 18 years. But Ausra and other companies plan much bigger plants in the future."

*Potent greenhouse gas more common than estimated: study. AFP/hosted by Google. October 23, 2008. -- Washington (AFP) — "A potent greenhouse gas many thousands of times more effective at warming the world's atmosphere than carbon dioxide (CO2) is four times more prevalent than previously thought, according to a study released Thursday. Researchers using a new NASA-funded measurement network discovered there was 4,200 metric tons of the gas nitrogen trifluoride in the atmosphere in 2006, not 1,200 tons as previously estimated for that year. In 2008 there are 5,400 metric tons of the gas in the atmosphere, an average of an 11 percent tonnage increase per year, said Ray Weiss, head of the research team from the Scripps Institution of Oceanography in La Jolla, California. Nitrogen trifluoride, which could not be detected in the atmosphere using previous techniques, is 17,000 times more potent as a global warming agent than a similar mass of CO2. Emissions of nitrogen trifluoride, which is one of several gases used during the manufacture of liquid crystal flat-panel TV displays and electronic microcircuits, were previously considered so low that the gas was not thought to be a significant potential contributor to global warming."

US energy company to warn investors on coal plants. By David B. Caruso, Yahoo Finance, October 23, 2008. -- New York ( Associated Press) – "A major owner of coal-burning power plants has agreed to tell investors more about how global warming could be bad for business. New York Attorney General Andrew Cuomo announced Thursday that the energy company Dynegy Inc. has agreed to put detailed information in its financial filings on any material business risks posed by the outcry over climate change. That could include warning investors about looming government regulations that might make it more expensive to emit carbons, or the possibility that the company could be sued over pollution. The agreement is the second of its type. Xcel Energy Inc. made a similar pledge to Cuomo's office in August and the attorney general has pressured three other power companies to follow suit: AES Corp., Dominion Resources Inc. and Peabody Energy Corp."

With Free Bikes, Challenging Car Culture on Campus. By Katie Zezima, stopglobalwarming.org, October 23, 2008. -- "Biddeford, Me. — When Kylie Galliani started at the University of New England in August, she was given a key to her dorm, a class schedule and something more unusual: a $480 bicycle.... The University of New England and Ripon College in Wisconsin are giving free bikes to freshmen who promise to leave their cars at home. Other colleges are setting up free bike sharing or rental programs, and some universities are partnering with bike shops to offer discounts on purchases."

US wind energy adds 1,400 MW of capacity.Trade group: US wind energy adds 1,400 MW of new capacity during second quarter of 2008. By Dirk Lammers, Associated Press,October 22, 2008, Yahoo Finance. -- "Sioux Falls, S.D. -- The U.S. added nearly 1,400 megawatts of new wind energy capacity during the second quarter of 2008, providing enough electricity to power more than 400,000 homes, according to an industry report released Wednesday."

Alternative Energy Suddenly Faces Headwinds. By Clifford Krauss. Published October 20, 2008, New York Times. Houston — "For all the support that the presidential candidates are expressing for renewable energy, alternative energies like wind and solar are facing big new challenges because of the credit freeze and the plunge in oil and natural gas prices. Shares of alternative energy companies have fallen even more sharply than the rest of the stock market in recent months. The struggles of financial institutions are raising fears that investment capital for big renewable energy projects is likely to get tighter. Advocates are concerned that if the prices for oil and gas keep falling, the incentive for utilities and consumers to buy expensive renewable energy will shrink."

Climate change is 'faster and more extreme' than feared. By Paul Eccleston, Telegraph.co.uk/ wwf.org.uk, October 20, 2008 -- "Climate change is happening much faster than the world's best scientists predicted and will wreak havoc unless action is taken on a global scale, a new report warns. 'Extreme weather events' such as the hot summer of 2003, which caused an extra 35,000 deaths across southern Europe from heat stress and poor air quality, will happen more frequently. Britain and the North Sea area will be hit more often by violent cyclones and the predicted rise in sea level will double to more than a metre, putting vast coastal areas at risk from flooding. The bleak report from WWF - formerly the World Wildlife Fund - also predicts crops failures and the collapse of eco systems on both land and sea…. The agency says that the 2007 report from the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) - a study of global warming by 4,000 scientists from more than 150 countries which alerted the world to the possible consequences of global warming - is now out of date."

Environmental Failure: A Case for a New Green Politics. By James Gustave Speth, Yale Environment 360, October 20, 2008. -- "The U.S. environmental movement is failing – by any measure, the state of the earth has never been more dire. What’s needed, a leading environmentalist writes, is a new, inclusive green politics that challenges basic assumptions about consumerism and unlimited growth. A specter is haunting American environmentalism – the specter of failure. All of us who have been part of the environmental movement in the United States must now face up to a deeply troubling paradox: Our environmental organizations have grown in strength and sophistication, but the environment has continued to go downhill, to the point that the prospect of a ruined planet is now very real. How could this have happened?"

Europe’s Leadership in Carbon Control at Risk in Credit Crisis. By James Kanter. Published October 20, 2008, New York Times. Brussels — "Europe’s role as a global leader in combating climate change risks becoming the next victim of the global financial crisis. As the threats of global recession and rising unemployment loom after the expensive bank bailouts, some European leaders are demanding that the trade bloc backpedal on a pledge announced with much fanfare last spring to cut greenhouse emissions by 20 percent and to generate 20 percent of power through renewable sources by 2020. At a meeting Monday in Luxembourg, the Italian environment minister, Stefania Prestigiacomo, warned that her country had 'many requests for changes,' and would support turning the potentially expensive pledge into law only if the issue could be reviewed again next year. That follows threats by the leaders of Italy, Poland, Latvia and others at the European Union meeting last week in Brussels to veto the measures unless they were softened."

How does solar power work? Chemist Paul Alivisatos explains how to generate electricity from sunlight. By Susannah Locke, Scientific American, October 20, 2008. -- "The sun—that power plant in the sky—bathes Earth in ample energy to fulfill all the world's power needs many times over. It doesn't give off carbon dioxide emissions. It won't run out. And it's free.... Old-school solar technology uses large crystals made out of silicon, which produces an electrical current when struck by light. Silicon can do this because the electrons in the crystal get up and move when exposed to light instead of just jiggling in place to make heat. The silicon turns a good portion of light energy into electricity, but it is expensive because big crystals are hard to grow. Newer materials use smaller, cheaper crystals, such as copper-indium-gallium-selenide, that can be shaped into flexible films. This 'thin-film' solar technology, however, is not as good as silicon at turning light into electricity...."

Offshore Wind May Power the Future. By Emily Waltz, Scientific American, October 20, 2008. -- "Not only are offshore winds stronger but landlubbers have fewer objections to turbines almost invisible from the coast. The waters of the Jersey Shore may soon become home to the nation's first deepwater wind turbines. New Jersey officials recently announced the state would help fund an initiative by Garden State Offshore Energy to build a 350-megawatt wind farm 16 miles (26 kilometers) offshore. The state wants by 2020 many more of these parks, at least 3,000 megawatts worth, or about 13 percent of the state's total electricity needs."

Solar Refrigeration: A Hot Idea for Cooling. How to build a solar refrigerator: The brighter the sun, the better it works. By Duane Schrag, Scientific American, October 20, 2008. -- "Fishermen in the village of Maruata, which is located on the Mexican Pacific coast 18 degrees north of the equator, have no electricity. But for the past 16 years they have been able to store their fish on ice: Seven ice makers, powered by nothing but the scorching sun, churn out a half ton of ice every day.... The solar energy hitting 54 square feet (five square meters) of land each year is the equivalent of all the electricity used by one American household, according to data from the National Renewable Energy Laboratory and Energy Information Administration, both part of the U.S. Department of Energy. Making cold out of hot is easier than one might think. A group of students last year at San Jose State University built a solar-powered ice maker with $100 worth of plumbing and a four-by-eight-foot (1.2-by-2.4-meter) sheet of reflecting steel. No moving parts, no electricity but give it a couple hours of sunshine and it can make a large bag of ice...."

The 'win-win' solution failing the rainforests. Market-based answers to deforestation in Latin America are backfiring, say conservation groups. By Oliver Balch, guardian.co.uk, October 20, 2008. -- "On paper, the idea looks like a conservation masterstroke. Take a huge swath of pristine rainforest, put a price on the rainfall it produces and other 'services', and sell these off to rich philanthropists with a conscience. That's precisely the rescue package dreamt up by investment house Canopy Capital. And it's working. The London-based firm has persuaded 10 wealthy individuals to buy into the 'ecosystem services' of Guyana's heavily forested Iwokrama Reserve. The logic is straightforward. Trees need to be worth more standing up than chopped down. Giving them a 'utility value' is one way of achieving that…. Despite millions being poured into sustainable projects in the Amazon, for example, illegal loggers are still hard at work in the world's largest rainforest. Monthly deforestation rates in August were almost three times higher than the same time last year, according to Brazil's National Institute for Space Research...."

Curbing warming still a goal. Financial crisis won’t halt effort, U.N. says. Published October 15, 2008 Columbia Daily Tribune. Warsaw, Poland (Associated Press) -- "Environment ministers agreed yesterday that the world financial crisis must not halt efforts to combat global warming, the top United Nations climate official said. Officials from the United States, China, Canada, India, the European Union and more than 30 other countries met for two days of informal talks in Warsaw ahead of a climate conference in December. 'There was a very strong consensus that the current financial turmoil should not be an excuse to slow down action on climate change,' U.N. climate chief Yvo de Boer told The Associated Press after the talks. Scientists said the emission of carbon and other greenhouse gases, mostly from fossil fuels, must peak within 10 to 15 years and then drop sharply to avoid potentially catastrophic changes in the climate."

Economy trumps climate. Crisis might thwart greenhouse gas caps. Published October 13, 2008, Columbia Daily Tribune. Washington (Associated Press) -- "The economic free fall gripping the nation might bring down one of the main environmental objectives: capping the greenhouse gases that are blamed for global warming. Democratic leaders in the House and the Senate, and both presidential candidates, continue to rank tackling global warming as a chief goal next year. But the focus on stabilizing the economy probably will make it more difficult to pass a law to reduce carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases. At the very least, it will push back when the reductions would have to start"....

A 'Green New Deal' can save the world's economy, says UN. By Geoffrey Lean, The Independent, October 12, 2008. -- "Top economists and United Nations leaders are working on a 'Green New Deal' to create millions of jobs, revive the world economy, slash poverty and avert environmental disaster, as the financial markets plunge into their deepest crisis since the Great Depression.

Nature loss 'dwarfs bank crisis.' By Richard Black, BBC News, October 10, 2008. -- "The global economy is losing more money from the disappearance of forests than through the current banking crisis, according to an EU-commissioned study. It puts the annual cost of forest loss at between $2 trillion and $5 trillion. The figure comes from adding the value of the various services that forests perform, such as providing clean water and absorbing carbon dioxide."

The Costs of Unconventional Fossil Fuels. By Kate Galbraith, New York Times, October 8, 2008. -- "A new report looks at the economic and environmental tradeoffs associated with oil sands and coal-to-liquids fuel production. Producing fuel in unconventional ways, such as from oil sands or coal, would significantly increase carbon emissions relative to conventional oil production , according to a study released on Wednesday by the RAND Corporation, the nonpartisan research institute based in Santa Monica, Calif. (see also this report summary).

Projects in the wind. Demand for turbines overwhelms makers, causes start-up delays. By Erin Ailworth, Boston Globe, October 8, 2008. -- "A new wind turbine at the Otis Air National Guard Base on Cape Cod was supposed to start cranking soon, generating enough electricity to save about $660,000 a year. But the $4.6 million turbine project - like many others in Massachusetts and elsewhere - is in limbo because key parts of the machine have yet to arrive…. Blame a worldwide parts shortage. For all the talk about renewable energy and heated debates over the siting of wind turbines, the reality is the turbines can't be made fast enough to meet growing demand."

Can Coal Be Clean? A Debate Between Michael Brune of Rainforest Action Network and Joe Lucas of American Coalition for Clean Coal Electricity. Democracy Now,October 7, 2008. [Audio, video, and transcript] -- "While John McCain and Barack Obama have painted clean coal as a panacea that will help solve the nation’s energy problem, many environmental and scientific groups have questioned whether the burning of coal can ever be clean. We host a debate between Rainforest Action Network director Michael Brune, author of the new book Coming Clean: Breaking America’s Addiction to Oil and Coal, and Joe Lucas of the American Coalition for Clean Coal Electricity."

Tax breaks big and small sweeten financial bailout. By Jim Abrams. October 4, 2008. Washington (Associated Press) — "Millions of taxpayers, thousands of businesses and groups as diverse as solar power developers and natural disaster victims will see tax relief with the House vote Friday to approve and send to the president a $700 billion financial rescue plan. The tax relief package attached to the rescue bill promotes renewable energy development and extends dozens of tax breaks from the critical research and development tax credit to breaks for such narrowly focused groups as motor sports racetrack owners, film producers and bicycle commuters. The renewable energy part of the package alone, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi said, will 'create and save half-a-million good-paying jobs in America immediately.' Virtually all of the tax breaks already exist. But many of them expired Jan. 1 for use in the current tax year, and the others would have expired three months from now."

** Google PowerVotes: Clean Energy 2030! Published by carlosrymer, October 2, 2008, (It’s Getting Hot in Here) -- "While America’s youth are working hard towards having 1 million youth pledge to Power Vote, Google has announced its own PowerVote pledge with its Clean Energy 2030 Proposal. The Internet giant has continued to lead beyond its main business by pledging to make Renewable Energy Cheaper Than Coal, joining General Electric in figuring out how to get America’s national grid to be “smart,” and even becoming a leader by example with a large solar power installation at their headquarters. Now, Google has announced a proposal that could wean America off of most fossil fuels by 2030, a plan in line with what T. Boone Pickens has called for with his Pickens Plan and the call by Al Gore to make all electricity consumed in America renewable by 2018. Google’s proposal calls for a 100% reduction in coal and oil consumption in America by installing 300 GW of onshore wind energy, 80GW of offshore wind energy, 170GW of solar photovoltaic, 80GW of concentrated solar power, 15GW of conventional geothermal, and 65GW of enhanced geothermal. It also calls for an increase in sales of plug-in and hybrid vehicles to 90% of all sales by 2030 (reaching 42% of the U.S. vehicle fleet in 2030), increasing conventional vehicle fuel efficiency to 45mgp by 2030, an acceleration of the vehicle fleet turnover from 19 to 13 years (increasing sales by 31%), and building some 32,000 kilometers of new transmission lines. The bill: $4.4 trillion . If we begin in 2010, this means an annual investment of $220 billion by the private sector and the government, with the majority of it coming from the private sector. It will also mean savings of $1 trillion by 2030 due to the lower price of renewables compared to oil, as well as other factors."

Nuclear isn't necessary. By Arjun Makhijani, Nature Reports Climate Change, Published online October 2, 2008. -- "The notion that we need nuclear power to address climate change does not reflect the realities of the marketplace or rapid new developments in energy technology...."

Ohio roofs go green. Cincinnati leads push in the U.S. Published October 2, 2008, Columbia Daily Tribune. Cincinnati (Associated Press) -- "Officials want to see more green roofs on building tops in Cincinnati. The city council yesterday became the first in Ohio with a plan to channel grants and loans to residents and businesses to replace tar and shingles with vegetation. Supporters of the idea want to see Cincinnati become a leader in green roofs, a European-born movement that they say not only is pleasing aesthetically but reduces stormwater runoff, filters pollutants and cuts heating and cooling costs."

Scum of the Earth. Scientists see potential for fast-growing algae in biofuels and more. Published October 2, 2008, Columbia Daily Tribune. Borculo, Netherlands (Associated Press) -- " Set amid cornfields and cow pastures in eastern Holland is a shallow pool that is rapidly turning green with algae, harvested for animal feed, skin treatments, biodegradable plastics - and with increasing interest, biofuel. In a warehouse 120 miles southwest, a bioreactor of clear plastic tubes produces algae in pressure-cooker fashion that its manufacturer hopes will one day power jet aircraft. Experts said it will be years, maybe a decade, before this simplest of all plants can be efficiently processed for fuel. But when that day comes, it could go a long way toward easing the world’s energy needs and responding to global warming."

Energy Star has lost some luster. The program saves energy but hasn't kept up with the times. ConsumerReports.org, October, 2008. -- "If you need a new refrigerator, you might be drawn to the Samsung RF267ABRS. This sharp-looking bottom-freezer, which we're testing for a future report, is equipped with French doors, through-the-door ice and water dispensers, and many other inviting features. This refrigerator might also appeal because it carries the Energy Star badge of honor, thanks to its claimed 540-kilowatt-hour annual consumption. ‘By being Energy Star compliant you are assured that your Samsung model is helping the environment by using less energy while saving you money,’ a blurb on the company's Web site says. But in our comparative energy tests, which are tougher than the Department of Energy's and better resemble how you use a refrigerator, it used 890 kWh per year"....

*Global Warming: Beyond the Tipping Point. 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? By Michael D. Lemonick, October, 2008, Scientific American. -- "The basic proposition behind the science of climate change is so firmly rooted in the laws of physics that no reasonable person can dispute it. All other things being equal, adding carbon dioxide (CO 2) to the atmosphere—by, for example, burning millions of tons of oil, coal and natural gas—will make it warm up.... The most recent major report from the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change in 2007 projects a temperature rise of three degrees Celsius, plus or minus 1.5 degrees—enough to trigger serious impacts on human life from rising sea level, widespread drought, changes in weather patterns, and the like.... But according to Hansen and his nine co-authors, who have submitted their paper to Open Atmospheric Science Journal, the correct figure is closer to six degrees C.... Hansen says, the point at which major climate disruption is inevitable is already upon us. 'If humanity wishes to preserve a planet similar to that on which civilization developed and to which life on Earth is adapted,' the paper states, 'CO 2 will need to be reduced from its current 385 ppm [parts per million] to at most 350 ppm.' The situation, he says, 'is much more sensitive than we had implicitly been assuming.'"

SEPTEMBER 2008

After The Circus Leaves Town. Posted by Trip Van Noppen, September 30, 2008. Earthjustice -- "What's happened in Congress during the last two weeks on energy and drilling issues could send us several major steps backwards on the road to a clean and prosperous energy future. As I write this, Congress—instead of passing measures to further increase fuel efficiency and reduce oil demand—is capitulating to the "drill, baby, drill" drumbeat. At midnight, two critical moratoriums will lapse: on offshore drilling and oil shale development in the West. At the same time, crucial tax incentives for wind and solar energy have yet to be renewed. Earthjustice's Policy and Legislation team in DC have been in the thick of fighting provisions that would make America even more reliant on dirty fuels. Extraction and processing of these fuels—tar sands, oil shale and liquid coal—can produce more than twice the global warming pollution as conventional oil. Supporting these fuels through tax incentives is completely at odds with mandatory carbon reductions that Congress must enact if we have any chance of slowing global warming."

**Dear Mr. President: Let Me Green The Green Zone. An Iraqi War Veteran Leaves Behind A "War For Oil" to Fight For a Renewable Energy Revolution. thedailygreen, September 30, 2008. -- "On November 13, 2001 – two months after the largest attack on domestic soil this generation has seen – Jeffrey Owens enlisted in the U.S. Army. It was shortly after his 30th birthday. “I wasn’t looking for a career, I just wanted to serve,” he recalls. He enlisted as a combat engineer and shipped overseas. After two tours in Iraq and service in Western Europe, the Iraqi war veteran has embarked upon his third tour of duty. His mission is still focused on serving his country, and the enemy is still an insidious global threat. But instead of fighting what many have called a war for oil, Jeffrey Owens has joined the renewable revolution. His enemies are America’s dangerous reliance on foreign oil and the devastation the liberal use of fossil fuels has wrought on the global environment. Owens’ new mission is three-fold: first, it’s educating those who’ve not had his experience overseas on the critical nature of United States energy independence; next, it’s evangelizing the economic and environmental benefits of going solar, both here and abroad. Third, it’s earning his PhD in Physics to improve the spectrum of available solar photovoltaic and solar thermal technologies."
[Note: Jeffrey Owens is now a board member of the Columbia Climate Change Coalition].

Green Jobs Now: 9-27-08, National Day of Action to Build the New Economy. Host an Event, Find an Event, Sign the Petition. Sponsored by Green For All, 1Sky, and WeCanSolveIt.org.

Green the Bailout. By Thomas L. Friedman. Published September 27, 2008, New York Times. -- "Many things make me weep about the current economic crisis, but none more than this brief economic history: In the 19th century, America had a railroad boom, bubble and bust. Some people made money; many lost money. But even when that bubble burst, it left America with an infrastructure of railroads that made transcontinental travel and shipping dramatically easier and cheaper.... The early 21st century saw a boom, bubble and now a bust around financial services. But I fear all it will leave behind are a bunch of empty Florida condos.... In a green economy, we would rely less on credit from foreigners 'and more on creativity from Americans,' argued Van Jones, president of Green for All, and author of the forthcoming 'The Green Collar Economy.' 'It’s time to stop borrowing and start building. America’s No. 1 resource is not oil or mortgages. Our No. 1 resource is our people. Let’s put people back to work — retrofitting and repowering America"'....

*Huge Nationwide Rallies Call for 'Green Jobs Now!' Over 100,000 People Rally for a New Green Economy and Clean Energy Corps. September 27, 2008, Wall Street Journal, MarketWatch. Oakland, Calif., Sept 27, 2008 /PRNewswire-USNewswire via COMTEX/ -- "With a reeling economy, soaring gas prices and rising fears of a global climate crisis, more than 100,000 people rallied at events across the country to urge leaders to jump start the clean energy economy. The events, ‘Green Jobs Now: A Day to Build the New Economy,’ urged policy makers to think beyond the short-sighted distraction of drilling and, instead, create real energy solutions that build a new green economy strong enough to create millions of green jobs and lift people out of poverty."

**What the Economy Needs Now Are Good, Green Jobs. By Kari Lydersen, AlterNet. Posted September 26, 2008. -- "A national day of action tomorrow for green jobs is showing that clean energy can be our modern day gold rush. If a coalition of clean energy and social justice groups has its way, renewable energy will be something of a modern day gold rush, providing both clean energy and scores of stable living-wage jobs for urban and rural Americans. Climate change and declining fossil fuel deposits are igniting interest in renewable energy, and many see the possibility of an economic boom in the building and installation of wind turbines, solar panels and geothermal energy systems along with a blossoming industry in green buildings and retrofits. Leaders of this new vision are calling for a 'green economy' and are sponsoring a national day of action on Sept. 27 called "Green Jobs Now: A Day to Build the New Economy" ….

Global warming pollution increases 3 percent. By Seth Borenstein – September 25, 2008. Washington (Associated Press) -- "Worldwide man-made emissions of carbon dioxide — the main gas that causes global warming — jumped 3 percent last year, international scientists said Thursday. That means the world is spewing more carbon dioxide than the worst case scenario forecast by a Nobel Prize-winning group of international scientists in 2007. Scientists said if the trend does not stop, it puts the world potentially on track for the highest predicted rises in temperature and sea level. The pollution leader was China, followed by the United States, which past data show is the leader in emissions per capita in carbon dioxide output. And while several developed countries slightly cut their CO2 output in 2007, the United States churned out more. Still, it was large increases in China, India and other developing countries that spurred the growth of carbon dioxide pollution to a record high of 9.34 billion tons of carbon (8.47 billion metric tons). Figures released by science agencies in the United States, Great Britain and Australia show that China's added emissions accounted for more than half of the worldwide increase. China passed the United States as the No. 1 carbon dioxide polluter in 2006. Emissions in the United States rose nearly 2 percent in 2007, after declining the previous year. The U.S. produced 1.75 billion tons of carbon (1.58 billion metric tons)."

**Global Warming Reality Check. Global Carbon Emissions Up 38% Since 1992. September 25, 2008, TheDailyGreen. -- "Underscoring the magnitude of the challenge posed by global warming, new U.S. government data estimates that worldwide emissions of carbon dioxide have gone up 38% since 1992, when the United Nations agreed to a framework for reducing greenhouse gas emissions. The increase in emissions out-paces even the worst-case scenarios published by scientists affiliated with the U.N. The Kyoto Protocol, which industrialized nations other than the United States have agreed to adhere to, aims to reduce emissions in those countries 5% below 1990 levels by 2012. Ultimately, scientists have said the world needs to reduce its emissions by 50% or more below 1990 levels by mid-century to avert the worst consequences of global warming."

Stop Global Warming Virtual March. (stopglobalwarming.org) September 25, 2008. -- "The Windy City Looks Mighty Pretty . Last week, Mayor Richard M. Daley of Chicago announced a dramatic plan to drastically cut greenhouse gas emissions, in an effort to stop global warming and become one of the greenest cities in the nation. As the Associated Press reported: ‘The plan calls for reducing greenhouse gas emissions to three-fourths of 1990 levels by 2020 through more energy-efficient buildings, using clean and renewable energy sources improving transportation and reducing industrial pollution.'"

Gore Calls for Civil Disobedience at Clinton Global Initiative. Published by jakebrewer, September 24th, 2008 , global warming (It’s Getting Hot in Here). -- "At today’s Clinton Global Initiative, Al Gore said that we are at a point in our world’s history, and in need of such immediate action, that if you are a young person it’s time for civil disobedience. In particular to bring coal plants to a halt. On a panel with Queen Rania of Jordan, Ellen Johnson Sirleaf of Liberia, Neville Isdell (the CEO of Coca Cola), and Bono - moderated by President Clinton himself - Gore was fiery in his calls for action and investment in new clean energy technologies.  He was even more fiery in his strong denouncements of nonexistent clean coal ('There is no such thing!'), and a congress that is today voting on an energy bill that lifts the moratorium on mining coal shale, calling it - with dramatic pause - 'IN-SANITY.'"

**Business of Green: A Special Section, The New York Times, September 23, 2008.

Electricity From What Cows Leave Behind. By Katie Zezima. Published September 23, 2008, New York Times. -- "For years, the cows at Green Mountain Dairy here produced only milk and manure. But recently they have generated something else: electricity. The farm is part of a growing alternative energy program that converts the methane gas from cow manure into electricity that is sold to the power utility’s grid. Central Vermont Public Service, which supplies electricity to 158,000 customers around the state, was among the first utilities in the country to draw electricity from cow manure on dairy farms. About 4,000 utility customers participate by agreeing to pay a premium for the electricity."

Pumping Hydrogen. By Jad Mouawad. Published September 23, 2008, New York Times. -- "On a strip of Santa Monica Boulevard in Los Angeles, a futuristic experiment posing as an ordinary fuel station may be bringing the world one step closer to the hydrogen age. From the moment engineers started dreaming about hydrogen as an alternative to oil, they faced a nagging question: What should come first — the fuel-cell car or the hydrogen pump?"

**Is the financial crisis more dire than the climate crisis? Posted by Joseph Romm, September 22, 2008, Grist. -- "Not even close . If there's no action before 2012, that's too late. What we do in the next two to three years will determine our future. This is the defining moment. So warned IPCC head Rajendra Pachauri last fall when the IPCC released its major multi-year report synthesizing our understanding of climate science. And remember, Pachauri was handpicked by the Bush administration to replace the 'alarmist' Bob Watson. It's the facts that make scientists alarmists, not their politics (see 'Desperate times, desperate scientists'). What happens if we fail to act in time to avert the climate catastrophe? We cross carbon-cycle tipping points, such as the loss of the tundra, beyond which there is 'no redemption.' We head toward CO2 concentrations this century that are triple or quadruple preindustrial levels. We should expect 0.8 to 2.0 meters of sea level rise this century, inundating the homes of 100 million people. We face desertification of one third the planet and loss of the glaciers that provide water to a billion people. We face loss of more than two thirds of the species on the planet, and a hot, acidic, and largely lifeless ocean. We face humanity's self-destruction -- 6 degrees C total planetary warming."

Northeastern states to auction carbon credits. Published September 22, 2008 Columbia Daily Tribune. Albany, New York (Associated Press) -- "A coalition of 10 northeastern states this week will take steps to check global warming when it conducts the nation’s first carbon auction, taking the same approach that curbed lake-killing acid rain. Environmental groups, energy producers and government leaders will be watching closely as the Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative sells carbon credits Thursday in the first of a series of quarterly online auctions. The cap-and-trade greenhouse gas reduction program, which aims to hold carbon dioxide emissions steady through 2014 and then gradually reduce them, is widely viewed as a model for future programs around the globe."

Permafrost May Survive Global Climate Change, New Evidence Suggests. By Henry Fountain. Published September 22, 2008, New York Times. -- "One of the potential consequences of a warmer world, according to scientists who study such things, is the deep thawing of the permafrost. Thawing could release huge quantities of carbon into the atmosphere, as vegetation, bones and other organic material, long locked up in the deep freezer that is the permafrost, decompose. But a study published in Science suggests that the impact of warming on the permafrost may not be as bad as forecast. The evidence comes in the form of a wedge of ancient ice found at an old mining site in the Yukon in Canada."

Bloomberg, Economists, Greens Tell Ways & Means: Price Carbon Upstream, Distribute Revenues to Consumers. by Charles Komanoff, September 21,2008 . Reported for the Carbon Tax Center by James F. Handley. -- "The 'fierce urgency' of the climate crisis compels action, said Rep. John Larson (D-CT) at Thursday’s House Ways and Means Committee’s packed hearing on climate change revenue measures. Hurricane Ike’s devastation of coastal Texas imparted deeper meaning to Martin Luther King’s phrase. Witnesses pointed to storm-related damage as one of many ways in which failure to reduce the greenhouse gas emissions that drive global warming will destroy ecosystems and economies alike. Citing the effectiveness and simplicity of a carbon tax, New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg urged Congress to tax fossil fuel producers upstream, and distribute revenue downstream to consumers by reducing payroll taxes. A carbon tax would impose a cost proportional to carbon emissions, but because revenue distribution would not be linked to consumption, the system would 'use capitalism' to create broad incentives for energy conservation and alternative energy, Bloomberg said."

Economic crisis threatens EU measures on climate change. by Christian Spillman, September 21, 2008, Yahoo News. Bruxelles (AFP) -- "The recent economic downturn could push the European Union to adopt more modest ambitions in its fight against climate change. Although the European Commission has said it wants to cut greenhouse gases by 20 percent by 2020, business leaders oppose the use of fines to oblige industry to reduce its emissions -- especially in the current economic crisis."

Berkeley Approves City-Backed Loans for Solar Panels. By Felicity Barringer. Published September 17, 2008, New York Times. -- San Francisco -- "The Berkeley City Council moved late Tuesday to eliminate one of the biggest obstacles to making homes more energy-efficient: the upfront cost. In a move being watched by other cities around the country, the Council unanimously approved a program to give city-backed loans to property owners who install rooftop solar-power systems. The loans, which are likely to total up to $22,000 apiece, would be paid off over 20 years as part of the owners’ property-tax bills."

Chevy Volt's unveiling sparks questions about financing. By Ken Bensinger, Los Angeles Times, September 17, 2008. -- Detroit -- "Tuesday's unveiling of the Chevrolet Volt electric hybrid car was supposed to be a celebration of new technology, the birth of a new class of automobile. Instead, the crowd at General Motors Corp.'s Renaissance Center was buzzing over who was going to pay for it: GM or American taxpayers? GM revealed the much-hyped vehicle at an event celebrating the automaker's centennial. Immediately afterward, company executives faced a barrage of questions about whether some of the $25 billion in low-interest loans the industry is urging Congress to fund would be used to subsidize the Volt's development and production."

**Presidential Candidates’ Positions on Science Issues. By William J. Broad. Published September 15, 2008, New York Times. -- "Both presidential candidates have now issued answers to a series of questions about science policy, Senator Barack Obama having done so in late August and Senator John McCain on Monday. Their responses show clear areas of agreement on such apple-pie issues as ocean health, as well as sharp contrasts, as when Mr. Obama stresses the role of government and Mr. McCain that of business in addressing some of the nation’s main challenges. What follows is a digest of their answers, as posted by Science Debate 2008. The private group, in an effort endorsed by leading scientific organizations, has worked since November to get candidates to articulate positions on science policy. The full answers are at www.sciencedebate2008.com.

**Roll back time to safeguard climate, expert warns. A return to pre-industrial levels of carbon dioxide urged. By David Adam, The Guardian, September 15 2008. -- "Scientists may have to turn back time and clean the atmosphere of all man-made carbon dioxide to prevent the worst impacts of global warming, one of Europe's most senior climate scientists has warned. Professor John Schellnhuber, director of the Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research in Germany, told the Guardian that only a return to pre-industrial levels of CO2 would be enough to guarantee a safe future for the planet. He said that current political targets to slow the growth in emissions and stabilise carbon levels were insufficient, and that ways may have to be found to actively remove CO2 from the air."

Cape Wind lands another permit. By Patrick Cassidy, September 11, 2008 , Cape Cod Times. -- "State environmental officials have quietly issued a key permit for the proposed Nantucket Sound wind farm. The state Department of Environmental Protection last month issued a water quality certificate for Cape Wind Associates' plan to install nearly eight miles of transmission cable through Lewis Bay in West Yarmouth that would connect to 130 wind turbines in the sound. If the turbines are built, an additional five miles of cable in federal waters would link the wind farm to the region's electric grid. 'It does meet our approval as long as they follow our regulations,' DEP spokesman Ed Colletta said this week."

Europe Lowers Goals for Biofuel Use. By James Kanter. Published September 11, 2008, New York Times. -- Paris — "European legislators said Thursday that government goals for using biofuels should be pared back, prompting the fledgling industry to fire back with a campaign warning that alternatives may be no cleaner. European governments pledged last year to increase the use of biofuels to 10 percent of all transport fuel by 2020, amid expectations that energy derived from crops would provide a low-carbon alternative. On Thursday, the European Parliament’s influential Industry Committee endorsed the general 10 percent target — but added a number of modifications meant to move away from traditional biofuels made from grains or other crops toward other, renewable energy sources."

The Incidence of US Climate Policy. Posted by Rich Sweeney, September 10, 2008, (Common Tragedies, Thoughts on Environmental Economics). -- "Last week Dallas Burtraw, Margaret Walls and I released a new RFF discussion paper titled, 'Where You Stand Depends On Where You Sit: The Incidence of US Climate Policy.' In it we analyze the first-order impacts of 10 different cap-and-trade policy alternatives across regions and income groups. Rather than overtly advocating one policy or attempting to optimize outcomes along some predefined dimension, this initial report is intended largely to highlight the potential distributional effects of capping carbon and to describe the broad range of options available for policymakers to address these effects....

New York yellow cab owners sue over green plan. September 9, 2008. New York (Reuters) -- "A group of New York taxi owners is suing the city over a plan to turn the entire fleet of cabs 'green' by 2012, saying the plan compromises safety and is unconstitutional. Under the plan, promoted as an environmental model for other large cities, every new taxi must get at least 30 miles per gallon, a target now met by hybrid and clean diesel cars."

Cloudy days ahead. Solar power firms face glut of panels, end of tax credit. Published September 8, 2008,Columbia Daily Tribune. Portland, Ore. (Associated Press) -- "Oregon, which weathered the tech boom and bust, might be headed for bubble trouble in solar manufacturing. Experts predict a worldwide glut of solar panels and a short-term shakeout of the U.S. sun-power industry that could slow investment in factories of the type state officials are scrambling to attract.... Patterson, who hosted presidential candidate Barack Obama at PV’s plant in May, expects either a Republican or Democratic administration to renew and enhance solar incentives. But he laments the intervening uncertainty...."

Strongest Storms Grow Stronger Yet, Study Says. By Kenneth Chang. Published September 3, 2008, New York Times. -- "A new study finds that the strongest of hurricanes and typhoons have become even stronger over the last two and a half decades, adding grist to the contentious debate over whether global warming has already made storms more destructive. 'I think we do see a climate signal here,' said James B. Elsner, a professor of geography at Florida State University who is the lead author of the paper, being published in Thursday’s issue of the journal Nature."

Extreme and risky action the only way to tackle global warming, say scientists. Geo-engineering 'better than doing nothing'. By David Adam, environment correspondent, The Guardian, September 1, 2008. -- "Political inaction on global warming has become so dire that nations must now consider extreme technical solutions - such as blocking out the sun - to address catastrophic temperature rises, scientists from around the world warn today."

Worries over stability of Greenland icesheet. By Richard Ingham, September 1, 2008, couriermail.com.au. -- "Scientists say they can no longer rule out a fast-track melting of the Greenland icesheet, a prospect once merely the preserve of doomsayers. Such melting would see much of the world's coastline drowned by rising seas. The researchers found that the great Laurentide icesheet which smothered much of North America during the last Ice Age melted far swifter than realised, dumping billions of tonnes of water into the ocean."

*Can Democracy Catch Up to Climate Science? By Larry J. Schweiger, President and Chief Executive Officer, National Wildlife Federation, National Wildlife , August-September 2008. -- "When he first appeared before the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee, Dr. James E. Hansen, head of NASA’s Goddard Institute for Space Studies, brought alarming findings from a three-dimensional climate model to warn the committee and the world that the Earth was overheating and that we were all responsible. Well, that was 20 years ago. We now know so much more about the consequences of climate change as it unfolds all over the planet. With more than 10,000 peer-reviewed studies published about it, global warming is a highly documented, rapidly expanding crisis that will affect everyone and alter the very nature of tomorrow. Yet despite two decades of accumulating, increasingly alarming science, our government has failed to enact a single law to do anything to curb this crisis....

AUGUST 2008

Walrus in a Warming World . The melting of Arctic sea ice poses new challenges for Pacific walrus. by Bill Sherwonit, Defenders Magazine , Summer 2008. -- "The first hints that something was amiss in the oceanic world of Pacific walrus washed onto eastern Siberian shores in the late 1990s. For the first time in memory, local residents and scientists saw thousands of walrus cows and calves on land in late summer. Normally the animals are far offshore during this season, floating on the sea-ice pack as it retreats north through the Chukchi Sea, between Alaska and Russia. More disturbing signs surfaced in 2004. A team of climate change researchers cruising through the Beaufort Sea observed walrus calves swimming alone in deep water, far from either ice or land. 'Crying' loudly, the calves apparently had been separated from—and possibly abandoned by—their mothers. Alarmed by the encounters, the researchers published their discovery in a scientific journal, noting that nothing like this had ever been reported."

Wind, solar energy built on temporary tax breaks. By Jim Abrams, Associated Press Writer, August 31, 2008, Yahoo News. Washington -- "Congress is putting the short-term future of renewable energy companies in jeopardy even as the presidential candidates and most lawmakers hail windmills, solar panels and biofuels as long-term solutions to high gasoline prices and global warming."

Arctic sea ice drops to 2nd lowest level on record. PeoplePC Unlimited, August 27, 2008. -- Washington - "More ominous signs Wednesday have scientists saying that a global warming "tipping point" in the Arctic seems to be happening before their eyes: Sea ice in the Arctic Ocean is at its second lowest level in about 30 years. The National Snow and Ice Data Center reported that sea ice in the Arctic now covers about 2.03 million square miles. The lowest point since satellite measurements began in 1979 was 1.65 million square miles set last September."

5 Steps to an Environmental Revolution. By Bill Vitek, Prairie Writers Circle. Posted August 27, 2008, AlterNet -- "Efficiency tweaks won't save us. Even if every car in the world were a hybrid, growing demand would dwarf savings.... We want to see our current problems as part of the usual ups and downs of the business and climate cycles. But in the past three years oil production has remained steady while the price has doubled. Oil supplies will soon fail to keep up with ballooning world demand. Then the other fossil fuels will flare out too. But not before adding to atmospheric carbon dioxide already a third higher than pre-industrial levels and strongly tied to a long, abnormal rise in global temperatures."

Dispatch from Denver: Making Climate Change the Issue. Why we need to make 'global warming' the most important issue of the convention. ByJeffrey Allen, OneWorld.net. Posted August 26, 2008. -- "Author and environmental leader David Orr is upset about the corruption of language in the United States. He doesn't like how some groups have co-opted phrases like 'pro-life' and 'conservative' to promote their own political agendas, which often have little to do with saving lives or acting conservatively. But the greatest travesty, he says, is the way Americans throw around the term 'global warming.' 'This isn't 'global warming,' he exclaims with an air of severity and deep concern. 'This is planetary destabilization. And it's already begun. The question is: How do we arrest this before it gets to the point of catastrophe?' Orr joined a panel of top climate scientists and activists this morning at The Big Tent, a new media and activist hub just steps away from the action inside the Democratic National Convention here in Denver this week...."

*Not-So-Permafrost: Big Thaw of Arctic Soil May Unleash Runaway Warming. New estimates show that frozen Arctic soil contains far more potential greenhouse gas than previously recognized--and could speed climate change as it melts. By David Biello, August 26, 2008, Scientific American. -- "'Drunken' trees listing wildly, cracked highways and sinkholes—all are visible signs of thawing Arctic permafrost. When this frozen soil warms, it releases carbon dioxide, methane and other greenhouse gases as microbes start to thrive on the organic material it contains—a potentially potent source of uncontrollable climate change. Now new research published in Nature Geoscience shows that such frozen Arctic soil holds nearly twice as much of the organic material that gives rise to planet-warming greenhouse gases as previously estimated."

Why T. Boone Pickens' 'Clean Energy' Plan Is a Ponzi Scheme. By Scott Thill, AlterNet . Posted August 21, 2008. -- "The controversial oil magnate has made headlines for a supposed conversion to cleaner energy, but there's ample reason to be suspicious.... You can't always get what you want, the Rolling Stones counseled. But if you try sometimes, you get what you need. Factor billions of dollars, questionable loyalties and a privatization rap sheet invested more in profit than people into the equation, and you usually can get both what you want and what you need. In the case of hyper-loaded oil tycoon T. Boone Pickens , that means having your cake on climate crisis, fossil fuel addiction, eminent domain, water privatization and corporate earnings -- and eating it too."

Republicans Have Handed Democrats a Winning Election Issue. ByDavid Morris, AlterNet. Posted August 20, 2008. -- "But so far, Democrats have been refusing to accept the gift. The Republicans keep handing the Democrats a winning election issue. And the Democrats keeping refusing to accept the gift. I hope the beginning of the formal election campaign knocks some sense into them. The gift is the Republicans' continued opposition to extending renewable energy incentives. Eight times since the fall of 2007, a Republican-threatened filibuster has thwarted a vote on extending these incentives. They will expire at the end of this year -- and with that expiration, many believe the solar and wind industries will come to a grinding halt."

*Bloomberg Offers Windmill Power Plan. By Michael Barbaro. Published August 19, 2008, New York Times. -- "In a plan that would drastically remake New York City’s skyline and shores, Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg is seeking to put wind turbines on the city’s bridges and skyscrapers and in its waters as part of a wide-ranging push to develop renewable energy. The plan, while still in its early stages, appears to be the boldest environmental proposal to date from the mayor, who has made energy efficiency a cornerstone of his administration.Mr. Bloomberg said he would ask private companies and investors to study how windmills can be built across the city, with the aim of weaning it off the nation’s overtaxed power grid, which has produced several crippling blackouts in New York over the last decade."

Renewable Power's Growth in Colorado Presages National Debate. Peter Slevin, Washington Post, August 18, 2008. Denver -- "When Colorado voters were deciding whether to require that 10 percent of the state's electricity come from renewable fuels, the state's largest utility fought the proposal, warning that any shift from coal and natural gas would be costly, uncertain and unwise. Then a funny thing happened. The ballot initiative passed, and Xcel Energy met the requirement eight years ahead of schedule. And at the government's urging, its executives quickly agreed to double the target, to 20 percent."

Climate Change Is Already Affecting the West's Water. By Bob Burnett, Huffington Post, AlterNet, August 14, 2008. -- "By 2020 Glacier National Park will be 'Puddles National Park' and the rest of the west won't be much better off. So where's the concern? It's said our primeval ancestors had a simple arithmetic system: 'One, two, three, many.' That describes the focus of many 2008 voters, whose concerns are the economy, energy prices, Iraq, and 'those other problems.' As we get closer to the presidential election, most Americans aren't worried about global warming. Maybe they will be when they turn the tap and no water comes out."

Plug-In Hybrid From G.M. Is Nearly Ready for Testing. By Nick Bunkley. Published August 14, 2008, New York Times. Traverse City , Mich. — ""General Motors said Thursday that it had “essentially finished' designing its first plug-in hybrid car, the Chevrolet Volt, and would have production-ready prototypes within 10 days. The automaker still has considerable work to do on the car’s lithium-ion battery and other technology in the two years before the Volt is scheduled to go on sale, but completing the design is a milestone for what is arguably the most crucial car in decades for G.M."

Two Large Solar Plants Planned in California. By Matthew L. Wald. Published August 14, 2008, New York Times. -- "Companies will build two solar power plants in California that together will put out more than 12 times as much electricity as the largest such plant today, the latest indication that solar energy is starting to achieve significant scale. The plants will cover 12.5 square miles of central California with solar panels, and in the middle of a sunny day will generate about 800 megawatts of power, roughly equal to the size of a large coal-burning power plant or a small nuclear plant. A megawatt is enough power to run a large Wal-Mart store."

Eight Strikes and You’re Out. By Thomas L. Friedman. Published August 12, 2008, New York Times. -- "John McCain recently tried to underscore his seriousness about pushing through a new energy policy, with a strong focus on more drilling for oil, by telling a motorcycle convention that Congress needed to come back from vacation immediately and do something about America’s energy crisis. “Tell them to come back and get to work!” McCain bellowed.... It was only five days earlier, on July 30, that the Senate was voting for the eighth time in the past year on a broad, vitally important bill — S. 3335 — that would have extended the investment tax credits for installing solar energy and the production tax credits for building wind turbines and other energy-efficiency systems. Both the wind and solar industries depend on these credits — which expire in December — to scale their businesses and become competitive with coal, oil and natural gas.... Senator McCain did not show up for the crucial vote on July 30, and the renewable energy bill was defeated for the eighth time.... In fact, John McCain has a perfect record on this renewable energy legislation. He has missed all eight votes over the last year — which effectively counts as a no vote each time. Once, he was even in the Senate and wouldn’t leave his office to vote."

**Handle With Care. By Cornelia Dean. Published August 11, 2008, New York Times. -- "Last year, a private company proposed 'fertilizing' parts of the ocean with iron, in hopes of encouraging carbon-absorbing blooms of plankton. Meanwhile, researchers elsewhere are talking about injecting chemicals into the atmosphere, launching sun-reflecting mirrors into stationary orbit above the earth or taking other steps to reset the thermostat of a warming planet. This technology might be useful, even life-saving. But it would inevitably produce environmental effects impossible to predict and impossible to undo. So a growing number of experts say it is time for broad discussion of how and by whom it should be used, or if it should be tried at all."

EPA chief draws staff’s criticism. Greenhouse gas emissions spark debate. McClatchy Newspapers. Published August 5, 2008, Columbia Daily Tribune. Washington -- "Environmental Protection Agency chief Stephen Johnson stunned his staff last month when he publicly opposed their proposals for regulating greenhouse gas emissions, four union officials representing EPA staff working on global warming policies said in a letter provided to McClatchy yesterday. The letter alleges that Johnson subverted the work of EPA staff and damaged the agency’s reputation for 'sound science and policy'.... Congressional committees are investigating whether the EPA’s decisions have been made in accord with the conclusions of its staff and whether the White House interfered with some of the agency’s work...."

Electric Cars Are the Key to Energy Independence. By David Morris. Posted August 2, 2008. AlterNet. -- "Renewables won't give us energy independence unless that electricity is used as a substitute for oil in our transportation system. Al Gore's heroic speech challenging us to make our electrical system 100 percent renewable promised it would simultaneously address three major crises: the weak economy, catastrophic climate change and the dire national security problems inherent in our dependence on imported oil. He got two out of three right. A crash renewable electricity initiative would provide an immediate boost to our economy and could slow climate change, since electricity accounts for about a third of our overall greenhouse gas emissions."

JULY 2008

*Climate Experts Tussle Over Details. Public Gets Whiplash. By Andrew C. Revkin. Published July 29, 2008, The New York Times. -- "When science is testing new ideas, the result is often a two-papers-forward-one-paper-back intellectual tussle among competing research teams. When the work touches on issues that worry the public, affect the economy or polarize politics, the news media and advocates of all stripes dive in. Under nonstop scrutiny, conflicting findings can make news coverage veer from one extreme to another, resulting in a kind of journalistic whiplash for the public. This has been true for decades in health coverage. But lately the phenomenon has been glaringly apparent on the global warming beat....

Transportation by the Numbers. Posted July 28, 2008, Environmental Defense Fund. -- "With gas prices skyrocketing, public transit ridership is at an all time high. Instead of cutting back on public transportation services, we should be reforming our national transportation system to create more affordable travel options for the whole country. Check out our 10 Facts About Oil and Gas to learn more. 96 Percent of the world's transportation energy currently supplied by oil. $75 Cost of barrel of oil on July 18th, 2007. $131 Cost of barrel of oil on July 18th, 2008. 9.6 billion Number of fewer miles Americans drove in May 2008 compared to May 2007. 10.3 billion Number of trips taken via the U.S. public transportation system in 2007, the highest in 50 years...."

Make Freddie and Fannie Go Green. By Brent Blackwelder & James S. Henry, July 24, 2008, The Nation. -- "After nearly a decade of US overspending on largely non-green, energy-inefficient, low-density housing, our nation is in the midst of the largest bank bailout since the 1980s Savings and Loan crisis. Congress is responding by rushing through legislation that would allow the US Treasury to lend up to $300 billion to Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, two gargantuan government-sponsored enterprises that now guarantee nearly 45 percent of the nation's $12 trillion in mortgages.... Now is the time to create a green Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac. We need to be farsighted as we look to the next generation of houses. The goal must be to shift from underwriting energy-guzzling McMansions to a green lending strategy that protects us from energy inflation and the impacts of rapid climate change."

**Paul Ehrlich: "The Dominant Animal" (Island Press). [Audio, transcript available]. Diane Rehm Show, July 24, 2008. -- "Paul Ehrlich warned of a looming ecological crisis in his 1968 best-selling book, 'The Population Bomb.' Forty years later, he’s back with a new look at how the impact human evolution has had on the environment may threaten the survival of the species. Paul Ehrlich, Professor of Population Studies and Biology at Stanford University and author of 'The Population Bomb,' among other books, essays, and papers."

Climate talk aims at skeptic. Panel disputes claims about global warming. By Jedd Rosche. Published July 23, 2008, Columbia Daily Tribune. -- "With signs for nearly $4 per gallon gas just down the street, about 100 people walked, biked and drove last night to the Columbia Public Library for a discussion on climate change. The Columbia Climate Change Coalition hosted a four-person panel discussion after the screening of the 2007 documentary 'Everything’s Cool' by Daniel Gold. The film tracks public perception of global warming as well as the efforts of several environmental crusaders and climate-change skeptics. Monta Welch, CCCC executive director, said that, amid myriad recent documentaries on the environment, 'Everything’s Cool' helped distinguish between facts and hype."

Solar power from Saharan sun could provide Europe's electricity, says EU. · Huge £35bn supergrid would pool green sources · Brown and Sarkozy back north African plan. By Alok Jha, science correspondent, The Guardian, July 23 2008. -- "A tiny rectangle superimposed on the vast expanse of the Sahara captures the seductive appeal of the audacious plan to cut Europe's carbon emissions by harnessing the fierce power of the desert sun. Dwarfed by any of the North African nations, it represents an area slightly smaller than Wales but scientists claimed yesterday it could one day generate enough solar energy to supply all of Europe with clean electricity."

Climate Film Draws a Rebuke. By Andrew C. Revkin. Published July 22, 2008, New York Times. -- "A controversial British documentary called 'The Great Global Warming Swindle' unfairly portrays several scientists and the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, Britain’s television watchdog agency ruled on Monday. The agency, the Office of Communication, issued a report rebuking Channel 4 in Britain, which broadcast 'Swindle' last year. But the report said the film, while 'intemperate' in its characterizations of the dominant scientific view that humans are the main force in warming the planet, 'did not materially mislead the audience so as to cause harm or offense.'"

**Some clever people think that global warming offers a huge business opportunity for companies who can find new ways of tackling climate change. Peter Day's World of Business, BBC Radio: Hot Stuff (part 2) : July 22, 2008. -- "Peter Day hears from a few small start up companies who seem to have few fears about embarking on projects which may have a huge impact on our world ... or might just fizzle out." Download podcast.

**Al Gore's Energy Proposal. Diane Rehm Show [Audio, transcript available]. July 21, 2008. -- "Former Vice President and Nobel Prize Winner Al Gore is challenging the nation to clean up its energy act. A look at the goals he's laid out and the feasibility of undertaking a major shift to renewable and clean energy sources in just ten years. Guests: Cathy Zoi , CEO of the Alliance for Climate Protection... Andrew Revkin, covers the environment for 'The New York Times' ... David Conover, counsel, National Commission on Energy Policy...."

Oilman rails against energy imports. Published, July 20, 2008, Columbia Daily Tribune. The following editorial appeared in the Chicago Tribune on Monday. -- "As legendary oil investor T. Boone Pickens tells the story, Republican Bob Dole wanted him to head up his 1996 presidential campaign in Texas. In return, Pickens wanted to be Dole’s chief adviser on energy policy.... He proposes replacing the 22 percent of electricity the nation gets from natural gas with wind energy. That would free up that natural gas to become an alternative fuel for cars. He says cars running on natural gas could cover 38 percent of U.S. transportation needs...."

*Gore Urges Change to Dodge an Energy Crisis. By John M. Broder. Published July 18, 2008, New York Times. Washington. -- "Former Vice President Al Gore on Thursday urged the United States to wean the nation from its entire electricity grid to carbon-free energy within 10 years, warning that drastic steps were needed to avoid a global economic and ecological cataclysm. Like a modern Jeremiah, Mr. Gore called down thunder to justify the spending of trillions of dollars to remake the American power system, a plan fraught with technological and political challenges that goes far beyond the changes recently debated in Congress and by world leaders."

Lightning Strikes: Get Used to Catastrophic Wildfires and Worse. By Scott Thill, AlterNet. Posted July 18, 2008 . -- "In California there were 8,000 lightning strikes in one event, and that was months before fire season. There is more of that in store across the West....  As the Union of Concerned Scientists argued in the paper 'Early Warning Signs of Global Warming: Droughts and Fires,' published before global warming consciousness took hold this century, 'Warmer global temperatures are expected to cause an intensification of the hydrologic cycle, with increased evaporation over both land and water.' As the same organization explained in an analysis of the Nobel-winning Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change's 2007 report, 'Nearly 90 percent of the 29,000 observational data series examined revealed changes consistent with the expected response to global warming.'"

** Al Gore: Green Energy by 2018 (7/17 Speech) [YouTube Video]. July 17, 2008 .

Al Gore Throws Down the Gauntlet in Today's Energy Challenge Speech. Posted by Seth Colter Walls, Huffington Post, July 17, 2008. With link to the YouTube Video.

Seafloor could trap CO2, scientists say. Published July 16, 2008, Columbia Daily Tribune. Seattle -- "Scientists say a partial solution to global warming might lie beneath the seafloor off the coasts of Washington and Oregon. Deep volcanic rocks could serve as a kind of storage locker for carbon dioxide, trapping the greenhouse gas under great pressure with virtually no chance of leaking back into the atmosphere, says a study published yesterday in the proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences."

The U.S. Can Become a World Leader in Solar Power. Posted by Breakthrough Generation Fellow on July 16, 2008, Breakthrough Institute. -- "Energy experts in Europe predict that the U.S. can recapture its lost leadership position as the world's leader in solar manufacturing and development, but only if government investment continues. What we need, what we must demand, is investment to give American innovators the tools they need."

**EPA details health risks of global warming. Published July 15, 2008, Columbia Daily Tribune. Washington (Associated Press) -- "Government scientists detailed a rising death toll from heat waves, wildfires, disease and smog caused by global warming in an analysis the White House buried so it could avoid regulating greenhouse gases. In a 149-page document released yesterday, experts laid out the scientific case for the grave risks that global warming poses to people and to the food, energy and water on which society depends. 'Risk (to human health, society and the environment) increases with increases in both the rate and magnitude of climate change,' scientists at the Environmental Protection Agency said."

First U.S. Town Powered Completely By Wind. By Andrea Thompson, Senior Writer. Posted July 15, 2008, LiveScience. -- "Rock Port , Mo. , has an unusual crop: wind turbines. The four turbines that supply electricity to the small town of 1,300 residents make it the first community in the United States to operate solely on wind power . "That's something to be very proud of, especially in a rural area like this — that we're doing our part for the environment," said Jim Crawford, a natural resource engineer at the University of Missouri Extension in Columbia." Related video.

In Deep-Sea Rock, a Place for CO2. By Henry Fountain. Published July 15, 2008, New York Times Observatory. -- "As everyone knows, the world has a carbon dioxide problem, and there are many suggestions for dealing with it. One is sequestration, keeping the gas out of the atmosphere through long-term storage...."

Out of Sight, Out of Clime: Burying Carbon In a Vault of Sea and Rock. The best place to store all that carbon dioxide from power plants might turn out to be volcanic formations off the U.S. west coast. By David Biello, Scientific American, July 14, 2008. -- "Volcanic rocks deep beneath the sea off the coast of California, Oregon and Washington State might prove one of the best places to store the carbon dioxide emissions that are causing global warming , a new study finds. In fact, the very instability that causes earthquakes and eruptions adds an extra layer of protection to keep the CO 2 from ever escaping."

"A Reef in Time." Diane Rehm Show , July 14, 2008. [Audio, transcript available]. "An expert on coral reefs explains why Australia's Great Barrier Reef, and coral reefs the world over, are in danger of becoming extinct” do largely to climate change. Guest J.E.N. Vernon, former Chief Scientist with the Australian Institute of Marine Science and the author of the three-volume "Corals of the World."

Trina to supply cells for solar-powered plane. Yahoo News, July 14, 2008. Los Angeles (Reuters) -- "For travelers weary of watching air fares tick upward due to soaring fuel prices, here's an encouraging piece of news -- a plane that can fly around the world on solar power."

Environmental Groups Slam G8 Leaders for Not Doing More on Global Warming. Democracy Now [Video & Audio Stream] July 8, 2008. -- "In Japan, world leaders at the G8 summit have announced they would work toward cutting carbon emissions by at least 50 percent by 2050. The White House hailed the declaration as a major step forward, but environmental campaigners criticized the lack of a commitment to midterm targets...."

G-8 endorses halving global emissions by 2050. By Joseph Coleman, Associated Press Writer. Yahoo News, July 8, 2008. Rusutsu, Japan -- "World leaders on Tuesday endorsed halving world emissions of greenhouse gases by 2050, edging forward in the battle against global warming but stopping short of tough, nearer-term targets. The Group of Eight leading industrial nations — the United States, Japan , Russia , Germany, France, Britain , Canada and Italy — also called on all major economies to join together to stem the potentially dangerous rise in world temperatures."

UNI-SOLAR Laminates to Power World's Largest Rooftop Solar System for General Motors. Solar Power System to Produce 15 Million Kilowatt Hours of Renewable Energy Annually. Rochester Hills, Mich., July 8, 2008 ( PRNewswire-FirstCall via COMTEX News Network ) -- "Energy Conversion Devices, Inc. (ECD) (Nasdaq: ENER), announced today that its UNI-SOLAR(R) thin-film flexible solar laminates will power the world's largest rooftop solar power system. The 12-megawatt system is being installed on GM's assembly plant in Figueruelas, Zaragoza, Spain and will become operational in the fall of 2008. ECD will supply the solar laminates through its wholly owned subsidiary, United Solar Ovonic, LLC."

U.S. Lifts Moratorium on New Solar Projects. By Dan Frosch. Published July 3, 2008, New York Times. Denver — "Under increasing public pressure over its decision to temporarily halt all new solar development on public land, the Bureau of Land Management said Wednesday that it was lifting the freeze, barely a month after it was put into effect. The bureau had announced on May 29 that it was no longer processing new applications to build solar power plants on land it oversees in six Western states after federal officials said they needed first to study the environmental effects of solar energy, a process that would take two years."

Harry Reid Tells Truth about Coal, Oil. Sen. Majority Leader says ‘coal makes us sick, oil makes us sick;’ Comments go viral; Truth telling praised by environmentalists. Contact: Nick Berning, Friends of the Earth. July 02, 2008. Washington, D.C. — "Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid spoke about the adverse health and environmental consequences of burning coal and other fossil fuels on Monday, and a YouTube video of Reid’s remarks has gone viral, reaching more than 360,000 viewers. Reid’s refreshingly honest rhetoric stood out and won praise from environmentalists at a time when many politicians seem scared to stand up to the oil and gas lobbies and many are even insisting coal can be clean."

JUNE 2008

Solar Water Heaters Now Mandatory In Hawaii. CNN Environmental News Network , June 30, 2008. -- "Hawaii has become the first state to require solar water heaters in new homes. The bill was signed into law by Governor Linda Lingle, a Republican. It requires the energy-saving systems in homes starting in 2010. It prohibits issuing building permits for single-family homes that do not have solar water heaters. Hawaii relies on imported fossil fuels more than any other state, with about 90 percent of its energy sources coming from foreign countries, according to state data."

The Ethics of Climate Change: Pay Now or Pay More Later? "Weighing our own prosperity against the chances that climate change will diminish the well-being of our grandchildren calls on economists to make hard ethical judgments." By John Broome. Scientific American, June 2008.

North Pole has heat wave. Good chance top of globe will be ice-free. Published June 29, 2008, Columbia Daily Tribune. Washington (Associated Press) -- "There’s about a 50-50 chance the North Pole will be ice-free this summer, which would be a first in recorded history, a leading ice scientist says. 'The weather and ocean conditions in the next few weeks will determine how much of the sea ice will melt, and early signs are not good,' said Mark Serreze. He’s a senior researcher at the National Snow and Ice Data Center and the University of Colorado in Boulder, Colo. 'The chances for a total meltdown at the pole are higher than ever because the layer of ice coating the sea is thinner than ever,' he said."

Solar Paralysis. [Audio]. Marketplace Report, National Public Radio. June 27, 2008. -- "Faced with a surge in the number of proposed solar power plants, the federal government has halted new solar projects on public land, pending environmental impact studies. They're expected to take about two years and could paralyze the solar industry. Alex Cohen speaks to Marketplace's Sam Eaton."

As Oil Prices Rise, Carmakers Look to Electric Future. [Audio & Transcript]  PBS, June 25, 2008. -- "Rising oil prices and improvements in battery technology are fueling new interest in developing electric cars. Spencer Michels reports on how industry giants and start-up car companies alike plan to release new vehicles by 2010."

Climate change linked to national security. By Pamela Hess, Associated Press Writer. Published June 25, 2008, Columbia Daily Tribune. Washington (Associated Press) -- "Global warming probably will mean more illegal immigration and humanitarian disasters, undermining shaky governments and possibly expanding the terrorism threat against the U.S., intelligence agencies say. 'Logic suggests the conditions exacerbated (by climate change) would increase the pool of potential recruits for terrorism,' said Tom Fingar, deputy director of national intelligence for analysis."

*Scientist warns of warming. It’s Earth’s ‘last chance,’ NASA expert says. Published, June 25, 2008, Columbia Daily Tribune . Washington (Associated Press) -- "Exactly 20 years after warning America about global warming, a top NASA scientist said the situation has gotten so bad that the world’s only hope is drastic action. James Hansen told Congress on Monday that the world has long passed the 'dangerous level' for greenhouse gases in the atmosphere and needs to get back to 1988 levels. He said Earth’s atmosphere can only stay this loaded with man-made carbon dioxide for a couple of decades without changes such as mass extinction, ecosystem collapse and dramatic sea level rises. 'We’re toast if we don’t get on a very different path,' Hansen, director of the Goddard Institute of Space Sciences, told The Associated Press. 'This is the last chance.'"

High-tech firms warm to role in cutting carbon. San Francisco Chronicle. Published June 24, 2008, Columbia Daily Tribune. -- "The high-tech industry over the next dozen years could be a big contributor to global warming, according to a report released Friday - or, it could play a major role in cutting emissions. Depending on how they manage their businesses and what types of products they produce, communications and information technology companies could reduce global emissions of carbon dioxide by 2020 by 15 percent, close to what some scientists and economists say is needed for the world to avoid dangerous climate change, the study said. The 90-page report was funded by the Climate Group...."

**Global Warming Twenty Years Later: Tipping Points Near. By James Hansen director, NASA Goddard Institute for Space Studies. June 23, 2008. -- "My presentation today is exactly 20 years after my 23 June 1988 testimony to Congress, which alerted the public that global warming was underway. There are striking similarities between then and now, but one big difference. Again a wide gap has developed between what is understood about global warming by the relevant scientific community and what is known by policymakers and the public. Now, as then, frank assessment of scientific data yields conclusions that are shocking to the body politic. Now, as then, I can assert that these conclusions have a certainty exceeding 99 percent. The difference is that now we have used up all slack in the schedule for actions needed to defuse the global warming time bomb. The next President and Congress must define a course next year in which the United States exerts leadership commensurate with our responsibility for the present dangerous situation. Otherwise it will become impractical to constrain atmospheric carbon dioxide, the greenhouse gas produced in burning fossil fuels, to a level that prevents the climate system from passing tipping points that lead to disastrous climate changes that spiral dynamically out of humanity’s control...."

**On the 20th anniversary of his groundbreaking global warming testimony before the U.S. Senate, James Hansen discusses his belief that the planet is dangerously close to tipping points that would be extremely difficult to reverse.  Diane Rehm Show, June 23, 2008. [Audio Stream]. -- "The NASA climate scientist reflects on what has and hasn't changed in two decades, political pressures, and the controversy he's stirred by speaking out. James Hansen is a climate scientist; director, NASA Goddard Institute for Space Studies."

How Satellites Could Power the Future. By Michael Schirber, LiveScience. June 18, 2008. -- "Placing solar panels in space above both night and clouds was first considered 40 years ago. But the estimated cost was, in a word, astronomical. The idea, however, has seen a resurgence, thanks to rising oil prices and advances in solar technology. A report from U.S. Defense Department found that space-based solar is technically feasible and economically viable."

Environmentalists oppose solar power plans. Published June 16, 2008, Columbia Daily Tribune. San Diego (Associated Press) --" It seems like an idea any environmentalist would embrace: Build one of the world’s largest solar power operations in the Southern California desert and surround it with plants that run on wind and underground heat. But San Diego Gas & Electric Co. and its potential partners face fierce opposition because the plan also calls for a 150-mile, high-voltage transmission line that would cut through pristine parkland to reach the nation’s eighth-largest city. The showdown over how to get renewable energy to consumers likely will play out elsewhere around the country as well, as state regulators require utilities to rely less on coal and natural gas - the biggest source of carbon dioxide emissions in the United States."

Extreme Weather & Global Warming: Floods in Iowa & China, Wildfires in California, Heat Waves on the East Coast, Tornadoes Across the Midwest. June 16, 2008, Democracy Now. [Web Audio and Video Stream] -- "The words 'extreme weather' are rarely associated in the mainstream media with another two words: 'global warming.' But scientists argue that these extreme weather events are consistent with changes they have long predicted would accompany global warming. We speak to Joseph Romm of ClimateProgress.org and Perry Beeman of the Des Moines Register."

International Energy Agency Calls for Massive Clean Energy Technology Push. Posted by Teryn Norris, June 11, 2008, Breakthrough Institute. - "'A global revolution is needed in ways that that energy is supplied and used.' That's the main thrust of the International Energy Agency's landmark report, Energy Technology Perspectives 2008, released last Friday, which calls for massive investments in clean energy technology and infrastructure."

The End of an Era for Cap and Trade? Posted by Lindsay Meisel, June 10, 2008, Breakthrough Institute. -- "Kyoto is dead -- and that's a good thing. In its place, we need massive global investment in new clean energy technology...."

Climate Change and America's Best Loved Places. (Wilderness Society). June 2008 . -- " America ’s public lands — some 600 million acres of land and 150,000 square miles of protected waters—are the birthright of every citizen, and the legacy we hold in trust for generations to come. Global warming poses an unprecedented threat to the nation’s iconic landscapes — our national parks, forests, wilderness areas, and wildlife refuges. At the same time, protecting these natural places is more important now than ever before. Our country’s public lands store carbon and offer one of our best hopes for sustaining the plants, animals, birds, clean water and air, and recreational opportunities that are important to our heritage."

Who Killed Cap and Trade? Posted by Michael Shellenberger, June 7, 2008, Breakthrough Institute.  -- " The new political center on climate will be defined around cost-containment and technology investment. If it's done right, it will establish American economic leadership on energy, strengthen our economy, and create a win-win for Americans and Chinese alike."

Majority of Senate Voices Support for Progress on Comprehensive Climate Change Bill. Environmental Defense Fund, June 6, 2008 -- "A majority of the U.S. Senate today voiced support for moving forward with the Climate Security Act, marking an historic turning point in the debate over national climate policy. While the bill could not survive continuing delay tactics, it garnered important new momentum that sets the stage for quick action in the next Congress."

*Senate fails to vote on global warming measure. Published June 6, 2008, Columbia Daily Tribune. - Washington (Associated Press) - "Senate Republicans today blocked a global warming bill that would have required major reductions in greenhouse gases, pushing debate over the world’s biggest environmental concern to next year for a new Congress and president. Democratic leaders fell a dozen votes short of getting the 60 needed to end a Republican filibuster on the measure and bring the bill up for a vote, prompting Majority Leader Harry Reid to pull the legislation from consideration."

Senate Drops Climate Legislation. U.S. Senate Roll Call Votes 110 th Congress - 2 nd Session. June 6, 2008. Vote Summary on the Question: On the Cloture Motion (Motion to Invoke Cloture on the Boxer Amdt. No. 4825). How Senators voted.

Emissions cap-and-trade plan is a government boondoggle. By George F. Will.  Published June 5, 2008, Columbia Daily Tribune. - "An unprecedentedly radical government grab for control of the U.S. economy will be debated when the Senate considers saving the planet by means of a cap-and-trade system to ration carbon emissions. The plan is co-authored - with John Warner - by Joe Lieberman, an ardent supporter of John McCain, who supports Lieberman’s legislation and recently spoke about 'the central facts of rising temperatures, rising waters and all the endless troubles that global warming will bring.' Speaking of endless troubles, 'cap-and-trade' comes cloaked in reassuring rhetoric about the government merely creating a market, but government actually would create a scarcity so government could sell what it has made scarce."

Victory in California: Prop 98 Defeated! Posted by Derek Walker in States and Cities June 5, 2008 (Environmental Defense Fund). - "Two weeks ago I posted about California's Dangerous "Proposition 98", with hidden provisions threatening the state's environmental laws. The alternative, Proposition 99, achieves the stated goals of Proposition 98 (protecting homeowners from having their dwellings seized for development) without threatening environmental protections. The vote took place on Tuesday, and I have good news to report. Despite an aggressive and deceptive ad campaign financed by wealthy landlords, Californians were not fooled...."

*Cap and Trade Legislation. (Diane Rehm Show) June 3, 2008. [Audio] - "The Senate is debating a bill that would reduce U.S. carbon emissions through a cap and trade system. Supporters says the measure is a good first step in fighting global warming, while opponents, including President Bush, say the measure would hurt the economy and push gas prices even higher. Guests: Stephen Moore , Darren Samuelsohn, Manik Roy, Rep. Jay Inslee, (D-Washington), John Stowell."

Man’s climate role unproved. Group ignores science showing historical change. By S. Fred Singer. Published June 3, 2008, Columbia Daily Tribune. - "In June 2007, the Royal Society of London, the world’s oldest science academy... published a pamphlet titled '‘Climate Change Controversies: a simple guide.' It was designed to undermine the scientific case of climate skeptics. The Society presented what it called "misleading arguments" on global warming and then tried to shoot them down.... The Royal Society thus adopts the IPCC claim that current warming is almost certainly anthropogenic - human-caused - but presents no independent evidence to support such a claim.... In its pamphlet, the Royal Society purports to speak on behalf of a consensus of scientists. But no such consensus exists....

Senate climate debate starts tonight (June 2, 2008). (Friends Committee on National Legislation). - "Friends, This evening (Monday, June 2), the Senate will begin to debate the “Lieberman-Warner Climate Security Act of 2008” (S. 3036). Please contact your senators nowand urge them to take strong action now to assure a safe, livable climate for our children, grandchildren, and future generations."

MAY 2008

Why Grassroots Initiatives Can't Fix Climate Change. A grassroots approach alone won't make the earth stop warming. By The Editors, Scientific American, May 2008. This story was originally printed with the title, "Climate Fatigue". -- ...."For all the consciousness-raising value of grassroots initiatives, the world is still far from squarely facing up to the issues.... because what matters is the load of greenhouse gases in the entire atmosphere, reaching those numbers would be hard, to say the least, for the U.S. to do alone.... If concentrations rise to 1,250 ppm CO2-eq or above, as they do in two of the IPCC scenarios, the chances become about one in six that the warming will exceed five degrees C (nine degrees F). According to the Stern Review, a major report on the economics of climate change, a five-degree increase would be 'far outside the experience of human civilisation.' It would also risk 'irreversible ... physical changes, such as the collapse of ocean currents,' as well as “mass migrations and social instability."

*Barbara Boxer's Democratic Radio Address on Global Warming May 31st, 2008 [Audio and transcript]

Mounting Costs Slow the Push for Clean Coal. By Matthew L. Wald. Published May 30, 2008, New York Times. - Washington — "For years, scientists have had a straightforward idea for taming global warming. They want to take the carbon dioxide that spews from coal-burning power plants and pump it back into the ground. President Bush is for it, and indeed has spent years talking up the virtues of “clean coal.” All three candidates to succeed him favor the approach. So do many other members of Congress. Coal companies are for it. Many environmentalists favor it. Utility executives are practically begging for the technology. But it has become clear in recent months that the nation’s effort to develop the technique is lagging badly."

Climate summit cooling off, says U.N. diplomat. Published May 25, 2008, Columbia Daily Tribune. Kobe, Japan (Associated Press) - "The world is losing momentum in the battle against global warming, the U.N. climate chief warned yesterday, urging environmental ministers from wealthy nations to revive the effort by setting clear targets for reducing greenhouse gases. The ministers gathered in the western Japanese city of Kobe for a three-day meeting as evidence mounted that rising world temperatures have been taking a toll on the earth at a faster rate than previously forecast."

Evangelicals question man-made warming. Published May 24, 2008, Columbia Daily Tribune. Washington (Associate Press). -- "A coalition of conservative evangelical leaders wants to enlist 1 million Christians to sign a statement questioning whether human-caused global warming is a real threat and arguing that restrictive environmental policies harm poor people. The 'We Get It!' campaign is the latest development in an ongoing disagreement among evangelicals about climate change. 'Our stewardship of creation must be based on biblical principles and factual evidence,' the statement says. 'We face important environmental challenges, but must be cautious of claims that our planet is in peril from speculative dangers like man-made global warming.'"

Aspen trees starved in global warming experiment. By John Flesher, Associated Press Writer . Pellston, Mich. (Associated Press) May 22, 2008. -- "Chain saws scream in a northern Michigan forest, but it's not the familiar sound of lumberjacks. This time the tree killers are environmental researchers. They hope that years from now the aspens they remove will be replaced with a healthy mix of maples, oaks, beeches and pines - which should soak up more carbon dioxide from an ever warmer world."

Bear puts a face on warming. By H. Josef Hebert of The Associated Press. Published May 16, 2008, Columbia Daily Tribune. Washington - "It’s not about saving the polar bear as much as the polar bear saving us. The Arctic bear facing extinction because of global warming is bringing home the consequences of cheap energy and - until recently - the need for little sacrifice. It also reminds us that a choice soon might come between accepting higher electricity and transportation costs and reducing the pollution that is raising the earth’s temperature. In listing the bear as threatened under the Endangered Species Act, the Bush administration is taking pains to draw a line between protection of the majestic mammal and the origin of its plight - global warming...."

Report touts wind’s potential. Turbines could provide 20 percent of power. (Associated Press) Published May 13, 2008, Columbia Daily Tribune. Washington. - "Two decades from now, Americans could get as much electricity from windmills as from nuclear power plants, according to a government report that lays out a possible plan for wind energy growth. The report, a collaboration between the Department of Energy research labs and industry, concludes wind energy could generate 20 percent of the nation’s electricity by 2030, about the same share now produced by nuclear reactors. Such growth would pose a number of major challenges but is achievable without the need of major new technological breakthroughs, said the report released yesterday."

**It Isn't Morning in America Anymore -- It's Dusk on Planet Earth. By Bill McKibben, Tomdispatch.com. Posted May 12, 2008, AlterNet - "If we want to preserve a planet similar to that on which civilization developed, we've got to cut CO2 emissions. Even for Americans, constitutionally convinced that there will always be a second act, and a third, and a do-over after that, and, if necessary, a little public repentance and forgiveness and a Brand New Start -- even for us, the world looks a little Terminal right now. It's not just the economy...."

APRIL 2008

**The latest issue of TIME has gone green, literally. [April 28, 2008 Issue]. - "As Managing Editor Richard Stengel explains, this special issue of TIME represents a first for the magazine: 'For this one issue, we've exchanged our trademarked Red Border for a green one. By doing so, we are sending a clear--and colorful--message to our readers about the importance of this subject, not just to Americans but to everyone else around the world as well.'" (quoted from a stopglobalwarming.org email message).

Scam Artists Are Prepped to Fleece Green Industries as Soon as the Money Comes in. By Stan Cox, AlterNet. Posted April 28, 2008. - "As long as an investing class makes all major environmental decisions, no new sources of energy will replace even one barrel or ton of fossil fuel. Hard times are looming. And in their desperation to keep the American economy afloat, government and business will be tossing overboard any proposals for real environmental protection. No time for such romantic foolishness when there are investments to be protected. Get those tax refunds back into retailers' registers, quick! Not that we won't be hearing about the environment; indeed, the next growth spurt, if it comes, is likely to be clothed in a green as green as the felt on a blackjack table."

Eight Reasons Our Changing World Will Turn You Into an Environmentalist, Like It or Not. By AlterNet Staff , AlterNet . Posted April 22, 2008. -"The challenges our society faces with depleted energy resources, water shortages, soaring food costs all point to environmental solutions.... AlterNet picked eight topics -- water, global warming, food, health, energy, pollution, consumption and corporations -- that pose real dangers to the future of human life and selected a series of recent essays that illustrate these problems, along with links to organizations and further resources that address these issues. (Please use the comment section to share other articles and resources on these issues.)...."

How Many Earth Days Do We Have Left? By Terrence McNally, AlterNet. Posted April 22, 2008. - "Lester Brown, author of Plan B 3.0, shows us how we can change in enough time to save life on earth, as we know it. Of all the resources needed to build an economy that will sustain economic progress, none is more scarce than time. That is one of the key messages of PLAN-B 3.0: Mobilizing to Save Civilization, the newest book by Lester Brown -- available as a free download at earthpolicy.org. Plan A -- the western fossil-fuel-based, auto-centered, throwaway economic model -- is not going to work for China, India, or the 3 billion other people in developing countries, and it will not continue to work for the industrial countries either. It's time for Plan B -- an all-out response at wartime speed proportionate to the magnitude of threats facing civilization. The four overriding goals of PLAN B 3.0 are to stabilize climate and population, eradicate poverty, and restore the earth's damaged ecosystems. Failure to reach any one of these goals will likely mean failure to reach the others as well....

Wear BLUE for Earth Day 2008 to Vote for NO COAL. (Architecture 2030) -"Want to stop global warming? Wear BLUE for Earth Day 2008! Join millions of people around the world who will be wearing BLUE to signify their vote for NO COAL. Events will be happening April 19th through April 22nd, so.... No matter what you’re doing for Earth Day 2008, wear BLUE …. Then, on April 22, make your voice heard. Pick up the phone: Call Congress at 202.224.3121 and ask for an immediate ‘Moratorium on Coal’ - a halt to the construction of any new conventional coal-fired power plants. Through this Call for Climate event, Earth Day hopes to generate over a million phone calls to Congress! Your BLUE vote will count. Fifty-nine conventional coal plants were canceled in 2007. That’s over a third of the 151 planned. That happened before millions of people joined together to say No Coal."

*Cap and Trade. (The Diane Rehm Show ) April 21, 2008. [Audio; CD and transcript available] - "President Bush recently unveiled a plan to reduce greenhouse gas emissions beginning in 2025. Critics say it does not do enough to address global warming. What to do about climate change. Guests: Kit Batten , Managing Director for Energy and Environmental Policy, Center for American Progress; Juliet Eilperin, reporter, Washington Post; Kenneth Green, Resident Scholar, American Enterprise Institute...."

Earth Day 2008: A Call for Climate. (earthdaynetwork) - "Earth Day 2008 is expected to be the biggest yet! From Tokyo to Togo, to our flagship event on the National Mall in Washington, DC and 7 other U.S. cities, we will be galvanizing millions of people around the world behind a Call for Climate, our global warming action theme. Hundreds of events are popping up all over the globe and April 22 should be a most memorable Earth Day. We will be asking people to call their government and urge significant and equitable action on climate change.   Sign Earth Day Network's Sky Petition and visit our website for more."

Earth Day 2008 Events Worldwide. "Create an event, Register your event, Find an event...." (Earthdaynetwork)

*The Way We Live Now. Why Bother? By Michael Pollan, Published: April 20, 2008, New York Times, The Green Issue. - "Why bother? That really is the big question facing us as individuals hoping to do something about climate change, and it’s not an easy one to answer.... For us to wait for legislation or technology to solve the problem of how we’re living our lives suggests we’re not really serious about changing — something our politicians cannot fail to notice. They will not move until we do.... Here’s the point: Cheap energy, which gives us climate change, fosters precisely the mentality that makes dealing with climate change in our own lives seem impossibly difficult. Specialists ourselves, we can no longer imagine anyone but an expert, or anything but a new technology or law, solving our problems.... In the judgment of James Hansen, the NASA climate scientist who began sounding the alarm on global warming 20 years ago, we have only 10 years left to start cutting — not just slowing — the amount of carbon we’re emitting or face a 'different planet.' Hansen said this more than two years ago, however; two years have gone by, and nothing of consequence has been done. So: eight years left to go and a great deal left to do.... If you do bother, you will set an example for other people. If enough other people bother, each one influencing yet another in a chain reaction of behavioral change, markets for all manner of green products and alternative technologies will prosper and expand.... Measured against the Problem We Face, planting a garden sounds pretty benign, I know, but in fact it’s one of the most powerful things an individual can do — to reduce your carbon footprint, sure, but more important, to reduce your sense of dependence and dividedness: to change the cheap-energy mind...."

Critics fire salvos at Bush plan. Emissions proposal too late, ‘insincere.’ (Associated Press) Published April 17, 2008, Columbia Daily Tribune. Washington - "President George W. Bush called for a halt yesterday in the growth of greenhouse gases by 2025, acknowledging the need to head off serious climate change. The plan came under fire immediately from environmentalists and congressional Democrats who favor mandatory emission cuts, a position also held by all three presidential contenders...."

Chill Out: Campus Solutions to Global Warming. "On April 16th, tune in to the broadcast.... sponsored by Earth Day Network organized by the National Wildlife Federation and ClimateCounts.org student-made videos, inspiring presentations from contest winners, solution-focused discussions, and live Q&As with people who really are changing the world."

President changes his stance. Bush takes aim at greenhouse gases. Published April 16, 2008, Columbia Daily Tribune. Washington (Associated Press) - "Revising his position on global warming, President George W. Bush was expected to propose today a new target for stopping the growth of the nation’s greenhouse gas emissions by 2025. The president also was to call for putting the brakes on greenhouse gas emissions from electric power plants within 10 to 15 years, said a senior administration official familiar with the afternoon speech Bush was to deliver in the Rose Garden...."

America’s Climate Security Act” Needs Strengthening. (Friends Committee on National Legislation). Posted April 4, 2008. -"The climate is changing fast. Many around the world today are already feeling the harmful effects as Arctic sea ice melts; tropical cyclones become more intense; and heat waves, drought, and flooding increase. Scientists warn that our grandchildren will likely suffer far more if we continue business as usual greenhouse gas pollution today. 'America’s Climate Security Act' (S. 2191) seeks to address the morally imperative task of reducing U.S. carbon emissions by establishing an economy-wide cap-and-trade system.... However, S. 2191 needs to be strengthened in several significant ways...."

Climate and Health (Environmental Defense). April 2008. -"More extreme weather from a warming planet may put more people in harm's way and cause illness. Are you or your region prepared? Are you are in a high-risk group?  What are the health dangers? Tips for a healthy, low-carbon life...."

MARCH 2008

Climate Change Is a Wake-Up Call to Radically Reform Our Economy. By Preeti Mangala Shekar and Tram Nguyen, ColorLines. Posted March 31, 2008 AlterNet. -"The people most affected by the injustices of the polluting economy are already helping to lead the way. Last year, the Oakland-based Ella Baker Center for Human Rights, with a minuscule staff and budget, worked relentlessly to pass the Green Jobs Act in Congress -a bill that if authorized will direct $125 million to green the nation's workforce and train 35,000 people each year for "green-collar jobs." ... In these efforts lay a hopeful vision-that the crises-ridden worlds of economics and environmentalism would converge to address the other huge crisis-racism in the United States...."

Cities switch off lights for Earth Hour. By Caryn Rousseau, Associated Press writer. Published March 30, 2008 Columbia Daily Tribune. Chicago ( Associated Press) -"From the Sydney Opera House to Rome's Colosseum to the Sears Tower's famous antennas in Chicago, floodlit icons of civilization went dark Saturday for Earth Hour, a worldwide campaign to highlight the threat of climate change. The environmental group WWF urged governments, businesses and households to turn back to candle power for at least 60 minutes starting at 8 p.m. wherever they were."

The Future of Our Shared Environment — Today. March 26-30, 2008 (Aspen Environment Forum). -"The Aspen Institute and National Geographic Magazine invite you to the first ever Aspen Environment Forum, in Aspen, Colorado—a powerful, three-day exchange examining the future of our shared environment. Inspired by intellectually rich exchanges with today’s foremost thought leaders on the environment, participants will come away with a better understanding of the challenges of preserving the environment within a robust economy. All are welcome. Join us! Register Now."

Massive chunk of ice slides off Antarctica. Some researchers blame 160-square-mile loss on global warming. Washington (Associated Press). Published March 26, 2008, Columbia Daily Tribune. - "A chunk of Antarctic ice about seven times the size of Manhattan suddenly collapsed, putting an even greater portion of glacial ice at risk, scientists said yesterday. Satellite images show the runaway disintegration of a 160-square-mile chunk in western Antarctica, which started Feb. 28. It was the edge of the Wilkins ice shelf and has been there for as long as 1,500 years. This is the result of global warming, said British Antarctic Survey scientist David Vaughan."

Western Antarctic ice chunk collapses. by Seth Borenstein (stopglobalwarming.org)  March 25, 2008. - "A chunk of Antarctic ice about seven times the size of Manhattan suddenly collapsed, putting an even greater portion of glacial ice at risk, scientists said Tuesday.... This is the result of global warming, said British Antarctic Survey scientist David Vaughan...."

*U.S. Scientists and Economists' Call for Swift and Deep Cuts in Greenhouse Gas Emissions. (Union of Concerned Scientists). March 24, 2008, -"There is growing momentum in the United States to establish policies that cap and reduce our nation's heat-trapping emissions…. We call on our nation’s leaders to swiftly establish and implement policies to bring about deep reductions in heat-trapping emissions. The strength of the science on climate change compels us to warn the nation about the growing risk of irreversible consequences as global average temperatures continue to increase over pre-industrial levels (i.e., prior to 1860).... A distinguished group of U.S. scientists and economists have come together to develop and endorse this Call for Swift and Deep Cuts in Greenhouse Gas Emissions. The core purpose is to ensure that this debate is informed by a powerful, succinct statement from top U.S. experts on the urgency of U.S. action, and the scale and feasibility of needed reductions." Sign the letter.

Spring springs upon us earlier than ever. Washington (Associated Press). Published March 23, 2008, Columbia Daily Tribune - "The capital’s famous cherry trees are primed to burst out in a perfect pink peak about the end of this month. Thirty years ago, the trees usually waited to bloom till around April 5. In central California, the first of the field skipper sachem, a drab little butterfly, was fluttering about on March 12. Just 25 years ago, that creature predictably emerged there anywhere from mid-April to mid-May...."The alarm clock that all the plants and animals are listening to is running too fast," Stanford University biologist Terry Root said. Blame global warming. The fingerprints of man-made climate change are evident in seasonal timing changes for thousands of species on Earth, according to dozens of studies and last year’s authoritative report by the Nobel Prize-winning international climate scientists."

Censoring Science: Inside the Political Attack on Dr. James Hansen and the Truth of Global Warming. Democracy Now, March 21, 2008. –"Dr. James Hansen is widely regarded as the leading climate change scientist in the country. For the past 25 years he has headed NASA’s Goddard Institute for Space Studies. Just over a year ago, Dr. Hansen went public with a charge that made headlines around the world –that the Bush administration had been trying to silence his warnings about the urgent need to address climate change.... His story is detailed in a new book by author Mark Bowen titled, 'Censoring Science: Inside the Political Attack on Dr. James Hansen and the Truth of Global Warming.'"

A global threat multiplier. by Paul Rogers . Published March 20, 2008 by openDemocracy –"A European Union study on the problems of global climate change, leaked to the press four days before its official launch on 14 March 2008, contained the sobering assessment that a failure to take radical action now to address global warming would create the likelihood of severe conflict over resources in the decades ahead. Two days later, on 16 March, data from the United Nations Environment Programme ( Unep) reveals that the rate of shrinking of glaciers across the world - a key marker of climate change - has accelerated; this more than doubled between 2006 and 2007, and the 2007 figure was five times the average for the 1980-99 period. These two documents, taken together, present governments and citizens in the leading emissions-producing countries in particular with an unavoidable test."

Global warming rushes timing of spring. by Seth Borenstein (stopglobalwarming.org) March 19, 2008. - "The capital's famous cherry trees are primed to burst out in a perfect pink peak about the end of this month. Thirty years ago, the trees usually waited to bloom till around April 5.... Pollen is bursting. Critters are stirring. Buds are swelling. Biologists are worrying. 'The alarm clock that all the plants and animals are listening to is running too fast,' Stanford University biologist Terry Root said. Blame global warming...."

Climate Change: The World's Biggest Security Threat. By Nicole Itano, Christian Science Monitor. Posted March 18, 2008, AlterNet. -"Unchecked climate change could spark instability in energy-producing states and lead to the collapse of fragile states around the world. Rising sea levels are what some nations fear most about global warming. But in Europe, climate change is likely to mean a new flood of immigrants from Africa and other poorer countries, according to a new report.... 'Unchecked climate change could not only cause a flood of new environmental migrants to Europe, it could spark instability in energy-producing states and lead to the collapse of fragile states around the world,' says the report by EU foreign-policy chief Javier Solana and Benita Ferrero-Waldner, the European commissioner for external relations. Climate change, the report says, is a 'threat multiplier' which 'intensifies existing trends, tensions, and instability.'"

In a Warmer Yellowstone Park, a Shifting Environmental Balance. By Jim Robbins. Published March 18, 2008, New York Times. Yellowstone National Park , Wyo. — "The grassy sweep of the Lamar Valley in the northeastern corner of this park is famous for its wildlife, especially its vast herds of elk and bison and the wolves that hunt them. But while walking across the Lamar last fall, Robert L. Crabtree, chief scientist with the Yellowstone Ecological Research Center in Bozeman, Mont., pointed out a cascade of ecological changes under way. The number of grizzly bears and gophers in the valley has increased, Dr. Crabtree said, an increase supported by the spread of an invasive plant from the Mediterranean that a warming climate benefits."

EU told to prepare for flood of climate change migrants. By Ian Traynor, The Guardian, March 10 2008. -"Global warming threatens to severely destabilise the planet, rendering a fifth of its population homeless, top officials say."

Can Global Warming Be Slowed by Complex Concept of Carbon Trading? By Kelpie Wilson, TruthOut.org. Posted March 6, 2008. AlterNet. -"American businesses are finally getting on board with the complicated method of carbon trading to reduce emissions. By refusing to sign on to the Kyoto climate treaty, Americans have insulated ourselves from the complexities of the carbon market the European Union has been trading in for the last three years. But that state of ignorance, while not exactly blissful, is about to end."

Oil, timber giants start biofuel firm. McClatchy Newspapers. Published March 3, 2008, Columbia Daily Tribune. Seattle - "In a move to speed the development of alternative fuels that don’t consume food crops, oil giant Chevron and timber behemoth Weyerhaeuser are setting up a joint venture called Catchlight Energy. The companies said Friday the venture will pursue new technologies for converting cellulose and lignin - the compounds plants are made of - into biofuels.

FEBRUARY 2008

House OKs repealing of oil subsidies. Bill would give funds to alternative energy. Published February 28, 2008, Columbia Daily Tribune. Washington (Associated Press) - "The House approved $18 billion in new taxes on the largest oil companies yesterday as Democrats cited record oil prices and rising gasoline costs in a time of economic troubles. The money collected over 10 years would provide tax breaks for wind, solar and other alternative energy sources and for energy conservation. The legislation, approved 236-182, would cost the five largest oil companies an average of $1.8 billion a year over that period, according an analysis by the House Ways and Means Committee. Those companies earned $123 billion last year."

Northern residents lament snowy winter. By Don Babwin, February 26, 2008, Columbia Daily Tribune. Chicago (Associate Press ) -"....In Boston, for example, 49.6 inches of snow has fallen this winter, or 19.3 inches more than normal. In Madison, Wis., where it never had snowed more than 76.6 inches, the city already had seen 77 inches by Feb. 12. Last week, Grand Rapids, Mich., shattered its December-February snowfall record of 85.1 inches set in 1951-52...."

Move Over, Oil, There’s Money in Texas Wind. By Clifford Krauss, Published February 23, 2008, New York Times. Sweetwater , Tex. —…. "Texas, once the oil capital of North America, is rapidly turning into the capital of wind power. After breakneck growth the last three years, Texas has reached the point that more than 3 percent of its electricity, enough to supply power to one million homes, comes from wind turbines…. At the end of 2007, Texas ranked No. 1 in the nation with installed wind power of 4,356 megawatts (and 1,238 under construction), far outdistancing California’s 2,439 megawatts (and 165 under construction). Minnesota and Iowa came in third and fourth with almost 1,300 megawatts each (and 46 and 116 under construction, respectively). Iowa, Minnesota, Colorado and Oregon, states with smaller populations than Texas, all get 5 to 8 percent of their power from wind farms, according to estimates by the American Wind Energy Association."

Spanish company to build one of world's largest solar power plants in Arizona desert. (Associated Press) Published: February 22, 2008, International Herald Tribune. Phoenix. -"A Spanish company is planning to build one of the world's largest solar power plants on 3 square miles of Arizona desert.... Abengoa Solar… could begin construction as early as next year on the 280-megawatt plant in Gila Bend.... It could be producing solar energy by 2011…. estimated to be enough to supply up to 70,000 homes at full capacity."

What Planet Is He On? Perspectives on the President’s State of the Union and Budget. By Ned Stowe, Posted February 21, 2008, Friends Committee on National Legislation. -"Last year, scientists from around the world warned that the U.S. and other leading greenhouse gas emitters must reduce their emissions 25 to 40 percent below 1990 levels by 2020 and 80 to 95 percent below 1990 levels by 2050 if the world is to avoid more dangerous effects of extreme climate change. However, the world may need to cut even more emissions sooner. More recent earth observations indicate that the ice in the Arctic Ocean, Greenland, and portions of Antarctica may be melting much faster than previously thought."

Count Carbon Along With Calories. Interview with Michael Specter (FreshAir from WHYY). Webcast. February 20, 2008. -"That guilty feeling after a big meal might be about more than calories and cholesterol. New Yorker science and technology writer Michael Specter joins Fresh Air to explain how carbon emissions released during food production are having an impact on the environment. Calculating carbon output is a complex, if not counterintuitive, process, Specter says. In the February 25 issue, he writes about the difficulties of measuring carbon footprints in an article titled 'Big Foot: In Measuring Carbon Emissions, it's Easy to Confuse Morality and Science.'"

Windfalls in Lieberman-Warner Global Warming Bill: Quantifying the Fossil Fuel and Potential Nuclear Industry Giveaways. (Friends of the Earth) February 2008. -"In mid October, Senators Joseph Lieberman (I-Conn.) and John Warner (R-Va.) introduced America’s Climate Security Act of 2007. Although some positive changes have been made since the October introduction of the legislation, this bill continues to give up to a trillion dollars to the fossil fuel industry. This report explains one of the significant pitfalls of this cap and trade legislation, pertaining to the distribution and allocation of pollution permits and the spending of auction revenue."

Global Warming: Nine Things that Will Put us Over the Edge. By Steve Connor , The Independent UK. Posted February 8, 2008, AlterNet. -"Scientists have identified nine 'tipping points' of climate change. Nine ways in which the Earth could be tipped into a potentially dangerous state that could last for many centuries have been identified by scientists investigating how quickly global warming could run out of control."

Car-Free, Solar City in Gulf Could Set a New Standard for Green Design. By Andrew C. Revkin. Published February 5, 2008, New York Times. -"In an ever more crowded world facing environmental limits, the push is on to create entire communities with reduced needs for energy, water, land and other resources. The latest effort comes not in some green hub like Portland, Ore., but in the Persian Gulf, fueled as much by oil wealth — and the need to find postpetroleum business models — as environmental zeal."

Wall Street Shows Skepticism Over Coal. Banks Push Utilities To Plan for Impact Of Emissions Caps. By Jeffrey Ball, Wall Street Journal, February 4, 2008; Page A6. -"Three of Wall Street's biggest investment banks are set to announce today that they are imposing new environmental standards that will make it harder for companies to get financing to build coal-fired power plants in the U.S. Citigroup Inc., J.P. Morgan Chase & Co. and Morgan Stanley say they have concluded that the U.S. government will cap greenhouse-gas emissions from power plants sometime in the next few years."

JANUARY 2008

**Face It, There Is a Solution to Global Warming (Architecture 2030). Kick off FOCUS THE NATION with: FACE IT WEBCAST. Turn it around on January 30-31, 2008.
What you must know about global warming to make a difference...

• Substitute the webcast for any class!
• It’s a concise, half-hour webcast jammed-packed with key information.
• It’s viewable any time after 9 am, January 30, 2008.
• And, the details of the Reverberate Competitions will be unveiled during the webcast!

**FOCUS THE NATION: GLOBAL Warming Solutions for America. Focus the Nation is organizing a national teach-in on global warming solutions for America —creating a dialogue at over a thousand colleges, universities, high schools, middle schools, places of worship, civic organizations and businesses, and directly engaging millions of students and citizens with the nation’s decision-makers. Focus the Nation will culminate January 31st, 2008 in simultaneous educational symposia held across the country. Our intent is to move America beyond fatalism to a determination to face up to this civilizational challenge, the challenge of our generation.

Join the Town Hall Meeting January 30, 2008. (Sierra Club). "Get on the phone with the candidates! ... Would you like a chance to ask the Presidential candidates what they would do to fight global warming, put us on the path to a clean energy economy, make the EPA an enforcement agency again, or reform the Army Corps of Engineers? As a Sierra Club member, you could have the opportunity next week to pose those questions. That's when the Sierra Club plans to sponsor a teleconferenced Town Hall with all the Presidential candidates who accept our invitation."

State of the Union: A Missed Opportunity on Climate. Ned Stowe, Friends Committee on National Legislation, Guest blogger, The Quaker’s Colonel, January 29, 2008 .

Peabody takes stake in energy startup. By Jeffrey Tomich, St. Louis Post-Dispatch. January 26, 2008. -"Looking for new ways to take advantage of its vast coal reserves, St. Louis-based Peabody Energy Corp. says it's taking a minority stake in a startup company that's developing technology to turn the black rock into natural gas used to run power plants or furnaces. The agreement with GreatPoint Energy Inc. of Cambridge, Mass., calls for the companies to evaluate the potential for a coal-to-natural gas plant on land owned by St. Louis-based Peabody and using the company's coal reserves. Other terms weren't disclosed."

U.S.-state plan aims at making Hawaii nearly energy-independent. By Bob Keefe , West Coast Bureau, Austin American Statesman. January 26, 2008. -"Energy could come from ocean waves, biofuels based on algae or palm oil, volcanic heat. Federal and state energy officials are planning a major investment in new technologies in an attempt to make Hawaii the nation's first state to get the vast majority of its energy from renewable sources. U.S. Department of Energy officials are expected to announce the unprecedented plan Monday, just before the opening of a U.S.-sponsored international summit on climate change in Hawaii."

EPA chief defends greenhouse gas waiver denial. Washington (Associated Press). Published January 25, 2008, Columbia Daily Tribune.- "The Bush administration’s top environmental regulator faced off yesterday against Democratic senators who took turns denouncing him for blocking tailpipe emission cuts in California and more than a dozen other states. EPA Administrator Stephen Johnson defended his decision and didn’t budge as he was accused of doing the bidding of the White House and the auto industry. It was his first Capitol Hill appearance since denying a federal waiver last month that would have allowed California to implement a law slashing greenhouse gas emissions from cars and trucks. Other states could then have followed suit, and 12 were ready to do so with others making preparations."

Tell EPA Administrator Stephen Johnson to stop censoring documents! (Barbara Boxer, Take Action). Posted January 25, 2008. -"Join 6,781 Americans and email EPA Administrator Stephen Johnson: Demand that he produce full, complete, and uncensored documents explaining his decision to block 19 states from fighting global warming now!"

Will Coffee Be a Casualty of Climate Change? By Dean Cycon, Chelsea Green Publishing. Posted January 25, 2008, AlterNet. - "Coffee farmers in South America don't need to read the latest IPCC reports; they already know…. High in the Sierra Nevada (Snow-Capped Mountains) of Colombia, indigenous Arhuaco coffee farmer Javier Mestres had no such doubts….Javier saw the results of a warming planet clearly in the premature flowering of his coffee plants….He showed me the smaller, weaker berries that dotted the stems and wondered why the outside world wanted to harm these beautiful plants. Why were we changing the world?"

Climate 'clearly out of balance. BBC News, January 24, 2008. - "The world's climate is 'clearly out of balance and is warming', the world's largest society of Earth and space scientists has said in a statement. The American Geophysical Union (AGU) warned that changes to the Earth's climate system were 'not natural'…. It warned that the world faced a tough challenge over the coming 50 years: 'Even the lower limit of impending climate change - an additional global mean warming of 1.0C (1.8F) above the last decade - is far beyond the range of climate variability experienced during the past 1,000 years.'"

EU energy: Revolution for the UK? By Richard Black, Environment correspondent, BBC News website, January 24, 2008. - "If the European Commission's proposals on energy amount to a 'revolution', as president Jose Manuel Barroso claimed when he announced them on Wednesday, what does the revolution look like? How will it change the face of Britain over the next 12 years? The targets our island nation is supposed to achieve, remember, are several: a 20% jump in energy efficiency, 10% of vehicle traffic powered by biofuels, and 15% of energy derived from renewable sources."

Global Warming by the Numbers. Economic opportunity and a clean energy future. (Environmental Defense) Posted January 22, 2008. - "Global warming is the most serious environmental threat of our time. As these facts show, affordable options are available. And America cannot afford to fall behind any more in the race to invent clean, renewable energy sources."

Urge Your State to Join the Clean Car Lawsuit! (Union of Concerned Scientists). January 22, 2008. "Thirteen states, representing over a third of the U.S. auto market, have already adopted clean car standards to reduce global warming pollution from vehicles. But Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) Administrator Stephen Johnson rejected the advice of his staff, directives of two federal judges, and the Supreme Court, and denied the waiver states need to implement these crucial standards."

Take the Earth Hour challenge. Jagoda S. Pike, Publisher (TheStar.com) January 19, 2008. - "How much does an hour weigh?... We are working with the World Wildlife Fund Canada to bring Earth Hour to Toronto and we want you to join us in turning off the lights, saving energy and helping to save the planet. At 8 p.m. on Saturday, March 29, what began in Australia goes global. From Manila to Copenhagen, Tel Aviv and Suva, Fiji, communities around the world will unite for one hour to reduce their ecological footprint."

**Global Warming. The Diane Rehm Show, [Audio] January 16, 2008. "Guest host: Susan Page of USA Today. Last year was one of the hottest on record and new studies show polar ice melt accelerating. The latest on global warming and where the policy debate may lead. Guests: Dean Scott , senior reporter for climate change, Bureau of National Affairs; Angela Anderson, director of Pew Environment Group's global warming campaign; Jeff Holmstead, former assistant administrator for air and radiation at the Environmental Protection Agency (2001-05); now heads the environmental strategy section at Bracewell & Giuliani LLP; Gavin Schmidt, climatologist and climate modeler, NASA's Goddard Institute for Space Studies."

Detroit debuts. Automakers put green foot forward at showcase. Detroit (Associated Press). Published January 14, 2008 Columbia Daily Tribune. - "Hybrids, advanced diesels and green alternatives are pushing aside the traditional displays of speed and chrome at this week’s Detroit auto show, a nod to a new fuel-efficient reality for car makers. Automakers, only weeks after Congress approved tougher fuel-efficiency requirements, are broadening their array of cars that get more on a gallon of gasoline, cut carbon dioxide emissions and use alternative power sources."

GM buying into ethanol. Detroit ( Detroit Free Press) Published January 14, 2008, Columbia Daily Tribune. - "It sounds like a fevered dream of science: a fuel that costs less than $1 a gallon to create, made out of anything from wood chips to your kitchen trash, that takes little water or natural resources. And it’s available in volumes large enough to ease some of America’s thirst for oil within five years…."

Insurers encourage homeowners to rebuild ‘green.’ New York (Associated Press). Published January 9, 2008, Columbia Daily Tribune. - "Sean Walsh returned to his mother’s San Diego home after the October wildfires to find it burned to its foundation. He said he plans to help her rebuild the tri-level, five-bedroom abode - happily used to host 19 grandkids - exactly as it was, only greener…. Spurring clients to rebuild to greener standards is an insurer’s hedge against climate change and the worse and more frequent natural disasters that could be brought on by warming global temperatures, Steinmetz said."

Polar bears might make list because of global warming. Anchorage, Alaska (Associated Press) Published January 9, 2008, Columbia Daily Tribune. - "Federal officials said Monday that they will need a few more weeks to decide whether polar bears need protection under the Endangered Species Act because of global warming…. Listing polar bears as 'threatened' with extinction could trigger limits on development, particularly oil and gas exploration and production, that could harm the animals. That listing is a step below 'endangered,' the most severe classification under the Endangered Species Act."

Five Innovation Initiatives for 2008. Environmental Defense. Posted January 8, 2008. "Getting the economics right can win lasting environmental solutions."

Five Questions You Should Ask the Presidential Candidates. by Greg Haegele, Sierra Club on January 3, 2008. PlanetGreen.Treehugger. "1. How would your administration plan to reduce global warming emissions? 2. How will your administration work with other nations to reduce global warming pollution worldwide? 3. How would you balance federal funding for public transportation and road construction? 4. How do you respond to industries who try to argue that we have to choose between jobs and clean energy? 5. What are your policies on new coal fired power plants and new nuclear power plants?"

DECEMBER 2007

Global warming fails to heat up election. By Ellen Goodman. Published December 30, 2007, Columbia Daily Tribune. -"Because this is the list-making time of year, allow me to add a tiny trophy to Al Gore’s very full shelf: the prize for the most elegant speech of 2007…. The inconvenient truth of the 2008 election year is that climate change is still way down the dance card of most-talked-about topics. It’s ranked No. 12 among Democratic candidates and No. 15 among Republicans. Out of the 2,275 questions on the Sunday morning talk shows, the League of Conservation Voters counted only three on global warming."

Blind faith or planned future. Alan Guebert ( © 2007 ag comm.). December 29, 2007. -"Every fence or barn built by a rancher, every tractor purchased by a farmer is an act of faith in the future because that fence, barn or tractor is an investment in 20, 30, maybe even 50 years of tomorrows. Where will America’s – and the world’s – farmers and ranchers be in 20 or 50 years? Nowhere where they are today because our present petroleum-based, climate changing, water-sucking system of food production cannot economically and agronomically survive without enormous changes."

Solar energy 'revolution' brings green power closer. Panels start solar power 'revolution. By John Vidal, environment editor, The Guardian, December 29 2007. "The holy grail of renewable energy came a step closer yesterday as thousands of mass-produced wafer-thin solar cells printed on aluminium film rolled off a production line in California, heralding what British scientists called "a revolution" in generating electricity."

Is the Hydrogen Age Just Around the Corner? By Jerry Brown and Rinaldo Brutoco and James Cusumano, Ode. Posted December 28, 2007. -"Hydrogen fuel cells will never be a practical source of power, right? Wrong. The technology is set to take off sooner than you think."

Fuel economy standard sets high bar for Detroit. McClatchy Newspapers. Published December 21, 2007, Columbia Daily Tribune. Washington - "It took Congress, the White House, Detroit’s automakers and the UAW more than two decades of bare-knuckled political brawling to hammer out a compromise on higher fuel economy rules for cars and trucks that all sides could live with…. The new standards are expected to save 1.1 million barrels of oil per day and $22 billion for consumers. The 35 mpg standard will be an industry-wide average by 2020, and experts at the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration will have to set different standards for cars and trucks, with each vehicle assigned a mileage target based on its design."

** The Energy Bill. The Diane Rehm Show, December 20, 2007, 10:00 A.M. Guest host: Steve Roberts. -"Congress passed and President Bush signed into law and energy bill which increases fuel efficiency standards and biofuels production. It also phases out the incandescent light bulb. We'll examine the new law and what impact it could have on the economy and the environment."

You Decide: Best Green Story of 2007. Sierra Club Insider. December 18, 2007 .

“Energy Independence and Security Act of 2007”: Should We Cheer or Cry? Friends Committee on National Legislation, a Quaker Lobby in the Public Interest. Posted December 17, 2007. -"December 13, the Senate approved a scaled down version of the House energy bill. Now it goes back to the House from whence it came for a final vote. The White House says the president will sign this bill (after threatening to veto previous stronger versions). The question is: Should we cheer or cry? Hoorah! H.R. 6 raises the vehicle fuel economy standard to 35 miles per gallon by 2020. Sob! Why so slow and so little? ..."

Late Reversal by U.S. Yields Climate Plan. By Thomas Fuller and Andrew C. Revkin. Published December 16, 2007, New York Times World. Nusa Dua, Indonesia — "In a tumultuous final session at international climate talks in which the United States delegates were booed and hissed, the world’s nations committed Saturday to negotiating a new accord by 2009 that, in theory, would set the world on a course toward halving emissions of heat-trapping gases by 2050. The finish to the negotiations came after a last-minute standoff during a day of high emotions, with the co-organizer of the conference, Yvo de Boer, fleeing the podium at one point as he held back tears. The standoff started when developing countries demanded the United States agree that the eventual pact measure not only poorer countries’ steps, but also the effectiveness of financial and technological assistance from wealthier ones. The United States capitulated in that open session.... That change followed a more profound shift by the Bush administration, which agreed during the two-week conference to pursue a new pact fulfilling the unmet goals of the original treaty; the pact would take effect in 2012 when the only existing addendum, the Kyoto Protocol, expires."

U.S. backs down on climate accord. Bali, Indonesia (Associated Press). Published December 16, 2007 Columbia Daily Tribune. - "In a hushed conference hall, as envoys from 186 nations looked on, the world’s lone superpower took a tongue-lashing from its most powerless, nation after poor nation assailing the U.S. 'no' on the document at hand. Then the delegate from Papua New Guinea leaned into his microphone. 'We seek your leadership,' Kevin Conrad told the Americans. 'But if for some reason you are not willing to lead, leave it to the rest of us. Please get out of the way.' The U.N. climate conference exploded with applause, the U.S. delegation backed down, and the way was cleared yesterday for adoption of the 'Bali Roadmap,' after a dramatic half-hour that set the stage for a grinding two years of climate talks to come."

*Bali Bulletin: Dramatic Final Hours. Posted by Peter Goldmark, Program Director, Environmental Defense, Climate and Air. December 15, 2007 - Also see his previous dispatch from Bali and background on the meetings.

Move Over Kyoto — Here Comes a ‘Copenhagen Protocol,’ By Andrew C. Revkin , December 15, 2007 , New York Times Dot Earth. -"So agreement was finally reached in Bali. After an hours-long public standoff Saturday in which the unthinkable happened — boos and hisses at a treaty conference — the world’s nations adopted a common two-year 'road map' leading to the first comprehensive update to the ailing 1992 Framework Convention on Climate Change."

Bali climate conference enters final day. Bali, Indonesia (Associated Press). Published December 14, 2007, Columbia Daily Tribune - "U.S., European and other envoys at the U.N. climate conference took their 11th-hour talks into the early hours Saturday, working to resolve a dispute over how ambitious the goal should be in negotiating future cutbacks in global-warming gases."

Global Warming "Tipping Points" Reached, Scientist Says. by Mason Inman, stopglobalwarming.org, December 14, 2007. -"Earth has already crossed a number of climate change "tipping points" at which today's levels of greenhouse gases will cause additional large and rapid changes, a leading climate scientist said yesterday. But it's not too late to avoid much of the damage by curbing the use of fossil fuels such as oil and coal, climatologist James Hansen added during a presentation at the American Geophysical Union fall meeting in San Francisco. Today's level of CO2 in the atmosphere is enough to cause Arctic sea ice cover and massive ice sheets such as in Greenland to eventually melt away, said Hansen, of the NASA Goddard Institute for Space Studies in New York City.

Senate approves trimmed-back energy bill. By H. Josef Hebert, Associated Press writer. December 14, 2007 (Yahoo! News). Washington. -"The Senate passed a trimmed-back energy bill that would bring higher-gas mileage cars and SUVs into showrooms in the coming decade and fill their tanks with ethanol. The measure was approved Thursday with strong bipartisan support 86-8 after Democrats abandoned efforts to impose billions of dollars in new taxes on the biggest oil companies, unable by one vote to overcome a Republican filibuster against the new taxes. The bill now goes to the House, where a vote is expected next week. The White House issued a statement saying President Bush will sign the legislation if it reaches his desk, as is expected."

2007 among warmest years on record. Jennifer C. Kerr. Washington (Associated Press ) Published December 13, 2007, Columbia Daily Tribune. - "A vast swath of the United States was warmer than usual this year, leading to severe drought conditions and wildfires in the West and Southeast. Texas, the Lone Star state, stood alone, the only one to record below average temperatures."

California wins court ruling on vehicle emissions. Sacramento , Calif. (Associated Press ). Published December 13, 2007, Columbia Daily Tribune. - "California scored a major victory yesterday in its bid to be a player in the fight against global warming, as a federal judge ruled that the state has the authority to regulate greenhouse gas emissions from cars. The ruling by U.S. District Judge Anthony Ishii in Fresno was another in a series of losses this year for automakers, who have sought to block California’s clean car mandates from taking effect here and in 16 other states that together make up nearly half the U.S. population. The win for environmentalists is tempered by the federal Environmental Protection Agency, however, which has yet to grant California’s two-year-old request for a waiver, the last roadblock to the new rules."

Gore critical of U.S. stance. Bush blocks progress at climate talks, he says. Bali, Indonesia ( Associated Press ). Published December 13, 2007, Columbia Daily Tribune. - "Al Gore said today the United States is 'principally responsible' for blocking progress at the U.N. climate conference, and European nations threatened to boycott U.S.-led climate talks next month unless Washington compromises on emissions reductions. The former vice president urged delegates to take urgent action to reduce emissions of greenhouse gases blamed for global warming."

*Senate votes on fuel economy. House to get bill after expected approval. Washington ( Associated Press ). Published December 13, 2007, Columbia Daily Tribune. - "The Senate was on the verge today of approving and sending back to the House the first increase in automobile fuel economy in three decades and huge gains in ethanol use as part of a compromise energy bill. Democrats were forced to strip away a contentious $21.8 billion tax package, including billions of dollars in tax increases on the biggest oil companies, because of determined Republican opposition and a White House veto threat. Democratic leaders fell one vote short, 59-40, in getting the 60 votes needed to overcome a GOP filibuster."

**Melting in Arctic speeding up. Expert predicts ice almost gone by 2012. Washington (Associated Press). Published December 12, 2007 Columbia Daily Tribune. - "An already relentless melting of the Arctic greatly accelerated this summer, a warning sign that some scientists worry could mean global warming has passed an ominous tipping point. One even speculated that summer sea ice would be gone in five years. Greenland’s ice sheet melted nearly 19 billion tons more than the previous high mark, and the volume of sea ice at summer’s end was half what it was just four years earlier, according to new NASA satellite data obtained by The Associated Press."

**Chair of UN Climate Panel Says Nobel Peace Prize Signals a "Clarion Call for the Protection of the Earth" (Democracy Now). December 11, 2007. -"Rajendra Pachauri, the chair of the UN’s Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, accepted the Nobel Peace Prize in Oslo on behalf of the group on Monday. 'Peace can be defined as security and the secure access to resources that are essential for living,' said Pachauri. “In this regard, climate change will have several implications, as numerous adverse impacts are expected for some populations in terms of access to clean water, access to sufficient food, stable health conditions, ecosystem resources and security of settlements.” [includes rush transcript]."

Emission cuts debated at climate summit. By Joseph Coleman, Bali, Indonesia (Associated Press). Published December 11, 2007, Columbia Daily Tribune. - "Delegates at the U.N. climate conference struggled to agree Tuesday on whether they will call on rich nations to cut greenhouse gas emissions by specific amounts, and the U.N. chief warned that the human race faces oblivion if it fails to confront global warming. Ban Ki-moon, who is presiding over the final days of a conference aimed at setting an agenda and deadline for talks on a pact to replace the Kyoto Protocol in 2012, urged quick action as negotiators haggled over wording that would be acceptable to all."

In Duck Blinds, Visions of Global Warming. By William Yardley (New York Times Warming Trends). December 11, 2007 . Rich Hill, Mo. — "After 32 years of hunting ducks in the wetlands of Missouri, Chuck Geier knows when temperatures will drop and waters will freeze. That means he also knows when the birds will fly and hunting will be best. Except that much of what he knows is now in question. 'It used to be by Dec. 6, this place was frozen,' said Mr. Geier, 51, a national sales manager for a telecommunications company. 'That’s not true anymore.'"

**It Is Time to Make Peace With the Planet" - Al Gore Accepts 2007 Nobel Peace Prize. (Democracy Now). December 11, 2007. -"The Nobel Peace Prize was awarded Monday to former Vice President Al Gore and the UN’s Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change for their work to help combat global warming. 'We and the earth’s climate are locked in a relationship familiar to war planners: ‘Mutually assured destruction,’ Gore said in his acceptance speech. 'It is time to make peace with the planet.' [includes rush transcript]."

Mitch McConnell, George Bush, Dick Cheney Are "Climate Criminals" - Environmentalist in 99th Day of Climate Emergency Fast Blasts GOP. (Democracy Now). December 11, 2007. -"Environmentalist Ted Glick is heading to Capitol Hill today to protest Republican opposition to a House-approved energy bill. The Bush administration and leading Republicans oppose the measure. Glick is now on the ninety-ninth day of a fast to protest the failure of Congress to address climate change. [includes rush transcript]."

**Al Gore’s Speech on the Acceptance of the Nobel Peace Prize December 10, 2007 Oslo, Norway.

Britain plans to pursue wind power. By Raphael G. Satter. London (Associated Press). Published December 10, 2007,Columbia Daily Tribune. - "Britain unveiled plans Monday to generate enough electricity through offshore wind farms to power every home in the country by 2020, increasing production more than 60-fold and changing the look of its coastlines. Britain 's wind-swept coasts and shallow waters are ideal for offshore turbines, but wind generated power currently accounts for less than 2 percent of its energy generation."

Dems cite manipulation in climate report. By H. Josef Hebert. Washington (Associated Press). Published December 10, 2007, Columbia Daily Tribune. -"The White House has systematically tried to manipulate climate change science and minimize the dangers of global warming, asserts a Democratic congressional report issued after a 16-month investigation. Republicans called the report, issued Monday by Rep. Henry Waxman, D-Calif., a 'partisan diatribe' against the Bush administration. The report relies on hundreds of internal communications and documents as well as testimony at two congressional hearings to outline a pattern where scientists and government reports were edited to emphasize the uncertainties surrounding global warming, according to Waxman."

‘Make peace with the planet,’ Gore urges. Oslo , Norway (Associated Press). Published December 10, 2007, Columbia Daily Tribune. - "Al Gore received his Nobel Peace Prize today and urged the United States and China to make the boldest moves on climate change or 'stand accountable before history for their failure to act.' In accepting the prize he shared with the U.N. climate panel, the former vice president said humanity risks sliding down a path of 'mutually assured destruction. It is time to make peace with the planet,' Gore said in his acceptance speech that quoted Churchill, Gandhi and the Bible. 'We must quickly mobilize our civilization with the urgency and resolve that has previously been seen only when nations mobilized for war.'"

U.N. climate leaders jump-start discussion. Bali, Indonesia (Associated Press). Published December 10, 2007, Columbia Daily Tribune. - "The world’s top two polluters, the United States and China, say they are not ready to commit to mandatory caps on greenhouse gases. But that’s not a worry to the organizers of this month’s U.N. climate conference, who say they only want to jump-start the world’s talks toward a new climate accord. 'This meeting is not about delivering a fully negotiated climate change deal, but it is to set the wheels in motion,' the U.N. climate chief, Yvo de Boer, said yesterday."

*Bali Bulletin (Union of Concerned Scientists). December 3-14, 2007 . "UCS reports from UN global meeting on climate change in Bali, Indonesia. December 4, 2007: Australia ratifies Kyoto; Surprising statements by Japan   (Posted by Alden Meyer, Strategy and Policy Director)."

U.S. to go its own way: Americans resist U.N. global warming caps. Bali, Indonesia (Associated Press). Published December 9, 2007, Columbia Daily Tribune. - "The United States will come up with its own plan to cut global warming gases by mid-2008 and won’t commit to mandatory caps at the U.N. climate conference here, the chief U.S. negotiator said yesterday. 'We’re not ready to do that here,' said Harlan Watson, the Department of State’s senior climate negotiator and special representative. 'We’re working on that, what our domestic contribution would be, and again we expect that sometime before the end of the Major Economies process.'"

Cities, states take lead to fight global warming. Bali, Indonesia (Associated Press). Published Saturday, December 8, 2007 Columbia Daily Tribune. - "Despite Bush administration reluctance, U.S. states and cities could make an American "national commitment" to a new global agreement to cut greenhouse gases, the chief U.N. climate scientist said yesterday. In an interview with The Associated Press, Rajendra Pachauri said the U.S. approach to climate change might be altered by the upcoming presidential election or by the combined actions of states and cities."

** Energy Bill Passes House and Fails in Senate. (Friends of the Earth. Environmental Roundup) December 8, 2007. "After months of negotiations, Speaker Nancy Pelosi and Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid this week agreed to bring a strong energy package to the floor of each house.  Unfortunately, while the bill passed the House of Representatives on Thursday, it was defeated by a Senate filibuster this morning and will now likely be dramatically scaled back before being sent to the president."

World climate change protests kick off. By Raphael G. Satter of the Associated Press. London ( Associated Press), Published December 8, 2007, Columbia Daily Tribune -- "Skiers, fire-eaters and an ice sculptor joined in worldwide demonstrations Saturday to draw attention to climate change and push their governments to take stronger action to fight global warming. From costume parades in the Philippines to a cyclist's protest in London, marches were held in more than 50 cities around the world to coincide with the two-week U.N. Climate Change Conference, which runs through Friday in Bali, Indonesia."

House passes a sweeping energy bill. Fuel efficiency would increase and alternative sources would expand. The measure faces a tough road in the Senate. By Richard Simon, Los Angeles Times, December 7, 2007. Washington -- "The House on Thursday approved the biggest increase in vehicle fuel-economy standards since gasoline cost less than a dollar a gallon, in a sweeping energy bill that is headed for a showdown in the Senate and a possible veto from President Bush. The measure would require a 40% increase in fuel efficiency for new cars and light trucks by 2020, for a fleetwide average of 35 miles per gallon, and would be the first congressional raising of the standards since they were established in 1975."

All nations 'need emission goals.' By Richard Black, Environment correspondent, BBC News website December 6, 2007. "Britain 's Trade and Development Minister Gareth Thomas has said that developing countries will need targets for greenhouse gas emissions. Rich nations had to lead emissions cuts, he said, but developing countries such as China should have targets too."

Amazon 'disappearing fast'. VIDEO. (BBC News website) December 6, 2007. "Deforestation is destroying the Amazon faster than previously thought, conservationists have warned."

Energy-efficiency goals adopted by state panel. By David R. Baker. SF Gate/San Francisco Chronicle. December 6, 2007. California should make all new homes so energy-efficient by 2020 that they won't need to draw power from the state's electrical grid, according to a plan for meeting the state's future energy needs. Adopted unanimously Wednesday by the California Energy Commission, the plan contains dozens of recommendations that touch on almost every way California generates and uses energy. They are designed both to lower the state's energy use and to cut the greenhouse gas emissions that come from burning fossil fuels.

Dispatches from the Deep. By Laura Tangley. National Wildlife, December/January 2008. "Outfitted with high-tech tags, far-ranging and deep-diving elephant seals are collecting data critical to understanding the oceans, including changes tied to global warming."

Navigating Through Carbon Confusion. By Mark Wexler. Green Consumer. National Wildlife, December/January 2008. "Travel is a powerful tool for increasing people’s appreciation for the natural world, but to effectively offset the pollution generated by their trips, consumers need to carefully study the options."

Solar is the Solution. By Steve Heckeroth. Mother Earth News. December 2007/January 2008. "We know that relying on coal, oil and natural gas threatens our future with toxic pollution, global climate change and social unrest caused by diminishing fuel supplies. Instead of relying on unsustainable fossil fuels, we must transform our economy and learn to thrive on the planet’s abundant supply of renewable energy. I have been studying our energy options for more than 30 years, and I am absolutely convinced that our best and easiest option is solar energy, which is virtually inexhaustable…. We already have the technology and energy resources we need to build a sustainable, solar-electric economy that can cure our addiction to oil, stabilize the climate and maintain our standard of living, all at the same time."

Twelve Environmental Victories in 2007. Environmental Defense, December 4, 2007. "This time of year, many are singing about turtle doves, French hens and maids a'milking. Well, we may not have five golden rings, but here's our list of 12 environmental victories in 2007 you may have missed. While we continue to make progress on our number one priority - capping America's global warming pollution - we hope this list inspires you and brings you cheer this holiday season. With your help, we're making a difference and winning real victories for the environment."

Climate change costs billions: Victims ask U.N. for compensation. Bali, Indonesia (Associated Press). Published December 4, 2007 Columbia Daily Tribune- "Victims of climate change, real and potential, appealed today for a vast increase in international aid to protect them from and compensate them for rising seas, crop-killing drought and other likely impacts of global warming."

**Politics of Global Warming. The Diane Rehm Show. December 4, 2007. "An update on challenges to be faced at the U.N. sponsored international climate change conference taking place in Bali and legislation being considered here that would cut U.S. emissions here by 15% by 2020. Guests David Doniger , climate center policy director, NRDC; John Fialka, environment and energy reporter for 'The Wall Street Journal,' Washington bureau; John Stowell, v.p. environmental policy, Duke Energy."

Stuck on Coal, and Stuck for Words in a High-Tech World. By Andrew C. Revkin. , New York Times, Published December 4, 2007. "Human progress, Loren Eiseley wrote in 1954, has largely been a climb up 'the heat ladder' from one energy source to the next. Each has been more convenient or potent or economical than the last. No one lugs firewood to warm a high-rise apartment building in Chicago. But the climb has stalled."

Are Words Worthless in the Climate Fight? By Andrew C. Revkin , New York Times, December 3, 2007. " In Science Times this week, I have a story examining the limits of language. Can scientists or anyone else find new words sufficiently potent to inspire action on long-term challenges, like shifting from unfettered use of coal and oil to limit the odds of climate surprises?"

Experts gather in Bali for climate conference. Bali, Indonesia (Associated Press). Published December 3, 2007 Columbia Daily Tribune - "Delegates and scientists from around the world opened the biggest-ever climate change conference today, urging rapid progress in building a new international pact by 2009 to combat global warming - or risk economic and environmental disaster."

NOVEMBER 2007

The acid threat. As CO 2 rises, shelled animals may perish. National Geographic Magazine, November 2007. If carbon dioxide continues to rise unchecked, computer models show that acidification will deplete carbonate ions in much of the ocean by 2100, turning the waters corrosive for many shell-building animals.

** “We Are Now In The Danger Zone”: Leading Australian Scientist Tim Flannery on Climate Change and How To Save the Planet. Democracy Now November 23, 2007. Watch 256K stream . Listen to Segment.

Lakes near ‘dead zone’: Atlanta-area water down to the dregs. Atlanta (Associated Press) Published November 18, 2007 Columbia Daily Tribune. - "With drought tightening its grip on the Southeast, the Atlanta area’s reservoirs are almost down to the dregs - the dirtier, more bacteria-laden water close to the bottom - and it’s going to require more aggressive and more expensive purification."

Warming imperils planet’s treasures, climate experts say. Valencia, Spain (Associated Press). Published November 18, 2007, Columbia Daily Tribune. -"Global warming is 'unequivocal,' and carbon dioxide already in the atmosphere commits the world to sea levels rising an average of up to 4.6 feet, the world’s top climate experts warned yesterday in their most authoritative report to date…. According to the U.N. panel of scientists, whose latest report is a synthesis of three previous ones, enough carbon dioxide already has built up that it imperils islands, coastlines and a fifth to two-thirds of the world’s species."

**Watch presidential candidates discuss climate and energy. Sponsored by GRIST Environmental News & Commentary. On Saturday, November 17, 2007. "Grist sponsored the first-ever presidential candidate forum focusing on the issues of energy policy and climate change. Hillary Clinton, John Edwards, and Dennis Kucinich spoke about their green platforms. (All Democratic and Republican presidential candidates were invited to attend)."

Solar Power, At Last? The long-sought mechanism for a superior solar cell may now be at hand. By Boonsri Dickinson , Discover Magazine, November 16, 2007. For years physicists have sought a revolutionary approach to solar energy. Instead of working on ordinary solar cells, which require many photons to produce a single electron, they have focused on quantum dots, which need only one photon to produce multiple electrons. This process, called multiple exciton generation (MEG), has so far worked only in toxic materials like lead. Now Arthur Nozik at the National Renewable Energy Laboratory has proved that MEG works in silicon, the material that constitutes most solar cells. The next step: Prove that MEG can be scaled out of the lab to become commercially viable.

*U.N. releases climate guide for lawmakers. Valencia, Spain (Associated Press). Published November 16, 2007, Columbia Daily Tribune. - "Working until dawn, negotiators today concluded a policy guide for governments on global warming that declares climate change is here and getting worse, one of its authors said. Provisional agreement on the text - which is about 20 pages and summarizes thousands of pages of data and projections - required compromises among the more than 140 delegations but resulted in a "good and balanced document," said Bert Metz, a Dutch scientist who helped draft the report."

Keeping Our Big Blue Planet Green. (November 2007). "The MU Department of Forestry monitors how trees are working naturally to balance carbon and water in Missouri’s Ozarks. A tall tower – one of 118 throughout America – is outfitted with equipment to measure CO 2, water vapor and meteorological information. The project is part of a coordinated network created to monitor and address scientific uncertainties associated with global climate change."

Global Warming Index: Costs of Inaction (Environmental Defense Action Fund). Posted November 14, Updated November 15 , 2007. "Opponents of global warming action frequently claim that the costs of global warming action will be too great. But, as these facts show, there are serious costs to global warming inaction."

Governors Challenge Congress to Cap Global Warming Pollution in New TV Ad. (Environmental Defense Action Fund). Posted November 14, 2007. "Three western governors, Arnold Schwarzenegger (R-CA), Brian Schweitzer (D-MT) and Jon Huntsman (R-UT), challenge Congress to cap America's global warming pollution in a new Environmental Defense Action Fund TV ad."

Challenges to Both Left and Right on Global Warming. By Andrew C. Revkin . Published November 13, 2007, New York Times.

Democratic Leaders Poised to Sabotage Hope for Renewable Energy. By Kelpie Wilson, TruthOut.org. Posted November 13, 2007 (AlterNet). "Democratic leaders Nancy Pelosi and Harry Reid said that they would jettison the renewable energy provisions in both the House and Senate versions of the 2007 energy bill, in the interest of passing a bill before the Thanksgiving. Republicans have been holding up action on the bill for months now …. The big sticking points for Republicans have been support for renewable energy and ending billions of dollars in subsidies for oil companies. Democrats would like to use the oil subsidy money to support solar and wind power."

Policy Solutions for 2008 Presidential Candidates (Union of Concerned Scientists). November 13, 2007. "The 2008 presidential election presents an important opportunity to educate the people who want to lead America--highlighting critical issues affecting our health, safety, and environment. The Union of Concerned Scientists is urging all candidates to …. Implement an economy-wide cap on global warming pollution that grows more stringent over time to achieve an 80 percent reduction in U.S. emissions by mid-century…" more….

Experts say getting fit fights climate change. Washington (Associated Press). Published November 12, 2007, Columbia Daily Tribune.- "America’s obesity epidemic and global warming might not seem to have much in common. But public health experts suggest people can attack them both by cutting calories and carbon dioxide at the same time. How? Get out of your car and walk or bike half an hour a day instead of driving. And while you’re at it, eat less red meat. That’s how Americans can simultaneously save the planet and their health, say doctors and climate scientists."

U.N. official urges climate plan: inaction ‘criminally irresponsible,’ he says. Valencia, Spain (Associated Press) Published November 12, 2007, Columbia Daily Tribune.- "The U.N.’s top climate official challenged world policymakers today to map out a path to curb climate change, charging that to ignore the urgency of global warming would be ‘nothing less than criminally irresponsible.’ Yvo de Boer issued his warning at the opening of a weeklong conference that will complete a concise guide on the state of global warming and what can be done to stop the Earth from overheating."

Climate bill's 60% emission cut. BBC News November 6, 2007. - - "The UK will be the first nation to put carbon emissions levels into law. Prime Minister Gordon Brown has committed the UK to reducing carbon dioxide emissions by 60% before 2050 to help tackle global warming. The Climate Change Bill will make the UK the first country to put carbon emissions reduction targets into law."

Climate change a security threat, study says. Amsterdam, Netherlands (Associated Press). Published November 4, 2007 Columbia Daily Tribune. - "Climate change could be one of the greatest national security challenges ever faced by U.S. policymakers, according to a new joint study by two U.S. think tanks. The report, to be released tomorrow, raises the threat of dramatic population migrations, wars over water and resources, and a realignment of power among nations. During the last two decades, climate scientists have underestimated how quickly the Earth is changing - perhaps to avoid being branded as "alarmists," the study said. But policy planners should count on climate-induced instability in critical parts of the world within 30 years."

Scientists deploy ocean monitors. Washington (McClatchy Newspapers). Published November 4, 2007, Columbia Daily Tribune.- "Scientists have just finished deploying a worldwide network of 3,000 automated floating sensors that will provide unprecedented information about the oceans’ powerful effect on the world’s climate. The Argo network, named for the ship that carried the fabled Greek sailors, the Argonauts, covers the seas in unmatched scope and detail. Because water covers 75 percent of the Earth’s surface, what happens in the oceans affects rising sea levels, the warming of the atmosphere, the birth of tropical storms and hurricanes, and much of the world’s food supply. The sea also absorbs half of the excess carbon that’s blamed for global warming. 'Now we can accurately measure changing ocean temperature globally for the first time,' said Dean Roemmich, a marine scientist at the Scripps Institution of Oceanography in San Diego."

OCTOBER 2007

Walden Warming. By T. Edward Nickens. National Wildlife Oct/Nov 2007, vol. 45 no. 6. "Following in Thoreau’s footsteps, Massachusetts researchers are creating the most complete picture yet of global warming’s impact on the biology of a U.S. region."

**What Happens in Greenland Will Not Stay in Greenland. By Larry J. Schweiger, President and Chief Executive Officer National Wildlife Federation . National Wildlife Oct/Nov 2007, vol. 45 no. 6 . "Ice is melting at an alarming pace all over the world. Nowhere is it more obvious than at the head of Jakobshavn Fjord near Ilulissat on the west coast of Greenland."

*A clean machine: Local firm using acetylene to power internal combustion engines. By Kevin Coleman of the Tribune’s staff. Published October 31, 2007, Columbia Daily Tribune. "A local company headed by former Missouri Gov. Roger Wilson says it has developed breakthrough technology that uses a clean-burning gas made from renewable sources to power internal combustion engines. The company, A Fuels Technologies LLC, a subsidiary of Go-Tec Inc., has filed an application with the U.S. Department of Energy to designate acetylene gas an alternative fuel. The company has patents on technology developed over a decade that Director of Research and Development Joe Wulff said can run engines on 'rocks and water.'"

**Going Green in the Private Sector. The Diane Rehm Show Monday October 29, 2007. "Congress is considering legislation to regulate greenhouse gas emissions, but many businesses are already actively seeking ways to reduce their carbon footprints. We'll talk about some of the challenges and opportunities of going green in the private sector."

Green Schools Offer Healthier Classrooms -- and Might Boost Test Scores. By Samantha Cleaver, Plenty Magazine. Posted, AlterNet, October 29, 2007.

**Leading Australian Scientist Tim Flannery on Global Warming and the Worsening Dangers of Climate Change Denial. Democracy Now, October 25th, 2007.

*CO2 emissions higher than thought. Washington (Associated Press). Published October 24, 2007 Columbia Daily Tribune. -"Just days after the Nobel prize was awarded for global warming work, an alarming new study finds that carbon dioxide in the atmosphere is increasing faster than expected. Carbon dioxide emissions were 35 percent higher in 2006 than in 1990, a much faster growth rate than anticipated, researchers led by Josep Canadell of Australia’s Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organization reported in yesterday’s edition of Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences."

Rising temperatures linked to extinctions in new study. Washington (Associated Press). Published October 24, 2007, Columbia Daily Tribune. - "Whenever the world’s tropical seas rose several degrees, Earth experienced mass extinctions over millions of years, according to a first-of-its-kind statistical study of fossil records. And scientists fear it might be about to happen again - but in a matter of several decades, not tens of millions of years."

**White House doctors CDC climate speech. Office removes references to effect of warming on diseases. Washington (Associated Press). Published October 24, 2007, Columbia Daily Tribune. -" The White House significantly edited testimony prepared for a Senate hearing on the impact of climate change on health, deleting key portions citing diseases that could flourish in a warmer climate, documents obtained by The Associated Press showed today."

Drinking water worries create crisis in Georgia. Cumming, Ga. (Associated Press). Published Sunday, October 21, 2007, Columbia Daily Tribune. - "With water supplies rapidly shrinking during a drought of historic proportions, Gov. Sonny Perdue declared a state of emergency yesterday for the northern third of Georgia…. More than a quarter of the Southeast is covered by an 'exceptional' drought - the National Weather Service’s worst drought category."

Warm weather dulls New England colors. Above-average temperatures leave ‘leaf peepers’ wanting. East Montpelier, Vt. (Associated Press), Published Sunday, October 21, 2007, Columbia Daily Tribune. - … "Forested hillsides usually riotous with reds, oranges and yellows have shown their colors only grudgingly in recent years…. ‘It’s nothing like it used to be,’ said University of Vermont plant biologist Tom Vogelmann, a Vermont native. According to the National Weather Service, temperatures in Burlington have run above the 30-year averages in every September and October for the past four years, save for October 2004, when they were 0.2 degree below average."

Deal on warming looks slim: U.S. still roadblock to world agreement. The Associated Press. Published Sunday, October 14, 2007, Columbia Daily Tribune. "It’s October, and global warming campaigner Al Gore has won the Nobel Peace Prize. In November, the United Nations’ climate scientists issue a capstone report on where the planet is headed. And in December, envoys of almost 200 nations gather in Bali, Indonesia, hoping for action to head off the worst of climate change. But because of something that happened in September, their chances look slim."

Gore Waves the Red Flag on Climate Change. Gore wins the 2007 Nobel Peace Prize for his efforts to sound the alarm on climate change. National Public Radio- Fresh Air. October 12, 2007. Includes other NPR links regarding Gore’s Nobel Prize. Former Vice President Al Gore talks about his efforts to educate the world on global warming (an interview was originally broadcast on May 30, 2006).

**A key threshold crossed. By Gregory M. Lamb, The Christian Science Monitor Online, October 11, 2007. "An Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change report to be released next month will show that the limit on greenhouse-gases scientists hoped to avert has already been surpassed."

Ice Caps Melting Fast: Say Goodbye to the Big Apple? By Paul Brown, AlterNet. Posted October 10, 2007. "The talk of sea level rise should not be in centuries, it should be decades or perhaps even single years.... It is hard to shock journalists and at the same time leave them in awe of the power of nature. A group returning from a helicopter trip flying over, then landing on, the Greenland ice cap at the time of maximum ice melt last month were shaken…. What they were all talking about was the moulins, not one moulin but hundreds, possibly thousands…. It is the name for a giant hole in a glacier through which millions of gallons of melt water cascade through to the rock below. The water has the effect of lubricating the glaciers so they move at three times the rate that they did previously."

Man, nature make humidity increase. Moisture in the air rises from ’70s to now. Washington (Associated Press) Published Wednesday, October 10, 2007, Columbia Daily Tribune. - "The world isn’t just getting hotter from man-made global warming, it’s getting stickier. It really is the humidity."

**Report sounds warning. Expert says emissions unexpectedly high. Sydney, Australia (Associated Press) Published Wednesday, October 10, 2007 Columbia Daily Tribune.- Worldwide economic growth has accelerated the level of greenhouse gas emissions to a dangerous threshold scientists had not expected for another decade, a leading Australian climate change expert said. Tim Flannery told Australian Broadcasting Corp. that an upcoming report by the U.N. Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change will contain new data showing the level of climate-changing gases in the atmosphere already has reached critical levels."

Climate Change: Can We Stop It? By Bill McKibben, New York Review of Books. Posted October 8, 2007. Alternet. "A review of controversial books on climate change and the environmental movement by Bjørn Lomborg and Ted Nordhaus and Michael Shellenberger. 'The authors of the first two books under review have some doubts about a strategy that emphasizes limits on carbon emissions, Lomborg for economic reasons and Nordhaus and Shellenberger for political ones.'"

Do Progressives Have the Wrong Idea About Change? By Ted Nordhaus and Michael Shellenberger, AlterNet. Posted October 8, 2007. "The authors of the new book Break Through argue that scaring people with bad news about the environment is no way to get them to change -- what's needed is a dream we all want to be a part of."

Fox News Tries to Put a Positive Spin On Global Warming. Posted by Faiz Shakir. Alternet. October 8, 2007. "Fox News looks at the melting ice caps as an opportunity to compete with other countries over oil reserves. This blog, written by Faiz Shakir, originally appeared on Think Progress. This past July, Robert Greenwald's Brave New Films released ' Fox Attacks: The Environment.' The short film documented Fox News' assault on global warming science. Watch it here."

Activist Ted Glick on 32nd Day of “Climate Emergency Fast” to Protest Washington Inaction on Global Warming. Friday, October 5th, 2007. Democracy Now. "Ted Glick is the coordinator of the U.S. Climate Emergency Council. He is on the 32nd day of a fast to protest the failure of lawmakers in Washington to address climate change."

How to Address Humanity's Global Crises? Challenge Corporate Power, Embrace True Democracy. By Vandana Shiva, AlterNet. Posted October 1, 2007. "The physicist, activist and author outlines the scope of the ‘triple threat’ represented by the end of cheap oil, human-induced climate change, and resource scarcity…. The following remarks were made this September at a conference on ‘Confronting the Global Triple Crisis -- Climate Change, Peak Oil, Global Resource Depletion & Extinction,’ in Washington DC. For more information, visit the International Forum on Globalization's website."

SEPTEMBER 2007

Democrat offers proposal ‘you’re not going to like’. Washington (Associated Press) Published Thursday, September 27, 2007. Columbia Daily Tribune - "Dealing with global warming will be painful, says one of the most powerful Democrats in Congress. To back up his claim, he is proposing a recipe many people won’t like - a 50-cent gasoline tax, a carbon tax and scaling back tax breaks for some homeowners. 'I’m trying to have everybody understand that this is going to cost and that it’s going to have a measure of pain that you’re not going to like,' Rep. John Dingell, who is marking his 52nd year in Congress, said yesterday in an interview with The Associated Press."

**Environmental worry grows. Most Americans unhappy with inaction. Washington (Associated Press) Published Thursday, September 27, 2007. Columbia Daily Tribune - "People want their leaders to move boldly to help the environment but give them dismal grades for their actions so far, according to a poll released yesterday that highlighted rampant pessimism on the issue. Only about one in five voiced approval of how President George W. Bush, Congress and U.S. businesses have been handling the environment."

Rice urges climate change accord. BBC News. Thursday, September 27, 2007. "US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice has said climate change is a real problem, and world leaders should forge a new global consensus on tackling it. At a meeting of the top 16 polluting countries, Ms Rice said nations should pursue lower-carbon energy sources. She expressed support for UN efforts to achieve international agreements on the issue at talks in Bali in December. Critics are concerned that the meeting might be used to press for voluntary rather than binding emission cuts."

*Climate scientists hopeful about change. Washington (Associated Press) Published. Wednesday, September 26, 2007. Columbia Daily Tribune - "Climate scientist Michael Mann ran down the list of bad global warming news: The world is spewing greenhouse gases at a faster rate. Summer Arctic sea ice is at record lows. The ice sheets in Greenland and West Antarctica are melting quicker than expected."

UN chief urges immediate climate action. B y Charles J. Hanley (stopglobalwarming.org). September 24, 2007. "U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon told an unprecedented summit on climate change Monday that 'the time for doubt has passed' and a breakthrough is needed in global talks to sharply reduce emissions of global-warming gases."

*U.N. leader hosts summit on climate - Schwarzenegger, Gore to present. United Nations (Associated Press). Published Monday, September 24, 2007 Columbia Daily Tribune. - "U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon told an unprecedented summit on climate change today that ‘the time for doubt has passed’ and a breakthrough is needed in global talks to sharply reduce emissions of global-warming gases. ‘The U.N. climate process is the appropriate forum for negotiating global action,’ Ban told assembled presidents and premiers, an apparent caution against what some see as a U.S. effort to open a separate negotiating track."

*Green litigation. By Thomas Wagner of The Associated Press. Sunday, September 23, 2007, Columbia Daily Tribune. "Facing the prospect of a climate change, environmentalists are turning to the courts for help in curbing pollution. The cases might help persuade the public and governments to take action to limit global warming."

*Investors urge action on climate change. By Jorn Madslien, Business reporter, BBC News. September 23, 2007. "President Clinton wants companies to act against climate change. Bill Clinton will be taking a leaf out of his political ally Al Gore's book on Monday as he takes part in the New York launch of a major study of large, global corporations' attitudes to climate change."

A New Clue About Global Warming? Massive releases of CO2 after the last ice age have been tracked back to ocean changes. By John K. Borchardt. USA Weekend.com September 23, 2007. "Massive releases of carbon dioxide into the atmosphere at the end of the last ice age might help us better understand and control today's global warming."

Rising seas to swamp history. Scientists predict Americana losses. The Associated Press. Columbia Daily Tribune . Sunday, September 23, 2007. "Ultimately, rising seas will likely swamp the first American settlement in Jamestown, Va. as well as the Florida launch pad that sent the first American into orbit, many climate scientists are predicting. In about a century, some of the places that make America what it is might be slowly erased."

U.N. climate leader praises Bush’s shift. United Nations (Associated Press) Published. Sunday, September 23, 2007. Columbia Daily Tribune . - "The Bush administration has made a "significant" shift on global warming but still falls short on the 'much more aggressive' policies needed to head off its damaging impact, the United Nations climate chief said yesterday. 'It’s very clear that we’re not on track,' Yvo de Boer told The Associated Press. More than 70 presidents and prime ministers and 80 other national representatives are gathering here for tomorrow’s U.N. 'climate summit.'"

*Bush aide says warming man-made. By Roger Harrabin. Environment analyst, BBC News. Friday, September 14, 2007. "The US chief scientist has told the BBC that climate change is now a fact. Professor John Marburger, who advises President Bush, said it was more than 90% certain that greenhouse gas emissions from mankind are to blame."

*Federal judge gives boost to states on limiting vehicle emissions. Bob Egelko, Staff Writer, San Francisco Chronicle. Thursday, September 13, 2007. "States can limit vehicle emissions of gases that contribute to global warming despite the Bush administration's refusal to do so, a federal judge ruled Wednesday, rejecting the auto industry's challenge to a Vermont statute and spurring optimism among supporters of a pioneering law in California."

World Conservation Union: 16,300 species threatened. Wed September 12, 2007. By Deborah Zabarenko, Environment Correspondent. Washington (Reuters) - "From the lowland gorillas of Africa to corals of the Galapagos Islands, more than 16,300 species are threatened with extinction, the World Conservation Union said on Wednesday in its annual Red List."

Energy shortcuts can lead to big savings. McClatchy Newspapers. Published. Monday, September 10, 2007. Walnut Creek, Calif. Columbia Daily Tribune. - "Red, purple and blue towels flap in the breeze as Ellen Ferlazzo of Pleasanton, Calif. pins them on her clothesline - one of many low-cost, low-tech-to-no-tech strategies she uses to save money and cut carbon emissions."

*APEC leaders make climate deal.  Activists say pact not strict enough. Published. Sunday, September 9, 2007. SYDNEY, Australia (Associated Press), Columbia Daily Tribune - "Pacific Rim leaders yesterday said the world needs to 'slow, stop and then reverse' greenhouse gas emissions and adopted modest goals to curb global warming. Thousands of demonstrators rallied to demand stronger action."

Ice loss threatening polar bears, experts say. Published. Saturday, September 8, 2007. Washington (Associated Press). Columbia Daily Tribune- "Two-thirds of the world’s polar bears will be killed off by 2050 - and the entire population gone from Alaska - because of thinning sea ice from global warming in the Arctic, government scientists forecast yesterday."

Democracy Now, Sept. 6, 2007. Former Secretary of State George Shultz and Environmentalist Paul Ehrlich on Global Warming, Global Warring, China, Al Gore and the Environment. Listen to Segment. Watch 256k stream.

AUGUST 2007

*Climate Change. Agencies Should Develop Guidance for Addressing the Effects on Federal Land and Water Resources. United States Government Accountability Office. This Report Is Temporarily Restricted Pending Official Public Release. Report to Congressional Requesters. August 2007.

U.S. Faces Uptick in Violent Weather, Study Says. Published Friday, August 31, 2007 Columbia Daily Tribune. Washington (Associated Press). " As the world warms, the United States will face more severe thunderstorms with deadly lightning, damaging hail and the potential for tornadoes, a trailblazing study by NASA scientists suggests."

Trying to Connect the Dinner Plate to Climate Change. By Claudia H. Deutsch. Copyright 2007, New York Times, August 29, 2007. (link to Climate Arc). "Big animal rights groups do not share the same mission, but they have coalesced around a message that eating meat is worse for the environment than driving."

'We're in meltdown.' Sea ice in the Arctic is approaching a record low - and the locals wear T-shirts in the summer. Inuit activist Sheila Watt-Cloutier tells Louise Johncox how climate change is threatening her people's way of life. The Guardian, Thursday August 23, 2007.

Businesses cash in on carbon cuts. Columbia Daily Tribune. Associated Press, London. August 20, 2007.

Tune it green: Musicians rock on the environmental revolution with biodiesel buses and concert recycling. By Preston Jones, McClatchy Newspapers, August 19, 2007.

Truth About Denial (Global warming is a hoax*) by Sharon Begley. Newsweek, August 13, 2007.

MAY-JULY 2007

Do You Live in One of the World's 15 Greenest Cities? Grist Magazine. Posted July 27, 2007 (AlterNet). Here's the top 15 cities and few runners up who have made the most impressive strides toward eco-friendliness and sustainability

How Green Is Your Candidate? By David Roberts , Grist Magazine . Posted July 12, 2007 . -"Find out where the presidential candidates stand on climate and energy issues. All of the Democratic presidential candidates put energy independence and climate change among their top-tier issues. They all support carbon cap-and-trade systems of varying strengths. They all at least gesture at renewable energy and hybrid cars...."

National Geographic Magazine. Two articles in the June 2007 issue:
        Vanishing Sea Ice (excerpts & pictures)  
       *Big Thaw (excerpts & pictures)

How to Stop the Planet from Burning . By George Monbiot, South End Press. Posted May 3, 2007 (AlterNet). " We know that climate change is happening. But can it be stopped? George Monbiot's book ‘Heat’ shows how it can."

2006

Hidden Opportunity in Global Warming. By Marjorie Kelly, Tellus Institute. Posted December 21, 2006. "The U.S. media might have missed the significance of the Stern Review on the Economics of Climate Change, but the public shouldn't miss the message: It's about hope."

Solution to Global Warming Is Us. By Julia Whitty, Mother Jones. December 16, 2006. "It is time to shift from personal denial to personal responsibility when it comes to climate change."