climate change

Why We Left Our Farms to Come to Copenhagen

Tue, 08 Dec 2009 09:31:13 -0500

by La Via Campesina

Copenhagen, 7th December 2009

Coal Is Deadly, Not Cheap

Mon, 07 Dec 2009 11:09:48 -0500

by Stephanie Pistello, Ben Evans, Jeff Biggers and Ben Sollee

As world leaders gather for the Copenhagen Climate Summit, we disagree with Commerce Lexington that energy legislation is "the most immediate threat to Kentucky's business climate."

Nothing could be further from the truth. Dirty energy led to Lexington's embarrassing selection last year as the worst carbon footprint contributor in the nation. Commerce Lexington has taken a giant carbon step backwards.

Cap and Fade

Mon, 07 Dec 2009 10:23:14 -0500

by James Hansen

AT the international climate talks in Copenhagen, President Obama is expected to announce that the United States wants to reduce its greenhouse gas emissions to about 17 percent below 2005 levels by 2020 and 83 percent by 2050. But at the heart of his plan is cap and trade, a market-based approach that has been widely praised but does little to slow global warming or reduce our dependence on fossil fuels. It merely allows polluters and Wall Street traders to fleece the public out of billions of dollars.

Neither Canada Nor the World Can Afford Growth of Dirty Oil

Mon, 07 Dec 2009 09:58:46 -0500

by Matt Price

Today in Copenhagen, the Harper government will walk into the UN climate summit not with the intention of transitioning Canada into a clean energy economy, but instead with the agenda of prolonging the oil industry frenzy in the tar sands in northern Alberta.

The Manufactured Doubt Industry and the Hacked Email Controversy

Mon, 07 Dec 2009 08:40:56 -0500

by Jeff Masters

In 1954, the tobacco industry realized it had a serious problem. Thirteen scientific studies had been published over the preceding five years linking smoking to lung cancer. With the public growing increasingly alarmed about the health effects of smoking, the tobacco industry had to move quickly to protect profits and stem the tide of increasingly worrisome scientific news.

How to Break the Climate Stalemate Between the Global South and the North

Mon, 07 Dec 2009 08:27:23 -0500

by Gopal Dayaneni and Mateo Nube

To stop the climate crisis, we're going to have to build a fairer world.

Any solution to climate change will require all nations to act together to reduce global emissions. But the fact is, countries around the world are not entering a "post-carbon future" on a level playing field. Poor countries have had the smallest role in creating the climate crisis, and they have fewest resources available to change and adapt.

An Open Letter to Congress From US Scientists on Climate Change and Recently Stolen Emails

Fri, 04 Dec 2009 13:09:02 -0500

by Climate Experts

As U.S. scientists with substantial expertise on climate change and its impacts on natural ecosystems, our built environment and human well-being, we want to assure policy makers and the public of the integrity of the underlying scientific research and the need for urgent action to reduce heat-trapping emissions. In the last few weeks, opponents of taking action on climate change have misrepresented both the content and the significance of stolen emails to obscure public understanding of climate science and the scientific process.

Hot Under the Collar at Cold Shoulder for Global Warming

Fri, 04 Dec 2009 11:29:07 -0500

by Anne Johnstone

The Earth is flat. At least that used to be the universal view until about the fourth century BC. By medieval times, most Europeans accepted that it was spherical but old ideas die hard.

So it was that just 40 years ago members of the International Flat Earth Society dismissed the Apollo Moon landing as a hoax, staged by Hollywood and based on an Arthur C Clarke script.

Family Planning for the Planet a.k.a. Population Control–Disingenuous Patriarchy That Does Not Empower Women

Fri, 04 Dec 2009 10:21:12 -0500

by Lucinda Marshall

The U.N. Population Fund (UNFPA)’s recent report, “Climate Change Connections: Gender and Population’s” linkage between access to family planning and reproductive healthcare and climate change has led to some troubling analysis regarding population control. According to the overview of the report,

The world’s population is forecast to grow from today’s 6.7 billion to between 8.0 and 10.5 billion by 2050.
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Western Lifestyle Unsustainable, Says Climate Expert Rajendra Pachauri

Sun, 29 Nov 2009 09:29:06 -0500

by James Randerson

Hotel guests should have their electricity monitored; hefty aviation taxes should be introduced to deter people from flying; and iced water in restaurants should be curtailed, the world's leading climate scientist has told the Observer.

Rajendra Pachauri, the chair of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), warned that western society must undergo a radical value shift if the worst effects of read more