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Friday, October 31, 2008
Thursday, October 30, 2008
Credit crisis & climate change efforts
posted by Eugene Pek, 30 October 2008, Pandan Terrace
Visit the link below for more on Financial crisis has lessons for climate fight: expert
What is carbon finance?
posted by Eugene Pek, 30 October 2008, Pandan Terrace. Eugene acknowledges the credit of the author(s), whose name(s) are not mentioned in the source, of this Q & A article (sourced online on 20 October 2008).
Source: Gaël Grégoire, Carbon Finance Instrument to Improve Coastal Zone, Solid Waste Management, MEDITERRANEAN WORKSHOP ON INTEGRATED COASTAL ZONE MANAGEMENT (ICZM) POLICY, Alghero, Sardinia (Italy), May 19-21, 2008. World Bank/METAP
What is carbon finance? Carbon finance is the general term applied to resources provided to a project to purchase greenhouse gas (GHG) emission reductions (“carbon” for short). Commitments of carbon finance for the purchase of carbon have grown rapidly since the first carbon purchases began less than eight years ago. As of May 2004, the global market for GHG emission reductions through project-based transactions has been estimated at a cumulative 320 million tons of carbon dioxide equivalent since its inception in 1996. Asia now represents half of the supply of project-based emission reductions, with Latin America second with 27 percent. Volumes are expected to continue to grow as countries that have already ratified the Kyoto Protocol work to meet their commitments, and as national and regional markets for emission reductions are put into place, notably in Canada, Japan and the European Union (the European Union has already put in place its Emissions Trading Scheme as of January 2005).
Why do greenhouse gas emission reductions have value? Meeting the Kyoto targets will require public and private investments. Many industrialized governments that have ratified the Protocol have already begun implementing domestic policies and regulations that will require emitters to reduce greenhouse gas emissions, according to the established targets. So far, experience has shown that the cost of reducing one ton of carbon dioxide (a greenhouse gas) can cost from $15 up to $100 in industrialized countries. By contrast, there are many opportunities to reduce greenhouse gases in developing countries at a cost of $1 to $4 per ton of carbon dioxide. Hence, an emission reduction that was achieved at a lower cost has value to a public or private entity in an industrialized country that is required by regulation to reduce its emissions.
What is the World Bank’s involvement in Carbon Finance? The threat climate change poses to long-term development and the ability of the poor to move out from poverty is of particular concern to the World Bank. The carbon finance activities of the World Bank are a natural extension of the Bank’s mission to reduce poverty. The Bank makes every effort to ensure that poor countries can benefit from international responses to climate change including the emerging carbon market for GHG emission reductions. The private market for emission reductions, still in an early stage, does not yet have significant volume, and the potential benefits have not reached developing countries. These countries, particularly the poorest among them, are bypassed by the carbon market and the potential development benefits it would bring. The World Bank’s carbon finance products help grow the market by extending the frontiers of carbon finance to new sectors or countries that have yet to benefit, and to reduce market entry risks for other buyers.What specific role is the Bank playing in the development of a market for carbon trade? The role of the Bank through its Carbon Finance Unit has been one of market facilitator and catalyst. The Bank has made significant efforts in the development of the carbon market, first by launching the Prototype Carbon Fund (PCF) to demonstrate how to cost-effectively achieve GHG reductions while contributing to sustainable development. More recently, the Bank launched a series of carbon funds to expand learning-by-doing to other countries and economic sectors, and to address market failures, such as through the Community Development Carbon Fund (CDCF) and Bio Carbon Fund (BioCF), which are designed to enable smaller and rural poor communities to benefit from carbon finance. The Bank has developed a balanced approach between stimulating demand as a buyer in the early stages of the market and its support to sellers to tap new and additional sources of funds from carbon trade to support their sustainable development and to alleviate poverty. This will consist of meeting the demand for capacity building and technical assistance through Carbon Finance (CF) -Assist, and designing instruments in consultation with developing countries to enable them to directly access the market.
Who are the beneficiaries of the Bank’s actions in carbon finance? The main beneficiaries of the Bank’s actions in the carbon market: a) The global community. The Bank’s efforts to catalyze a market for greenhouse gas mitigation and sustainable development hopefully contributes to the success of the market mechanisms, which are essential to lowering the cost of global action on climate change. b) The Public and Private sectors that wish to participate in the market. Through the establishment of Carbon Funds, and by pooling early participants in the market, the World Bank has reduced the market entry risk for other market players. The Bank’s procedures to create carbon assets are in the public domain. c) The least developed countries and poor areas of all developing countries. The Bank is involved in market areas that the private sector simply won’t go because they perceive the risk as being too high. By doing this , the World Bank is helping to bring the benefits of carbon finance to those parts of the world that would be by-passed by the market. The Bank provides technical assistance in order to develop the set of procedures and institutional arrangements that can make the market more sustainable. For example in one developing country, it took 18 months to get the first approval for a carbon finance project. Now there are almost a dozen projects in that country.
The Bank has created several carbon funds. How do they work? Who owns these funds? The World Bank manages several funds and facilities comprised of public and private participants. These funds are public or public-private partnerships managed by the World Bank as a Trustee. They operate much like a closed-end mutual fund; they purchase greenhouse gas emission reductions from projects in the developing world or in countries with economies in transition, and pay on delivery of those emission reductions. The emission reductions can be used against obligations under the Kyoto Protocol or for other regulated or voluntary greenhouse gas emission reduction regimes. All the emission reduction credits are purchased on behalf of the public and private sector Participants in the funds. The World Bank is acting as an honest broker to ensure that the benefits of carbon finance make their way also to the developing world and to countries with economies in transition. The World Bank regularly consults with a wide range of stakeholders, including the PCF’s Host Country Committee, about the design and operation of these carbon funds.
Why do investors and governments find the World Bank Carbon Funds an attractive business proposition? Companies and governments are attracted to the various Carbon funds of the World Bank by the proven record of the World Bank in providing shareholders with Kyoto-compliant certified emission reduction assets at a guaranteed low price. Additional benefits for investors include the acquisition of high-value knowledge and intelligence on carbon finance and emerging national, regional and international markets.
Who are the main players in the carbon market at this point in time? Companies and governments are attracted to the various Carbon funds of the World Bank by the proven record of the World Bank in providing shareholders with Kyoto-compliant certified emission reduction assets at a guaranteed low price. Additional benefits for investors include the acquisition of high-value knowledge and intelligence on carbon finance and emerging national, regional and international markets.
Natural environment that we still possess
by Eugene Pek, 30 October 2008, Pandan Terrace
The work of Mother Nature is beyond comprehension. The use and non-use values of these nature's masterpieces make up the total economic value.
Self-taken photographs, Oct 2008
Good blend of nature & development
by Eugene Pek, 29 October 2008, Pandan Terrace
Balanced development and a good blend between economic motives and environmental preservation.
Some self-taken photographs at Pangkor Laut Resort.
Wednesday, October 29, 2008
Will you allow beautiful beaches to erode by rising sea level?
by Eugene Pek, 29 October 2008, UTAR Sg Long
The recent Sydney climate change impact report cautioned that rising sea levels will erode the iconic beaches of Sydney by 2050. By that year, the sea level will rise 40cm above the level of 1990.
Higher global temperature melts the iceland in the Antartica and this would add to the volume of sea water contributing to rising sea level.
Imagine a similar scenario that of Sydney happening to Malaysia. What are some of the possible impacts?
(1) Many scenic beaches will be eroded and (2) there will be higher flood risks in coastal rivers.
Cannot imagine if these beautiful beaches are eroded one day... (see pix. Emerald Bay, Pangkor Laut Island, Oct 2008)
Forests' worth
by Eugene Pek, 28 October 2008, UTAR Sg LongMalaysia houses one of the world's oldest tropical rainforests. And within these forests, many herbs and medicinal plants can be found, namely the wild ginger, pepper, wild berries are some of them.
Trekking through the Jim Thompson Trail at Cameron Highlands and the Pangkor Laut virgin forest allowed me to observe many types of wild orchids, pepper leaves, special ant ferns (unlike the green ferns we know, ant ferns are hard black blocks).
These rainforests supply many medicinal plants which are priceless!!!
Pix taken in Pangkor Laut virgin forest, Oct 2008
Mangrove forests: What about them?
by Eugene Pek, 28 October 2008, UTAR Sg LongWhen I visited the Bako National Park, Sarawak, way back in 1997, not much has been taught to me about mangrove forests and its value. The first impression seeing the mangroves is that they look muddily-ugly and are sometimes smelly.
However, after a decade my thought and love for mangrove forests takes a 360 degree turn. I start to learn that mangroves do not only provide firewoods that can help generate energy but also a breeding place for many migratory birds and fish species.
Research has found that mangrove forests can act as tsunami-cushion which can soften the impact of strong tidal waves; A Mother nature's shield.
Mangrove forests are wonderful!!!
Pix taken in Bako National Park, June 1997
Tuesday, October 28, 2008
How much are hornbills worth?
by Eugene Pek, 28 October 2008, UTAR Sg Long
A time will come when the hornbills will extinct from the nature due to excessive development.
Therefore, is the preservation of this bird species a worthwhile effort?
Before one can answer this question, an economic value has to be put onto these birds; i.e. how much are they worth?
Monetising these values would be able to give us their worth.
How then to monetise them?
There are a few valuation techniques that can be employed to monetise the birds.
If one considers only the use-value, i.e. the satisfaction of bird lovers from sighting these birds, then the travel cost method (TCM) can be used.
TCM estimates the value of an environmental service or site using travel and time cost incurred by the public traveling to the recreational site to enjoy the recreational benefits (i.e. bird sighting). The underlying premise of TCM is that if a person is willing to pay (WTP) a cost to visit the site, it will represent the value a person placed on the recreational park.
Pix taken in Pangkor Laut Resort, Oct 2008.
Wednesday, October 22, 2008
New Dimension: Agricultural Multifunctionality (AMF)
by Eugene Pek, 22 October 2008, UTAR Sg Long
The conventional manner of defining agricultural has evolutionalised from only a single role of food supply to multiple roles to include non-food benefits, better termed as AMF. These extended roles include the functions of economic, social, environment, food security and cultural. They blend well with the concept of sustainable development with calls for not only the environmental concerns but also environmental sustainability, economic sustainability and socio-political sustainability. . The following discussion of the extended roles of agriculture is drawn from the work of Jamal et al. (2006):
1. Economic function
This role relates to the direct economic benefits accrued to farmers from crop planting activities. Jamal found that average farm projects in his sampling site have had slight positive effects on agricultural income and consequently, on total income generation in 2004 and 2005 relative to the previous years.
2. Social function
This function is discussed in three different contexts, i.e.:
2.1 Altruism value (AV)
This is the benefit derived from the traditional sharing of wealth made possible through paddy plantation especially in the muslim community. In the same work, Jamal estimated the AV to be USD10.3 million.
2.2 Employment opportunities
Even though agriculture contributes only 16 percent of the total employment in the country, paddy plantation specifically, does play its role in the provision of employment. On average each hired labourer received payment of some USD 7.90 per day and aggregate returns per annum or the value of employment opportunity benefits is highly substantial at USD 31 million.
2.3 Sheltering function (SF)
This function is critically important in times of economic recession as a taker of excess or unemployed workforce from urban areas. In
3. Environmental function
Alike the social function, this function is discussed in three different contexts, i.e.:
3.1 Flood mitigation function
Paddy fields are good rain water storage ‘tanks’ during the monsoon seasons, preventing floods in the nearby cities. Jamal asserted that this intangible value is one the most valuable contribution of paddy fields to the ecosystem. The estimated value of the flood mitigation function is approximately USD 0.034 million.
3.2 Heat mitigation function
Literatures show that paddy fields play an important role in heat mitigation. Empirical investigation found that USD 53,350 can be saved from the cost of cooling systems by the reliance of heat mitigation on the ecological function of paddy fields.
3.3 Air pollution reduction function
Air pollution is one of the environmental problems in the country, much so with the presence of haze sent by the forest fires in the neighboring country,
4. Food security
This function of the AMF is to ensure adequate level of rice production in the country at all times for the ever increasing population. Report has found that with a simulation of 20 percent decline in rice production due to the liberalization of free trade, urban Malaysians are willing to pay (WTP) a price premium of 33 percent i.e. around USD 1 per month. As an aggregate the estimated value of this function is USD 9.2 million annually.
5. Cultural function
This cultural function is an addition to Jamal’s selected functions. Like Japan and many other countries, Malaysia values agricultural activities and rural landscape dearly not only for commercial reasons like food exports and tourism but the cultural values they offer that help create strong communal bonds. Agricultural is a way of life to the Japanese as evident in the work of Goda, Kada and Yabe (2006) which talks about these amenities as the pride and ‘brand name’ of their hometowns. Autumn festivals as thanksgiving of good harvest and ‘Obon’ reunion time are still being practiced widely in
Acknowledging the increasing importance of these agriculture multifunctions, there are efforts in promoting these new dimensions in the country. Activities aim at inculcating more awareness and appreciation of the public are based on the objectives of making more multimedia awareness of AMF and a good example is the television advertisement of Sime Darby (the biggest oil palm producing company in the world), showing the importance of having sustainable palm oil production towards a more balanced growth.
These are important initiatives but may not be sufficient to drive more intervention from the government sector into recognizing AMF as a crucial element in sustainable development. The following sections discusses call for sustainable development (particularly in palm oil production) due to conventional reasons and offer some extended profound thoughts on AMF which may be worth deliberating.
Global Social Equity? Should the rich pays for rainforests?
by Eugene Pek, 22 October 2008, UTAR Sg Long
The issue of sustainable development is a question of efficiency in ecological management.
There are several world renowned national parks in the country like the National Park, more known as Taman Negara,
At this juncture, the discussion aims to highlight the need for a biodiversity market to create a world trust fund that would aid the high conservation costs of national parks in the country. The fund can channel monetary aids to the state government to ensure ling-term sustainability of those parks which are dearly valued by the world. Chichilnisky, who proposed and wrote the global trading of carbon emissions with preferential treatment for poor countries which became part of the Kyoto Protocol adopted by 166 nations in December 1997, noted in her environmental sustainability conference lecture at Monash University Malaysia in December 2007 that she is working on a similar model for biodiversity market. With this market in place in the near future it will be excellent to see preferential treatment being given to the developing countries like
Tuesday, October 14, 2008
Will environmental values change David Ricardo's comparative advantage?
by Eugene Pek, 15 October 2008, UTAR Sg Long
Back to where ‘you’ belong
The idea of planting crops only in their country of origin may be worth pondering. Famous street trees in Pretoria and Johannesburg named the ‘jacarandas’ are under threat as they are either to be felled or prevented from regenerating. Why bother about street trees? It has been claimed by some ecologists that jacarandas are invasive and would harm the biodiversity of the surroundings they inhibit. These trees are not domestically-originated, akin ‘white-immigrant’ from tropical and subtropical regions of South and Central America, Mexico, and the Caribbean, and hence they will draw more ecological resources to grow than the other native tree species. The continuation of planting jacarandas will lead to environmental resource inefficiency which is deteriorating to other local tree genus.
Extended comparative advantage
The ecological inefficiency caused by the jacarandas may shed some lights in broadening our thought in reassessing the concept of comparative advantage by David Ricardo. The principle of comparative advantage rests on the opportunity cost of production rather than the absolute cost. The opportunity cost of production of a good can be measured in terms of the production unit of another good need to be reduced to increase production by one more unit.
The principle of comparative advantage shows that even if a country has no absolute advantage in any product (i.e. cost of productions are higher in all goods as compared to the other country), the country can still specialized and export the product for which she has the lower opportunity cost of production. However, in comparative advantage, only financial costs are considered. The non-financial costs, more known as non-market values, are left out.
With the call for sustainable development and advancement of non-market valuation methodologies, it is timely that the environmental impacts of specializing and producing a good or service be reflected in the total cost of production. The valuation of these non-financial values of ecosystems can be estimated using valuation techniques like the contingent valuation and choice model. The incorporation of these environmental values change the total cost of production and possibly alters the specialization of goods that a country should produce.
Malaysian agriculture: Its sustainability issue
by Eugene Pek, 15 Oct 2008, UTAR Sg Long
Issues towards sustainable development
Currently in the country, the production of palm oil is faced with more sustainable issues than the plantation of other crops. There seems to be some mismatch of perception on the concern of sustainable growth in terms of land management used for oil palm plantation between the Malaysian government and international non-governmental bodies (NGOs). These NGOs and the Western countries are condemning Malaysia on the way forests are cut to make way for palm oil plantation especially in the Sabah state.
The negative claims
Statistics show that the land area in Sabah used for palm oil plantation has increased nearly 2.5 folds in 2004 (1,200,000 hectares) as compared to 1994 (500,000 ha) as quoted in Rahimatsah (2007). The NGOs perceives that the extension is through cutting of virgin forests. Jeffrey Sachs once claimed that Sabah is the most unique place on earth in terms of environmental and ecological endowments and he would like his future generations to have the equal opportunity to enjoy these gifts of nature. Therefore if more and more land is cleared via deforestation for palm oil production, the Sachs juniors may not been able to enjoy the bequest values of the ecosystems of Sabah that are very much appreciated by Sachs senior.
The conventional debates of sustainable development in palm oil production are not directly related or caused by the technological frontier but more of the concerns on the origin of the four million ha (2007) of land used as oil palm estates in the country. The idea of clearing forests for the sake of ‘agri-commercial’ reasons will affect the natural habitats of priceless animals and flora and fauna. The tigers, Sumatran rhinoceros, Asian elephants and orangutans are some of the very unique animals that are affected by land conversions for commercial uses. The Orangutans, especially, are faced with serious habitats problems and high possibility of extinction thanks to the estate expansion to reap high returns of palm oil in the world market.
The other critical concern is the destruction of peatlands, which is crucial ‘carbon sink’ and ‘water retention’ role player. Land clearing for agricultural use will see peatlands tidied commonly through the traditional method of burning which releases huge concentration of carbon dioxide into the air due to the ‘carbon sink’ role of the peatlands. Evidently, during the 1997 Indonesia forest fires which see many peatlands destroyed and responsible for the vast increase of world carbon dioxide levels, an estimated 0.81 to 2.57 Gt of carbon was released and that was equivalent to 13-40 percent of the amount released by fossil fuel burning globally.
The real scenario
Commercial profits aside, the Malaysian government is dismissing all these baseless allegations as the country values highly and is a staunch devotee of sustainable development. The land areas used for palm oil production are from old logging areas or unproductive forests rather than the virgin rainforests as claimed. Tan et al. (2007) asserted that 64 percent of total land mass in Malaysia is rainforests as compared to United Kingdoms (UK) with a mere 12 percent. In addition to that, oil palm plantations only occupied 10 percent of the total mass land in the country. Besides, the government aims to plant 500,000 ha of forest plantation, double the existing ones in the states of Johor, Pahang, Sabah and Sarawak. So, if Malaysia is to be charged guilty in ‘raping’ the virgin rainforest, what about UK?
In the same work of Tan et al., it was reported that from 1990 to 2005, there was only less than one million ha of new land being converted into palm oil estate, but not as massively claimed by the west. In this study, it was also suggested that oil palm plantations are more effective than rainforests in playing the role of ‘carbon sink’ in terms of assimilation of dry matter per ha per year. Several studies indicated that biodiversity of flora and fauna in oil palm estates are not only stably unaffected but has attracted many species of birds, butterflies and mammals, notably even rare species like leopard cats.
A caucus “Roundtable on Sustainable Palm Oil” (RSPO) to promote the growth and use of sustainable palm oil and forging stronger co-operation within the supply chain and other stakeholders was established in 2004. Malaysia as one of the founding members is actively participating in managing RSPO activities and committing herself to the RSPO Principles and Criteria (e.g. transparency of management, commitment to long-term economic and financial viability, responsible in conservation of natural resources and biodiversity and others) to ensure sustainable palm oil production. Sustainability in palm oil is analogous to sustainability in the Malaysian agriculture due to its position as the number one agricultural crop in the country.
Complementing the RSPO is the Best management practice (BMP) that has been implemented and practiced in the country as initiatives towards agricultural sustainability. Operations from harvesting to production of oil palm products have been carried out consistently with the best approaches. Integrated pest management, use of organic fertilizers (from palm oil’s empty fruit brunches), zero open burning and planting of leguminous crops (to minimize soil erosion) are some of the BMP.
Should rich countries pay for rainforests?
By Gerard Wynn
LONDON (Reuters) - Rich countries should pay tropical nations billions of dollars a year to save their forests, using donor money and global carbon markets to foot the bill, said a UK-commissioned report on Tuesday.
In the longer-term, by 2030, developing countries should also start paying to help create "carbon neutral" global forests through binding targets to slow deforestation and plant trees.
Clearing and burning forests for timber and farms creates about a fifth of the greenhouse gases blamed for climate change, but growing urgency to tackle the problem is dividing opinion on how to fight the problem.
Tuesday's report drew criticism from some carbon traders and green groups, saying it down-played costs and skirted real world issues of corruption and land disputes.
The report, "Climate Change: Financing Global Forests," firmly pinned hopes on the notion of carbon trading, where rich countries pay poor ones to cut carbon emissions, so that they can carry on polluting as normal.
"Deforestation will continue as long as cutting down and burning trees is more economic than preserving them," said Johan Eliasch, author of the report and Prime Minister Gordon Brown's special representative on deforestation.
The report estimated that finance from carbon markets could curb deforestation rates by 75 percent by 2030, and urged inclusion of forests in a new global climate pact slated for agreement under U.N.-led talks by the end of next year.
But carbon markets would still leave a funding gap of $11-19 billion by 2020, said the report, to be met by donors currently struggling against a worldwide banking crisis.
Extra pressures now on tropical forests include clearances to plant vegetable oils for biodiesel, and more cattle ranches to satisfy a richer world's increasingly meat-hungry diet.
Carbon markets use a carrot approach, allowing developing countries to earn carbon offsets for chopping fewer trees than in the past, and then selling these offsets to rich countries as a cheaper option to domestic greenhouse gas emissions curbs.
COSTLY
Some critics said that the report's cost estimate of $33 billion a year to halve deforestation by 2030 was too small.
Offsets would have to compensate farmers for not planting valuable crops such as palm oil.
That implied high prices, which made one expert doubt the report's claim that forestry offsets could halve costs for rich nations to fight climate change.
"Over the next decade, forest carbon credits could conceivably cut mitigation costs by 13 percent," said Eric Bettelheim, chairman of a private company Sustainable Forestry Management, citing an estimate by Environmental Defense.
In addition, the report excluded the cost of planting new trees to replace the shortfall in timber supply.
"It's an enormous, industrial-scale undertaking, trees take time to grow and planting trees and maintaining them is expensive," added Bettelheim, estimating the total cost to halve deforestation rates at $50-100 billion.
The Eliasch report skirted the problem of corruption and illegal logging, said Simon Counsell, executive director at the green group the Rainforest Foundation.
The report recommended that rich country donors spend $4 billion over five years for research, to fund local bodies, and resolve local land disputes.
"It really fails to appreciate just how serious and long-term these problems of corruption and governance actually are," said Counsell, adding they would take 10 years to address.
"In DRC (Democratic Republic of Congo) there's fewer than 10 people in the forestry department managing an area of forest twice the size of France. That's the reality on the ground."
What can climate deal do to help credit crisis?
Climate deal seen helping overcome financial crisis
By Gareth Jones
WARSAW (Reuters) - Tackling climate change will help, not hinder, governments' efforts to overcome the global financial crisis, the EU's environment chief said on Tuesday.
The 27-nation European Union has set ambitious goals to curb carbon dioxide emissions by a fifth by 2020, compared to 1990 levels, partly by making power generators and heavy industry pay for permits to pollute in its emissions trading scheme.
Critics say the financial crisis makes it very difficult for industry to make the necessary big investments in clean energy.
"We think this (climate) package is consistent with solving the financial crisis... At the moment, people are focused on the economic crisis, but our package is part of the solution," Environment Commissioner Stavros Dimas told reporters in Warsaw.
"Fighting climate change means investment in energy efficiency, promoting renewable sources and providing incentives to stimulate the economy and contribute to growth."
The EU also argues that moving to a low-carbon economy will create jobs and reduce the bloc's exposure to volatile prices of fossil fuels such as oil and coal which lead to global warming.
Poland and other ex-communist EU member states have expressed concern that carbon dioxide (CO2) curbs will stunt their economic growth by sharply increasing energy prices.
Asked if the Commission was willing to make amendments to its package, Dimas said: "It is not for the Commission to accept amendments, it's for the European Council (of national governments) and for the European Parliament."
"The package is just an instrument to achieve the climate change targets agreed by member states... The Commission can make changes which do not compromise the environmental objectives," he added.
EU ACCORD
Dimas said he was hopeful that France, the EU's current chairman, could forge agreement among member states on the Commission's climate package by the end of this year.
"This package is good for Europe because Europe's economy will become more efficient," he said.
Dimas was in Poland, along with representatives of dozens of other countries, for preparatory talks ahead of a planned U.N. conference in the western Polish city of Poznan in December that is meant to pave the way for a new global climate deal.
The current Kyoto Protocol, which does not set CO2 emission targets for major emerging economies such as China and India, expires in 2012. The United States has also not joined Kyoto.
Referring to this week's talks in Warsaw, Dimas said: "Nobody has said we should cut down our efforts (because of financial crisis). They all said we should continue. We need to send a strong signal from Poznan on fighting climate change."
2007 Nobel Peace Prize Winner: Al-Gore on Climate Change
SPEECH BY AL GORE ON THE ACCEPTANCE OF THE NOBEL PEACE PRIZE DECEMBER 10, 2007 OSLO, NORWAY
Your Majesties, Your Royal Highnesses, Honorable members of the Norwegian Nobel Committee, Excellencies, Ladies and gentlemen.
I have a purpose here today. It is a purpose I have tried to serve for many years. I have prayed that God would show me a way to accomplish it.
Sometimes, without warning, the future knocks on our door with a precious and painful vision of what might be. One hundred and nineteen years ago, a wealthy inventor read his own obituary, mistakenly published years before his death. Wrongly believing the inventor had just died, a newspaper printed a harsh judgment of his life’s work, unfairly labeling him “The Merchant of Death” because of his invention – dynamite. Shaken by this condemnation, the inventor made a fateful choice to serve the cause of peace.
Seven years later, Alfred Nobel created this prize and the others that bear his name.
Seven years ago tomorrow, I read my own political obituary in a judgment that seemed to me harsh and mistaken – if not premature. But that unwelcome verdict also brought a precious if painful gift: an opportunity to search for fresh new ways to serve my purpose.
Unexpectedly, that quest has brought me here. Even though I fear my words cannot match this moment, I pray what I am feeling in my heart will be communicated clearly enough that those who hear me will say, “We must act.”
The distinguished scientists with whom it is the greatest honor of my life to share this award have laid before us a choice between two different futures – a choice that to my ears echoes the words of an ancient prophet: “Life or death, blessings or curses. Therefore, choose life, that both thou and thy seed may live.”
We, the human species, are confronting a planetary emergency – a threat to the survival of our civilization that is gathering ominous and destructive potential even as we gather here. But there is hopeful news as well: we have the ability to solve this crisis and avoid the worst – though not all – of its consequences, if we act boldly, decisively and quickly.
However, despite a growing number of honorable exceptions, too many of the world’s leaders are still best described in the words Winston Churchill applied to those who ignored Adolf Hitler’s threat: “They go on in strange paradox, decided only to be undecided, resolved to be irresolute, adamant for drift, solid for fluidity, all powerful to be impotent.”
So today, we dumped another 70 million tons of global-warming pollution into the thin shell of atmosphere surrounding our planet, as if it were an open sewer. And tomorrow, we will dump a slightly larger amount, with the cumulative concentrations now trapping more and more heat from the sun.
As a result, the earth has a fever. And the fever is rising. The experts have told us it is not a passing affliction that will heal by itself. We asked for a second opinion. And a third. And a fourth. And the consistent conclusion, restated with increasing alarm, is that something basic is wrong.
We are what is wrong, and we must make it right.
Last September 21, as the Northern Hemisphere tilted away from the sun, scientists reported with unprecedented distress that the North Polar ice cap is “falling off a cliff.” One study estimated that it could be completely gone during summer in less than 22 years. Another new study, to be presented by U.S. Navy researchers later this week, warns it could happen in as little as 7 years.
Seven years from now.
In the last few months, it has been harder and harder to misinterpret the signs that our world is spinning out of kilter. Major cities in North and South America, Asia and Australia are nearly out of water due to massive droughts and melting glaciers. Desperate farmers are losing their livelihoods. Peoples in the frozen Arctic and on low-lying Pacific islands are planning evacuations of places they have long called home. Unprecedented wildfires have forced a half million people from their homes in one country and caused a national emergency that almost brought down the government in another. Climate refugees have migrated into areas already inhabited by people with different cultures, religions, and traditions, increasing the potential for conflict. Stronger storms in the Pacific and Atlantic have threatened whole cities. Millions have been displaced by massive flooding in South Asia, Mexico, and 18 countries in Africa. As temperature extremes have increased, tens of thousands have lost their lives. We are recklessly burning and clearing our forests and driving more and more species into extinction. The very web of life on which we depend is being ripped and frayed.
We never intended to cause all this destruction, just as Alfred Nobel never intended that dynamite be used for waging war. He had hoped his invention would promote human progress. We shared that same worthy goal when we began burning massive quantities of coal, then oil and methane.
Even in Nobel’s time, there were a few warnings of the likely consequences. One of the very first winners of the Prize in chemistry worried that, “We are evaporating our coal mines into the air.” After performing 10,000 equations by hand, Svante Arrhenius calculated that the earth’s average temperature would increase by many degrees if we doubled the amount of CO2 in the atmosphere.
Seventy years later, my teacher, Roger Revelle, and his colleague, Dave Keeling, began to precisely document the increasing CO2 levels day by day.
But unlike most other forms of pollution, CO2 is invisible, tasteless, and odorless -- which has helped keep the truth about what it is doing to our climate out of sight and out of mind. Moreover, the catastrophe now threatening us is unprecedented – and we often confuse the unprecedented with the improbable.
We also find it hard to imagine making the massive changes that are now necessary to solve the crisis. And when large truths are genuinely inconvenient, whole societies can, at least for a time, ignore them. Yet as George Orwell reminds us: “Sooner or later a false belief bumps up against solid reality, usually on a battlefield.”
In the years since this prize was first awarded, the entire relationship between humankind and the earth has been radically transformed. And still, we have remained largely oblivious to the impact of our cumulative actions.
Indeed, without realizing it, we have begun to wage war on the earth itself. Now, we and the earth's climate are locked in a relationship familiar to war planners: "Mutually assured destruction."
More than two decades ago, scientists calculated that nuclear war could throw so much debris and smoke into the air that it would block life-giving sunlight from our atmosphere, causing a "nuclear winter." Their eloquent warnings here in Oslo helped galvanize the world’s resolve to halt the nuclear arms race.
Now science is warning us that if we do not quickly reduce the global warming pollution that is trapping so much of the heat our planet normally radiates back out of the atmosphere, we are in danger of creating a permanent “carbon summer.”
As the American poet Robert Frost wrote, “Some say the world will end in fire; some say in ice.” Either, he notes, “would suffice.”
But neither need be our fate. It is time to make peace with the planet.
We must quickly mobilize our civilization with the urgency and resolve that has previously been seen only when nations mobilized for war. These prior struggles for survival were won when leaders found words at the 11th hour that released a mighty surge of courage, hope and readiness to sacrifice for a protracted and mortal challenge.
These were not comforting and misleading assurances that the threat was not real or imminent; that it would affect others but not ourselves; that ordinary life might be lived even in the presence of extraordinary threat; that Providence could be trusted to do for us what we would not do for ourselves.
No, these were calls to come to the defense of the common future. They were calls upon the courage, generosity and strength of entire peoples, citizens of every class and condition who were ready to stand against the threat once asked to do so. Our enemies in those times calculated that free people would not rise to the challenge; they were, of course, catastrophically wrong.
Now comes the threat of climate crisis – a threat that is real, rising, imminent, and universal. Once again, it is the 11th hour. The penalties for ignoring this challenge are immense and growing, and at some near point would be unsustainable and unrecoverable. For now we still have the power to choose our fate, and the remaining question is only this: Have we the will to act vigorously and in time, or will we remain imprisoned by a dangerous illusion?
Mahatma Gandhi awakened the largest democracy on earth and forged a shared resolve with what he called “Satyagraha” – or “truth force.”
In every land, the truth – once known – has the power to set us free.
Truth also has the power to unite us and bridge the distance between “me” and “we,” creating the basis for common effort and shared responsibility.
There is an African proverb that says, “If you want to go quickly, go alone. If you want to go far, go together.” We need to go far, quickly.
We must abandon the conceit that individual, isolated, private actions are the answer. They can and do help. But they will not take us far enough without collective action. At the same time, we must ensure that in mobilizing globally, we do not invite the establishment of ideological conformity and a new lock-step “ism.”
That means adopting principles, values, laws, and treaties that release creativity and initiative at every level of society in multifold responses originating concurrently and spontaneously.
This new consciousness requires expanding the possibilities inherent in all humanity. The innovators who will devise a new way to harness the sun’s energy for pennies or invent an engine that’s carbon negative may live in Lagos or Mumbai or Montevideo. We must ensure that entrepreneurs and inventors everywhere on the globe have the chance to change the world.
When we unite for a moral purpose that is manifestly good and true, the spiritual energy unleashed can transform us. The generation that defeated fascism throughout the world in the 1940s found, in rising to meet their awesome challenge, that they had gained the moral authority and long-term vision to launch the Marshall Plan, the United Nations, and a new level of global cooperation and foresight that unified Europe and facilitated the emergence of democracy and prosperity in Germany, Japan, Italy and much of the world. One of their visionary leaders said, “It is time we steered by the stars and not by the lights of every passing ship.”
In the last year of that war, you gave the Peace Prize to a man from my hometown of 2000 people, Carthage, Tennessee. Cordell Hull was described by Franklin Roosevelt as the “Father of the United Nations.” He was an inspiration and hero to my own father, who followed Hull in the Congress and the U.S. Senate and in his commitment to world peace and global cooperation.
My parents spoke often of Hull, always in tones of reverence and admiration. Eight weeks ago, when you announced this prize, the deepest emotion I felt was when I saw the headline in my hometown paper that simply noted I had won the same prize that Cordell Hull had won. In that moment, I knew what my father and mother would have felt were they alive.
Just as Hull’s generation found moral authority in rising to solve the world crisis caused by fascism, so too can we find our greatest opportunity in rising to solve the climate crisis. In the Kanji characters used in both Chinese and Japanese, “crisis” is written with two symbols, the first meaning “danger,” the second “opportunity.” By facing and removing the danger of the climate crisis, we have the opportunity to gain the moral authority and vision to vastly increase our own capacity to solve other crises that have been too long ignored.
We must understand the connections between the climate crisis and the afflictions of poverty, hunger, HIV-Aids and other pandemics. As these problems are linked, so too must be their solutions. We must begin by making the common rescue of the global environment the central organizing principle of the world community.
Fifteen years ago, I made that case at the “Earth Summit” in Rio de Janeiro. Ten years ago, I presented it in Kyoto. This week, I will urge the delegates in Bali to adopt a bold mandate for a treaty that establishes a universal global cap on emissions and uses the market in emissions trading to efficiently allocate resources to the most effective opportunities for speedy reductions.
This treaty should be ratified and brought into effect everywhere in the world by the beginning of 2010 – two years sooner than presently contemplated. The pace of our response must be accelerated to match the accelerating pace of the crisis itself.
Heads of state should meet early next year to review what was accomplished in Bali and take personal responsibility for addressing this crisis. It is not unreasonable to ask, given the gravity of our circumstances, that these heads of state meet every three months until the treaty is completed.
We also need a moratorium on the construction of any new generating facility that burns coal without the capacity to safely trap and store carbon dioxide.
And most important of all, we need to put a price on carbon -- with a CO2 tax that is then rebated back to the people, progressively, according to the laws of each nation, in ways that shift the burden of taxation from employment to pollution. This is by far the most effective and simplest way to accelerate solutions to this crisis.
The world needs an alliance – especially of those nations that weigh heaviest in the scales where earth is in the balance. I salute Europe and Japan for the steps they’ve taken in recent years to meet the challenge, and the new government in Australia, which has made solving the climate crisis its first priority.
But the outcome will be decisively influenced by two nations that are now failing to do enough: the United States and China. While India is also growing fast in importance, it should be absolutely clear that it is the two largest CO2 emitters — most of all, my own country –– that will need to make the boldest moves, or stand accountable before history for their failure to act.
Both countries should stop using the other’s behavior as an excuse for stalemate and instead develop an agenda for mutual survival in a shared global environment.
These are the last few years of decision, but they can be the first years of a bright and hopeful future if we do what we must. No one should believe a solution will be found without effort, without cost, without change. Let us acknowledge that if we wish to redeem squandered time and speak again with moral authority, then these are the hard truths:
The way ahead is difficult. The outer boundary of what we currently believe is feasible is still far short of what we actually must do. Moreover, between here and there, across the unknown, falls the shadow.
That is just another way of saying that we have to expand the boundaries of what is possible. In the words of the Spanish poet, Antonio Machado, “Pathwalker, there is no path. You must make the path as you walk.”
We are standing at the most fateful fork in that path. So I want to end as I began, with a vision of two futures – each a palpable possibility – and with a prayer that we will see with vivid clarity the necessity of choosing between those two futures, and the urgency of making the right choice now.
The great Norwegian playwright, Henrik Ibsen, wrote, “One of these days, the younger generation will come knocking at my door.”
The future is knocking at our door right now. Make no mistake, the next generation will ask us one of two questions. Either they will ask: “What were you thinking; why didn’t you act?”
Or they will ask instead: “How did you find the moral courage to rise and successfully resolve a crisis that so many said was impossible to solve?”
We have everything we need to get started, save perhaps political will, but political will is a renewable resource.
So let us renew it, and say together: “We have a purpose. We are many. For this purpose we will rise, and we will act.”
Visit his blog @ http://blog.algore.com
2008 Economic Nobel Prize Winner: Paul Krugman
U.S. economist Paul Krugman gestures while speaking at a news conference on the campus of Princeton University in Princeton, New Jersey, October 13, 2008. Krugman, a fierce critic of the Bush administration for policies that he argues led to the current financial crisis, won the 2008 Nobel prize for economics on Monday. (REUTERS/Tim Shaffer)
Visit his blog @ http://krugman.blogs.nytimes.com/
Monday, October 13, 2008
Valuation on peatlands is obviously possible.
Tree saplings are seen growing near river banks as part of a project to rehabilitate burnt and degraded peatlands in the Central Kalimantan ex-Mega Rice project in this May 1 2007 file photo. (REUTERS/Hardi Baktiantoro/Files)
HONG KONG (Reuters) - Warmer temperatures in the years ahead will dry up peatlands, release more carbon dioxide into the world's atmosphere and aggravate global warming, a study in Japan has found.
Peat is the accumulation of partially decayed vegetation in very wet places and it covers about two percent of global land mass. Peatlands store large amounts of carbon owing to the low rates of carbon breakdown in cold, waterlogged soils.
Tree saplings are seen growing near river banks as part of a project to rehabilitate burnt and degraded peatlands in the Central Kalimantan ex-Mega Rice project in this May 1 2007 file photo. (REUTERS/Hardi Baktiantoro/Files)
Using computer modelling, scientists in Japan found that peatlands -- concentrated in high latitude places like Canada, Russia and Alaska -- look set to get dryer with increasingly warmer global temperatures.
A warming of four degrees Celsius causes a 40 percent carbon loss from shallow peat and 86 percent carbon loss from deep peat, according to the study, published in the latest issue of Nature Geoscience.
"This will cause carbon loss from the soil which means an increase in carbon dioxide concentration in the atmosphere, which will further worsen global warming," said Takeshi Ise from the Japan Agency for Marine-Earth Science and Technology.
"So we have to do something to mitigate global warming," he told Reuters by telephone.
Global warming is caused by an increase in atmospheric greenhouse gases such as water vapour, carbon dioxide, methane and ozone. The increase in carbon dioxide is mostly blamed on human activities such as burning of coal, oil and gas.
Copyright © 2008 Reuters
Sunday, October 12, 2008
Credit crisis & climate change
U.N. says credit crisis could enable "green growth"
Sat Oct 11, 2008 1:29pm EDT
By Patrick Worsnip
UNITED NATIONS (Reuters) - Instead of sidelining the fight against climate change, the global credit crisis could hasten countries' efforts to create "green growth" industries by revamping the financial system behind them, the U.N. climate chief said on Friday.
But that would depend on governments helping poor countries -- who are key to saving the planet's ecology -- tackle their problems, instead of spending most available money on rescuing the financial world, Yvo de Boer told reporters.
De Boer said the financial "earthquake" that has seen markets plunge worldwide in recent weeks could damage U.N.-led climate change talks, but only "if the opportunities that the crisis brings for climate change abatement are ignored."
"The credit crisis can be used to make progress in a new direction, an opportunity for global green economic growth," de Boer, who heads the Bonn-based U.N. Climate Change Secretariat, told a news conference.
"The credit crunch I believe is an opportunity to rebuild the financial system that would underpin sustainable growth ... Governments now have an opportunity to create and enforce policy which stimulates private competition to fund clean industry."
De Boer said a successful outcome to climate change negotiations in Copenhagen in December 2009 would create new markets, investment opportunities and job creation.
But he warned that "if available global capital is used primarily to refloat the financial world, we literally will sink the futures of the poorest of the poor.
"And I hope that the credit crunch will not mean that people in the South will have to wait for those in the North to have repaid their credit card debts and mortgages before attention is again turned to the South."
Without reaching out a hand to developing countries, it would be very difficult to make advances on the rest of the environmental agenda, De Boer said.
Environment ministers will meet in two months' time in Poznan, Poland, to prepare for the Copenhagen summit, which is due to agree on a new global-warming accord to succeed the Kyoto Protocol, which expires in 2012.
Ministers in Poznan must make clear they were "willing to put financial resources, the architecture, the institutions in place that will allow developing countries to engage in a global approach on both mitigation and adaptation," he said.
Funding did not have to all come from governments and he foresaw "an approach where we very much use the market".
De Boer said the financial crisis had not so far affected the Kyoto Protocol's Clean Development Mechanism, which allows rich countries to offset their carbon footprints by investing in clean energy projects in developing countries.
"I don't see a slowdown in the CDM pipeline at the moment," he said.
Friday, October 10, 2008
Warmer world threatens Antarctic penguins
Warmer world threatens Antarctic penguins. Can an environmental valuation be done?
Climate Change & Biodiversity
Climate change may threaten biodiversity in tropics
Thu Oct 9, 2008 7:36pm EDT
By Julie Steenhuysen
CHICAGO (Reuters) - Climate change may soon make the tropics too hot for many native species, which will be forced to head for higher ground to escape the heat, U.S. researchers said on Thursday.
The study suggests climate change is not only threatening polar bears and other cold-loving species. It is putting heat-loving species at risk as well.
"We know the climate is getting warmer," said Robert Colwell of the University of Connecticut, whose research appears in the journal Science.
"If things continue as projected, there will be a 3 degree Celsius (5.4 degree Fahrenheit) warming in the Costa Rican tropics within the next century," he said.
Colwell and colleagues predict that as the climate in the tropics warms, thermal bands will move up the mountains by about 600 meters (yards) in elevation. "The current climate at 100 meters will be at 700 meters," he said in a telephone interview.
Colwell and colleagues analyzed data on nearly 2,000 species of plants, insects, and fungi in Costa Rica. His team thinks about half of these species would have to move to completely new territory, well beyond the upper ranges on the mountainside.
"If species are stressed by the heat, they will do better in their accustomed climate zone. We expect ranges to move up the mountain as has been documented already in Europe and the United States," he said.
As a result, lowland populations in the tropics may soon experience decreases in biodiversity and species richness, in part because no other species are adapted to the climate.
And species at higher elevations may run out of room to climb higher.
Colwell said the projection contradicts the assumptions of many researchers, who believe species in the tropics would not be affected as harshly by climate change.
"The current conventional wisdom even among scientists is that tropical species will be OK despite global warming because in ancient times -- 5 to 50 million years ago -- the climate was warmer and there were tropical forests," he said.
"We argue this is not so clear. That there needs to be much more research done to see if this is the case," he said.
In a separate study in the same journal, researchers at the University of California-Berkeley compared recent changes in small mammal populations at Yosemite National Park in California to a study done in 1918.
Not surprisingly, they found mammals like shrews, mice and ground squirrels have moved to higher elevations or clustered themselves in smaller, more hospitable regions.
They saw shifts in about half the species studied.
So far, the population movements have not changed the biodiversity in the park, the researchers said, but they have changed the populations of animals interacting with one another.
"These kinds of changes in community composition have been going on forever," James Patton, who led the field work in Yosemite, said in a statement. "It is the speed with which these changes are taking place that gives one pause."
(Editing by Eric Beech)
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