February 2009 Archives

The use of coal must end if we are to maintain an operable atmosphere, human civilization and all the Earth's complex life

The growing and powerful climate movement [search] has, based upon climate science, already shown conclusively that climate change is real and deadly. Now we must urge politicians, industry and individuals to immediately act and transform themselves if we are to survive. Finally, a mass protest against coal -- whose plants are "factories of death" -- is to occur in America, reflecting the urgency and depth of the one most important, sufficient climate response through non-violent civil disobedience.

Coal generates the highest greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions [search] per unit of energy obtained, and large reserves remain that must not be burned if we are to survive. Continued reliance upon coal, without immediate phasing-out of plants that emit into the atmosphere, is incompatible with any scenario to reduce atmospheric GHGs to a safe level in time to avert irreversible and catastrophic climate change.

Ecological Internet wholeheartedly endorses the Capitol Climate Action -- the largest mass civil disobedience for the climate in U.S. history. On March 2, you are urged to join thousands of people in protesting at the Capitol Power Plant in Washington DC, a plant that powers the U.S. Congress with dirty energy. We encourage you to consider marching and getting arrested to make the point that the age of coal is over, and/or to show your support for the brave protestors and the end of coal by sending the message below.

The climate change science keeps on getting clearer, and it is not pretty. A new study by the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences [ark], updating a 2001 assessment by the Inter-governmental Panel on Climate Change that looked at temperature changes and the risks they pose, found "the risks of negative impacts of climate change [search] on humans and nature are larger than just a few years ago". The new study found that even small changes of global mean temperatures could produce the kinds of conditions singled out as "reasons for concern" in the 2001 assessment, such as damage to coral reefs or endangered species; and extreme weather events like cyclones, heat waves or droughts.

Humanity, the Earth, and our sister species are at a crossroads. We can continue to willfully downplay the dangers posed by climate change, or we can organize and resist in order to achieve the policies necessary to maintain our shared biosphere and thus our shared being. We know we must reduce human population and inequitable consumption. There is no future for logging old forests and burning coal. And energy efficiency, conservation and renewables are the only road to keeping the lights on. We can pursue these sufficient ecological policies with a revolutionary spirit of action, or we can roll over and die. We still have the power and time to stop this crisis, but just barely. Commit yourselves to a New Earth Rising.

In a major policy shift [ark] by the new Obama administration, the EPA has announced it will reexamine the possibility of regulating carbon dioxide emissions from coal-fired power plants. While not finalized, this is the first step towards meeting our recent alert's demand that carbon dioxide be regulated under the Clean Air Act [search].

The new President is to be congratulated for thinking about sufficient policy adequate to truly address the threat posed by abrupt and run-away climate change. Without regulations on coal plants, to ensure no more are built that emit into the atmosphere, there is little chance of salvaging an operable atmosphere. What an exciting and effective climate change movement [search] of which we and President Obama are part. Let's make sure we stay on top of this one and support the President to get it implemented. And remember, no matter what anyone may tell you, coal kills really bad.

Canadian government wants special treatment for the world's dirtiest oil. In first international trip, President Obama must stand strong on clean energy and sufficient climate policies.

By Earth's Newsdesk, a project of Ecological Internet
CONTACT: Dr. Glen Barry, glenbarry@ecologicalinternet.org

(Seattle, WA) -- On February 19, President Barack Obama travels to Canada on his first international trip as President, where he will face pressure from the Government of Canada to support production of Alberta's filthy tar sands oil [search]. An international network of environmental groups has launched the "Obama2Canada" campaign[1] urging President Obama to stand strong on his new energy economy agenda and reject entreaties from Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper to shelter the dirtiest oil on earth from global warming regulation.

"Tar sands oil is the dirtiest form of energy in the world. It has no place in President Obama's plans for a clean energy economy," said Sierra Club Dirty Fuels Campaign Coordinator Pat Gallagher. "Tar sands oil accelerates global warming. It destroys forests. It endangers public health. Instead of importing this expensive, dirty oil, we can invest in clean energy that will create millions of much-needed, sustainable jobs."

Quite a week in climate science. Ends up global warming is accelerating [ark | more\ark] at a much faster pace, causing more environmental damage, than predicted even a few years ago. Continued use of coal is denounced as "death factories" [ark]. And crop-based biofuels are speeding up global warming [ark] by fueling the destruction of rainforests [search].

These warnings comes from highly respected mainstream scientists, and illustrate how the science has progressed to indicate global ecological crises are much more dire than even recent worst case scenarios. Of course many of us have known climate change will be abrupt [search], and that maintaining standing rainforests and ending use of coal, would be keystone climate change responses for decades; but been stonewalled by media, government and mainstream and even radical environmental bureaucracies. It is clear that the IPCC report of 2007 is already dated, and we cannot wait until 2014 to finalize the next.

Canadian government wants special treatment for the world's dirtiest oil. In first international trip, President Obama must stand strong on clean energy and sufficient climate policies.

TAKE ACTION! On February 19, President Obama travels to Canada on his first presidential international trip, where he will face pressure from the Government of Canada to support production of Alberta tar sands [search] oil. Called oil sands by proponents, tar sands are the very dirtiest of fossil fuels. Producing oil from tar sands emits three times the global warming pollution as conventional oil, requires excessive amounts of energy and fresh water, and destroys huge swaths of ancient boreal forest.

President Barack Obama must be strongly encouraged to stand strong on his new energy economy agenda and commitment to urgently address climate change, and reject entreaties from Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper to shelter the dirtiest oil on Earth from global warming regulation. Let the President know how seriously you take climate change, urging him to reject tar sands and support further immediate urgent action in pursuit of sufficient climate change policies. TAKE ACTION!

Atmospheric carbon dioxide levels [search] have hit a new high of 392 parts per million (ppm) [ark], with no indication the world economic downturn is cutting emissions. This is a rise of 2-3 ppm from a year earlier, up a third since the industrial revolution, and is the highest in at least 800,000 years. Some had hoped that at least an economic depression would reduce this growth. But nearly 7 billion consumers, all seeking the fruits of democratic consumption, seem only to know how to burn more fossil fuels and cut more natural vegetation in pursuit of livelihoods and meaning for their lives.There are a dwindling number of solutions able to divert this imminent train wreck without economic and ecological collapse.

The most favorable and least disruptive to the status quo is a global carbon tax [search] that definitively and in a straight forward manner puts a price upon carbon. And Obama's Energy Secretary is floating the idea [ark], which deserves all our support. It is known with certainty that given the political will, this will be far preferable to failed carbon markets [search] which have yet to demonstrate actual emissions reductions [ark] and appear to be collapsing [ark] with much of the rest of the financial system. The hour is late and options dwindling. Barring a carbon tax, I am firmly convinced only a global Earth stewardship revolution that destroys polluting and other ecologically destructive industries can achieve global ecological sustainability and save humanity, our sister species and our shared habitat.

The world is now clear that we live in times of great peril. Economies cannot exist without ecology. And this is why in this moment of economic shame, the best investment [ark] is to put all resources at the human family's disposal into solving climate change [search] and related global ecological crises including deforestation, dead oceans and water scarcity. We will almost certainly not get another chance beyond Obama -- he must act on climate now [ark].

President Obama can immediately start regulating carbon dioxide as a pollutant under the Clean Air Act [search] while rejecting Canadian tar sands [ark]. U.S. government renewable energy investments can be increased by an order of magnitude right now. And he can commit the resources, brain-power and full political might of his office and America to a comprehensive international treaty of shared yet differentiated national responsibilities to reign in emissions, to be finalized at the Copenhagen climate summit [search] at the end of the year.

Our deepest sympathies go out to Australia's bushfire sufferers [ark] who are victims of climate change. Much of Australia is a dry tinderbox due to years of climate change induced drought [ark | search], making conditions ideal for massive bushfires. We so hope that this tragic loss of life can contribute to the necessary climate change solutions [ark] in Australia and globally (and go beyond more studies [ark]).

Despite progress on climate policy, Australia remains in denial. They simply must break their dependency upon coal exports [search] and natural habitat destruction [search] if these sorts of conflagrations are to be minimized in the future. We have seen the future and it is happening now in Australia.

Sometimes readers and even supporters of Climate Ark suggest we are excessively apocalyptic. Perhaps there is some redemption to our decade of providing a voice in the climate wilderness, as Steven Chu [search] -- Nobel laureate and Obama's Energy Secretary -- picks up in his first interview [ark] on some of our language and specific warnings regarding climate change and water shortages [search]. "I don't think the American public [ark] has gripped in its gut what could happen... We're looking at a scenario where there's no more agriculture in California. I don't actually see how they can keep their cities going." What an ecologically insightful observation from the government, directly mirroring our recent warning, making clear there really is a new sheriff in town!

Climate change has again and again proven to be more abrupt and dramatic than even the worst case scenarios. Too many people, consuming too much (and inequitably) are liquidating the terrestrial, aquatic, marine and atmospheric ecosystems we depend upon for being. Climate change, along with other alterations of the Earth System, place human and all life's habitat at risk. It is marvelously refreshing to see that government officials finally get it in the good old U S of A. And if the Obama team really believes their rhetoric, they have a moral responsibility to urgently pursue ambitious and sufficient policies -- such as ending coal and ancient forest logging -- required to avert global ecological collapse [search]. Again and forever, no ecology, no economy (or anything else).

Ecological Internet's recent protest against large-scale alteration of oceans to capture carbon left off an important point: it doesn't work, as the amount of carbon actually removed long-term is minuscule [ark]. Geo-engineering [search] -- whereby mad scientists intend to engineer an atmosphere and other ecosystem services provided dependably for free for millennia by an operable biosphere -- is much in the news this past week. This is at least partly because of Ecological Internet's Earth Action Network's massive protest (411,471 protest emails sent) against an illegal large-scale German and Indian ocean fertilization experiment (there is a UN moratorium for such activities on the high seas), and our extensive outreach to global media highlighting "oceans are not carbon dumps and a biosphere cannot be engineered".

Though the geo-engineering experiment has commenced and large amounts of iron have been dumped, the protest was successful in raising awareness of the outlandish and risky plans to try to redesign or augment the already perfectly designed Earth System. A line has been drawn in the sand -- those seeking to experiment upon our shared biosphere without international consensus will face massive people protests and ultimately will be stopped. If these outrageous schemes must be researched, they can be done by studying natural processes -- not widespread and illegal manipulations of the Earth commons. And large-scale geo-engineering implementation -- whether experimental or commercial -- upon our shared Earth requires unanimous UN approval.

Desperate and risky planetary manipulations will not save the climate or the Earth, only intensive and methodical transformation of ourselves and our society can do that. Geo-engineering a biosphere won't work, is prohibitively costly and complex, and almost certainly will cause more damage than good. Now let's get on with dramatically and immediately reducing emissions.