In scenes reminiscent of the large scale destruction wrought by Typhoon Ondoy (international name Ketsana) in late 2009 in which 400 died, torrential rains brought widespread flooding in the capital Metro Manila and nearby provinces. Almost a million people are affected and some 250,000 forced to evacuate, majority of whom are workers and poor, with 15 deaths already reported.
I attended the Climate Commission public forum in Melbourne last Tuesday night with my daughter. I felt that it was important that she came along to see the charts on the screen, to hear from the Climate Commissioners and climate scientists directly, and perhaps question them about her future. Because global warming will have an increasing impact on the climate of the future, and the life of the kids of today, and eventually their children and future generations.
Yesterday the Federal Minister for Resources and Energy, Martin Ferguson, announced withdrawal of $100 million funding for the HRL proposed coal gasification 600MW power station in the La Trobe Valley.
The 2012 Uranium Film Festival’s Yellow Oscars go to Germany, Sweden, USA and Ukraine.
Government robbery – now called a carbon tax
This short piece of the Adelaide road shows about 30 lamps fully on in a mid day. Those lamps at that spot are on very often whole day. Sometimes only they are off.
Typically such lamps have 100-400W each. So one may argue that it is only 6kW of power assuming a 200W per lamp. It is not much comparing to a total power consumed by Adelaide and to total wasted power. Is it only a 6kW?
By Patrick O’Connor, SEP candidate for Melbourne: 6 July 2012 Prime Minister Julia Gillard’s carbon tax finally came into effect on July 1. The Labor government and its de facto coalition partner, the Greens, marked the occasion by again boasting of the measure’s environmental and social credentials.
Delta Electricity this afternoon announced the closure of the 45 year old Munmorah coal fired power station at least partly due to the introduction of the carbon tax. The power station is located on the shores of Lake Munmorah on the central coast of NSW between Sydney and Newcastle.
Reasons for the closure being cited by Delta Energy include the reduction in energy demand in NSW resulting in an excess in electrictiy supply, the aging nature of the infrastructure and the high cost of maintenance, and that "the carbon tax further erodes its viability."
June 28, 2012: Up to 300 People gathered on the steps of the Victorian Parliament house to show opposition to new coal projects which would destroy prime farmland and triple Victoria's contribution to greenhouse pollution.
Residents from Bacchus Marsh and south Gippsland attended to show their opposition to new coal mining projects and plans to use an experimental drying technology by Exergen to open up further mining and the export of brown coal.
Related: Latrobe Valley Coal Power and Climate Change | Carbon capture and storage and the Melbourne earthquake | No coal mine in Bacchus Marsh - locals and activists halt exploratory drilling | Photoset on Flickr
MANILA, Philippines - Various cause-oriented groups warned the Philippine delegation and world leaders attending the three-day United Nations Conference on Sustainable Development (UNCSD) in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil not to fall into the trap of believing that the proposed "Green Economy" is "a tool and mechanism for sustainable development."
UNESCO's International Day for Biological Diversity on May 22 focussed strongly on conserving our marine diversity. One of the important marine ecosystems are the seagrass meadows around the coasts of the world. A new global scientific research study just released has shown that seagrass meadows store significantly more carbon than any land based forest. They are very important as carbon sinks. But they are also suffering a major decline due to pollution from agricultural and mining development and chemical runoff, coastal development changing water turbidity upsetting photosynthesis in seagrass, and increasing sea surface temperatures affecting seagrass growth due to global warming.
The new global study of seagrass meadow ecosystems has found that coastal seagrass beds store much more carbon than can be stored in even the most carbon dense forests, such as the temperate native forests of Victoria. Seagrass meadows can store up to 83,000 metric tons of carbon per square kilometre, mostly in the soils below them. In comparison, a typical land forest stores around 30,000 metric tons per square kilometre mostly as wood. It is the first global study to analyze the carbon storage capacity in seagrasses.
More Information: Seagrass Watch | Global Seagrass Monitoring Network
