Best of our wild blogs: 28 Aug 08

Cyrene Reef mapped!
kindly shared by Dr Raju, on the wild shores of singapore blog

Big Trees For Me!
about a heritage tree on the Garden Voices blog

Read more!

Shot in the arm for Sumatran elephants and tigers

WWF 28 Aug 08;

The Indonesian government is to double the size of a national park that is one of the last havens for endangered Sumatran elephants and tigers.

Tesso Nilo National Park was created in 2004 with 38,000 hectares of forest. Today’s declaration will see that figure increase to 86,000 by the end of this year.

"This is an important milestone toward securing a future for the Sumatran elephant and tiger," said Dr. Mubariq Ahmad, WWF-Indonesia's Chief Executive. “To ensure the commitment is effectively implemented we must redouble our efforts to eliminate poaching and illegal settlements within this special forest.”

With more than 4,000 plant species recorded so far, the forest of Tesso Nilo has the highest lowland forest plant biodiversity known to science, with many species yet to be discovered.

WWF has been supporting the government effort to extend and protect the park as the last block of lowland forest in central Sumatra large enough to support a viable elephant population. About 60 to 80 elephants are estimated to live there, along with 50 tigers.

Tesso Nilo forest is also an important watershed for more than 40,000 people living in the surrounding 22 villages.

“Tesso Nilo is still under serious threat from illegal activities, but if we can protect the forests there it will give some of Sumatra’s most endangered wildlife the breathing room they need to survive,” Dr Ahmad said.

“And while we greatly appreciate this precedent for more protection from the Indonesian government, there are other areas on Sumatra that need safeguarding for the sake of its wildlife, its threatened indigenous peoples and to reduce the climate impacts of clearing.”

WWF helped establish and supports the Tesso Nilo Community Forum, run by all 22 local communities living in the buffer zone of the national park. The forum supports joint actions to protect the Tesso Nilo forest and gives the communities a unified and more influential voice in park management.

WWF is working with local communities that suffer from human-wildlife conflict as a result of disappearing forests in the province. Hundreds of elephants have died in the last few years.

A successful Elephant Flying Squad uses domesticated elephants and mahouts to keep wild elephants inside the park from raiding village crops outside the park. WWF also promotes the planting of buffer crops that are not attractive to elephants.

New plans to protect native tigers and elephants in Sumatra
Paul Eccleston, The Telegraph 28 Aug 08;

New measures aimed at conserving dwindling numbers of native tigers and elephants on the island of Sumatra have been announced.

The Tesso Nilo National Park - a critical area of forest for the two endangered species - is to be more than doubled in size, the Indonesian government said.

The Park in Riau Province contained only 38,000 hectares of forest when it was created in 2004 but this will be increased to 86,000 hectares by the end of this year.

Riau Province has the highest deforestation rate of any province in Indonesia suffering an 11 per cent loss between 2005 to 2006. It has lost more than 4m hectares of forest in the past 25 years which represents almost two-thirds of the original forest.

The province is home to an estimated 210 Sumatran elephants - the remainder of an 84 per cent population decline in the past 25 years - and 192 Sumatran tigers after a 70 per cent loss over the same period.

It is estimated there are 60-80 elephants and 50 tigers within the new boundaries of the Park which is one of the last strongholds for both species.

With more than 4,000 plant species recorded so far, the forest of Tesso Nilo has the highest lowland forest plant biodiversity known to science with more than 4,000 plant species recorded so far and many more still to be chronicled.

WWF, the conservation organisation, has been supporting the Indonesian government's effort to extend and protect the park as the last block of lowland forest in central Sumatra large enough to support a viable elephant population.

Dr Mubariq Ahmad, WWF-Indonesia's chief executive, said: "This is an important milestone toward securing a future for the Sumatran elephant and tiger.

"To ensure that the commitment is effectively implemented, we must redouble our efforts on the ground to eliminate poaching and illegal settlements within this special forest.

"Tesso Nilo is still under serious threat from illegal activities, but if we can protect the forests there, it will give some of Sumatra's most endangered wildlife the breathing room they need to survive.

"And while we greatly appreciate this precedent for more protection from the Indonesian government, there are other areas on Sumatra that need safeguarding for the sake of its wildlife, its threatened indigenous peoples and to reduce the climate impacts of clearing."

WWF helped establish the Tesso Nilo Community Forum, run by all 22 villages in the buffer zone of the national park. The forum supports joint actions to protect the forest and gives the communities a voice in park management.

WWF also works with local communities that come into conflict for land with species such as elephants which stray out of the national park into local villages and raid crops.

An Elephant Flying Squad uses domesticated elephants and mahouts to keep wild elephants inside the park from raiding village crops. It also helps plant buffer crops that are not attractive to elephants.

Two of the world's largest pulp mills are based in Riau Province which has lost more natural forest to pulpwood concessions than any other Indonesian province.

The clearing of carbon-rich peatlands and peat forests in Riau has contributed to Indonesia having the third-highest rate of greenhouse gas emissions in the world, behind only the United States and China.

Endangered Sumatran Elephants, Tigers Get Boost
PlanetArk 29 Aug 08;

GENEVA - Sumatra's endangered elephants and tigers should get a boost from an Indonesian government move to expand one of their last havens, a four-year-old national park on the island, conservation body WWF said on Thursday.

But WWF warned that increased efforts would be vital to ensure that poaching and other illegal activities -- like unsanctioned logging and settlement -- did not continue in the park, Tesso Nilo in Sumatra's Riau Province.

"This is an important milestone towards securing a future for the Sumatran elephant and tiger," said Mubariq Ahmad, head of WWF in Indonesia as it was announced in Jakarta that the park area would be more than doubled to 86,000 hectares (212,500 acres).

"Tesso Nilo is still under serious threat from illegal activities, but if we can protect the forests there it will give some of Sumatra's most endangered wildlife the breathing room they need to survive," declared Ahmad.

WWF, whose international headquarters are at Gland near Geneva, said 60 to 80 elephants and some 50 tigers were believed to live in the area now to be covered by the park.

Set up in 2004 with 38,000 hectares (93,900 acres), it also has the highest lowland forest plant diversity known to science. Some 4,000 unique species have been recorded and many more remain to be discovered, WWF said.

Riau Province is home to about 210 elephants, down from around 1,250 just 25 years ago, and 192 tigers, whose numbers have dropped from around 650 over the same period.

The main cause of the decline of both Sumatran species, WWF indicated, is deforestation, the rate of which in Riau is the highest of any Indonesian province.

Some 65 percent of Riau's forest cover, key to the animals' survival, has disappeared since the early 1980s, largely as a result of increased activity by global pulp and palm oil companies -- and from illegal logging.

WWF said two of the world's largest pulp and paper mills are located in the province, which had lost more natural forest to pulpwood concessions than any other in Indonesia.

The clearing of carbon-rich peat land and peat forests in Riau have contributed to Indonesia having the world's third highest rate of greenhouse gas emissions, behind only the United States and China, the conservation body added. (Editing by Richard Williams)

Read more!

Put 'eco' back in 'economics'

Growing in a green way means short-term costs but long-term benefits
Jessica Cheam, Straits Times 28 Aug 08;

I RECENTLY came to the conclusion that 'growth' is overrated. Or at least, that conventional definitions of economic growth need updating.

To quote from Canadian environmental activist David Suzuki, we need to put the 'eco' back into economics.

Both concepts, he notes, are derived from the same root word 'oikos' (eco) which literally means house - that is, the environment we live in.

The word 'economics' is a combination of 'oikos' and 'nomos' (rules, management). Thus, economics means house management. Somewhere along the way however, we have forgotten about the 'eco' in economics.

What triggered these thoughts was the recent public exercise to gather ideas for a blueprint on Singapore's green journey for the next 10 years.

Since its debut on July 28, the Sustainable Singapore website has received 700 suggestions and counting, on issues ranging from solar energy and cycling, to the country's energy efficiency.

I noted with interest the quick assurances issued by the Government that Singapore's green steps will be taken 'in a manner that will not upset economic development'. Finance Minister Tharman Shanmugaratnam added: 'What will not be compromised is economic growth.'

Not that these statements are peculiar to Singapore: they are not. They crop up often in multilateral debates on greening economies.

And for good reason: economic growth is important, as it leads to increased wealth and job security, all elements of a happy and stable country.

As Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong pointed out in his Rally speech, growth gives us the resources to solve problems.

Singapore has used its wealth to move towards greening its economy, such as by making investments into environment-related research and development.

Still, the fear that economic growth will be compromised hampers efforts to go green faster.

When in town earlier this year, the UN Environment Programme's executive director Achim Steiner said to me: 'You can never expect a politician to say you're going to lose your job, or I'm going to make your life more miserable, for the sake of the environment.'

The sad fact, he added, is that 'many of those in charge of economies today exaggerate the cost of moving towards greater sustainability, and under-represent the returns from such actions'.

'This has led many countries to defer decisions about the future for far too long and the result is it gets much more expensive,' he said.

So how to balance the costs and benefits in greening any economy? How much gross domestic product (GDP) should be sacrificed?

In conventional economics, environmental costs are treated as externalities and unaccounted for.

Take China as an example. A recent Financial Times report highlighted its deteriorating environment as the 'devastating price' it pays for its rampant growth.

While millions of citizens are lifted out of poverty, 'large swathes of the country' are being 'devastated and unable to support even basic ecologies'.

Some reports put China's economic losses from environmental degradation at some 5 to 10 per cent of gross GDP.

It is an example of how measuring growth by GDP figures alone is a 'narrow, artificial indicator' that captures economic activity but does not account for real costs, said Mr Steiner.

The good news is, more economists are starting to realise this. The United Nations is working with leading universities and the World Bank to create a new wealth indicator that will take into account the drawing down of 'natural capital' from the environment.

As we in Singapore start thinking about sustainable development, we should keep in mind these changing definitions of wealth and growth.

While we try to perfect the art of 'balancing costs and benefits', we should also ask what we are defining as the reasonable cost of greening.

Are we willing to take the necessary steps, or will our 'greenspeak' just be lip service?

Do not get me wrong, I am not saying we should stop growing. Indeed, the green movement presents tremendous growth opportunities for us in the clean energy, water and environmental sectors.

All I am saying is we can grow in a much greener way, which might cost more in the short-term, but offer much longer-term returns.

And we must dare to do it.

There are already suggestions aplenty. Top of the list would be a greener tax structure to encourage Singaporeans to go green, similar to the pro-family tax structure unveiled earlier last week that aims to get Singaporeans to make more babies.

Under this tax structure could be rebates for adopting energy saving devices, concessions on income from carbon trading, and tax incentives for efficient and pollution-reducing equipment for businesses.

Pricing structures for utilities can also be made greener. For example, electricity can be made more expensive at higher consumption volumes.

Some countries such as Sweden and Norway are ahead of the curve, adopting bold environmental policies that others have avoided (like a direct tax on carbon emissions). They have proven that it works.

One country Singapore could take a leaf from: Switzerland. There, residents have to pay for how much rubbish they throw out. Here, we pay for someone to take our rubbish away, for the waste to be landfilled or incinerated. But we do not pay for the damage or costs to the environment our rubbish causes.

If, like Switzerland, we factored the cost of our rubbish into daily life, our actions will be a lot more different. People will start factoring the cost of their waste and recycling will come naturally.

Such are the changes we can suggest and lobby for, during this nationwide call for ideas to make Singapore greener.

Put the 'eco' back to economics, and chances are, we'll get it right.

Read more!

Trials on new system of buying electricity start later this year

Margaret Perry, Channel NewsAsia 27 Aug 08;

SINGAPORE: A new way of buying electricity is expected to result in lower energy costs for home-owners.

To be on trial later this year, the Electricity Vending System (EVS) is the latest stage in a S$3 million project. If successful, it will be rolled out to all 1.2 million homes and small shops.

The EVS aims to bring down household energy bills by giving customers the freedom to choose different electricity packages from suppliers.

The EVS allows a home owner to buy electricity from vending machines at the touch of a screen. Terminals will be placed at convenience stores and customers will also be able to buy electricity via the Internet and their mobile phones.

Once payment is made, the amount is instantly credited to the user's home electricity monitor via wireless technology. The monitor will beep when the credit runs low to warn home-owners to top up their accounts.

And if the user registers their handphone number, an SMS will be sent advising them to top up their accounts. This can be done via a reply SMS.

One of the biggest ways consumers could save money through this system is simply by being more aware of how much electricity they use.

A consumer display unit will show exactly how much electricity is being used at any one time. As soon as an appliance is switched on, the number on the display unit rises.

For example, switching on a light bulb uses little energy but turning on an electric kettle causes electricity usage to shoot up. Hence, users will be able to see instant savings when they turn off appliances.

The Energy Market Authority (EMA), Singapore's energy market regulator, expects electricity suppliers to offer different peak and off-peak packages to suit the different lifestyles of consumers.

1,000 volunteers from Marine Parade and West Coast will test out the EVS. The trial at Marine Parade will start in November this year, while that at West Coast will start in February 2009. Each trial will last for six months.

Seow Kang Seng, EMA's director of consumer safety and crisis management, said: "In order to keep the costs low for the pilot projects, we actually tried to look for places which have a good mix of private housing, HDB housing and some small shops such that we can get enough volunteers to take part and get a good mix."

Competition will keep prices down. Since 2003, about 10,000 large industrial users, which account for 75% of electricity demand, have been able to negotiate their own electricity rates with SP Services or private retailers such as Tuas Power Supply and Keppel Electric.

But small consumers such as households have only been able to buy electricity from SP Services at a flat rate through monthly bills.

The new monitor for EVS costs more than the current electricity meter, but this is expected to be less than the amount currently spent on the billing, opening and closing of accounts and meter reading, which would no longer be necessary.

Mr Seow said: "Currently we have these processes like account opening, account closing, billing, meter readings, account management processes. Under the EVS system, all these processes will not be required."

If the trials are successful, all households will eventually be switched to the EVS. But it will not be rolled out islandwide until at least 2010.

- CNA/ir

New meters to track households' energy use
Trial involving 1,000 homes will also offer different electricity price plans
Tania Tan, Straits Times 27 Aug 08;

A PILOT project to help households keep tabs on their energy consumption will be rolled out soon.

Advanced electricity meters which give consumers detailed information on their energy usage will be a key focus of the six-month project, which will begin in November.

The meters will be fitted in 1,000 households in the eastern and western regions during the test.

The devices can give consumers an idea of how much energy they are using, including hourly consumption, and the rates they are paying, down to the last cent.

By doing so, they can help consumers to know when to reduce their energy consumption if necessary.

Said Energy Market Authority (EMA) director for consumer safety and crisis management Seow Kang Seng: 'If they think they're using too much, then they can switch off certain appliances and scale back usage.'

Another key plank of the pilot project is a trial of the so-called Energy Vending System, a telco-style billing and consumption plan that will allow households to pick which energy provider and pricing structure they want in future.

Currently, consumers have no choice but to buy electricity from just one company - SP Services - at a flat rate of 25 cents per kWh.

Under the trial, SP Services will simulate a free market: It will offer participating households electricity priced at peak and off-peak rates, the cost of which will depend on when users tap into the power grid.

Said Mr Seow: 'It's like buying mobile phone plans. Consumers can pick packages which best suit their lifestyles.'

Participants in the trial will be able to buy electricity online or at two 'vending machines' in Marine Parade and West Coast. The areas are selected because they give the best mix of HDB and private housing and small businesses.

Feedback from the trial will be studied before a decision is made late next year on whether to give the system the green light.

If the go-ahead is given, about 1.2 million households can expect to be on the Electricity Vending System in about three years' time.

The system is expected to produce more competitive energy pricing, since different retailers will be bidding to win consumers, said Mr Seow.

However, he was unable to say just how much cheaper electricity would be under the new system.

He was confident, however, that the trial will go smoothly.

'We do not foresee anything that's too difficult to resolve,' he said.

Read more!

80% of imported chikungunya cases visited Johor recently

Lynda Hong, Channel NewsAsia 27 Aug 08;

SINGAPORE : The large number of travellers between Singapore and Johore is a major reason for the recent surge in the number of chikungunya fever cases here, said Health Minister Khaw Boon Wan in Parliament on Wednesday.

Mr Khaw said about 80 per cent of the 61 imported cases here had recently travelled to the southern state of Johore in Malaysia, where cases have been on the rise.

While his ministry is working closely with the National Environment Agency to eliminate breeding sites locally, Mr Khaw stressed that the public also had to play their part.

He said: "At this point in time, Johore is a major problem area, and it also coincides with the durian season, and I know many Singaporeans go to durian plantations. So if you do, I think you should just protect yourself... mosquito repellents may help." - CNA/ms

Read more!

Mekong flood woes in South-east Asia

China's dams a cause for concern
Michael Richardson, Straits Times 28 Aug 08;

CHINA says it remains a developing country despite its impressively rapid rise in the league of global power. By some measures, it is now the world's third biggest economy and second largest exporter. However gauged, China is clearly a nation with increasing power and influence, especially if you live in nearby South-east Asia.

So it comes as no surprise that China is blamed these days for local troubles almost as ritualistically as the United States is, the superpower Beijing says it will never emulate. The latest finger- pointing at China comes in the wake of devastating floods in parts of northern Thailand and Laos. The Mekong, South-east Asia's largest river, overflowed its banks, inundating villages and rice fields, and leaving a swathe of destruction that will cost many millions of dollars to repair.

The water level on Aug 15 at Vientiane, the capital of Laos on the banks of the Mekong, was the highest since records began in 1913. It has dropped since then but low-lying regions in Cambodia and in the Mekong delta of southern Vietnam are bracing themselves for similar damage as the flood waters move downstream.

Some Thais hit by the floods, as well as non-governmental organisations campaigning against dam building, point the finger at China. The water released from the reservoirs of three big Chinese dams on the upper reaches of the Mekong, they say, swelled the run-off from a tropical storm and heavy monsoon rain across northern Laos and China's southern Yunnan province earlier this month.

But the Mekong River Commission (MRC), in a statement on Monday, pointed out that the volume of releasable water held by the three Chinese hydropower dams to generate electricity was too small to have been a significant factor in the flooding. The MRC, established by the governments of Cambodia, Laos, Thailand and Vietnam in 1995 at the end of a long period of conflict in the region, helps to coordinate management of the Mekong basin in South-east Asia.

As the world's 12th longest river, the Mekong runs through or between six countries - China, Myanmar and the four MRC member states. Although the Mekong starts high in China's Qinghai-Tibetan plateau and flows through China for more than one-third of its total length of over 4,300km, China is not an MRC member. Nor is reclusive Myanmar.

The MRC said that the combined storage capacity of the three Chinese dams along the upper section of the Mekong is less than one cubic km. It added that only a small part of this could have been released as the flood waters in the area accumulated between Aug 8, when the tropical storm struck, and Aug 12, when the flood peak in the Mekong was measured at Chiang Saen, in Thailand, where the MRC has its most northerly monitoring station.

At Chiang Saen on that day, measurements showed an accumulated flood run-off volume for the month of 8.5 cubic km. Further downstream at Vientiane on Aug12, it was 23 cubic km. This led the MRC to conclude that any release from the Chinese dams 'could not have been a significant factor in this natural flood event'.

While this may be true, Chinese dam construction on the upper reaches of the Mekong is a legitimate source of concern for downstream South-east Asian countries. To generate electricity, water has to be released to drive the turbines. Their worry is that too much will be released in the wet season, contributing to flooding, and too little in the dry season, when the water is needed in South-east Asia.

This concern will be accentuated when China completes the fourth dam on its section of the Mekong by 2013. This dam in Xiaowan, at 292m high, will be one of the world's tallest. It will generate over 4,000MW of electricity, the equivalent output of at least four nuclear power stations.

Its reservoir will impound water in a 190 sq km reservoir that Chinese officials say will hold 15 billion cubic m of water, nearly five times the volume held by the three existing dams.

The officials claim that the way they manage and release water from Xiaowan will benefit downstream countries. They say they will reduce the amount of water flowing into South-east Asia by 17 per cent during the flood season and increase the flow by 40 per cent in the dry season.

Four more dams are planned along the Mekong in Yunnan, one of which will have a storage capacity similar to Xiaowan's. It is estimated that just filling the Xiaowan dam's reservoir will take between five and 10 years, using half the upper Mekong's flow. Clearly, a cascade of dams on this scale will affect the amount and quality of water available to downstream states in South-east Asia.

Averaged over the year, only about 20 per cent of the water flowing into the lower section of the Mekong comes from China. However, Chinese policy is particularly important in the dry season, when the long stretch of the Mekong on its territory accounts for 50-70 per cent of the water flow at the mouth of the river in Vietnam, where it meets the South China Sea.

The four member states of the MRC will meet China and Myanmar in Vientiane tomorrow. The two non-members have the status of dialogue partners. If China is serious when it promises a cooperative and mutually beneficial partnership with South-east Asia, it should join the MRC as a full member, share all hydrological information with its neighbours and integrate its Yunnan dam planning into the development blueprint for the lower Mekong basin.

This would strengthen the MRC's efforts to develop and apply an integrated management plan for the whole of the Mekong River basin, with multilateral as well as national interests in mind.

The writer is an energy and security specialist at the Institute of Southeast Asian Studies.

Read more!

Floods leave 2.5 million in India marooned

People caught off-guard as area has not seen flooding in past 55 years
P. Jayaram, Straits Times 28 Aig 08;

NEW DELHI: An estimated 2.5 million people in the eastern Indian state of Bihar have been stranded after a swollen river breached its banks following torrential rains and inundated hundreds of towns and villages.

'To call it floods is an understatement. It's a catastrophe,' Bihar's chief minister Nitish Kumar said, as he urged the affected people to run to safety.

'Our top priority at the moment is to evacuate people and bring them to the safer places,' he added.

The disaster was caused by the surging waters of the river Koshi, known as 'Bihar's sorrow', for the flood havoc it unleashes every monsoon season.

The disaster this year was exceptionally bad as the river, which had shifted its course over the past 300 years, returned to its original course and inundated over 800 towns and villages that lie between the old and new courses.

The Koshi is a cross-border river between Nepal and India and a major tributary of the river Ganges. The unstable nature of the river is attributed to the heavy silt it carries during the monsoon season.

Television news channels showed unending stretches of muddy water with only the tops of houses and trees visible in most places. The water is between 2m and 2.5m high in many places. The marooned people were seen atop houses and high grounds waiting to be rescued.

'The area hasn't seen floods for the past 55 years and therefore people were caught unawares. The army has been called in. Using 300 boats, we have evacuated thousands,' state minister for disaster management, Mr Nitish Mishra, said.

Mrs Ranjeeta Ranjan, an MP for the area, said: 'Waters are still rising, hundreds of bodies are floating in the water.'

Health officials said cases of diarrhoea and fever had been reported in the affected areas because people were forced to drink the contaminated waters.

'Given the scorching heat, unsafe drinking water and poor hygiene conditions, cases may soon increase,' the United Nations Children's Fund said in a statement in New Delhi.

Officials put the death toll from the floods at 46 - but it is expected to rise.

The federal Disaster Management Authority has rushed 48 motorised boats and 31 Indian Air Force helicopters to join in the rescue and relief operations.

The Koshi has also wreaked havoc in Nepal, where it originates. Nepali papers said thousands of people had been left homeless and more than 10,000ha of cultivable land had been submerged.

Nepal's new Prime Minister Prachanda, who visited the flood-hit areas last week, blamed the Koshi barrage, built by India in Nepal under a bilateral pact 50 years ago, for the floods in his country.

He branded the pact as 'a historic blunder' and said Nepal had written to India to repair the embankments' damage.

Read more!

Nuptial diners try to save face, not sharks

Grace Tsoi, The Hong Kong Standard 28 Aug 08;

Face and tradition outweigh ecology when it comes to wedding banquets, according to the manager of a top restaurant chain.

"Only a few couples have requested we change the menu due to environmental concerns," Maxim's Group Cantonese Cuisine senior operations manager Raymond Wong Tat-fai said yesterday.

Wong said most newlyweds still asked for a traditional menu not only to accommodate the requests of parents, but also because they fear they will lose face if shark's fin soup and steamed coral fish are not on the tables during the banquet.

Shark's fin and coral fish represent extravagance and are considered a must for banquets despite the fact both are on the list of endangered species.

In February 2007, 20.4 percent of all sharks and related species were included in the World Conservation Union red list as being threatened with extinction.

Sharks are difficult to replenish because they grow slowly and their breeding rate cannot keep up with demand. In addition, it is hard to breed sharks in captivity as they are solitary hunters and prefer to act alone.

Although specially bred coral fish are now more common on banquet tables, it may be too late to preserve the wild coral fish. According to research conducted by Hong Kong University in June, the once- abundant yellow croaker has now disappeared from local waters.

"It is very difficult to change traditional concepts and we can only do it slowly," Eco Association supervisor Ivan Wu Chan-kin said.

Read more!

Whale Meat Shipped to Japan May Be Discarded, Greenpeace Says

Stuart Biggs, Bloomberg 27 Aug 08;

Whale meat worth about $1.6 million sitting in warehouses waiting for import into Japan may be thrown away because the importer hasn't applied for a permit, Greenpeace International said.

As much as 80 tonnes of meat from fin whales, an endangered species, and 5 tonnes of minke whale have been in storage for more than two months, Greenpeace said. Under Japanese law, perishable goods can be discarded if they are stored for more than three months without the right permits, the environmental group said.

Australia, the U.S., New Zealand and other countries, along with environmental groups including Greenpeace, are trying to stop all slaughter of whales, setting themselves against Iceland and Norway, the exporters of the meat, and Japan, which has the world's biggest whaling program.

``This pointless import only serves to increase criticism of Japan,'' Wakao Hanaoka, Greenpeace Japan's oceans campaigner, said in the statement. ``The whale meat should be returned to its senders at their own expense.''

Tsuyoshi Iwata, an official of the Far Seas Fisheries division of Japan's Ministry of Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries, said the shipment won't be discarded because frozen whale meat can last for about 10 years.

Greenpeace's claims are ``nonsense,'' Iwata said, adding that he didn't know the name of the importer. Greenpeace named the company last month as Tokyo-based Asia Trading Ltd., a company established two weeks before the meat was shipped.

Taste and Texture

There's no listing in the phone directory or on the Internet for Asia Trading.

The fin whale meat was caught in 2006 and put in deep freeze, Kyodo News cited Kristjan Loftsson, chief executive officer of Icelandic whaling company Hvalur, which exported the meat, as saying in June. The meat is in demand in Japan for its taste and texture, Kyodo cited Loftsson as saying.

The meat is valued at about 175 million yen ($1.6 million), based on the market price of 2,060 yen per kilogram of regular grade red whale meat. Fin whales are listed as endangered under the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species.

Japan, Norway and Iceland are the world's biggest whaling nations. While Norway and Iceland hunt commercially, Japan hunts under a license it issues for scientific research, allowed under the terms of the IWC's moratorium on commercial whaling as long as the meat is later consumed.

The U.S., Australia and other countries say the research program is commercial whaling in disguise.

Japan's whaling fleet killed 211 whales out of a quota of 260 in the most recent expedition, which ended last week, according to an official statement, adding to the 60 minke whales killed in the region on an expedition which ended in May.

Japan killed 551 whales out of a planned catch of as many as 1,035 on its most recent expedition to Antarctica, which ended in April after being disrupted by activists from the Sea Shepherd Conservation Society and Greenpeace.

Read more!

Biofuels 200 times more expensive than forest conservation for global warming mitigation

mongabay.com 27 Aug 08;

The British government should end subsidies for biofuels and instead use the funds to slow destruction of rainforests and tropical peatlands argues a new report issued by a U.K.-based think tank.

The study, titled "The Root of the Matter" and published by Policy Exchange, says that "avoided deforestation" would be a more cost-effective way to address climate change, since land use change generates more emissions than the entire global transport sector and offers ancillary benefits including important ecosystem services.

"Preventing deforestation, promoting afforestation/reforestation and stopping peatland destruction are some of the cheapest and most effective ways of reducing global greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions," the authors write. "We propose the introduction of market mechanisms that can ensure investment is directed into these areas and a strategy to make this happen as quickly as possible."

"The prevention of deforestation and peatland destruction requires no technological development and little capital investment. This method of reducing GHG emissions is dramatically cheaper than all other mitigation technologies currently available—as low as US$0.1 per tonne of CO2," they continue.

"The economics is startling — if developed countries spent the same amount of money on preventing deforestation and the destruction of peatlands as they do on biofuel subsidies (US$15 billion), this would halve the total costs of tackling climate change. In addition to this, the protection of these habitats yields a plethora of valuable eco-system services, particularly in the poorest countries."

The report says that despite the benefits and the low costs, British government policy does not place any value on protecting forests and peatlands. Arguing that this is a mistake, the authors recommend a series of policy actions.

First and foremost, the report urges the British government to abandon its targets and subsidies for biofuels. Not only do biofuels distort food markets, they promote destruction of tropical forests and peatlands, resulting in greenhouse emissions. Further, biofuels are a costly and ineffective means for fighting climate change. The authors demonstrate this by comparing the cost and the emissions savings between potential avoided deforestation mechanisms and the U.K. government's Renewable Transport Fuel Obligation. They find that the biofuel initiative will save 2.6-3 million tons of carbon dioxide per year at a cost of £550 million ($1 billion), while a similar investment in preventing deforestation and peatland destruction could result in avoided emissions of 40-200 million tons of CO2 per year or a 50 times greater amount of avoided emissions. The savings would be equivalent to 37 percent of all UK carbon dioxide emissions for 2005.

Beyond a moratorium on incentives for biofuels, the authors recommend supporting efforts to reduce peatland destruction in Southeast Asia, especially Indonesia, where large tracts of peatlands are being drained and cleared for the establishment of oil palm plantations. The authors say that because of the high levels of carbon storage in peatlands, reducing their destruction is "one of the lowest-hanging fruits of climate change mitigation." The U.K. should exert political pressure on the drivers of deforestation while simultaneously offering financial carrots for reducing destruction. The report calls on the government to support capacity building — through financial support and technology transfer — in developing countries to prepare for avoided deforestation as well as seed-funding for pilot projects. The authors urge the establishment of a forest carbon market that would provide a "realistic price" for carbon that fully values the ecosystem services provided by healthy forests and provides a financing mechanism for conservation measures. The authors say credits should be generated both by reforestation and reducing deforestation and degradation and asks the British government to push for an international agreement that recognizes the role of avoided deforestation in future climate change mitigation.

"In the UK we can dramatically increase funding for forest and peatland projects domestically and with key partners, especially in Southeast Asia, as well as lobbying at an international level for the right global policies," Ben Caldecott, editor of the report, was quoted as saying by BBC News. "All this can be done within our current budget, by ending wasteful and damaging biofuel subsidies."

Read more!

Community project convincing builders to recycle waste

Construction waste makes up a much larger proportion of landfill than household rubbish. Is it time the drive to recycle shifted its focus?

Mel Poluck, The Guardian 27 Aug 08;

Richard Simpson's daily challenge is to persuade foremen on building sites to separate waste. The former architect is co-founder of the Brighton & Hove Wood Recycling Project, which has recycled nearly 6,000 tonnes of timber since it opened in 1998. All would otherwise have been buried or chipped.

The initiative was one of the first in Britain to take waste wood from building sites to be reused. From humble beginnings when he and a colleague lugged wood across town in a clapped-out camper van, the project has since become a model for community recycling.

"To building firms we were just a bunch of hippies," says Simpson. "But we were the first in the country to go to commercial building sites. The trick is to win over the foreman." And to have a steady stream of volunteers and staff, who between them have collected lab tables from Roedean school, stage sets, and timber from Brighton pier and English Heritage sites.

Grassroots projects such as this are playing an underrated but important role in diverting materials produced by construction from landfill. Simpson provides timber to customers as diverse as the Chelsea Flower Show, students and home improvers.

The project has become a model for community recycling nationwide. Simpson's co-founder, Richard Mehmed, has gone on to help establish 21 wood recycling projects in Cambridge, east London, Glasgow, Llandudno and Manchester, among others, using Brighton as a template.

These kinds of projects are making an impact but the task is herculean. Last week, the House of Lords science committee reported that householders account for 9% of the UK's waste annually. The construction industry, by contrast, generates 90m tonnes of waste a year, producing about 32% of the UK's total waste. Up to a third of construction materials end up in landfill and nearly 13% of materials delivered to building sites never get used.

The Lords called for councils to prioritise reducing waste from businesses, and argued that companies should be made responsible for the waste associated with their products. "We would like to see the VAT regime reformed so that products that have a long life-cycle, or can be easily and cheaply repaired rather than replaced, are made economically more attractive," said Lord O'Neill, who chaired the waste reduction sub-committee.

The threat of rising landfill tax, set to reach £48 per tonne by 2011, will certainly force construction companies to take waste seriously. "It can be difficult to persuade people of the moral argument behind recycling [but] when a business realises that it will affect them financially, they are likely to respond," says Zoe Le Grand, project manager at industry body Constructing Excellence. "Legislation is getting tighter. If they want to prepare their business for the future, they should get arrangements in place for recycling as soon as possible."

Some contractors have started to act. Taylor Woodrow ran a pilot plasterboard recycling scheme in 2005 resulting in recycling rates of 72% from its housebuilding programmes. And like many construction companies, Persimmon Homes' Anglia branch segregates waste materials into separate skips on site, with 300 tonnes of recyclate distributed monthly to metal, plastics and woodchip companies.

Skanska, one of the contractors for the £1bn Bart's and the Royal London hospitals' redevelopment, has during the project reached recycling rates of 99.6% - 50,000 tonnes. "A waste volume is agreed before we sign the contract," explains James MacMillan, the programme's environment manager. "If the trade contractor goes over that, they pay for the waste. The key is to prevent waste from coming to site in the first place, [by] reducing packaging and working with trade contractors. Segregation and waste management should be the last link in the chain."

Reuse of recyclate brought in from elsewhere is becoming more common. BAA's Terminal 5 construction at Heathrow reused more than 80,000 tonnes of materials. Crushed glass from local recycling banks was used to make site roads and around 30% of the concrete mix used for buildings, taxiways and aircraft stands was from a power generation byproduct, pulverised fuel ash.

For smaller building firms that do not have the resources to employ an environment manager, help is at hand. Guidance has emerged from the Waste and Resources Action Programme (Wrap) and the Environment Agency's NetRegs website.

The government, it seems, has woken up to the construction waste problem. Last April, the Environment Agency mandated site waste management plans for construction projects in England worth more than £300,000, in which, from the pre-construction stage onwards, firms must declare waste materials and how they will be disposed of. The agency says this will cut 100m tonnes of waste annually.

Last June, the Strategic Forum for Construction, an industry-cum-government body, launched the strategy for sustainable construction, declaring aims for 50% reduction of construction, demolition and excavation waste to landfill by 2012 compared with this year. In May, the Construction Resources and Waste Roadmap was published by a public-private consortium, proposing 10 actions. The report was funded by a body of the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs.

But the outlook for agencies created by the government to encourage sustainable practice among business is beginning to look gloomy. In the next tax year, the government plans to cut funding for environmental advisory agency Envirowise by more than 50%, and the Market Transformation Programme, National Industrial Symbiosis Programme and Wrap will all see their budgets slashed, something the waste reduction sub-committee expressed "extreme disappointment" over.

Read more!

Arctic Ice Second-Lowest Ever; Polar Bears Affected

Deborah Zabarenko, PlanetArk 28 Aug 08;

WASHINGTON - Arctic sea ice shrank to its second-lowest level ever, US scientists said on Wednesday, with particular melting in the Chukchi Sea, where polar bears were recently seen swimming far off the Alaskan coast.

This year's Arctic ice melt could surpass the extraordinary 2007 record low in the coming weeks. Last year's minimum ice level was reached on Sept. 16, according to the National Snow and Ice Data Center.

Even if no records are broken this year, the downward trend in summer sea ice in the Arctic continues, the Colorado-based center said. Last year's record was blamed squarely on human-spurred climate change.

"No matter where we stand at the end of the melt season it's just reinforcing this notion that Arctic ice is in its death spiral," said Mark Serreze, a scientist at the center. The Arctic could be free of summer ice by 2030, Serreze said by telephone.

This year's data "primarily reflects melt in the Chukchi Sea off the Alaskan coast and the East Siberian Seas off the coast of eastern Russia," the center said.

The Chukchi Sea is home to one of the world's largest polar bear populations and also includes a vast area where the United States sold oil and gas rights worth US$2.66 billion last year.

On Tuesday, Arctic sea ice stretched over 2.03 million square miles (5.26 million sq km), which is less than the 2005 mark of 2.05 million square miles (5.32 million sq km), set on Sept. 21 of that year, the center's analysis found.

The record drop in 2007 left a minimum ice cover of 1.59 million square miles (4.1 million sq km). The fabled Northwest Passage was open for the first time in memory.

Government scientists reported seeing at least nine polar bears swimming in open water over a six-hour period on Aug. 16, including one more than 50 miles (80 km) offshore, World Wildlife Fund officials said.


LONGER SWIMS FOR POLAR BEARS

That represents a huge increase over previous sightings, said Margaret Williams of the fund's Alaska office. A total of 12 polar bears were spotted in open water between 1987 and 2003, Williams said in a telephone interview.

In 2004, she said, four drowned bears were observed.

"Unfortunately it's what we might expect to see if bears are forced to swim longer distances," Williams said. "The Arctic is gigantic. When you have nine bears sighted in one transect (route) ... one can assume that there are likely a lot more bears swimming in open water."

She noted that bears are capable swimmers and rely on sea ice as platforms for hunting seals, their main prey. If relegated to land, bears have little to hunt and sometimes feed on carrion or garbage and can be a threat to humans.

As more Arctic ice melts, bears are forced to swim longer distances to find adequate platforms for hunting. Rescuing bears in distress in open water is problematic, Williams said: tranquilizing the bears sends them into the water to drown.

The US government in May listed polar bears as a threatened species because their icy habitat was disappearing, but offered no plans to address climate change or drilling in the Arctic for fossil fuels that spur the climate-warming greenhouse effect.

Summer ice melt in the Arctic is seen as a strong indicator of climate change, and feeds on itself in what scientists call a positive feedback loop where warming exposes dark sea water, which absorbs more solar radiation than the white ice.

Arctic sea ice is sometimes dubbed Earth's air conditioner for its ability to moderate world climate. In the last decade, this ice has declined by roughly 10 percent. (Editing by Sandra Maler)

Arctic sea ice drops to 2nd lowest level on record
Seth Borenstein and Dan JOling, Associated Press 28 Aug 08;

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.

With about three weeks left in the Arctic summer, this year could wind up breaking that previous record, scientists said.

Arctic ice always melts in summer and refreezes in winter. But over the years, more of the ice is lost to the sea with less of it recovered in winter. While ice reflects the sun's heat, the open ocean absorbs more heat and the melting accelerates warming in other parts of the world.

Sea ice also serves as primary habitat for threatened polar bears.

"We could very well be in that quick slide downward in terms of passing a tipping point," said senior scientist Mark Serreze at the data center in Boulder, Colo. "It's tipping now. We're seeing it happen now."

Within "five to less than 10 years," the Arctic could be free of sea ice in the summer, said NASA ice scientist Jay Zwally.

"It also means that climate warming is also coming larger and faster than the models are predicting and nobody's really taken into account that change yet," he said.

Five climate scientists, four of them specialists on the Arctic, told The Associated Press that it is fair to call what is happening in the Arctic a "tipping point." NASA scientist James Hansen, who sounded the alarm about global warming 20 years ago before Congress, said the sea ice melt "is the best current example" of that.

Last year was an unusual year when wind currents and other weather conditions coincided with global warming to worsen sea ice melt, Serreze said. Scientists wondered if last year was an unusual event or the start of a new and disturbing trend.

This year's results suggest the latter because the ice had recovered a bit more than usual thanks to a somewhat cooler winter, Serreze said. Then this month, when the melting rate usually slows, it sped up instead, he said.

The most recent ice retreat primarily reflects melt in the Chukchi Sea off Alaska's northwest coast and the East Siberian Sea off the coast of eastern Russia, according to the center.

The Chukchi Sea is home to one of two populations of Alaska polar bears.

Federal observers flying for a whale survey on Aug. 16 spotted nine polar bears swimming in open ocean in the Chukchi. The bears were 15 to 65 miles off the Alaska shore. Some were swimming north, apparently trying to reach the polar ice edge, which on that day was 400 miles away.

Polar bears are powerful swimmers and have been recorded on swims of 100 miles but the ordeal can leave them exhausted and susceptible to drowning.

And the melt in sea ice has kicked in another effect, long predicted, called "Arctic amplification," Serreze said.

That's when the warming up north is increased in a feedback mechanism and the effects spill southward starting in autumn, he said. Over the last few years, the bigger melt has meant more warm water that releases more heat into the air during fall cooling, making the atmosphere warmer than normal.

On top of that, researchers were investigating "alarming" reports in the last few days of the release of methane from long frozen Arctic waters, possibly from the warming of the sea, said Greenpeace climate scientist Bill Hare, who was attending a climate conference in Ghana. Giant burps of methane, which is a potent greenhouse gas, is a long feared effect of warming in the Arctic that would accelerate warming even more, according to scientists.

Overall, the picture of what's happening in the Arctic is getting worse, said Bob Corell, who headed a multinational scientific assessment of Arctic conditions a few years ago: "We're moving beyond a point of no return."

Science Writer Seth Borenstein reported from Washington and Dan Joling reported from Anchorage, Alaska. AP writer Arthur Max contributed from Accra, Ghana.

Read more!

Mystery of Greenland's Ice Lingers as Sheet Shrinks

Robert Roy Britt, LiveScience.com 27 Aug 08;

Scientists have cautioned that a warming planet could melt Greenland's vast ice sheet, a potentially catastrophic event that would raise sea levels and inundate coastal communities around the globe.

Yet while they puzzle over when and whether this might happen, they're also mystified over how the giant island formed so much ice in the first place. Greenland's ice sheet is the second largest in the world, behind only Antarctica.

Strangely, other parts of the globe at similar latitudes, including northern Canada and Siberia, don't have year-round patches of ice anywhere near as extensive or thick.

A new study finds that a mysterious drop in greenhouse gases around 3 million years ago allowed Greenland's ice to proliferate. The research could help with forecasts about the fate of the ice and the potential for rising seas.

Why it matters

If all of Greenland's ice were to melt, perhaps as quickly as in a few centuries, seas would rise 21 feet (6.5 meters) all around the planet, according to the U.S. Geological Survey. And already, an alarming melt is under way there, other studies find. In 2007, the ice melted at a rate of 150 percent of the average going back to 1988.

Recent studies have found that as the ice melts more rapidly, water pours through fissures and gets under glaciers, acting like a lubricant to allow the ice to race ever-faster toward the sea. In addition, when snow melts at high altitudes and then refreezes, it can absorb up to four times more sunlight, creating even more melting the next year.

Some scientists fear a snowball effect could exacerbate the ice sheet's disintegration in as little time as a matter of decades.

But given a lack of understanding about the mechanisms, and questions about how warm the planet will get and how much ice will melt, scientists' estimates for the extent of sea-level rise by the end of this century range from just inches to perhaps 6 feet or so.

The new study

Around 3 million years ago, there was an increase in the amount of rock and debris deposited on the ocean floor around Greenland. The stuff must have been deposited by ice that had originated on land and then become icebergs, indicating that large amounts of ice on Greenland only began to form around that time, scientists say.

"Prior to that, Greenland was largely ice-free and probably covered in grass and forest," said Dan Lunt of the University of Bristol in England. "Furthermore, atmospheric carbon dioxide levels were relatively high. So the question we wanted to answer was why did Greenland become covered in an ice-sheet?"

Theories abound, from changes in ocean circulation to changes in the Earth's orbit or tectonic uplift of the planet's surface. Another idea is that atmospheric greenhouse gas concentrations changed. Lunt and his colleagues used computer models of climate and ice sheets to test the theories.

Each theory got some support. But the only one producing effects large enough to explain the current reality was that carbon dioxide, a greenhouse gas that acts like a blanket to keep heat in and warm our world, fell to levels closer to those of pre-industrial times.

The research, funded by the British Antarctic Survey, is detailed in the Aug. 28 issue of the journal Nature.

What it means

Here's the really interesting part: When Greenland was ice-free, carbon dioxide was at 400 parts per million by volume in the atmosphere, Lunt explained via email. The level was 280 ppm before the Industrial Revolution. Now it has climbed back to 385 ppm.

Next year, Lunt and colleagues plan to publish a study that applies their finding to the question of what this means for the future of the ice and the potential for higher sea levels. For now, he told LiveScience, "The work does certainly indicate that the ice sheet is sensitive to changes in atmospheric carbon dioxide concentrations."

The study does not answer why Greenland got covered in ice but other northern locales did not. Lunt has an idea, however:

"The answer is most likely related to the fact that underneath the ice on Greenland are some high-altitude mountains on the east coast, which are high enough to be cold enough that ice can form, which then flows slowly down the slopes and eventually covers the entire island," Lunt explained. "In certain time periods [for example about 20,000 years ago], when the Earth's orbit is aligned in a certain way, ice does start to form in Canada and Siberia - for example in the last Ice Age."

Yet another big question has now been raised: Why did elevated atmospheric carbon dioxide concentrations fall so dramatically 3 million years ago?

Lunt's colleague, Alan Haywood of the University of Leeds, tackles that one: "That is the million dollar question which researchers will no doubt be trying to answer during the next few years."

Read more!

Poor Nations Need US$130 Bln a Year On Climate - WWF

Alister Doyle, PlanetArk 28 Aug 08;

ACCRA - Rich nations will need to provide about US$130 billion a year by 2030 to help developing countries cope with climate change, or about five times current flows, the WWF conservation group said on Wednesday.

A WWF study showed that there were 16 funds, run by UN agencies, the World Bank and others, channelling money to poor nations to help them curb rising greenhouse gases and adapt to effects of warming such as droughts, floods and rising seas.

But a big worry was that Africa, the poorest continent and among the most vulnerable to a changing climate, was getting only fractional amounts. Africa might get further left behind with a trend towards funds managed outside the UN system.

"Currently there is something like US$25 billion available for developing countries," said Donald Pols, head of international finance for the Geneva-based WWF group.

"The estimated need in 2030 would be about US$130 billion a year. So there is still a gap of US$105 billion," he told Reuters. "Only a small fraction is going to Africa," he said.

The data in Pols' study was based on calculations by Germany's Wuppertal Institute think-tank.

Most finance now comes from the UN's Clean Development Mechanism (CDM), under which rich nations can invest in cutting greenhouse gases in poor nations and claim credits back home.

That is generating billions of dollars in carbon dioxide credits from projects such as wind farms in India or refrigerant factories in China which are destroying powerful greenhouse gases.

"Most money is going to the large developing countries, China, India and Brazil," Pols said, adding it was good in many ways that funds were diversifying from the United Nation.

"But there is a danger that the UN process will be sidelined by hard cash," he said. Companies have so far found few market opportunities in Africa, partly because poor countries emit the least greenhouse gases.

"Africa has a voice in the UN system. Africa does not have a voice in the market," he said. Of the 16 funds, 14 were set up in the past 18 months alone.

Pols also said that for every 24 dollars going to help curb greenhouse gas emissions only one dollar was going to help countries adapt to impacts of climate change, ranging from heatwaves that disrupt farming to rising seas.

"In Africa, the type of projects that need to be funded is access to water, agriculture, so you can produce food with less water," he said.(Editing by Dina Kyriakidou)

Read more!