Best of our wild blogs: 22 Dec 09

Job opportunity: Education Officer with the Raffles Museum
from Raffles Museum News

exploring coral rubble area @ Chek Jawa
from NEW HOPE, CHEK JAWA a new blog about Chek Jawa!

Semakau - Hunter seeker!
from Biodiversity Singapore

Day over at Ubin on 19 Dec 2009
from Where Discovery Begins

Botanic Gardens
from Singapore Nature

Bukit Batok Nature Park
from Biodiversity Singapore

Penes for your thought
from The annotated budak

Courtship behaviour of the Indian Skimmer
from Bird Ecology Study Group

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We are disappointed so far: PM

Straits Times 22 Dec 09;

Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong, Senior Minister S. Jayakumar and Minister for the Environment and Water Resources Yaacob Ibrahim were interviewed by the Singapore media last Saturday in Copenhagen, Denmark, before the United Nations Conference on Climate Change concluded. We carry today an edited excerpt of the interview.

# Prime Minister, could you tell us what your reaction is to the progress?

PM: We are disappointed with the outcome so far.

This is a very difficult negotiation because we are dealing with a problem which is very long term - maybe decades, maybe beyond 100 years. And we are having to contemplate actions on a very long-term basis. What you do now is not going to show results before the next elections, not even after the next three elections. For governments to weigh these very far-off risks with the very far-off commitments that are involved is very difficult.

Secondly, the countries have very different perspectives on this issue. If you are a Scandinavian and have a high standard of living and have focused on green issues for quite some time, then naturally you want ambitious targets - deep cuts and binding commitments. If you are living in a developing country and worried about your three meals a day, as (Brazil's) President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva said yesterday, then global warming is not item one on your agenda, and you do not want to do anything which would compromise the possibilities for your people to grow, develop and prosper in the long term.

Thirdly, there are countries that have specific concerns, like the Association of Small Island States which are worried about the sea levels rising, or poor countries in Africa, which are unable to afford the measures needed to adapt to climate changes.

To bring all these together and develop a coherent proposal to move forward is a big challenge. The differences are quite deep ones, in perspectives and national priorities. So I do not see this reaching a full and harmonious conclusion this time. But I hope the work that has been done can be left alive and form the basis for further work. And hopefully within the next year or so, we will be able to reach a treaty.

Singapore has spoken up in this tone. We are a small island state too - not quite so low-lying as Maldives or Tuvalu, but small, vulnerable and alternative-energy disadvantaged. If there is no deal, we are in jeopardy. If there is a deal, we are committed to do our part. We have offered to reduce carbon emissions by 16 per cent below BAU (business-as-usual) as our contribution to an agreement. It is conditional on the agreement being reached and other countries also doing their part too.

Our offer stands. Whether or not there is an agreement, we will start to do part of it. But we must make sure that we get credit for the things we do on our own, and not, after we have done that, find that there is a new baseline and we have to cut more from there. Then there will be no end.

SM Jayakumar: We are disappointed. But what has been achieved, let us keep it alive and see how procedurally and substantially we can get more countries on board.

# Has Singapore been asked to do anything, in terms of making changes and making compromises?

PM: No. We have made our offer of 16 per cent below BAU. It has been noted and welcomed. And we have not been the focus of the difficulties because even if Singapore were to stop breathing, it is not going to save the earth.

Minister Yaacob: In the small group meetings when they put up the figures of the various countries, Singapore's figures were also put up. So they have acknowledged what we have put on the table and they know what we are committed to do.

SM: There was also an appreciation of the special circumstances and constraints that Singapore faces.

PM: We will start doing some of the measures that we would have to do in order to get to a 16 per cent target. Whether we get to 16 per cent or not depends on whether there will be an agreement. If there is no agreement, we are not obliged to reach 16 per cent. Our Sustainable Development Blueprint has set a 7 to 11 per cent target, so that part, we will do regardless. But we must make sure that (everything) done, if there is subsequently a deal, we get credit for our merit.

SM: So that will not be discounted.

# Does that mean that we will not have any new measures in the Sustainable Blueprint?

PM: No, that depends. To reach 16 per cent, we will have to take new measures. We have to consider what these will be. There will be regulations. For example, more stringent energy efficiency standards may be necessary. There may be other requirements for building, insulation, air-conditioning - Green Marks, Platinum Standards and so on and so forth.

There may have to be fiscal measures because if you look at other countries, either they have gone for cap-and-trade or they are thinking of some kind of a carbon tax. We would have to contemplate these too. And if we do them, then we will also need incentives and counterbalancing measures to buffer the impact on households and companies.

We have to plan and consider all these possibilities now. Whether we do them, when we do them, how we phase them in, it depends on what the final outcome will be, whether there is a new treaty.

# PM, you mentioned you were disappointed with the outcome. What is the most disappointing?

PM: We have always known that reaching an agreement would be very difficult. When Danish Prime Minister (Anders Fogh) Rasmussen came to Singapore during Apec (the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation forum) in November, he already said that a legally binding treaty was out of the question and that we should aim for a political statement.

If countries had started contemplating what goes into a political statement at that point, and there had been a process to have systematic discussions to put up a reasonably balanced proposal for the whole plenary session to consider, we might have surfaced the basic disagreements earlier, and it would have been a more constructive exercise.

But over the last two months, there has been a lot of sound and fury, a lot of trench fighting over procedures. Every inch of ground has been contested repeatedly. When finally you join issue on the substance, you are not in a right frame of mind to take a considered view which is both practically realistic, politically feasible and also shows a certain vision and detachment from the immediate close-quarter combat.

One reason why it is so difficult to reach a climate change deal is that, actually, the mitigation measures are very difficult to do. Some studies claim that it costs only 1 per cent of world GDP to solve the climate change problem and reduce carbon emissions by 80 per cent. I do not believe that.

For example, the Americans, who have been, as one writer said, brought up on abundant energy for 300 years: That was how the continent was - all the resources were there, you have water, you have timber, you build spacious suburbs, you drive big cars. Even poor people use cars as their principal means of transport. To change from that, to consume now one-quarter of what you used to consume in terms of fossil fuels - even with the best will in the world, you are not going to achieve that within one generation. And it is difficult to get that will, to have political leaders decide that they want to begin to change, instead of, as one American told me, just kick the can down the road.

Similarly, for the Chinese to compromise their growth is going to be very, very difficult to contemplate, because the momentum, the desire of so many people for a better life, to lift themselves out of poverty, is tremendous. And to say, no, you will not take the coal that is lying there on the ground and will instead put up solar panels or windmills that cost maybe five or 10 times as much as coal - even if Beijing were to issue such an edict, how many provinces will listen to it? The cost is very high, and therefore it is very difficult to do.

For us today, there is a cost to achieve this 16 per cent below business-as-usual, but if other countries are doing their part, then this is our small contribution to reducing the problem. If not, then it does not make sense for us to do it by ourselves.

# In your speech (to the conference), you asked developed countries to step in. What is the reaction?

PM: The US has committed to doing something. They put down a target of 17 per cent. It is the first time they have put down a target because they never signed up to Kyoto. They repudiated Kyoto. The Europeans have committed to reducing by 80 per cent by 2050.

There will be arguments on whether you should do more or not. Certainly many countries think that America over the longer term ought to do more. But it depends on what their political system will accept. Even if the leaders say, I will do this, when the moment comes to cause it to happen, the legislatures may or may not back them.

That has happened in Australia, where the Senate has thrice rejected Prime Minister Kevin Rudd's proposal for cap-and-trade. And in Europe, though they are trying their best, even they have not found it easy to hit the Kyoto targets, much less reduce by 80 per cent.

In terms of contributing finances, the developed countries have made certain commitments - promises of money - to help the poorer countries adapt. But they would want to make sure that the money is well directed and properly spent. And that will be quite complicated.

# What is Singapore's position towards the deal or the agreement that has been reached by the US and a few major (developing countries)?

PM: We think it is a useful basis to take the process forward... in order to try and reach a less imperfect arrangement.

Looking at the reaction of the countries that have spoken up at the plenary, including some of those who have participated in developing this agreement, my conclusion is: Although there is such a text that came up from a small group, it does not necessarily mean that even this small group wholeheartedly endorses it.

'Not perfect' but Singapore supports it
Straits Times 22 Dec 09;

AFTER the US and leading developing countries like China and India presented their draft accord, the Singapore delegation presented a statement on Saturday at the closing plenary session of the Copenhagen summit.

Aiming to show Singapore's support for the draft accord, the statement read:

'My delegation notes that the documents... presented were worked out by a group of parties of which we were admittedly not part of. However, it was a group of countries that crossed all sections and interest groups... we believe represented all of us.

'My delegation supports the sentiment, commitment and above all good faith in which it has been worked on and presented now to all parties, and we lend our voice to that of our colleagues in the Association of Small Island States and others who have called for it to be the basis to move us forward in Copenhagen and beyond.

'It is not perfect... but it represents important elements which we now face the grave danger of losing. We appeal to those colleagues who disagree with this view to reconsider and to identify clearly the points of contention or disagreement so that we can reach an acceptable compromise to move this forward in the most appropriate documentary form.'

Singapore supports Copenhagen Accord although document "not perfect"
Hoe Yeen Nie, Channel NewsAsia 22 Dec 09;

COPENHAGEN: Singapore has said it supports the "sentiment, commitment and above all, good faith" of the Copenhagen Accord.

It said the document can be the basis to move the climate change process forward in Copenhagen and beyond.

In a statement presented at the UN Climate Change Summit in the Danish capital, Singapore said it recognised that the document is "not perfect". But nonetheless it "represents important elements which we now face the grave danger of losing".

The statement said Singapore hopes those who object to the Accord would reconsider and identify clearly the points of contention or disagreement so that an acceptable compromise can be reached. - CNA/de

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When Jakarta taxpaying communities step in to deal with city issues

Evi Mariani, Jakarta Post 21 Dec 09;

Perhaps inadvertently, Jakarta – like many other cities in the world – has been swept away by the force of the market and neoliberalism, which has consequently transformed the way the city administration works.

In his 1989 paper “From Managerialism to Entrepreneurialism: The Transformation in Urban Governance in Late Capitalism” in the journal Geografiska Annaler, Human Geography Professor David Harvey argues that urban governance has “increasingly become preoccupied with the exploration of new ways in which to foster and encourage local development and employment growth”.

Harvey says such a stance is in contrast with the managerial role urban governance used to perform in the decades before the 1980s, which primarily focused on the local provision of services, facilities and benefits for the urban population.

Harvey based his argument on his observation on developed cities in Western Europe and North America in the 1980s. Yet two decades later and a thousand kilometers away, I find his analysis is applicable to contemporary Jakarta, which is increasingly pro-market. One of the consequences of the shift is the deterioration of public services as the administration has been busy ensuring a climate conducive to investment, and developing poor areas by evicting and gentrifying, among others.

One proof of the entrepreneurial Jakarta is the way the administration leases its property assets to the private sector, including for trade centers (such as ITC Mangga Dua), rather than build social housing for the poor or those in the lower-middle income bracket.

In the absence of managerial administration, community-based urban initiatives arise. What I would like to discuss in appreciation here are the kinds of initiatives trying to fill the gap left by the entrepreneurial administration, mostly driven by educated, taxpaying middle-class society.

This year welcomed a new one, Ruang Jakarta or Rujak, which is mostly Internet-based, using the address rujak.org. Initiated by, among others, an architect with a passion for environment and social issues, Marco Kusumawijaya, Rujak wants to create a network of residents of Greater Jakarta who want to do something for a better city. Within its young life, Rujak has drawn its readers’ attention to a broad range of urban issues, from earthquakes to floods, culture to local cuisine, and public space to waste management.

In a nutshell, everything that could help Jakarta become a sustainable metropolis. One could find a more visionary stance about Jakarta than one can find in any city agency in the administration. They say evaluate the malls, while the administration says they are open to new mall investments as long as the market allows.

Rujak is an addition to a list of initiatives that while criticizing the administration’s performance, also try to do something positive for Jakarta, a city that many people hate.

Recently, Governor Fauzi Bowo complained about the habit of littering, but as the leader of the city, he said he would not enforce the existing bylaw prohibiting littering, saying that it would be a hard feat as most of the perpetrators are poor people. Besides complaining, he has done nothing more.

But the Group Concerned About Waste, or Gropesh, stepped in years ago. They do campaigns, clean up garbage from public space on their own. And they say Fauzi lacks the political will and is only using poor people as an excuse not to do anything. Many prosperous residents litter too, Gropesh says.

Also in the social environment realm, there is the Jakarta Green Map, which regularly organizes gatherings to map the city. They have produced a map tracing city potentials along the Transjakarta corridors. They also have mapped lakes in Greater Jakarta. Recently, in cooperation with the Bike-to-Work Community (B2W), Green Map traced bicycle routes from Senayan in Central Jakarta to Lebak Bulus in South Jakarta.

Everybody fends for themselves in pro-market Jakarta, the urban poor too, though they are less publicized and most do not have organizations. Researcher AbdouMaliq Simone from London presented his report last year and among his findings in North Jakarta communities was that many of the residents got jobs not from the local administration, but from local gangs.

Simone said this was the result of a dysfunctional administration. He went on that in the long run, such informal authority could not work as it did not make people any better off. While communities like Rujak, Green Map, B2W, Gropesh and many others deserve heartfelt appreciation, I argue that the groups, or at least some of the job descriptions the group has assumed, are also the result of a dysfunctional or in Harvey’s word, entrepreneurial, administration.

For instance, if the administration carries out public services well, then communities like Green Map could focus more on mapping smaller-scale neighborhoods, their own, not mapping the Greater Jakarta lakes, which the administration should have done.

Essential to such entrepreneurial governance is the term public-private-partnership, Harvey says. In Jakarta’s case, oftentimes the administration claims the work of the communities by using this public-private-partnership scheme. It exerts minimum effort — the deployment of few agency officials and a small budget – while claiming a bonus: Increased public participation.

Lately, Jakarta has also seen an appropriation of community work for corporate interests. Green Map Indonesia has published an official statement to the effect that it refuses to join the Green Festival in Jakarta because the festival is sponsored by the Sinar Mas Group, a conglomerate currently in the spotlight for alleged massive logging that deforests Indonesia’s rainforests.

One could expect that the participation of Green Map Jakarta in the festival this year would be their last. It is important for the communities to be aware that the entrepreneurial administration and the market forces it supports so dearly have a great interest in the good and sincere work the communities do. While cooperation is generally good, communities should realize that one side could gain more than the other.

In the interests of these communities, I say strike a stronger bargain or even say no if necessary. My heart, and I’m sure the hearts of many, goes to you.


The author is a staff writer at The Jakarta Post.

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New warbler bird species discovered in Vietnam

Matt Walker, BBC News 15 Dec 09;

A new species of warbler has been discovered in the forests of Vietnam and Laos.

The small green and yellow bird was first sighted in 1994, but at the time was thought to be a different species surviving 1000km from its usual home.
Now studies of the bird's morphology, DNA and vocalisations have confirmed it to be a unique species. Scientists have named it the Limestone leaf warbler.

Details of the bird's discovery are published in the journal Ibis.

"The bird was first seen at one place in Vietnam in July 1994 and again at the same place in April the following year, and in one area in central Laos in May 1995," says taxonomist Professor Per Alstrom of the Swedish Species Information Centre, a part of the Swedish University of Agricultural Sciences in Uppsala.

"Initially, the bird was identified as a Sulphur-breasted warbler, in itself an interesting finding, since it was apparently breeding more than 1000km south of its previously known breeding areas in China.

"Later it was realised that its songs differed markedly from the songs of the Sulphur-breasted warbler, and further studies were undertaken."

These studies by Prof Alstrom and colleagues, who included scientists from the Wildlife Conservation Society's Lao Program and Birdlife International in Indochina, confirmed the bird's unique identity.

Distinct voice

The plumage of the Limestone leaf warbler (Phylloscopus calciatilis) is almost identical to that of the Sulphur-breasted warbler (Phylloscopus ricketti), though the new species appears to have a colder yellow chest and more grey topside and stripped crown.

But the new species is smaller, with shorter wings, rounder wing tips and a proportionately larger bill.

"Its vocalisations, both song and contact call, are markedly different from those of the Sulphur-breasted warbler," says Professor Alstrom.

DNA analyses also suggest that it is more closely related to the Yellow-vented warbler (Phylloscopus cantator) from eastern Himalayas, northern Laos and adjacent part of China, which is quite different in plumage.

So the new species looks markedly different to its closest relative, Professor Alstrom explains, but very similar to its more distant relative.

"The most likely explanation [for this]," he says, "is that the plumages have not diverged much in the Sulphur-breasted and Limestone warblers since they separated from a common ancestor."

Surprisingly, the Yellow-vented warbler and the Limestone leaf warbler separated from a common ancestor much later, but have diverged much more in plumage.

The vocalisations have similarly diverged in all three species.

"Leaf warblers and many other warblers are renowned for being very similar-looking, while having distinct vocalisations, so it is very likely that other new species of warblers will be discovered," says Professor Alstrom.

Despite being unknown to science as a new species until now, the Limestone leaf warbler is quite numerous.

Professor Alstrom's team believes that the bird inhabits limestone karst habitats in Vietnam and Laos, and may also breed in several locations in southern China.

One other new species, the Bare-faced bulbul (Pycnonotus hualon), was described earlier this year from central Laos. Its habitat is similar to the Limestone leaf warbler, which highlights the ecological importance of the region.

New Warbler Discovered in Laos
ScienceDaily 21 Dec 09;

A diminutive, colorful bird living in the rocky forests of Laos and Vietnam has been discovered by a team of scientists from the Wildlife Conservation Society, Lao PDR Department of Forestry, Swedish University of Agricultural Science, Swedish Museum of Natural History, BirdLife International and other groups.

Named the "limestone leaf warbler" because it breeds in Laos's limestone karst environments -- a region known for unusual wildlife -- it is similar to other warblers in this area of Southeast Asia, except for its distinct vocalizations and slight morphological differences.

A description of the new species is published in the journal IBIS (The International Journal of Avian Science). Authors include: Per Alstrom, Swedish University of Agricultural Science and the Swedish Museum of Natural History; Peter Davidson, J. William Duckworth and Robert Timmins, Wildlife Conservation Society; Jonathan C. Eames and Trai Trong Le, Birdlife International in Indochina; Cu Nguyen, Vietnam Academy of Science and Technology; Urban Olsson, University of Goteborg; and biologist Craig Robson.

"The discovery of this new species is very exciting and underscores the importance of this region of Indochina for conservation," said Colin Poole, Executive Director of the Asia Program for the Wildlife Conservation Society. "With increased attention from biologists, the Annamite mountain range of Laos in particular is revealing itself as a Lost World for new and unusual wildlife."

The tiny bird is greenish-olive with a yellow breast and striped crown. Although it looks similar to other warblers, it is smaller with shorter wings and a larger bill than its closest relative the sulfur-breasted leaf warbler.

According to the study, the bird has a loud and distinct call, which is what first alerted the authors that the bird may be new to science.

Scientists presume there are many limestone leaf warblers in this region. But its habitat isn't without threats. Many parts of the species' native forests have been cleared as a result of wood collection. WCS is continuing to work with the Lao Government in an effort to reduce the threats limestone leaf warblers and other wildlife face in this region.

Earlier this year from this same region, a team of scientists from WCS and the University of Melbourne described the bare-faced bulbul -- another species previously unknown to science. In 2002 in this same area, Robert Timmins of WCS described the Kha-nyou, a newly discovered species of rodent so unusual it represented the lone surviving member of an otherwise entirely extinct family. Three years earlier, he described a unique striped rabbit in the region also new to science.

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Kew discovers new plant species in one of its own glasshouses

Botanists at Kew unveil a bumper crop of new plant species for 2009 including one that had been growing under their noses for 50 years
Ian Sample, guardian.co.uk 22 Dec 09;

The quest to catalogue Earth's rich flora has taken botanists to the farthest flung and most treacherous corners of the world, from the humid rainforests of the Amazon to the highest peaks of Borneo.

Which made it all the more surprising when Iain Darbyshire stumbled upon a species of plant unknown to science while taking a lunchtime stroll around the Royal Botanic Gardens in west London.


Darbyshire, an expert in African botany at Kew, happened upon the foot-tall plant in full bloom, its striking green and grey heart-shaped leaves set off by tiny white and pink flowers.

"I just happened to take a different route through the glasshouse that lunchtime and stumbled across it," Darbyshire told the Guardian. "I knew instantly that it was a new species. It was just sat there waiting for someone to study it."

Record books revealed the plants had been donated by Swedish botanists in the 1990s after an expedition to the Eastern Arc mountains of Tanzania. Unsuspecting gardeners had tended them for more than a decade, using them as tropical bedding in Kew's Princess of Wales Conservatory.

The plant was officially named Isoglossa variegata last month and is among more than 250 new plant and fungus species discovered and described by the gardens' botanists in the past year.

Almost a third of all the species are believed to be facing extinction as their habitats are eroded or destroyed by logging, climate change and other environmental disruption.

In western Madagascar, Kew botanists hiked across extraordinary landscapes of limestone pinnacles and discovered several new species of wild coffee plant, the most traded commodity in the world after oil.

This unique environment has given rise to coffee plants that look nothing like those found elsewhere. Some of the species are conspicuously hairy, and two, Coffea labatii and Coffea pterocarpa, have colourful winged fruit.

The region experiences torrential seasonal downpours that create ephemeral rivers and pools across the stoney forest floor. "These winged fruit float very well, so the feature might be an evolutionary adpatation to aid their dispersal," said Aaron Davis, a coffee expert and taxonomist at the Gardens.

Alternatively, the wings may ensure the fruit are scattered far and wide by making them more visible to lemurs, which feed on the coffee beans.

The hirsute coffee plants might have sprouted hair to protect against harsh ultraviolet rays in the dry season.

"There's a misconception that we've found all the plants there are to find, but we are still in a golden age of discovery," said Davis. "We don't know our planet well enough and we are running out of time. Species are going extinct before we even know about them."

Around 70% of wild coffee species are in danger of extinction.

Elsewhere in Madagascar, botanists noticed two new species of small flowering plants called Gymnosiphon. The bizzare plants draw their energy not from the sun, but from fungi that live underground.

Further expeditions to the rainforests of Cameroon led to the discovery of three giant trees that grow to more than 30m high. One, Berlinia korupensis, is a member of the pea family. The tree towers above its neighbours at 42m high and produces foot-long pods that explode when they ripen, propelling seeds far across the forest floor.

Among some of the smallest species identified this year are tiny wood-rotting fungi from Australia that are less than a millimetre wide and cover trees like a thin coating of paint.

"They are small, but they perform a vital role in decomposition of plant material and recycling of nutrients," said Brian Spooner, a Swedish fungus expert working with Kew researchers.

In South Africa, botanists spotted a plant with lumpy wooden tubers that grow up to a metre high. The species was identified as a yam, but only 200 or so are known to exist in the wild. It is under threat from local medicinal plant collectors who use it as a treatment for cancer.

Some 20 new species were discovered in Brazil alone, the most striking being a red passion flower that is probably pollinated by hummingbirds and produces edible egg-shaped fruit. The plant was spotted in an expedition to the Amazon rainforest in Mato Grasso, Brazil.

The largest haul of new species came from Mount Kinabalu, the highest peak in Borneo, where botanists Jeff Wood and Phil Cribb have identified 38 new species of orchid. Nearly 900 different species live in a 1,200sq km area of the island.

Each new species is identified by detailed visual inspections that are often backed up my genetic analyses. To identify all the world's flora could take another 50 years, but the effort is crucial for conserving rare species and reintroducing species that only exist in protected areas.

Stephen Hopper, director of the Royal Botanic Gardens Kew, said the speed of discovery and classification of new species is increasing under the organisation's Breathing Planet Programme.

"These new discoveries highlight the fact that there is so much of the plant world yet to be discovered and documented. Without knowing what's out there and where it occurs, we have no scientific basis for effective conservation," said Hopper.

Canopy Giants and Miniature Fungi Among 250 New Species Discovered in Kew's 250th Anniversary Year
ScienceDaily 22 Dec 09;

Giant rainforest trees, rare and beautiful orchids, spectacular palms, minute fungi, wild coffees and an ancient aquatic plant are among more than 250 new plant and fungi species discovered and described by botanists from the Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew in this, the botanical organisation's 250th anniversary year. The new species come from a wide-range of fascinating locations including Brazil, Cameroon, East Africa, Madagascar, Borneo and New Guinea. Nearly a third are believed to be in danger of extinction.

Following in the footsteps of their famous botanical predecessors such as Sir Joseph Banks, Sir Joseph Hooker, and Charles Darwin, taxonomic botanists at the Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew continue to explore and study the world's plant and fungal diversity, making astonishing discoveries every year. Their work involves a combination of fieldwork in remote and exotic parts of the world, and research in the Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew's Herbarium, a vast scientific collection of over seven million dried plants specimens, perhaps the largest of its kind in the world. This work has never been more relevant and pressing than in the current era of global climate change and unprecedented loss of biodiversity -- especially as we count down to the International Year of Biodiversity in 2010.

"These new discoveries highlight the fact that there is so much of the plant world yet to be discovered and documented. Without knowing what's out there and where it occurs, we have no scientific basis for effective conservation. It is vital that these areas of botanical science are adequately funded and supported.

Examples of the new discoveries are listed below.

Canopy Giants from the rainforests of Cameroon

Among the most gigantic of the new species discoveries are three towering rainforest trees discovered by Xander van der Burgt, and colleagues in the Korup National Park in Cameroon. Talbotiella velutina (www.kew.org/plants-fungi/talbotiella-velutina.htm) and Lecomtedoxa plumosa both reach more than 30m into the forest canopy, but Berlinia korupensis (www.kew.org/plants-fungi/Berlinia-korupensis.htm), named by Dr Barbara Mackinder, tops these at more than 42m in height with a buttressed trunk almost 1m wide. The Berlinia is a member of the pea family (Leguminosae). It bears beautiful white flowers from which enormous pods some 30cm in length develop. The pods explode when ripe, propelling the seeds ballistically away from the mother tree. Surveys of the Korup National Park revealed that this tree is extremely rare. "We found just 17 trees in our surveys," says van der Burgt. "Even though Korup is protected, Berlinia korupensis is critically endangered due to human pressures on the park." The Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew and in-country collaborators have discovered and described more than 100 new plant species from Cameroon since 1995, although Dr Martin Cheek, leader of the programme in Cameroon, comments that "species discovery is accelerating [with] more than 50 of these new species described since 2005."

From the tallest to the smallest

The smallest species on this year's new species list are wood-rotting fungi, which are less than a millimeter thick and cover their hosts like a lick of paint. With a Swedish colleague, Dr Brian Spooner and Dr Peter Roberts, the Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew's experts on fungal taxonomy, have just described five of these minute fungi. "They are small, but they perform a vital role in decomposition of plant material and recycling of nutrients," says Dr Spooner. These new fungi were among many specimens collected during a joint Anglo-Australian expedition to the Kimberley Region of Western Australia in 1988 and which are still under study. Other miniature discoveries in this year's list include two new species of Gymnosiphon; bizarre little flowering plants less than 10cm tall that derive their energy not from the sun but from underground fungi (www.kew.org/plants-fungi/gymnosiphon-afro-orientalis.htm). Marie Briggs, the Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew botanist, who discovered one of these plants in Madagascar in 2007, seems to have a penchant for discovering small plants. While on an expedition to western Madagascar in 2009 she found specimens of a new genus of succulent belonging to the coffee family (Rubiaceae), and which is less than 3cm tall.

Mountains of orchids

With just over 25,000 species, the orchids are probably the world's largest flowering plant family. The Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew's orchid experts Dr Jeff Wood and Dr Phil Cribb have added 38 new species to the total this year alone. Wood has been studying the orchids of Mount Kinabalu, the highest mountain in Borneo (4095m), for more than a decade and yet continues to discover species new to science. "Kinabalu is unbelievably rich," says Dr Wood. "In an area of just 1,200 square kilometres 866 different orchids occur, including 13 new species described this year alone." But there is trouble in paradise; Borneo's forests are being devastated by widespread logging for timber and oil palm plantations. Dr Wood has named a further 15 new species this year, all of which have been discovered in logging areas in Borneo. Orchids face a further threat -- illegal collection for the horticultural trade. Wood's research is essential -- put simply, by placing these spectacular plants on the map, he is throwing them a lifeline.

Two dozen new palms

An astounding 24 new species of palm feature on the list. Some are enormous forest canopy trees, such as the 25m tall Cyrtostachys bakeri (www.kew.org/plants-fungi/Cyrtostachys-bakeri.htm), discovered by Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew palm expert Dr Bill Baker in Papua New Guinea, but most are slender, elegant palms from the rainforest undergrowth. Twenty of the new palms come from Madagascar, which is home to 188 palm species. "After 20 years of research, we're still finding new species in Madagascar," says Dr Baker. "A half of all known Madagascar palms have been discovered by Kew botanists." Less than 10% of Madagascar's original vegetation remains and a further 200,000-300,000 hectares of forest are destroyed every year. As a result, 90% of Madagascar's palms, including all of the 20 new species, are threatened with extinction because of habitat loss and destruction of palms for the numerous useful products that they provide, such as food and construction materials. Some are incredibly rare; for example, fewer than 10 individuals of one of the new species, Dypsis humilis (www.kew.org/plants-fungi/Dypsis-humilis.htm), were found in a single forest patch used heavily by local people for timber. Innovative conservation strategies involving local communities are needed to save these species. This approach has been effectively employed for the conservation of the 'suicide palm', Tahina spectabilis (www.kew.org/plants-fungi/Tahina-spectabilis.htm), discovered in Madagascar by a collaborative team led from the Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew in 2007.

The coffee species that could save your daily cup from climate change

Seven wild coffee species, mostly native to the mountains of northern Madagascar, feature on the list. This takes the total number of new coffee species discovered by the Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew and its partners over the past ten years to nearly 30, including some weird and wonderful species. Coffea labatii and Coffea pterocarpa (www.kew.org/plants-fungi/Coffea-pterocarpa.htm) have winged fruits, while Coffea namorokensis and Coffea bissetiae are distinctly hairy, and Coffea ambongensis and Coffea boinensis have the largest seeds of any coffee species: their 'coffee beans' are more than twice the size of those of Coffea arabica (Arabica coffee www.kew.org/plants-fungi/Coffea-arabica.htm), the main species used in the commercial production of coffee.

"We're still finding new species of coffee, including those directly related to crop plants," says the Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew's coffee expert Dr Aaron Davis. "Coffee is the world's second most traded commodity, after oil, with at least 25 million farming families dependent on its production for their livelihoods, yet we still have much to learn about its wild relatives. We estimate that 70% of wild coffee species are in danger of extinction due to habitat loss and climate change.

"Conserving the genetic diversity within this genus has implications for the sustainability of our daily cup, particularly as coffee plantations are highly susceptible to climate change. Those involved in the coffee trade could help to future-proof the industry by working with Kew and its partners to create reserves to conserve coffee genetic resources."

Ancient aquatic plant on the rocks

Isoetes eludens (www.kew.org/plants-fungi/isoetes-eludens.htm), a species of an ancient group of spore-plants known as quillworts, and so named because it eluded its discoverers for seven years, was found in a mountain-top rock pool in a remote corner of Namaqualand, South Africa by the Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew's Director, Professor Stephen Hopper. Botanists are concerned that these exposed temporary rock pools -- known by the local Nama people as !gau -- are vulnerable to climate change which could mean the 5cm high plant's days are numbered. Urgent collection of spores and long-term storage in seed banks is an important next step to secure the conservation of this intriguing species. Quillworts date from fossils aged more than 150 million years old in an era before the evolution of flowering plants.

"To discover a completely new species in a small pool just 2m in diameter and 15cm deep was an unexpected delight. It highlights how much more work is needed to reveal the full diversity of the Cape's world-famous flora," says Professor Hopper.

Critically endangered 'cancer cure' yam

Dioscorea strydomiana is a critically endangered species from South Africa with only two populations of about 200 plants known in the wild. It does not look like a typical yam -- it is shrub-like in appearance with a huge, slow growing, lumpy wooden tuber above the ground measuring up to 1m in height and diameter. The tuber sprouts multiple shoots each spring. The species is regarded as a cancer cure in the region where it grows and as a result is under threat from over-collection by medicinal plant collectors who cut pieces off the tubers. The Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew's yam expert, Dr Paul Wilkin, describes this species as "the most unique and unusual yam I have come across, and probably the most threatened."

Indigos and relatives

Fourteen species of the blue dye indigo producing genus Indigofera have been described as new to science in 2009. Few natural by-products have played as prominent a role in history and in international trade as indigo. It has been a valued dye from the earliest human civilizations because of its compatibility with all types of natural fibres and its ability to be combined with other natural dyes to create a range of colours not possible to produce with synthetic substitutes. The Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew has had a long-standing interest in the research of this genus and these discoveries arose during ongoing research in southern tropical Africa.Of the 14 new species described, 11 are highly localised and are threatened with extinction.

Indigofera has more than 750 species and occurs throughout the tropical regions of the world. It is member of Leguminosae (pea family).

Discovered in a glasshouse

Most of this year's discoveries come direct from the wild, but in one case, a new species was found closer to home -- in Kew Gardens' Princess of Wales conservatory. Dr Iain Darbyshire, an expert on African botany, stumbled across Isoglossa variegata (www.kew.org/plants-fungi/isoglossa-variegata.htm) during a lunchtime wander in the glasshouse, where it was used for tropical bedding. Dr Darbyshire, who has contributed 36 new species from the Acanthus family (Acanthaceae) alone to this year's list, later found specimens in the Herbarium. It was first collected nearly 100 years ago but on another specimen from the 1950s there is a note stating "Name urgently desired." Fifty years on, the job is now done, the delay reflecting the overwhelming task of charting the world's plants. Isoglossa variegata is one of more than 100 new species from East Africa and southern tropical Africa and is part of a major commitment by the Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew, initiated some 50 years ago, to document the flora from this area in two major projects, the Flora of Tropical East Africa and Flora Zambesiaca. These great works, which document around 12,500 and 10,000 species respectively, are now nearing completion.

Brazilian passion

Passiflora cristalina (www.kew.org/plants-fungi/passiflora-cristalina.htm) is among the 20 new Brazilian species discovered by the Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew this year. It is a striking red passionflower with edible egg-shaped fruits and is thought to be pollinated by hummingbirds. Dr Daniela Zappi discovered it during an expedition to the Amazon rainforest in Mato Grosso, Brazil. The plants in this part of the Amazon are poorly known and threatened by deforestation from cattle farming. "We are almost certainly losing species from this region before they are known to science, and our work is a race against time." says Dr Zappi. "The survey work we have carried out so far is a major step forward in scientific knowledge and is being used by local government agencies to develop a much-needed plan to protect this area."

Also on the list is a new legume genus, Tabaroa catingicola, discovered by Brian Stannard from the Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew and his Brazilian colleagues, on the lower slopes of the Rio de Contas mountain range in southwestern Bahia. The legume family is of great research significance because so many species are used throughout the world as sources of food and medicine. Great potential exists to utilise more species, which is why continued taxonomic research into this family is essential.

Knee-high eucalyptus discovered in SW Australia

To many British gardeners the eucalyptus is a fast growing monster; casting shade and debris… usually in the neighbour's garden. In Australia, however, the over 900 species of eucalypts are integral to the landscape and culture and come in all shapes and sizes. It seems fitting, therefore, that the Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew's Director, Professor Stephen Hopper, an Australian himself, has recently described two fantastic new species in southwest Australia. "You might expect that the plants of Australia are already well-known," says Professor Hopper, "but these kinds of finds are far from unusual, especially in the southwest." Professor Hopper discovered Eucalyptus sweedmaniana (www.kew.org/plants-fungi/Eucalyptus-sweedmaniana.htm) with his colleague Luke Sweedman, after whom he named the plant. It is a dwarf in comparison to most eucalyptus species, forming a low-growing mallee (shrub) around 1m high. It survives the bush fires that are common in the area by dying back to a woody underground rootstock, known as a lignotuber, from which it can resprout later. The second new species (Eucalyptus brandiana www.kew.org/plants-fungi/Eucalyptus-brandiana.htm), although larger than sweedmaniana, isn't so lucky; it lacks a lignotuber and is killed by fire. Both species are known from just a few hundred plants each and are in need of conservation. However, both have potential as ornamentals in Australia (and perhaps elsewhere), which could provide a welcome backup plan to secure their futures.

The full list of over 290 new discoveries can be found on www.kew.org/new-discoveries, together with profiles of selected species, an interactive map and a link to a specially created Google Earth layer.

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Time running out for orangutans: conservationists

Beh Lih Yi Yahoo News 21 Dec 09;

KOTA KINABALU, Malaysia (AFP) – The world has less than 20 years left to save the orangutan, according to conservationists who predict the charismatic red ape will become extinct if no action is taken to protect its jungle habitat.

There are thought to be 50-60,000 orangutans still living in the wild in Malaysia and Indonesia, but deforestation and the expansion of palm oil plantations have taken a heavy toll.

"The orangutans' habitat is fragmented and isolated by plantations, they can't migrate, they can't find mates to produce babies," said Tsubouchi Toshinori from the Borneo Conservation Trust (BCT).

Environmentalists are calling for the creation of wildlife "corridors" in Malaysia to link the scraps of jungle where orangutans have become trapped by decades of encroachment by loggers and oil palm firms.

Tsubouchi said that although studies have predicted orangutans will disappear within 50 years if their habitat continues to vanish, action needs to be taken within the next two decades to stall that process.

"We have to establish the corridors in 10 or 20 years, otherwise we won't be able to do anything later," he said.

Some 80 percent of the world's orangutans live in Borneo, which is split between Malaysia and Indonesia, and the rest are found in Indonesia's Sumatra province.

"What we have left today is maybe only 10 percent of what we used to have before," said Marc Ancrenaz from the environmental group Hutan which focuses on conserving the 11,000 orangutans in Malaysia's Sabah state in Borneo.

An aerial survey carried out by Hutan and wildlife authorities in Sabah last year revealed some 1,000 orangutan treetop "nests" located in 100 small patches of forest completely surrounded by palm oil plantations.

"If we are not able to establish connectivity in the next 10 or 20 years, there is a risk that this population will reach a stage which will make it impossible for us to enable them to survive," Ancrenaz warned.

But he said that if immediate action is taken, there is still a good chance of ensuring the long-term survival of the primate as there is still enough genetic diversity for it to thrive.

"Unlike the rhinoceros whose numbers are so few, we still have a decent size population for the orangutan. If they are going to become extinct, it will not be in the next 10 years," he said.

There are only about 250 Sumatran Rhinoceros left in Malaysia and Indonesia, making it the most highly endangered rhino species in the world.

Experts say that wildlife corridors would enable orangutans to move across the fragmented landscape and alongside rivers to seek food and mates.

The corridors could be used by other endangered species such as the pygmy elephant and rhinoceros, but progress on the initiative has been slow.

The Malaysian palm oil industry, often criticised for its poor environmental performance, pledged to fund the corridors at an October conference but nothing has yet been done.

Malaysian Palm Oil Council (MPOC) chief executive Yusof Basiron said he was waiting for environmentalists to advise how much land would be needed, and denied that lack of action was threatening the species' future.

"Last time they said the orangutans will go extinct in 2012, now they say in 15 or 20 years -- why keep on shifting the goal posts?" he asked AFP.

Some in the industry have accused Western lobby groups of trying to smear palm oil -- used extensively for biofuel and processed food like margarine -- to boost rival products from developed countries.

Malaysia is the world's second-largest exporter of palm oil after Indonesia, and the industry is the country's third largest export earner, raking in 65.2 billion ringgit (19 billion dollars) last year.

Eric Meijaard, who studies orangutans in Indonesia, said the situation was even worse there and that deforestation was responsible for the loss of up to 3,000 orangutans a year in Borneo.

"If we are losing them at the rate that we are losing now, they are going to be pretty much gone in 15 to 20 years," said the ecologist from the Indonesia-based People and Nature Consulting International.

"In Indonesia, the whole process of conversion is still very rampant and the land use changes very fast -- what is still a natural forest concession today may be a plantation tomorrow."

Ancrenaz said he is "not convinced" that the the battle to save Asia's only great ape is a lost cause.

"There are still ways to rectify the issues and to find solutions, but we have to act very fast, we can't afford to wait too long."

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US Federal government to investigate state's damaging of coral reef off Maui

Associated Press, Star Bulletin 21 Dec 09;

WAILUKU The state's accidental dropping of concrete blocks on live coral will be investigated by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration.

Dan Polhemus, administrator of the state Department of Land and Natural Resources' Division of Aquatic Resources, said the department requested the federal investigation so the inquiry would be independent.

The department sank 1,400 one-ton concrete blocks off Keawakapu, Maui, on Dec. 2 to enhance an existing artificial reef. But it reported the next day that some of the slabs had fallen on live coral.

Last week, Polhemus said it appears about 50 of the slabs were dropped on the reef, while the rest fell on sand.

The department's artificial reef program has been temporarily halted.

See also "Concrete blocks dropped on live reef in Maui" Federal agencies to probe reef damage, Slabs ‘destroyed’ live coral Ilima Loomis, Maui News 20 Dec 09

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Potatoes, algae replace oil in US company's plastics

Virginie Montet Yahoo News 21 Dec 09;

HAWTHORNE, California (AFP) – Frederic Scheer is biding his time, convinced that by 2013 the price of oil will be so high that his bio-plastics, made from vegetables and plants, will be highly marketable.

Scheer, 55, is the owner of Cereplast, a company that designs and makes sustainable plastics from starches found in tapioca, corn, wheat and potatoes.

He has believed for the past 20 years that the price of oil will eventually make petroleum-based plastics obsolete and clear the way for his alternative.

"The tipping point for us is 95 dollars a barrel," he said. At that price "our product becomes cheaper" than traditional plastic.

"The day where we hit 95 dollars a barrel I think all of a sudden you're going to see bio-plastics basically explode," he said.

According to Scheer, once oil prices are consistently that high, which he expects to be the case around 2013, major chemical companies like Dupont and BASF will have no choice but to join him in bio-plastics.

By 2020, he expects the US market for the plastics to be worth 10 billion dollars, up from its current value of about a billion dollars.

The world market for traditional oil-based plastics is worth 2,500 billion dollars.

Cereplast, which has 25 employees in California and in Indiana, has accumulated a series of patents for the technology it uses to create the bio-plastics.

With annual sales of five million dollars, Cereplast manufactures resins that biodegrade naturally within three months for use in products including cups, plastic lids and packaging.

They also produce "hybrid" resins of polypropylene that are stronger and more durable, for use in cars or children's toys.

"In using our resin, we basically inject up to 50 percent agricultural renewable resources... giving them a better carbon footprint," said Scheer.

"Each time you create one kilo of traditional polypropylene, you create 3.15 kilos of carbon dioxide. When we create one kilo of bio-propylene, we create 1.40 kilos of carbon dioxide, so clearly you have a substantial saving with respect to greenhouse gases, creating a much better carbon footprint for the product," he said.

Creating plastics that are biodegradable is key, Scheer says, because just 3.5 percent of polypropylene plastic in the United States gets recycled.

Around 70 percent of all plastic waste "ends up in landfills and stays there a very long time," he said.

Americans go through 110 billion plastic or plastic-covered cups each year, using and discarding what the Food Packaging Institute describes as "astronomical numbers" of disposable containers.

"It takes between 70 to 100 million years to make fossil fuel and you are going to use your cup at Starbucks for 45 minutes max," said Scheer.

But using potatoes and corn to produce billions of tonnes of bio-plastics might not be the most sustainable business plan either, as spikes in food prices in 2008 illustrated.

So Scheer is also looking at algae.

"Algae presents the same kind of physical and thermal property that we find in starches," he said. "We can grow algae extremely fast, in very large quantities, at a very low price."

Cereplast hopes to offer a plastic made with algae for commercial sale by the end of 2010 and is projecting its annual sales will have doubled by then.

The success is bittersweet for Scheer, who was born in Paris but has become known as the one of the "grandfathers" of the bio-plastics industry in the United States, rather than his home country.

"The United States are a land of opportunity for the entrepreneur," he said. "I regret that France didn't give me that kind of opportunity."

Read more!

Squid Invasions Signal Changes in the Pacific Ocean

Some Fish Stock Decline as Jumbo Squid Migrate to New Waters
Moises Velasquez-Manoff, ABC News 19 Dec 09;

When large numbers of jumbo squid first showed up in California's Monterey Bay in 1997, scientists weren't sure what had brought the cephalopod that far north. An unusually strong El Niño event had warmed the eastern Pacific. But the squid, dubbed el diablo rojo – the red devil – in its native waters off the coast of Mexico, didn't typically venture farther north than Baja California.

And indeed, within two years, the Humboldt squid – Dosidicus gigas – had disappeared from central California waters.

But in 2002 – another El Niño year – they reappeared. This time, they took up permanent residence and pushed even farther north – past Oregon, Washington, and British Columbia, until, by 2004, fishermen near Sitka, Alaska, were hauling them in.

When scientists dug through historical records, they discovered that the squid's northward advance wasn't entirely unprecedented. There were accounts from the 1930s of the creatures in Monterey Bay. But never in numbers comparable to what scientists observed now – schools many hundreds strong. And no one had ever seen them as far north as Alaska.

"This occurrence has gotten weird enough to not really make it into the realm of 'normal,' " says John Field, a fisheries biologist with the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration in Santa Cruz, Calif.

Fishermen Worry Squid Will Diminish Fish Stocks

Fishermen worry that the squid, a voracious predator weighing up to 110 pounds and reaching more than six feet in length, will diminish valuable fish stocks.

Hake, for example, a major Pacific fishery, has declined since the squid arrived.

Scientists, meanwhile, ponder what the dramatic range expansion of a species usually confined to lower latitudes implies about the Pacific Ocean in general.

They're gradually piecing together a story of natural cycles that, together with climate change, have altered the eastern Pacific in a way that favors jumbo squid.

Originally, some thought that the squid were growing more numerous because overfishing had reduced their predators and competitors, such as tuna. But in the absence of concrete evidence of overfishing, scientists have since looked to changing environmental conditions for an explanation.

Oxygen-Depleted Waters Expand

Now, they think the squid are moving both north and south from their equatorial stronghold – they've also become more abundant in Chilean waters – because conditions they're uniquely adapted to – low-oxygen, or hypoxic, water at a certain depth – are expanding poleward from the tropics as well.

From Chile to Alaska, the low-oxygen layer "has started to move closer to the surface," says Louis Zeidberg, a researcher at the University of California, Los Angeles. "It's this scary trend."

An oxygen-depleted layer of water exists naturally many hundreds of feet below the ocean surface. But for the past 50 years in the Pacific Ocean, this layer has become less saturated with oxygen and moved upward. At depths between 656 and 1,640 feet, areas of the north Pacific have lost between 1 and 2 percent of their oxygen each year during the past 25 years, says Frank Whitney, a scientist emeritus with Fisheries and Oceans Canada in Sidney, British Columbia. And the top edge of this low-oxygen zone has advanced upward at an average rate of almost 10 feet per year.

Most sea life that has gills prefers to avoid these hypoxic waters. For these species, the ocean has effectively become 246 feet shallower in the past quarter century. This may explain why some fish species off the coast of British Columbia have moved to shallower areas, and, in some cases into Alaskan waters, says Mr. Whitney. "I would suggest that would be in response to hypoxia."

How Ocean Waters Lose Oxygen

Some of the deep water along the west coast of North America originates off the coast of equatorial South America, where the water is already "old," meaning that it hasn't been in contact with the atmosphere for many years. And it's further leached of oxygen when organic detritus drops from the highly productive surface waters of the tropical eastern Pacific. As this organic material sinks, it decays, sucking oxygen from the water and creating one of the largest hypoxic zones in the world.

The planet has warmed in the past 30 years and, generally, sediment cores indicate that the warmer Earth becomes, the larger this eastern Pacific hypoxic zone grows, says Francisco Chavez, a researcher with the Monterey Bay Aquarium Research Institute in Moss Landing, Calif.

There are two possible explanations for this. An ocean that warms from the top down becomes stratified, like a layer cake. The warmer and more buoyant surface then inhibits oxygenation of cooler waters below. The second possibility: increased productivity. More organic material means more decay and more oxygen removed from the ocean. Some of that oxygen-depleted water then flows north.

Paradoxically, however, productivity in the eastern Pacific is highest when the cycles influencing surface temperatures are in their cool phase. That's when nutrient-rich water wells up from the deep, fertilizing the algae that ultimately support one of the most productive marine ecosystems on Earth. Recently the ocean has entered a "cool" phase of the 20- to 50-year cycle called the Pacific Decadal Oscillation – warmer waters in the western tropical Pacific, but cooler ones in the eastern tropical Pacific. "When we're in the cold phase of the PDO, we have lower oxygen," says Dr. Chavez.

What Thriving Squid May Indicate

Others have also noted a link among increased productivity, hypoxia, and squid abundance. Longtime fishermen in Mexico's Sea of Cortez report that there were far fewer squid there in the past, says William Gilly, a professor of biology at Stanford University in Palo Alto, Calif. He suspects that agricultural development inland and the large quantities of fertilizer now dumped by rivers into the mostly enclosed sea have caused algal blooms, worsened hypoxia, and made the sea more inviting to the opportunist squid.

"The fertilizers and the oxygen minimum zone go in parallel, and then at some point the [numbers of] squid just explode," he says.

The question remains, however, about what's causing the hypoxic zone to expand not just locally but across the entire eastern Pacific. Whitney doubts that it's higher productivity caused by fertilization.

"We see this hypoxia because the ocean and atmosphere are not exchanging oxygen as well as they used to," he says.

He suspects that changing conditions in the sub-Arctic Pacific where deep water is created are at fault. In winter, oxygenated surface waters near Japan and Russia become cold and dense enough to sink. But intensified stratification, he thinks, has disrupted this process.

Rising temperatures have probably contributed, but Whitney also suspects a freshwater influx, a phenomenon observed in parts of the North Atlantic.

Low-density fresh water has probably capped the ocean, inhibiting the exchange of gases between ocean and atmosphere and impeding deep-water formation. Melting arctic ice and permafrost have probably increased freshwater flow into the north Pacific.

Rain could also be having an impact. Climate models predict that, in a warmer world, rainfall will increase at certain latitudes. More water evaporates from warmer tropical seas, and a warmer atmosphere holds more moisture. But eventually this water must fall from the sky somewhere. Some, Whitney suspects, falls at the higher latitudes of the sub-Arctic Pacific. "You keep doing that decade after decade, there's going to be some impact," he says.

Although natural cycles are probably behind some of the changes in the Pacific Ocean that scientists are observing, climate change seems to be pushing the ocean beyond the limits of natural variability. The jumbo squid invasion of California and beyond is one symptom of these larger oceanographic changes.

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Indonesian Voice Joins Chorus Criticizing Climate Summit Result

Fidelis E Satriastanti, Jakarta Globe 20 Dec 09;

In the aftermath of the United Nations climate conference, at least one local environmentalist agreed with many of his colleagues around the world that without the creation of a legally binding treaty, the Copenhagen talks were generally a failure.

Fitrian Ardiansyah, program director for climate and energy at the World Wide Fund for Nature-Indonesia, said the lack of transparency, an unclear set of procedures and the lack of leadership ultimately doomed the summit.

“The conference did deliver on an outcome, yes. But whether the Copenhagen Accord will be able to reverse the dangerous effects of climate change, it’s still considered weak,” Fitrian said.

The accord includes an agreement on climate fund contributions by developed countries and a commitment to limit global warming to two degrees Celsius — well short of the demands of island nations. Experts also considered the articles enumerated in the accord to be unclear.

Fitrian agreed, saying that overall, the deal hammered out in Denmark left much to be desired.

“While the pledge [to limit carbon emissions] is well meant, there is still a long way to go toward forming a legally-binding treaty,” he said. “Many people want to protect our planet from the dangers of climate change, but such an endeavor entails the efforts of both rich and poor countries.”

Greenpeace International slammed world leaders for claiming they had reached a deal.

“Rather than coming together to secure the future of hundreds of millions of people and agreeing to a historic deal to avert a climate crisis, the leaders of the world’s most powerful countries have betrayed the current generation and future generations as well,” said Kumi Naidoo, executive director of Greenpeace International

“The world is facing a tragic crisis in leadership. Averting the climate chaos has just gotten a lot harder,” he said.

Naidoo also criticized those who called the Copenhagen Accord a positive development, saying that it in fact was a step backward.

“It does not contain any strong measures for emission reduction in developed countries,” Naidoo said. “It is a major concession to industries that are polluting [the environment], especially in the fossil-fuel sector, which lobbied hard to undermine a [legally-binding treaty] and now has the license to continue to pollute.”

Greenpeace called the Copenhagen summit a missed opportunity.

“The world has to resume negotiations next year. It needs to get back on track from Bali [to Copenhagen] to Mexico, where a fair, ambitious and legally binding agreement must be adopted to avert the catastrophic effects of climate change,” Naidoo said.

Fitrian said the Indonesian government could also play a critical role in showing that it was committed to negotiating a stronger accord in the future.

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China Says "Development Right" Key In Climate Talks

Chris Buckley, PlanetArk 22 Dec 09;

BEIJING - China will treat talks on a binding global climate change pact in 2010 as a struggle over the "right to develop," a Chinese official said, signaling more tough deal-making will follow the Copenhagen summit.

The rancorous meeting ended on Saturday with a bare-boned agreement that "noted" a broad accord struck at the last moment between the United States and the big developing countries -- China, India, Brazil and South Africa.

China, the world's biggest emitter of greenhouse gases from human activities and its biggest developing economy, was at the heart of the talks, and bared some its growing assertiveness in grinding late-night sessions.

"It was a result that came from hard work on all sides, was accepted by all, didn't come easy and should be treasured," Chinese premier Wen Jiabao said, according to remarks posted on the Foreign Ministry's website on Monday.

Wen said China is willing to build on the Copenhagen agreement and push forward international cooperation on climate change.

Talks on a binding treaty are to extend throughout next year, and China is bracing for more strife over how to mesh its economic and emissions growth with a commitment to cut greenhouse gas levels.

"The diplomatic and political wrangling over climate change that is opening up will be focused on the right to develop and space to develop," a Foreign Ministry official, Yi Xianliang, said in comments cited by the official People's Daily on Monday.

The negotiations that culminated in Copenhagen showed "conflicts were increasingly sharp and the crux of disputes was steadily involving each country's core interests," said Yi.

Wealthy nations had failed to spell out their commitments to help poor countries cope with global warming, he said.

"With the international financial crisis and other factors getting mixed in, the developed countries retreated from their stances and positions, and then sought to shift the blame to developing countries, especially the big emerging powers," the People's Daily quoted Yi as saying.

"BETTER THAN TOTAL COLLAPSE"

The contention centers on how far to bring China's domestic vows to reduce emissions growth into an international pact, and what support from rich countries China will receive in return.

China has vowed to cut greenhouse gas emissions intensity -- the emissions pumped out to create each unit of economic worth -- by 40 to 45 percent by 2020, compared to 2005 levels. But it has called that a voluntary domestic step.

With China's economy likely to grow strongly, its total emissions will also keep rising, although its average emissions per person remain far lower than rich nations'.

"The agreement reached was better than total collapse," said Wang Ke, a climate change policy expert at Renmin University in Beijing who was in Copenhagen to observe the talks.

"But China and other developing countries will feel the negotiations to come will be equally tough as we get into the details ... The funding commitments from the developed countries are still vague, and technology transfer issues were barely mentioned (in the Copenhagen accord)."

The accord held out the prospect of $100 billion in annual aid from 2020 for developing nations but did not specify where this money would come from. China has said it should have the formal right to such aid, even if the most vulnerable countries are first in line to receive it.

British Environment Minister Ed Miliband, in an article published on Monday, accused China and some other developing nations of frustrating agreement, including a goal to cut global greenhouse gas emissions in half by 2050.

Such goals will be empty unless rich countries vow to make steeper cuts in emissions and agree on how to parcel out the remaining share of the global emissions "budget," said Wang Yi, an expert at the Chinese Academy of Sciences in Beijing.

"The coming year of negotiations will be very demanding and nothing will be easy to solve," he said.

"We need to be clear about how the 50 percent would be shared out, otherwise it's an empty slogan, and now we need actions, not posturing."

Rich nations say China's efforts to slow greenhouse gas growth, such as closing dirty power plants, should be subject to international verification to assure wary voters and lawmakers that Beijing is keeping its word.

China has said such checks would violate its sovereignty and erode United Nations treaty rules saying developing countries do not shoulder the internationally binding emissions targets that developed countries must accept.

The broad language agreed in Copenhagen about "international consultations and analysis" for checking greenhouse gas emissions of developing nations leaves room for compromise, said Jiang Kejun, an expert on climate change policies at the state-run Energy Research Institute in Beijing.

(Editing by Ken Wills and Jerry Norton)

Britain blames China for climate talks' failure
Peter Griffiths, Reuters 21 Dec 09;

LONDON (Reuters) - Britain accused China and a handful of others on Monday of holding the world to ransom by blocking a legal treaty to fight global warming as countries traded blame for the deadlock in Copenhagen.

Describing the climate change summit as "at best flawed and at worst chaotic," Prime Minister Gordon Brown demanded urgent reform of the process to try to reach a legal treaty when the talks resume in Germany next June.

The summit ended with a underwhelming agreement on Saturday when delegates "noted" an accord struck by the United States, China and other emerging powers that fell far short of original goals.

"Never again should we face the deadlock that threatened to pull down these talks," said Brown, who tried to take a lead role in the talks.

"Never again should we let a global deal to move toward a greener future be held to ransom by only a handful of countries."

The failure to reach a legal treaty sent European carbon prices to a six-month low on Monday.

The accord set a target of limiting global warming to a maximum 2 degrees Celsius over pre-industrial times -- seen as a threshold for dangerous changes such as more floods, droughts and rising seas. But it did not say how this would be achieved.

It held out the prospect of $100 billion in annual aid from 2020 for developing nations, but did not specify precisely where this money would come from. Decisions on core issues such as emissions cuts were pushed into the future.

U.S. President Barack Obama said the deal was an "important breakthrough," but only one step on the road toward the emissions cuts needed. U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-Moon said it was "a success ... a significant step forward."

'RIGHT TO DEVELOP'

China said it would treat talks on a binding climate pact in 2010 as a struggle over the "right to develop," signaling more tough deal-making to come.

China, the world's biggest emitter of man-made greenhouse gases was at the heart of the talks, and demonstrated a growing assertiveness in grinding late-night talks.

Chinese premier Wen Jiabao said: "It was a result that came from hard work on all sides, was accepted by all, didn't come easy and should be treasured," adding that China was willing to build on the Copenhagen deal.

With governments, environmental groups and charities swapping blame for the failure in the Danish capital, Britain pointed the finger at China, Bolivia, Cuba, Nicaragua and Sudan.

British Energy and Climate Change Secretary Ed Miliband said China held the key to the world agreeing to a legal treaty, but it must first realize that a deal will not damage its economy.

"The most important thing for a country like China is to persuade them that they have nothing to fear from a legal treaty," Miliband said. "I can't see how you can have a legal treaty for the future without all countries being bound by it."

Negative reaction to the accord came to a boil in Germany, where environmental groups, churches, industrialists and economists slammed the compromise as a disaster.

"Governments around the world have failed their populations in the climate deal," said Dennis Snower, president of the Kiel-based Institute for World Economy (IfW).

The European Union, criticized for failing to raise its unilateral emissions cut offer to 30 percent from 20 percent, was ill-prepared for Copenhagen, said Daniel Cohn-Bendit, the Greens' co-president in the European Parliament.

"Diplomats aren't ready to negotiate over climate change, unlike disarmament or crises. They know how to handle immediate problems, not the long term," he told French paper Liberation.

(Additional reporting by Chris Buckley in Beijing; Brian Rohan in Berlin; Sophie Hardach in Paris; Patrick Worsnip in New York; William James and Michael Szabo in London; editing by Robin Pomeroy)

Europe feels left out in cold on climate deal
Seth Borenstein And Raphael G. Satter, Associated Press Yahoo News 22 Dec 09;

LONDON – It's a climate deal that has Europe feeling left out in the cold.

The continent that used to take the lead in advocating climate action is now taking the lead in climate complaining. And it's not just upset with the results, but the process itself.

Europe's goals were generally not met, and Danish Prime Minister Lars Loekke Rasmussen, host of the U.N.-sponsored climate talks in Copenhagen, was shoved aside as president of the conference in favor of Philip Weech of the Bahamas.

When a deal was reached, those in the room were heads of state from Africa, North and South America and Asia — not Europe.

The unhappiness extends to Europe's business community, which worries that a failure to agree to international emissions cuts could put them at a competitive disadvantage.

Since Europe had already agreed to binding emission cuts, "they needed the United States and developing countries to agree to binding reductions, which they didn't because the United States couldn't without the United States Congress acting," said Fred Krupp, president of the Environmental Defense Fund in the U.S. The developing countries didn't agree because the U.S. didn't, he added.

The Copenhagen Accord emerged principally from President Barack Obama's meeting with Chinese Premier Wen Jiabao and the leaders of India, Brazil and South Africa. But the agreement was protested by several nations that demanded deeper emissions cuts by the industrialized world.

The U.S.-brokered compromise calls for reducing emissions to keep temperatures from rising more than 2 degrees Celsius (3.6 degrees Fahrenheit) above preindustrial levels.

The agreement's key elements, with no legal obligation, were that richer nations will finance a $10 billion-a-year, three-year program to fund poorer nations' projects to deal with drought and other impacts of climate change, and to develop clean energy. A goal was also set to mobilize $100 billion a year by 2020 for the same adaptation and mitigation purposes.

The nations attending the U.N. conference agreed by consensus on a compromise to "take note" of the accord, instead of formally approving it.

Robert Orr, the U.N. policy coordination chief, said a document will shortly be opened for signatures from all countries, and U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon urged all to sign and work toward a legally binding treaty in 2010.

Politicians are blaming China and other developing countries for cutting the heart of out of the climate deal, with Britain accusing Beijing of vetoing a deal for mandatory emission cuts and an EU official complaining that some Latin American countries had held the entire conference hostage.

"Never again should we face the deadlock that threatened to pull down those talks," British Prime Minister Gordon Brown said Monday. "Never again should we let a global deal to move towards a greener future be held to ransom by only a handful of countries."

British climate change minister Ed Miliband wrote in The Guardian newspaper that most countries — developed and developing — supported binding cuts in emissions, but that "some leading developing countries currently refuse to countenance this." He singled out Beijing as the culprit behind the talks' near-collapse.

"We did not get an agreement on 50 percent reductions in global emissions by 2050 or on 80 percent reductions by developed countries. Both were vetoed by China, despite the support of a coalition of developed and the vast majority of developing countries," Miliband wrote.

China saw it differently.

"China has played an important and constructive role in pushing the Copenhagen climate talks to earn the current results, and demonstrated its utmost sincerity and made its best effort," Wen told the official Xinhua news agency.

"These are hard-won results made through joint efforts of all parties, which are widely recognized and should be cherished," he said.

EU officials returned from Copenhagen disappointed by the meager outcome of the conference and angry that countries such as Nicaragua, Bolivia, Sudan and Venezuela kept the rest from signing a more ambitious global pact.

The EU claimed a climate leadership role for Europe by promising in March 2007 to cut its emissions by 20 percent by 2020, compared with 1990, and by 30 percent if others, notably the United States, followed suit. While that has not happened, the EU sticks by its emissions cuts of 20 percent and 30 percent.

But Europe's role is not what it could have been or used to be, said Jorgen Delman, a China studies professor at Copenhagen University.

"They didn't play the role they could have played," Delman said. "But I think it was clear that the U.S. and China would be dominant. The European Union as a bloc was not in a position to be a dominant player."

Europe's problem was that it offered too much, too soon in negotiations, and was essentially taken for granted, experts said. In addition, when it comes to emissions of greenhouse gases, all of Europe combined isn't as a big a player as the U.S. or China. The biggest emitter in Europe is Germany, and it is behind India, Russia and Japan.

"Europe could shut down and it really wouldn't matter" in terms of the types of significant emission cuts, said John Christensen, head of the U.N. Environment Program's center for energy, climate and sustainable development, based in Denmark.

Another problem was that Denmark's leaders made "various mistakes" early in the bureaucratic process that slowed things down and annoyed some African nations, Christensen said. That led to Rasmussen stepping down.

Not all in Europe were critical. German Chancellor Angela Merkel defended the summit's outcome as a first step that paves the way for action. She added that "anyone who just badmouths Copenhagen now is engaging in the business of those who are applying the brakes rather than moving forward."

European companies said they were "disappointed by the limited outcome" of the climate talks that did nothing to demand that other regions match rules that punish polluters in Europe — which they fear will force heavy energy users such as steel and chemicals to quit the 27-nation bloc.

"The Copenhagen Accord has not brightened the prospect for a global level-playing field in the future," said a press release from BusinessEurope, which represents some 20 million companies.

"On the contrary, European companies have to pay for their emissions under the EU Emission Trading Scheme and are as exposed to carbon leakage as they were before Copenhagen," it said.

The companies also say they "strongly regret" that the U.S., China and others "only repeated their limited mitigation commitments."

They called for them to swiftly move toward a legally binding agreement "because companies need predictability to develop the new green solutions on which a future low-carbon economy will depend."

Europe's steel industry federation Eurofer said that in the name of remaining competitive, the EU should avoid increasing its target to reduce emissions to 30 percent by 2020 until industries in other parts of the world make similar cuts.

___

Associated Press writers Robert Wielaard and Aiofe White in Brussels, Jennifer Quinn in London, Edith M. Lederer at the U.N., and Tini Tran in Beijing contributed to this report.

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Q+A: What Copenhagen Accord Means For Prices, Markets

Michael Szabo, PlanetArk 22 Dec 09;

LONDON - European carbon prices crashed by almost 9 percent on Monday after UN climate talks ended on Saturday with a bare-minimum agreement between after the U.S., China and a few other emerging powers that falls far short of the conference's original goals.

The European Union said the accord -- weaker than a legally binding treaty and weaker even than the 'political' deal many had foreseen -- was not ambitious enough to persuade it to raise its carbon cutting target to a 30 percent cut by 2020 versus 1990 levels from a 20 percent cut.

The Copenhagen Accord also cast more uncertainty on the post-2012 future of a carbon offset trading scheme under the Kyoto Protocol called the Clean Development Mechanism (CDM).

Market players weighed in on how this will affect prices for EU Allowances, the permits traded under the EU's $92 billion Emissions Trading Scheme (EU ETS), for Certified Emissions Reductions (CERs), the offsets traded under the CDM, and how it will affect the development of global carbon markets in general.

WHAT DOES THIS MEAN FOR CARBON PRICES?

* Mark C. Lewis, analyst at Deutsche Bank

"There is now no near-term prospect of the EU raising its 2020 target. As a result, sentiment will be negatively affected and we expect EUA prices to decline over the next few sessions."

"With the selling of surplus EUAs by industrials in early 2010 already a real possibility before the outcome of Copenhagen was known, we would not now be surprised to see sustained EUA price weakness through to the middle or end of February 2010."

* Emmanuel Fages, analyst at Societe Generale

"The mood will be bearish. I do not think many speculators had long positions left - they started being disposed of on Thursday. What we could see is not mainly length sales, but short creation. Prices cannot go down very far. Sentiment is not enough to move prices much as fundamentals will continue driving the scheme for the operators."

* Meg Brown, analyst at Citigroup

"The unsatisfactory outcome of the negotiations now makes it unlikely that the EU's 20 percent target will be changed, in our view, with the most likely reconsideration of the target not until 2015 -- in line with the new accord's timeline."

"This is be negative for EUA prices in the short term, through 2010 and potentially through to 2020. We assume an average Phase 2 (2008-12) EUA price of 20 euros per tonne, rising to 25 euros in 2013 and 30 euros in 2020, based on an expectation of some tightening of the scheme from 2013. Our floor price for periods of low permit demand is 10 euros."

* Trevor Sikorski, director at Barclays Capital

"The impact is likely to be transitory. After this morning's strongly bearish opening, the market is more likely to return to reasonably normal trading patterns. The Copenhagen failure did little to alter the expected supply-demand balance under the EU ETS and it is not likely to have changed the underlying hedging pattern of power sector participants. The impact on the industrial sales is harder to call, as it does mean that some of the potential upside for EU carbon prices has been eroded."

"Q1 is still likely to see a low for carbon prices as, if anything, there is slightly more incentive for industrial length to hit the market. We expect prices are likely to average 11.50 euros in Q1 before strengthening over the remainder of 2010."

WHAT DOES THIS MEAN FOR CARBON MARKETS IN GENERAL?

* David Metcalfe, director at Verdantix

"A non-binding agreement that codifies national commitments and includes voluntary emission reductions of countries like China significantly increases the probability that the Kerry-Boxer (U.S. cap and trade) legislation will be passed."

"Executives responsible for energy and climate change plans should avoid new investments in the Kyoto-based global carbon markets. Badly defined rules, insufficient UN staff and a depressed carbon price conspire to make this a very high risk market. The accord further postpones crucial reform of this dysfunctional market mechanism."

* Mark C. Lewis, Deutsche Bank

"It heightens uncertainty over the continuation of the CDM and JI mechanisms beyond 2012, at least in their current forms ... The development of new CDM projects is likely to slow over the course of next year, and perhaps significantly so."

"This opens up the possibility of ... bilateral deals between the EU and third countries under which emissions reduction projects could be established in to generate credits for use in the EU ETS over 2013-20 (note: any such credits would complement, not replace, Kyoto offsets."

* Meg Brown, Citigroup

"International offset markets were hoping for detail on how CDM would be expanded, perhaps including sector-specific benchmarks and an expansion of the market's size. Heavy industry must wait longer for clarification of emission liabilities and international abatement mechanisms ... This will likely perpetuate carbon market uncertainty post 2012."

* Alessandro Vitelli, director at IDEAcarbon

"Copenhagen is a bottom-up, federal process where sovereign nations contribute their national commitments to the process. Kyoto expressed a similar approach in a top-down fashion, which earned it the enduring enmity of the U.S."

"For the markets, Copenhagen holds the continued promise of interlinked markets in both developed and developing countries."

* Trevor Sikorski, Barclays Capital

"This is a very disappointing outcome that is even below our modest expectations. The news is bearish ... I see nothing here that should drive investment in the carbon commodity and low carbon technology."

* James Cameron, vice-chairman at Climate Change Capital "There are small encouragements in the reform of the CDM which should make the process better - quicker, fairer and more effective at taking tonnes of carbon out of the atmosphere."

* Richard Gledhill, head carbon market services, PwC

"President Obama gave a clear message in his speech in Copenhagen - America is going to take action on climate now. If passed by Congress, U.S. climate legislation could create a market three times the size of the EU scheme. That would be a massive boost to the global carbon market, but would also move its focus from London to New York."

(Editing by Sue Thomas)

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