Small islands win UN vote on climate change security

Claudia Parsons, Reuters 3 Jun 09;

UNITED NATIONS, June 3 (Reuters) - Small Pacific islands vulnerable to rising sea levels won a symbolic victory at the United Nations on Wednesday with the passage of a resolution recognizing climate change as a possible threat to security.

The non-binding resolution, passed by consensus by the General Assembly, may help put climate change on the agenda of the more powerful U.N. Security Council, which deals with threats to international peace and security.

General Assembly resolutions are largely symbolic but can carry moral weight. Several representatives said this one was important as the first to explicitly link climate change to security -- a principle previously resisted by powerful Security Council members including Russia and China, who questioned whether the issue belonged in the Security Council.

"We are of the firm view that the adverse impacts of climate change have very real implications for international peace and security," Nauru Ambassador Marlene Moses told the General Assembly, speaking on behalf of the Pacific Small Island Developing States which introduced the resolution.

Moses said small islands were already experiencing the "dire and immediate impacts" of climate change, including the inundation of coastal areas, the submergence of islands, loss of freshwater supplies, flooding, drought, damaged crops and increased disease.

The resolution said the 192-member General Assembly was "deeply concerned that the adverse impacts of climate change, including sea-level rise, could have security implications."

It invited all relevant U.N. bodies to intensify efforts to address climate change and asked Secretary General Ban Ki-moon to submit a report on possible security implications.

Agreed after months of bargaining, the resolution was passed as climate change negotiators from 181 governments meet in Bonn, Germany for talks on a new U.N. climate treaty due to be agreed in Copenhagen in December.

Governments face six months of tough negotiations on a draft text they have accepted as a starting point for talks on a treaty to curb the use of fossil fuels and widen the fight against climate change beyond the existing Kyoto Protocol. (Edited by Alan Elsner)

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Clash of cultures: The conflict between conservation and indigenous people in wild landscapes

Conservationists have often seen native people as a problem to be solved by eviction. Now both sides are learning mutual respect

Mark Dowie, The Guardian 3 Jun 09;

In most human conflicts, there are good guys and bad guys. This is not so in the history of global conservation, which is at least partly a story of good guy versus good guy. The major contestants in the struggle to protect nature and preserve biological diversity may seem to be transnational conservation organisations on one side and rapacious extractive industries on the other. But there is a larger, more lamentable conflict: the one between transnational conservation and the worldwide movement of indigenous peoples - good guys both.

These two forces share a goal that is vital to life on earth - a healthy and diverse biosphere. Both are communities of integrity led by some of the most admirable, dedicated people alive. Both care deeply for the planet and together are capable of preserving more biodiversity than any other two groups on it. Yet they have been terribly at odds with one another over the past century or more, violently so at times, mostly because of conflicting views of nature, radically different definitions of "wilderness" and profound misunderstandings of one another's science and culture.

The perceived arrogance of "big conservation" is a confounding factor; so too is the understandable tendency of some indigenous people to conflate conservation with imperialism. The results of this century-old conflict are thousands of protected areas that cannot be managed and an intractable debate over who holds the key to successful conservation in the most biologically rich areas of the world.

Violent effort

The conflict began in the bucolic stillness of Yosemite valley in the eastern Sierra Nevada mountains of California. From the middle of the 19th century until 1914, when Yosemite became a national park, a concerted and at times violent effort was made to rid Yosemite of its natives, a small band of Miwok Native Americans who had settled in the valley about 4,000 years ago.

During the same period, most of the major parks created in America - notably Yellowstone, Grand Canyon, Mesa Verde, Mount Rainier, Zion, Glacier, Everglades and Olympic - repeated the Yosemite example by expelling thousands of tribal people from their homes and hunting grounds so that the new parks could remain in a "state of nature". This practice of conservation was exported worldwide, becoming known as "the Yosemite model". Refugees from conservation areas have never been counted; they are not even officially recognised as refugees. But the number of people displaced from traditional homelands worldwide over the past century in the interest of conservation is estimated to be close to 20 million, 14 million of them in Africa alone.

I have travelled across all five inhabited continents researching this subject, visiting hundreds of indigenous communities, some in conflict with western-style conservation, others in harmony with it. Although tension persists, along with arrogance, ignorance and the conflicts they breed, I found an encouraging dialogue growing between formally educated wildlife biologists, who once saw humanity as inimical to nature, and ancient aboriginal societies that have passed their remarkable ecological knowledge from generation to generation without a page of text. I found, mostly in the field, a new generation of conservationists who realise that the very landscapes they seek to protect owe their high biodiversity to the practices of the people who have lived there, in some cases for thousands of years.

Wildland conservation has a recorded history and a literary tradition. Aborigines evicted from their homelands in the interest of conservation have only memory and the bitter oral narrative I heard again and again while visiting their makeshift villages and refugee camps; their pre-eviction experience is rarely recorded outside the literature of anthropology. So the concept of "fortress conservation" and the preference for "virgin" wilderness has lingered in a movement that has tended to value all nature but human nature, and refused to recognise the positive wildness in human beings.

Thus the beautifully written and widely read essays and memoirs of early American eco-heroes such as John Muir, Lafayette Bunnell, Samuel Bowles, George Perkins Marsh and Aldo Leopold inform a conservation mythology that until quite recently separated nature from culture and portrayed both natives and early settlers of frontier areas as reckless abusers of nature, with no sense or tradition of stewardship, no understanding of wildlife biology and no appreciation of biodiversity.

It was the "manifest destiny" of conservation leaders, then, to tame what the 17th-century Massachusetts Puritan poet and minister Michael Wigglesworth described as

A waste and howling wilderness / Where none inhabited / But hellish fiends, and brutish men / That devils worshipped

It has taken transnational conservation a century to see the folly of some of its heroes, such as Richard Leakey, who recently denied the existence of indigenous peoples in his home country, Kenya, and called for the removal of all "settlers" from game reserves and other protected areas.

Today, all but the most stubborn enclose-and-exclude conservationists are willing to admit that it is specious to conflate nature with wilderness and occupants with "first visitors". They have recognised that indigenous people manage immense areas of biologically rich land, even if they don't own it. And most, although not all, are managing it well.

Hostile evictees

Some conservationists argue that a policy of tolerating the impoverishment of indigenous people has wrecked the lives of 20 million poor, powerless but eco-wise people, and has been an enormous mistake - not only a moral, social, philosophical and economic mistake, but an ecological one as well. For it is far better to have good stewards living on land than to have that same land cleared of residents and surrounded by hostile evictees. Enlightened conservationists are beginning to accept the axiom that only by preserving cultural diversity can biological diversity be protected, and vice versa.

As conservationists and native people make their uneasy convergence, I hope they will come to agree that they both own the interdependent causes of biodiversity conservation and cultural survival, that they need each other, and that together they can create a new conservation paradigm that honours and respects the ways of life of people who have been living sustainably for generations on what can only be fairly regarded as their native land.

And I hope that native people will blend their traditional knowledge systems with the newer sciences of ecology and conservation biology in search of better ways to preserve the diversity of species , which is not only vital to their own security but to all life on earth. At this point, as the entire planet seems poised to tip into ecological chaos, with almost 40,000 plant and animal species facing extinction and 60% of the ecosystem services that support life failing, there may be no other way.

• Mark Dowie's latest book is Conservation Refugees: The Hundred-Year Conflict Between Global Conservation and Native Peoples, published by MIT Press, priced £18.99. To order a copy for £17.99 plus p&p, call 0330 333 6846 or go to guardian.co.uk/bookshop

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Competitors Behind Palm Oil Slurs: Industry Boss

Sunanda Creagh, PlanetArk 4 Jun 09;

JAKARTA - Western countries are using climate change as an excuse to constrain palm oil production in Asia because it competes with Western business interests, Indonesia's palm oil industry chief said on Wednesday.

Indonesia and Malaysia produce most of the world's palm oil -- a product used in cooking, chocolate, cosmetics and as a biofuel -- but vast areas of forest have been cleared in both countries since the 1980s to fuel a boom in palm oil production.

Environmental groups including WWF and Greenpeace have called on Indonesia to curb deforestation and palm oil expansion.

However, Joefly J. Bahroeny, head of the Indonesian Palm Oil Producers' Association, said that NGOs could be part of a campaign driven by Western business interests in competing commodities such as rapeseed, soybeans and fossil fuels.

"It's all about business," he told a forum of palm oil producers.

"Palm oil has become a competitor as biofuel not only with rapeseed products but also a real competitor to fossil fuels controlled by Western interests. Do these other people truly care about global warming? Or do they also want to get rich with the excuse of climate change?"

Bahroeny said his industry had been accused of killing orangutans, burning forests and selling a product high in cholesterol.

"Now it's climate change. We don't know their real reason but we are suspicious. What next?" he said.

Most of Indonesia's palm oil plantations are in Sumatra and Kalimantan, areas that have large areas of forest and carbon-rich peat lands.

I Nyoman Suryadiputra, a scientist from Wetlands International, said clearing and draining the peatlands to plant palm oil causes the soil to release huge amounts of carbon dioxide into the air, which worsens climate change.

Carbon dioxide is the main greenhouse gas and is released from burning fossil fuels as well as deforestation. Large amounts of CO2 are released annually during the dry season in Indonesia through slash-and-burn agriculture and burning of forests.

The Indonesian government earlier this year lifted a moratorium on palm oil expansion into peatlands and the industry may now develop peat bogs less than three meters deep.

Bahroeny said he expected big palm oil expansion by members of the association in East Kalimantan in the near future and that his industry helped to alleviate poverty in rural areas.

He also said he was suspicious of a U.N.-backed scheme called reduced emissions from deforestation and degradation (REDD), which allows developing countries to raise potentially billions of dollars in carbon credits in exchange for conserving forests and peatlands.

Environmentalists dispute the palm oil industry's views.

"The people that will be worst affected by climate change are not the people in the Northern economies but people like us in developing countries," said Fitrian Ardiansyah, climate and energy campaigner with WWF Indonesia.

(Editing by Sara Webb)

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Dams leave some African farmers high and dry

Jim Giles, New Scientist 3 Jun 09;

Dams are supposed to help farmers manage water supply and boost crop yields, but in Africa they may actually have cut agricultural production, researchers warn.

Africa has over 1000 large dams, the majority of which are used for irrigation, say Eric Strobl of the École Polytechnique in Paris and his brother, Robert Strobl of the European Commission in Brussels.

The pair used satellite images to compare crops around the dams with those in nearby areas. Between 1981 and 2000, the dams caused an average 1 per cent drop in annual yields, conclude the Strobls.

Downstream from dams, farmers can benefit from a steady year-round water flow. But those around the dam itself are often not so lucky. In dry years, the reservoir behind a dam can only be maintained if local farmers are prevented from extracting too much water from the rivers that flow into it. That leads to less irrigation and lower yields around the dams, which more than cancels out the downstream benefits.
'No gains'

A 1 per cent drop in not necessarily a disaster, says Eric Strobl. "But if a country is already in poverty it could mean a lot."

Rohini Pande of Harvard University produced similar results when she examined dams in India. "The main way to look at this is that there is no [agricultural] gain from dams," she says. "And building them costs a lot of money."

Despite his findings, Strobl says that large dams can have a positive impact if they are more effectively located. He looked at the effect of building dams on around 1400 sites in Africa where as many farmers as possible benefit from the downstream irrigation. His preliminary calculations suggest that these dams could boost yields by almost 20 per cent even in dry years.
Rich before poor

But big dams often attract opposition from advocacy groups, and Strobl's optimistic predictions will not change that. Terri Hathaway, a Cameroon-based campaigner with International Rivers, says that major dam projects often benefit large farmers and industry at the expense of local people.

The 7-kilometre long Merowe Dam in Sudan, which began producing electricity earlier this year, is one example. The dam will ultimately pump out 1250 megawatts, more than doubling the country's electricity capacity.

The reservoir behind the dam contains 10 million cubic metres of water, but tens of thousands of people were displaced when it was created. Some were moved to distant desert areas and have since protested about water shortages.

The researchers' work can be viewed here (pdf format)

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Farm aid could cut climate change, poverty: FAO

Yahoo News 3 Jun 09;

ROME (AFP) – Aid to farmers in poor countries could help curb greenhouse gas emissions affecting climate change and reduce poverty and hunger for some billion people worldwide, the UN food agency said Wednesday.

"If agriculture in developing countries becomes more sustainable... and becomes more resilient against the impact of climate change, this should help to reduce the number of currently around one billion hungry people and offer better income and job opportunities," said Food and Agricultural Organisation Assistant Director-General Alexander Mueller.

The impact of farming on climate change is clear as agriculture accounts for about 14 percent of global greenhouse gas emissions, and land use changes such as deforestation another 17 percent, the FAO said.

Between 1990 and 2005, emissions by agriculture in developing countries increased by around 30 percent and are expected to rise further, it said.

"Millions of poor farmers around the globe could help in reducing greenhouse gas emissions," said Peter Holmgren, FAO co-ordinator for UN climate change negotiations.

He said massive funding is needed to change unsustainable farming methods and train farmers in new practices in the developing world.

"Sustainable farming practices offer important options to mitigate greenhouse gas emissions and, at the same time, to increase agricultural productivity," the agency said.

Holmgren stressed that a new global climate agreement should include agriculture and fund measures to mitigate the impact of farming such as reduced tillage, improved grassland management and restoration of degraded lands.

The United Nations will host a conference in Copenhagen in December tasked with agreeing on a new climate change pact to replace the Kyoto Protocol which expires in 2012. The new pact should spell out curbs on greenhouse-gas emissions by 2020 that will be deepened by 2050.


Agriculture is essential for facing climate change
FAO 3 Jun 09;

Climate change mitigation from agriculture could also benefit hunger and poverty reduction

3 June 2009, Rome - Agricultural mitigation in developing countries can make farming more resilient to the vagaries of climate change and can also reduce hunger and poverty, FAO said in a policy brief for climate change negotiators currently meeting in Bonn/Germany.

"If agriculture in developing countries becomes more sustainable, if it increases its productivity and becomes more resilient against the impact of climate change, this should help to reduce the number of currently around one billion hungry people and offer better income and job opportunities," said Alexander Mueller, FAO Assistant Director-General.


"Millions of poor farmers around the globe could help in reducing greenhouse gas emissions," said Peter Holmgren, FAO focal point for the UN climate change negotiations.

"But this requires massive investments and information — to change unsustainable farming methods and to train farmers in mitigation practices. A new global climate agreement, to be adopted in Copenhagen in December, therefore needs to include agriculture," Holmgren added.

Current global funding arrangements such as the Kyoto Protocol's Clean Development Mechanism are not reaching farmers in poor countries, Holmgren said.

New and more flexible financing mechanisms are needed that offer incentives to farmers, including smallholders, so that they may participate in greenhouse gas emission reductions and removals.

The scope of the Clean Development Mechanism, for example, could be expanded in order to include reduction of emissions from deforestation and forest degradation, wetlands, croplands and grasslands, in order to realize the high potential for sequestering carbon in soils and above ground biomass.

Funding for climate change activities in agriculture in developing countries should be new and additional and should be clearly separate from official development aid, while opportunities to use funding from different sources in mutually reinforcing ways should be fully exploited.


Agriculture — a source and a sink


Agriculture is a major source of greenhouse gasses accounting for 14 percent of global emissions. Land use changes such as deforestation account for an additional 17 percent.


Between 1990 and 2005, emissions by agriculture in developing countries increased by around 30 percent and are expected to rise further.

But sustainable farming practices offer important options to mitigate greenhouse gas emissions and, at the sme time, to increase agricultural productivity.

Soil carbon sequestration through reduced tillage, improved grassland management and restoration of degraded lands, forms the major part of mitigation potential from agriculture.

Other mitigation options include more efficient use of fertilizer, improving water and rice management planting trees, altering forage and sustainable use of animal genetic diversity.

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Farmers Poised to Offset One-Quarter of Global Fossil Fuel Emissions Annually

World Watch Institute 2 Jun 09;

Washington, D.C.-Innovations in food production and land use that are ready to be scaled-up today could reduce greenhouse gas emissions equivalent to roughly 25 percent of global fossil fuel emissions and present the best opportunity to remove greenhouse gases already in the atmosphere, according to a new report by the Worldwatch Institute and Ecoagriculture Partners.

As the price of carbon rises with new caps on emissions and expanding markets for carbon offsets, the contribution of land-based, or "terrestrial," carbon to climate change mitigation efforts could increase even further.

Carbon capture and sequestration technologies, which remain unproven and will not be ready for implementation for a decade at best, promise only to sequester greenhouse gases that have yet to be released into the atmosphere. Agricultural and other land use management practices, in contrast, are the only innovations available today to sequester greenhouse gases that are already in the atmosphere-pulling in carbon dioxide through photosynthesis to grow and sustain more plants.

Mobilizing agricultural carbon sequestration is therefore an essential tool in the effort to reduce the atmospheric concentration of greenhouse gases to the 350 parts-per-million level that many scientists argue we must achieve to avoid catastrophic climate change. A recent assessment published by Worldwatch in State of the World 2009: Into a Warming World found that emissions of carbon dioxide will have to "go negative"-with more being absorbed than emitted-by 2050 to achieve this goal.

"The science and policy communities in Europe and beyond have focused most of their attention to date on improving energy efficiency and scaling up renewables," said Ecoagriculture Partners' Sara Scherr, co-author of Mitigating Climate Change Through Food and Land Use with Sajal Sthapit. "While these initiatives are integral in the transition to a low-carbon economy, any strategy that seeks to mitigate global climate change without reducing emissions from agriculture, forestry, and other land uses is doomed to fail."

More than 30 percent of all human-caused greenhouse gas emissions are linked to agriculture and land use, rivaling the combined emissions of the transportation and industry sectors. The report outlines five major strategies for reducing and sequestering greenhouse gas emissions through farming and land use:

* Enriching soil carbon. Soil, the third largest carbon pool on Earth's surface, can be managed to reduce greenhouse gas emissions by minimizing tillage, cutting use of nitrogen fertilizers, and preventing erosion. Soils can store a vast amount of additional carbon by building up organic matter and by burying carbon in the form of biochar (biomass burned in a low-oxygen environment).
* Farming with perennials. Two-thirds of all arable land is used to grow annual grains, but there is large potential to substitute these with perennial trees, shrubs, palms, and grasses that produce food, livestock feed, and fuel. These perennials maintain and develop their roots and branches over many years, storing carbon in the vegetation and soil.
* Climate-friendly livestock production. Livestock accounts for nearly half of all greenhouse gas emissions from agriculture and land use. Innovations such as rotational grazing, manure management, methane capture for biogas production, and improved feeds and feed additives can reduce livestock-related emissions.
* Protecting natural habitat. Deforestation, land clearing, and forest and grassland fires are major sources of greenhouse gas emissions. Incentives are needed to encourage farmers, ranchers, and foresters to maintain natural forest and grassland habitats through product certification, payments for climate services, securing tenure rights, and community fire control.
* Restoring degraded watersheds and rangelands. Restoring vegetation on vast areas of degraded land can reduce greenhouse gas emissions while making land productive again, protecting critical watersheds, and alleviating rural poverty.

The report also responds to several key issues that have constrained the use of terrestrial carbon solutions and highlights six principles for tapping the full potential of land use mitigation. These include: incorporating the full range of terrestrial emission options, including cap-and-trade systems, in climate investment and policy; promoting voluntary markets for greenhouse gas emission offsets from agriculture and land use while working out rules for regulated markets; and linking terrestrial climate mitigation with climate adaptation, rural development, and conservation strategies to generate widespread benefits beyond climate-helping to mobilize a worldwide-networked movement for climate-friendly food, forest, and other land-based production.

Although the climate conversation has long focused on developing enduring solutions in the energy sector, Worldwatch President Christopher Flavin says that land use is equally important. "The bottom line is that innovations in agriculture provide the best opportunity to remove carbon from the atmosphere. We cannot reach 350 ppm without changing the way we grow our food and use our land."

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Technology Seen Key To Oil Sands: Chu

Ayesha Rascoe, PlanetArk 3 Jun 09;

WASHINGTON - U.S. Energy Secretary Steven Chu said on Monday he believes technology can solve environmental problems associated with Canada's oil sands and that the huge nearby resource contributes to U.S. energy security.

Chu told the Reuters Global Energy Summit that the balance between the environmental impact from the huge energy resource in northern Alberta and its importance to U.S. energy supply is a complicated one that will require solutions from the industry.

Environmental groups have mounted major campaigns to get the message out to Americans that the expansion of Canada's oil sands industry threatens to intensify global warming, deforestation and damage to water resources.

"It's a complicated issue, because certainly Canada is a close and trusted neighbor and the oil from Canada has all sorts of good things. But there is this environmental concern, so I think we're going to have to work our way through that," he said. "But I'm a big believer in technology."

Canada is the largest foreign supplier of oil to the United States and its oil sands represent the biggest deposits of crude outside the Middle East.

The Canadian and Alberta governments as well as the oil industry are going to great lengths to ensure that U.S. energy and environmental policies do not put oil sands-derived crude at a disadvantage in its most important market.

The resource is mined in open pits as well as produced in wells with the aide of steam pumped into the ground. Then it must be processed by upgrading plants into light oil that can be fed into refineries.

There is concern about the large amount of energy required to produce oil sands, Chu said. He said Canadian producers point out they are making strides in extracting the crude "more cleanly."

Cutting the energy used to extract a barrel of oil sands crude would be "economically good and it will be environmentally much better," he said.

(Editing by Phil Berlowitz

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Green energy overtakes fossil fuel investment, says UN

Clean technologies attract $140bn compared with $110bn for gas, coal and electrical power
Terry Macalister, guardian.co.uk 3 Jun 09;

Green energy overtook fossil fuels in attracting investment for power generation for the first time last year, according to figures released today by the United Nations.

Wind, solar and other clean technologies attracted $140bn (£85bn) compared with $110bn for gas and coal for electrical power generation, with more than a third of the green cash destined for Britain and the rest of Europe.

The biggest growth for renewable investment came from China, India and other developing countries, which are fast catching up on the West in switching out of fossil fuels to improve energy security and tackle climate change.

"There have been many milestones reached in recent years, but this report suggests renewable energy has now reached a tipping point where it is as important – if not more important – in the global energy mix than fossil fuels," said Achim Steiner, executive director of the UN's Environment Programme.

It was very encouraging that a variety of new renewable sectors were attracting capital, while different geographical areas such as Kenya and Angola were entering the field, he added.

The UN still believes $750bn needs to be spent worldwide between 2009 and 2011 and the current year has started ominously with a 53% slump in first quarter renewables investment to $13.3bn.

Counting energy efficiency and other measures, more than $155bn of new money was invested in clean energy companies and projects, even though capital raised on public stock markets fell 51% to $11.4bn and green firms saw share prices slump more than 60% over 2008, according to the report, Global Trends in Sustainable Energy, drawn up for the UN by the New Energy Finance (NEF) consultancy in London.

Wind, where the US is now global leader, attracted the highest new worldwide investment, $51.8bn, followed by solar at $33.5bn. The former represented annual growth of only 1%, while the latter was up by nearly 50% year-on-year.

Biofuels were the next most popular investment, winning $16.9bn, but down 9% on 2007, as the sector was hit by overcapacity issues in the US and political opposition, with ethanol being blamed for rising food prices.

Europe is still the main centre for investment in green power with $50bn being pumped into projects across the continent, an increase of 2% on last year, while the figure for America was $30bn, down 8%.

But while overall spending in the West dipped nearly 2%, there was a 27% rise to $36.6bn in developing countries led by China, which pumped in $15.6bn, mostly in wind and biomass plants.

China more than doubled its installed wind turbine capacity to 11GW of capacity, while Indian wind investment was up 17% to $2.6bn, as its overall clean tech spending rose to $4.1bn in 2008, 12% up on 2007 levels.

A number of Green New Deals – government reflationary packages designed to kickstart economies and boost action to counter climate change – have been laid out by ministers around the world.

The slump in global renewable ­investment during the first quarter of 2009 has alarmed the UN and New Energy ­Finance, the London-based consultancy that compiled the figures for the UN.

Michael Liebreich, chief executive of NEF, said the second quarter had revealed "green shoots" of recovery, which indicated this year could end up with investment at the upper end of a $95bn to $115bn range, but still a quarter down on 2008 at the least.

About $3bn of new money had been raised via initial public offerings or secondary issues on the stock markets in the second quarter, compared with none in the first three months of this year.

The New Energy Index of clean tech stocks, which had slumped from a 450 high to 134 by March, had since bounced back to 230, while more project financing had been raised in the last six weeks than in the 13 before that, he said.

But Steiner and Liebreich are still anxious that politicians do more to stimulate growth.

"There is a strong case for further measures, such as requiring state-supported banks to raise lending to the ­sector, providing capital gains tax exemptions on investments in clean technology, creating a framework for Green Bonds and so on, all targeted at getting investment flowing," said Liebreich.

It is important stimulus funds start flowing immediately, not in a year or so, he added: "Many of the policies to achieve growth over the medium-term are already in place, including feed-in tariff regimes, mandatory renewable energy targets and tax incentives. There is too much emphasis amongst some policy-makers on support mechanisms, and not enough on the urgent needs of investors right now."

Green energy investments top carbon fuels: UN
Yahoo News 3 Jun 09;

WASHINGTON (AFP) – Global investments in renewable energy overtook those in carbon-based fuels for the first time in 2008, attracting a record 155 billion dollars, a UN report said Wednesday.

Of that sum, 36 billion dollars was invested in producing clean energy in emerging economies such as China, a increase of 27 percent compared to 2007.

And 105 billion dollars was spent directly developing power generating capacity from wind, solar, small-hydro, biomass and geothermal sources.

The 2008 investment was more than four times higher than that in 2004 according to the report Global Trends in Sustainable Energy Investment 2009, prepared for the UN Environment Programme's (UNEP) Sustainable Energy Finance Initiative.

Wind power attracted the highest new investment with 51.8 billion dollars, although solar energy made the largest gains, 49 percent up to 33.5 billion dollars. Biofuels registered a nine percent fall to 16.9 billion dollars.

But amid the global recession, new investments in green energy in the first quarter of 2009 fell by 53 percent to 13.3 billion dollars compared to the same period in 2008.

"Without doubt the economic crisis has taken its toll on investments in clean energy when set against the record-breaking growth of recent years," said Achim Steiner, UN Under-Secretary General.

Some signs of an upswing in activity has been seen in 2009 but the sector could fall behind the levels seen in the previous two years, the authors warned.

Stimulus packages put together by governments to shore up their economies are helping to boost the sector with many of them pumping funds into green projects and research into renewable energy sources.

"However, the biggest renewables stimulus package of them all can come at the UN climate convention meeting in Copenhagen in just over 180 days time," said Steiner, referring to the UN-hosted climate change conference in December.

"This is where governments need to seal the deal on a new climate agreement -- one that can bring certainty to the carbon markets, one that can unleash transformative investments in lean and clean green tech," he added.

The United States and China have led the field putting up some 67 billion dollars each into sustainable energy. But more could be done, argued Michael Liebreich, chairman of New Energy Finance.

"There is a strong case for further measures, such as requiring state-supported banks to raise lending to the sector, providing capital gains tax exemptions on investments in clean technology, creating a framework for Green Bonds and so on, all targeted at getting investment flowing," he said.

"What's most important is that stimulus funds start flowing immediately, not in a year or so."

Economic Crisis Hits EU and US Clean Energy As Emerging Economy Investments Rise 27% to $36 billion

• However Renewables Draw More Investment than Fossil-Fueled Energy Technologies in '08
• Geothermal Sees Fastest Growth - Wind Power Tops Overall Investment, Solar Posts Largest Gains

UNEP 3 Jun 09;

New York/London/Nairobi, 3 June 2009 - $155 billion was invested in 2008 in clean energy companies and projects worldwide - not including large hydro, a new report launched today says.

Of this $13.5 billion of new private investment went into companies developing and scaling-up new technologies alongside $117 billion of investment in renewable energy projects from geothermal and wind to solar and biofuels.

Extremely difficult financial market conditions prevailed during 2008 as a result of the global economic crisis.

Nevertheless investment in clean energy topped 2007's record investments by 5% in large part as a result of China, Brazil and other emerging economies.

Of the $155 billion, $105 billion was spent directly developing 40 GW of power generating capacity from wind, solar, small-hydro, biomass and geothermal sources.

A further $35 billion was spent on developing 25 GW of large hydropower, according to the report.

This $140 billion investment in 65 GW of low carbon electricity generation compares with the estimated $250 billion spent globally in 2008 constructing 157GW of new power generating capacity from all sources.

It means that renewables currently account for the majority of investment and over 40% of actual power generation capacity additions last year.

Achim Steiner, UN Under-Secretary General and UNEP Executive Director, said: "Without doubt the economic crisis has taken its toll on investments in clean energy when set against the record-breaking growth of recent years. Investment in the United States fell by two per cent and in Europe growth was very much muted. However, there were also some bright points in 2008 especially in developing economies—China became the world's second largest wind market in terms of new capacity and the world's biggest photovoltaic manufacturer and a rise in geothermal energy may be getting underway in countries from Australia to Japan and Kenya".

"Meanwhile other developing economies such as Brazil, Chile, Peru and the Philippines have brought in, or are poised to introduce policies and laws fostering clean energy as part of a Green Economy. Mexico for example, the Global host of World Environment Day on 5 June, is expected to double its target for energy from renewables to 16 per cent as part of a new national energy policy," he added.

Overall Highlights from the Report

Wind attracted the highest new investment ($51.8 billion, 1% growth on 2007), although solar made the largest gains ($33.5 billion, 49% growth) while biofuels dropped somewhat ($16.9 billion, 9% decrease).

Total transaction value in the sustainable energy sector during 2008 – including corporate acquisitions, asset re-financings and private equity buy-outs – was $223 billion, an increase of 7% over 2007. But capital raised via the public stock markets fell 51% to $11.4 billion as clean energy share prices lost 61% of their value during 2008.

Investment in the second half of 2008 was down 17% on the first half, and down 23% on the final six months of 2007, a trend that has continued into 2009.

One response to the global economic crisis has been announcements of stimulus packages with specific, multi-billion dollar provisions for energy efficiency up to boosts to renewable energies.

"These 'green new deals' lined up by some economies, including China, Japan, the Republic of Korea, European countries and the United States contain some serious clean energy provisions. These will help support the market," said Mr. Steiner.

"However, the biggest renewables stimulus package of them all can come at the UN climate convention meeting in Copenhagen in just over 180 days time. This is where governments need to Seal the Deal on a new climate agreement—one that can bring certainty to the carbon markets, one that can unleash transformative investments in lean and clean green tech," he added.

Green Energy Costs Coming Down - Solar Costs Set to Fall 43%

The investment surge of recent years and softened commodity markets have started to ease supply chain bottlenecks, especially in the wind and solar sectors, which will cause prices to fall towards marginal costs and several players to consolidate. The price of solar PV modules, for example, is predicted to fall by over 43% in 2009.

Carbon Markets Continue Upward

Despite the turmoil in the world's financial markets, transaction value in the global carbon market grew 87% during 2008, reaching a total of $120 billion. Following the lead of the EU and Kyoto compliance markets, several countries are now putting in place a system of interlinked carbon markets and working towards a global scheme under the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC).

Growth Shifts to the Developing World

On a regional basis, investment in Europe in 2008 was $49.7 billion, a rise of 2%, and in North America was $30.1 billion, a fall of 8%.

These regions experienced a slow-down in the financing of new renewable energy projects due to the lack of project finance and the fact that tax credit-driven markets are mostly ineffective in a downturn.

With developed country market growth stalled (down 1.7%), developing countries surged forward 27% over 2007 to $36.6 billion, accounting for nearly one third of global investments.

China led new investment in Asia, with an 18% increase over 2007 to $15.6 billion, mostly in new wind projects, and some biomass plants.

Investment in India grew 12% to $4.1 billion in 2008. Brazil accounted for almost all renewable energy investment in Latin America in 2008, with ethanol receiving $10.8 billion, up 76% from 2007. Africa achieved a modest increase by comparison, with investments up 10% to approximately $1.1 billion.

The Greening of Economic Stimulus Packages

Not surprisingly given market conditions, private sector investment was stalling in late 2008 but government investment looks ready to take up some of the slack in 2009.

Sustainable energy investments are a core part of key government fiscal stimulus packages announced in recent months, accounting for an estimated $183 billion of commitments to date.

Countries vary significantly in terms of investment and the clarity of their measures. The US and China remain the leaders, each devoting roughly $67 billion, but South Korea's package is the "greenest" with 20% devoted to clean energy. This green stimuli illustrates the political will of an increasing number of governments for securing future growth through greener economic development.

According to Michael Liebreich, Chairman & CEO of New Energy Finance, "There is a strong case for further measures, such as requiring state-supported banks to raise lending to the sector, providing capital gains tax exemptions on investments in clean technology, creating a framework for Green Bonds and so on, all targeted at getting investment flowing".

"What's most important is that stimulus funds start flowing immediately, not in a year or so. Many of the policies to achieve growth over the medium term are already in place, including feed-in tariff regimes, mandatory renewable energy targets and tax incentives. There is too much emphasis amongst some policy-makers on support mechanisms, and not enough on the urgent needs of investors right now."

Between 2009 and 2011 UNEP estimates that a minimum of $750 billion – or 37% of current economic stimulus packages and 1% of global GDP – is needed to finance a sustainable economic recovery by investing in the greening of five key sectors of the global economy: buildings, energy, transport, agriculture and water.

2009 and beyond: Climate change, energy security and green jobs

New investments in the first quarter of 2009 fell by 53% to $13.3 billion compared to the same period in 2008, reflecting the depth of the global financial crisis, according to the report, which notes "'green-shoots' of recovery during the second quarter of 2009, but the sector has a long way to go this year to reach the investment levels of late 2007 and early 2008."

Climate change, economic recovery and energy security will spur far greater investments in coming years.

In particular, the growing understanding that global carbon emissions (CO2) must peak around 2015 to avoid dangerous climate change (based on the 4th assessment of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change- UNEP/World Meteorological Organisation) will make clean energy investments national priorities.

Annual investments in renewable energy, energy efficiency and carbon capture and storage need to reach half a trillion dollars by 2020, representing an average investment of 0.44% of GDP.

These levels of investment are not impossible to achieve, especially in view of the recent four year growth from $35 billion to $155 billion. However, reaching them will require a further scale-up of societal commitments to a more sustainable, low-carbon energy paradigm.

With the current stimulus packages now in play and a hoped-for Copenhagen climate deal in December, the opportunity to meet this challenge is greater than ever, even seen from the depths of an economic downturn.

Global Trends in Sustainable Energy Investment 2009 - Sector Hi-lites

WIND

Wind attracted the highest new investment ($51.8 billion, 1% growth on 2007), confirming its status as the most mature and best-established sustainable generation technology. Wind's leading position continues to be driven by asset finance, as new generation capacity is added worldwide, particularly in China and the US.

SOLAR

Solar continues to be the fastest-growing sector for new investment ($33.5 billion, 49% growth on 2007), with compound annual growth of 70% between 2006 and 2008.

Solar's growth reflects the easing of the silicon bottleneck and falling costs, which are expected to decline 43% in 2009. Solar project financing underwent the most dramatic growth in 2008, rising 71% to $22.1 billion.

BIOFUELS

Investment in biofuels fell 9% in 2008 down to $16.9 billion. Although the technology is well established, particularly in Brazil, it has suffered for the past two years from over-investment in early 2007, followed by a fall from grace caused by a combination of high wheat prices, lower oil prices and an increasingly heated food-versus-fuel controversy.

Biofuels technology investment is now focused on finding second-generation / non-food biofuels (such as algae, crop technologies and jatropha): the second half of 2008 saw next-generation technology investment exceed first-generation for the first time.

GEOTHERMAL

Geothermal was the highest growth sector for investment in 2008, with investment up 149% and 1.3 GW of new capacity installed. The competitive cost of electricity from geothermal sources and long output lifetimes have made this an attractive investment despite the high initial capital cost.

ENERGY EFFICIENCY

New private investment in energy efficiency was $1.8 billion – a fall of 33% on 2007 – although this figure doesn't capture the investments made by corporates, governments and public financing institutions.

The energy efficiency sector recorded the second highest levels of venture capital and private equity investment (after solar), which will help companies develop the next generation of sustainable energy technologies for areas such as the smart grid. Energy efficiency also attracted more than 33% of the estimated $180 billion in green stimulus measures.

Global Trends in Sustainable Energy Investment 2009 - Regional Hi-lites

EUROPE

Europe continues to dominate sustainable energy new investment with $49.7 billion in 2008, an increase of 2% on 2007 (37% CAGR from 2006-2008).This investment is underpinned by government policies supporting new sustainable energy projects, particularly in countries such as Spain, which saw $17.4 billion of asset finance investment in 2008.

NORTH AMERICA

New investment in sustainable energy in North America was $30.1 billion in 2008, a fall of 8% compared to 2007 (15% CAGR from 2006-2008). The US saw a slow-down in asset financing following the glut of investment in corn based ethanol in 2007. Also, the number of tax equity providers fell for wind and solar projects due to the financial crisis.

AFRICA

South Africa - Feed-in Tariffs Kick Start Green Investment

On 31 March 2009, South Africa announced 'feed-in' tariffs that guarantee a stable rate-of-return for renewable energy projects. South Africa is hoping to spur the sort of investment spurred in Germany and Denmark through feed-in tariff schemes.

Sub-Saharan Africa - Geothermal Kenya & Sweet Sorghum Ethanol

Elsewhere in Sub-Saharan Africa, lack of finance is the principal barrier to sustainable energy roll-out. However, some notable progress was made in 2008.

In Kenya, a number of investments are underway; including the continents first privately financed geothermal plant and a 300MW wind farm planned for construction near Lake Turkana.

In Ethiopia, French wind turbine manufacturer Vergnet signed a EUR 210 million supply contract in October 2008 with the Ethiopian Electric Power Corporation for the supply and installation of 120 one MW turbines.

In Angola, Brazilian industrial conglomerate Odebrecht set up an Angolan sugar cane processing plant and plans to steer its production from ethanol to sugar when it comes online late next year. UK-based Cams Group announced plans for a 240 million liter per year sweet sorghum ethanol facility in Tanzania.

North Africa - Sun and Wind

Renewable energy in North Africa remains focused on Morroco, Tunisia and Egypt, particularly in solar and wind. Egypt recently announced its expectation that wind farms in the Saidi area will produce 20% of the country's energy needs by 2020. Morocco's government has also outlined plans to meet 10% of its power needs with renewable energy sources.

ASIA

China - Asia's Green Energy Giant

By 2008, China was the world's second largest wind market by newly installed capacity and the fourth largest by overall installed capacity. Between 5GW and 6.5GW of new capacity was installed and commissioned in 2008, bringing total capacity to 11GW to 12.5GW.

China became the world's largest PV manufacturer in 2008, with 95% of its production for the export market.

Some 800MW of biomass power was added in 2008, bringing the total installed capacity for agriculture waste-fired power plants up to 2.88GW. Development of biofuels has all but ground to a halt, mostly due to high feedstock costs.

India - Pressing Need for Grid Improvements and Clean Power Generation

In 2008 the largest portion of new investment in India went to the wind sector, growing 17% - from $2.2 billion to $2.6. Thanks to a supportive policy environment, solar investment grew from $18 million in 2007 to $347 million in 2008, most of which went to setting up module and cell manufacturing facilities.

Small hydro investment in India grew nearly fourfold to $543 million in 2008, while biofuels investment stalled and fell from $251 million in 2007 to only $49 million in 2008.

Japan – A New Push for Sustainable Energy

In December 2008, Japan unveiled a new $9 billion subsidy package for solar roofs, granting JPY 70,000 ($785)/kW for rooftop PV installation. For the first time in three years, domestic shipments of solar cells rose between April to September (up 6%), indicating a fundamental change in domestic solar demand.

Geothermal also seems to be reawakening in Japan, after a twenty-year lull. In January 2009, plans for a 60MW geothermal plant were announced.

Australia – Geothermal and Wind Gaining Support

The Australian government has set up a A$500m ($436 million) Renewable Energy Fund to accelerate the roll-out of sustainable energy in the country. A$50 million has already been committed to helping geothermal developers meet the high up-front costs of exploration and drilling.

Geothermal is expected to provide about 7% of the country's baseload power by 2030. Wind will also benefit from Australia's new push for sustainable energy, and is expected to provide most of the 20% renewable energy by 2020 target.

Other Asian Countries - Philippines, Thailand, Malaysia

In late 2008, the Philippine government signed a new Renewable Energy Law, offering specific incentives (mainly tax breaks) for renewable generation - a first for Southeast Asia and perhaps a model for other countries. Thailand and Malaysia have been talking about introducing renewable energy legislation for some time; and other countries are planning biofuel blending mandates, similar to those introduced by the Philippines in 2007 and subsequently by Thailand.

LATIN AMERICA

Brazil - World's Largest Renewable Energy Market

About 46% of Brazil's energy comes from renewable sources, and 85% of its power generation capacity thanks to its enormous hydropower resources and long-established bioethanol industry.

Some 90% of Brazil's new cars run on both ethanol and petrol (all of which is blended with around 25% ethanol). By the end of 2008, ethanol accounted for more than 52% of fuel consumption by light vehicles.

Brazil is now moving into wind. The government has announced a wind-specific auction to take place in mid-2009, for the sale of approximately 1GW of wind energy per year.

Brazil also has a global leader in renewable energy financing. In 2008 the Brazilian Development Bank (BNDES) was the largest provider globally of project finance to renewable energy projects.

Chile, Peru, Mexico and the rest of Latin America

Brazil accounted for more than 90% of new investment in Latin American, but several other countries are looking to implement regulatory frameworks supportive of renewable energy.

Chile's recently approved Renewable Energy Legislation is responsible for regulating the country's renewable energy sector, where small hydro, wind and geothermal projects have become increasingly attractive for investors. It requires electricity generators of more than 200MW to source 10% of their energy mix from renewables.

In 2008 Peru introduced legislation that requires 5% of electricity produced in the country to be derived from renewable sources over the next five years, including financial incentives such as preferential feed-in-tariffs and 20-year PPAs for project developers.

Mexico has a non-mandatory target to source 8% of its energy consumption from renewable sources by 2012. However a new national energy plan expected at the end of June 2009 is expected to double that target.

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Pertamina plans to build new refinery capacity

Business Times 4 Jun 09;

(JAKARTA) Indonesia's state oil firm Pertamina said yesterday it plans to build new refinery capacity totalling 700,000 barrels per day (bpd), part of efforts to curb costly oil product imports by South-east Asia's biggest economy.

Pertamina's nine refineries have a combined capacity of around one million bpd. But they only supply 70 per cent of domestic oil product consumption and 30 per cent comes from imports.

Indonesia has previously signed a series of initial agreements with countries such as Iran and China on new refineries but so far none has materialised and some officials have said the downstream sector is not attractive for investors.

Pertamina's president director, Karen Agustiawan, said the expansion plans included new refineries in Java and adding to capacity in another refining centre on the heavily populated island.

'We will build a new refinery in Bojonegara, West Java, Tuban in East Java and we will increase Balongan's refinery capacity. Total combined capacity is 700,000 bpd,' Ms Agustiawan told reporters.

Pertamina had said previously it would increase capacity at Balongan in West Java from 125,000 bpd to 250,000 bpd.

Vice-President Jusuf Kalla, who had held talks with Ms Agustiawan, told reporters Indonesia must stop depending on importing oil products. 'We must become self-sufficient in oil products within two to three years so that we will not import oil products,' Mr Kalla said.

Ms Agustiawan said Pertamina would have partners to build new refineries, without elaborating.

Pertamina has signed memorandum of understandings on joint ventures with Iran and China's Sinopec Corp to build refineries in joint ventures, but none has been built\. \-- Reuters

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Green Boot Camp Puts Cities Through Their Paces

Zaher Karp, PlanetArk 4 Jun 09;

Energy efficiency has grown in popularity thanks in part to the Obama administration, bringing new attention to retrofitting with promises of green jobs and meeting energy goals. A range of business people, experts and officials from 17 cities met this week at the Harvard Kennedy School to discuss how to build jobs and modernize buildings.

"Green Boot Camp: Recovery Through Retrofitting" brought together over 120 senior officials and experts with the promise of training and networking efforts towards a green economy. Organized and sponsored by Living Cities, who recently released the "Green Cities" report, the conference was designed to ensure the right strategies are employed to tackle problems related to cost, workforce size and knowledge.

According to Living Cities, cost-effective residential and commercial building energy efficiency improvements could lead to 500 megatons of potential emission abatement, and a slew of green jobs. Every $1 million invested in structural energy efficiency creates nearly 22 new jobs, per the Apollo Alliance.

The program is also sponsored by the Project on Municipal Innovation, a partnership between Living Cities and Harvard, coordinated by the Institute for Sustainable Communities. Seeking to answer the question presented by rising energy costs and economic strife, the boot camp is intended to complement and focus efforts to create jobs and reduce carbon emissions.

The boot camp agenda pursued the issues that confront the implementation of an integrated structural energy retrofitting initiative: sustainable finances, support for the resulting green jobs and increasing citizen participation. Building support for efficient retrofitting is sought through policy, marketing and community action.

Confirmed via his Twitter feed, Ron Sims, Deputy Secretary of the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development, spoke at the boot camp. Another keynote speaker, Auden Schendler, author of the recent book "Getting Green Done," talked about how vital a massive building retrofit program is to "save the planet."

Director of Sustainability for Aspen Ski Company, Schendler has been vocal about the difficulty in really greening your company, an impossible task, he said in an interview with BusinessWeek. Green initiatives are all about making the insurmountable possible- one of the attendees, Cathy Polaski, Minneapolis Director of Economic Development, said that stimulus funds have provided for "unprecedented partnerships," reported USA Today.

These unlikely collaborations have been forged by the boot camp, bringing state and city officials, utilities, energy efficiency providers, university extensions, along with a variety of private sector professionals together.

One of the issues that Living Cities highlighted in their "Green Cities" report was a lack of initiatives towards low-income families, an issue that will inevitably need to be addressed in any mass retrofit initiative. Such concerns may have received attention, as Anne Keeney was in attendance, Executive Director of the Seattle Jobs Initiative, which trains and supports low-income individuals.

Director of energy efficient homes for the Baltimore City Department of Housing and Community Development, Ken Strong, and Ted Atwood, city energy advisor also attended, from a city that is implementing green changes, like LED traffic lights, and has completed a greenhouse-gas inventory.

Mark Alan Hughes, Chief Policy Advisor and Director of Sustainability for Philadelphia, attended, bringing insights from a city that may soon reap benefits from it's university development of an exterior insulation, aptly-dubbed "Exolation." Exolation was designed with low-income rowhouses in mind, after determining that existing exterior-wraps were inefficient.

Energy efficiency and conservation grant deadlines for $3.2 billion are rapidly approaching, paving the way for later funding towards green jobs and low-income home weatherization. As these deadlines loom closer, efforts like this boot camp that work towards implementing an infrastructure to support soon-to-be flourishing areas, like green jobs, are vital.

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How Antarctica Got Its Ice

Andrea Thompson, livescience.com Yahoo News 3 Jun 09;

Antarctica is a massive block of ice today, but it used to more simply be a range of glacier-topped mountains like those found in Alaska and the Alps.

The strange continent's thick ice sheets formed tens of millions of years ago against an Alpine-style backbone of mountains during a period of significant climate change, a new study finds.

The Antarctic continent now is covered almost entirely by ice that averages about a mile (1.6 kilometers) thick.

Scientists have known for some time that the Antarctic Ice Sheet formed around 14 million years ago, "but we didn't know how it formed," said study team member Martin Siegert of the University of Edinburgh in Scotland.

Specifically, researchers had little idea of the topography that lies underneath the thick layers of ice, which would provide clues to the history of ice on the southernmost continent, as well as inform models of how current ice flow might be impacted by climate change.

So little was known about the landforms beneath the Antarctic ice, in fact, that scientists had more information about the geography of the surface of Mars than at the Earth's own South Pole.

At a site called Dome A (the highest ice feature in Antarctica), only one Soviet traverse in 1957-58 and one radar flight in the 1970s had looked for topography below the ice. These studies showed that a mountain range, dubbed the Gamburtsev mountains, sat beneath the ice, but little detail was known about them or the rest of the sub-ice topography.

That changed with a detailed radar survey conducted in 2004-05 and 2007-08 by Chinese glaciologists over an 11.5 square mile (30 square kilometer) section of the region.

The radar study, detailed in the June 4 issue of the journal Nature, showed the Gamburtsev mountains in greater detail.

Antarctic Alps

The topographical features show a landscape carved out by small glaciers, much like the European Alps.

The climate required to allow these glaciers to form and flow started around 34 million years ago, at the end of the Eocene epoch. Small changes in Earth's orbit likely drove the glaciers to advance and recede (just at these glaciers that once covered North America did).

The glaciers carved out valleys that had already been worn in by river flow, changing the topography. Once the expansive ice sheets that now cover the continent began to form, they preserved these landforms in frigid perpetuity.

More radar surveys of Antarctica are already underway and Siegert said these should gives scientists a much better picture of what is hiding under all that ice.

Knowing what topographical features sit below the ice helps scientists better model how the ice flows around those features.

"It allows us to understand how ice flows in Antarctica," Siegert said. "The topography has a major influence on the ice flow of Antarctica."

With a better understanding of ice flow, scientists can better model how Antarctica's ice will respond to changes in Earth's climate, which have already affected ice shelves in parts of Antarctica.

The work was funded by the National Natural Science Foundation of China, the International Polar Year program CHINARE, and the UK Natural Environment Research Council.

Origin of Antarctic ice revealed
Victoria Gill, BBC News 3 Jun 09;

Incredible peaks and valleys, buried beneath ice for 14 million years, have revealed evidence of how the East Antarctic ice sheet first formed.

Scientists used radar to map an area of the Gamburtsev mountains - believed to be the point of origin of the ice.

The region would have been cold enough for the first glacier to form.

Writing in the journal Nature, the researchers say their findings provide important clues about how the ice sheet will behave as our climate changes.

"This is the largest reservoir of ice on Earth, and the most poorly understood place on our planet," said the British Antarctic Survey's Fausto Ferraccioli, a scientist involved in a separate international project to study the region.

He explained that the elevation and location of the Gamburtsev Mountains - in the centre of the ice sheet - made them an "ideal place" for the formation of the very first ice.

Icy unknown

Sun Bo from the Polar Research Institute of China, who led this study, has now provided further insight into the evolution of the ice sheet.

He and his colleagues travelled 1,235km (767 miles) by tractor train from a research station at the edge of East Antarctica, to the summit of Dome A of the Gamburtsev range, near the centre.

Dr Sun's team then attached radar equipment to the tractor and drove around, meticulously surveying a 30km by 30km square of the glacial region.

Their radar revealed a landscape that, 14 million years ago, looked similar to the European Alps.

"This is true scientific exploration," said Martin Siegert, head of the school of geosciences at Edinburgh University, who was also involved in the study.

"There's nothing to guide you really. Peering down at the ice sheet beneath your feet, you just don't know what's under there."

And for this type of exploration, the use of radio waves is very powerful.

When the waves reach the interface between ice and rock they bounce back, because of the difference in electrical properties between the two.

"You just measure the two-way travel time as they go down and come back up again," explained Dr Siegert. "Then you can convert that to ice thickness, because you know the velocity at which [the radio waves] are travelling."

Dr Siegert said the research team was "very lucky" to see such a clear image of the underlying landscape. They discovered a whole valley system - with mountains at the edge of the survey region and the valley in the middle.

"That's perfect, because it allows us to work out how the valley would have worked when it was filled with ice, and how the water would have flowed when there was no ice there at all," said Dr Siegert.

Frozen in time

By looking at ancient climate patterns, scientists have previously estimated that the East Antarctic ice sheet formed around 14 million years ago, burying and preserving the Gamburtsev mountain landscape under ice that is now up to 3km thick.

"You need a mean annual temperature of about 3C for the glaciers to form the way they did," Dr Siegert told BBC News.

"The mean annual temperature in this region now is -60 C. So we believe that these mountains are relics of [glacial erosion] in Antarctica before the ice sheet was in place."

He added that the findings provided an insight into the stability of the ice.

"It is a critical part of our Earth's system," said Dr Ferraccioli. "If the whole ice sheet collapsed, sea levels would rise by 60m."

"There's been a lot of climate change over the last 14 million years," Dr Siegert said. "And what we can say about this place in the middle of the Antarctic is that nothing has changed."

But, he warned, if levels of atmospheric carbon dioxide continued to rise, in around 1,000 years they will approach the same levels that existed "before there was persistent ice sheet in Antarctica".

"This puts the ice sheet into the context of global climate and what conditions are needed to grow an ice sheet," explained Dr Siegert. "The worrying thing is that we seem to be going back to carbon dioxide concentrations consistent with there being a lot less ice around."

How Antarctica grew its ice – and lost its hanging gardens
Catherine Brahic, New Scientist 3 Jun 09;

Up to 3000 metres beneath the ice, at the coldest point on Earth, towering peaks, hanging valleys and deep gorges have been frozen in ice for 14 million years. Now the first detailed view of this frozen landscape is revealing how the world's biggest chunk of ice – the Antarctic ice sheet – was born.

The radar images suggest that Antarctica "grew" its ice cap in three stages, carving out the rock below in distinct ways as glaciers expanded, retracted, and flowed downstream.

The images were collected between 2004 and 2008 by researchers who drove huge trains of caterpillar tractors in tight lines over Dome A, a plateau of ice at the heart of Antarctica. The tractors carried radars that pinged down through the ice and sent back profiles of the frozen rock landscape below.

Dome A, the highest point on the continent, is also one of the coldest places on Earth, with temperatures as low as -90 °C. Far beneath its frozen surface lie the Gamburtsev mountains, where glaciologists believe the Antarctic ice sheet was born. Its distance to the ocean and high altitude would have made it the coolest spot on the continent 34 million years ago, when the ice began to grow.
Stranger than Mars

Because Dome A is so remote and so cold, and because kilometres of ice separate the surface from the mountain tops, we know more about the surface of Mars than we do about the Gamburtsev. Until recently, only a single radar flight some 30 years ago had probed the chain.

In the past few years glaciologists have used planes and tractors to map out the iced mountains more fully. Earlier this year, the British Antarctic Survey revealed images of the mountains' profile. Now, a Chinese, Japanese and UK team have published results detailing the 900-square-kilometre area beneath Dome A.

By studying the images, the researchers have determined how the ice cap formed. First, some 34 million years ago, small mountain-top glaciers developed. They froze and thawed with variations in Earth's orbit, sometimes filling the range's main valley and its tributaries, sometimes disappearing entirely. These variations would have created distinct, high-altitude cirques, hanging valleys and deepened the main valley.

Isotope records from the deep ocean show that global temperatures dropped by up to 8 °C about 14 million years ago. This froze the ice to the rock, and it will have moved very little since then, preserving the landscape below.

Rocks are not all that will have been frozen in time and space. Martin Siegert of the University of Edinburgh, UK, says it is very likely that there are bits of frozen vegetation down there too – far out of reach. "It would have looked much like Patagonia today, with quite lush forests and small valley glaciers cutting into the alpine topography," he says.

Journal reference: Nature (DOI: 10.1038/nature08024)

Ghost alps of Antarctica are glimpsed after 14 million years
Yahoo News 3 Jun 09;

PARIS (AFP) – Millions of years ago, rivers ran in Antarctica through craggy mountain valleys that were strangely similar to the European Alps of today, Chinese and British scientists reported on Wednesday.

In a study published by the British journal Nature, they gave a snapshot of terrain that for aeons has lain hidden beneath ice up to several kilometres (nearly two miles) thick.

The imaging comes from a gruelling effort by Chinese glaciologists to probe the mysterious realm beneath the East Antarctic heights, one of the most forbidding places in the world.

In 2004-5 and again in 2007-8, the team hauled deep-penetrating ground radar around a box-shaped sector, measuring 30 kilometers (18 miles) by 30 kilometres, at a point called Dome Argus, or Dome A.

Dome A lies at 4,093 metres (13,302 feet) above sea level and has an average annual temperature of -58.4 degrees Celsius (-73 degrees Fahrenheit).

Beneath it is an ice sheet between 1,649 and 3,135 metres thick that smothers the Gamburtsev mountains, a range named after a Soviet geophysicist, Grigoriy Gamburtsev, who detected the peaks in 1958.

The radar reflections revealed "classic Alpine topography" similar to Europe's Alps, showing that once there were river valleys that cut their way through the mountains.

Later, these valleys were gouged and deepened by glaciers.

"The landscape has probably been preserved beneath the ice sheet for around 14 million years," says the paper.

The research chimes with deep-sea isotope records that give insights into how Earth got its polar caps.

These suggest there was a period of global cooling, called the Eocene, between 52 and 34 million years ago.

Then came two progressively sharper periods of cooling, linked to a fall in levels of naturally-produced greenhouse gases in the atmosphere -- the same gases that, man-made, are today blamed for warming.

Changes in Earth's orbit and the formation of the frigid current that flows around Antarctica contributed to the process of placing the continent in a deep freeze.

The first of the big chills came at the start of what is called the Oligocene period, around 34 million years ago, when glaciers first started to form in Antarctica.

The Gamburtsev mountains, because of their high altitude, were probably one of the places where glaciation first began, the scientists believe. At the time, there would have been a mean summer temperature of three degrees C (37 degrees F), they estimate.

The second cooling spurt came some 14 million years ago, characterised by a plunge in temperatures of around six to seven degrees C (10.8-12.6 degrees F), reaching up to eight degrees C (14.4 degrees F) in the Transantarctic Mountains, the spine that divides East from West Antarctica.

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El Nino odds said to rise above even

Reuters 3 Jun 09;

MELBOURNE (Reuters) - Australian farmers stand a greater-than-even chance of being hit by a drought-inducing weather pattern known as El Nino, the country's official weather forecaster said on Wednesday.

The Bureau of Meteorology said that if recent trends in Pacific climate patterns held up, there was an above-50 percent chance an El Nino event would be established by July. That is more than double the normal risk of an El Nino in any year.

"This view is supported by several computer forecasts of El Nino, which have firmed in their predictions of an event in 2009," David Jones, head of climate analysis at the bureau's National Climate Center, said in a statement.

Last month, the bureau had put the odds at above 20 percent.

U.S. forecasters at Colorado State University said on Tuesday there was "a slightly greater chance of a weak El Nino developing this summer/fall than there was in early April."

Australia is the world's fourth-largest wheat exporter. The possibility of an El Nino could reduce estimates for the next crop, which is now being sown.

"If it plays out that we do have a drier season again, particularly through spring, then for some farmers it will be diabolical because they have had three or four seasons in a row...of bad, failed crops," said Gavin Warburton, crop analyst at Australian Crop Forecasters.

However, he said it was too early to adjust forecasts, given there was no certainty that El Nino would occur. Even if it did, the extent of the impact on rainfall could vary, he added.

Current estimates for the crop range from 21 million to 23 million metric tons, little changed from the 21.4 million metric tons harvested in 2008/09, which was the best crop in four years following drought-breaking rains in some parts of the country.

El Nino means "little boy" in Spanish and it creates havoc in weather patterns across the Asia-Pacific region.

Scientists have linked El Nino events in the Pacific Ocean with Australian droughts. El Nino occurs when the eastern Pacific Ocean heats up, with warmer, moist weather moving toward the east, leaving drier weather in the western Pacific and Australia.

The most devastating El Nino was in 1997/98 when it caused drought in Australia and Indonesia and floods in Peru and Ecuador.

The bureau said surface temperatures across the equatorial Pacific had risen by about 0.8 degrees Celsius since the start of April to 0.5 degrees Celsius above average. The El Nino threshold is 0.8 degrees Celsius above average.

"It is still possible that the recent trends may stall without the El Nino thresholds being reached," the bureau said.

(Reporting by Simone Giuliani; Editing by Mark Bendeich)

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