Spell Out Indonesia's Carbon-Cutting Plan, President Told

Fidelis E Satriastanti, The Jakarta Globe 27 Sep 09;

Environmental groups are calling on President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono to explain precisely how the government will reduce carbon emissions in the forestry sector after he announced targeted cuts of up to 26 percent by 2020.

Yudhoyono announced his plan at the Group of 20 summit on Friday in the US city of Pittsburgh. He called for international support to help Indonesia reduce emissions by even more, as much as 41 percent from current levels.

“We are devising an energy mix policy . . . that will reduce our emissions by 26 percent by 2020,” Yudhoyono said during a working lunch. “With international support, we are confident we can reduce emissions by as much as 41 percent.”

He said the target was achievable because most of the country’s emissions come from forest-related activity, such as forest fires and deforestation.

“We are also looking into the distinct possibility of committing a billion tons of CO 2 reduction by 2050,” he said. “We will change the status of our forests from that of a net emitter sector to a net [carbon] sink sector by 2030.”

At a G-8 Summit last year in Hokkaido, Japan, Yudhoyono committed to reducing carbon emissions from deforestation by 50 percent this year, 75 percent by 2012 and 95 percent by 2025.

But Joko Arief, a forest campaigner for Greenpeace Indonesia, said the government would not receive any international support without providing detailed plans describing exactly how it would reduce emissions.

“If we’re talking about targets, then we’re talking about forest fires and deforestation, because those two have been the largest carbon emitters for Indonesia,” Joko said.

“However, there are still no official commitments from the government on how to handle these factors. There are still many forest fires going on in this country, and the government seems to be getting used to this condition without taking action to stop it.”

Teguh Surya, head of advocacy for the Indonesian Forum for the Environment (Walhi), said it was inappropriate for the country to rely on international support to stop deforestation and forest degradation because it could backfire in international negotiations.

“These kinds of commitments should be made carefully because it could lead to shifting the responsibility for deeper cuts in emissions from developed countries to developing countries,” Teguh said, adding that Yudhoyono had committed to many targets but plans had not been implemented.

Only a small number of developed countries have announced their carbon-reduction commitments for 2020. The European Union has committed to a cut of 20 percent, Japan to 25 percent, and Norway to 30 percent.

Agus Purnomo, secretary of the National Council on Climate Change, said it does not plan to announce Yudhoyono’s reduction targets during international talks in Bangkok beginning today. The talks are being held to draft a negotiating text for December’s UN Climate Change Conference in Copenhagen.

“If we’ve reached the article [of the text] where we’ll need to give numbers, then the president’s numbers will be our reference,” Agus said.

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Researchers go underground to reveal 850 new species

University of Adelaide EurekAlert 28 Sep 09;

Australian researchers have discovered a huge number of new species of invertebrate animals living in underground water, caves and "micro-caverns" amid the harsh conditions of the Australian outback.

A national team of 18 researchers has discovered 850 new species of invertebrates, which include various insects, small crustaceans, spiders, worms and many others.
Some of the 850 new species discovered in underground water, caves and micro-caverns across outback Australia. Courtesy of the Australian Center for Evolutionary Biology & Biodiversity, University of Adelaide.

The team – led by Professor Andy Austin (University of Adelaide), Dr Steve Cooper (South Australian Museum) and Dr Bill Humphreys (Western Australian Museum) – has conducted a comprehensive four-year survey of underground water, caves and micro-caverns across arid and semi-arid Australia.

"What we've found is that you don't have to go searching in the depths of the ocean to discover new species of invertebrate animals – you just have to look in your own 'back yard'," says Professor Austin from the Australian Center for Evolutionary Biology & Biodiversity at the University of Adelaide.

"Our research has revealed whole communities of invertebrate animals that were previously unknown just a few years ago. What we have discovered is a completely new component to Australia's biodiversity. It is a huge discovery and it is only about one fifth of the number of new species we believe exist underground in the Australian outback."

Only half of the species discovered have so far been named. Generically, the animals found in underground water are known as "stygofauna" and those from caves and micro-caverns are known as "troglofauna".

Professor Austin says the team has a theory as to why so many new species have been hidden away underground and in caves.

"Essentially what we are seeing is the result of past climate change. Central and southern Australia was a much wetter place 15 million years ago when there was a flourishing diversity of invertebrate fauna living on the surface. But the continent became drier, a process that last until about 1-2 million years ago, resulting in our current arid environment. Species took refuge in isolated favorable habitats, such as in underground waters and micro-caverns, where they survived and evolved in isolation from each other.

"Discovery of this 'new' biodiversity, although exciting scientifically, also poses a number of challenges for conservation in that many of these species are found in areas that are potentially impacted by mining and pastoral activities," he says.

The research team has reported its findings at a scientific conference on evolution and biodiversity in Darwin, which celebrates the 200th anniversary of Charles Darwin: www.evolutionbiodiversity2009.org. The conference finishes today.

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The team's research has been funded by the Australian Research Council (ARC) Environmental Futures Network.

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Population: Overconsumption is the real problem

Fred Pearce, New Scientist 27 Sep 09;

THERE is a pervading myth that efforts to fight climate change and other environmental perils will be to no avail unless we "do something" about population growth. Even seasoned analysts talk about the threat of "exponential" population growth. But there is no exponential growth. In most of the world fertility rates are falling fast, and the countries where population growth continues are those that contribute least to our planetary predicament.

Back in the late 1960s, when Paul Ehrlich wrote his seminal book The Population Bomb, rapid population growth was arguably the number 1 threat to the planet's future. Many believed that only strict birth control could prevent doomsday. But after scandals about forced vasectomies in India and China's draconian one-child policy, such views fell into disrepute. What's more, Ehrlich's prediction of hundreds of millions of deaths from famine in the 1980s fortunately failed to be borne out.

Now the demographic monster has become a hot topic again. Yet the arguments still don't fit the reality. The population "bomb" is fast being defused. Women across the poor world are having dramatically fewer babies than their mothers did - mostly out of choice, not compulsion. Half a century ago, the worldwide average for the number of children a woman had was between five and six. Now she has 2.6. In the face of such a fall it is hard to see what more "doing something" about global population might achieve.

Half the world now has a fertility rate below the replacement level, which, allowing for girls who don't make it to adulthood, is around 2.3. This includes most of Europe, east Asia, North America and the Caribbean. There are holdouts in a few Muslim countries - but not Iran, where fertility is 1.7 - and many parts of Africa. But rich or poor, socialist or capitalist, Muslim or Catholic, secular or devout, with tough government birth control policies or none, most countries tell the same story.

This hasn't yet stopped the world's population from rising. It stands at 6.8 billion, and is growing by 75 million a year. This is mostly because the huge numbers of young women born during the 20th-century's worldwide baby boom are still fertile: they may typically only have two children each, but that is still a lot of babies. Soon, however, if fertility rates continue to decline, each generation of women will be smaller than the last.

Of course fertility rates may not continue to decline, but to date the evidence of countries that have got down to the replacement level is that they don't stick there, they carry on declining. The reasons for this may have a lot to do with the changing position of women in society. Where men take a greater role in bringing up children, and the state intervenes to help working mothers, fertility rates stay quite close to replacement. Where they do not, then super-low fertility may follow; women, in effect, go on childbirth strike.

Even if the world population does stabilise soon and starts to glide downwards, that won't solve the world's environmental problems. The real issue is not overpopulation but overconsumption - mostly in rich countries that have long since given up adding substantial numbers to their population.

Take one measure: carbon dioxide emissions. Stephen Pacala, director of the Princeton Environmental Institute, calculates that the world's richest half billion people - that's about 7 per cent of the global population - are responsible for 50 per cent of the world's emissions. Meanwhile, the poorest 50 per cent are responsible for just 7 per cent of emissions. One American or European is more often than not responsible for more emissions than an entire village of Africans.

Every time those of us in the rich world talk about too many babies in Africa or India, we are denying our own culpability. It is the world's consumption patterns we need to fix, not its reproductive habits.

Fred Pearce's book Peoplequake will be published in February 2010 by Eden Project Books

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Palau appeals for new shark haven to be respected

Yahoo News 27 Sep 09;

KOROR (AFP) – The tiny Pacific republic of Palau, which has declared itself the world's first shark sanctuary, has urged international respect for the decision to compensate for its lack of enforcement ability.

President Johnson Toribiong unveiled details of the sanctuary in his speech to the United Nations on Friday.

However, the small country which presides over rich fishing grounds has only one patrol ship to enforce the sanctuary in Palau's 621,600 square kilometre (237,000 square mile) exclusive economic zone, an area about the size of France.

Toribiong, who described sharks as "a natural barometer for the health of our oceans", appealed to world leaders to join Palau's effort to protect the sharks.

"Palau will become the world?s first national shark sanctuary, ending all commercial shark fishing in our waters and giving a sanctuary for sharks to live and reproduce unmolested in our 237,000 square miles of ocean," he said.

"We call upon all nations to join us."

Palau came to prominence as a shark campaigner in 2003 with the introduction of anti-shark fishing legislation which carries a 250,000 dollar fine for fishing, mutilation and transport of sharks in Palau waters.

Then president Tommy Remengesau Jr. staged a spectacular protest that same year when he publicly set fire to shark fins seized from a foreign vessel found in Palau waters.

However, shark fishing remains a lucrative business, especially with the demand in parts of Asia for shark's fin soup, and a recent flyover of Palau waters found more than 70 foreign fishing vessels, many of them operating illegally.

"It is anomalous that Palau is experiencing economic difficulty while it sits in the middle of the richest waters in the world. We can no longer stand by while foreign vessels illicitly come to our waters," Toribiong said.

About 130 shark species are found in Palau waters and Matt Rand, director of the Pew Environment Group?s global shark conservation campaign, said the sanctuary declaration would fill a "dire need" to save the creatures.

"More than one third of the world?s shark species are threatened or near threatened with extinction," Rand said.

Dermot Keane, founder of the Palau Shark Sanctuary, believed Toribiong's initiative would take marine conservation and shark protection to a new level.

It sends the message that "shark fishing is no longer acceptable and that the country will enforce its laws and those who violate it should be held liable".

With a population of about 21,000, Palau is one of the smallest countries in the world with an economy heavily reliant on tourism and fishing.

Much of the tourist activity is centered on diving and snorkelling in tropical waters filled with coral reefs, marine life and World War II wrecks.

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Solomon Islands study on dolphins targeted in the live export trade

SPREP Assists Solomon Islands in Dolphin Research
Solomon Times 28 Sep 09;

The Secretariat of the Pacific Regional Environment Program is working with the Solomon Islands government to research the species of dolphins targeted in the live export trade.

The Marine Species Programme of SPREP focuses on 3 groups of sea animals which are of conservation concern in the pacific region the dugong, marine turtle and whales and dolphins.

The Marine Species Program Coordinator, Lui Bell, has told the Solomon Island Broadcasting Corporation that there is no data on the species of dolphins that exist in Solomon Islands.

He says information is needed to see which species of dolphins exist in the Solomon Islands and to see if the ones which are being exported are facing the threat of becoming extinct.

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U.S. reviewing humpback whale endangered status

Audrey McAvoy, Associated Press Google News 28 Sep 09;

HONOLULU — The federal government is considering taking the humpback whale off the endangered species list in response to data showing the population of the massive marine mammal has been steadily growing in recent decades.

Known for their acrobatic leaps from the sea and complex singing patterns, humpback whales were nearly hunted to extinction for their oil and meat by industrial-sized whaling ships well through the middle of the 20th century. But the species has been bouncing back since an international ban on their commercial whaling in 1966.

"Humpbacks by and large are an example of a species that in most places seems to be doing very well, despite our earlier efforts to exterminate them," said Phillip Clapham, a senior whale biologist with the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA).

The government is required by law to review the endangered species status of an animal or plant if it receives "significant new information." The National Marine Fisheries Service, a NOAA agency, received results last year from an extensive study showing that the North Pacific humpback population has been growing 4 to 7 percent a year in recent decades.

Public comment is being accepted until Oct. 13 on the upcoming review, which is expected to take less than a year. It's the first review for humpbacks since 1999.

A panel of scientists will then study the data and produce a scientific report on their analysis in late spring or early summer. It's unclear what the decision on delisting the humback will be.

"I don't know where the humpback people are going to come out," said David Cottingham, who heads the marine mammal and sea turtle conservation division at the Fisheries Service. "It would be premature to talk about it."

Some environmental groups are already opposing the possibility of a delisting.

Miyoko Sakashita, the ocean programs director at the Center for Biological Diversity, said that ongoing climate change and ocean acidification are emerging threats that may hurt humpback whales.

"Ocean conditions are changing so rapidly right now that it would probably be hasty to delist the humpbacks," Sakashita said.

Ralph Reeves, who chairs the cetacean specialist group at the International Union for the Conservation of Nature, said the U.S. should remove humpbacks from the list if populations have sufficiently recovered.

He said conservationists must "be prepared and willing to embrace success" if they're to maintain what he called a "meaningful" endangered species program.

"The whole process, the credibility of it, depends on telling people that things are really bad when they're really bad and tell people that they aren't so bad when they aren't so bad," Reeves said.

There are now an estimated 18,000 to 20,000 humpbacks in the North Pacific, up from just 1,400 in the mid-1960s.

An early 1990s survey of humpbacks in the North Atlantic showed the population there was some 10,600. The results of a follow-up to that study, expected by the end of the year, are likely to show this population has grown, too.

The global humpback population is estimated to be about 60,000, according to the Swiss-based Conservation of Nature union.

Helping the humpbacks is that they reproduce once every two to three years, as opposed to every three to five years for other whale species. They also have a diverse diet, including krill and herring, capelin and other fish.

"They feed on a lot of different kinds of things, so they're adaptable," Clapham said. "They seem to be a resilient species generally with a lot of options."

There are some subpopulations of humpbacks, however, that aren't as robust. A South Pacific group that feeds in the Antarctic and then migrates to the warm waters off New Caledonia, Samoa and Tonga to breed and calve isn't doing as well.

Whale experts say this is because commercial whaling, and later, illegal whaling by the Soviet Union, shrunk this population so dramatically that it's had a harder time recovering.

There are also humpback populations about which relatively little is known. These include humpbacks that spend the winter in tropical waters off southern Japan and the Philippines and the summer near Russia's Far East coast.

This group also appears to be relatively small, with only about 1,000 whales.

There is a chance the review could lead to the removal of healthier subpopulations from the endangered species list while other groups that are still at risk could be left on.

Something similar happened in 1994 when the federal government removed a U.S. West Coast population of the gray whale from the endangered species list but left on the list a separate population of gray whale that lives off Russia's Pacific coast.

The U.S. doesn't have authority over species management in the waters of other nations, but it may prosecute U.S. citizens and corporations that violate U.S. endangered species law overseas.

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As Oil Enriches Australia, Spill Is Seen as a Warning

Meraiah Foley, The New York Times 27 Sep 09;

SYDNEY, Australia — Visitors hoping to peek at Australia’s exotic marine life usually head straight for the Great Barrier Reef. But conservationists say that an equally remarkable, but lesser known, marine environment is under threat from the booming oil and gas exploration taking place among the reefs and atolls off Australia’s northwest coast.

A damaged oil well in the region has been spewing thousands of gallons of crude oil into the Timor Sea since Aug. 21, when a blowout forced the evacuation of all 69 workers on the platform. Emergency crews have been working overtime to contain the spill, but officials say it could take about three more weeks to plug the leak.

The platform is above the Montara oil field, about 155 miles northwest of Mungalalu Truscott Airbase in the remote Kimberley region of Australia. The leaking well head is owned by Thailand’s national petroleum company, PTT Exploration and Production, one of many energy companies that have set up operations in western Australia to feed Asia’s growing appetite for oil and gas.

In the first half of this year, more than 50 wells were drilled in the tropical waters off western Australia, adding to hundreds of other recent projects. Last month, the government gave Chevron the green light to expand its exploration of the huge Gorgon gas field, a $40 billion project that was opposed by conservationists because of its potential environmental impact.

Economists credit the booming trade in petroleum and other mineral resources for helping Australia escape the brunt of the global economic downturn, but environmentalists say this prosperity comes at a price. They say the Montara oil spill is merely a sign of things to come unless greater protections are extended to vast stretches of tropical reefs off northwestern Australia.

“It’s a classic conflict between development and the ecological values of the region,” said John Carey, manager of the Kimberley Conservation Program with the Pew Environment Group. “We need to get the balance right. But the balance at the moment is that less than 1 percent of this globally significant area is under any form of protection.”

The Thai oil company said it was still investigating what had caused the blowout. To stop the spill, the company has hired a specialist rig to drill 1.6 miles below the seabed and flood the area with heavy mud.

But such highly specialized equipment is not easy to come by. It took three weeks to tow the rig from Singapore.

The company has declined to estimate how much oil has spilled into the sea, saying it is too dangerous to take accurate measurements from the damaged rig. The company and Australian maritime officials, who are helping to clean up the spill, say that the slick is around 25 miles wide and 85 miles long, but that the leakage appears to be slowing.

The federal environment minister, Peter Garrett, said this month that the government believed that 300 to 400 barrels of oil were leaking into the sea each day. That amounts to more than 450,000 gallons of oil, and unknown quantities of gas and condensate, since the blowout began. By that count, the Montara leak is relatively small. The Exxon Valdez, by comparison, dumped around 11 million gallons when it ran aground off the Alaskan coast in 1989.

The oil slick has not reached any coastlines, thanks in part to mild weather conditions and efforts by the Australian government to break up the slick by spraying it with chemical dispersant. But conservationists worry that the spill could take a heavy toll on marine animals that feed and travel on or close to the ocean’s surface.

“We need to shatter the myth that an oil spill is only a problem when it washes up on beaches,” said Gilly Llewellyn, the manager of conservation programs with WWF-Australia.

PTT, the Thai company, has said it is committed to helping clean up the spill and plans to conduct environmental monitoring of the region to assess the damage. Australia’s energy minister, Martin Ferguson, has announced plans for a thorough investigation into the cause.

Mr. Ferguson and the Australian Petroleum Production and Exploration Association, which represents 98 percent of oil and gas operators in the country, have defended the industry’s record, saying the Montara well head leak is the first offshore blowout since 1984.

Marine researchers and conservation groups say they are realistic about the economic drive to continue developing the region, but want the government to designate more marine sanctuaries and to enact stronger environmental regulations in western Australia. The government is expected to release a strategy for the region next year.

“You can’t stop production; this is a huge area of future exploration,” said Nic Bax, the principal investigator of the Marine Biodiversity Research Hub. “We need to make sure we’re working cooperatively with industry to work out what is the best and safest way to do this.”

Fears oil spill will become 15,000sqkm killing slick
Lex Hall, Timor Sea The Australian 28 Sep 09;

TWO hundred kilometres off Australia's northwest coast, chunks of toxic residue, fallout from the nation's third largest oil spill, stain the normally clear water that is home to thousands of marine species and birdlife.

Conservationists with the WWF believe this is clear evidence of the damage caused by a leak at the Montara oil field, 200km off the coast of Broome.

As it moves into its fifth week, the spill is leaking at a rate of 400 barrels a day.

The rig's operator, Thai-owned petrol and exploration company PTTEP Australasia, say it will be at least another three weeks before the problem is fixed.

For now though, conservationists estimate the spill to be covering an area of at least 15,000sq km -- or 100 times the size of Sydney Harbour.

WWF is near the end of a seven-day mission to survey the wildlife in the area and determine the level of toxicity in the water.

So far, they've observed an abundance of marine and bird life, including many rarely seen species such as Hawksbill turtles and sea snakes.

The observations were made before entering areas with heavy oil pollution. WWF-Australia's conservation director Gilly Llewellyn says the chunks of waxy residue found about 100km from the Montara field likely came from the August 21 spill.

"If you look at them closely, they seem to be leaving oily streaks behind them," she tells The Australian. "When you rub them between your fingers, you get an oily, waxy feel. What this strongly indicates is that we've got the waxy remnants of weathered oil here."

Dr Llewellyn's team has travelled to the edge of the 40km exclusion zone, taking water samples. As they move closer to the rig, the surface of the water becomes glossier, indicating the presence of "fresher", more potent oil and just metres from the boat a sea snake writhes in the milky sludge. "This is an area where we're seeing a lot of seabirds, fish, sea snakes and cetaceans (whales and dolphins)," she says.

So far, 11 birds have been affected, with five dead, according to the Department of Environment. But Dr Llewellyn's team fears the toll could be much greater, with up to 30,000 sea snakes and 16,000 turtles at risk.

"We have to dispel the myth that it's a desert out here," she says. "This is a rich feeding area for many species of marine life, as well as migratory birds."

Many seabirds feed off the surface and it's feared their breeding patterns could be terminally disrupted. Dolphins, too, are at risk of ingesting contaminants.

Macquarie University dolphin expert Kersten Bilgmann says this could have lasting effects on what is one of the world's largest tropical marine ecosystems.

"Just as in humans, loading of toxins weakens the immune system," Dr Bilgmann says.

PTTEP says it will be three more weeks before they can plug the leak. Dispersant has been used to break up the oil but it's feared toxicity could persist.

"It's essentially moving the problem from the surface to beneath the sea, which supports a wealth of marine life," says ecologist Simon Mustoe, head of the Ecology Group for the Environment Institute of Australia and New Zealand.

A Senate inquiry into the leak has been announced.

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Toxic cocktails 'threaten health'

CRC CARE, Science Alert 27 Sep 09;

Governments worldwide need to move with urgency to tackle the mounting risk to human health posed by the cocktail of toxic contaminants in our living environment, a leading scientist has warned.

“Heath Ledger and Michael Jackson both died from mixtures of drugs, not from single drugs. Their cases are a warning of what can happen when you take in two or more toxic substances,” says Professor Ravi Naidu, convenor of the global CleanUp 09 conference which opens in Adelaide tomorrow.

People living in both urban and rural environments around the world are increasingly exposed to toxic mixtures of heavy metals and organic chemicals such as pesticides, PCBs and VOCs in their food, water, air and soil – yet most governments continued to address the problem one chemical at a time, Prof. Naidu, the managing director of CRC CARE, says.

“In contaminated sites we are almost always dealing with mixtures. As we see from the cases of Ledger and Jackson, combinations can sometimes be far more deadly than individual substances.

“It makes far better sense to assess the risk to human health posed by the combined contaminants, than to look at them one by one.”

This meant assessing not only the mixture of chemicals, but which parts of it were capable of reaching the public via the food chain, water, air or dust, and the combined health effects this might have.

This issue, known as bioavailability, represents another huge challenge for the environmental clean-up sector worldwide, Prof. Naidu says.

“Bioavailability means establishing whether or not the toxic substance can actually reach you. In some cases it can – and in others, for various reasons, it can’t. The sites we ought to clean up as a priority are the ones where the toxins are available to reach the public and environment.”

However most environmental agencies the world over still insist on cleaning up sites where contaminants have been found, even if the contaminants are safely locked up in the soil and unable to reach the public. This wastes money, delays economic development and causes unnecessary concern to the community, he says.

A third major challenge was to stop trying to solve the problem of pollution simply by moving it somewhere else, to become a threat to future generations.

“Many countries, including Australia, are still trying to solve the problem of contamination by digging up toxic waste and polluted soil and dumping it in landfills on the urban fringe.

“Years later the city has expanded, these toxic dumps have become part of the suburbs, and their contents again threaten to the health and safety of the community.

“You cannot overcome pollution merely by moving it. You have to disable it.

“Dig-and-dump is not an answer to the problem of contamination, and needs to be replaced by approaches which involve turning the toxic substances into forms which are completely safe, or locking them up so they become unavailable to harm anyone.”

Professor Naidu says Australia has been slow to adopt best practice in risk assessment and clean-up, in part because the States still had widely different approaches to the issue.

“Overall, there has been a lack of progress in addressing the issue of contamination and using the latest scientific methods for dealing with it. Although we have excellent National Environment Protection Measures (NEPM), we are not working together at the practical clean-up level as well as we should.

“We are not properly addressing the question of multiple contamination, the issue of bioavailability or the need to move away from dig-and-dump to safer, more sustainable methods.

“It is time we did.”

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Dust storms spread deadly diseases worldwide

Dust storms like the one that plagued Sydney are blowing bacteria to all corners of the globe, with viruses that will attack the human body. Yet these scourges can also help mitigate climate change

John Vidal, The Observer 27 Sep 09;

Huge dust storms, like the ones that blanketed Sydney twice last week, hit Queensland yesterday and turned the air red across much of eastern Australia, are spreading lethal epidemics around the world. However, they can also absorb climate change emissions, say researchers studying the little understood but growing phenomenon.

The Sydney storm, which left millions of people choking on some of the worst air pollution in 70 years, was a consequence of the 10-year drought that has turned parts of Australia's interior into a giant dust bowl, providing perfect conditions for high winds to whip loose soil into the air and carry it thousands of miles across the continent.

It followed major dust storms this year in northern China, Iraq and Iran, Pakistan, Saudi Arabia, Afghanistan, east Africa, Arizona and other arid areas. Most of the storms are also linked to droughts, but are believed to have been exacerbated by deforestation, overgrazing of pastures and climate change.

As diplomats prepare to meet in Bangkok tomorrow for the next round of climate talks, meteorologists predict that more major dust storms can be expected, carrying minute particles of beneficial soil and nutrients as well as potentially harmful bacteria, viruses and fungal spores.

"The numbers of major dust storms go up and down over the years," said Andrew Goudie, geography professor at Oxford University. "In Australia and China they tailed off from the 1970s then spiked in the 1990s and at the start of this decade. At the moment they are clearly on an upward trajectory."

Laurence Barrie is chief researcher at the World Meteorological Organisation (WMO) in Geneva, which is working with 40 countries to develop a dust storm warning system. He said: "I think the droughts [and dust storms] in Australia are a harbinger. Dust storms are a natural phenomenon, but are influenced by human activities and are now just as serious as traffic and industrial air pollution. The minute particles act like urban smog or acid rain. They can penetrate deep into the human body."

Saharan storms are thought to be responsible for spreading lethal meningitis spores throughout semi-arid central Africa, where up to 250,000 people, particularly children, contract the disease each year and 25,000 die. "There is evidence that the dust can mobilise meningitis in the bloodstream," said Barrie.

Higher temperatures and more intense storms are also linked to "valley fever", a disease contracted from a fungus in the soil of the central valley of California. The American Academy of Microbiology estimates that about 200,000 Americans go down with valley fever each year, 200 of whom die. The number of cases in Arizona and California almost quadrupled in the decade to 2006.

Scientists who had thought diseases were mostly transmitted by people or animals now see dust clouds as possible transmitters of influenza, Sars and foot-and-mouth, and increasingly responsible for respiratory diseases. A rise in the number of cases of asthma in children on Caribbean islands has been linked to an increase in the dust blown across the Atlantic from Africa. The asthma rate in Barbados is 17 times greater than it was in 1973, when a major African drought began, according to one major study. Researchers have also documented more hospital admissions when the dust storms are at their worst.

"We are just beginning to accumulate the evidence of airborne dust implications on health," said William Sprigg, a climate expert at Arizona University.

The scale and range of some recent dust storms has surprised scientists. Japanese academics reported in July that a giant dust storm in China's Taklimakan desert in 2007 picked up nearly 800,000 tonnes of dust which winds carried twice around the world.

Dust from the Gobi and Taklimakan deserts is often present over the western United States in the spring and can lead to disastrous air quality in Korean, Japanese and Russian cities. It frequently contributes to the smogs over Los Angeles. Britain and northern Europe are not immune from dust storms. Dust blown from the Sahara is commonly found in Spain, Italy and Greece and the WMO says that storms deposit Saharan dust north of the Alps about once a month. Last year Britain's Meteorological Office reported it in south Wales.

Some scientists sought to attribute the 2001 foot-and-mouth outbreak to a giant storm in north Africa that carried dust and possibly spores of the animal disease as far as northern Britain only a week before the first reported cases.

The scale and spread of the dust storms has also surprised researchers. Satellite photographs have shown some of the clouds coming out of Africa to be as big as the whole land mass of the US, with a major storm able to whip more than a million tonnes of soil into the atmosphere. Sydney was covered by an estimated 5,000 tonnes of dust last week, but the WMO says Beijing was enveloped by more than 300,000 tonnes in one storm in 2006.

"The 2-3 billion tonnes of fine soil particles that leave Africa each year in dust storms are slowly draining the continent of its fertility and biological productivity," said Lester Brown, director of the Earth Policy Institute research group in Washington DC. "Those big storms take millions of tonnes of soil, which takes centuries to replace."

Brown and Chinese scientists say the increased number of major dust storms in China is directly linked to deforestation and the massive increase in numbers of sheep and goats since the 1980s, when restrictions on herders were removed. "Goats will strip vegetation," said Brown. "They ate everything and dust storms are now routine. If climate change leads to a reduction in rainfall, then the two trends reinforce themselves." China is planting tens of millions of trees to act as a barrier to the advancing desert.

However, research increasingly suggests that the dust could be mitigating climate change, both by reflecting sunlight in the atmosphere and fertilising the oceans with nutrients. Iron-rich dust blown from Australia and from the Gobi and Sahara deserts is largely deposited in oceans, where it has been observed to feed phytoplankton, the microscopic marine plants that are the first link in the oceanic food chain and absorb large amounts of carbon dioxide. In addition, the upper layers of the rainforest in Brazil are thought to derive much of their nutrient supply from dust transported across the Atlantic from the Sahara.

Just as scientists struggle to understand how dust is affecting climate, evidence is growing that another airborne pollutant, soot, is potentially disastrous. Minute particles of carbon produced by diesel engines, forest fires and the inefficient burning of wood in stoves is being carried just like dust to the remotest regions of the world.

A study by the United Nations Environment Programme has just concluded that the pollutant has played a major part in shrinking the Himalayan glaciers and has helped to disrupt the south Asian monsoon.

"Soot accounts from 10% to more than 45% of the contribution to global warming," said Achim Steiner, director of the UN's environment programme. "It is linked to accelerated losses of glaciers in Asia because soot deposits darken ice, making it more vulnerable to melting."

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UK Met Office: catastrophic climate change could happen with 50 years

Catastrophic climate change could happen with 50 years, five decades earlier than previously predicted, according to a Met Office report.

Louise Gray, The Telegraph 27 Sep 09;

An average global temperature rise of 7.2F (4C), considered a dangerous tipping point, could happen by 2060, causing droughts around the world, sea level rises and the collapse of important ecosystems, it warns.

The Arctic could see an increase in temperatures of 28.8F (16C), while parts of sub Saharan Africa and North America would be devastated by an increase in temperature of up to 18F (10C).

Britain's temperature would rise by the average 7.2F (4C) which would mean Mediterranean summers and an extended growing season for new crops like olives, vines and apricots.

However deaths from heat waves will increase, droughts and floods would become more common, diseases like malaria may spread to Britain and climate change refugees from across the world are likely to head to the country.

The Government-funded study, which has been sent to the Department for Energy and Climate Change, included new figures on increased emissions from fossil fuels and considered the effect global warming will have on the ability of the oceans and rainforests to absorb carbon dioxide.

More than 190 countries are meeting in Bangkok this week for the latest round of UN negotiations to try to prevent catastrophic climate change. It is hoped a global deal to limit emissions will be made in Copenhagen this December.

Dr Richard Betts, Head of Climate Impacts at the Met Office Hadley Centre, said the new study showed how important it was to try and reduce emissions.

The global picture shows rainfall could decrease by 20 per cent in Central America, the Mediterranean and parts of coastal Australia, causing mass drought. Temperature rises in the Amazon would cause the rainforests to die, while Alaska and Siberia would see the melting of the permafrost causing more carbon dioxide to be released.

"Four degrees C of warming averaged over the globe translates into even greater warming in many regions, along with major changes in rainfall," said Dr Betts. "If greenhouse gas emissions are not cut soon then we could see major climate changes within our lifetimes."

The study is being presented today (Monday) at a conference at Oxford University, which consider problems for Britain, such as water shortages in the South East, die back of tree species like beech in the south of the country and the need to build coastal defence around counties like Norfolk.

Dr Mark New, of the Oxford University School of Geography and the Environment, said scientists now have a better understanding of the recent increase in carbon emissions because of developing countries like China and India building coal fired power stations.

There is also more information on the affect global warming will have on certain "carbon cycles". It is thought more carbon dioxide will be released into the atmosphere by organic materials in the soil decomposing at a faster rate, while warmer oceans are less able to absorb the greenhouse gas.

He said: "The eventual temperature we reach is a result of the carbon we put in the atmosphere so if we do not reduce emissions faster, the timing is much sooner. The faster the rate of change in getting to four degrees, the less time we have to adapt. Four degrees by the 2050s compared to four degrees by 2100 gives us half as much time to adapt to a new climate and that must have massive implications."

World leaders have agreed to try to keep global warming less than 2C above pre-industrial levels by the end of the century. However temperature rises have already gone above 1.3C and are likely to meet 2C because of carbon dioxide that is locked into the atmosphere.

Dr New said the world must now concentrate on keeping the rise below 4C to try to prevent the worst effects of climate change.

"Two degrees is important politically but in terms of what is going to happen, I think a lot of people think it is a lost cause already," he said. "Four degrees is highly plausible given the evidence and it is different enough from two degrees that we can start exploring the difficulties and what the world will look like."

DECC said ministers will use the new study to push for a tough deal at Copenhagen calling for rich countries to reduce emissions by 80 per cent by 2050 and poor countries to limit carbon dioxide in return for financial help.

A spokesman said: “A four degree rise in global temperatures would have serious consequences for mankind with food security, water availability and health all being adversely affected. This report illustrates why it imperative for the world to reach an ambitious climate deal at Copenhagen which keeps the global temperature increase to below two degrees.”

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Warming suppressing El Nino

Science Alert 28 Sep 09;

El Niño, the periodic eastern Pacific phenomenon credited with shielding the United States and Caribbean from severe hurricane seasons, may be overshadowed by its brother in the central Pacific due to global warming, according to an article in the September 24 issue of the journal Nature.

"There are two El Niños, or flavors of El Niño," said Ben Kirtman, co-author of the study and professor of meteorology and physical oceanography at the University of Miami's Rosentstiel School of Marine and Atmospheric Science. "In addition to the eastern Pacific El Niño which we know and love, a second El Niño in the central Pacific is on the increase."

El Niño is a recurring warm water current along the equator in the Pacific Ocean that affects weather circulation patterns in the tropics. The eastern El Niño increases wind sheer in the Atlantic that may hamper the development of major hurricanes there. The central Pacific El Niño, near the International Dateline, has been blamed for worsening drought conditions in Australia and India as well as minimizing the effects of its beneficial brother to the east.

Led by Sang-Wook Yeh of the Korea Ocean Research & Development Institute, a team of scientists applied Pacific Ocean sea surface temperature data from the past 150 years to 11 global warming models developed by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change. Eight of the models showed that global warming conditions will increase the incidence of the central Pacific El Niño. Over the past 20 years, according to the data, the frequency of an El Niño event in the central Pacific has increased from one out of every five to half of all El Niño occurrences.

"The results described in this paper indicate that the global impacts of El Niño may significantly change as the climate warms," said Yeh.

Though the centers of the central and eastern areas are roughly 4,100 miles apart, El Niños historically have not simultaneously occurred in both places. An increase in central Pacific El Niño events may reduce the hurricane-shielding effects of the eastern Pacific event.

"Currently, we are in the middle of a developing eastern Pacific El Niño event," said Kirtman, "which is part of why we're experiencing such a mild hurricane season in the Atlantic. We also anticipate the southern United States to have a fairly wet winter, and the northeast may be dry and warm."

Kirtman expects the current El Niño event to end next spring, perhaps followed by a La Niña, which he expects may bode for a more intense Atlantic hurricane season in 2010.

Growing up in southern California, Kirtman frequently had to man the sump pump in his family's basement during the rainy season, which he learned later was caused by El Niño.

"We're finally learning about how ocean current flows and increases in sea surface temperature influence weather patterns, which affect every one of us, including the kid manning the sump pump," he said. "I have devoted much of my career to studying El Niño because of how it affects people and their lives."

Kirtman works with various meteorological organizations around the world to help developing countries respond to climate extremes.

"We provide them with the forecasts," he said, "and the countries use the results to develop their response."

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G20 Agrees On Phase-Out Of Fossil Fuel Subsidies

Jeff Mason and Darren Ennis, PlanetArk 28 Sep 09;

PITTSBURGH - The world's largest economies agreed on Friday to phase out subsidies for oil and other carbon dioxide-spewing fossil fuels in the "medium term" as part of efforts to combat global warming.

But Group of 20 leaders at a two-day summit meeting here did not advance discussions about financial aid for developing nations dealing with climate change, exacerbating concerns that U.N. talks to form a new climate pact are in peril.

Some $300 billion a year is spent worldwide to subsidize fuel prices, boosting demand in many nations by keeping prices artificially low and, thus, leading to more emissions.

The agreement -- backed by all of the G20 including Russia, India and China -- was a victory for U.S. President Barack Obama, whose credentials for fighting climate change have been marred by dimming prospects that the U.S. Senate will pass a bill to reduce emissions before the December U.N. meeting.

"This reform will increase our energy security ... and it will help us combat the threat posed by climate change," Obama told reporters at the close of the meeting.

"All nations have a responsibility to meet this challenge, and together we have taken a substantial step forward in meeting that responsibility," he said.

Eliminating such subsidies by 2020 would reduce greenhouse gas emissions blamed for global warming by 10 percent by 2050, leaders said, citing data from the International Energy Agency and the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development.

The statement from the G20, comprised of major rich and emerging economies, said energy and finance ministers would develop timeframes and strategies for implementing the subsidies phase-out and report back at the next G20 summit.

Environmental activists welcomed the move, though they expressed disappointment in the lack of a firm timetable and the failure to make progress on financing for poor countries.

"Removing fossil fuel subsidies could be an important step toward cutting CO2 emissions," said David Waskow, climate adviser for development group Oxfam International.

"But it should not be allowed to distract from the failure of rich countries to offer poor countries the help they need."

WORRIES AHEAD OF COPENHAGEN

The G20 committed to intensify efforts to reach a U.N. deal on climate change later this year, a joint statement said. Leaders agreed to keep in touch about the issue, and some Europeans suggested another meeting would happen soon.

"I do not hide my concern at the slow rate of progress. Negotiations cannot be an open-ended process. It's time to get serious now, not later," said European Commission President Jose Manuel Barroso, referring to climate negotiations.

The leaders will ask their finance ministers to come up with a range of options for climate finance -- payments from rich countries to poor countries dealing with global warming -- at their next meeting.

Energy producers were not enthused by the subsidy phase-out plan. The American Petroleum Institute, which represents the U.S. petroleum and natural gas industry, said Washington must clarify how the policy would affect the United States.

"The Obama administration and Congress now face many difficult choices if they choose to comply with the G20 commitment to phase-out fossil fuel subsidies," the API said.

"Above all else, the president and Congress should not use this commitment as an excuse to raise energy taxes on American consumers and businesses."

A U.S. official said the policy was not likely to have a big effect on large oil companies but could have an impact on independent producers.

The G20 statement also called on big institutions such as the International Energy Agency and OPEC to analyze the scope of energy subsidies and make suggestions at the next G20 summit for implementing the subsidy phase-out.

Asking for OPEC input may have been a way of bringing Saudi Arabia, a major oil producer, on board.

The group agreed to increase energy market transparency with regular reports on oil production, consumption, refining and stock levels.

(Editing by Frances Kerry)

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