Philippines: President won’t castigate Indonesia for haze, to offer help instead

Kristine Angeli Sabillo INQUIRER.net 27 Oct 15;

With a number of provinces now affected by the haze caused by forest fires in Indonesia, President Benigno Aquino III on Tuesday said he prefers to offer help than blame its Association of Southeast Asian Nations (Asean) neighbor.

Earlier reports said Palawan, Cebu, Leyte, General Santos City, Davao and Cotabato are just some of the areas affected by the haze, which brings about increased risk of respiratory infections and cardiac ailments, according to the Department of Health.

“Instead of castigating an Asean brother country, in the Asean Summit we should really look for wherewithal direction, the attitude of change, to help Indonesia avoid this problem,” the President said during a forum hosted by the Foreign Correspondents Association of the Philippines (Focap) at Solaire in Paranaque.

“That, I think, is the most constructive activity that we should be undertaking. Rather than concentrating on apportioning blame,” he said.

Aquino explained that the haze just recently reached the country and that he is still waiting for the Department of Science and Technology’s study and recommendation on the matter. RAM


Prices of N95 masks double as Indonesian haze blankets Cebu
Jhunnex Napallacan, Jocelyn R. Uy, Inquirer Visayas, Philippine Daily Inquirer 27 Oct 15;

CEBU CITY—The prices of N95 face masks have doubled due to a high demand following reports of hazardous haze and dust particles over Metro Cebu.

N95 masks now cost P105 each from P55, said Councilor Dave Tumulak, chair of the Cebu City Disaster Risk Reduction and Management Council.

There was also a reported shortage of supply of the face masks and hoarding by suppliers to jack up the prices, he added.

“I told the Office of the Civil Defense about this so the OCD would inform the Department of Trade and Industry to control the prices of the N95 masks,” Tumulak said.

Environment officials earlier urged residents to wear protected masks due to the dust particles in the air that were beyond normal because of the haze triggered by the forest fires in Indonesia and pollution in Metro Cebu.

But on Monday, the Department of Environment and Natural Resources (DENR) said the dust particles in Metro Cebu’s air had gone down although the public must continue to protect themselves.

Based on the ambient air quality monitoring as of Monday morning, the dust particles, or particulate matter (PM), measuring 2.5 micrometers in diameter reached 34 micrograms per cubic meter, below the limit of 75 micrograms per cubic meter, according to DENR Director William Cuñado.

As of 3 p.m., Cuñado said the PM measuring 2.5 micrometers in diameter reached an average value of 56 micrograms per cubic meter within the 24-hour period, still below the limit.

Back to normal

He said this meant that air quality had gone back to normal.

When the report of haze came out on Saturday, people started buying N95 masks from the pharmacies and other medical suppliers.

Judith Obera, sales clerk of Berovan Marketing, said there was a high demand for N95 masks but denied that the prices were high.

“A lot of people were looking for N95 masks. But we had run out of stocks,” she said.

In an advisory Monday, the Department of Health (DOH) urged residents in the affected areas to stay indoors with good ventilation, avoid low-lying areas where smoke and suspended particles may settle and to wear outdoors the appropriate dust mask.

The advisory was issued as the thickening haze from Indonesian forest fires reached the southern and central parts of the country, putting the elderly, children and those with respiratory and cardiovascular ailments at risk.

“Haze due to forest fire can cause air pollution, which can bring about increased risk for respiratory tract infections and cardiac ailments,” the DOH said.

Affected areas

In an interview with reporters, Health Secretary Janette Garin said that based on data provided by the Environmental Management Bureau, the areas affected by the haze in Luzon and Visayas were Cebu, Palawan and Leyte provinces and General Santos City, Davao and Cotabato in southern Mindanao.

Garin said children and the elderly in these areas were strictly being advised to stay indoors. Those with sinusitis, chronic obstructive pulmonary disease, asthma, bronchitis, diabetes and heart conditions must also avoid going outdoors to prevent their conditions from getting worse.

“We don’t encourage children to play outside because their lungs are not yet that mature and their respiratory rate is faster compared to adults, so they are at risk of inhaling more haze particles,” Garin said.

She also warned against exercising outdoors as it increases the intake of airborne toxins harmful to health. “When you exercise, you increase breathing so you will inhale more particles… which can aggravate pulmonary conditions and allergies,” she added.

Garin said the DOH was highly recommending the use of face or dust masks in the areas affected by the haze. “In areas where there is very thick haze, you should also protect your eyes,” she added.

Read more!

Indonesia: Parts of Aceh Completely Submerged Amid Severe Floods

Muhammad Hamzah Jakarta Globe 27 Oct 15;

Jakarta. Severe floods have struck Aceh, forcing hundreds of residents to flee as their houses have become completely submerged underwater, and in some cases, even being carried away by the current.

High-intensity rains have poured down on the districts of Southeast Aceh, South Aceh and West Aceh from Sunday afternoon through to Monday morning, causing the local Gelombang River to overflow and flood residential areas, roads, irrigation channels, rice fields and mosques.

Residents are afraid that the floods will not subside any time soon as the areas are reportedly still cloudy, indicating that there are more rains to come.

“The floods in Southeast Aceh have swept away five houses while 10 others are severely damaged and 102 are buried in mud. The flooding across the main highway stretches as long as 100 meters,” Ali Basrah Pasaribu, the Southeast Aceh deputy district head, said on Monday.

The Aceh Disaster Mitigation Agency (BPBD) is still evacuating victims, leading them to higher ground in order to avoid the floods.

This was the case in South Aceh,, where hundreds of families have been forced to abandon their homes.

In West Aceh, it was reported that three houses had been washed away by the floods while others were submerged underwater due to rising water levels.


Floods submerge 3,238 houses in Langkat, North Sumatra
Antara 27 Oct 15;

Langkat, N Sumatra (ANTARA News) - Some 3,238 houses in five sub-districts in Langkat District, North Sumatra Province, were flooded following incessant heavy rains over the last few days, according to the Langkat disaster mitigation office.

Tanjungpura sub-district was the worst hit by the flooding, Noto Atmojo of the local disaster mitigation agency, stated here, Tuesday.

The five sub-districts affected by the floods are Sawit Seberang, Padang Tualang, Hinai, Tanjungpura, and Sei Lepan.

In Sei Lepan, the floods inundated a 150-hectare palm oil plantation. The floodwaters, reaching a height of up to 150 centimeters, submerged several roads and cut off land transportation.

In Tanjungpura, the floodwaters submerged 2,766 houses located in the villages of Teluk Bakung, West Pematang Cengal, Paya Perupuk, Baja Kuning, Pekubuan, Pekan Tanjungoua, and Pantai Cermain.

In the meantime, floods also hit South Aceh District, inundating more than one thousand houses, following heavy downpours on early Tuesday.

"It is estimated that more than one thousand houses have been flooded in South Aceh. The floods were triggered by early morning heavy rains," Erwiandi from the South Aceh disaster mitigation office, noted.

The floods affected the sub-districts of Tapaktuan, Samadua, Sawang, Central Trumon, and East Trumon.

The floodwaters in most of the sub-districts have resided, and the local authorities have set up public kitchens to help the flood victims.(*)

Read more!

30 years later, is there an end in sight to haze problem?

Today Online 28 Oct 15;

KUALA LUMPUR — For decades, smoke from Indonesia blows into Malaysia towards year-end, erasing the country’s iconic skylines and driving people indoors to wait out what has now become known as the “haze season”.

A headline from nearly 20 years ago said “ASEAN ministers to discuss smog problem” — and in 2015, they are still discussing it.

After talking for so long and extensively, what have Malaysia and Indonesia achieved?

“Sadly, nothing much,” said Dr Helena Varkkey, a senior lecturer at Universiti Malaya’s Department of International and Strategic Studies, in an email interview.

“Haze has only become more severe as the years go by. Both governments continue to call for stricter enforcement of zero-burning and controlled burning laws. They, however, are continually being flouted.”

Dr Varkkey, who has written more than a dozen academic articles on smoke, said while Indonesia had brought several individuals and companies to court for illegal burning and sentenced them, this was “a very small proportion of the total wrongdoers”.

“Otherwise, both countries usually respond to haze in a very reactive manner. Firefighters and aircraft are deployed only after fires are detected, and not much, if any, preventive actions are taken before the burning season.

“The government (and people) seem to forget the haze as soon as the sky is clear — out of sight out of mind.”

Dr Varkkey said Southeast Asia has been experiencing almost annual smoke since 1982 and, 33 years later, Malaysians shouldn’t hold their breath for year-round clear skies to return.

“The haze problem persists simply because of the lack of enforcement. Both countries have rather strong laws governing clearing of land. However, companies, especially, are able to get away with flouting them.

“This is because there are often close patronage relations between companies and the governing bodies.

“Individuals from these companies are often connected to government elite either through genuine friendships or reciprocal relations built through election funding or other political contributions.”

She said these close relationships allowed companies to gain what should, by right, be illegal – access to peatlands, and to get away with burning if and when it happens.

For example, Dr Varkkey said, policemen purposely delayed investigations so that evidence could be cleared, adding that even if cases were brought to court, they were often dropped with no explanation.

But although the problem persists in Indonesia, neighbouring countries, such as Singapore and Malaysia, are feeling the burn.

The smoke from Indonesia’s fires have forced schools here to shut down for several days at a time, flights to be cancelled, and has reportedly triggered increase in cases of respiratory illnesses across several states. At its peak, the air pollutant index (API) recorded a “very unhealthy” level of 308 for Shah Alam on Oct 4, at 9am.

But Malaysia’s hands were mostly tied in the matter, given that the problem and solution remained in Indonesia, said Dr Varkkey.

“However, the Malaysian government can play a stronger role in pressuring Malaysian plantation companies operating in Indonesia to adhere to laws, and possibly even holding them responsible for their actions in Malaysian courts, even though the wrongdoings occurred in Indonesia.

“Singapore is trying out such a law, and this mechanism will be something to watch for Malaysia.

“If the enforcement problems mentioned above are not addressed, and if patronage relations continue to reign supreme over laws and regulations, there is little hope to end the years of haze.”

She said in the early years, smoke was normally attributed to villagers in various parts of Indonesia and, to a lesser extent, Malaysia practising “swidden agriculture”, which involved slashing and burning different parts of the jungle to make way for new crops.

But as time went by, new culprits emerged: commercial plantations and, to a certain extent, pulp and paper, said Varkkey.

“A key contributor (is) plantations opening up on peatlands. Even though peatlands are protected lands, demand for land and also other factors (like lack of villagers living here) have encouraged (usually illegal) opening of these lands.

“Peatlands are highly fire-prone when dried out in preparation for planting. When burned, it produces the thick, black, and heavy smoke that easily travels across state boundaries. And these fires are notoriously hard to put out, as they burn underground.”

She said for the annual smoke to disappear for good, governments must go beyond their “regular reactive response”.

Proactive action was needed, she said, and suggested as an example that they use aircraft to circle jungles and croplands before the burning season to warn people they were being watched.

She said Indonesian President Joko Widodo, or Jokowi, had instructed his ministers to revoke licences of companies found to have used fire and this had allowed the government to identify thousands of guilty companies.

“However, it still remains to be seen if these cases will be resolved satisfactorily.

“If patronage relations prove to still be stronger than Jokowi’s clout, then we should all brace ourselves for more haze in the following years.” THE MALAYSIAN INSIDER

Read more!

Singapore ups efforts to grow clean technology, renewable energy sectors

Speaking at the opening of the Asia Clean Energy Summit on Tuesday (Oct 27), Minister for Trade and Industry (Industry) S Iswaran revealed that the Economic Development Board had secured five new investments across the fields of solar, fuel cells, smart grids and testing services in Singapore.
Patrick John Lim Channel NewsAsia 27 Oct 15;

SINGAPORE: The Republic has increased efforts to grow the clean technology and renewable energy sectors with new investments.

Speaking at the opening of the Asia Clean Energy Summit on Tuesday (Oct 27), held during the Singapore International Energy Week, Minister for Trade and Industry (Industry) S Iswaran revealed that the Economic Development Board had secured five new investments across the fields of solar, fuel cells, smart grids and testing services in Singapore in 2015.

The companies - Intelligent Energy, Accenture, OMNETRIC Group, DNV GL and Grass Energy - have committed a total of S$150 million in cumulative business expenditure over the next five years and the creation of over 100 jobs.

Speaking at the event, Mr Iswaran said: "These investments are a strong vote of confidence of Singapore's role as an effective cleantech hub, with an emphasis on innovation, project development and financing activities."

Also at the opening, Mr Iswaran witnessed the signing of a Memorandum of Understanding between Singapore Power and its first batch of innovation partners, 3M and OMNETRIC Group under its Singapore Power Energy Advanced Research and Development programme (SPEAR).

The SPEAR programme is part of a S$30 million dollar initiative between Singapore Power and EDB to drive innovation, commercialisation of next generation energy network technologies, for greater reliability and efficiency throughout Singapore's grid infrastructure.

- CNA/dl


Singapore boosting efforts to develop clean energy
Seow Bei Yi, The Straits Times AsiaOne 29 Oct 15;

SINGAPORE - Five companies have committed to investing a total of $150 million towards the development of clean energy in Singapore.

The money will be spent over the next five years across the fields of solar, fuel cells, smart grids and testing services. It will also create more than 100 jobs here.

Minister for Trade and Industry (Industry) S. Iswaran announced these and other developments yesterday at the second Asia Clean Energy Summit held at Marina Bay Sands.

Clean energy is viewed as a key solution to reducing pollution and the impact of climate change. Renewable energy is also becoming more attractive, due to its growing cost competitiveness and contributions to enhancing energy security.

"The haze that has affected several countries in South-east Asia has further reinforced the need for sustainable development and sustainable business practices," said Mr Iswaran.

With demand for energy in Asia expected to more than double by 2035, Singapore can establish itself as a centre for "clean technology".

This may be done through innovation and testing, not just for technology, but also in terms of business models.

The five companies investing here include Singapore-based Graess Energy, which will serve as German solar energy company Grass Group's new headquarters.

Fuel cells specialist Intelligent Energy will open its first supply chain hub outside of its British headquarters, and consulting firm Accenture will expand its smart grid capabilities by strengthening its team of experts here.

Information technology company Omnetric Group plans to open a regional hub for research and development in the first half of 2016, focusing on the development of smart grid systems.

Certification firm DNV GL will open a new test centre here to attract and support companies to develop and test network and digital substation technologies.

The Asia Clean Energy Summit also saw the signing of a partnership between trade promotion agency IE Singapore, the Asian Development Bank and the Sustainable Energy Association of Singapore.

It sees IE Singapore coming on board to provide assistance for the Sustainable Energy Centre of Excellence, a regional training centre that aims to train policymakers, giving them skills for developing sustainable energy projects. The centre ran its first workshop in July.

Yesterday, utilities company Singapore Power and the Economic Development Board signed a memorandum of understanding with the Singapore base of US conglomerate 3M and Omnetric Group. As part of the Singapore Power Energy Advanced Research and Development programme, it will aim to develop and pilot cutting-edge technologies.

- See more at: http://business.asiaone.com/news/singapore-boosting-efforts-develop-clean-energy#sthash.JF6XMv07.dpuf

Read more!

Bird photographers stuff styrofoam into live fish to bait eagles

AsiaOne 28 Oct 15;

SINGAPORE - A group of bird photographers in Singapore are raising the ire of people on the Internet after they were caught on video pumping air and stuffing styrofoam bits into a live fish in order to bait eagles.

The incident allegedly took place on Aug 16 this year at a park in Bukit Gombak.

Chinese daily Lianhe Zaobao said it understands that the Agri-Food and Veterinary Authority of Singapore (AVA) is investigating the case.

According to Zaobao's report, the photographers were allegedly trying to bait the endangered Grey-headed Fish Eagles, which feed on fish. There are only 12 to 18 such birds left in Singapore, it said.

In the video, a man can be seen injecting air into the swim bladder of a live fish with a syringe. The fish is then handed to another man who stuffed styrofoam bits into the fish through the mouth. A third man then threw the fish into the pond in the park.

The men were trying to keep the live fish struggling near the surface of the water in order to lure the eagles with an "easy meal", according to a National University of Singapore researcher that the newspaper spoke to.

The video was put online by Mothership.sg in a report on Monday (Oct 26). The incident was reported first on the 10,000 Birds blog "after a tip-off by one Charlie Gordon, an amateur nature photographer from Singapore", Mothership reported.

The Animal Concerns Research and Education Society (ACRES) has called the photographers' actions cruel, to fish and eagles. The eagles could be harmed after ingesting the styrofoam, it said.

It also said that it has been notified of the case and has referred it to AVA.

A reader on Mothership has apparently identified four of the men in the video, showing screenshots of social media pages belonging to these men. The social media accounts of these men have apparently been deactivated or removed, but the screenshots and photos show that these men, which closely resembles the men in the video, having posted many well-taken photos of birds on social media.

This incident calls to mind a similar case last year - that of photographers tying a young bird to a shrub to get good shots of its parents. A photographer was fined $500 in that case, Zaobao reported.

Read more!

7 cats found dead in 12 days in Yishun

Foo Jie Ying, My Paper AsiaOne 28 Oct 15;

SINGAPORE - A spate of Yishun cat deaths so alarmed Nee Soon Member of Parliament (MP) Louis Ng that he has vowed to ensure that the people behind these "barbaric acts" are caught.

In a Facebook post last Friday, Mr Ng, who is also the executive director of the Animal Concerns Research & Education Society (Acres), wrote: "In the past month, seven cats have been found dead and one wounded, in suspicious circumstances...

"Many of you have contacted me and I share your concerns about this and want to ensure that the person (or persons) committing these barbaric acts is/are caught."

Speaking to The New Paper yesterday, Mr Ng 37, said: "I'm very disturbed. That's why I did the Facebook post. The AVA (Agri-Food and Veterinary Authority) and police are investigating, but they can only put out so many eyes.

"But if everyone is out there (watching), we might get somewhere."

The most recent incident, on Oct 5, involved Bushy, a community cat that was found dead near Yishun Polyclinic. It was the seventh cat to die in 12 days.

A Cat Welfare Society (CWS) volunteer who patrols the Yishun area said Bushy was found bloodied under a tree. "The night before it was found dead, it was well. My husband fed it and it was running about," said the volunteer, who declined to be named.

Late last month, a seriously injured cat was found at Northland Primary School. It had suffered blunt trauma on its back and it eventually succumbed to its injuries, added the volunteer.

Aside from the seven dead cats in the Yishun area, another feline called Greyie was also found injured at Northland Primary. It survived, but its hind legs are now paralysed.

The CWS volunteer believes that the abuse cases have been caused by the same few people due to the pattern of injuries found on the cats - blunt trauma on the spine or lower back.

Mr Ng declined to comment further on the deaths, citing ongoing police investigations.

He acknowledged that nabbing the culprits is an uphill task.

"People can say they are looking, say, for a Chinese man in his 40s, but that's very vague. It's pretty difficult to find a person like that. "There is an increased volume of patrolling because of the cat killings, but it's difficult because the area is big and we never know when these people strike," he said.

As the cats were found near open-air carparks, the MP is hopeful that the culprits may have been caught in action on in-car cameras. He said: "The footage is crucial and provides concrete evidence.

"Some people may leave their in-car cameras on all the time, but nobody reviews the footage regularly, so I'm hoping if I give the dates and locations of the cat deaths, people can check and hopefully find something."

"The (Facebook) post also sends out a message that we are watching," Mr Ng said.

Cases of animal abuse and deaths are not new and the animal rights activist hopes to put an end to these incidents through awareness of animal welfare.

There has been some progress, he said.

For instance, an angler who was caught on video trying to nab an otter pup was identified soon after the video was uploaded online.

Although alternative options such as legislation exist, Mr Ng feels that caring for animals should be intrinsic, rather than be motivated by fear.

"If we don't do something only because we might get caught, I don't think we can progress further as a society," he said, adding that animal welfare issues will be one of the causes he will champion in Parliament.

The recent Yishun cat deaths are just a subset of the rising number of cat abuse cases in Singapore, said CWS chief executive Joanne Ng. She said the CWS responds to an average of 50 cat-related cases daily.

"And that's on the low end. About 10 per cent of these cases are about cats being abandoned or injured and they are often linked to neglect.

"To me, that's not a good reflection of our society or the mental health of people. It tells me that people are highly stressed and they are taking it out on helpless animals," she said.


Another cat found dead at foot of Yishun block; 8th cat death in 6 weeks
Chew Hui Min, Straits Times AsiaOne 31 Oct 15;

SINGAPORE - Another cat was found dead in Yishun on Friday (Oct 30) morning, the eighth in six weeks.

Nee Soon MP Louis Ng appealed for witnesses on Facebook with a post on Friday afternoon.

He wrote: "I'm extremely disturbed and upset that another cat has been found dead this morning at Blk 115B Yishun Ring Road."

Mr Ng told The Straits Times that he hopes that there were witnesses or the CCTVs at the block captured something.

"A lot of units are facing that direction, so I'm hoping that someone saw something," Mr Ng said, adding that evidence is hard to come by in these cases.

Ms Veron Lau of the Cat Welfare Society said that "the cat was discovered at 10.30am by a kindergarten teacher who heard a thud".

According to Ms Lau, this was the third cat thrown from the block this year. The previous cases happened in February and April, she said.

Read more!

Rising perils of climate change

David Fogarty, Straits Times AsiaOne 28 Oct 15;

The weather has been breaking new records, with this year expected to be the warmest on record. July, August and September have been the hottest months since modern records began.

Last week, Hurricane Patricia, one of the most powerful storms recorded, slammed into northern Mexico. Earlier this month, record floods hit the US state of South Carolina.

As extremes grow, everyone will be affected, from the poorest in Africa and India to those in well-off cities such as Singapore, New York and Hong Kong.

Climate change threatens the world's food and water supplies, cities and coastlines. Sea levels are rising as the oceans become warmer, dramatically increasing the odds for storms.

Warmer and more acidic oceans are also damaging reefs and fish stocks.

Globally, the weather is becoming more prone to extreme droughts, floods and storms. Growing crops, catching enough fish and keeping reservoirs full are proving more challenging every year.

In Paris, nearly 200 nations will meet from Nov 30 to Dec 11 to try to agree on the final shape of a global pact to curb the pace of climate change.

Ultimately, the pact is about cutting greenhouse gas emissions, chiefly carbon dioxide (CO2) from burning fossil fuels in cars, power stations and industry. CO2 builds up in the atmosphere and oceans, trapping extra heat that is fuelling wilder weather.

Doing a deal is urgent and long overdue after previous efforts failed to deliver a pact that brings all nations on board.

"It's late. It may already be too late," French President Francois Hollande told a recent gathering in Paris of high-ranking officials, scientists, business executives, NGOs and media.

"If no substantial measures are taken, we won't be dealing with hundreds of thousands of refugees but millions over the next 20 or 30 years," he said, in direct reference to the migrant crisis in Europe.

Everyone has to get on board.

"The agreement seeks to foster international co-operation and spur ambitious climate action by every country, big or small, developed or developing, as this is the best way to address the global challenge of climate change," a spokesman for Singapore's National Climate Change Secretariat (NCCS) told The Straits Times in an e-mail.

A study released this month by US intelligence agencies said climate change and extreme weather were among the threats to food availability in countries of strategic importance to the US over the next 10 years. Extreme weather was also a likely cause of social and political unrest.

"We judge that weather and climate patterns to 2025 will be key in determining local and regional crop production and will be a dominant factor contributing to the volatility of food prices," said the report from the Office of the Director of National Intelligence.

Africa and Asia were the regions where food security would be most affected, the report said.

Reiterating the risks, US Secretary of State John Kerry said this month that global warming was the biggest threat to global food security.

Singapore is not immune and is vulnerable to rising sea levels, hotter temperatures and changes in rainfall patterns.

And, as a global trade hub, it can be affected by weather disasters outside, from the food it imports, such as seafood, to the materials manufacturing firms need to make their goods.

Climate change can also affect investments Singaporeans make in other countries.

A study led by Australian researchers and published this month warned of a collapse of global fish stocks. A combination of warming oceans, increased acidity, pollution and overfishing would reduce the diversity of marine species.

"There will be a species collapse from the top of the food chain down," the study's authors warned.

Rising seas from melting glaciers and polar ice caps threaten hundreds of millions of people along low-lying coastlines, from Manila to Miami, to Lagos and London.

According to an Indonesian government report, 42 million Indonesians living within 3km of the coast are vulnerable to rising sea levels.

In a study published on Oct 13, researchers found steep cuts to emissions in the next decade are the only way to avoid substantial Antarctic ice loss and associated sea-level rise, The Guardian reported.

The study, published in the journal Nature, found that if global average temperatures rose by around 3 deg C, this would trigger accelerating ice loss that would go on for thousands of years, raising sea levels by 0.6m to 3m by the year 2300, depending on how high man- made greenhouse gas emissions remain.

But if the rise in global average temperatures remains within 2 deg C, ice loss can be minimised.

Animals will suffer too, with many forced to move to cooler areas or unable to hunt, such as polar bears, which rely on vanishing sea ice in the Arctic to catch seals and other prey.

The Arctic is warming twice as fast as the rest of the planet.

The world, though, is responding to the threat and more than 150 nations have made emissions reduction pledges ahead of the Paris talks - though these pledges commit the world warming by at least 3 deg C, signalling that much more carbon belt-tightening is needed.

Many nations already see the benefits of cutting carbon pollution, such as the United States, which has put caps on emissions from power plants.

China is curbing coal use to tackle air pollution. China has invested heavily in hydro, wind and solar power and installed more renewable energy-generating capacity than any other nation.

India aims to build 100 gigawatts (GW) of solar capacity by 2022 from about 4GW now and has set a target of 60GW of installed wind power capacity by the same year.

Globally, wheat, rice, corn and other crops are being re-engineered to cope with droughts, heat and salinity. Such collective efforts are the only way the world will be able to both adapt to and rein in the accelerating pace of climate change.

"No country is immune to the effects of climate change and no country can deal with it on its own," the NCCS spokesman said.

Read more!

Bikini islanders seek US refuge as sea levels threaten homes

Matt McGrath BBC News 27 Oct 15;

Flooding in the Marshall Islands in 2014 caused extensive damage and left hundreds homeless

About 1,000 Bikini islanders have applied to relocate to the United States as rising seas threaten their adopted home.

The residents were moved from their Pacific atoll as result of atomic bomb tests in the 1940s.

But their new home, on another of the Marshall Islands, is struggling against huge tides and increasing storms.

The islanders have now asked Washington to change the terms of a trust fund to allow them settle in the US.

In 1946 several hundred islanders were moved from Bikini Atoll by the US government, which wanted to test atomic weapons on the remote atoll.

Some 23 nuclear tests were conducted including the huge Bravo hydrogen bomb, the largest weapon detonated at that time by the US.
King tides

The islanders moved to a nearby island in the Marshall chain called Kili in 1948.

Under an agreement with the US, a resettlement trust fund was eventually established to help the Bikini residents. This would pay for construction of homes within the Marshall Islands.

But now the islanders say that their homes are being swamped by the increased ingress of sea water during king tides.

There was widespread flooding in 2011 and again this year. Salt is also creeping up from beneath Kili, threatening agriculture and water supplies. In the early part of this year the island's runway was entirely flooded, cutting off the residents.

"The people of Bikini came back to us and asked us to take this proposal to the US, to request the resettlement trust fund be used to settle people in the US not just the Marshall Islands," said Tony de Brum, Foreign Minister of the Marshall Islands.

"We have not seen the final text of the legislation but the request that went in was on the basis of Kili being uninhabitable because of climate change."

The US Department of the Interior is supporting the islanders and is now proposing legislation in Congress that would change the terms of the resettlement trust.

Under an agreement between the Marshalls and the US, islanders have the right to live, work and study in the US without restrictions on the duration of their stay.

"This is an appropriate course of action for the United States to take regarding the welfare and livelihood of the Bikinian people, given the deteriorating conditions on Kili and Ejit Islands in the Marshall Islands - with crowding, diminishing resources, and increased frequency of flooding due to King Tides on their islands," said Assistant Secretary of the Interior Esther Kia'aina.

The Marshall Islands government says the experience of the Bikini islanders shows the need for a new global agreement on climate change.

They believe that a new deal can be agreed at a global conference in Paris that begins at the end of November.

One key element for the island state is that the agreement stipulate that global temperature rises be kept under 1.5 degrees C from pre industrial levels.

Minister de Brum said that from the point of view of small islands and atoll states, two degrees "cannot remain as the absolute cap for everything we are trying do in limiting global warming".

Read more!

Australia: Seagrass, unsung ecological hero, potential economic powerhouse

Tiger Webb ABC News 26 Oct 15;
Seagrass meadows provide carbon capture and storage at a rate up to a hundred times greater than rainforests. So why aren't they being used as an economic resource? The Science Show investigates.

Paul Lavery is a professor of marine ecology at Edith Cowan University, and he is excited about seagrass.

Despite the name, seagrasses aren't actually grasses—they evolved from terrestrial plants and have more in common, evolutionarily speaking, with lilies. Seagrass often gets mistaken for seaweed, though only the former produces fruits and flowers, and the latter lacks the specialised plant tissue that more easily allows seagrass to absorb nutrients from sediment on the sea floor.

Seagrasses get a lot done simply by showing up. The leaves and stems of seagrass slow water currents close to the seabed, reducing erosion and improving water quality. Seagrass provide shelter from predators and a safe spawning point for fish. Some species of fish spend their entire life cycles in seagrass meadows. Seagrass is also an important source of food. Even dead seagrass—washed ashore and known as wrack—provides habitat and nutrients for crabs.

Lavery has another reason to be excited about seagrass habitats: seagrass meadows are phenomenally productive carbon sinks.

'They pack a huge punch in terms of the amount of carbon they can lock away,' says Lavery, who believes the carbon storage capacity of the soil beneath seagrasses to be, per square metre, between ten and one hundred times that of terrestrial systems. In fact, the amount of carbon dioxide stored in aquatic ecosystems is so great that biologists had to give it its own label: blue carbon.

'Blue carbon is the term that we use to talk about carbon captured by marine vegetated ecosystems,' Lavery says. 'These are salt marshes, mangroves, seagrass ecosystems mainly, we use that to differentiate from carbon captured by terrestrial ecosystems—rainforests, the arboreal forest of the northern hemisphere—which we refer to as green carbon.'

Australia's coastline offers the largest and most diverse seagrass assemblage in the world. 'We are blessed,' says Lavery, 'it's fantastic to work here.'

'But we also have some of the best examples of destroying seagrass meadows in the world.'

Mining and coastal development throw up sediment, blocking the light needed for seagrass to photosynthesise. Run-off in rainier seasons can result in 'nutrient-laden water', which sounds as though it would be healthy for aquatic plants but unfortunately isn't. Oh, and there's the pressures brought about by climate change and trawling.

But, says Lavery, the biggest problem facing Australian seagrasses has to be dredging. As the Australian economy became more dependent on exports, port numbers increased and their size expanded. And that has necessarily involved a lot of sediment dredging.

'If you took all the of the sediment that was going to be dredged,' Lavery mimes with his hands, 'And put those into one cubic metre packing boxes side by side, you could go around the equator three and a half times.'

And that's a problem for blue carbon, because seagrass meadows can only effectively sequester carbon when it's locked away permanently. When deep sediments are disturbed—by dredging or natural causes such as cyclones or flooding—the carbon stored within the sediment can be released. 'You throw it up into this oxygenated and nutrient-rich surface water, and potentially what happens is that bacteria turn it back into carbon dioxide,' Lavery says. 'And that goes back into the atmosphere.'

Biodiversity isn't often seen as sexy, and it can be difficult for policy makers to get het up about erosion. Efforts to engage citizen science in the cause of Australian meadows, laudable though they are, do effectively amount to watching (sea)grass grow. But what if Australia's seagrass meadows were viewed as an economic resource? Enter Lavery and his team, who worked on a very conservative estimate of the amount of carbon the meadows stored and worked out its dollar value, based on prices paid at the global carbon trading market at the time.

'We came up with a value of many billions of dollars,' he says.

Concerns have been raised over the cost and efficiency of carbon capture and storage as a means of carbon emission abatement in Australia. According to Lavery, many of the problems with carbon capture and storage could be cheaply and efficiently solved by the use of seagrass meadows.

Unfortunately for Lavery, he has seen a gradual shift away from the use of seagrass in global carbon trading schemes. 'Which is a great pity, I think, because there's potentially an economic bonanza there, which would also have the win-win situation of conserving and looking after these really important seagrass ecosystems.'

So, what does he see as the way forward? 'I think two things need to happen: scientists need to be able to provide very reliable information on how much carbon is stored and where its stored—and what we desperately need is economists to come in from the other side and make it apparent to decision makers about how this carbon can be factored into trading systems.

'As scientists, we're not very good at that.'

Lavery points to forestry systems that provide an economic incentive for conserving productive ecosystems—particularly through United Nations programmes such as REDD+, which provides financial incentives to countries shown to reduce their emissions from deforestation. But for Lavery, the economic argument is the icing on the seagrass cake.

'Here in Western Australia, the Rock Lobster fisheries are the single biggest fishery that we have. They're dependent on those seagrass ecosystems ... elsewhere with mangroves and salt marshes, it's all interconnected.

'The values that seagrass serve are enormous and this is just one more very compelling reason to be looking after these systems.'


Damaged seagrass meadows release ancient carbon
Anna Salleh ABC Science 21 Oct 15;

Human damage to seagrass meadows leads to the release of ancient carbon stores, a study has found.

Australian researchers studied sea grass meadows in Jervis Bay that had been disturbed by seismic testing in the 1960s.

"We found that in the area that had been disturbed, there had been a 72 per cent decline in the amount of organic carbon," marine ecologist Dr Peter Macreadie for Deakin University and the University of Technology, Sydney said.

The findings suggest protecting and restoring seagrass meadows could be an important strategy in mitigating climate change, say the authors in today's issue of the Royal Society journal Proceedings B.

If our findings are common throughout the rest of the world ... then we're talking about a hell of a lot of carbon that's being released.
Dr Peter Macreadie
Seagrass is a flowering plant that forms underwater meadows around coasts on every continent except Antarctica. Seagrass meadows act as a nursery ground for juvenile fish, cycle nutrients, stabilise our coastlines and prevent erosion.

But, they are also very good at sequestering carbon.

"What we've learnt about seagrasses is they can capture and store carbon at a rate of 40 times faster than tropical rainforest," said Dr Macreadie.

He said seagrasses lock away the carbon for much longer than forests on land.

"They store the carbon for millennial timescales," said Dr Macreadie. "It will stay there more or less permanently so long as you don't disturb those ecosystems."

'About 1,000 years' worth of carbon lost'

It had been unclear whether ancient carbon would stay locked in the ground if seagrass meadows were disturbed, or if it would be released again, eventually back into the atmosphere where it could accelerate climate change.

To investigate the issue, Dr Macreadie and his colleagues sampled soil in the areas where the seagrass had been lost and compared it to nearby pristine areas where there had been no loss.

When the researchers dated the sediments they found the sediments were between 1,300 to 3,000 years old.

"About 1,000 years' worth of carbon that had been sequestered had been released and lost as a result of that disturbance," Dr Macreadie said.

He said the findings had implications for the large amounts of seagrass being lost due to coastal development.

"We know that about 50 per cent of the world's seagrasses have disappeared since the 1990s," Dr Macreadie said.

"That's about two football fields of seagrass per hour."

"If our findings are common throughout the rest of the world ... then we're talking about a hell of a lot of carbon that's being released."

How meadows capture carbon

The carbon in the soil of seagrass meadows comes not only from dead seagrass, but also from a host of other life forms such as plankton, as well as sediment from land, all of which are filtered out of the water by the seagrass.

In fact, said Dr Macreadie, previous research has shown, on average globally, about 50 per cent of carbon in seagrass beds comes from the land.

It is believed carbon is able to collect underneath seagrass meadows because of the anoxic environment they create, which prevents aerobic microbes from breaking down the carbon.

In support of this, Dr Macreadie and colleagues also found the microbes in the soil of the Jervis Bay seagrass meadows were different where disturbance had occurred.

"We saw that in the disturbed areas there were much higher abundances of microbes that have the capacity to eat the carbon and break it down," Dr Macreadie said.

There has been growing awareness over the past five years of the importance of seagrasses, salt marshes and mangroves to the carbon cycle.

"They occupy less than 1 per cent of the sea floor but they sequester more than half of the carbon in the ocean, maybe as much as 70 per cent," Dr Macreadie said.

He said the findings suggest protection and replanting of seagrass meadows could prove to be an important strategy to offset carbon emissions.

While the IPCC is yet to officially include seagrass meadows in carbon accounts, he said the Australian Government was making moves to do so.

Read more!

Half million die in decade of disasters in Asia Pacific - U.N.

Alisa Tang Thomson Reuters Foundation 27 Oct 15;

BANGKOK, Oct 27 (Thomson Reuters Foundation) - The Asia Pacific region, the most disaster-prone part of the world, suffered 1,625 disasters in the decade through 2014, and needs to spend more on adapting to climate change and preparing for more extreme weather, the United Nations said on Tuesday.

The region's disasters - 40 percent of the global total - claimed half a million lives over the decade, affected 1.4 billion people and caused $523 billion in economic damage, the 2015 U.N. Asia-Pacific Disaster Report said.

The world body urged the region's governments to invest more in adapting to climate change and preparing for disasters as the risks the region faces are worsened by its rapid economic growth and mushrooming population.

"Building resilience is not a choice or luxury for us, but a compulsion," Shamshad Akhtar, head of the U.N. regional development arm for Asia Pacific, said at the launch of the report in Bangkok.

"Investing in disaster risk reduction is of course proven effective. It's a critical area, but at the same time it's neglected."

FACTBOX: Asia's deadliest disasters, benefits of early warnings

Some 772 million poor people in the region are particularly vulnerable to disasters and tend to live in low-value, hazard-prone areas such as urban slums, steep slopes, flood plains and riverbanks, the report said.

They lack the resources to take preventive measures and do not having savings to draw upon when disaster strikes, it said.

International aid for disasters was $28 billion from 2004 to 2013, but most of this was for emergency response and rehabilitation, rather than prevention, it said.

In the Pacific Island nation of Fiji, the government began allocating funds for disaster risk reduction in 2013, "shifting from a culture of reaction to a culture of prevention", said Inia Batikoto Seruiratu, Fijian national disaster management minister.

Home to about 887,000 people, Fiji is improving roads, bridges and jetties, as well as lifelines such as water and electricity infrastructure, Seruiratu said at the U.N. conference centre in Bangkok.

MAKING HOMES STRONGER

With most people living in rural areas, Fiji is also focusing on programmes to ensure economic well-being, increasing its budget to help rural communities repair or rebuild homes with better quality materials that can withstand cyclones, he said.

"If you look at the figures from previous disasters, a lot of money is spent on housing rehabilitation because most people lose their houses," Seruiratu said.

"It's about cost and benefit: Increase the allocation on housing, rather than spending more money when the disaster comes."

Akhtar said regional cooperation was crucial as many disasters strike across borders, including floods, cyclones, droughts, and most recently the 7.5-magnitude earthquake on Monday that killed hundreds in Afghanistan and Pakistan.

"It is a grave concern that disasters are becoming more frequent, much larger and more intense," she said.

"Increasing threats from transboundary risks across the region demand ... cross-border sharing of information and regional cooperation."

She said multi-hazard early warning systems help save lives, adding that early warning systems must include fast and reliable dissemination of warnings, community awareness on how to respond, and long-term financial sustainability to support developing these mechanisms.

"Since the Indian Ocean tsunami in 2004, our early warning system strengthened, but gaps remain in the last mile," Akhtar said.


FACTBOX-Asia's deadliest disasters, benefits of early warnings
Alisa Tang Thomson Reuters Foundation 27 Oct 15;

BANGKOK, Oct 27 (Thomson Reuters Foundation) - The United Nations Economic and Social Commission for Asia and the Pacific (ESCAP) on Tuesday released its 2015 report on the most disaster-prone region in the world.

The Asia-Pacific region was hit by 1,625 natural disasters from 2005 to 2014, which killed half a million people and caused $523 billion in economic damage.

The region suffered 40 percent of all disasters worldwide, 60 percent of deaths, and 80 percent of the number of people affected.

Here are other facts from the U.N. 2015 Asia-Pacific disaster report:

- In the period from 2005 to 2014, earthquakes and tsunamis were the most deadly disasters, killing 200,000 people.

- The most frequent disasters were floods and storms. Storms killed about 170,000 people, floods killed about 40,000.

- Within the Asia Pacific region, Southeast Asia had the most disasters, with 512 events from 2005 to 2014 and 177,000 deaths.

- Over the past decade, the region had eight of the 10 largest disasters in terms of fatalities, and four of the 10 largest in terms of economic damage.

- Cyclone Nargis, a category 3 storm that hit Myanmar in 2008, was the world's second deadliest disaster in the past decade, with 138,000 killed or missing. (The deadliest was the Haiti earthquake in 2010, with 225,570 deaths.)

- Also in 2008, a 7.9-magnitude earthquake in China's Sichuan province killed 87,000 and caused $60 billion in damage.

- In 2011, Japan's 9.0-magnitude earthquake and tsunami killed 20,000 people and caused $165 billion in damage, representing 3.8 percent of the country's GDP.

- The region also had a large number of deaths from extreme temperatures with 56,000 killed in a severe heat wave in North and Central Asia in 2010.

- Based on present trends, by the year 2030 economic losses in the region could average $160 billion per year.

- Recent investments in disaster resilience include hanging footbridges in the Philippines to provide access to schools and vital infrastructure during floods; in Thailand typhoon forecasts five to seven days in advance so farmers can harvest crops early.

- From 2004 to 2013, international assistance to the region totalled $438 billion, including $18.2 billion for emergency response to disasters, $6.8 billion for reconstruction, relief and rehabilitation, and $2.9 billion for disaster prevention and preparedness.

- Early warning and preparedness have dramatically reduced the death toll of cyclones in Bangladesh, where 4,234 were killed in a category 5 storm in 2007, down from 138,866 killed in a category 3 storm in 1991, and 300,000 killed in a category 3 storm in 1970.

Read more!

Quake damage could have been mitigated: Indian environmentalists

Urbanisation and the clearing of forest land along the Himalayan range has led to rapid stress developing underground - exacerbating the risks of the release of pressure more frequently.
Zain Awan, Channel NewsAsia 27 Oct 15;

NEW DELHI: Hundreds have died after a magnitude 7.5 earthquake hit north-eastern Afghanistan and Pakistan on Monday (Oct 26) with tremors felt as far away as India.

The quake, just slightly weaker than the one which struck Nepal over six months ago, was felt in many Indian states.

"The earthquake was strong like the one that struck some time ago,” said Srinagar resident Mohammed Shafi Sheikh. “When we rushed out the street lights and the ground was shaking. Everyone was panicking."

"I had just returned from school when the earthquake jolted everything,” added Aashi Saiyyed, a Jammu resident. “We rushed out of our homes."

While damage on the Indian side has been minimal, some geologists suggest the disaster could have been prevented if environmental policies were followed.

India has seen rapid urbanisation, an explosive population growth and much of its forest land along the Himalayan range cut to make way for more urbanisation. This has led to rapid stress developing underground - exacerbating the risks of the release of pressure more frequently.

In the state of Jammu & Kashmir alone, over 60 per cent of water bodies have given way to the construction of homes and tourism developments

"The primary motive is infrastructure without even taking cognizance of what is the soil nature that we have, the soil type and vulnerability in terms of seismic zone we have,” said Vimlendu Jha, executive director of Swechha. “If you look at landslides … the cause is largely because of geological reasons but also because of man-made interventions."

But it is not just earthquakes that experts are cautious about. Northern India has also witnessed massive floods over the last five years with over 5,000 people dying in 2013 in the state of Uttarakhand alone.

Though the Himalayan regions of Kashmir, Himachal Pradesh and Uttarakhand, have strict regulations for logging and construction, ecologists say these rules have not always been strictly followed.

They warn that more needs to be done to prevent such catastrophes from happening again.

- CNA/ec

Read more!

Global warming to increase heat, decrease productivity in SE Asia - report

Alisa Tang Thomson Reuters 28 Oct 15;

BANGKOK, Oct 28 (Thomson Reuters Foundation) - Rising temperatures and humidity due to climate change are likely to increase the number of days with unsafe "heat stress," putting Southeast Asia at great risk of significant drops in productivity, a research firm said on Wednesday.

Southeast Asia over the next three decades could lose 16 percent of its labour capacity due to rising heat stress, which could cause absenteeism due to dizziness, fatigue, nausea and even death in extreme cases, the British firm Verisk Maplecroft said.

The company predicted the biggest losses in productivity in Singapore and Malaysia, with 25 percent and 24 percent decreases from current levels. Indonesia could see a 21 percent drop, Cambodia and the Philippines 16 percent and Thailand and Vietnam 12 percent.

"Climate change will push heat stress impacts to boiling point with significant implications for both national economies and the health of vulnerable workers," said James Allan, head of environment at Verisk Maplecroft, in a statement.

The company used climate projections to calculate the drop in labour capacity, based on the occurrence of conditions that prompt heat stress and leave workers unable to perform physical activity.

It said by 2045 the number of heat stress days in Singapore and Malaysia will rise to 364 (from 335 and 338 respectively); to 355 from 303 in Indonesia; and to 337 from 276 in the Philippines.

Calculating potential lost productivity for 1,300 cities, the company found 45 of the 50 highest risk cities were in Southeast Asia, including Kuala Lumpur, Singapore and Jakarta.

Twenty of the 50 highest risk cities are in Malaysia, 13 in Indonesia, four in the Philippines and three are in Thailand.

High-risk cities outside the region included Cartagena, at the top of the list, and Barranquilla in Colombia, Panama City and Arraijan in Panama, and Manaus in Brazil.

Read more!