Japans Plan for Emissions Reductions

post from FUTURISM NOW on 05 January 2010 10:19:12 PM. © FUTURISM NOW

Kambayashi/AP - Japanese Prime Minister Yukio Hatoyama speaks during his first press conference of the year.

Japan released its New Policy Agenda of Japan on Climate Change in English in mid-December. (Download the agenda here). According to their document, it both verified their proposed reductions of 25% and proposed new substantive reductions.

“. . . . Prime Minister Hatoyama stated that the new mid-term target to reduce emissions by 25% compared to 1990 levels was hinged on establishing ?a fair and effective international framework in which all major economies participate,? but made no clarification whatsoever of his standards for ?fairness.? In fact, perhaps equitability criteria have not yet been defined even within the government. . . .

“The new mid-term target, or ?30% reductions below 2005 levels? represents the most stringent of the four options discussed in the Mid-Term Target Review Committee under the former administration. It had once been dismissed because it would have too large an impact on the economy and the policy tools and scale that it called for were unrealistic.”

The U.S. is only proposing a 17% reduction in emissions based on 2005 levels, which is about a 4% reduction based on 1990 levels. It must be tough for the U.S. government to be “bettered” in this way by countries as small but ambitious as Japan. Can’t the U.S. do more? We need to at least try. More ideas from the Japanese agenda:

Actually the number of 17% of the U.S. is with respect to 2005.

Vision for a Developed-Developing Country Cooperation Model: For International Contribution by Industry to Climate change Solutions (1) Industry should also consider ways to ?bridge? developed and developing countries. Contributions should be centered on substantively reducing GHG emissions through energy and environmental technology transfer and international intersectoral cooperation and agreement and supplying products that will contribute to creating a global low-carbon consumption society in terms of LCA (life cycle assessment).

(2) Japan, the US and China should launch a model project of developed-developing country cooperation based on public-private partnership in areas including energy conservation, renewable energies and nuclear energy. Reductions generated in the project should be trilaterally accredited among the three countries as offset credits that could be used for the purpose of staying in compliance with domestic schemes.

(3) Furthermore, industry could also look into setting up a new organization provisionally called the Institution for Engineering Solutions for Climate change, which would be based on public-private partnership to promote the projects described above, to implement the Voluntary Action Plan in wider international dimensions and to collect benchmarking data.

They make a good point below about individuals versus countries (which is also an idea I like since Copenhagen collapsed into political fighting Individuals and their cities and states will make up a huge part of fighting climate change, but how much is possible is yet unknown).

However, in order to employ equalized emissions per capita as an equitability standard, fundamental rules under the Kyoto Protocol [...]

Read The Full Article:
http://www.civilianism.com/futurism/?p=3988

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Albatross Chicks Fed Plastic Ocean Pollution by
Parents

post from Curious Cat Science and Engineering Blog on 05 January 2010 10:19:00 PM. © Curious Cat Science and Engineering Blog

photo of dead Albatross chick

See more photographs of remains of albatross chicks on the Midway Atoll, a tiny stretch of sand and coral near the middle of the North Pacific.

The nesting babies are fed bellies-full of plastic by their parents, who soar out over the vast polluted ocean collecting what looks to them like food to bring back to their young. On this diet of human trash, every year tens of thousands of albatross chicks die on Midway from starvation, toxicity, and choking.

To document this phenomenon as faithfully as possible, none of the plastic in any of these photographs was moved, placed, manipulated, arranged, or altered in any way. These images depict the untouched stomach contents of baby birds in one of the world’s most remote marine sanctuaries, more than 2000 miles from the nearest continent.

Read The Full Article:
http://engineering.curiouscatblog.net/2010/01/05/albatross-chicks-fed-plastic-oce
an-pollution-by-parents/

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Keep Correcting the Deniers Because Exxon is
Still Paying Them

post from FUTURISM NOW on 05 January 2010 08:46:46 PM. © FUTURISM NOW

GOP Protest Builds Against EPA Regulating Greenhouse Gases

A storm of Republican protest is erupting over the Environmental Protection Agency?s finding that greenhouse gases pose a public danger, with the latest wave coming from a state among those most at risk from the effects of climate change.

Republicans are stepping up their efforts to stop climate change legislation. They are also continuing their campaigns of propaganda to create confusion in the public’s mind about global warming.

We really have to keep pushing back at the deniers and climate change skeptics before they do any more harm to public opinion, because they are pulling out all the stops. Their new campaign is “CO2 is Green”. This is from Media Matters:

A new group named “CO2 is Green” (really) is contending that “CO2 is not a pollutant. CO2 makes Earth green because it supports all plant life. It is Earth’s greatest airborne fertilizer.” (Astoundingly inaccurate!)

The Washington Post wrote:

The man behind the latest entry to the climate legislation wars is H. Leighton Steward, a veteran oil industry executive, co-author of the “Sugar Busters!” dieting books, and winner of an Environmental Protection Agency award for a report on damage being done to Mississippi wetlands. Now retired, he says he wants to “get the message out there” that carbon dioxide, which the Supreme Court has ruled a pollutant and which most scientists regard as a dangerous greenhouse gas, “is a net benefit for the planet.”

Steward has joined forces with Corbin J. Robertson Jr., chief executive of and leading shareholder in Natural Resource Partners, a Houston-based owner of coal resources that lets other companies mine in return for royalties. Its revenues were $291 million in 2008.

Not only have Steward and Robertson founded “CO2 is Green” to take misinformation to the airwaves, they’ve also launched “Plants Need CO2″ to educate Americans about the joys of carbon pollution.

They have formed two groups — CO2 Is Green designated for advocacy and Plants Need CO2 for education — with about $1 million. Plants Need CO2 has applied for 501(c)(3) tax status, so that contributions would qualify as charitable donations, said Natural Resource Partners general counsel Wyatt L. Hogan, who also serves on the group’s board.

This has to be fought against. Some kind of climate legislation has to get passed this year, preferably a tax and dividend bill. (See the Larson bill in the House. America?s Energy Security Trust Fund Act of 2009). The cap and trade bill isn’t good enough because it won’t right climate change aggressively enough, but we can work on making that stronger.

In the meantime, working against us will be this denier cult, which is really driven by money and greed. (Join the CO2 is Green Facebook group here and have some fun setting them straight.) Wherever people see climate deniers online, my recommendation is to respond to them with as many facts as you can.* They are using new tactics, straw man arguments, red herrings, blatant lies, you name it, [...]

Read The Full Article:
http://www.civilianism.com/futurism/?p=3971

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Frankfurt am Main U-Bahn-Kunst (Frankfurt Subway
Art), 6

post from Living the Scientific Life (Scientist, Interrupted) on 05 January 2010 07:59:54 PM. © Living the Scientific Life (Scientist, Interrupted)

tags: Frankfurt am Main U-Bahn-Kunst, Frankfurt am Main, Germany, Expat Life, Frankfurt Subway Art, photography

Frankfurt am Main U-Bahn-Kunst.

Hauptwache, Frankfurt am Main, Germany.

Image: GrrlScientist, 29 December 2009 [larger view].

One last look at the completed work.

Read the comments on this post...

Read The Full Article:
http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/scienceblogs/grrlscientist/~3/huBC-khvMGM/frankfur
t_am_main_u-bahn-kunst_5.php

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Tomorrow Night in NYC: SciCafe at AMNH

post from Living the Scientific Life (Scientist, Interrupted) on 05 January 2010 06:59:03 PM. © Living the Scientific Life (Scientist, Interrupted)

tags: education, public outreach, SciCafe, science cafe, AMNH, American Museum of Natural History, NYC, streaming video

Who: Ichthyologist Melanie Stiassny
What: free public presentation, "Mysteries of the Congo: Exploring the World's Deepest River"
When: 700pm, Wednesday, 6 January 2010
Where: Gottesman Hall of Planet Earth, American Museum of Natural History, Enter at the 81st Street (Rose Center) [directions and maps]
Cost: free, and there is a cash bar (must be 21+ with ID)

Read the rest of this post... | Read the comments on this post...

Read The Full Article:
http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/scienceblogs/grrlscientist/~3/cKR7RdMo8VI/tomorrow
_night_in_nyc_scicafe.php

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New mathematical model aids Big Bang
supercomputer research

post from Machines Like Us - Science at the speed of thought on 05 January 2010 06:31:25 PM. © Machines Like Us - Science at the speed of thought

Scientists have made many discoveries about the origins of our 13 billion-year-old universe. But many scientific mysteries remain. What exactly happened during the Big Bang, when rapidly evolving physical processes set the stage for gases to form stars, planets and galaxies?

Read The Full Article:
http://machineslikeus.com/news/new-mathematical-model-aids-big-bang-supercomputer
-research

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Goddard scientist's breakthrough given ticket to
Mars

post from Machines Like Us - Science at the speed of thought on 05 January 2010 06:09:08 PM. © Machines Like Us - Science at the speed of thought

The quest to discover whether Mars ever hosted an environment friendly to microscopic forms of life has just gotten a shot in the arm.

Read The Full Article:
http://machineslikeus.com/news/goddard-scientists-breakthrough-given-ticket-mars

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JLo supports reality

I am not all that big on celebrity endorsements, but I do understand that they can be very beneficial in getting the word out on important topics ot people who might not otherwise hear it.So I’m pleased to see that Jennifer Lopez did a short video[...]

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http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/BadAstronomyBlog/~3/-1C7u1X4fBw/

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Pictures of a Toddler (Universe)

Here’s an article showing pictures from the Hubble Telescope taken of the very, very early universe. The galaxies have stars that are only about 600 million to 800 million years old – about as far back as the Hubble Telescope can see (the universe itself is about 13.7 billion years old…).

Read The Full Article:
http://www.micfarris.com/2010/01/pictures-of-a-toddler-universe/

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Here Is Why The Apple Tablet Might Be Awesome

The hype and attention surrounding the impending launch of the Apple tablet is a fascinating marvel in the tech industry. The product has not even been launched yet – Apple (AAPL) has not officially confirmed that the product is even in development – but nevertheless the entire tech community from media to consumers is absolutely [...]

Read The Full Article:
http://singularityhub.com/2010/01/05/apple-tablet-blows-the-doors-off-it-is-going
-to-be-awesome/

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