from Richard J.T. Klein <richard.klein@sei.se> date Sun, Aug 1, 2010 subject Deadline for abstracts extended to 10 August: ‘Climate Adaptation in the Nordic Countries’

Due to technical problems with the abstract submission system we have extended the deadline for submitting abstracts to Tuesday 10 August. Abstracts can be submitted online at http://nordicadaptation2010.net/

Abstracts are invited on all issues relevant to climate adaptation in the Nordic countries, including (but not limited to) the following:

- Theory and methods for adaptation research
- Scenario-based impact studies
- Vulnerability assessment and vulnerability indicators
- Adaptation as a social process (including cultural factors, values, institutions)
- Climate information, climate services
- Adaptation planning and decision tools
- Adaptation policy development
- The economics of adaptation
- Adaptation in urban regions
- Adaptation in rural areas
- Adaptation and natural resources (forests, agriculture, water, marine environment)
- Adaptation in the tourist sector
- Adaptation and human health
- Insurance, finance and adaptation
- The role of non-state actors in adaptation (civil society, private sector)
- Gender perspectives on adaptation
- Nordic adaptation within an EU and global context
- Links between adaptation and mitigation

We also welcome your suggestions for parallel sessions, especially those that bring together knowledge from multiple locations and research projects. Session proposals should include a description of the session (topic, motivation, format). Please send your session proposal, together with abstracts for each suggested presentation, by email to nordicadaptation.content@sei.se no later than 10 August. All parallel sessions will be 90 minutes long.

As communicated earlier, the international conference ”Climate Adaptation in the Nordic Countries: Science, Practice, Policy’ will take place in Stockholm on 8–10 November 2010. Please note that we are unable to provide financial support to participants. Any requests to this effect will be ignored.

Should you have any further questions, do not hesitate to contact us at nordicadaptation.content@sei.se.

Richard Klein

—
Professor Richard J.T. Klein
Stockholm Environment Institute
Kräftriket 2B
10691 Stockholm, Sweden
http://web.me.com/rjtklein/

We know that most paper nominated the American Robert Dudley to replace Tony Hayward at the helm of the sinking BP.
After all one third of the company’s oil and gas wells, refineries and other business interests are in the US, and no less then 40% of its shareholders are in the US – and you bet – the major known disaster they are part of is in the US. So, will an American at top help quiet down the anti-foreigner sentiment projected at Hayward?

But then the following article tells us that this is a case fit to push a woman to the top – if you wish – over the cliff – thus scoring points somehow in a lost situation. You see – women can advance and take over the job from failed men? Will this then hold up? Will it be a fitting American Woman of  Texas – or Alaska – may be?

Tony Hayward Out at BP; Don’t Be Surprised If They Pick a Woman to Replace Him.

http://www.fastcompany.com/1674475/tony-hayward-out-at-bp-dont-be-surprised-if-they-pick-a-woman-to-replace-him

———————————————————————————————————————

Day 96 to the Macondo Blow-out: Tony Hayward Out at BP; Don’t Be Surprised If They Pick a Woman to Replace Him.

BY Anya Kamenetz July 26, 2010.

Tony Hayward is reported to be out as the CEO of BP, with a sweet 600,000-pound pension waiting for him (that’s $928K) as a “reward” for not only presiding over the Deepwater Horizon disaster, but performing like a whiny schoolboy in the weeks and months since. “I want my life back”? Congratulations, you’ve got it.

If history is any guide, BP may well choose a woman to replace him. During the recent financial crisis and recession, women emerged as the go-to turnaround leadership candidates for institutions and nations in trouble. Carol Bartz as CEO of the embattled Yahoo. Mary Schapiro as head of the beleaguered SEC. Elin Sigfusdottir and Birna Einarsdottir, appointed to run two (out of three) of Iceland’s nationalized banks (New Landsbanki and New Glitni), after the collapse of the country’s financial system and Johanna Sigurdardottir as the nation’s interim prime minister–both the first-ever female head of state in Iceland and the first openly gay head of state anywhere. Elizabeth Warren, currently the leading candidate to head the newly created Consumer Financial Protection Bureau and try to make sense of the hash of consumer financial protections. Even at BP itself, before Cynthia Warner left to head biofuels startup Sapphire Energy, she was made the head of a new health, safety, and security group in BP’s refining sector in response to the 2005 Texas City disaster (unfortunately, she apparently failed to have a lasting impact on the oil company with the worst safety and environmental record in the Big Six).

Michelle Ryan and Alex Haslam, two British social psychologists, say these kind of barbed opportunities are all too commonly offered to women. They call this phenomenon “the glass cliff.”

In 2008, the S&P 500 fell 38.5%, its worst year since 1937. But the average large company run by a woman was down four points more–42.7%. Women’s average tenure as CEOs tends to be lower and stock performance worse.

Ryan and Haslam’s studies have found the reason behind this: It’s not that women are categorically worse leaders, but that they are disproportionately hired as CEOs only at firms that have been struggling for years. High-flying companies almost never appointed women to top positions. Their controlled experiments confirm that professionals in the business, legal, and academic worlds are far more likely to choose a woman for a leadership role when the enterprise’s chances are dicey.

The glass cliff is a dangerous corollary to the glass ceiling. For many complex reasons, women–along with other outsiders like minorities–tend to be handed the chance to lead only when an enterprise is already on a downward spiral. If BP decides to go this way, you heard it here first.

www.unece.org/oes/disc_papers/climat_change.html

—–

UNECE climate change activities^[1]

Table of Contents:

Introduction
Conventions
Vehicle regulations
Energy efficiency in production
Energy-efficient housing
Sustainable forestry
Sustainable biomass
Other related UNECE areas of work

Introduction

Climate change is a human-induced process of global warming, largely resulting from the emission of greenhouse gases (GHGs) such as carbon dioxide, nitrous oxide, methane and fluorocarbons.[2] Countries are under increasing pressure to curb their emissions of these gases and to enhance carbon sinks in a drive to mitigate the effects of climate change. However, combating the threats of human-induced global warming requires more than mitigation; it is equally important to reduce society’s vulnerability to climate change through adaptation, as established by the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) Nairobi work programme on impacts, vulnerability and adaptation to climate change, launched in 2005. Adaptation addresses the impacts of climate change, including climate variability and weather extremes.[3]

The United Nations Secretary-General has put climate change at the top of the United Nations agenda, ensuring that the “United Nations system will continue … to bring to bear the collective strength of all its entities as an integral part of the international community’s response to climate change.”[4] The five regional commissions have assumed an active role in coordinating United Nations support for action on climate change at the regional level through the regional coordination mechanisms mandated by the Economic and Social Council in its resolution 1998/46 (annex III).[5] The five commissions are seen as conveners to support global, regional and national action on climate change, while coordinating their workplans and implementation efforts with other organizations that have significant mandates in their respective areas.[6]

The United Nations Economic Commission for Europe (UNECE) is a key driving force in combating climate change in the pan-European region and beyond. The UNECE region comprises 56 member States, spanning the whole European continent, the Caucasus and Central Asia, and also including Israel, Turkey, Canada and the United States of America. The region has a crucial role in contributing to the local and regional success of UNFCCC, as was noted by UNECE member States at the “Sixth Ministerial Conference “Environment for Europe” (Belgrade, 10–12 October 2007).[7] UNECE has spearheaded the region’s efforts to achieve the targets of United Nations Millennium Development Goal 7, especially to integrate the principles of sustainable development into country policies and programmes and to reverse the losses of environmental resources.

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Conventions

Long-range Transboundary Air Pollution

The 1979 UNECE Convention on Long-range Transboundary Air Pollution (LRTAP), and its protocols aim to cut emissions of air pollutants, inter alia, sulphur dioxide (SO2), nitrogen oxides (NOx) and non-methane volatile organic compounds (NMVOCs). Such pollutants can either directly influence global warming, by affecting the cooling or absorptive characteristics of the atmosphere, or indirectly influence it through, for example, ozone formation. Recent studies have shown important synergies in addressing air pollution control and climate change mitigation and have highlighted the economic and environmental co-benefits that are possible by tackling these issues in an integrated way.

The Convention has 51 Parties and eight protocols, which are all in force. The most recent of these, the 1999 Gothenburg Protocol, is currently under revision. It targets the environmental effects of acidification, eutrophication and ground-level ozone through emission cuts for SO2, NOx, NMVOCs and ammonia. Such cuts are known to mitigate global warming.

A recent major conference and workshop entitled “Air Pollution and Climate Change: Developing a Framework for Integrated Co-benefit Strategies” was held in September 2008 in Stockholm under the auspices of the Convention and the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP), and in consultation with the UNFCCC secretariat. It brought together policymakers and scientists from all United Nations regions to consider ways to develop and implement integrated programmes for decreasing emissions of both air pollutants and GHGs. The conclusions stressed the importance of using integrated strategies. Of special note was the possible “buying of time” in GHG mitigation through cuts in such air pollutants as black carbon and ozone, and air pollutants with a strong radiative forcing effect, which might be cut more readily than CO2 and achieve some GHG mitigation in the short term. The conference agreed there was a need to strengthen air pollution abatement efforts as well as climate change mitigation to achieve better health and environmental protection. It also noted the significant cost savings of using integrated approaches. The conclusions and recommendations of the workshop will be considered by the Convention’s Executive Body (Meeting of the Parties) in December 2008.

The Convention is using different models and methods to analyse environmental effects and to calculate the necessary emission abatement and related costs. In this way, cost-effective pollution control strategies can achieve the desired environmental targets with the least overall expenditure. Recent use of the Greenhouse Gas and Air Pollution Interactions and Synergies (GAINS) integrated assessment model, developed by the Convention’s Centre for Integrated Assessment Modelling, has explored synergies and trade-offs between emissions of air pollutants and GHGs, for current and projected energy use. The model includes both end-of-pipe controls and non-technical measures, such as behavioural changes in traffic or economic instruments.

The Convention’s scientific bodies are also incorporating climate change issues into their programmes of work. The European Monitoring and Evaluation Programme (EMEP), which monitors and models air quality, is involved in reporting and estimating emissions. Reporting requirements of the Parties have been harmonized with those of UNFCCC. EMEP is also responsible for the integrated assessment modelling work described above. The international programmes of the Working Group on Effects monitor and model environmental and human health effects of air pollution. Increasingly, these need to take account of the links to observed or predicted changes in climatic conditions. They also provide long-term monitoring of data that can identify changes that might be associated with a changing climate.

Discussions in the Convention’s bodies have drawn attention to the strong links between air pollutant and GHG emissions and have highlighted specific issues where integration of strategies is needed. For example, the current emphasis on renewable energy is leading to increased use of wood as a fuel. However, unless appropriate boiler technology is used, this can also lead to increased air pollution.

Water

The intrinsic relation of the hydrological cycle – and thus water availability, quality, and services – to climate change makes adaptation critical for water management and the water sector in general. The UNECE Convention on the Protection and Use of Transboundary Watercourses and International Lakes (Water Convention) is an important legal framework for the development of adaptation strategies, in particular in the transboundary context.

At their fourth meeting in Bonn, Germany, in 2006, the Parties to the Water Convention took a decisive step to supporting the development of adaptation strategies by agreeing to elaborate a guidance document on water and adaptation to climate change. A draft has now been prepared by the Task Forces on Water and Climate and on Extreme Weather Events, both under the Convention’s Protocol on Water and Health. This marks the first attempt under any convention to flesh out a climate change adaptation strategy in the water sector with a particular emphasis on transboundary issues. Based on the concept of integrated water resources management, the Guidance will “provide advice on how to assess impacts of climate change on water quantity and quality, how to perform risk assessment, including health risk assessment, how to gauge vulnerability, and how to design and implement appropriate adaptation measures” [ibid. p. 8]. The Guidance is expected to be formally adopted in November 2009 at the next meeting of the Parties.

One important step in the Guidance’s preparation was a workshop on climate change adaptation in the water sector organized under the Water Convention and the Protocol on Water and Health (Amsterdam, 1–2 July 2008). The workshop, which allowed for an exchange of experience in the region, an assessment of information needs for adaptation strategies and a discussion of the benefits of and mechanisms for transboundary cooperation, touched upon the institutional, policy, legal, scientific and financial aspects of adaptation in the water sector and included cross-cutting issues such as education. The workshop highlighted current challenges such as still limited transboundary cooperation, the focus on short-term rather than long-term measures, and the need to consider climate change together with other global drivers of change, e.g. the energy and food crises and changes in production and consumption patterns.

The Protocol on Water and Health, the first legally binding instrument aimed to achieve the sustainable management of water resources and the reduction of water-related disease, is also highly relevant to climate change adaptation. It establishes joint or coordinated surveillance and early-warning systems, contingency plans and response capacities, as well as mutual assistance to respond to outbreaks or incidents of water-related disease, especially those arising from extreme weather events. The Protocol’s Ad Hoc Project Facilitation Mechanism is a funding tool for implementation of the Protocol at the national level; its provisions on safe drinking water and sanitation are also of relevance to climate change.

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Access to information, public participation and justice

The UNECE Convention on Access to Information, Public Participation in Decision-making and Access to Justice in Environmental Matters (Aarhus Convention) constitutes the only legally binding instrument so far to implement principle 10 of the Rio Declaration on Environment and Development, which provides for the participation of citizens in environmental issues by giving them appropriate access to the information concerning the environment held by public authorities, including access to judicial or administrative proceedings, redress and remedy. Access to scientifically based information and public participation in decision-making on environmental issues – as provided by the Convention – are widely recognized as an important foundation for climate change mitigation efforts. UNFCCC, for example, underlined the importance of these principles at its thirteenth session, encouraging Parties to facilitate access to data and information and to promote public participation in addressing climate change and its effects and in developing adequate responses.[8] Environmental information can help to raise awareness about climate change issues and to strengthen synergies between mitigation and adaptation needs. Public participation in this process ensures that social values and trade-offs are represented in political decisions on climate-related issues.

UNECE is a co-organizer of the international conference, “The Role of Information in an Age of Climate Change” (Aarhus, Denmark, 13–14 November 2008). The event, marking the Aarhus Convention’s tenth anniversary, brings together leading scientists, policymakers, government authorities, non-governmental organizations, and representatives of the private sector to promote public access to information and public participation in addressing climate change.

The Protocol on Pollutant Release and Transfer Registers (PRTR), adopted in May 2003, is the first legally binding international instrument on PRTRs. PRTRs assist governments in collecting information on the emission of GHGs and toxic or hazardous substances from industrial facilities and other sources. By making this information available to decision makers and the wider public, PRTRs contribute to enhancing companies’ environmental performance, regional mitigation efforts and the fight against global warming and climate change.

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Vehicle regulations

Transport is a significant and growing contributor to global climate change. According to some estimates, it is responsible for 13 per cent of all anthropogenic emissions of GHGs and for almost one quarter of the world’s total CO2 emissions from fossil fuel combustion.[9]

In May 2008 in Leipzig, Germany, UNECE took part in the OECD International Transport Forum Ministerial Session, “The Challenge of Climate Change”, the first global meeting of transport ministers that focused on energy and climate change challenges relevant to the transport sector. Climate change mitigation and adaptation activities in the transport sector focus on different means of CO2 abatement: (a) innovative engine technologies to increase fuel efficiency; (b) use of sustainable biofuels; (c) improved transport infrastructure, including inter-modal transport and logistics to avoid road congestion; (d) dissemination of consumer information on eco-driving; and (e) implementation of legal instruments. In their key messages, transport ministers urged UNECE World Forum for Harmonization of Vehicle Regulations (WP.29) to “accelerate the work to develop common methodologies, test cycles and measurement methods for [light] vehicles” [ibid. p. 5], including CO2 emissions. For over 50 years, the World Forum has served as a platform for developing harmonized global regulations for vehicle construction, thus increasing their environmental performance and safety.

The World Forum agreed that a possible strategy for the automotive sector to contribute to the abatement of emissions was to pursue: (a) improved energy efficiency and the use of sustainable biofuels as a short-term objective (2015); (b) the development and introduction into the market of plug-in hybrid vehicles as a mid-term objective (2015–2025); and (c) the development and introduction into the market of electric vehicles as a long-term objective (2025–2040). This strategy would shift the automotive sector from the use of fossil energy to the use of hydrogen and electric energy. To be effective, this strategy needs to rely on the sustainable production of electricity and hydrogen, a crucial policy issue identified for future discussions on global warming and the reduction of CO2 emissions.

The World Forum previously adopted amendments to UNECE regulations to limit the maximum admissible level of vehicle emissions for various gaseous pollutants (e.g. carbon monoxide, hydrocarbons, NOx) and particulate matter. These have resulted in a substantial abatement of the emissions limits for new private cars and commercial vehicles. Moreover, UNECE Regulations were amended to include electric and hybrid vehicles as well as vehicles with engines fuelled with liquefied petroleum gas or compressed natural gas. At the present time, the World Forum is considering a number of energy efficiency measures, such as the development of a common methodology and measurement method to evaluate environmentally friendly vehicles, hydrogen and fuel cell vehicles, the use of other alternative energy sources such as biofuels including biogas, the installation in vehicles of engine management systems (e.g. the stop-and-go function), intelligent transport systems, tyre-pressure monitoring systems and the development of tyres with low rolling resistance. Once a consensus is reached, many of these measures are likely to be added to the UNECE regulations, which will help increase vehicles’ energy efficiency.

As concerns fuel-quality standards, in 2007 the World Forum demonstrated the close link between the market fuel quality and the emissions of pollutants from motor vehicles.  It recognized that further reduction of emissions required that cleaner fuel be available to consumers.  The lack of harmonized fuel quality standards was seen to hamper the development of the new vehicle technologies. Supported by UNEP and the International Petroleum Industry Environmental Conservation Association, the World Forum is committed to developing a necessary standard on market fuel quality, thus enabling vehicles to use fuels that minimize vehicle emission levels.

The Transport Health and Environment Pan-European Programme (THE PEP), a joint project of UNECE and the World Health Organization Regional Office for Europe, was initiated to help achieve more sustainable transport patterns and a better reflection of environmental and health concerns in transport policy. In particular, THE PEP also promotes sustainable urban transport, including alternative modes of transport, in the region.

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Energy efficiency in production

As energy is a major market in the UNECE region, which contains 40 per cent of the world’s natural gas reserves and 60 per cent of its coal reserves, a number of UNECE activities promote a sustainable energy development strategy, a key to the region’s climate change mitigation and adaptation efforts. The combustion of fossil fuels, the mainstay of the region’s electricity generation, is also a major source of GHG emissions. The sustainable energy projects of UNECE aim to facilitate the transition to a more sustainable and secure energy future by optimizing operating efficiencies and conservation, including through energy restructuring and legal, regulatory or energy pricing reforms. UNECE projects also encourage the introduction of renewable energy sources and the use of natural gas until cleaner energy sources are developed and commercially available, as well as the greening of the coal-to-energy chain.

For the period 2006–2009, the UNECE Energy Efficiency 21 (EE21) programme is working to promote regional cooperation to enhance countries’ energy efficiency and to reduce their GHG emissions, thus helping them meet their international treaty obligations under UNFCCC and the UNECE conventions. Energy efficiency is achieved by focusing on more efficient production, conservation and use of all energy sources in order to minimize GHG emissions.

Within the overall EE21 programme, UNECE manages the Financing Energy Efficiency Investments for Climate Change Mitigation project, with a budget of approximately US$ 7.5 million, financed by the Global Environment Fund, Fonds Français pour l’Environnement Mondial and the European Business Congress. This project is currently establishing a privately managed equity fund with private and public sector partners. The fund, which will benefit from both public and private sources, will target energy efficiency and renewable investment projects in 12 countries in Central Asia and Eastern and South-Eastern Europe.

Another project within the EE21 programme is RENEUER, a regional activity supported by the United States Agency for International Development, the United States Department of Energy, France and other bilateral donors. RENEUER promotes sustainable development in the region by overcoming regional barriers and creating favourable conditions for the introduction of advanced technologies for the efficient use of local energy resources.

Outreach activities to other regional commissions in the context of energy efficiency for climate change mitigation are being organized under the Global Energy Efficiency 21 (GEE21) project. This project, to be launched in December 2008 in Poznan, Poland, will develop a systematic exchange of information on capacity-building, policy reform and investment project financing to promote cost-effective energy efficiency improvements that will reduce air pollution, including GHGs.

The work of two expert groups under the Committee on Sustainable Energy relates to climate change mitigation. The Ad Hoc Group of Experts on Coal Mine Methane (CMM) promote the recovery and use of methane gas from coal mines to minimize GHG emissions. In February 2008 in Szczyrk, Poland, a UNECE-supported workshop assessed prospects for CMM recovery and use, noting that “Global potential for CMM projects to contribute to climate change mitigation and take advantage of the carbon markets is very strong because a reduction of one ton of methane yields reductions of 18 to 23 tons of carbon dioxide equivalent”.[10] However, economic feasibility of such projects typically requires a clear regulatory and legal framework, reasonable access to markets and relatively stable prices.

The Ad Hoc Group of Experts on Cleaner Electricity Production from Coal and Other Fossil Fuels held its first meeting in November 2007. Its programme of work includes reviewing the prospects for cleaner electricity production from fossil fuels and measures or incentives to promote investment in cleaner electricity production. The Group also assesses the regulatory needs for promoting investment in cleaner electricity production from fossil fuels, appraises the comparative advantages of investments in new capacities and analyses issues related to carbon capture and storage technologies, especially in the context of emerging economies in the UNECE region.[11]

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Energy-efficient housing

Due to both its high GHG emissions and its large potential for energy-saving measures, the housing sector plays a critical role in climate change mitigation. IPCC estimates that the global potential to reduce emissions at roughly 29 per cent for the residential and commercial sectors.[12] The energy-saving potential in this sector is also considerable: UNEP estimates that in Europe, buildings account for roughly 40 to 45 per cent of energy consumption, emitting significant amounts of carbon dioxide (CO2). Residential buildings account for the lion’s share of these emissions.[13]

Energy-efficient buildings can contribute to climate change mitigation and adaptation by reducing buildings’ energy consumption as well as by making them more resistant to severe weather events. Improving energy efficiency is especially important in the UNECE region, where projected increased housing construction and homeownership are likely to be accompanied by higher electricity consumption and thus growing emissions. UNECE has a programme geared to achieving maximal energy efficiency in the region’s housing, which will allow countries to share experience and good practice in reducing energy consumption in the residential sector, both vis-à-vis existing housing stock and new residential housing construction. This is expected to especially improve energy performance in parts of the region where progress is hampered by low innovation capacity and by a lack of knowledge about technical options to improve the thermal efficiency of existing buildings, and by outdated building codes that prevent countries from embracing the latest energy-efficient construction techniques. The programme will also include a wide-ranging regional assessment – featuring financing mechanisms, case studies, workshops and seminars for policymakers – and will benefit from close collaboration with above-mentioned EE21 project.

To date, UNECE has published country profiles on the housing sectors of Albania, Armenia, Bulgaria, Georgia Lithuania, Poland, Republic of Moldova, Romania, Russian Federation and Serbia and Montenegro. In 2009, two workshops (in Sofia and Vienna) will address the issue of energy efficiency in housing. A group of interested experts will assist the host countries in shaping the programme of the events and will provide the necessary expertise. In September 2008, the Committee on Housing and Land Management addressed energy efficiency in housing in the region, focusing on the legislative framework and incentives.[14]

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Sustainable forestry

Forests and wood are integrally linked to climate change and have an important role to play in mitigation and adaptation. Forests sequester carbon from the atmosphere when they grow, thereby offsetting a significant part of GHG emissions. According to the forthcoming UNECE Annual Report, the annual increase of carbon in EU-27 forests is equivalent to 8.6 per cent of GHG emissions in the European Union (EU). In Europe, forests sequester approximately 140 million tons of carbon a year. Wood products are a store of carbon, keeping it from release to the atmosphere. Forests store more than 80 per cent of terrestrial aboveground carbon and more than 70 per cent of soil organic carbon. They are also the source of wood energy that can substitute fossil energy, thereby reducing GHG emissions.[15] Wood can also be a substitute for non-renewable construction materials such as plastics, steel or concrete.

The UNECE Timber Committee has an active role in monitoring these trends and in promoting sustainable forest management. It collects basic data on forest resource assessment (e.g. carbon sequestration and storage in forests) and the production of and trade in forest products (e.g. harvested wood products, substitution of other materials). It contributes to policy monitoring by reporting on qualitative indicators of sustainable forest management and by publishing a chapter in the Forest Products Annual Market Review. It is currently developing a database on forest sector policies and institutions. In September 2008, UNECE hosted a workshop on “Harvested Wood Products in the Context of Climate Change Policies” to discuss different approaches to account for carbon stored in wood products and their economic, social and ecological impacts. It will also participate in the plenary session on Forest and Climate Change during European Forest Week (Rome, 21–24 October 2008). Finally, the UNECE Timber Committee provided an analytical contribution to the European Forest Sector Outlook Study in 2005 and has authored various papers on wood availability and the market for wood.

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Sustainable biomass

Since 1998, UNECE has been directing a major cross-sectoral project for enterprises in the biomass sector in the region. One of the central tasks of climate change mitigation is to replace fossil fuels with alternative energy. The project aims to strengthen sustainable biomass supply from selected countries in the UNECE region to energy producers in the EU, with a focus on agro- and wood residues, whose use is an important alternative to the use of (food) crops for fuel. The project also seeks to improve the logistics chain of biomass trade from producer to the end-user through improved inland transportation, port and trade logistics, and customs cooperation with respect to imports and exports of biomass. Two further aims of the project are facilitating the exchange of good practice with the private sector and exploring cross-sectoral approaches that take into account environment, energy, trade and transport issues.

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Other related UNECE areas of work

The “Environment for Europe” ministerial process

The “Environment for Europe” process provides a pan-European political framework for the discussion of key policy issues, development of programmes and launching of initiatives to improve the region’s environment and harmonize environmental policies. At the Sixth Ministerial Conference “Environment for Europe” (Belgrade, 10–12 October 2007), environment ministers explicitly recognized the urgent need to address climate change in the UNECE region. The Conference saw the launch of the Belgrade Initiative[16], a subregional effort in South-Eastern Europe to support subregional implementation of the UNFCCC through a Climate Change Framework Action Plan and a virtual climate change-related centre in Belgrade designed to help raise awareness and build capacity.

UNECE Strategy on Education for Sustainable Development

The UNECE Strategy of Education for Sustainable Development (ESD), adopted in 2005 by ministers and other officials from education and environment ministries across the UNECE region, endeavours to integrate key themes of sustainable development into all education systems. It constitutes the regional pillar of implementation of the United Nations Decade of ESD. At the joint session on ESD held during the Sixth Ministerial Conference “Environment for Europe”, environment and education ministers referred to the problems posed by climate change as a “leading example of where ESD could be applied to daily life, as climate change affects everyone and ESD offers an essential way to shape knowledge and attitudes, and hence could help us to address these problems” [17]

Modifying transport policies based on traffic-based information about carbon dioxide emissions

In order to evaluate the implementation of new national or regional measures to reduce their contributions to the global warming, Governments must analyse different possible strategies, especially those that address the total energy consumption of the transport sector. To make the right policy decisions and to optimize their strategies to attain CO2 reduction targets, an assessment and analysis tool is needed that integrates the most recent developments in transportation. This tool should be transparent so as to ensure that decisions overly swayed by special-interest groups. Such an information tool is currently under consideration. It is based on a uniform methodology for evaluating CO2 emissions in the land transport sector, and incorporates climate-relevant indicators as well as new transportation trends.

Environmental Performance Reviews

The UNECE Environmental Performance Reviews (EPRs), based on the OECD/DAC peer review process, aim to improve individual and collective environmental management. Since 1996, Central, South-East and Eastern European as well as Central Asian countries have been reviewed by UNECE, in addition to a few countries in transition that were reviewed in cooperation with OECD (Bulgaria, Belarus, Poland and the Russian Federation). A second round of EPRs have already been carried out for Belarus (2005), Bulgaria (2000), Estonia (2001), Republic of Moldova (2005), Ukraine (2006), Montenegro and Serbia and (2007) and Kazakhstan (2008), and are in process for Kyrgyzstan, Ukraine and Uzbekistan.

By disseminating relevant information, they contribute to enhancing public access to information about the environment and environmental issues and thus to more informed decision-making, relevant to the climate change debate. In future, they can provide a comprehensive analysis of instruments used in the context of regional climate change mitigation and adaptation efforts, a means to share good practice and highlight gaps in this area, and a way to offer important policy recommendations.

Strategic environment assessment

The UNECE Convention on Environmental Impact Assessment in a Transboundary Context (Espoo Convention) provides a framework for considering transboundary environmental impacts in national decision-making processes.

The Convention’s Protocol on Strategic Environment Assessment (SEA), not yet in force, will ensure that Parties integrate consideration of the environment into their plans and programmes at a very early planning stage. SEA can be used to introduce climate change considerations into development planning. This is in line with the conclusions reached at the high-level event “The Future in Our Hands”, convened by the Secretary-General in September 2007, as well as the recommendation of IPCC[18] that climate change mitigation and adaptation be integrated into an overarching sustainable development strategy. The IPCC also concluded that consideration of climate change impacts in development planning, as might be provided by SEA, is important for boosting adaptive capacity, e.g. by including adaptation measures in land-use planning and infrastructure design or by reducing vulnerability through existing disaster risk reduction strategies.[19]

Statistics related to climate change

The global official statistics community still only engages in an ad hoc way with the issues of climate change. UNECE is reviewing the possibility of setting up a joint task force (subject to the approval of the Bureau of the Conference of European Statisticians) to explore statistical activities related to the UNFCCC guidelines on the compilation of emission inventories. The task force will also take into account the recommendations that are expected to be developed at a forthcoming conference on statistics of climate change in the Republic of Korea. In June 2008, the meeting of the United Nations Committee of Experts on Environmental-Economic Accounting (UNCEEA) recommended that statistics on emissions should become part of the regular production and dissemination process of official statistics at the national level. In this context, national statistical offices should gradually take on the responsibility for regularly compiling emission statistics and contributing to the review of the guidelines to assembling emission registers.

This is expected to contribute to a better understanding of how official statistics can contribute to the understanding, measurement and monitoring of the different aspects of climate change as well as to bring together all current activities in a coherent framework.

Innovation and financing

UNECE has organized workshops and seminars with a view to enhancing the understanding of the process of technology diffusion, identifying possible barriers to take-up, and providing training and technical assistance to the region’s Governments on their innovation policies. This includes a financing dimension, in particular regarding early-stage financing of innovative enterprises. During the International Conference Investing in Innovation, which took place in Geneva in April 2008, a session on how environmental challenges can be addressed through innovation brought together policy makers and specialized financial intermediaries to discuss emerging trends in the allocation of risk capital for eco-investing and the type of policies required to encourage the mobilization of private financing in this area.

Efforts to mitigate or adapt to climate change are significantly boosted by the diffusion of existing technologies but also by the introduction of new ones. Given the scale and systemic nature of the necessary shift towards low carbon technologies, there is a clear link between the challenges posed by climate change mitigation and innovation policies.  In future, work on innovation and its related financing and intellectual property aspects could help to inform policies in relation to climate change.

We think it will – others’ opinions follow:

Iceland Volcano: Not Yet A Global Cooling Eruption

Date: 16-Apr-10
Country: NORWAY
Author: Alister Doyle,
A vast cloud from an intensifying volcanic eruption in Iceland is too small so far to slow global warming as happened in 1991 with the explosion of Mount Pinatubo in the Philippines, experts say.

Icelandic Volcano Eruption Intensifies

Date: 16-Apr-10
Country: ICELAND
Author: Omar Valdimarsson
A volcanic eruption in Iceland, which has thrown up a 6-km (3.7 mile) high plume of ash and disrupted air traffic across northern Europe, has grown more intense, an expert said on Thursday.

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The New York Times – Eruption Wasn’t That Powerful, but Effects May Linger.

By HENRY FOUNTAIN

Published: April 15, 2010

Bill Burton, associate director of the United States Geological Survey’s volcano hazards program, said the current eruption under the Eyjafjallajokull glacier bore similarities to the last eruption there, in 1821. “We seem to be reprising that episode again,” he said.

That eruption continued, on and off, until 1823. While no one can predict how long this one may last, Dr. Burton said, in volcanology, “The past is the key to the present.”

He added, “So if the other eruption lasted for two years, this one might as well.”

While an on-again, off-again eruption might not have much effect on air travel over the long term, it could affect the weather in northern Europe, said Richard Wunderman, a volcanologist with the Smithsonian Institution’s Global Volcanism Program. The volcanic plume contains a lot of sulfur, he said, “that can become an aerosol up there that hangs around a long time reflecting sunlight.”

“It’s not enough that it’s probably going to be cooling the whole climate,” he added. On a regional basis, it could also create what is called volcano weather, with smoglike conditions. That is what happened during the eruption of another volcano in Iceland in 1783, which spewed sulfur dioxide and other compounds and created a persistent haze. (Benjamin Franklin, who experienced the haze in Paris during negotiations on the treaty that ended the Revolutionary War, was among the first to draw the link between eruptions and climate.)

Unlike huge volcanic blasts including the one at Mount Pinatubo in the Philippines in 1991, the eruption in southern Iceland began slowly about a month ago, with a series of fissures on the eastern side of the volcano and what volcanologists call fire fountaining, the spewing of hot magma through vents. Dr. Burton said that it was only when the magma found a new route through the volcano earlier this week — shifting to the summit, directly under the glacial ice — that the ash-rich eruption began.

That eruption late Wednesday created a plume of ash that spread out across northern Europe at high altitudes, forcing aviation authorities to ground flights and close airports because of the risk of damage to aircraft, particularly the engines, from abrasive silicate particles.

Dr. Burton said that when the eruption shifted to the summit, there were indications that the silica content of the ash increased. “Theoretically, the more silica-rich the ash, the more risky or greater threat there is,” he said. But any volcanic plume is dangerous. “The plane is effectively sandblasted,” he said. “Even the windows can become frosted.”

Dr. Burton said the eruption ranked low on a measure of power called the volcanic explosivity index, nowhere near Pinatubo, which rated a 6 on the 1 to 8 scale.

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The Financial Times playful editorial writes that the Eyjafjallajokull volcano seemingly decided to give Icelanders something else to talk about then the responsibility their three banks had for the start of the financial crisis – the fact that built in problems from the UK and the Netherlands landed on the Iceland management of the banks. Now, their little volcano is sending its ash flying to those two neighboring countries as if it were a revenge. But what may be even a bigger volcano explosion might be if the activity expands to the near by Katla volcano as this happened 200 years ago – so things might get worse before any better.

The case of accession of Macedonia is no laughing matter. It is still unknown how Greece’s current financial and economic troubles will have an impact on the Macedonian name dispute. Athens is currently under tremendous pressure from big eurozone countries such as Germany and France to cut back spending and provide accurate data on its deficit, while facing unprecedented scrutiny by the European Commission.

Some diplomats suggest that this offers a window of opportunity for clearing the name dispute and should be seized, while others say that because of the painful economic measures, Athens will be even less inclined to compromise on the name issue, a matter of national pride.

But neither are some gestures from the government in Skopje of any help, such as naming the airport and a major highway after Alexander the Great, a king of the ancient Greek kingdom of Macedon – moves which prompted fierce criticism in Greece.

Brussels officials familiar with the matter say that if a solution is found, Macedonia’s membership could be coupled with Iceland’s, which has also applied to join the club. Their accession would happen after Croatia’s, which is the closest to EU membership at this stage.

“Once we open negotiations, people are in for a big surprise. Everybody thinks Iceland will have no problems in joining, but actually it is Macedonia who will be flying through the negotiating chapters. Apart from some classical problems with the judiciary and fight against corruption, Macedonia has harmonised its legislation and implemented a lot of EU requirements,” one EU source told this website.

As for Iceland, although it is part of the EU’s internal market, negotiations are likely to run into trouble over fisheries and other topics dear to the Nordic islanders. The current financial dispute with Great Britain and the Netherlands is also not looking good for the EU prospects of Reykjavik. And contrary to the situation with the Balkan country, some parts of the Icelandic political establishment are against EU membership.

For now, both Macedonian and Greek officials, despite the declared willingness to find a solution, have not yet inched closer to a result. The UN mediator on the issue, Matthew Nimetz, is due in Skopje next week. The UN is just the bigger international body to stir the EU soup.

OK, more important to us seems the Financial Times comment from Washington about “Baroso’s man goes to Washington.”

The comment is by Tony Barber who runs a Brussels blog and he addresses the EU appointment of Joao Vale de Almeida to be EU’s next Ambassador to the US.

The outgoing Ambassador is John Bruton who was a former Irish Prime Minister and well known to Congress and the White House when he got his appointment in 2004.

The incoming Ambassador is a Portuguese Eurocrat who worked for Mr. Baroso and is totally unknown to Washington. Indeed some in Washington have seen him as involved as a by-stander to the G8 and G20 meetings, but when faced with him, following the EU elected so called Permanent President and sort of Foreign Ministers, both of whom are totally unknown to Washington, all what they see as qualifications for Mr. Vale de Almeida is that for five years – 2004 – 2009 he was Chief of Staff for the EU Commission’s President Mr. Baroso – the non-permanent and non-rotating – third EU President – of that nebulous intractable – so called European Union – the symbol of its refusal to be united, even though he was the one that did in effect push for the Lisbon rules for creating that goal of a United Europe.

The laughs come up when the author of the note points out that the perception is reinforced by the fact that Baroso has engineered the Ambassadorial appointment for his man in advance of the newly being created EU foreign service under Dame Ashton – who will have her job as who chooses ambassadors.

OK, we hope the EU helps squeeze Greece into allowing its neighbors to chose their own names, and to squeeze Island of allowing its fish to be caught by Greek fishermen. The mess in Cyprus can then be left to the UN to handle that other tough issue and in the meantime – the EU of 27 will require from the world to be seen as an EU of 28 – with the EU itself being the added state that enlarges meeting tables with one more unproductive participant.

The sad thing is that the world needs an EU that amounts to the missing G3 with which China and the US can sit down at a small table before inviting over India, Brazil, South Africa, Turkey, Mexico, Japan, Australia, Russia . . . one or two more, and start looking at what is of highest importance for the future of the Planet – issues such as global warming and climate change.

GLOBAL WARMING IGNITES BORDERS AS WELL

By Manuel Manonelles, BARCELONA, (IPS) Posted by Other News January 3, 2009.

Little by little, it is being confirmed that the melting of the polar ice caps, whether in Antarctica or the Arctic, is happening significantly faster than initially predicted. The consequences of this for peace, one of the main victims of climate change, are enormous.

Glaciers and areas of high-altitude mountains that were previously considered zones of perpetual snow are now melting. A paradigmatic case is that of the alpine border between Switzerland and Italy where during a recent routine verification, certain sections of ice or perennial snow that had been on the map since 1861 were found to be missing. In this case, the two countries have enjoyed long periods of peaceful coexistence and are approaching the problem in a logical and cordial fashion, forming a commission to find a technical solution.

However, the possible implications of cases like this in other geographical areas are very worrisome. The destabilising potential of a similar development on the India-Pakistan border would be enormous, particularly in the zone of Kashmir or the Siachen glacier, where more than 3000 soldiers of both countries have died since 1984. The same is true of the tense China-India border, or the deeply problematic border between Afghanistan and Pakistan, which will grow increasingly porous with melting, contributing to a rise in destabilisation in what are already two of the most unstable countries on the earth.

Another major effect of global warming is the gradual opening of major global shipping lanes in areas that had previously been impassable because of ice. The Northeast Passage along the north of Russia, used recently for the first time in history, shortens travel between the ports of China, Japan, and Korea and Hamburg, Rotterdam, and South Hampton by 4,000 kilometres. With the Northwest Passage along northern Canada, travel between the China and the ports of the eastern United States is similarly shortened.

The opening of these new routes will completely change the dynamics of intercontinental trade and might render irrelevant places that until now were considered geostrategically essential, such as the Panama and the Suez Canal.

Add to this the draw of massive reserves of raw materials expected to be present in the Arctic, ever more accessible as the ice recedes, which is provoking a race for control of the area – including an arms race – and is stoking tensions particularly between Russia, Norway, Denmark, the United Kingdom, Canada, and the United States. The Russian news agency TASS has calculated oil reserves in the area at over 10 billion tonnes. Last year Canada approved an extraordinary 6.9 billion dollar arms bill to strengthen its military presence in its arctic zone, while Russia has resumed tactical flights of nuclear bombers in its polar region, triggering the protests of numerous countries.

This also explains, in part, the speed with which the European Union is processing the application for EU membership of bankrupt Iceland, which would place the body in the best possible position for future negotiations and territorial claims in the area with regard to future access to the “Arctic banquet”.

The melting of the ice caps is also the major cause of rising sea levels, which have other irreversible territorial, social, and economic consequences, such as the physical disappearance -partial or total- of certain small island states of the Pacific likely to occur within a few years -the Maldives, Samoa, Kiribati, among others. Obviously the implications are vast, including – in addition to the personal, environmental, cultural, and national trauma – the political and legal status of future states that have no territory. The principal components of the global infrastructure, from ports and refineries to airports and nuclear plants, are also seriously at risk, and will find themselves near or at or even below sea level.

It is important to note in this context that the majority of the global population lives in areas close to the sea, starting with megacities like Mumbai, London, New York, Shanghai, Tokyo, and Buenos Aires, and densely-populated areas like the Ganges delta in Bangladesh, where rising sea levels are already wreaking havoc in the form of water pollution and related effects. Recent studies indicate the possibility of some 200 million new environmental refugees in coming years -refugees who would only increase the already considerable humanitarian pressures and tensions in these areas and exacerbate existing or latent conflict.

The Global Humanitarian Fund issued a report this year that shows unequivocally that climate change today is responsible for some 300,000 deaths per year. Numbers for the medium and long-term are even higher. In this context, the urgency of fighting climate is a pre-condition for a peaceful future. Therefore, the international community has no other option, specially after the fiasco in Copenhagen, to spring into action as soon as possible. It is about climate, but also about peace and human lives.

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This and all “other news” issues edited by Roberto Savio can be found at http://www.other-net.info/index.php

“Iceland will be a hugely important partner if they join, contributing to the EU’s geographic completeness,” said Iceland’s ambassador to the EU, Stefan Haukur Johannesson, who was appointed chief negotiator in the upcoming accession talks; he continued – “The northwestern flank will be added, which is key in the age of climate change and when the EU is starting to develop its own Arctic agenda.”

The EU is keen to get a toehold on the Arctic, with its enormous oil and gas potential and shipping possibilities via Northwest Passage. The bloc itself has no territorial access to the pole. With Iceland on board, the EU would instantly be on the Arctic Council, membership of which has been blocked by Canada.

But Iceland’s governing coalition is divided over the EU application. The normally euro-sceptic Left Greens gave their okay to moving ahead with negotiations in order to join the government, but much of their membership has not reacted well to the decision and MPs are under pressure from local branches of the party. Some analysts are speculating that it could split the party in two, with the more environmentally minded wing of the party the more pro-EU.

The centre left Social Democratic Alliance and their far-left coalition partners are also split over what attitude to take toward energy-intensive industries and a range of other policy issues.   It is far from certain if the government were to fall that any new coalition would continue with the application process.

On Friday, a poll carried out by the Research Center of Bifröst University for the TV channel Stöð Two found that 54 percent of Icelanders now oppose membership while only 29 percent are in favour, with 17 percent uncertain.

The survey suggests that opposition to joining the bloc has hardened in the last few months, as a poll in August had EU supporters on 34.7 percent and opponents on 48.5 percent. In September, another poll put backers of accession on 32.7 percent and opponents on 50.2 percent.

After the crash of Iceland’s three banks  people are still very angry. They don’t know who they should be angry at, so the EU, seemingly,  has turned into a sort of scapegoat. “There’s anger at everything foreign – the Brits, the Dutch, the IMF, the EU. They make no distinction,” said the Ambassador. “Another opinion says that with the banking collapse, there was a panic. a huge majority wanted to join the EU – now that is gone.” This opinion also says -  “If we joined the EU, we would get maybe five MEPs, similar to Malta, and three votes in the Council of Ministers. Our voice just would not be heard there. Our interests would instantly be sidelined by the bigger countries.” Iceland’s main interest is in the fisheries, that provide it with one third of the foreign currency earnings, and the EU might not help in this area.

———- Forwarded message ———-

Maldives Join the Climate Neutral Network with a Pledge to Become World’s First Carbon Neutral Nation
Nairobi, 4 May 2009 – The Republic of Maldives, one of the countries most affected by climate change, has joined the Climate Neutral Network led by the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP).

This follows the announcement by Maldives President Mohamed Nasheed earlier this year to make the Indian Ocean island nation the world’s first carbon neutral country in just 10 years’ time, by 2019.

This ambitious objective will be achieved by fully switching to renewable sources of energy such as solar panels and wind turbines, investments in other new technologies, and sharing of best practices.

President Nasheed declared that “the Maldives will no longer be a net contributor to greenhouse gas emissions”.

“Climate change isn’t a vague and abstract danger but a real threat to our survival. But climate change not only threatens the Maldives, it threatens us all”, he added.

No part of the Maldives’ 1,200 tropical coral islets rises more than six feet (1.8 meters) above sea level, leaving the 400,000 inhabitants at great risk of rising sea levels and storm surges.

As part of coping with the effects of climate change, the Maldives Government focuses on coastal zone protection, land use management and protection of critical infrastructure.

The Maldives has become the seventh country to join the Climate Neutral Network (CN Net), a UNEP initiative launched in February 2008 to promote global transition to low-carbon economies and societies which also includes cities, regions, companies and organizations.

The other six nations that have pledged to move towards climate neutrality and joined the CN Net are Costa Rica, Iceland, Monaco, New Zealand, Niue and Norway.

Welcoming the Republic of Maldives on board the CN Net, UN Under-Secretary-General and UNEP Executive Director Achim Steiner stated that: “Climate neutrality is not just a developed nations’ concern, nor is it their prerogative. Developing nations such as Maldives can indeed leapfrog by embracing the low-carbon development model, which will assist in greening their economies and weathering both climatic and economic storms.”

“When the most climate change vulnerable nations display leadership in addressing the cause of the problem which they had very little to contribute to, there is no excuse for others not to act. The global community of nations can and must express its commitment to protecting the planet and powering green growth by sealing an ambitious climate deal at this year’s UN Climate Change Conference in Copenhagen”, he concluded.

For more information, contact:

At the Government of the Republic of Maldives: Ahmed Saleem, Permanent Secretary, Ministry of Housing, Transport and Environment, Tel: 3331695, Fax: 3331694, or e-mail:  saleem at meew.gov.mv, internet: http://www.environment.gov.mv/

At UNEP:

Nick Nuttall, UNEP Spokesperson and Head of Media, on Tel: +254-20-762-3084, Mobile: +254-733-632755, or when traveling: +41-79-596-5737, or e-mail:  nick.nuttall at unep.org

Or: Xenya Cherny Scanlon, Information Officer, Climate Neutral Network, on Tel: +254- 20-762-4387, Mobile: +254-721-847-563, or e-mail:  xenya.scanlon at unep.org; internet: http://www.unep.org/climateneutral

***********************************
Jim Sniffen
Programme Officer
UN Environment Programme
New York
tel: +1-212-963-8094/8210
 info at nyo.unep.org
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Posted in Costa Rica, Iceland, Maldives, Monaco, New Zealand, Niue, Norway

Discuss this article

From: Marc Pallemaerts <MPallemaerts@ieep.eu>
Date: Tue, Apr 14, 2009

The Institute for European Environmental Policy (IEEP) recently carried out an analysis of the extent to which the EU (and its then 15 Member States) fulfilled the solemn promises made to developing countries in the so-called ‘Bonn Declaration’ of 23 July 2001. Eight years ago, at the UNFCCC Conference of the Parties (COP6bis) which paved the way for the entry into force of the Kyoto Protocol, the EU-15 together with five other OECD donor countries (Canada, New Zealand, Norway, Iceland and Switzerland) collectively made a ‘strong political commitment’ to raise US$410 million a year from 2005 to help developing countries tackle climate change and to review this pledge in 2008. These Annex II Parties to the UNFCCC agreed to provide additional funds in a number of ways: through contributions to the Global Environment Facility (GEF), through other multilateral and bilateral aid channels (additional to 2001 ODA levels), and through three new climate change funds established under the Bonn/Marrakech agreements to provide financial assistance to developing countries: the Special Climate Change Fund, the Least Developing Countries Fund and the Kyoto Protocol Adaptation Fund.

IEEP undertook a detailed analysis of the levels of aid channelled through these different options for each of the EU signatories to the Bonn Declaration (EU-15). Results show that whilst the EU-15 may, overall, have fulfilled their commitments under that declaration, the data published by Member States is far from conclusive and the quality of reporting does not allow full independent verification of the amount of aid provided. Funds made available by the EU-15 through the GEF and dedicated multilateral climate change funds alone (approximately US$160 million/year) amount to less than half of the funds needed to meet the EU’s share of the Bonn commitment (US$369 million/year). Apparently, funding through bilateral channels accounts for most of the aid provided, but such assistance is a lot harder to monitor and verify at the international level. The lack of clarity and transparency in official reporting to the UNFCCC makes it impossible to affirm that much of the ‘additional’ aid actually provided since 2001 did not merely consist of ‘re-branded’ aid money.

To download the IEEP study, presented at a conference in Brussels on 28 January 2009, click http://www.ieep.eu/publications/pdfs/200…

For further information contact:

Dr Marc Pallemaerts
Senior Fellow &
Head of the Environmental Governance Programme
Institute for European Environmental Policy (IEEP)
Quai au Foin 55
Hooikaai 55
1000 Brussels
BELGIUM
Direct Tel.: 32-(0)2-7387471
Fax: 32-(0)2-7324004
Email:  mpallemaerts at ieep.eu
___________________________________________________________
IEEP is an independent not for profit institute dedicated to advancing an environmentally sustainable Europe through policy analysis, development and dissemination. IEEP undertakes work for external sponsors in a range of policy areas. We also have our own research programmes and produce the Manual of Environmental Policy: The EU and Britain www.mep-online.com. For further information about IEEP, see our website at http://www.ieep.eu or contact any staff member.

The Indian Jewish Purim celebration will be held in Rego Park, Queens next Saturday evening, March 7th, from 7pm – until.   Please see below and attached flyer for more details.   Reservations are a must!

Charge is $25 for adults and $10 for children under 12 years!

Hope to see you there!

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From: Romiel Daniel <rdaniel@ariela-alpha.com>
Subject: FW: PURIM CELEBRATION 2009 revised
To:  jewsofindia at yahoo.com

Community Listing

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PURIM CELEBRATIONS

Purim is just round the corner. Let us enjoy the festival in the spirit it warrants.

Enjoy Bollywood, Israeli and the latest American music with one of the best DJ’s.

Music for grandchildren, children, adults and grandparents.

Dress code suitable for Purim. Your choice whether you want to be Mordechai or Esther or Ahasuerus or any other character of Purim. Or come as yourself.

Enjoy delicious Indian Kosher Food and snacks, also American snacks.

Place:                           Rego Park Jewish Center, Crystal Ballroom

97-30 Queens Boulevard,   Rego Park, NY 11374

Date:                             Saturday March 7th, 2009

Time:                           7:00 PM and onwards

The charge is only $25.00 per adult $10.00 for children below the age of 12 years.

RSVP with a check to “Indian Jewish Congregation of USA” by March 3rd, 2009.

Romiel Daniel

Presiding Officer

Latvian government could fall as crisis bites.
Leigh Phillips, Brussels, EUobserver, February 4, 2009

As unrest spreads in Latvia as a result of the worsening economic crisis, the government faces a no confidence vote in the parliament on Wednesday (4 February).

The vote could see the first European Union government – and the second in Europe after Iceland – felled by the financial and economic turmoil that has hit Latvia harder than most other states in the 27-member bloc.

Tractors blocked roads in Latvia in the second such protest in a week.

On Tuesday (February 3, 2009), the country’s agriculture minister resigned in the wake of farmer protests that blocked the main road around the capital, Riga, and saw the agriculture ministry building surrounded by tractors.

The government convened an emergency meeting out of which emerged €34 million (22m lats) in fresh aid for the farmers. Shortly after Prime Minister Ivars Godmanis announced the decision, the agriculture minister, Martyns Roze, fell on his sword.

The economic crisis has bludgeoned the country’s farmers, whose productivity has slid as prices plunge. The losses are bankrupting rural Latvia, with producers unable to pay their loans and processing firms going out of business.

Some 15 million lats is to come from the State Forests budget and another 7 million from the Latvian Privatization Agency. The aid amounts to around 5 million lats more than originally planned.

A system of export loan guarantees is also to be established for dairy farmers, which, according to the prime minister, will temporarily save the sector from bankruptcy.

The industrial sector has also dropped off the cliff, with industrial production dropping 2.5 percent in December, equal to a year-on-year decline of 14.2 percent, according to figures released on Tuesday by Statistics Latvia. The fall comes atop an already steep drop of 3.1 percent in November.

Manufacturing has been pummelled in particular, seeing a decline of 18.2 percent on an annual basis.

Some 70 percent of the people have lost faith in the government according to polls and last week, the Union of Greens and Farmers said it would abandon the ruling coalition if the government did not come up with additional aid for farmers.

The prime minister approached opposition parties to join the government, but they all declined his offer.

Meanwhile, the country’s neighbour, Lithuania, is itself seeing fresh protests, a fortnight after riots over the economic crisis hit the capital.

A small demonstration of some 200 people, many of whom pensioners, was countered by 500 police officers and a kilometre-long fence was put up to protect the Seimas, the Lithuanian parliament, from the “unsanctioned protest”, according to Vilnius police commissariat spokesperson Loreta Tumalaviciene, the Baltic Course newspaper reports.

No EU referendum in Iceland under new government.
LEIGH PHILLIPS

EUobserver from Brussels, 02.02.2009

The new Icelandic government is to examine the question of joining the EU and the euro. But the junior partner in the new coalition, the Left Green Movement, says no EU referendum is likely any time soon.

Concern over Iceland’s fisheries is a major block to EU adhesion.

The changeover comes amid street protests caused by the economic crisis last month, with the European Commission saying Iceland could join the EU by 2011 if it wants to take shelter in the bloc.

The new government has said it will establish a parliamentary committee to examine the question of joining the European Union and whether the euro should be adopted to replace the battered krona.

The committee will report on its findings on 15 April ahead of snap general elections on 25 April.

But the Left Green Movement has ruled out the possibility of an EU membership referendum in tandem with the April vote, despite such ideas being floated by the Social Democrats in coalition talks.

“There won’t be any referendum on joining the European Union during the lifetime of this government,” Finnur Dellsen, assistant to Left Green Movement party leader Steingrimur Sigfusson, told this website.

The 10-member cabinet of the caretaker government is split evenly between both parties, with two non-politicians also appointed to ministerial posts.

But the radical Left Green Movement has spiked in popularity following the economic turmoil, while bankers and free-market advocates have become persona non grata.

Current polls put the Left Greens at 32.6 percent, with the Independence Party on 22.1 percent and the Social Democrats 19.2 percent, according to Iceland’s Frettabladid newspaper.

***

Mr Dellsen said the Left Greens are open to two referendums after the April election – one to allow negotiations with Brussels to begin and a second to allow actual accession when the talks end.

“Our fisheries in particular have been maintained in a sustainable manner, unlike those of the EU, which has been unable to control overfishing,” said Mr Dellsen.

Meanwhile, Social Democrat Johanna Sigurdardottir – the country’s new prime minister and the world’s first openly gay national leader – said one of the government’s first moves will be to replace the leadership of the central bank, the Sedlabanki.

Despite its left-wing flavour, the government was clear that it would adhere to the programme agreed between the IMF and the outgoing administration, and “base itself on a very prudent and responsible policy in economic and fiscal matters,” adding however that it “will, at the same time, prioritise social values, the principles of sustainable development, women’s rights, equality and justice.”

Commission green-lights industrialisation of Arctic.

LEIGH PHILLIPS – EUOBSERVER / BRUSSELS, November 20, 2008.

The rapidly melting Arctic is a bonanza of oil, gas, fish and mineral wealth waiting to be exploited – so long as it is done in a sustainable manner, the European Commission believes.

Faster transit routes, including the fabled Northwest Passage sought by explorers for centuries, and expanded possibilities for polar tourism also provide exciting opportunities for businesses, according to the EU executive, which on Thursday (20 November) adopted a communication outlining Europe’s first ever policy towards the Land of the Midnight Sun.

“We cannot remain impassive in the face of the alarming developments affecting the Arctic climate and, in consequence, the rest of our planet,” said fisheries commissioner Joe Borg, while speaking to reporters after the publication of the policy document.

“The Arctic is an essential and vulnerable component of the Earth’s ecosystem,” echoed his colleague, external relations commissioner Benita Ferrero-Walder. “The effects of climate change are more advanced and more evident in the Arctic than in any other area of the world.”

But this is no reason not to exploit the region, they both argued.

“On the other hand, the combination of the climatic changes and the recent technological developments opens up new opportunities interlaced with challenges,” said Mr Borg.

“There are significant mineral resources, in particular hydrocarbon resources in the Arctic located under the sovereign territories or inside the exclusive economic zones of the Arctic states,” said Ms Ferrero-Waldner.

She added that there is already exploration for fossil fuels going on and so there was no point in trying to put a halt to such activity.

“Exploitation is already going ahead in some places and could be profitable. But it must be sustainable and comply with strict environmental standards.”

The document has three main thrusts – the protection of the Arctic environment and its people, the sustainable exploitation of resources, and the improvement of multi-lateral governance of the region.

Ms Ferrero-Walder described these elements as the three pillars of EU Arctic policy.

The fisheries commissioner also noted that the retreating ice opens new fishing grounds, but warned that considerable parts of the Arctic ocean are not covered by regional fisheries management organisations.

“The boundaries of these pristine waters need to be regulated to avoid overfishing,” he said. The commission believes the best authority to oversee such a process is the Northeast Atlantic Fisheries Council and will take initiatives to widen the scope of this body.

The commission is to apply for observer status with the Arctic Council, an intergovernmental forum that brings together the Arctic nations: Canada, Denmark, Finland, Iceland, Norway, Russia, Sweden and the US.

Additionally, in order to improve maritime surveillance, the commission is working with the European Space Agency to explore the development of a polar orbiting satellite system. This would permit better knowledge of shipping traffic and co-ordinate faster reactions during emergencies.

***

Law of the Sea

The commission strongly backs developing the governance of the region, which has until now has been very weak as a result of the inhospitable environment that left few humans interested in the Arctic.

In May this year, the five Arctic Ocean coastal states – Russia, Canada, the United States, Norway and Denmark – adopted a declaration supporting the maintenance of the existing legal framework that covers the region: the UN Convention on the Law of the Sea.

However, in October, the European Parliament overwhelmingly voted in favour of the negotiation of an international Arctic treaty to protect the high north.

Although the parliament’s resolution also supports the sustainable development of the Arctic, including for fossil fuel extraction, some environmental groups would like to see an Arctic treaty that mirrors the Antarctic Treaty, which set aside Antarctica as a scientific preserve, banned territorial claims and prohibited military activities.

The commission however rejects the parliament’s perspective.

“I back the views of the Arctic states that an Arctic Charter is not the way forward,” said Mr Borg. “The bedrock for action in the Arctic Ocean remains the Law of the Sea.

He encouraged those countries present in the Arctic that are not signatories to the convention to sign on “as soon as possible.” The United States is not a party to the Law of the Sea.

The Liberal grouping in the European Parliament largely welcomed the communication but criticised the failure to support the euro-deputies’ position on a new treaty.

“If there is one disappointment with the communication, it is that the commission has not taken up the parliament’s call to open international negotiations designed to lead to the adoption of an international treaty for the protection of the Arctic,” said UK MEP Diana Wallis.

***

Potential for catastrophe:

Environmental groups are horrified at the commission’s support for the industrialisation of the Arctic, and are extremely sceptical that many proposed activities can be done in a sustainable fashion at all, particularly fossil fuel development, shipping goods across the Arctic Ocean and expanded fisheries.

“Increasing human activities could significantly accelerate the threats facing the Arctic, which would have cascading effects all over the world,” warned Oceana, an oceans campaign group.

“Irresponsible development in the Arctic ecosystem holds the potential for catastrophe”, said Xavier Pastor, the director of the group’s European division.

Oceana says that there must be a comprehensive scientific assessment before any development can take place, followed by principles of precautionary management.

The commission says it does indeed support the precautionary principle for the Arctic and plans to open a dialogue with environmental groups about the Arctic.

The fisheries commissioner said he indeed supports such thinking.

“I think the prudent way forward is the precautionary approach,” Mr Borg said. “If it turns out that the environmental damage caused by certain activities is too high, then we will take the necessary action.”

Oceana is doubtful.

“Yes, they say they’re going to take a precautionary approach, but they also say that about fisheries, so that doesn’t bode well,” said Julie Cator, the group’s policy director.

“If the environment is so important in their thinking, why wasn’t the environment commissioner there [to present the communication] as well?”

The environment directorate-general was not involved in the drafting of the communication.

The commission said that environment commissioner was unable to attend as he was in Strasbourg.

=========

European Commission

• Arctic Communication

Press Release

• The Arctic merits the European Union’s attention – first step towards an EU Arctic Policy

Website

• The EU and the Arctic region

Postpone UN climate summit, suggests former Irish president.
Former Irish president Mary Robinson has said that a crucial UN climate change summit due to take place in Poland in December should be postponed until after Barack Obama is inaugurated as US president.

Speaking at a meeting in Brussels on Thursday, Robinson, now vice president of the Club of Madrid, an organisation of former world leaders, said, “It would make more sense to postpone the summit until 20 January. It can’t possibly be led by a lack of understanding for the kind of change that Obama wants.

“This summit, which sounds great and sexy, is happening at the wrong time.”

Also speaking at the event, held to publicise the ‘Road to Copenhagen’ initiative – which refers to the UN climate meeting due to take place in 2009 in the Danish city – was commission vice president Margot Wallström.

She said, “The election of Barack Obama has sent a forceful positive signal to the EU. We see it in terms of negotiating a post-Kyoto agreement.

“We find it hugely important that Obama – with his strong statements on climate change – will be president.

“If we can have a signal from America that they are willing to sit down and talk, it will affect China and India.”

The ‘Road to Copenhagen’ project, which Robinson and Wallström are spearheading along with former Norwegian prime minister and UN special envoy on climate change, Gro Harlem Brundtland, was created to give the general public, industry, politicians and NGOs a say in the UN climate negotiations.

The Poznán summit in Poland this December is due to lay down the formal agenda for the whole process, but the decisive summit will be held in Copenhagen next year.

Robinson, Wallström and Brundtland were joined at the press conference by the Icelandic singer Björk, who has started her own climate campaign to find eco-friendly options for Iceland’s rich natural resources.

—————–

Unless postponed until the change in US Administration, Poznan will end up in a ditch and better to postpone it then let it derail the following Copenhagen meeting.

The Road to Copenhagen is a very bright idea if there is a productive Poznan meeting – otherwise Copenhagen will turn naturally into Poznan II and not into a Kyoto II as the UN professionals hope, or a Copenhagen I as an agreement between the US, China, India, Brazil would entail. Poznan is thus a make or brake event on the road to Copenhagen, and a US represented by Paula Dobriansky will just push the rest of those present into the ditch.

Barak Obama cannot speak up before January 20, and obviously cannot have his negotiator vetted by US Congress before he takes over as US President. He said clearly that he works under the rules of the US Constitution that says there is only one President at a given time. Pushing for keeping the Poznan date under these conditions is rather like saying that it is imperative for those opposing the notion that the world must be kept addicted to petroleum and other fossil carbons in their self-interest must have the day.

Barak Obama could appoint his Climate Change negotiator on January 20, 2009, right there at his inaugural speech, and Congress could approve his selection, the speediest, within a month – so, a Poznan meeting in March 2009 is the earliest it makes sense to hold this meeting if you are positively inclined to do something about climate change. We keep saying so for over a year, this even before we had an inkling of who might be next US President. We kept pouring cold water on the UN euphoria with their debate time-line. We are afraid that UN talk is very expensive – it allows people to fly around freely but is not intended to come up with results. Statements by the UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon, on how much he wants to see results from the climate change negotiations, and rosy pronunciations from the Executive of the UNFCCC, Yvo de Boer, cannot change the reality that in the end – it is the US President that holds the keys for a positive outcome of the Climate Change negotiations. It is in the promise of the US and the response from the Brazil, China, India, that an effective plan will be born.

See please also:

The Columbia University World Leaders Forum, September 26, 2008, Became The Podium For Prime Minister Anders Fogh Rasmussen of Denmark To Make Known A Roadmap To The December 2009 Climate Change Meeting in Copenhagen. The Prime Minister Is Keenly Interested That The Copenhagen Event Becomes The Turnaround Point From Our Present Descent Towards Global Environmental Disaster, and He Negotiated This Week A Roadmap With The UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon and The Two Candidates For The US Presidency. We Wished Him All The Luck He Needs; Nevertheless We Expressed Some Skepticism.

Posted on Sustainabilitank.info on September 27th, 2008
by Pincas Jawetz ( PJ at SustainabiliTank.com)

Melting ice in the Arctic, but the lure of resources is just too strong. Europe’s Arctic adventure – The new cold rush for resources.
LEIGH PHILLIPS, the EUobserver, November 7, 2008. THIS ARTICLE FROM TROMSO, NORWAY.

EUOBSERVER / TROMSO – PART ONE – There’s this grizzled old guy in the hospital with worsening lung cancer. The doctors can’t tell him whether it’s fatal yet, but each new test shows a rapidly deteriorating condition.

He’s been a heavy smoker all his life, although he’s trying to quit, but one day, while he’s wandering the corridors, he comes across a long-abandoned storeroom and it’s rammed to the gills with cigarettes, cigars, roll-your-own tobacco of every brand and region. There are Cuban cigars, Moroccan apple-flavoured nargileh tobacco, Swedish snus and jars of aromatic pipe shag. It’s an Aladdin’s cave of tobacco left over from the days when hospital cafeterias still sold cigarettes, and the nurses and security staff are nowhere to be seen.

The man briefly thinks that he should just forget he ever opened the storeroom door and get back to the business of quitting, but he’s dazzled by the hoard and instead stuffs as much of it into his pyjamas as he can to take back to his bed and puffs his nicotine-addled brains out.

There’s no tobacco hoard in a cupboard somewhere in the Arctic, but there is however a quarter of the world’s remaining undiscovered oil and gas now within reach as a result of the far north rapidly melting.

Like the old man in the hospital, the European Union and countries on the shores of the Arctic sea have said to themselves: “There may be a chance that we can slow down and reverse global warming, so we really should give up our addiction to fossil fuels. But how can we turn our backs – and our wallets – on such a bonanza, even if it’s full of the very stuff that caused the problem in the first place?”

Or is such an environmentalist caricature unfair to the people of the northern regions, for the most part long shut out from the industrial development and the wealth of the more southerly parts of Europe, Canada, Russia and the United States?

Many of those living in the Arctic are aboriginal people, who have historically borne the double burden of underdevelopment in their regions and racial prejudice. And until recently very little has been available to anyone up north apart from far-from-bountiful farming and the occasional mine that inevitably closes down.

Can we really say “No” to improving the standard of living in the north through development, especially if it can be done sustainably?

With recent months in particular seeing both a cascade of truly alarming news on how fast the Arctic is changing and pronouncements from the European Union and other circumpolar powers on plans for exploitation of newly accessible resources, the EUobserver decided to visit Europe’s patch of the Arctic, the northernmost tip of mainland Norway – still outside the EU, but very much Brussels’ advance guard up in the high north – to find out the reality behind the headlines about the coming “scramble for the Arctic”, and look at all sides in the debate over the Arctic’s future.

***

Methane burps:

The situation at the top of the world has taken a sharp turn for the worse just in the last few weeks.

On 6 September, leading European and American ice specialists at the US National Ice Center reported that for the first time, a ring of navigable waters around the Arctic ice cap opened up the fabled Northwest Passage through the Canadian Arctic archipelago – the maritime Holy Grail of a faster trade route from Europe to Asia sought for centuries by explorers – and the Northern Sea Route, also known as the Northeast Passage, over Eurasia, at the same time.

Then, in late September, Swedish and Russian scientists found the first evidence that millions of tonnes of methane – a gas that is 20 times more powerful a greenhouse gas than carbon dioxide – is bubbling up from beneath the Siberian Arctic seabed.

The amount of methane stored beneath the Arctic is greater than the world’s remaining global stores of coal and it is now rising up from the bottom of the ocean through “methane chimney” discovered by scientists aboard the research ship Jacob Smirnitskyi.

Days later, British scientists aboard the James Clark Ross found hundreds of plumes of methane burping up from the Arctic seabed to the west of the Norwegian archipelago of Svalbard midway between mainland Norway and the North Pole.

NASA’s top climate scientist, James Hansen, says that the release of methane clathrates from permafrost regions and beneath the seabed will unleash powerful feedback forces that could produce runaway climate change that cannot be controlled – the so-called methane time bomb – a prediction of radical environmental transformation far worse than the worst-case scenarios theorised by the UN’s Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change.

Then on Tuesday (28 October), the European Space Agency reported that Arctic sea ice was thinning at a record rate, with the thickness of sea ice in large parts of the Arctic having declined by as much as 19 percent last winter compared to the previous five winters.

***

Last days of the ‘ice bear:’

“The Arctic is warming at two times the rate of the rest of the world,” says Nalan Koc, a senior scientist with the polar climate programme at the Norwegian Polar Institute, in Tromso, explaining why all of this is happening.

Tromso, in the far north of Norway and home to the world’s northernmost university, at the same time is preparing itself for the economic bonanza that the melting will bring.

Nalan Koc, however, is not as excited as other Tromso inhabitants. In a Power Point presentation of this Arctic apocalypse, she starkly lists the myriad ways in which the environment is fundamentally altering. “Amplified by positive feedback, the Arctic is seeing increased precipitation, declining snow cover, rising river flows, thawing permafrost, melting glaciers, retreating summer sea ice, rising sea levels, and ocean salinity changes making the water less saline.”

The talk, despite its subject, is deceptively banal. Where are the four horsemen? A moon turned blood-red? Instead, the end of days is being announced not by skeletonous biblical heralds but in bullet points and embedded videos that take three minutes to load.

The permafrost is melting under tundra that previously was stable, she explains, buckling roads and highways as the ground beneath them gives way.

In the marine environment, sea temperatures are rising and the ice cover is melting. Ice-dependent species such as the polar bear, which the Norwegians more accurately call “isbjorn” or “ice bear,” as well as the walrus and the ringed seal all face an uncertain future. Some scientists believe the polar bear will be extinct by mid-century.

“When you’ve been around up here for as long as I have, you begin to see it with your own eyes from year to year,” she says. “You can feel it in your bones.”

Last year saw a record low extent of Arctic sea ice cover – 4.3 million square kilometres – more than 40 percent below averages in the 1980s and more than 20 percent below the previous record low in 2005. “But more important than the extent is the volume of the ice. Most of the older thicker ice is not surviving from one summer to the next. As of 2007, most of the ice was three or four-year-old ice. As of 2008, most ice is just one year old.”

The massive ice loss and thinning is forcing scientists to quickly ratchet lower even their worst expectations – the 2007 melting came some 30 years ahead of model predictions.

In 2004, it was predicted that the ice would have melted sufficiently to allow commercial traffic in the Arctic Ocean by 2090. In 2007, it was predicted that commercial traffic would be able to cross by 2040. As of 2008, the predictions are for some time in the next five years, with the first start-up possibly in 2009. Models now predict an ice-free Arctic Ocean in the summer some time between 2013 and 2040.

The last time the Arctic Ocean was ice-free in the summer was over a million years ago.

Her colleague, Kit Kovacs, the Biodiversity Research Programme leader at the institute says: “The changes are happening so rapidly that scientists are having trouble processing it all. From initial tests to publishing papers takes at a minimum months or a couple of years, but change is happening much faster than that.

“The biodiversity loss is just as profound as if there were a loss of the Amazon rainforest within the space of five years.”

***

Oil and gas bonanza:

What looks like the end for the polar bear, however, looks like Christmas for resource companies and European energy security concerns.

Johan Petter Barlindhaug, the chair of North Energy, a northern-Norway-based oil-and-gas start-up currently exploring energy sources on the Norwegian continental shelf, says the melting Arctic could offer northern peoples, who have historically lived in a very much underdeveloped region, a chance to have similar standards of living as those who live in the cities and towns further south.

“Climate change poses lots of threats, but it also opens up a range of possibilities,” he says.

Oil companies like North Energy and Norwegian energy giant Statoil Hydro believe the Arctic holds as much as 25 percent of the worlds undiscovered oil and gas deposits – as much as the combined reserves of Canada and Saudi Arabia.

Russia’s Gazprom already has approximately 34 trillion cubic metres (113 trillion cubic feet) of gas under development in the Barents Sea and Moscow is claiming territory in the Arctic that contains an estimated 586 billion barrels of oil.

Mineral resources may also abound, particularly coal, iron, lead, copper, nickel, zinc and sulphides, as well as precious minerals such as gold and diamonds. Recent diamond discoveries in the Canadian Arctic have made the country, which previously didn’t produce any of the stones, the third biggest exporter of diamonds in the world.

On maps that place the North Pole at the centre of the world, instead of the equator, Mr Barlindhaug shows how a melting Arctic also opens up three different shortcuts for shipping goods between Europe and Asia – routes that will save shipping firms, exporters and importers, and the world’s navies and smugglers – billions of euros.

The shipping industry is hoping for a 20 percent saving, he enthuses, with still greater savings for the megaships that cannot fit through the Suez or Panama canals and have to sail round the tips of Africa or South America.

Although Mr Barlindhaug believes that the third shortcut – straight across the pole – offers the most potential.

“The Northwest and Northeast Passages aren’t as important as building ports on Iceland and in Norway and Russia,” he says. “This is because the Canadians view the Northwest Passage as domestic, and there’s something of the same with the Northeast Passage, which is within Russian borders.

“In any case, international waters closer to the North Pole provide routes that are much shorter. But it’s also a matter of speed and cost. Between the Canadian or Russian islands, you can’t pick up much speed while you’re navigating through them. It’s too narrow.

“But at 20-25 knots across the pole, then you’re really saving some money. It would take just five days to cross from the Bering Sea to the Barent Sea. It doesn’t need to be completely ice free.”

He then moves on to the expanded fishing opportunities and potential for discoveries of new medicines derived from invertebrates living in extreme polar environments that round out the economic bounty becoming available as the climate warms up.

Some 10 percent of global white fish stocks swim through the waters of the Barents Sea, the Bering Sea, and near Iceland, offering catches worth billions of euros.

Nonetheless, “bio-prospecting” for new medicines is by far the greater catch, believes Mr Barlindhaug: “These invertebrates are chemical factories that will produce the next generation of medicines. They’re far more important than the fish that is up there.”

In a visit to brand-spanking new labs at the University of Tromso, Jeanette Andersen, of Mabcent-SFI, a public-private bio-prospecting outfit launched last year with €20.5 million (180m NOK) in funding, explains the potential for new treatments and cures coming from molluscs that poison passing fish or colourless mini-starfish that love the cold.

“The marine environment in the high Arctic is unparalleled with respect to combination of temperature and light regimes,” she says. “This implies evolution of organisms with unique physiological and biochemical adaptations.”

She says that the potential is enormous, from antibiotics, chemotherapy, and painkillers to anti-bacterials, anti-oxidents, anti-inflammatory medicines, but Mabcent also hopes to discover creatures that have cosmetic and industrial applications, and even better food and drink preservation.

“But all high-profit,” she enthuses, describing how her biologist and chemist colleagues dive off into the depths of the Arctic Ocean like a team of submariner Indiana Joneses, before they race back to the university to freeze the hundreds of different specimens. They then grind them into a pulp that is investigated by viking boffins at stupidly expensive machines who identify the wild new molecules produced by the exotic biochemistry of these nigh-on alien creatures.

“Living in environments that range from 1.8 to 8 degrees celsius, these organisms are adapted to cold temperatures. As you warm up the metabolism, you speed up the effectiveness of enzymes, so the thinking is that enzymes existing at these temperatures will work faster in warm humans.”

However, some of the different industries opening up as Arctic waters open up pose a threat to others.

Pooh-poohing the idea that oil and gas exploration threatens the environment, North Energy’s Mr Barlindhaug reckons it’s a massive expansion of unsustainable fishing practices and illegal fishing that pose the greatest threat, particularly to bio-prospecting.

“Bottom trawling is much more damaging than oil and gas exploration, as the you find oil all over the rocks and sand on the sea bed. These creatures are used to it – there’s nothing to worry about from oil and gas exploration.

“Bioprospectors should be more scared about increased fishing activity. That’ll damage these organisms much more,” he insists.

Jeanette back at Mabcent is not so sure: “We need to be worried about oil and gas exploration. What Mr Barlindhaug said is too easy an answer to the question of oil spills. Some organisms will adapt, yes, but others are very vulnerable.”

In the second part of the EUobserver’s look at the politics and business of the melting Arctic, appearing on Monday, we look at Kirkenes, a small harbour town sometimes called ‘Little Murmansk’ for its 10 percent Russian population, and how it is set to be transformed by the oil and gas bonanza opening up as the ice disappears.

Friday, Nov. 7, 2008

Japan asked to join new Arctic shipping regime.

By KEISUKE OKADA, Staff writer, The Japan Times online.
Japan should join hands with the United States and other Arctic states in ongoing multilateral efforts to create a new shipping regime in the Arctic Ocean, a U.S. official said Thursday in Tokyo.

International cooperation is vital to ensure that shipping in the Arctic is “safe, secure and reliable,” according to Mead Treadwell, chairman of the U.S. Arctic Research Commission, an advisory body to the president and Congress.

As a result of receding sea ice, caused by global warming, the Arctic is expected to open up for global shipping in the future. This will present strategic options for Japan’s industry in light of shorter shipping routes from Japan to Europe via the Arctic Ocean, Treadwell said at a media conference in Tokyo.

The eight-nation Arctic Council, established in 1996 as a high-level intergovernmental forum to promote cooperation among Arctic states, is currently working on an Arctic marine shipping assessment, due to be completed in 2009, according to Treadwell.

Aware of the strategic importance, China and South Korea have already joined the Arctic Council as observers and Treadwell recommended that Japan do likewise.

Aside from its potential for shipping, the Arctic is surfacing as a new battleground for energy resources. In August 2007, Russia stunned the world by planting its national flag in a titanium capsule on the seabed beneath the North Pole, causing other Arctic states — the U.S., Canada, Denmark and Norway — to scramble for a share of a potential new oil bonanza.

This Stock Collapse Is Petty When Compared to the Nature Crunch.
By George Monbiot, The Guardian. Posted October 15, 2008.

The financial crisis at least affords us an opportunity to now rethink our catastrophic ecological trajectory.

This is nothing. Well, nothing by comparison to what’s coming. The financial crisis for which we must now pay so heavily prefigures the real collapse, when humanity bumps against its ecological limits.

As we goggle at the fluttering financial figures, a different set of numbers passes us by. On Friday, Pavan Sukhdev, the Deutsche Bank economist leading a European study on ecosystems, reported that we are losing natural capital worth between $2 trillion and $5 trillion every year as a result of deforestation alone.

The losses incurred so far by the financial sector amount to between $1 trillion and $1.5 trillion. Sukhdev arrived at his figure by estimating the value of the services — such as locking up carbon and providing fresh water — that forests perform, and calculating the cost of either replacing them or living without them. The credit crunch is petty when compared to the nature crunch.

***

The two crises have the same cause. In both cases, those who exploit the resource have demanded impossible rates of return and invoked debts that can never be repaid. In both cases we denied the likely consequences. I used to believe that collective denial was peculiar to climate change. Now I know that it’s the first response to every impending dislocation.

***

Gordon Brown, for instance, was as much in denial about financial realities as any toxic debt trader. In June last year, during his Mansion House speech, he boasted that 40% of the world’s foreign equities are now traded here. The financial sector’s success had come about, he said, partly because the government had taken “a risk-based regulatory approach”. In the same hall three years before, he pledged that “in budget after budget I want us to do even more to encourage the risk takers”. Can anyone, surveying this mess, now doubt the value of the precautionary principle?

Ecology and economy are both derived from the Greek word oikos — a house or dwelling. Our survival depends on the rational management of this home: the space in which life can be sustained. The rules are the same in both cases. If you extract resources at a rate beyond the level of replenishment, your stock will collapse. That’s another noun which reminds us of the connection. The Oxford English Dictionary gives 69 definitions of “stock”. When it means a fund or store, the word evokes the trunk — or stock — of a tree, “from which the gains are an outgrowth”. Collapse occurs when you prune the tree so heavily that it dies. Ecology is the stock from which all wealth grows.

The two crises feed each other. As a result of Iceland’s financial collapse, it is now contemplating joining the European Union, which means surrendering its fishing grounds to the common fisheries policy. Already the prime minister, Geir Haarde, has suggested that his countrymen concentrate on exploiting the ocean. The economic disaster will cause an ecological disaster.

Normally it’s the other way around. In his book Collapse: How Societies Choose to Fail or Succeed, Jared Diamond shows how ecological crisis is often the prelude to social catatrosphe. The obvious example is Easter Island, where society disintegrated soon after the population reached its highest historical numbers, the last trees were cut down and the construction of stone monuments peaked. The island chiefs had competed to erect ever bigger statues. These required wood and rope (made from bark) for transport, and extra food for the labourers. As the trees and soils on which the islanders depended disappeared, the population crashed and the survivors turned to cannibalism. Diamond wonders what the Easter islander who cut down the last palm tree might have thought. “Like modern loggers, did he shout ‘Jobs, not trees!’? Or: ‘Technology will solve our problems, never fear, we’ll find a substitute for wood.’? Or: ‘We don’t have proof that there aren’t palms somewhere else on Easter … your proposed ban on logging is premature and driven by fear-mongering’?”.

***

Ecological collapse, Diamond shows, is as likely to be the result of economic success as of economic failure. The Maya of Central America, for instance, were among the most advanced and successful people of their time. But a combination of population growth, extravagant construction projects and poor land management wiped out between 90% and 99% of the population. The Mayan collapse was accelerated by “the competition among kings and nobles that led to a chronic emphasis on war and erecting monuments rather than on solving underlying problems”. (Does any of this sound familiar?) Again, the largest monuments were erected just before the ecosystem crashed. Again, this extravagance was partly responsible for the collapse: trees were used for making plaster with which to decorate their temples. The plaster became thicker and thicker as the kings sought to outdo each other’s conspicuous consumption.

***

Here are some of the reasons why people fail to prevent ecological collapse. Their resources appear at first to be inexhaustible; a long-term trend of depletion is concealed by short-term fluctuations; small numbers of powerful people advance their interests by damaging those of everyone else; short-term profits trump long-term survival. The same, in all cases, can be said of the collapse of financial systems. Is this how human beings are destined to behave? If we cannot act until stocks — of either kind — start sliding towards oblivion, we’re knackered.

***
But one of the benefits of modernity is our ability to spot trends and predict results.

If fish in a depleted ecosystem grow by 5% a year and the catch expands by 10% a year, the fishery will collapse. If the global economy keeps growing at 3% a year (or 1,700% a century), it too will hit the wall.

I am not going to suggest, as some scoundrel who shares a name with me did on these pages last year, that we should welcome a recession. But the financial crisis provides us with an opportunity to rethink this trajectory; an opportunity that is not available during periods of economic success. Governments restructuring their economies should read Herman Daly’s book Steady-State Economics.

As usual I haven’t left enough space to discuss this, so the details will have to wait for another column. Or you can read the summary published by the Sustainable Development Commission (all references are on my website). But what Daly suggests is that nations which are already rich should replace growth — “more of the same stuff” — with development — “the same amount of better stuff”.

A steady-state economy has a constant stock of capital that is maintained by a rate of throughput no higher than the ecosystem can absorb.

The use of resources is capped and the right to exploit them is auctioned.

Poverty is addressed through the redistribution of wealth. The banks can lend only as much money as they possess.

Alternatively, we can persist in the magical thinking whose results have just come crashing home.

The financial crisis shows what happens when we try to make the facts fit our desires. Now we must learn to live in the real world.

—————-
George Monbiot is the author Heat: How to Stop the Planet from Burning. Read more of his writings at Monbiot.com.                   This article originally appeared in the Guardian.