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350.org's Bill McKibben on David Letterman:
Put Solar on the White House on 10/10/10
Bill McKibben, David Letterman Show via Youtbe

Learn more at: http://www.350.org . Bill McKibben, 350.org founder, appears on the David Letterman Show to talk about our campaign to put solar back on the White House and the upcoming 10/10/10 Global Work Party this October 10, when millions of people around the world will get to work on climate solutions.

Follow our effort to bring Jimmy Carter's solar panel back to the White House by visiting: http://putsolaron.it
(1 September 2010)
Run time of 11:35. David Letterman is surprisingly seriously during the interview. In fact he's downright radical. He ends by saying, "Thank you, Bill, for scaring the crap out of me!" -BA

Bjørn Lomborg: $100bn a year needed to fight climate change
Juliette Jowit, Guardian
Exclusive 'Skeptical Environmentalist' and critic of climate scientists to declare global warming a chief concern facing world
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The world's most high-profile climate change sceptic is to declare that global warming is "undoubtedly one of the chief concerns facing the world today" and "a challenge humanity must confront", in an apparent U-turn that will give a huge boost to the embattled environmental lobby.

Bjørn Lomborg, the self-styled "sceptical environmentalist" once compared to Adolf Hitler by the UN's climate chief, is famous for attacking climate scientists, campaigners, the media and others for exaggerating the rate of global warming and its effects on humans, and the costly waste of policies to stop the problem.

But in a new book to be published next month, Lomborg will call for tens of billions of dollars a year to be invested in tackling climate change.
(30 August 2010)
About time.

-BA

The Lomborg Deception: About Yesterday’s Front-Page Story in the Guardian
Howard Friel, Common Dreams
Yesterday, London's Guardian newspaper, an important paper with some of the West's best journalists, including Johann Hari, Suzanne Goldenberg, George Monbiot, and Chris McGreal, printed a front-page feature article about a new book on climate change edited by Bjorn Lomborg, which mistakenly depicted him as a converted climate change activist.

The article began: "The world's most high-profile climate change sceptic is to declare that global warming is ‘undoubtedly one of the chief concerns facing the world today' and ‘a challenge humanity must confront,' in an apparent U-turn that will give a huge boost to the embattled environmental lobby."

The article then quoted Lomborg as follows: "Investing $100 billion annually would mean that we could essentially resolve the climate change problem by the end of this century." In an accompanying interview, the Guardian described Lomborg as "the dissenting climate change voice who changed his tune."

Has Lomborg really changed his tune? To answer this question, one would have to know the original tune, and listen to this new one with a more finely tuned ear. Unfortunately, the Guardian appears to have been misled by what Lomborg says in his soon-to-be published edited volume, Smart Solutions to Climate Change: Costs and Benefits.

... While spanning the globe for "smart solutions" to climate change and to improve the human condition, Lomborg ignores an obvious major source of human suffering, economic deprivation, human rights violations, and vast amounts of wasted money-that is, perpetual war and global military spending-which now totals approximately $1.5 trillion per year. While Lomborg argues on cost-benefit grounds, by citing a select group of climate economists, that it is too expensive for the world's economies to reduce CO2 emissions, he voices no opposition to the state of perpetual global war and sky-high military expenditures.

Lomborg is not a responsible climate commentator, and it would be good if responsible news organizations finally figured that out.

Howard Friel's most recent book is The Lomborg Deception: Setting the Record Straigh about Global Warming (Yale University Press, 2010)
(1 September 2010)

Poorer nations hit with 'exorbitant' consultancy fees for carbon offset projects
Reese Erlich, Guardian
The UN-certified scheme that allows developed nations to pay for carbon reductions abroad instead of making domestic cuts has come under fire for paying high fees to consultants from rich countries.

The Guardian has learned that the Nepalese government has so far paid a Norwegian company €150,000 to verify a greenhouse gas reduction programme for which it is seeking carbon credits. That sum would pay for 340 of the small-scale carbon cutting projects the government is trying to set up.

Seperately, the conservation charity WWF pays €20,000 (£16,000) per verification visit for a smaller project using the same technology, but under a different scheme.
(25 August 2010)

The Coming Flood of Climate Refugees
Anna Clark, GreenBiz
What happens when a country's immigrant population doubles in the span of two decades? Nations scramble to prepare as flooding and water scarcity precipitated by escalating environmental catastrophes cause millions to spill across international borders. As America absorbs its share of refugees, we'll face the economic and security ramifications of a threat that we still haven't collectively acknowledged.

... Director Michael Nash has discovered one way with his internationally acclaimed documentary Climate Refugees, the first film to intimately portray the human face of climate change. Drawing on interviews with experts such as Lester Brown, Nobel laureate Wangari Maathai, and politicians from Nancy Pelosi to Newt Gingrich, Climate Refugees examines the plight of an estimated 25-40 million already displaced people.

Following a Q&A with Michael, here's an introduction to the startling consequences of climate-induced mass migration:
(18 August 2010)

At a climate camp convergence and protest in Quebec
Toban Black
Here are some photos from an August climate camp gathering and protest in Dunham, Quebec — just north of Vermont. A tar sands pipeline and pumping station project (”Trailbreaker”) was our main target at the camp.

... The main campaign around the climate camp is a way of blocking tar sands expansion, while helping out local victims, at the same time. The pipeline project cuts across Maine, Quebec, Ontario, Michigan, Illinois, and other surrounding areas — so there are plenty of points of intervention, and plenty of grounds for solidarity.

... In the first photo there are signs that say ‘No dirty oil in our territory’ and ‘climate action camp’ (in French). The banners in other photos say ‘Change the system, not the climate’ (in French), ’stop the wave of destruction’ (in French), “CO2lonialism”, and ‘Change the system! Not the climate!’ “Trailbreaker = Tar sands”.

Our tents we were on a cowfield which the cows had been temporary moved away from. Most of the cow patties were cleared away too.

... After brief statements from activists, we embarked on a march along rural roads, toward the site of a proposed pumping station. We chanted, we sang, and we did a collective dance. We also performed what we called a “human oil spill.” That spill was somewhat like a quick die-in — but with some more playful theatre. One protestor also had a tub drum, and another played a harmonica.

After the march — at the site of the possible tar sands pumping station — speakers talked about tar sands issues, while food was prepared and eaten. Some of us prepared the corn together there. Francophone and indigenous perspectives were important sides of that gathering.
(26 August 2010)