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Supermajors ‘worst climate offenders’

The findings of the study by the US-based Climate Accountability Institute reveal the 90 companies have between them generated nearly two-thirds of greenhouse gas emissions since the dawn of the industrial age. They are said to have been responsible for 63% of cumulative emissions between 1751 and 2010, amounting to about 914 gigatonnes of CO2 out of a total of about 1450 gigatonnes, according to the newly published report. The list of climate offenders includes 50 investor-owned companies, mainly oil supermajors, as well as 31 state-owned companies such as Statoil, Saudi Aramco and Russia’s Gazprom. ChevronTexaco was the leading emitter among investor-owned companies, causing 3.5% of greenhouse gas emissions, with ExxonMobil not far behind at 3.2%. In third place, BP has caused 2.5% of global emissions, while Statoil was ranked as the 34th largest emitter on the overall list of 90 companies. Nearly 30% of emissions were produced by […]

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Surviving Climate Change: Is a Green Energy Revolution on the Global Agenda?

A week after the most powerful “super typhoon” ever recorded pummeled the Philippines, killing  thousands  in a single province, and three weeks after the northern Chinese city of Harbin suffered a devastating “ airpocalypse ,” suffocating the city with coal-plant pollution, government leaders beware!  Although individual events like these cannot be attributed with absolute certainty to increased fossil fuel use and climate change, they are the type of disasters that, scientists tell us, will become a pervasive part of life on a planet being transformed by the massive consumption of carbon-based fuels.  If, as is now the case, governments across the planet back an  extension of the carbon age  and ever increasing reliance on “unconventional” fossil fuels  like tar sands and shale gas, we should all expect trouble.  In fact, we should expect mass upheavals leading to a green energy revolution. None of us can predict the future, but […]

Posted On : Published By : Tom Whipple
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Demonstrators at Warsaw climate summit demand emission cuts

WARSAW, Poland, Nov. 18 (UPI) — Climate change demonstrators took to the streets of Warsaw during the weekend as host Poland comes under fire from critics at the U.N. COP19 climate summit. Chanting “Change the system, not the climate,” and “Justice and positive energy for all,” nearly 1,000 people marched through Warsaw Saturday as part of the international “March for Climate and Social Justice,” the Polish broadcaster TVN 24 reported. The event caused traffic congestion in the heart of the city as it wound its way from the Palace of Culture and Science, passed over the Poniatowski Bridge along Jerusalem Avenue and past the National Stadium, where the UN climate summit is being held. The march ended at Skaryszewski Park near the National Stadium, where demonstrators set up an “eco-park.” At the head of the procession was a large inflatable globe, emphasizing the demonstrators’ point decisions made to reduce […]

Posted On : Published By : Tom Whipple
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Japan lowers carbon dioxide emissions reduction target

TOKYO, Nov. 18 (UPI) — Japan has slashed its carbon dioxide emissions reduction target. Japan says it now tentatively aims to reduce its greenhouse gas emissions by 3.8 percent from fiscal 2005 levels by 2020 instead of the 25 percent cut from 1990 levels as promised in 2009. The announcement Friday from the world’s fifth-largest emitter of carbon dioxide struck a blow to the United Nations’ Nov. 11-22 climate talks in Warsaw, Poland. “I don’t have any words to describe my dismay,” Xinhua News Agency quoted China’s negotiator in Warsaw, Su Wei , as saying about the downwardly revised air pollution goal. Japan’s environment minister, Nobuteru Ishihara, said the new target “does not consider the possible effect of nuclear power plants reducing emissions” and that Japan “would set a more definite target” after it decided which sources of energy it would use in the future, The New York Times […]

Posted On : Published By : Tom Whipple
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‘Apocalyptic’ storm floods Sardinia, 16 dead

AP Photo ROME (AP) — Emergency crews worked to reach remote parts of flood-ravaged Sardinia on Tuesday after a torrential rainstorm killed at least 16 people, downed bridges and swept cars away. Italy’s civil protection chief, Franco Gabrielli, said one person remained unaccounted for and that the toll of 16 may still rise as crews reach isolated areas in the countryside where some homes are submerged. The island, famed for its Costa Smeralda beaches of crystal clear water and dry Mediterranean climate, received more than 400 millimeters of water in 24 hours, he told Sky TG24. Olbia Mayor Gianni Giovanelli said the city had been destroyed by the “apocalyptic” storm, with bridges felled by gushing, muddy rivers and water levels reaching 3 meters (10 feet) high in some places. Premier Enrico Letta convened the cabinet Tuesday morning to declare a state of emergency to free up funding and resources. […]

Posted On : Published By : Tom Whipple
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'Apocalyptic' storm floods Sardinia, 16 dead

AP Photo ROME (AP) — Emergency crews worked to reach remote parts of flood-ravaged Sardinia on Tuesday after a torrential rainstorm killed at least 16 people, downed bridges and swept cars away. Italy’s civil protection chief, Franco Gabrielli, said one person remained unaccounted for and that the toll of 16 may still rise as crews reach isolated areas in the countryside where some homes are submerged. The island, famed for its Costa Smeralda beaches of crystal clear water and dry Mediterranean climate, received more than 400 millimeters of water in 24 hours, he told Sky TG24. Olbia Mayor Gianni Giovanelli said the city had been destroyed by the “apocalyptic” storm, with bridges felled by gushing, muddy rivers and water levels reaching 3 meters (10 feet) high in some places. Premier Enrico Letta convened the cabinet Tuesday morning to declare a state of emergency to free up funding and resources. […]

Posted On : Published By : Tom Whipple
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UN climate chief calls on coal industry to change

WARSAW, Poland (AP) — The U.N.’s chief climate diplomat has urged the coal industry to diversify to cleaner energy sources and leave most of the world’s remaining coal reserves in the ground. On the sidelines of a U.N. climate conference, Christiana Figueres told CEOs of coal companies meeting Monday at Poland’s Economy Ministry that their industry needs to change radically to curb emissions of heat-trapping gases that scientists say are warming the planet. The coal event is seen as a provocation by climate activists, who climbed the roof of the Economy Ministry and unfurled a banner that read, “Who rules the world? Fossil industries or the people?” Poland generates about 90 percent of its electricity from coal and Economy Minister Janusz Piechocinski said coal must be a part of talks on reducing CO2 emissions. © 2013 The Associated Press . All rights reserved. This material may not be published, […]

Posted On : Published By : Tom Whipple
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Demonstrators at Warsaw climate summit demand emission cuts

WARSAW, Poland, Nov. 18 (UPI) — Climate change demonstrators took to the streets of Warsaw during the weekend as host Poland comes under fire from critics at the U.N. COP19 climate summit. Chanting “Change the system, not the climate,” and “Justice and positive energy for all,” nearly 1,000 people marched through Warsaw Saturday as part of the international “March for Climate and Social Justice,” the Polish broadcaster TVN 24 reported. The event caused traffic congestion in the heart of the city as it wound its way from the Palace of Culture and Science, passed over the Poniatowski Bridge along Jerusalem Avenue and past the National Stadium, where the UN climate summit is being held. The march ended at Skaryszewski Park near the National Stadium, where demonstrators set up an “eco-park.” At the head of the procession was a large inflatable globe, emphasizing the demonstrators’ point decisions made to reduce […]

Posted On : Published By : Tom Whipple
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Hello Warsaw, This Is Haiyan Calling

Via Flickr from hmcotterill This commentary is a joint publication of Foreign Policy In Focus and TheNation.com . It seems these days that whenever Mother Nature wants to send an urgent message to humankind, it sends it via the Philippines. This year the messenger was Haiyan, known in the Philippines as Yolanda. For the second year in a row, the world’s strongest typhoon barreled through the Philippines, Yolanda following on the footsteps steps of Pablo, a.k.a Bopha, in 2012. And for the third year in a row, a destructive storm deviated from the usual path taken by typhoons, striking communities that had not learned to live with these fearsome weather events because they were seldom hit by them in the past. Sendong in December 2011 and Bopha last year sliced Mindanao horizontally, while Yolanda drove through the Visayas, also in a horizontal direction. That it was climate change creating […]

Posted On : Published By : Tom Whipple
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New climate pact must consider historical emissions: Chinese official

WARSAW, Nov. 14 (Xinhua) — A new global pact under discussion at the ongoing UN climate talks should take into account historical carbon emissions by developed countries, a Chinese official said here Thursday. Su Wei, deputy chief of the Chinese delegation, said industrialized countries are mainly responsible for greenhouse gas emissions in the past two hundred years. The current climate change was caused mainly by developed countries since the industrial era as greenhouse gas has an atmospheric life of 50 to 200 years, he said. “It is important to take the historical responsibility element into the context of climate actions after 2020,” said Su, who is also director of the climate change department of China’s National Development and Reform Commission. China supports Brazil’s proposal to study the historical responsibility for the accumulated carbon emissions, he added. The two-week climate talks held in the Polish capital is set to lay […]

Posted On : Published By : Tom Whipple