UN Warns of 70 Percent Desertification by 2025
Agence France Presse, October 4th, 2009

http://www.ienearth.org/REDD/index.html

If they think REDD is just another rip-off scam, they are likely to find statements like the following anything but reassuring:

“At a bargain price of about $5 a ton, REDD credits could either slash expenses in meeting emissions targets or afford lawmakers the flexibility to propose more lofty aims.”

At whose expense are such “lofty aims”? Not American taxpayers, count on that (we need to save our money for lofty bailouts).

This article in the Times (UK Broadsheet) is stating that the world can afford to release 2.2 trillion tonnes of CO2 in the 21st century to keep the temperature below 2C. This must be just preposperous for 2.2 trillion tonnes would more than likely leave 1.2 trillion tonnes of it in the atmosphere (300 parts per million of additional CO2) making 700 ppmv in the atmosphere!!! So how can anyone declare that that is potenitally safe?

I am getting quite upset about the media and their reporting of AGW. I know that there are a range of possibilities and probabilities but 2C is more than likely at 450 ppmv which is only another 400 billion tonnes of CO2 or 15 years of emissions.

Sierra Pacific’s announcement comes less than a week after the Schwarzenegger administration pushed through new rules allowing the company to sell carbon credits.

http://www.latimes.com/ news/ local/ la-me-logging-deal1-2009oct01,0,3972470.story

Sierra Pacific Industries’ announcement comes less than a week after the administration of Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger pushed through new rules that allow the firm to sell its trees’ ability to absorb harmful carbon dioxide from the air.

Gov’t Buries Fact that Logging Blows Our Emissions Target
http://thetyee.ca/ Opinion/ 2009/ 09/ 23/ LoggingCO2/

Forest emissions push CO2 77 per cent higher than BC’s official numbers say. We need a plan.

British Columbia’s Greenhouse Gas Inventory Report. The report gives a break-down of CO2 emissions by sector — with a major source tucked away in the “memo” section and not counted at all.

According to the report, total greenhouse gas emissions in British Columbia in 2007 were 67 megatonnes. These mainly originate from the use of fossil fuels (80 per cent) as well as waste (six per cent), agriculture (four per cent) and deforestation (five per cent). So far, all correct. But it’s the innocuous-sounding item “emissions from forest land remaining forest land” that hides the real bomb: a whopping 51 megatonnes of CO2. This figure appears only as a “memo item” in the report and is not counted as part of B.C.’s total emissions. B.C.’s carbon emissions would be 77 per cent higher if emissions from forests were included.

Mountain Pine Beetle changed the equation

Water Sucking Solar Farms Breed Water Wars
http://www.treehugger.com/ files/ 2009/ 10/ water-sucking-solar-farms-breed-water-wars.php?dcitc=th_rss

If you thought there were water wars brewing before, just wait.
Many solar projects consume enormous amounts of water. How much water are we talking? According to a recent New York Times article, proposed plans for two solar farms in Nevada would gulp up 1.3 billion gallons of water annually–or 20 percent of the area’s available water.

[JR: As readers know, CSP can -- and will -- be low water use. Guess it's time to repost!]

I woul imagine that the USA is failing to appreciate the magnitide of the problem.

I sent the following letter to WeCanSolveit.org.

A new study shows that what was presently on the table in the Copenhagen talks will push us to 3.5 degrees Celsius (6.3 Fahrenheit) by the end of the century. The problem is that 3 million years ago the earth was 3 degrees Celsius warmer than today and sea levels were 85 feet higher than today. If that amount of warming can lead to the melting of the ice sheets, then it will certainly melt all the mountain glaciers and turn a large part of the globe into a dustbowl. This is one reason the world’s leading climate scientist, Jim Hansen, published a paper last year saying we had to return to 350 ppm CO2 in the atmosphere by the end of the century; right now we are 389 ppm.

In light of this, I think we need to look at mass demonstrations on next Earth Day. The climate agreement will not all be sealed by April 2010. Wecansolve it has 2.3 million members, plus all the different environmental organizations probably pushes the number to 3 million. If we could coordinate among other environmental groups and if they could all ask each member to get 5 to 10 people to protest on earth day we have a protest of 15 to 30 million people. If this protest was organized quickly and members of wecansolveit.org and others could get pledges from their members, then it could be released to the press that this demonstration was going to happen, which would further pressure world leaders, especially the US.

I am giving a lecture to 300 people in Nebraska next week suggesting this very idea. I will start preparing people on the micro level here in my city, I would urge you to work on this on the macro level.

I would like a response to this email. I appreciate your time and all the work you are doing for my children’s future.

“The situation is difficult because we recorded rainfall of between 220 and 230 millimetres (nine inches) in three or four hours in some parts of Sicily,” said Bernardo De Bernardinis, Bertolaso’s deputy.

The real costs of adaptation are likely to be 2-3 times greater than estimates made by the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change ( UNFCCC ), say Professor Martin Parry

this new study suggests that previous attempts to figure out the costs have drastically under-estimated how expensive this could be. With such large sums potentially involved, the pressure to act now to reduce the extent of climate change is greater than ever.