UN Chief - Warning to governments

UN Climate Chief says estimate of record emissions is stark warning to governments

Bonn, 30 May 2011 - Latest estimates from the International Energy Agency (IEA) showing that greenhouse gas emissions from world energy generation reached record levels in 2010 are a stark warning to governments to provide strong new progress this year towards global solutions to climate change, UN Climate Chief Christiana Figueres said on Monday.

"This is the inconvenient truth of where human generated greenhouse gas emissions are projected to go without much stronger international action now - and into the future," said the Executive Secretary of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC).

"Governments are meeting next week in Bonn to prepare for the next major international climate conference to be held in Durban at the end of the year. It is clear that they need to push the world further down the right track to avoid dangerous climate change," the UN's top climate change official said. "I won't hear that this is impossible. Governments must make it possible for society, business and science to get this job done," she added.

The latest IEA estimates published today show that energy-related CO2 emissions in 2010 were at their highest level in history, following a brief dip in 2009 due to the economic impacts of the global financial crisis.

The Paris-based organization also estimated that 80% of all projected 2020 greenhouse gas emissions from the power sector are already locked into the global system of power generation by plants that already exist or are under construction.

Dr. Fatih Birol, Chief Economist at the IEA who oversees the annual World Energy Outlook, today called the latest estimates a "wake-up call" for the international community.

"The world has edged incredibly close to the level of emissions that should not be reached until 2020 if the 2ºC target is to be attained," he said.

"Given the shrinking room for manoeuvre in 2020, unless bold and decisive decisions are made very soon, it will be extremely challenging to succeed in achieving this global goal agreed [at the UN climate change conference] in Cancun," he added.

Alluding to the upcoming round of UN climate change negotiations in Bonn, Germany (6 - 17 June), UNFCCC Executive Secretary Ms. Figueres said:

"No nation will solve climate change alone. And no nation is alone in feeling its impacts. We're only a few days away now from the mid-year climate negotiations and governments need to pick up speed."

In Cancun, governments launched the most comprehensive package ever agreed to help developing nations deal with climate change, including a set of new international institutions to deliver that support.

They also agreed a major effort to reduce greenhouse gas emissions, but left open the question of how to raise their collective level of ambition to keep the global temperature rise at least below two degrees.

Ms Figueres said that, in Durban, governments will have two main challenges that they have agreed to resolve:

First, to strengthen the international conditions that will allow nations to work together to make deeper global emission cuts. This includes the question of deciding the future of the Kyoto Protocol.

Second, to agree on the effective designs of the new climate institutions that will provide adequate and efficient climate support to developing countries. This includes the Green Climate Fund, Technology Mechanism and establishing the Adaptation Committee.

"In the wider world, I see two very encouraging trends," said Ms Figueres. "Countries, including the biggest economies, are moving forward with new

policies that promote low-carbon prosperous growth, even if they don't always attach climate labels to these policies. And the private sector continues to increase its investment in low-carbon business and renewable energy and wants to do more."

"In Durban at the end of the year, governments need to take the new steps that will drive both these trends forward and much faster," she said.

"The meeting in Bonn is a major opportunity to prepare these essential steps," she added.

New Species of Tiger Stingray Named

An Amazon stingray known as the tiger ray has finally earned its scientific stripes: It's been officially recognized as a new species.
For more than a decade, aquarium traders in the upper Amazon River Basin of Peru have caught the freshwater fish, whose name—Potamotrygon tigrina—is inspired by its orange-black coloration and banded tail.
Up to 31 inches (80 centimeters) wide, the species is distinct from other stingrays based on, among other features, its conspicuous colors and its tail spines, which are lower and not as closely grouped as those of its relatives.
(See related pictures: "Odd Stingless Stingrays Discovered in Amazon.")
"It's one of the prettiest species," said Marcelo de Carvalho, a zoologist at the University of São Paulo in Brazil who led a new study on the tiger ray.
Tiger Ray's Patterns a Mystery
Why P. tigrina is so striking compared with the bland browns and tans of other stingrays is still a mystery, de Carvalho added.
For instance, the stripes could be warning coloration—although most Amazon freshwater stingrays have few predators, other than the occasional crocodile.
"It's kind of ungainly to fit into the mouth of another fish," he said.
Overall there's virtually nothing known about the tiger ray—in fact, aquarium traders who catch them in the wild or breed them in captivity probably know much more about their biology than most scientists, he added.
P. tigrina is one of the most popular types of pet rays in Asia, especially in Japan and China..
Giving the animal a formal species classification "is the first step in understanding how we can regulate this resource," de Carvalho said.

source :
http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2011/05/110506-new-tiger-stingray-amazon-pet-fish-animals-science/?source=link_fb20110507tigerstingray

 

Japan - decision to close the Hamaoka nuclear reactor

We welcome Prime Minister Kan’s request to close Hamaoka,  This is the first time a Prime Minister has directly requested Hamaoka nuclear plant in Japan be closed, however, it cannot be the last.

Fukushima has provided a  reminder of the consequences of nuclear power, and there are many other dangerous reactors still active. The government must continue to close and decommission existing plants, cancel all new reactor builds and put Japan on a course for a future powered by renewable sources of energy. Only then can the Japanese people feel safe.  
Will Malaysia  go on with their plan for the  Nuclear  power plant ????
 ---   Pandang ke Timur  !!!

U.N. clean energy scheme grows, 3,000 projects as to date

3,000 projects ...

The United Nations said its Clean Development Mechanism (CDM) is growing steadily, having registered 3,000 carbon cutting energy projects to date.
Under the CDM, firms invest in projects that reduce climate-warming emissions in developing nations and receive credits called certified emissions reductions (CERs) in return.
The scheme began in 2005 and has clean energy projects in 71 countries.
As well as the 3,000 projects registered, another 2,600 projects are at various stages of the vetting process, the U.N. said.
"Growth remains steady. The number of projects beginning validation in the first three months of 2011 was 17 percent higher than in the same period in 2010," it said in a statement on Thursday.
The U.N. said 1,039 projects have earned a total of more than 600 million CERs to date.
Analysts predict that a record number of U.N. carbon offsets, which are generated from the CDM, will be issued this year.
The U.N. has handed out more than 110 million CERs so far this year, compared to 132 million in the whole of 2010, setting up 2011 to reach a yearly issuance record which will keep prices subdued, analysts told Point Carbon News.
Procedures for handing out credits are being streamlined and a backlog of offsets is being cleared, partly leading to the issuance increase.
Thomson Reuters Point Carbon analysts forecast 1,092 million CERs will be issued by the end of 2012, which would see the U.N. award a further 322-387 million CERs next year.
Governments agreed last year at a U.N. climate meeting in Cancun that mechanisms like the CDM have a key role to play in fighting climate change.
But nations are still uncertain whether to change the shape of the CDM or keep its present form after the Kyoto Protocol expires in 2012.
"The Clean Development Mechanism is still evolving and will continue to do so," said UNFCCC executive secretary Christiana Figueres.
"But from the original concept to now, it has been a success way beyond the initial expectations, not only in the number of projects but also in its ability to attract private sector investment into bettering livelihoods and environments of people in the developing world," she added.
The CDM has come under fire for being too opaque, too complex and not delivering additional emissions cuts. Last year, its integrity was dented when some project developers were accused of exploiting the system