EcocentricEcocentric
One of the biggest obstacles to reducing carbon emissions is the simple fact that political time and climatological time are very, very different. Politicians in elected democracies think on two- or four-year cycles—if that—while even the leaders of an autocratic state like China, without the pressures of an election, are still …
EcocentricPsychology
Over on the mainpage, I have a Going Green column on a forthcoming psychology study that found that news articles and other messages that emphasize the scariest, most catastrophic possible impacts of global warming actually increase climate change skepticism, not the other way around. You can read about it here, and for more detail check …
EcocentricEcocentric
Not to use an overly technical term here, but there’s a neat paper in this week’s Science that explains clearly why carbon dioxide (CO2) is the main agent behind changes in the Earth’s climate—now and in the geologic past. First a bit of background: one argument you might hear from skeptics of manmade climate change is that CO2 is much …
EcocentricUncategorized
A little good news/bad news on the climate and energy front. In the Sept. 10 Science, Steven Davis and Ken Caldeira of Stanford University have a study that estimates what future carbon emissions—and consequent global warming—would be from existing energy and transportation infrastructure. (In other words, what would happen if we …
EcocentricEcocentric
It’s one of the most pressing questions facing climate scientists today: how vulnerable are the vast ice caps on Greenland and Antarctica to rising temperatures? An unfathomable amount of ice is stored on those two land masses, and as that ice melts and flows into the oceans, global sea levels rise—if all the ice on Greenland …
EcocentricUncategorized
The Amazonian rainforest isthe planet’s respiratory system–the more than 1 billion acres of trees help regulate the climate and produce more than 20% of the Earth’s oxygen. And that’s why one of the biggest fears surrounding climate change is the possibility of what’s known as Amazon dieback–the risk that higher temperatures and …
EcocentricEcocentric
A carbon cap now seems to be beyond the greenest dreams of environmentalists, but is it possible that Senator Majority Leader Harry Reid’s energy bill will be more than just oil spill measures? It could happen. Though Reid had said last week that he wouldn’t be able to include a renewable energy standard (RES) in his bill—mandating …
EcocentricEcocentric
Expects lots of forthcoming post-mortems on comprehensive climate and energy legislation, which effectively died (for now) last week when Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid decided not to include a carbon cap or renewable energy standard on the stripped-down bill he intends to introduce this week. I’ve already had my say—today in the …
EcocentricRegulation
Carbon cap-and-trade is dead—at least for this political lifetime. And while the circular firing squad among Democrats and greens has already begun, it’s worth taking a deep breath and remembering that there are other tools that can be used to deal with climate change. As TIME’s Joe Klein points out, the Supreme Court ruled more than …
EcocentricEcocentric
Burn carbon—it’s good for the marmots. Not a slogan you’re likely to see at the next climate change rally, but according to a new study published in the July 21 Nature, it might just be true—at least for a little while.
Scientists led by Arpat Ozgul, an ecologist at University Imperial College London, examined more than three …
