Climate Change Despair & Empowerment Roadshow Articles

Climate Change Despair & Empowerment Roadshow
A PROJECT OF THE RAINFOREST INFORMATION CENTRE
http://www.rainforestinfo.org.au

NEWS & ARTICLES

25 June An exciting exchange between Clive Hamilton and George Monbiot.
A critical assessment of George Monbiot’s scheme for a 90 per cent cut in carbon emissions.
George Monbiot's reply

19 June Draining tropical peatlands in SE Asia responsible for 8% of total Global Warming emissions. 90% from Indonesia, mostly for Palm Oil plantations.

14 June 2007 Nuclear Power Threatens Our Water by Michael Gardiner - Feedback on the Draft Report Uranium Mining, Processing and Nuclear Energy Review issued by Department of the Prime Minister and Cabinet Australian Government 12 December 2006. longer version here

14 June detailed policy summaries of Australian political parties on the Vote Climate web site

2 June John Seed's report on the N American Climate Change Despair & Empowerment roadshow.

22 May New energy rules could unleash an economic boom and help quash climate change
By Timothy E. Wirth, Vinod Khosla and John D. Podesta

15 May Deforestation: The Hidden Cause of Global Warming
In the next 24 hours, deforestation will release as much CO2 into the atmosphere as 8 million people flying from London to New York. Stopping the loggers is the fastest and cheapest solution to climate change. So why are global leaders turning a blind eye to this crisis? By Daniel Howden Published: 14 May 2007 in The Independent

10 May To Remake The World by Paul Hawken

4 May Turnbull's hypocrisy on climate - The Government is deliberately misleading Australian voters, writes Ian Dunlop formerly a senior international oil, gas and coal industry executive. He chaired the Australian Coal Association in 1987-88, and the Australian Greenhouse Office Experts Group on Emissions Trading from 1998-2000.

April 2007 Don’t give up on 2°C Nick Hurd MP and Clare Kerr

30 April Thought provoking article on climate and forests

26 April Over Ninety Percent Of Australians Concerned About Climate Change by Richard Bowden - AHN Staff Writer

20 April Earth Day Cometh and Earth Day Goeth (and Where Have All the Bees Gone?) by Paul Watson, Founder and President of Sea Shepherd Conservation Society

10 April Reserves to Dry Up as Clean Coal Becomes Viable Sydney Morning Herald, Wendy Frew Environment Reporter

10 April Ross Gelbspan on Lateline transcript Particularly joyful were his quotes on Nick Stern being very conservative and geosequestration being a furphy.

9 April 1315 Events planned in 50 US states on April 14 Step It Up!

6 April Climate Change: The Challenge of the Century? by Stephen Leahy

5 April Geoengineering: Gambling with Gaia. With hopes for Kyoto dimming, some governments may conclude that massive earth restructuring is the only feasible way out

4 April quotes from our favourite Al Gore interview, with Jonathon Friedland on Ch4 UK

3 April Britain Announces Plans for Required Climate Change Study in Schools

1 April Climate change ‘could create 200m refugees’ - Jonathan Leake, Environment Editor, Times Online

1 April The Billion Tree Campaign: The United Nations Environment Programme campaign to encourage people, businesses, and governments to enter tree-planting pledges online to plant at least one billion trees worldwide during 2007.

31 March Jim Hansen calls for a grass roots movement

30 March Venezuela’s president Chavez has decided to leave the coal in the ground in the Sierra de Perija

28 March Climate Change Action in Schools

26 March How Europe can save the world The EU's landmark deal on carbon controls must be the model for a new Kyoto agreement.

25 March Bill McKibben says we're stuffed. We've eaten, developed and drilled to near oblivion, says the environmental writer. It's time to realize that having more stuff is not the road to paradise. Oh, really?

23 March Please take 30 mins to watch this video of Al Gore addresing Congress yesterday on Global Warming

22 March Sydney Morning Herald story on Climate Action Groups "In a bid to secure a greener world for their children, mothers are forming grassroots pressure groups."

19 March More concern about climate in Australia than in any of the other 16 countries polled

17 March THE EFFECT OF MILITARY ON CLIMATE CHANGE “The world’s armed forces are the single largest polluter on Earth,” KCantw9473@aol.com

16 March Adaptation. "I am concerned that you do not mention adaptation to climate change. Perhaps you are aligned with those, like Gore, who find it politically and ethically wrong even to speak of adaptation..."

13 March Sunday Times review "To the End of the Earth" This is our future - famous cities are submerged, a third of the world is desert, the rest struggling for food and fresh water. Richard Girling investigates the reality behind the science of climate change

11 March item from Graeme Drysdale of Ballarat documents, articles and papers re the whole carbon business; it is becoming more prevalent to assume that we can keep on polluting and expect carbons sinks, etc to offset bad behaviour. Problems with tree planting, offsets etc.

3 March What a classic, finally the lowdown on carbon offsetting http://www.cheatneutral.com/ follow the links.

27 February SMH.com.au story on Rising Tide's blockade of ALP NSW headquarters - demanding that NSW ALP declare before this month's state elections whether or not they would, if re-elected, give the go-ahead to a proposed new coal export terminal which in one fell swoop would DOUBLE NSW CO2 pollution. Go Rising Tide!

24 February Announcing a green era Where to go next in climate policy in an election year?
Environment writer Matthew Warren previews the next possible moves

21 February UK Activists occupy Carbon Neutral Company

19 February Global Warming, Cut The Carbon Or Die By Mike Roselle. Build 10,000 wind mills. Nothing will change
without phasing out carbon-spewing plants.

7 February John Seed Capacity Crowd at Richmond Town Hall, Melbourne

26 January Full House at Coffs Harbour Climate Change Despair & Empowerment roadshow

17 January Telephone Conference with Mark Diesendorf Jan 17, 2007 A Sustainable Future for Australia

14 January Human rights abuses, land conflicts, broken promises - the reality of carbon 'offset' projects in Uganda

13 January great article "A Storm of Denial" by Paul Rogat Loeb

12 January http://www.culturechange.org/cms/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=64&Itemid=33 good article about melting ice and rising seas

11 January "Bridging Peak Oil & Climate Change Activism" An excellent and sober analysis of how these two groups might better cooperate to the benefit of all of us.

20 December http://www.earthday.net/edntv/
Earth Day Network now has an online television network with a good
range of high-quality programs on climate change and alternative
energy. Needs broadband.

15 December Joanna Macy: THE END OF OIL, CLIMATE CHANGE , AND THE GREAT TURNING

5 December A licence to carry on polluting? by Larry Lohmann New Scientist, 5 December2006

4 December Ross Gelbspan's talk at MIT

15 November 2006 Global Warming Increases Species Extinctions Worldwide
Source: University of Texas at Austin

23 October 2006. Biofuels will be of very limited use in combating climate change and may be a major source of distraction and confusion.. Beware the hype. See http://www.monbiot.com/archives/2005/12/06/worse-than-fossil-fuel/ , www.biofuelwatch.org.uk/ & www.newstatesman.com/200608070031 Beware also Carbon Trading and the attempt by "business as usual" to ply its trade under this disguise.

21 October 2006 In Australia, an estimated $6.5 billion a year in public subsidies to the fossil fuel industry are undermining our sustainable future. see www.sustainabilitycentre.com.au/Subsidies.pdf Meanwhile the Australian government's offers a pathetic 2% renewable energy target. Even China has 15%. The Australian Cooperative Research Centre for Renewable Energy was not funded beyond June 2003 and funding for the CSIRO’s atmospheric research department has been cut. Government policies have forced the closure of the Roaring 40s wind farms in Tasmania and South Australia and the Pacific Hydro wind farms in Victoria. Now the Vestas Nacelle wind turbine assembly plant has announced it too will be closing with 100 jobs lost. Worldwide, over US$200 billion in public subsidies go to the oil and coal industries. Little wonder that wind and solar find it hard to compete.

18 October Reduce air travel. Aviation is the fastest growing source of greenhouse gas emissions, already accounting for over 8 million tonnes of of carbon dioxide each year. At present aeroplane fuel is untaxed in Australia, this has to change - more than 10 per cent of the UK total emission from aeroplanes, what are Oz figures? See http://environment.guardian.co.uk/travel/story/0,,1924388,00.html and www.planestupid.com/

14 October Lightbulb giveaway is switched off. A scheme to cut greenhouse gases by giving away millions of low-energy lightbulbs and shower heads has been shut down after households installed less than half of the products. See http://theaustralian.news.com.au/story/0,20867,20578570-2702,00.html

9 October 2006, Herald Sun - Tim Costello writes: The urgency of climate change grows by the day.

Sept 2006 Climate Friendly -- 'offset' for carbon emission through investing in clean energy.

June 2006 - Citizens Climate Campaign: Putting Climate Change on the Political Agenda. The aim is to get thousand sof ordinatry people all over Australia sending a short message every month by letter or email to let our goverment know that climate change is an issue of major concern to the voting public. To join this campaign, send an email saying "Yes!" to climatez@bigpond.net.au.

16 May 2006 Visit this new website -- www.globalclimatechangeaction.org -- to send a letter, sign a petition, collect signatures etc.

Feb 2006 Email the Government about their submission to the UN on the Kyoto Protocol! Visit www.foe.org.au

31 Jan 2006 Expose Exxon - One minute Movie and Action to urge ExxonMobil to change direction

16 Jan 2006 Article in The Independent of London : James Lovelock: The Earth is about to catch a morbid fever that may last as long as 100,000 years . Each nation must find the best use of its resources to sustain civilisation for as long as they can

Ever since reading Ross Gelbspan's Boiling Point -- www.heatisonline.org -- the realisation has been growing in me that climate change is not just an environmental issue but a civilisational issue which will soon swamp all others.

As important as it remains to try and save a bit of rainforest here and a bit there, it seems more and more that it is the Cenozoic Era itself that is at stake and climate change is the ultimate challenge.

So I would like to commend Gelbspan's book to you or if you don't have time to read, an hour-long DVD is available of a talk that Gelbspan gave last year to the World Affairs Council in San Francisco.

The owners of this material (WaterPlanet Environmental Broadcast Service (WEBS) zena12@earthlink.net ) have given me permission to reproduce 20 copies of this DVD and if you are willing to screen this for your community or friends, send me a mailing address (and if possible a small donation to cover duplication and postage), and I will send you a copy as long as copies last.

I will be summarising Gelbspan in my talks around the US next April/May as well as the material in the two important articles below which debunk the myth of the market-based so-called solutions to the impending climate chaos crisis and "the current obsession amongst the wealthy of the western world with offsetting their guilt by paying spurious companies to pretend to lock in carbon by (often only) pretending to plant trees."