Only Green Part of Most Biofuels is the Wealth (Subsidies) They Generate

05/02/200801/04/2009 Stephen Agriculture/Food, CLIMATE CHANGE/GLOBAL WARMING, developing world, Energy, ENVIRONMENT, News biofuel, food prices, subsidies

By Stephen Leahy

Feb 4 (IPS) – Biofuels have quickly turned from environmental saviour to just another mega-scale get-rich quick scheme. Countries and regions without their own oil reserves to tap now see their farms, peatlands and forests as potential “oil fields” — shallow but renewable lakes of green oil.

Renewable does not mean sustainable, and in most cases the only green part of biofuel is the wealth they generate.

Not surprisingly, given the record high oil prices, worldwide investment in bioenergy reached 21 billion dollars in 2007, according to the U.N. Environment Programme. The Inter-American Development Bank announced 3 billion dollars for investment in private sector biofuel projects — mainly in Brazil — while the World Bank said it had 10 billion dollars available in 2007.

Meanwhile development assistance for food-producing agriculture had fallen to 3.4 billion dollars in 2004 — with the World Bank’s share less than 1 billion dollars, according to the Bank’s own World Development Report on Agriculture released in October 2007. And most of this financial assistance was spent on subsidising use of chemical fertilisers. Continue reading →

Fidel Castro Endorses “Plan B” To Save Civilization

04/02/2008 Stephen CLIMATE CHANGE/GLOBAL WARMING, ENVIRONMENT, News, sustainability

Fidel Castro, yes El Presidente Fidel Castro of Cuba, writes in an Jan 31st article posted in English by the Cuban News Agency about a recent visit with Brazilian President Lula:

“I talked to him, of course, about the climate change, and the little attention paid by a great number of leaders of the industrialized world to this issue.

When I spoke with him on January 15 in the afternoon, I could not make reference to the article that would be published only three days later, written by Stephen Leahy from Toronto. This article announces a new book by Lester Brown called Mobilizing to Save Civilization. “

Castro goes on to quote extensively — with a few translation errors — from my IPS article: How to Halt Collapse of Civilization – new bk.

Who knew that Castro was deeply concerned about climate change? And he aptly summarizes the complete absence of discussion about climate change during the US Presidential primaries. Sure the economy may be in trouble, but there is no economy without a stable climate system.
See also: Plan B 3.0: Mobilising to Save Civilisation

Africa, South Asia Face Mega-Famines

01/02/200801/02/2008 Stephen Africa, Agriculture/Food, CLIMATE CHANGE/GLOBAL WARMING, developing world, News

By Stephen Leahy

Feb 1 (IPS) – Climate change will cause major disruptions in the global food system, and adaptation to those changes needs to begin immediately, experts say.

Otherwise one-fifth of the world’s population could starve and millions of others become climate refugees, forced by heat and drought to abandon their lands and hunt for food elsewhere in the coming decades.

To prevent this nightmarish future, researcher David Lobell says the world community should focus its efforts where climate threats are likely to make the greatest impacts.

“We used historical data to determine what food-producing regions of the world were most sensitive to changes in temperature and rainfall,” said Lobell, author of the study published in the journal Science today.

“Impoverished regions of Southern Africa and South Asia will be hit first and hardest by climate change,” Lobell told IPS from his office at Stanford University’s Programme on Food Security and the Environment. Continue reading →

The 2% Climate Solution – WEBCAST WED

30/01/2008 Stephen CLIMATE CHANGE/GLOBAL WARMING

To avoid dangerous levels of climate change the US, Canada and rest of the developed world need to cut roughly 2% of current emission levels of CO2 every year for the next forty years.

It’s not a tough as it sounds.

Find out tonight, Wed Jan 30 and 8 pm EST by listening in to live and free webcast of experts to explain what it would take for the US to make a 2% cut in emissions each year for the next decade.

Continue reading →

Biofuels: Another Good Reason to Hate American Policy

25/01/200806/05/2009 Stephen Agriculture/Food, CLIMATE CHANGE/GLOBAL WARMING, developing world, Energy, ENVIRONMENT, News, sustainability

By Stephen Leahy

Jan 25 (IPS) – U.S. biofuels production is driving up food prices around the world, giving billions of poor people a very good reason to hate U.S. policy, say environmentalists.

“The U.S. has led the fight to stem global hunger, now we are creating hunger,” said Lester Brown, president of the Earth Policy Institute, an environmental think tank in Washington.

The booming U.S. ethanol industry is diverting enormous amounts food into fuel: 81 million tonnes of grain in 2007 and 114 million tonnes this year, equaling 28 percent of the entire U.S. grain harvest, Brown told IPS.

Previous eras of high grain prices were mainly the result of bad weather, but these price hikes are the result of government policy, he said.”Grain prices are at record or near-record highs and they will go higher,” he said. “We might be the first society in history to use public tax dollars to drive up its own food prices.” Continue reading →

Carbon Taxes Coming; Corpos Get Ready for Low-Carbon Diet

24/01/200825/01/2008 Stephen CLIMATE CHANGE/GLOBAL WARMING, economics, Energy, ENVIRONMENT, News

By Stephen Leahy

Jan 21 (IPS) – With a tax on carbon emissions appearing to be inevitable, some of the world’s largest corporations will be asking their suppliers to report on their carbon emissions as part of future reduction efforts.

“Investors are demanding that companies know what their carbon emissions are and consumers want companies to be green,” said Paul Dickinson, CEO of the Carbon Disclosure Project (CDP), an independent not-for-profit organisation in Britain that is coordinating the effort.

“A global price for carbon is coming and we are helping companies to prepare to operate in a carbon-constrained world,” Dickinson told IPS. Continue reading →

Extinction Tourism — See It Now Before Its Gone

18/01/200810/01/2011 Stephen CLIMATE CHANGE/GLOBAL WARMING, Culture, ENVIRONMENT, Global Issues and Perspectives, News

By Stephen Leahy*

TORONTO, Jan 18 (Tierramérica) – Hurry! Hurry! See the polar bears, penguins, Arctic glaciers, small pacific islands before they disappear forever due to global warming.

Tourism companies are now using climate change as a marketing tool: Visit the pacific island paradise of Tuvalu before rising sea levels swallow it in the next 30 to 50 years. See the Arctic while there is still ice and polar bears.

“Some companies are using climate change as a marketing pitch, a ‘see it now before it’s gone’ kind of thing,” says Ayako Ezaki, communications director for the International Ecotourism Society, based in Washington DC.

This independent environmental journalism depends on public support. Click here learn more.

Continue reading →

How to Halt Collapse of Civilization – new bk

17/01/2008 Stephen Agriculture/Food, CLIMATE CHANGE/GLOBAL WARMING, Energy, ENVIRONMENT, News, sustainability

By Stephen Leahy

Jan 17 (IPS) – Imagine it’s a glorious new era and everything you’ll do as part of your normal day helps to stabilise the climate and the global population, eradicate poverty, and restore the earth’s damaged ecosystems.

Sound unrealistic?

It better not be because that is what it will take to prevent the end of human society as we know it, according to a new book, “Plan B 3.0: Mobilising to Save Civilisation“.

The crisis we face is both dire and urgent, requiring a transformative effort like the mobilisation of nations during World War II, says author Lester Brown, president of the Earth Policy Institute, an environmental think tank in Washington. Continue reading →

Oil Sands Projects Ignore Environment – New Report

13/01/200804/01/2009 Stephen CLIMATE CHANGE/GLOBAL WARMING, ECOLOGY, Energy, Science/Tech, sustainability, water

Canada’s oil sand companies continue to pollute the air, water and landscape of a large portion of northern Alberta to supply America’s oil.

Canadian pollution regulations are far less stringent than the US and voluntary for the most part. Now a groundbreaking study by the Pembina Institute and the World Wildlife Fund, released Thursday, shows government reliance on industry to voluntarily do the right thing for the land, water and air of northern Alberta has failed.

For the complete story on the Oil Sands Project that supplies much of America’s oil see: Destroying Canada’s Boreal Forest for America’s Oil – 30-page eBook

Global Economy Going Green?

10/01/2008 Stephen CLIMATE CHANGE/GLOBAL WARMING, economics, Energy, ENVIRONMENT, News, sustainability

By Stephen Leahy

Jan 9 (IPS) – There appears to be hope for the planet yet.

After much urging and dire threats, the global economy, much like a stubborn and temperamental toddler, is starting to reluctantly turn towards sustainability, according to the “State of the World 2008” report released by the Worldwatch Institute Wednesday.

“Innovative green efforts by governments and business are becoming commonplace,” said Gary Gardner of Worldwatch, a U.S.-based environmental think tank.

Continue reading →