Category Archives: Climate Change

Canada’s fossil fuels are risky business with Global Carbon Budget

October 31, 2013Carbon Tax - Cap and Trade, Climate Change, EconomicsCommon Sense Canadian

Canada's Fossil Fuels risky business with Global Carbon Budget — Alberta Tar Sands operation near Fort McMurray (photo: Kris Krûg)

by Carol Linnitt – republished from Desmog Canada

In its latest report the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) gave global greenhouse gas emissions a worldwide limit, know as the global ‘carbon budget.’ In order to prevent temperatures from rising above the 2 C threshold scientists have designated to avoid “dangerous” climate change, total global emissions need to stay within about 921 billion tonnes or gigatonnes (Gt).

As Marc Lee, senior economist with the Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives recently pointed out, the carbon budget “should be a wake-up call for Canada.”

“With a development model based on ever more fossil fuel extraction, Canada’s economy and financial markets are on a collision course with the urgent need for global climate action,” he said.

As Lee explains the global carbon budget of 921 Gt gives the planet a 66 per cent chance of staying within the 2 C limit. But that chance gets drastically worse if we surpass the budget: emitting as much as 1068 Gt leaves us with a mere 50 per cent chance.

Canada’s portion of the emissions pie would depend on negotiations, but would likely end up being between 4 (given our population size) and 24 Gt (given our gross domestic product).

When pooled together, however, Canada’s proven reserves of bitumen, oil, natural gas and coal add up to 91 Gt. If you add our probable reserves in you end up with a whopping grand total of 174 Gt.

Even if Canada’s negotiators were shrewd, Lee allows, and end up with a 30 Gt national budget because Canada relies on fossil fuel exports, still two-thirds of Canada’s proven reserves, and 83 per cent of proven-plus-probable reserves would need to remain unburnt.

As Lee writes, this has significant impact on Canada’s financial market:

[quote]This math should alarm institutional investors, and pension funds in particular – because stock market valuations are premised on fossil-fuel-producing companies extracting those resources. Analysts have called this a ‘carbon bubble’ in our financial markets.

This is bad news for the Toronto Stock Exchange (TSX), which is highly weighted toward the fossil fuel sector, with total market capitalization of fossil fuel companies of about $400-billion to $500-billion. Fossil fuel companies account for about 24 per cent of the total value of the S&P/TSX composite index.[/quote]

A report recently released by the Carbon Tracker Initiative shows that “currently financial markets have an unlimited capacity to treat fossil fuel reserves as assets.” This unchecked incorporation of what are already considered unburnable carbon reserves is a major market failure, write the report’s authors, that is “creating systemic risks for institutional investors, notably the threat of fossil fuel assets becoming stranded as the shift to a low-carbon economy accelerates.”

The concept of “stranded assets” made international headlines last week after a coalition of 70 investors worth $3 trillion pressured 45 of the biggest oil and gas companies to deal with this concern.

The very real limitations placed on the value of Canada’s carbon assets due to their impact on climate change also casts the Harper Government’s position on resource development in a new light.

Recently Natural Resources Minister Joe Oliver told the World Energy Congress in Daegu, South Korea that “expanding and diversifying our energy exports is a top priority of the Canadian government.”

[quote]Canada is well placed to meet the growing demand for oil and gas. Canada is the world’s fifth-largest producer of oil and has the third-largest proven reserves – 172 billion barrels, of which 168 billion are from the oil sands. Canada is the world’s fifth-largest producer of natural gas, with recoverable gas resources approaching 1,300 trillion cubic feet – some 200 years of production at current rates.[/quote]

In addition to having enormous carbon reserves, Canada is failing to adequately manage its current emissions output. According to a new Environment Canada report, Canada’s carbon emissions in 2020 will be 20 per cent higher than the Harper Government’s promised reductions under the 2009 Copenhagen Accord.

Canada’s emissions are set to be 66-107 per cent higher than its required reductions to avoid more than 2 C of warming.

Wildrose leader Smith admits climate change real, human-caused

October 26, 2013Climate Change, Climate Science, Politics, Western CanadaCanadian Press

RED DEER, Alta. – Alberta Wildrose Leader Danielle Smith, under fire by critics as a weak leader and climate change denier, announced Friday she now believes climate change exists and that mankind is at least partially to blame. As her party delegates opened a weekend policy convention, Smith told reporters:

[quote]I accept that climate change is a reality, as do our members. I accept that there’s a human influence on it. I leave the debate about the details to the science about (to) what extent it is and how fast it is occurring.[/quote]

Smith has been sharply criticized this week for refusing to say if she believes climate change exists, echoing disastrous statements she made in last year’s election campaign.

Afraid of what her members thought

Smith said Friday she has hedged in the past because she wasn’t sure where party rank and file stood on the issue, and said what opinions she did hear were across the spectrum.

“I really didn’t have a gauge of where our members were at because it had never come forward for debate,” said Smith.

“Remember, we are a grassroots party and I do take my marching orders from our members. When our members are silent on particular issues, I try my best to interpret. Sometimes we get it wrong, and in this case I’m pleased to see our members want us to move forward on a policy.”

Wildrose voting on climate policy

Party delegates will vote Saturday on two resolutions to direct the caucus to push for measures to reduce greenhouse gases, which lead to the extreme weather anomalies associated with climate change.

Smith said a straw poll of delegates on Friday indicated those resolutions will pass overwhelmingly, and said she takes that as a green light to speak out on climate change.

“It gives me a mandate,” she said.

The science of climate change has bedevilled the right of centre Wildrose party for more than a year.

According to some political observers it was the single biggest reason the party’s surging popularity fell through the floor just days before the vote in last year’s election, after Smith announced the science of climate change was not settled.

Climate silence attacked by NDP, Conservatives

Earlier this week, Smith declined to spell out her stand on climate change when asked by reporters about the upcoming environmental resolutions.

That led NDP Leader Brian Mason and Environment Minister Diana McQueen to sharply criticize Smith as a poor leader for refusing to stake a stand on a matter of clear importance to Albertans.

McQueen also stated that Alberta would be seen as a “joke” on the international stage if it was represented by a party that didn’t believe in climate change.

Those comments rankled Smith.

“I don’t accept a lecture from a do-nothing environment minister like Diana McQueen,” she said.

“If you look at our neighbours in Ontario and Quebec, they’re already below their 1990 levels (while) Alberta has increased its greenhouse gas emissions by 46 per cent.

“So every time this issue comes up the reason why (McQueen) points at our party is because there’s been absolutely no progress by her party — and it’s affecting Alberta.”

Climate change denier’s speech cancelled

The Wildrose also moved Friday to cancel the headline speaker for a Nov. 2 party fundraiser for MLA Jason Hale.

The speaker was author/filmmaker Bruno Wiskel, known for the book “The Sky is Not Falling,” which argues that glaciers have been melting and water levels rising for millenia, long before humans showed up.

Smith said Hale told her Wiskel was booked by an over-enthusiastic volunteer.

“I understand the fundraiser was put together by one of his well-meaning volunteers, and that the speaker has been cancelled,” said Smith.

“It’s very clear that our members want us to go in a particular direction.”

Stefan Baranski, spokesman for Premier Alison Redford, said the volunteer explanation is a weak fabrication for what was clearly a party-sanctioned event.

He said the fundraiser shows that what the party says and what it believes are two different things.

“Albertans won’t be fooled by Danielle Smith and her promises to sweep their extreme agenda under the rug,” said Baranski.

The verbal fireworks underscore the bitter animosity that exists between Redford’s Progressive Conservative party and Smith’s Wildrose.

Wildrose-Conservative blood-feud

The Wildrose is made up of many disaffected former Tories who grew disenchanted with what they called the party’s top-down management style and its decision to abandon the fiscal conservatism of former premier Ralph Klein and embrace taking on debt to pay for infrastructure.

The blood-feud acrimony surfaced again Friday when the Wildrose kicked out three PC staffers, accusing them of posing as Wildrose delegates in order to spy on the debate.

Smith said all parties allow opposition members to attend rival events as long as they register and are clearly marked as observers.

Baranski said his staffers did register as observers, but were turfed anyway, officially for lack of space.

“What that says to us is the Wildrose is clearly hiding something, clearly afraid of what looking into what their members are debating,” said Baranski.

Smith said that’s not the case.

“We’ve been open to having observers in the past,” she said.

“But if you’re going to try to sneak in and pretend you’re a member and start videotaping or audiotaping other members’ conversations with them thinking that you’re here as another Wildroser, we’re not going to allow for that.

“If they’re going to sneak their way in to spy on us, what else would they expect us to do?”

A mandatory leadership review was also held Friday and Smith received the support of 90.2 per cent of members in the vote.

Merkel took BMW money before putting brakes on EU emissions cuts

October 15, 2013Carbon Tax - Cap and Trade, Climate Change, International, PoliticsCanadian Press

Merkel took BMW money before putting brakes on tougher emissions cuts — German Chancellor Angela Merkel gets a tour of new BWW designs at a recent auto show

BERLIN – Germany blocked the introduction of tougher European Union emissions rules for cars shortly after Chancellor Angela Merkel’s party received a large donation from three major BMW shareholders, according to newly released parliamentary records.

Opposition parties on Tuesday cited the donation as evidence of an uncomfortably close relationship between Merkel and German automakers.

Following weeks of German lobbying, the environment ministers of the EU’s 28 nations agreed Monday to seek further tweaks to the proposed emissions rules that come into force in 2020.

Just days earlier, Merkel’s Christian Democratic Union had received 690,000 euros ($935,900) from Susanne Klatten, her mother Johanna Quandt and brother Stefan Quandt. The Quandt family holds almost half of the shares in the Munich-based BMW, whose luxury cars on average emit well over the proposed limit of 95 grams of carbon dioxide per kilometre.

Merkel’s party insisted there was no link between donation and the pressure that her government put on other European countries to hold off on the emissions deal.

“The Quandt family has supported the CDU with private donations for many years, independently of whether the CDU was part of the government or in opposition,” the party said in a statement.

The opposition Left Party noted that the decision to block the new emissions rules would directly benefit German automakers such as Daimler, Volkswagen and BMW.

“The suspicion that this corporation bought itself a favourable policy is hard to dismiss,” it said.

The auto industry and its suppliers employ some 740,000 people in Germany.

The Green Party, which is one of two parties holding talks with the CDU to form a coalition government following last month’s election, also criticized the donation, saying it harmed Germany’s image abroad.

In a compromise deal in June, national EU governments and the European Parliament agreed to force carmakers to further slash their average carbon dioxide emissions from a 2015 target of 135 grams.

Germany wants to delay the introduction of the new emissions limit until 2024.

Sinkholes and other sinking feelings

October 12, 2013Climate ChangeRay Grigg

On the quiet night of August 11, 2013, a 30-m-wide sinkhole opened at Summer Bay near Orlando, Florida, and half of a luxury three-story villa collapsed into the yawning chasm. The event destroyed the comforting mood of peaceful security created by the soothing beiges and subtle pinks of the villa’s decorating scheme. Flooring, joists, rafters, walls, trusses and roof tiles tumbled into a tangled mess. Within the fault lines visible in the surrounding grass, a smaller adjoining building leaned at a precarious angle toward the irresistible gravity of the hole. Nearby palm trees were tilted at an uncomfortable angle.

Sinkholes are common in Florida. Much of the southern half of the state sits on a flat bed of limestone where rain, groundwater and intrusions of the Atlantic Ocean dissolve the rock’s calcium, riddling the subsurface with labyrinthian networks of tunnels and caverns. While a few open near the surface to create occasional problems for the 5.5 million people living in South Florida, this is not their biggest threat.

Florida faces another sinking problem

South Florida is flat. Its highest elevation is about 4 metres. Low swamps, bayous and channels define its western shore. Its east coast is comprised of long beaches. Its major city, Miami, occupies a long and narrow isthmus that is barely 2 metres above sea level. And the world’s oceans are rising.

Most of this rise during the past century — about 0.2 metres — has been due to the expansion of water caused by warming oceans. Now the rise is accelerating, compounded by the melting of the world’s glaciers and the ice sheets of Greenland. Scientists expect an additional 0.2 to 0.4 metres by 2050. Predictions are 1 metre, perhaps as much as 2 metres by 2100. Increasingly violent weather events could cause storm surges of 5 or 6 metres. The future of Miami is destined to be wet.

Vancouver near top of list for rising sea level threat

With $416 billion in assets presently at risk, Miami is number two on the list of the 20 major cities most in danger of flooding, just behind Guangzhou in China. New York, New Orleans, Mumbai, Nagoya, Tampa-St. Petersburg, Boston, Shenzen, Osaka-Kobe and Vancouver follow in that order.

On a list of 136 major coastal cities threatened by rising ocean levels, Vancouver places as the 10th most at risk of suffering serious damage, according to a study authored by Dr. Robert Nicholls, a professor of coastal engineering at the University of Southampton (Globe and Mail, Aug. 20/13).

$1 trillion a year at stake from rising oceans

Without extensive efforts to mitigate the damage from rising oceans, losses to coastal cities are expected to reach $1 trillion per year by 2050, although complex and expensive engineering projects could reduce annual damage to $63 billion (Ibid.). The city of New York is planning a $20 billion enterprise of movable flood walls to protect Manhattan, with 6 metre levees to save Staten Island and artificial dunes to spare the state’s Atlantic coastline.

But the prospects present sobering challenges. And New York is but one coastal city at risk. A study in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences predicts that 1,700 American towns and cities will be below sea level by 2100 — the number could be reduced to 80 if all carbon dioxide emissions stopped immediately.

Goodbye, Miami

Miami’s low elevation and lack of grade is already presenting water problems. Torrential rainstorms, a common event in Florida, overburden the drainage systems and cause shallow flooding of streets and neighbourhoods. Very high tides can send the sea gushing up through manhole covers (Jeff Goodell, “Goodbye, Miami”, Rolling Stone, June 30/13). The 88 million litres of sewage that Miami produces every day is increasingly difficult to pump away.

Fresh water supplies are already compromised by rising ocean levels, a problem exacerbated by the 12 billion litres per day that South Florida draws from aquifers for drinking and agriculture. This lowering of fresh water levels invites an even greater intrusion of salt water into wells, many of which have been abandoned for drilled replacements.

The challenge and expense of getting adequate supplies of fresh water is expected to get worse. The option of desalinization as a costly source of fresh water may be unaffordable as the state and city struggle with the financial burden imposed by combating the other threats of a rising ocean.

Miami is not New Orleans

Miami is not New Orleans, explains Piet Dircke, the program director for water management in the Netherlands:

[quote]New Orleans looks a lot like the Netherlands — it is below sea level, with a big dike around it. If you don’t pump it out, the city drowns. It’s a big bathtub. We know how to do that. Miami is different” (Ibid.)[/quote]

Glenn Landers, a senior engineer at the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, elaborates about the low and porous limestone plateau that underlies South Florida. “Imagine Swiss cheese,” he says, “and you’ll have a pretty good idea what the rock under southern Florida looks like” (Ibid.).

Even if it were possible to build the thousands of kilometres of dikes necessary to keep the area dry, rising ocean levels will find access via the innumerable passages in the limestone. The volumes of water arriving by this subterranean means will be too persistent to stop and too great to remove.

So the same kind of sinkhole that swallowed the luxurious villa in Summer Bay will become a critical part of Southern Florida’s watery future. If the scientific predictions are correct, such sinkholes may be the only unique feature that distinguishes Miami from the hundreds of other coastal towns and cities trying to save themselves from the threat of rising oceans.

IPCC report shows action on climate change is critical

October 5, 2013Climate Change, Climate ScienceDr. David Suzuki

The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change just released the first of four chapters of its Fifth Assessment Report. It shows scientists are more certain now than in 2007 when the Fourth Assessment was released that humans are largely responsible for global warming – mainly by burning fossil fuels and cutting down forests – and that it’s getting worse and poses a serious threat to humanity. It contains hints of optimism, though, and shows addressing the problem creates opportunities.

The IPCC was set up in 1988 by the World Meteorological Organization and UN Environment Programme at the request of member governments. For the recent study, hundreds of scientists and experts worldwide combed through the latest peer-reviewed scientific literature and other relevant materials to assess “the state of scientific, technical and socio-economic knowledge on climate change, its causes, potential impacts and response strategies.”

IPCC scientists as certain as they can be

Scientists are cautious. That’s the nature of science; information changes, and it’s difficult to account for all interrelated factors in any phenomenon, especially one as complicated as global climate. When they say something is “extremely likely” or 95 per cent certain – as the latest report does regarding human contributions to climate change – that’s as close to certainty as science usually gets. Evidence for climate change itself is “unequivocal”.

According to the latest installment, which cites 9,200 scientific publications in 2,200 pages, “It is extremely likely that human activities caused more than half of the observed increase in global average surface temperature from 1951 to 2010.” It also concludes oceans have warmed, snow and ice have diminished, sea levels have risen and extreme weather events have become more common.

Warming slowing, but threat just as serious

The report also dismisses the notion, spread by climate change deniers, that global warming has stopped. It has slowed slightly in recent years, scientists say, because of natural weather variations and other possible factors, including increases in volcanic ash, changes in solar cycles and, as a new scientific study suggests, oceans absorbing more heat.

An increase in global average temperatures greater than 2 C above pre-industrial levels would result in further melting of glaciers and Arctic ice, continued rising sea levels, more frequent and extreme weather events, difficulties for global agriculture and changes in plant and animal life, including extinctions. The report says we’ll likely exceed that threshold this century unless we choose to act.

This means a strong, concerted global effort to combat climate change is necessary to protect the health of our economies, communities, children and future. That will cost us, but far less than doing nothing. Although governments of almost 200 countries agreed global average temperature increases must be kept below 2 C to avoid catastrophic warming, we are on track for the “worst case scenario” outlined by the first assessment report in 1990. Research indicates it’s possible to limit warming below that threshold if far-reaching action is taken. We can’t let skeptics sidetrack us with distortions and cherry-picking aimed at creating the illusion the science is still not in.

The value of investing in sustainable alternatives

The reasons to act go beyond averting the worst impacts of climate change. Fossil fuels are an incredibly valuable resource that can be used for making everything from medical supplies to computer keyboards. Wastefully burning them to propel solo drivers in cars and SUVs will ensure we run out sooner rather than later.

Working with other nations to meet science-based targets to cut global warming pollution and create clean, renewable energy solutions would allow us to use our remaining fossil fuel reserves more wisely and create lasting jobs and economic opportunities. That’s why the David Suzuki Foundation is working with the Trottier Energy Futures Project to identify clean-energy opportunities for Canada.

Shifting to cleaner energy sources would also reduce pollution and the environmental damage that comes with extracting coal, oil and gas. That would improve the health of people, communities and ecosystems, and reduce both health-care costs and dollars spent replacing services nature already provides with expensive infrastructure.

The IPCC report gathers the best science from around the world. It’s clear: There’s no time to delay. The first chapter examines the current science of climate change, the second will look at impacts and the third will consider strategies to deal with the problem. A report synthesizing the three chapters will be released in 2014. We must take it seriously.

Written with contributions from David Suzuki Foundation Communications Manager Ian Hanington.

Climate Change will hit Canada harder: international report

September 30, 2013Climate Change, Climate ScienceCanadian Press

OTTAWA – The latest international report on climate change confirms that global warming is amplified in Canada and the trend is going to continue, the David Suzuki Foundation said Monday.

The report from the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, which was partially released Friday before being unveiled Monday in its entirety, confirms the planet is heating up and that it’s likely human activities are to blame.

The Suzuki foundation, however, said the detailed report shows that climate change hits harder in northern countries such as Canada. Global warming is magnified at or near the polar regions, largely due to the loss of ice and snow cover.

Canada has seen double the average warming

Canada has experienced double the average global temperature increase during the last century, the foundation said, while adding that it’s not too late to cut carbon emissions and avert the worst effects of global warming. Said Ian Bruce, the foundation’s science and policy manager, in a statement:

[quote]Our future will not be determined by chance. It will be determined by choice: either we ignore the reality of the science or we make changes to reduce carbon emissions.[/quote]

Harper Govt claims climate change “leadership”

The Harper government greeted the preliminary details of the report last week by saying it’s already acting to cut greenhouse gas emissions and by taking some partisan potshots at its political rivals.

The government is already “playing a leadership role in addressing climate change,” Environment Minister Leona Aglukkaq said Friday.

“Unlike the previous Liberal government, under whose watch greenhouse gas emissions rose by almost 30 per cent, or the NDP, who want a $21-billion carbon tax, our government is actually reducing greenhouse gases and standing up for Canadian jobs.”

Canada falling far behind on emissions targets

Aglukkaq’s own department, however, says the country is on pace to make it only halfway to its promise to reduce greenhouse gases by 17 per cent below 2005 levels by 2020.

Aglukkaq’s comments drew scorn from both the Liberals and the NDP.

With LNG emissions, BC will fail to meet climate targets

September 29, 2013Carbon Tax - Cap and Trade, Climate Change, Energy and Resources, LNGCanadian Press

VICTORIA – A report presented to the United Nations indicates British Columbia is meeting its legislated targets to cut greenhouse gas pollution, but environmental leaders say that won’t last much longer even if the province sets up a smokescreen to hide the air pollution created by proposed liquefied natural gas operations.

Environment Canada’s national inventory submission in April to the United Nations Framework Convention on climate change shows B.C.’s greenhouse gas, or GHG, emissions have declined almost six per cent since 2007 when the province passed its law to cut the emissions by 33 per cent by 2020.

The inventory report, which measures GHG emissions from farms, factories, vehicles, gas fields and numerous other entities, measured B.C.’s carbon dioxide emissions at 59,100 kilo tonnes in 2011 — the most recent numbers. In 2007, when B.C. passed its Greenhouse Gas Reduction Targets Act, Environment Canada reported that B.C. emitted 62,600 kilo tonnes of GHG’s.

The report stated Canada’s total GHG emissions for 2011 measured 702 megatonnes, up 19 per cent since 1990, when the report first started measuring pollution emissions.

Liberals not serious about GHGs: Former climate science advisor

But B.C. climate scientist Mark Jaccard, who helped the Liberal government develop its climate targets law and implement the carbon tax, said he’s given up on Canada’s GHG reduction plans and is now working with the California Energy Commission which is advising U.S. President Barack Obama on cutting emissions.

Jaccard said if B.C. really wanted its residents to know if the province was hitting or missing its targets Premier Christy Clark would call in independent reviewers to examine the results.

“If Christy were like (former premier Gordon Campbell), she would have them estimate, and then publicly release, the effect of LNG and other policies on B.C.’s GHG target,” he said. “If Christy were like (Prime Minister Stephen) Harper she would not.”

Jaccard said the B.C. government needs to feel continuous pressure from British Columbians about its legislated goal to cut GHG emissions by 33 per cent within the next seven years. Said Jaccard:

[quote]They are not interested in climate and GHG reduction. I work with groups making suggestions to the Obama government and associated institutions. And I work directly with the California Energy Commission. And I have done a bit for Canada’s Auditor General. But since Gordon Campbell left and since Stephen Harper got a majority there is no interest in people like me from our provincial and federal governments.[/quote]

B.C.’s Greenhouse Gas Reduction Targets law mandates regular reporting of the most up-to-date emissions numbers.

Campbell’s Liberals also established a Climate Action Secretariat to support programs across the province that reduce GHG emissions. The secretariat now is part of the Ministry of Environment.

Weaver: LNG emissions make BC’s climate targets ‘meaningless’

Victoria-area Green party MLA Andrew Weaver, who with Jaccard once served on Campbell’s blue ribbon environmental advisory Climate Action Team, said Wednesday the B.C. Liberals want to tell British Columbians the province is meeting its reduction targets, but once the LNG plants fire up, those targets are meaningless.

“They simply cannot go down the path and produce the LNG they want to produce and stay within their targets without abandoning them,” said Weaver, also a noted climate scientist.

[quote]Natural gas is not clean energy. I always call it cleaner energy. It’s cleaner than coal, but it’s not clean energy.[/quote]

Weaver said clean energy is renewable energy like electricity or wind.

cleanest LNG in the world“British Columbians are essentially being sold a bill of goods when they are told that somehow we’re going to have the because the reality is we are not on that path,” he said. “Some honesty in this discourse would be really appropriate.”

Liberals water down Clean Energy Act for LNG

Earlier this week, a report by Tides Canada released a report that concluded B.C. will not achieve its goal to develop the cleanest LNG plants in the world because natural gas fuelled operations will produce LNG emissions three times dirtier than electricity-driven plants in Australia and Norway.

In July 2012, the Clark government amended its Clean Energy Act to declare that the natural gas used to fuel LNG operations would be clean energy, but Weaver said calling natural gas clean may help the B.C. government get around its own emissions law, but Canada is duty-bound to report the real numbers to the United Nations.

“We have to have an honest discussion, a transparent discussion, one where you’re constrained by the truth to say that we are heading down a path where we are willingly and knowingly going to break this law,” he said. “That to me is troubling.”

NDP vows to hold Liberals to GHG targets

Outgoing New Democrat Leader Adrian Dix said his Opposition party intends to hold the government to its emission targets.

“This is an example of a government divorced from reality,” he said.

[quote]They claim emissions aren’t emissions anymore.

[/quote]

Government offers no specifics on meeting targets with LNG emissions

But Environment Minister Mary Polak steadfastly maintains the government is committed to meeting its emissions reduction targets and she’s counting on industry and governments, local and provincial to find ways to cut GHG emissions.

She said her major challenge remains developing a clean environmental policy that doesn’t adversely impact the bottom line of the companies looking to develop the LNG market.

Polak wouldn’t speculate on suggestions by Weaver and Jaccard that the government will completely exempt emissions from natural gas fuelled LNG plants from the targets law.

“You’re still dealing with a hypothetical,” she said. “On top of that, there’s every likelihood that you will see a range of approaches from different companies and different technologies,” she said.

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Harper government claims to be leader on climate change action

September 28, 2013Canada, Climate Change, Climate Science, PoliticsCanadian Press

OTTAWA – The Conservative government has responded to an international report on “unequivocal” global warming by slamming past Liberal inaction and renewing its warning of an alleged NDP carbon tax.

The latest report Friday from the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change confirms the planet is heating up and that it’s “extremely likely” human activities are the cause.

“Warming of the climate system is unequivocal, and since the 1950s, many of the observed changes are unprecedented over decades to millennia,” said the scientific report released in Stockholm.

[quote]The atmosphere and ocean have warmed, the amounts of snow and ice have diminished, sea level has risen, and the concentrations of greenhouse gases have increased.[/quote]

The report says the effects are especially apparent in the Northern Hemisphere, affecting everything from sea ice and snow fall to permafrost.

“Multiple lines of evidence support very substantial Arctic warming since the mid-20th century,” says the document.

Haper government playing ‘leadership role’ on climate change?

While environmental groups and some governments around the world used the report as a clarion call for action, Conservative Environment Minister Leona Aglukkaq issued a statement saying her government is already “playing a leadership role in addressing climate change.” Said Aglukkaq in the release:

[quote]Unlike the previous Liberal government, under whose watch greenhouse gas emissions rose by almost 30 per cent, or the NDP, who want a $21-billion carbon tax, our government is actually reducing greenhouse gases and standing up for Canadian jobs[/quote]

Canada, however, is on pace to achieve only half of its 2020 promise to reduce greenhouse gases by 17 per cent below 2005 levels, according to Environment Canada.

And of the reductions made, 75 per cent were attributed to provincial actions in a 2012 report by the National Round Table on the Environment and the Economy — a group the Conservative government has since closed down.

US on track to meet its targets

The State Department in Washington, meanwhile, reported Thursday that the United States is on track to meet its 2020 target.

John Kerry, the U.S. secretary of state, is nonetheless calling Friday’s IPCC report “another wake-up call.”

“Once again, the science grows clearer, the case grows more compelling, and the costs of inaction grow beyond anything that anyone with conscience or common sense should be willing to even contemplate,” Kerry said in a statement.

Harper won’t take ‘No’ for an answer on Keystone XL

The contrast in tone on the climate file between Ottawa and Washington was reinforced Thursday when Prime Minister Stephen Harper told a forum in New York that “you don’t take ‘No’ for an answer” on the controversial Keystone XL pipeline.

The TransCanada project to export Alberta bitumen to refineries on the U.S. Gulf Coast, which still needs President Barack Obama’s approval, has become a potent symbol for American environmentalists.

Critics fuming over Conservative comments

Aglukkaq’s sharp-elbowed, partisan response to the IPCC report left environmental critics fuming.

“We have an opportunity to rise to the challenge of protecting our kids’ future, so let’s not blow it to score political points and prop up oil company profits,” said Keith Stewart of Greenpeace Canada.

New Democrats said the minister’s comments embarrass Canada.

“This report should be a call to action for one of the greatest environmental challenges of our generation,” said NDP environment critic Megan Leslie, “not the basis for Conservative attacks on non-existent NDP policies.”

John McKay, the Liberal environment critic, labelled Aglukkaq’s release “really stupid.”

“As long as you’re not serious about pricing carbon, you’re not serious about climate change,” said McKay, something he said a number of provincial governments have already recognized.

Canada will face disproportionate effects from climate change

The IPCC report, the fifth by the UN-sanctioned intergovernmental panel, is designed to provide governments with solid scientific evidence to support policy making.

The reports also make up the baseline for UN negotiations toward a new global climate deal, which is supposed to be completed in 2015.

To that end, the IPCC reported that each of the last three decades has been successively warmer than any since 1850.

“In the Northern Hemisphere, 1983–2012 was likely the warmest 30-year period of the last 1,400 years,” said the report.

Canada can expect disproportionate climate effects because of its northern latitude.

“From a Canadian point of view it’s important to remember that the temperature change we experience in Canada is larger than the global average temperature change,” Greg Flato, a climate scientist with Environment Canada, said in an interview.

“That’s been the case in the historical observations and that’s been projected to continue in these climate model projections of the future.”

Fossil fuels driving climate change

Burning fossil fuels is the driving force, says the report.

Thomas Stocker, a co-chair of the IPCC working group, flatly asserted in an accompanying release that “substantial and sustained reductions of greenhouse gas emissions” are required.

The Canadian Association of Petroleum Producers noted that global energy demand is expected to grow by 35 per cent by 2035.

“Most economists agree that most of this demand will be met by fossil fuels for the foreseeable future,” CAPP spokesman Alex Ferguson said in an email.

Ferguson said the oilsands account for just 0.14 per cent of global GHG emissions, and Alberta requires a carbon tax of $15 per tonne — something many other oil exporting countries don’t have.

That won’t dissuade environmental critics who have long argued the Harper government’s emphasis on pipeline building, energy exports and oilsands expansion simply can’t be reconciled with overall emissions reductions.

Amid the accusations and counter-claims, Ian Bruce of the David Suzuki Foundation said the IPCC report actually does offer a message of hope, if governments have the will to hear it.

“Our parents’ generation didn’t know about climate change, but we do,” Bruce said. “It’s really up to our generation to tackle this problem.”

Panel: Climate change ‘extremely likely’ man-made

September 27, 2013Climate Change, Climate ScienceCanadian Press

International panel- Climate change 'extremely likely' man-made — Dr. Rajendra Pachauri, Chief of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change

STOCKHOLM – Scientists can now say with extreme confidence that human activity is the dominant cause of the global warming observed since the 1950s, a new report by an international scientific group said Friday.

Calling man-made warming “extremely likely,” the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change used the strongest words yet on the issue as it adopted its assessment on the state of the climate system.

In its previous assessment, in 2007, the U.N.-sponsored panel said it was “very likely” that global warming was man-made.

Warming ‘hiatus’

One of the most controversial subjects in the report was how to deal with a purported slowdown in warming in the past 15 years. Climate skeptics say this “hiatus” casts doubt on the scientific consensus on climate change.

Many governments had objections over how the issue was treated in earlier drafts and some had called for it to be deleted altogether.

In the end, the IPCC made only a brief mention of the issue in the summary for policymakers, stressing that short-term records are sensitive to natural variability and don’t in general reflect long-term trends.

“An old rule says that climate-relevant trends should not be calculated for periods less than around 30 years,” said Thomas Stocker, co-chair of the group that wrote the report.

Many scientists say the purported slowdown reflects random climate fluctuations and an unusually hot year, 1998, picked as a starting point for charting temperatures. Another leading hypothesis is that heat is settling temporarily in the oceans, but that wasn’t included in the summary.

Stocker said there wasn’t enough literature on “this emerging question.”

Improved climate change models

The IPCC said the evidence of climate change has grown thanks to more and better observations, a clearer understanding of the climate system and improved models to analyze the impact of rising temperatures. Said Qin Dahe, co-chair of the working group that wrote the report:

[quote]Our assessment of the science finds that the atmosphere and ocean have warmed, the amount of snow and ice has diminished, the global mean sea level has risen and the concentrations of greenhouse gases have increased.[/quote]

The full 2,000-page report isn’t going to be released until Monday, but the summary for policymakers with the key findings was published Friday. It contained few surprises as many of the findings had been leaked in advance.

Sea level projections rise, temperatures increases cool

As expected, the IPCC raised its projections of the rise in sea levels to 10-32 inches (26-82 centimetres) by the end of the century. The previous report predicted a rise of 7-23 inches (18-59 centimetres).

But it also changed its estimate of how sensitive the climate is to an increase in CO2 concentrations, lowering the lower end of a range given in the previous report. In 2007, the IPCC said that a doubling of CO2 concentrations would likely result in 2-4.5 C (3.6-8.1 F) degrees of warming. This time it restored the lower end of that range to what it was in previous reports, 1.5 C (2.7 F).

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The IPCC assessments are important because they form the scientific basis of U.N. negotiations on a new climate deal. Governments are supposed to finish that agreement in 2015, but it’s unclear whether they will commit to the emissions cuts that scientists say will be necessary to keep the temperature below a limit at which the worst effects of climate change can be avoided.

Using four scenarios with different emissions controls, the report projected that global average temperatures would rise by 0.3 to 4.8 degrees C by the end of the century. That’s 0.5-8.6 F.

Only the lowest scenario, which was based on major cuts in CO2 emissions and is considered unlikely, came in below the 2-degree C (3.6 F) limit that countries have set as their target in the climate talks to avoid the worst impacts of warming.

Kerry: ‘another wakeup call’

“This is yet another wakeup call: Those who deny the science or choose excuses over action are playing with fire,” U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry said in a statement. “Once again, the science grows clearer, the case grows more compelling, and the costs of inaction grow beyond anything that anyone with conscience or common sense should be willing to even contemplate.”

At this point, emissions keep rising mainly due to rapid growth in China and other emerging economies. They say rich countries should take the lead on emissions cuts because they’ve pumped carbon into the atmosphere for longer.

Climate activists said the report should spur governments to action.

“There are few surprises in this report but the increase in the confidence around many observations just validates what we are seeing happening around us,” said Samantha Smith, of the World Wildlife Fund.

The report adopted Friday deals with the physical science of climate change. Next year, the IPCC will adopt reports on the impacts of global warming, strategies to fight it and a synthesis of all three reports.

Attacks on climate change science hinder solutions

September 26, 2013Climate Change, Climate ScienceDr. David Suzuki

Attacks on climate change science hinder solutions — photo: Dan Crosbie

Starting in late September, the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change will release its Fifth Assessment Report in three chapters and a summary. Not to be outdone, contrarians have unleashed a barrage of attacks designed to discredit the science before it’s released. Expect more to come.

Many news outlets are complicit in efforts to undermine the scientific evidence. Contrarian opinion articles have run in publications in Canada and around the world, from the Financial Post and Washington Post to the Australian and the U.K.’s Mail on Sunday.

In the Guardian, scientists Dana Nuccitelli and John Abraham point out that attacks cover five stages of climate denial: deny the problem exists, deny we’re the cause, deny it’s a problem, deny we can solve it and claim it’s too late to do anything.

One attack that’s grabbing media attention is the so-called Nongovernmental International Panel on Climate Change’s report, “Climate Change Reconsidered II: Physical Science.” It’s written by Fred Singer, a well-known tobacco industry apologist and climate change denier, with Bob Carter and Craig Idso, also known for their dismissals of legitimate climate change science, and published by the Heartland Institute, a U.S. non-profit known for defending tobacco and fossil fuel industry interests. Heartland made headlines last year for comparing people who accept the overwhelming scientific evidence for human-caused climate change with terrorists and criminals such as Unabomber Theodore Kaczynski!

Read Singer’s report if you want. But it’s full of long-discredited claims, including that carbon dioxide emissions are good because they stimulate life. It’s not the goal of deniers and contrarians to contribute to our understanding of climate change; they want to promote fossil fuel companies and other industrial interests, a point explicitly stated in the Heartland-NIPCC news release.

It claims the Singer report, which isn’t peer-reviewed, provides governments with “the scientific evidence they need to justify ending the expansion of ineffective alternative energy sources and other expensive and futile strategies to control climate. Then they can focus on supporting our most powerful energy sources – coal, oil, natural gas, nuclear, and hydro-power – in order to end the scourge of energy poverty that afflicts over one billion people across the world.”

In other words, don’t worry about climate change, let alone health-damaging pollution or the fact that fossil fuels will become increasingly difficult to extract and eventually run out altogether. And even though mountains of solid evidence from around the world show climate change is and will continue to be most devastating for the world’s poorest people, the report feigns concern for those suffering from “energy poverty”.

Overall, the attacks on legitimate climate science are coming from people whose arguments have been debunked many times and who often have ties to the fossil fuel industry. Some, including Roy Spencer and Ross McKitrick, have signed the Cornwall Declaration, which states: “We believe Earth and its ecosystems – created by God’s intelligent design and infinite power and sustained by His faithful providence – are robust, resilient, self-regulating, and self-correcting, admirably suited for human flourishing, and displaying His glory. Earth’s climate system is no exception.”

The declaration also states that “There is no convincing scientific evidence that human contribution to greenhouse gases is causing dangerous global warming” and that renewable energy should not be used to replace fossil fuels. Their world view can’t accept the reality of climate change or its solutions no matter how much evidence is provided – something that offends many people of faith who believe we have a responsibility to care for the Earth.

The IPCC report, on the other hand, is a review of all the available science on climate change, conducted by hundreds of experts from around the world. It confirms climate change is happening, burning fossil fuels is a major cause and it will get worse if we fail to act. It also examines what appears to be a slight slowing of global warming – but certainly not a halt, as deniers claim – and offers scientific explanations for it. Upcoming chapters will also propose solutions.

Resolving the problem of climate change will cost, but it will be much more expensive to follow the defeatist advice of industry shills, whose greed and lack of care for humanity will condemn our children and grandchildren to an uncertain future.

Written with contributions from David Suzuki Foundation Communications Manager Ian Hanington.