Historic Agreement Safeguards Both Climate and Ozone Layer

Historic Agreement Safeguards Both Climate and Ozone Layer

Historic Agreement Safeguards Both Climate and Ozone Layer

MONTREAL, Quebec, Canada, September 22, 2007 (ENS) - In an unprecedented agreement, industrialized and developing countries have decided to accelerate the phaseout of coolant chemicals that are harmful to the ozone layer and also are a cause of global climate warming.

Representatives of 191 countries that are Parties to the Montreal Proctol on Substances that Deplete the Ozone Layer agreed unanimously Friday to accelerate phaseouts of hydrochlorofluorocarbons, HCFCs, from 2009.

HCFCs originally were approved as substitutes for chlorofluorocarbons, CFCs, that were known to deplete the ozone layer back in 1987 when the Montreal Protocol came into force.

Preparatory segment Co-Chairs Marcia Levaggi, Argentina, and Mikkel Sorensen, Denmark smile as agreement is reached. (All photos courtesy Earth Negotiations Bulletin)

This year, during five intense days of negotiations at the 20th anniversary Montreal Protocol conference, the historic deal was reached to accelerate the phaseout of HCFCs.

The details of the agreement - who phases out what and how much, who pays, and under what timetables - are to be made public later today by Canadian Minister of Environment John Baird and UN Environment Programme Executive Director Achim Steiner.

The agreement is unique in that it focuses on ozone recovery and also aims to reverse climate change, a benefit that was not foreseen in earlier understandings of how the stratospheric ozone layer relates to the planet's temperature and climate.

The accelerated phaseout willl potentially achieve five times the expected climate change benefits under the Kyoto Protocol under the most optimistic but unlikely scenarios. Considering the difficulties the Kyoto Protocol has had in achieving its objectives, the new Montreal agreement is even more important.

Brian Mulroney, who was Prime Minister of Canada in 1987 when the Montreal Protocol took effect, said, "It doesn't really matter whether the process is called Kyoto or something else, as long as we are addressing the urgency of global warming."

UNEP Head Achim Steiner

Steiner said there is great synergy between the two treaties.

"The Montreal Protocol is successfully assisting in the repair and recovery of the ozone layer. The Kyoto Protocol is tackling perhaps the greatest challenge of our generation - climate change. However, what is also emerging in 2007, and emerging with ever greater clarity, is that both treaties are mutually supportive across several key fronts," he said.

The Kyoto Protocol's clean development mechanism has led to the destruction of large volumes of the very potent greenhouse gas HFC-23, a by-product of the production of the coolant HCFC-22.

Currently, it is the only reliable mechanism available to prevent emissions of this gas in the short term, according to a new report by the Technology and Economic Assessment Panel of the Montreal Protocol released in Montreal this week.

Didier Coulomb International Institute of Refrigeration

Didier Coulomb of the International Institute of Refrigeration told delegates that environmentally friendly refrigerants have been developed.

Alternative cooling technologies such as thermoelectrics, thermoacoustics, acoustic compression, magnetic cooling, and gas cycles such as the Stirling cycle open up more possibilities, he said. Natural refrigerants, especially carbon dioxide and hydrocarbons, are making inroads in some parts of the world. Three recent projects use solar energy to operate air-conditioning systems.

Coulomb stressed that any decision on refrigerants should differentiate between industrial and non-industrialized countries and that cooperation and funding are vital to transfer technologies.

Developing countries, including Argentina, Brazil, Switzerland and several low-lying Pacific island nations brought new scientific findings to the table nearly nine months ago, when new research showed the added benefits of ozone replenishment to slowing climate change. They urged acceleration of HCFC phaseouts over 10 years instead of 40, the timetable that was in effect until today.

U.S. EPA Head Stephen Johnson

Supporters of the accelerated phaseout plan include the United States, Europe and China, who all helped tip the political balance to secure an agreementl.

Argentina, one of the most aggressive supporters of the phaseouts, was instrumental in informing negotiating ozone delegations and environmental ministries over the last several months of the large climate benefits that could be reached by linking the Montreal and Kyoto Protocols.

Argentina, Brazil, the United States and China, played a key role in helping steer negotiations during the Meeting of Parties in Montreal, when the deal seemed stuck due to negotiating teams' inability to get beyond technical hurdles. Finally, the historic agreement was reached in the final hour.

Scientists say the elimination of HCFCs could potentially quintuple the most optimistic objectives set by the Kyoto Protocol.

Some delegates in Montreal point to the unique linking of the two treaties and distinct sets of global environmental objectives as an indication that we are seeing a maturation of the world's global environmental governance system, and a sign that collaborative global environmental agreements can work.

David Doniger, NRDC

"This week's deal will sharply cut global emissions, especially by reducing large HCFC increases expected in the next decade from China and India," said David Doniger, policy director of the Climate Center at the Natural Resources Defense Council.

"The Bush administration deserves credit for working with other countries to push for faster cuts in HCFCs. The quicker phaseout will help heal the ozone layer and reduce skin cancer. Reducing HCFCs also helps cut global warming pollution," he said.

Looking ahead to the meeting of the world's largest global warming polluters in Washington next week, Doniger added, "We could not have protected the ozone layer with voluntary pledges and non-binding goals. That won't work for global warming either."

"The Montreal ozone treaty is a model for progress on global warming," said Doniger. "It shows that a binding treaty ?with industrial countries taking the lead and with real pollution limits for both developed and developing nations ?can successfully cut global pollution and trigger a clean technology revolution."

Climate change 'devastating Africa'

Extreme rainfall and flooding as a result of climate change has destroyed crops, homes and livelihoods in parts of Africa, Christian Aid has warned.

The aid agency said a number of countries across the continent were experiencing more unpredictable weather conditions, with the worst rainfall in decades.

Unusually heavy rain fell in the Ethiopian and Ugandan highlands in June and in Sudan in July, which was hit by floods as a result.

Flooding in Uganda washed away crops just as the harvest was due - following droughts earlier in the year.

In Kenya the rains were unusually intense, forcing 20,000 people to flee their homes as dykes burst in the Budalangi region, and destroying their harvest, Christian Aid said.

And in Mali, homes, crops and market gardens have been destroyed along with bridges and dams in what locals describe as the worst floods since 1946, leaving them reliant on aid for clean water, blankets and food.

Andrew Pendleton, Christian Aid's senior climate policy analyst warned: "These extremes of weather are exactly what have been predicted.

"Long dry periods followed by short, torrential rainy spells are creating havoc.

" Harvests are being destroyed with the result people are no longer able to feed themselves.

"The situation is only going to get worse unless we take action now."

UN General Assembly Opens With Focus on Climate

UN General Assembly Opens With Focus on Climate

UN General Assembly Opens With Focus on Climate

NEW YORK, New York, September 18, 2007 (ENS) - Climate change, financing for development, the Millennium Development Goals, management reform and counter-terrorism should all receive priority attention from the General Assembly over the next year, said the incoming president Srgjan Kerim today as he opened its 62nd session.

Previewing next Monday's high-level UN meeting on climate change, which will be attended by heads of state from around the world, Kerim called on all 192 UN member governments to dedicate themselves to devising a "collaborative, global response" to the Earth's warming climate. He said climate change is now causing developmental as well as environmental problems.

Incoming UN General Assembly President Srgjan Kerim gavels his first session to order. (Photo courtesy UN)

"The science has spoken; the time for action has come," he said, adding that the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change should remain at the center of international action.

Kerim, who is from the former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia, served as his country's ambassador to the United Nations from 2001 to 2003 and in several other positions with his national government.

"More than ever before, global challenges demand multilateral solutions," he said. "The United Nations is the appropriate multilateral forum to take action. That is why the revitalization of this General Assembly deserves our highest attention."

The high-level meeting on climate change will be convened by UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon, who today called for "strength and reassurance" to face the growing demands placed on the United Nations.

"The world turns to us, increasingly to solve more and more problems," said Ban. "And the problems seem to grow ever more complex ?from the conflict in Darfur to the impact of climate change on our planet."

Ban today announced that 154 speakers, including some 80 heads of state or government, will participate in the high-level dialogue on climate change.

"This will be an informal event where the leaders of the world come together, with a renewed sense of commitment, to tackle a problem that faces each one of us - and above all the most vulnerable populations on our planet, those endangered by rising sea levels and those whose supply of food and water will be greatly affected by the changing climate," he said.

Citing the reports by the UN's Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, IPCC, which have shown the science and impacts of the phenomenon as well as options for response, Ban stressed that the world's people are anticipating that their governments will take action.

UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon (Photo courtesy UN)

Climate change, also the theme of this year's General Assembly debate, is a "challenge to our leadership, skills and vision - and we have to address that challenge boldly," the secretary-general said.

With 191 Parties, the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change has near universal membership of all countries of the world. It is the parent treaty of the 1997 Kyoto Protocol, which has to date 175 member Parties.

Under the protocol, 36 states - both highly industrialized countries and countries undergoing transition to a market economy - have legally binding greenhouse gas emission limitation and reduction commitments, while developing countries have non-binding obligations to limit emissions.

The objective of both the UNFCCC and the Kyoto Protocol is to stabilize greenhouse gas concentrations in the atmosphere at a level that will prevent dangerous human interference with Earth's climate system.

The UNFCCC is holding its annual meeting this year in Bali, Indonesia December 3 - 14.

Hosted by the government of Indonesia, the conference is expected to draft the outlines of a successor agreement to the Kyoto Protocol, which expires at the end of 2012.

Several conferences earlier this year have been held to build the political will to negotiate the Kyoto successor agreement. The most recent meeting held in Vienna, Austria, concluded August 31 with a broad agreement by industrialized countries that emissions should be reduced by 25 to 40 percent below 1990 levels to avoid the worst effects of climate change.

"Human activity, particularly the burning of fossil fuels, has made the blanket of greenhouse gases around the earth thicker," the UNFCCC explains on its website. The resulting increase in global temperatures is alterating the complex web of systems that allow life to thrive on earth, such as cloud cover, rainfall, wind patterns, ocean currents, and the distribution of plant and animal species.

The minimum changes forecast could mean frequently flooded coastlines, disruptions to food and water supplies, and the extinction of many species.

More frequent and more powerful storms are occurring such as Hurricane Felix, which hit Central America earlier this month. Here, Felix survivors carry food aid from the UN's World Food Programme. (Photo by Alejandro Chicheri courtesy WFP)

Already, many effects of climate change are being observed, the UNFCCC points out. "Trends towards more powerful storms and hotter, longer dry periods have been observed and are assessed in the IPCC's Fourth Assessment Report."

"Warmer temperatures mean greater evaporation, and a warmer atmosphere is able to hold more moisture - hence there is more water aloft that can fall as precipitation," says the UN's climate secretariat."

At the same time, climate scientists say, dry regions lose still more moisture if the weather is hotter; worsening droughts and desertification.

In Africa's large catchment basins of Niger, Lake Chad, and Senegal, total available water has decreased by 40 to 60 percent, and desertification has been spread by lower average annual rainfall, runoff, and soil moisture, especially in southern, northern, and western Africa," says the UNFCCC.

In the Arctic, average temperatures have increased at almost twice the global rate in the past 100 years.

Temperatures at the top of the permafrost layer have generally increased since the 1980s by up to 3� ( 5.4�) the UN climate secretariat says.

In the Russian Arctic, buildings are collapsing because permafrost under their foundations has melted, the UNFCCC says. Almost all mountain glaciers in non-polar regions have retreated during the 20th century, and the overall volume of Swiss glaciers has decreased by two-thirds.

Scientists have observed climate-induced changes in at least 420 physical processes and biological species or communities, says the UNFCCC. Plants found on mountaintops have disappeared, which plants at lower levels have been migrating upwards. The mating and egg-laying of some bird species has occurred earlier in the season and growing seasons are longer across Europe.

Global Warming: "The Reawakening of Greenland"

Global Warming: "The Reawakening of Greenland" 
 

Global Warming: "The Reawakening of Greenland"



Fri, 2007-09-07 19:01 — donzzz

Greenland has been in a "Deep Freeze" for 400 years, ever since the "little ice age" aberation settled in. The Viking Norsemen had originally settled in this newly discovered land just about 200 years before the extremely cold period decended upon them. (The "little ice age" was an aberation of the major Wisconsin glacial period that the Earth was gradually recovering from for the past 50,000 years.)

When the Norsemen decided to settle this newly discovered virgin land of vast green pastures the climate was pleasant. The summers were long enough to grow crops and there was little or no sea ice to clog the harbors. It only seemed fitting to name their new homeland, Greenland.

This all changed when the "little Ice age" settled in. The summers grew colder and shorter, the glaciers began advancing and sea ice began to clog the harbors. Scientists have determined that the 14th century was the coldest period known in Greenland during the past 700 years. The advancing glaciers, short summers and long cold winters had a devastating effect on the farming and ranching of the Norse settlements. These adverse conditions, along with the build up of sea ice in the harbors, eventually led to the isolation and extinction of the original Norse settlers.

Now that the cooling aberation of this "little ice age" is over the glaciers are once again melting, the rolling countryside of Greenland can once again bloom. The coastal sea ice will no longer clog the harbors and when the glaciers have retreated far enough, new towns can be established, farming and ranching will again flourish. It will be like a great reawakening for the land after being trapped in a deep freeze for 400 years.

The enviromentalists are blaming this global warming phenomenon on the emission of greenhouse gases caused by automobile and industrial emissions. British Prime Minister Tony Blair recently said "global warming is advancing at an unsustainable rate". Blaming greenhouse gases may be true to a limited extent and should be taken into consideration but the major reoccuring glacial cycles that have been going on long before mankind came on the scene are the overwhelming cause of the present global warming phenomenon.

The major glacial ages have been reoccuring with remarkable regularity in the past million years, with vast interglacial periods of warm, mild climate in between these extremely cold periods. The planet has been recovering from the "Wisconsin" major glacial period for the past 50 thousand years. The "little ice age" was just a little aberation in this long warming recovery. This global warming period should level out into a major warm interglacial period that may last over 1000 centuries.

As the global warming trend continues toward the interglacial age, the northern lands of Alaska, Russia and Canada's climate will become milder. The permafrost will retreat further north and the tree lines will advance northward. Vast new agricultual areas will become available as the summers become longer for growing crops and ranching.

In the south the weather will continue to become more energetic causing more and stronger hurricanes and tornadoes in the southern USA. The low lying underbelly of the country will become much more vulnerable to the higher sea level and stronger storms. Levees and sea walls will have to be built much stronger and higher. It may become totally impractical to live in low lying areas of the Gulf region. This will be a very slow process however, perhaps taking as long as several hundred years. The low lying countries of Bengaladesh and Holland, etc. will also be at risk to the rising sea level.

The sea level of the oceans have already risen quite abit during this global warming period. The coast lines of countries around the world will continue to recede as the sea level rises. Evidence of this can be seen around the Mediterrean Sea where ancient harbors that were once above sea level, are now well below sea level. England and Europe were connected by a land as also was Siberia and Alaska. The coast lines around the world will continue to recede as the warming climate releases more glacial ice back into the ocean. Perhaps there really was an "Atlantis civilization" 15,000 - 20,000 years ago when a lot more ice was locked up in glaciers and the sea level was much lower.

The polar regions have already become increasingly important because of warming climate trend. With the polar sea ice disappearing, seaports and trade routes are being planned along the far northern coast lines. Already commercial shipping is beginning to use the polar routes as the Artic Ocean becomes more navigatable. Cruise ships are even beginning to explore this area. Canada is planning to build a deep-water port at Iqaluit, the Arctic territorial capital. Political friction is already beginning to heat up over Canada's claims in the Polar region.

How long this present global warming phase will last is anyone's guess. It may be nearly over or it may go on for some time yet. What ever it is, as the warming trend levels off and merges with the major interglacial period that follows, if it is anything like the previous major glacial cycles it will last for at least a thousand centuries. A thousand centuries of warm mild climate, now if only mankind can last through this century.

Don Hamilton, author of "The Mind of Mankind: Human Imagination, the source of Mankind's tremendous power!