29/08/2016

Climate Sceptic MP Appointed Chair Of Environment And Energy Committee

The Guardian

Liberal Craig Kelly will lead backbench committee that provides advice and feedback on legislation and policies
Liberal member for Hughes Craig Kelly with Tony Abbott during question time in 2015. Kelly has been appointed chairman of the environment and energy committee. Photograph: Mick Tsikas/AAP
The climate sceptic Liberal MP Craig Kelly has been appointed chairman of the backbench environment and energy committee, with National party MP Kevin Hogan as secretary.
The committee will provide feedback on legislation and policies relating to the environment and energy, including to the minister, Josh Frydenberg.
Kelly served on the committee during the last parliament and previously invited climate sceptics to “balance” a presentation given by top climate scientists.
He has been writing on the issue for a number of years, noting that the convicts found it hotter in the 1700s.
“But I wonder if any of these people actually knew that Sydney’s so-called ‘record hot day’ on Tuesday 8th Jan this year [2013], that had them screaming “Global Warming”, was actually COOLER than the weather experienced by the convicts of the First Fleet in Sydney way back in the summer of 1790/91?” Kelly wrote.
He wrote on his Facebook page during the election campaign: “And with freezing temperatures and even snow forecast for Melbourne’s outskirts and in parts of New South Wales, I hope many of the warmists haven’t sold their coats.”
Hogan holds the marginal seat of Page on the New South Wales north coast. He has opposed coal seam gas development in his area.
The appointments were part of the political housekeeping required by the return of parliament after the election. The Coalition party room elected all the backbench committees and those with legislation to scrutinise met immediately to consider the bills.
Flanked by the deputy prime minister, Barnaby Joyce, and the deputy Liberal leader, Julie Bishop, Malcolm Turnbull addressed the joint party room when it reconvened after lunch for another meeting to consider policy issues such as the contentious superannuation changes.
West Australian Liberal Nola Marino has been reappointed as chief government whip along with South Australian Liberal Rowan Ramsey and Queensland Liberal Bert van Manen. Ramsey and van Manen replace Queensland Liberal Ewen Jones and Tasmanian Liberal Brett Whiteley, both of whom lost their seats in the election.

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A Massive Crack Is Threatening To Cause An Entire Antarctic Ice Shelf To Collapse

ScienceAlert - Bec Crew

An iceberg the size of Delaware is about to break free.
Larsen B ice shelf. Credit: Armin Rose/Shutterstock
Scientists have been monitoring a fracture in one of the world’s biggest ice shelves, and report that in the last five months alone, it’s grown an extra 22 kilometres (13.67 miles) in length, and now stretches for a total of 130 km (80 miles).
It’s now only a matter of time before a massive chunk of this Antarctic ice shelf - known as Larsen C - breaks free, and then we’ll have the third largest loss of Antarctic ice in recorded history on our hands.
Located on the coast of the Antarctic Peninsula, the Larsen ice shelf is split up into three smaller ice shelves - Larsen A, B, and C. Larsen A and B have already experienced massive declines over the past two decades, and now Larsen C, the biggest of them all, is in a world of trouble itself.
Researchers from Project MIDAS, a British Antarctic Survey that involves teams from several UK universities, report that around 12 percent of the entire Larsen C ice shelf is expected to break off, leaving the exposed ice front at its most retreated position ever.
"Computer modelling suggests that the remaining ice could become unstable, and that Larsen C may follow the example of its neighbour Larsen B, which disintegrated in 2002 following a similar rift-induced calving event," they report in a blog post.
What’s left of the Larsen B ice shelf is widely considered to be on borrowed time, having lost a chunk of ice the size of Rhode Island back in 2002. Remember this?
Larsen B ice shelf loss in 2002. Credit: NASA Goddard Space Flight Centre
It now covers an area of 1,600 square kilometres (625 square miles), and is expected to disintegrate by the end of the decade. That’s pretty devastating, when you consider that Larsen B has been stable for at least the past 12,000 years.
The Larsen A ice shelf disintegrated in January 1995, and now Larsen C looks like it’s on its way out too.
Just to give you an idea of how much ice we’re talking about here, Larsen C covers around 55,000 square km (21,235 square miles). That’s 10 times the size of Larsen B, and about half the size of Iceland.
Last year, the MIDAS team published a study in the journal Cryosphere describing how Larsen C is currently melting from the surface and the base, and now its gigantic fracture is cracking at a rate no one could have predicted.
Once the outer edge breaks free, researchers are predicting an iceberg measuring about 6,000 square kilometres (2,316 square miles) - close to the size of Delaware - will fall off into the ocean.
"If this will calve off in the next, say two or three years, the calving front will be retreated very far back, further than we’ve seen it since we were able to monitor this," one of the team, Daniela Jansen from the Alfred Wegener Institute Helmholtz Centre for Polar and Marine Research in Germany, told Chris Mooney at The Washington Post.
"And our theory in this paper was basically that the calving front might become unstable. Once the iceberg has calved off completely, there might be a tendency for the ice front to crumble backwards."
IMAGE
Just to add to Larsen C’s woes, a separate study published in Nature Communications in June found that meltponds have been forming on the surface - something that’s just recently been found by the thousands on the Langhovde Glacier in East Antarctica.
This will only serve to accelerate the disintegration process.
If Larsen C did end up losing all its ice, scientists have predicted that this could raise global sea levels by around 10 cm (3.9 inches).
But let’s not get ahead of ourselves here. As Mooney points out, a large loss of ice from Larsen C won’t necessarily be a terrible thing for the world’s oceans - not immediately, at least.
"A study earlier this year in Nature Climate Change looked at ice shelves around Antarctica to determine how much area they could lose without ceasing to form their crucial function of buttressing glaciers and holding them back, and found that Larsen C actually has a lot of 'passive' ice that it can lose without major consequences," he says.
The MIDAS team isn’t as optimistic, so unfortunately, we’re left to wait and see when this massive chunk will break off, and what the consequences will be for life on Earth. Watch this space.

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Australian Conservation Foundation Loses Federal Court Case On Adani Coal

Fairfax - Peter Hannam

Adani's Carmichael coal mine has cleared another legal hurdle after the Federal Court threw out a challenge against the project by the Australian Conservation Foundation.
The ACF had sought to establish a landmark climate change case in Australia, arguing approval of the proposed mega coal mine in Queensland's Galilee Basin was inconsistent with the country's international obligations to protect the Great Barrier Reef.
The case had gained more urgency since being lodged in November last year, with the reef experiencing its worst recorded bleaching event, which scientists say may have killed off a fifth or more of its corals in one hit.
Federal court rejects environmental challenge against Adani Carmichael mine. Stefan Armbruster
Adani Australia welcomed Monday's decision, stating on Facebook that the verdict "again reinforces the stringency of the strict, science and evidence-based federal environmental approval process governing the company's planned mine at Carmichael".
"At their core, these challenges have been about stopping investment and jobs as part of a wider activist campaign against mining," the Indian-based miner said, adding that a recent report by PwC had put the costs of delay at about $3 billion.
Matthew Canavan, federal minister for resources, said on Twitter that the decision was "good news for jobs".
The conservation group, however, vowed to keep fighting to prevent the mine - with a production capacity of as much as 60 million tonnes a year - from going ahead.
Adani's giant coal mine in the Galilee Basin aims to export mainly to India if it proceeds. Photo: NYT
"If the Carmichael mine proceeds, its coal will create 4.7 billion tonnes of climate pollution over the proposed life of the mine, wiping out Australia's efforts to reduce pollution and contributing to more frequent and severe bleaching events on the reef," Kelly O'Shanassy, ACF's chief executive, said in a statement.
"It is extraordinary that in 2016 a federal Environment Minister can argue in court that a mega-polluting coal mine will have no impact on the climate and the Great Barrier Reef," she said. "We'll do everything we can to stop this mine."
Before the verdict from Justice Griffiths, ACF chairman Geoff Cousins predicted more challenges against coal mines such as Adani's.
"Win or lose ... these issues will become and more prominent as time goes on," Mr Cousins said.
Mr Cousins said groups such as ACF were pinning their hopes on Josh Frydenberg, the new federal environment and energy minister, to take a different stance on climate matters.
"Josh Frydenberg has a great opportunity to lead," Mr Cousins said. "He's certainly aware of all these issues."
Mr Frydenberg replaced Greg Hunt after the July 2 election returned the Turnbull government to power.
ACF has said Carmichael would be Australia's largest mine, covering more than 45,000 hectares in size and producing as much carbon dioxide annually as New Zealand.
A spokesman for Adani said the company is ready to proceed with the mine "pending the resolution of a small number of outstanding legal challenges".
"[I]f those issues are finalised, construction can commence in 2017," he said.
The parties have seven days to agree on the legal costs of the case, ACF said.

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