17/12/2019

Why Did The Madrid Climate Talks Fall Short?

Sydney Morning Herald - Aritz Parra | Frank Jordans (AP | AAP)

Madrid: This year's UN climate negotiations in Madrid, the longest in 25 nearly annual such gatherings, has ended with major polluters resisting calls to ramp up efforts to keep global warming at bay.
Faced with the tough task of reconciling the demands of scientists, protesters on the streets and governments back home, the COP25 negotiators ended up disappointing many and leaving for next year's talks in Glasgow, Scotland, key issues such as the regulation of global carbon markets.
COP25 President Carolina Schmidt, during the closing plenary in Madrid, on Sunday. Marathon international climate talks ended with negotiators postponing until next year a key decision on how to regulate global carbon markets. Credit: AP
Here is a look at the main issues resolved, and the sticking points for future negotiations.

Are bolder targets needed?
The final declaration cited an "urgent need" to cut planet-heating greenhouse gases in line with the goals of the landmark 2015 Paris climate change accord. But it fell far short of explicitly demanding that countries submit bolder emissions proposals next year, which developing countries and environmentalists had demanded.
COP25 President Carolina Schmidt listen a speech from a party member during the closing plenary in Madrid. Credit: AP
The Paris accord established a common goal of keeping temperature increases below 2 degrees Celsius, ideally 1.5 degrees by the end of the century. So far, the world is on course for a 3 to 4-degree rise, with potentially dramatic consequences for many countries, including rising sea levels and fiercer storms.
Scientists say global emissions of carbon dioxide and other pollutants have to start falling rapidly as soon as possible to meet the Paris goal.


US President Donald Trump ridiculed 16-year-old Greta Thunberg after the Swedish climate activist was named Time's Person of the Year for 2019.

After two nights of fractious negotiations, delegates in Madrid decided to defer some of the thorniest issues to the next U.N. climate summit in Glasgow in November.
"The global emissions' curve needs to bend in 2020, emissions need to be cut in half by 2030, and net zero emissions need to be a reality by 2050," said Johan Rockstrom, head of the Postdam Institute for Climate Impact Research.
"Achieving this is possible - with existing technologies and within our current economy," said the revered climate scientist. "The window of opportunity is open, but barely."
Swedish climate activist Greta Thunberg in Madrid last week. Credit: AP
How to regulate global carbon markets?
Economists say market mechanisms can speed up the shift from fossil fuels to renewable energy sources. One way to do this is by putting a price on carbon dioxide, the most abundant man-made greenhouse gas, and gradually reducing the amount countries and companies are allowed to emit.
The European Union and some other jurisdictions around the world already have limited emissions trading systems for buying and selling carbon credits.
The Paris accord was meant to establish the rules for carbon trading on a global scale.
But setting the rules for a robust and environmentally sound market and linking up existing systems is difficult. So, too, is the question of allocating a percentage of the revenue to help countries adapt to the effects of warming temperatures.
The main point of resistance lies in the existence of old carbon credits left over from a now-discredited system established under the 1997 Kyoto Protocol. Developing countries such as Brazil insisted during the past two weeks in Madrid on keeping those emissions credits, while also resisting strict accounting of future trades.
The argument that carbon markets that are not transparent enough and leave loopholes for double counting can undermine efforts to reduce emissions won at the end, postponing the decision on the issue for Glasgow.

Aid for the poor
In summit lingo the issue is known as "loss and damage." In essence, it was recognised several years ago that developing nations are much more vulnerable to the negative effects of climate change, even though they contribute least to the problem.
A tentative agreement was reached in 2013 that rich countries would help them foot the bill.
But attributing specific weather disasters such as hurricanes and floods, or slow but irreversible changes like sea level rise and desertification, to climate change remains a delicate issue given the potential costs involved.
The United States, in particular, had opposed any references to possible liability in the summit's conclusions, and scored a victory when a decision on it was also postponed for another year.
Developing countries also demand that compensation be kept a separate issue from funds to help the countries adapt and mitigate the effects of a warming planet. The Green Climate Fund, which was established to that end, is currently far from reaching the target of $US100 billion a year in contributions.

Heat on the street
Chile, which chaired the conference, chose to give it the slogan "Time for Action."
That echoed the blunt demands from protesters, who have been staging mass rallies around the world for the past year demanding leaders take what they call the "climate emergency" seriously.
European Union countries responded to public pressure this week by agreeing to a long-term goal of cutting the bloc's greenhouse gas emissions to net zero, meaning any that remain will be offset with carbon reduction measures.
Some observers and EU ministers had hoped this signal from Brussels would boost the talks in Madrid. If anything, it revealed the vast gap between what countries can agree at the regional level and what the UN process is capable of.

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(AU) Rupert Murdoch Says 'No Climate Change Deniers Around' – But His Writers Prove Him Wrong

The Guardian - 

Some columnists in News Corp’s papers didn’t get their boss’s message
Rupert Murdoch’s declaration last month that ‘there are no climate change deniers’ at News Corp must have been missed by many of the publisher’s columnists. Photograph: Matt Baron/REX/Shutterstock
“There are no climate change deniers around I can assure you,” Rupert Murdoch said last month at News Corp’s annual general meeting.
His declaration that the publisher of the Daily Telegraph, the Australian and owner of Sky News was free of climate deniers was widely greeted with mirth.
The next day the geologist Ian Plimer proved Murdoch’s doubters correct when he published an opinion piece in the Australian claiming the major pollution in western nations was “the polluting of minds about the role of carbon dioxide”.
“There are no carbon emissions,” he wrote. “If there were, we could not see because most carbon is black. Such terms are deliberately misleading, as are many claims.”
That piece of commentary attracted the usual round of applause from pundits certain they knew better than climate scientists. Where once ignoring scientists and experts would result in a failing subject grade, in some sectors it’s now considered an “opt-in” belief.
That’s despite 97% of scientists standing in agreement – and apparently now even Murdoch, albeit a little later than most would like.
But perhaps someone should let his publications know. In the weeks since the media baron made his proclamation – including the tidbit “we have reduced our global carbon footprint by 25% six years ahead of schedule” – not all of News Corp’s writers received the message.
The following stories appeared over the same duration that News Corp publications were putting out articles (in the hundreds) about climate change, including warnings from scientists about the need for action, glaciers melting and criticisms of Australia’s policies.

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Bushfires blind alarmists in media to climate reality
The Australian, 24 November
Chris Kenny
Hysterical efforts to blame the fires on climate change continue, even though we have always faced this threat and always will ... Tinder-dry conditions on the eastern seaboard this year are attributable to drought but as I have reported before, according to the head of the UNSW centre for climate extremes, Professor Andy Pitman, there is insufficient evidence to directly link the drought to climate change. Much media ignores the history of worse conditions and fires, and the lack of long-term rainfall trends, and runs hard on climate causal links.

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SA bushfires prove where warmist beliefs fall down
The Herald Sun, 25 November
Andrew Bolt:
Let’s assume you’re silly enough to think global warming is causing worse bushfires around the world. (In fact a recent Nasa study found that the area burned by fire has dropped 24% over 18 years.)
… True, the world has warmed slightly as it rebounds from the little ice age that stretched from 1300 to around 1870, but can we cool it on this panic?
In that time of warming, life expectancy has shot up, world grain crops have set new records, and the death rate from extreme weather has been slashed by 99%.
But, above all, can we drop our incredible arrogance in thinking man now has the power to change the climate? That just a few Australian politicians could do what we once believed would test even God?

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One-eyed ABC loses sight of wider, more diverse picture of Australia
The Australian, 30 November
Richard Alston:
… The ABC is, indeed, notorious for presenting only one side of the picture on many big issues, whether it be climate change, immigration, asylum-seekers, gay marriage, the Palestinians or the unspeakable Donald Trump … Have you ever heard an ABC interviewer stoutly cross-examine a refugee lawyer or put a climate change advocate through their paces?

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Therese Rein goes wild: Scott Morrison caused fires
The Herald Sun, 30 November
Andrew Bolt:
This is nuts. Therese Rein, wife of Kevin Rudd, thinks prime minister Scott Morrison could have stopped fires in NSW by changing the world’s climate.
Wow. That’s religion talking, not science.
This global warming hysteria is totally off the dial.

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ABC reporters the real climate deniers
The Australian, 2 December
Chris Mitchell:
Andrew Bolt told his viewers on Tuesday night that he had again complained to the ABC about the latest Media Watch segment. If you follow Bolt’s many writings about climate it is obvious he does accept the temperature is rising. It has risen one degree since the start of the 20th century.
But Bolt also reports scientists from other disciplines who question parts of the science. Many say climate models are not yet sophisticated enough to account for the effective regulation of atmospheric CO2 by the deep oceans, forests and soils. Bolt and others criticised by Media Watch often point to effects from solar activity. Many writers, like many climate scientists, say CO2 is not the most important greenhouse gas, pointing to water vapour and methane. These are all facts.

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Greta Thunberg’s invincible ignorance has infected our smartest
The Herald Sun, 8 December
Andrew Bolt:
The science is clear: Morrison can do nothing to change the world’s climate and stop fires. Australia is just too small to make a difference.
[Therese] Rein and other critics such as Malcolm Turnbull are plainly irrational to suggest Morrison could dial down some giant thermostat.
Is there any point in also showing that the fires aren’t caused by global warming, and that a recent Nasa study shows fires are now burning less land, not more?
[Scott] Morrison can do nothing to change the world’s climate and stop fires.
No, facts have lost their power ever since postmodernism conquered our universities and reassured the stupid they were mere social constructs. Even conspiracies.
To mention facts now is no longer to bring light into darkness, but to set fire to your reputation.

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Logic Crimes of the New York Times
The Daily Telegraph, 9 December
Tim Blair:
Formerly a newspaper of record, the New York Times has in recent decades has become a newspaper of leftist causes. Name any fashionable political trend and the New York Times is all over it.
Climate change is of particular interest to the Times, which in 2014 ran this headline: ‘The End of Snow?’
But five years later the same paper reported: ‘A powerful winter storm socked much of Montana with a wave of heavy snowfall on Sunday, with weekend totals climbing to 40 inches in some places, and breaking century-long daily records.’
Unable to get things right in the US, the Times now turns to NSW and our bushfires.
‘In some countries, such widespread environmental effects have led to changes in policy,’ the Times notes.
‘In Australia, however – where the air in Sydney was ranked among the worst in the world last month – prime minister Scott Morrison has resisted.’
What is he meant to do? Pass a law against bushfire smoke?

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Turnbull and Q&A deceive viewers again on climate
The Herald Sun, 10 December

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Jane Fonda leads the world into the grip of anti-human hysteria over climate change
The Daily Telegraph, 10 December
Kevin Donnelly:
Environmental extremists like Fonda also refuse to acknowledge that the science of climate change is far from settled. In the scientific world the links between climate change and man-made fossil fuels is far from unanimous.
Not only do many scientists argue carbon is an essential part of the atmosphere ensuring plant growth but they also argue such is the complexity involved in analysing cause and effect that it is simplistic and wrong to only focus on one cause.
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On The Front Line Of The Climate Emergency – In Pictures

The Guardian

As COP25 takes place in Madrid, this collection of photographs from Getty Images highlights the climate crisis around the world, from Greenland’s melting ice sheets to rising seal levels in Alaska and Louisiana, the forest fires in the Amazon and Indonesia, and the impact of forests and the Lobster fishery in Maine

A drone view shows how close some of the homes
are to the lagoon in Kivalina, Alaska
The residents of Kivalina are hoping to stay on their ancestral lands, rather than dispersing due to their island being swallowed by the rising waters. The city administrator Colleen Swan says the way of life in the village will change with the climate and they will adapt.
Photograph: Joe Raedle/Getty Imageszzz

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Melting ice forms a lake on free-floating ice jammed
into the Ilulissat Icefjord during unseasonably
warm July weather near Ilulissat, Greenland
Climate change is having a profound effect in Greenland, where summers have become longer over the last few decades and glaciers and the Greenland ice cap are retreating more quickly.

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The town of Ilulissat on Disko Bay, Greenland
As the Earth’s climate warms, summers have become longer in Ilulissat, allowing fishermen a wider period to fish from boats on open waters and extending the summer tourist season.

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Locals play soccer on a Saturday in August in Ilulissat, Greenland
Long-term benefits of warmer weather are uncertain, however, as warming waters could have a negative impact on the local fish and whale population.

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Kivalina, which is at the end of an eight-mile barrier reef
between a lagoon and the Chukchi Sea
The village is 83 miles above the Arctic circle. Kivalina and a few other native coastal Alaskan villages face the warming of the Arctic, which has resulted in the loss of sea ice that buffers the island’s shorelines from storm surges and coastal erosion.

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Celina Wesley, Enoch Swan and McKye Swan fish
for tomcod in the Chukchi Sea
The hunters in the village have witnessed the migration patterns of fish, caribou, seal and whale that they need for the long winter months change due to the warming weather.

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A home on stilts sits amid coastal waters
and marshlands in Port Fourchon, Louisiana
A combination of rising waters and sinking land have caused the highest rates of relative sea-level rise on the planet. Since the 1930s, Louisiana has lost more than 2,000 square miles of land and wetlands, an area roughly the size of Delaware. In the past 30 years, as subsidence continues and the effects of climate change increase, Louisiana has been losing a football field’s worth of land every 100 minutes.

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An abandoned boat sits amid dead cypress trees
in coastal waters and marsh in Venice, Louisiana
Many oak trees and cypress trees throughout Louisiana’s coastal marshes have died due to a combination of saltwater intrusion and subsidence.

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The $1.1bn Lake Borgne surge barrier in New Orleans, Louisiana
The massive structure was built by the Army Corps of Engineers along with other reinforcements to defend the city against future hurricanes and storms. The organisation SouthWings provides a network of volunteer pilots that advocate for the restoration and protection of ecosystems.

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A fire burns in a section of the Amazon rainforest
in Candeias do Jamari near Porto Velho, Brazil
According to INPE, Brazil’s national institute of space research, the number of fires detected by satellite in the Amazon region this month is the highest since 2010.

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A section of the Amazon rainforest that has been cleared
in the Candeias do Jamari region
INPE says the number of fires detected by satellite in the Amazon region is the highest since 2010.

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Peatland and forest burns during a fire patrol
by the Indonesian national board for disaster
management in Central Kalimantan, Indonesia
Illegal fires to clear land for agricultural plantations have raged across Indonesia’s Sumatra and Borneo islands as recent satellite data showed that the number of forest fires have jumped sharply.

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A firefighter walks through smog as they
try to extinguish the fire on burned peatland
and fields in Palangkaraya, Central Kalimantan
This rise is adding to concerns about the smog across south-east Asia and the impact of increasing wildfires outbreaks worldwide due to global warming.

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A woman tries to extinguish the fire
on burned peatland and fields near her house
in Palangkaraya, Central Kalimantan
Photograph: Ulet Ifansasti/Getty Images

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New trees grow by dead lodgepole pine killed
by the mountain pine beetle in Beaverhead-Deerlodge
National Forest along the Flint Creek Range in Montana, US
According to the 2017 Montana Climate Assessment, the annual average temperatures in the state has increased 2.5F since 1950 and is projected to increase by about 3F to 7F by 2050.

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A lone lodgepole pine stands
in Beaverhead-Deerlodge National Forest, Montana
As climate change makes summers hotter and drier in the Northern Rockies, forests are threatened with increasing wildfire activity, deadly pathogens and insect infestations, including the mountain pine beetle outbreak.

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A log grapple wheel loader moves and stacks logs
at the Sun Mountain Lumber log yard in Deer Lodge, Montana
Although the number of new trees infested each year by the pine beetle has reduced since the height of the outbreak around 2012, the insects have killed more than 6m acres of forest across Montana since 2000.

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The 4th of July parade in Deer Isle, Maine
Deer Isle and the surrounding area rely heavily on the lobster business, and there has been a surge in lobsters being trapped in recent years.

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Collin Proper waits on the Stonington Lobster co-op wharf
for the lobster boat he crews to arrive before they head
into the Gulf of Maine to check on traps in Stonington, Maine
Reports indicate that since 1982 the temperatures in the Gulf have warmed about 2.3F and the warmer water has helped increase lobster populations.

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Lance, Jeremy Pratt and Nathaniel, all lobstermen,
sort through traps as they toss back a lobster
that is too small to keep in Deer Isle
There is concern among scientists that if in-shore water temperatures continue to rise, it may push lobsters farther offshore to deeper, cooler waters, or northward into the cooler Canadian waters, which over time would disrupt the Maine lobster business.
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