Healthy soil and sustainable growing

["TradingPostPaul" <tradingpost@riseup.net>]

Just more justification for sensible farming and water use. - paul

Climate changes now "irreversible," U.N. report warns
http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/nationworld/2004019443_climate17.html
By Alan Zarembo and Thomas H. Maugh II
Los Angeles Times

About the IPCC
The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, formed in 1988, has issued
four sets of reports. The first two, in 1990 and 1995, were the foundation
for the 1997 Kyoto Protocol. The third, in 2001, and the fourth, released
in sections this year, were increasingly strident in warning that humans
are rushing toward a dramatic alteration of the environment by heating up
the atmosphere.

2007 REPORT

February: The IPCC said it was "very likely," or more than 90 percent
probable, that human activities had caused most of the warming in the past
half-century. The panel also said warming was "unequivocal" and projected
that temperatures would rise by 3.2 to 7.2 degrees Fahrenheit this century.

April: The IPCC outlined likely impacts of warming and said it could lead
to more hunger, water shortages and extinctions of animals and plants. The
panel said crop yields could drop by 50 percent by 2020 in some countries,
projected a steady shrinking of Arctic sea ice in summers, and said
millions will be threatened by floods by the 2080s because of rising sea
levels.

May: The IPCC said costs of action could be moderate, or less than 0.12
percent of global gross domestic product a year, but that time was running
out to avert the worst effects. The toughest scenario would require
governments to ensure greenhouse-gas emissions start falling by 2015.

The Washington Post and Reuters

The United Nations' Nobel Prize-winning panel on climate change approved
the final installment of its landmark report on global warming Friday,
concluding that even the best efforts at reducing carbon-dioxide levels
will not be enough. The world, the report says, also must focus on adapting
to "abrupt and irreversible" climate changes.

New and stronger evidence developed in the past year also suggests that
many risks cited in the panel's first three reports this year actually will
be larger than projected and will occur at lower temperatures, according to
a draft of the report.

The report from the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC)
summarizes thousands of pages of research produced over six years by
delegates from 140 countries and is expected to serve as a "how-to" guide
for governments meeting in Bali, Indonesia, beginning Dec. 3 to hammer out
a successor to the Kyoto Protocol, which is set to expire in five years.

The panel and former Vice President Al Gore were awarded the 2007 Nobel
Peace Prize for their global-warming work.

The report — the fourth this year — says governments will have to spend
billions of dollars every year to mitigate the effects of increased
temperatures, but even that will not be adequate, and many countries simply
will have to learn to live with the changes.

Failure to act will leave nearly 1 billion people at risk from water and
food shortages, droughts, coastal flooding and severe storms, concluded the
delegates, who have been meeting in Valencia, Spain.

The report emphasizes that global warming is "unequivocal" and that there
is high confidence that humans are responsible. Global temperatures have
risen about 1.5 degrees Fahrenheit since the beginning of the Industrial
Revolution in the 18th century.

The panel estimates that temperatures could increase by an additional 3.2
degrees to 7.8 degrees by 2100. Sea level could rise seven to 23 inches
over that period.

As the concentration of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere continues to
rise, more attention is being placed on how the world will cope.

"People are recognizing a lot of near-term impacts of climate change are
already locked in," said Shardul Agrawala, an IPCC author and principal
economist for climate at the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and
Development in Paris. "The importance of adaptation has been growing in the
IPCC reports."

Advocating for adaptation once was viewed as defeatism, especially among
environmentalists.

"It was seen a potential smoke screen behind which high-emission countries
could hide so they wouldn't have to make binding agreements to reduce,"
said Nathan Hultman, a professor of science, technology and international
affairs at Georgetown University.

But the panel stressed that adaptation is now as important as reducing
carbon dioxide.

In its most basic sense, adaptation is the construction of walls to protect
coastlines from rising sea levels or draining glacier-fed lakes in the
Himalayas to prevent flooding of villages below.

But it is also smarter development — building bridges higher, planting
drought-resistant crops or replacing dirt roads with paved ones to prepared
for increased rainfall. It also could be the relocation of entire
communities.

For some places, adaptation is the only option.

"These low-lying countries, the Maldives, Palau, the small island states,
they can change their emissions all they want," Hultman said. "It's going
to have zero effect on the climate. But they are on the front line of the
receiving end."

Even with increased attention to adaptation, it remains a poor cousin to
mitigation.

International funds for mitigation total $19 billion, according to
estimates. Adaptation funds for developing nations so far amount to a few
hundred million dollars — primarily in aid from rich countries.

In 2001, the United Nations set up an adaptation fund that relies on a 2
percent tax levied on some carbon-reduction transactions made by European
countries under Kyoto.

It expects to generate up to $1.5 billion by 2012. But the fund has no
administrative body, and no money has been given out.

The developed world will have far less trouble adapting, because it has the
money and the technology. But even rich countries will face problems such
as drought.

The new report was scheduled to be formally released today. Experts who
participated in drafting the document said its conclusions are not as
strong as scientists would have preferred, but that it went beyond what the
U.S. delegation and others would have preferred.

The final document does not commit participating governments to mitigation
efforts, but its adoption by consensus indicates those governments will not
disavow its conclusions.

A small minority have rejected the IPCC reports, arguing that the world has
gone through previous natural shifts in temperature and that society and
industry should not be put to the difficult task of curbing emissions.
President Bush, until recently, questioned the validity of global warming.

James Connaughton, chairman of the White House Council on Environmental
Quality, said Friday night that the IPCC report "lays out a wide variety of
mandatory and nonmandatory controls that deal with carbon emissions. These
tools have effectiveness that varies from country to country. We have been
careful not to prefer one tool over another, but to ensure that we are
using the right tool."