climate

The U.K. government on Thursday launched a Google Earth layer that models what Earth might look like in the event of a significant worldwide rise in temperature.

Specifically, the interactive map visually demonstrates what could happen if carbon emissions are not curbed, and as a result, Earth's temperature rises four degrees Celsius above the pre-industrial worldwide climate average. As a plethora of scientists and politicians have repeatedly stated, an increase in things like drought and agricultural disruption as a result of drought, could lead to instability and violence in some parts of the world.

The free downloadable Four Degrees Celsius layer … Read more

President Barack Obama, under pressure to spur job growth, said on Saturday two solar energy companies will get nearly $2 billion in U.S. loan guarantees to create as many as 5,000 green jobs.

In his weekly radio and Web address, Obama coupled his announcement with an acknowledgment that efforts to recover from the recession are slow a day after the Labor Department reported that private hiring in June rose by 83,000.

"It's going to take months, even years, to dig our way out, and it's going to require an all-hands-on-deck effort," he said. … Read more

WASHINGTON--Sen. John Kerry (D-Mass.) and Sen. Joseph Lieberman (I-Conn.) are scheduled to formally unveil on Wednesday a compromise U.S. climate change bill they want passed this year.

Besides bringing down emissions of carbon dioxide and other gases blamed for global warming, it would expand offshore oil drilling and nuclear-power production in a move to appeal to a broader number of senators.

Here are highlights of the bill, called the "American Power Act," according to a summary of the legislation being circulated to senators and obtained by Reuters:

Carbon emissions reductions By 2020, carbon pollution would be cut … Read more

OSLO--The United States is asking for ideas about how to tackle global warming without raising expectations of breakthroughs in 2010 ahead of climate talks among the world's top emitters on Sunday in Washington.

A document obtained by Reuters on Friday listing U.S. questions to delegates from 16 other major economies shows the two-day talks will focus on the fate of U.N. climate talks, the non-binding Copenhagen Accord, and the Kyoto Protocol.

It does not answer key questions such as what the United States, the biggest emitter behind China, plans to do under any future U.N. plan. U.S. legislation to cap greenhouse gas emissions is stalled in the U.S. Senate.

Instead it shows that major nations may have to go back to the drawing board after the Copenhagen summit failed to come up with a binding deal at the climax of two years of U.N. negotiations.

"The general focus of the meeting: what are the key issues that need to be addressed in order to have a successful outcome?" it asks of preparations for the next annual talks of environment ministers in Cancun, Mexico, November 29 through December 10.

"What is the outcome we are all seeking in Cancun? A set of decisions; a legally binding agreement; something else?" according to the document, signed by Michael Froman, deputy White House national security adviser, and U.S. climate envoy Todd Stern. … Read more

BOSTON--Corporate America needs to track its use of energy and resources as closely as it does its hiring and cash flow if it wants to keep pace with social concern about climate change and other sustainability issues, an activist U.S. investor group argues in a new report.

Population growth and a rising standard of living across the world will bring opportunities--but also risks of higher energy costs, scarcer water, and other possible consequences of climate change, the Ceres coalition of socially concerned investors, companies and public interest groups said.

Over the next decade, investors and consumers will expect more … Read more

Senator John Kerry said a bipartisan climate change bill would emerge soon in the U.S. Senate, contradicting what he called the "conventional wisdom" that the legislation was dead this election year.

Kerry is working closely with the Obama administration and a bipartisan group of senators on a comprehensive bill to reduce U.S. carbon dioxide pollution blamed for global warming.

"We're on a short track here in terms of piecing together legislation we intend to roll out," Kerry told a climate policy forum, without giving details of his proposals.

The Massachusetts Democrat and White … Read more

The U.S. Senate is unlikely to pass a comprehensive climate change bill to reduce greenhouse gas emissions this year, according to a Reuters survey of 12 key Democrat and Republican Senators who could hold the swing votes.

While the Obama administration and a bipartisan core of senators still hope there is life for a climate change bill that would put a price on carbon emissions and help reinvigorate ailing international talks, the senators interviewed by Reuters this week were much more pessimistic.

The survey underscores that global warming--a scientific finding still hotly disputed by many Americans--could end up being … Read more

Long-time energy efficiency professional Rob Pratt created a company to tap into the energy on college campuses around the environment.

Energy Climate Solutions, which formally launched on Thursday, was set up to offer energy efficiency and clean-energy services to colleges and universities, organizations typically well suited to invest in efficiency.

"College presidents are the ones who have the mission of figuring out a sustainability story and what to do about green," Pratt said. "They are being pushed--one president told me, 'This is my Vietnam. Not all the students are pushing (to lower carbon emissions), but the ones … Read more

President Barack Obama said on Wednesday that disappointment over the outcome of the Copenhagen climate change summit was justified, hardening a widespread verdict that the conference had been a failure.

"I think that people are justified in being disappointed about the outcome in Copenhagen," he said in an interview with PBS Newshour.

"What I said was essentially that rather than see a complete collapse in Copenhagen, in which nothing at all got done and would have been a huge backward step, at least we kind of held ground and there wasn't too much backsliding from where … Read more