!--paging_filter--Lynne Purvis stood apart at a Ritz Carlton cocktail party Thursday night. p Surrounded by coal, oil, and natural gas executives at a a href="https://gems.bankofamerica.com/public/EventOverview.do?dispatch=displayamp;eventId=WzQzXG8uXdA%3Damp;site=client"Bank of America energy conference/a in Key Biscayne, Florida, Purvis and her six friends had not been invited.  Armed with banners and signs, they still made their presence known. /p p quot;Bank of America forgot to put alternative energy into the agenda,quot; Purvis, a member of the activist group a href="http://www.evergladesearthfirst.org/"Everglades Earth First!/a, said into her megaphone. quot;So as the clean energy transition team, we were asked to speak to you all tonight.quot; /p p The party guests were less than impressed with Purvis's sense-of-humor. One guest allegedly wrestled the activists' banner out of their hands. During the melee, Purvis said, two of her associates were doused with beer. /p p quot;We did commit trespassing,quot; Purvis said. quot;But is trespassing truly a crime as opposed to putting the entire planet in turmoil?quot; /p p b/b /p p Climate activists worldwide are raising the stakes, with many turning to civil disobedience to make their voices heard. Actions in recent months have ranged from a href="http://news.smh.com.au/national/25-arrested-at-nsw-power-station-protest-20081101-5fs1.html"chaining themselves to coal conveyor belts in Sydney/a, to a href="http://www.reuters.com/article/environmentNews/idUSTRE4AF1R020081116"forming port blockades in the Netherlands/a, to a href="http://www.independent.co.uk/news/people/profiles/first-person-i-was-one-of-the-kingsnorth-six-955326.html"scaling smokestacks in the United Kingdom/a. /p p The rise in activism reflects growing frustration against the continued, and expanding, use of coal as a source of energy. The fuel, while affordable, is directly linked to climate change and air pollution. /p p quot;What I see is - in the last year - it just exploded and went from being a sizable amount of people, several thousands of very active youth all around the country, to just hundreds of thousands of young people,quot; said Brianna Cayo Cotter, communications director for a href="http://energyactioncoalition.org/"Energy Action Coalition/a, a network of North American youth climate activists. quot;I feel like the floodgates are about to open. We have the numbers. We have the skills. We have the passion.quot; /p p In Europe, where some 50 new coal plants are being planned, a href="http://www.greenpeace.org/raw/content/international/press/reports/coal-the-eu-and-eon.pdf"Greenpeace is leading a continent-wide campaign [PDF]/a to halt eight upcoming projects in Germany, Belgium, and the Netherlands. In the United Kingdom, plans are under way to build the country's first coal plant in 34 years. Activists have escalated their opposition to the proposed construction this year. /p p In the United States, a href="http://www.sierraclub.org/environmentallaw/coal/plantlist.asp"a nationwide fight against 150 proposed new coal-fired power plants/a that began four years ago has put a serious dent in the coal industry's plans. Through the courts, government lobbying, and acts of civil disobedience, activists have helped cut in half the number of new coal power stations. /p p The movement achieved a major victory last week. In response to a a href="http://www.sierraclub.org/"Sierra Club/a lawsuit, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency ruled that a proposed coal plant in Utah would a href="http://gristmill.grist.org/story/2008/11/13/165551/28"need a plan for controlling its carbon dioxide (COsub2/sub) emissions/a before being granted a federal operating permit. The ruling essentially delays all such permits for the time being. quot;In the immediate future, no new coal plant will be moving forward,quot; said Virginia Crame, a Sierra Club associate press secretary. /p p Meanwhile, the a href="http://www.ran.org/"Rainforest Action Network (RAN)/a has staged campaigns targeting two of the largest funders of such coal projects: Bank of America and Citibank. Last weekend, RAN and Greenpeace a href="http://ran.org/campaigns/global_finance/spotlight/november_14_15_day_of_action_against_coal_finance/"organized more than 50 events/a across the country to protest the banks' financial support of the fossil fuel industry. /p p quot;Ab /blot of people are jazzed up about it because global warming was such an important issue in the election on the state and federal level,quot; said Mary Nicol, the a href="http://www.greenpeace.org/"Greenpeace/a student network coordinator. quot;The cleanest coal plant is the one that isn't built. The youth generation really understands that.quot; /p p Environmental author Bill McKibben organized 1,400 simultaneous call-to-action events, known as a href="http://stepitup2007.org/"Step It Up/a, in 2007. He has since founded a href="http://www.350.org/"350/a, an organization that raises awareness of the 350 parts per million of COsub2/sub equivalent that many climate scientists consider the maximum level necessary for a stable climate. /p p Following a a href="http://salsa.democracyinaction.org/o/423/t/1906/event/index.jsp?event_KEY=46206"rally at the U.S. Capitol/a yesterday, McKibben said that plans for a fall 2008 global day of action would be announced at the a href="http://www.unfccc.int/"climate conference in Poland/a next month. quot;Hopefully there will be rallies on every corner of the planet. We have organizers working on every continent except Antarctica,quot; he said. quot;We need people to realize that coal is the dirtiest fuel on our planet.quot; /p p McKibben also said he expects more acts of civil disobedience in the next year. quot;It'll happen. Keep your eyes open in D.C.,quot; he said. /p p The Energy Action Coalition is expecting 10,000 participants at its second annual a href="http://www.powershift09.org/"Powershift/a, a conference of climate workshops, lobbying, and protests in Washington in February. Similar quot;climate campsquot; have been held this past year in a href="http://www.climatecamp.org.uk/"London/a, a href="http://www.klimacamp08.net/"Hamburg, /a and a href="http://www.climatecamp.org.au/"Newcastle (Australia)./a /p p The large-scale campaigns rekindle memories of effective grassroots campaigns from the 1960s and ‘70s. But a saturation of information has made it more difficult now for organizers to attract attention, said a href="http://www.american.edu/sis/faculty/facultybiographies/wapner.htm"Paul Wapner/a, director of the Global Environmental Politics Program at American University. /p p quot;There is a changing landscape in which activism in general, not just environmental, finds its expression,quot; Wapner said. quot;With the Internet and all sorts of media, it's hard to figure out how one makes a difference and not just have their message get lost in the virtual world.quot; /p p Regardless of whether the world is watching, more activists are risking arrest for the cause, and more support is coming their way. /p p In the U.K., a href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2008/sep/12/activists.kingsnorth"six Greenpeace activists faced criminal charges/a this past summer for damaging a coal-fired power station on the Kent coast. With the support of NASA climatologist James Hansen, an Inuit leader, and other environmentalists, the defendants argued that they were acting on behalf of the world-specifically the Pacific island state of Tuvalu, the Arctic ice cap, and China's Yellow River, they said. /p p The jury ruled that their actions were indeed protecting property in England and across the globe. The activists were a href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2008/sep/11/activists.kingsnorthclimatecamp"cleared of all charges/a. /p p In the United States, a href="http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,1856987,00.html"11 protestors/a who formed a human barrier to a power plant construction site in Virginia in September faced 10 criminal charges and a maximum penalty of 14 years in prison, until a plea bargain was reached last month. Hansen again offered his support. /p p quot;If this case had gone to trial, I would have requested permission to testify on behalf of these young people, who, for the sake of nature and humanity, had the courage to stand up against powerful ‘authority,'quot; Hansen said in a a href="http://www.columbia.edu/~jeh1/mailings/20081023_Obstruction.pdf"prepared statement [PDF]/a. /p p Next month, Lynne Purvis will appear in court as well. She faces charges of trespassing, unlawful assembly, and resisting arrest following a protest earlier this year against the a href="http://www.browardpalmbeach.com/2008-11-06/news/tree-huggers-mobilize-to-stop-fpl-from-building-everglades-power-plant/"construction of a natural gas-fired power plant in the Everglades/a. She, too, requested that Hansen testify on her behalf, but he has yet to respond. /p p Stories of climate activists who have avoided punishment did not, however, influence Purvis, she said. quot;I honestly don't pay too much attention to that kind of stuff. My personal motivation is that whatever the consequence, it's better than the massive consequence that will be felt by the entire community and the entire planet.quot; /p p iBen Block is a staff writer with the /ia href="/"Worldwatch Institute/ai. He can be reached at /ia href="mailto:bblock@worldwatch.org"bblock@worldwatch.org/ai./i /p p i/i /p p iFor permission to reprint this article, please contact Julia Tier at /ia href="mailto:jtier@worldwatch.org"jtier@worldwatch.org/ai./i /pdiv class="feedflare" a href="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~f/worldwatch/all?a=K8k3N"img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~f/worldwatch/all?i=K8k3N" border="0"/img/a a href="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~f/worldwatch/all?a=OFG3N"img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~f/worldwatch/all?i=OFG3N" border="0"/img/a a href="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~f/worldwatch/all?a=aJkjn"img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~f/worldwatch/all?i=aJkjn" border="0"/img/a /divimg src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~r/worldwatch/all/~4/458704781" height="1" width="1"/

Confusion has continued regarding trends in global temperatures. The misconception 'the global warming has stopped' still lives on in some minds. We have already discussed why this argument is flawed. So why have we failed to convince ? The confused argument hinges on one data set - the HadCRUT 3V - which is only [...]

!--paging_filter--img src="/system/files/images/e2/Kyoto.png" alt="Kyoto protocol map" title="lt;pgt;Photo courtesy Wikimedialt;/pgt;The United States is currently the last remaining industrialized nation not to ratify the Kyoto Protocol. (Blue countries on the map signed and ratified the cap-and-trade treaty.)" class="caption" align="right" height="140" width="250" /Despite new leadership in the United States promising to cap the country's greenhouse gas emissions, some environmental leaders say it is unlikely that an international climate treaty will pass in the next year. p During his campaign, U.S. president-elect a href="http://www.nature.com/climate/2008/0810/full/climate.2008.100.html"Barack Obama supported a global cap-and-trade agreement/a for regulating his nation's carbon emissions. As a result, many international observers are hoping the United States will agree to binding emissions-reduction targets at the a href="http://unfccc.int/2860.php"high-profile climate change negotiations/a scheduled for December 2009 in Copenhagen, Denmark. /p p Such optimism may be unrealistic, however. The ongoing financial crisis, a potential withdrawal of U.S. troops from Iraq, and an increasingly unstable war in Afghanistan will likely dominate the White House's political agenda in 2009. /p p If the United States does not accept mandatory emissions-reduction targets at Copenhagen, a href="http://www.washington.polemb.net/index.php?document=396"a panel/a of environmental leaders and climate negotiators said last week that the climate conference will be much less meaningful. /p p quot;I doubt U.S. legislation will be ready by Copenhagen,quot; said Elliot Diringer, vice president of international strategies at the a href="http://www.pewclimate.org/"Pew Center on Global Climate Change/a and a deputy assistant to former President Bill Clinton. quot;The odds of accomplishing comprehensive negotiations at Copenhagen are not very high. In fact, they're very low.quot; /p p The outcome from Copenhagen will hinge in part on how quickly the U.S. Congress can pass a cap-and-trade bill, and on whether lawmakers would approve an international climate treaty before adopting domestic legislation. In 1997, when the Congress was last faced with a similar timing challenge, a href="http://www.nationalcenter.org/KyotoSenate.html"the U.S. Senate rejected the Kyoto Protocol/a in a 95-0 vote before the international treaty was even finalized. /p p quot;We cannot repeat the mistakes of the past - first working out an international climate negotiation and then returning to U.S. legislation,quot; said a href="http://www.unis.unvienna.org/unis/pressrels/2004/sga882.html"Robert Orr/a, the United Nations Assistant Secretary-General for Policy Planning. quot;It won't work.quot; /p p Some of the panel's negotiators remain optimistic. Thomas Becker, chief climate negotiator for Denmark, said the financial aid package that the U.S. Congress swiftly passed in October is an indication that climate change legislation could be approved in the next year. quot;An aid package was passed overnight. It shows if the political will is there, you can do it,quot; Becker said. quot;It's not impossible. It's a question of priority.quot; /p p Quick passage of an international agreement is a challenging prospect because of the lawmaking rules of the U.S. Senate. To ratify a treaty, the legislation would require support from two-thirds of the Senate, or at least 67 votes. In comparison, only a majority in both chambers is necessary to pass a bill, and a bill requires just 60 votes to avoid a filibuster - a legislative tool that delays a vote by indefinitely extending the time for debate. /p p Congressional Democrats a href="http://gristmill.grist.org/story/2008/6/6/6159/54712"failed to pass an emissions cap-and-trade bill/a earlier this year. But the incoming Congress, which includes 20 more Democrats in the House of Representatives and 6-8 new Democrats in the Senate, is expected to face less partisan opposition in the next two years. In addition, current members of Congress have recently suggested more willingness to address climate change. /p p Some Congressmen, however, are already attempting to control expectations. Jeff Bingaman, chair of the Senate Energy Committee, suggested last week that a cap-and-trade bill may not be ready until 2010. quot;The reality is, it may take more than the first year to get it all done,quot; he said, according to an a href="http://www.iht.com/articles/ap/2008/11/12/america/NA-US-Global-Warming.php"iAssociated Press/i report/a. /p p Aside from capping emissions, the Obama administration is expected to act quickly on a variety of other significant climate-related measures. /p p Obama has suggested he would a href="http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2008/11/11/MNLI141O9P.DTL"grant the state of California permission to regulate carbon dioxide emissions from automobiles/a under the U.S. Clean Air Act, which the Bush administration has opposed since December. The reversal would allow California, and the 16 states that have followed its lead, to cut vehicle emissions 30 percent between 2009 and 2016. /p p The next administration will also decide whether new coal-fired power plants will be required to control their greenhouse gas emissions in order to receive a federal operating permit. An Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) appeals board ruled last week that a proposed a href="http://gristmill.grist.org/story/2008/11/13/165551/28"Utah power plant cannot be constructed/a until a regional EPA office decides how its emissions will be regulated; the gases are pollutants under the Clean Air Act, according to a a href="http://www.law.cornell.edu/supct/html/05-1120.ZS.html"2007 Supreme Court ruling/a, the board said.  /p p But Obama's intentions remain vague on many environmental fronts. Diplomats and environmentalists are urging the President-elect to attend next month's climate negotiations in Poznań, Poland, to clearly demonstrate his support for a new international agreement, even though he would only act as an observer. The conference is expected to result in a draft text of the treaty. /p p quot;We hope the administration of President-[elect] Obama will come to Poznań,quot; said Janus Zaleski, the Polish deputy minister of environment, at last week's panel. quot;This will send a message to the world that the U.S. is intent in participating on an international stage.quot; /p p iBen Block is a staff writer with the Worldwatch Institute. He can be reached at a href="mailto:bblock@worldwatch.org"bblock@worldwatch.org/a./i /p p i/i /p p iFor permission to reprint this article, please contact Julia Tier at a href="mailto:jtier@worldwatch.org"jtier@worldwatch.org/a./i /pdiv class="feedflare" a href="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~f/worldwatch/all?a=4aBwN"img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~f/worldwatch/all?i=4aBwN" border="0"/img/a a href="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~f/worldwatch/all?a=6ApKN"img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~f/worldwatch/all?i=6ApKN" border="0"/img/a a href="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~f/worldwatch/all?a=QWWin"img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~f/worldwatch/all?i=QWWin" border="0"/img/a /divimg src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~r/worldwatch/all/~4/455875365" height="1" width="1"/

!--paging_filter--p img align="right" width="250" src="/system/files/images/e2/oil_rig_sunset.jpg" alt="oil rig" height="191" title="lt;pgt;Photo courtesy Calum Davidson/Flickrlt;/pgt;Current consumption rates will cause world energy demand to increase 1.6 per year until 2030, the IEA reports." class="caption" /The world can expect energy prices to continue their generally upward spiral in the years ahead if global energy policies remain the same, the a href="http://www.iea.org/"International Energy Agency (IEA)/a reported this week. /p p Rapid economic development in China and India, coupled with relatively consistent energy use in industrialized nations, will likely strain the world's ability to meet a projected rise in energy demand of some 1.6 percent a year until 2030, the agency predicted Wednesday in its annual a href="http://www.iea.org/Textbase/npsum/WEO2008SUM.pdf"iWorld Energy Outlook/i report [PDF]/a. /p p The IEA significantly increased its projections of future oil costs in this year's report due to the changing outlook for demand and production costs. It now expects crude oil to average $100 per barrel over the next two decades and more than $200 per barrel in 2030, in nominal terms. Last year's forecast estimated that a 2030 barrel would amount to only $108. /p p quot;One thing is certain,quot; said Nobuo Tanaka, the IEA's executive director, in a a href="http://www.iea.org/Textbase/press/pressdetail.asp?PRESS_REL_ID=275"prepared statement/a. quot;While market imbalances will feed volatility, the era of cheap oil is over.quot; /p p Oil and natural gas resources are expected to supply the world for more than 40 years at current consumption rates. But the report expressed concern that rising world energy demands will outpace production. /p p quot;There remains a real risk that under-investment will cause an oil-supply crunch in that timeframe,quot; the report said. quot;The gap now evident between what is currently being built and what will be needed to keep pace with demand is set to widen sharply after 2010.quot; /p p The price of meeting the world's energy demands is estimated at $26.3 trillion through 2030-an average of more than $1 trillion a year, the IEA said. /p p In addition to higher prices, most new oil fields are offshore or smaller than in years past, making oil extraction more difficult than ever. quot;Oil resources might be plentiful, but there can be no guarantee that they will be exploited quickly enough to meet the level of demand,quot; the report said. /p p Demand for oil is predicted to rise from the current 85 million barrels per day to 106 million barrels per day in 2030, the report said. Due to this year's high oil prices, the predictions are 10 million barrels per day less than what was a href="http://www.worldenergyoutlook.org/2007.asp"projected last year/a. Still, this represents an increase of 1 percent per year. /p p Natural gas demand is expected to grow even faster, at a rate of 1.8 percent per year. And coal demand would advance 2 percent per year on average, according to the report. /p p China and India are expected to account for more than half of the projected additional energy demand, and their power sectors would consume 80 percent of the additional coal. Overall, countries that are not members of the a href="http://www.oecd.org"Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development/a, a grouping of 30 industrialized economies, are estimated to represent 87 percent of the increased energy demand. /p p The result of this energy boom would be a steady rise in energy-related greenhouse gas emissions. The IEA said the emissions increase expected under this scenario would result in a 6-degree Celsius rise in the average global temperature by the end of the 21st century. This would likely devastate many species and coastal communities worldwide. /p p The report also notes that renewable energy will likely surpass natural gas to become the second-largest source of electricity behind coal sometime after 2010. /p p These predictions, however, are based on a business-as-usual approach to energy use. If the international community enacts quot;profound shiftsquot; in energy policies, namely through a href="http://www.unfccc.int/"an international climate change agreement/a, the world's unsustainable energy path may be avoided, the report said. /p p The IEA estimates that $4.1 trillion in additional energy-efficiency investments is needed between 2010 and 2030 to stabilize greenhouse gas concentrations at 550 parts per million (ppm) of carbon-dioxide (COsub2/sub) equivalent. To reduce concentrations to a lower 450 ppm, $2.4 trillion more would be needed to pay for low- or zero-carbon power plants, and $2.7 trillion for more energy-efficient equipment. /p p Some climate researchers, including James Hansen of NASA's Goddard Institute of Space Studies, have stated that the atmosphere needs to stabilize greenhouse gas concentrations at 350 ppm in order to avoid a href="http://www.columbia.edu/~jeh1/2008/TargetCO2_20080407.pdf"quot;irreversible catastrophic effectsquot; [PDF]./a The atmosphere currently contains an estimated 385 ppm of COsub2/sub equivalent. /p p Representatives from the renewable energy industry have criticized the IEA report for underestimating clean energy's future potential. The IEA projected that renewable energy, excluding hydropower, could supply 4 percent of total power generation in 2030. /p p quot;We regret that the IEA still does not fully realize the actual dynamics and economics of renewable energy,quot; said Stefan Gsänger, secretary general of the a href="http://www.wwindea.org/home/index.php"World Wind Energy Association/a, in a statement. quot;The new iWorld Energy Outlook/i may, as a kind of self-fulfilling prophecy, mislead policy makers to make poor decisions by not putting enough focus on renewable energy and thus slowing down the renewable energy deployment rates.quot; /p p The a href="http://www.energywatchgroup.org/Homepage.14+M5d637b1e38d.0.html"Energy Watch Group/a, a German-based international network of scientists, a href="http://www.energywatchgroup.org/fileadmin/global/pdf/2008-11-07_EWG_REO_2030_Summary_E.pdf"released a report [PDF]/a earlier this week that predicted renewable energy could supply between 17 and 30 percent of global electricity and heat demands by 2030 if investments increased significantly. /p p The IEA report also calls for energy efficiency and renewable energy investments to address the current global financial crisis. a href="http://www.ens-newswire.com/ens/nov2008/2008-11-12-01.asp"Several organizations/a, including the a href="/node/5935"Worldwatch Institute/a, have called for similar quot;a href="http://www.unep.org/greeneconomy/"Global Green New Deals/a,quot; just days before leaders from the world's 20 largest economies meet in Washington, D.C., this weekend. /p p quot;We cannot let the financial and economic crisis delay the policy action that is urgently needed to ensure secure energy supplies and to curtail rising emissions of greenhouse gases,quot; the IEA's Tanaka said. quot;We must usher in a global energy revolution by improving energy efficiency and increasing the deployment of low-carbon energy.quot; /p p iBen Block is a staff writer with the a href="/"Worldwatch Institute/a. He can be reached at a href="mailto:bblock@worldwatch.org"bblock@worldwatch.org/a./i /p p i/i /p p iFor permission to reprint this article, please contact Julia Tier at a href="mailto:jtier@worldwatch.org"jtier@worldwatch.org/a./i /pdiv class="feedflare" a href="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~f/worldwatch/all?a=sPGvN"img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~f/worldwatch/all?i=sPGvN" border="0"/img/a a href="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~f/worldwatch/all?a=XICnN"img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~f/worldwatch/all?i=XICnN" border="0"/img/a a href="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~f/worldwatch/all?a=ymA5n"img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~f/worldwatch/all?i=ymA5n" border="0"/img/a /divimg src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~r/worldwatch/all/~4/452830726" height="1" width="1"/

!--paging_filter--p When a href="http://afp.google.com/article/ALeqM5jZQ6vAvYgtQ2RrvpbdTVXvcBupAA"leaders of the 20 largest economies gather in Washington this week/a, a centerpiece of their deliberations should be a Global Green Deal that capitalizes on the current economic crisis to build economically and environmentally sustainable economies. /p p The perfect storm of today's economic, environmental, and social ravages requires a robust, multi-pronged response. Indeed, the challenge for global political leadership, including U.S. President-elect Obama, is not merely to kickstart the global economy, but to do so in a way that creates jobs iand /istabilizes climate, increases food output using iless/i water and pesticides, and generates prosperity with igreater /iequality of incomes. Successful political leaders will be those skilled at identifying synergies among today's hydra-headed problems and using them to craft powerful global coalitions from such constituencies as business, labor, and community organizations. /p p This broad approach will require a conceptual blueprint evocative of America's 1930s New Deal - but more audacious in scope and vision. The a href="http://www.unep.org/greeneconomy/"United Nations Environment Programme has recently called for a transformation of the global economy/a so that it works for the broad majority of humankind, within boundaries set by the planet's rate of resource renewal and waste-absorption capacity. This historic moment calls for not merely repairs to our hyper-productive, yet ailing, economy, but for a new approach suited to the realities of a heavily populated and environmentally stressed world - a Global Green Deal that shifts the focus from growth to development, and that is geared less to providing consumerist superfluities than to ensuring that nobody's true needs go unmet. /p p A Global Green Deal would have several strategic objectives: /p ul type="disc" libTransition to a renewable energy economy./b/li /ul blockquote p Make renewable energy sources the dominant feature of the world's energy system, and systematically phase out reliance on fossil fuels. Wind and solar technologies are not just more environmentally benign than oil, coal, and nuclear power, but also more jobs-intensive. Alternative forms of energy already provide employment to more than 2 million people worldwide, and continued rapid growth will likely multiply these numbers in coming years.  /p /blockquote ul type="disc" libLaunch an/b befficiency revolution./b/li /ul blockquote p Doing more with less is one of the surest paths to wealth creation, and environmentalists have a great many ideas to raise energy and materials efficiency. Indeed, some European analysts have asserted that a tenfold increase in resource productivity is possible. Transport, housing, industry, and utilities are ripe with opportunities for huge efficiency gains. A quot;dematerializationquot; of economic activity requires far less mining and logging, and thus permits a sharp reduction in their environmental impacts. /p /blockquote ul type="disc" libInvest in green infrastructure./b/li /ul blockquote p Revolutionizing the electrical grid, creating transportation systems that are less reliant on automobiles and embrace rail and mass transit, and encouraging settlement structures that are compact, not sprawling, will stimulate economic activity, create millions of jobs, and free us of unnecessarily high levels of energy and materials use. /p /blockquote p b/b /p ul type="disc" libMake materials circulate. /b/li /ul blockquote p Analyst Walter Stahel of the Product Life Institute has pointed out that the front end of an economy-extractive activities such as mining, logging, oil drilling, and fishing-tends to use less labor and create more pollution than manufacturing and maintenance activities. A circular economy emphasizes durability, repairability, recycling, and remanufacturing, squeezing more value out of the resource base and generating greater employment. Companies will thrive on helping their customers derive the most functionality and service out of a product, rather than merely seeking to maximize sales. /p /blockquote p b/b /p ul type="disc" libWork for a fairer distribution of wealth within and across borders./b/li /ul blockquote p According to the International Labour Organization, two-thirds of countries for which data are available underwent an increase in income inequality in 1990-2005 between the top 10 and bottom 10 percent of wage earners. Management - worker pay disparities rose to new heights. CEOs at the Samp;P 500 leading U.S. firms averaged $10.5 million in 2007, 344 times the pay of the average American worker. (And the top 50 U.S. hedge- and private-equity fund managers averaged $588 million each, some 19,000 times as much as the average U.S. worker.) Just three decades ago, CEO pay averaged only 30 to 40 times the pay of the average worker. /p /blockquote p Translating these goals into reality will require smart regulations, tax shifts, subsidy reforms, mandates, incentives, and an ecologically-inspired industrial policy. uA powerful first step is for governments to ensure that prices quot;tell the ecological truthquot; /u- ending the free ride that fossil fuels have enjoyed vis-à-vis renewables and ensuring that the air and water pollution, health impacts, and climate destabilization inherent in burning oil, natural gas, and coal are fully reflected in the price of energy. /p p Carbon taxes and similar measures accomplish this goal. Governments can use the resulting revenues to lighten the tax burden falling on labor in the form of payroll taxes. Such an ecological tax shift, which has been carried out on a limited basis in Europe, would encourage job creation. Other measures might include tax credits for companies that reduce their energy and material intensity or that step up their recycling, reuse, and remanufacturing activities - with double the tax break to those firms that use their savings to hire more employees. /p p uA second idea is to use government procurement power to create large-scale markets for green technologies and employment generation/u, overcoming barrier-to-entry and chicken-and-egg problems that often bedevil innovative approaches. From the local to the national level, governments around the world spend trillions of dollars on public purchases every year. Intelligent use of procurement programs, coupled with expansive consumer product labeling and information campaigns, can play a critical role in ramping up economies of scale that render green products cost-competitive. /p p uPublic works programs, a third tool in government's toolbox/u, may be useful in both urban and rural settings, at least on a temporary basis. In rural areas, they could focus on reforestation and measures to halt soil erosion and adapt to climate change. Coupled with the promotion of organic agriculture as well as land reform, such programs can help create more resilient rural economies. In urban areas, they could focus on efforts to establish green belts, rehabilitate park and other green areas, modernize infrastructure, and build or expand pedestrian zones and biking lanes. /p p uFourth, retrofitting existing buildings will slash heating and cooling needs and would be a boon for the world's 111 million construction industry jobs/u. Germany's experience - government and private investments to weatherize apartments created or saved 140,000 jobs in a five-year span - is instructive. But a Green Deal would go far beyond housing for the world's middle class to combine greening measures with efforts to provide decent housing for those marooned in the world's teeming slums. /p p uStrategic investments in greening the auto industry could also pay major dividends/u. Having focused on churning out gas-guzzling SUVs, some of the major manufacturers, like GM, are now struggling for survival. Governments could inject resources into the industry under the condition that Ramp;D and commercialization efforts are unequivocally devoted to developing high-efficiency vehicles, while mandating that new models achieve fuel efficiency on an ambitious upward sliding scale. In recognition of the quot;built-inquot; consumption levels of existing inefficient fleets and the normally slow turnover rate, governments could pair such efforts with programs that buy up inefficient vehicles. /p p However, transportation policy needs to look beyond the auto industry and commit to a major revival of inter-urban rail and urban mass transit networks. Expanding and modernizing such systems and their infrastructure would offer an alternative to a car- and airplane-focused approach, stimulate innovation, reduce air pollution, and provide large numbers of well-paying manufacturing jobs.b/b /p p b/b /p p uFinally, the financial industry's rescue effort should be leveraged to turn the financial sector from a purveyor of the debt-driven consumer juggernaut into a force for green development/u. Such a re-orientation would seek to overcome the problem of high up-front costs for more efficient appliances and equipment by developing sustainable credit programs. In a greening economy, advantageous credit terms would be made available for weatherizing houses, installing solar panels, purchasing more durable and efficient goods, and other transactions that promise green dividends. So-called quot;location-efficient mortgagesquot; are being offered in a small handful of U.S. cities. In essence, they offer preferential mortgages in areas that are well-connected to public transit and walkable. Used widely, they can counteract the sprawling settlement structures that are at the base of automobile dependency. /p p b/b /p p bWhere might the money come from?/b /p p The origins of the current crisis are found in the a href="http://www.theoildrum.com/node/4617"quot;overgrowth of financial assets relative to growth of real wealth,quot;/a as University of Maryland professor Herman Daly has put it. Nonetheless, a global credit crunch threatens to starve even legitimate business and household needs and could trigger mass unemployment. This raises a key question: can capital for a global green rescue effort be mobilized? /p p Despite the global economic contraction, the answer may well be yes. The $700 billion committed to the U.S. financial bailout, plus additional large sums marshaled by other countries, suggests that governments can raise sizable sums of capital in emergency situations. Any number of large pools of capital might be tapped to fund a Green New Deal, if the right incentives were set in place. Here are a few ideas: /p ul li div bMilitary spending /b- The Stockholm International Peace Research Institute reports that world military spending in 2007 ran to a record a href="http://www.sipri.org/contents/milap/milex/mex_trends.html"$1.3 trillion/a - 45 percent higher in real terms than a decade earlier. The United States alone is spending about a href="http://www.iht.com/articles/2008/10/06/opinion/edcarroll.php"$700 billion/a per year on maintaining the Pentagon and conducting wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. In a world with no major power conflicts, a substantial portion of these budgets would be better dedicated to a Global Green Deal. /div /li /ul ol type="disc" libSovereign wealth funds /b- Oil rich nations and governments with large trade surpluses held $2-3 trillion dollars in wealth in 2008. Why not design incentives for government holders of such capital to invest in a Global Green Deal? /li /ol ul li div bTobin Tax /b- Trade in the world's currencies amounted to $3.7 trillion idaily /iin 2007. Why not institute a Tobin tax - a levy named for its earliest proponent, economist James Tobin - as a way to raise Green Deal revenue? Even a minimal tax on foreign exchange transactions could bring in many billions of dollars, as well as dampen destabilizing currency speculation. /div /li /ul ul li div bFossil fuel subsidies /b- These are estimated at $150-$250 billion each year. Oil companies are highly profitable, and their product is toxic to climate stability. Why not remove government supports and pledge those funds to a Global Green Deal? And a tax on quot;windfallquot; oil profits, carbon taxes, or proceeds from the auction of carbon allowances could all serve the same dual purposes. /div /li /ul ul li div bInsurance industry /b- The cost of weather-related natural disasters is on the rise, and is considered a quot;strategic threatquot; to the insurance industry. Between 1980 and 2004, the cost of such eventssup /suptotaled $1.4 trillion, of which $340 billion weresup /supinsured. The industry may have a strong incentive to contribute to the climate stabilization piece of a Global Green Deal. b /b /div /li /ul ul li div bTreasury bonds - /bBonds are commonly used for a variety of purposes, and could be dedicated to green investments. For instance, China's government has supported hundreds of energy conservation projects since 2006 in part by issuing treasury bonds.  /div /li /ul ul libPrivate Capital Flows - /bThe energy industries alone invest several hundred billion dollars each year in fossil fuel-related projects; a share of that capital could be redirected to energy efficiency and renewable energy initiatives. /li /ul p Moving a Global Green Deal agenda is not the work of a single leader or even a small group of governments. Instead, it will require an overhaul of global governance at least as great as the one that occurred after World War II, when the United Nations and the Bretton Woods financial and economic institutions were founded to establish a new era of global stability. Today, a new international policy architecture is needed that includes issues such as climate change and other environmental issues that are central to the health of the global economy. /p p This includes a fresh direction for the World Bank and International Monetary Fund to promote green and equitable development, and innovative arrangements for cooperative green technology development and sharing of best sustainability practices. In January 2009, a group of governments will establish the new International Renewable Energy Agency. IRENA is to become a key driver of the large-scale adoption of renewables around the world. Paired with an organization to promote international cooperation on energy efficiency, IRENA could become the core of Green Deal global governance. /p p This is a tall order in this severely challenged and constrained world, but the G20 meeting later this week is the ideal venue to begin this process. It is typically during times of crisis, not contentment, that humanity rises to new challenges. The present circumstances likely present a brief window of opportunity-a chance to shuffle the deck and create a more just and green civilization for a crowded world. Let the work begin. /p p Gary Gardner iand/i Michael Renner iare senior researchers with the a href="http://www.worldwatch.org"Worldwatch Institute/a, an environmental research organization based in Washington, D.C./i /p p bFor Additional Information:/b /p p Worldwatch Institute's a href="/node/5840"Green Jobs/a Web page. /p p Michael Renner, Sean Sweeney, and Jill Kubit, ia href="/node/5925"Green Jobs: Working for People and the Environment/a/i, Worldwatch Paper 177 (Washington, DC: Worldwatch Institute, October 2008).  /p p Worldwatch Institute, ia href="/node/5554"State of the World 2008: Innovations for a Sustainable Economy/a/i (New York: W. W. Norton amp; Company, 2008). /p p United Nations Environment Programme, a href="http://www.unep.org/Documents.Multilingual/Default.asp?DocumentID=548amp;ArticleID=5955amp;l=en"quot;Global Green New Deal - UNEP Green Economy Initiative,quot;/a 22 October 2008. /p p Al Gore, a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2008/11/09/opinion/09gore.html?scp=2amp;sq=Al%20Goreamp;st=cse"quot;The Climate for Change,quot;/a iNew York/ii Times/i, 9 November 2008 /pdiv class="feedflare" a href="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~f/worldwatch/all?a=XGXbN"img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~f/worldwatch/all?i=XGXbN" border="0"/img/a a href="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~f/worldwatch/all?a=F1TIN"img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~f/worldwatch/all?i=F1TIN" border="0"/img/a a href="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~f/worldwatch/all?a=t7qNn"img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~f/worldwatch/all?i=t7qNn" border="0"/img/a /divimg src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~r/worldwatch/all/~4/450894364" height="1" width="1"/

As many people will have read there was a glitch in the surface temperature record reporting for October. For many Russian stations (and some others), September temperatures were apparently copied over into October, giving an erroneous positive anomaly. The error appears to have been made somewhere between the reporting by the National Weather Services and [...]

!--paging_filter--p img align="right" width="250" src="/system/files/images/e2/IUCNWWF.jpg" alt="IUCN World Congress" height="166" title="lt;pgt;Photo courtesy IUCN via Flickrlt;/pgt;WWF International Director General Jim Leape addressed the World Conservation Congress during its opening ceremony last month." class="caption" / /p p emUpdated version/em  /p p At a time when more than a third of the planet's species are threatened with extinction, the resources that are needed for effective conservation far exceed the money available for the cause. /p p As a result, large conservation groups have turned to corporate donors for more of their funding over the past decade. The financial support often compensates the groups for their help in lessening the environmental impact of a corporation and its supply chain. /p p The strengthening of corporate ties, however, has fueled a debate within the environmental movement about the role of industry in conservation work. /p p The groups accept the funding according to internal guidelines that they say prevent corporate donors from directly influencing the integrity of specific programs. /p p Yet at a time when more companies are trying to be quot;green,quot; several grassroots leaders say the relationships allow companies to quot;greenwashquot; their public images. Their concern is that the true benefactors of the partnerships are not imperiled species or ecosystems, but the corporations themselves. /p p bConservation Budgets Grow/b /p p In recent years, conservation funding has increased considerably. Among the three largest conservation organizations worldwide - a href="http://www.nature.org/aboutus/annualreport/files/annualreport2007.pdf"The Nature Conservancy (TNC) [PDF]/a, the a href="http://assets.panda.org/downloads/wwf_annual_review_07.pdf"WWF Network [PDF]/a, and a href="http://www.conservation.org/discover/about_us/annual_report/Pages/annual_report_financials.aspx"Conservation International/a (CI) - combined revenues in 2007 exceeded $2 billion, more than double the revenues in 2000. /p p The three groups received at least $35 million more from their corporate partnerships last year than in 2003, although their annual reports do not clarify all sources of corporate funding. /p At the a href="http://cmsdata.iucn.org/downloads/cgr_2008_17_financial_plan.pdf"International Union for the Conservation of Nature (IUCN) [PDF]/a, a network of more than 1,000 environmental, scientific, and governmental institutions, funding reached nearly $100 million last year - an 11.5 percent increase from three years prior. A greater percentage of the group's funding will come from the private sector in the years ahead - jumping from 7.7 percent in 2009 to 11.9 percent in 2012 - according to IUCN's projections.  p The conservation groups point to a variety of partnerships that have been critical in spurring corporations to lessen the environmental impacts of their operations and products. Examples include efforts to source sustainably harvested wood, use carbon offsets, boost resource efficiency, and make other supply-chain improvements. /p p a href="http://www.worldwildlife.org/who/media/press/2008/WWFPresitem10453.html"A partnership between The Coca-Cola Company and WWF/a, for instance, led the company to announce last month that it would improve water efficiency 20 percent by 2012 and reduce greenhouse gas emissions 5 percent in its facilities in developed nations. /p p quot;We're seeing many more examples of different kinds of collaborations with groups, from a cross-spectrum of the environmental movement, with companies in different industries,quot; said Justin Ward, vice president of business practices at CI's a href="http://www.celb.org/xp/CELB/"Center for Environmental Leadership in Business/a. quot;But we want to be careful not to blend our name and affiliation with a company if there's not real action to back that up.quot; /p p Grassroots leaders say that while the collaborations focus on a corporation's global environmental footprint, impacts at the local level often continue to be ignored. /p p Antonio Claparols, president of the Ecological Society of the Philippines, said that in his country, several international conservation groups are working alongside large mining companies that have degraded the land and allegedly violated local villagers' rights. /p p Since the partnerships began, he said, several of his Filipino colleagues have lost their respect for the large NGOs. quot;They have no credibility on the ground,quot; Claparols said. /p p bIUCN and Shell /b /p p img align="right" width="250" src="/system/files/images/e2/Shell_protestors.jpg" alt="Shell protests" height="166" title="lt;pgt;Photo courtesy ItzaFineDay/Flickrlt;/pgt;Activists rally against Shell International energy policies in British Columbia by raising awareness of Shell's activities in Nigeria." class="caption" /The debate came to a head in October at the a href="http://cms.iucn.org/news_events/events/congress/index.cfm"World Conservation Congress/a, the world's largest gathering of conservationists, held this year in Barcelona. The host, IUCN, was accused of risking its reputation over a a href="http://cms.iucn.org/about/work/programmes/business/bbp_our_work/bbp_shell/bbp_shellsecondment/index.cfm"five-year collaboration it launched with the energy company Shell International/a in 2007. /p Through the deal, IUCN will attempt to mitigate the environmental impact of several Shell operations. Potential projects include the decommissioning of an oil field northeast of Scotland, natural gas production in Sweden, and oil exploration in the Arctic. Shell would compensate IUCN for the cost of the group's involvement. Shell was also a sponsor for the Barcelona Congress. p Many in the wider environmental community argue that Shell, despite its recent a href="http://www.chron.com/disp/story.mpl/business/6061497.html"support of renewable energy/a, carries a significant legacy of environmental degradation and human rights abuse. a href="http://ngm.nationalgeographic.com/2007/02/nigerian-oil/oneill-text.html"In Nigeria, oil spills/a and gas flaring have polluted many parts of the country.b /bShell is also defending accusations that it was complicit in the death of a href="http://www.foe.co.uk/resource/press_releases/ken_sarowiwa_remembered_in_10112006.html"Ken Saro-Wiwa/a, a Nigerian activist who campaigned against the company until the government executed him for alleged murder. a href="http://www.earthrights.org/content/view/578/41/"The case/a will be heard by a U.S. District Court in February. /p p The public connection between Shell and IUCN - a respected, 60-year-old conservation organization - has frustrated several of the environmental groups that are part of IUCN's global network. quot;People are very upset about how companies use IUCN's name on their promotional materialquot; said Barbara Bramble, a senior international affairs advisor at the U.S-based a href="http://www.nwf.org/"National Wildlife Federation/a. quot;It drags IUCN into the dirt.quot; /p p Led by a href="http://www.foe.org/"Friends of the Earth International/a and other international environmental groups, members of the World Congress called for IUCN to terminate its Shell agreement. quot;A long-term partnership agreement with Shell is not the right way to influence Shell,quot; a Friends of the Earth statement said. quot;There are strong reputational risks.quot; /p p Claparols used harsher language to describe the partnership. quot;The Union is being held hostage by extractive industries,quot; he said. quot;I don't mind dialoging with industry.... But when you put the name of IUCN with Shell, it's like you're endorsing everything Shell does.quot; /p p Not all grassroots conservationists agreed with ending the contract. Shahid Sayeed Khan, director of Pakistan-based a href="http://www.indusearth.org/main.htm"Indus Earth/a, said dialogue between environmental groups and corporations is essential to prevent widespread industrial degradation. quot;No question that the Shell experience in the past is not comparable to anything IUCN supports. But people change, institutions change, attitudes change,quot; he told the Congress. /p p IUCN warned its members that ending the Shell relationship could threaten conservation programs. Moreover, breaking such a contract prematurely may be illegal. quot;In case this agreement is terminated, other businesses will hesitate to engage with IUCN,quot; a statement to the Congress said. quot;This will greatly compromise the abilities for IUCN to raise money and for businesses to be engaged with conservation activities.quot;  /p p bNGOs Vote Against Shell Deal /b /p p For the Congress to terminate the Shell contract, IUCN's governmental and NGO members would have both had to agree to the action. The measure received a 60 percent vote from NGOs, but fewer than 20 percent of governments were in favor. /p p The controversy was recognized by IUCN's leaders during the Congress's closing ceremony. President Ashok Khosla encouraged IUCN members to act as watchdogs, in addition to scientific experts, to ensure corporate partners do not take advantage of their collaborations. /p p quot;We have considerable consensus that the Union must engage with corporations, large, medium and small,quot; he said. quot;However, the terms of such engagement must be such as to lead to positive conservation outcomes, and ensure that at no time is IUCN's integrity or capacity to fulfill its mission compromised in any way.quot; /p p The clash at the Congress was atypical in a community that generally seeks to avoid public criticism. Despite persistent concerns that corporate partnerships create conflicts of interest for environmentalists, many current and former employees of the large conservation groups cannot speak freely about these relationships, according to Christine MacDonald, author of ia href="http://greeninc.blogs.nytimes.com/tag/christine-macdonald/?scp=2amp;sq=Christine%20MacDonaldamp;st=cse"Green, Inc: An Environmental Insider Reveals How a Good Cause Has Gone Bad/a./i quot;These big conservation groups control so much of the funding...so people are reluctant to speak out,quot; she said. /p p The IUCN-Shell dispute also suggests a divide between the large international conservation groups and smaller groups at the grassroots level and in developing countries. /p p quot;There is always a little tension in the NGO community because everyone is focused on what their priority is, advancing their mission,quot; said Suzanne Apple, vice president of business and industry at a href="http://www.worldwildlife.org/"WWF-US/a. quot;The best thing we can do as an NGO is to be...open about our work with businesses...and what impact that has on others.quot; /p p iFull disclosure: The Worldwatch Institute is a member of the IUCN network./i /p p strongCorrection:/strong The original version of this story mistakenly reported that an IUCN World Congress motion to terminate an IUCN contract with Shell International was sponsored by Paris-based a href="http://www.pronatura.org/index.php"Pro-Natura International/a. In fact, Switzerland-based a href="http://www.pronatura.ch/"Pro Natura/a, a member of Friends of the Earth International and founder of IUCN, sponsored the motion. /p p iBen Block is a staff writer with the a href="http://www.worldwatch.org"Worldwatch Institute/a. He can be reached at /ia href="mailto:bblock@worldwatch.org"bblock@worldwatch.org/ai./i /p p iFor permission to reprint this article, please contact Julia Tier at /ia href="mailto:jtier@worldwatch.org"jtier@worldwatch.org/a. /pdiv class="feedflare" a href="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~f/worldwatch/all?a=PwopN"img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~f/worldwatch/all?i=PwopN" border="0"/img/a a href="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~f/worldwatch/all?a=pNd2N"img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~f/worldwatch/all?i=pNd2N" border="0"/img/a a href="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~f/worldwatch/all?a=laWEn"img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~f/worldwatch/all?i=laWEn" border="0"/img/a /divimg src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~r/worldwatch/all/~4/449420364" height="1" width="1"/

!--paging_filter--p img align="right" width="200" src="/system/files/images/e2/2092665274_e2df713fd4.jpg" alt="Barack Obama" height="301" title="lt;pgt;Photo courtesy Barack Obama campaignlt;/pgt;An Obama administration is expected to pass a federal renewable energy portfolio standard, national energy-efficient building codes, and a cap on greenhouse gas emissions." class="caption" /With the election of Barack Obama, the United States and the world expect a new direction in the fight against climate change.br / br / The choice of Senator Obama - an African-American born in Hawaii, schooled in Indonesia and the United States, and seasoned while fighting for tenant's rights in Chicago's South Side - reflects the diversity that defines America. But it was his well-reasoned approach to policy and messages of hope that won voters - qualities that many say the U.S. government abandoned during George W. Bush's tumultuous administration.br / br / The same values that earned Obama keys to the White House are vital to address the most challenging threats to global sustainability. An international climate change agreement will rely upon American leadership, and the many issues such a treaty involves - population growth, resource depletion, economic disparity - call for international problem-solving and a worldwide commitment to change. /p p a href="http://gristmill.grist.org/story/2008/11/5/165710/317"Environmental leaders in the United States and abroad/a quickly suggested that the election reflected the American people's desire to reverse President Bush's damaging climate change policies. quot;Today's landslide election of Barack Obama and pro-environment candidates across the country signals a strong rejection of the failed energy policies of the last eight years and a historic mandate for large-scale, transformational change,quot; a href="http://climateprogress.org/2008/11/05/friends-of-the-earth-action-on-the-election-results/"said Brent Blackwelder/a, president of a href="http://www.foe.org/"Friends of the Earth - U.S./abr / br / Yet it was the economy that overwhelmingly dominated voters' minds. More than 60 percent said it was their most important issue, a href="http://www.cnn.com/ELECTION/2008/results/polls/#val=USP00p6"according to exit polls/a. quot;Except for younger voters, I'm not sure the environment played such a big role,quot; said Riley Dunlap, an environmental sociologist at a href="http://regentsprofessors.okstate.edu/index.php?view=articleamp;catid=35%3Acurrent-regents-professorsamp;id=67%3Ariley-dunlapamp;option=com_contentamp;Itemid=67"Oklahoma State University/a. br / br / Although climate change was rarely a major campaign issue - questions of carbon reduction levels or renewable energy policies were sparsely debated - several energy policy issues became constant components of campaign speeches. Republican candidate John McCain advocated offshore drilling and nuclear power as paths toward energy independence. Obama, a Democrat, countered with a $150 billion plan to support energy efficiency and renewable energy. br / br / While climate change may not have dominated voters' decisions, Obama's comprehensive energy strategies likely influenced his image as an agent of change. quot;There's every reason to suggest Obama's commitment to energy policy, renewable energy, and conservation was an asset,quot; Dunlap said.br / br / Aside from the presidential election, voters broadly supported Congressional candidates who advocated greater action on climate change. Among the Democratic Party's gains in both the House of Representatives and the Senate, a href="http://www.lcv.org/newsroom/press-releases/clean-energy-wins.html"at least 92 of the 116 candidates endorsed by the League of Conservation Voters (LCV) /awere victorious. br / br / quot;With strong new leaders like these, we expect to pass significant global warming and clean energy legislation in the next year,quot; said Gene Karpinski, president of the a href="http://www.lcv.org"LCV/a, an environmental group that campaigns for politicians with the best environmental track record.br / br / With Democratic control of the White House and Congress, policies such as a cap on greenhouse gas emissions, a federal renewable energy portfolio standard, higher fuel efficiency standards, national energy-efficient building codes, and a long-term extension of renewable energy tax credits are all likely. br / br / The election, in combination with a slight rise in oil prices, is already affecting the alternative energy market. a href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/business/2008/nov/06/wind-power-vestas"iThe Guardian/i/a reported that stock values jumped 30 percent for a href="http://www.solarintegrated.com/"Solar Integrated Technologies/a, 22 percent for a href="http://www.solarintegrated.com/"Renewable Energy Corporation/a, and 16 percent for wind turbine manufacturer a href="http://www.vestas.com"Vestas/a.  br / br / quot;With an administration recognizing how important [renewable energy] is, I think that the level of investment both domestically and around the world will go up exponentially in the next few years, just because it's sound economics,quot; said David Hales, president of thea href="http://www.coa.edu/" College of the Atlantic/a in Bar Harbor, Maine. br / br / A true indication of the White House's intentions will be Obama's upcoming Cabinet selections. Environmentalist a href="http://voices.washingtonpost.com/the-trail/2008/11/06/robert_f_kennedy_eyed_to_head.html"Robert Kennedy, Jr. /aand former Pennsylvania Department of Environmental Protection a href="http://thehill.com/leading-the-news/door-opens-on-cabinet-speculation-2008-11-05.html"Secretary Kathleen McGinty /aare rumored as being among the leading candidates for Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) administrator.br / br / Hales, who was director of the U.S. Agency for International Development's Global Bureau during the Clinton administration, said a strong environmentalist appointed to lead the EPA may be less indicative, and meaningful, than whom Obama chooses to lead the Treasury Department or Office of the U.S. Trade Representative. These departments would also be involved in a climate change solution, and they may have greater influence on environmental policies around the globe, he said. br / br / quot;If Obama appoints a U.S. trade representative who perceives his/her mission as making the world safe for the dollar, then that's a sign that the consistency of the overall Obama strategy is beginning to fall apart,quot; said Hales, a former Worldwatch Institute fellow. quot;It's much more important to have someone who understands that economies are based in part on a sustainable relationship with the basic resources that underlie the economy.quot;br / br / iBen Block is a staff writer with the a href="http://www.worldwatch.org"Worldwatch Institute/a. He can be reached at a href="mailto:bblock@worldwatch.org"bblock@worldwatch.org/a.br / br / For permission to reprint this article, please contact Julia Tier at a href="mailto:jtier@worldwatch.org"jtier@worldwath.org/a. /i /pdiv class="feedflare" a href="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~f/worldwatch/all?a=3FUhN"img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~f/worldwatch/all?i=3FUhN" border="0"/img/a a href="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~f/worldwatch/all?a=SyrtN"img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~f/worldwatch/all?i=SyrtN" border="0"/img/a a href="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~f/worldwatch/all?a=PSqXn"img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~f/worldwatch/all?i=PSqXn" border="0"/img/a /divimg src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~r/worldwatch/all/~4/445369031" height="1" width="1"/

!--paging_filter--img align="right" width="200" src="/system/files/images/e2/solarthermal.jpg" alt="solar thermal dish" height="217" title="lt;pgt;Photo courtesy NRELlt;/pgt;As renewables such as concentrated solar thermal (above) become competitive with traditional energy sources, the International Renewable Energy Agency plans to spread the technologies worldwide." class="caption" /A consortium of European governments is developing the world's first International Renewable Energy Agency. p The agency, known as a href="http://www.irena.org/"IRENA/a, will serve as a global cheerleader for clean energy. It plans to offer technical, financial, and policy advice for governments worldwide, according to a joint announcement from Germany, Spain, and Denmark - the project's leaders. /p p Renewable energy is on the rise worldwide as governments attempt to reduce greenhouse gas emissions and create domestic energy sources. Despite a variety of international organizations that are helping with the clean energy transition, IRENA's leaders said no single agency addresses the local, national, and international needs of both developed and developing nations. /p p quot;IRENA aims to become the main driving force in promoting a swift transition towards the extensive and sustainable use of renewable energy worldwide,quot; said Hermann Scheer, general chairman of the a href="http://www.wcre.org/"World Council for Renewable Energy /aand a champion for the agency since 1990, in a a href="http://www.eurosolar.de/en/"prepared statement/a. quot;There exist international agencies for fossil and nuclear energies, but none for renewables. IRENA will close this gap.quot; /p p Scheer, a Social Democratic member of the German Parliament, led his government to commit to IRENA's creation in 2006 - arguing that it was a necessary balance to the a href="http://www.iaea.org/"International Atomic Energy Agency/a created in the 1950s. /p p The international organizations that currently focus on renewable energy include the a href="http://www.iea.org/"International Energy Agency (IEA)/a,  a href="http://www.worldbank.org/"World Bank/a, a href="http://www.ren21.net/"Renewable Energy Policy Network for the 21st Century (REN21)/a, a href="http://www.reeep.org/"Renewable Energy and Energy Efficient Partnership (REEEP)/a, and several a href="http://www.unsystem.org/"United Nations/a agencies. /p p Despite the large number of clean energy organizations and networks, most energy funding supports the fossil fuel industries, IRENA's founders say. Development aid leaders often cite the higher initial cost of technologies such as wind or solar in their decision to fund cheaper energy sources. Fossil fuel energy such as coal-fired power plants, however, warms the climate and can damage local environments. /p p quot;While conventional energies enjoy political privilege, including large amounts of public money for research and development, military protection of the supply chain, and $300 billion in global annual subsidies, renewable energies are discriminated against,quot; said Bianca Jagger, chair of the a href="http://www.worldfuturecouncil.org/"World Future Council/a, a href="http://www.wagingpeace.org/articles/2008/04/15_jagger_irena_speech.php"at a meeting of IRENA organizers/a in April. quot;The IEA only recently showed interest in renewable energy sources. Other existing networks have no mandate to advise governments on the accelerated introduction of renewable energy.quot; /p p Binu Parthan, deputy director of programs for REEEP, said IRENA's global focus would be helpful for renewable energy development. But he was doubtful whether the agency could address the challenges of technology transfer or funding shortfalls all on its own. quot;One suggestion to IRENA  is rather than create an entire new organization, it could serve as an umbrella of sorts, bringing together the work of those other institutions.quot; /p p Parthan added that an organization focused solely on renewable energy may further marginalize discussions on energy efficiency. quot;Having an organization looking only at renewable energy, the supply side, is not optimal. We need to look at energy efficiency on the demand side, as well,quot; he said. quot;That needs to be brought into the picture.quot; /p p At a conference in Madrid last month, IRENA's 51 participating nations agreed that the agency's first projects would be presented in January, at the formal launch of IRENA. In the meantime, details such as the organization's headquarters, leadership, and funding still need to be finalized. /p p The involved nations currently include nearly all of Europe as well as Australia, Argentina, Brazil, India, Indonesia, and the United Arab Emirates. /p p In the past year, global renewable energy sources have increased dramatically. More than 250 gigawatts of capacity, excluding large hydropower, exists globally. Clean energy investments surpassed $148 billion in 2007, a 60 percent increase from 2006, according to the a href="http://www.unep.org/Documents.Multilingual/Default.asp?DocumentID=538amp;ArticleID=5849amp;l=en"U.N. Environment Programme/a. /p p Several countries in charge of the IRENA initiative, including Germany and Denmark, are home to some of the world's leading producers of renewable energy technologies. /p p iBen Block is a staff writer with the /ia href="/"Worldwatch Institute./ai He can be reached at /ia href="mailto:bblock@worldwatch.org"bblock@worldwatch.org/ai./i /p p iFor permission to reprint this article, please contact Julia Tier at /ia href="mailto:jtier@worldwatch.org"jtier@worldwatch.org/ai. /i /pdiv class="feedflare" a href="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~f/worldwatch/all?a=cTsbN"img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~f/worldwatch/all?i=cTsbN" border="0"/img/a a href="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~f/worldwatch/all?a=IM7KN"img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~f/worldwatch/all?i=IM7KN" border="0"/img/a a href="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~f/worldwatch/all?a=U06kn"img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~f/worldwatch/all?i=U06kn" border="0"/img/a /divimg src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~r/worldwatch/all/~4/443385052" height="1" width="1"/

We discuss climate models a lot, and from the comments here and in other forums it's clear that there remains a great deal of confusion about what climate models do and how their results should be interpreted. This post is designed to be a FAQ for climate model questions - of which a few are [...]

!--paging_filter--img src="/system/files/images/e2/fishing.jpg" alt="commercial fishing" title="lt;pgt;Photo courtesy EPAlt;/pgt;Environmentalists worry that greater market access for environmental goods could increase the exploitation of key natural resources such as fisheries. " class="caption" align="right" height="225" width="200" /By Ambika Chawla /p p The director of the World Trade Organization (WTO), Pascal Lamy, a href="http://ictsd.net/i/news/bridgesweekly/31176/"said earlier this month/a that negotiations for a global free-trade deal are urgently needed to restore confidence in shaken financial markets. /p p Renewed talks could jumpstart efforts to remove barriers to trade in a wide range of economic sectors, helping to stimulate markets, Lamy said. Sectors being targeted for greater liberalization under the WTO include natural resources such as fisheries and timber as well as agriculture, services, and industrial goods. /p p Discussions on natural resources trade would take place within the WTO's negotiations on so-called a href="http://www.wto.org/english/tratop_e/markacc_e/nama_negotiations_e.htm"quot;Non-Agricultural Market Accessquot;/a (NAMA), a series of talks launched in 2001 at the organization's Fourth Ministerial Meeting in Doha, Qatar. But progress in this and other key trade areas has come to an effective standstill since high-level negotiations broke down in Doha and more recently a href="http://www.radioaustralia.net.au/news/stories/200807/s2318291.htm"in Geneva this July/a. /p p Free-trade enthusiasts tout the benefits of NAMA's push for the unhindered movement of goods and resources across national borders. But some environmental groups are concerned that the negotiations could pose a serious threat to ecological, social, and economic sustainability.   /p p According to these organizations, including a href="http://www.foei.org/"Friends of the Earth International/a, a href="http://www.greenpeace.org/international/"Greenpeace International/a, and the a href="http://www.iatp.org/"Institute for Agriculture and Trade Policy/a, reducing and eliminating barriers to trade, including import and export tariffs as well as non-tariff barriers, could override legislation critical to environmental protection. They worry that measures such as the certification of wood products, restrictions on trade in chemicals, and precautions against invasive species could potentially be considered non-tariff barriers to free trade. /p p A 2004 a href="http://www.foeeurope.org/trade/NAMA%20position%20paper%20October%202004.pdf"Friends of the Earth Europe report/a charges that legislation regulating food, fisheries, minerals, timber, and electronics, as well as chemical testing and recycling standards, could all be challenged as barriers to trade. According to the report's findings, governments that have raised questions about the compatibility of health and environmental standards with trade rules include Argentina, Australia, Bulgaria, Egypt, Hong Kong, India, Japan, Turkey, and the United States.  meta name="ProgId" content="Word.Document" / meta name="Generator" content="Microsoft Word 11" / meta name="Originator" content="Microsoft Word 11" / link href="file:///C:%5CDOCUME%7E1%5CBblock%5CLOCALS%7E1%5CTemp%5Cmsohtml1%5C01%5Cclip_filelist.xml" rel="File-List" / style st1\:* { BEHAVIOR: url(#ieooui) }/stylestyle/style /p p But past experience indicates that submitting a complaint to the WTO does not necessarily mean that national environmental legislation will be overturned. In 2006, for example, a href="file:///C:/Documents%20and%20Settings/hilary/Local%20Settings/Temporary%20Internet%20Files/OLK16E/U.%20http:/ictsd.net/i/news/biores/9014"the European Union presented a legal complaint to the WTO Dispute Settlement Body/a against Brazil's restrictions on imports of retreaded (used) vehicle tires. Brazil countered that the restrictions were necessary to protect the country's health and environmental standards. The Dispute Settlement Body ultimately voted in favor of Brazil's position. /p p Environmentalists also worry that greater market access for environmental goods could increase the exploitation of key natural resources. The forest, fisheries, minerals, and aluminum sectors are at particular risk because they are designated for so-called a href="http://www.foeeurope.org/trade/NAMA%20position%20paper%20October%202004.pdf"quot;zero-zero liberalization,quot;/a a bargaining process whereby one country eliminates its trade barriers in exchange for another country to do the same. Canada, Iceland, New Zealand, Norway, and Thailand have all tabled zero-zero proposals for fish products, and New Zealand and Australia have presented such proposals for forests. /p p Carin Smaller with the Institute for Agriculture and Trade Policy says a range of government and independent research on the potential impact of trade liberalization on fisheries and forests has found that quot;further liberalization will have a negative impact on these sectors.quot; a href="http://www.unep.ch/etu/publications/UNEP_Fisheries.pdf"Case studies/a from the United Nations Environment Programme, for example, conclude that fisheries liberalization would be detrimental to the economies and marine diversity of Argentina, Mauritania, and Senegal, she says. /p p A a href="http://oceans.greenpeace.org/en/documents-reports/tradingaway"Greenpeace International study/a released last year concludes that quot;while consumers in developed countries should see some short-term economic benefits of less expensive seafood, these will be short-lived because further liberalization will only accelerate resource depletion through continued over-fishing, especially in developing countries.quot; /p p On the other hand, trade liberalization could benefit fisheries by acting as a forum where countries can present proposals to prohibit harmful subsidies that distort fisheries production and trade. Subsidies to the fishing industry a href="http://www.wto.org/english/forums_e/ngo_e/wwf_fishsubs_e.pdf"total some $15-20 billion a year/a and come in the form of direct payments to boat owners as well as tax write-offs to developing-country governments that grant permission to industrial-country fleets to fish in their waters. These subsidies often provide incentives for the industry to exploit already-depleted fisheries.  /p style/style p style st1\:* { BEHAVIOR: url(#ieooui) }/styleAt the 2001 WTO Ministerial Meeting in Doha, talks on fish subsidies were integrated into the official trade negotiations, giving governments the opportunity to present alternative proposals. Several delegations have since submitted proposals to the WTO that have successfully eliminated distorting subsidies. /p p Proponents of NAMA say liberalization could also bring much needed foreign investment to developing countries. This increased investment would generate revenue that, if distributed properly, could foster employment and provide financial support to innovative environmental programs, such as projects to sustainably manage forests and fisheries, market affordable organic products, and develop renewable energy technologies. /p p As world leaders focus greater attention on the role that trade liberalization could play in boosting the global economy, divergent viewpoints are emerging within the WTO, particularly between industrialized and developing countries. quot;The text of the NAMA paper would need to be drastically reworded before it becomes acceptable to not just India, but developing countries in general,quot; said India's commerce secretary, Gopal Pillai. /p p iAmbika Chawla is a /iState of the World 2009i fellow at the a href="//"Worldwatch Institute/a. She can be reached at achawla@worldwatch.org./i /p p iFor permission to reprint this article, please contact Julia Tier at jtier@worldwatch.org./i /pdiv class="feedflare" a href="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~f/worldwatch/all?a=eKF2N"img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~f/worldwatch/all?i=eKF2N" border="0"/img/a a href="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~f/worldwatch/all?a=Ht7TN"img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~f/worldwatch/all?i=Ht7TN" border="0"/img/a a href="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~f/worldwatch/all?a=Y8u6n"img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~f/worldwatch/all?i=Y8u6n" border="0"/img/a /divimg src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~r/worldwatch/all/~4/441035694" height="1" width="1"/

!--paging_filter--meta name="ProgId" content="Word.Document" / meta name="Generator" content="Microsoft Word 11" / meta name="Originator" content="Microsoft Word 11" / link href="file:///C:%5CDOCUME%7E1%5CBblock%5CLOCALS%7E1%5CTemp%5Cmsohtml1%5C01%5Cclip_filelist.xml" rel="File-List" / style st1\:* { BEHAVIOR: url(#ieooui) }/stylestyle/style p img src="/system/files/images/e2/servers.jpg" alt="computer server" title="lt;pgt;Photo courtesy Matt McGeelt;/pgt;The world’s 30.3 million computer servers and other IT systems now account for about 2 percent of global greenhouse gas emissions." class="caption" align="right" height="301" width="200" /The office is becoming a major driver of climate change. /p p Despite ongoing efforts to improve energy efficiency in the workplace, the world's growing reliance on the Internet is leading to a rapid increase in greenhouse gas emissions. /p p The energy required to power all the world's computers, data storage, and communications networks is expected to double by 2020, according to a new a href="http://www.mckinsey.com/"McKinsey amp; Company/a analysis. /p p The rising emissions are due largely to a href="/node/5464"greater Internet use in China and India/a, where coal-fired power plants generate the majority of the countries' energy. China accounted for 23 percent of global emissions related to information technology (IT) last year. Worldwide, IT systems' emissions were equivalent to the annual carbon dioxide emissions from more than a half-billion automobiles. /p p The predicted emission growth comes after years of increased energy demand from the world's computer servers. The amount of electricity required for servers doubled between 2000 and 2005, according to a a href="http://www.iop.org/EJ/abstract/1748-9326/3/3/034008/"Stanford University study/a. The world's 30.3 million servers and other IT systems now account for about 2 percent of global greenhouse gas emissions, the a href="http://www.mckinseyquarterly.com/How_IT_can_cut_carbon_emissions_2221"McKinsey report said/a. /p p North America's office technology caused one-fourth of the world's IT-related emissions in 2002. China has since passed the region to become the world leader in both overall greenhouse gas emissions and emissions attributed to IT. /p p China and the world's emerging economies, including India, Brazil, and Indonesia, are expected to increase their IT emissions 9 percent annually in the years ahead. By 2020, McKinsey predicted IT would be the cause of 1.54 gigatons of greenhouse gases, or 3 percent of global emissions. If these calculations are accurate, the carbon footprint of IT would be comparable to that from aviation. /p Several energy-efficiency controls now under development may significantly reduce office technology emissions. Potential improvements include increased server consolidation, meta name="ProgId" content="Word.Document" / meta name="Generator" content="Microsoft Word 11" / meta name="Originator" content="Microsoft Word 11" / link href="file:///C:%5CDOCUME%7E1%5CBblock%5CLOCALS%7E1%5CTemp%5Cmsohtml1%5C01%5Cclip_filelist.xml" rel="File-List" / style st1\:* { BEHAVIOR: url(#ieooui) }/stylestyle/styleadvanced a href="http://news.zdnet.com/2424-9595_22-222748.html"data center cooling systems/a, and software that cut servers' energy use when demand is low. p The McKinsey study also noted that the same technology that has increased the workplace's carbon footprint can reduce global emissionsb. /bquot;Smart controlsquot; - sensors that monitor and help avoid unnecessary electricity - are already being installed across the world. quot;The same way IT improved labor productivity in the ‘80s and ‘90s, IT can improve energy productivity today,quot; said lead author Giulio Boccaletti, a McKinsey consultant.b br / /b /p p In order for the emission - and financial - savings to occur, office managers must be willing to pay for the initial efficiency changes. Businesses, however, are often geared toward finding new sources of revenue rather than ways to improve infrastructure.b /b /p p quot;Energy efficiency, until very recently, is something people haven't really seen as a fundamental business driver, even though it can create enormous returns,quot; said Boccaletti, a former climate scientist at Massachusetts Institute of Technology. /p p Many offices and homeowners already appear to be switching to one of the simplest energy-efficiency improvements: compact fluorescent lamps (CFLs). According to a recent a href="/node/5920"Worldwatch Institute analysis/a, global CFL sales more than tripled from 750 million units in 2001 to 2.4 billion in 2006, based on data from Chinese manufacturers. /p p Electric lighting consumes 19 percent of the world's electricity grid production. If all the incandescent light bulbs in the United States were replaced with CFLs, the country would avoid 158 million tons of carbon dioxide emissions, according to an industry estimate, the equivalent of removing more than 30 million cars off the road. /p p iBen Block is a staff writer with the a href="//"Worldwatch Institute/a. He can be reached at a href="mailto:bblock@worldwatch.org"bblock@worldwatch.org/a./i /p p iFor permission to reprint this article, please contact Julia Tier at a href="mailto:jtier@worldwatch.org"jtier@worldwatch.org/a./i /pdiv class="feedflare" a href="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~f/worldwatch/all?a=PGX5M"img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~f/worldwatch/all?i=PGX5M" border="0"/img/a a href="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~f/worldwatch/all?a=HXZoM"img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~f/worldwatch/all?i=HXZoM" border="0"/img/a a href="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~f/worldwatch/all?a=Rxa2m"img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~f/worldwatch/all?i=Rxa2m" border="0"/img/a /divimg src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~r/worldwatch/all/~4/437887730" height="1" width="1"/

letters range from amusing claims that we are overlooking changes in the magnetic field, to tales about how the “weight” of carbon dioxide keeps it “near the ground”. If the writer sounds serious, then I treat them seriously, and do my best to provide a helpful reply. Often, though, I find myself [...]

!--paging_filter--p bWashington/bb, D.C./bb-/bAs capital markets around the world are being rescued by national governments, global unemployment is reaching record levels and the labor market is expanding by tens of millions of workers each year. In the face of the twin challenges of stagnating economies and climate change, stimulating green industry is more important than ever, according to a new assessment released by the Worldwatch Institute. /p p quot;It's time for a bailout for the environment: one that creates jobs, is global in scope, and can help rebuild communities amidst the ashes of the current economic crisis,quot; says Michael Renner, co-author of the report, ia href="/node/5925"Green Jobs: Working for People and the Environment/a/i,  written in collaboration with Sean Sweeney and Jill Kubit of Cornell University's Global Labor Institute.sup*/sup /p p Green jobs are not only about renewable energy employment. Reengineering buildings, transportation systems, agriculture, and basic industry all have the potential to create jobs that help reduce humanity's carbon footprint and protect the environment. The report provides an overview of green jobs by sector: /p ul li div In China, brenewable energy technologies/b employ an estimated 1 million people in the wind, solar PV, solar thermal, and biomass industries. /div /li li div The bbuilding and construction/b sector employs more than 111 million people worldwide. Retrofitting the European Union's residential building sector to cut carbon dioxide emissions by 75 percent would lead to some 2.6 million new jobs by 2030. /div /li li div Jobs in manufacturing fuel-efficient cars remain limited in number. bPublic transit/b offers a greener alternative. In the United States, transit agencies employed some 367,000 people in 2005. An estimated 900,000 people are employed in urban public transport in the European Union. /div /li li div The bsteel, aluminum, cement, and paper industries/b are highly energy-intensive and polluting. Worldwide, more than 40 percent of steel output and one-quarter of aluminum production is based on recycled scrap, rendering the estimated quarter million jobs in these two sectors at least a quot;shade of green.quot; /div /li li div bRecycling/b programs create as many as 15 million jobs worldwide, but can entail dirty, undesirable, poorly paid, and even dangerous work, particularly in developing countries. In Brazil, over 90 percent of recyclable material is collected by scrap collectors who have organized themselves into a national movement with 500 cooperatives and 60,000 collectors. /div /li li div A study of 1,144 borganic farms/b in the United Kingdom and the Republic of Ireland showed that organic farms employed on average one-third more employees per farm than conventional counterparts. In the Dominican Republic, organic farms are reducing the movement from rural to metropolitan areas with local employment opportunities. /div /li li div Nearly 1.2 billion people depend on bagroforestry/b for subsistence and income, particularly in Africa, Asia, and Latin America. Planting trees on agricultural land provides multiple environmental benefits and can raise farm incomes. /div /li /ul p Addressing the climate challenge in particular requires a multipronged approach that can create jobs, according to the report. This approach prioritizes the development of more environmentally benign technologies; greater efficiency of energy, water, and raw material use; altered lifestyle and consumption choices; economic restructuring; and environmental restoration efforts. It also requires adaptation to those changes that now seem inevitable and perhaps irreversible. /p p While there is significant untapped potential in the green jobs sector, not all news is good, according to the report. Global unemployment stands at roughly 6 percent, affecting some 190 million people. Some 487 million workers do not earn enough yet to rise above the $1-a-day level of extreme poverty. Furthermore, green investments are found primarily in a relatively small number of countries. Green jobs development is still an exception in most developing countries, which account for some 80 percent of the world's workforce. /p p Other issues include the rising level of informality in the global economy, a lack of rules and standards to help ensure decent jobs, and the fact that environmental costs are too often externalized, making it harder for green enterprises to compete. /p p Integrating social and environmental aspects into the cost of doing business and undertaking large-scale public and private sector investments will be key to realizing the massive potential that green jobs hold. Government targets, mandates, business incentives, and reformed tax and subsidy policies must promote sustainable development in order for the green labor market to take off. /p p quot;Given all of the uncertainties in today's world, it's time for a bold commitment and international cooperation to promote green economies that support conservation, low carbon technologies, recycling, and local communities,quot; says Renner. quot;I can't see how we'll escape our twin economic and environmental crises if we don't.quot; /p p * The report is derived from a longer, in-depth study, iGreen Jobs: Towards Decent Work in a Sustainable, Low-Carbon World/i, commissioned for a joint initiative of the United Nations Environment Programme, the International Labour Organization, the International Trade Union Confederation, and the International Organisation of Employers. It is available for download at a href="http://www.unep.org/labour_environment/features/greenjobs-report.asp"www.unep.org/labour_environment/features/greenjobs-report.asp/a. /p p align="center" -END- /p p b/b /p p ia href="/node/5925"strongGreen Jobs: Working for People and the Environment/strong/a/i /p p ba href="/node/5840"Worldwatch's Green Jobs Web page/a /b /pdiv class="feedflare" a href="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~f/worldwatch/all?a=KbtDM"img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~f/worldwatch/all?i=KbtDM" border="0"/img/a a href="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~f/worldwatch/all?a=UaCDM"img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~f/worldwatch/all?i=UaCDM" border="0"/img/a a href="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~f/worldwatch/all?a=KrN7m"img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~f/worldwatch/all?i=KrN7m" border="0"/img/a /divimg src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~r/worldwatch/all/~4/436901258" height="1" width="1"/

!--paging_filter--img align="right" width="250" src="/system/files/images/e2/debate08.jpg" alt="U.S. presidential election" height="137" title="lt;pgt;Photo Courtesy Commission on Presidential Debateslt;/pgt;Barack Obama says he would provide $150 billion over ten years to help create 5 million new green jobs in the United States." class="caption" /With less than a week until the United States elects its next president, and at a time when Americans are losing their jobs in record numbers, the two leading candidates are suggesting that the financial crisis can be resolved by addressing the country's worsening energy crisis. p Combining job creation and energy policy into one economic stimulus plan is gaining steam among political and environmental leaders worldwide. Yet despite similar rationales, the plans presented by the Democratic and Republican candidates offer distinct options. And not all of the proposed jobs would truly be quot;green.quot; /p p Democratic Senator Barack Obama touts quot;green jobs,quot; the catch-phrase for high-quality, environmentally sustainable employment, as a key pillar of his campaign platform. These jobs range from retrofitting buildings with energy-efficient technologies, to manufacturing solar panels, to maintaining wind turbines. /p p quot;There is no better potential driver that pervades all aspects of our economy than a new energy economy,quot; Obama said in a recent ia href="http://www.time.com/time/politics/article/0,8599,1853081,00.html"Time magazine interview/a/i. quot;That's going to be my No. 1 priority.quot; /p p a href="http://www.barackobama.com/pdf/factsheet_energy_speech_080308.pdf"Obama's plan [PDF]/a would inject $150 billion of government aid into programs that support renewable energy and energy efficiency over the next decade. He estimates the program would create 5 million jobs quot;that pay well and can't be outsourced, jobs building solar panels and wind turbines and fuel-efficient cars,quot; according to a statement he made at a quot;a href="http://my.barackobama.com/page/community/post/amandascott/gGg3F2"jobs summit/aquot; last week. Obama also advocates a national quot;a href="http://www.eere.energy.gov/de/renewables_portfolio_standards.html"renewable energy portfolio standard/aquot; that would mandate that utilities supply 25 percent of their electricity from clean energy sources. /p p Yet Obama comes from Illinois, a state with heavy reliance on nuclear and coal energy. Before running for president, he a href="http://www.plentymag.com/features/2008/10/obama.php"sponsored legislation/a that would subsidize coal-fired power plants, but Obama has since stated that he supports coal only if the greenhouse gas emissions from power plants are stored underground-an unproven technology known as carbon, capture, and sequestration (CCS). Obama says he is quot;a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-R52J2D5QQU"not a nuclear proponent/a,quot; but nuclear may be included in his energy portfolio if a solution to store nuclear waste is discovered. /p p Republican Senator John McCain supports scaling up renewable energy and energy efficiency as well, although a href="http://www.johnmccain.com/Issues/JobsforAmerica/energy.htm"his plan/a excludes details about how he would expand these green jobs. He has been much more enthusiastic about the additional 45 nuclear plants he advocates by 2030, which he estimates would create 700,000 new jobs. /p p quot;If we really want to enable technologies of tomorrow, like plug-in electric cars, we need electricity to plug into,quot; a href="http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=93323734"McCain said/a earlier this year in reference to nuclear power. More recently, however, the candidate has a href="http://www.treehugger.com/files/2008/10/nuclear-safety-environment-john-mcain-blah-blah.php"downplayed the environmental concerns/a related to nuclear power, such as waste disposal and uranium mining. /p p McCain's quot;a href="http://www.johnmccain.com/downloads/jobsforamerica.pdf"Jobs for Americaquot; plan [PDF]/a also highlights the potential employment opportunities in extractive industries. He calls for expanded oil and natural gas drilling in the United States, and he suggests that expanded research into CCS would lead to employment. The coal, oil, and natural gas industries, however, have steadily a href="/node/5824"required fewer workers/a in recent years as mining equipment replaces jobs. /p p The a href="http://www.greenjobsforamerica.org/"Green Jobs for America Campaign/a, a coalition of environmental and labor groups, has requested that the a href="http://www.peri.umass.edu/green_recovery/"U.S. government set aside $100 billion/a for tax credits, loan guarantees, and public investment in green job-related technology. The campaign estimates that 2 million jobs would be created over two years. /p p Leaders from around the globe are also calling for increased support for green jobs as financial instability spreads worldwide. /p p The United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP) last week requested international support of a a href="http://www.unep.org/Documents.Multilingual/Default.asp?DocumentID=548amp;ArticleID=5957amp;l=en"quot;Global Green New Deal,quot;/a a proposal similar to the Depression-era policies of U.S. President Franklin Delano Roosevelt. If green jobs take off worldwide, the concurrent crises of global energy shortages and climate change could also be alleviated, UNEP Executive Director Achim Steiner said. /p p quot;The financial, fuel, and food crises of 2008 are in part a result of speculation and a failure of governments to intelligently manage and focus markets,quot; Steiner said in a prepared statement. quot;The flip side of the coin is the enormous economic, social, and environmental benefits likely to arise from...new green jobs in clean tech and clean energy businesses up to ones in sustainable agriculture.quot; /p p The European Commission, Germany, and Norway are supporting the initiative by providing nearly $4 million to research how governments can integrate green jobs into their economies. /p p Renewable energy and supplier industries have created an estimated 2.3 million jobs worldwide, and more are expected as wind, solar, and geothermal power sources expand across the globe, according to a href="/taxonomy/term/68"Worldwatch Institute/a analyses. /p p Energy efficiency has long been touted as a policy option for economic growth. In California, efficiency mandates implemented in the 1970s saved residents $56 billion between 1972 and 2006, while creating about 1.5 million jobs, according to a recently released a href="http://are.berkeley.edu/~dwrh/CERES_Web/index.html"University of California at Berkeley study/a. /p p The UNEP plan is the first that mentions organic farming as an answer to the global market meltdown. Organic agriculture is often considered a niche market with limited large-scale economic advantages. /p p Locally grown, organic produce, however, requires labor-intensive employment in the countries where the food products are demanded. The higher price of organic foods has led to greater profits, due largely to the avoidance of expensive fertilizers, UNEP said in a a href="http://www.unep.org/labour_environment/features/greenjobs-report.asp"report/a co-authored by the Worldwatch Institute and released alongside UNEP's Green New Deal plan. Avoiding fertilizers also reduces energy use. /p p But in some regions, especially where farmers are competing with cheap imports and large-scale farms, the greater demands of organic compliance may force farmers to quot;operate on razor-thin margins,quot; the report said. Also, employees on organic farms are often paid the same as they would if they worked on a conventional farm, according to a href="http://gristmill.grist.org/story/2005/10/18/18022/134"a 2005 survey/a of organic farmers in California. /p p iFor more information about green job opportunities that could support a quot;Global Green New Deal,quot; read /ia href="/node/5925"Green Jobs: Working for People and the Environment/ai, written by Worldwatch researcher Michael Renner i/iin collaboration with researchers at Cornell University's a href="http://www.ilr.cornell.edu/globallaborinstitute/"Global Labor Institute/a. See also our special online series, quot;a href="/node/5844"The Greening of Labor/a.quot;/i /p p iBen Block is a staff writer with the a href="/"Worldwatch Institute/a. He can be reached at a href="mailto:bblock@worldwatch.org"bblock@worldwatch.org/a./i /p p i/i /p p iFor permission to reprint this article, please contact Julia Tier at a href="mailto:jtier@worldwatch.org"jtier@worldwatch.org/a./i /pdiv class="feedflare" a href="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~f/worldwatch/all?a=moShM"img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~f/worldwatch/all?i=moShM" border="0"/img/a a href="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~f/worldwatch/all?a=4aNlM"img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~f/worldwatch/all?i=4aNlM" border="0"/img/a a href="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~f/worldwatch/all?a=Yah6m"img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~f/worldwatch/all?i=Yah6m" border="0"/img/a /divimg src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~r/worldwatch/all/~4/435989203" height="1" width="1"/

!--paging_filter--img align="right" width="200" src="/system/files/images/e2/forestbare.jpg" alt="forest" height="267" title="lt;pgt;Photo courtesy Rototom/Wikimedialt;/pgt;If the world’s wealthiest corporations donated 1 percent of their profits to conservation, $10 billion would be raised to protect ecosystems such as old growth forests." class="caption" /A new conservation fund will request that the world's wealthiest companies dedicate 1 percent of their profits to protect threatened forests, fisheries, and other at-risk ecosystems. /p p The a href="http://www.iucn.org/"World Conservation Union (IUCN)/a is launching an quot;a href="http://64.233.169.104/search?q=cache:HeyNcvWqrjQJ:www.iucn.nl/sbeos/doc/file.php%3Fnid%3D6574+earth+profit+fundamp;hl=enamp;ct=clnkamp;cd=1amp;gl=usamp;lr=lang_en"Earth Profits Fund/aquot; that would target the world's a href="http://money.cnn.com/magazines/fortune/global500/2008/full_list/"500 largest corporations/a, which earn an estimated $1 trillion in profits annually. If 1 percent of the profit could be collected each year, the fund would receive $10 billion, organizers estimate. /p p The fund is among several efforts to find alternative funding for conservation programs at a time when financial instability is sweeping through markets worldwide. /p p a href="http://seagrant.uaf.edu/map/staff/steiner.html"University of Alaska/a professor Richard Steiner, the fund's founder, said many large corporations that do not deal with natural resources directly have never been asked to donate large amounts to conservation. /p p In addition, Steiner said that many corporate donations, while commendable, are rarely enough to address the full scope of environmental problems. quot;Certainly private companies all give money to various causes, thousands of companies do that,quot; he said. quot;But by dispersing money as they choose, there is always a risk that it's done primarily for PR value rather than for conservation benefits.quot; /p p For instance, British insurance company a href="http://www.aviva.com/csr08/index.asp?pageid=16"Aviva/a describes itself as the first global insurer to be quot;carbon neutral,quot; and it dedicates millions of dollars each year to charities, including the conservation group a href="http://www.panda.org/"WWF/a. Yet its total contributions - £6.75 million ($10.5 million) in 2007 - represent about 0.4 percent of its annual profit. /p p To ensure that donations result in meaningful environmental improvements, Steiner said the donors would not be able to decide how their money would be spent. IUCN would likely be in charge of collecting and overseeing the donations, although details about how the fund would be implemented have not yet been finalized. /p The a href="http://www.gefweb.org/default.aspx"Global Environment Facility/a (GEF) - a joint World Bank-United Nations agency that provides most of the world's funding for global environmental projects - already serves a style st1\:* { BEHAVIOR: url(#ieooui) }/stylestyle/stylepurpose similar to the proposed Earth Profits Fund. But Steiner said the facility has been unable to raise enough funds through government support. The GEF will receive $3.13 billion from donor countries through 2010. p quot;Even if [official development assistance] and all other government programs for sustainability are added in, the total amount of conservation finance is an order of magnitude short of what is necessary to reverse trends in environmental integrity of the biosphere,quot; he said. /p p According to an a href="http://www.earth-policy.org/Books/PB3/Plan%20B%203.0%20Data%20-%20Chapter%2013.xls#%27Table%2013-2%27%21A1"Earth Policy Institute study/a, about $113 billion is needed each year to address all the world's conservation goals, such as the restoration of fisheries, croplands, and forests.  /p p The GEF acknowledges that billions of dollars will be necessary in the coming years as competition for the world's limited resources increases and as climate change becomes more severe, said Robert Dixon, leader of the GEF's climate and chemical team. /p p Dixon said the GEF is considering private funding for the first time. quot;The resources needed to continue adequate support for conservation and climate change projects, these are enormous sums of money,quot; he said. quot;We will be placing greater emphasis on public-private partnerships and other innovative finance mechanisms to replenish the GEF.quot;b /b /p p IUCN agreed to help develop the fund at the group's a href="http://www.iucn.org/news_events/events/congress/index.cfm"World Conservation Congress/a earlier this month in Barcelona, Spain. Steiner said that Achim Steiner, Executive Director of the a href="http://www.unep.org/"United Nations Environment Programme/a, has also expressed interest. /p p Richard Cellarius, the a href="http://www.sierra.org/"Sierra Club/a's vice president for international affairs, sponsored the fund at the World Conservation Congress. quot;It's going to be a long haul to get it implemented,quot; Cellarius said. quot;Trying to get [financial] resources for conservation is an uphill battle.quot; /p p iBen Block is a staff writer with the a href="//"Worldwatch Institute/a. He can be reached at a href="mailto:bblock@worldwatch.org"bblock@worldwatch.org/a./i /p p iFor permission to reprint this article, please contact Julia Tier at a href="mailto:jtier@worldwatch.org"jtier@worldwatch.org/a./i /pdiv class="feedflare" a href="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~f/worldwatch/all?a=6xEuM"img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~f/worldwatch/all?i=6xEuM" border="0"/img/a a href="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~f/worldwatch/all?a=Ogn4M"img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~f/worldwatch/all?i=Ogn4M" border="0"/img/a a href="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~f/worldwatch/all?a=FOA5m"img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~f/worldwatch/all?i=FOA5m" border="0"/img/a /divimg src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~r/worldwatch/all/~4/434844184" height="1" width="1"/

!--paging_filter--p bWashington/bb, D.C./b- Aggressively replacing the world's incandescent lightbulbs with compact fluorescent lamps (CFLs) could reduce lighting energy demand by nearly 40 percent and cut greenhouse gas emissions from day one, according to the a href="/node/5920"latest Vital Signs Update/a released by the Worldwatch Institute. By 2030, these savings would add up to 16.6 billion tons of carbon dioxide-more than twice the amount released in the United States every year. /p p Electric lighting consumes more than 19 percent of the world's electricity, causing as much greenhouse gas pollution every year as half of all the light passenger vehicles on the road worldwide. CFLs help lower energy demand and reduce greenhouse gas emissions because they use about 75 percent less energy than traditional lightbulbs. /p p quot;CFLs are a winning technology, cleaning up pollution and saving consumers money on their energy bills at the same time,quot; said Alice McKeown, a researcher for the Worldwatch Institute.  /p p Fortunately, strong growth in CFL production and sales can be seen worldwide. Between 2001 and 2006, production of CFLs in China-which accounts for roughly 85 percent of global output-tripled from 750 million units to 2.4 billion units. Sales of CFLs in the United States alone rose by more than 300 percent early in the decade, growing to 397 million units in 2007.  At the same time, the total number of CFLs in use worldwide nearly doubled from an estimated 1.8 billion to 3.5 billion in 2003. /p p quot;CFLs are an important part of the solution to climate change and are available today, not somewhere down the line,quot; said McKeown. quot;We need to double our efforts to flip the switch for consumers worldwide.quot; /p p -END- /pdiv class="feedflare" a href="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~f/worldwatch/all?a=c9zNM"img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~f/worldwatch/all?i=c9zNM" border="0"/img/a a href="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~f/worldwatch/all?a=i13MM"img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~f/worldwatch/all?i=i13MM" border="0"/img/a a href="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~f/worldwatch/all?a=53rfm"img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~f/worldwatch/all?i=53rfm" border="0"/img/a /divimg src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~r/worldwatch/all/~4/434007358" height="1" width="1"/

!--paging_filter--img align="right" width="200" src="/system/files/images/e2/R_K__Pachauri.jpg" alt="R. K. Pachauri" height="281" title="lt;pgt;Photo courtesy World Economic Forumlt;/pgt;R. K. Pachauri suggested that the news media increase local reports of climate change." class="caption" /The chair of the a href="http://www.ipcc.ch/"Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change/a said the news media are not sufficiently addressing the severity of climate change at a meeting of U.S. environmental journalists earlier this week. p R.K. Pachauri, head of the 2,500-member IPCC, said that unless policies are enacted soon to mitigate greenhouse gas emissions, the global perils from shifting weather patterns and sea level rise will become worse in the coming years. /p p To communicate the dangers of climate change, Pachauri urged the annual gathering of the a href="http://www.sej.org/"Society of Environmental Journalists/a (SEJ) to report how the most recent IPCC assessment will affect local communities. /p p quot;In the last year and a half, there has been a massive explosion of awareness; however, the media has not reported enough about the emergency and depth of action,quot; said Pachauri, who has led the United Nations panel since 2002. /p p The fact that only a href="http://people-press.org/report/417/a-deeper-partisan-divide-over-global-warming"half of Americans polled/a consider human activity to be the main cause of climate change is often blamed on media coverage. But news reports of climate change have steadily increased in recent years, especially since a href="http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/10/30/AR2006103000269.html"government reports/a, a major a href="http://www.pbs.org/newshour/bb/law/july-dec06/scotus_11-29.html"Supreme Court hearing/a, and the documentary quot;a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0497116/"An Inconvenient Truth/aquot; brought attention to the climate crisis in 2006. /p p Pachauri suggested that major news agencies now rely too much on high-level science reports or large climate-related events for their stories, rather than examples of climate change's ongoing effects. quot;We need to go beyond the cyclical coverage of climate change and emphasize the day-to-day relevance,quot; he said. /p p SEJ President Timothy Wheeler said news stories often reflect what public opinion polls suggest are priority topics. According to a a href="http://people-press.org/report/417/a-deeper-partisan-divide-over-global-warming"January 2008 Pew Research Center study/a, U.S. voters listed global warming toward the bottom of their current policy concerns. quot;When the economy is the way it is, a war is going on, these are the things that grab the headlin