UNEP Urges Better Conservation of the Planet’s Life-Support Systems for Fighting Poverty, Delivering Growth and Meeting the Millennium Development Goals

Beijing/Nairobi, 30 March 2005 – The value of the world’s forests, wetlands, coral reefs and other ecosystems for fighting poverty and delivering sustainable development is spotlighted today in an international report.

The Millennium Ecosystem Assessment makes the case that ecosystems and the services they provide are financially significant and that to degrade and damage them is tantamount to economic suicide, said Klaus Toepfer, Executive Director of the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP).

The Assessment, in which UNEP has played a key role, makes it clear that humankind is running down its ‘natural capital’.

It argues that the loss of natural services, such as the purification of the air and water, protection from disasters and provision of medicines, as a result of damaged and degraded ecosystems have become a significant barrier in the quest to meet the Millennium Development Goals by 2015.

Mr. Toepfer, attending the launch of the report in Beijing, China, said: “There are many pressing reasons to value ecosystems and the extraordinary range of services they provide. The habitats, wildlife and landscapes of this planet are sources of beauty, focuses of spirituality and culturally significant for people, communities and countries.”

“They are also, and this is especially true for the poor, the basis of livelihoods from forestry and fishing to farming and tourism. For too long their economic value has been ignored. Ecosystem services have been treated as free and their exploitation, limitless,” he said.

“The Millennium Ecosystem Assessment gives us, in some ways for the first time, an insight into the economic importance of ecosystem services and some new and additional arguments for respecting and conserving the Earth’s life support systems. I am not one of those who believe everything in this world should be boiled down to dollars and cents. But these estimated values are a good start and are a useful and additional reason to care for and respect natural capital alongside financial and human capital,” said Mr. Toepfer.

He also praised the methodology of the Assessment noting that it was a departure from the traditional methods that focus on counting individual species and then monitoring their ups and downs.

Mr. Toepfer said he believed that assessing ecosystems offered a better way of meeting the targets and timetables of the World Summit on Sustainable Development�s Plan of Implementation.

This calls for a reversal of the rate of loss of biodiversity by 2010.

Some Highlights

The report, the work of over 1,300 experts, claims that intact and healthy ecosystems are often worth more than altered, damaged and degraded ones.

Wetlands are important habitats for fish, birds and plants. They are also natural water pollution filters and water storage facilities. They also have high recreational value.

The report claims that an intact wetland, in this case in Canada, is worth $6,000 a hectare whereas one that has been cleared for intensive agriculture is worth only around $2,000 a hectare.

The same argument is made for intact mangroves versus the same area cleared for shrimp farming–$1,000 a hectare in Thailand versus about $200 a hectare when cleared for aquaculture.

The report estimates the recreational value of ecosystem services by citing the case of Marine Management Areas in Hawaii. It claims that among six of these areas the recreational value ranges from $300,00 to $35 million.

The 3,000 hectare Muthurajawela Marsh in Sri Lanka, a coastal peat bog, is valued at $5 million a year for the flood control services it provides locally.

The report also looks at the costs of damaging and degrading ecosystems.

It cites the collapse in the early 1990s of the Newfoundland cod fishery due to over-fishing. This put tens of thousands of people out of work and cost $2 billion in income support and retraining.

Eutrophication in England and Wales as a result of the over-use of fertilizers and other sources such as waste water caused damage to freshwaters amounting to up to $160 million a year in the 1990s.

The burning of 10 million hectares of Indonesia�s forests in the late 1990s, cost an estimated $9 billion in increased health care, lost production and lost tourism revenues, says the report.

The net annual loss linked with invasive, �alien�, species in the Cape Floral region of South Africa is estimated at $93 million.

The report says the costs of restoring ecosystems can be high, indicating that it is cheaper to conserve them rather than pollute and clean up afterwards.

The State of Louisiana in the United States has put in place a $14 billion wetland restoration plan to protect 10,000 square kilometres of marsh, swamp and barrier islands in part to reduce storm surges generated by hurricanes.

The report also argues that human security is also at risk from ecosystem decline. It argues that the severity and frequency of floods and fires has been aggravated by damage to the Earth’s natural capital.

For example between 1990 and 1999, more than 100,000 people were killed by floods causing damages totaling $243 billion. This is partly blamed on the canalisation of rivers and other natural water bodies.

Original press release: Earth�s Ecosystems Crucial for Economic, Social, & Spiritual Stability (UNEP)

The human race is living beyond its means. A report backed by 1,360 scientists from 95 countries – some of them world leaders in their fields – today warns that the almost two-thirds of the natural machinery that supports life on Earth is being degraded by human pressure.

The study contains what its authors call “a stark warning” for the entire world. The wetlands, forests, savannahs, estuaries, coastal fisheries and other habitats that recycle air, water and nutrients for all living creatures are being irretrievably damaged. In effect, one species is now a hazard to the other 10 million or so on the planet, and to itself.

“Human activity is putting such a strain on the natural functions of Earth that the ability of the planet’s ecosystems to sustain future generations can no longer be taken for granted,” it says.

Read the full story: Two-thirds of world’s resources ‘used up’ (Gaurdian)

Even as friends and foes of the Cape and Islands Wind Farm Project prepare to revisit –and re-argue–the offshore turbines’ potential impact on Nantucket Sound, participants in an innovative MIT program will present new strategies for resolving science-intensive environmental disputes to members of the Bush administration in Washington, D.C.

The MIT group, comprised of five students and one faculty member, is visiting the Department of the Interior today. All six are participants in an MIT-based partnership between the Department of Urban Studies and Planning (DUSP) and the U.S. Geological Survey’s Science Impact program. The partnership is known as the MIT-USGS Science Impact Collaborative, or MUSIC.

The group’s two-day Washington visit is led by Herman Karl, co-director of MUSIC and a USGS Senior Scientist on loan to MIT. The other co-director is Lawrence Susskind, Ford Professor of Urban and Environmental Planning. The MUSIC interns making presentations are DUSP graduate students Peter Brandenburg, Anna Brown, Lindsay Campbell, Jennifer Peyser (project manager) and Basilia Yao.

Each MUSIC group member will discuss possible ways of applying the program’s consensus-building process known as “joint fact-finding.” This is a set of techniques that participants can use to establish shared understanding of technical and scientific issues and methods and to reach agreement on how to manage gaps in information.

“Most stakeholders involved in environmental disputes have different levels of scientific understanding, and trust among stakeholders can erode if each group brings its own scientific resources to support its position, leading to dueling or competing studies and experts, to a breakdown of the policy-making process, or worse yet, endless litigation,” said Karl.

The MUSIC interns’ presentations will include “A Spectrum of Strategies for Collaborative Decision-Making” (Campbell); “The Six Steps of a Joint Fact-Finding Process” (Brown); “Cape Wind Project and Long Island Power Association: Contrasting Case Studies” (Yao); “Opportunities for Integrating Joint Fact-Finding Into the NEPA Process” (Peyser) and “Joint Fact-Finding in the Adaptive Management Cycle” (Brandenburg).

Chip Groat, USGS director and a strong supporter of MUSIC, is heading the panels of Washington experts that will listen to the student presentations today and tomorrow.

Real-world experience

The MUSIC program was developed at MIT by Susskind, who has also helped to pioneer the use of joint fact-finding in a range of public policy-making situations. MUSIC interns are required to take a yearlong seminar on joint fact-finding and to work on field-based projects with USGS and other branches of the Department of the Interior.

The graduate interns in Washington this week came to MUSIC with practical, if frustrating, experience in the conflict-ridden field of environmental planning.

Before starting at MIT, Brown was “more focused on international dimensions of environment, conflict and development.” She worked for Seeds of Peace, an organization that seeks to build relationships among young people from regions of conflict and elsewhere.

She pointed out that in New England, a joint fact-finding process could “help identify a way to meet regional energy needs by using natural gas. There are environmental, social and cultural concerns, safety hazards and economic factors at play. Communities in Maine, Massachusetts and Rhode Island have been grappling with whether to pursue an LNG terminal in the region–a true case of “not in my back yard.’”

Brandenburg worked for 10 years as a planner and forest and parks manager for the Massachusetts Department of Environmental Management; he was responsible for managing motorized off-road vehicles on state forest trails. “I basically worked on that every day for 10 years and never reached a lasting, durable conclusion,” he said.

He identified the Cape Wind Project as “definitely a case that could use some joint fact-finding. A very similar scenario is the decision of whether to drill for oil in the Alaska National Wildlife Refuge.”

Peyser, the MUSIC project manager, was inspired by the success of collaborative decision-making in an Arizona dispute, she said; she seized the chance to become project manager in her second year in DUSP. “I saw it as a great opportunity to continue working on joint fact-finding both in the university setting and potentially in practice on the ground.

“MUSIC has great potential to impact how – and with whom – environmental decisions are made in this country,” she said.

Beginning in September 2005, there will be four returning and four new MUSIC interns in DUSP. They will be supported by the National Parks Service, the Fish and Wildlife Service and the USGS.

Cape Wind Project meeting

The Cape Wind Project, with its controversial environmental, economic and aesthetic impact on Nantucket Sound and Cape Cod, has been an important case study for participants in MUSIC and proponents of joint fact-finding since 2003. After the issuing of the draft environmental impact statement (DEIS) in November 2004, the permitting agency has yet to announce any decision on the project. The delay is widely seen as politically motivated.

On April 2, MUSIC will host stakeholders in the Cape Wind offshore wind energy proposal to discuss the permitting process and possible ways of resolving some of the scientific issues in dispute. MUSIC interns have prepared a web page (http://scienceimpact.mit.edu) to portray how citizens might use joint fact-finding.

Ali Mostashari, a doctoral candidate in engineering systems, has organized the April 2 meeting. In 2004, as part of his dissertation research project on policy design in the Cape Wind Project, Mostashari convinced more than 44 representative stakeholder organizations to summarize their views of the offshore wind energy siting and permitting process.

“Pubic hearings are just not sufficient to address the complex projects such as Cape Wind. We have seen how conflict can prolong the permitting process, without improving its substance. The goal of the April 2nd workshop is to learn from stakeholders in the current permit process how it can be improved for future offshore wind projects, as well as similar issues such as siting of LNG facilities,” Mostashari said.

Original press release: D.C. trip focuses on resolving environmental disputes (MIT)

London, UK – WWF ‘flooded’ the British Parliament in a stunt to highlight the impacts of climate change.

An image of the River Thames having risen high up the side of the Palace of Westminster, and the message “Vote to Stop Climate Chaos” was projected onto the building as part of a campaign to press politicians to take tougher action on climate change, particularly in the run-up to the general election.

Already London and the South-East are feeling the effects of climate change, and research shows that if current trends continue central London could be submerged within the next 100 years. The Thames barrier has been activated 55 times in the twenty years since it was built as a result of tidal surges, half of which were in the last five years.

The threat of flooding due to climate change is so severe that the government predicts the barrier may have to be raised up to 325 times a year by 2100. It is estimated that if just one flood broke through the Thames Barrier it would cost around £30bn in damage to London, roughly 2 per cent of GDP.

Unchecked climate change could also lead to a rise in summer temperatures of 5C in London and the South-East and to a 30 per cent increase in winter rainfall and winter floods.

WWF will be using the general election period to demand that politicians commits to year on year reductions in carbon dioxide emissions – the main greenhouse gas – in order to achieve their target of a 20 per cent reduction by 2010. The global conservation organization also projected the statement: 69 per cent of people are worried about climate change – what are YOU going to do about it – onto Battersea power station to highlight the government’s failure to set tough limits on carbon dioxide pollution from industry.

“British politicians have been guilty of a lot of rhetoric on climate change and very little action,” said Andrew Lee, Director of Campaigns at WWF-UK.

“We may only have a decade to take action to reduce soaring greenhouse gas emissions and prevent the worst impacts of climate change becoming reality. It is vital that the next government makes the right decisions over the next parliamentary term. Ignoring the issue is not an option.”

Last week WWF released the results of a YouGov poll which showed that more than 1 in 3 (38 per cent) people believe climate change will cause problems in their lifetime and 69 per cent view it as a real threat. Nearly half of people (46 per cent) would support increasing taxes to subsidise transport fares to encourage people to use their cars less and 85 per cent of people support more government money going into the development of renewable energy like wind farms.

Original press release: WWF puts UK Parliament under water (WWF)

In a unique collaboration, a Minnesota electric cooperative will supply the thermal energy requirements for an ethanol plant proposed in North Dakota. The ethanol plant to be sited next to the power plant will have lower construction costs by eliminating the need for a boiler and the existing power plant will become more efficient by utilizing thermal energy that would have otherwise have been wasted.

Great River Energy, the Minnesota-based transmission and distribution electric cooperative, has signed a memorandum of understanding with Headwaters Inc. to become co-owner of a 50 million gallon, $65 million ethanol plant on land next to the Coal Creek Station power plant near Underwood, N.D. Representatives at the Coal Creek station have reported that construction costs at the ethanol plant will be about $15 million less by using heat from the existing power plant instead of building their own boiler system. Construction is planned to begin in the fall and the ethanol plant would begin operation the fall of 2006.

North Dakota enacted an ethanol production incentive program in 2003 to help attract new plants (ND Laws 2003, Chapter 57). Their “counter-cyclical” production incentive ties a very generous $0.40 per gallon production incentive to the average North Dakota price per bushel of corn (baseline of $1.80/bushel) and the average North Dakota rack price per gallon of ethanol (baseline of $1.30/gallon). While the incentives on a per gallon basis are large, annual distribution of ethanol incentives cannot exceed $1.6 million and that limits payments to around 4 million gallons per year. Each ethanol facility is limited to a cumulative total of $10 million in state incentive payments.

Original press release: New Ethanol Plant Will Use Waste Heat From Existing Power Plant (Democratic Energy)

Climates like those of the movie ‘Monsoon Wedding’ may extend more widely into Africa, North America and South America, according to a University of Oregon geologist�s analysis of an ancient greenhouse event.

“We know the gathering greenhouse will be warm, but this new information confirms that the contrast between the rainy season and the dry season will increase dramatically,” says Greg Retallack, whose study indicating that a troubled greenhouse is brewing is published in the April issue of the journal Geology.

In this case, the word ‘troubled’ refers to the stormy conditions shown to have been in play during a well-known greenhouse event some 55 million years ago during the late Paleocene epoch. Retallack explored the relationship between seasonality and rainfall in soils, then applied the same techniques to buried soils spanning the ancient greenhouse event.

“This is known to have been a time of high atmospheric carbon dioxide from studies of the breathing pores in fossil leaves,” he explains. “At that time, Wyoming warmed from a mean annual temperature of some 55 degrees to a summer-like 65 degrees Fahrenheit (12 to 18 degrees Celsius). Rainfall in Utah jumped from 16 inches per year to 26 inches per year. As a result, sagebrush deserts of the western U.S. were transformed into sub-humid woodlands.”

Retallack agrees with previous research indicating that the cause of the late Paleocene greenhouse spike, which lasted less than half a million years, was a catastrophic release of natural gas from undersea ices and permafrost.

“In a remarkable parallel to modern hydrocarbon pollution of the atmosphere, this natural methane oxidized to carbon dioxide and created a global greenhouse event,” he explains. “The past methane outburst dwarfed even human consumption of hydrocarbons, and there is a danger that another similar outburst could be triggered by warming of polar and submarine ice due to human activities. Our little warming push could repeat the troubled times of 55 million years ago.”

However, Retallack says these findings indicate it is unlikely that super storms will freeze North America and Europe, as depicted in the recent movie ‘The Day After Tomorrow.’

“During the greenhouse spike of 55 million years ago, tropical mangroves and rain forests spread as far north as England and Belgium and as far south as Tasmania and New Zealand,” Retallack says. “Turtles, alligators and palm trees graced Ellesmere Island in the Canadian Arctic, which is now the treeless abode of musk oxen and polar bears.”

The bottom line: A new Ice Age is probably the least of our worries.

“Frostbite and snow-blindness are less likely to be in our future than heat stroke and malaria,” Retallack asserts. “Mint julep, anyone?”

Buried soils have long been known as sources of evidence of past rainfall, but Retallack says they also can be used to determine the seasonality of rainfall as well as the amount of rainfall because the spread within the profile of carbonate nodules is related to the difference in precipitation between the driest and wettest month. Retallack uses this feature in ancient soils to reinterpret past climates.

Retallack is an authority on paleosols (ancient soils) and is writing a book about healing the global greenhouse. His textbook, ‘Soils of the Past: An Introduction to Paleopedology,’ is widely used on college and university campuses. At the UO since 1981, his research is funded by the National Science Foundation.

Original press release: New Research Indicates a �Troubled� Greenhouse is Brewing (NASA Earth Observatory)