A group of Britain’s leading industrialists has written to the prime minister urgently demanding long-term policies to combat climate change.

The heads of the 12 leading firms say climate change is a huge challenge that needs serious investment by business.

But they say they cannot invest because they are not sure what future government policies on climate will be.

The letter is signed off by the heads of BP, Shell, HSBC Bank, BAA, John Lewis, Scottish Power and more.

Between them the firms employ tens of thousands of people and have a turnover of 452bn.

Read the complete story: Industry Chiefs’ Environment Plea (BBC)

European energy imports are predicted to rise from 50% today to 70% by 2030. Wind energy is one of Europe’s largest indigenous energy resources and it can help to build European energy independence, according to the EWEA, the European Wind Energy Association.

Already today, wind power installed in Europe is saving over 50 million tonnes of CO2 every year. On current trends, wind energy can save more than 100 million tonnes of CO2 p.a. across Europe by 2010, delivering more than 30% of the EU’s total Kyoto Protocol obligation and generating power equivalent to the needs of 34 million European households.

“Wind power has no resource constraints; the fuel is free, endless. Wind power stations can be constructed and can deliver power far quicker than other conventional sources, with no import dependence and no fuel price risk. In terms of carbon delivery, wind energy is outperforming many other proposed solutions”, said Corin Millais, EWEA CEO.

“It is a widely stated truism that there is no silver bullet in the quest for climate solutions. However some bullets pack a deadlier punch”, said Millais. “Wind energy is an advanced technology which can cut carbon and help to meet growing electricity demand. Wind power is one of the few energy supply technologies that has the maturity, clout and global muscle to deliver deep cuts in CO2 . The competition for climate change solutions - like the earth’s climate - is hotting up. Wind energy needs to remain at the forefront of technical and policy innovations.”

The key role of renewable energies like wind power in tackling climate change is acknowledged. The recent European Environment Agency (EEA) assessment on greenhouse gas emission trends in Europe, for example, concluded that the promotion of renewable energy has the greatest impact on emissions in most EU Member States for both implemented and planned policies� (1). The International Energy Agency, IEA, estimates that the EU will need to build 766GW of power stations by 2030 in order to cover new demand and for replacement of older generation. The investment choices made now will determine the level of emissions of carbon dioxide for many decades.

Emissions trading on the other hand won�t be a short term boost for wind energy. The price of a CO2 allowance is unlikely to ever reflect the external costs associated with pollution and emissions of conventional power. Because allowances are allocated for free to existing polluters,most carbon based electricity is not covered . The cost of an emission allowance applies to the marginal unit of electricity, raising the market price for all kWh produced. So fossil power producers will receive the higher price for each kWh they produce but costs for emitting CO2 will only apply to the very small share of
kWh that does not benefit from free allocation. It is estimated that this could result in profits for power generators of 11-12 billion per year. Auctioning all carbon credits is the only fair market way to allocate costs. Precisely how the ETS will impact on the business strategies of all utilities remains to be seen over the next few years

Original press release: Wind Energy: Helping to Build European Energy Independence (EWEA - European Wind Energy Association)

A new analysis of Africa’s past and future climate shows that the Sahel region, which experienced catastrophic drought for decades until rains returned in the 1990s, could experience wetter monsoons for decades to come. However, drought across southern Africa is projected to intensify further. Oceanic warming consistent with an increase in greenhouse gases appears to be a factor in these expected 21st-century changes to Africa’s monsoons.

James Hurrell of the National Center for Atmospheric Research (NCAR) presents the findings today in New Orleans at the spring meeting of the American Geophysical Union. The study, conducted with Martin Hoerling (National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration), was supported by NOAA and the National Science Foundation, NCAR’s primary sponsor.

The study, which draws on 80 simulations of global climate from five computer models, provides new evidence linking drought in southern Africa to the warming of the Indian Ocean. However, it contradicts earlier studies that tied Indian Ocean warming to drought in the Sahel. Instead, the new results relate Sahelian drought to a late 20th-century cooling of the North Atlantic Ocean. A subsequent switch to North Atlantic warming, partly consistent with the impact of greenhouse gas increases, is the main factor behind the Sahel’s recent swing from drought to moist conditions, the researchers believe.

“Changes in the Indian and Atlantic oceans are causing large regional effects in Africa, and these have substantial impacts on people. Now we can explain these climatic effects,” says Hurrell.

Recurrent drought since the 1970s has plagued southern Africa, including Angola, Zambia, and Zimbabwe. Meanwhile, the nearby Indian Ocean has warmed more than 1 degree Celsius (0.6 degree Fahrenheit) since 1950. As showers and thunderstorms develop in the rising air above the warming ocean, says Hurrell, they help lead to sinking air and drought in a surrounding ring that includes southern Africa.

“In our models, the Indian Ocean shows very clear and dramatic warming into the future, which means more and more drought for southern Africa,” says Hurrell. “It is consistent with what we would expect from an increase in greenhouse gases.”

Hurrell and Hoerling compared model results from 1950-99 to several control runs that omitted the Indian Ocean warming. None of those runs showed the magnitude of drying that actually occurred in southern Africa. When the models did include the Indian Ocean warming, southern Africa consistently dried out. The models also project that by 2049, monsoons across southern Africa could be 10% to 20% drier than the 1950-99 average.

A different process appears to shape rainfall in the Sahel. When sea-surface temperatures are warmer in the South Atlantic than in the North, it pulls the Sahelian monsoon cycle south as well, depriving the region of its usual rains.

“This was the situation during much of the latter half of the 20th century,” says Hurrell. “We believe the North Atlantic Ocean cooling was natural and masked an expected greenhouse-gas warming effect.”

Since 1990, the sea-surface temperature pattern has reversed, warming more rapidly in the North Atlantic than in the South. The models examined by Hurrell and Hoerling show this trend intensifying in future decades. They project that the Sahel monsoon will be some 20% to 30% wetter by 2049 compared to the 1950-99 average.

The warming of Indian Ocean waters is well beyond the range expected from natural processes. This strengthens the case that greenhouse gases are involved, says Hurrell. In the Atlantic, natural variability affects ocean temperatures more strongly, making it more difficult to attribute changes there to greenhouse-gas effects.

Paleoclimate records show that even greater climate swings have occurred in Africa’s monsoons, most likely related to past variations in solar output and in Earth’s orbit. “From a paleoclimate perspective, the recent African dryings appear to be neither unusual nor extreme,” says Hurrell.

Monsoon rains, critical to life in much of Africa, shift north and south with the seasons. They normally reach the Sahel from July to September and the southern part of the continent from February into April. Low-pressure centers moving west from the Sahel during the monsoon often serve as seed for tropical storms and hurricanes in the North Atlantic. Hurrell’s work does not address the possible impact of increased rains in the Sahel on future Atlantic hurricane activity.

For their study, Hurrell and Hoerling examined output from computer models at NCAR, NASA, NOAA, the European Centre for Medium-Range Weather Forecasts, and France’s National Center for Meteorological Research (CNRM).

Original press release: A Continent Split by Climate Change - New Study Projects Stronger Drought in Southern Africa, More Rain in Sahel (NCAR)

NASA successfully launched a new environmental satellite today for the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA). It will improve weather forecasting and monitor environmental events around the world.

The NOAA-18 (N) spacecraft lifted off at 6:22 a.m. EDT from Vandenberg Air Force Base, Calif., on a Boeing Delta II 7320-10 expendable launch vehicle. Approximately 65 minutes later, the spacecraft separated from the Delta II second stage.

“The satellite is in orbit and all indications are that we have a healthy spacecraft,” said Karen Halterman, the NASA Polar-orbiting Operational Environmental Satellites (POES) Project Manager, Goddard Space Flight Center (GSFC), Greenbelt, Md. “NASA is proud of our partnership with NOAA in continuing this vital environmental mission,” she added.

Flight controllers tracked the launch vehicle’s progress using real-time telemetry data relayed through NASA�s Tracking and Date Relay Satellite System (TDRSS) starting about five minutes after launch. Approximately 26 minutes after launch, controllers acquired the spacecraft through the McMurdo Sound ground station, Antarctica, while the spacecraft was still attached to the Delta II. Spacecraft separation was monitored by the TDRSS.

The solar array boom and antennas were successfully deployed, and the spacecraft was placed in a near-perfect orbit. The satellite was acquired by the NOAA Fairbanks Station, Alaska, 86 minutes after launch and deployments, and a nominal spacecraft power system was confirmed. NOAA-N was renamed NOAA-18 after achieving orbit.

NOAA-18 will collect data about the Earth�s surface and atmosphere. The data are input to NOAA�s long-range climate and seasonal outlooks, including forecasts for El Ni�o and La Ni�a. NOAA-18 is the fourth in a series of five Polar-orbiting Operational Environmental Satellites with instruments that provide improved imaging and sounding capabilities.

NOAA-18 has instruments used in the international Search and Rescue Satellite-Aided Tracking System, called COSPAS-SARSAT, which was established in 1982. NOAA polar-orbiting satellites detect emergency beacon distress signals and relay their location to ground stations, so rescue can be dispatched. SARSAT is credited with saving approximately 5,000 lives in the U.S. and more than 18,000 worldwide.

Twenty-one days after spacecraft launch, NASA will transfer operational control of NOAA-18 to NOAA. NASA�s comprehensive on-orbit verification period is expected to last approximately 45 days.

NOAA manages the POES program and establishes requirements, provides all funding and distributes environmental satellite data for the United States. GSFC procures and manages the development and launch of the satellites for NOAA on a cost-reimbursable basis.

NASA�s Kennedy Space Center, Fla., was responsible for the countdown management and launch of the Delta II, which was provided by Boeing Expendable Launch Systems, Huntington Beach, Calif.

Original press release: NASA Successfully Launches Environmental Satellite (NASA Earth Observatory)

The glacier on Tibet-Qinghai Plateau in southwest China is quickly disappearing, Chinese scientists have said.

After years of research, scientists announced their forecast that three-fourths of the glacier in the southeast of Tibet and the marine glacier along the Hengduan Mountains, a series of parallel mountains ranges running through Sichuan, Yunnan and Tibet, will fade away in 2100 if the temperature rises by 2.1 degrees Celsius.

A study of the glacier in Mount Qomolangma, known in the West as Mt. Everest, showed that the glacier in this area will keep melting.

The melting slowed from 1920s to 1930s and from 1970s to 1980s, scientists said. Global warming has picked up speed since the 1980s, and the melting pace of the glacier will accelerate.

Taking the glacier on the Tanggula Mountains in Tibet for example, half of the 2213-square-meter glacier will melt by 2050 if the temperature rises by 2.4 degrees Celsius. 90 percent will disappear if the temperature rises by 5.8 degrees.

Original press release: Glacier on Tibet-Qinghai Plateau Melting Fast (Xinhua News Agency)

The ice sheet covering the interior of Antarctica is thickening, researchers report in the journal Science.

This bulge may temporarily buffer rising sea levels, they believe.

Antarctica’s “weight gain” is due to extra snowfall, caused by rising temperatures, the team thinks.

However, scientists worry the overall mass of the Antarctic may be decreasing because ice near the coasts is melting, possibly at a greater rate.

Read the complete story: Antarctic buffers sea level rise (BBC)