A new study published today in “Nature” by authors from the Biodiversity and Climate Research Centre and the Goethe University Frankfurt suggests that large parts of Africa’s savannas may well be forests by 2100. The study suggests that fertilization by atmospheric carbon dioxide is forcing increases in tree cover throughout Africa. A switch from savanna to forest occurs once a critical threshold of CO2 concentration is exceeded, yet each site has its own critical threshold. The implication is that each savanna will switch at different points in time, thereby reducing the risk that a synchronous shock to the earth system will emanate from savannas. --
Goethe University Frankfurt, 28 June 2012
Here’s my advice to the UN about how to get its mojo back on global warming: Accept reality. Stop making energy more expensive. Start telling the truth. --Lorrie Goldstein,
Toronto Sun, 29 June 2012
Coal has overtaken gas as the main method of keeping the UK’s lights on, figures show. Britain is burning more now than at any time since 2006, despite official promises to move to greener fuels. Imports are up 20 per cent to 18 million tons this year — with coal responsible for generating 42 per cent of all UK electricity, the Department of Energy says. --Ben Jackson,
The Sun, 29 June 2012
It is a night and day difference in power markets on the different sides of the Atlantic ocean. Coal generation is booming in the UK, where it just displaced natural gas as the top source of electricity. What's the difference? The price of natural gas is low here and expensive there, because America has embraced the Shale Gas revolution, while the UK and Europe have not. --John Hanger's
Facts of the Day, 29 June 2012
Families could lose thousands of pounds thanks to a government scheme aimed at cutting bills by making homes energy efficient. MPs will today vote on the Green Deal offering loans of up to £10,000 to households for improvements like loft insulation, but Labour says families face paying more than twice that. --Tom McTague,
The Mirror, 2 July 2012
The Met Office’s track record of short-range (five-day) forecasting is, in my experience, very good and getting better, but its longer-range predictions have often been not just badly wrong, but consistently biased on the warm, dry side. Now look at the curriculum vitae of the chairman of the Met Office, Robert Napier. He is also chairman of the Green Fiscal Commission and the World Conservation Monitoring Centre, and has been a director of the Carbon Disclosure Project, the Alliance of Religions and Conservation and the Climate Group. He is so high up in the church of global warming, he is a carbon cardinal. --Matt Ridley,
The Times, 2 June 2012
The tectonic plates of Middle East politics are shifting fast. Egypt’s Arab spring may have run into the sand of anti-democratic Islamism, but the days when oil-rich Arab sheikhs colluded to hold Western economies to ransom will soon end. Massive shale oil and gas discoveries across the West, Israel’s rising status as a Middle East energy powerhouse and a deepening internal rift over strategic policy are all colluding to hasten OPEC’s demise. --Peter Glover,
Energy Tribune, 29 June 2012
