Climate Change archive

28.02.2006 Investment in renewable alternatives and energy efficiency and conservation measures will deliver greater emissions reductions than nuclear power, more cheaply, and without safety risks, Britain's Green Party said on Tuesday as it launched its Alternative Energy Report.

28.02.2006 Tony Blair appears, yet again, to be sidelining the Kyoto process for dealing with climate change, Friends of the Earth said after the Prime Minister met campaigners on Tuesday morning and was told that UK policies fall far short of the action needed to avert disaster.

28.02.2006 Stop Climate Chaos campaign group will urge the UK Government to take urgent and effective action on climate change when they meet with the Prime Minister, Tony Blair, and an exceptional line-up of other cabinet ministers including the Chancellor, Gordon Brown today.

27.02.2006 If you just saved 20% of the energy you use everyday you'll help prevent climate change, says the Energy Saving Trust. Find out how to reduce your impact on the environment and save money.

24.02.2006 Construction giants Lafarge, Skanska and Arelor were among the founding members of an international initiative to ‘green’ the multi-billion dollar building and construction sector this week.

23.02.2006 Most British people would accept new taxes on goods and services that damage the environment, according to a Guardian/ICM poll which reveals a widespread willingness to make personal sacrifices to tackle the threat of climate change.

22.02.2006 The fact that the US President consulted novelist Michael Crichton on global warming would be funny — if the consequences of George Bush's policies weren't so dire, says Frank O'Donnell.

22.02.2006 The periodic warming of the Pacific Ocean known as El Niño threatens food supplies for millions of Africans by reducing crops yields, say researchers.

21.02.2006 How would our winter olympians fare if the snow turned to slush, or vanished altogether? Watch some short film clips about the likely consequences.

21.02.2006 The Lena River, ninth-longest river in the world, flows through one of the world’s iciest lands, where the sun is seldom seen during winter. Nearly 80% of the watershed is continuous permafrost – earth that never thaws fully, even in summer. However, climate change is reaching this remote outpost; with consequences not just locally but, probably, for the rest of the world as well.

21.02.2006 Britain could lose its ability to impose environmental taxes, restrictions and safeguards on airlines under a draft treaty between the EU and US which curtails the power of national governments.

20.02.2006 Greenland's glaciers are melting even faster than previously thought and contributing more and more to sea level rise. Scientific reports say the amount of ice being dumped into the ocean from the Greenland Ice Sheet has doubled in the last five years.

20.02.2006 Geothermal energy plants, which make use of our planet's interior heat, are becoming increasingly popular in Western Europe. While Switzerland, Italy and Iceland have long harvested the heat from deep down, the latest country with a geothermal boom is Germany.

17.02.2006 The world's plants are using less water, thanks to boosted atmospheric carbon dioxide – it may mean raised rivers and greater flood risks.

17.02.2006 "A new energy source that can save the world from climate crisis and destruction has been discovered: yellow coal, the harnessed energy of human spite. But how long will it last, and what happens when people start to get happy?" openDemocracy presents the first English translation of Russian writer Sigizmund Krzhizhanovsky's darkly satirical short story, Yellow Coal, written in the 1920s, on how humans almost save the world from climate change.

16.02.2006 The level of carbon dioxide in the Earth's atmosphere is likely to grow more than expected as soil bacteria, in response to rising temperatures, break down more organic material and produce more CO2, according to results by an international research team.

15.02.2006 Governments are failing to take the necessary action to ensure delivery of the Kyoto Protocol one year after the global treaty came into force to cut greenhouse gas emissions.

15.02.2006 Home computer users are being invited to participate in a mass experiment to predict how the Earth's climate will change.

14.02.2006 Carbon emissions from one new home built in the UK could be offset by small energy efficiency measures applied to five existing homes, the Sustainable Development Commission will say today as it launches its publication and film ‘Home Truths’. Government's plans for new homes will generate 1.4 million tonnes of carbon through building alone.

14.02.2006 Britain, a self-styled global leader in combating climate change, is set for a new legal showdown with the European commission over government plans to allow businesses to pump out more greenhouse gases under the EU's carbon emissions trading scheme.