Electric Car Revolution Has Begun

This is an excellent review of the current state of the electric car industry.  It is everywhere now and well on the way to been a major part of th mix.  The first objective is the available short haul market that will free between three to four millions of barrels of oil production.

Just accommodating that will produce the infrastructure and support capability that simply does not exist yet.  From that base, it is easy to grow and slowly innovate into other parts of the market.

It is one thing to post that this is necessary as I did two years ago.  It is much more gratifying to actually seeing it emerge in sufficient manufacturing depth to assure one of ultimate success.

A global loss of two million barrels of production per day is now something we can actually handle this coming year if we really had to on a rush basis..

There are a lot of images in the original article.  Use the link to look at them.

The Electric Car Revolution Starts Now!

http://www.greenchipstocks.com/report/the-electric-car-revolution-starts-now/479

For years, we've been singing the praises of electric and plug-in hybrid electric vehicles (PHEVs). We even devoted an entire section to them in our book, Investing in Renewable Energy. But only within the past year or so have we seen some real progress on manufacturing these fuel-efficient vehicles.

Sure, there have always been start-ups, universities, and forward-thinking engineers who spent years building their own electric vehicles. But only now are we starting to see the major automakers putting aside their prejudices (which nearly put some of them out of business), and moving forward with their first generations of highway-capable electric and plug-in hybrid electric vehicles.

So let's take a look at what's coming down the pike in the next few years. . .

General Motors

Perhaps the most anticipated PHEV right now is the Chevy Volt. This vehicle is an extended-range electric car that can be driven for at least 40 miles on electricity stored in the battery. Following that 40-mile range, the gas engine kicks in, allowing the car to drive up 400 miles on a full tank. The Volt will use a lithium-ion battery pack and is expected to hit the market in 2011.

GM is also on track to launch a plug-in SUV in 2011. Some were concerned this wouldn't happen, as the electrified SUV was supposed to be a Saturn Vue. Saturn was scrapped by GM as a part of its reorganization. However, we're now hearing that the SUV will come from Chevy, Cadillac, Buick, or GMC.

Ford

In January 2009, Ford announced a new electrification strategy involving three types of vehicles:

·Battery Electric Vehicles (BEV)

·Hybrid Electric Vehicles (HEV)

·Plug-In Hybrid Electric Vehicles (PHEV)

The company's HEVs are already well-known and don't need to be detailed here. While HEVs certainly help decrease fuel consumption, we are going to focus on the electric vehicle and PHEV — only with those will you start to see real, robust fuel savings.

Due out in 2011 is an electric vehicle, based on the Focus platform. The all-electric car will have a range of about 100 miles on a single charge.

Ford also has a battery-powered van which is likely to be ready by 2010. The van gets about 100 miles on one charge — more than enough mileage for a city delivery van or municipal vehicle.

And Ford is also in the process of electrifying its hybrid SUV, the Escape. This one is expected to be in production by 2012.

Chrysler

Chrysler has said that it plans on delivering an electric vehicle in North America in 2010. In September 2008, before Chrysler filed for bankruptcy, the company revealed three electric prototypes:

·A Dodge sports car

·A Jeep Wrangler

·A Chrysler Minivan

Toyota

In July 2009, the Nikkei Business Daily reported that Toyota plans to start mass producing PHEVs in 2012. The vehicle is expected to deliver an all-electric range of between 12.4 and 18.6 miles, and will use lithium-ion batteries produced by its joint venture with Panasonic Corporation. Toyota expects 20,000 to 30,000 vehicles for the first year's output.

Mitsubishi

Japanese automaker Mitsubishi began fleet sales of its electric vehicle, the i-MiEV, in 2009. This vehicle has an all-electric range of 80 miles with a top speed of 80 mph. The company also plans to test the vehicles in the United States with help from Portland General Electric.

Subaru

In February 2009, Subaru displayed its mini-EV, the Stella, at the Melbourne International Motor Show. The vehicle delivers approximately 50 miles on a single charge, with a top speed of 62 mph. About 170 of the vehicles have already been sold in Japan.

Porsche

After receiving such a positive response to its plug-in hybrid 918 Spyder at the Geneva Auto Show, Porsche announced in March, 2010 that it would mass produce it. This vehicle boasts 78 miles per gallon (16 miles in all-electric mode), and enough torque to blast off from 0 to 60 in 3.2 seconds. It's expected to hit the market in 2015.

 
Nissan

Nissan revealed its electric offering, the LEAF, in August 2009. It's an electric hatchback that boasts a 100-mile all-electric range, delivering a top speed of about 76 mph. Nissan claims the vehicle's price will be within the range of a comparable gasoline-engine car. The LEAF is expected to arrive in Europe, Japan, and the United States by the end of 2010.

Honda

Just a few weeks after Nissan unveiled the LEAF, Honda announced its plans to develop an electric car that will debut in 2015. Not much was released about the vehicle, except for the fact that it's expected to be about the size of a minicar.

**IMAGE TO BE PROVIDED WHEN AVAILABLE**

Hyundai

Hyundai's i10 Electric car is scheduled to go into limited production in South Korea in 2010. The vehicle is expected to deliver an all-electric range of just less than 100 miles, with a top speed of 80 miles per hour.

Daimler

In November 2009, Daimler began production on the second generation Smart fortwo electric. Delivering up to 115 km per charge with a top speed of 100 km hour, the vehicle will be leased to customers in Berlin and other cities throughout Europe and the United States. Beginning in 2012, it will be available to anyone who wants it.

Daimler also plans to manufacture a small batch of electric Mercedes-Benz vehicles. These will likely be the Mercedes-Benz BlueZERO E-Cell Plus. The vehicle is expected to deliver an all-electric range of 71 miles and a total range of up to 370 miles, when using the supplemental combustion engine with an electric generator.

Kia

Kia unveiled its electric offering, the Ray, at the 2010 Chicago auto show. This vehicle (which is currently only a concept) utilizes lightweight materials and design to reduce aerodynamic drag, special laminate films on the windows that help reduce the need for air conditioning, and solar panels on the roof, which power up lighting and climate control systems. When operating in hybrid mode, the Ray delivers 77.6 miles per gallon. In all-electric mode, you can get about 50 miles.

BYD

BYD has taken the electric vehicle movement by storm. Based in China, BYD launched its first mass-produced electric car in 2008. It's called the F3DM and it is available in 14 Chinese cities. The vehicle gets about 60 miles on one charge, and has a top speed of about 100 mph. BYD expects to introduce the $22,000 vehicle in the United States in just two years.

Of course, it's not just the major automakers bringing electric and plug-in hybrid electric vehicles to the marketplace. In fact, there are some smaller companies and young start-ups that are beating the majors to the punch.

Take Tesla Motors, for instance. . .

Tesla Motors

Tesla Motors currently sells an all-electric vehicle called the Tesla Roadster. And with an all-electric range of 244 miles and a top speed of 125 mph, this vehicle has caused quite a stir. Launching from zero to 60 in under 3.9 seconds, the Tesla Roadster has become a symbol of electric vehicle progress.

Tesla is also hard at work on its next car: the Tesla Model S Sedan. This vehicle can deliver 300 miles on one charge, carry seven people, and goes for about half the price of the two-seater Roadster. Certainly not a cheap car by any stretch of the imagination. . . but at about $50,000, also not completely out of reach for those who would typically plunk down roughly the same amount for a Lexus or BMW 5 Series. The Model S is expected to be available in two years.

As a side note, Tesla is also providing the lithium-ion batteries for the Smart fortwo electric.

TH!NK Global

TH!NK's "TH!NK City" is an all-electric vehicle designed for urban driving. It delivers about 100 miles on one charge, with a top speed of 62 miles per hour. The vehicle is only available in Europe and is currently being sold to government and utility fleets. As an interesting side note, the TH!NK was initially produced in 2000 by Ford. In 2003, Ford sold the project to a Swiss company called Kamkorp Microelectronics. Then in 2006, Norwegian investment group InSpire bought TH!NK. The company is actually called TH!NK Global.

On January 5, 2010, TH!NK announced it would build its first car for the U.S. market in Indiana starting in 2011.  The company plans on selling its TH!NK City in the U.S. in late 2011 by importing vehicles assembled in Finland.  The import sales will arrive before U.S. production starts.

Fisker Automotive

In 2007, Fisker Coachbuild, LLC and Quantum Technologies formed a joint venture partnership to build the Fisker Karma — a PHEV with a top speed of 125 mph. Delivering 50 miles in all-electric mode before the gasoline engine kicks in, the Karma is a luxury PHEV.

If imagination is more important to you than luxury, you may find the next one particularly interesting. . .

Aptera Motors

Aptera Motors has created an especially unique electric vehicle. It's called the 2e, and it delivers an all-electric range of 100 miles with a top speed of 90 mph. What makes this vehicle so fascinating is its aerodynamic design, which contributes to its superior efficiency and Jetsons-like look.

Coda Automotive

In 2009, electric car manufacturer Coda Automotive announced it would introduce a full-performance, all-electric sedan to the California market in 2010.

The vehicle delivers a range of between 90 to 120 miles on a single charge and achieves a top speed of 80 mph. The car also comes with Sirius satellite capability for all those folks who require their morning dose of Howard Stern.

Electrorides

While we're definitely excited to see the shape of electric vehicles to come, we can't concentrate solely on personal transportation. Especially when there's just as much (if not more) opportunity in the commercial sector.

After all, those big commercial trucks log more miles and require more fuel than even the biggest gas-guzzling SUVs found in so many driveways today.

As a result, with oil prices so volatile these days, many commercial truck operators are now scrambling to find new or replacement vehicles that aren't completely reliant upon gasoline and diesel. And that's opening the flood gates for dozens of new outfits that can supply electric and hybrid-electric commercial trucks.

One of the latest entries into the commercial electric truck arena is a company called Electrorides, which has developed an all-electric truck called the Zero Truck.

The ZeroTruck is a Class 4 electric delivery truck. It's actually an Isuzu N Series chassis that's been converted to run on a high-performance lithium polymer battery pack. Since the Isuzu chassis makes up nearly 80 percent of the market, this is the most logical way to go.

The vehicle does have a premium of about $100,000 attached to it. But at current diesel prices, the premium should be recouped within about five years. . . not too shabby, when you consider the typical 10-year lifespan of these kinds of trucks.

And of course, the fuel savings can add up fast.

A typical monthly payment on an Isuzu truck of this nature can run from $850 to $900. The typical monthly diesel bill? Between $1,200 and $1,800!

After decades of complacency, the world of auto manufacturing is finally starting to evolve.

While it won't happen overnight, the days of gas-guzzling SUVs and unacceptable fuel economy standards are coming to an end. They will be replaced by market-influenced fuel economy standards and electric and plug-in hybrid electric vehicles that will ultimately deliver all the convenience, power, speed and status that our car-centric nation has come to enjoy and expect.

Of course, we're only at the beginning of this very exciting transformation. And especially over the next few years, we're going to see amazing things. . .

·New battery technologies that'll up the ante on driving ranges

·Quick-charge technologies that will enable consumers to repower their cars in less than 10 minutes

·Dramatic price reductions for electric and plug-in hybrid electric vehicles

·New start-ups that will go toe-to-toe with the majors — igniting some fresh competition that's always good for the marketplace (and the consumer)

·Much-needed reductions in oil consumption

The last bullet point is definitely the most important. And electric and plug-in hybrid electric vehicles provide a real solution when it comes to reducing oil consumption.

According to the Bureau of Transportation Statistics, 78% of daily commuters in the U.S. drive 40 miles per day or less. And as you probably also know by now, most electric and plug-in hybrid electric vehicles being developed today are focused on delivering 40 miles or better.

Now according to the most recent U.S. Census data, 112,904,000 working Americans over the age of 16 drive or are driven to work. So that gives us a rough estimate of about 88 million daily commuters, driving no more than 40 miles per day.

If half of those folks had access to an electric or plug-in hybrid electric vehicle that delivered the necessary miles per charge to get from point A to point B. . . that's 44 million daily commuters who would not require a single drop of gasoline.

Assuming the average fuel economy for these passenger cars is 27.5 miles per gallon — the current corporate average fuel economy standard is for passenger cars — a typical commuter driving 40 miles per day would go through 1.45 gallons per day.

Based on those 44 million commuters, you're looking at a consumption rate of 63.8 million gallons of gasoline per day. It takes about 2.1 gallons of oil to make one gallon of gasoline.  So that comes to about 133.9 million gallons, or 3.19 million barrels of oil being displaced.  That's about the equivalent of 55 percent of our daily imports from OPEC.

And this does not include commercial trucks. Very soon we will be electrifying sweepers, tow trucks, garbage trucks, etc.

Yes, my friends — the cars of the future will overwhelmingly be electric.

And the opportunities stemming from this transformation will be the catalyst for a new way of life, and a new generation of wealth.

You can download the PDF version here: The Electric Car Revolution Starts Now! 

Marc Thiessen on Waterboarding

I have recently read Marc Thiessen’s recent book ‘Courting Disaster’ and think every citizen should become familiar with its contents in the same way every one is familiar with the effectiveness of a rifle.

Enhanced interrogation methodology won the war against the terrorists for the past several years because it provided clinical methodology that forced captured terrorist leaders to disgorge their knowledge freely.  We imagine these methods from our knowledge of past horrors conducted by amateurs.  The difference is night and day.

And yes, we have the need and the right to acquire actionable intelligence from an enemy.  That we can do it without killing or maiming him must be considered a huge improvement over the past.  That alone should mean that the methods can in fact be used more freely.  Or do we go back to pulling finger nails off with pliers.  The argument that it should not be done at all fits right in with not conducting war at all because it is wrong.  No one ever bothers to tell the enemy.

Today we face an enemy who is not fighting our soldiers at all.  He is engaged in killing women and children in large numbers with combatants mostly a sideshow.  He is not a legal enemy combatant as a state sponsored soldier is.  As Thiessen makes clear our defense is mostly to make a captured leader talk.

Waterboarding has been catching bad press.  Here the argument that it is somewhat different than that given to soldiers in training is specious.  The purpose of the training is to make the soldier understand his personal limits and not to break him.  The purpose with a detainee is to break him as fast as possible and waterboarding has proven irresistible.  Its power is that the subject, however prepared is unable to convince his body to not respond with panic and abject overwhelming fear.

Yet it does not damage or kill.  The subject is soon unable to further resist however tough they are.

As I have stated, while torture relies on pain and progressive physical damage to overcome subject resistance, these methods rely on overcoming the subject’s ability to manage fear without any real damage at all.  In that state the subject ultimately submits to his captors and becomes fully cooperative.

It is torture, but a form unlike any other previously practiced ineffectually.  This method makes the subject lose control over his ability to resist.  It also provides timely actionable intelligence.  The maximum that a subject has held out is fifteen days.

I will go a little further.  The method of weatherboarding needs to be applied immediately on capture to any non cooperative enemy combatant by trained specialists.  This may seem to be harsh, but it is not.  Ninety nine percent cannot stand it for more than a couple of minutes and seconds would be more like it.  They are instantly rendered cooperative and begin babbling all they have.  Another reason for this to be in the field is that soldiers will improvise if deemed necessary as they always have and that is a bad choice.

All other methods are potentially way more damaging and they tie up resources and sooner or later cost lives.  Intelligence in actual combat is needed as soon as possible, not days later.  In fact, once you have someone for a few hours, his usefulness is very low unless he is special in some way. 

This book is about strategic information which can be largely gathered from actual leaders and does he not consider field intelligence. 

Marc Thiessen and the Dishonest Waterboarding Debate

Posted by MICHAEL SCHERER Tuesday, March 9, 2010 at 9:30 am

http://swampland.blogs.time.com/2010/03/09/marc-thiessen-and-the-dishonest-waterboarding-debate/

"We waterboarded in the CIA--the CIA waterboarded three terrorists. Just three. Nobody was waterboarded at Guantanamo. You know who else the U.S. has waterboarded? Tens of thousands of American service members during their SERE training."

--Marc Thiessen, former White House speechwriter on CNN, January 20, 2010

In late January, the former Bush Administration speechwriter Marc Thiessen, who has since become a Washington Post columnist, appeared on Christiane Amanpour's CNN show to discuss harsh waterboarding. He made a splash.

Mid-interview, Thiessen pulled out a transcript of a previous Amanpour report in which the CNN host had compared the U.S. practice of waterboarding to a water torture practice used by the genocidal regime of Pol Pot. "There have been so many misstatements made about the enhanced interrogation techniques, comparing them to the Spanish Inquisition and the Khmer Rouge, and I have to tell you Christiane you are one of the people who have spread these mistruths." Amanpour's journalistic failing, according to Thiessen, was a report in which Amanpour had visited a former Khmer Rouge prison, looked at a painting in which a prisoner was submerged in a "box of water," and then asked someone if they knew that this technique had been used on U.S. terror suspects. In other words, Amanpour had gotten the details of the CIA version of waterboarding wrong. CIA interrogators never used a box of water when they waterboarded.

Thiessen was right, and he can be applauded for pointing out the distinction. But then what are we to make of the fact that just a few minutes later, on the very same CNN show, Thiessen clearly committed the same error? As he has before and since, Thiessen claimed that the waterboarding of U.S. terror suspects was not so bad because the technique has been used on "tens of thousands" of U.S. servicemen in training. Now, Thiessen knows the CIA program inside and out. He has written a book on it. And it seems inconceivable to me that he did not know he is clearly misrepresenting the waterboarding techniques that the CIA used.

The Bush-era Justice Department, the same agency that approved the techniques, admitted as much, as my former colleague Mark Benjamin notes in a story today for Salon describing in detail the CIA waterboarding process.

The CIA's waterboarding was "different" from training for elite soldiers, according to the Justice Department document released last month. "The difference was in the manner in which the detainee's breathing was obstructed," the document notes. In soldier training, "The interrogator applies a small amount of water to the cloth (on a soldier's face) in a controlled manner," DOJ wrote. "By contrast, the agency interrogator ... continuously applied large volumes of water to a cloth that covered the detainee's mouth and nose."

There were other differences. The SERE training program used water. The CIA program used saline solution, because the duration and volume of water was so intense that CIA doctors feared the detainees would die of hyponatremia. Benjamin continues:

While Bush-Cheney officials defended the legality and safety of waterboarding by noting the practice has been used to train U.S. service members to resist torture, the documents show that the agency's methods went far beyond anything ever done to a soldier during training. U.S. soldiers, for example, were generally waterboarded with a cloth over their face one time, never more than twice, for about 20 seconds, the CIA admits in its own documents.

As I have said before, I think it is a good thing that Marc Thiessen wants to keep the debate over harsh interrogation going. These are hard issues, and I do not think they have been fully digested by the American people. For instance, I think most people have still not fully understood that some of the worst pain inflicted on prisoners came not from the waterboarding, but from the CIA policy of forced sleep deprivation by stress position for as long as seven consecutive days during periods of extended caloric limitation. But I remain disappointed with the quality of Thiessen's arguments, which seem to be designed more for cable news soundbites than for serious discussion. I wish he held himself to a higher standard.

The full CNN clip follows below.

Read more:

 http://swampland.blogs.time.com/2010/03/09/marc-thiessen-and-the-dishonest-waterboarding-debate/#ixzz0vwUsY34x

Notes From the Bee Keeping Front

The chronic population problem facing commercial beekeeping has naturally elicited a broad response from many folks.

This work by an experienced beekeeper clarifies how much available cropland needs to be in place.  That it has not been much of a problem until recently is more a response to the collapse that is encouraging the general improvement in husbandry.

I have seen folks push the creation of small open fields of wild flowers and the like.  Again, our enthusiasm for thousand acre fields has not made things easy for either wild flowers or for bees.

We are not going to return to the traditional mixed farm that had none of these issues, not so much because anything was planned for but because many acres were occupied as fence rows and waste land, all of which harbored mature wild.

We do have to consciously set aside wilds in which natural cover is promoted and rarely exploited.  We are vacating uneven ground that is very suitable for this and building woodlands will help.

The present problem is that efforts are uncoordinated and needs to be better planned and cooperated on.  I have posted on valley management for woodlands and this thinking naturally extends to bee husbandry.

How Much Land Does It Take to Feed a Bee Colony? More Than You Think

Kim Flottum

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http://www.thedailygreen.com/environmental-news/blogs/bees/

June 24, 2010 at 12:33pm By Kim Flottum |

There's a lot going around about the ties between honey bee nutrition and Colony Collapse Disorder. Some of it is going around because I have been preaching this gospel for years now, and finally some are beginning to listen. Of course I'm not the only one... I just happen to have more places to preach than most people, so I get heard more.

But the question remains: how much does it take to feed a honey bee colony? It's not like I can go to the store and simply get a bag of Purina Honey Bee Chow... although beekeepers do feed their bees protein supplements on occasion. But even the best of these – and for the most part the formulas are secrets – are only short term fixes for a short term lack of food... sort of like that Power Bar thing you bring along on bike rides or hikes. Don't read the ingredients 'cause you don't want to know: Even though it tastes like sawdust and cardboard, it's filling and good for you, says the label. That's pretty much what honey bee chow is to a honey bee, too.

Mostly, beekeepers feed bees when there's nothing else for bees to eat, and beekeepers want their bees to be raring to go before a crop blooms. That's a key beekeeping secret: have lots of bees in your hives before the bloom, so those lots of bees can gather lots of nectar and pollen. If you let them raise lots of bees on that bloom, like they are programmed to do, then when the bloom is over you have lots and lots of bees, and they eat all the honey they just made. For a beekeeper, that's not a good plan.

But how much do bees eat? Well, the rule of thumb is that it takes an acre of flowers to feed a colony of bees. But that's a constant acre of bloom to feed a colony of bees, not just a field of dandelions blooming in May then gone and the bees have enough for the rest of the year. Nope, doesn't work that way.

Bees need that blooming acre as early in the season as possible... say, January in the far south, March in the mid-section, and April in the north. And that bloom usually comes in the form of trees: Willows, maples and the like. There are about 40 full-sized trees on an acre. For one colony. That's about a million blossoms, by the way.

But trees quit after a week or two and the bees are still eating. Then, under the trees, come dandelions for a week or so, but then what? Where do the bees go then? To other trees maybe, on another acre somewhere. Black Locust trees are wonderful, if it doesn't rain during bloom, then tulip poplar maybe, then basswoods. Meanwhile on some other acre white clover starts to bloom, then the alfalfa in that farmer's field nearby. By late summer a strong, healthy colony of bees have burned through about 20 or so acres of blossoms. I'm going to talk more about nutrition, lots more because it has become very, very apparent that more needs to be said.

But for now, in case you can't picture an acre... it's the size of a football field without the end zones. And by the end of this month a colony of bees will have eaten 20 of them (maybe more), each full of flowers.

Read more:

http://www.thedailygreen.com/archives/environmental-news/blogs/bees/by_author/5403/15;1#ixzz0s5S3v5ia

Oceans Absorb Less Carbon Dioxide as Marine Systems Change

From: Ben Block, Worldwatch Institute, More from this Affiliate

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The oceans are by far the largest carbon sink in the world. Some 93 percent of carbon dioxide is stored in algae, vegetation, and coral under the sea. But oceans are not able to absorb all of the carbon dioxide

released from the burning of fossil fuels. In fact, a recent study suggests that the oceans have absorbed a smaller proportion of fossil-fuel emissions, nearly 10 percent less, since 2000.

The study, published in the current issue of Nature, is the first to quantify the perceived trend that oceans are becoming less efficient carbon sinks. The study team, led by Columbia University oceanographer Samar Khatiwala, measured the amount of human-caused carbon dioxide emissions pumped into the oceans since 1765.

Industrial carbon dioxide emissions have increased dramatically since the 1950s, and oceans have until recently been able to absorb the greater amounts of emissions. Sometime after 2000, however, the rise in emissions and the oceans' carbon uptake decoupled. Oceans continue to absorb more carbon, but the pace appears to have slowed.

The reason is based in part on simple chemistry. Increased concentrations of carbon dioxide have turned waters more acidic, especially nearer to the poles. While carbon dioxide dissolves more readily in cold, dense seawater, these waters are less capable of sequestering the gas as the ocean becomes more acidic. The study revealed that the Southern Ocean, near Antarctica, absorbs about 40 percent of the carbon in oceans.

Article continues: http://www.worldwatch.org/node/6323

Ribbon Seal Protection Sought by Activists

From: Dan Joling, AP via Discovery News

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Ribbon seals should be listed as threatened or endangered because global warming is quickly melting sea ice, which the seals depend on for several months each year, two environmental groups said in a lawsuit filed against the federal government in San Francisco Thursday.

The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration in December denied a listing under the Endangered Species Act for the seals found off the coasts of Alaska and Russia.

The Center for Biological Diversity and Greenpeace sued in U.S. District Court, claiming the agency ignored the best science available on global warming.

Article continues

Climate-change technology risks 'catastrophic' outcome

• June 17, 2009 07:23 AM

Risky and unproven climate-changing technologies could have "catastrophic consequences" for the earth and humankind if used irresponsibly, according to a new report.

Yet without drastic further cuts in carbon dioxide emissions, a geoengineering solution may offer the only hope of saving the world from disastrous run-away global warming, experts warned.

A report by the Royal Society, Britain's leading academic institution, looks at the feasibility and potential dangers of technologies designed to cool the earth.

They include artificial "trees" that suck carbon dioxide out of the air, and spraying sulphate particles high in the atmosphere to scatter the sun's rays into space. The scientists concluded that, although some approaches were possible, they had not yet been properly researched and posed serious potential dangers for the planet.

Professor John Shepherd, who chaired the Royal Society geoengineering working group, said: "It is an unpalatable truth that unless we can succeed in greatly reducing carbon dioxide emissions we are heading for a very uncomfortable and challenging climate future, and geoengineering will be the only option left to limit further temperature increases."

"Our research found that some geoengineering techniques could have serious unintended and detrimental effects on many people and ecosystems — yet we are still failing to take the only action that will prevent us from having to rely on them."

Article continues: http://www.birminghampost.net/birmingham-business/birmingham-business-news/other-uk-business/2009/09/01/climate-change-technology-risks-catastrophic-outcome-report-65233-24585797/

Abrupt reversal detected in Arctic cooling trend

David Perlman, Chronicle Science Editor

The Arctic climate has been warmer over the past decade than during any 10-year period in 2,000 years, according to a study by an international research team that adds powerful new evidence that human-generated greenhouse gases have speeded the pace of the planet's recent warming.

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The report from an international team of climate scientists concludes that climate change in the Arctic has accelerated since the Industrial Revolution, abruptly reversing a long-term worldwide cooling trend.

"The study provides a clear example of how increased greenhouse gases are now changing our climate," said Caspar Ammann of the National Center for Atmospheric Research in Boulder, Colo., a co-author of the report published Thursday in the journal Science.

To deduce the Arctic's decade-by-decade climate trend over the centuries, the leading scientists in the international study analyzed sediment cores in 14 Arctic lakes that revealed the varied growth rates of long-buried plants. They also studied Arctic tree rings to determine their growth rates and ages as well as ice cores from glaciers across the Arctic that showed patterns of relative warm and cold.

Researchers at other institutions, seeking to look for patterns of climate change even further back in time, used astronomical records to study the well-known wobble of the globe as it spins on its axis. They found that the Northern Hemisphere has long been moving away from the sun's warmth. During the summer solstice, the Northern Hemisphere is now a million kilometers - about 621,000 miles - farther away from the sun than it was 2,000 years ago, according to the scientist's computer models.

The result was a global period of relative cold that would have continued, the scientists found. But about 1850, at the beginning of the Industrial Age, the planet's climate began overcoming the cooling trend, and the Arctic climate has warmed decade by decade ever since as greenhouse gas emissions have increased, the scientists say.

Stephen Schneider, a Stanford climate expert and biologist who did not participate in the study, called the seven-year study, involving seven major research institutions in three nations, "a heroic effort."

The study, he said, "shows that nature has been, unfortunately, cooperating with theory and showing us on a long-time scale of millennia that the mainstream view is once again bolstered."

It is clear again, Schneider said, that anthropogenic influences - the increasing emission of greenhouse gases into the Earth's atmosphere - are the prime cause of global warming.

For the rest of the article go to:

http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2009/09/04/MNB219HIRT.DTL&tsp=1