IPCC and Geoengineering: the bitter pill is also a poison pill
Enviado por Joëlle Deschambault el
Last week’s negotiating session resulted in the UN’s climate expert body giving a reluctant nod of support to a controversial – and largely theoretical – geoengineering technique known as BECCS (Bioenergy with Carbon Capture and Storage). Geoengineering refers to extreme technological fixes that aim to alter the climate on a large scale. In its report approved Saturday April 12, Working Group III (WGIII) of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) largely – and wisely – bypassed geoengineering, but did suggest that BECCS is a bitter pill that a warming world could find itself having to swallow. BECCS and other Carbon Dioxide Removal (CDR) technologies will be especially needed, according to the IPCC, in “overshoot” scenarios, where mitigation of greenhouse gas emissions is delayed or inadequate, necessitating faster, deeper emissions cuts in the long run to limit temperature rise. The IPCC notes that “overshoot,” in general, makes it less likely that any given temperature goal will be met.
Delegados de la ONU esquivan el tema de la geoingeniería
Enviado por Joëlle Deschambault el
El Panel Intergubernamental sobre Cambio Climático (IPCC) presentó ayer su 50 Reporte de Evaluación (AR5), en cuyo Resumen para Elaboradores de Políticas no se encuentra ninguna referencia a la geoingeniería, aunque abunda sobre sus efectos negativos en su informe completo. Publicado después de una semana de negociaciones del Grupo de Trabajo II (WGII, que trabaja sobre las vulnerabilidades humanas y ecológicas frente al cambio climático y las opciones para adaptación), el informe de ahora representa una victoria precaria sobre la creciente presión que sufre el IPCC por parte de los promotores de la geoingeniería y algunos gobiernos —como Rusia, Estados Unidos, Canadá y Reino Unido— para legitimar la geoingeniería como solución al cambio climático.
UN Delegates Dodge Geoengineering Bullet Point
Enviado por Dru Oja Jay el
The latest instalment of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change’s (IPCC) Assessment Report (AR5), released today, contains no reference to geoengineering in its Summary for Policymakers, though it attributes a slew of negative effects to so-called planet hacking in its full report. Released after a week-long negotiating session of Working Group II (WGII, which assesses the human and ecological vulnerabilities to climate change and options to adapt), today’s report represents a precarious victory over ongoing pressure within the IPCC – by geoengineering proponents and some governments (e.g., Russia, the USA, Canada and the UK) – to legitimize geoengineering as a solution to climate change.
¿Suicidio en Carnaval? Terminator regresa al Congreso en Brasil
Enviado por Joëlle Deschambault el
Firme la petición para detenerla
Organizaciones de la sociedad civil brasileña alertaron ayer que una iniciativa de ley iniciada en 2007 para revertir la prohibición de uso de semillas Terminator podría reactivarse (nuevamente) en el Congreso de ese país. Existen dos iniciativas al respecto desde hace varios años, pero una de ellas, introducida en 2007 por el diputado Eduardo Sciarra del PSD (la PL 268/2007) comenzó a reactivarse en julio pasado y llegó a ponerse en primer plano en octubre 2013. La legalización de Terminator en Brasil tendría implicaciones globales, comenzando por la violación a la moratoria sobre Tecnologías de Restricción del Uso Genético (TRUG, apodadas tecnologías Terminator), vigente desde el año 2000 en el Convenio sobre Diversidad Biológica.
Suicide at the Carnaval? Terminator is back in the Brazilian Congress
Enviado por Joëlle Deschambault el
Push to Pass Suicide Seeds Legislation Could Come While Deputies Dance
Sign the petition to stop it!
Brazilian civil society organizations warned yesterday that a 2007 bill to end Brazil’s ban on Terminator seeds could soon be on the move (again) in the Brazilian Congress. While two bills have been on the congressional agenda for several years, a 2007 bill (PL 268/2007, filed by Rep. Eduardo Sciarra – PSD party) began moving through the Congress last July and came to a head last October. The legalizing of Terminator in Brazil would have global implications, including as a violation of the United Nations moratorium on Terminator technologies, in place since 2000 at the Convention on Biological Diversity.
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Recent Blogs
The Big Fix - 9 Tech controversies to watch for in 2009
Enviado por Jim Thomas el
Written for The Ecologist - February 2009
available online at http://www.theecologist.org/pages/archive_detail.asp?content_id=2053
Somebody somewhere has to have a cunning plan to fix our environmental problems and save the world – right? Jim Thomas sorts through the big tech ideas you’ll be reading about this year
TECHRECKONING: The Sugar Rush
Enviado por Jim Thomas el
Jim Thomas
Written for The Ecologist - February 2009
The next big hit fuelwise will have corporations falling over each other to claim plant life, but the comedown could leave us in a sticky mess
TECH RECKONING: A Green Whitewash
Enviado por Jim Thomas el
Jim Thomas
Written for The Ecologist- December/January 2009
The extreme climate technologists behind monochrome schemes to slow global warming are one colour short of a palette
TECH RECKONING: Cloudbusting
Enviado por Jim Thomas el
Jim Thomas
Written for The Ecologist - November 2008
Don’t be fooled by The Cloud – the world of the internet seems weightless, but it is leaving an increasingly heavy footprint behind it
Tech Reckoning: Life In The Mix
Enviado por Jim Thomas el
Written for The Ecologist 01/10/2008
Available online at http://www.theecologist.org/pages/archive_detail.asp?content_id=1978
If there is a video gamer in your life, chances are that you have heard of Spore, the latest creation from the super successful inventor of ‘The Sims’.
Hanging in Hong Kong with the Syn Bio Crowd
Enviado por Jim Thomas el
Apparently in some places they call Hong Kong "Disneyland". What better place than among the sci-fitowers of this gotham-city landscape for the brave new pioneers of Synthetic Biology to gather, plan and celebrate the next stage of artificial life. For the next few days Synthetic Biology 4.0, the fourth global congress of syn bio leaders, will be meeting at Hong Kong's University of Science and Technology to discuss synthetic organisms, whole genome construction, next generation biofuels and all manner of biohackery.
Plastic Plants
Enviado por Jim Thomas el
Henry Ford dreamed of making plastic cars out of soy. Now Dow, DuPont and other chemical giants are also dreaming of a ‘green’ future. But, as Jim Thomas argues, bioplastic is not the eco-solution it’s cracked up to be.
Article from New Internationalist Magazine September 2008 issue - available online here
Technofixes: Climate Solution Or Corporate Scam?
Enviado por Jim Thomas el
Can science save the planet or should we avoid putting our faith in high-tech fixes to deliver us from the ecological mess we‘ve made? Jim Thomas and Paul Fitzgerald push each other’s buttons.
Read the debate here in the latest issue of New Internationalist Magazine: http://www.newint.org/features/special/2008/08/01/technofixes/
TechReckoning: Mapping Macrobes
Enviado por Jim Thomas el
Mapmaking and conquest has a disturbingly close history. As indigenous people learned, the innocuous mapmaker may be followed by weapons, property claims and exploitation. So too for the recent rash of science projects using mapping
TechReckoning - The black hole of unknowing
Enviado por Charlie el
Written for The Ecologist - 20/06/2008
As to global annihilation, I’m stumped. Most of us wouldn’t recognise a strangelet if it casually devoured us in the street