One Climate Scientist, says: Emissions are “soaring way out of control,” far above even the bleak scenarios considered by last year's report from the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) and the Stern review. The battle against dangerous climate change has been lost, and the world needs to prepare for things to get very, very bad. The climate targets debated by politicians and campaigners are fanciful at best, and "dangerously misguided" at worst.  see

100 Effects of Global Warming: Fewer, less or none —  frogs, salmon dinners, Great Barrier Reef, Glaciers, penguins, snorkeling, cod, Ganges River, mangrove trees, and . . . More — poison ivy,  mosquitoes, hurricanes and cyclones, mold and ragweed  (so more allergies and asthma), jellyfish attacks, acidic oceans, and more.   see , see

Taking the Cars from the Suburbs: Vauban, Germany, completed in 2006, shows a growing trend in Europe and the U.S.  to separate suburban life from the auto, the “smart planning” movement.  “Vauban, with  5500 residents within a rectangular square mile, may be the most advanced experiment in low-car suburban life.” Dozens of shopping malls, fast-food restaurants and housing compounds have been refused planning permits based on the new British regulations. see

Clean Coal? Not So Much: The term “Clean Coal” is basic shorthand for a technology  that does not exist. It’s a marketing myth promoted by the big coal companies in order to rake in more public subsidies. Coal, which makes up 50% of our energy use in the US today, is the largest source of greenhouse gas emissions in the country and on the planet, as well as one of the largest sources of air and water pollution worldwide. It’s the dirtiest of all energy technologies. And we’re at least a decade away from knowing how to burn “clean” anything from coal. see. see

No More Cheap Food: The era of cheap and abundant food appears to be drawing to a close. The health of a nation’s food system is a critical issue of national security. After cars, the food system uses more fossil fuel than any other sector of the economy — 19 percent. And while the experts disagree about the exact amount, the way we feed ourselves contributes more greenhouse gases to the atmosphere than anything else we do — as much as 37 percent, according to one study. see

Farm Animals Are 18 Percent of the Emissions Problem: What to do about farm emissions is the most important problem that has evaded discussion in the global warming crises. Global consumption of meat is expected to double between 2000 and 2050. Proposals include everything from persuading consumers to eat less meat to slapping a “sin tax” on pork and beef.  see , see

Yosemite’s Animals: UC Berkeley researchers found that, of the 28 small mammals observed in the transect, half had expanded their range upward by more than 500 meters, or 1,600 feet. Climate change is change where Yosemite’s animals roam. see , see

Mass Extinctions: Earth is in the midst of the sixth mass extinction of both plants and animals, with nearly 50 percent of all species disappearing, scientists say. The last mass extinction near the current level was 65 million years ago, called the Cretaceous Tertiary extinction event, and was probably the result of a meteor hitting the Earth. see

Australia and Global Warming: More than any industrialized nation, Australia is seeing the increasingly dangerous effects of hotter and dryer weather  — changes from, many claim, climate change. In February, when the temperature in Melbourne reached 116° F — the hottest day ever recorded in the city — driving winds pushed a  bushfire across 1,500 square miles of eucalyptus forests in the state of Victoria.  see , see

U.S. Dept. of Energy Agrees:  Peak Oil is here. The latest report by the Department says the days of cheap oil are gone. The Federal government projects declines in production through 2030 and increasing use of alternate and non-conventional fuels — these often pose even greater threats to the environment. Examples of the switch might be the increasing reliance on Canadian tar sands and the Brazilian ethanol fields.  see

Ailing Canadian Forests: Canada’s forests, stressed from global warming, insect infestations and persistent fires, are for the first time pumping more climate-changing carbon dioxide into the atmosphere than they are taking out of it. Officials say global warming is causing the crisis in their forests. Inexorably rising temperatures are slowly drying out forest lands, leaving trees more susceptible to fires, which release huge amounts of carbon into the atmosphere. see

Biofuels: The Feast May Be Over: Corn ethanol costs $1 a gallon to make; cellulosic fuel from stalks, leaves and straw costs $5 to $6. Michigan State University's Mariam Sticklen says, "It's still early days, "but the world needs a no-food-for-fuel policy." Frauke Thies, a Greenpeace campaigner, adds: "We are not opposed to biofuels in principle, but the practices of today are not sustainable." see

Warming Faster than Predicted: Greenhouse gas emissions have increased more quickly than expected and higher temperatures are triggering self-reinforcing feedback mechanisms in global ecosystems. "We are basically looking now at a future climate that's beyond anything we've considered seriously in climate model simulations." see

CO₂ Levels Already Too High: “CO2 levels nowcompromise the stability of the polar ice sheets. How fast ice sheets and sea level will respond are not understood, but given the potential size of the disaster, I think it’s best not to learn firsthand.” To maintain a planet similar to that on which civilization developed, an optimum CO2 level would be less than 350 ppm — a dramatic change from most previous studies. see

Not for the Birds: The decline in bird populations worldwide is a sign that governments are failing to keep promises to slow damage to nature by 2010, reports Birdlife International. Rising human populations and clearing forests for farming or biofuels are wrecking natural habitats. Even common birds, such as doves or skylarks in Europe, are becoming scarcer. see

Transition Movement:  Planning for the End Times. A movement designed to put new self-sufficient systems in place to help communities withstand the shocks that will come as oil grows astronomically expensive, climate change intensifies, and industrial society frays or collapses entirely. Having taken root in England, the movement is also growing in the U.S. The global emergency demands transformation,  and who knows  we might actually enjoy making those changes.  see

Poll Shows Less Concern about Warming: Americans are less concerned about rising global temperatures than they were a year ago. The latest Pew Research poll shows global warming came in last among 20 voter concerns, trailing issues like addressing moral decline and decreasing lobbyists. Only 30 percent of the voters deemed global warming to be “a top priority,” compared with 35 percent in 2008. see , see

Australians Try to Avoid the Word “Drought:” Australian government experts on the Drought Policy Review Expert Social Panel have concluded that "Words like drought have negative connotations for farm families," They suggested, "There needs to be a new national approach to living with dryness, as we prefer to call it, rather than dealing with drought." see

A Century of Resource Wars:  The 2003 Iraq conflict was first case, David King warns. The UK’s former chief scientific adviser says that climate change will fuel many scrambles for commodities. With popular growth, natural resources dwindling, and seas rising due to climate change, the squeeze on the planet will lead to more conflict. see

Western Forests throughout the U.S. and Canada are Dying: The bark beetle is killing up to 90 percent of the western forests along both the coastal ranges and the Rocky Mountains. A combination of global warming and severe drought has weakened the western forests along both the coastal ranges and the Rocky Mountains.  see

Starvation Politics:  If the food situation continues to deteriorate, entire nations will break down at increasing rates. We have entered a new era in geopolitics. In the 20th century the main threat to international security was superpower conflict; today it is failing states. It is not the concentration of power but its absence that puts us at risk. see