About

Hot Topic covers climate change and its impacts on New Zealand. It is the companion web site to Hot Topic: Global Warming And The Future Of New Zealand, a recent book by Gareth Renowden, published by AUT Media in August 2007. Gareth and his co-blogger Bryan Walker blog on climate news as it happens: interesting new science, political developments in NZ and on the international scene, and the antics of climate cranks — with special reference to NZ’s own “Climate Science Coalition”. Check back often, subscribe to the site’s RSS feed or follow the Hot Topic Twitter feed to keep up-to-date with the latest climate change news.

Gareth Renowden (MA Oxon) is the author of the award-winning The Truffle Book (Limestone Hills 2005), The Olive Book (Canterbury University Press 1999) and Video – The Inside Story (Collins (UK) 1983). He has written for and worked on a wide variety of magazines and newspapers in Britain, NZ and the US. He is trying to grow truffles, olives and grapes on a small farm in North Canterbury, and is a former president of the NZ Truffle Association. He is a member of the committee of the NZ Meteorological Society, deputy chair of the North Canterbury Radio Trust, and a founder member of the Waipara River Protection Group.

Bryan Walker is a long-retired English teacher who lives in Hamilton. He writes book reviews and occasional columns for the Waikato Times. Retirement activity included some years of close involvement with the NZ Section of Amnesty International. In recent years he has been seized by the seriousness of human-caused climate change and these days spends a good deal of time reading and writing on the subject.