Global warming and the future of New Zealand
More news of melting ice from the top of the world. According to Marc Tedesco, lead author of a paper in the May 29 issue of the American Geophysical Union’s Eos:
“The sensors detected that snowmelt occurred more than 10 days longer than the average over certain areas of Greenland in 2006
NZ’s business leaders remain to be convinced about the accuracy of climate science, according to the New Zealand Herald’s coverage of its own Mood of the Boardroom survey:
The country’s top chief executives don’t think climate-change science is accurate and believe the Government is overstating the risk to New Zealand. But they’re ready to prepare for a carbon-constrained economy.
The situation is no better in small to medium enterprises (SMEs):
At least seven out of 10 SME heads (72 per cent) are yet to be convinced of the science of climate change, but 79 per cent say New Zealand should prepare for a carbon-constrained global economy. Sixty-eight per cent identify a risk to the national brand or exports if New Zealand doesn’t move to reduce carbon emissions.
I suppose that’s a relief: they’re willing to do the right thing anyway. I hope they will find the time to read Hot Topic (due out early August). It’s always better to do the right thing for the right reason.
Further down the page, Roger Kerr of the Business Roundtable is given room to prove just how much of a dinosaur he is when it comes to climate change:
“Carbon neutrality is completely unobtainable for the foreseeable future, even if we closed all our agricultural sector, banned all cars and other forms of transport and stopped economic growth. What then should New Zealand do about the Kyoto Protocol? We are not going to meet our commitments by a country mile. Do we ignore the protocol or do we honestly withdraw from it?
Is peak oil good news or bad news? Much depends on your perspective. The gloomier prognostications about peak oil – living in a world where oil supplies are limited and expensive – suggest that it will be a bigger problem than climate change, and arrive sooner. On the other hand, if we’re forced to cut back on our usage of oil and gas as fuel for energy and transport, we might have a better chance of stabilising atmospheric carbon dioxide at levels low enough to limit the damage from climate change. The IPCC’s high-end scenarios typically assume that there’s plenty of fossil fuel – coal, oil and gas – to get us to double pre-industrial concentrations and beyond. What happens if the oil runs out?
From the department of bad news: global carbon dioxide emissions are speeding up, and one of the world’s largest natural carbon-absorbing sinks, the ocean to the south of New Zealand, is showing signs of becoming saturated.
RealClimate’s latest post, Start here, is a very useful pointer to global warming information resources on the web:
We’ve often been asked to provide a one stop link for resources that people can use to get up to speed on the issue of climate change, and so here is a first cut. Unlike our other postings, we’ll amend this as we discover or are pointed to new resources. Different people have different needs and so we will group resources according to the level people start at.
I’ll stick it on the Hot Topic permanent links page, when we get one.
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