Reaction to the emissions trading scheme (ETS) has not been slow coming in, and so far the government seems to have pulled off a remarkable balancing act, gaining at least grudging support from most quarters. Bill English was quick to say that the ETS looked “broadly sound
Tag: ACT
Thursday build-up
With only a couple of days to the government’s big emissions trading announcement, the media are getting all excited. Colin James in the Herald grumbles about the lack of consultation and the need to build a consensus outside of Parliament, and then switches tack to suggest that the really important negotiations are to do with what follows Kyoto. Rod Oram in the Sunday Star Times suggests (rather more cogently) why there’s hope of action by the US, Australia and China. The Press, meanwhile, fears that some power companies might make windfall profits under emissions trading (step forward Meridian), and predicts that forestry could be the next big thing.
Trumpet, blowing of one’s own, #1
The first full review of HT is out. Bryan Walker in the Waikato Times liked the book.
AUT University’s newly established press can be congratulated on their first publication. The subject is vital, the exposition lucid, and the presentation attractive. The book deserves many readers.
Suckers for punishment can hear me interviewed on Tremane Barr’s Prism Webcast News here. The barking during the first five minutes is Peg, the amazingly charming truffle hound, demanding to be let in.
Hot wine, or merely mulled?
Jim Salinger of NIWA gave a talk on climate change and its implications for New Zealand’s wine growers at their annual Romeo Bragato conference, held in Auckland at the end of August.. The Herald reported some of the likely changes:
In the Gisborne area, chardonnay was likely to be replaced by shiraz, grenache and zindafel, while chardonnay and merlot were likely to be replaced by shiraz and malbec in Hawke’s Bay. Wairarapa’s pinot noir could be supplanted by merlot, malbec and cabernet franc grapes while cabernet sauvignon and merlot were likely to replace sauvignon blanc in Marlborough. In Canterbury, sauvignon blanc could replace chardonnay, while the pinot noir very suited to both Canterbury and Otago, could spread out to higher altitude sites in these regions.
Meanwhile, Napa Valley wineries are concerned about predictions that their premium vineyards could be worthless by the second half of this century, and in Alsace growers are reporting that climate change is already having a dramatic impact:
On a cobweb-encrusted rafter above his giant steel grape pressers, Rene Mure is charting one of the world’s most tangible barometers of global warming. The evidence, scrawled in black ink, is the first day of the annual grape harvest for the past three decades. In 1978, it was Oct. 16. In 1998, the date was Sept. 14. This year, harvesting started Aug. 24 — the earliest ever recorded, not only in Mure’s vineyards, but also in the entire Alsace wine district of northeastern France.
Mure wants to experiment with Rhone varietals like syrah, but France’s appellation rules make that difficult.
Friday fun
There’s a good analysis of the activities of our own little band of climate cranks, the NZ Climate “Science