Gareth Renowden • Nov 09, 2011 •
A damning review of the climate policy of the current government by three leading academics finds that it has made “little substantive progress” on reducing greenhouse gas emissions, that work on adapting to climate change impacts has been “even more deficient”, and that current policies are likely to be “economically wasteful”. End-of-term review of the [...] … Read More
Gareth Renowden • Nov 09, 2011 •
Environment minister Nick Smith, Labour’s David Parker and the Green Party’s Kennedy Graham debate climate policy in these edited highlights from the first of Oxfam NZ’s election debates, held last week in Auckland. Debate ranged from whether New Zealand can become carbon-free to the likelihood of a cross-party agreement on long-term issues that last more [...] … Read More
Gareth Renowden • Jun 05, 2011 •
Here’s a high quality video of Jim Hansen’s talk at the University of Canterbury last month (excellent work by the audiovisual team at UC). Well worth watching, if only because it provides a succinct summary of Hansen’s current thinking. As Dr. Chuck Kutscher of the National Renewable Energy Laboratory in the US said: If you [...] … Read More
Bryan Walker • May 27, 2011 •
I’ve been reading the admirably lucid report of the Australian Climate Commission which Gareth highlighted recently, and reflecting on its restrained exposition of the current state of the science. One couldn’t ask for a clearer or more accessible statement within its 70 page range. At the same time I’ve started reading a book by philosopher [...] … Read More
Gareth Renowden • May 26, 2011 •
Before he left New Zealand, Jim Hansen wrote an open letter to prime minister John Key on behalf of the youth of New Zealand, and specifically 350.org. It’s well worth reading in full, because it encapsulates the case for taking action here, and now. I would be most interested in seeing a meaningful response from [...] … Read More
Gareth Renowden • Apr 12, 2011 •
At the Climate Futures Forum in Wellington a couple of weeks ago, David Karoly discussed the idea of considering carbon emissions as a “stock” problem, not a “flow” problem. If we want to give ourselves a 75 percent chance of coming in below a 2ºC rise in the global average temperature, then we (as in [...] … Read More
Gareth Renowden • Apr 05, 2011 •
Two busy days in Te Papa last week, and a lot to think about. The Climate Futures Forum organised by the Climate Change Research Institute at VUW was fascinating and disturbing in equal measure. Fascinating because it’s hard not to be interested when a lot of very smart people are feeding you information, and disturbing [...] … Read More
Gareth Renowden • Mar 01, 2011 •
I’ve just sent my submission on the NZ government’s intention to make a formal commitment to a target of a 50 percent reduction in net greenhouse gas emissions by 2050 to the Ministry of the Environment — barely squeaking in before the published deadline. My original intention was to submit a closely argued case for [...] … Read More
Bryan Walker • Feb 14, 2011 •
I was struck by a passage in Noam Chomsky’s conversational remarks on climate change in the video clip Gareth recently posted. Commenting on the campaign waged by powerful business lobbies to convince the public that global warming is a liberal hoax, he pictures the people responsible as trapped by their functions in the institutions they work [...] … Read More
Jim McVeagh • Jan 31, 2011 •
Nick Smith has just sensibly announced that he will extend the target date for air quality standards out from 2013 to 2020. Predictably, Labour are ranting about people dying because of the delay in implementing the standards. The Idiot at No Right Turn is even calling Nick Smith a murderer! Apparently Mr. Smith is going [...] Related posts: … Read More