Cycling to work, I emit hydrocarbons

Not me - my car that is sitting back at home. While I'm saving those co2 emissions, it is releasing hydrocarbons and contributing to smog:Vehicles sitting in the sun for days at a time can spew out damaging hydrocarbons – one of the main ingredients in smog, a federal government study has found.Hydrocarbons are in the vapour that escapes from petrol tanks on a warm day. Most newer cars have

Australia's carbon intensity begins to fall

While electricity use increased, emissions from electricity generation fell due to a shift to gas-fired and renewable generators from black coal plants, as Ben Cubby, environmental reporter for the SMH, writes:AUSTRALIA'S greenhouse gas emissions may be reaching a plateau, even though demand for electricity is rising inexorably, new data suggests.A slight trend towards burning gas instead of coal

It's the quick and the dead in the climate wars with this killer iPhone app

Ever reached an impasse in an argument about climate change, for want of accurate knowledge?Science's answers to the common climate deniers' talking-points, painstakingly assembled by John Cook over many years, are now available at the tips of your fingers and right before your opponent's lying eyes, right when you need them next:The app, published by Skeptical Science and Shine Technologies, has

Garnaut's post-Copenhagen waiting game - Plan B

Professor Ross Garnaut, Australia's answer to Sir Nicholas Stern, tells Tony Jones where the emerging global emissions trading market finds itself post-Copenhagen - we have entered the "waiting game":And my proposal is a proposal that was in the original report. I call the situation we're in after Copenhagen, the waiting game.We're waiting for international agreement to provide a basis for

Where do we go from here?

The last three months or so has been somewhat depressing for those hoping for concerted global action on climate change (which is on reason why my blogging has been light). Yet, they have been heady months for what is becoming a powerful climate-skeptic movement.The relentless amplification of allegations from 'climategate', the damp-squib Copenhagen conference, and the constant attacks on the

AGW debate: Lord Christopher Mockington vs Timothy Lambert

Have you heard the one about the amateur scientific genius who has been a member of the House of Lords? Apparently, it's not true:For some time - Google “Monckton” and “Nobel Prize” and see for yourself - the great sceptic-in-chief has been passing himself off as a Nobel Laureate.Cornered last month by the Sydney Morning Herald, he reportedly said it was “a joke, a joke.” Anyhoo, said comedic

The last time co2 levels were this high, we dragged our knuckles around

If you were to believe global warming deniers, climate change is all right because the climate changes all the time.True enough; but the last time atmospheric carbon dioxide levels were sustained at 387 parts per million (ppm) was 15 million years ago, during the Burdigalian stage of the Mioscene Epoc, according to XXXX of UCLA in his paper XXXX.Unlike now, 15 million years ago CO2 levels were