Winter ramble - Exploring Galada Tamboore grasslands in Campbellfield

Sunny winter day...to good to spend inside. Stop reading the latest scientific reports on accelerating climate change, or arguments over the carbon tax. Quickly hang up the washing and it was time to head out exploring the bike paths of Melbourne's northern suburbs and the magic of Merri Creek. I wanted to visit the Galada Tamboore grasslands up in Campbellfield.

Solartopia - Pete Seeger sings a vision of a wind and solar powered world

A friend sent me the link to this youtube video song - Solartopia - produced in 2010. It was good to see Pete Seeger still singing such topical and empowering songs. Songs easy to sing along with and be motivated by. An positive climate change anthem with a vision for a better future for ourselves and our children.

Oceans at high risk of unprecedented Marine extinction scientists warn

A report issued last week from the International Programme on the State of the Ocean (IPSO) has strongly warned of the damage to the health of the world's oceans and marine life and that if the current business as usual trajectory of damage continues "that the world's ocean is at high risk of entering a phase of extinction of marine species unprecedented in human history."


Dr. Alex Rogers, Scientific Director of IPSO and Professor of Conservation Biology at the Department of Zoology, University of Oxford, gives the overview of the main problems affecting the ocean — and some suggested solutions.

Related: International Programme on the State of the Ocean (IPSO) | The Ocean in a high CO2 world | Frontline - World's oceans in crisis: What can be done?

Climate change blamed in extreme shift from drought to flood in China

An extreme shift in weather in June across much of southern and eastern China has been put down to the effects of global warming and climate change. Usually light rains start in June in the middle and lower Yangtze valley leading in to the summer monsoonal rains and typhoon season, but this year torrential rains and storms struck on June 3 and have continued unleashing devastating floods, the worst in over 50 years.

Chen Zhenghong, senior engineer at the Meteorological Bureau of Central China's Hubei province, said the sharp shift between drought and flood in East and Central China was a result of global warming, according to a Xinhua News Agency report in China Daily on 17 June.

Ferguson and Gillard feeding HRL's coal gasification technology in Melbourne

Just as Australia is about to get a price on carbon, the Federal Government is funding a new coal fired power station for Victoria. On Monday a little bit of street theatre for the media was enacted in Treasury Place outside the Prime Minister's Melbourne offices.

Report from Indymedia: Look at Fergo and Gillard did!

Afforestation no substitute for reducing CO2 emissions

A new scientific study published in Nature Geoscience says that major afforestation will have little impact on slowing global warming and that "afforestation is not a substitute for reduced greenhouse-gas emissions".

Cape Grim Greenhouse gas website launched by CSIRO

The CSIRO and Australian Bureau of Meteorology have launched a website showing the monthly data for greenhouse gases measured at the windswept Cape Grim Station located in the path of the roaring forties on the west coast of Tasmania. Cape Grim is one of three important baseline atmospheric stations for measuring background greenhouse gases, the other two being Mauna Loa in the middle of the Pacific and Alert Weather Station on Ellesmere Island in the Canadian Arctic. About 15 other stations around the world also collect and track atmospheric emissions data.

Missouri River floods endanger nuclear power plants

Large parts of the US midwest are experiencing heavy rainfall and flooding, not unlike what Queenslanders saw in December and January this year when Brisbane was inundated. A major problem with urban infrastructure on flood plains is the risk of innundation during flood events, flood events likely to become more frequent with climate change. In Nebraska two nuclear power Stations are threatened by floodwaters.

The Climate Show 14

An engaging radio show from New Zealand discussing the latest on climate change. This episode discusses the latest Christchurch earthquakes, ash clouds from Volcanoes in Chile and Eritrea disrupting flights, extreme weather in the US and the impact of La Nina, massive flooding in the Mississippi, drought impacts on France's nuclear plants most of which are located next to drought affected rivers, warmest May on record for New Zealand, new UN report on black carbon and how a reduction could cut future warming, Australian climate scientists cearing up the climate debate, Summer predictions for Arctic sea ice, John Cook from Skeptical Science on John Christy's climate crocks and an interactive history of climate science and large reductions in the cost of solar panels in the USA to the point where solar may be cheaper than fossil fuels in the next few years much more.

Read more at the Climate Show website.

Bonn Talks Conclude: "You Can't Negotiate with Science"

Guest post from the Daily Kos

As the Bonn Climate Talks sputtered and choked past the finish line today, the general consensus was that immediate high level political intervention on the part of Northern developed countries is mandatory to the success of international climate negotiations tasked with cutting GHG emissions to less than 2 degrees by 2020.

Related: Ambassador of Bolivia on UN climate talks in Germany | Bonn: World Bank dirty investments fueling climate change claims report | Oxfam - Developing countries pledge bigger climate emissions cuts than world's richest nations