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December 29, 2005 |
| Climate & Environment Weekly is
brought to you by
The Center for Science and Public Policy
(CSPP). CSPP is a non-profit, non-partisan public policy
organization. CSPP relies on scientific experts in many nations and the vast body of peer-reviewed literature to help lawmakers, policy makers, and the media distinguish between scientific findings that are agenda-driven and those that are based on accepted scientific methods and practices. In a timely manner, the Center's Science Watch Team alerts policy makers, the media, and the public to unreliable scientific claims and unjustified alarmism which often lead to public harm. We strive for a fair and balanced examination of science. 2005 - A Space Odyssey Okay, we don't have the moon bases that we were supposed to have by 1999. On the other hand, we don't have hostile aliens and lame 1970s haircuts either, so perhaps we can call it even... >>Read More<< A Junk Science Christmas Carol Last week's revelations that a South Korean stem cell researcher faked results that were touted in the journal Science might result in a most Dickensian Christmas Eve for editor-in-chief David Kennedy, who shouldn't be surprised if the ghost of Jacob Marley appears at his bedside warning of imminent visits by the Ghosts of Junk Science Past, Present and Future... >>Read More<< A Year of Public Health Lunacy (from the New York Post) Public-health advocates have to rally popular sentiment and political support to achieve many of their goals -- but increasingly, they seem to put politics before science. Threats such as AIDS, smoking and a potential flu pandemic demand careful weighing of facts and evidence -- it is a disservice to the public to approach them in any other way. That's why recent absurd, unscientific and highly politicized actions in the name of promoting public health are so troubling... >>Read More<< CEOs Should Mind Their Own Business President Coolidge once said the business of America is business. He might have added that the business of business is to pursue profits, for lately some corporate leaders seem to have lost sight of that basic precept... >>Read More<< CLIMATE WARS HEATING UP - ILLARIONOV ATTACKS BRITAIN, VOWS TO BURY KYOTO President Vladimir Putin's personal adviser on all things economic last week accused British Prime Minister Tony Blair's government of declaring "all-out and total war on Russia" and using "bribes, blackmail and murder threats" to force it to ratify the Kyoto Protocol... >>Read More<< Commentary - Our Christmas message - the sin of presentism and the state of fear..... A volcano erupts killing 92,000 people. Drastic climate change afflicts Europe, laying waste to summer. Some 200,000 people die from hunger and cold. Frosts end in June and begin again in August. Mighty storms, unleashing abnormally-high amounts of rainfall, lead to severe flooding on many rivers, including the Rhine... >>Read More<< Cremations ban planned to cut mercury pollution THOUSANDS of families could be prevented from cremating their relatives in north Liverpool because of environmental concerns. The city council has announced plans to stop cremations at Anfield Crematorium from April 1 because of a new law monitoring mercury pollution levels. Services would still take place at the listed building, which is the country's oldest crematorium, but coffins would then be transported across the city to Springwood Crematorium, in Allerton... >>Read More<< Debate heats up over Earth's population If you thought the planet was already struggling under the weight of billions of humans, think again. Researchers have worked out the population's ultimate limit, and claim the Earth could withstand up to 200,000 times as many of us... >>Read More<< EDITORIAL - KYOTO HYPOCRITES When world leaders met in Montreal earlier this month to discuss global warming, one idea won near-universal agreement: Because it refuses to sign or live by Kyoto, the U.S. is a villain. The reigning mythology goes like this: Europe and Canada have heroically struggled to save the planet by acting responsibly to cut greenhouse gases, while an economically rapacious U.S. does as it pleases and leaves the cleanup to others... >>Read More<< Europeans missing their Kyoto targets Britain and Sweden are the only European countries honouring their Kyoto commitments to cut greenhouse gasses, according to a think-tank report. Although the US is portrayed as the ecological villain for refusing to sign up to the agreement, 10 out of the 15 European Union signatories - including Ireland, Italy and Spain - will miss their targets without urgent action, the Institute for Public Policy Research found... >>Read More<< HOW BRITISH OFFICIALS HELPED TO UNDERMINE RUSSIA'S YOUNG DEMOCRACY Sir David King is Tony Blair's Chief Scientific advisor and a famous proponent of the notion that climate change is a more serious threat than terrorism. He is used to getting his way, and he usually does in European climate circles... >>Read More<< Insect Migration - Climate Science Censorship I want to express my big thanks to Steve, Ross & John A, for this web log. I have several experiences with Nature, Science and the Holocene, but I never imagined that there was that large REAL censorship attitude within CLIMATE research. I have been able to present my own results on several occasions, but it is completely impossible to get them published... >>Read More<< Japan's population declines by 19,000 The total population of Japan, including everyone who has been a resident longer than three months, fell to 127.76 million as of Oct. 1 for the first drop in the postwar period, the government said Tuesday... >>Read More<< Japan's population starts shrinking TOKYO (AFP) - Japan's population fell for the first time in 2005, the government said, calling it a "turning point" that will force the world's second largest economy to adapt to a rapidly aging society... >>Read More<< KREMLIN REASSERTS CONTROL OF OIL, GAS Russia, the world's second-largest oil producer, sees energy as a key foreign policy tool. MOSCOW - Call it PetroKremlin. A vast state-run energy conglomerate has been assembled over the past year, some experts say, to fuel Russia's bid to revive Soviet-style great power status... >>Read More<< Life after Lee On his watch Exxon Mobil became the second-biggest company in the world. But now Lee Raymond is going. LEE RAYMOND, the combative chairman of Exxon Mobil, could be the most successful oilman in a century. During his decade and a half at the helm, his firm—a direct descendant of the original Standard Oil Trust founded by John D. Rockefeller in 1882—has outperformed its peers on almost every financial measure... >>Read More<< No Global Warming Here - Temperatures To Plunge In Britain Britain is bracing itself for more icy blasts and heavy snow with even colder conditions moving in. Workers have already been greeted with freezing and icy weather as they return to work after the Christmas break. Kent, eastern England and eastern Scotland have experienced the most severe weather conditions... >>Read More<< Proposed coal plant finds favor, criticism When the wind blows, Paul Rolke doesn't want it spreading bits of poisonous mercury and other potentially harmful pollutants across his Robertson County ranch. But the 51-year-old Rolke is afraid that might happen if plans for a 1,720-megawatt, coal-fueled power plant come to fruition... >>Read More<< RUSSIA'S TICKING TIME BOMB - DEMOGRAPHIC CRISIS MAY COST COUNTRY $400 BILLION The Russian economy is set to lose over $390 billion in the next two decades if the government, business and society do not take immediate action to reverse the demographic catastrophe already looming, a business lobby group said in a report Wednesday... >>Read More<< Seven US states sign CO2 plan in break with Bush New York, Dec 20 Reuters - Seven northeastern US states have signed the country's first plan to create a market for heat-trapping carbon dioxide by curbing emissions at power plants, New York Gov. George Pataki said on Tuesday... >>Read More<< Weather trend not unusual - Disasters often run in cycles The world is not ending. So say the experts on tsunamis, hurricanes and other natural disasters, including Jay Lawrimore, chief of the climate monitoring branch at the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration... >>Read More<< |
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