Tiempo Climate Newswatch

The leaders of the Group of Eight nations have agreed that "climate change is happening now, that human activity is contributing to it, and that it could affect every part of the globe." The final communiqué from the G8 summit, which took place July 6-8th 2005 in Gleneagles, Scotland, contains a commitment "to take urgent action to meet the challenges we face." "The Gleneagles Plan of Action which we have agreed demonstrates our commitment. We will take measures to develop markets for clean energy technologies, to increase their availability in developing countries, and to help vulnerable communities adapt to the impact of climate change," claim the G8 leaders. They concluded that dialogue, technological development and marketing, rather than emissions targets, were the means to address the climate problem.

The lack of any concrete programme for emissions reductions disappointed many observers. Tony Juniper, from Friends of the Earth International, commented that "despite the growing evidence of human induced climate change and the dangers of its impacts becoming more widely known and understood, the outcomes of this summit leave us very little further ahead. While the leaders carry on talking, the world continues warming." Lord May of Oxford, President of the Royal Society, believes that "at the heart of the communiqué is a disappointing failure by the leaders of the G8 unequivocally to recognize the urgency with which we must be addressing the global threat of climate change."

More information

• ENS
• BBC
• ABC
• ENN

• Summary of summit outcome
• Gleneagles Plan of Action (0.4Mb download)

Speaking at the close of the G8 summit in July 2005 British Prime Minister Tony Blair welcomed the commitment in the Gleneagles Plan of Action to "a new Dialogue between the G8 and the emerging economies of the world to slow down and then, in time, to reverse the rise in harmful greenhouse gas emissions." The Dialogue will begin on 1st November 2005 with a meeting in the United Kingdom. The G8 leaders have requested that the World Bank creates a new framework for mobilizing investment in clean energy and development.

The G8 leaders committed to boost global development aid by US$50 billion annually by 2010, with US$25 billion extra a year for Africa. Rock musicians Bob Geldof and Bono, who have been backing a public campaign to press for action on Africa, broadly welcomed the deal. "Six hundred thousand people will be alive to remember this G8 in Gleneagles who would have lost their lives to a mosquito bite," said Bono. Geldof referred to the outcome as a "qualified triumph". He gave the leaders marks of 10/10 for their pledges on aid and 8/10 on debt relief. "A great justice has been done," he said. We are beginning to see the lives of the poor of Africa determined not by charity but by justice."

More information

• ENS
• SciDevNet
• China Daily
• Singapore News
• BBC

• Statement by Paul Wolfowitz, President of the World Bank
• Summary of summit outcome
• Gleneagles Plan of Action (0.4Mb download)

The "direct and indirect other environmental impacts of growing, harvesting, and converting biomass to ethanol far exceed any value in developing this energy source on a large scale," according to researchers from Washington State University, Richland. Marcelo E Dias de Oliveira and his colleagues used the ecological footprint approach to assess the implications of ethanol production from sugarcane in Brazil and corn in the United States. "Ethanol cannot alleviate the United States' dependence on petroleum," they conclude.

In the United States, ethanol production from corn resulted in 10 per cent more energy than was used in the production process. In Brazil, ethanol production from sugarcane resulted in only 3.7 per cent more energy. The researchers took account of effects on carbon dioxide emissions, soil erosion, biodiversity loss and pollution. In Brazil, greater use of fuel ethanol would not be as effective in reducing carbon in the atmosphere as slowing deforestation. In the United States, fueling the automobile fleet would require an impractically large area of corn production with environmental impacts outweighing any benefits. Multiple alternatives to fossil fuels are needed, the study concludes, though ethanol may have a role to play where there are critical pollution problems, making use of agricultural wastes.

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Background

• Nature
• Science Daily

• Earth Policy Institute