Tiempo Climate Newswatch

The World Bank has announced a new project to promote clean energy in developing countries, the development of an Investment Framework for Clean Energy and Development. Over the next two years, World Bank staff will consider technology options, analyze the impact of climate change on developing countries and make specific programme proposals. At present, it is not clear how the programmes will be financed, though a number of funding schemes have been proposed. A grant may be created to help developing countries cut the cost of buying new high-efficiency energy technology and infrastructure. Another suggestion is that the gains from more efficient production from upgraded power plants could repay the loans that funded the overhaul.

The plan was criticized during discussions at the Development Committee session that ultimately approved the project. Colombian finance minister Alberto Carrasquilla, said that some of his colleagues "find the [project] to be biased toward the development of alternative, renewable sources of energy not yet commercially viable while neglecting the bigger picture of aiming for cleaner, more efficient traditional energy sources." Agnes van Ardenne, Dutch development minister, argued that the project primarily targets middle-income countries and that she would have preferred an "energy for all" initiative covering the millions who have no access at all to electricity.

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• Reuters
• Yahoo
• SABC News
• World Peace Herald

• Report to Development Committee, World Bank

Chinese scientists have shown that climate change is having a serious impact on the Qinghai-Tibet plateau, known as the "roof of the world". According to Dong Guangrong of the Chinese Academy of Sciences, the glacier on the plateau is shrinking at a rate of seven per cent a year. He calls for world attention to the environmental deterioration caused by global warming in this area. Analysis of China's 681 weather station records confirms a regional warming trend of 0.9 degrees Celsius over the past 20 years.

A new study has revealed a weakening of the Walker Circulation, the equatorial flow of air that is linked to the occurrence of El Niño and La Niña events. The trend has occurred since the 1800s and amounts to a reduction in strength of 3.5 per cent. It has accelerated over the past 50 years. Though the trend is not large, "the Walker circulation is fundamental to climate across the globe," according to research leader Gabriel Vecchi of the University Corporation for Atmospheric Research in the United States.

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• SciDev.Net
• IOL

• EurekAlert!
• Reuters

The United States government has made available, on request, a confidential draft of part of the Fourth Assessment Report by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), which is not due to be formally published until 2007. The United States Climate Change Science Programme (CCSP) made the document freely available as it wanted as many experts and stakeholders as possible to comment on the draft report from the physical science working group. The IPCC Assessments are prepared and reviewed by hundreds of scientists and policy analysts but protocol dictates that the evolving text remains confidential until finally approved in February 2007.

The current draft, as released by the CCSP, reports that "there is widespread evidence of anthropogenic warming of the climate system in temperature observations taken at the surface, in the free atmosphere and in the oceans." It concludes that "it is very likely that greenhouse gas forcing has been the dominant cause of the observed global warming over the past 50 years." IPCC Chair, Rajendra Pachauri, was reported to have been unaware of the plan to publish the draft report. The IPCC has stressed that the current text is subject to change as the review process continues.

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• Independent
• Times Online

• To request access to IPCC Working Group I report, US Climate Change Science Programme
• Clarification, IPCC