Tiempo Climate Newswatch

Concern about global warming is leading to the requirement that climate forecasts become as common as weather forecasts, participants at the third World Climate Conference, held in Geneva, Switzerland, heard last week. "We're seeing now a convergence between what users are beginning to ask for and the ability of the scientific community to provide something on a scale and in a fashion that is relevant to what the users need," Jane Lubchenco, head of the United States National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), told the Associated Press. "Climate services is a new concept," said Thomas Karl, director of NOAA's National Climate Data Center. "In the past there wasn't a recognition that the climate community could provide information which you could base decisions on."

A Global Framework for Climate Services was established at the conference. This initiative aims to "enhance climate observations and monitoring, transform that information into sector-specific products and applications, and disseminate those products widely,” said Alexander Bedritsky, World Meteorological Organization president. Conference participants called for enhancement of the Global Climate Observing System and all its components and the World Climate Research Programme, which should be underpinned by adequate computing resources and increased interaction with other global climate research initiatives. They also emphasized the need to strengthen climate services information systems taking advantage of existing national and international arrangements, climate user interface mechanisms, focusing on building linkages and integrating information between the providers and users of climate services, and capacity building through education, training and strengthened outreach and communication.

The latest World Economic and Social Survey, from the United Nations Department of Economic and Social Affairs, has called for a "Marshall Plan" to help developing nations tackle climate change. Shifting to clean energy and adapting to climate change would require "a level of international support and solidarity rarely mustered outside a wartime setting," the report concludes. "The ballpark figure... is one per cent of world GDP, something in the order currently of 500 billion to 600 billion dollars annually is what developing countries will need in terms of international support to make this kind of shift sooner rather than later," said author Richard Kozul-Wright.

"Climate change challenges us all to find a new development paradigm that balances economic growth and long-term prosperity with social progress and ecological sustainability," said Noeleen Heyzer, executive secretary of the United Nations Economic and Social Commission for Asia and the Pacific. "If we don't address the challenges of climate change an increasing number of nations and their peoples will be pushed into poverty - never has there been a greater call for global solidarity," she continued. The funding proposed is some five times greater than previously suggested.

Geoengineering may be needed to head off planetary catastrophe but it should not be considered a "quick fix", according to a new report from the Royal Society in the United Kingdom. "Nothing should divert us from the priority of reducing global carbon dioxide emissions and ensuring that the December meeting in Copenhagen does lead to real progress," said Martin Rees, Royal Society president. "But if such reductions achieve too little too late there will be surely pressure to contemplate a plan B."

Two principal means of geoengineering were considered. First, and more promising, carbon dioxide can be removed from the air by planting trees or it may be possible to extract carbon dioxide artificially on a large-scale. Second, the amount of solar radiation reaching the Earth's surface could be managed, by, for example, huge mirrors in space that reflect the sun's heat away from the planet. The report concludes that some geoengineering techniques are technically feasible but cost and safety remain concerns. Others are so costly, risky or uncertain that they should only be considered a last-ditch resort. The chair of the study's review panel, John Shepherd from the University of Southampton, warned that the research "found that some geoengineering techniques could have serious unintended and detrimental effects on many people and ecosystems, yet we are still failing to take the only action that will prevent us from having to rely on them."