Tiempo Climate Newswatch

The Brazilian government has created a "crisis cabinet" to crack down on illegal logging after a surge in Amazonian deforestation. "The order is to suffocate environmental crime," said environment minister Izabella Teixeira. By the end of the year, environmental protection agency Ibama will launch 200 operations, supported by armed federal police operatives, in the soy-growing state of Mato Grosso, where farmers are said to be converting large areas of native forest.

A new study by Brazil's National Institute for Space Research and the Hadley Centre in the United Kingdom has warned that a tipping point could be reached if 40 per cent of the Amazonian forest were to be removed as the regional climate impact of forest loss is exacerbated by global climate change. Even a reduction of 30 per cent in forest area might significantly affect the region's hydrological cycle, threatening local ecosystems. As global climate change develops and deforestation increases the frequency of drought, over half the Amazonian forest could be lost over the next twenty years, the study concludes.

The United Kingdom is adopting the most ambitious greenhouse gas targets of any developed nation, a 50 per cent reduction below the 1990 level in carbon emissions by the year 2025. "By making this commitment," said Prime Minister David Cameron, "we will position the United Kingdom as a leading player in the global low-carbon economy, creating significant new industries and jobs." "This is a recognition that to be very ambitious on public spending [cuts] does not mean you can't be ambitious on climate change targets," commented Connie Hedegaard, European Union climate change commissioner.

The British government is, with some conditions, accepting the recommendations of the independent Committee on Climate Change for a new carbon budget. To meet the 2025 target, the committee projects that heat pumps will have had to be installed in 2.6 million homes and 31 per cent of new cars will have to be electric. Forty per cent of the nation's power should come from wind, wave and tide sources by 2030. David Kennedy, chief executive of the committee, said: "We have moved into uncharted territory and are going to be watched carefully by other countries. No one else has a target like this."

The world must decouple the rate of economic growth from that of natural resource consumption, concludes a new report from the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP). If not, by 2050, humanity could be consuming three times the current amount of minerals, ores, fossil fuels and biomass, "far beyond what is sustainable," according to the International Resource Panel report. "Decoupling is not about stopping growth. It's about doing more with less. Global resource consumption is exploding. It's not a trend that is in any way sustainable," commented Ernst von Weizsacker, co-chair of the panel.

"Decoupling makes sense on all the economic, social and environmental dials," said Achim Steiner, UNEP executive director. "People believe environmental 'bads' are the price we must pay for economic 'goods'. However, we cannot, and need not, continue to act as if this trade-off is inevitable," he continued. "Decoupling is part of a transition to a low carbon, resource-efficient Green Economy needed in order to stimulate growth, generate decent kinds of employment and eradicate poverty in a way that keeps humanity's footprint within planetary boundaries."