Tiempo Climate Newswatch

The latest round of climate negotiations ended with political motivation still lacking in responding to the climate threat. "There are at least two realities here that we have to bring together," commented Christiana Figueres, executive secretary of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change. "On one hand, science is saying our emissions in the atmosphere have to peak in 2015. That makes things that much more pressing for governments. The other reality is tied to politics and economics, which also affect climate deals," she continued. Little progress was made with regard to the future of the Kyoto Protocol, one of the major negotiating issues. "There are still many countries in the climate talks that don't want to see results and try to slow things down by bringing up procedural questions about the negotiations," said Martin Kaiser of Greenpeace Germany.

Progress was made in operationalizing the various support mechanisms for developing countries agreed in Cancún. "Strong convergence has emerged on how the Adaptation Committee will be governed, what its composition will be and what its specific role will be," Figueres said. "This progress means that the Committee could be fully operationalized at Durban." Discussions concerning the Green Climate Fund continued, with reservations expressed regarding some financing proposals. "On long-term finance, some developed countries stressed innovating sources of money, such as introducing market mechanisms and global carbon tax, aviation and shipping tax," said Su Wei, head of the Chinese delegation, expressing concern that some of these means would transfer the obligation of financing to developing countries. No date has yet been set for the next negotiating round.

The Sun may be about to enter a quiet phase, scientists from the National Solar Observatory (NSO) and the Air Force Research Laboratory in the United States report. Three independent indicators - the state of the solar interior, the visible surface and corona - suggest that the next sunspot cycle will be very weak or may not take place at all. "This is highly unusual and unexpected," said Frank Hill of NSO. "But the fact that three completely different views of the sun point in the same direction is a powerful indicator that the sunspot cycle may be going into hibernation."

The most recent extended period of low solar activity, the Maunder Minimum, in the late 17th century coincided with the most severe phase of a period of low temperatures in Europe, a period known as the Little Ice Age. Cooling on a scale that could significantly offset greenhouse warming is, however, considered unlikely even in the event of a prolonged solar minimum. "In my opinion, it is a huge leap to an abrupt global cooling, since the connections between solar activity and climate are still very poorly understood," Hill said. Joanna Haigh at Imperial College London commented: "It would certainly be very risky to suggest that we rely on the sun's activity to compensate for global warming. In a future Grand Minimum, the sun might perhaps again cool the planet by up to 1 degree Celsius. Greenhouse gases, on the other hand, are expected to raise global temperatures by between 1.5 and 4.5 degrees Celsius by 2100."

A new survey of the world's barrier islands has concluded that sea-level rise may have mixed effects on these coastal features. A gradual rise in sea level could create new barrier islands, but a rapid rise, particularly when coupled with decreased sediment supply, would lead to inundation, breakup and disappearance.

"It would be nice if we could say we can predict exactly how a given island or island chain will react to rising sea levels or some other environmental change, but we're simply not there yet for most islands, especially for many tropical islands where research dollars are scarce," said lead investigator Matthew Stutz of Meredith College in Raleigh, North Carolina, United States. "We're still a long way from being able to accurately model how an individual island will change as a result of climate change or even simple development pressure." The survey was based on a global collection of satellite images from Landsat 7 and information from topographic and navigational charts.