Climate Change News Digest

This year will almost certainly set the record for lowest Arctic ice volume ever recorded (see 'When things were rotten'). But whether it will set the less important - but more visible - record for sea ice extent is less certain. You can see how close 2010 is to 2007 now. On the one hand, the National Snow and Ice Data Center just issued their July report, which notes, 'June saw the return of the Arctic dipole anomaly, an atmospheric pressure pattern that contributed to the record sea ice loss in 2007.' On the other hand, they point out ...

Last month, Judge Martin Feldman, a federal trial judge in Louisiana, handed down a poorly- reasoned opinion lifting the Obama Administration''s temportary moratorium on new oil drilling in the Gulf of Mexico. Feldman owned stock in Exxon and other drilling companies. Today in New Orleans, a three- judge panel of the US Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit will consider whether to stay Feldman''s decision. According to a new report by the Alliance for Justice, however, it is unlikely that these Fifth Circuit judges will approach the case without the perception of bias. TP has the story in this cross- post.

By Peter Goodchild We begin with two basic facts. The first is that the worlds present annual consumption of oil is nearly 30 billion barrels. The second is that the worlds present population is nearly 7 billion. From there we can add some reasonable estimates of both oil decline and population decline

By Les Blumenthal A sobering new report warns that oceans face a fundamental and irreversible ecological transformation not seen in millions of years as greenhouse gases and climate change already have affected temperature, acidity, sea and oxygen levels, the food chain and possibly major currents that could alter global weather

A look at how more hot extremes might, or might not, spur climate and energy action.

Nearly eight months after thousands of e- mail messages and files of climate scientists were scattered around the Web, authorities have still not labeled the release a crime.

As catastrophes go, sea level rise is probably fairly low on everybody''s list. The most dire effects will be felt over many decades or centuries, whereas the jobless are wondering what''s going to happen to them next month or next year. Still, expanding oceans provide a longer term perspective on where humanity stands with respect to Planet Earth. read more

The swiftly unfolding environmental catastrophe in the Gulf of Mexico has riveted the world''s attention in recent weeks, but as the blog Aid. Data points out, the amount of oil spilled in the Niger Delta over five decades far exceeds the disaster in the Gulf, with even more devastating environmental consequences. Citing statistics from the United Nations Development Program, Aid. Data says estimates of oil spilled in the Niger Delta since 1960 range from 5.75 million to 10 million barrels, roughly triple the amount of oil that has Click to enlarge. UNDPOIL SPILLED: Nigeria spill (1960-present) and the 2010 BP spill gushed into the Gulf of Mexico from the blown- out Deepwater Horizon rig.

No polar bears have been more closely studied than Canada''s western Hudson Bay population. Biologists have compiled an impressive store of data on everything from the weight of females at denning, the decreasing body mass of bears of all sexes, the increasing length of time the bears spend annually on the shores of Hudson Bay, and the decline of sea ice in the bay itself. Now, polar bear biologist Andrew E. Derocher and colleagues from the University of Alberta have marshaled that data to forecast how long it will be before western Hudson Bay''s polar bears disappear. The answer is sobering ...

The surest sign of a warming Earth is the steady melting of its ice zones, from disappearing sea ice in the Arctic to shrinking glaciers worldwide. Now, scientists are using increasingly sophisticated satellite technology to measure the extent, thickness, and height of ice, assembling an essential picture of a planet in transition. BY MICHAEL D. LEMONICK

by Gavin and Mike The long- awaited and surprisingly thorough Muir- Russell report (readable online version) was released this morning. We' ve had a brief read through of the report, but a thorough analysis of this and the supplemental information on the web site will have to wait for a day or so. The main issue is that they conclude that the rigour and honesty of the CRU scientists is not in doubt. For anyone who knows Phil Jones and his colleagues this comes as no surprise, and we are very pleased to have this proclaimed so vigorously. Secondly, they conclude that none of the emails cast doubt on the integrity and conclusions of the IPCC, again, something we have been saying since the beginning.

The official UK inquiry into the climategate affair confirms the "rigour and honesty of the scientists involved" but tells them to be more open

Humans were fiddling with climate thousands of years even before we started farming " if we had a hand in the extinction of woolly mammoths

Warming waters could mean crocodiles will struggle to find food and protection

The climate change deniers are digging themselves an ever deeper hole over 'Amazongate'

Fossil- fuel power stations will have until June 2020 to comply with the next phase of EU pollution rules, under the Industrial Emissions Directive (IED) passed by the European Parliament yesterday.

The "rigour and honesty" of the scientists at the centre of a row over climate research, sparked when hundreds of emails were stolen from a world- renowned research centre, is not in doubt, an independent review said today.

Public scrutiny of science and the scientific method can never be a bad thing, especially when the research involves something as important as climate change. But there must come a time when the results are accepted by all reasonable people. This time has surely come in the case of the "Climategate" emails stolen from the University of East Anglia and posted on the internet last autumn with the evident purpose of discrediting scientists at the centre of the effort to understand climate change.

Toward the end of the last ice age, a major reorganization took place in the current system of the North Pacific with far- reaching implications for climate, according to a new study published in the July 9, 2010, issue of Science by an international team of scientists from Japan, Hawaii, and Belgium.

Exceptionally long heat waves and other hot events could become commonplace in the United States in the next 30 years, according to a new study by Stanford University climate scientists.