Read this story from Agence France-Presse on a new report commissioned by the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development predicting grave socioeconomic ramifications from increasing environmental problems. (March 16, 2012)

PARIS - Pressures on Earth’s ecosystem are now so great that future generations could be doomed to falling living standards, the OECD said on Thursday in a report looking to the mid-century.

"Providing for a further two billion people by 2050 and improving the living standards for all will challenge our ability to manage and restore those natural assets on which all life depends," it warned.

"Failure to do so will have serious consequences, especially for the poor, and ultimately undermine the growth and human development of future generations."

The report by the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) builds on previous peeks-into-the-future, ending in 2030, that focused on climate change, biodiversity and the impacts on health for pollution.

"The prospects are more alarming than the situation described in the previous edition," it said, speaking of "irreversible changes that could endanger two centuries of rising living standards."

Read more: http://www.canada.com/business/Environmental+crunch+worse+than+thought+OECD+2050+report/6313069/story.html

Dr. Nina Federoff, president of the American Association for the Advancement of Science, said at a recent gathering of the AAAS in Vancouver that she is "scared to death" about the public's declining acceptance of global warming and the growing influence of well-funded skeptics who are spreading misinformation about climate change. "I'm very worried," she confided to reporters, noting leaked documents from the influential Heartland Institute of Chicago that reveal it is planning a program for US public schools intended to discredit the evidence that the burning of fossil fuels is creating world-wide environmental threats.

Listen to this interview of Damien Gillis on Victoria's CFUV 101.9 FM by the Hidden News' host Mehdi Najari. The pair discuss a range of topics, including the Harper Government's taxpayer-funded Tar Sands PR campaign and the characterization of environmentalists and citizens opposed to the proposed Enbridge pipelines as radicals and threats to the national interest. What is the world's scientific community saying about Canada's muzzling of scientists and cutting off funding to key research projects and regulatory bodies - and how is that damaging Canada's global reputation? (19 min - from March 7, 2012)

Read this story from the Globe and Mail on a recent editorial by prestigious scientific journal Nature's open criticism of the Harper Government's muzzling of science. (March 1, 2012)

One of the world's leading scientific journals has criticized the federal government for policies that limit its scientists from speaking publicly about their research.

The journal, Nature, says in an editorial in this week's issue that it is time for the Canadian government to set its scientists free.

It notes that Canada and the United States have undergone role reversals in the past six years, with the U.S. adopting more open practices since the end of George W. Bush's presidency while Canada has been going in the opposite direction.

The editorial says that since taking power in 2006, Prime Minister Stephen Harper's government has tightened the media protocols applied to federal government scientists and employees.

Nature says policy directives on government communications that have been released through access to information requests have revealed the Harper government has little understanding of the importance of the free flow of scientific knowledge.

The journal says its own news reporters have experienced firsthand the obstacles the Canadian government puts in the way of people trying to gain access to science generated by government scientists on the public payroll.

“The Harper government's poor record on openness has been raised by this publication before ... and Nature's news reporters, who have an obvious interest in access to scientific information and expert opinion, have experienced directly the cumbersome approval process that stalls or prevents meaningful contact with Canada's publicly funded scientists,” the editorial says.

Read more: http://www.theglobeandmail.com/news/politics/leading-journal-demands-harper-set-canadas-scientists-free/article2355740/

Tipping points are haunting uncertainties because they pertain to the unpredictable moment when the cumulative effects of environmental disturbance can trigger feedback loops of unstoppable change that can collapse entire ecosystems. They apply everywhere, from species loss and climate change to ocean acidification and food production. The best predictors are mostly intelligent estimates based on projected effects. Tipping points leaves scientists anxious because of the combination of uncertainty and extremely serious consequences.

British Columbia's controversial and widely misunderstood carbon tax will soon be subjected to a comprehensive review with the results likely to be revealed in next year's budget, just in time for the tax to become another pre-election political football to be kicked around by voters and political parties in the run-up to the May 14, 2013 voting day. B.C. Finance Minister Kevin Falcon announced the move in his 2012-13 budget speech, and a few more details were provided in budget documents. Here, John Twigg provides in-depth analysis of BC's carbon tax and its uncertain future.

Read this story from the Vancouver Sun on the mounting criticism from climate scientists of BC's growing coal exports and their contribution to carbon emissions. (Feb. 20, 2012)

VANCOUVER -- Coal is fast gaining notoriety as the dirtiest fossil fuel and a growing source of global greenhouse gas emissions, all of which is staining the B.C. government's green climate-action initiatives.

"It's a curious inconsistency of the old economy and the new economy at the same time," said Dan Kammen, a professor of energy at the University of California in Berkeley.

In an interview Monday, he said B.C. must take into account not just carbon emissions within the province, but the full emissions resulting from its coal exports.

"On one hand B.C. is an impressive innovator ..." said Kammen, who recently served as chief technical specialist for renewable energy and energy efficiency at the World Bank.

B.C.'s climate-action initiatives include provincial greenhouse gas targets, low-carbon energy projects, the Carbon Tax Act and the Pacific Carbon Trust.

"Like the U.S. and Australia, B.C. also exports coal and that has to go on the books somewhere," Kammen continued. "That accounting is going to be controversial. No one wants to put pressure on a revenue-producing and job-producing [export] industry.

"But it's exactly the sort of thing we have to sort out as we figure how to institute a lower-carbon economy going forward."

Read this fascinating report from the University of Washington and NASA scientists on new research into arctic sea ice decline and freshwater accumulation in the Beaufort Sea. (Jan. 4, 2011)

A hemispherewide phenomenon – and not just regional forces – has caused record-breaking amounts of freshwater to accumulate in the Arctic’s Beaufort Sea.

Frigid freshwater flowing into the Arctic Ocean from three of Russia’s mighty rivers was diverted hundreds of miles to a completely different part of the ocean in response to a decades-long shift in atmospheric pressure associated with the phenomenon called the Arctic Oscillation, according to findings published in the Jan. 5 issue of Nature.

The kaleidoscope turns, the patterns change, but the colours remain mostly dark and sombre. This year, last year, and the years before are sobering because the dramatic changes in awareness, policy and mechanisms we need to address our major environmental challenges do not match the urgency they require. Everyone who is informed on environmental matters is justifiably subdued because our corrective actions are not even slowing the erosion of the fundamental ecosystems that provide us with our essential comfort and security.

Read this story from CBC.ca on a new report from the oil and gas industry's lobby that confirms carbon emissions from the Alberta Tar Sands are on the rise.

The intensity of oilsands carbon emissions — the amount of greenhouse gases created per every barrel of oil produced — increased by two per cent between 2009 and 2010, according to an industry report.

The 2010 Responsible Canadian Energy progress report by the Canadian Association of Petroleum Producers (CAPP) also found that overall greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions from the oilsands rose 14 per cent in the same time period as the number of oilsands operations expanded.

"The increase in total GHG emissions is a result of the significant increase in both mining and in situ production, both of which require more fuel — for mine trucks, in situ steam production and upgraders," read the report.

The document offered the same explanation for the increase in intensity. (Dec. 16, 2011)

Read more: http://www.cbc.ca/news/business/story/2011/12/16/pol-capp-oil-industry-emissions-report.html