I admit, I wouldn’t know a snowman from a snowwoman unless s/he pulled up his/her skirt and showed me his carrot in a very strategic place.

Nevertheless, the snow people were out in Helsinki protesting the warming up of the climate.

I reckon if i were made of snow, i’d want the world to stay cooler, too, wouldn’t you?

But, for what it’s worth, it’s hard to get all riled up when it’s Frosty telling you to chill, no?

Here’s what you look like when all is well.

Here is what happens when you start to melt.

The end result … you need someone to dress you.

Yeah, indeed. The world needs us to take care of it.

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There’s good news and bad news about a 10% drop in CO2 emissions overall in FY08 in Japan.

The good news for the CO2 watchers is that emissions are down. Yeah, I said that. The bad news is that five major industries – steel, chemicals, oil, paper and cement — are suffering from steep production cuts.

“The five industries accounted for a quarter of Japan’s total emissions of climate warming gases in fiscal 2007.”

Japan can now say it is closer to meeting its Kyoto Protocol targets. The 10% drop translated to about 30% of the required cuts Japan needs to make. 2009 promises to bring Japan even closer…unfortunately.

Sad to say, the best (only?) way to meet targets, is to stop production.

The conflict between the environmentalists and the political activists about global warming causes and the impact of human activity on rising global temperatures, seems to have been rekindled once again by a controversial report by the Japan Society of Energy and Resources (JSER).

Three of the five researchers who conducted the extensive study concluded that global warming was majorly a cause of the natural heating and cooling cycle. And that we humans, had little or no impact on that matter.

While the report didn’t cause any major uproar in the west, it seems only a matter of time before theories start flying again.

In what is a very harsh reply to the accepted global warming theory, the report focuses on what it claims to be the immaturity of simulation work cited in support of the theory of anthropogenic climate change.

Giving a detailed account of temperature change and its causes, the current cycle of the global temperature rise, is attributed to the last small ice age that has reportedly ended by 2000. While three of the five scientists seem to claim that the hot and uneven weather patterns in the last decade are not a result of CO2 emissions by human activity, it also fails to explain why the temperatures seem to still be on the rise after the predicted natural cycle has ended.

Irrespective of the validity of the theory (Bill is waving for it being true), such notions and conclusions may be bad for environment because they could stop encouraging people to go green.

Image by softpixtechie

Tokyo will soon require domestic electricity companies to buy surplus solar power generated by households at about twice the current price.

The plan will come into effect as early as April the start of Japan’s new fiscal year. Tokyo wants to promote solar power as part of Japan’s efforts to cut greenhouse gas emissions.

“Japan has already led solar power technology in the world. With the scheme, we would like to firmly secure the lead.”

Japan’s utility companies now voluntarily buy surplus electricity from domestic solar panels. A bill will go to parliament to make buying mandatory for power companies at double the current price. Homeowners will be able to recover the initial cost of installing photovoltaic cell systems quicker and more homes will be encouraged to install solar panels.

Japan has pledged a 10-fold increase in solar power use by 2020 from today’s level and offer solar power systems at half the current price within four years.

Japan is badly behind in meeting its own targets under the Kyoto Protocol. With this new scheme, they will start catching up, or else.

Image courtesy of lcrf

Ho hum.

Some ‘top scientists’ are predicting “global warming is likely to worsen faster and cause more environmental damage than has been predicted.”

“Unless aggressive measures are taken, the greenhouse gases will accumulate faster than expected in the Earth’s atmosphere, increasing the danger of irreversible climate change by the end of the century, a leading climate scientist of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC).”

Climate Change 2007 warned of severe global climate change, disastrous impacts, floods, forest fires and desertification.

The newest report says that CC2007 was too optimistic.

Mitigating global warming via multiple approaches are urged. “Reductions in desertification rates reduce the likelihood of drought in arid zones; reductions in greenhouse-gas emissions will be particularly effective in industrialized nations, the IPCC assessment said.”

Well, I’m really motivated now, aren’t you?

Ho hum.

No matter who or what caused it – human or natural causes, global warming is a fact and we should do our best to prevent any of “deadly” effects. With that in mind a group of artists from England came up with an interesting public art project meant bring awareness into our lives. Dubbed the Watermarks project, it uses official UK government predictions and large-scale projections to show possible water levels of a potential future flooding onto buildings. Now in Bristol, we’d definitely love to see the Watermarks caravan in New York or San Francisco. It has an amazing message isn’t it? [via StyleCrave]

Perito Moreno

Global warming – happening, not happening, human caused, not caused and all that aside. Yeah, there is global climate change. And whether we can do anything about it and all that aside…there is a glacier, Perito Moreno in the southern Patagonia region, also known as the “White Giant” that is gaining as much as 3 meters a day!

An ‘expert’ from the University of Alaska tries to explain – “Glaciers don’t respond solely to temperature changes. The area’s heavy precipitation has apparently increased along with the world’s recent climatic shifts, combining with strong, cold Patagonian winds to reinforce the glacier.”

Perito Moreno

In other words, he doesn’t know and he is fishing for reasons.

Perito Moreno is one of the largest glaciers in South America. And it the most famous because of its accessiblity to tourists. It is located about 3,000 km (1,900 miles) southwest of Buenos Aires.

So, why is it that when glaciers are melting it’s cause by global warming? And when glaciers continue to grow it’s caused by global warming? What’s up with that?

Japan’s space agency will send a global warming monitoring satellite into space this week.

The satellite will monitor greenhouse gases and help in the fight against climate change. There’s a chance of success for the first half of the mission; the second half is a non starter.

The satellite will orbit the Earth every two hours and collect new climate data every three days.

The greenhouse satellite is called the Go-Sat and JAXA says it will be able to detect infrared signals absorbed by greenhouse gases.

The satellite also has sensors that can observe carbon dioxide and methane distribution.

The satellite will orbit for five years. First data is expected for scientists by April or May.

The satellite is expected to provide info for UN climate officials who hope to have a new emission treaty by December 2009.

A couple of foreign tourists can be seen walking along the Karola Glacier – 5,560 meters high, situated on the boundary between Nargarze and Gyangze Counties of southwest China’s Tibet Autonomous Region.

Here’s the Karola Glacier.

Here are the pics.

We don’t know what the glacier looks like, or how far it extends during its peak. Is it smaller now because of global warming or is it just time to be small? Last year, my wife and I took a cruise to Alaska. The glaciers there are growing. Our environmentalist couldn’t explain why.

In case you have ever been too embarrassed to ask, by the way, where is Tibet?

A close up … look

Temperatures have dipped to Arctic levels in Minneapolis. A snowstorm followed. People died from exposure. Even Kansas (you’re not in Kansas anymore) and Missouri dropped to single digits (-15Cish). At one place, Hallock, wind chill was -58 below.

I have been in the bitter cold before, changed a tire at -25C and saw ice sculptures in Northern China at the same temperatures. Seems to me that at some point, cold is just cold.

Still, the weather service says that skin left out in -40F for 10 minutes will freeze. That can’t be fun.

Snow storms are rocking the MidWest as well.

Meanwhile, where I live in sunny Northern California, we had record highs in San Francisco and Oakland for the day BEFORE the sun came up.

My bet is that my midwestern far neighbors are wondering – “Where’s global warming when you need it?”