environmental indicators - greenhouse gas emissions

Researchers cataloguing air bubbles inside Antarctic ice believe that current levels of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere, such as carbon dioxide and methane, are higher than at any other time in the last 650 000 years. Over the past 50 years atmospheric carbon dioxide levels have risen 200 times faster than at any other time during this period.

The researchers have discovered that in the past carbon dioxide levels in the atmosphere did not exceed 290 parts per million; presently, CO2 levels are around 375 parts per million. The situation is similar for methane: up from hovering at around 600 parts per billion to today's atmospheric concentration of well over 1,700 parts per billion.

According to the latest figures on greenhouse gas emissions from the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change, compared to 1990 levels overall emissions of developed countries were down 5.9% in 2003, from 18.4 billion to 17.3 billion tonnes CO2 equivalent. The UNFCCC emphasized however that a large part of these reductions was achieved in the early 1990s in countries of Eastern and Central Europe. Projections indicate the possibility of emission growth by 2010.

In Australia, the total aggregate emissions over the period 1990 to 2003 increased by 23.3%, the 7th highest increase of the developed countries. The US had the 11th highest increase at approximately 13%.

Such figures are not reported by the Australian government however who prefer to quote figures which take into account the land use, land use change and forestry sector, or LULUCF. When this sector is considered Australia’s total aggregate emissions increased by 5% over the same period allowing the Federal Government to claim that Australia is on target for meeting its GHG emission target of 108% of 1990 levels.

All figures quoted do not include the sector of land use, land use change and forestry which can be a net source or a net sink for GHG emissions unless otherwise stated.

For more information visit the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change website at http://unfccc.int

The main greenhouse gases are:
CO2 - Carbon dioxide
CH4 - Methane
N2O - Nitrous oxide
PFCs - Perfluorocarbons
HFCs - Hydrofluorocarbons
SF6 - Sulphur hexafluoride

[adding more to this - including references]

do the right thing

al and i were in perth on tuesday to meet a friend, and while we were walking down murray street, al noticed some graf on the footpath. as we continued to walk towards the city centre, more odd colours and shapes were noticed. we eventually made out that these dark blobs were actually stencils.

if you've ever walked on the footpaths in perth city and actually looked at them, you'd notice that they are pretty grungy. these stencils were so well done that they blended in to the aesthetic almost seemlessly. the stencils were representations of the people walking on the footpath. men in suits, people with backpacks, it was great.

so, al and i grabbed the camera and took some shots. as we were doing this, people, being curious creatures, started to look at the footpath as well, and you could just about make out the smile on their faces as they realised what they were looking at. beautiful!!

i'll get al to help me out putting some pics on this page so everyone can see them.

so, after our walk down murray street, we headed back to the train station. our friend was looking for a bin on the whitfords platform, but none were to be found. he asked the friendly, neighbourhood train guard what the deal was. apparently, perth train station staff are removing bins because they pose a terrorism risk!! what the fuck!!

now, i can understand that explosive packages may be surreptisiously placed into bins, but removing all bins from the train platform - wow! when i was growing up the people of perth were bombarded with the message "do the right thing" and put your rubbish in the bin. and now, what are we meant to do with our rubbish?

yes, we could take our own rubbish bag and bring our rubbish home with us, walk a little further to find a bin, or just chuck it on the ground. i'm guessing that most will go for the third option. so, a bit of rubbish on the ground is the price we pay for making sure our train stations are safe from terrorist attacks.

i imagine that bins in bus stations and airports will also go the same way. what about bins at shopping centres, schools, universities, even those in parliament house and foyers of buildings.

now, it would be a good thing if people started to approach the fewer bins landscape by reducing the amount of rubbish that is created, but i can't see that happening anytime soon. we are hooked on consumerism, and consumerism involves a hell of a lot of rubbish. everything is packaged!!

so, as a final word, i guess it will be interesting to see how we start to tackle the increase in rubbish on our streets that the threat of terrorism will lead to. fucking terrorists. :)

tuart conservation

here's a laugh for ya...

on the 23/11, our beloved premier (not), dr. geoff gallop put out a press release concerning a new walk trail to be built through tuart woodland south of bunbury. the reasons for this....

"...tuart was the most significant tree dominated woodland on the swan coastal plain and its conservation was vital. the new walk trail will highlight the importance of conserving our tuart woodlands for generations to come.
the trail will provide students and researchers with the opportunity to access information about the woodlands while enabling members of the community to experience the unique ecology of the tuart forest first-hand."

now, to me this is ironic in the extreme!! never mind the hypocrisy inherrent in this statement.

let me fill you in.....

just recently a group of dedicated, truly beautiful people who are concerned with conserving and saving the biodiversity of this planet, have spent months camped in the ludlow tuart forest to protect it from cable sands' bulldozers and earth moving equiptment. cable sands want to mine titanium mineral sands in the area, which is (read was) home to some of the tallest tuart trees in the world and part of the only tall tuart forest in the world.

gallop and our environment minister, judy edwards, decided that cable sands could go ahead and rip out 147 ha of this forest so the mine could go ahead because they believed that it was the best thing for the conservation of the area (huh?). their reasoning was that the $1.5m promised by cable sands would allow the protection of tuart forest for future generations. never mind that it will take at least 400 years for any semblance of this forest to return to the area. it will be generations upon generations before tuart will once again dominate this area within a healthy functioning ecosystem. and, contrary to the cable sands and government line, it has not been shown that tuarts can be successfully regenerated on mined soil. they grow only in the area of the swan coastal plain because of the composition of the soil!!

yes, parts of the area are weed infested, with exotics such as arum lillies and bridal creeper, but these weeds can be eradicated through an intensive programme involving hand weeding and a little bit of effort. let alone the fact that the fire regime of the area has been completely fucked up by the wadjella[var. sp.] (white/european invader).

this little patch that has now been destroyed by cable sands and the west australian government is situated between the northern and southern tuart forest national park, and i believe that if an intensive ecosystem management plan had been put in place, the area could have been incorporated within the greater tuart forest national park within a couple of decades. now, we must wait to see if a healthy, self repairing ecosystem can be re-established in the area, which will take a lot longer than a couple of decades and require a hell of a lot more money.

and now gallop is saying that tuarts must be conserved by way of a walk trail because of the unique ecology of the area. what a fool!!

wake up gallop. conservationists have been telling the west australian government how unique this area is in terms of its biodiversity for years. a walk trail will not fix anything. stopping mining in the area will be only the first step in a diverse programme to help save this inherently west australian ecosystem.

begin again

greetings

back from study land and after about a week's break am determined to try and write something at least every couple of days.

i've set this blog up so i can do some personal writing on the way i view the world, what i think about the shit i see in the mainstream media, and just general rambling.

i would in no way class myself a writer, although since i've been at uni, i'm finding that i can write a decent essay, and i'm not to bad at writing scientific reports either. i'm currently in the middle of a bachelor of science degree in environmental management, and am doing quite well, owing to the fact that i am extremely interested in the stuff i'm learning, which is completely different from when i first went to uni straight after high school (business - yuuccchh). i think there's a good argument for getting out and getting some life experience before settling into the hard core, self discipline that is required of tertiary education, and i certainly won't be pushing my kids to go straight from high school to uni if they don't want to. you have enough pressure on you during your final year of high school, without trying to decide what you want to do for the rest of your life. as my partner and i have both discovered, it takes time before you know what you truly want to do, and how you feel you can best contribute to the community - from a local to a global scale.

anyway, i've chosen to set up this blog so i can write more and develop this skill. although not developing it in a way that any lecturer would give great marks, but just trying to expand. i guess when you live with a writer, it's gonna rub off in some way.

so, i look forward to ranting here and getting some shit off my chest, throwing a bit of education in to the mix - and having a little fun along the way.

begin now

first post of my blog...will probably be pretty quiet here until after my exams

so if i don't see you before the 18th u know why

am looking forward to ranting my little ass off here and hopefully getting a few comments and reactions from people out there.

c u on the other side of exams....