The Blue Sky

Former Vice President Al Gore is cofounder and Chairman of Generation Investment Management, a firm that is focused on a new approach to Sustainable Investing.

Gore is also cofounder and Chairman of Current TV, an independently owned cable and satellite television network for young people based on viewer-created content and citizen journalism. A member of the Board of Directors of Apple Computer, Inc. and a Senior Advisor to Google, Inc. Gore is also Visiting Professor at Middle Tennessee State University in Murfreesboro, Tennessee.

Mr. Gore is the author of An Inconvenient Truth, a best-selling book on the threat of and solutions to global warming, and the subject of the movie of the same title, which has already become one of the top documentary films in history. In 2007, An Inconvenient Truth was awarded two Academy Awards for Best Documentary Feature and Best Original Song.

Since his earliest days in the U. S. Congress 30 years ago, Al Gore has been the leading advocate for confronting the threat of global warming. His pioneering efforts were outlined in his best-selling book Earth in the Balance: Ecology and the Human Spirit (1992). He led the Clinton-Gore Administration’s efforts to protect the environment in a way that also strengthens the economy.

Al Gore was born on March 31, 1948, the son of former U.S. Senator Albert Gore, Sr. and Pauline Gore. Raised in Carthage, Tennessee, and Washington, D.C., he received a degree in government with honors from Harvard University in 1969. After graduation, he volunteered for enlistment in the U.S. Army and served in the Vietnam War. Upon returning from Vietnam, Al Gore became an investigative reporter with the Tennessean in Nashville, where he also attended Vanderbilt University’s Divinity School and then Law School.

Al Gore and his wife, Tipper, reside in Nashville, Tennessee. They have four children- Karenna, Kristin, Sarah, and Albert III; and three grandchildren: Wyatt Gore Schiff, Anna Hunger Schiff, and Oscar Aitcheson Schiff.

Target:
To facilitate the life of animals in Iran

New presidential election in Iran is under way and the  animal lovers of Iran will Vote for a president who promises to facilitate  the life of animals (both feral and wildlife) as well as humans who are protecting them.

One of the main reasons for victory of President Barak Obama was his support for nearly every animal protection bill which was pending in USA congress.  He wrote of the important role animals play in our lives, as companions in our homes, as wild life in their own environments, and as service animals working with law enforcement and assisting persons with disabilities.

http://www.thepetitionsite.com/1/animal-protection-law-in-iran

By Azadeh Ansari
CNN
 
 

(CNN) — Forests in the Pacific Northwest are dying twice as fast as they were 17 years ago, and scientists blame warming temperatures for the trend, according to a new study.

The study, to be released Friday in the journal Science, is the first large-scale analysis of environmental changes as contributing factors in the mortality of coniferous forests.

The data for this research was gathered by generations of scientists over a 50-year period at multiple sites in Oregon, Washington, California, Arizona, Colorado, New Mexico and southwestern British Columbia. Seventy-six forest plots, all more than 200 years old, were monitored by scientists doing some of the most rudimentary research — counting trees.

"It’s not a happy story, but, an important one," said Phillip van Mantgem, a research ecologist with the U.S. Geological Survey and the lead author of the study. "These are beautiful places. They do change and respond to their environment, sometimes quickly."

"If in your hometown where you live, the death rates of your friends and neighbors doubled and there are no compensating birth rates, wouldn’t you want to figure out what’s going on?" said Nathan Stephenson, research ecologist with the U.S. Geological Survey and one of the authors of the report.

The study primarily focused on three types of coniferous trees: pines, firs and hemlocks. Older-growth forests — some up to 500 years old — have trees of all ages, and researchers found that mortality rates have increased for all age groups. Since mortality rates went up across the board, scientists ruled out a number of other possible causes, including ozone-related air pollution, long-term effects of fire suppression and normal forest dynamics.
in the end, California had the highest tree death rate. Of the three types of coniferous trees studied, pines were found to be dying at the fastest rate. Ultimately, higher tree mortality may lead to significant shifts in forest structure and function, the report states.

"Much of the world’s population in North America, Europe, most of China and large portions of Russia live near temperate forests, so what happens in these forests has global importance," said Jerry Franklin, a professor of forest resources at the University of Washington whose work was instrumental in maintaining the research plots.

"My guess is that forest loss has the potential to greatly exceed forest establishment," he added.

The new findings concern scientists who see the study as further confirmation of the harmful effects of climate change on ecosystems.

According to the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, a scientific intergovernmental body, concentrations of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere are now at their highest levels for at least 650,000 years. Scientists on the panel say the increase began with the birth of the Industrial Revolution 250 years ago.

The new research also suggests that as trees die, they actually emit more carbon than they absorb. Trees are key players in regulating climate because they convert carbon dioxide, which they store in their trunks and roots, to oxygen. Changes in climatic conditions or various diseases can cause the gradual dying of plant shoots.

"The concern here is that these might be early warning signs of dieback," said Stephenson.

Some scientists say that tree species unable to tolerate warmer conditions might just re-establish themselves in cooler areas. Given the speed at which warming appears to be occurring, it’s not clear whether tree species will be able to migrate fast enough to survive, said van Mantgem of the U.S. Geological Survey.

"Warmer temperatures cause earlier summer droughts, less snow pack, and cause ideal breeding grounds for invasive species and pathogens," he added.

"One hypothesis is that warmer climates can make it easier for invasive species to reproduce and grow in these temperate forests. If the trees are already under a lot of environmental stress, they are more prone to serious insect attack," he said.

Scientists say forests in the Western U.S. have been increasingly damaged in recent years by invasive insect species such as the bark beetle — a sign that rising temperatures are having an adverse effect. Bark beetles are known to attack trees already weakened by other environmental factors.

"Many of these beetles cannot survive in cold temperatures, and it’s getting warmer," said Tim Barnett, a ­research marine physicist at Scripps Institution of Oceanography at the University of California, San Diego. Barnett authored a research paper linking drought conditions in the American West to increased human activity.
"It is perfectly reasonable to assume that this problem is going to get worse, not better," he said.

CNN

CNN

LONDON, England (CNN) — The first comprehensive report into the human cost of climate change warns the world is in the throes of a “silent crisis” that is killing 300,000 people each year.

More than 300 million people are already seriously affected by the gradual warming of the earth and that number is set to double by 2030, the report from the Global Humanitarian Forum warns.

“For the first time we are trying to get the world’s attention to the fact that climate change is not something waiting to happen. It is impacting seriously the lives of many people around the world,” the forum’s president, former U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan, told CNN.

Speaking to CNN’s Becky Anderson in London on Friday, Annan said the migration of people from newly uninhabitable areas presents a security issue that needs to be addressed by the United Nations Security Council.

“This is one of the reasons why I’ve described climate change as all encompassing,” he told CNN. “This threat to our health, this threat to food production, this threat to security. It raises political tensions, it will have people on the move — and they are on the move — and many more which will bring tensions.”

The report, titled “Human Impact Report: Climate Change — The Anatomy of a Silent Crisis” comes just six months before the United Nations Climate Conference in Copenhagen to forge a post-Kyoto climate agreement for 2012 and beyond.

Annan called on Member States to reach a “global, effective, fair and binding” outcome on climate change, as the report warned that the talks could “well be the last chance for avoiding global catastrophe.”

He told CNN: “The U.S. administration has joined the mainstream about fighting climate change and that is a big step, and I hope that will also put a new momentum into the negotiations.”

The report’s startling numbers are based on calculations that the earth’s atmosphere warmed by 0.74 degrees Celsius between 1906 and 2005. The Global Humanitarian Forum says that temperatures will rise by almost two degrees Celsius, regardless of what’s agreed in Copenhagen.

“No matter what,” the report concludes, “the suffering documented in this report is only the beginning.” A rise of two degrees, it says, “would be catastrophic.”

Of the 300,000 lives being lost each year due to climate change, the report finds nine out of 10 are related to “gradual environmental degradation,” and that deaths caused by climate-related malnutrition, diarrhea and malaria outnumber direct fatalities from weather-related disasters.  See photos of devastation around the world »

The vast majority of deaths — 99 percent — are in developing countries which are estimated to have contributed less than one percent of the world’s total carbon emissions.

The report warns climate change threatens all eight of the Millennium Development Goals — a set of goals agreed by leading nations in 2000 which aim to reduce extreme poverty by 2015.

Around 45 million of the 900 million people estimated to be chronically hungry are suffering due to climate change, the report says. Within 20 years that number is expected to double. At the same time food production is expected to fall, driving food prices up 20%.

The countries considered to be most vulnerable are those in the semi-arid dry land belt that runs from the Sahara/Sahel to the Middle East and Central Asia, Sub-Saharan Africa, South and Southeast Asia, Latin America and parts of the U.S., small island states and the Arctic region.

Australia is singled out as the developed country most vulnerable to the direct impacts of climate change. Over the past 15 years, the combination of rising temperature and lower rainfall has produced the worst drought in the country’s recorded history.

While developed countries — including Australia — have committed funds to counter the impact of climate change, the Global Humanitarian Forum says developing nations need a dramatic injection of funds — up to 100 times more than is currently available to help them adapt to the changes.

The total economic cost of climate change each year is thought to be $125 billion, although the Forum warns that figure may be too conservative and doesn’t take into account the impacts on “health, water supply and other shocks.”
While commissioned by the Global Humanitarian Forum, the report was reviewed by a panel of experts, including Rajendra Pachauri of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), Jeffrey Sachs of the Earth Institute at Columbia University and Barbara Stocking of Oxfam.

learn mere on www.CNN.com

PARIS — Climate change does indeed pose a serious threat to the world’s polar bear population, Environment Minister Jim Prentice said here Tuesday while attending a conference of ministers representing the world’s top greenhouse gas-emitting economies.

Prentice clarified comments he made in March that have contributed to a sharp debate among scientists about whether bears are indeed at risk due to melting Arctic ice caused by the warming climate.

"It is clear the polar bear is a mammal that has developed over time as an expert at hunting from sea ice, so clearly the absence of sea ice is going to be problematic," Prentice told Canwest News Service.

In March, Prentice said: "I don’t think anyone disagrees the whole process of climate change has implications for polar bears. What those implications are is still under scientific investigation. It could be positive, it could be negative."

Prentice said Tuesday he was referring in March to the differing impacts of climate change on the 13 sub-species of Polar bears living in various geographical areas.

"The effect of global warming has different impacts on different sub-populations, and even the scientists, I think, acknowledge that the effects have not been studied on each of the sub-populations," he said.

"Generally speaking over time it will be negative. I’ve never disputed that."

He said he showed his concern for the polar bear’s survival by launching a national consultation initiative looking at ways to protect the animal.

A group of scientists recently produced a paper criticizing those who suggest the bears, more than half of which live in Canadian territory, could benefit from climate change.

Ian Stirling, an Edmonton-based emeritus researcher with Environment Canada, told Canwest News Service in a recent e-mail that climate change is unquestioningly harmful.

"One sees all manner of either misleading statements, or ones that are taken out of context, to even suggest in some cases that climate change will be good for polar bears, or at least that they will just adapt to life on land," Stirling wrote. "Really, it is not a complicated question. Polar bears evolved to exploit an ecological niche on the sea ice. They are large, specialized predators that depend on the sea ice for their existence."

In Paris, Prentice said he was satisfied with the progress made at the two-day gathering of environment ministers from 17 major economies that produce 80 per cent of the world’s greenhouse gas emissions.

He was taking part in the Major Economies Forum, meeting, an initiative of President Barack Obama to seek greater climate change co-operation from major developed and developing countries such as India and China.

The United Nations will lead talks in December in Copenhagen aimed at striking a global treaty. The accord would replace the Kyoto Protocol, which expires in 2012.

China has demanded that the U.S. and other major economies commit to reductions of at least 40 per cent by 2020 from 1990 levels.

But only the European Union has come close to that target, vowing to cut emissions by 20 per cent by 2020 over 1990 levels. The EU said it would boost its commitment another 10 per cent if other major economies followed its lead.

The Obama administration has proposed reducing America’s emissions by 14 per cent by 2020 over its 2005 level. Estimates suggest that translates into a three per cent cut over 1990 levels.

Canada has vowed to reduce greenhouse gases by 20 per cent from 2006 levels by 2020.

U.S. climate envoy Todd Stern said Sunday that China’s demand is unrealistic given that a treaty would have to go through the U.S. Congress.

"We are jumping as high as the political system will tolerate," Stern said.

Prentice said a new treaty must have both the participation of the U.S. and major emitters from the developing world.

"We need to ensure that whatever we arrive at in Copenhagen is ratifiable by the Americans, and that we need to be pragmatic in that sense."

With files from Randy Boswell
© Copyright (c) Canwest News Service

This is the English version of www.artmanforbluesky.blogfa.com and is here to share my Ideas about the environmental issues and mostly global warming.

 You probably ask your self why is that important, or why some people get it serious, what is out there which scared some human. It’s my biggest concern because I know how effective is global warming and other problem like air pollution or water pollution.

I want to ask you, do you have any concern about animals’ right or green house gases, iceberg melting, jungle decreasing and so many other problems which the mother earth is suffering now. if yes stay with me to make our voice louder and if not again stay with me to show you how much are these facts important. At the end I am sorry for my weak English.

hi dear and accept my warm welcome and help me to be stronger in this way.

may you ask what way oh yeah I forgot to say I am here to invite everyone to conserve our beautiful planet Mother Earth