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CLIMATE SCIENCE
Climate: World failing to meet 2C target, say analysts
By Mariette LE ROUX, Marlowe HOOD
Bonn (AFP) Sept 2, 2015


Indonesia to cut emission by 29 percent in 2030
Jakarta (AFP) Sept 2, 2015 - Indonesia has unveiled an ambitious new target for reducing carbon emissions, promising to slash its greenhouse gas output by 29 percent by 2030, the government said Wednesday.

The increased commitment by one of the world's largest greenhouse gas emitters will be officially submitted to the United Nations later this month ahead of a major climate change summit in December.

"We have reached the decision to reduce (emissions) by 29 percent by 2030," environment and forestry minister Siti Nurbaya Bakar told reporters.

The pledge goes beyond Indonesia's 2009 agreement to slash emissions by 26 percent -- or 41 percent with international assistance -- by 2020.

The final draft submission states Indonesia has set aside 12.7 million hectares (31.4 million acres) of forest for conservation to help realise its target. The government also hopes to derive nearly a quarter of its vast energy needs from renewable sources within a decade.

"Beyond 2020, Indonesia envisions an even bolder commitment to emission reductions," said the draft submission distributed by the ministry.

Indonesia, along with several other emissions-intensive economies, had been under pressure to submit its target before the UN climate summit in Paris.

"The Indonesia baseline uses the business as usual scenario of emission projections starting in 2010, based on historical trajectory (2000-2010), projected increases in the energy sector, and the absence of mitigation actions," the submission says.

It is hoped that a new pact to cut global emissions applicable to all countries will be hammered out at the long-awaited conference.

Extra CO2 a boon to plants, but only at low temperatures
Perth, Australia (UPI) Sep 2, 2015 - Phytoplankton are plant-like microorganisms that serve as the foundation for many marine food chains. Like plants, phytoplankton covert sunlight into chemical energy and carbon dioxide into oxygen.

Logic suggests that more CO2 would be advantageous to phytoplankton. But a new study in the Arctic Ocean suggests growing levels of carbon dioxide offer a boost only at low temperatures.

According to researchers at the University of Western Australia, rising CO2 concentrations in Arctic waters are having a positive effect on phytoplankton growth -- but that effect fades as water temperatures rise.

"This influx of CO2 could benefit primary producers, but we cannot forget that the temperature of the Arctic Ocean is also increasing almost three times faster than global temperatures," Lara Garcia-Corral, a researcher with UWA's Oceans Institute and School of Plant Biology, explained in a press release. "With the advent of the summer, when the temperature increases, the fertilizing effect of carbon dioxide diminishes to nothing and the ability of phytoplankton to capture CO2 decreases."

Even though CO2's plant-boosting effects may be limited to specific temperature ranges, researchers say it's important to better understand the interplay between plant communities and the changing ratios of chemicals in the atmosphere and ocean.

"These changes have a significant impact on ecosystems and the regulation of CO2," Garcia-Corral said. "Therefore, they are fundamental to elaborate projections of future impacts of climate change."

The work of Garcia-Corral and her colleagues is detailed in the latest issue of the journal of Nature Climate Change.

Inadequate national targets for curbing climate-altering greenhouse gases meant emissions would be "far above" the level required to stave off disastrous global warming, analysts warned Wednesday.

Instead of the UN-targeted ceiling of two degrees Celsius (3.6 degrees Fahrenheit) over pre-Industrial Revolution levels, the world was on track for 2.9-3.1 C by 2100, according to the Climate Action Tracker (CAT), a tool developed by a consortium of four research organisations.

"The climate targets so far submitted to the UN by governments collectively lead to global emissions far above the levels needed to hold warming to below 2 C," said a CAT statement.

Fifty-six governments have submitted pledges, known as Intended Nationally Determined Contributions, or INDCs, that will form the backbone of a universal climate-rescue pact to be inked in Paris in December.

Including major emitters China, the United States and the 28-member European Union, pledges so far cover some 65 percent of global emissions, and 43 percent of the world population.

To stay under the 2 C threshold, which scientists say is necessary to avoid catastrophic impacts, greenhouse gas emissions would have to drop from about 50 billion tonnes of CO2 equivalent (GtCO2e) per year today, to 39-43 GtCO2e in 2025 and 36-45 GtCO2e in 2030, according to the CAT.

- Goal 'almost infeasible' -

"The current INDCs lead to emissions levels that exceed the benchmark 2 C limit by 12-15 GtCO2e in 2025, and 17-21 GtCO2e in 2030," said the CAT statement.

Current pledges for 2030 would make the 2 C goal "almost infeasible", it found.

Rather, they would result in temperature increases closer to "2.9-3.1 C by 2100," Bill Hare of Climate Analytics, a CAT contributor, told AFP.

The authors said the current level of ambition should not be locked into the long-awaited Paris agreement -- the first that will commit all the world's nations to slashing CO2 and other planet-harming greenhouse gases.

It was important that the pact include wording on narrowing the gap between what is needed and what has been promised, they warned, as diplomats met in Bonn for the penultimate round of negotiations before the crucial November 30-December 11 Paris conference.

But the negotiators themselves expressed frustration Wednesday at their halting progress, with just seven official negotiating days left before they head for the French capital.

Instead of line-by-line revision of the text, still over 80 pages long and littered with contradictory proposals, the Bonn session had seen "conceptual discussions, going around in circles," Amjad Abdulla of the Maldives, who speaks for the Alliance of Small Island States (AOSIS) told AFP.

"I wonder if there will be any progress to report back at home," added Samuel Adejuwon of Nigeria.

If not, he told a special stock-taking plenary, "it might be difficult for me to justify sending delegates here again in October."

- 'Inadequate' ratings -

Of the 15 INDCs assessed by CAT, seven were rated "inadequate" -- those of Australia, Canada, Japan, New Zealand, Singapore, South Korea and Russia.

Six were rated "medium" -- those of China, the EU, Mexico, Norway, Switzerland and the United States.

Only two, those of Ethiopia and Morocco, were "sufficient" in line with the 2 C goal.

"Most governments that have already submitted an INDC need to review their targets in light of the global goal and, in most cases, will need to strengthen them," said Niklas Hoehne of NewClimate Institute, another CAT contributor.

"Those still working on their targets need to ensure they aim as high as possible."

The ten highest emitters yet to submit INDCs are India, Brazil, Iran, Indonesia, Saudi Arabia, South Africa, Thailand, Turkey, Ukraine, and Pakistan, which together account for 18 percent of global emissions.


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