Green Room
The Cancun climate meeting has started amid low expectations
Some readers may have been wondering what has happened to our regular Green Room strand. Here it is in its new guise.
The Green Room has taken upon itself a new and slightly different mission. Rather than commissioning comment and opinion articles on environment-related issues, we will scour the web with the aim of bringing you the most interesting and thought-provoking environment stories, comment and analysis we can find on other sites.
We’ll continue to report on our Science/Environment pages about the issues and stories of the day of course, and we hope that this new Green Room format will allow us to do that while also broadening the range of subjects and viewpoints we can bring to your attention. You can read the next Green Room entry in a fortnight.
Concerned about the way it is reported in the media, the UK’s Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Defra) has added a new section to its website - Myth Busters.
In the regularly updated section, the department looks to correct what it sees as inaccurate coverage.
on a topic that is set to be one of the main environment and rural affairs stories in the UK next year - bovine TB and badger culling.
The Myth - Badgers will be culled to control bovine TB when vaccination could do just as good a job.The Truth - More than 25,000 cattle were slaughtered last year because of bovine TB.
The department’s myth busters write:
“As our research published this week shows, while vaccination will not be as effective as culling in quickly lowering the TB infection in the badger population, vaccination does have a part to play and our consultation covers how the two might be used together.”
Environmentalist Mark Lynas found himself he was not the “pariah of the green movement”.
After winning plaudits from the green-minded for authoring books, such as Six Degrees and High Tide, he found himself somewhat alienated following the broadcast of the documentary, in which he was featured being critical of the way current environmental campaigns are being conducted.
In a , Mr Lynas is quoted as saying:
“Does the environmental movement still speak for the environment? Or are the greens in danger of being left behind, trapped in their own ideological fortress, as the world outside changes rapidly?”
He goes on to question the green movement’s stance on issues such as nuclear power and GM food. The reason for Mr Lynas’s epiphany? He explains that the time had run out, and called for urgent decisions to be informed by “sound science, and not by outdated prejudice”.
It is fast approaching that time of year when ministers from all corners of the globe gather under one roof to agree that urgent action is needed to curb climate change, only to disagree on what needs to be done.
Judith Curry - professor and chairwoman of the School of Atmospheric Sciences at Georgia Institute of Technology, US - raised a few eyebrows among her fellow climate scientists earlier this year when she entered the lions’ den and , one of the leading sites which voices the concerns of climate sceptics.
Active in the blogosphere since 2006, she recently decided to raise her head above the parapet permamently. She has set up her own blog, , in response to her growing concerns over the apparent “tribal nature” of parts of the debate, brought to the boil this year in the media melting pot, following the rows over “ClimateGate” and mistakes in the IPCC’s most recent climate assessment.
In a recent posting, she set out the reasons why she was looking to engage with sceptics. Some of the 500+ responses make interesting reading.
, Phil Jones - one of the scientists at the centre of the ClimateGate saga - reflects on the past year that saw his world turn upside down.
The row erupted in November 2009 when more than 1,000 e-mails, most of which were “personal correspondence”, and documents were illegally taken from the University of East Anglia’s Climatic Research Unit (Cru) and released into the public domain.
Critics said the data showed that the scientists were trying to manipulate their findings to support the idea that human activity was warming the atmosphere at an unprecedented rate.
Such was the fallout, that numerous inquiries were established. All of which cleared the scientists of wrongdoing, but the reviews did call for more openness.
In the interview, Professor Jones said he liked to think the worst was now over but still recalls the level of personal abuse he received, some of which threatened his safety and that of his family.
“Someone, somewhere, will hunt you down,” read one, Nature reports. “You are now blacklisted,” read another. “Expect us at your door to say hello.”
Now back at the helm of Cru, what lessons have the past year taught Professor Jones?
“I’m a little more guarded about what I say in e-mails now.”
