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Nobel Prize to champions in battle against climate change
Oct 12, 2007, 15:45 GMT
Austrian Renate Christ (front C), Secretary of the United Nation\'s (UN) Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), poses for photographers with some of her co-workers in Geneva, Switzerland, 12 October 2007. The IPCC and former US vice president Al Gore have jointly won the Nobel Peace Prize 2007 for raising awareness about the threat of climate change. EPA/MARTIAL TREZZINI
For the second time in three years, the Nobel Peace Prize committee in Oslo put the spotlight on the environment Friday when it awarded the 2007 prize to former US vice president Al Gore and the UN climate watchdog IPCC in a move widely hailed around the globe.
The five-member Norwegian Nobel Committee cited Gore and the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change for their work in educating the public about global warming.
The committee praised the recipients 'for their efforts to build up and disseminate greater knowledge about man-made climate change, and to lay the foundations for the measures that are needed to counteract such change.'
Nobel Committee Chairman Ole Danbolt Mjos said the prize was in 'support of the work the IPCC has done and the work Al Gore has done.'
While 'the Nobel Committee is no scientific committee, the important thing is the message that the world is threatened by global warming,' Mjos said, adding 'there is need for action now.'
Mjos noted that the UN climate panel 'consists of working groups of 2,500 scientists' and includes government representatives and policy makers from 130 countries.
On Gore, he said the former US vice president had been 'clearest' in communicating the message of climate change and its consequences, referring to Gore's Academy Award-winning documentary film, An Inconvenient Truth.
In awarding the prize to Gore and the IPCC, the Nobel Committee returned to the issue of environment again after three years. In 2004 the award went to Kenyan environmental activist Wangari Maathai.
This year's recipients expressed their gratitude for the honour while vowing to step up their efforts in the battle against global climate change.
In a statement, Gore said he was 'deeply honoured' and said the award was even more meaningful because he was sharing it with the IPCC, 'the world's pre-eminent scientific body devoted to improving our understanding of the climate crisis - a group whose members have worked tirelessly and selflessly for many years.
'We face a true planetary emergency. The climate crisis is not a political issue, it is a moral and spiritual challenge to all of humanity. It is also our greatest opportunity to lift global consciousness to a higher level,' Gore, 59, said.
He also said he would donate his share of Nobel prize money to the Alliance for Climate Protection, a bipartisan non-profit group is devoted to changing public opinion about the urgency of solving the climate crisis.
Rajendra Kumar Pachauri, the Indian chairman of the Geneva-based IPCC, said in New Delhi that the Nobel prize came as 'recognition of the work done by IPCC and the state governments of the countries of the panel.
'It recognizes the effects of climate change and I hope I will live up to the expectations of this award given by the Nobel Committee,' he said.
Pachauri, 67, added that he was happy that Gore was sharing the award with IPCC: 'I consider him one of the brightest leaders today.'
The Nobel prize, worth 10 million kronor (1.53 million dollars), will be handed over at a ceremony in Oslo on December 10. The prize will be shared in two equal parts.
The award ceremony will coincide with a scheduled conference on the Indonesian island of Bali to launch UN talks on a global treaty to replace the Kyoto Protocol on emissions cuts due to expire in 2012.
The UN climate panel and Gore were selected from 181 nominations, including 46 organizations.
In Oslo, Borje Brende, former Norwegian environment minister and member of parliament who nominated Gore, said preventing climate change was 'a peace project.'
'This is a prize that puts pressure on the political leaders,' Brende told Norwegian broadcaster NRK.
Norwegian Prime Minister Jens Stoltenberg said the prize was 'a big inspiration for everyone working to avert climate change' and was a 'recognition' of science and 'the great popular commitment' for the issue.
Praise for the recipients poured in from around the planet, including the 2004 laureate Maathai, the European Union, German Chancellor Angela Merkel, British Prime Minister Gordon Brown, French President Nicolas Zarkozy, the White House, UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon, and the European Greens Party.
A lone dissenter was known Gore-basher and global warming sceptic Czech President Vaclav Klaus, who through a spokesman avowed that 'Gore's doubting of basic cornerstones of the current civilization does not contribute to peace.'
© 2007 dpa - Deutsche Presse-AgenturCOMMENT
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Older Talkback
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What does climate change have to do with peace? What do they do, just give these to the flavor of the month?
Look forward to tantrums from the neo-cons and anti-warmers everyone.
time for me to go back to being an environmental engineering consultant. I used to do that and now there's a ton of tax money to vacuum up!
Let me explain that to you SP4 and rid you of your ignorance ,if possible :Climate change means gunger,hunger causes migration ,migration means tensions (you should know that as your peers always bash on illegal mexican immigrants ).Tensions causes war .
What Gore does is warn against the consequences of climate change .If you care to study ,you'll find that the USA is not some kind of island in a sea of changes .It is concerned and agruculture is at stake in the USA .That means hunger and conflicts .With the generous amount of weapons freely available in the USA that even could mean BIG trouble .Need more explanations SP4 ?I've tried to keep it very simple for you .
I'd be okay with Al Gore getting the Nobel Peace Prize - if he practiced what he preached. This is like when he invented the internet. :)
as always sp4 talks like a man with a paper asshole
I agree with tonny. We must not allow gunger in this world no matter what.
what gore did is give government an excuse to raise our taxes even further
'Oh Well' has a potty mouth!
'Climate change means gunger....'
Makes about as much sense as the idea that CO2 is causing it....
SP4 thinks there was legitimate evidence to invade Iraq (all proven to be false), but you deny all of the scientific evidence that global warming is happening (shrinking polar ice caps, warming oceans etc).
on a geologic scale, the earth's temperature varies alot and does its sun. even if I grant you that the temperature is in an upward trend, I think it is arrogant to think humans have that level of control.
I mean I have read science fiction about terra-forming and I just don't think were that good. We are good at adapting and that is what I bet on. We're survivors.
Well,if so, we need to be pretty fast at adapting ! This is from another part of this site, dated today -
'This year, the IPCC is in the process of releasing its most dire assessments ever, warning that global warming was 'unequivocal' and that the world has about eight years left to respond by reducing carbon emissions blamed for climate change'
It's a shame that Al Gore is so bland in public. He's been warning about climate change for more than a decade. Sure there's some hyperbole and self-agrandizement. But contrast this with Bush labeling global warming 'junk' science. Until he lost the Congressional elections last year, he claimed that global warming was fictitious.
For anyone in our international audience, I'd like to apologize for being so America-centric. But we consume 20. . .25% of the world's energy with only 5% of the population. And it's our push for economic growth and a concumption-based culture, which is fueling the fossil fuel frenzy. So, the biggest change in behavior is required from us Americans.
Does it really matter whether the Peace Prize is the best vehicle for recognition? It's certainly a good one. Otherwise, we wouldn't be commenting. Even the negative comments demonstate the attention that the prize is bringing to this issue.
Now, all of us need to roll up our own sleeves and improve our personal performance and make a dent in our own situation. That's the bottom line.
''SP4: Just one QuestionOct 12th, 2007 - 16:00:48
What does climate change have to do with peace? What do they do, just give these to the flavor of the month?''
GOOD QUESTION FOR A CHANGE!
Since the climate is going to affect the survival of white man in Holand, so to reduce the temp might save a nation. But the whiteman does not know, that he is near extinction, no matter what!
...than a pig does Sunday.
We had tensions with the Soviet Union for 50 years and never had a war! We had tensions with other nations and never had war. In fact, a lot of the starvation in the world today, comes from war itself! In fact, virtually All starvation is politically generated. We have more than enough food to feed the world. In fact, we even pay people in the USA to NOT produce food! If it were not for your environazi friends pimping to the ethanol lobby, the cost for food would even be cheaper!
War's Tonny, come from well wishing boobs, unprepared to defend themselves,blindly hoping for peace while careening towards an enemy who is calculating aggression. The power differential means, at best, a short conflict. War is politics, by other means, and all leaders operate on the first rule, which is to maintain incumbency at all costs.
In fact, the war we have now is the classic showcase for this.
Also, you don't acknowledge the HUGE areas of cultivation that will open as a result of global warming. Large parts of Asia and North America, previously unable to support cultivation, will now be available with pristine soil to do so! In fact, there are some who say we will INCREASE output world wide!
Gore has found someone to honor him, in the face of some very tenuous connections to world peace. Good for Al. After all, the sycophantic slob needs this like a junkie needs dope.
No, Tonny, I think you are just a little more than FULL of crap! Gore deserves an award for peace less than I do for dancing.
Guess what I think of your pseudointellectual bullsh-t?
The people commenting here who don't believe global warming is real, you are so stupid, I can't believe you can even read and write.
Ignorance is no excuse SP4,the shrinking of the ice cap is already leading to the first conflicts as Russia and Canada are now in a state of conflict over the exploitation of the resources in the arctic .But of course you don't know that,do you ?You comfort yourself with selecting information that confirms your bias .SCience has obviously no appeal to you .Even the things that happen in your own back yard seem to evade your attetion .
Are you not the very same guy that reached the conclusion that there is no relation between carbon emission and the melting of the artcic ice caps ?Just continue to spread you appaling lack of knowledge and make it your banner .
You comments on the program that Jillary Clinton brings forward to turn the USA to a more democratic society are dismissed with the usual slander and ranting about Hsu and other whatever your simple mind seems to be able to assimilate .Climatre change debate is over and done with ,the major scientific community including the past peace nobel prize winners ,as well as the nobel prize winners for physics and chemistry are lauding the nomination if Al Gore and the IPCC,so does the rest of the planet .What do you oppose to that .A truckkdriver annex schoolmaster bickering about a few unimportant details,Bush?Cheney?Pat Robertson?Rush Limbaugh ?Fox ?May I suggest you at least make an attempt to educate yourself ?
Failure to curb the effects of climate change only lead to raising the bill tenfold. THis kind of problem does not simply vanish when you stop thinking about it .Saving energy is saving money AND the future of our children .
Can you imagine what will happen to them if agriculture dwindles and there is not even enough crops to feed the population ?
IF it wasnt for G.Bush fighting terrorists we would have to worry about that and not be able to focus on climate change. Tonni is not from Belgium he is a fake. And Pete could you please man up and tell us where you are from?...Since you bash the USA constantly and never offer anything relevant,, I would like to know what you base you minformation about Americans on...The media?...As far as Big oil Al Gore how much environmental damage did making ipods with slave labor in china do?Sad that people like tonni think more of Al Gore and the faith required and dont belive in God. You can goole tonni's past comments and see what a idiot this clown is.
Most of what fake USA hater Pete i mean tonni says is more relevant to the coming Ice age than Warming.
Here is what I find puzzling. Let us assume, just of the sake of discussion, that human activity is indeed the cause of the current warming trend. We are here discussing a very large system, the entire world, with and ENORMOUS amount of momentum, or heat lag, if you prefer. What that means is that no matter what we do now, or stop doing now, the climate will continue to warm during the next hundred years or more. Also, if the climatologists who regularly talk to television reporters are correct, the dry places on Earth will become drier. The wet places on Earth will experience even more precipitation than they are experiencing now. Also, we will see an increase in sea level, in other words, we will start losing land along the coasts and most of our port cities are going to have major problems staying in business.
Has anyone who participates in this forum heard ANY politician advocate increased spending on planning for these events? Have any of them advocated increased spending on irrigation or flood control projects? What about the relocation of affected populations? In other words, do you hear any politician talking about how to actually cope with this coming crisis? The only thing I have heard or read on this subject came from some politician in South Africa.
This, to me, is just further evidence that the whole thing is politically motivated hog-swaller. This is horrifying to me because I think we ARE seeing a warming trend in our climate. Unfortunately, our politicians have seen this as an opportunity to seize control of people's lives rather than doing something about the actual problems arising from climate change. While doing so, they are FAILING to address the very real and very dangerous problems that will likely arise from climate change.
Look at it this way. I doubt Albert Gore could hang a pre-fab window frame. Rock musicians are useless when it comes to laying pipe or building levees. We are on our own for this one, folks. The politicians are only going to get in the way. If you live near a coast, you are well-advised to start looking over topographic maps and start figuring out whether or not your property is about to be at hazard from increased flooding. If you live in a arid region, you had best start thinking about how to store and conserve water. Our celebrated political figures do NOT have a clue about how to deal with this situation so you can bet your butt and all its fittings that they WILL fail to address any of it.
Very few people against recognition of climate change offer little more than their personal wish to state that either climate change is not happening,either it is not provoked by human activity .Must we still oppose the work of the topnotch climatologists and other scientific branches .May I remind you that not only the Nobel Prize committee but also the former winners in all branches of science are behind the winner .Are you seriousle thinking that morons like Pat Robertson,George Bush,Rush LImbaugh are to be taken more serious on the matter when all the evidence they can produce is no more than a few farts in a bottle .The USA is in dire need of an intelligent president .The majority of your own population id fed up with the poor quality of your political rulers.Sigh,one more year to wait .I guess I will be patient .
Tonny,
There is good reason to doubt the claim that global warming is caused by human activity. The actual science pretty much speaks for itself. IPCC did NOT make a good case for this particular political cause. OTOH, we ARE seeing a warming trend and we SHOULD be doing something about adapting to it.
Noharness,exacrly how much of the polar cap must be vanished before you change your mind,perhaps it would be wise to set your own markings .Meanwhile more than a quarter is gona already,the North-Wesr passage is wide open ,freak weather is allready occuring in Africa,the South of Europe like Spain,Portugal,the Baleares ,etc,Floods in Western africa ,very uncommon .I hope you are more clever than your buddy SP4 who fails even to see a connection between climate change and conflicts ,whilst it is already starting under his very nose .
Perhaps if you would care to read a few reports and check the panel of scientists ,including the nobel prize winners for science and the scientists of the foremost notorious universities as opposed to the neocon thinktanks and the current Bush administration sieded by FOX ,you might learn about it .Sounds like you need some more available information
Lets do nothing about islam facism and just blame the USA for doing something , Climate change is normal and the threats from the comingbut hey guess who we will call when we need help...Exactly, The threats posed by the coming ICe age far outweigh the un caused by man myth of global warming. THese folks are just liberals who are in terror denial. There are many options to cool the planet but the next ice age will be colder. We have what now tonni i mean pete,noharness etc 8 years till we are flooded, total idiocy, lets have faith in al gore not god...The messiah of the new religion global warming mythology, good thing they are trying to call it climate change as we get colder.
See what I mean noharness? 2buffoons is a perfect illustration of my case .Not hindered by any knowledge ,or at least failing to bring in any argument to defend his denial ,he offers the typical paranoid ranting that stands for whatever FOX network wants to feed you americans .Now I know you are not the same kind of breed ,you offer logic and motivation .But your solution ,adaptation to the changing climate, is not realistic .I've just finished reading an article on this site stating that state governors now are arguing about water rights as some parts of the USA are facing extreme drought .You great lakes seem to be the point of interest of some ,desperate for water .Russians and Canadians are already bickering over the arctic exploitation rights .Are you not afraid of the machinery of climate change reaching will fuel yet another source of carbon emission,gigantic forest fires that will consume the amazon forests and others ,adding even more to the rising temperature .It is only lack of imagination and knowledge that keeps you from understanding that in a few years even agriculture could disappear in those parts of the USA that are now suffering of drought as well as dwindle in those parts not yet affected .In a country where weapons are more available than common sense 'i distinctly refer to people like 2buffoons and SP4 ),what do you think will happen ?Already 30000 americans are killed every year as the result of violence ?Can you guess how these statistics will evolve under new harsh climate conditions ? At least Gore is very eager to study the subject as opposed to Bush who has no interest in anything except his hobby (terrorism ) .How much more than the warnings of you army generals or economists like Greenbaum do you need to figure out that your president is a disgrace to human intelligence ? If you have childrern and care about their future ,you MUST get information from other ,more reliable sources than FOX,EXXON,the White House .THat is not easy ,as Rupert Murdoch controls your media,he is your local Sylvio Berlusconi .Even the NGC channel is owned by him .It is now offering lots of bullshit programs on terrorism,technology and weapons but nothing much on climate change .And that called National Geographic Channel ?
Big brother already happened in America ,and just as in the book from Orwell,nobody notices .It is very effective...
If your from Belgium, Why do you have so much interest in the USA, Why are you controlled by Msnbc and George Soros? Climate change is normal and currently not caused by man, the sky is falling mentality you have is not going to occur. A Ice age is looming and you refuse to do anything about it. You dont believe in god but you believe in Al Gore. Their are droughts in the USA and their are floods and cold weather as always. The planet just came out of a mini ice age??? You the clintons and Big oil al gore ignored terrorists for the last decade and now look what must be done, G Bush has done a great deal yet fake USa haters not from belgium now have time to focus on global warming myths. If you google your posts over the last year you can see you provide no relevant information or anything of substance. What is Belgium doing about anything. Is abortion torture? Is green marketing actually increasing environmental damage due to increased sale of biofuels? Your messiah Big Oil Al Gore is the greatest hypocrite anyone has seen and has hings are getting desperate because we are beginning to cool and it is harder to sell warming.
Scientists hope new evidence of an ancient rise in sea level from a fresh water flood will tell them how global warming can lead to global cooling.
A global cooling event was caused by global warming? Sounds strange. But that is exactly what scientists say happened.
The Earth was emerging from an ice age 8,200 years ago. Seas were warming and life was heating up. Then quite abruptly and for a relatively short period of time -- about 100 years -- the entire globe chilled down again, by almost 10.8 degrees Fahrenheit (6 Centigrade).
One widely held theory for the chill was the sudden release of a substantial amount of fresh water into the northern Atlantic.
A lake twice the size of the Caspian Sea broke through an ice sheet that contained it over current day Minnesota and Canada, the evidence shows. It poured its fresh water into the salty Atlantic and changed the density of the ocean water.
The oceans work on a sort of conveyor belt method to circulate cold and warm waters, thereby helping control cold, moderate, and warm areas of the globe. (Earth's climate is only partly affected by land temperatures and sunlight. Oceans, which store vast amounts of energy and are slow to warm up and cool down, contribute greatly to climate.)
But what happens if that conveyor belt stops or slows down?
Cold, fresh water sinks, and warm salty water rises. The influx of fresh water into the Hudson Bay from Lake Agassiz provided a barrier against the warm, salty water struggling to move north on the conveyor belt. This effectively shut down the circulation of warm water in the Northern Atlantic.
With warm waters unable to move as far north the world became cooler. The amount of water Lake Agassiz dumped into the ocean is equivalent to how much the seas rose. Knowing these amounts will tell scientists how much fresh water could create this type of climate change nowadays, were a bunch of it to suddenly find its way into the ocean.
The oceans were able to find their balance relatively quickly in that ancient event, and the effects wore off in about a century, but a century of that kind of change today would create widespread havoc.
'There is nothing like Lake Agassiz today, but there are things that could have a comparable effect,' said Torbjorn E. Tornqvist, an geologist at the University of Illinois at Chicago. 'Places like the Greenland ice sheet are very sensitive to warming and a lot of fresh water could enter the northern oceans and mess up circulation.'
Scenarios such as this are exactly why Törnqvist says investigations into past climate are vital to understanding current and future climate.
'What if patterns of precipitation change from global warming? Having more precipitation in one place than in another could freshen ocean waters and play a role in climate cooling,' Tornqvist told LiveScience.
The research of Tornqvist and his students centered on peat deposits in the Gulf of Mexico, where they found samples that were 8,200 years old.
Tornqvist explained that peat is formed between sea level and high tide, and since there is very little influence from tides in the Gulf of Mexico, it is the perfect place to study changes in sea level accurately. The results of the research, which are detailed in the Dec. 11 online version of Geophysical Research Letters, showed a rise in sea level of less than about 4 feet (1.2 meters).
The rise might be even less, according to Tornqvist, and determining exactly how much less will provide a better picture of how fresh water influx affects the ocean conveyor belt and global climate.
With this new data, and previous evidence from ice cores in Greenland that also showed a rise in sea level at the same time, scientists hope they can narrow down how much the seas rose. Then they can calculate how much water flowed into the ocean.
Understanding these past climate changes will give scientists a better sense of what could happen today if similar events occurred.
'Climatologists urgently need this type of information to run their climate models in order to understand the conditions that can produce such an abrupt climate change,' Tornqvist said
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Derrick TyksonOct 12th, 2007 - 15:59:34
Maybe if I made the effort to build up and disseminate greater knowledge about man-made climate change, and to lay the foundations for the measures that are needed to counteract such chang... I'd get a nobel prize too.
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