The IPCC has called for urgent action on climate change [ark], and UN Secretary General Ban calls it the "defining challenge of our age" [ark]. Despite emerging from a consensus driven, political negotiating process; it appears that the "Summary for Policymakers of the Synthesis Report [...]
EARTH APPEAL 2007 YEAR-END FUND-RAISER -- Running the world's largest non-profit environmental portals, and most effective biocentric action network, requires high-end computer servers, massive band-width and modest staffing; please donate individually even as we diversify funding sources
This I know. The Earth's [...]
Following is a full chronology of Ecological Internet's (EI) negotiations with Rainforest Action Network regarding their support of ancient forest logging certified by Forest Stewardship Council (FSC). The conversations commenced upon an open letter sent by EI to RAN on October 4, 2007 entitled "Open Letter of Concern Regarding [...]
Environmental groups embracing certified logging of primary and old-growth forests threaten climate, biodiversity, ecosystems, sustainability and humanity -- stop giving them money
What do Rainforest Action Network (RAN), Greenpeace (GP) and WWF have in common? Each support first time, industrial logging of ancient rainforests certified by the Forest Stewardship [...]
Having recently won the Nobel Peace Prize, the UN's Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) [search] is meeting in Spain Monday to finalize the landmark Fourth Synthesis Report on global warming. Scrutiny and criticism of the IPCC's processes is growing [ark [...]
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The good news is that Ecological Internet (EI) is half way [...]
A new poll finds mllions of people around the world are willing to make personal sacrifices [ark] to help address climate change. Ecological Internet has long noted there is little chance of addressing climate change and related global ecological crises [...]
EARTH APPEAL 2007 YEAR-END FUND-RAISER This is no time to let up on EI's successful biocentric information campaigns, knowledge tools & commentary for climate and rainforest action -- Donate now!
Ecological Internet is THE leading global, hard-hitting activist network providing information retrieval tools [...]
TAKE ACTION! New York City's (NYC) Department of Parks and Recreation is one of America's largest destroyers of rainforests, reports New York based Rainforest Relief. Parks and other NYC and state agencies including the Department of Transportation (DOT) and NYC Transit use [...]
Professor James Lovelock is making similar warnings as those found in this blog lately, that the rate of observable global heating appears to far exceed even the most pessimistic predictions [ark | more\ark] made by the cautious, conservative and at times [...]
It is late, despair high; yet ambitious policies emphasizing sacrifice and preparation can keep the Earth from dying
Excerpt from Earth Meanders personal essay [full]: Human caused ecosystem destruction has progressed well beyond the Earth's carrying capacity -- its ability to provide goods and services, and to regenerate. Global [...]
Major new research from Queensland, Australia "has found a direct link between land-clearing and climate change," [ark] and that land clearing triggers hotter droughts [ark]. Areas throughout southern Queensland cleared of native vegetation were found to have lost [...]
Primates, humankind's closest relatives [ark], are deeply threatened. Nearly a third of all monkeys, apes and other primates are at risk of extinction [ark] due to "rampant habitat destruction, the commercial sale of their meat and the trade in illegal wildlife." [[...]
Across America freshwater supplies are becoming scarce [ark], and water efficiency [search] is needed as never before. Examples are all around us: "An epic drought in Georgia [search] threatens the water supply for millions. Florida doesn't have nearly enough water for its expected population boom. The [...]
I have resisted as long as I could pointing out the fact that Western forest fires are precisely in line with long-standing predictions regarding regional impacts of climate change [ark] expected in West/Southwestern United States. Ecological truth must be spoken often and loudly. Of course there are other [...]
I have resisted as long as I could pointing out the fact that Western forest fires are precisely in line with long-standing predictions regarding regional impacts of climate change [ark] [more\ark] expected in West/Southwestern United States. Ecological [...]
"Humanity is changing Earth's climate so fast and devouring resources so voraciously that it is poised to bequeath a ravaged planet to future generations" [ark] -- so finds the fourth Global Environment Outlook (GEO-4). The report is published by the United [...]
A new study indicates atmospheric CO2 is increasing swiftly [ark] "due to faster economic growth coupled with a halt in carbon intensity reductions [search], in addition to natural sinks [search] removing a smaller proportion of emissions from the air." This is [...]
Excerpts from new Earth Meanders essay: These essays have been silent on proposals for a nuclear energy [search] revival and clean coal [search] carbon sequestration as climate change solutions. I remain deeply uncertain and even ambivalent regarding their desirability and ultimate effectiveness. Nuclear and clean coal energies [...]
For the first time in the nation, a state regulatory agency in Kansas "has turned down a permit for a large coal-fired power plant [ark] solely because of the global warming gases it would emit." [more\[...]
Bottled water is deeply environmentally damaging [search] and purchasing bottled water faces a backlash [ark] from an increasingly ecologically literate public. Water bottles number in the billions -- using petroleum in their construction, and taking up landfill space. Water needs to [...]
In a major victory for Uganda's people, rainforests, environment and ecologically sustainable development aspirations; the Ugandan government has finally scrapped controversial plans [ark | more\ark] to allow Mabira rainforest [search], one of the country's [...]
Given revelations of misconduct in Democratic Republic of Congo's rainforests by the World Bank, the Bank's desire to administer global carbon payments for rainforest protection as a means to address climate change is suspect
TAKE ACTION! The World Bank's independent inspection panel has found serious [...]
Al Gore and the United Nations' Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) have won the Nobel Peace Prize [ark]! It was awarded "for their efforts to build up and disseminate greater knowledge about man-made climate change, and to lay the [...]
A whole range of environmental and social woes have emerged from an ill-informed, incautious rush into biofuels. Humanity's knee jerk reaction has been to seek to replace our dependency upon fossil fuels with a dependency upon living biomass; rather than embracing conservation, efficiency and true renewables. Emerging concerns with biofuels [...]
Even as climate change and poor land use cause deserts to expand around the world [search], Egypt is poised to use limited water supplies to irrigate their deserts [search]. The Egyptian government is moving forward with a US$70 billion plan to [...]
UPDATE: RealClimate is at odds with Flannery's findings that in terms of carbon equivalency we are past 450ppm. The main thrust of my comments stand: we are perilously close if not past dangerous levels of emissions now, and clearly warming is occurring more rapidly [...]
The global campaign to ensure biofuels are not produced at the expense of ancient rainforests appears to be yielding positive results, as these efforts are costing oil palm market share in Europe. Ecological Internet's work has [...]
A leaked report by the World Bank's independent inspection panel has found the World Bank gravely broke its own rules in regard to rainforest policies and projects pursued since 2002 in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC). The World Bank encouraged foreign companies to destructively [...]
Finally some good rainforest news that involves empowering local peoples to benefit from standing ancient rainforests, rather than logging them a bit more carefully. The Wai Wai of Guyana have chosen to benefit from intact, standing rainforests. Their massive region [...]
October 4, 2007
Mr. Michael Brune
Executive Director
Rainforest Action Network
221 Pine Street, 5th Floor
San Francisco, CA 94104 USA
mbrune@ran.org
Re: Open letter of concern regarding RAN's support for ancient forest logging, and notification of impending campaign
Dear Mr. Brune,
I am writing on behalf of Ecological Internet's global ancient forest protection [...]
We are assured by Florida's Governor Crist that the American lifestyle is not incompatible with the need to address climate change [search] and reduce fossil fuel consumption. As paraphrased by Reuters, "Americans do not need to pare back their [...]
Australia, already suffering some of the most evident impacts of climate change anywhere [search] and ravaged by a monumental climate change enhanced drought [search], has this week been further buffeted by scientific predictions regarding climate change [more [...]
Is humanity so resistant to change that we will tamper with the biosphere's workings to construct a "Frankensphere"; rather than reducing population, consumption and emissions?
It is being widely suggested that humanity can "geo-engineer" a global solution to climate change [search]; that is, [...]
The Chinese economic miracle has been based upon misuse of water. and other natural resources. The Chinese water bubble economy is profoundly serious crisis [search] threatening Chinese and global ecology and stability. Stores of freshwater are essentially being mined, and natural waterways treated as waste dumps. This has [...]
TAKE ACTION: Australian media reports that Australia's Federal Minister for Environment and Water Resources, Malcolm Turnbull, will be announcing this week whether the federal government will provide environmental approval for the proposed Tasmanian ancient forest fed pulp mill. As expected the Tasmanian state parliament recently rubber-stamped the project. However, [...]
Climate change is not some future abstraction that can be put off with a bit of piddling about now, it is here and killing now. Australia is undergoing one of its most severe droughts ever [search]; as [...]
I recently noted in a personal Earth Meanders essay that "the population bomb has burst". In recent years there has been a frustrating dearth of discussion or action on the root cause of climate change and nearly every other environmental crises -- [...]
Climate Ark has obtained exclusive video showing President Bush is poised to demonstrate bold climate change leadership [windows video | original version] with dramatic new proposals at this week's Bush sponsored climate talks [search]. It appears the Toxic [...]
The population bomb has burst, the climate and biosphere are in tatters, and tyrannical, militaristic governments rule; yet there remains a path to global ecological sustainability
The Earth is a living organism, which some call Gaia. Humanity is taking apart Gaia's life support systems in an orgy of procreation and consumption. [...]
A new BBC poll finds 2 out of 3 respondents from 21 countries including big polluters such as the U.S., India and China believe "major steps starting very soon" need to be taken to combat global warming. Further, 8 in 10 accept that [...]
Climate Ark and Ecological Internet are pleased to once again support "Step It Up" climate protests, a national event on November 3, 2007 to call for U.S. leadership on global warming. There are a few things we particularly like about [...]
Shockingly, a new scientific study finds that two prominent biofuels release more total greenhouse gases (GHG) [more] than burning comparable amounts of oil and petroleum. This is because their release of nitrous oxide -- a particularly potent GHG [...]
TAKE ACTION: Selective logging diminishes primary and old-growth forests' carbon stores, ecosystems, and biodiversity; and has no place in proposed carbon market payments for rainforest and climate protection
The concept of "avoided deforestation" -- whereby countries are paid to protect forests -- [...]
New Jersey based Friends of the Rainforest and Ecological Internet's campaign to stop the use of ancient rainforest timbers for boardwalk repairs is progressing nicely -- garnering media attention and already changing the city council's vote. An important precedent is being set that ancient rainforest timbers belong in rainforest [...]
Scientists at Britain's MetOffice Hadley Centre have confirmed what many of us suspected. Given continuing delays in real efforts to decrease greenhouse gas emissions, the world will almost certainly exceed two degrees Celsius of warming above pre-industrial levels, the point near where it is generally considered global heating will [...]
Contacts: Rhonda VanWingerden, rhondavw@yahoo.com; Dr. Glen Barry, glenbarry@ecologicalinternet.org
Ocean City, New Jersey, September 10, 2007 -- Friends of the Rainforest (FOR) and Ecological Internet have launched an Internet based international protest campaign to stop Ocean City, NJ from using ipê, an ancient rainforest wood, for boardwalk decking. [...]
That begins by stopping ancient forest logging, ending burning of coal and reducing aviation
Here is excerpt from most recent Earth Meanders personal eco-essay: There are times in human history where obligations to truth, humanity and being take precedent over personal safety, consumption and comfort. Now is one such [...]
TAKE ACTION! The Colombian government is embarking on a massive expansion of oil palms, sugar cane and other monocultures for agrofuels and other markets at the expense of rainforests, biodiverse grasslands and local communities... Palm oil expansion is linked to [...]
Yet again we are warned that climate change and increasing population will cause massive starvation [more | search]. It is appalling how few people are aware that soil, land and even the atmosphere's waste absorption potential are finite resources. [...]
ALERT UPDATE! The Tasmanian state parliament has, as expected, approved the proposed ancient forest fed pulp mill. However, in a positive development, the Australian federal Environment Minister Malcolm Turnbull has announced that he is extending the time available to decide whether to grant federal environmental approval for the project [...]
China's government has belatedly issued rules to its foreign logging ventures, a too little too late response to being identified as the heart of a global trade for lumber from illegal logging [search] that it sells to markets in the United States and Europe. Efforts to date by [...]
China and the U.S. continue to compete for the dubious honor of being the world's worst climate and environmental national villain [search]. As humanity careens towards self-immolation, both the Chinese totalitarian and American imperialist regimes use the international climate change and environmental negotiations to jockey for national advantage rather [...]
An epic environmental disaster of unprecedented proportions is playing itself out in China. Yes, Europe and the United States are historically culpable for introducing and establishing capitalism without reference to sustaining natural capital as the foundation of economic life. Yet China has embraced resource intensive, ecosystem devastating capitalism [...]
TAKE ACTION: Dramatic efforts required to stop the expansion of Tasmanian old-growth forest logging by construction of a massive new pulp mill by Gunns Ltd
Tasmania, Australia's woodchipping giant Gunns Ltd. is poised to be granted fast track approval by the Tasmanian government to build a massive chemical pulp [...]
Nonprofits Conservation Websites Inform More than 35,000 Visitors a Day
CLEVELAND,OH August 24, 2007 Thunderstone Software LLC announced today that Denmark, Wisconsin-based Ecological Internet, Inc. has renewed its license of Thunderstone's Webinator Web Index & Retrieval System to continue offering industry-leading search capabilities on all its environment conservation websites, [...]
And what an equitable, just and ecologically sustainable society will look like
Excerpt from recent Earth Meanders personal eco-essay: The Earth, human society and those species with who we share creation are on a crash course with global ecological collapse characterized by horrific death and destruction. Human populations have exploded [...]
TAKE ACTION! The rise in demand for air travel is one of the most serious environmental threats facing the Earth. Global aviation's negative impact upon global climate and ecology [search] is becoming more evident and known. Aviation accounts for about 2% [...]
TAKE ACTION! Ocean City, New Jersey is a seaside resort that has a 2.5 mile wooden boardwalk fronting the Atlantic Ocean... Citizens are campaigning to stop the city from using FSC certified ipê timbers for its [...]
PRESS RELEASE
For immediate release 13th August 2007
Joint Press Release by Biofuelwatch, Ecological Internet and Rainforest Rescue
Millions of farm birds could be left without enough food and breeding sites next spring if plans to scrap Europes agricultural land set-aside targets for next year go ahead, warn environmental groups. [...]
A climate change protest camp [more | news search] has been set up outside Heathrow airport in the UK, and thousands of protesters are expected at the "Camp for Climate Action" which will highlight the link between aviation [...]
Arctic ice cover has shrunk faster this summer than in any year since reliable satellite imagery of the polar cap became available in 1979. A record has been set for the lowest recorded northern hemisphere sea ice area, and we still have five [...]
Excerpt from recent personal Earth Meanders environmental essay: Hate to say it, but I told you so. Global ecological collapse is upon us and the human family is entering a Hobbesian struggle for survival of the Earth and all her species including humans. Even mainstream leaders tell us we [...]
I am saddened, shocked and dismayed at humanity's continued climate change denial [search]. How sure of cataclysmic climate change impacts must we be before we fundamentally change our way of being individually and socially? The UN reports that the world suffered an unprecedented string [...]
TAKE ACTION! Europe's bird and insect populations, as well as heavily stressed terrestrial ecosystems, face decimation as the European Commissioner for Agriculture plans to scrap land set-asides for the 2008 season. This unexpected move is a response to rising grain prices [...]
President Bush has announced he will host talks with government leaders on climate change [news search] some three days after the United Nations holds crucial climate talks in September. Leading economic powers and carbon emitters from the industrialized and developing world [more | more2] have been [...]
It is reported that plans to build a massive South American natural gas pipeline through the Amazon rainforest from the Caribbean to Brazil have "cooled off". This was the most atrocious of many inappropriate industrial developments planned for the Amazon [search] which Ecological Internet has publicized and protested [...]
It is very encouraging to see a high-profile U.S. politician -- former US Democratic presidential candidate Senator John Kerry -- proposing serious legislation to address illegal logging [search] in Asia, Africa and Latin America. Destruction and diminishment of [...]
E-Protest calls for Greenpeace and WWF to withdraw from Forest Stewardship Council and work to end ancient forest logging
An ancient rainforest logging operation in Peru recently certified under the Forest Stewardship Council (FSC) scheme by Rainforest Alliance SmartWood has been implicated in massive cross-border illegal logging. Workers from the Peruvian [...]
TAKE ACTION!: Support for "certified" ancient rainforest logging crumbles further due to string of inappropriate and illegal certifications, most recently in Peru; and as Norway rejects FSC and all primary rainforest logging certification schemes.
An ancient rainforest logging operation in Peru recently certified by Rainforest Alliance SmartWood under the Forest [...]
As Britain reels from rainfall of unprecedented intensity [news search], a new scientific study found that heavier rainfall is caused by global warming [more | more2]. The study in the journal Nature found that "more intense rainstorms across parts of the northern [...]
Excerpts from recent Earth Meanders personal essay: Humanity's obsession with celebrity, status and wealth is a major component of the disease killing the Earth and her species including humans. I am concerned with the direction Al Gore, as the self-appointed climate movement leader, is [...]
TAKE ACTION: Let Ugandan Government know rainforests and their ecological services including water, climate and biodiversity are more important than sugar which can be grown elsewhere
Ugandan President Yoweri Museveni continues to pursue legally dubious plans to destroy large areas of the Mabira Forest Reserve [search], Uganda's [...]
This blog regularly bashes President Bush and his political counterparts for criminally negligent obstruction of vital climate change policy responses. Bush reneged on first term campaign promises to regulate carbon dioxide [search], withdrew from Kyoto, and has just generally impeded crucial international cooperative measures. Frankly, regardless of good deeds [...]
No rainforest is protected for long. And in the case of Uganda's Mabira forest reserve [search] -- a vital ecosystem near the capital -- the President has pulled a massive bait and switch. There were strong indications a couple months ago that plans to clear a large part of [...]
Insists can 'protect' ancient forests & climate while actively promoting their first time 'certified' logging
By Ecological Internet's Climate Ark and Rainforest Portal
[www.climateark.org] and [www.rainforestportal.org]
July 6, 2007
Greenpeace International has confirmed astonishing allegations by Ecological Internet that they actively promote [...]
Must admit I have been a skeptic regarding the need or likely effectiveness of the Live Earth concerts. Awareness of global warming is not lacking, rigorous policy actions now in response are. So I was pleasantly surprised to see the Live Earth's 7-point [...]
TAKE ACTION. There is no denying the fact that Greenpeace supports Forest Stewardship Council (FSC) efforts to certify logging [search] of primary and old-growth forests as environmentally acceptable. It is a matter of public record. FSC's international board is chaired [...]
Here is an excerpt and link to the full text of my most recent Earth Meanders personal essay:
Ecology is the study of how organisms interact with each other and their physical environment. Sounds deceptively simple and non-threatening to the status quo, but I contend that growing ecological knowledge [...]
A new study by United Nations University suggests climate change is making desertification [more] "the greatest environmental challenge of our times". They report that some 50 million people may be displaced within the next 10 years as a result of desertification [search], and [...]
Climate change impacts both ecologically and socially appear to be going from to 60 mph in 2 seconds. Dramatic news regarding ice melt in Greenland [more | search] as this huge ball of ice is starting to become lubricated from intra-ice melt water flows. [...]
The Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) has become the latest tropical rainforest rich, yet materially poor, nation to embrace payments for "avoided deforestation". The DRC joins Ecuador [more | more2] and Papua New Guinea (PNG) in [...]
Per-capita an individual American still far out-emits all
According to the Netherlands Environmental Assessment Agency, China's emissions of carbon dioxide have exceeded those of the United States. The report released this week said that China's emissions for the year surpassed those of the U.S. by 8% [more]. Congratulations China [...]
Here are excerpts from my personal "Earth Meanders" environmental essays:
Cellulosic ethanol another chimerical climate "solution" that furthers biological homogenization and ecological collapse
Humanity's epitaph may well read "Much Potential, but Cut and Burnt Themselves to Death". Nearly every environmental crisis can be traced to burning [...]
In yet another indication of the abrupt and serious warming occurring in the Arctic, researchers have found that Arctic spring has moved a month earlier in only a decade [more]. "Rising temperatures are causing snow to melt sooner than before, extending the summer period [...]
FINAL MID-YEAR 2006 FUND-RAISING APPEAL
$5,000 more must be raised to reach EI's goal of $60,000
By Dr. Glen Barry, President, Ecological Internet, Inc.
Donate online or by check now at [www.ecoearth.info]
Ecological Internet has nearly reached its mid-year fund-raising goal. We need those that made pledges but have not paid [...]
In a last minute effort to hand out forests to cronies before his term ends, the Bush administration has proposed eliminating protections from 1.5 million acres from Northwest forests considered critical to the survival of the northern spotted owl [search]. This will reopen the 1990s battle between timber [...]
While trumpeting yet more rhetoric on climate change absent action goals and timetables as a victory, the G8 leaders have failed to reach agreement on immediate emission targets to keep global mean temperature rise below 2 degrees compared to pre-industrial levels. The G8 meeting [news search] failed to [...]
I heard on the radio yesterday that water is the next carbon. The expansion of Coca-Cola's water conservation efforts would allegedly be an example. I guess this means its use and misuse effects human societies ability to exist, but anyone could have told you that the water crisis is [...]
A user pointed out this popular media account of a recent Science journal article that finds "the world is now on track to experience more catastrophic damages from climate change than in the worst-case scenario forecast by international experts". The research found that between 2000 [...]
Yet another stunning victory for Ecological Internet's (EI) Earth Action Network and partners, as Amerindian Villages in Guyana where Barama/Samling has been logging illegally have thrown Samling out of those communities. Or depending upon how you spin it, Samling withdrew after being told in no uncertain terms that the residents [...]
Uganda's government has scrapped plans to convert thousands of hectares of rainforest into a palm oil plantation. The government said it could not license Kenyan company Bidco to plant palm for biofuels in what is now a protected forest on Bugala island in Lake Victoria. Days earlier, the Ugandan government [...]
A user pointed out this popular media account of a recent Science journal article that finds "the world is now on track to experience more catastrophic damages from climate change than in the worst-case scenario forecast by international experts". The research found that between 2000 [...]
TAKE ACTION: WWF is the world's largest ancient forest logging apologist; actively promoting questionable "certified, sustainable" logging in Guyana, Russia and -- and may be the World's greatest threat facing endangered ancient forests
For many years the international conservation group WWF has supported Forest Stewardship Council (FSC) certification [...]
Whoo, whoo a major rainforest victory! Uganda's cabinet has suspended a proposal to give away part of the Mabira rainforest near its capital and on the shore of Lake Victoria [more | search]. The significance of the protection remaining on this important Ugandan rainforest from sugar cane [...]
Funding Appeal #2 - GIFT THE EARTH 2007
* $18,730 raised, 53 donors, 31% to goal $41,270 to go
Please Donate Now -- Your Donation is DOUBLED, matched 100% -- so in actuality just need $20,000 in small donations to keep free thinking bright green eco-thought and solutions going
No [...]
Here is an excerpt and link to my recent personal Earth Meanders essay:
The Earth is entering a new phase in its human caused decline. We are witnessing the advance edge of bioregional and continental scale ecological collapse -- the final stage of environmental decline before global ecological collapse. [...]
As a forest conservation activist for 18 years, who later also became a climate change advocate for the past 9 years, it is so gratifying to see recent widespread acceptance of what has become Ecological Internet's central message -- large, connected ancient primary and old-growth forests are a requirement [...]
Support Ecological Internet's Highly Successful Biocentric Campaigns, Knowledge Tools and Commentary
Funding Appeal #1 - What EI and You Have Done Recently
[www.climateark.org]
By Dr. Glen Barry, President, Ecological Internet
It is the time of year (every mid-May and November) when we ask network participants to "Gift the Earth" by supporting [...]
TAKE ACTION: Given the science and evident abrupt climate changes, Kyoto successor agreement must be negotiated now that includes mandatory emissions reductions for all major emitting economies
More than 1,000 government delegates are now meeting in Bonn to try to break gridlock in international climate change negotiations amid [...]
