And the winner is....
Al Gore and the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change ( IPCC) have jointly won the Nobel Peace Prize for 2007 -
“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”

Al GoreEx vice president Gore, whose documentary “An Inconvenient Truth” helped to publicise the man-made causes of Climate change, is donating all of the proceeds of the award to the Alliance for Climate Protection.

Mr. Rajendra Pachauri, the Chairman of the IPCC, paid tribute to the scientific community, whom he called “the winners of this award” and announced, “This is an honour that goes to all the scientists and authors who have contributed to the work of the IPCC, which alone has resulted in enormous prestige for this organization and the remarkable effectiveness of the message that it contains".Despite the win, the US Government has stated it will not change its environmental policy nor ratify the Kyoto agreement to limit carbon emissions.
There is also ongoing speculation as to whether Gore will run for election. Time will tell. However the award is an international achievement, and the planet is clearly winning.Image from An Inconvenient Truth and IPCC websites

The third part of the IPCC report is released. Climate change can be stopped is the good news. To let come this true action is needed. However this call to mind might not mark the tipping point in international engagement against climate change. There is another thing in the presentation of the report on May 4th in Bangkok that has gotten policy makers' and politicians' attention: Growth of economy and wealth of the people do not have to correspond with the use of energy. This means that rising energy use is not neccessary for economies to increase; interesting news for growing economies in China, India and elsewhere. The scientists checked this by observing the world economies from the seventies of the 20th century on until today and compared it with the energy consumption.
The upper line marks the growth of wealth, the one beneath, the blue line the use of energyUntil 2050 CO2 emissions would have to diminuished by 50-85 percent to prevent the climate collaps we all are afraid off. To achieve this from 2015 on emissions must not increase anymore. By doing so the temperature raise would stop with 2° Celsius by 2100. The costs say the scientists are about 0,12% of the world's economic performance. With part III the IPCC report closes. After a few years of working hard the scientists have achieved a lot: they fought for a global media attention and created awarness for the alarming facts and figures regarding climate change. We spoke with one of the scientists who is a co-author of the latest report, Dr. Niklas Hoehne, from Ecofys about the work in the world's most esteemed scientist circle.

Niklas Hoehne Why were you asked to contribute to the IPCC assessment report?Scientists were nominated by the governments of UN member nations to contribute to the IPCC report. The criterion was that these scientists have written publications relevant to the IPCC assessment topics. I personally wrote my dissertation on the political framework of the Kyoto protocol.Could you help us understand what took place in the long period needed to prepare the IPCC report?The process did indeed require several years. First of all the governments of the UN member nations voted on a table of contents, which determined the chapters of the three main sections of the IPCC report. That was in October 2004. After that around 150 authors met for the first time in Jena as the working group for the third section. By the way, a total of six Germans took part in working group III.How did it go from there?There were four meetings. After each meeting a draft was put together that was again reviewed. The first review was informal, the second review was carried out by experts, and the third review by the respective governments. The fourth review is now taking place the beginning of May in Bangkok. At this juncture a 23-page summary is being produced from the 1000-page report, whereby each thought will be discussed sentence-by-sentence. How did you perceive the clash that ensued the beginning of April regarding the wording and phrasing of the 23-page summary of the report’s second section?The report is a consensus document. It is not just the publication of scientists, but is “intergovernmental”. That means that it contains political viewpoints to a certain degree.Is the report therefore advice for politicians, a guide for political action?No, it is not that. For each chapter we scientists compiled and evaluated all relevant literature. We did not invent anything new. Our job was to compile all pertinent information and fit all the results together to form an overall picture.No political realism then?We don’t hand out advice to the politicians of our day. Of course we have integrated literature about political developments in our report. These are developments that took place in the past; their evaluation doesn’t substantiate guidelines for political activity in the present. One accusation aimed at the working groups was that you deliberately stoke up fears through your report. I can’t comprehend this viewpoint at all. A great many experts have worked on this document, and there were four phases of review. That means that at the end there were no more extreme positions. If at the end of such a process as this one there is a clear message, then this message is significant and very momentous. It is not blown up out of proportion – on the contrary - if anything, it has been toned down.What will be stated in section III that is being reviewed for the final time in Bangkok on May 4th? What chances do we still have?Section III is a summary of the political measures that have to be seized on the domestic and international levels in order to stop climate change. Included in the report is what we have to do to reduce emissions and till what time that must happen. Without foreclosing the details, there are possibilities of arresting climate change to a measure that many experts would classify as unperilous.

How so?We can reach that only if we implement immediately all possibilities now at our disposal on all levels!Does that mean no more new coal-fired power plants?We do not give, as I already said, advice for concrete technical options. We do not say: no lignite, only renewable energies or something like that. We present all existing options. There are numerous options that can be implemented to reduce or terminate the production of greenhouse gas emission.In that case, what must be done concretely?On the personal level, each consumer has to make his or her purchase decisions in such a way that he does not pollute the environment or cause a lot of emission. On the national level, the federal government must implement the ambitious measures it has announced and not allow those measures to be watered down in the discussion with interest groups. On the international level, a new global climate agreement must be adopted.

Is the catalogue of countermeasures realistic?This question is left without comment in the assessment report. I personally think that the catalogue of countermeasures is theoretically possible. Whether it is politically enforceable, that is a difficult question. The report describes the situation in all clarity and illustrates the possible remedies. It reveals that change of direction is not as expensive as many fear.
Interview: Alex Goerlach
Foto and grafic: Spiegel online

As rumour goes it must have been quite a fight about phrases and points before the third part of the IPCC (Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change) report was ready to get released today. Titled “Mitigation of Climate Change” this part deals with exactly that: how to mitigate or even avoid the worst consequences of climate change based on our knowledge today. The sigh couldn’t have been greater around the world reflected in today’s headlines. The German magazine “Der Spiegel” for example reads: “Saving the world will only cost the thousandth part of the global gross domestic product”.
It implies that most people thought it would be worse. After the first two reports stating the crude facts about the scientific basis of climate change and its impacts, things didn’t look good for us. We thought we would have to pay for the part we played in causing the crises.Based on the newest report, it seems like money isn’t our problem. In fact our problem is time. Till 2050, CO2 emissions have to be minimized by 50 to 85 percent. Consequences for our nearer future are that we have to stop CO2 emissions from going up till 2015. The report includes a list of things which can be done to reach the goal. But the most crucial part hides behind the numbers: the whole world has to work together and move in one direction. More than questionable thinking of the efforts undertaken by China to water down this part of the report as well as all the industrial nations still having to find a common strategy how to deal with climate change. One thing is for sure yet: the costs for mitigation are relatively manageable right now – but will get higher with every second we hesitate or stuck in negotiations.

Once again Rajendra Pachauri will be in the focus of world public. The scientist from India who is the chairman of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change will present on May 4th the third and last part of the groups report on climate change.It is hardly known that a group of scientists - 450 to be precisely- has attracted so much attention from politicians and journalists around the globe.
Pachauri during a panel sessionBangkok will see another run on the scientists. The third part of the report the group is presenting will face solutions for climate change whose reasons and impacts have been the content of the first two parts of the panel's research. It is entitled "Mitigation of Climate Change".The "impact-part", better the 23 pages long summary out of 1000, which is a wrap up for politicians has caused a lot of troubles and formed strange allies such as the US together with China and Saudi-Arabia. Those nations negotiated until dawn to diminuish the sound of the scientist's warnings; many times a "probably" was demanded. USA and China fear losses for their economies. The second part has been disclosed on Friday April 6th which was Good Friday this year in the Christian Calendar. A good feeling however neither the report nor the behaviour of certain delegations could create.Pachauri knows the trouble the report of the IPCC creates and he wants it this way. Otherwise it might not show any impact as reports of scientists usually do. Pachauri is the Director General of Tata Energy Research Institute). This institute originally works and provides professional support in the areas of energy, environment, forestry, biotechnology, and the conservation of natural resources to government departments, institutions, and corporate organizations. Pachauri has taken charge as Chairman of IPCC from April 2002 onwards.

Mitigation is in our hands
Mitigation now must not be done half-hearted Pachauri emphazises wherever he goes at the moment. Things that have to be done - the report will name a lot of them - might cost something in the beginning. However and this is what we know since the Stern-Report on the Economic costs of climate change it will be a minimum price compared what we have to pay if there will be no mitigation at all today.

Friday 6th of April 2006 will not be recalled as a "Good Friday", though the day in this year is entitled with this name for Christians remember the death of Jesus.Being Christian or not, we all would have wished to have gotten better, good, news from the IPCC. We were prepared by the first part of the report in January though - and learn now that the impacts of global warming might be even bigger than we thought.To the 2500 scientists who signed the report droughts, hurricanes, floods, economical losses will be amongst the impacts of global warming. The 23 pages long summary of their 1400 pages report for politicians was hard discussed before the release: Newspapers reported that the United States tried to reach for the cancelation of the passage that says that the US will see hard ecological damages due to climate change. China that - because of being labeled as a development country - has not to sign the Kyoto protocol announced after international protest to change their environmental politics by the year 2013.In May the IPCC will release the third and last part of the report. It will contain descriptions for solutions to moderate the impacts of climate change. On 17th april the United Nations Security Council will debate for the first time about climate change in history. On the agenda of the G8 summit in June in Heiligendamm climate change is set as well."Good Friday" in German language is called "Kar-Friday", "Kar" - signifing "mourning". This describes the mood of many who heard about the IPCCreport last Friday.In English or German - or basically in any other language - we all hope to see a little of Easter in May when we will be told that we cn stop climate change to a certain extend if we just get it started now!