A taskforce of eight leading British engineering, utility and transport companies is predicting the world will reach peak oil in three to five years. The taskforce looked at three possible scenarios: a collapse in production, a decline, or a plateauing of production once peak oil is reached.

Taskforce chairman, ex-Greenpeace scientist and chair of SolarCentury, Jeremy Leggett, says even Shell Oil agrees with the third option, although the company is more optimistic about when the plateau will be reached. Continue reading ‘BP Looks to Oil Sands as Peak Oil Beckons’

More bad news on the climate. A study by British researchers has found that the Arctic sea ice thickness “plummeted” last winter, thinning by as much as half a metre in some regions.

The team from University College London argue that the results provided the first definitive proof that the overall volume of Arctic ice was decreasing. “The ice thickness was fairly constant for the five winters before this, but it plummeted in the winter after the 2007 minimum,” lead author Katherine Giles told the BBC News. Continue reading ‘As Arctic Ice “Plummets,” JFK Speaks on Climate…’

So its free-fall on the stock-markets again. This morning the London market plunged by over 5 per cent as the chaos in the world’s financial markets continued.

All the expectations are that Wall Street will dive this afternoon. What is spooking the markets is the thought of a painful and long-lasting depression. But in the middle of this turmoil the oil giants BP and Shell are set to announce record profits. Continue reading ‘Meanwhile Big Oil Makes $10 Million an Hour…’

Just as European leaders are faltering in their efforts to tackle climate change, a new survey of the science by WWF has found that the climate is changing much faster, stronger and sooner than even the IPCC (Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change) forecast.

According to WWF, research on climate change and its impacts published since the latest assessment report from the IPCC is revealing that global warming is accelerating at times far beyond IPCC 2007 forecasts. Continue reading ‘Climate Change Happening Faster, Stronger, Sooner’

Far from the financial crisis acting as a spring board for a green revolution, several EU leaders produced a predictable political response yesterday by trying to undermine ambitious CO2 targets.

President Sarkozy of France, who holds the EU presidency, led the way in appealing to all 27 countries to stick to their target to cut Europe’s CO2 emissions by 20 per cent by 2020.  Continue reading ‘EU CO2 Targets in “Disarray”’