Australia removes climate 'crisis' from Pacific islands draft declaration

Scott Morrison at the Pacific Islands
Forum in Funafuti, Tuvalu. Australia
 has been working to soften language
 on coal and the climate emergency
in its draft declaration.

Australia has succeeded in removing all but one reference to coal on the draft communique of the Pacific Islands Forum, and is expected to be able to get that removed on Thursday as Pacific leaders including Scott Morrison meet to debate the text.

Sources familiar with the negotiations on the communique, which is used for regional policy making, told Guardian Australia that Australia has been working hard during negotiations to soften the language on climate change and has succeeded in many mentions.

Read the story from The Guardian by Kate Lyons - “Australia removes climate 'crisis' from Pacific islands draft declaration.”

The rise of the tinkerers: how DIY activists are making their own way

When Brisbane City Council started removing bus shelters to 'clean up' the city, reportedly "at the request of local businesses", homeless people lost dry places to sleep, public transport users could no longer sit shielded from the weather, and Michael Candy was mobilised.

Michael Candy and a fellow "Dirty Worker"
install the Bitter Bench in William Street,
Brisbane, at the former site of a bus shelter. 

A prolific robotics tinkerer, Candy invented the Bitter Bench, a motorised seat designed "as a retaliation" for "the city's most vulnerable being targeted”.

On a bright January morning in 2012, he and some friends donned high-vis gear, positioned traffic cones in Brisbane's William Street, and set his bench into concrete.

It was rigged to tip people off as they sat, triggering "a proximity-activated audio system" that played recorded testimonials from the homeless people who had been displaced. A sign told pedestrians this was "mayor Campbell Newman's penance to the homeless”.

Read Katherine Wilson’s story in The Sydney Morning Herald - “The rise of the tinkerers: how DIY activists are making their own way.”

World has missed chance to avoid dangerous global warming – unless we start geo-engineering the planet

The world has missed the chance to avoid dangerous global warming – unless we start geo-engineering the atmosphere by removing greenhouse gases, according to new research.

Planet Earth - do we resort to geo-engineering?

Scientists used computer models to assess what needs to be done to restrict global warming to between 1.5 and 2 degrees Celsius, the limits adopted by the Paris Agreement on climate change.

They found that the world was likely to overshoot this temperature but could bring it back down to 1.2C by the end of this century by using techniques to remove carbon dioxide from the air.

Giant biological machines could be created to do this by growing vegetation which absorbs carbon, then burning the resulting biomass in power stations that capture the emissions.

Read Ian Johnston’s story in the Independent - “World has missed chance to avoid dangerous global warming – unless we start geo-engineering the planet.”