You are right...just as corrupt toadie governments supporting the US suck up our aid to them for their political and military elites. Monte, such corruption crosses most ideological and cultural/political boundaries.

We can neither buy "democracy" nor altruistic governments through bribery or through conquest.

Afghanistan has a population of over 26 million people (according to 2000 census). At $18M in aid per year, that comes out less than 75 cents per person for the year . I don't know what kind of improvements you can realistically put in place on such a low figure.

A point about the talking heads. That's all they do. Talk. They will say anything in spite of the facts. I hold to the theory that truth is a circle. Each side will describe part of it without showing you the whole picture. Until you see ALL of the facts, it is difficult to come to an accurate conclusion.

And by the way, IMHO All governments are corrupt to a degree. It is part of human nature. Remember the saying "All power corrupts; absolute power corrupts absolutely."

And by the way, IMHO All governments are corrupt to a degree. It is part of human nature. Remember the saying "All power corrupts; absolute power corrupts absolutely."

You will get no argument here. I am no fan of government control, regulation, or intervention in almost everything, especially something that cannot be proven emphatically at this time like the cause of global warming, and in particular when executed by a worldwide government like the UN or by a treaty organization created by the Kyoto Treaty.

I expect my government, that I support with my efforts and taxes, to first protect me above all else and I find that impossible when a single government controls everything. Governments are especially inept at introspection and the bigger they are the more that is so. The Iraq Oil for Food scandel is just such an example. The UN has resisted every attempt by the US to have it internally address the very apparent violations by countries and individuals within the UN. In other words, single world organizations are the epitomy of the absolute power that corrupts absolutely.

I find it ironic that liberals are quick to express their right to freely protest the actions of our government in their own behest, but abhor that our elected government would express that same right on our behalf on a much bigger global stage like the UN or the scope of the Kyoto Treaty. Apparently, as individuals we should be able to march to whatever liberal beat we choose, but the US government must goose step with the rest of the socialistic world or be branded a renegade.

I am not sure how the talking heads arrived at their numbers, but I recall much larger numbers involving hundreds of millions not tens of millions. Perhaps the aid numbers you quote do not include the monies sent for opium eradiation. I also don't consider the large amounts given to Israel, Egypt, Pakistan, and the other 'stans' as primarily aid, but rather as military aid destined for providing protection for the US indirectly. If you subtract the military contribution out of the huge amounts given those allies you would have little actual aid given to them that is meant to help their poor. In the case of Afghanistan, the money was given to the Taliban to help them eradicate opium fields and provide those poor farmers with replacement sources of income. It has become painfully apparent since that time that the Taliban and Al Queda made other uses of at least some portion of that money.

"In the case of Afghanistan, the money was given to the Taliban to help them eradicate opium fields and provide those poor farmers with replacement sources of income."

How did it happen that under Western tutelage, Afghanistan is now, if not the world leader, 2nd in opium production? The growers and producers made an amazing come back in the past couple of years.

Yeah, you'd think that Air America had expanded service beyond SE Asia. Maybe our Special Forces have reconstituted self-help and self-funding projects in those 'Stans typically part of the opium trade? Pay back on Old Europe? Competition to undermine our enemies in the War on Drugs? Generating subrosa funds and contacts in the War on Terror?

Talking heads are often either full of bull nuggets or are propaganda voices for special interests. We long ago passed the time where there was an honest distinction between reporting and propagandizing.

Monte, your points about the Kyoto Treaty are noted. However, some of your information regarding Afghanistan are way off the mark. BION, it was the Taliban that initially cut off the supply of opium. We did not provide any funds for the erradication of opium either directly or indirectly.

I provided with a report of aid provided to Afghanistan. Here is one for Columbia in which we provide funds for the erradication of drugs. Over 90% of the funds that are supplied to Columbia are for the erradication of narcotics. Contrast that to Afghanistan where we provided no funds for the erradication of narcotics where nearly 100% of the funds were used for food.

Although the Taliban tried to erradicate the drug trade in Afghanistan, it is still pretty certain that they did still profit from it. Again, this comes from the governments being corrupt theory. Money buys influence in government whether you are in this country or Iraq or Afghanistan or Cuba. The problem with the erradication program is that you have to find a substitute for the farmers to grow in order for them to make a living. Citrus, soy and other crops have been used before as substitutes, but the lure of money in poor 3rd and 4th world countries is tough to overcome. Bribing local officials is considered part of the cost of doing business.

Monte, I am not knocking your stance on the Kyoto Treaty. I agree with you on many points. 40% of the pollution from this country is eminated from government. Until we as citizens fundementally change the way our governments operate, private industries will be the ones who suffer. However, in world affairs, things just don't magically happen. There are fundemental reasons why things happen. What you hear from the so called pundits on TV is the current situation. Very little analysis is done on the causes of those reasons. Some of the roots of those problems go back hundreds or even thousands of years. Understanding those reasons goes a long way into fixing the problems in the long run. Remember the Serbian conflict? Band-ade solutions are like sticking a finger to stop a dam from leaking. No flood now, but what happens next?

Learning history is easy; learning its lessons seems almost impossibly difficult

---Nicholas Bentley

Here is a link that might be useful: Columbia Report

AzDesertRat-
mucho trouble trying to connect to the columbia report. I got it once and then tried a hyper link within on a miscellaneous monies spent and I kept getting disconnected from the server. And again and agian trying to reconnect to just the link. It is difficult to discern anything without getting a better look at that report- however just the quick view I had I noticed that monies allocated for food was zero until 1990 and then a small token gesture compared to the tonage for other selected areas such as the drugs. Aw...I cant remember now and its gone.:(

Darn, that looked really interesting, I'll keep trying again tomorrow.

G4, I just tried and wasn't able to reach it either. The site must be down or under repair.

However, funny we should be talking about the Kyoto Treaty. From today's Wall Street Journal

Climate Control
As Planet Heats Up,
Scientists Plot
New Technologies
Appetite for Oil, Coal Drives
Search for 'Painless Cure'
To Global-Warming Issue
Storing Carbon Inside a Rock

By ANTONIO REGALADO and JEFFREY BALL
Staff Reporters of THE WALL STREET JOURNAL
October 22, 2004; Page A1

In a warehouse on the outskirts of Tucson, Ariz., engineers are building a prototype machine they believe could help stave off global warming. The scheme, hatched by Columbia University physicist Klaus Lackner, would remove carbon dioxide directly from the air -- and store it in rocks or under the earth.

Dr. Lackner says it will take decades before his idea for a world-wide network of wind-powered machines, each able to remove several hundred pounds of carbon dioxide from the air a day, could become reality. For now, the plan is more than a little quirky. The company behind it, grandly named Global Research Technologies, has three employees and operates on a $5 million line of credit from a wealthy donor.

The wind-machine is a massive long shot. But a growing chorus of scientists, environmentalists and large corporations now agree that to seriously address the world's global-warming problem, a major technological shift is what the planet needs.

If Russia ratifies the Kyoto Protocol -- its lower house of parliament is expected to approve it today -- it will trigger the implementation of the treaty for most industrialized nations. The treaty is meant to slow the rapidly accelerating release into the atmosphere of so-called greenhouse gases, chiefly carbon dioxide. CO 2, produced by the burning of fossil fuels such as oil and coal, forms an atmospheric layer that reflects the sun's heat back toward Earth, heating the planet in a process known as the greenhouse effect, or global warming.

......

You need a subscription to view the article. I am able to email the full article to anyone who requests it. If you want the full article, email me and leave me your email address and I will have the article sent to you. I think it is worth reading

Here is a link that might be useful: Kyoto Article --WSJ (subscription required)

Oh yeah this hag again.....

I have some questions WHO WROTE the Kyoto treaty?

Why must one stand still and even go backwards while others can pump out pollution

When we start trusting any other country to make our internal policies we are done, would you let me tell you how to live.

If you can't kill your enemy with bullets then kill him with regulations and guilt,, Oh those poor folks in _______(pick one) can't live unless the big fat USA stop being themselves.

All you world socialist can kiss my butt,

Who wrote the Kyoto Treaty?

Er, actually, I think we did.

President Clinton, I believe, initiated the treaty and signed it. It only needed ratification when Bush came into office...

But since the Bush family gets their money from oil, and since oil alone is responsible for 140+ TONS of the CO2 being spewed into the atmosphere over every square mile of the earth's surface every year...

Well, of course Bush wasn't going to have any part of environmental legislation that might diminish his family's wealth.

(And by the way, if you're wondering, Monte also works in the oil industry.)

Love,

Claudia

This discussion reminded me of an analysis of the Kyoto protocol published in Foreign Affairs magazine and recently resurrected. The article is long but very thorough and fair to the US's position and Bush's categoric rejection of the Protocol.

--------------------------------------------------
What Makes Greenhouse Sense?
Thomas C. Schelling
From Foreign Affairs, May/June 2002

Summary: The Kyoto Protocol need not be a partisan issue. Climate change needs to be addressed, but the 1997 pact was never going to pass the Senate. By abandoning it, Bush at least avoided hypocrisy. It might take a century to reach a consensus on solving the greenhouse gas problem, but that is no excuse for wasting time getting started.

Here is a link that might be useful: What Makes Greenhouse Sense?

Good post, Marshall. It is a relief to get somewhat away from the blame game some Bush bashers are so eager to play.

This whole issue is complex. Hundreds of millions of Americans are a part of solutions and blame. Ex President Clinton and especially Al Gore are in an "easy" position whereas they could critize without paying any price for the resulting results. Remember NAFTA? Cursed if you do and cursed if you don't.

But since the Bush family gets their money from oil, and since oil alone is responsible for 140+ TONS of the CO2 being spewed into the atmosphere over every square mile of the earth's surface every year...

Area of the surface of the Earth:

A = 4*PI*r^2 where r = Radius of Earth = 4,000 miles

A = 201,061,929 square miles of Earth surface.

Weight of Earth's atmoshere over each square mile:

W = P*A where P = air pressure at sea level = 14.7 psi, and A = square inches per square mile = 4,014,489,600 square inches.

W = 14.7 psi * 4,014,489,600 sq in = 59,012,997,120 lb = 29,506,498 ton over each square mile of Earth's surface

Percentage of Earth's atmosphere occupied by the quoted 140 ton of CO2 from oil:

%CO2 from Oil = 100 * 29,506,498 ton/140 ton = 0.00047%

That is less than 1/2 of 1/1000 of one percent of the atmosphere! It could also be expressed as less than 1/2 of 1/1000 of 1/100 of the atmosphere! Aren't statistics wonderful. The exact same fact expressed as well over one hundred tons by you is much more impressive, isn't it, but in reality it is such a miniscule amount compared to the atmosphere itself that propogandists wouldn't dare express it in those terms.

The total typical CO2 composition of the atmosphere is 0.035% of all the gases combined, so the oil generated fraction is only 1.36% of all the CO2 present. Doesn't look very significant anymore, does it?

Oh my, 140 tons per square mile!! I'm not impressed, but others might be who are gullible enough to be shocked with the spin.

Are you sure that all the Bush family gets all their money from oil? They have no other significant income?

As I recall, the Kyoto Protocols were drafted at a conference in Kyoto, Japan by representatives from several countries, most of them socialist and third world, hence the name Kyoto, not by the USA or certainly not solely by former President Clinton. He may have signed the Kyoto Treaty, in Rio de Janeiro, I believe, but I am not even sure on that. However, without approval from the US Senate, my signature would have carried just as much authority so big whoopee for former President Clinton.

Well, of course Bush wasn't going to have any part of environmental legislation that might diminish his family's wealth.

Does that test also apply to former Vice President Gore, a self-proclaimed environmental protector, who's family also had strong connections with the oil and gas industry, or is it only convenient criticism?

Monte the "mole"

Go git him, Monte!

Nice statistical review. But not all atmospheric components are equal; the bulk is inert and some of those other tiny components are very "reactive" in the energy budget of the biosphere.

BTW, the Kyoto process began in 1992 and was never ratified by the US, even with the signature of Gore (as I recall) as the US head rep at the final meeting in Kyoto. Maybe it was Bubba but whatever, it was a memorandum of understanding. Required was passage in both legislative branches of participating countries for the protocols to become a formal treaty. Fat chance in the US and Clinton knew it,thus, he never sent up the protocol for a yea or nay. The Protocol would a disaster for the US economy, at least in the short run (given the timelines and goals.)

Monte, I'm not gonna check all your figures, but there's an error in your first line: The area of the earth is approximately 50 million square miles, not 200 million square miles.

And since the total original percentage of CO2 in the atmosphere before the industrial revolution was very tiny -- about 270 parts per million, or 27 thousandths of a percent -- that 2 thousandths of a percent you calculated (the 2 is your 1/2, times 4 to correct your mistake in the earth's surface area) is obviously significant in the long term.

The CO2 content of the atmosphere is now 360 parts per million. That's an increase of 33%, most of which has occurred in just the last 30 years.

Moreover, within the last three years scientists have noted a disturbing phenomenon: the levels of atmospheric CO2 are no longer rising at a steady rate, but are jumping higher every year by more than double the rate measured four years ago. This has scientists both puzzled and worried, since the increase doesn't correspond to any significant increase in our consumption of fossil fuels.

There is a possibility that we are seeing the first signs of a "runaway" effect which is occurring because warming oceans are releasing additional CO2, which in turn causes the atmosphere to retain more heat, which warms the oceans further...

*sigh*

Love,

Claudia

Claudia,

How do they get the CO2 to accumulate over just the dry land portion of the Earth? Your 50,000,000 square miles is amazing close to the 25% fraction of the Earth's surface covered by dry land. I rechecked the equation for the surface area of a sphere and I am sorry to report that it is still correct. The diameter of the Earth is very close to 8,000 miles, so the radius of 4,000 miles is also correct. Is it more convenient to stack the CO2 over land to make the numbers look more impressive?

As far as the increase in CO2, I am only addressing the portion due to oil, which is all you addressed and where your post implied the majority of the blame. Oil and natural gas generate only a fraction of the CO2 that is created by man. Forest, cropland, and prairie fires started by man and burning coal generate much of the total androgenic CO2.

This has scientists both puzzled and worried, since the increase doesn't correspond to any significant increase in our consumption of fossil fuels.

I take that to mean that even the scientists are unable to pin the blame entirely on the burning of fossil fuels and that they admit the entire process is very complex and still beyond their level of knowledge.

It certainly is a good thing that our court systems don't rely on the precautionary principle, as many environmentalist do, to decide if an individual is innocent or guilty. In your court, all people would be guilty just to make sure we don't miss a chance to stop a crime, just as you are willing to indict fossil fuels and industrialized countries as the sole cause of global warming, even though the more knowledgable expert witnesses for the prosecution, the scientists, are even uncertain about the facts.

Without a doubt, CO2 is a greenhouse gas, but it is just one of several in the atmosphere. Of those gases, some are far more effective than CO2 as greenhouse gases or far more prevalent like water vapor, yet the attention is always directed to CO2. I believe this is because it has become obvious to the losers of the world that they might be able to extort aid from the winners, via tools like the Kyoto Treaty, by convincing enough gullible people that the winners are the cause of the loser's plight, not the lack of initiative and will on their part or corruption within their own countries.

That's what I get for trusting my memory on figures I haven't looked at in over six months...

Must be getting old.

You are right, Monte, the surface area of the earth (from references, not calculations) is 196,935,000 sq miles.

The 2 thousandths of a percent figure did seem high, because that's 20 parts per million, about six times the current measured yearly rise in atmospheric CO2 -- but I thought that trees and other plants must be converting the rest back to oxygen. Apparently I'm an optimist.

Your figure of 1/2000 of a percent, or 5 parts per million, means that nearly all of the CO2 from burning petroleum products is now accumulating in the atmosphere, not being converted through photosynthesis.

There's an old Chinese curse: May you live in interesting times.

This is going to be an interesting decade.

Love,

Claudia

I double checked--the radius of the earth is 3937 miles, 4000 is close enough.

The Kyoto treaty has several inherent flaws which is why I disagree the treaty. The biggest flaw is that while it addresses the production (or amount) of greenhouse gases emitted (only by the 'developed world', mind you), it does nothing to address the consumption of these gases. Thousands of square miles of forests are cut down each year. Especially troubling is the fact that these forests are major users of CO2, but the countries such as Brazil, India, Indonesia, and China are excluded from the Kyoto Treaty. On top of that, the most popular method of deforestation is using 'slash and burn', which releases the the CO2 back into the atmosphere.

The aforemention countries have some of the largest populations and the largest growing economies in the world. The rate of deforestation will increase, while at the same time, the appetite for fossil fuels will skyrocket. A double-whammy.

The rate of global warming has been increasing partially due to some of the world's icecaps melting and releasing the frozen CO2 back into the atmosphere, compiled with the increase in fossil fuels, and the loss of some of our forests along with some unknowns.

A global treaty has to address both production and consumption of greenhouse gases. Until that is done, we will continue see global temperatures increase. I do not blame any specific industry for the increase in CO2 levels (all are copable to some level), but the use of all fossil fuels and conventional fuels coupled with the deforestation of our especially tropical forests are the roots of the problems and should be addressed in any future treaties.

I do consider myself an environmentalist, but a pragmatic environmentalist. I generally look for a complete solution to the problem, not a band ade. We do need to voluntarily cut down emissions of greenhouse gases and also find ways of reducing the CO2 in the atmosphere. Perhaps if every man, woman and child on earth planted a tree a day for the next few decades, we may be better off. I posted part of an article of the use of machines to remove CO2 from the atmosphere and dump it in the earth. If it is a provable technology in the future, that should be part of the solution, not the cure.

My thoughts anyway

"President Clinton, I believe, initiated the treaty and signed it." ..Who took money from the RED Chinesee WHo had yes sir are you fat (yaser airfat)(sp) visit the white house more than MOnica.. Who left this nation vunerable to terrorist....

Liberalism is a mental disorder....it causes one to think right is wrong, black is white....and if we only would be nice to everyone that we would be loved.......

Suck it up, F_er. Five more days, then you might just have a whole new list of villians to rant over. I gather that it is better to mean to everyone so as not to be exposed to loving. Hoot!

Nice does not = fair.

Fair is not always nice.

The Kyoto treaty is like me and my down home boys asking someone like you (M) to take 2/3rds of your brain out so we can converse on the same plain, be equals, what progress is there in that? Wouldn't it be better if we caught up?

You betcha, Bubba! Except the US has more "brain" than all continents except Europe; in other words, the US account for more co2 anthropogenic emissions than the combined output of everyone except Europe, or so I've been reading and hearing. (One of Nader's sound bits too, yesterday.)

You seem to be putting me in with the pro-Kyoto party. Shame on you, Bubba.

I have never known where to put you M....

After some further developments I think the Ruskis are up to something...

Of course they are...they have vast areas of forests and an underdeveloped economy relying heavily on coal and old industrial structures. They also sit on a lot of natural gas and some petroleum. So they can play several games, including trading emission credits and claim lots of sequestering in their forests.

Speaking of the devil:

------------------------------------------------

Putin signs Kyoto Protocol completing ratification

MOSCOW - President Vladimir Putin has signed a bill confirming Russia's ratification of the Kyoto Protocol, clearing the way for the global climate pact to take force early next year, the Kremlin said Friday.

Both houses of parliament last month ratified the protocol, which aims to stem global warming by reducing greenhouse-gas emissions. Putin signed the bill on Thursday, the Kremlin said.

Without Russia's support, the pact - which has been rejected by the United States and Australia - could not have come into effect. It needed endorsement by 55 industrialized nations accounting for at least 55 percent of global greenhouse gas emissions in 1990.

After years of hesitation, Putin pledged in May to speed up approval in return for the European Union's support of Russia's bid to join the World Trade Organization. The 1997 pact would take effect 90 days after Russia notified the United Nations of its ratification.

The pact's approval followed fierce debates among Russian officials. Russia's foes of Kyoto, led by Putin's economic adviser Andrei Illarionov, warned that the pact would stymie the nation's economic growth. Kyoto backers rejected that claim, saying even after a five-year recovery, the post-Soviet economic meltdown has left emissions some 30 percent below the baseline.

http://www.theunionleader.com/articles_showa.html?article=46646

..." the US account for more co2 anthropogenic emissions than the combined output of everyone except Europe, or so I've been reading and hearing. (One of Nader's sound bits too, yesterday.) ..."

Trying to keep up guys!
Marshall, curious I did a google search and found this on 'anthropogenic emissions'. Since I found it I thought I would share it, too.

Here is a link that might be useful: what Marshal was referencing to

good catch, ggg.

Have you folks noticed a major output of articles on arctic warming/global warming? See the latest issues of Scientific American and National Geographic for user-friendly articles. I catching a bit of panic among some scientists and policy wonks over the rate at which global warming is proceeding as measured by such parameters as ice melt timing and range and changes in tundra ecology.

Ok everyone, here is another view. I get a newsletter from these guys. Not everything I agree with, but nevertheless, an interesting view.

More Gas about Global Warming

by Patrick J. Michaels

With gas prices running around $2 per gallon, our economy is performing a wonderful natural experiment on global warming policy.

Proponents of the infamous Kyoto Protocol on global warming argue that this is about the price that is required in order to reduce our emissions of carbon dioxide to 7 percent below where they were in 1990, as mandated by the treaty. This price, they argue, will change behavior. Mainly, people will buy more economical cars.

It's impossible to meet Kyoto's mandates, which start in 2008. There's simply not enough time to ratchet down emissions so quickly. In response, Sens. John McCain, Arizona Republican, and Joe Lieberman, Connecticut Democrat, have authored slightly less stringent legislation, dubbed "Kyoto Lite," which sets the emissions targets and timetables back a few years.

Well, thanks to the wonders of a tight gas supply (the last oil refinery was built in the United States decades ago) and increasing demand (developing China, for example), in the last year we have seen the price rise advocated by the supporters of Kyoto and Kyoto Lite in order to substantially reduce gasoline use.

They were wrong. People are increasing their purchases of gas-hogs and buying relatively fewer of the new gas-electric hybrids.

....

Here is a link that might be useful: Rest of Article

I have seen a few articles about the Arctic impact of global warming in the past few weeks. Yesterday I read this one about the results of a suvey by the Arctic Climate Impact Assessment which says the Arctic is warming at twice the rate of the rest of the planet. They predict polar bears will meet their demise due to loss of habitat as will many other arctic species including native people.

The report isn't all gloom & doom. For example, more productive fisheries will be open, easier access to oil & gas reserves and more farmland could result. (Anthropocentrism at its worst, imo).

Here is a link that might be useful: fast arctic thaw

Terra-forming aspirations perhaps, too. Opening a year-round Northwest Passage to shipping would also be a boon to Europe and East Asia.

You sure called this one Marshall. A follow up to yesterday's story ...

**Energy companies would find it easier to transport oil and gas because the warmer temperatures would open sea routes.

"By the end of this century, the length of the navigation season...along the Northern Sea route is projected to increase to about 120 days from the current 20-30 days," the report said.

However, a longer shipping season will increase the risk of oil spills, the report warned.**

Isn't it ironic that developing fossil fuels, implicated in global warming, would be given this much consideration?

Here is a link that might be useful: on thin ice

Europeans long sought a Northwest Passage to Cathay and the Indies, following a more direct Great Circle routing. Spain and Portugal pretty much controlled the South Sea (southern Atlantic), especially once the New World was "discovered" and divided by Papal Bull into Portugese and Spanish segments. It's likely that the sea-faring peoples of northwestern Europe long knew of North America and the seas lying to the east and north of that part of the world, probably believing these areas to be islands like those lying east of the Baltic and North Seas (e.g. British Isles, Iceland, Greenland, and many smaller groupings.)

In more modern times the Czarist and Soviet regimes long sought warm-water ports and the means to force passage in the northern seas to counter the control of the more southern waters by maritime powers.

Could this cancel Arctic warming?

Here is a link that might be useful: the globe and mail

I say hoooooorrrrray for GW. It is better to be a leader than a follower. These types of stands are some of the reasons why the people of the United States gave him four mor years.

Now that's a coherent posting...are you meaning tree stands, hat stands, hand stands...?

A stand advocating doing nothing to address fossil fuel dependency and alternative energy needs. That's not leading - that's bringing up the rear.

How did it happen that under Western tutelage, Afghanistan is now, if not the world leader, 2nd in opium production? The growers and producers made an amazing come back in the past couple of years.

Easy. There is no oil, so the best way to make profit is opium. USA are very good at teaching how to make money. And the Afghanis are good pupils. You remember Oliver North, do you?

"Experimental radar provides 3-D forest view
An advanced radar technique to image forests in three dimensions has undergone an ESA-backed test campaign in Indonesia. A future space-based version could measure global biomass to sharpen the accuracy of climate change models"
Experimental radar provides 3-D forest view

1 February 2005
An advanced radar technique to image forests in three dimensions has undergone an ESA-backed test campaign in Indonesia. A future space-based version could measure global biomass to sharpen the accuracy of climate change models.
The campaign, called the Second Indonesian Airborne Radar Experiment (INDREX-II), involved flying a test instrument called the Experimental Synthetic Aperture Radar (E-SAR), built by the German Aerospace Centre (DLR), in a Dornier-228 aircraft over eight test sites around Kalimantan on the island of Borneo.
The sites varied in character from pristine rainforest to coastal mangroves and oil palm and rubber plantations. They were also measured in detail on the ground to provide 'ground truth' for the radar results, around 200 Gigabytes of raw data having been gathered during three weeks of flights.


DLR's Dornier-228
"We had already carried out tests in European forests," explained INDREX-II team member Dirk Hoekman of the University of Wageningen. "We were able to extract the difference between the tree canopy and the forest floor and from knowing tree height, we can use specially-developed algorithms to estimate forest biomass with a reasonable degree of certainty.

"What we needed to know was if the same was true of much denser tropical forests. So with ESA's support and the co-operation of the Indonesian Ministry of Forestry we carried out this aerial survey over test sites that were also measured from the ground, in order to gather a sizeable tropical radar database. There is still a lot of analysis to be done, but early findings look promising."



Obtaining forest height
Hoekman added that the instrument also showed high sensitivity to flooded, burnt and logged forest areas, while Irena Hansek of DLR recounted that individual tall trees standing above the surrounding canopy could be detected.

An improved global picture of forests  which cover about 27% of the Earth's total land surface  would have multiple uses. Woodland is an economic resource that is also central to the environment: as a haven for biodiversity, preventing soil erosion and flooding and influencing local climate.



Validation of the Mawas test site, Kalimantan
Forests are also the most significant onshore stores of carbon, helping to absorb excess carbon dioxide that would otherwise increase global warming. So the Kyoto Protocol, about to come into force, allows nations with forested areas to set them against carbon emission. Accurate quantification of total forest biomass would provide verification for Kyoto and also shrink current uncertainties within climate change models.

The campaign took place during last November and December. Details of INDREX-II were presented during a workshop in ESA's European Space Research Institute (ESRIN). Some 135 researchers from 27 countries attended the POLINSAR 2005 event, named for a relatively new radar technology called synthetic aperture radar (SAR) polarimetric interferometry (Pol-InSAR).

Participants in the weeklong workshop heard that other potential applications of the technology included monitoring of urban areas, ice fields and agriculture.



Radar interferometry to produce Digital Elevation Models
What is Pol-InSAR?
Radar has come a long way since its initial development for range and direction finding in the run-up to World War Two. Today satellites such as ESA's Envisat routinely scan the Earth with radar signals, building up highly detailed surface images - even through clouds and local darkness  out of reflected radar backscatter.

In addition to simply imaging a site, two radar images of the same location acquired from close to the same position in space can be combined together using a technique called SAR interferometry (InSAR). Working on the same basis as stereoscopic vision, a dual image InSAR dual-image combinations throw up colourful interference pattern 'fringes' that resemble contour lines on the map.



Etna eruption seen from SAR
These fringes contain topographic height information that can be used to generate highly accurate digital elevation models (DEMs). InSAR can also be applied to detecting millimetre-scale ground movement taking place between acquisitions, such as ground subsidence or tectonic motion.

Extra information can also be gathered on a site based on the fact that radar signals can have different polarisations; just as visible light does  as demonstrated by the high amount of glare screened out with polarized sunglasses.



Colour composite of airborne radar images
Envisat's Advanced Synthetic Aperture Radar (ASAR) is a dual-polarisation instrument, meaning that it can transmit and receive in either Horizontal (H) or Vertical (V) polarisations. In Alternating Polarisation (AP) mode it transmits in the same way, but can receive back radar pulses in both H and V polarisations. Combinations of HH/VV HH/HV or VV/VH polarisation pairs are possible.

Depending on the physical and chemical properties of the surface, the responses from these different combinations of polarisation pairs can vary considerably, for example enabling the differentiation of separate crop species in the same field, or telling sea ice from open water.



SAR Polarimetry
The new generation of airborne radar sensors go one better than ASAR because they include full quad-polarisation capability: this means their signal can be retrieved simultaneously in H and V polarisations, so that by sending alternating H and V pulses a full spread of combinations can be obtained, generating more information-rich imagery.

These two techniques of InSAR and polarimetry have both been around a long time. Pol-InSAR is the combination of these two processes  the performance of interferometry from multi-polarised radar images.

"Using Pol-InSAR brings us an extra dimension in the imaging of forests," said Scott Hensley of California's Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL). "The interferometry part gives us the height data, while the polarisation part provides information on depth and also the orientation of objects relative to the instrument. This can then be processed to form a complete three-dimensional picture."



Transporting E-SAR
In the case of forests, Pol-InSAR typically relies on longer L- or P- band wavelengths upon in preference to the shorter C-band wavelengths used by the radar satellites currently in orbit - these code letters being a legacy from radar's wartime origins.

Envisat's C-band radar has a wavelength of 5.8 centimetres, which is too short to pierce through a dense forest canopy. Instead Pol-InSAR measurements are made using L- and P-band wavelengths, which range between around 15 to 100 cms  closer to the dimensions of the trees researchers are interested in.

The E-SAR sensor used during INDREX-II has multi-polarisation X-, C- L- and P-band wavelengths available. Hensley's team has been surveying tropical forests in Costa Rica with the AIRSAR airborne instrument, similarly with multi-polarisation C-, L- and P-band wavelengths.



INDREX-II
Putting Pol-InSAR into space?
Pol-InSAR is a relatively young field, albeit one that has come on greatly since the first POLINSAR workshop at ESRIN back in January 2003. That meeting concluded with recommendations that Pol-InSAR be tested on further forest types, which led to the INDREX-II campaign.

This time discussions were centred on the prospect of the current generation of airborne sensors eventually making it into orbit aboard to a Pol-InSAR-capable satellite.

There are several new radar missions due to enter service - including Germany's TerraSAR-X, Japan's Advanced Land Observing Satellite (ALOS), the Italian-French CosmoSkyMed and Canada's Radarsat-2 Â but while they offer researchers an increased range of radar wavelengths and polarization combinations, none are optimised for Pol-InSAR.

A major hindrance is that a single satellite can take time to revisit the same area  35 days in the case of Envisat. In just a few days between images, vegetation growth in forested areas can be so great to prevent InSAR coherence: the two scenes have changed too much for interferometry to work.

One simple but costly solution that was raised was to launch constellations of satellites to minimise revisit times. Another suggestion was to forego satellites in favour of high-altitude unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) platforms over areas of continuing interest.

Isn't it wonderful how successful we are becoming in measuring the components of problems but cannot agree on (mostly political) solutions?

Another spur was reported in the journal New Scientist:

Antarctic ice sheet is an 'awakened giant'
13:38 02 February 2005
NewScientist.com news service
Jenny Hogan, Exeter

The massive west Antarctic ice sheet, previously assumed to be stable, is starting to collapse, scientists warned on Tuesday.

Antarctica contains more than 90% of the world's ice, and the loss of any significant part of it would cause a substantial sea level rise. Scientists used to view Antarctica as a "slumbering giant", said Chris Rapley, from the British Antarctic Survey, but now he sees it as an "awakened giant".

[[[snip]

If the ice on the peninsula melts entirely it will raise global sea levels by 0.3 metres, and the west Antarctic ice sheet contains enough water to contribute metres more. The last report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, published in 2001, said that collapse of this ice sheet was unlikely during the 21st century. That may now need to be reassessed, Rapley warned.

[[[snip]]]

Melting glaciers would perhaps add to sea level, but ice sheets that are mostly submerged would not add as much as first thought.

Today is the Day....

A Brief History of Climate Change
By The Associated Press

posted: 16 February 2005
06:04 am ET

Today the Kyoto Protocol takes effect in an effort by 140 countries to reign in emissions of carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases. The world's biggest emitter, the United States, is not participating, so the result is expected to be limited, reducing by about one-tenth a projected 30 percent rise in worldwide emissions between 1990 and 2010.

Key events in the story of climate change:

1750: Before Industrial Revolution, atmosphere holds 280 parts per million of heat-trapping carbon dioxide, later research determines.

1898: Swedish scientist Svante Ahrrenius warns carbon dioxide from coal and oil burning could warm the planet.
1955: U.S. scientist Charles Keeling finds atmospheric carbon dioxide has risen to 315 parts per million.

1988: NASA scientist James Hansen tells U.S. Congress global warming "is already happening now.''

1992: Climate treaty sets voluntary goals to lower carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gas emissions.

1995: U.N.-organized scientific panel says evidence suggests man-made emissions are affecting climate.

1997: Treaty parties approve Kyoto Protocol mandating emission cuts by industrial nations, an approach rejected in advance by U.S. Senate.

1998: Warmest year globally since record-keeping began in mid-19th Century.

2001: U.N. scientific panel concludes most warming likely due to man-made emissions; President Bush renounces Kyoto Protocol.

2004: Carbon dioxide reaches record 379 parts per million; Russia gives crucial ratification to Kyoto Protocol.

2005: Kyoto Protocol takes effect on Feb. 16.

A related story :

Toasty 2005? Year Could Become Warmest on Record
By LiveScience Staff

posted: 10 February 2005
04:00 pm ET

Last year was the fourth warmest since the late 1800s and climate conditions in place could cause 2005 to be the warmest, NASA scientists said this week.

The analysis of 2004 data by NASA confirms figures for 2004 released in December by the World Meteorological Organization. The numbers are based measuring stations around the globe, with each day's high and low being averaged. Temperatures are recorded on land and at sea, in part with satellite data.

The 2004 average temperature at Earth's surface around the world was 0.86 Fahrenheit (0.48 degrees Celsius) above the average temperature from 1951 to 1980, NASA scientists said.

The warmest four years since 1890s, when reliable record-keeping began:

1998
2002
2003
2004
"There has been a strong warming trend over the past 30 years, a trend that has been shown to be due primarily to increasing greenhouse gases in the atmosphere," said James Hansen of NASA's Goddard Institute for Space Studies.

In any year, temperatures around the world can be nudged up or down by short-term factors like volcanic eruptions or El Ninos, when warm water spreads over much of the tropical Pacific Ocean. The large spike in global temperature in 1998 was associated with one of the strongest El Ninos of recent centuries, the scientists say, and a weak El Nino contributed to the unusually high 2002-2003 global temperatures.

Manmade pollutants play a role, too, most scientists agree. Hansen said Earth's surface now absorbs more of the Sun's energy than gets reflected back to space.

That extra energy, together with the weak El Nino, is expected to make 2005 warmer than the years of 2003 and 2004 and perhaps even warmer than 1998, which had stood out as far hotter than any year in the preceding century, according to a NASA statement.

Hansen and his colleagues also note that global warming is now significant enough that it is beginning to affect seasons, making them warmer than before on a more consistent basis.

Some scientists argue that the human contribution to global warming has been insignificant.

The 2004 average temperature at Earth's surface around the world was 0.86 Fahrenheit (0.48 degrees Celsius) above the average temperature from 1951 to 1980, NASA scientists said.

That said, I noticed in the paper this morning that my heating degrees since July 1 are a little more than 10% under mean.

Marshall may say that weather is not climate, but eventually it is.

No, weather is never climate; maybe one can say weather might come to reflect local or microclimate. Weather is but a small element of the complex of gaseous and energy global budgets.

The Kyoto Treaty will ultimately accelerate the rate of global warming due to greenhouse gases, assuming the warming is due to man's contribution, by encouraging the unlimited industrialization of third world nations containing almost 2/3rd of the world's population during their grace periods. Of particular concern are China, India, and Brazil. This will happen, with or without the participation of the USA, despite the rediculous claims of the Kyoto Treaty's proponents. The USA's voluntary greenhouse gas reductions will probably outpace the worldwide per capita average reduction over the same time frame, if any, that occurs due to this faulty treaty.

As I have stated over and over, as has our Congress and all the Presidents since the treaty's creation, this is essentially an economic blackmail treaty, not an environmental treaty.

I am surprised that you make the claim that the Kyoto Protocol is an environmental treaty, even environmental blackmail ploy.

The issue seems to be: do we hold the vast majority of population hostage to slow economic development while allowing the small industrialized populations to continue accelerated growth (relative and absolute)? Once co2/carbon flux is under control, then the poor regions can be allowed some limited industrial growth at comfortable levels of incremental increase of carbon emissions.

You lost me.

For all those who love to bash the USA for not getting in on the great Kyoto Treaty farce, here is something for you to consider. China, with 1.3 billion people, is now the number one consumer in the world, and as everyone knows is exempt from the farce.

Almost sounds like China is ready to collaspe under it's own waste? Kyoto treaty aside I'm glad we had the smarts to establish the EPA back when we had the smarts to do so.

Back to the original topic of Russia signing on to Kyoto. This article discusses how factories in one Russian town are taking advantage of the financial benefits of the Treaty to modernize and with an eye toward the future, eventually sell credits. Their empahasis is economic rather than environmental. I agree with Marshall's comment, questioning how one can view Kyoto as an environmental act.

Sad to say my country Australia , does not believe in it