Adapting agriculture to climate change : preparing Australian agriculture, forestry and fisheries for the future [book]

Editors: Chris Stokes & Mark Howden

"Moves beyond describing the causes and consequences of climate change to providing options for people to work towards adaptation action. Climate change implications and adaptation options are given for the key Australian primary industries of horticulture, forestry, grains, rice, sugarcane, cotton, viticulture, broadacre grazing, intensive livestock industries, marine fisheries, and aquaculture and water resources. Case studies demonstrate the options for each industry." - cover.
Call number: 632.10994 ADA 2010
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Projected Costs of Generating Electricity 2010 [online]

Authors: Nuclear Energy Agency / International Energy Agency

"Presents the latest data available for a wide variety of fuels and technologies, including coal and gas (with and without carbon capture), nuclear, hydro, onshore and offshore wind, biomass, solar, wave and tidal as well as combined heat and power (CHP). It provides levelised costs of electricity (LCOE) per MWh for almost 200 plants, based on data covering 21 countries (including four major non-OECD countries), and several industrial companies and organisations. For the first time, the report contains an extensive sensitivity analysis of the impact of variations in key parameters such as discount rates, fuel prices and carbon costs on LCOE. Additional issues affecting power generation choices are also examined." - abstract.

Communicating climate change: history, challenges, process and future directions (journal article)
by Susanne C. Moser
from Wiley Interdisciplinary Reviews: Climate Change, Vol 1 No 1 pp 31-53
"Since anthropogenic climate change first emerged on the public agenda in the midto-late 1980s, public communication of climate change and—more recently—the question of how to communicate it most effectively have witnessed a steep rise. This paper synthesizes what is known, presumed, and still unknown about how to effectively communicate this problem."

A new look at carbon offsets (journal article)
By Marcel Brinkman
from McKinsey Quarterly Feb 2010
"Carbon markets will continue to play a role in pricing—and limiting—emissions, but the opportunity in developing markets may be less promising than once expected."
Contact the Library for a copy of this article.

Requiem for a species : why we resist the truth about climate change [book]

Author: Clive Hamilton
Sometimes facing up to the truth is just too hard. There have been any number of urgent scientific reports in recent years emphasising just how dire the future looks and how little time we have left to act. But around the world only a few have truly faced up to the facts about global warming.This book is about why we have ignored those warnings, so that now it is too late. It is a book about the frailties of the human species: our strange obsessions, our hubris, and our penchant for avoiding the facts. It is the story of a battle within us between the forces that should have caused us to protect the earth, like our capacity to reason and our connection to nature, and our greed, materialism and alienation from nature, which, in the end, have won out.

Call number: 363.73874 REQ 2010
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THE COMPLEX POLITICS OF CLIMATE CHANGE (journal article)
By Andrew Norton
from Policy Vol. 25 Issue 4 Summer 2009/2010, pp. 22-26
"The public's aspirations for climate change policy are not matched by their willingness to act."

Mapping climate change knowledge: an editorial essay (journal article)
by Mike Hulme
from Wiley Interdisciplinary Reviews: Climate Change, Vol. 1, No. 1, pp. 1-8
"The relationship between climate and society has always been dynamic. Physical climates
have played important roles in the biological and social evolution of human beings and fashioned the biogeophysical systems which provide the goods and services from which human economic and cultural life emerges. Similarly, humans have imposed themselves upon climate, both in the ways in which climates have been imagined, studied, and articulated in thought and language and in the growing influences that human actions have had on the physical operations of climate.
This relationship between climate and society has been characterized throughout history and prehistory by both creativity and fear. ...
Examples of contestation emphasise the need for stronger interactions between the traditional climate disciplines of meteorology, oceanography, ecology, and economics on the one hand, and the social sciences and the interpretative humanities on the other. The perspectives and contributions of these latter disciplines are now probably more important than the climate sciences to ongoing public and policy debates."

State of the World 2010 : Transforming Cultures from Consumerism to Sustainability [journal]

Author: Worldwatch Institute

"It will take a sustained, long-term effort to redirect the traditions, social movements and institutions that shape consumer cultures towards becoming cultures of sustainability. These institutions include schools, the media, businesses and governments. Bringing about a cultural shift that makes living sustainably as 'natural' as a consumer lifestyle is today will not only address urgent crises like climate change, it could also tackle other symptoms like extreme income inequity, obesity and social isolation that are not typically seen as environmental problems.

State of the World 2010 paints a picture of what this sustainability culture could look like, and how we can - and already are - making the shift." - from publisher.

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Find it at: State of the World : a Worldwatch Institute report on progress towards a sustainable society, in the journal collection.

Doing business in a new climate : a guide to measuring, reducing and offsetting greenhouse gas emissions [book]

Authors: Paul Lingl, Deborah Carlson and the David Suzuki Foundation

Around the world, a growing number of businesses are taking steps to reduce their climate impact by managing their greenhouse gas emissions. At the same time, these businesses are discovering that effective greenhouse gas management can enhance their brands, motivate employees, increase operational efficiencies, and save money.

This guide walks readers through the key activities that make up a greenhouse gas management program, including measuring, reducing, and offsetting emissions and developing a communications strategy around the program. Throughout, case studies of over fifty leading businesses from around the world highlight innovation and solutions to common challenges, and further resources are provided for each section.

Find it at: 658.4083 DOI 2010 or
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Cities, Towns and Renewable Energy : Yes In My Front Yard [online]

Authors: International Energy Agency & OECD

Local governments have the power to influence the energy choices of their citizens. Many cities and towns have already encouraged energy efficiency measures. Even so, as demand for energy services continues to grow, the energy infrastructure that every city and town depends on will need to be expanded, upgraded or replaced. This provides the opportunity to increase the deployment of renewable energy technologies and decentralised energy systems, and hence gain the multi-benefits of increased energy security, climate change mitigation and sustainable development, but also the social benefits of reduced air pollution, such as improved health and employment. ...

The goals of this report are to inspire city stakeholders by showing how renewable energy systems can benefit citizens and businesses, assist national governments to better appreciate the role that local municipalities might play in meeting national and international objectives, and help accelerate the necessary transition to a sustainable energy future.

Population growth and Australia's 2020 greenhouse gas emission commitments (journal article)
by Bob Birrell and Ernest Healy
from People and Place Vol 17 No 4 pp.18-28
"The Australian Government has stated an unconditional commitment to reduce greenhouse gas emissions by five per cent on year 2000 levels by 2020. However, in the absence of new abatement measures, Treasury-led modelling indicates that Australia's emissions will grow from 553 milion tonnes in 2000 to 774 million tonnes in 2020. This article disaggregates the Treasury modelling in order to estimate the contribution of population expansion to this growth. It shows that 83 per cent of the forecast will be attributable to population growth. This article concludes that it is very unlikely we will achieve the target by 2020 in the absence of attention to the population growth factor."

Greening our built environment : costs, benefits, and strategies [book]

Authors: Greg Kats, Principal author ; Jon Braman and Michael James

“Green” buildings—buildings that use fewer resources to build and to sustain—are commonly thought to be too expensive to attract builders and buyers. But are they? The answer to this question has enormous consequences, since residential and commercial buildings together account for nearly 50% of American energy consumption—including at least 75% of electricity usage—according to recent government statistics.

This eye-opening book reports the results of a large-scale study based on extensive financial and technical analyses of more than 150 green buildings in the U.S. and ten other countries. It provides detailed findings on the costs and financial benefits of building green. According to the study, green buildings cost roughly 2% more to build than conventional buildings—far less than previously assumed—and provide a wide range of financial, health and social benefits. In addition, green buildings reduce energy use by an average of 33%, resulting in significant cost savings.

Find it at: 720.47 GRE 2009 or, Click here to request a copy through your library.

How Carbon Offsets Will Change The World As We Know It (article)
by Mark Schapiro
from New Matilda, January 22 2010
"With a preserve designed in large part to safeguard stored carbon, a new set of imperatives comes into play. Turning trees into carbon credits requires knowing how to extrapolate from carbon measurements to determine a forest's potential as a carbon sink. It requires knowing as precisely as possible how many trees there are and of what size — which means minimising the unpredictable activities of human beings, as small scale as they might be. "

Rising Tigers, Sleeping Giant (journal article)
from Issues in Science & Technology Vol. 26 Issue 2 Winter 2010, pp. 81-84
"The article focuses on the competition regarding clean energy markets of Asia and the U.S. It speculates that Asian countries China, Japan and South Korea will outperform the U.S. for clean energy market dominance due to its big government investments as a support for research and innovation, domestic markets, manufacturing capability, and related infrastructures. It projects that the U.S. will be out-invested by those Asian countries with three-to-one margin in 2015 albeit the passing of the former's climate and energy legislation bill. It notes that the Chinese government provides free land, research and development (R&D) money, and loans with lower interest rates for clean technology firms than the U.S. Several graphs are also presented depicting the energy-related data of the countries."

Changing Climate, More Damaging Weather (journal article)
By Robert Repetto and Robert Easton
from Issues in Science & Technology Vol. 26 Issue 2 Winter 2010, pp. 67-74
"The article discusses the impact of changing climate on infrastructure and public safety investments in the U.S. It notes that the failure to acknowledge the effects of climate change results to dangerously inaccurate guidance for significant infrastructure and public safety investments. It suggests to speed up research programs which associate climate change and extreme weather events on the embodiment of its estimates. It states that underestimation of future weather probabilities can lead to unreliable decisions regarding investment and programs that make communities and infrastructure resist extreme weather. It explains that climatic change impact will heighten the possibilities that New York will be hit by more severe hurricanes in which infrastructure investors will be affected."

Can Technology Really Save Us from Climate Change? (journal article)
By Alex Rau, Rob Toker and Joanne Howard
from Harvard Business Review Vol 88 Iss 1 Jan 2010, pp. 21-23
"The article presents the authors' views on the outlook for the development of technological innovations and entrepreneurial industries that can reverse global warming. The discussion focuses on Moore's Law in the context of how long it takes to develop and implement energy-related innovations. The efficient use of capital investment and government regulations for clean technology and cost-benefit analysis for projections of emission rates and abatements in new energy technologies such as wind energy and solar photovoltaics are discussed."

Land & Water Australia, 1990-2009 : research reports and publications [CD ROM]

Author: Land and Water Australia

Contains an archive of all Land and Water Australia's research papers, publications and tools on topics including: climate, native vegetation, water & rivers and innovation, biodiversity, landscape management, and more.

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Sustainable development for public administration [book]

Authors: Deniz Zeynep Leuenberger and John R. Bartle

"Focuses on the application of sustainability and sustainable development theories to public administration practice. It's designed to guide planning, resource management, and outcomes measurement for future and current non-profit and public managers. ... Introduces sustainable development and related theories; ties these theories to public administration practice; and elaborates on applications to specific PA specializations including energy management, transportation, water, waste management, urban development, wildlife conservation, and higher education. It also includes a chapter specifically geared to outcome measurement of sustainability goals in public and non-profit agencies." - from publisher.

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Energizing our future : rational choices for the 21st century [book]

Authors: John Wilson & Griffin Burgh

"Presents a comprehensive review of practical alternative energy choices for the twenty-first century. It addresses three critical energy-related topics that are causing great confusion in public debate: global warming, the hydrogen economy, and nuclear power - and gives readers an opportunity to form a grounded, factually correct foundation for understanding the energy challenge and develop their own informed and actionable opinion." - cover.

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The Economics of climate change mitigation : policies and options for global action beyond 2012 [online]

Author: Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD)

"Addresses key climate policy issues including: an ideal set of climate policy tools; the size of the economic and environmental costs of incomplete country or sector coverage of climate change mitigation policies; how to concretely develop a global carbon market; the case for, and what can we reasonably expect from, R&D and technology support policies; and the incentives for major emitting countries to join a climate change mitigation agreement." - abstract.