“Never before has a single species driven such profound changes to the habitats, composition and climate of the planet.”

A special issue of the Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society B (Biological Science) — “Biological diversity in a changing world” — paints a bleak picture of what Homo ‘sapiens’ sapiens is doing to the other species on the planet.

Prior to this year, I wrote about extinction only occasionally — since the direct impact of unrestricted greenhouse gas emissions on humanity seemed to me more than reason enough to act.  But the mass extinctions we are causing will directly harm our children and grandchildren as much as sea level rise.  In particular, I believe scientists have not been talking enough about the devastation we are causing to marine life (see “Geological Society: Acidifying oceans spell marine biological meltdown “by end of century”).

In 2007, the IPCC warned that “as global average temperature increase exceeds about 3.5°C [relative to 1980 to 1999], model projections suggest significant extinctions (40-70% of species assessed) around the globe.”  That is a temperature rise over pre-industrial levels of a bit more than 4.0°C.  So the 5°C rise we are facing on our current emissions path would likely put extinctions beyond the high end of that range.

Given the irreversibility of mass extinction, and the multiple unintended consequences it engenders, it must be considered one of the most serious of the many catastrophic impacts we face if we don’t act soon.

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Our guest blogger is Center for American Progress Agriculture Policy Director Jake Caldwell.

The Obama administration has been active in recent weeks on several significant advances in biofuels policy. Rural areas will increasingly become both the direct providers of renewable energy and the beneficiaries of a region-by-region clean energy transformation as an increasing number of sustainable biomass and biofuels energy facilities — and the jobs that accompany them — are sited in rural communities. Separately, the EPA announced that it is willing to approve higher blends of ethanol in newer vehicles to allow the use of 15 percent ethanol and 85 percent gasoline or E15 in our gas tanks. Many of these initiatives reflect and build upon earlier policy recommendations made by the Center for American Progress and others. They are steps in the right direction, but our biofuels policy still needs reform to maximize the economic and environmental benefits to the nation.

The combination of Congress’s RFS mandate to produce 36 billion gallons of biofuels by 2022, the recently announced USDA initiatives, and EPA’s boost in the ethanol blend to E15 for late-model cars and trucks should enable the current biofuels industry to support additional reforms needed in key aspects of biofuels policy:

– Further promotion of advanced biofuels that deliver measurable lifecycle greenhouse gas emissions reductions
– USDA should reinstate the lifecycle greenhouse gas emissions requirement for feedstocks seeking eligibility in the Biomass Crop Assistance Program
– Reform of the federal loan guarantee programs for the construction of biorefineries
– Boosting biofuel distribution infrastructure
– Elimination of the current import tariff on imported biofuels
– A phase-out of the expiring blender’s credit in favor of a variable and performance-based producer tax credit

Biofuels that deliver measurable lifecycle greenhouse gas emissions reductions, minimize the use of food-based feedstocks, and reduce public health and environmental impacts should be encouraged. With the right policy in place we can maximize the benefits of biofuels, and ensure they contribute to greater economic growth, less pollution, and reduced oil dependence.

Read more at “Fine Tuning Our Biofuels Policy.”

The fight over EPA’s GHG authority “is going to be the most important fight for the environment on Planet Earth next year.”

While the president remains timid in defense of climate science and the EPA’s authority to regulate greenhouse gas emissions (see “The failed presidency of Barack Obama, Part 2“), one of his former employees understands both the importance of the issue and the need for rhetoric to match the urgency.

I’m talking about climate hawk Van Jones.  After the Stewart/Colbert rally, he spoke bluntly about where progressive are, how we got here, and what we need to do.  Alternet has the story:

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On May 4, 2007, Greensburg, Kansas, was destroyed by an F5 tornado.  Almost every building in town was leveled.  Eleven were killed, dozens injured.  Yet within days, the people of Greensburg had committed to rebuild their town, and to rebuild green.  Today, Greensburg is the greenest town in the USA, and maybe the world.  Much of their electricity now comes from wind.  There’s some solar.  There’s geothermal.  And there’s highly efficient buildings.  There are more LEED Platinum rated buildings in Greensburg per person, and per acre, than anywhere in the United States.  All town buildings are now LEED Platinum.  There are Platinum rated homes, a beautiful, LEED Platinum school for the children of Kiowa county, and Platinum-rated private businesses.  People come from all over the world to see how a small farming community pulled together to rebuild and transform.  When I visited this September with Randy Olson, we met two visitors from China’s leading teacher training university who were touring Greensburg’s new school to learn how they can develop green schools in China.

All this happened deep in the heart of Kansas, a red state with strong conservative values.  The people of Greensburg are religious and mostly Republican.  Most of them voted for President George W. Bush, twice, and were proud to pull the lever for him. I expect that, like many other Kansans, many of them don’t believe in global warming.  And yet they rebuilt green.

That’s guest blogger Prof. John Sterman of MIT’s Sloan School of Management.  Sterman is a leading expert on systems thinking and climate change.

Without further ado, here’s the world premier of “Amber Waves of Green,” directed by  scientist-turned-filmmaker Randy Olson:

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General Electric Plans to Invest $2 Billion in China

General Electric Co. plans to invest more than $2 billion in China in technology and financial service ventures and research, adding 1,000 jobs in a country Chief Executive Officer Jeffrey Immelt is targeting for growth.

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Not satisfied with being the most self-centered, tone deaf, and incompetent CEO in recent memory, Tony Hayward is now vying for the title of worst former CEO.

Back in July the yachting multimillionaire revealed he remained a proud, deluded whiner, when he said, “I think BP’s response to this tragedy has been a model of good social corporate responsibility” and I “was demonised and vilified…. life isn’t fair … sometimes you step off the pavement and get hit by a bus”!

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