UN Reports End To El Niño Pattern Over The Pacific Wednesday, 7 July 2010, 10:26 am Press Release: United Nations

UN Meteorological Agency Reports End To El Niño Pattern Over The Pacific

New York, Jul 6 2010 2:10PM
The weather pattern known as El Niño rapidly dissipated in early May, giving way to the development of cool, neutral to weak La Niña conditions in the tropical Pacific Ocean, the United Nations World Meteorological Organization (WMO) reported today.

El Niño refers to an abnormal warming of surface ocean waters in the eastern tropical Pacific, while La Niña is characterized by unusually cool ocean temperatures in the eastern equatorial Pacific. Both events can disrupt the normal patterns of tropical precipitation and atmospheric circulation, and have widespread impacts on climate in many parts of the world.

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The prevailing conditions are more likely than not to strengthen into a basin-wide La Niña over the coming months, according to the El Niño/La Niña update issued by WMO.

By mid-June, the sea-surface temperatures had decreased to approximately 0.5 degrees Celsius below normal over the central and eastern equatorial Pacific, near the borderline of La Niña conditions.

Further, below average sea temperatures exist beneath the surface of the central and eastern equatorial Pacific. Forecast models continue to predict further decreases in the central and eastern Equatorial Pacific sea-surface temperature. In particular, most dynamic models strongly favour further La Niña development, according to WMO.

While it is likely that La Niña conditions will further develop in the next several months, the timing and magnitude of such an event in 2010 are as yet uncertain, with no indications at this time of a particularly strong event in terms of sea-surface temperatures.

The unusual climate patterns and extremes that occur in association with La Niña conditions also occur independently of La Niña, and therefore individual users of climate information should seek detailed interpretation for their locations and sectors, WMO said in the update.

Over the coming months, the climate forecasting community will provide detailed interpretations of regional climate conditions through the National Meteorological and Hydrological Services, it added.

http://www.scoop.co.nz/stories/WO1007/S00115.htm

UN fears 'irreversible' damage to natural environment

AFP/HO/Great Barrier Reef Marine Park – Handout photo from the Great Barrier Reef Marine Park Authority shows a scuba diver inspecting the damage …

Mon May 10, 7:08 am ET

GENEVA (AFP) – The UN warned on Monday that "massive" loss in life-sustaining natural environments was likely to deepen to the point of being irreversible after global targets to cut the decline by this year were missed.

As a result of the degradation, the world is moving closer to several "tipping points" beyond which some ecosystems that play a part in natural processes such as climate or the food chain may be permanently damaged, a United Nations report said.

The third "Global Biodiversity Outlook" found that deforestation, pollution or overexploitation were damaging the productive capacity of the most vulnerable environments, including the Amazon rainforest, lakes and coral reefs.

"This report is saying that we are reaching the tipping point where the irreversible damage to the planet is going to be done unless we act urgently," Ahmed Djoghlaf, executive secretary of the UN Convention on Biological Diversity, told journalists.

Djoghlaf argued that extinction rates for some animal or plant species were at a historic high, up to 1,000 times those seen before, even affecting crops and livestock.

The UN report was partly based on 110 national reports on steps taken to meet a 2002 pledge to "significantly reduce" or reverse the loss in biodiversity.

Djoghlaf told journalists: "There is not a single country in the world that has achieved these targets, we continue to lose biodioversity at unprecedented rate."

Three potential tipping points were identified.

Global climate, regional rainfall and loss of plant and animal species were harmed by continued deforestation of the Amazon rainforest, the report said.

Many freshwater lakes and rivers were becoming contaminated by algae, starving them of oxygen and killing off fish, affecting local livelihoods and recreation for local populations.

And coral reefs were collapsing due to the combined blow of more acid and warming oceans, as well asoverfishing, the UN found.

UN Environment Programme (UNEP) director general Achim Steiner underlined the economic value and returns of "natural capital" and its role in ensuring the health of soil, oceans and the atmosphere.

"Humanity has fabricated the illusion that somehow we can get by without biodiversity or that it is somehow peripheral to the contemporary world," Steiner said.

"The truth is we need it more than ever on a planet of six billion heading to over nine billion people by 2050."

The report argued that biodiversity was a core concern for society that would help tackle poverty and improve health, meriting as much attention as the economic crisis for only a fraction of the cost of recent financial bailouts.

It advocated a new strategy to tackle the loss alongside more traditional steps such as the expansion of protected natural areas and pollution control.

They included attempts to regulate land consumption, fishing, increased trade and population growth or shifts, partly through a halt to "harmful" or "perverse" subsidies.

The issues raised by the report are due to be discussed at a UN biodiversity meeting in Japan in October.

1. UNEP report

http://news.yahoo.com/s/afp/20100510/ts_afp/unenvironmentbiodiversityeconomy

No comprehensive climate deal this year

UN: No comprehensive climate deal this year

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AP – Director of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change, UNFCCC, Yvo de Boer, arrives at …

2 hrs 27 mins ago

KOENIGSWINTER, Germany – The United Nations chief negotiator onclimate change says there will not be a comprehensive deal to fightglobal warming this year.

Yvo de Boer told reporters in Germany on Monday the next U.N. climate change conference in Cancun, Mexico, in December will provide a "first answer" on greenhouse gases "but it will not provide an answer that is good enough."

The U.N. climate chief says a good outcome of Cancun would be decisions on an "operational architecture on climate change" with an actual treaty coming later.

He says he expects such an international climate treaty before the end of 2012, but even that will "not be the definitive answer to the climate change challenge."

De Boer said earlier this year he will resign July 1.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20100503/ap_on_re_eu/climate