International

"A bit of news about the melting of the Arctic waterways associated with climate change: Gazprom, the Russian energy giant, says it recently completed the world’s first liquefied natural gas cargo delivery through the Arctic Northern Sea Route. Escorted by Russian nuclear icebreakers, the giant L.N.G. carrier Ob River went through the waters of the Barents and Kara seas and then through an icy passage between the Vilkitsky and Bering straits."

"Norway has agreed to give $180 million to Brazil as part of a broader $1 billion deal for slowing deforestation in the Amazon rainforest, Oslo's environment minister said on Thursday."

"Norway has promised $1 billion each to Brazil and Indonesia for protecting their tropical rainforests and warned Jakarta earlier this year that its progress in reforming its forestry sector will not be sufficient to meet its pledge to reduce carbon emissions by 26 percent by 2020.

"Checking 20 years' of projections by the foremost global climate science panel against reality finds that the group has consistently underestimated the pace and impacts of climate change – with severe consequences for the public it is tasked to inform."

"DOHA, Qatar -- The Senate's rejection yesterday of a treaty to extend rights to disabled people internationally does not bode well for a climate change treaty, observers here said today as the clock began to wind down on this year's U.N. climate talks."

"Extreme weather is the new normal and poses a threat to the human race, U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon said on Tuesday, as he sought to revive deadlocked global climate change talks."

"French utility EDF has raised the cost of the construction of its next-generation nuclear reactor by more than 2 billion euros on Monday, the latest in a series of overruns for the first EPR reactor built in France."

"DOHA, Qatar -- Hassan al-Kubaisi considers it a gift from above that drivers in oil- and gas-rich Qatar only have to pay $1 per gallon at the pump."

"You've heard of peak oil—the idea that the globe's easy-to-get-to petroleum reserves are largely cashed, and most of what's left is the hard stuff, buried in deep-sea deposits or tar sands. But what about peak phosphorus and potassium? ...These nutrients, which are essential for plants to grow, are extracted from soil every time we harvest crops, and have to be replaced if farmland is to remain productive."

"DOHA, Qatar -- 'Climate change is taking place before our eyes and will continue to do so as a result of the concentrations of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere, which have risen constantly and again reached new records,' said World Meteorological Organization Secretary-General Michel Jarraud."

"Time is running out for Kiribati as the effects of climate change cause more people to lose their homes while the world procrastinates on the issue."