Brave new blog

Environment

The highly successful Climate Change Q & A free public seminar series at the University of Adelaide might have finished for 2008, but the series lives on thanks an equally successful website.

A blog established to support the seminar series - http://bravenewclimate.com - will continue to discuss the science behind global warming.

"With more than 75 posts and 1500 comments since its launch in August, the blog has added an interesting dimension to our Climate Change
Q & A seminar series," said Professor Brook, host of the Q & A series and Director of the University's Research Institute for Climate Change and Sustainability.

"It makes the seminars more accessible to people who were unable to attend for one reason or another. Readers can download the seminar audio recordings and slide presentations, subscribe to RSS feeds, read posts, access additional resources, and most importantly engage in online discussions about the seminar topics and the related issues that we discuss on the blog."

The series wrapped up last month, with the last two seminars getting to the heart of key issues in the climate change debate. The first of these was "Will it cost the earth to avoid climate change?"

Professor Brook said: "There is a very real fear in the community that by mitigating carbon emissions we will ruin the economy.

"A raft of wait-and-see stalling techniques have arisen out of fear that taking decisive action now to reduce emissions will throw us into an economic depression or back to the Stone Age. Meanwhile, viable solutions to fossil fuel supplies remain under-developed."

The final topic for the series was "Greenhouse denial versus good science: The 'pretend debate'". The guest speaker, Michael Lardelli, also reflected on society's neglect of the peak oil problem.

"Perfect agreement is hard to achieve, particularly on subjects as complex and expansive as climate change. However, the vast majority of scientists do agree that human activity is causing global climate change, that peak oil is real, and that the consequences will be negative and far reaching and that urgent action must be taken," Professor Brook said.

For more information and to continue the discussion, visit: http://bravenewclimate.com