Papa Hemingway probably didn’t see this coming.

When he wrote “The Snows of Kilimanjaro” in the 1930s, Ernest Hemingway described the summit of that African mountain as “wide as all the world, great, high, and unbelievably white in the sun.”

It’s still wide, but may not be white much longer, according to a new study published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences that says the remaining ice fields atop Kilimanjaro in Tanzania could be gone in 20 years or less, a casualty of climate change. Changes in clouds and precipitation play a minor role but the scientists say it’s mostly due to global warming.

Here’s the trail of data released by the National Science Foundation, which helped fund the research:

– 85 percent of the ice that covered the mountain in 1912 had been lost by 2007, and 26 percent of the ice there in 2000 is now gone.

– A radioactive signal marking the 1951-52 “Ivy” atomic tests that was detected in 2000 some 1.6 meters (5.25 feet) below the surface of the Kilimanjaro ice is now lost, with an estimated 2.5 meters (8.2 feet) missing from the tops of the current ice fields.

– Elongated bubbles trapped in the frozen ice at the top of one ice core show surface ice melted and refroze, apparently the only time there’s been sustained melting in this core in the last 11,700 years.

– Even a 300-year-old drought some 4,200 years ago didn’t melt the ice, though it did leave an inch-thick layer of dust.

These observations confirm that the current climate conditions at Mount Kilimanjaro are unique over the last 11 millennia. The same changes are happening on Mount Kenya and the Rwenzori Mountains in Africa, in the South American Andes and in the Himalayas.

Read more about it here.

Might be something for climate negotiators in Barcelona and on Capitol Hill to think about.

Photo credit: Lonnie Thompson, Ohio State University (Ice fields atop Tanzania’s Mount Kilimanjaro glow golden in the last of the afternoon sun.)

    When you’re looking for shrinking packs of multiyear ice in the Arctic Ocean, bizarre things tend to happen. Top Canadian scientist David Barber knows this first hand, as he explained in a presentation in Parliament on Wednesday. Barber said that to all extents and purposes the multiyear ice in the Arctic had already vanished, which could open up the region to shipping and mineral exploitation.

    Barber, who holds Canada’s Research Chair in Arctic System Science at the University of Manitoba, boarded the icebreaker Amundsen last month and steamed north from the Arctic port of Tuktoyaktuk to look for the Beaufort Sea pack ice, the “thickest, hardest, meanest, multi year sea we have left in the northern hemisphere”.

    According to up-to-date satellite maps provided by the Canadian Ice Service, the Amundsen should have started ploughing into progressively thicker ice almost from the start. Soon after the ship set sail Barber went to bed, and then woke up at 2 am in a panic.

    “I looked on my screen and we’re doing 13 knots. We do 13.7 knots in open water and we’re right here (in an area where the maps show there should be thick ice) somewhere, doing 13 knots,”  he said.

      “And I just panicked, I thought ‘Oh My God, Stephane the captain is not on the bridge and the first officer has gone crazy, he’s driving this thing way too fast through the sea ice’. So I go up on the bridge and talk to the guys and they say “There is no ice here’.”

    The ship sailed for hundreds of miles, first to the north and then eastwards, “trying to find multiyear sea ice that would even slow us down”. All they found was so-called rotten ice — a thin layer covering small chunks of multiyear ice.

    Eventually the ship found a 10-mile floe of “nice typical traditional Beaufort Sea pack ice” close to the Canadian Arctic archipelago. As they were about to attach the ship to the floe Barber looked out and saw a crack open up right in front of him. “I went ‘Wow, that’s kind of weird’.”  Even weirder, he and a colleague then saw the ice move up and down as a swell hit it.

    “And as we watched, literally, without any exaggeration, the entire multi-year floe broke up in five minutes,” he said. Barber blames waves which started off the north coast of Siberia and then rolled across the Arctic Ocean, pushed along by a low pressure system and unencumbered by rotten ice.

    No wonder he says that “I’ve never seen anything like this in my 30 years of working in the high Arctic”.

((Broken Arctic sea ice as seen from a window in from a U.S. Coast Guard C130 flight over the Arctic Ocean September 30, 2009. REUTERS/Yereth Rosen))

Taiwan, hit by its worst typhoon in 50 years in August, has found a culprit for the disaster that killed about 770 people and begun using it to get precious attention overseas where the island is usually overlooked in favour of its giant political rival China.

Global warming is taking blame for Morakot, which was freakish as Taiwan’s only major typhoon of the year and because it lingered instead of blowing straight through. The island’s foreign ministry says that as global warming’s victim it should get to participate in the U.N. Framework Convention on Climate Change  in time for its December talks in Copenhagen. Sixteen countries have already voiced support.

“We are a victim of this problem. It’s closely related to the public’s economic interests,” said Yang Kuo-tung, director general of the foreign ministry’s treaties and legal affairs. Morakot’s incessant rain caused agricultural losses of T$16.47 billion ($510 million).  ”It’s no laughing matter.”

But Taiwan’s bid for participation faces a new kind of storm despite recent detente with China, a powerful veto-wielding Security Council member. China has claimed sovereignty over Taiwan since 1949 and blocked more than a decade worth of applications to enter the United Nations on grounds that the self-ruled island lacks statehood.

Taiwan dropped an the annual bid to join the whole United Nations this year  to avoid upsetting China, but figures that knocking at the door of a small U.N. agency would cause little stir, especially with the woes of Morakot in its back pocket. Taiwan would both teach and learn as a Convention participant, Yang said.

But although China-Taiwan ties have improved via trade talks since mid-2008, officials in Beijing have resisted opening international organisations to Taiwan. Unless it whips up a powerful public relations storm that generates the kind of populist momentum at home and abroad that followed Taiwan’s colourful, music and video-enhanced U.N. bids, the island won’t make it for the Copenhagen talks and may wait up to two years before it can participate in the Convention, political analysts say.

“I don’t think ordinary people know about this organisation,” said Alex Chiang, international politics associate professor at National Chengchi University in Taipei. “You have to let other people know we’re qualified for participation. That’s the job for the government, telling people about it. They haven’t done much for public relations.”

((Pictures — Top right: Motorcyclists stop at an intersection in Taipei September 23, 2009. Taiwan is known as the one of the highest motorbike-density country in the world and motorbikes are responsible for a big share of Taiwan’s greenhouse gas emissions, according to local media. REUTERS/Pichi Chuang. Left: Damaged buildings are seen after Typhoon Morakot swept Kaohsiung county, southern Taiwan August 11, 2009.  REUTERS/Stringer))

Remember the Christian Coalition of America?

Under the political operative Ralph Reed in the 1990s it was an electoral force to be reckoned with as it mobilized millions of conservative Christians to vote for mostly Republican Party candidates and causes.

It has since lost influence and political ground to other "religious right" groups such as the Family Research Council. But it remains a sizeable grassroots organization and is still unflinchingly conservative.

So it will no doubt surprise some to see that this week it has joined with the National Wildlife Federation -- whose 4 million members and supporters includes 420,000 sportsmen and women -- to run an ad urging the U.S. Senate to pass legislation that among other things addresses the pressing problem of climate change.

"Defending the status quo is no longer an option. We need swift action
to ensure America is the world leader in clean energy technology.
We can put Americans to work making and installing the clean,
renewable energy technologies that reduce our dependency on
foreign oil and address climate change.
Senators should work together to move forward with a clean energy plan for America," says the ad, which ran this week in Politico.

It comes as the U.S. Senate considers a bill to curb the greenhouse gas emissions linked to global warming.

Other U.S. Christian groups and prominent evangelicals such as Florida mega-pastor Joel Hunter have urged action on climate change -- a top priority of President Barack Obama -- on the grounds that the poor will bear the brunt of warming temperatures. They also see a biblical responsibility to care for God's creations.

(PHOTO: Vanishing Arctic Sea ice is one of the most visible signs of global warming. REUTERS/NASA/Handout)

But influential conservative Christians such as Richard land of the Southern Baptist Convention have spent the past months assailing the cap and trade provisions of the bill as a massive tax hike. In many religious right circles the climate change issue is seen as downright hysterical or an attempt by leftists to cripple the U.S. economy.

But even the most hard-line conservative Christians are no longer united on this issue.

Lindsey Graham, a conservative Republican Senator from South Carolina, broke ranks with his party and recently outlined a compromise to limit carbon emissions in a New York Times op-ed piece he co-wrote with Democratic Senator John Kerry.

That won him praise from national hunting groups and local ones in his home state, which has a robust shooting and fishing culture woven into its rural fabric.

We have recently blogged and written on U.S. hunters and anglers -- many of whom are evangelical Christian, conservative and Republican -- urging action on climate change, not least because of its threat to the game they pursue.

Roberta Combs, the president of the Christian Coalition, told me in a telephone interview that her group joined forces with the NWF on this issue because it saw a biblical need to look after God's creation. But she said it also wants America to pursue alternative energy policies to reduce its independence on foreign oil including expanding its use of nuclear power -- a stance sure to make many greens see red.

"We don’t agree with environmental groups on everything but if we can find things we agree on this will be a better bill…I’m real proud of Senator Graham. He’s a man of lots of wisdom,” she said.

Republicans are mostly skeptical of any move to "cap and trade" U.S. carbon emissions that result from burning coal and oil, decrying it as a massive job-killing tax by forcing the use of more expensive wind and solar power.

But a big chunk of their base seems to be parting company with them on this issue though climate change skepticism still runs deep in the U.S. heartland.

According to a Pew Research Center poll released on Thursday, 36 percent of Americans say global warming is a result of human activity, down from 47 percent in April 2008.

The surprise award of the Nobel Peace Prize to Barack Obama just nine months into his presidency on Friday may put pressure on him to visit a 190-nation meeting on a new U.N. climate treaty in Copenhagen.

The prize will be handed over in Oslo on Dec. 10, the anniversary of the 1896 death of the award’s founder Alfred Nobel, and the U.N. talks will run in Copenhagen from Dec. 7-18. It takes about an hour to fly between the two Scandinavian capitals.

And the Norwegian Nobel Committee heaped praise on Obama, including his climate policies, in its citation.

“Thanks to Obama’s initiative, the USA is now playing a more constructive role in meeting the great climatic challenges the world is confronting,” the secretive five-member committee said.

 Some Norwegian politicians said they hoped the award would stiffen Obama’s resolve to push the U.S. Senate to pass early legislation to cut greenhouse gas emissions in the years to 2020.

Former U.S. President George W. Bush dropped efforts to get the Senate to ratify the U.N.’s Kyoto Protocol, a pact adopted by all other industrialised nations for curbing greenhouse gas emissions until 2012. Obama wants the United States to have a bigger role in a new global treaty to be agreed in Copenhagen.

Environmental group Greenpeace said Obama should visit Copenhagen.

“In accepting the award in Oslo on 10th December President Obama has an incredible opportunity, and responsibility, to then travel to the UN Copenhagen Climate Summit to help avert climate chaos and conflict,” Greenpeace’s International Executive Director Gerd Leipold said in a statement.

And Denmark’s Climate Minister Connie Hedegaard also expressed hopes that Obama would come to Copenhagen: “It’s hard to imagine that he will be receiving the Nobel Peace Prize in Oslo on Dec. 10th and then come empty-handed to Copenhagen a week later.” 

And what a difference a week makes — the award of one of the world’s top accolades in Oslo is a stunning turnaround just a week after Obama went to Copenhagen and suffered a defeat by unsuccessfully lobbying for Chicago to get the 2016 Olympic Games.

But a problem is that the first week of the Copenhagen talks will be run only by senior government bureaucrats — environment ministers from around the world are due to turn up only from Dec. 16 to decide on a new pact to succeed the Kyoto Protocol. 

So, to have the most impact on the negotiations, should Obama go for a few days’ vacation skiing in Scandinavia after collecting the Nobel Prize before travelling to Copenhagen?

(Picture credits: top - U.S. President Barack Obama (R) and first lady Michelle Obama arrive for an event to look at the stars with local middle school students and astronomers from across the country on the South Lawn at the White House in Washington, October 7, 2009. REUTERS/Jim Young. Right: The Nobel Peace Prize medal awarded to South African Archbishop Desmond Tutu)

OK, so President Barack Obama's lightning jaunt to Copenhagen last week was less than successful. Even with Oprah along, the Cheerleader-in-Chief couldn't clinch the deal for Chicago to host the 2016 Olympics. It happens.

But now that he knows the way to Denmark, might the American president consider arguing the U.S. case at international climate meetings in Copenhagen in December? The White House said he might, if other heads of state showed up.

"Right now you've got a meeting that's set up for a level not at the head of state level," presidential spokesman Robert Gibbs told reporters on Air Force One last week. "If it got switched, we would certainly look at coming."

Those climate talks might need a bit of a boost from the United States. White House climate czarina Carol Browner has said it's unlikely Obama will be able to sign any U.S. legislation to curb climate change before the December meeting. And that sets up a familiar Catch-22: if there's no U.S. law in place before Copenhagen climate talks, can the United States commit to anything? And if there IS a U.S. law in place, does the United States have the flexibility to maneuver in these international negotiations?

Climate negotiators already know the answer to the first part of that conundrum; they agreed to the Kyoto Protocol without backing from the U.S. Congress and came home to find no support for this 1997 carbon-capping deal. The United States is still the only industrialized nation not to ratify it.

After the Olympic disappointment -- Chicago was the first city of the final four to be cut from the running; Rio won -- is Obama's presence something that U.S. climate negotiators actually want? The global environmental community cheered his election last year after eight years of the George W. Bush administration, but he may not be the rock star on climate that he was then.

And let's just face it: arriving at climate change talks aboard a fuel hog like Air Force One could send a mixed message -- unless the White House commits to offsetting the big plane's emissions by investing in windmills or tree-planting in a friendly developing country.

So today's question: would an Obama visit to the Copenhagen climate talks help or hurt the chances for a global deal? Let us know what you think.

Photo credits: REUTERS/Chaiwat Subprasom (demonstration against Barack Obama and other world leaders outside UN climate change talks in Bangkok, Oct 5, 2009)

REUTERS/Shannon Stapleton (Obama shakes U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon after addressing a U.N. summit on climate change, Sept 22, 2009)

Scientists aboard the Russian research vessel Professor Khromov spent the weekend collecting samples of water, sealife and ocean-floor mud at a spot in the western Arctic Ocean that in most years would be covered with sea ice.

The ship, carrying researchers for the six-week RUSALCA expedition, was in its most northerly planned sampling stop, or “station,”  a location nearly 350 miles (563 km) northwest of Barrow, Alaska. During the mission’s last cruise in 2004, the most northerly accessible location was 345 miles (555 km) south of the weekend’s station.

Mission coordinator Kevin Wood, of the U.S. National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration,  writes from the ship that the water is open on all sides. “There isn’t enough ice here to make a margarita,” Wood said.

The joint U.S.-Russian expedition is carrying out research to gauge the effects of global warming on the Bering Strait and Chukchi Sea through the end of the month.

The U.S. National Snow and Ice Data Center reported last week that the Arctic’s sea ice thawed to its third smallest on record. This is up slightly from from the last two years, but continues an overall decline that is symptomatic of climate change. The smallest summer ice pack on record was in 2007.

Dredging the sea floor, researchers scooped up small tube-like organisms that resemble plastic cocktail stirs. So far, they have yet to be identified, Wood said.

The Khromov is preparing now to steam another 46 miles (74 km) to where radar images show the ice edge to be.

Stephan Dolezalek, Managing Director of VantagePoint Venture Partners and Tom Werner, Chief Executive of solar power company SunPower, sat down at Reuters' Global Climate and Alternative Energy Summit in San Francisco and shared their views on global warming, investment and cleantech.

Dolezalek sees industrialization in developing countries as a more predictable impetus for investment than global warming.

Werner sees global warming as a stimulus for new business and a tool for adaptation.

What are your thoughts?  Is global warming an economic stimulus, an unreliable driver for investment, neither or both?

(Editing/video by Courtney Hoffman, pictures by Kim White)

Rodney Russ lives for the times he is at the rudder of a Zodiac.

For the owner of Heritage Expeditions, the New Zealand-based company that is operating the Russian research ship Professor Khromov in the Bering Sea, the more challenging the conditions the better.

“The rougher the waves, the more difficult the landing, the more remote and obscure the place, the more I enjoy it,” Russ said in a corridor on the Khromov.

So it was with disappointment that Russ was forced to put the inflatable boat with the outboard motor away, after he had donned his wet-weather gear and readied the craft for a spin off the Siberian coast in late August.

The plan was nixed by the Russian navy representative on board.

It took months for the joint U.S.-Russian RUSALCA oceanographic expedition to get the necessary clearances to travel through Russian waters in the Khromov, deploying data-gathering moorings, and using a high-tech instrument to take water samples.

There was nothing in the permits about zipping around the ship in a Zodiac. Doing it could jeopardize the RUSALCA mission, which is geared to gauging the impact of global warming on the region over several years.

The next day, the ship’s research path took it slowly back toward the Russian-United States border, which lies between two tiny inhabited islands – Big Diomede and Little Diomede (Little’s on the U.S. side).

The moment the Khromov crossed the border, Russ lowered his Zodiac into the Bering Strait, and invited some passengers to take some pictures of the ship and its cold-water surroundings as it sat just on the U.S. side of the boundary between the two onetime Cold War foes.

The sea was glasslike, so it wasn’t the high-seas adventure it could have been for Russ, who began his career as a wildlife biologist. No matter.

“I was keen for the program to get some photographs,” he said. “I’m always raring to go. If there’s a chance to drive a Zodiac, I’ll go in.”

(Photo – Rodney Russ powers his Zodiac away from the Russian research ship Professor Khromov in U.S. waters of the Bering Strait on August 28, 2009. REUTERS/Jeffrey Jones)