Planetary Ruin

In recent official statements, Washington has indicated it might be looking for a compromise during negotiations in Bali for a successor agreement to the Kyoto Protocol, which expires in 2012. But sources say the White House is discreetly searching for partners in Beijing and Dehli to derail the prospects for any binding agreements to curb emissions of greenhouse gases.

In the run-up to the Bali Climate Conference that opened Monday, the administration of US President George W. Bush established contact with representatives of the Chinese and Indian governments in an attempt to curb progress on climate protection initiatives…

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What concerns me with the US attempts to bring the other 2 largest emission contributors together in an alliance to stop protection initiatives, is that all 3 will be able to blame the other 2. And essentially, nothing will be done.

Big corporations will make more money I suppose.

And some more extinctions will occur.

And the little ball floating in space that we reply on for our survival will get a little dirtier.

The question that remains is, at what point do those extinctions that no one seems to worry about include the human species? Bet we care then.

Leonardo DiCaprio sat down with The Hollywood Reporter and a handful of select film publications at the Hotel du Cap in Cannes on Saturday to discuss his upcoming environmental documentary “The 11th Hour.” The film, which premiered in a special Out of Competition screening Saturday at the Festival de Cannes, uses a barrage of images and reams of interviews with the world’s top environmental scientists to paint a bleak but still optimistic picture of the fate of our planet. “Hour” was directed by sister Nadia Conners and Leila Conners Petersen, who wrote the script with DiCaprio. 

Q: People see films like “An Inconvenient Truth” and “The 11th Hour” and they wonder, ‘What can I do’? What would you tell them?

A: It’s voting, in a twofold way. You have voting at the booth for politicians that support green policies and endorsing by voting with your dollars. Endorsing new technologies, if you can, endorsing these companies to come up with cheap alternatives for the future. That’s why personal action is important to a very large degree. I mean look at the sort of revolution with the Toyota Prius. I mean that has shown specifically to automakers that there is a demand for alternative vehicles and it has propelled the auto industry into the future with knowing that we can not go on with business as usual, with gas-guzzling vehicles. It’s supply and demand ultimately.

Q: With “The 11th Hour” are you hoping to reach a different audience than Al Gore’s “An Inconvenient Truth” just because of who you are and the kind of attention this film will get because of your involvement with it?

A: “Yes, I guess you could call it a different audience. I mean, I didn’t want to make this an overly political film, where just because of your political affiliation, you think you are somehow responsible for this and are somehow to blame. There are political overtones in the movie, we do point the finger. But ultimately, it is not about preaching to the choir, about reaching an audience that already gets it and already wants to become active. It’s about, I suppose — and this is just about me following the lead of what the scientists and the experts have been saying — it’s the cultural transformation that needs to happened. It’s a swelling up from the ground level from people that are going to have to demand action. It goes beyond whether you are a democrat or republican in the United States. It goes beyond that. It goes into the realm of every politician having to be responsible because there is such a cultural awareness about global warming and environmental issues that they have to deal with it.”

Q: Are you worried that, because you are a celebrity, people could dismiss this movie simply because of who you are?

A: “I am completely aware of the fact that being someone from quote-unquote Hollywood will garner certain amount of skepticism and criticism as why should we listen to this person? I wanted to pose myself as a concerned citizen, not as an expert. I ask the questions and allow these people (the scientists) to give the answers. But you can also talk about the Hollywood community and about how they have traditionally been a part of a lot of great movements in the United States, going back to the civil rights movement or the peace movement. I don’t think there’s nothing wrong with that. As long as I don’t pretend to be somebody who does have a degree, you know what I mean? But rather as a concerned citizen. Hopefully a larger audience will watch the film as opposed to if I wasn’t involved with it.

Q: The film doesn’t pander to a populist level. You get into a lot of pretty complicated detail in the film.

A: Well that comes down to the fact that these are extremely complicated issues and can’t be put into a format of predigested baby food that is spoon-fed (the audience). These are complicated issues to wrap your head around, and we knew that. But ultimately the most important thing to us was whether you were emotionally moved at the end of the movie. And on a personal level, I believe that has been accomplished. Yes, a lot of the science is very hard to wrap your head around. But I was very clear in the movie. I want the public to be very scared by what they see. I want them to see a very bleak future. I want them to feel disillusioned halfway through and feel hopeless. And then when we get into the entire section in the second half when we talk about cultural transformation and a new way of looking at things and the alternatives or green technology and all these things, you realize there is great hope and there are options on the table. And hopefully the audience is moved and galvanized to do something about it. Hopefully.

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Trash from China’s satellite-killing missile test has spread widely in space, creating a debris cloud that could jeopardize spy satellites and commercial imagery satellites in low orbits around Earth, U.S. officials said on Monday.

Even the manned International Space Station is vulnerable to being hit by some of the thousands of pieces of trash created when China slammed a ground-based medium-range ballistic missile into an aging Chinese weather satellite about 537 miles above Earth on January 11, the officials said.

“The test created a lot of debris. It definitely raises the possibility that something is going to be hit, including the space station,” Peter Hays, a senior adviser to the Pentagon’s National Security Space Office, told Reuters.

Theresa Hitchens, who heads the non-profit Center for Defense Information, told a conference held by the George C. Marshall Institute that U.S. tracking data showed debris from the test had been seen from 266 miles to 1,875 miles above the Earth.

“A huge number of satellites have been put in harm’s way,” she said, estimating that more than 120 satellites were orbiting in the area. It could take decades for debris from the Chinese weather satellite to fall out of orbit.

GeoEye, the world’s largest commercial satellite imagery company, operates its satellites around 425 miles (680 km) above Earth, but said it was not concerned because its satellites were in a different orbit. GeoEye spokesman Mark Brender said it can maneuver satellites in their orbits and “close their lens caps” during cosmic dust storms.

Col. Patrick Rayermann, chief of the U.S. Army’s Space and Missile Defense Division, told Reuters the Chinese test had reenergized discussions about the need for a treaty or certain rules for actions taken by space-faring countries. However, he added that verifying compliance could prove difficult.

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