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Show I Wed/Thurs/Fri, April 11-13, 2007 The Park Record B-8 CHRYSLER Global Issues hurt the poor Jeep LEGACY By DOUGLAS FISCHER CHRYSLER/JEEP DODGE DODQI - * . ' • " • • : . w . MediaNews Group Wire Service The absence of serious action to curb industrial and automotive emissions will cook the planet beyond society's - and nature's - ability to adapt, according to a report released Friday by a panel of international scientists and diplomats. Poor countries are particularly vulnerable, but virtually every spot on the globe faces change that will last thousands of years. Among those changes will be increased hunger in the poorest countries, water shortages in the West, and massive floods and avalanches in Asia, warned the United Nation's Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change. One in five species worldwide risks extinction. The polar bear, for example, will become extinct. The United States will face increased wildfires, heat waves and coastal flooding, with California facing all three plus a 75 percent increase in the number of smoginduced bad air days. Industrial and automotive emissions driving the change are having an impact today, the panel concluded after a bitter all-night session in Brussels, Belgium. "The poorest of the poor in the world - and this includes poor people in prosperous societies - are going to be the worst hit," Rajendra Pachauri, the panel's chairman, said at a news conference. "People who are poor are least able to adapt to climate change." The report, the second of three major reports on climate change expected this year from the intergovernmental panel, made clear the rich nations need to lead. Don't count the United States among them. President Bush said this week that while he takes global warming "very seriously," any solution "can- * • 2007 JEEP UBERTYSk 239/mo 7003 2007 CHRYSLER ASPEN. A U RCMAlNtNO 2004't) 2007 JEEP COMPASS 2006 DODGE MAGNUM E CHARGER RTAWD 2006 DODGE RAM MEGA CABS^l RAM2500MEGACAB * 27 montfi I M M , 10,900 mHn p r y«r. Onto ratlin all wbatM. Discount fndudM I M W loyalty, 93,000 down plus tax, Qcenslng and f«es, ** 3fi month l e w , 10,500 miles per year. Dealer retain all rebates. Discount includes Farm Bureau, $3t000 down plus tax, licensing and fees. A MONTH i •••; X7027 2004 DODGE NEON X7037 2002 DODGE INTREPID X7051 SATURN L300 X7053 CHRYSLER PT CRUISER X7007 CHEVY CLASSIC $300-400 A MONTH* • • • • •. _ • " i ' - ! " 7 ' X-'! $200-300 A MONTH* AWD LIMITED-LIKE NEW! 67049 2007 DODGE CALIBER X7059 2003 MITSUBISHI MONTERO J7027A 2003 JEEP WRANGLER SPORT By KATY HUMAN MediaNews Group Wire Service Droughts is the southwestern part of the U.S. will soon become a permanent feature, not just an occasional occurrence, according to a new study. The southwestern droughts of the past several dozen years are different from those that will occur as the planet warms, scientists discovered in a study published Friday in the journal Science. "The future changes, they are something we haven't seen before," said Jian Lu, co-author of the study and a researcher with the National Center for Atmospheric Research in Boulder, Colo. "It is hard to find any resemblance to them in the past, so we can't take much experience from the past," Lu said. Lu and his colleagues found that historic droughts in the southwest could all be linked Jo natural variation in sea-surface temperatures, often to La Nina conditions, where the tropical Pacific Ocean cools. That spins weather patterns around the globe - usually drying out the southwest. Such ocean-driven droughts can last one season or several years, but they break when the sea-surface temperatures shift back toward normal or warm, said co-author Richard Seeger, a researcher at Columbia University's Lamont-Doherty Earth Observatory in Palisades, N.Y. Seeger's research team used 19 computer models to study the origins of the droughts that have been predicted for the future in a warmer world. Global warming causes a very different type of drought, by sending rainstorm and snowstorm tracks northward, and by evaporating more moisture from the ground. There's little relief from shifting ocean temperatures, Seeger said. "The next century, it will be like a permanent 1930s or 1950s drought," he said. Changes in drought patterns may have already started. Seeger said. In 1998, a La Nina system in the tropical Pacific triggered a drought in the southwest. "That drought didn't go away when sea-surface temperatures in the tropical Pacific returned to normal," Seeger said. "Whether it's a sign of the anthropogenic changes already occurring, that needs to be looked at. "However, the models do suggest this should be changing right about now." Lawsuit threatened to protect flower X7054 2003 SUBARU OUTBACK I7082A2002 FORD EXPLORER SPORT-LOW MILES The first reporl, issued in February, assessed the science-of climate change and concluded humans are "very likely" causing the global warmup. The third, due in May, will explore the economic impacts of doing nothing to curb emissions. Without action to curb carbon emissions, man's livable habitat will shrink starkly, said Stephen Schneider, a Stanford scientist who was one of the authors. "Don't be poor in a hot country, don't live in hurricane alley, walch out about being on the coasts or in the Arctic, and it's a bad idea to be on high mountains with glaciers melting." "We can fix this," by investing a small part of the world's economic growth rate, Schneider said, "It's trillions of dollars, but it's a very trivial thing/' In California, the effects could be equally daunting, said Amy Leuers, California Climate Program manager for the Union of Concerned Scientists and lead author of the state's assessment of a wanner planet's impacts. Predictions include: • Two to four times more heatwaves in California similar to last summer's, which left 150 people dead, killed 25,000 cattle and maxed the state's electrical grid. • A 90 percent reduction in the Sierra snowpack, source of drinking water for at least two-thirds of California's 33 million residents. • A 75 percent to 85 percent increase in the days conducive to smog formation. "The economic argument (against action) makes no sense," Leuers said. "The reality is the climate is changing and the world is recognizing it. People are taking action. The smart governments are not only addressing this issue because it is the right thing to do, but because there's a smart business opportunity here. The people who do take action and who do take the lead will be the winners." Weather change will hurt PARK CITY'S PRE-OWNED CERTIFIED FACTORY OUTLET JALESEVENT! not hurt economic growth," and reductions in greenhouse gases must not be nullified by increased emissions from developing nations such as China and India. But all is not doom and gloom. California's ongoing efforts to trim energy use, strip greenhouse gases from fuels and reduce emissions 80 percent below 2000 levels by midcentury could - if adopted by the United States and other industrialized nations - avert much of the worst-case scenarios outlined in the report, say many scientists working on energy and climate issues. "We are conducting a singularly dangerous and ill-advised experiment with the world's climate," said Ralph Cavanagh, co-director of the Natural Resource Defense Council's energy program. "The question is what will it take to stop this experiment and how much will it cost. California's progress ... is the most hopeful part of thai." Cavanagh was in Davis, Calif., on Friday to open the University of California, Davis' Western Cooling Efficiency Center, which hopes to revolutionize the country's air conditioners. In the past 30 years, for instance, per capita electrical use has jumped 50 percent across the United States. In California, use has stayed flat. But if California is to avoid losing its coasts, wine industry, or Sierra snowpack, society must do more. "We must bend the curve down," Cavanagh said. "California will lead on this and will make it easier for Washington to do what it must do: Make the case for mandatory limits on global warming pollution and strategies for achieving them at the lowest possible cost." The U.N. report is the clearest and most comprehensive scientific statement to dale on the impact of global warming mainly caused by man-induced carbon dioxide pollution. m WASHINGTON (AP) Conservationists in Utah and Colorado are threatening to sue the federal government unless it protects a rare wildflower that grows in areas of oil and gas exploration. Environmentalists and plant experts said Graham's penstemon, a relative of the snapdragon with brilliant lavender-pink flowers, was proposed for the endangered-species list in January 2006, but the Fish and Wildlife Service reversed course in December. Critics believe the reversal was a result of politics, not science. The flower lives only on oil shale outcrops in the energy-rich Uinta Basin between northeastern Utah and northwestern Colorado, which is rapidly being developed by energy companies. The proposed listing in 2006 said habitat loss was a serious threat to the flower. The Endangered Species Act requires citizens to give the government 60 days notice before filing a lawsuit. The Center for Native Ecosystems, Utah Native Plant Society, Colorado Native Plant Society and Southern Utah Wilderness Alliance Thursday said they filed a notice Thursday. The Interior Department could avoid a lawsuit by reinstating and completing the proposal to protect the flower, the groups said. $400-500 A MONTH* X7008 2C05 JEEP GRAND CHEROKEE X7044 2004JEEPGRCHEROKEEV84WD P6066 2005 JEEP GR CHEROKEE LIMITED V8. leather, roof LOREDO4X4 X70192004ACURAMDXleather, roof DVD X7057 2004 SAAB Q-SAPC X7026 2C04 CHEW SUBURBAN LT leather X7057 2004 SAAB 9-5 ARC 20in chrome wheels,towmiles X7013 2007TOYOTACAMRYSEIowrries X7028 2005 TOYOTA ¥\LON XLS M e;en,r:: X7030 2006 NISSAN MURANO S X7033 2005 DODGE DURANGO LIMITED" X7035 2003 HONDAPILOT EX leather, DVD X7046 2005 DODGE RAM 2=C0 QUAD CAB H£\]| X7038 2004 DODGE RAM 2500 long bed X7039 2005 FORD EXPLORER SPORT TOK J5106A2006 LINCOLN ZEPHYR, leather roef. 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