The Arctic's warming trend is beginning to affect the climate farther south, the National

Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration said this week in its annual Arctic Report Card.

"There is evidence that the effect of higher air temperatures in the lower Arctic
atmosphere in fall is contributing to changes in the atmospheric circulation in both the
Arctic and northern mid-latitudes," wrote the report's authors, a team of 69 international
scientists.

Extreme cold and big snowfalls can be blamed on the Arctic changes, according to
NOAA.

"Beyond affecting the humans and wildlife that call the area home, the Arctic's warmer
temperatures and decreases in permafrost, snow cover, glaciers and sea ice also have
wide-ranging consequences for the physical and biological systems in other parts of the
world," NOAA Administrator Jane Lubchenco said.

Sea ice reaches its minimum in September every year. This year's September ice cover
was the third-smallest recorded since microwave satellites started taking measurements in
1979, the authors wrote.

"The last four summers have experienced the four lowest minimums in the satellite
record, and eight of the 10 lowest minimums have occurred during the last decade," the
report card said.

The sea ice also appears to be much younger than two decades ago, as ice that survived
from year to year has dwindled to a fraction of its former mass, the data showed.

Watch a NOAA video illustrating the changes

Greenland, the Arctic's great glacier-covered land mass, experienced record-setting high
air temperatures, ice loss and glacier area loss, the report said.

"A combination of a warm and dry 2009-2010 winter and the very warm summer resulted
in the highest melt rate since at least 1958 and an area and duration of ice sheet melting
that was above any previous year on record since at least 1978," the authors wrote.

Furthermore, "a clear pattern of exceptional and record-setting warm air temperatures is
evident at long-term meteorological stations around Greenland," they wrote.
Governments need to do more to increase energy efficiency and boost green technologies
to avoid a spike in oil prices as China drives a 36 percent spike in world energy demand
through 2035, a global watchdog warned Tuesday.

The International Energy Agency said that oil supplies will be pushed near their peak
over the coming decades, endangering government pledges to limit the increase in global
temperatures to 2 degrees Celsius.

The Paris-based IEA - the energy arm of the Organization for Economic Cooperation and
Development, a grouping of the world's richest nations - said that global energy
consumption will reach 16.7 billion metric tons of oil equivalent by 2035.

China's demand will jump 75 percent, accounting for more than a third of that surge in
energy use, the IEA predicted in its annual World Energy Outlook.

"It is hard to overestimate the growing importance of China in global energy," IEA
Executive Director Nobuo Tanaka told reporters in London. "How the country responds
to the threats to global energy security and climate posed by rising fossil fuel use will
have far-reaching consequences for the rest of the world."

But other countries will also have a major impact on the way that world energy demand
and supply shapes up over the coming decades, Tanaka said.

"Recent events have cast a veil of uncertainty over our energy future," Tanaka said. "We
need to use energy more efficiently and we need to wean ourselves off fossil fuels by
adopting technologies that use a much smaller carbon footprint."

Tanaka said the Copenhagen Accord on tackling global warming and an agreement
among G-20 countries to phase out subsidies are positive steps but more needs to be done
to use energy more efficiently.

Nations meeting in Copenhagen last December pledged varying reductions to their

carbon emissions by 2020 - ranging from 17 percent for countries including the United
States and Canada to 45 percent for China.

The agency lowered its 2035 estimate for oil use by 6 million barrels a day to 99 million
barrels - up from 84 million barrels last year, because of government pledges to curtail
carbon emissions under the Copenhagen Accord.

Its assumption that government policy commitments will be met also led to a slowing in
annualized energy demand to an average of 1.2 percent from 2008 to 2035, from 2
percent over the previous 27 years.

But it remains doubtful of some of those promises.

"Whether or not these countries fulfill their targets is a big question," said IEA Chief
Economist Fatih Birol. "We consider Copenhagen to be a failure ... some of the pledges
are very vague."

The IEA report predicted that oil prices could soar as high as $135 a barrel and are
expected to average $113 a barrel by 2035, compared to an average of $60 in 2009, as
higher prices are needed to bring demand into balance with supply.

The Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries will account for 50 percent of the
worlds oil supply by 2035 as production from outside the group falters, the IEA said.

OPEC, which already pumps around 40 percent of the world's oil, last week forecast that
world energy demand will rise by 40 percent in the next three decades even as the
appetite for oil shrinks because some of the need will be met by other sources.

In its annual World Outlook, the 12-nation oil producers' bloc forecast that world oil
demand will grow to a daily 105.5 million barrels in 2030, an increase of 21 million
barrels a day over last year.

It added that crude's role in fueling the world will fall "over time," although it will still be
over 30 percent by 2040. It suggests renewables and natural gas could become increasing
alternatives.

But the report added that fossil fuels overall will remain dominant, satisfying 80 percent
of energy needs.

The IEA - a policy adviser to 28 member countries, mostly industrialized oil consumers -
said the use of renewable energy is expected to expand rapidly to 2035 but the rate of
growth depends on the intensity of government policies aimed at reducing greenhouse
gas emissions and diversifying the energy supply mix.

It said that investment of $5.7 trillion is needed over 2010-2035 to produce electricity,
while biofuels need another $335 billion.

The IEA also forecast that consumption of natural gas will increase 44 percent to 4.5
trillion cubic meters in 2035, from 3.1 trillion cubic meters in 2008, according to the
agency.

Read more: http://www.thestate.com/2010/11/09/1553010/more-government-action-on-

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