International Asilomar Conference on Climate Intervention Technologies

International Asilomar Conference on Climate Intervention Technologies

The Organizing Committee for the International Asilomar Conference on Climate Intervention Technologies has been assembled to emphasize 1) scientific excellence in fields related to climate intervention, 2) leadership expertise in developing consensus around difficult climate-related issues, and 3) diversity of scientific expertise and geographic background.

Organizing Committee

Chair: Dr. Michael MacCracken, Chief Scientist, Climate Institute.

Dr. MacCracken is a climate modeler who spent much of his career at Lawrence Livermore National Laboratories. He spent 9 years as the Executive Director of the US Global Change Research Program, the federal interagency committee that coordinates global change research across the federal government. He is the past President, International Association of Meteorology and Atmospheric Sciences. Dr. MacCracken has substantial experience in getting consensus on difficult issues. For example, was the lead author of the US agency response to the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) 4th Assessment Report published in 2001. That job required that he get consensus from scientists in federal agencies on specific wording in the three volume document.

Honorary Chair: Dr. Paul Berg, Stanford University Emeritus Professor

Dr. Berg won the Nobel Prize in 1980 for his work on recombinant DNA techniques. He was the chair of the organizing committee of the groundbreaking 1975 Asilomar Conference on Recombinant DNA Technologies. This conference resulted in a scientific consensus on the guidelines to minimize risk associated with recombinant DNA research. The Biosafety Levels identified by the conference are still used worldwide to determine the level of containment necessary for scientific research on hazardous biological materials. The conference was the first instance in which members of the scientific community voluntarily identified and agreed on procedures to minimize risk associated with scientific research

Corresponding Committee Member: Dr. Paul Crutzen, Max Planck Institute, Germany and Scripps Institution of Oceanography, University of California

Dr. Crutzen won the first Nobel Prize ever given for environmental research in 1995 (together with Dr. Sherwood Rowland and Dr. Mario Molino) for his work in identifying the role of chlorofluorocarbons in stratospheric ozone chemistry and in generation of the ‘ozone hole’. He also won the Tyler Prize for Environmental Achievement. Dr. Crutzen is a stratospheric chemist and initiated the public science discussion of geoengineering/climate intervention with his provocative 2006 essay in the journal Climatic Change on the potential to artificially reduce temperatures using stratospheric aerosols.

Members of the Committee:

Dr. Scott Barrett

Dr. Barrett has just been appointed the Lenfest-Earth Institute Professor of Natural Resource Economics at Columbia University. This is a joint appointment with the School of International and Public Affairs and the Earth Institute. He a social scientist and economist known for his research into game theoretical analysis of climate change treaties. His book on the subject Environment and Statecraft: The Strategy of Environmental Treaty Making was published in 2003. He has been involved in the discussions of the Kyoto Treaty and its comparison to the more successful Montreal Protocol. More recently, he has been publishing on the institutions set up to control the regional and global spread of infectious diseases. Before moving to Columbia Dr. Barrett was a professor of political science at Johns Hopkins University where he served as Director of the International Policy Program and Professor of Environmental Economics & International Political Economy. He previously taught at the London Business School and was also affiliated with the University College London.

Dr. Roger Barry

Dr. Barry is the Director of the World Data Center for Glaciology and Distinguished Professor of Geography at the University of Colorado. His research focuses on Arctic climate, cryosphere-climate interactions, mountain climate and climate change impacts on Arctic sea ice and permafrost. His distinguished career in this field has been recognized with the Goldthwait Polar Medal, the first Francois Emile Matthes Award, and the Founder’s Medal – one of two gold medals awarded annually – by the Royal Geographical Society, London, in recognition of his excellence in geographical research, fieldwork, teaching, and public engagement. Dr. Barry has participated as both an author and a reviewer of UN Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) climate assessments and as an IPCC author.

Dr. Steven Hamburg

Dr. Hamburg is the Chief Scientist of the Environmental Defense Fund. As Chief Scientist, Dr. Hamburg is responsible for the scientific integrity of EDF’s positions and programs. His training and research specialty is ecosystem ecology, with a focus on forests. Dr. Hamburg has served as an advisor to both corporations and non-governmental organizations and was awarded an Environmental Merit award by the US Environmental Protection Agency for his climate change-related activities. Dr. Hamburg also serve as the Ittleson Associate Professor of Environmental Studies at Brown University and before going to the Environmental Defense Fund, Dr. Hamburg chaired the Center for Environmental Studies at Brown.

Dr. Richard Lampitt

Dr. Lampitt is a Senior Scientist with the National Oceanography Center of the UK and an associated professor of the University of Southampton. Dr. Lampitt is a biogeochemist who specializes in the role of the oceans in the global carbon cycle. He is a leader in developing large international oceanographic campaigns for ocean observation and for carbon cycle studies and currently heads the European Commission-funded EuroSITES program of ocean observation networks around the world. Dr. Lampitt is also a leading designer of oceanographic instrumentation.

Dr. Diana Liverman

Dr. Liverman is the Co-Director of Institute for Environment and Society and Professor of Geography and Regional Development at the University of Arizona. She also holds a position as Professor of Environmental Science at the University of Oxford and Senior Fellow in the Environmental Change Institute, Oxford University. Her main research interests include climate impacts, vulnerability and adaptation, and climate policy and mitigation especially in the developing world. She also works on the political economy and political ecology of environmental management in the Americas, especially in Mexico. Dr. Liverman is a member of the US NAS Committee on the Human Dimensions of Global Environmental Change and the Inter American Institute (IAI) for Global Change Research. Currently she is a member of the new National Academy of Sciences Committee on America’s Climate Choices, which is advising the US government on responses to climate change. She is also the chair of the scientific advisory committee international Global Environmental Change and Food Systems (GECAFS) program and sits on the parent committee for the international Earth Systems Science Partnership. Like others on the organizing committee, Dr. Liverman has substantial experience in the IPCC process and has been a chapter lead author in the IPCC volume on adaptation.

Dr. Thomas Lovejoy

Dr. Lovejoy is the Heinz Center Biodiversity Chair at the Heinz Center for Science and the Environment. Dr. Lovejoy is an internationally known expert in biodiversity, having coined the term early in his career. Previously he served as President of the Heinz Center since May 2002. Before coming to The Heinz Center, he was the World Bank’s Chief Biodiversity Advisor and Lead Specialist for Environment for Latin America and the Caribbean and Senior Advisor to the President of the United Nations Foundation. Dr. Lovejoy has been Assistant Secretary and Counselor to the Secretary at the Smithsonian Institution, Science Advisor to the Secretary of the Interior, and Executive Vice President of the World Wildlife Fund – U.S. He originated the concept of debt-for-nature swaps, and is the founder of the public television series Nature. In 2001 he was awarded the prestigious Tyler Prize for Environmental Achievement.

Dr. Gordon McBean

Dr. McBean is a Professor at the University of Western Ontario, and Chair for Policy in the Institute for Catastrophic Loss Reduction. His research specialties are boundary layer research, hydrometeorology and environmental impact research, and weather forecasting. Previously Dr. McBean was the Assistant Deputy Minister, Meteorological Service of Canada (MSC); Professor and Head, Department of Oceanography, University of British Columbia; Professor and Chairman, Atmospheric Science Programme, University of British Columbia, and; Senior Scientist, Canadian Climate Centre, MSC, located at the Institute of Ocean Sciences. Dr. McBean also chaired the Joint Scientific Committee of the World Climate Research Program, served on the International Group of Funding Agencies for Global Change Research. He is a Fellow of the Royal Society of Canada, the Canadian Meteorological and Oceanographic Society and the American Meteorological Society.

Dr. John Shepherd

Dr. Shepherd is a Professorial Research Fellow in Earth System Science, School of Ocean and Earth Science, National Oceanography Centre, University of Southampton, UK. Dr. Shepherd is also Deputy Director (External Science Coordination) of the Tyndall Centre for Climate Change Research, and a Fellow of the Institute of Mathematics and its Applications. He was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society in 1999. His current research interests include the natural variability of the climate system on long time-scales, and the development and use of intermediate complexity models of the Earth climate system, for the interpretation of the palaeo-climate record, and for long-term projections of climate change. Dr. Shepherd chairs the Royal Society study of Geoengineering and has had to lead that process to achieve consensus on the different points of view regarding geoengineering.

Mr. Stephen Siedel

Mr. Siedel is the Vice President for Policy Analysis and General Counsel at the Pew Center on Global Climate Change. Mr. Siedel is an economist and lawyer with extensive experience in environmental programs and regulations. He directs the domestic analysis program for the Pew Center on Global Climate Change and oversees the Pew Center’s science and environmental impacts portfolio. Prior to joining Pew Center, Mr. Seidel managed EPA’s Stratospheric Protection program including the development and implementation of the Montreal Protocol on Substances that Deplete the Ozone Layer and the regulatory and voluntary partnership programs developed under Title VI of the Clean Air Act. Mr. Seidel also served as a Senior Analyst at Council on Environmental Quality and the White House Climate Change Task Force. Under the auspices of the International Civil Aviation Organization, he co-chaired a multinational working group on market-based measures to limit greenhouse gas emissions.

Dr. Richard Somerville

Dr. Somerville Richard is Distinguished Professor Emeritus and Research Professor at Scripps Institution of Oceanography at the University of California, San Diego. Dr. Somerville is a meteorologist who has studied cloud physics and the interactions between aerosols and clouds. He was a Coordinating Lead Author in Working Group I for the 2007 Fourth Assessment Report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change. In recent years Dr. Somerville has also published on the interaction of scientists with policymakers in the field of global climate change and on ethics and global change. Dr. Richard was an organizer of the 2007 Bali Climate Declaration by Scientists. This effort by climate scientists focused on ensuring quantitative scientific substance into the UN climate negotiations.

Dr. Tom Wigley

Dr. Wigley joined the University of Adelaide in Australia this year as a Professor. He is a specialist in large-scale climate and carbon-cycle modeling and climate data analysis. Before returning to the University of Adelaide where he received his PhD, he was a Senior Scientist at the National Center for Atmospheric Research in the US and he was director of the Climatic Research Unit in the School of Environmental Sciences at the University of East Anglia in Norwich, United Kingdom. Dr. Wigley is one of the few scientists who have used large scale models to understand the potential impact of geoengineering/climate intervention techniques. He is a Fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science.

Asilomar International Conference on Climate Intervention Technologies, March 22-26, 2010

Click on the link below to see the document:

AsilomarConferenceReport.pdf

AmberWatch Kids Letters

We, at Guttman Initiatives, take great pride in helping our children learn how to stay safe.

• Nicole S.
• Billy W.
• Yasir C.

TOP

TOP

TOP

Child Abduction: Waking Up to Every Parent’s Worst Nightmare

We never think it will happen to us but then we see yet another media report of a child missing and it begins to hit closer to home. These days we must take extra precautions to protect our precious children from being taken from us. Linda Sharp, author of Stretchmarks On My Sanity: The Growing Pains of Raising a Family, offers some tips in preventing child abduction.

It happened again

Another state, another bedroom, another innocent sleeping child abducted in the middle of the night. Another mother and father awakened from sweet dreams to be thrust into their worst nightmare.

It has happened again, this time in Utah.

Like every parent reading or watching the news that Thursday morning, my heart skipped a beat and my stomach began to ache as I learned of the abduction of 14-year-old Elizabeth Smart of Salt Lake City, Utah. Her younger sister, also in the room at the time, paralyzed into submission, both made mute by the threat of harm to Elizabeth.

Fear. The single most powerful weapon an abductor has on their side. Fear that buys them silence. Fear that buys them time.

We teach our children. We teach them to look both ways before crossing a street. We teach them how to dial 9-1-1 in emergencies. We warn them to “not take candy from or talk to strangers”. We police them as they chat on the Internet. We practice fire drills in our homes. We buy smoke detectors and security systems for our homes. We make them take vitamins. Make them eat right, sleep enough, brush their teeth. We do everything we can to educate them, keep them from harm. And then one four letter emotion renders all our efforts useless.

Fear. How can we combat such a deeply ingrained component of the human psyche? What tools or information can we teach our children that may well save their lives in the future?

Combating fear

Detective Ryan O’Connell, 30 year police veteran advises, “You have to drill into your children the fact that NOISE is their best defense in the face of abduction. Regardless of what threat is being made at them or their loved ones, they MUST raise an alarm, cause a commotion, put the fear of being caught into the bad person.”

Anecdotal research has shown that threatening to hurt the child or a loved one is the No.1 technique employed by abductors to buy silence. More menacing than the gun or knife they may be brandishing is the “What if” put before the child.

Public abductions happen quickly. Far too many parents have learned the lesson that in the blink of an eye, their child can be whisked away. Stores such as Walmart install video cameras, teach employees codes such as ADAM to be used in the case of a missing child. Yet even a lockdown code of ADAM is too little too late when no sound of distress has come from the child.

The National Center for Missing and Exploited Children offers these eight safety tips for children:

1. I always check first with my parents or the person in charge before I go anywhere or get into a car, even with someone I know.
2. I always check first with my parents or a trusted adult before I accept anything from anyone, even from someone I know.
3. I always take a friend with me when I go places or play outside.
4. I know my name, address, telephone number and my parents’ names.
5. I say no LOUDLY if someone tries to touch me or treat me in a way that makes me feel scared, uncomfortable or confused.
6. I know that I can tell my parents or a trusted adult if I feel scared, uncomfortable or confused.
7. It’s OK to say no, and I know that there will always be someone who can help me.
8. I am strong, smart and have the right to be safe.

As a parent of three young daughters, I make it a point to regularly go over these tips and stress how important it is to communicate any fear they may face. Of course I do not want them walking through life in a constant state of anxiety, but I also do not want them to be “easy targets” for someone who may want to harm them. They all know that their best moment for help is the moment something is happening. They are being taught that a stranger is not to be believed, that their safety is better ensured if they scare the stranger.

Talk to your children. Whatever their age, communicate to them that NOISE is their best defense. And as you tuck your child into bed tonight, checking the windows, checking the doors, know that you have armed them with a tool to combat fear and help ensure that their, and your, sweet dreams are not turned into nightmares.

Age-appropriate tips

The help you can offer a young child is somewhat different from what is useful for an older child. Here are some suggestions:

Young children should:

• Never say they are alone if they answer the phone: they can offer to take a message or say their parents will phone back.
• Never answer the door if they are alone.
• Not invite anyone in the house without the permission of a parent or babysitter.
• Not go into people’s houses without letting anyone know where they are.
• NEVER get into anyone’s car without permission.
• Do not take candy or other gifts from strangers or anyone else without asking a parent first.
• NEVER play in deserted buildings or isolated areas.
• Scream and scatter books and belongings if they are forced towards a building or car.
• Move away from a car that pulls up beside them if they do not know the driver.
• Be taught that it’s all right to say “no” to an adult if the person wants them to do something you’ve taught them is wrong.
• Know that no one has the right to touch any part of their bodies that a bathing suit would cover.
• Tell you, school authorities or a police officer about anyone who exposes private parts.
• Tell you if someone has asked them to keep a secret from you.
• Go to the nearest cashier if lost or separated from you in a store or mall.

Older children/teens should:

• Tell you where they are at all times or leave a written or recorded message at home.
• Never hitchhike.
• Avoid shortcuts through empty parks, fields, alleys.
• Run home or go to the nearest public place and yell for help if they are being followed.
• Learn to recognize suspicious behavior and remember a description of the person or vehicle to give you or the police. Write the plate number in the dirt or snow if nothing else is available.
• If attacked for money, jewelry or clothing give it up rather than risk injury.
• Feel that they can talk to you and call you to pick them up at any time, any place. Parents should:
• Avoid clothing and toys with your child’s name on it. A child is less likely to fear someone who knows his/her name.
• Check all potential babysitters and older friends of your child. NEVER leave your child alone in a public place, stroller or car. Not even for a minute.
• Always accompany young children to the bathroom in a public place and advise them never to play in or around the area.
• Always accompany your child on door-to-door activities, i.e. Halloween, school fundraising campaigns, etc.
• Point out safe houses or homes with the Block Parent sign where children can go if they are in trouble.
• Create an environment in which the child feels free to talk to you. Let him/her know that you are interested and sensitive to their fears.
• Teach them that the police are their friends and that they can rely on them if they are in trouble.
• Keep an up-to-date color photograph of your child, a medical and dental history and have your child fingerprinted.

The Nation’s Leading Wireless Industry Carriers Embrace a Common Cause for Children with the Amberwatch Foundation’s Amberwatch Mobile Initiative

Alltel, AT&T, Sprint, T-Mobile USA, and Verizon Wireless Announce Support of the AmberWatch Mobile Initiative

SAN DIEGO, Calif. (May 29, 2008) - Today at Qualcomm’s BREW 2008 Conference, Dr. Paul Jacobs, CEO of Qualcomm, announced that leading companies in the wireless industry have committed to participate in and support the AmberWatch Mobile Initiative, a charitable effort that generates funds for the AmberWatch Foundation and its non profit partners. Wireless industry companies involved in this groundbreaking initiative include Alltel, AT&T, Sprint, T-Mobile USA and Verizon Wireless, along with Qualcomm and WaveMarket, creating an effort that will impact the welfare of our nation’s children in a very positive way.

Every 40 seconds, a child in America is reported missing and by the time they have reached the age of eighteen, one in four girls and one in six boys will be sexually abused (Source: Finkelhor, David, Hotaling, G., Lewis, I., Smith, C. “Sexual Abuse in a National Survey of Adult Men and Women: Prevalence, Characteristics, and Risk Factors.” Child Abuse and Neglect, Vol. 14, pp. 19-28, 1990). The AmberWatch Foundation is dedicated to the health and welfare of children by educating children and their parents on how to avoid potentially dangerous situations and stay safe from sexual predators. The innovative AmberWatch Mobile Initiative will provide funding to the AmberWatch Foundation and its national “Be Safe!” education programs. This funding also will aid other national AmberWatch Foundation partner charities with complimentary missions. Each carrier may develop its own program to support the AmberWatch Mobile Initiative.

“This powerful collaboration behind the AmberWatch Mobile Initiative proves that industries can join together to support missions. We are thrilled that these companies are working with us to enable us to continue providing invaluable safety education through our programs across the nation.” said AmberWatch Foundation President Joe Zerucha.

“Qualcomm’s vision for wireless has always been to put transforming products into the hands of consumers such that it helps improve their lives and redefine the way they interact with their world,” said Paul E. Jacobs, CEO, Qualcomm. “We are proud to partner with the AmberWatch Foundation and all the major operators in the United States in an effort to help keep America’s kids safe.”

For more information on the AmberWatch Mobile initiative, please visit www.AmberWatchFoundation.org.

About The AmberWatch Mobile Initiative

The AmberWatch Mobile Initiative is a charitable program of the AmberWatch Foundation and is an “Industry Integrated Charitable Initiative” designed and developed by Guttman Initiatives. Leading companies in the wireless industry have come together to generate funds through a variety of efforts including the use of LBS solutions powered by Wavemarket. AmberWatch Mobile will generate ongoing funding to support AmberWatch Foundation’s “Be Safe” educational programs and other programs of the AmberWatch Foundation’s charitable partners focused on keeping America’s children safe and healthy.

About AmberWatch Foundation

Headquartered in Irvine, California, the AmberWatch Foundation is a national not-for-profit organization passionately dedicated to keeping kids safe from molestation and abduction through preventative education programs. At the core of their mission is the AmberWatch Foundation’s “Be Safe!” Education Program, that educates children (and parents) on how to stay safe from child abductors and molesters. The AmberWatch Foundation partners with local law enforcement and educators to deliver the program at no cost to the school, municipality or local community. For more information, please visit www.AmberWatchFoundation.org.