Is China poor? Key question at climate talks

BONN, Germany (AP) — Another round of U.N. climate talks closed without resolving how to share the burden of curbing man-made global warming, mainly because countries don't agree on who is rich and who is poor.

China wants to maintain a decades-old division between developed and developing countries, bearing in mind that, historically, the West has released most of the heat-trapping gases that scientists say could cause catastrophic changes in climate.

But the U.S. and Europe insisted during the two-week talks that ended Friday in Bonn that the system doesn't reflect current economic realities and must change as work begins on a new global climate pact set to be completed in 2015.

"The notion that a simple binary system is going to be applicable going forward is no longer one that has much relevance to the way the world currently works," U.S. chief negotiator Jonathan Pershing said.

Countries like Qatar and Singapore are wealthier than the U.S. per capita but are still defined as developing countries under the classification used in the U.N. talks. So is China, the world's second largest economy.

Finding a new system that better reflects the world today, while also acknowledging the historical blame for greenhouse gas emissions, is the biggest challenge facing the U.N. process as it seeks a global response to climate change.

"That is a fundamental issue," said Henrik Harboe, Norway's chief climate negotiator. "Some want to keep the old division while we want to look at it in a more dynamic way."

The U.N. climate talks are based on the premise that industrialized countries must take the lead on climate change by committing to reducing emissions of carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases. They are also expected to provide money to help poor countries grow in a sustainable way and to protect the most vulnerable nations from rising sea levels, droughts and other consequences of a warming world

Disputes on how to categorize countries going forward was behind much of the procedural wrangling that slowed down the talks in Bonn. Delegates failed to agree on an agenda until the last day, leaving most of the work for a bigger summit in Qatar in November.

A separate dispute between developing countries delayed the appointment of officials to steer the talks. That stalemate was also unlocked on the last day.

The slow pace frustrated climate activists who fear that there won't be enough political will to rein in emissions to avoid dangerous levels of warming in coming decades.

"The talk here doesn't match the action that science says is required," said Mohamed Adow, senior climate change adviser at Christian Aid.

China's lead negotiator Su Wei told The Associated Press that the proposed new deal, which would have binding commitments for all countries after 2020, must be based on the principle of "common but differentiated responsibility" enshrined in previous climate agreements.

"That means we still would continue the current division between developed and developing countries," Su said.

He said China is still a developing country because if you look at wealth per capita, it barely makes the world's top 100. More than 100 million Chinese live below the poverty line, which Beijing has defined as about $1 a day.

Still, Western officials say China's fast-growing energy needs and rising emissions mean it can no longer be off the hook in climate negotiations.

"We need to move into a system which is reflecting modern economic realities," EU negotiator Christian Pilgaard Zinglersen said.

In the early 1950s, China accounted for just 2 percent of global emissions while the U.S. accounted for more than 40 percent, according to Climate Analytics, a climate research group based in Potsdam, Germany.

Today China's share of global emissions exceeds 25 percent, while the U.S. share has fallen toward 20 percent.

China and its supporters reject blame for stalling the climate talks, saying it is the U.S. and other developed nations that are unwilling to live up to their obligations to cut carbon emissions.

The U.S. refused to join the only binding accord to limit emissions — the 1997 Kyoto Protocol — partly because it didn't include China.

Seyni Nafo, spokesman for a group of African countries in the climate talks, noted that the U.S. also said that joining Kyoto would harm the U.S. economy. Years later, the U.N. climate effort still has little support in the U.S. Congress, which includes outspoken climate skeptics.

"We are hoping that they will get on board this time, which is not a given," Nafo said.

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New Study Throws Dark Matter Finding Into Question (SPACE.com)

A new study of dark matter, the mysterious hidden stuff thought to pervade the universe, casts doubt on a previous finding that offered hope that dark matter had finally been seen.

In 2008, a European-Russian satellite called Payload for Antimatter Matter Exploration and Light nuclei Astrophysics (PAMELA) discovered a strange overabundance of particles called positrons, which are the antimatter counterpart to electrons. Matter and antimatter, which have the same mass but opposite charges, destroy one another when they meet.

According to theory, when a particle of dark matter collides with its antiparticle, they annihilate, unleashing a burst of energy and exotic particles. Dark matter is thought to make up 98 percent of all matter in the universe and 23 percent of its total mass and energy. Scientists have yet to directly detect invisible dark matter, but its existence is inferred based its gravitational pull on regular matter.

The positrons found by PAMELA were thought to be the products of dark matter annihilation with antimatter, and scientists were hopeful that the tantalizing discovery could prove the existence of the elusive dark matter.

But a new study has raised more questions about PAMELA's discovery. Researchers at the Kavli Institute for Particle Astrophysics and Cosmology (KIPAC) at Stanford University in California confirmed the overabundance of positrons, but when they did not see a sudden drop-off of this excess beyond a certain energy level, they knew something was wrong.

"If the antimatter we measure is coming from the annihilation of dark matter particles, then the positron excess should drop off fairly suddenly at an energy level that corresponds with the mass of the dark matter particle," study co-author Stefan Funk, an assistant professor of physics at Stanford University, said in a statement.

Rather, Funk and his colleague, Justin Vandenbroucke, found that the number of positrons continued to increase in line with the level of energy. [7 Surprising Things About the Universe]

"Some have concluded that this altogether rules out dark matter as a source of the antimatter we're measuring," Funk said. "At the very least this means that if the positrons are coming from dark matter annihilation, then dark matter particles must have a higher mass than allowed by the PAMELA measurement."

But the results are not necessarily a definitive strike against the finding, the researchers said.

"We're taking an observational point of view and simply reporting the data that we observe," Vandenbroucke said. "However, I know that articles are already appearing that say our result likely rules out the dark matter interpretation. Personally, I think that is too strong of an interpretation."

Additional observations will be needed to settle the debate, the researchers said. One instrument in particular, the antimatter-hunting Alpha Magnetic Spectrometer (AMS), is expected to yield helpful results.

NASA's space shuttle Endeavour carried the AMS experiment to the International Space Station in May, where it was installed on the exterior of the complex. It has been operating ever since. This detector should be able to collect more precise data at higher energies, Vandenbroucke said.

"AMS has a very large magnet in its detector and so can naturally and very easily distinguish between electrons and positrons," Funk said. "That experiment will most likely be able to make a final statement on this. It's something we are all eagerly awaiting."

Funk and Vandenbroucke used NASA's Fermi Gamma-ray Space Telescope, which studies the highest energy forms of light. Since the telescope is designed to detect neutral light particles, called photons, it does not have a magnet to separate negatively charged electrons and positively charged positrons.

The researchers were forced to improvise, but luckily a natural magnet exists close to home: Earth. The planet's magnetic field naturally bends the paths of charged particles that almost continuously rain from space, they explained.

The scientists then studied geophysical maps of Earth and calculated how the planet filters out charged particles seen by the telescope, in a novel approach at the intersection of astrophysics and geophysics.

"The big takeaway here is how valuable it is to measure and understand the world around us in as many ways as possible," Vandenbroucke said. "Once you have this basic scientific knowledge, it's often surprising how that knowledge can be useful."

The researchers detailed their results in a paper submitted to the journal Physical Review Letters.

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Huntsman Gives Nonanswer to Space Policy Question (ContributorNetwork)

Another Republican presidential candidate, former Utah governor and ambassador to China Jon Huntsman, was asked about space policy. While former Speaker Newt Gingrich's response was hostile and angry, Huntsman's reply was vague.

According to the Orlando Sentinel: "When asked Thursday about the long period NASA now faces before it can have a manned space flight program again, Huntsman began by talking about first getting the country's economic house in order. He said space will be a part of that because of the 'long term return on investment" from space projects.'

"'We always want to be at the cutting edge of space flight. Today it's an affordability issue. When we get around to space policy, we'll come down here and make sure people are fully aware of what our hopes are,' he said."

The nonresponse that Huntsman gave had none of the luster of "We choose to go to the moon," but it was much as one might expect coming from a politician who had likely never been confronted with a space policy question before. Huntsman artfully gave a nod to the continuing debt crisis, but at the same time held out hope that something might happen that would tie space into jump starting the stalled economy.

There is not much yet from the Republican field of candidates concerning space issues, aside from Huntsman's tap dance and Gingrich's attack on NASA and lauding of the private sector. In a way, nether matters as neither man is given much of a chance of winning the nomination, not to mention the general election.

Huntsman is considered a moderate and the second coming of John McCain, but without the charisma and war record. Gingrich's campaign is in full meltdown mode with staff abandoning ship and questions about the former Speaker's seriousness about running for president being raised.

The candidates to look for a space policy that might actually have a chance of being implemented are Mitt Romney, Michele Bachmann and Tim Pawlenty and -- if they choose to run -- Rick Perry and Sarah Palin. That is because these three candidates and two potential candidates might win.

Romney has spoken in vague terms about support for space exploration. Palin has lauded space as well in her two books, "Going Rogue" and "America by Heart." Coming from Texas, Perry would be expected to be supportive of NASA as well.

Nothing is certain, of course, until the candidates formulate a policy proposal. The debt crisis makes any increase for NASA a hard sale. However, regulatory and tax incentives for commercial space are certainly possibilities.

President Barack Obama's space policy, as unpopular as it is, has given the Republican candidates an opening to make space an issue, tying it perhaps to American exceptionalism, economic revival and national security. Whether anyone will take the opportunity remains to be seen.

Mark R. Whittington is the author of Children of Apollo and The Last Moonwalker. He has written on space subjects for a variety of periodicals, including The Houston Chronicle, The Washington Post, USA Today, the L.A. Times, and The Weekly Standard.

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