Will China Change on Climate?

According to the AP,

China, Norway and the UN Development Program signed an agreement on Monday to develop programs to combat the effects of climate change in China's rural areas, including the melting of glaciers in Tibet.
The programs will help provincial governments assess potential risks caused by climate change and develop ways to respond, the UNDP said in a statement.
The signing ceremony was witnessed by Chinese Premier Wen Jiabao and visiting Norwegian Prime Minister Jens Stoltenberg.
"The presence of the two top leaders shows the strong commitments of both governments to responding to the global challenge of climate change," Khalid Malik, the UNDP representative in China, was quoted as saying in the statement.

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Melting Ice on Greenland

Today's New York Times reports that the ice on Greenland is melting a a rate as high as 80 cubic miles a year, revealing islands that were previously connected to the mainland by ice. If Greenland melts completely it could raise the world's oceans by 23 feet.
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Climate Change Doubles Russian Natural Disasters

The rate of natural disasters in Russia has doubled in the past decade due to global warming, according to Russia's Minister of Emergency Situtations. Most alarmingly, in Russia's northern regions the permafrost is melting.
"Over the last 30 years the average depth of melting in the permafrost zone increased by 20 centimeters and keeps progressing. If the melting continues, the foundations of homes, communication lines and gas pipelines could begin sinking," the minister said.
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Alpine Ski Resorts Wake Up and Smell the Climate Change

As reported previously in this very blog, the European Alps are experiencing their warmest winter in hundreds of years. In layperson's terms, that means the skiing, what little of it there is, stinks. Snow machines churn out fake white stuff every morning, but by midmorning, rising temps require resorts to turn off the equipment because the psuedo-snow will no longer stick.

According to a story in the New York Times, Climatologists...say the warming trend will become dramatic by 2020. The new studies are alarming, suggesting that the Alps are warming twice as fast as the average in the rest of the world. In 1980, 75 percent of Alpine glaciers were advancing; now, 90 percent are retreating.