Today the United Nations General Assembly widely approved a resolution calling for a global moratorium on executions toward the goal of abolishment of the death penalty worldwide. Though not legally binding, the resolution symbolically signifies the majority opinion of the international community in opposition to executions.

Marginalized groups often suffer disproportionately in the aftermath of a natural disaster, reports the world's largest humanitarian agency. Minority groups, women, the disabled, and the elderly are most vulnerable, the International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies says, because embedded discrimination makes these groups largely invisible to aid agencies and governments in times of crisis. As a consequence, they often face greater impoverishment, disability, and fatality after a disaster.

This is the final article in the five-part series Beyond Kyoto: A Broader Policy on Climate Change, which examines the history of the Kyoto Protocol and the challenges it has yet to address, in conjunction with the UN climate conference this week.

When the international climate talks in Bali conclude tomorrow, there will have been numerous firsts for the conference: the first Forest Day, the first inclusion of trade and finance ministers in negotiations, Australia's ratification of the Kyoto Protocol, even a move toward compromise by China, which has historically been staunchly opposed to emissions limits. But what is not markedly different since the 1997 dealings is the U.S.'s position, which if maintained through tomorrow will end the conference divisively--essentially, the U.S., Japan, and a few other countries against all others.

This is the fourth article in the five-part series
Beyond Kyoto: A Broader Policy on Climate Change

Deforestation is the second leading contributor of carbon emissions worldwide after the burning of fossil fuels, accounting for one-fifth of annual emissions. However, the Kyoto Protocol lacks measures to protect forest or to reward nations for its conservation, an oversight that was contentious even when the pact was first drafted. With the UN conference now working on an agreement to succeed Kyoto, deforestation is once again a hot topic at this year's negotiations.

This is the third article in the five-part series
Beyond Kyoto: A Broader Policy on Climate Change

It is difficult, and remains contentious, to single out the contribution of climate change to contemporary crop failures, droughts, and severe weather events. However, there's little disagreement that global greenhouse gas emissions are increasing and that carbon dioxide and other gases will persist in the atmosphere decades after their release. In light of this, adaptation to climate change has moved from a tangential concern for a few countries to a practical necessity in national planning across the globe. The implications of adaptation even transcend national boundaries, affecting international relations and development aid flows worldwide.

This is the second article in the five-part series
Beyond Kyoto: A Broader Policy on Climate Change

Among the opinions of heads of state, environment ministers, and NGOs, next week's climate conference will have to accommodate a relatively new force in such discussions: business leaders. Corporations, aware of the environmental and economic risks of a delayed response to climate change, and aware also of the potential opportunities for investment that mitigation technologies represent, have been increasingly vocal in urging U.S. and international greenhouse gas emissions limits.

This is the first article in the five-part series
Beyond Kyoto: A Broader Policy on Climate Change

Representatives from 180 nations will meet in Bali, Indonesia next week to discuss plans for a greenhouse gas emissions agreement to succeed the Kyoto Protocol. That agreement, the first global pact containing binding commitments by most developed nations to stabilize GHG emissions, will expire in 2012.

Populations of bluefin tuna, already on the decline worldwide due to overfishing, are likely to continue to plummet after international management body ICCAT failed to adopt stricter fishing quotas for the upcoming year. The results of last weekend's meeting brought condemnation from conservation groups, and scientists warn that limits twice the species' ability to repopulate may lead to a collapse of commercial tuna fishing and a population level that will never rebound.

Do you know where your power comes from? You can find out in a few clicks, thanks to new website CARMA.org, a database which includes 50,000 power plants worldwide--and the CO₂ pollution each of them produces.

CARMA, which stands for Carbon Monitoring for Action, is the latest in a growing trend of environmental mashups--that is, applications that combine data from multiple sources to create a new tool, intuitively presenting large amounts of data. In the case of CARMA, carbon emissions data from power plants across the globe are overlaid on Google Maps, which allows immediate geographic visualization of the biggest polluters and comparison between locales.

Move over, corn--last week saw the groundbreaking of the U.S.'s first commercial cellulosic ethanol plant, which will use wood scraps to produce the fossil fuel alternative. Range Fuels' plant, located in Georgia, is expected to produce 20 million gallons of ethanol per year by 2009, every drop of which will be made from leftover wood waste.

Wood is a feedstock there should be no shortage of, since the area's surrounding timber industry disposes of about a quarter of each tree processed. The conversion to fuel involves mixing waste products--not only wood but leaves, bark, and pine cones--with steam, chemically transforming them into a gas known as "syngas." Syngas can then be refined into a liquid and made into ethanol and methanol. The complexity and expense of this refinement process are great in comparison to other biofuels (see figure), and until now these factors have limited cellulosic ethanol to the laboratory. Therefore, many are closely watching Range Fuels as a test of whether such plants can be commercially successful in the U.S.