Campaign climate. Sen. Blanche Lincoln's ascendancy to the Agriculture Committee chairmanship was a bad omen for passage of climate-change legislation in 2010 due to her close ties to agricultural producers and processors seen as major contributors of greenhouse gases. [News Source]

Earlier springs could destroy delicate balance of UK wildlife, study shows. Recent winters have been ending earlier than ever before, according to a new assessment of Britain's wildlife that reveals global warming could be disrupting the delicate balance of nature. [News Source]

Studying storm surge risks. Researchers funded by a $170,000 federal grant are focusing on Sarasota and its Gulf of Mexico shoreline to demonstrate how low-lying coastal communities grow more vulnerable to storm surge as sea levels rise. And they are rising, scientists say. [News Source]

Legally binding? It’s so 2009. Washington's climate policy analysts from environmental groups are quietly abandoning – at least temporarily – the once sacrosanct notion that nations must agree to legally binding emission targets. [News Source]

U.N. climate panel and chief face credibility siege. Dr. Rajendra K. Pachauri and the IPCC are now under intense scrutiny, facing accusations of scientific sloppiness and potential financial conflicts of interest from climate skeptics, right-leaning politicians and even some mainstream scientists. [News Source]

Coal ad blitz launches new spot as industry sees political gains. An advertising campaign that previously pushed "clean coal" launches new spots focused on jobs and low-cost power – the latest in a three-year, nearly $120 million effort to sell Congress and the White House on coal's future. There are signs that it is working. [News Source]

State lawmaker calls for offshore drilling, end to global warming commission. Sen. Andrew Brock says the legislature should move to tap the massive natural gas reserve experts believe is sitting off the North Carolina coast. [News Source]

Barrage could destroy Severn estuary. A similar dam in the Netherlands caused damage almost "beyond repair." [News Source]

All that wild and woolly weather is part of global warming. Despite the record cold and snow in the Northern Hemisphere, global warming is here to stay, say climatologists. Extremes of weather – short-term meteorology – are part of the big climate picture. [News Source]

Climate scientists hit out at ’sloppy’ melting glaciers error. Climate scientists who worked on the UN panel on global warming have hit out at "sloppy" colleagues from other disciplines who introduced a mistake about melting glaciers into the landmark 2007 report. [News Source]

Watering the air. Two new studies show that in America’s heartland, summers are now cooler and wetter than they were in years past. The scientists suggest that the change in the Midwest climate may have happened because of farming. [News Source]