Wall Street may have pushed Garnaut’s lastest report off the front pages yesterday, but the blogosphere gave it plenty of attention. It was a good day for Crikey to launch our new environment group blog, Rooted.

Garnaut’s defeatism. You could see it in his eyes and feel it in the air today – Professor Garnaut is convinced that humanity is incapable of actually solving the climate crisis. His report and statements are infused with despair and defeatism, summed up in the closing line of his press conference this afternoon: “the failure of our generation will haunt humanity until the end of time”. — Tim Hollo, Rooted

Will Wall Street kill the climate debate? Given that the release of the Garnaut report was delayed by a couple of hours this morning while Rudd and the rest wrapped their head around Wall Street, it seems appropriate to ask — will the economic meltdown push the climate change debate off the page for good?– Sophie Black, Rooted

Garnaut adrift. Of the two main news stories in Australia yesterday–the global financial crisis and the release of the final Garnaut report on the economics of climate change–the latter was the more puzzling and the more disturbing. After an initial draft which seemed eminently sensible and coherent (see my post of July 7) an interim draft moved to an incomprehensible position, with cuts of around 5% to 10%, and an acceptance of a global carbon dioxide level of 550 ppm (implying an acceptance of catastrophic climate change and a planet increasingly hostile to human populations). — Geoff Wells

Garnaut’s dismal view. While Al Gore, and renowned NASA climate scientist, James Hansen are encouraging people to take civil disobedience to physically stop the construction of new coal power stations, Garnaut argues that we need to find the balance between continued economic growth and ‘cost effective mitigation’. — John Hepburn, Rooted