April 17, 2010 :: J.E. Robertson :: Comments Off
The Environmental Protection Agency, still playing catch-up from years of inaction on key environmental regulatory responsibilities, has for the first time in its history vetoed the approval of a permit for mountaintop removal mining. Last month, the EPA began to apply existing environmental protections for the first time in a way that allowed the agency to put a stop to one of the most radically environmentally degrading practices related to the mining industry.
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April 10, 2010 :: staff :: Comments Off
Swiss-based Solar Impulse has achieved the maiden voyage of its solar-powered aircraft. From here on, the question will no longer be whether solar-powered air travel is possible, but how efficient are the technologies allowing it to compete with combustion-powered air travel.
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February 20, 2010 :: J.E. Robertson :: Comments Off
In response to a recent article, explaining that record snowfall in certain places does not equate to a proof that global warming is not happening, but rather, that global warming is an apt explanation for why the record snowfalls would occur there, a number of climate skeptics chose to attack certain points in the piece, using what they take to be established science. In some cases, the evidence cited was simply misrepresented or misinterpreted, according to the wishes of the skeptics themselves.
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January 28, 2010 :: staff :: Comments Off
Those of us in public office can respond to this reality by playing it safe and avoid telling hard truths and pointing fingers. We can do what’s necessary to keep our poll numbers high, and get through the next election instead of doing what’s best for the next generation. But I also know this: If people had made that decision 50 years ago, or 100 years ago, or 200 years ago, we wouldn’t be here tonight. The only reason we are here is because generations of Americans were unafraid to do what was hard; to do what was needed even when success was uncertain; to do what it took to keep the dream of this nation alive for their children and their grandchildren.
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January 27, 2010 :: J.E. Robertson :: Comments Off
Pres. Barack Obama’s first official State of the Union address was an impassioned call to action, and something of a civics lesson. He reprimanded both parties in Congress, admonishing Democrats not to “run for the hills” and reminding Republicans that if they claim a leadership role by obstructing legislation, then they have an obligation to the public to participate in the process. The address artfully positioned Obama’s agenda astride the political center, leaving the Republicans little room in the center from which to attack his policies.
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January 11, 2010 :: J.E. Robertson :: Comments Off
Despite the widespread debate in the US, China and other heavily coal-burning countries, about the degree to which “clean coal” can be a solution to the daunting challenge of how to reduce carbon emissions that contribute to global warming and climate destabilization, the technology does not yet exist. There are no clean coal plants in the US.
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January 8, 2010 :: J.E. Robertson :: Comments Off
After decades of environmental scientists seeking to raise awareness about the detrimental impacts of burning ever more carbon-based fuels, the Copenhagen Accord shows a global willingness to recognize the gravity of the issue and to take concrete —if as yet unnamed— policy actions to address the challenges of coming decades.
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January 5, 2010 :: J.E. Robertson :: 3 Comments
At the end of Barack Obama’s first year in office, there is controversy over the nature and extent of his accomplishments, and even some allies and supporters appear to have forgotten the atmosphere of multidirectional crisis in which Obama took office. What’s more, the steady decline in Obama’s approval ratings appears to follow very closely a shift in media reporting away from reporting facts and back to the hyper-commentary style of the run-up to the Iraq war, an atmosphere in which conservative political propaganda fares better than the facts of deliberative action.
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January 1, 2010 :: J.E. Robertson :: 2 Comments
As we enter the second decade of the 21st century, we find ourselves part of a global human civilization undergoing major change at an unprecedented rate, and how we adjust to those changes will determine what quality of life and how much real democracy there is, even who lives and who dies, across the global village. For decades, postmodern philosophical theory has examined the problem of atomization of the fabric of human society, but new trends suggest there is concurrent with spreading individualism a swell of interdependence among individuals, communities and nation-states.
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December 28, 2009 :: J.E. Robertson :: One Comment
The Sandia National Laboratories have achieved a landmark breakthrough in solar-voltaic power-generation technology. The snowflake-like “solar glitter” uses 100 times less material to produce the same amount of electricity as today’s standard 6-inch square solar cells. This achievement of ultra-miniaturization now has the potential to move solar-voltaic power generation to the forefront of the clean energy revolution, and help speed the transition away from carbon-based combustible fuels.
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December 24, 2009 :: J.E. Robertson :: Comments Off
China has outraged political and diplomatic leaders around the world by aggressively blocking agreement on hard targets for binding emissions cuts, refusing even to agree to any accord that would include mention of other nations’ specific cuts. One observer told the BBC that he observed China, India and Saudi Arabia as the key powers working to prevent binding targets from being adopted, but China was the most immovable opponent to a binding agreement.
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December 21, 2009 :: staff :: Comments Off
(1) [W]e shall, recognizing the scientific view that the increase in global temperature should be below 2 degrees Celsius, on the basis ofequity and in the context of sustainable development, enhance our long-term cooperative action to combat climate change. … (2) We agree that deep cuts in global emissions are required according to science, and as documented by the IPCC Fourth Assessment Report with a view to reduce global emissions so as to hold the increase in global temperature below 2 degrees Celsius … (10) We decide that the Copenhagen Green Climate Fund shall be established as an operating entity of the financial mechanism of the Convention to support projects, programme, policies and other activities in developing countries related to mitigation including REDD-plus, adaptation, capacity-building, technology development and transfer….
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December 19, 2009 :: Eva Scherson :: One Comment
After two weeks of intense and sometimes bitter negotiations, US president Barack Obama arrived in Copenhagen to marshal all his diplomatic skills in brokering the beginnings of a viable framework for global carbon emissions reductions. Late Friday, it was announced that five nations —the United States, China, India, Brazil, and South Africa— had carved out a deal that would, for the first time, bring all the world’s major economies into the same camp on efforts to curb greenhouse gas emissions.
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December 18, 2009 :: staff :: Comments Off
When US president Barack Obama arrived in Copenhagen, there was no global agreement on how to address climate change and greenhouse gas emissions, and talks were described as being “in a state of chaos”. His morning schedule of face to face meetings was reorganized so he could attend an emergency conference of key leaders. Talks were scheduled to continue through the weekend, and yet before midnight, agreement had been reached.
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December 18, 2009 :: staff :: Comments Off
Gordon Brown plans “plan b” 2nd round of talks if Copenhagen conference fails to achieve global pact. The plan would call for a smaller number of nations to meet to agree to concrete steps to curb emissions and move their contribution to the world economy toward a green energy future.
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December 18, 2009 :: J.E. Robertson :: Comments Off
With the US promising to commit $100 billion over ten years to help fund mitigation efforts against the impacts of climate destabilization and China all but refusing outright to agree to any pact that requires international verification of emissions reductions and/or how international funds are spent, the technological solution remains a key priority.
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December 18, 2009 :: staff :: Comments Off
Good morning. It’s an honor to for me to join this distinguished group of leaders from nations around the world. We come together here in Copenhagen because climate change poses a grave and growing danger to our people. You would not be here unless you —like me— were convinced that this danger is real. This is not fiction, this is science. Unchecked, climate change will pose unacceptable risks to our security, our economies, and our planet. That much we know.
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December 18, 2009 :: staff :: One Comment
The furious negotiations of the final days of the Copenhagen conference on climate change has produced another draft of a potential Copenhagen Accord, which would drop the 2010 deadline for establishing a binding global treaty, but would keep the absolute upper limit of an eventual 2ºC global average temperature rise above pre-industrial levels.
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December 18, 2009 :: Anjika Sridhar :: One Comment
The United States is pledging to “take the lead” on a global fund of $100 billion over ten years, designed to help developing nations transition to a zero-combustion energy economy and fend off the already mounting ravages of climate destabilization. The offer was announced yesterday by Sec. of State Hillary Rodham Clinton, and was intended in part to put added pressure on China to agree to a binding climate deal with emissions reduction verification processes built in.
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December 18, 2009 :: J.E. Robertson :: One Comment
The Copenhagen climate conference is intended to round out two weeks of global negotiations with an agreement of some sort aimed at securing major progress on carbon emissions limits. It remains uncertain whether an agreement will be reached, so Pres. Obama’s trip is being treated as a “high-stakes gamble” in the US media. In fact, Obama will be one of 115 heads of government in attendance, and the White House’s statement that while his attendance cannot guarantee agreement, a decision not to could scuttle negotiations, seems the most level-headed.
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December 17, 2009 :: J.E. Robertson :: Comments Off
Devoting valuable grain crops to fuel production has had an immediate negative impact on the global food supply, reducing supply and pushing prices higher, even as one billion people suffer from chronic hunger. In the United States, high prices and economic crisis mean on in eight are now insufficiently able to access adequate food supplies. But a new generation of crop-based biofuels will be more efficient and need not interfere with the food supply.
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December 16, 2009 :: J.E. Robertson :: Comments Off
The dispute over whether or not wealthy industrialized nations like the US can agree with fast-developing nations, still in the process of industrialization, like China and India, on how best to formulate global emissions policies to combat climate change has been explained backwards. It is commonly said that China and India want the right to continue burning ever-increasing amounts of carbon-based fuels until they catch up to the US and the industrialized nations in per-capita emissions levels. But the problem is more a matter of what cuts the industrial nations are willing to undertake.
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December 14, 2009 :: staff :: Comments Off
This video from Congress.org uses animation to illustrate the way “cap and trade” proposals to limit greenhouse gas emissions —and slow or reverse climate change— would work. The video is a simplified explanation of the very complex array of regulatory reforms that will need to be implemented in order to achieve the goals laid out, but it is accurate in its description of the logic of cap and trade.
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December 13, 2009 :: Denver Lessing :: Comments Off
Sen. James Inhofe (R-OK) is fond of calling the entire global field of climate science “a hoax”, and not only advocates inaction to curb the unraveling of climate systems, but devoutly champions the expansion of the very activities that are driving the planet to crisis. Had he been in office during the catastrophic 1930s “Dust Bowl” and had he had any success in convincing government and farmers to apply such an approach, Oklahoma could have been turned into a permanent desert with the characteristics of a failed state in perpetual need of food aid and expensive imports.
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December 11, 2009 :: J.E. Robertson :: Comments Off
The United Nations Copenhagen Conference on emissions-linked climate destabilization is reported to be progressing toward a new global framework for regulating carbon emissions and mitigating the breakdown of global climate systems. According to the UN website, “The UN Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) has noted an eagerness among the parties to the talks to sit down and complete as much work as possible before the arrival of high-level government officials next week.”
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December 10, 2009 :: Eva Scherson :: Comments Off
Big business interests have come out in fierce opposition to the proposed EPA regulation of emissions that contribute to the greenhouse effect, and the fundamental destabilization of global climate patterns. The opponents of new regulatory measures allege such regulation would unduly hamper the ability of businesses responsible for the emissions to profit from their existing business model. Supporters of heavy investment in carbon-based industries are, without any pretense otherwise, seeking a free pass on harm to human health.
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December 9, 2009 :: J.E. Robertson :: One Comment
The United States’ Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) has ruled that carbon and other greenhouse gas emissions pose a danger to human health, two years after the US Supreme Court gave it the authority to regulate carbon emissions for that very reason, under the Clean Air Act. The finding gives new weight to the American administration’s efforts to help achieve international consensus on aggressive emissions reductions at Copenhagen.
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December 8, 2009 :: J.E. Robertson :: Comments Off
An idea for how to spur investment in new job opportunities has been floating around the world of financial and political analysis: could the money coming in as banks repay their TARP bailout loans be devoted to infrastructure development in a way that creates tens or even hundreds of thousands of jobs?
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December 7, 2009 :: staff :: One Comment
The Copenhagen Conference on Climate Change opened today, with 192 nations in attendance, making it the most significant event ever staged to bring governments together to fashion a global response to climate destabilization. 15,000 participants representing governments and the fields of science, economics and public policy research, are gathered to try to reach agreement on the first true global protocol for curbing emissions and countering the threat of comprehensive climate destabilization.
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December 7, 2009 :: J.E. Robertson :: Comments Off
The e-mails that were stolen from servers at the British University of East Anglia’s climate science center do not show evidence of any conspiracy to falsify science; all they really reveal is evidence of how poorly some people handle political tensions regarding an issue of grave importance for human civilization. So far, the only thing the e-mail scandal has shown is that a handful of people felt that junk science might derail needed environmental regulatory reforms on which the future of human civilization will depend.
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December 1, 2009 :: staff :: Comments Off
Global carbon dioxide emissions from fossil fuels in 2008 were nearly 40% higher than those in 1990. Even if global emission rates are stabilized at present –day levels, just 20 more years of emissions would give a 25% probability that warming exceeds 2oC. Even with zero emissions after 2030. Every year of delayed action increase the chances of exceeding 2oC warming.
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November 29, 2009 :: J.E. Robertson :: Comments Off
The United States is trudging through the tailing winds of an economic storm that saw trillions of dollars in wealth wiped away, major financial institutions demolished, and an investment-based nationalization of the nation’s largest banks, and the mystery, according to most observers, is: where are the jobs? One after another source will say job recovery trails recovery in national economic growth by six to eighteen months.
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November 27, 2009 :: J.E. Robertson :: Comments Off
The Modesto Irrigation District (MID) will test the applicability of mega-battery technology for storing clean energy produced from wind farms, for more effective and well-timed distribution to Pacific coast states. Primus Power Corp. will use a new $14 million federal grant, along with other investment channels to store up to 25 megawatts of electricity. The project is a start, for a region where demand can exceed 600 megawatts on hot summer days.
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November 21, 2009 :: Eva Scherson :: Comments Off
Can we expect China’s cooperation on emissions reduction? It’s clear that China has shifted its energy policy somewhat, to take account for the potential long-term strategic economic benefit of being a major source for green energy technology, know-how and to use green energy to fill out the nation’s energy supply and possibly permit exportation of energy or fuels.
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November 19, 2009 :: staff :: Comments Off
If we’re looking at a rise in overall global energy consumption as an “opportunity”, we should class all particulars of the debate in terms of the long-term viability of the energy resource to be exploited. While carbon-based commodities may see steep returns in the short term, heavy front-end investment in carbon-based fuels will reduce the long-term viability of those commodities as business models, thus curving down the benefit over time.
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November 18, 2009 :: J.E. Robertson :: Comments Off
Pres. Obama has reportedly secured Chinese president Hu Jintao’s pledge of cooperation on global economic recovery, efforts to curb emissions and combat climate destabilization, and nuclear non-proliferation, both in Iran and North Korea. The pledge of cooperation came despite Obama’s demand that China honor the “universal” human rights of its people, alongside differences over how strongly to pressure Iran to guarantee its nuclear pursuits are legal and peaceful in nature.
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October 24, 2009 :: J.E. Robertson :: Comments Off
International efforts to reduce greenhouse gas emissions and slow climate destabilization have been hampered by concerns that developing countries will not reduce their emissions aggressively enough, so leaving industrialized nations at a cost-competitive disadvantage. But evidence suggests a failure by developing nations to curb emissions expansion could pose the most significant threat to their political and economic stability.
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October 23, 2009 :: J.E. Robertson :: Comments Off
Even as momentum gathers for major collaborative climate-linked emissions regulatory policy, aimed at reducing greenhouse-gas emissions like carbon dioxide (CO2), some in industry remain convinced of an outdated theory that assumes emissions reduction must be bad for business. The US Chamber of Commerce (CC), a leading business lobby, is devoting $150 million to fight regulation [...]
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October 20, 2009 :: J.E. Robertson :: Comments Off
Insurers campaign to kill healthcare may be helping renew support for the public option, as Congress prepares to vote. A shift in subsidies is driving a clean energy boom in the American west, and emissions legislation is likely to pass Congress this year. Financial regulatory reform will establish a Consumer Financial Protection Agency. Immigration and gay-rights reform will likely wait till 2010.
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September 29, 2009 :: J.E. Robertson :: Comments Off
The field of ecological research and reporting is a part of the basic human urge to engage the world through reason and a quest for understanding. It is not about seizing control of society’s urges and services and limiting the freedom of anyone, but rather about making sure we have the information we need to make the best choices, then advocating for those choices, when inertia and custom stand in the way of better health — for individuals and in the manner in which human individuals respond to their social and natural environments.
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September 26, 2009 :: staff :: Comments Off
We also took unprecedented steps to secure loose nuclear materials; to stop the spread of nuclear weapons; and to seek a world without them. As the first U.S. president to ever chair a meeting of the United Nations Security Council, I was proud that the Council passed an historic and unanimous resolution embracing the comprehensive strategy I outlined this year in Prague.
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September 22, 2009 :: staff :: One Comment
Pres. Barack Obama today delivered his first address to the UN General Assembly, promoting cooperation to green the global economy and combat climate change. He pledged the US would lead by example, and called on other nations to find common ground and work to secure the global environment against irreversible degradation.
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September 16, 2009 :: J.E. Robertson :: Comments Off
One solution for California would be the expansion of its efforts across the region and the nation, to spur the creation of a full-scale renewable resource-based power grid, to optimize both generative capacity and distribution. The question is, now that the decision has been made to shift toward renewables, how can California go beyond the 1/3 threshold and build a strong renewable-energy export economy?
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September 15, 2009 :: staff :: Comments Off
Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger (R-CA) is reported to be planning to enact the most stringent renewable energy regulations in the nation, requiring public utilities to generate fully one-third of their electric output from renewable resources by the year 2020. California has been pushing for aggressive new standards requiring a transition to renewable energy, but was blocked by the Bush-era EPA from implementing more stringent state-wide emissions protocols and has recently seen a tough battle in Sacramento over the question of imposing on utilities a shift to clean, renewable resources.
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September 13, 2009 :: J.E. Robertson :: Comments Off
As the “perfect storm” gathers from inchoate, deceptively non-threatening winds, we can look ahead, backward and into the mirror and ask how crisis comes, or why, if it is inevitable, if we might just fall right out of it, as we fell into it. But the answer is simple: human crisis comes from excess, from inordinate ambition, from misplaced aggression, from over-exploitation of resources, each of which generates real and problematic tension across the landscape of human experience.
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September 9, 2009 :: J.E. Robertson :: Comments Off
When Barack Obama, not a month into his first term as president of the United States, announced a far-reaching, phased-in recovery plan, this February, he was trying to do something more clever and more appropriate than an all-or-nothing one-shot stimulus. That would have been a ham-fisted gamble at best, in the midst of a complex banking crisis, especially because such an attempt had failed in Bush’s last year to stave off recession.
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September 4, 2009 :: Riga Listin :: Comments Off
The Mercedes B-class F-cell will be out in 2010 in the US and Europe, with an initial limited production fleet of 200 vehicles. The vehicles will be lease-only, as Mercedes works to perfect the technologies and market strategies it needs to bring the car to mass market.
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September 3, 2009 :: J.E. Robertson :: 6 Comments
With a profound philosophical rift emerging in the nation’s chief opposition party, intolerance and programmatic lack of empathy are becoming the hallmarks of a troubled Republican minority. Party strategists are now worrying that, whatever the benefit might be for “building the base”, a more hard-line, less flexible, less inclusive vision of Republicanism will hurt the party’s chances in national elections.
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August 31, 2009 :: staff :: Comments Off
The governor of Massachusetts, Deval Patrick, has announced he will work with lawmakers to arrange for an interim appointment to replace the late Sen. Ted Kennedy, until the special election, now scheduled for 19 January 2010, allows voters to choose a senator to complete the last three years of his current 6-year term. The announcement paves the way for negotiations with state lawmakers about how to appoint a “caretaker”, and who should get the appointment.
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August 15, 2009 :: J.E. Robertson :: Comments Off
The quest for the most fuel-efficient vehicles has entered a new phase, with major government private-sector investment in research and development for industrial-scale commercial production of a new class of gas-electric hybrid vehicles and EVs (all-electric cars). Swiss-based Solar Impulse is building the world’s first 100% solar-powered airplane, an achievement that will revolutionize the travel, industrial production, transport and fuel sectors.
More on page 4064
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