Our Unfolding Destiny: Possibilities and Probabilities

In our last column (June 1-30, 2009) we stated that what is required for the achievement of a sustainable society is the replacement of the present exponential growth system with an economic and political order based upon both ecological imperatives and the requirements for intergenerational well being. In short, and as stated by Aurelio Peccei […]

India: Distress cattle sale rampant in Jhabua

…Extensive use of herbicides in this region has resulted in a steep decline in fodder cultivation alongside the main crop. This, coupled with a shift to non-fodder cash crops such as tomato and chilli, means there is nothing to feed the cattle with. The only option is to sell them. And since most of them […]

History can no longer guide farmers, investors: U.N.

GENEVA (Reuters) – Climate change has made history an inaccurate guide for farmers as well as energy investors who must rely on probabilities and scenarios to make decisions, the head of a United Nations agency said on Wednesday. Michel Jarraud, director-general of the World Meteorological Organization, said that water and temperature projections have become more […]

Power is shut off as bills pile up

More Americans are having their power shut off as the weak economy makes it harder to pay bills. “We see record numbers of households becoming disconnected or in danger of disconnection,” says Mark Bixby, energy director of Rockford, Ill. Five years ago, his office distributed federal funds annually to about 300 households that had their […]

Australia approves gas megaproject

In order to understand energy geopolitics in Asia, even in East Asia, it is no longer adequate to look westward to Central and Southwest Asia across the Arabian Peninsula to North Africa. A new, massive liquefied natural gas (LNG) development in Australia has just passed an important environmental hurdle, and China, India and Japan are […]

Iran May Fail To Tap Oil Find As Sanctions Tighten-Analysts

Iran may struggle to put its latest oil field discovery into production because of a lack of technology and tougher commercial sanctions, analysts said Tuesday. Raja Kiwan, analyst at PFC Energy told Zawya Dow Jones “the question is how expensive and difficult is it to produce and do the Iranians have the resources to undertake […]

Taking a Dim View of Solar Energy

Who could possibly be against homeowners using solar panels to power their homes? Utility companies. It’s not hard to understand why a big utility might not like the idea of homes, businesses, schools, and even government buildings being covered in solar panels. If every building in America is generating its own solar energy, that throws […]

Bacterial biofuel breakthrough

Research engineers at Ohio State University in the USA said they have developed a new strain of the bacterium Clostridium beijerinckii in a bioreactor containing bundles of polyester fibres, that produced up to 30 grams of butanol per litre. Previously, at a rate more than 15 grams per litre concentrations of alcohol, the tank fermentation […]

Watermelon juice is the latest source of renewable energy

Forget chip fat, sugar cane or rapeseed oil – the latest source of biofuel could be watermelons. Scientists have discovered that the fruit is a great source of sugar that can be readily distilled into alcohol to power cars and farm machinery. And because retailers rejects 360,000 tons of “substandard” fruit annually in America alone […]

German wind power moves further out to sea

A pioneering German wind power plant’s new high-tech equipment, to capture higher winds further offshore and for longer periods, is exciting the industry. The Alpha Ventus wind park started this month and operates 45 km off the German-Dutch coast. Existing European wind parks operate only 20 km offshore at the most.“Alpha Ventus is navigating uncharted […]

Behind the Carnage in Baghdad

“Iraq will be a colony of Iran” As security deteriorates in Baghdad, there’s a new cause for worry: The head of the U.S.-trained Iraqi National Intelligence Service (INIS) has quit in a long-running quarrel with Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki — depriving that country of a key leader in the fight against sectarian terrorism. Gen. Mohammed […]

Extended drought threatens China farmland

The extended drought in China’s north and northeast regions now threatens over 8 million hectares of farmland. Heeding requests from the country’s drought-fighting authority that more be done to alleviate the situation, the oil and power industries have joined the campaign to bring some relief to parched villagers. Zhangjiakou city, in Hebei Province, is experiencing […]

Learsy: Peak Oil Agonistes

The New York Times Finally Comes Around to Where HuffPost Never Feared to Tread This is a day of deep gloom for the McPeaksters, those preaching the gospel of “Peak Oil”. The New York Times, otherwise deeply empathetic to oil patch pseudo science, this day burst one of the most entrenched of the oil patches’ […]

Subpriming the Pump

Oil wealth used to hurt only those who had it. Now, it’s hurting everyone. The resource curse has gone global. For years, oil wealth was mostly a danger to those, paradoxically, who possessed it. Resource-rich Middle Eastern countries, and their labor-exporting neighbors, failed for decades to invest adequately in their people or to diversify their […]

Lots of Food, but for How Long?

In the city where I live, Vancouver, British Columbia, it has never been so easy to get food, any kind of food. You want a watermelon in January? Walk into the nearest supermarket. Complain about the prices if you must, but North Americans typically pay less than 15 per cent of their income to eat. […]

A Rail Boondoggle, Moving at High Speed

The Obama administration’s enthusiasm for high-speed rail is a dispiriting example of government’s inability to learn from past mistakes. Since 1971, the federal government has poured almost $35 billion in subsidies into Amtrak with few public benefits. At most, we’ve gotten negligible reductions — invisible and statistically insignificant — in congestion, oil use or greenhouse […]

U.S. Crop Yields Could Wilt in Heat

Yields of three of the most important crops produced in the United States Roberts adds that while the study examined only U.S. crop yields under warming scenarios, the crop commodity market

Largest firms need to double CO2 reductions to avoid dangerous climate change

Based on current reduction targets, the world’s largest companies are on track to reach the scientifically-recommended level of greenhouse gas cuts by 2089 – 39 years too late to avoid dangerous climate change, reveals a research report – The Carbon Chasm – released today by the Carbon Disclosure Project (CDP). It shows that the Global […]

Triumph of the commons: Helping the world to share

Do you ever get the impression that civilisation has degenerated into an unedifying free-for-all? Like pigs gobbling at their troughs, we all seem to be out to get as much as possible of whatever is on offer. Everyone is at it, from loggers felling the Amazonian rainforest and fishers fighting over the last few cod […]

Top UN climate scientist backs ambitious CO2 cuts

PARIS “But as a human being I am fully supportive of that goal. What is happening, and what is likely to happen, convinces me that the world must be really ambitious and very determined at moving toward a 350 target,” he told AFP in an interview. AFP

Canada's Oil Sands – Part 1

This is the first in a two-part series about Canada’s oil sands. In this post, I will talk about a recent American Petroleum Institute (API)-sponsored media trip I made to see Canada’s oil sands, and give a little background on material being extracted. In the second part of the series, I will talk about future […]

Cyber-Attack Strategy: Part of Russian Attack on Georgian Pipelines

John Bumgarner, a former cyber-security expert for the CIA and other U.S. intelligence agencies, is attracting much attention for his report concluding that Russia’s military offensive in Georgia last year was coordinated with a pre-arranged civilian cyber-attack on the country. What appears to have gone unreported is Bumgarner’s conclusion that the region’s oil apparatus was […]

Saudi Blasts American Energy Policy

The question of American All the talk about energy independence, Mr. al-Faisal said, is

Slums of Suburbia

At ground zero in the housing meltdown Though expanding, the valley’s population is overwhelmingly young and poor, with a median age of less than 30 and poverty rates that rival Detroit and Appalachia. Big, sprawling, single-family suburban houses were the wrong fit. But the farmland was cheap, the zoning codes were lax, and, with Proposition […]

A Farm on Every Floor

IF climate change and population growth progress at their current pace, in roughly 50 years farming as we know it will no longer exist. This means that the majority of people could soon be without enough food or water. But there is a solution that is surprisingly within reach: Move most farming into cities, and […]

Watch out! Disaster looming for Kenya

Politicians cared little about the burning of East Africa’s largest forest – until the lights in Nairobi started going out The largest forest in East Africa acts as a water tower for an otherwise arid land, feeding its lakes and rivers, regulating the climate and refreshing its underground acquifers. But an epic drought has plunged […]

World faces hi-tech crunch as China eyes ban on rare metal exports

Beijing is drawing up plans to prohibit or restrict exports of rare earth metals that are produced only in China and play a vital role in cutting edge technology, from hybrid cars and catalytic converters, to superconductors, and precision-guided weapons.A draft report by China’s Ministry of Industry and Information Technology has called for a total […]

Should Africa be generating much of Europe's power?

Two hugely ambitious power-generating schemes have been launched in recent weeks, one offering to create the world’s largest solar farm and the other to create the biggest hydroelectric dam on the planet. In both cases the location for the mega-projects is Africa: the solar-power scheme envisages harnessing the sun in the Moroccan and/or Algerian Sahara; […]

Pakistan seeks US, China aid on energy

Energy-deficient Pakistan is seeking help from the United States and China to help it overcome its energy crisis through a long-term upgrade and diversification of the antiquated power sector as larger cities suffer power cuts on a daily basis.Last week, US President Barack Obama’s special envoy to Pakistan and Afghanistan, Richard Holbrooke, said that recent […]

Sinopec Actively Seeking Overseas Investments

China Petroleum & Chemical Corp. Asia’s largest refiner by capacity, said Monday that it is actively seeking overseas investments in oil and gas resources as part of its new three-year plan to boost crude oil and natural gas production. Chairman Su Shulin said Sinopec has set up a unit to review overseas acquisition opportunities – […]

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