Climate change, ecology, nature, environment, eco-friendly politics, non-profit projects, human rights, preservation, wildlife... all that we care about.
According to legislation passed in 2002 by the Social Democratic-Green Party coalition, all nuclear power stations in Germany are to be decommissioned by 2022.
However, according to a recent television interview, current German Chancellor Angela Merkel of the Christian Democratic Union plans to extend this deadline by another 10-15 years.
From a report in Deutsche Welle:
The chancellor, [...]
Projected astronomic growth in transport and wind energy development during the next 20 years threaten the already imperiled Baltic sea, according to a new report by the WWF.
The report, entitled ‘Future Trends in the Baltic Sea’ warns that almost all maritime activity is projected to expand over the next two decades, which will add enormous [...]
Poor BP. After the Deepwater Horizon mishap they have been tarred by their own brush, so to speak.
But lets face it, despite BP’s exceptionally bad safety record, it’s a bad brush all around; whether you’re a pelican in the Gulf of Mexico or a person living beside Alberta’s tar sands or in the Niger River [...]
The Greenpeace ship Esperanza is currently protesting deep sea oil drilling in the Arctic by UK firm Cairn Energy, the first company granted permission to drill in Greenland’s icy and environmentally sensitive waters.
Cairn Energy is also one of the targets of the recent Climate Camp protests in Edinburgh, where the company is based.
Greenpeace campaigner Leila [...]
Climate change activists stepped up their game and held a rash of demonstrations in Edinburgh, Scotland today.
Members of the activist group Climate Camp have been set up outside the Royal Bank of Scotland (RBS) global headquarters in Edinburgh since last week in order to protest the bank’s financing of the fossil fuel industry. But today [...]
Despite growing environmental awareness and energy efficiency measures, the developed world consumes more than ever. At the same time people in China and much of the developing world are adopting more energy intensive lifestyles.
So more cars and meat consumption in China, etc., combined a growing obsession for the latest consumable goods – like phones, cars [...]
During a trip last month from the Portuguese capital of Lisbon to its second largest city Porto, in the north of the country, I noticed a lot of wind turbines dotting the landscape. I’m not the only one either.
The New York Times published a piece yesterday on Portugal’s green makeover. Wind, hydro, solar and wave [...]
The government of Spain’s electric vehicle scheme has so far failed to take off.
Spain’s plans to fill its roads with electric cars, which can top up at service stations and converted phone booths across the country, have hit a bump in the road. So far only 16 electric cars have been sold in Spain this [...]
Britain’s energy secretary Chris Huhne has lifted the ban on local authorities selling back surplus electricity into the national power grid.
The plan is to encourage local councils to generate their own renewable energy by installing solar panels and wind turbines on council owned property, including both homes and public buildings. Any extra electricity can be [...]
If the unusually hot weather in Europe this summer is an environmental ‘cloud’ of bad news – forest fires in Russia, algal blooms in the Baltic, etc. – then an increase in capacity for renewable energy in Germany is the ‘silver lining’.
A new report by Germany’s Fraunhofer Institute for Wind Energy and Energy Systems Technology [...]
You might think you can do a better job than the UK government at cutting CO2, becoming more energy efficient and deciding how Britain should move towards a low carbon economy.
Well the UK’s Department of Energy and Climate Change let’s you try it out – in a computer simulation, of course.
The Independent’s environment editor loves [...]
Former UK Energy and Climate Change Secretary Ed Miliband thinks the new coalition government’s energy policies are a ‘huge disappointment’ to industry and to the country.
Well, he would say that, wouldn’t he? He’s in the shadow cabinet and that’s sort of their job. Yet it seems Miliband is indeed more pro-active in terms of helping [...]
Latin America has huge potential for wind and solar power. Brazil already has large and long-established hydropower and biofuel industries, but along with Mexico, Colombia and other Latin American countries, they are increasingly looking towards European models of renewable energy.
From an article in Scientific American:
European wind farms dwarf Latin American efforts in terms of production [...]
For those of you who didn’t swoon when Edward Norton urged us to ban the plastic bag, here is another National Geographic video featuring Hollywood starlets Natalie Portman and Chloe Sevigny. I dare you to watch it without afterwards gleefully smashing your energy-sucking bulbs and rushing out for a bunch of those efficient twirly CFL [...]
Despite the recent economic downturn, the green energy market has grown to the point of eclipsing fossil fuel – at least in terms of the creation of new power capacity in Europe and the United States.
In 2009 renewables accounted for over 50% of new power capacity in the US and 60% in the Europe. Green [...]
Certain Internet giants were recently criticized by a Greenpeace report because they source their power from coal-fired stations. Facebook and Apple were named as guilty parties, while Google and Yahoo came out looking a bit more eco-friendly than the competition.
But cloud computing – or web-based computer use – can also generate heat and electricity. It’s [...]
The UK’s independent advisory body established under the Climate Change Act has stated that Britain needs to invest more in low carbon technologies in order to meet its goal of cutting 1990 emissions levels by 80% by the year 2050.
The Committee on Climate Change (CCC) was established with the purpose of reporting to the UK’s [...]
As the world’s attention is still focused on the BP Gulf of Mexico disaster the EU’s energy commissioner, Gunther Oettinger, is calling for a moratorium on deep water oil drilling in Europe.
The energy commissioner met with oil industry representatives on Wednesday and clearly stated that he is in favor of banning deep sea oil drilling [...]
A recent piece for The Ecologist, entitled ‘Biomass Britain: do fields of energy crops spell an end to grazing livestock’, explores the possibility of a revolution in the UK’s land use.
70-80% of land in the UK is used by the British livestock industry. The possibility of a near-complete shift from livestock farming to the growing [...]
The Payatas garbage dump in Quezon City, Philippines is legendary among dumpsites of the world, for its sheer size and also for the desperate living conditions of the many people who subsist by scavenging there.
Payatas made headlines 10 years ago when hundreds of informal settlers perished under a mountain of trash that collapsed during a [...]
Germany’s Federal Environment Agency claims that the European nation could get all its power from renewables by 2050.
At the moment Germany derives 16% of its electricity from renewable sources such as solar and wind – a threefold increase from 1995. Some 300,000 jobs in the renewable energy field have been created since 2000 and Germany [...]
An independent report commissioned by the UK’s Conservative Party – when they were in opposition – has found that Britain needs a green investment bank in order to meet its emissions goals for 2020.
The report, entitled ‘Unlocking investment to deliver Britain’s low carbon future’ discusses low carbon investment, issuing ‘green bonds’, tax incentives to help [...]
Ready for some negative news?
The 8.6% fall in UK greenhouse gas emissions last year was down to the economic slump rather than government initiatives.
According to an article in the Guardian, the government needs to take significant action over the next year in order to reach legally binding emissions targets (34% on 1990 levels by 2020). [...]
A new campaign by the Japanese government encourages people to go to bed one hour earlier in order to save energy and cut down on CO2 emissions. Not watching TV and having lights on late at night could cut household energy consumption by up to 20%
The campaign, launched by Japan’s Environment Ministry, is called ‘Morning [...]
The long dark and gooey shadow of the Deepwater Horizon disaster in the Gulf of Mexico is shining a gruesome light on offshore drilling, its toll on the environment and the true cost of oil.
Yet the Gulf spill is also getting all the attention, while other environmental issues or injustices suffer from neglect or overshadowing. [...]
With fossil fuels running out, not to mention polluting the earth and heating up the planet, the largest energy consuming countries are constantly looking for new sources of power.
One vast renewable and obviously inexhaustible source is sunlight.
As technology for capturing solar energy and converting it to usable power continually develops – making solar power an [...]
Several American technological companies are developing methods of wireless energy transference, as was once envisioned by legendary inventor and electrical engineer Nikola Tesla. The details the firms are using in their various methods of delivering wireless power differ from Tesla’s ideas, particularly in terms of the amount of power and the distance it travels.
WiTricity has [...]
Yesterday the Queen gave her speech to formally open Parliament. The Queen’s Speech sets out the UK government’s proposals for new laws and policies.
Included in the Queen’s Speech was the new government’s energy bill, known as the Energy Security and Green Economy Bill, from the Department for Energy and Climate Change. It is credited to [...]
Scientists have come up with an alternative fuel source that vegan environmentalists wouldn’t like to use: whey.
Whey is the watery part of milk that remains after it is separated from curds during the process of cheese making. Although already used as an ingredient in several types of cheese and as a popular high protein nutritional [...]
The International Energy Agency (IEA) predicts that solar power will supply 20-25% of energy needs by the year 2050. Half of this will be from photovoltaic solar panels, initially driven by feed-in tariff schemes like the UK government’s controversial FIT plan. The other half will come in the form of Concentrated Solar Power, or CSP, [...]
