Climate Change

Scrapping fossil fuel subsidies is the idea here.  The caption is from today’s lead editorial in the “Financial Times.”  Among its many felicitous effects, is the fact that “If effective in promoting efficient consumption, elimination would reduce the risk of runaway global warming.”  The Third Assessment Report (2001) of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change […]

I mentioned this new film on climate change this past Friday.  For more, see this review from my FPA sister blog, Global Film Review.  Sean Murphy is bringing a lot of insight to movies important to a better understanding of international affairs.

UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon organized a truly historic event today:  the Summit on Climate Change.  President Obama was among the many speakers.  Carol Browner, Assistant to the President for Energy and Climate Change, and one of the critical voices within the Obama Administration for a robust and progressive approach to meeting the challenge of climate […]

So while presidents, premiers and prime ministers were over at Ban Ki-moon’s Summit on Climate Change today saving the world, some pretty extraordinary innovators were elsewhere on Manhattan Island talking about green building.  I went to the Green Buildings Expo back in June and visited a lot of folks at their booths and talked with […]

In yet another in a seemingly endless series of gems of reporting on climate change, energy and sustainability, the “Financial Times” has this today.  The report looks at critical developments from sub-national governments from California to Sao Paulo to London and many points in between.   There are also interesting ads from TckTckTck and UNDP.  There’s […]

Here’s a succinct and hopeful message from UNFCCC Executive Secretary Yvo de Boer on where we are on the international politics.  We will know more this week after the UN Climate Summit and the G20 meetings.

I’ve written about nuclear power here a number of times.  To be upfront with you:  I’ve been an opponent for almost 40 years, since long before Chernobyl and Three Mile Island.  I have seen very little along the way to change my views.  In the light of the specter of climate change, I’ve tried to […]

I wrote last month about some exciting activities coming up, including the Brita Climate Ride. In Washington this week, the State Department is hosting meetings of the Major Economies Forum on Energy and Climate (MEF).  (See my posts related to the MEF.)  US Special Envoy for Climate Change Todd Stern is leading the US delegation.  […]

The venerable World Resources Institute has a terrific new source for data and information – EarthTrends.  I’ve been using some of their charts in my class on climate change at NYU. Further to my posts from Andalusia and the Algarve on concentrated solar power (here and here), EarthTrends has a terrific graphic on solar radiation […]

I wrote a letter to the “NY Times” in response to Tom Friedman’s column last week, Our One-Party Democracy, in which he says, essentially, that because the Chinese have an autocracy they are better at promoting renewable energy.  The “International Herald Tribune” had my letter forwarded from the “NYT” and I had hoped they would […]

What’s one got to do with the other?  Fair question.   I wrote about this relationship in May here. Statoil, the Norwegian oil company, has a big stake in the tar sands, and a number of leading Norwegian politicians and their parties want them out.  Many, if not most Norwegians, infinitely to their credit, want to […]

The good folks at “The Economist” went to the North American Biochar Conference 2009 in August.  I’ve been bitten by the biochar bug.  See my post here, plus the article I wrote for Grist.  The virtues of biochar – A new growth industry? has some good insights, many of which were gleaned from the papers […]