Environmental Economics & Sustainable Development

• Gore, Gandhi, and Dioum

  Al Gore at TED
  March, 2008
  
  
  
  Here is an excellent presentation on issues pertaining to the new environmental movement--global climatic disruption and resource constraints (in comparison to the previous environmental movement--biodiversity, toxins, air/water quality, and population). In the past, I have been skeptical towards Al [...]
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  Posted: April 16, 2008, 6:59pm EDT
  

• David Suzuki, Air, and Intelligence

  David Suzuki talking about air and alveoli
  March 12, 2008 -- 11th Annual Commonwealth Lecture
  
  Our lungs are made up of about 300 million capsules, or alveoli, and they are clustered around an alveolar stem like grapes. We have lots of these clusters in our lungs [...]
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  Posted: April 06, 2008, 11:41pm EDT
  

• Conscientious Investments: The Carbon Principles

  Banks Set Emissions Standard for U.S. Power Industry
  1999 -- By Lisa Lee, Reuters via ENN
  
  Three Wall Street banks said on Monday they will set environmental standards that factor in risks posed by carbon-emissions when lending to power companies that seek to build coal-fired power [...]
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  Posted: February 05, 2008, 12:47am EST
  

• State of Green Business 2008

  
  
  Download reportThank you for visiting this Environmental Economics blog. Please bookmark and return daily! [...]
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  Posted: February 01, 2008, 11:38pm EST
  

• 1 Megawatt Powers 778 Homes!

  A one-megawatt electric plant running continuously at full capacity can power 778 households each year, according to the U.S. Department of Energy. There are 1,000 kilowatts in a megawatt. Solar technology has lower capacity because its power generation is constrained by availability of the sun.
  
  
  
  Source: [...]
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  Posted: February 01, 2008, 11:33pm EST
  

• Why 80% GHG Reductions Are Necessary: Concentrations, Emissions, Stocks, and, Flows

  
  
  
  Read more...Thank you for visiting this Environmental Economics blog. Please bookmark and return daily! [...]
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  Posted: February 01, 2008, 11:27pm EST
  

• Combined Renewable Energy Powerplant

  
  
  Thank you for visiting this Environmental Economics blog. Please bookmark and return daily! [...]
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  Posted: January 09, 2008, 12:38am EST
  

• AEP Settles With Government

  AEP Settles Long-Running U.S. Acid Rain Suit
  October 9, 2007 -- Reuters via ENN
  
  U.S. power generator American Electric Power has settled an eight-year legal battle over acid rain with the U.S. government and other plaintiffs, but the agreement will not change the company's 2007 earnings,' [...]
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  Posted: October 10, 2007, 2:10am EDT
  

• PG&E Gives Away 1 Million CFLs

  PG&E Gives Away 1 Million Energy Efficient Light Bulbs
  October 3, 2007 -- By Todd Woody, Green Wombat
  
  In the U.S.' biggest compact fluorescent light bulb giveaway, California utility PG&E began handing out 1 million energy-efficient CFLs today. The bulbs use 75 percent less electricity than conventional' [...]
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  Posted: October 03, 2007, 5:36pm EDT
  

• Climate Change Agreement by 2009?

  Thank you for visiting this Environmental Economics blog. Please bookmark and return daily! [...]
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  Posted: October 02, 2007, 5:38pm EDT
  

• Avoiding Collapse in Modern Civilization

  THE NATURE OF THE NEW WORLD
  October 2, 2007 -- By Lester R. Brown, Earth Policy Institute
  
  Plan B 2.0 Book Byte:
  
  We recently entered a new century, but we are also entering a new world, one where the collisions between our demands and the earth’s [...]
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  Posted: September 30, 2007, 3:55pm EDT
  

• Biofuels May Raise GHG Emissions, says Nobel Laureate Paul Crutzen

  Biofuels could boost global warming, finds study
  September 21, 2007 -- By Zoe Corbyn, Chemistry World
  
  Growing and burning many biofuels may actually raise rather than lower greenhouse gas emissions, a new study led by Nobel prize-winning chemist Paul Crutzen has shown. The findings come in the [...]
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  Posted: September 25, 2007, 2:48pm EDT
  

• Carbon Tax, CAFE Standards and Cap-and-Trade: An Economist's View

  One Answer to Global Warming: A New Tax
  September 16, 2007 -- By N. Gregory Mankiw, The New York Times
  
  
  In the debate over global climate change, there is a yawning gap that needs to be bridged. The gap is not between [...]
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  Posted: September 19, 2007, 1:25am EDT
  

• Alex's Last Words

  Excerpts from:
  Brainy Parrot Dies, Emotive to the End
  September 11, 2007 -- By Benedict Carey, The New York Times
  
  He knew his colors and shapes, he learned more than 100 English words, and with his own brand of one-liners he established himself in [...]
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  Posted: September 11, 2007, 1:55am EDT
  

• Biomimicry, Maximizing Wealth and Minimizing Materials Flow

  Excerpt from:
  Natural Capitalism
  1999 -- By Paul Hawken, Amory Lovins and L. Hunter Lovins
  
  Materials efficiency is just as much a lesson of biological design as the making of spider-silk: biomimicry can inform not just the design of specific manufacturing processes but also the structure and function [...]
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  Posted: September 05, 2007, 1:38am EDT
  

• Natural Capitalism Quotes

  Excerpts from:
  Natural Capitalism
  1999 -- By Paul Hawken, Amory Lovins and L. Hunter Lovins
  
  Imagine giving a speech to Parliament in 1750 predicting that within seventy years human productivity would rise to the point that one person could do the work of two hundred. The speaker would [...]
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  Posted: September 04, 2007, 1:39am EDT
  

• The Man Who Planted Trees by Jean Giono

  The Man Who Planted Trees (L'homme qui plantait des arbres)
  The Story of Elzéard Bouffier
  1953 -- By Jean Giono
  Animated adaptation by Frédéric Back in 1987
  
  
  
  
  
  Thank you for visiting this Environmental Economics blog. Please bookmark and return daily![...]
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  Posted: August 30, 2007, 1:47am EDT
  

• Methane Hydrates (Clathrates) Could Power The World

  The great submarine burp
  August 27, 2007 -- The Economist
  
  Methane from the oceans could power the world
  
  Much effort is quietly going into the pursuit of what is probably the world’s greatest store of fossil fuel—caches of methane, the primary component of natural gas, stored [...]
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  Posted: August 27, 2007, 8:10am EDT
  

• Rabbit-Proof Fence Has Unintended Consequences

  At Australia’s Bunny Fence, Variable Cloudiness Prompts Climate Study
  August 14, 2007 -- By Sonal Noticewala, The New York Times
  
  
  A fence built to prevent rabbits from entering the Australian outback has unintentionally allowed scientists to study the effects of land use on [...]
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  Posted: August 15, 2007, 1:39am EDT
  

• 2007 Farm Bill

  After searching for information on the 2007 Farm Bill, I realized that I was still uncertain of all the proposals and debates. Please let me know if you have any suggestions for good articles on this topic.
  
  In addition to the article below, I would recommend these links:
  [...]
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  Posted: August 13, 2007, 1:39am EDT
  

• Yangtze River Dolphin: Likely Extinct

  Rare Yangtze River dolphin probably extinct: study
  August 7, 2007 -- By Michael Kahn, Reuters
  
  
  The long-threatened Yangtze River dolphin in China is probably extinct, according to an international team of researchers who said this would mark the first whale or dolphin to [...]
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  Posted: August 13, 2007, 12:24am EDT
  

• AC, DC and Wind Power

  Where The Wind Blows
  July 26, 2007 -- The Economist
  
  Plug in your toaster—or your television or your vacuum cleaner—and the electricity that surges through it is an alternating current. The question of whether the world would be powered by direct current (DC), in which electrons flow [...]
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  Posted: August 13, 2007, 12:11am EDT
  

• Compressed Air and Wind Power

  Trapped Wind
  July 26, 2007 -- The Economist
  
  Compressed air might help to make wind power more reliable
  
  Pumping water into the reservoir of a hydroelectric power plant may be a good way of storing energy captured by wind farms—but what if there are no such [...]
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  Posted: August 13, 2007, 12:10am EDT
  

• "He not busy being born is busy dying"

  Via CEOs for Cities
  Excerpts from:
  The Living City
  August 2007 -- By Jonah Lehrer, Seed Magazine
  
  Cities act just like creatures. They obey the same metabolic laws that govern every organism. Which means that cities, just like elephants, get more economical with size.
  
  It [...]
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  Posted: August 09, 2007, 12:06am EDT
  

• Death Valley, Galaxies and Sailing Stones

  
  
  I recently found this image of Death Valley on the NASA: Astronomy Picture of the Day website. I liked it so much that it is now part of this site. Futility Closet points out that rocks, like the one in this image, [...]
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  Posted: August 08, 2007, 12:25am EDT
  

• Production and Consumption

  The revolution of production and consumption
  May 29, 2006 -- By Timo Mäkelä, Sitra
  
  Growing numbers of decision-makers, scientists and economists believe that the world economy is heading towards a crisis because of diminishing natural resources and their consequently high prices. What is more, the race after [...]
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  Posted: August 07, 2007, 11:05pm EDT
  

• The 11th Hour

  Here is a trailer for the new documentary entitled The 11th Hour. It's world premiere was at the 2007 60th Annual Cannes Film Festival and will be released on August 17th 2007.Thank you for visiting this Environmental Economics blog. Please bookmark and return daily! [...]
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  Posted: August 06, 2007, 10:04pm EDT
  

• Sustainable Development: A 21st Century American Vision?

  As I watched E.O. Wilson speak on BookTV today I was reminded once again of how finite the world's resources are for ourselves and future generations. If every human consumed at equal rates to Americans, it would require four Earths to sustain it. This somber statistic persuaded me [...]
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  Posted: August 06, 2007, 12:37am EDT
  

• Wind Energy Market Outpacing Manufacturing Capacity

  Via Peak Energy
  Excerpt from:
  Despite Rising Costs, Wind Industry Thriving Worldwide
  July 26, 2007 -- By Stephen Lacey, Renewable Energy Access
  
  

  The wind industry is undergoing temporary growing pains similar to the silicon shortage experienced by the solar photovoltaic (PV) industry: there are simply [...]

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  Posted: August 02, 2007, 12:23am EDT
  

• Energy Efficiency Index from Merrill Lynch

  Merrill's Efficiency Index
  July 30, 2007 -- By Cassandra Vinograd, WSJ: Energy Roundup
  
  

  Merrill Lynch announced a new Energy Efficiency Index, currently comprised of 40 companies, to identify industry sectors that it says should benefit from the growing drive to improve energy efficiency.
  
  “While there [...]

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  Posted: August 01, 2007, 12:16am EDT
  

• Climate Change and Energy: 2008 Presidential Policy Directors

  Campaign 2008
  May 24, 2007 -- Environment & Energy TV
  
  Click here for the video.
  
  

  Panelists include, James Kvaal of John Edwards for America, Denis McDonough of Obama for America, John Raidt of McCain 2008 and Todd Stern of the Hillary Clinton for President Exploratory [...]

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  Posted: July 30, 2007, 2:17am EDT
  

• Global Fresh Water Supplies in Peril

  Water Tables Falling and Rivers Running Dry
  July 24, 2007 -- By Lester R. Brown, Earth Policy Institute
  
  

  PLAN B 2.0 BOOK BYTE:
  As the world’s demand for water has tripled over the last half-century and as the demand for hydroelectric power has grown even faster, dams [...]

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  Posted: July 26, 2007, 4:25pm EDT