Ecological Buddhism Blog

RENEWABLE ENERGY DEALS HITTING RECORD HIGH

2012-01-31T20:14:00.000Z

Global renewable energy deals climbed 40% to a record high of $53.5 billion last year from $38.2 billion in 2010, as solar, wind and energy efficiency overtook hydropower as the main deal drivers for the first time, a report has stated.

Historically, hydro power has dominated renewables deal flow, but deals worth $1 billion or more in wind, solar, biomass and energy efficiency have outnumbered hydro by seven to one, the PriceWaterHouse Coopers report said.

The renewables market is maturing, fuelling more consolidation, and a rethink of the role of nuclear in many countries after the Japanese nuclear crisis last year provided an extra boost to renewables generation in certain markets.

“Sustained high deal numbers and record total value reflect a maturing of the sector,” said Paul Nillesen, PwC renewables partner.

WHY PESSIMISM IS HEALTHY & THE MODERN WORLD ISN'T

2012-01-29T19:37:00.002Z

by Alain De Botton

LIGHT BULB WARS

2012-01-26T19:54:00.008Z

By Tina Casey

After all the (Republican party) fire and brimstone in the US over the impending phase-out of incandescent light bulbs, lighting giant Philips has stepped in to pour oil on troubled waters. The company has just launched a new energy efficient light bulb that looks and acts just like an incandescent light bulb. At 28% energy savings, the company’s new EcoVantage light bulb is designed to satisfy 21st century federal energy efficiency standards while preserving the classic 19th century styling.

ANOTHER KEYSTONE PIPELINE VICTORY

2012-01-19T22:50:00.003Z

BLOWING THE WHISTLE ON BIG OIL'S CORRUPTION OF THE U.S. CONGRESS

2012-01-19T12:30:00.004Z

from Bill McKibben
350.org

Assuming that what we're hearing (about the Adminstration's decision not to permit the Keystone pipeline prior to full environmental due diligence) is true, this isn't just the right call, it's the brave call.

The knock on Barack Obama from many quarters has been that he's too conciliatory. But here, in the face of a naked political threat from Big Oil to exact 'huge political consequences,' he's stood up strong. This is a victory for Americans who testified in record numbers, and who demanded that science get the hearing usually reserved for big money.

We're well aware that the fossil fuel lobby won't give up easily. They have control of Congress. But as the year goes on, we'll try to break some of that hammerlock, both so that environmental review can go forward, and so that we can stop wasting taxpayer money on subsidies and handouts to the industry. The action starts mid-day Tuesday on Capitol Hill, when 500 referees will blow the whistle on Big Oil's attempts to corrupt the U.S. Congress.

U.S. RANKS 27th IN SOCIAL JUSTICE

2012-01-16T21:50:00.002Z

by Jim Hightower

Being at the bottom of the heap in terms of social justice confirms the reality of both economic and political inequality that the Occupy movement is protesting.

"USA: We're No. 1!"

Oh, wait — Iceland is No. 1. But we did beat out Poland and Slovakia, right? Uh...no. But go on down the rankings and there we are! No. 27, fifth from the bottom. So our new national chant is, "USA: At Least We're Not Last!"

A foundation in Germany has analyzed the social justice records of all 31 members of the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD), ranking each nation in such categories as health care, income inequality, pre-school education, and child poverty. The overall performance by the United States — which boasts of being an egalitarian society — outranks only Greece, Chile, Mexico, and Turkey. Actually, three of those countries performed better than ours in the education of pre-schoolers, and Greece did better than the United States on the prevention of poverty.

Our bottom-of-the-heap ranking in social justice confirms the economic and political inequality that the Occupy movement is protesting. It also helps explain why this grassroots uprising in America has spread so rapidly to more than 600 communities and has generated such broad public support. After all, our nation is fabulously rich, ranking well ahead of nearly every other OECD member in national wealth, so there's no excuse for us sitting at the bottom of the list in education, health care, poverty, and other measures of a democratic and egalitarian society.

Bluntly put, We the People have let today's elites abandon America's founding principles of fairness, justice, and equal opportunity for all.

These privileged few have purchased our government, stolen the wealth and economic future of working families, and reduced America to a plastic imitation of the country we thought we had. The Occupy rebellion is long overdue and on target.

Join it.

WELCOME TO THE DENIERS' WINTER GAMES

2012-01-16T18:06:00.006Z

SSE REACHES A GIGAWATT OF ONSHORE WIND POWER

2012-01-08T17:06:00.003Z

As winter storms battered the UK, British energy giant SSE announced it had more than one gigawatt of onshore wind-farm capacity in operation for the first time—enough to power 800,000 homes for a year.

SSE is the UK’s second largest electricity generator (11,300MW) supplying electricity and gas to over 10 million homes in the UK and Ireland. Solid progress at its wind sites in Clyde, Griffin and Gordonbush in Scotland and Slieve Kirk in Northern Ireland means that its onshore wind capacity has increased from 40 megawatts six years ago to 1,150 MW now. This means that onshore wind now represents over a 10th of SSE's generation capacity.

Ian Marchant, the chief executive, said: "The safe and timely delivery of new assets is a priority for SSE and passing the one gigawatt milestone for onshore wind-farm capacity is a very positive development as we start the new year." The company has 30 operational onshore wind farms ---with another 48 projects in progress.

OCCUPY DEMOCRACY!

2012-01-05T09:57:00.001Z

by Robert Reich

CLIMATE CHANGE - LOOKING BEYOND THE DANGEROUS

2011-12-31T19:00:00.003Z

From Matania Ginosar

Dr. Kevin Anderson of the University of Manchester presented earlier this year a down-to-earth and sobering assessment of our Global Warming (GW) situation. He strips away the political cover and goes into the realistic and difficult situation we are already in. This 50 minutes presentation is subtitled Brutal Numbers & Tenuous Hope. It should be watched by anyone who cares about GW. Here are some of Anderson’s key observations:

Our key goal has been to limit the average global temperature to 2 degrees C. This is increasingly unlikely, given the little progress to date and our apparent inability to drastically speed up CO2 reductions. Some now suggest that we need to look at the possibility of 4 degrees.

It should be noted that a 4 degree C future is incompatible with an organised global community, is beyond adaptation, is devastating to the majority of ecosystems & has a high probability of being unstable. Any 4 degree C global average temperature would be an interim one on the way to a much higher final equilibrium level.

Consequently, it is widely accepted that 4 degrees C should be avoided at all costs. However our current emissions pathway risks reaching this catastrophic global average temperature it by mid-century—or even by 2035. Here is the link to Anderson's presentation:

Climate Change, Going Beyond the Dangerous
http://137.205.102.156/Ms%20S%20J%20Pain/20111124/Kevin_Anderson_-
_Flash_%28Medium%29_-_20111124_05.26.31PM.html

OCCUPY ECONOMICS!

2011-12-30T16:10:00.001Z

Occupy Economics from Softbox on Vimeo.

SOMETHING MAGICAL FOR XMAS

2011-12-24T15:40:00.006Z

MORE ON THE TAR SANDS PIPELINE STORY

2011-12-18T13:06:00.000Z

IMMUNITY TO GLOBAL WARMING

2011-12-15T00:36:00.002Z

SAVING AMERICAN DEMOCRACY

2011-12-10T09:49:00.000Z

by Senator Bernie Sanders

The Constitution of this country has served us well, but when the U.S. Supreme Court says that attempts by the federal government and states to impose reasonable restrictions on campaign ads are unconstitutional, our democracy is in grave danger. That is why I have introduced a resolution in the Senate calling for an amendment to the U.S. Constitution.

I did not do this lightly. In fact, I had never done it before. The U.S. constitution is an extraordinary document. In my view, it should not be amended often. In light of the Supreme Court's infamous 5-to-4 decision in the Citizens United case, however, I saw no alternative.

I strongly disagree with the ruling. In my view, a corporation is not a person. A corporation does not have First Amendment rights to spend as much money as it wants, without disclosure, on a political campaign.
Corporations should not be able to go into their treasuries and spend millions and millions of dollars on a campaign in order to buy elections.

The ruling has radically changed the nature of our democracy. It has further tilted the balance of the power toward the rich and the powerful at a time when the wealthiest people in this country already never had it so good. History will record that the Citizens United decision is one of the worst in the history of our country.

At a time when corporations have more than $2 trillion in cash in their bank accounts and are making record-breaking profits, the American people should be concerned when the Supreme Court says that these corporations have a constitutionally-protected right to spend shareholders' money to dominate an election as if they were real, live persons. If we do not reverse this decision, there will be no end to the impact that corporate interests can have on our campaigns and our democracy.

According to an Oct. 10, 2011, article in Politico, "the billionaire industrialist brothers David and Charles Koch plan to steer more than $200 million -- potentially much more -- to conservative groups ahead of Election Day 2012." Others are doing the same thing.

Does anybody really believe that that is what American democracy is supposed to be about?

Think about the consequences in Congress. When an issue comes up that impacts Wall Street, like breaking up huge banks, what will senators be thinking about when they decide how to vote? Every member of the Senate, every member of the House, in the back of their minds will be asking this: If I cast a vote this way, if I take on some big-money interest, am I going to be punished? Will a huge amount of money be unleashed in my state?

It's not just taking on Wall Street. Maybe it's taking on the drug companies. Maybe it's taking on the private insurance companies. Maybe it's taking on the military-industrial complex. Whatever powerful and wealthy special interests members of Congress are prepared to take on -- on behalf of the interest of the middle class and working families of this country -- they will know in the back of their mind that there may be a flood of money coming in to their state. They're going to think twice about how to cast that vote.

When the Supreme Court says that for purposes of the First Amendment, corporations are people, that writing checks from the company's bank account is constitutionally-protected speech and that attempts by the federal government and states to impose reasonable restrictions on campaign ads are unconstitutional, when that occurs, our democracy is in grave danger.

I am a proud sponsor of a number of bills that would respond to Citizens United and begin to get a handle on the problem. But more needs to be done, something more fundamental and indisputable, something that cannot be turned on its head by a Supreme Court decision. That is why I proposed the constitutional amendment in the Senate as a companion measure to an amendment proposed in the House of Representatives by Congressman Ted Deutch.

We have got to send a constitutional amendment to the states that says simply and straightforwardly what everyone - except five members of the United States Supreme Court - understands: Corporations are not people with equal constitutional rights. Corporations are subject to regulation by the people. Corporations may not make campaign contributions -- the law of the land for the last century. And Congress and states have the power to regulate campaign finances.

Show your support for this amendment by signing here: sanders.senate.gov/savingdemocracy

ANGER MANAGEMENT

2011-12-05T12:19:00.003Z

LATIN AMERICA READY FOR EXPLOSIVE RENEWABLES GROWTH

2011-12-04T14:00:00.000Z

As the costs associated with renewable forms of energy continue to drop and the prices of fossil fuels remain volatile, more Latin American nations are turning to wind and solar, as well as geothermal and biofuels, as solutions to achieve energy security.

Hydropower has long been a staple in many Latin American countries and Brazil has become a world leader in biofuel production. Now, we’re seeing the price of wind energy become competitive with other sources, especially in Brazil, the region’s driving economic force. The next step could be solar as international developers work to tap some of the world’s best resources.

Chilean Wind PPA: Pattern Energy has signed a 20-year power purchase agreement for the sale of electricity produced by a 115-MW wind farm along the coast 400 miles north of Santiago. Construction is scheduled to start in 2012 with commercial operation 2013. The project would represent the country’s largest wind development.

396 MW Wind Farm in Mexico: The Inter-American Development Bank has approved a $72 million loan for the construction of a wind farm in the southern Mexican state of Oaxaca. The 396-MW project would be Mexico’s largest wind power plant and one of the biggest in Latin America.

A Success for Two Nations: Bolivia is moving ahead with its first large-scale wind installation while Nicaragua reports that its wind projects have helped keep electricity prices down as the two nations move to install more wind capacity.

Brazil’s Wind Future: According to a Greenpeace official in Sao Paulo, Brazil’s expansion into wind power is so aggressive that wind farms could very well overtake natural gas thermal plants as the country's second-largest power generation source in five years, moving right behind the number one source — hydroelectric power.

Geothermal’s Potential: According to research by NRG, new exploration concessions have been awarded in Mexico, Argentina, Chile, Colombia and Peru, which could lead to high rates of growth in geothermal power development.

Pilot Solar Project in Brazil: Brazilian power utility firm La Companhia Energetica de Minas Gerais S.A. will begin construction of a 3-MW pilot solar photovoltaic plant in Sete Lagoas, Minas Gerais, in January. The 40 million reais ($22.46 million) project is expected to begin commercial operation in May.

Source: Renewable Energy World

ANOTHER POLITICIAN SAVES THE PLANET...

2011-12-01T11:08:00.002Z

SAVE US FROM GOVERNMENT REGULATION?

2011-11-29T18:06:00.001Z

JUST KEEP PADDLING

2011-11-24T09:32:00.005Z

ADBUSTERS' ROLE IN THE GLOBAL OCCUPY MOVEMENT

2011-11-21T19:28:00.003Z

It's a little over a month until Christmas and next weekend is traditionally when the annual shopping frenzy kicks off. But not everyone will be hot-footing it to their nearest mega-mall, because next Saturday also marks the annual Buy Nothing Day. Launched in the mid-1990s by the Canada-based anti-capitalist publication Adbusters, it's an idea in which people are encouraged to stay out of the shops for 24 hours to make a small stand against rampant consumerism. And this year they are thinking bigger than ever.

The plan, says Adbusters co-founder Kalle Lasn, is to stretch it out and turn it into a Buy Nothing Christmas. He wants us to bypass the tinsel, the tree and the tat and go cold turkey on consumerism for the whole festive period. "We are," he says, "going to try and take back our Christmas season from the commercial forces that have hijacked it."

If you think this sounds like the rantings of a deluded Bolshevik, it's worth noting a few things about Lasn and his cohorts at Adbusters, who have been producing the bi-monthly magazine from their Vancouver office since 1989. Lasn, an Estonia-born, former high-flyer in the advertising industry, now pushing 70, started Adbusters as an antidote to corporate greed, and what he saw as an aggressive pro-consumerist message that was being rammed down our throats. "We felt back then that there was a dark side to consumerism but no one ever talked about it," he says.

Lasn's background in advertising shows. Rather than being a ranting left-wing rag, Adbusters is slick and full of smart graphics and insightful critique. His ideas, so pertinent now in the global financial chaos of today, have always been ahead of their time. And it was he who, in last July's issue of Adbusters, ran a one-page poster which simply read "Occupy Wall Street, September 17th, bring tent".

What happened next sparked one of the most successful protest movements of recent times, one that has gone on to dominate the global news agenda for weeks. That one small page was responsible for hordes of disgruntled people congregating at Wall Street's Zuccotti Park and London's St Paul's Cathedral to express their fury at the world's extreme economic inequality, and many of them are still camping there to this day. And it was responsible for a further thousand or so other Occupy protests that sprung up in solidarity the world over. Lasn, it seems, has chanced upon a formula to harness global support.

"We were inspired by events in Egypt and Tunisia earlier this year," he says, "by that fact that a few smart people using Facebook and Twitter can put out calls and get huge numbers of people on to the streets to give vent to their anger. I always thought I would die a disappointed leftie, but now I have been redeemed. The idea that we, the people, can go into the iconic heart of global capitalism and take it over, and the fact that we can do that from an office staffed with 10 people and then sit back and watch the whole thing catch the imagination of the world – that gives me hope for the future."

Lasn believes the success of the Occupy movement is down to the fact we have reached an impasse, a kind of critical moment where our future has now become so bleak, people have been driven to act. "We have reached a tipping point," he says. "Our economic system has been run like a global casino and is teetering on the brink of collapse. None of our political leaders seem to know what the hell they are doing any more and there are now seven billion of us facing ecological crisis, too. Young people are looking at a future that doesn't compute. We have reached a moment where, unless we fight for a different kind of future, we're not going to have a future at all."

Lasn saw it all coming back in 1989 when Adbusters started out as a humble newsletter. It was born out of an epiphany Lasn had after seeing an advert on TV for the Canadian forestry industry. "[The advert] was hugely misleading," he says. "They basically said, 'Hey you people of Canada, we are doing a fantastic job of managing your forests, you have nothing to worry about, you will have forests forever.'" Lasn – who left advertising to make documentaries – decided to make his own 30-second advert to tell the other side of the story: the dangers of deforestation. However, when he took his advert to the TV station, they refused, point blank, to sell him airtime.

"That was a devastating moment for me," he says. "In my home country of Estonia you weren't allowed to speak up against the government. Fifty years later, I found myself in the heart of the democratic world suddenly totally unable to speak out because of one company's advertising money.

"It made me realise how all our media and information delivery systems are infiltrated by pro-consumption messages, and that basically every aspect of our lives is controlled to some degree by this consumer machine. Consumption patterns in America have increased by 300 per cent since the Second World War, and the average American now consumes three times more than they did 50 years ago. It was time to rage against the machine."

Adbusters now has a dedicated worldwide circulation of 70,000 (with 20,000 more online readers), and all this has been done without the company ever publishing a single advert. "We have broken all the rules of all the business models," says Lasn, "In this day and age to run a magazine without any advertising sounds moronic." Costs are covered by the slightly higher than usual cover price (£5) as well as donations.

From the beginning, Lasn and his team took a lead from the Situationist movement and, alongside the magazine, pioneered a series of interventions, pranks or "culture jams" as they like to call them. There is Digital Detox Week, for example, a campaign which runs every April and is aimed at challenging our over-reliance on technology. There is also an endlessly expanding gallery of spoof adverts poking fun at our big brands, which kick-started the trend for subverting corporate logos and defacing advertising billboards. (There's a whole gallery devoted to Nike, including one poster featuring a group of sheep which reads "I'm sick of just doing it.")

And there was the fabulously successful launch of the Blackspot sneaker, a fair-trade, environmentally friendly, logo-free shoe sold only through independent retailers; "An experiment in grassroots capitalism and an attempt to demonstrate you can change the way the world does business," says Lasn. Currently, the Blackspot is sold in more than 100 shops worldwide.

And, of course, there is Buy Nothing Day, which is now observed in countries from Sweden to Hong Kong and Japan to France. "When we started it we had all these people saying, 'Buy nothing? You're telling us to buy less? Isn't that bad for the economy? You guys are crazy.' But it had a spark about it right from the start and spread quickly, particularly in the UK and Australia. A lot of people had profound epiphanies when they tried it. Many found that half-way through the day they were like, 'I've got to buy that Mars bar, I've got to buy that cup of coffee.' People really suffered and sweated. It was like giving up an addiction."

Whether we are ready to start trying to kick this addiction remains to be seen. Ways in which Lasn suggests we start trying to get off the consumer treadmill include walking into a shop and asking ourselves, 'What would Jesus buy?', or giving a "gift exemption" card to friends and family – although what my six-year old son would say to that definitely isn't thank-you. And, he says, if it's all too much for our greedy consumerist hearts to contemplate, there are other options to try, such as a Buy Local, Buy Fairer or a Buy Indie Christmas.

Whether or not Lasn successfully manages to harness the support he has mobilised through the Occupy movement remains to be seen. He is optimistic. "This year feels different. Hopefully we will get some of the occupiers to have fun subverting the global commercial system in the month leading up to Christmas. It feels bigger and better than ever before. It feels like there are millions of people around the world all ready to play a cat-and-mouse game with the agents of capitalism."

Finally then, after more than 20 years plugging away with the Adbusters message, Lasn is allowing himself a moment of gratification. "Of course it feels good that after all this time people are finally starting to get it. But there is also a darkness underpinning that good feeling. It sounds apocalyptic, but I have a horrible feeling in the pit of my stomach that the economic pain people are going through is just the beginning. If that's right, then we will really see the young people of the world stand up in a way that is many times bigger than they have up until now. We need to find ways to capture the imagination of the rest of the world. If we can do that then I believe this movement may well pull off some incredible radical transformation that needs to happen to make the future of our planet work."

buynothingday.co.uk

I WILL SURVIVE...CAPITALISM!

2011-11-13T09:14:00.003Z

THE CLIMATE CHANGE DENIAL TANGO

2011-11-11T18:37:00.008Z

THE STORY OF BROKE

2011-11-09T19:13:00.004Z

CRITICAL STATE, USA

2011-11-08T19:17:00.002Z

by James Howard Kunstler

Portents of winter and the toothless chatter of flag-draped traitors vies with a fog of lies spread by Koch Brother messenger boys, Reagan nostalgia hucksters, suck-ups in office, Murdoch empire servlings, Banker PR catamites, and Jesus terrorists to occupy the national mind-space with a narcotic Jell-O of half-formed wish fulfillment scams. The nation is hostage to a confederacy of racketeers. Banking. Big Pharma. The Higher Ed / Loan nexus. GMO agri-biz. Fast food. Mandatory motoring. You name it. What a disgrace we are, and the worst of us are the least to know that.

This winter will be the Occupy Movement's Valley Forge. An uneasy quiet may settle across this land blanketed in frozen dishonesty while OWS goes to the ground. Wait until next summer when the Occupiers head for the nominating conventions. Chicago in 1968 was nothing compared to what might go down in Charlotte, NC (Democrats) and Tampa, FLA (Republicans) in 2012. These two giant, useless, political bucket shops need to be put out of business and something else has to take their place. Who will be the new breed of genuine patriots? It would be nice to suppose that something noble and intelligent might emerge from the current miasma, a reality-based third party. But history isn't so reassuring.

I heard some rumors. Lawrence Kotlikoff at Boston University - the only economist in the USA with a coherent plan for banking, healthcare, tax, and entitlement reform - said on a podcast some weeks back that he was advising an un-named national figure who intends to mount a third party campaign. I didn't have a clue who that might be.

Last week in Virginia a professional political back-stager, who had worked for the DNC during the Howard Dean days, told me that New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg was stealthily hiring Hillary Clinton's old campaign staffers in seeming preparation for... something. Well, Bloomberg wouldn't have to take anybody else's money - and by "anybody" I mean especially the corporations because, you know, corporations are people, with free speech rights (and feelings!). It also happens that Bloomberg is neither a Republican or a Democrat, but a registered independent. Will he go to the ground, too, this winter like OWS, and wait for the public disgust to mount toward criticality? Hey, sometimes your country calls (for help!) and figures arise and they undertake what's necessary, even against type. Abe Lincoln, in 1859, was a railroad lawyer - the horror!

I have no idea who else might be waiting in the background, someone tortured with disgust by the leveraged buy-out of the American common good, someone capable of articulating the terms of the convulsion we face in national life if we don't start doing things differently. Surely in a population of 310 million you can find more than a few resolute personalities who refuse to just sit back and watch the sickening spectacle of inept vacillation.

Of course, the first order of business is to get corporate money out of politics. Are we capable of doing that? Can we legislate a redefinition of corporate "personhood?" After all, corporations have no allegiance whatsoever to the public interest, only to their shareholders and boards of directors. Who was the Supreme Court kidding when they proposed in 2010 that corporations have a personal stake in politics. Corporations are sociopaths. They need to be tasered!

The second order of business is to enforce the existing laws in money matters and bring back laws (e.g. the Glass-Steagall act) that were recklessly thrown away in the systematic bid to loot the working public; then move beyond that to contest the web of rackets that make it impossible for Americans to even take care of themselves.

The third order of business is to shut down the war industry and close hundreds of overseas military bases that are draining scarce public capital.

The fourth order of business is to prepare the US public for the realities of the post-Global economy and the post-cheap-energy way of life. Tell them the truth: we don't have "a hundred years" of natural gas. We can't drill-drill-drill our way to "energy independence." We have to get more local, less complex, finer, and leaner. Give the American people a clear sense of where circumstances are taking us, even if it is a tough assignment.

More likely, nobody will step forward to take on the two major parties. In which case, plan now to occupy the political conventions. Google-map your routes to Tampa and Charlotte (Home of Bank of America!). Stake out the campsites and cheap lodgings. Prepare to shame these organized grifters, and to turn their self-serving jamborees upside-down.

More of the author's acerbic humour & insight can be found weekly at wwww.kunstler.com

ENGINEERS SAY WE HAVE ALL THE TECHNOLOGY WE NEED TO CUT CARBON

2011-11-02T14:00:00.002Z

By Jess Zimmerman

The world's engineers are getting sick of being told that cutting emissions is an engineering problem. Eleven of the biggest engineering organizations have released a joint statement saying, in effect, "You want carbon cuts? We can give you carbon cuts. Just say the word, smart guy."

We already have all the tech necessary to cut emissions 85 percent by 2050, say the engineers. What we don't have is support from governments -- laws that prioritize carbon reduction, and funding to put the technology into action.

Colin Brown of the Institution of Mechanical Engineers (one of the 11 signatory agencies) didn't even try to hide his contempt for all those non-geeks in government:

While the world’s politicians have been locked in talks with no output, engineers across the globe have been busy developing technologies that can bring down emissions and help create a more stable future for the planet. We are now overdue for government commitment, with ambitious, concrete emissions targets that give the right signals to industry, so they can be rolled out on a global scale.

The statement calls on world leaders to reach a global commitment to emissions reduction and energy efficiency at December's COP17 climate change talks. Once that commitment is in place and adequately backed up, say the engineers, the technology is there to carry it out. The 11 organizations that made the joint statement represent the U.K., Scandinavia, Germany, Japan, Australia, India, and Honduras...but not the U.S.

WIND INTERMITTENCY IS NO BIG DEAL AT ALL

2011-10-30T14:30:00.002Z

By Lauren Glickman

The anti-wind people saturate the media with claims that wind energy is “worthless” because wind doesn’t blow all the time. The truth is that the variable nature of wind resources doesn’t matter much. We can quantify exactly what the cost of this variability is. It turns out to be very modest indeed. Wind energy is just that, energy, and this is different from capacity or what are called “ancillary services.” We can quantify the cost of the ups-and-downs of wind energy, based on multiple academic and industry studies — the answer is 4 tenths of a cent per kWh.

Wind Provides Energy
Electricity markets reward generating companies in three different ways: Energy, Capacity and Ancillary services. Energy is straightforward: the buyer pays for energy, measured in kilowatt-hours. It’s like buying ice cream on a hot day: the seller gets paid to meet an immediate need. Capacity is also easy to understand. If you can guarantee me in January that you will be there to meet my need for ice cream on the hottest day of July, then that’s valuable. And it gets a separate, smaller payment. Finally, there is a market for ancillary services, which is more complex. Ancillary service providers are there to step in when the grid needs help — to maintain voltage or frequency, or to maintain technical parameters like power factor.

Wind farm owners rely on getting paid for “energy-only.” The value of wind capacity is 10 to 20% of nameplate capacity. So, a 100-MW wind farm is only worth as much as 15 MW of nuclear power from a capacity standpoint. However, the energy in wind is worth 100% of the energy in nuclear (or anything else) in the spot market.

So wind gets paid for “energy-only,” while fossil fuel generation gets paid for energy plus capacity plus ancillary services. Thus, intermittency is no big deal —energy markets have already accounted for all this. The key point is that the implicit costs can be seen in the ancillary services market (i.e., what it costs the system operator to pay for backup). It is about four tenths of a cent per kWh. That’s it. All you are paying for is a little fuel and a little maintenance.

What if Wind Provided 20% of Our Energy?
There are already states and countries that have 20% or more wind power over the course of a full year — Iowa for one; Denmark and Northern Germany for another. And, in some of these places, wind accounts for 50% or even 100% of electricity demand for certain periods. Are there rolling blackouts in Europe due to their reliance on wind energy? Not at all. The reliability of European grids is far better than US grids.

European grid operators have learned how to integrate wind in large quantities. Have they built large numbers of natural gas peaker plants to “back up” wind? Not at all. European power system experts state they are not aware of even a single gas peaker plant added to balance wind energy — not even in Northern Germany or Denmark. There is enough capacity in the system to handle everything without adding any extra capacity.

Denmark is able to balance the present system with strong interconnectors, market-based trade with the neighbouring countries, and good wind forecasts. Denmark plans to reach 50% wind penetration by 2025. It is a big challenge to integrate even more wind power in the system, but they think that they can manage this task, and base their activities on the development of a strong international transmission grid, a flexible and coherent energy system and Smart Grid solutions. The key is not “backup” for wind – a specious concept – but flexibility for the entire system across all generation types. The variability of wind is really nothing to worry about.

INDIA'S "BRAND" IS A BLUFF THAT WILL SOON BE CALLED ACROSS THE WORLD

2011-10-27T14:00:00.000+01:00

By Pankaj Mishra

Poverty, corruption & the “financial-intellectual complex” in India.

Last week, as India's TV anchors and columnists worked themselves up into a moralistic frenzy about a measure of poverty proposed by the planning commission (40p a day per person), I visited the new outlet for Tommy Hilfiger in the north Indian state of Himachal Pradesh. Press coverage about the opening, and accounts of the new Hermès store in Mumbai, which will sell saris for £6,000, seemed to make debates about India's poverty line look irrelevant.

The Hilfiger shop was empty, the salesmen sunk into torpor. There were no likely customers in sight when I passed it a few days later. Obviously, there are few takers for the reassuringly expensive preppy look in one of India's predominantly rural states. But the wisdom of financial elites and their mouthpieces in the media rarely brushes against actuality. In any case, appearances are everything in the age of globalisation.

Several new private "universities" have also opened up recently in Himachal. You might put this down to the high demand for quality education among India's overwhelmingly youthful population. But the universities not only lack faculties, laboratories and libraries; a few do not meet the criteria for acquiring property in the state. Private universities have become a pretext for real estate speculators to acquire expensive land from the government: another example of the collusion between state and private business manifested recently in some of India's biggest corruption scandals. These sweetheart deals would be somewhat excusable if, unlike most Indian institutions of learning, the private universities offered an education rather than degrees. But they are only interested in extracting steep tuition fees from parents anxious for their children to join India's new economy. Not surprisingly, as the Wall Street Journal pointed out, 75% of technical graduates and more than 85% of general graduates in India are unemployable.

For those making money while the sun shines there is no compelling reason to worry about the future. There is enough beguiling fantasy in the form of cloud-cuckoo-land projections (as much loved by globalised free marketeers as the central-planning communists of old): that India has a "demographic dividend" in the form of its young population, which is all set to out-produce and out-consume every other nation in the world in the next 30 years. The Economist magazine, in an embarrassingly upbeat report on the Indian economy, exults that "remarkably, in rural areas more than 20% of Indian students, most of them poor, attend private schools. The literacy rate is rising fast". But last month a study of schools in the biggest states found India's peers in adult literacy are Afghanistan and Papua New Guinea. Many children were unable to read even after three years of schooling.

The eminent economist Jean Dreze, told the Financial Times, "after 20 years of meteoric economic growth, there's been so little improvement in terms of the living standards of the people". Utsa Patnaik, one of India's most respected economists, pointed out: "Per head energy and protein intake has been falling for the last two decades as the majority of the population is unable to afford enough food." Delinked from "nutrition standards", especially in a time of high food inflation that has put cereals and vegetables out of reach for most Indians, the government's poverty line measures destitution rather than poverty.

How do falsehoods turn into truths in democratic societies, which are presumably immune to crude propaganda of the kind churned out by totalitarian regimes? Patnaik explains that "hundreds of economists are closely imprecated within a vast global poverty-estimating structure with the World Bank at its apex, producing increasingly misleading estimates every year in glossy reports". CEO-struck journalists – the "useful idiots" of the rich and powerful – hold up another end of what the economist Ha-Joon Chang calls the "financial-intellectual complex".

This is the brave new world of globalisation in which nothing is what it seems. And it bears more than a passing resemblance to another promised utopia: an alternate reality in which statistics were shamelessly manipulated, and a tiny privileged elite dominating both political and economic life lorded it over the rest, while propaganda machinery manned by a conformist media and assorted "useful idiots" stood ever ready to deceive the restless masses with loud proclamations of a new dawn for humanity. One day, of course, its bluff was called. We may not have to wait too long before the various Potemkin villages of our own time come crashing down.

COMPASSION IS REVOLUTION

2011-10-25T14:00:00.000+01:00

BILL CLINTON: CLIMATE DENIAL IS MAKING AMERICA INTO A JOKE

2011-10-20T14:00:00.002+01:00

"MIND-BOGGLING" PRICE REDUCTIONS LEAD TO SOLAR PV BOOM IN AMERICA

2011-10-17T14:30:00.000+01:00

Reports of the death of solar power are greatly exaggerated

by Adam Browning

In September, US solar company Solyndra filed for bankruptcy as a result of a drop in the cost of silicon. Specious media reports in the U.S. spun this event as the scandal-ridden end of solar power in the U.S.—which is like claiming there is no future for the internet because Netscape went out of business. The ironic truth is that Solyndra was the victim of a big success -- the price of solar power has fallen rapidly, making more expensive technologies like theirs uncompetitive. More significantly altogether, it has made solar power a real player in the U.S. energy economy.

Since October 2008, the average price of solar modules has fallen from $4.20 per watt to around $1.20 to $1.50 per watt today. These are mind-boggling reductions. And these new prices are resulting in extraordinary market development. As of June, California utilities have signed over eight gigawatts of solar contracts ... half of which are below the price of new natural gas generation. That's right. Gigawatts of solar cheaper than the fossil fuel alternatives.

Solyndra was attempting to develop a photovoltaic (PV) technology that didn't use silicon, the dominant raw material for PV then and today. For years, silicon was manufactured primarily for semiconductors, and the solar industry essentially relied on excess material. In 2004, when Germany introduced robust incentives and the solar industry really started taking off, shortage of silicon became a huge problem. There were seven plants in the world capable of manufacturing solar grade silicon, and as they had the scarcity in the value chain, they were able to command premium prices. The market price of silicon went through the roof. The main material for crystalline PV technology, which once cost $25 per kilogram (kg), soared to $450 per kg. Silicon manufacturers had the solar industry by the short hairs, and everyone looked for an alternative. Silicon was the single biggest obstacle to bringing down costs and bringing solar to scale, and everybody was trying to figure out how to deal with it.

Solar manufacturers that had relied on silicon-based PV technology tried to develop new methods that didn't need silicon. For example, Sharp, which was once the world's largest PV manufacturer using crystalline silicon technology, made a significant capital investment in a thin-film product that was half as efficient ... but used about 1 percent of the silicon. Venture-capital money poured into start-ups working on breakthrough new materials that addressed the silicon problem. Nanosolar, Solyndra and others received hundreds of millions of dollars of private venture funds to commercialize CIGS technology -- an approach that did not rely on any silicon at all.

What happened? Silicon got cheap, and the manufacture of crystalline silicon panels got even cheaper. All the innovation, market pressures, and government investment worked. Analysis from the DOE's Lawrence Berkeley National Lab shows that the pre-incentive price of going solar in the U.S. dropped 17% last year, and another 11% in the first half of 2011 -- record reductions since they began tracking the data. Importantly, federal and state market-building policies have been instrumental to those gains. What little policy support solar has received relative to its fossil counterparts is working as it should -- to build scale, bring down costs, and deliver strong economic returns on investment. Today the solar power industry is the fastest-growing industry in America.

The holy grail of those working in the field is to bring down costs. Solyndra had a reputed cost structure around $2 per watt. The fact that's no longer competitive is in fact a sign that solar is delivering on its promise faster and better than the brightest minds and the big bucks ever imagined.

DISPOSABLE PLASTICS BANNED IN BODHGAYA

2011-10-12T21:29:00.004+01:00

by Lillian Sum
www.sacredearthtrust.org

"We abuse land because we regard it as a commodity belonging to us. When we see land as a community to which we belong, we may begin to use it with love and respect" - Aldo Leopold

Since early 2009, Sacred Earth Trust, SET, has been working in cooperation with the local and the international communities to reduce the plastic pollution in Bodhgaya and surrounding villages. SET works by raising awareness of the issues in relation to plastic pollution and the effects on the land, water courses, human and animal health.

Bodhgaya Temple Management Committee (BTMC) agreed to officially ban disposable plastic at the grounds of the Mahabodhi Temple in September 2009 and it was publicly announce in October 2010. SET volunteers worked on gathering a petition of support for the ban, collecting over 7000+ signatures from local and international communities. This was presented to local and central government in 2009 and early 2010. This has led to the local government officially banning disposable plastics and agreeing to work towards implementation through education and practical action, starting within 500m of the central area around the Mahabodhi Temple.

4R's: REFUSE, REDUCE, REUSE, RECYCLE was introduced last year to bring awareness to plastic pollution of sacred land.

Village women have been an important part of the solution. Through developing income generation projects, sewing cloth bags has resulted in keeping 50,000+ plastic bags off the land during the winter of 2010. This initiative was supported by the Buddhist organisations, such as Kagyu Monlam, Nyingma Monlam, Tipitaka who come to Bodhgaya for the annual peace gathering events under the Bodhi Tree. Local supporters included hoteliers and businesses.

The local government in Gaya are developing a waste management system, by outsourcing the work to private Solid Waste Management (SWM) companies to deal with the ongoing clean up.

There have been several attempts to deal with the waste issues which accumulate during the peak seasons. The SWM system till now is to dump in a pile at collection points, and then take waste to the town dumpsite just outside town.. or the river bank of the famous Naranjana. The river remains a dry sandy riverbed apart from 6 weeks of the year, when the monsoon comes. Small improvements have been made this year such as new waste bins for collection placed along the main street and walking precinct.

There are many issues in Bodhgaya with respect to environment, social and economic developments which are all affected by or dependant on the tourism of Buddhist and Hindu pilgrims during 6 months of the year.

The sustainable development of Bodhgaya will take time to implement. All who want to, who can make a difference locally. All international visitors to the place of Buddha's enlightenment can make a huge difference by being conscious of what we consume and how we choose to do so.

Small things make a big difference……..

Say no to plastics- you can reduce plastic pollution on the land and impact on air pollution

Using your own cloth bags - reduce plastic bag use and use them more than once.

Bring your own reusable water bottles or thermal flasks -reduce use of plastic water bottles and polystyrene/plastic cups.

Bring your own cutlery, cups and plate s- reduce your disposable waste at events

Through conscious living and taking action we can be part of the solution!

For more info: www.sacredearthtrust.org

RACHEL MADDOW & CHRIS HAYES: WHY SHOULD WE OCCUPY WALL STREET?

2011-10-11T11:04:00.006+01:00

BILL McKIBBEN AT 'OCCUPY WALL STREET'

2011-10-10T16:36:00.001+01:00

IS THORIUM A NEW SAFE NUCLEAR FUEL?

2011-10-10T13:00:00.000+01:00

The idea is to create a new generation of nuclear reactors based on the element thorium, as opposed to the uranium used to produce nuclear power today. Thorium, its advocates claim, is beneficial not only because it's far more abundant and widely distributed in the Earth's crust than uranium; in addition, liquid-fluoride thorium reactors (LFTRs) could theoretically be much smaller, much cheaper and much safer than conventional nuclear reactors. The waste they produce would remain dangerous for a far shorter period and, crucially, couldn't be used to create nuclear weapons. As a bonus, these fourth-generation nuclear plants could even burn up the dangerous plutonium stored in existing nuclear waste stockpiles, using it as a fuel.

Liquid-fluoride thorium reactors are not just efficient but also proven – albeit some time ago. The US military produced a working prototype more than half a century ago at the Oak Ridge Laboratory in Tennessee. It ran for a number of years before the programme was suddenly shut down and the US government's stocks of thorium buried. The most likely reason for this decision, it seems, is that LFTRs – unlike uranium reactors – didn't go hand-in-hand with nuclear weapons production.

Richard Weinberg was the man who led the Oak Ridge thorium project until its untimely demise. He is also credited with designing the uranium pressurised water reactor that dominates today's nuclear industry, being one of the first scientists to warn about the risks of CO₂ emissions.

There's no way to know whether LFTR technology will live up to its promoters' vision of safe mini reactors rolling off production lines in the 2020s at low enough prices – and in sufficient quantities – to completely change the global energy and emissions picture. But no one seems to disagree that it's a good idea. There's no obvious scientific case why it couldn't work, and even many of the traditionally anti-nuclear green groups seem to be cautiously in favour – Craig Bennett, policy and campaigns director of Friends of the Earth, says he supports thorium research, but the NGO's head of science, policy and research has stated that "thorium nuclear reactors aren't going to be ready in time to avoid dangerous climate change."

THE MYTH OF ECONOMIC GROWTH HAS FAILED US

2011-10-05T14:00:00.000+01:00

By Prof. Tim Jackson

Every society clings to a myth by which it lives.

Ours is the myth of economic growth. For the last five decades, the pursuit of growth has been the single most important policy goal across the world. The global economy is five times the size it was half a century ago. If it continues to grow at the same rate it will be 80 times that size by the year 2100.

This extraordinary ramping up of global economic activity is without historical precedent. It is totally at odds with the finite resource base and the fragile ecology on which we depend for survival.

Most of the time, we avoid the stark reality of these numbers. Growth must go on, we insist.

The reasons for this collective blindness are easy enough to find.

Western capitalism is structurally reliant on growth for its stability. When growth falters - as it has done recently - politicians panic. Businesses struggle to survive. People lose their jobs and sometimes their homes.

Questioning growth is deemed to be the act of lunatics, idealists and revolutionaries.

Yet question it we must. The myth of growth has failed us. It has failed the two billion people who still live on less than $2 a day. It has failed the fragile ecological systems on which we depend for survival.

But economic crisis presents us with a unique opportunity to invest in change. To sweep away the short-term thinking that has plagued society for decades. To engage, for instance, in a radical overhaul of dysfunctional capital markets.

Untrammelled speculation in commodities and financial derivatives brought the financial world to the brink of collapse just three years ago. It needs to be replaced by a longer, slower sense of capital.

Fixing the economy is only part of the battle. We also have to confront the convoluted logic of consumerism. The days of spending money we do not have on things we do not need to impress people we do not care about are over.

Living well is about good nutrition, decent homes, access to good quality services, stable communities, satisfying employment.

Prosperity, in any meaningful sense of the word, transcends material concerns. It resides in our love for our families, the support of our friends, the strength of our communities, our ability to participate fully in the life of society, a sense of meaning and purpose in our lives.

THE CLIMATE CHANGE DENIAL COMEDY

2011-10-01T13:22:00.000+01:00

by David Mitchell

U.S. SOLAR PROJECTS BOOM AS PV PRICES KEEP ON FALLING!

2011-09-28T14:00:00.000+01:00

by Stephen Lacy

With solar module prices falling closer to the $1-a-watt threshold, many manufacturers are struggling to keep their heads above water. But project developers are doing quite swimmingly.

The continued decreases in panel prices are causing a boom in commercial-scale development throughout the U.S. According to analysis from Solarbuzz, the non-residential project pipeline has increased from 17,000 megawatts (MW) to 24,000 MW in just two months. Those figures include projects in all stages of development, so it doesn't necessarily mean they'll get built. But activity is increasing at an very rapid rate.

According to a 2010 analysis from the Solar Energy Industries Association, the average total installed cost of solar systems in the U.S. fell 20 percent, due largely to the increasing size of projects and the reductions in module and hardware prices.

China continues its dominance in the global solar PV manufacturing sector. But the two leading suppliers to these non-residential projects are actually American companies -- First Solar and SunPower. (However, those companies have moved much of their production to Asia.) The Chinese manufacturer Suntech is the third-largest supplier to these projects.

Even though many of the modules are being sourced from outside the country, these domestic installations provide an enormous value to local economies. According to a recent trade balance study from GTM Research, around 73 percent of the total economic value of a solar system stays in the U.S.

Despite the flurry of large-scale project activity in America, the country only represents 5 percent of the global market. But total market activity is expected to double this year, matching last year's 102 percent growth, and possibly giving the U.S. a 12 percent share of the market by 2015.

DOUBLING SOLAR PV ON AMERICAN HOMES BY 2016 IN ONE SHOT

2011-09-20T18:39:00.000+01:00

By Stephen Lacey

A leading American solar company is set to begin the largest residential rooftop project ever undertaken, effectively doubling the number of solar systems currently on homes around the U.S.

Armed with funds from two major investment banks and a loan guarantee from the Department of Energy that will cover close to a third of the $1 billion project, SolarCity plans to install 160,000 solar photovoltaic systems on houses and other buildings on military bases around the country in the next five years.

As a “solar services” provider, SolarCity owns, operates and maintains the systems, and sells the electricity to the end-user. By working with investment banks to pool together often-complicated state and federal incentives, the company streamlines the process and simply offers the customer solar electricity — often at prices lower than current electric rates.

SolarCity says it will try to employ American veterans and family members for the 750 people needed to complete the project, showing that green jobs do indeed exist. The company has seen extraordinary growth in recent years. After starting in 2006 with just two people, SolarCity has added over 600 employees since 2006. This latest project will again double the staff.

The $344 million loan guarantee will leverage $1 billion from private investors Bank of America Merrill Lynch and USRG Renewable Finance. This comes after Google invested $280 million in a fund for SolarCity installations this past June.

The DOE loan guarantee program is designed to fund “first-of-a kind” projects. As an ambitious 160,000-system undertaking, this project is exactly that. But it’s also a very safe bet. SolarCity is a company with a proven business model and a history of strong, sustainable growth.

IS IT WIERD ENOUGH YET?

2011-09-15T14:09:00.001+01:00

by Tom Friedman

Every time I listen to (U.S. Republican party candidates for president) Gov. Rick Perry of Texas and Representative Michele Bachmann of Minnesota talk about how climate change is some fraud perpetrated by scientists trying to gin up money for research, I’m always reminded of one of my favorite movie lines that Jack Nicholson delivers to his needy neighbor who knocks on his door in the film “As Good As It Gets.” “Where do they teach you to talk like this?” asks Nicholson. “Sell crazy someplace else. We’re all stocked up here.”

Thanks Mr. Perry and Mrs. Bachmann, but we really are all stocked up on crazy right now. I mean, here is the Texas governor rejecting the science of climate change while his own state is on fire — after the worst droughts on record have propelled wildfires to devour an area the size of Connecticut. As a statement by the Texas Forest Service said last week: “No one on the face of this earth has ever fought fires in these extreme conditions.”

Remember the first rule of global warming. The way it unfolds is really “global weirding.” The weather gets weird: the hots get hotter; the wets wetter; and the dries get drier. This is not a hoax. This is high school physics, as Katharine Hayhoe, a climatologist in Texas, explained on Joe Romm’s invaluable Climateprogress.org blog: “As our atmosphere becomes warmer, it can hold more water vapor. Atmospheric circulation patterns shift, bringing more rain to some places and less to others. For example, when a storm comes, in many cases there is more water available in the atmosphere and rainfall is heavier. When a drought comes, often temperatures are already higher than they would have been 50 years ago, and so the effects of the drought are magnified by higher evaporation rates.”

CNN reported on Sept. 9 that “Texas had the distinction of experiencing the warmest summer on record of any state in America, with an average of 86.8 degrees. Dallas residents sweltered for 40 consecutive days of grueling 100-plus degree temperatures. ... Temperature-related energy demands soared more than 22 percent above the norm this summer, the largest increase since record-keeping of energy demands began more than a century ago.”

There is still much we don’t know about how climate change will unfold, but it is no hoax. We need to start taking steps, as our scientists urge, “to manage the unavoidable and avoid the unmanageable.” If you want a quick primer on the latest climate science, tune into “24 Hours of Reality.” It is a worldwide live, online update that can be found at climaterealityproject.org and will be going on from Sept. 14-15, over 24 hours, with contributors from 24 time zones.

Not only has the science of climate change come under attack lately, so has the economics of green jobs. Here the critics have a point — sort of. I wasn’t surprised to read that the U.S. solar panel company Solyndra, which got $535 million in loan guarantees from the Department of Energy to make solar panels in America, filed for bankruptcy protection two weeks ago and laid off 1,100 workers. This story is an embarrassment to the green jobs movement, but the death by bankruptcy was a collaboration of the worst Democratic and Republican impulses.

How so? There is only one effective, sustainable way to produce “green jobs,” and that is with a fixed, durable, long-term price signal that raises the price of dirty fuels and thereby creates sustained consumer demand for, and sustained private sector investment in, renewables. Without a carbon tax or gasoline tax or cap-and-trade system that makes renewable energies competitive with dirty fuels, while they achieve scale and move down the cost curve, green jobs will remain a hobby.

President Obama has chosen not to push for a price signal for political reasons. He has opted for using regulations and government funding. In the area of regulation, he deserves great credit for just pushing through new fuel economy standards that will ensure that by 2025 the average U.S. car will get the mileage (and have the emissions) of today’s Prius hybrid. But elsewhere, Obama has relied on green subsidies rather than a price signal. Some of this has really helped start-ups leverage private capital, but you also get Solyndras. The G.O.P. has blocked any price signal and fought every regulation. The result too often is taxpayer money subsidizing wonderful green innovation, but with no sustainable market within which these companies can scale.

Let’s fix that. We need revenue to balance the budget. We need sustainable clean-tech jobs. We need less dependence on Mideast oil. And we need to take steps to mitigate climate change — just in case Governor Perry is wrong. The easiest way to do all of this at once is with a gasoline tax or price on carbon. Would you rather cut Social Security and Medicare or pay a little more per gallon of gas and make the country stronger, safer and healthier? It still amazes me that our politicians have the courage to send our citizens to war but not to ask the public that question.