Greenr - Accelerate the Change!

David Holmgren (futurist and the co-originator of the permaculture concept with Bill Mollison) explains the issues and points to scenarios in this fascinating site/paper:

FutureScenarios.org presents an integrated approach to understanding the potential interaction between Climate Change and Peak Oil using a scenario planning model. In the process I introduce permaculture as a design system specifically evolved over the last 30 years to creatively respond to futures that involve progressively less and less available energy.

Continued at http://www.futurescenarios.org/

Read on and I’m sure you’ll find it simultaneously frightening, and enlightening.

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As the price for staples like corn and rice escalate rapidly attention has focused on the (mis)use of food crops for fuel. Energy Farms Network is working on solutions:

Using science, proven tools, and evolving methodologies the Energy Farm Initiative seeks to demonstrate systems of agriculture that can sustain both farms and communities in the face of climate change and peak oil. This program weaves threads of the Relocalization vision into a fabric of local currency, local food and biofuel systems, revitalization of local industry, and community cooperation.

Energy Farms Network is a program of the Post Carbon Institute.

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As I begin a very expensive green remodel project, its heartening to read this news:

Promoting the green design, construction, renovation and operation of buildings could cut North American greenhouse gas emissions that are fuelling climate change more deeply, quickly and cheaply than any other available measure, according to a new report issued by the trinational Commission for Environmental Cooperation (CEC).

North America’s buildings cause the annual release of more than 2,200 megatons of CO₂ into the atmosphere, about 35 percent of the continent’s total. The report says rapid market uptake of currently available and emerging advanced energy-saving technologies could result in over 1,700 fewer megatons of CO₂ emissions in 2030, compared to projected emissions that year following a business-as-usual approach. A cut of that size would nearly equal the CO₂ emitted by the entire US transportation sector in 2000.

Press release continues…

Read the full report: Green Building in North America: Opportunities and Challenges

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The latest annual edition of Clean Energy Trends has just been published. Joel Makower and his colleagues at Clean Edge have once again identified key trends affecting clean-energy markets and produced their annual forecast, along with 2007’s investment trends.

The five trends we cover in this year’s Trends report cover electric cars (how all of the action seems to be from smaller players, not the major automotive companies); sustainable cities (the emergence of new, fossil-fuel, carbon-neutral cities - in the Middle East, of all places); wind (how the U.S. market is being driven by foreign companies); geothermal energy (it is experiencing a global renaissance, particularly as large, utility-scale projects); and shipping (the new push to create cleaner oceangoing transport, including putting sails on freighters).

Read on…

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While this blog tends to focus on solutions more so than problems, as a keen surfer I’m particularly attuned to the ocean - so this BBC coverage of findings presented at the annual meeting of the American Association for Advancement of Science (AAAS) in Boston.

Only about 4% of the world’s oceans remain undamaged by human activity, according to the first detailed global map of human impacts on the seas. A study in Science journal says climate change, fishing, pollution and other human factors have exacted a heavy toll on almost half of the marine waters. Only remote icy areas near the poles are relatively pristine, but they face threats as ice sheets melt, it warns. The authors say the data is a “wake-up call” to policymakers. Continued at BBC.

More at NYT &

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Trying to understand who’s who, and what’s what in green business? Help has arrived via Joel Makower and the editors over at GreenBiz.com. Their first report into US green business activities is now available at www.StateOfGreenBusiness.com.

The report debuts the GreenBiz Index, a set of 20 indicators of green business progress including measures of how efficiently companies are using resources, reducing toxics, purchasing green fleet vehicles and renewable power, and reporting social and environmental performance. It also features the 10 key green business trends of 2007, plus dozens of “Editors’ Picks,” lists of the best books, websites, reports, business initiatives, and other resources of the past year.

Surprisingly for such a well researched and organized report, its free!

Update : Coverage at technology news site Cnet

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Moving the green agenda forward is difficult enough without misinformation clouding issues. Fortunately there are organizations like Consumer Reports WebWatch and the Center for Media and Democracy (CMD).

Full Frontal Scrutiny is a new joint project between these two organizations that aims to shine a light on front groups — organizations that state a particular agenda, while hiding or obscuring their identity, membership or sponsorship, or all three. Google “front groups” and you’ll find CMD’s SourceWatch site at the top of the list.

CMD Research Director Sheldon Rampton summed the project up like this:

“Full Frontal Scrutiny will be like no other site on the Web. Fakers, phonies and front groups beware — you will be exposed.”

“For six years, Consumer Reports WebWatch has evaluated sites against five simple guidelines for credibility and trustworthiness,” said Beau Brendler, WebWatch’s director.

• Who owns the site?
• What’s its purpose and mission?
• Does it disclose sources of funding or key relationships with third parties?

These are important questions for consumers to ask about any Web site, and they’re also remarkably effective for ferreting out sites that intend to spin, obfuscate or dress up an unpopular agenda.”

Yes!

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My friend Christoph will be pleased: Switzerland scored top marks among 149 countries measured in six environmental areas including air pollution, water quality and how they control industrial pollution, according to the 2008 Environmental Performance Index released at the annual meeting of the World Economic Forum. Maybe its the way they handle ‘trash’.

Sadly, my birth country of Australia ranks even lower than the US “This is another reminder of the legacy of the Liberals in government,” the Minister for Climate Change and Water, Penny Wong, said in a statement. “Their climate change denial and confusion have left Australia with a lot of work to do.” Thats an understatement! More Aussie perspective in the Sydney Morning Herald.

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Enter the H2O Calculator at http://www.h2oconserve.org/, a project of ICCR, GRACE, Food & Water Watch, and the Johns Hopkins University Center for a Livable Future.

“Water scarcity is a growing problem throughout the US and abroad, and it is crucial that individuals and communities make efforts to conserve and protect this precious resource. H₂O conserve is a web-based project that offers tools and knowledge that enable individuals to make water conservation part of their everyday lives.”

Hear more via an interview with Wenonah Hauter, executive director of Food and Water Watch at Living on Earth.

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Treehugger looks into the people behind the ‘non-partisan’ Stats.Org finding it to be “…a front designed to confuse the public about science, operated by an extremist conservative think tank.”
Sourcewatch by the Center for Media and Democracy is a great resource if you want to do a ‘connecting the dots’ excercise of your own.

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