Earth Hour: 8.30 pm local time, 28th March, 2009
Mar 28, 2009 Information of the Day, Natural Resource Conservation
EarthHour
This is to remind one and all that today, the whole world will be commemorating the Earth Hour by switching off all lights for one hour from 8.30 pm local time.
Wherever you are on this planet of ours, this symbolism will let our leaders know that we are very serious about tackling the environmental crises facing our terra firma. More than the symbolism, it will save big bucks in electricity costs and carbon emissions, though insignificant compared to the scle of actual action needed to tackle the impending challenges: climate change, vanishing habitats and species, poluution and so on.
Find out more at the EarthHour website.
Tags: Climate Change, EarthHour, Pollution
Global initiative to improve fuel efficiency flagged off
Mar 7, 2009 Carbon Trading Mechanisms, Stars, Policy and Finance
50 by 50
FIA Foundation, International Energy Agency, United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP) and other international bodies recently initiated the 50 by 50 project on the sidelines of the Geneva Motor Show. Under this, the agencies will encourage initiatives for a 50% improvement in the average fuel
economy of all cars on the road worldwide by 2050 – thus, the 50:50 moniker.
Interestingly, the technologies required to improve the efficiency of new cars 30% by 2020 and 50% by 2030, and the efficiency of the global car fleet 50% by 2050, mainly involve incremental changes to conventional internal combustion engines and drive systems, along with weight reduction and better aerodynamics. To achieve a 50% improvement by 2030, the main additional measures would be full hybridisation of a much wider range of vehicles (possibly including, but not requiring, plug-in hybrid vehicle technologies).The differences in costs will be low enough to be recouped just by saved fuel bills in a couple of years, yet all this will save billions of barrels of oil every year if implemented. Read the rest of this entry »
Tags: Climate Change, fuel efficiency
EU environment commissioner calls for US action on climate change
Jan 28, 2009 Stars, Policy and Finance
Stavros Dimas
Posturing before the Copenhagen Summit on Climate Change seems to have begun with an EU official calling for bold US action. EU environment commissioner Stavros Dimas has published an open letter to US President Barack Obama, imploring the U.S. to take an ambitious lead. “If Europe’s efforts are to make a real difference,” Dimas writes, “then we need America to join us shoulder to shoulder in the battle against climate change.”
Dimas believes that American innovation and financial muscle will be important. Moreover, if US sets an example, it will become more difficult for China to resist call for action against the global fight against climate change. Dimas cautions against slacking off in the efforts to fight climate change, even in the current financial turmoil.
The European Commission itself is shortly expected to reveal its strategy for increasing climate-related investments to $231 billion per year by 2020 — a prelude to the successor to the Kyoto Protocol, to be negotiated in Copenhagen in March. It is expected to contain several strategies for financing low-carbon development, including new state investment in energy efficiency and the use of carbon-credit auction revenue for “clean investments” in the EU and abroad.
Read the letter here .
Tags: Barack Obama, Climate Change, Copenhagen, Kyoto, Stavros Dimas
BP releases a report on energy reports
Dec 18, 2008 Stars, Policy and Finance
We have hedge funds and then hedge funds that are funds of hedge funds i.e. they invest their money into multiple hedge funds. Similarly, now that energy and green issues are such a hot topic, we have had so many reports getting published all around, with claims and counterclaims. Sure enough, the time has come for a report of reports! Voila, here it is by BP! It is a collection of reports, all 360 pages of them. All the fact and figures to keep the environmental anoraks busy.
For example: New cars may get better fuel economy than old ones, but the old ones are still around. How long do they last, and how many miles does the average two-year-old car go a year, vs. the average 10-year-old car? Try the Transportation Energy Data Book, linked from the BP compilation.
BP cautions that it does not vouch for the data, and is simply providing a link to the most recent thinking in each area.
Tags: BP, Climate Change, Green Technology, reports
UK govt. committee recommends ambitious emission controls
Dec 1, 2008 Stars, Policy and Finance
Ambitious new targets to reduce the UK’s greenhouse gas emissions by at least 20% from today’s levels by 2020 were proposed today by the government’s Climate Change Committee in its report, “Building a Low-carbon Economy - The UK’s Contribution to Tackling Climate Change”.
The recommendation, if accepted by ministers, will mean big increases in renewable energy, home insulation and electric and hybrid cars and vans. Green energy would produce 30% of the UK’s electricity by 2020 and 40% of new cars would be low emissions by 2020.
The report further recommends tough new rules to make coal plants fit equipment to capture and store their carbon emissions as soon as the early 2020s, which would push up operating costs. But the committee estimates the changes would cost less than 1% of the national economic wealth in 2020.
Read more here.
Tags: Climate Change, Greenhouse gases, UK
Barrack Obama’s new message on climate change
Nov 20, 2008 Stars, Policy and Finance
US President-elect Barack Obama sent a video message to global warming organized by California Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger, promising that despite the ongoing economic turmoil, Mr. Obama plans to keep reductions in greenhouse gas emissions a central component of his energy, environmental and economic policies.
The world waits to see the words transformed into actions.
Tags: Barrack Obama, Climate Change