I can’t decide what to make of today’s announcement in Copenhagen heralding a new five-year program by industrialized nations to invest $350m in the deployment of renewable energy and energy efficient technologies in developing countries. On the surface this should be a cause of celebration. The big question is how will these funds will be spent? Here’s a hint, according to Climate Wire. Speaking on the sidelines of the U.N. climate conference here, Energy Secretary Steven Chu said the new program — with an $85 million U.S. contribution — would help get energy-efficient appliances and lighting to the poorest nations, Continue reading
December 2009
Can – or should – the charcoal trade be regulated?
A dispatch from Kenya this morning made me wonder if efforts to ban the charcoal trade in various African countries is at all effective. Can it be enforced? Who suffers? Has this strategy yielded results somewhere? I don’t know. What is clear is that the pace of decimation of African forests for charcoal and woodfuel is rapidly reaching crisis point in various countries — Uganda, Malawi, parts of Kenya and Tanzania. Excerpts from news dispatches help paint a picture. From the article mentioned earlier, reported by Wildlife Direct: “According to Elias Kimaru of the Kwale landscape project of the WWF Continue reading
Video: Africa’s forest have a lot to offer in Copenhagen
There is an excellent film by South Africa-based photojournalist Jeffrey Barbee that will hopefully get quite a bit of play in Copenhagen. It explores how African forests and woodfuel efficiency can play a big role in reducing CO2 emissions while improving people’s livelihood. We were especially interested to learn through this film about a stoves project in Malawi which is not only improving the lives the local inhabitants but also providing valuable carbon credits to an eco securities firm for sale on the voluntary carbon market. (The segment about Malawi and the stoves begins at 5:40 on part 2 but Continue reading
A Prius in Every Pot?
We have good reasons to believe the age of enlightened energy awaits us around the corner, right? Not so fast. It will be a long while before every thatched or corrugated tin roof on the globe has a photovoltaic array or a wind turbine. In the meantime, the plight of the energy poor – the 2.5 billion souls who depend on wood, charcoal, and animal dung for heating and cooking – will continue to deteriorate as they watch their environment, health, and prospects for emerging from poverty grow worse by the day. They are predictably scattered across the globe, but Continue reading
The latest from Copenhagen
I thought it useful to share some links to ongoing coverage of negotiations in Copenhagen. We are especially interested in green tech and clean fuels for the energy poor, of course, but REDD is also on our mind, so if you have any information you’d like to share, don’t hesitate to submit it! I’d also like to apologize in advance for the US-centric nature of these suggestions. I’ll be adding more international coverage later! Links: The NYT has several good blogs to turn to. Climate Change Conversations , Dot Earth (Enviro reporter Andy Revkin’s blog), and The Times Topic on Continue reading