Reported by Jessica Schoonover, Intern Reporter at The Charcoal Project More than half a million tons of charcoal have been produced and shipped over the past 8 years from the once dense but now denuded forests of Meghalaya, a small Indian state located north of Bangladesh. With one-third of the state covered by biologically diverse woodlands, the balance and preservation of this region’s ecosystem has been a major concern for members of Mait Shaphrang Movement, local conservation group, for over a decade. An article recently featured in The Telegraph, based in Calcutta, India, notes that the group sought the intervention Continue reading
November 2010
Peak Oil vs Peak Biomass: Are we there yet?
This New York Times article, based on the IEA (International Energy Agency) latest World Energy Outlook, suggests humanity is on the downward slope of the oil availability curve. We’ve often wandered what analogies, if any, existed between the concepts of “peak oil” and “peak biomass.” After all, both the fossil fuel industry and the biomass fuel community speak of “energy efficiency,” “carbon and particulate emissions,” “transport costs,” “public health,” and “environmental, Climate Change, and social impact” of these fuels. So, can we speak of “peak biomass?” And are we there yet? I think the answer is yes and no. Yes, Continue reading
U.N. and World Bank Report Says Act Now or Pay Much More Later for Climate Disasters
By NATHANIAL GRONEWOLD of ClimateWire Published: November 11, 2010 UNITED NATIONS — Annual monetary losses for natural disasters are expected to rise to $185 billion worldwide by the end of the century, even without factoring in the anticipated negative impacts of climate change, a new joint U.N. and World Bank study concludes. With climate change included, the global annual losses could increase by anywhere from $28 billion to $68 billion. But governments can drastically reduce these losses and rising mortality rates by implementing preventive systems and infrastructure changes that are much cheaper and simpler than the post-disaster cleanup that has Continue reading
A Insider’s Perspective on the Global Alliance for Clean Cookstoves
Kirk Smith, Ph.D., is probably the world’s leading authority on the public health impact of indoor air pollution caused by the incomplete combustion of biomass fuels for cooking and heating. His recent remarks help cast some light on what stakeholders can expect from the recent launch of the Global Alliance for Clean Cookstoves. We’ve borrowed the following excerpt from the good people at Indoor Air Pollution Updates and we urge you to click on the link to read the extended article. Smith KR, What’s Cooking? A Brief Update, Energy for Sustainable Development (2010), doi:10.1016/j. esd.2010.10.002 Full-text: http://ehs.sph.berkeley.edu/krsmith/publications/2010/ESD_whats_cooking.pdf (pdf, 89KB) Extensive world press Continue reading
VIDEO: India tackles energy poverty with solar panels
This BBC video report focuses on India’s public-private partnership to invest 55 million accelerate the deployment of solar panels for the country’s 450 million people who don’t have access to electricity. Continue reading