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The United Arab Emirates has just contracted with  a Sweedish firm, CSEM to purchase a floating solar island.  This concept has been around awhile, but this is the first sale.

The UAE is going to build a 100 meter wide “island”, producing about one megawatt at a cost of $5 million.  This is a concetrating solar power system that will convert seawater to hydrogen, which will then be barged to shore. 

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The Globe faces many challenges, that intersect in very complex system-of-system ways.  There are no Single Shot/Silver Bullet solutions out there. But, in some ways, there are solution sets that provide an integrated solution set that make them a potentially valuable Silver BB.

Our challenges include Peak Oil, Global Warming, clean water constraints, food supply challenges (including every increasing food miles, how far food is traveling to the dinner table), poor urban infrastructure, urban heat islands, housing challenges, etc …

Vertical urban agriculture offers a potential silver BB in this domain … with a new concept from Seattle offering one of the most integrated and interesting approaches that I’ve seen to date. [Read more →]

Truthiness is a satirical term created by television comedian Stephen Colbert to describe things that a person claims to know intuitively or “from the gut” without regard to evidence, logic, intellectual examination, or actual facts.

Truthiness … a term of ever so much relevance when it comes to climate skeptics and those demeaning the need to confront Global Warming, like Bjorn Lomborg and the New York Times’ John Tierney.

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“The majority of the world’s designers focus all their efforts on developing products and services exclusively for the richest 10% of the world’s customers. Nothing less than a revolution in design is needed to reach the other 90%.”
—Dr. Paul Polak, International Development Enterprises  

Just a few days remain for getting to the Design for the Other 90% exhibit at the Cooper-Hewitt museum in New York City. 

Of the world’s total population of 6.5 billion, 5.8 billion people, or 90%, have little or no access to most of the products and services many of us take for granted; in fact, nearly half do not have regular access to food, clean water, or shelter. Design for the Other 90% explores a growing movement among designers to design low-cost solutions for this “other 90%.”

This is an exhibit that I greatly regret not be able to make …

But, the virtual tour via the website is very much worth the trip.  Sections on Shelter, Health, Water, Education, Energy, and Transport with a tremendous links list.  [Read more →]

The Globe faces many challenges, that intersect in very complex system-of-system ways.  There are not Single Shot/Silver Bullet solutions out there. But, in some ways, there are solution sets that provide an integrated solution set that make them a potentially valuable Silver BB.

Our challenges include Peak Oil, Global Warming, clean water constraints, food supply challenges (including every increasing food miles, how far food is traveling to the dinner table), poor urban infrastructure, urban heat islands, housing challenges, etc …

Vertical urban agriculture offers a potential silver BB in this domain … with a new concept from Seattle offering one of the most integrated and interesting approaches that I’ve seen to date.

[Read more →]

Environmental issues are, too often, pigeon-holed as an elite issue — rich people driving Prius hybrids and buying their organic food. Status symbol, sometimes, as much as substance. 

Whether it is a question of pollution from industrial facilities or Global Warming impacts, it is (writ large) the poor who have the most to suffer from destruction to the environment, from wasteful pollution. 

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Global Warming … some people, when praising the positive impact of Global Warming or by arguing that the warming is not out of line with history, will begin speaking about English wine production in the 12th Century.  Others speak, with great concern, about how their favorite vintage is threatened. And, well, even though I love a great bottle of wine, it is has been hard to take this discussion seriously.  Considering all the threats the globe faces, all the terrifying potential implications from Global Warming/the Climate Crisis, should we really care all that much about what goes into wine cellars?

Maybe, however, there are other ways to look at the wine industry and Global Warming. Perhaps it isn’t just about swirling glasses in the Lives of the Rich and Famous, with chatting about ‘nose’ and ‘legs’ and …

Can the wine industry tell us something more about Global Warming?

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Chevron has come out with a game to structure the energy portfolio for a city.  EnergyVille “puts you in charge of meeting the energy demands of a city.”  You can choose nuclear … solar … oil … etc …

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To carry the book openly or to stash it away, that is a question one faces when reading Dave Praeger’s Poop Culture:  How America is Shaped By Its Grossest National Product.  That is an unusual reaction when reading something that, at its core, deals with a quite serious subject and deals with it well. And, that discomfort proves one of the core points of the book — about how American (and much of modern) culture seeks to suppress understanding and discussion of what is, at the end of the day (or whenever you hit the can or release gas or …), one of the most shared human experiences (after, perhaps, breathing …).

Reading this book provided an interesting experience, ranging from outright laughter to points that challenged thinking about daily activities to squeamish discomfort about the subject matter.  I learned, in some ways too much, about feces and humanity’s relationship with it.  Simply put, Poop Culture is a recommended read (and, if you wish, you can check out the website that started it all, PoopReport.com (update: dead link)).

But this series, this review, is about Energy … and, well, poop and energy and what we can learn from Poop Culture …

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The Washington Post featured a local high school’s green renovation in Titans of Ecology, which began

At the brand-new T.C. Williams High in Alexandria, a modern “green” school, students say the environmentally friendly design has led to a serious lifestyle change: They can’t doze in class anymore because sunlight pours in from practically every angle.

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