By Tom Schueneman •
November 17, 2009
Copenhagen is a water town, and the iconic symbol of Denmark’s capital city is the Little Mermaid silently standing watch over the harbor. Next month the Little Mermaid welcomes the global community coming to negotiate at least the foundation of an international treaty at the COP15 climate conference to carry beyond the Kyoto Protocol expiring in 2012.
The Little Mermaid takes her role as a symbol of climate change seriously. And she’s angry. Angry because also coming to her town are thousands of lobbyists and business (as usual) representatives intent on holding back progress for a dangerously warming world, opting instead for short term profits over long term sustainability.
The Little Mermaid is now the Angry Mermaid:
“So the Angry Mermaid decided to launch an award – in her own name – to highlight how corporate lobbyists were scheming to sabotage action to save the climate. She asked people she knew if they could suggest which companies were doing the most to undermine climate action – and she decided to publish a shortlist and ask the public to vote.”
Lester R. Brown
For the 193 national delegations gathering in Copenhagen for the U.N. Climate Change Conference in December, the reasons for concern about climate change vary widely. For delegations from low-lying island countries, the principal concern is rising sea level. For countries in southern Europe, climate change means less rainfall and more drought. For countries of East Asia and the Caribbean, more powerful storms and storm surges are a growing worry. This climate change conference is about all these things, and many more, but in a very fundamental sense, it is a conference about food security.
We need not go beyond ice melting to see that the world is in trouble on the food front. The melting of the Greenland and West Antarctic ice sheets is raising sea level. If the Greenland ice sheet were to melt entirely, sea level would rise by 23 feet. Recent projections show that it could rise by up to 6 feet during this century.
By Joanna Schroeder •
November 4, 2009
Tata Motors, the company whose claim to fame is selling one of the world’s cheapest and most fuel efficient cars, is considering letting other local India-based manufacturers produce and sell their Nano under their brands.
The company began selling the 56 mpg car last July, and, due to high demand, is in the process of building a manufacturing facility that would produce an additional 350,000 units per year. The plant, located in Sanand in Gujarat, should be up and running by March of 2010.
But in the meantime, Tata Motors is considering allowing smaller manufacturers produce, rebrand and sell the car under license from Tata. The maximum amount of production per year in this fashion would be 10,000 cars. Now that’s an interesting way of selling more cars. I would venture to say that I doubt an American car company would take a similar tack since they use the brand to drive sales.
By SolveClimate •
November 3, 2009
This post was written by Stacy Feldman (reporting from Barcelona, Spain), and originally published at SolveClimate.
The United States must deliver concrete mid-term greenhouse gas reduction targets by next month or it will destroy efforts to achieve a framework for a global climate change deal in Copenhagen, United Nations climate chief Yvo de Boer said Monday as a week of international talks on global warming began in Barcelona.
“I do not think the international community will accept an agreement that lacks clarity from the U.S. on targets,” de Boer said.
The Barcelona talks are the final five days of two years of global negotiations leading up to the crucial UN Climate Change Conference, from Dec. 7-18, in Copenhagen. De Boer’s worst fear now is that the Copenhagen conference will end with a lack of clarity on key issues and lead to a protracted political standoff.
“Negotiations must stop at Copenhagen. Otherwise negotiations will drag on when only the technical work should be going on,” he said.
A decision by the Obama administration to put a concrete 2020 target on the table could be the game changer for the world, he suggested.
By Joanna Schroeder •
October 29, 2009
UK-based Axon Automotive made its debut at the Sexy Green Car Show in Cornwall last year and they are making headlines again. They have officially debuted their upcoming Axon plug-in hybrid electric city car at the Milton Keynes Science Festival.
The element that makes this PHEV stand out is its light weight. The car is made from carbon fiber and it is paired with existing engine technology. According to test data from the company, it gets about 83.3 mpg US/100mpg UK. Tthe company’s website states that the Axon will be available to consumers in 2010 and has room for two adults and luggage. Other sources cite limited availability in 2011 with full production in 2012.
By Daniel Hohler •
October 22, 2009
Google Inc. is joining forces with space agencies around the world and the conservation organization Group on Earth Observations (GEO) to monitor deforestation rates using satellite imagery. Among the space agencies working on the program are NASA, the ESA, and the national space agencies of Japan, Germany, Italy, India, and Brazil.
The GEO is a global partnership of 80 governments and more than 50 organizations. Internet company Google currently collects satellite images for use in its Google Earth application, and will be providing satellite images to the project.
By Popular Mechanics •
October 19, 2009
Volvo C30EV on the road.
This post was written by Andrew English and originally appeared on the Popular Mechanics website.
In this rough economic climate, it appears Volvo has weathered the storm. In September, Ford’s Swedish car-making arm, Volvo, showed a 16 percent sales increase over last year—one of only nine automakers to do so. And the Swedes are showing a firm embrace on the latest environmental technologies, even if the company doesn’t quite have the wherewithal to put them all into production right now.
What will be in European showrooms next year is the plug-in hybrid V70 wagon with the capability of traveling 31 miles in electric-only mode. We’re going to have to wait for the battery-electric C30EV coupe, but Popular Mechanics was given a preview drive of both recently.
By Ryan Jones •
September 30, 2009
When you need to urgently need to blow your nose in Germany and don’t have a tissue on hand, you might ask a friend “Hast du ein Tempo?” (Do you have a Tempo?)
Tempo, it turns out, is a brand of tissue, not the German word for tissue.
Substituting a brand name for a general product description is relatively common across a number of languages. How many times have you heard someone say “Just Google that” or “Can I have a COKE please”? Over the years, powerful brands have impacted our culture and slipped into our language. For a brand, this is the ultimate compliment and a big awareness driver. In fact, Coke and Google (the 2 examples above) are now the #1 and #2 brands respectively on Interbrands latest list of powerful brands. Tempo continues to be a very powerful brand in Germany.
By Nick Chambers •
September 30, 2009
French energy minister Jean-Louis Borloo will announce a plan on Thursday for the country to invest 1 billion Euros ($1.46 billion US) in the infrastructure needed to encourage the adoption of electric cars. That investment will buy 4.4 million charging stations, upgrade the power grid, purchase a government fleet of electric cars, and provide subsidies to EV buyers and auto manufacturers.
France hopes that this amount of investment will be enough to get 2 million electric cars on its roads within 10 years.
By Chris Milton •
September 23, 2009
The moment sustainable motoring has waited for has finally arrived: a full range of all-electric cars.
Renault has launched the world’s first range of purely electric cars at the IAA Frankfurt Motor Show 2009. Designed to cater for everyone from a single traveller to local commerce, via 2.5 kids family cars, it’s a revolution in three important ways:
- the range is designed from scratch as a complete set of electric cars — not gas-fueled cars with an electric motor retro-fitted to give the manufacturer green kudos;
- the cars will be priced without an “electric premium,” allowing them to compete alongside gas-based engines on a like-for-like basis for the first time ever;
- most importantly, they’re real. Presented as concept cars, the Kangoo ZE is already in an advanced prototype stage, and I was lucky enough to drive it at Frankfurt.
