Europe

Biofuels aren’t a sustainable solution

At first I wasn’t sure even if I had huge doubts. But now this is a certainty as I came accross three articles on how biofuels production in the United States, Brazil and Europe is a threat to our societies and our environment. In Brazil, biofuels production are a danger to the Amazon rainforest as farmers …

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A global wind energy boom

If you think 2009 was a rotten year for all businesses, read on. To the Global Wind Energy Council 37.5 GW of wind energy capacity was installed in 2009 alone. This represents a 31 percent increase over 2008. In Europe, capacity grew up by 10 GW and investors pumped 13 billion euros into the industry. …

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E-bikes : a growing sustainable alternative to cars

We have seen previously that electric cars and vehicles are an interesting alternative to traditional cars with internal combustion engines. But another solution exist : electric bicycles. There are already 65 million e-bikes on Chinese roads and the market size is fastly increasing Such bicycles compete with cars in large cities like Shanghai as they …

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Think the current crisis is the worse ?

According to the Guardian, Richard Branson believes that ” The next five years will see us face another crunch – the oil crunch. This time, we do have the chance to prepare. The challenge is to use that time well.” The founder of the Virgin Group and other business leaders from the United Kingdom are urging …

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Glaciers are melting faster and faster

The UNEP and the World Glacier Monitoring Service published a report showing how glaciers all around the world are melting faster and faster, thus threatening the water supplies of hundred of millions of people. The report then noted that “the average annual melting rate of glaciers doubled after the turn of the millennium.” This scary …

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The critical issue of back up power

20 percent of America’s – and perhaps the world’s – electricity could soon come from wind and solar. Our societies thus need reliable, cheap and sustainable energy storage solutions. Concentrated solar could benefit from molten salts, yet wind energy doesn’t have yet its own solution. German and Swiss utilities are working on Compressed Air Energy Storage …

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An offshore wind energy boom in Europe

The European Wind Energy Association (EWEA) published its annual report and the results are encouraging as the offshore wind energy capacity grew by 54 percent in 2009 with 577 MW. The United Kingdom appears to be leading the sector as it installed more than half of the added capacity of the European Union. And this …

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Germany to cut its emissions by 40 percent

To Reuters, ” Germany will stick to a more ambitious goal of cutting greenhouse gas emissions by 40 percent by 2020 even though the U.N. climate conference in Copenhagen fell short of expectations, a government adviser said on Monday. “ Details of how the country will achieve such drastic cuts still remain to be defined. …

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The huge failure of the Copenhagen conference

The Copenhagen climate conference failed in preparing the future of the Kyoto Protocol. This is even more enraging as at first positive signs kept on piling : the United States and  many developing nations proclamed they would act. I saw it coming as still too many are elected representatives around the world that don’t understand the benefits a …

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Europe could slash emissions by 40 percent

A joint report by Friends of the Earth Europe (FOEE) and the Stockholm Environment Institute shows that Europe can cut its greenhouse gases emissions by 40 percent by 2020. This is not entirely new or surprising as the UK pledged for 34 percent cuts and as Europe could go as far as 30 percent. What …

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