Latin America

Mexico passes ambitious climate law

Yesterday the Mexican Lower House (Chamber of Deputies) passed a most ambitious law to fight climate change.  As the local newspapers report, this was a landslide as there was 280 votes for and only ten against. As Kees van der Leun noted on Twitter, the country would slash by 50 percent its greenhouse gases by …

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Bad climate news from the Amazon and the Arctic

I recently wrote about positive feedback mechanisms that would increase climate change as temperatures increase. It seems we are already seeing the very first tragic examples. The first one comes from Peru, where climate change led to a warming Atlantic Ocean, which itself led to a drying Amazon rainforest, which in their turn led to …

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Chevron to pay $18 billion to Ecuador

To Reuters : ” An Ecuadorean appeals court on Tuesday upheld a ruling that Chevron Corp should pay $18 billion in damages to plaintiffs who accused the U.S. oil giant of polluting the Amazon jungle and damaging their health. “ ” A judge ordered Chevron to pay $8.6 billion in environmental damages last February, but …

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Amazon deforestation at its lowest. Can this last ?

I noted last year that Amazon deforestation was at its lowest. Well it decreased again. To Grist : ” a study on deforestation in the Brazilian Amazon found that the number of square kilometers disappearing each year has hit a record low. “ However, these good news might be only temporary. Originally Grist was mentioning …

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Hydropower strikes back, with a controversy

To the New York Times : ” Hydropower, a renewable energy source often overshadowed by excitement about wind and solar power, is enjoying something of a global resurgence.” ” Huge, controversial dam projects have recently made headlines in Brazil, Chile and Laos. Many developing countries, hungry for energy to supply their growing economies (…) are …

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After Australia, floods in Brazil…

Just a couple of weeks after I was writing about the catastrophic floods in Australia, similar dramatic events claimed the lives of more than 500 people in the Rio de Janeiro State of Brazil. To the Telegraph, this makes it “ the country’s worst-ever natural disaster. “ What actually claimed most lives were mudslides as …

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Developing nations go massively in wind power

To CleanTechies developing nations will install more than 22,000 MW of wind power capacity in 2010. Of course, China is behind an important part of this, but countries like India, Mexico are also moving forward on clean energy. “If policy ambition has stalled in the industrialized world, it has if anything accelerated this year in …

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Mario Molina wants to clean Mexico’s air

I recently subscribed to Courrier International, a French weekly newspaper which translates and publishes articles from over 900 international newspapers. Recently it proposed an article on Mario Molina, the Mexican Nobel prize. This is how I came to read about today’s story in Nature magazine : ” Molina’s great challenge is to help Mexico City …

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Amazon deforestation drops to lowest in 22 years

Last year the deforestation of the Brazilian part of the Amazon rainforest was slowing dramatically. It keeps doing so: ” Brazil’s government says deforestation in the Amazon rain forest has dropped to its slowest pace in 22 years.” ” Environment Minister Izabella Teixeira says satellite imagery of the National Institute for Space Research shows that …

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Brazil to invest $5.5 billion in renewables by 2013

According to CleanTechies : ” The Brazilian government earlier this month held a wind, hydroelectric and biomass auction that is expected to prompt US$ 5.52 billion in investments in renewable energies in Brazil. “ ” (…) Brazil currently holds 65 percent of the installed potential for wind power generation in Latin America. The country currently …

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