10.27.2015
5.04.2012
5.03.2012
4.26.2012
Prix Milton F. Gregg Award
Moncton, April 26, 2012 - The Conservation Council of NB has selected Post Carbon Greater Moncton as the recipient of the Milton F. Gregg Conservation Award for organizational achievement. The Award is given out annually to an organization that has made an outstanding contribution to the improvement of the New Brunswick environment. We want to take this opportunity to thank all our friends for the support given since 2008.
2.16.2012
Comment se battre contre le gaspillage alimentaire
De nouvelles étiquettes ont fait leur apparition tout récemment dans les supermarchés britanniques de la chaîne Sainsbury's. Fini les recommandations appelant les clients à congeler les aliments dès leur achat : désormais, les consommateurs sont incités à prendre le réflexe congélation jusqu'à la date limite de consommation du produit.
La mesure a été inspirée par la "Waste & Resources Action Programme" (WRAP), une organisation britannique créée en 2000 pour aider les collectivités, les entreprises et les particuliers à réduire le gaspillage. La WRAP a établi dans une étude (PDF) que 60 % des consommateurs croient que les aliments doivent être absolument congelés le jour même de leur achat.
LES BRITANNIQUES, CHAMPIONS DU GASPILLAGE
L'initiative de Sainsbury's n'est pas isolée : le 6 janvier, la chaîne Marks & Spencer annonçait de son côté le lancement d'un nouveau type d'emballage, permettant de conserver les fraises fraîches deux jours de plus. Quant au gouvernement britannique, il a envisagé en avril dernier de supprimer les dates de péremption sur certains produits alimentaires comme les pâtes, la farine et le pain. Tout cela, dans un seul but : réduire l'énorme gaspillage alimentaire du Royaume-Uni et inciter les gens à ne pas jeter leurs aliments non périmés.
Cette problématique existe depuis des années de l'autre côté de la Manche. En 2005, une enquête commandée conjointement par The Guardian et la BBC révélait déjà que "les Britanniques gaspillent sans doute plus de nourriture que n'importe quelle autre nation, jetant entre 30 % à 40 % de toutes les denrées achetées ou cultivées chaque année". Plus récemment, un rapport de l'Organisation des Nations unies pour l'alimentation et l'agriculture (lien PDF) (FAO, Food and Agriculture Organization), chiffrait, en 2011, à près de 300 kg par personne la quantité de nourriture perdue ou gaspillée en Europe et en Amérique du Nord (pertes incluant tant les pertes dans le cycle de production que le gaspillage des particuliers). Soit deux fois plus que dans des régions en voie de développement comme l'Afrique sub-saharienne et l'Asie du sud-est.
1.16.2012
Saudis target 'triple-digit' oil price for the first time
Saudi Arabia said on Monday it wanted to keep crude oil prices at around $100 (U.S.) a barrel, the first time the kingdom has targeted a “triple-digit” price and a quarter above the previous ambition of $75 suggested by King Abdullah in November 2008.
Ali Naimi, the powerful Saudi oil minister, said the world’s largest oil producer aimed to “stabilize” oil prices slightly below the current level of $111 a barrel.
“Our wish and hope is we can stabilise this oil price and keep it at a level around $100”, Mr Naimi told CNN television. “If we were able as producers and consumers to average $100 I think the world economy would be in better shape.”
Brent rose 92 cents higher at $111.36 a barrel in afternoon trading in London on Monday.
Saudi Arabia is traditionally seen as a moderate country within the Opec oil cartel. But Mr Naimi’s comments put the kingdom in line with hawks such as Algeria and Venezuela, which in the past have said they want to keep prices above $100.
1.04.2012
What do triple-digit oil prices mean for growth?
Can we still expect to see sustained economic recoveries when oil, the world’s principal source of energy, is trading in triple-digit range?
As I argued several years ago in my book, Why Your World Is About To Get A Whole Lot Smaller, triple-digit oil prices will redefine our notion of an economic recovery because as soon as the global economy picks up, oil prices will quickly soar to levels that challenge growth.
Last year was a case in point. In the second full year of recovery from as deep a trough as any seen in the postwar period, oil prices once again rose swiftly to levels that, in the past, torpedoed economic growth. Brent crude, the world oil benchmark, averaged $111 per barrel. This cracked the previous record of an annual average high of $100 in 2008 - a peak subsequently followed by a huge global recession.
The North American benchmark, West Texas Intermediate (WTI), rose even more, increasing by 20 per cent from its 2010 average price of $79. Even with the hefty discount that it traded to world oil prices throughout most of last year (at times over $20 per barrel), WTI still averaged just a shade under triple-digit levels at $95/barrel last year.
Of course there are always special factors to explain these price levels: the Libyan revolution, Iran’s threat to close the Strait of Hormuz, or an increasingly destabilized Iraq. While all these events certainly pose credible threats to world oil production, they are, at the same time, background noise even if they dominate the front page.
The real story behind triple-digit oil prices is not the threat of supply shocks, but the sheer, unrelenting rise in world oil demand. Already closing in on 90 million barrels a day, the quick rebound in world oil consumption to new record highs demonstrates the global economy can’t grow without burning greater amounts of oil.
No matter how many rabbits the oil industry can pull out of its hat, be it tar sands from Alberta or shale oil from the Bakkens, supply just can’t seem to keep pace - at least not at the prices most consumers can afford to pay. That is the message that triple digit prices keeps telling us.
If the global economic expansion, troubled as it may be, continues, we will see even higher oil prices in 2012. But what does that say about the sustainability of growth?
And even if there is growth, what is the pace?
12.28.2011
Les poules débarquent en ville
Claire est une Parisienne qui a bien de la chance. Non contente d'habiter un rez-de-chaussée avec cour privative et jardin derrière la butte Montmartre, la jeune femme a le privilège, chaque matin, de pouvoir récolter un oeuf frais au saut du lit. Car depuis six mois, elle est l'heureuse propriétaire d'une poule naine. "J'avais envie d'un retour à la nature, explique-t-elle. Et puis cela me rappelle mon enfance." Ses voisins n'ont pas tiqué. Au contraire. "Leurs enfants sont ravis de nous rendre visite !", se réjouit-elle.
Avec sa poule en plein Paris, Claire passe encore pour une originale. Mais pour combien de temps ? L'élevage de gallinacés en ville gagne du terrain. Les jardineries Truffaut ont vendu plus de 20 000 poussins et poules pondeuses ou d'ornement à des particuliers en 2011. "L'activité basse-cour a augmenté de plus de 50 % cette année", précise Pierre-Alain Oudart, chef de produit. "Elle connaît un grand succès dans tous nos magasins en zone périurbaine." Cela se confirme à Toulouse, Aubagne et Amiens, mais également autour de la capitale, d'Herblay (95) aux abords du Stade de France, à Saint-Denis (93).
En deux ans d'existence, l'entreprise alsacienne Eco-poules a écoulé suffisamment de poulaillers en kit pour abriter 30 000 gallinacés : "Nous nous attendions à toucher des milieux plus ruraux", observe Stanislas de Beaumont, son fondateur. "Mais c'est en ceinture parisienne que nous avons le plus de clients. Et 80 % de nos ventes se réalisent sur Internet."
12.11.2011
Behind the Durban Blame Game
12.08.2011
12.07.2011
11.14.2011
Regulator unmoved by study showing trucks can be made safer for cyclists
It’s a debate that’s gone on for years: Should truck drivers be forced to install side guards to help prevent pedestrians and cyclists from being crushed under their rear wheels? To families and friends of the victims, it’s a life-saving measure, a position reinforced after the tragic death of a cyclist in Toronto last week. But the trucking industry and the federal transportation regulator argue the evidence of the side-guard’s effectiveness isn’t clear. The debate moves to Ottawa on Monday when opposition MP Olivia Chow will press the government to make the protection mandatory on trucks across the country. A report from 2010, commissioned by Transport Canada and made available to The Globe and Mail, shows that since the introduction of guards on the side of most trucks in Europe in the late 1980s, the number of cyclists and pedestrians killed or seriously wounded in crashes with large vehicles has dropped. More
11.01.2011
More hens, please
The sky has not fallen, Chicken Little. It was last March when chickens were the topic of conversation in Fredericton - specifically the keeping of chickens in urban coops in the backyards of residents. Residents Hazel Richardson and Philias Cyr had each applied for a one-year temporary use variance to keep three egg-laying hens in their backyards, and it was up to the Planning Advisory Committee to make the decision. The PAC seemed cautious, but curious and willing to entertain the request. Some neighbours were OK with the whole venture, while others wrote letters of protest and attended the PAC meeting to voice their concerns. One neighbour was so concerned she put her house up for sale and subsequently sold it. In the end, the PAC approved the requests, the hens moved in, and more than six months later, a lot of eggs have been cracked, but the sky has not fallen. In fact, PAC members, during their yearly tour of approved projects, visited Ms. Richardson's coop last week and found that everything was in order - no complaints, no odour, no noise. Happy hens, happy neighbours, happy family, lots of delicious, fresh eggs, and happy gardeners who collect the droppings for their plants. This is a success story, and we want to say thank you to the PAC for giving this venture a chance, and to Ms. Richardson and Mr. Cyr for the courage to take on this experiment and make it work. More
10.23.2011
Are we reaching ‘peak car’?
Anyone who has been stuck in big-city gridlock lately may find this hard to believe, but millions of Westerners are giving up their cars.
Experts say our love affair with the automobile is ending, and that could change much more than how we get around – it presents both an opportunity and an imperative to rethink how we build cities, how governments budget and even the contours of the political landscape.
The most detailed picture of the trend comes from the United States, where the distance driven by Americans per capita each year flatlined at the turn of the century and has been dropping for six years. By last spring, Americans were driving the same distance as they had in 1998.
The data are similar in Europe, Australia and Japan. And, although Canada doesn't keep national statistics on individual driving habits, Australian researcher Jeff Kenworthy has found that driving in the nation's five largest cities, combined, declined by 1.7 per cent per capita from 1995 to 2006.
If developed countries are reaching “peak car,” as some transportation experts are calling it, it's not just a product of high unemployment or skyrocketing fuel prices, as the pattern began to show up years before the 2008 financial crisis.
Nor is it primarily a matter of people feeling guilted into reducing their car use for the sake of the climate and the environment – the threat of separating people from their wheels (or taxing their fuel use) has long been one of the green movement's biggest stumbling blocks.
More
10.19.2011
IEA Predicts 'Dire Future'
By JAMES HERRON
PARIS—The world is headed for a "dire future" where high energy prices drag on economic growth and global average temperatures rise by more than 3.5 Celsius unless there are significant innovations to lower the cost of clean energy and carbon-capture technology, the International Energy Agency said Wednesday.
Speaking at the conclusion of a two-day meeting with international energy ministers and business leaders in Paris, senior officials from the agency painted a gloomy picture of the world's current trajectory.
The meeting concluded that growth in energy demand will be powered largely by coal and the only hope of restraining the rise in global temperatures to safe levels is to hope that the creation of cheaper technologies to capture carbon dioxide "might eventually allow it to be used in a more environmentally benign manner."
The meeting, which was attended for the first time by ministers from a large number of emerging economies, was a clear acknowledgment of how economic realities conflict with the goal of reducing carbon-dioxide emissions.
"Twenty percent of the world's population does not have access to reliable energy," said Martin Ferguson, Australia's Minister of Resources and Energy who was chairing the IEA meeting. These developing countries "are going to continue to grow their economy and hence their demand for energy."
This means that "coal will continue to be the world's fastest growing energy source for some time," with its consumption rising by two-thirds under the current trajectory, he said. "It's not for us to deny them, but to invent clean technology at the lowest possible cost," and share it with them, he said, adding that investment in carbon capture and storage and renewable energy is important.
Current clean energy technologies are insufficient to meet carbon-reduction targets, so in the nearer term improving energy efficiency is the most important action to take, the IEA said in a statement concluding the meeting.
"The scale and breadth of the energy challenge is enormous," the IEA said. "Unless much stronger action is taken ... energy related CO2 emissions would rise to a level consistent with a long-term global temperature increase of more than 3.5 Celsius, with dangerous consequences for the global environment and human welfare."
The door may already be closing on the opportunity to prevent average global temperatures from rising by more than two degrees Celsius, said the IEA's Chief Economist, Fatih Birol, on Tuesday.
Growing dependence on fossil fuels will also be economically damaging, the IEA said. "Persistently high levels of spending on energy imports would impose a drag on economic growth in many countries," it said. "The risk of serious energy-supply disruptions would continue to mount."
High oil prices this year have contributed to the economic slowdown many countries are currently experiencing, said the head of the IEA's oil markets division, David Fyfe.
10.17.2011
The worsening oil crisis and views of a German military think tank
DURHAM-- The global economic crisis shows no sign of significantly abating, with extremely sluggish growth and sometimes economic contraction occurring across Europe and the US in particular.
While the problem of credit remains the main focus of economists, there is also another factor to consider that many seem to have overlooked. The world is running out of affordable oil. The International Energy Agency stated in its 2010 report that the world saw an “all-time peak” in the production of conventional crude oil in 2006. While it delivered an optimistic scenario with respect to the discovery and utilisation of unconventional oil sources, such as tar sands and deep-ocean oil, there are still some problems when it comes to the ability to supply the global economy with these sorts of fuels.
Fatih Birol, chief economist at the International Energy Agency, has stated several times that “the age of cheap oil is over.” Our global economy has depended on cheap oil in order to function well and in order for long-distance supply chains to remain viable. However, the dynamics of supply and demand could result in a situation where oil prices are highly volatile, swinging from very high prices to very cheap prices in short periods of time. Such dynamics have been described by Dr Colin J. Campbell, a retired petroleum geologist and analyst, as the “bumpy plateau.” When the physical limits of oil production have been reached, any increase in oil demand as a result of investment in economic growth causes rapid price increases until these prices start to make global trade expensive. As a result, demand for oil falls because of the inability of companies to afford energy expenses and this drives down the price -- sometimes very dramatically. Can the world survive such a volatile future?
More
10.11.2011
Jeremy Rifkin: The Third Industrial Revolution
The world is doomed to repeat four-year cycles of booms followed by crashes if we don’t get off oil, Jeremy Rifkin warned a Climate One audience in San Francisco on October 3. The solution, what he calls the Third Industrial Revolution, is the “Energy Internet,” a nervous system linking millions of small renewable energy producers.
For Rifkin, author of the new The Third Industrial Revolution: How Lateral Power Is Transforming Energy and Changing the World, a seminal event occurred in July 2008, when the price of oil hit $147 a barrel. “Prices for everything on the supply chain went through the roof, from food to petrochemicals. Purchasing power plummeted all over the world that month. An entire economic engine of the Industrial Revolution shut down,” he said.
“That was the great economic earthquake,” he went on. “The collapse of the financial markets 60 days later was the aftershock. Our world leaders are still dealing with the aftershock, and have not gone to the nub of the crisis."
The reason this is happening now, Rifkin said, is that the “world is made out of and moved by fossil fuels.” We have reached peak oil per capita and global peak oil production, he said, citing the International Energy Agency’s finding that peak oil production probably occurred in 2006, at 70 million barrels per day.
"Every time we try to re-grow the economy at the same growth rate we were growing before July 2008, the price of oil goes up, all of the other prices goes up, purchasing power goes down, and it collapses.” This is a wall we can’t go beyond under the current energy regime, he said. “We’re in this wild gyration of four-year cycles, where we’re going to try to re-grow, collapse, re-grow, collapse.”
More
10.07.2011
Oil’s physical strength defies slowdown woes
The physical oil market continues to show a remarkable strength even if futures prices are lagging amid worries about the impact of an economic slowdown on demand.
The latest signal of supply and demand tightness comes from Asia and the Middle East. On the one hand, the cost of Oman-Dubai crude, the regional benchmark, in the spot market has surged significantly above their price for delivery later on the year and into early 2012. The downward slope of the curve, known as backwardation, is an indication of immediate tightness. On the other, the premium that Saudi Arabia charges to Asian refiners for its main crude stream has jumped to an all-time high.
As Edward Morse, the veteran oil watcher at Citigroup in New York, put it earlier this week, “the dire macro outlook continues to weight on the oil complex … but there remains very little in the way of weakness visible in the oil market itself”.
More
