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Coal is not the solution to energy poverty, warn aid agencies

Clean energy is preferable to coal-focussed policies which could leave a billion people still without electricity, analysis suggests

Coal power plants are not the solution to help billions of people without electricity or clean cooking facilities, aid agencies have warned.

Analysis by Cafod, Christian Aid and thinktank the Overseas Development Institute (ODI) suggests that continuing with current energy policies that focus heavily on coal, risks leaving a billion people without access to electricity and three billion without access to clean cooking facilities by 2030.

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Source: Guardian Environment

Gates Foundation would be $1.9bn better off if it had divested from fossil fuels

Analysis of the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation health charity, and 13 other major funds, reveals moving investments out of coal, oil and gas and into green companies would have generated billions in higher returns

The Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation would have had $1.9bn (£1.3bn) more to spend on its lifesaving health projects if it had divested from fossil fuels and instead invested in greener companies, according to a new analysis.

The Canadian research company Corporate Knights examined the stock holdings of 14 funds, worth a combined $1tn, and calculated how they would have performed if they had dumped shares in oil, coal and gas companies three years ago.

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Source: Guardian Environment

How Unilever was left off George Monbiot’s list of palm oil ‘laggards’ | Chris Elliott

None of those involved in the decision to remove Unilever’s name from the column were aware that the Guardian had any commercial relationship with the company

There are many checks and balances within a newspaper. There is the original author, the news or commissioning editor, and a system of revising the work of subeditors. While this is happening, lawyers will be checking for any legal problems.

But mistakes still happen.

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Source: Guardian Environment

China’s bottled water industry eyes up the Tibetan plateau

Tibet is encouraging companies to tap the Himalayan glaciers for premium drinking water, but the environmental stakes are high

In the last two decades China has become the world’s largest bottled water consumer and a major producer. With per capita consumption 19% lower than global average, the market is expected to continue to grow.

Although it currently makes up a small proportion of China’s annual bottled water production, water from Tibet’s mountain glaciers is seen as the new point of growth for China’s booming bottled water industry.

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Source: Guardian Environment

Is Growing at Home the Future of Food?

The case for a localised, even home-based food growing system is being made by the Open Agriculture Lab (OAL) at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT). They recently suggested that as much as 40% of an urban diet could eventually be produced in a domestic context, cutting down on transportation costs, while providing fresher and more nutritious food.

The Lab is actively working to develop domestic grow-boxes, which create controlled environments, where deliberate combinations of temperature, humidity and soil are created to grow specific types of food. It’s a new agricultural design that could then be utilised by families to create small home gardens, or even in the context of providing food for a local neighbourhood.

The Open Agriculture Lab’s director, Caleb Harper, argues for the idea that urban and peri-urban farming must have a significant role to play in the future diet, citing problems of freshness, storage and transport costs. He points out that the average age of an apple at a U.S. supermarket is 14 months. Significant amounts of nutrition are lost in a long period of treatment and storage.

Licensed under CC - credit Flickr user: Ajith Kumar
Licensed under CC – credit Flickr user: Ajith Kumar

The work of OAL also focuses on making information about food, where it has come from and how it has been made open source. Indeed, according to Harper, open-sourcing information about we consume is critical to the future of effective food systems.

There are a number of examples of innovators and startups that are embracing the concept of home-grown food. Circulate recently covered Hexagro, one of the finalists for this year’s Biomimicry Global Design Challenge, which proposes a mini-urban garden “tree-like structure”.

Another case  is the Urban Agriculture Company, a business that sells organic gardening kits. The ‘kit’ comprises a compostable container, a bag of soil and seeds to grow herbs or vegetables, equipping customers with a simple and effective set-up for growing fresh food in their own home.

Credit: The Urban Agricultural Company
Credit: The Urban Agricultural Company

Feeding the growing global population is unquestionably one of the most significant challenges of the 21st century. Whatever solutions are eventually found, there is clearly a growing momentum behind the idea that urban farming and localised food production could be at least part of the solution in the city context.

The post Is Growing at Home the Future of Food? appeared first on Circulate.

Source: Circulate News RSS

The Ultimate Hacking Keyboard and “Making Better Things”

In Circulate’s most recent feature piece, “To make things better, make better things”, Rapanui co-founder Martin Drake-Knight makes the point that good economics and a healthy environment are too often represented as oppositions. He argues that the best of both worlds is achievable through the combination of creative design, business and communication choices. The article is well worth a read, it combines big picture perspective with an insight into how Rapanui’s innovative business model has achieved success.

That’s where a Hungarian startup, Ultimate Gadget Laboratories (UGL), might just come in. UGL is currently seeking funding to produce the Ultimate Hacking Keyboard (UKL), an ergonomic device that has a high level of durability and repairability at the core of its design.

Credit: UGL
Credit: UGL

iFixit, often the judge, jury and executioner when it comes to the repairability of electronic devices, said this about the UHK:

“[The UHK] is proof positive that even compact, performance-designed, single-purpose gadgets can be designed for repair, from the ground up – complete with repair documentation”.

The keyboard is fully modular, is built with high quality materials and even collects data on the amount of usage to help advise when different parts are likely to need replacing.

UHK1
Credit: UGL

However, just as is the case with Rapanui, the Ultimate Hacking Keyboard needs to be able to compete in the marketplace. László Monda, founder and lead developer of the UHK, spoke to Circulate about the need to create a product that was ‘better’ than others in the marketplace.

“I think our major differentiator is being ergonomic and compact at the same time. It’s a super rare combination in itself. Also, our layout allows users to never leave the home row which increases productivity. Topping this with features like full programmability and mouse control results in a very distinctive value proposition.”

Starting at $200, the UHK is expected to be cost competitive with other ergonomic keyboards and crucially, its design, repairability and durability features should facilitate a more effective business model in the longer-term.

As Martin writes in his article, there are “companies outcompeting business as usual, proving that the best of both worlds is possible”.

The post The Ultimate Hacking Keyboard and “Making Better Things” appeared first on Circulate.

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Footfall scares the wood-pigeon and attracts the robin: Country diary 100 years ago

Originally published in the Manchester Guardian on 19 November 1915

After bumping over frozen ruts in lanes bordered by frost-decorated hedges, I reached the mere, only to find the fog hanging in a dense curtain; indistinct lumps on the water, just beyond the fringe of ice, were birds, but what kinds it was almost impossible to tell. Just beyond the reeds a couple of goldeneyes, recognisable by form rather than colour, were feeding; they have frequented this spot for nearly a fortnight. As I walked through the wood the crisp rime-rimmed beech leaves rustled beneath my feet, and nervous wood-pigeons dashed with clattering wings through the leafless branches. But the same footfalls which scared the wood-pigeons attracted another bird – a robin. Not content with coming to visit me he called my attention by a subdued but sweet little warble, and then, hopping and flitting through the undergrowth, kept pace with me whilst I walked. Why this difference in birds? The wood-pigeon, except in the London parks, where it is now tame, distrusts man and shuns him at once, but the robin seeks his company. When we dig in the garden the robin comes for what it can get; we are then useful food providers; but what can it hope to gain from our presence in the wood? Apparently it hopes for nothing, but is simply pleased to see us: perhaps its little brain may also realise that we are pleased to see it, and for that reason it need have no fear.

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Source: Guardian Environment

Fireworks are fun – but the effects are not

The sparkles from fireworks last a few seconds but the air pollution can linger in our cities for hours.

Firework smoke is rich in tiny metal particles making it very different to normal urban air pollution. These metals are used to make firework colours in much the same way as Victorian scientists identified chemicals by burning them in a Bunsen flame; red from strontium or lithium, blue from copper and bright green or white from barium compounds.

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Source: Guardian Environment

Jonathan Holliman obituary

My twin brother, Jonathan, who has died aged 69, helped ignite the modern environmental movement. In the early 70s he was a founding member of Friends of the Earth UK, set up the National Union of Students’ environment committee, and was an organiser of the first United Nations youth conference on the human environment.

A lover of hitchhiking and hostelling, in 1973 Jonathan received a Winston Churchill Memorial Trust fellowship and campaigned as an environmental activist in London, Japan and New Zealand. He was the author of three books on the environment, including Consumers’ Guide to the Protection of the Environment (1974).

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Source: Guardian Environment

Severe weather puts hundreds of Cumbrian homes at risk of flooding

Motorists told to drive ‘only if absolutely necessary’ after torrential rain and Environment Agency issues six severe flood warnings

Police have warned motorists in Cumbria to drive “only if absolutely necessary” after torrential rain left roads flooded and put more than 1,000 homes at risk.

The Environment Agency has issued six severe flood warnings – its highest level of alert – and emergency reception centres were set up in Kendal and Egremont. But Dave Hughes, the chairman of Kendal Mountain Rescue, said not everyone had been willing to leave their homes.

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Source: Guardian Environment