Even though there are still a few skeptics out there, we were excited to learn that the current draft of the American Power Act acknowledges the potential role biochar can play in capturing CO2 during the biomass combustion process. Whether or not this language will end up in the final draft of the APA that […]
American Power Act to fund biochar R & D as part of “fast CC mitigation” strategy. Read More »
Some entrepreneurs and financiers believe that Africa can benefit from the economic opportunities of climate change. They hold a radically different vision of the climate trends, seeing the chance for jobs and development, instead of just doom and gloom.
The seeds of change in Africa’s economic climate Read More »
Today, three billion people—nearly half the world’s population—burn coal, wood, dung, or compost to heat their homes and cook their food. In addition to the deforestation associated with open fire cooking, especially in regions of conflict, the need for fuel often leaves searchers vulnerable, exposing them to risk of attack.
The Darfur Stoves Project: A Market Solution to Poverty Read More »
The IPCC and the climate change movement are missing the boat on a crucial fix.
Why black carbon abatement is not one of the central topics of discussion by the climate change movement is a mystery to me given the findings in this report.
Yo, IPCC & CC movement! (cough, cough) Here’s an easy win: Black Carbon (wheeze, wheeze) Read More »
Is someone selling you counterfeit malaria pills? Let a mobile phone check on that for you. (1)
Too poor to have a bank account? Try mobile banking.(2)
Are you a herder in Kenya or Tanzania and have a sick goat? Track it on a mobile phone. (3)
Someone trying to pull a real estate scam on you in Lagos? Let Google’s Android handle that for you.(4)
Now, the World Bank is wondering if the mobile phone story may be the ticket out of energy poverty for rural sub-Saharan Africa.
We are pleased to share with you this list of 25 cookstove-related videos posted on YouTube and curated by the good people over at USAID’s Indoor Air Pollution News Update.
Thanks IAP Update for doing this!
Compilation of Energy-Efficient Cookstove videos on YouTube (via IAP Updates/USAID) Read More »
BEIJING (AFP) More than two million Chinese youths die each year from health problems related to indoor air pollution, with nearly half of them under five years of age, state media cited a government study as saying.
The study released by the China Centre for Disease Control and Prevention said indoor pollution levels can often be 5-10 times higher than those measured in the nation’s notoriously bad outdoor air, the China News Service said.
REPORT: Indoor air kills 2.2 million young Chinese Read More »
The Citizen Daily Tanzania’s entire forest cover will disappear in about 10 to 16 decades if the current high level of deforestation is not checked, a new survey warns. While the survey by Conservation International, a non-profit organisation with its headquarters in Washington, DC, United States, has revealed that 2,300 square kilometres of forests is
Tanzania to loose forest cover by the end of century Read More »
OPINION I almost cut myself shaving this morning while listening to a BBC News story about The Hartwell Paper, which I’d only heard about en passant. The Hartwell Paper was drafted by a group of academics in an attempt to offer a radically different way of framing the issues raised by climate change, and hence
Nathaniel Mulcahy’s speaks with the urgency and precision of someone on a mission and with little time.
Although he has patiently and politely dedicated the better part of an hour to our conversation, I know that the moment he hangs up he will be off to complete a million tasks on his to-do list.
Mulcahy has good reasons to be in a hurry. The first one is that he cheated death seven years ago following a really bad accident, so he’s a man on his second chance.
The second reason, which is linked to the first, is that he is determined to bring energy-efficient cookstoves to the world’s 2.4 billion people who sit at the bottom of the world’s energy ladder. They are the poorest of the poor who lack access to modern fuels and must make do with wood, charcoal, and animal dung to meet their everyday energy needs.
A Man, a Stove, a Mission Read More »
UNITED NATIONs – At least $35 billion to $40 billion of annual investments will be required to link all people in the world with modern forms of energy by 2030, a goal that must be reached while reducing heat-trapping carbon dioxide emissions, a U.N. advisory group recommended yesterday.
OPINION – Do the energy poor, especially those who depend on biomass for their primary fuel have to wait until electricity magically arrives in their home before they can get rid of their three-rocks-and-pot that is killing their children, mother, and wives?
This question was actually bravely posed at the UN last week in a closed door Q&A session held after the release of a report called Energy for a Sustainable Future.
The response given was, literally,”nothing.” Nothing is being done for the energy poor until electricity arrives.
UN report Energy for a Sustainable Future is pie in the sky Read More »
English 
French 