Welcome ! As a young French Master's graduate in international management now for hire I have been selecting since January 2007 the latest headlines and best researches on sustainable development, climate change and the world energy sector. Sounds great ? Don't hesitate to subscribe now !
To the AFP : ” Egypt announced on Wednesday it would build its planned nuclear powerplant on the Mediterranean coast of el-Dabaa which it hopes will start production in 2019, the state news agency MENA reported. “
” Egypt has already used several foreign companies as consultants, including Areva and Westinghouse Electric Co. (this) plant would be followed by three other reactors, tentatively scheduled to start production in 2025. “
This would be the fourth country in the region to build nuclear reactors. Meanwhile, the country is also willing to develop renewable energies such as wind and solar. Continue »
To the UNEP : ” In 2009, (…) both the US and Europe added more power capacity from renewable sources such as wind and solar than from conventional sources like coal, gas and nuclear. “
But this is not all as the United Nations give us more details : ” Renewables accounted for 60 % of newly installed capacity in Europe and more than 50 % in the USA in 2009.“
” This year or next, experts predict, the world as a whole will add more capacity to the electricity supply from renewable than non-renewable sources. ” Continue »
Here is my latest post for CleanTechies : ” The French government recently announced a large investment program for renewables and green chemistry. The investment, totaling $1.75 billion will be allocated over the next 4 years. ”
Named Démonstrateurs énergies renouvelables et chimie verte – or renewable energy and green chemistry demonstration – this program plans to allocate 450 million euros in subsidies and 900 million euros in low-interest loans.
As always, to read out more, please read the full article there. All ratings and comments are greatly appreciated and I look forward to reading from you there.
It seems that Pakistan is a victim of what I called global weirding earlier this month. Indeed, to the Financial Times the country is suffering from both massive floods and dramatic droughts.
To many news sources up to 20 million people have been affected by the floods. To the local government quoted by the United Nations up to six million of them are in need of food, shelter, clean water and health care.
It seems we are seeing more and more climate refugees. Indeed, after Russia and China it seems that over a billion climate refugees in 2050 is not that pessimistic…
To the New York Times, 36 years after the construction began, Iran finally opened its first nuclear reactor. The plant has a capacity of one gigawatt (compared to the 1,650 MW of an EPR).
Many around the world are fearing for the region’s peace as the uranium used in the plant could also be used for bombs and missiles. The Iranian government promised to give the spent fuel rods to Russia – who helped building this plant.
This would prevent proliferation. The Bushehr plant will begin producing electricity later this year , once the 82 tonnes of low-enriched uranium will have been delivered by Russia. Continue »
Iceland pledged in 1998 to become the first decarbonized economy. And despite having been hit very hard by the recent economic crises, Iceland may prove to be the ultimate proving grounds for electric cars.
Indeed its tiny population – 320,000 people – are all pretty much close to the capital city Reykjavik and the country enjoys a virtually 100% clean electricity production as it has massive geothermal capacity.
These two advantages are the perfect combination for a real country-wide experiment on this promising cleantech. A similar venture may soon start in Israel, with the Better Place Project.
The United Nations are launching the Decade for Deserts and the Fight against Desertification, an effort to improve the protection and management of the world’s drylands, home to over two billion people.
Drylands take up 41 percent of the land surface and are threatened by multiple factors such as soil degradation, climate change and unsustainable agriculture practices and poor water management.
An estimated S$42 billion (30 billion euros) is lost every year from desertification and land degradation. One billion people are at risks from desertification.
This isn’t surprising as I already noted that America could cut its coal consumption by 62 % by 2020 just by increasing its energy efficiency. Now comes a new study that shows that the USA could be completely coal-free by 2030.
If it can be done in America, it sure can be done in the European Union. Indeed, the group of countries relies almost as much on coal as the USA. Both get nearly 50 percent of the electricity from thermal sources.
For more on this study please check out the article on Ecogeek or the full study in the latest issue of Environmental Science and Technology,
To CleanTechies : « Biochar is charcoal type created by the pyrolysis of biomass, and differs from ordinary charcoal only in the sense that its primary use is not for fuel, but for biosequestration or atmospheric carbon capture and storage.»
«As much as 12 % of the world’s human caused greenhouse gas emissions could be sustainably offset by producing biochar. That’s more than what could be offset if the same plants and materials were burned to generate energy, »
Since CCS isn’t exactly the great solution some coal companies want to make us believe, perhaps biochar could sort of do the same, but at a lower cost.
Solar photoelectric and concentrating solar thermal are all the rage and little is said about the much simpler solar thermal. However this technology has a huge potential as New York will soon show.
Indeed the US State is willing to add the equivalent of no less than two gigawatts of capacity by 2020. Heating water and buildings with solar on such a scale would enable NY to save up to $175 million per year (around 135 million euros).
The goal is to enable New York to ” become the national leader in the research, development, deployment and manufacture of solar thermal technologies.” Continue »
