Insurance_Photo.jpg When it comes to assessing risk, the insurance industry is one of the leaders in the field. Whether it is health insurance, car insurance, or homeowner’s insurance, the industry is forced to analyze every possible scenario for a given person or structure, and impose a fee based on the
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Things Are Good: Japan Develops Wind Turbine That Doubles Output
A simple addition to the standard wind turbine setup called a wind lens can double, or even triple, the power output. Professor Prof. Yuji Ohya of the Kyushu University research institute for applied mechanics (RIAM) has been working with a team to improve the efficiency of wind turbines. Combining an
Continue readingDeSmogBlog: Here We Go Again – Republican Attacks On EPA Kick Off 2012 Agenda
business-anti-environment.jpg With the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) set to finally enact stricter air pollution standards in accordance with the Clean Air Act and two subsequent U.S. Supreme Court decisions requiring them to do so, powerful Republicans in the U.S. House of Representatives are working to make sure that the
Continue readingDeSmogBlog: Congressional ‘Scientific Integrity’ Hearing On Fracking In WY Is Quite Lacking In Scientists
120711_ECE03.JPG After starting the morning off with a little ritual stomping on the freedom of the press by ordering the arrest of Gasland director Josh Fox, the Republican members of the Energy and Environment Subcommittee got down to the real business of the morning: stomping all over the Environmental Protection Agency.
Continue readingThings Are Good: Competitive Carbon Footprint: GreenPocket
A German company had created a ‘game’ called GreenPocket that aims to make shrinking your carbon footprint competitive and fun. I’m quite curious how this will actually work, but I’m happy to see that the idea of making energy conservation entertaining is gaining steam. Based in Cologne, GreenPocket is a
Continue readingEnvironmental Law Alert Blog: Save the Fraser Declaration – Alberta and Northwest Territories First Nations join BC First Nations in opposing Enbridge Pipeline and Tankers Proposal
Wednesday, February 1, 2012 On January 30th, media, First Nations groups, activists and one law student intern crowded into a hotel room on the outskirts of Edmonton for a press conference held by the Yinka Dene Alliance. Alberta and Northwest Territories First Nations signed on to the historic “Save the
Continue readingEnvironmental Law Alert Blog: The environment needs your voice for 2 important public consultations
Friday, January 27, 2012 The record level of public engagement shown in the recent BC government consultations on cosmetic pesticides (8,700 people) shows that democracy is alive and well in BC. Whether you were one of the thousands of people who made their views known in that consultation or not,
Continue readingArt Threat: Is Enbridge using art to greenwash the Northern Gateway?
Enbridge Landscape, an illustration by Harpy. Protests voicing opposition to the Enbridge Northern Gateway Pipelines Project are quickly expanding. Public hearings on the controversial tar sands oil transport route — attracting hundreds of participants on the first day and igniting incendiary statements by Conservative politicians — provide evidence that political
Continue readingRed Tory v.3.0.3: Are You a Climate Change “Denier”?
Did you know that according to some folks, if you accept the scientific premise of climate change but happen to disagree with the fatuous and practically ineffective approaches to mitigating its effects by present means of harmful economic tinkering (mostly for political effect), you are now considered to be a
Continue readingNorthern Insights / Perceptivity: No foreign interests allowed
H/T Creekside Enbridge’s pipeline of distortions, by Harsha Walia, a Vancouver-based activist and writer trained in law, Vancouver Sun, January 2012. “…Delightful commentaries over the past few days have taken Prime Minister Stephen Harper and Natural Resource Minister Joe Oliver to task for their desperate theories about radical foreign environmentalists
Continue readingCanada II: Digging Deeper on Keystone XL
We are seeing a lot of headlines concerning pipelines these days. Here are some articles that should help shed light on what is actually happening with respect to the XL project. California Awaits Tar Sands Legal Ruling California’s low-carbon fuel standard is the world’s first attempt to require oil suppliers
Continue readingNorthern Insights / Perceptivity: NEB serves industry, not the public
I’ve long been aware of the National Energy Board but never paid much attention to it. However, for my article Regulators throwing loaded dice, I had a look at backgrounds of the people involved in the NEB. I was immediately reminded of a quote from police psychologist Mike Webster used
Continue readingThings Are Good: USA Rejects Keystone XL Pipeline
Yesterday saw two very effective protest movements in the USA, one was in regards to SOPA/PIPA and the other saw the Obama administration reject the Keystone XL pipeline. There are also concerns about carbon emissions from oil sands production in Alberta, a western Canadian province. Bill McKibben, founder of 350.org,
Continue readingNorthern Insights / Perceptivity: Regulators throwing loaded dice
Propaganda is a tool favoured by leaders who suppose unthinking citizens can’t determine the common interest. Noam Chomsky says it is to a democracy what the bludgeon is to a totalitarian state. The tar sands extraction industry and parasitical agents like Ethical Oil, along with Stephen Harper’s government, are investing
Continue readingDeSmogBlog: Permission Denied: Bulgaria Says "No" To Chevron’s Exploratory Fracking
Bulgaria Protest Tsvetelina Beloutova.jpg No kinky stuff, Bulgaria declared as it limited Chevron in using only conventional drilling techniques and not hydraulic fracturing. The Bulgarian government voted to prohibit Chevron from using fracking to search for natural gas in the northeast section of the country. The main driver for the
Continue readingNorthern Insights / Perceptivity: Toward amoral petro-state
An Open Reply to Joe Oliver’s Propaganda for the Petro State ENERGY & EQUITY: Nikiforuk joins the fray. Andrew Nikiforuk, The Tyee “Canada’s Natural Resource Minister Joe Oliver has just pulled a Hugo Chavez: he’s penned a formal and desperate attack on democracy and interfered in the nation’s allegedly impartial
Continue readingThe Progressive Economics Forum: Foreign influence in Canada’s oil patch
Natural Resources Minister Joe Oliver’s contention that the National Energy Board hearings on the Enbridge Northern Gateway pipeline are loaded down with foreign special interests is exactly right. But it is not the “environmentalists and other radical groups” that are the problem. It’s the oil and gas industry. This Statscan table
Continue readingEnvironmental Law Alert Blog: Attacks on Canadian public registered to participate in Enbridge Process are unacceptable
Tuesday, January 10, 2012 What began as a smear campaign against West Coast Environmental Law and other environmental groups has crossed a line with oil industry advocates EthicalOil.org and Ezra Levant (author of the book Ethical Oil), taking aim at the thousands of ordinary Canadians who have registered to express
Continue readingThings Are Good: Over 50% of Germany’s Renewable Energy Production Owned by People
Consumer-ready renewable energy can destabilize the traditional energy utility structure in a similar way to how the internet destabilized a lot of other old school industries. This is a good thing because it makes the production of resources (be it knowledge or energy or physical goods) more democratic and resilient
Continue readingPolitics, Re-Spun: Enbridge Gateway JRP Hearings Broadcast (Kitimat/Kitamaat) – January 10, 2011
Hi! My name is Tia! I’m a radical, eco-terrorist, and enemy of the state now! Whee! (This is almost as random as the people Harper appointed to the senate the other day, and makes just as much sense.) Due to my fervent opposition to the Enbridge Northern Gateway Pipeline, I can now add these spiffy
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