World is Green

Source: 1366 Tech

Having a big picture idea of what is happening in any field is very wothwhile while thinking about problems, solutions and opportunities.

If you start looking for some ideas, VCs may be a good guide to this. They need to invest across the whole sector, guess the potential of various ideas and have a general idea of where things are.

A while back I wrote about the investments of Vinod Khosla in Energy. One great learning was the way he organized his entire investments in energy into various parts.

Now, BNET (a sister company of the successful tech publication CNET) has a Green Tech 101 video presentation from Adam Grosser, general partner of Foundation Capital. The beauty of this 5 minute video is the way he has organized the entire sector, highlighted the major challenge in each and made it east to remember.

He calls it E-E-E-M-I-T. EMIT less and Change the world. Check out the video.

Today’s Cagle e-mail brings the killed cartoon of Mike Lester.

The background to the cartoon is based on this tangerine comment. If you are interested in Food Miles and Carbon footprint you may want to check this blog post.

Rupert Murdoch announced In May 2007 that News Ltd would become a Carbon Neutral Company by 2010. That is a great commitment by itself. However, what was more important was the focus of Murdoch on the audience that his papers captures.

He said:

Our audience’s carbon footprint is 10,000 times bigger than ours… That’s the carbon footprint we want to conquer. We cannot do it with gimmicks. We need to reach them in a sustained way. To weave this issue into our content– make it dramatic, make it vivid, even sometimes make it fun. We want to inspire people to change their behavior

The challenge is to revolutionize the message.

My conclusion was that, The real message in the speech is this: The unique potential– and duty– of a media company are to help its audiences connect to the issues that define our time.

Now, News Ltd has a launched a initiative called One Degree where they plan to continue the two goals suggested by Murdoch.

The website provides information on what News Ltd is doing to tackle climate change. Information on what consumers can do in the areas of water, recycling, lifestyle and energy. In addition, links to Climate Change science and questions about its validity are provided. Every refresh of the webpage provides a fact regarding climate change. And the website is a refreshing blue colour.

To continue their goal of connecing their audiences to the issue, The Advertiser, a News Ltd paper for the state of South Australia will start a “A 10-part series, outlining the history and challenges of climate change and how readers can make a difference, will be published in coming weeks.” This series will start from 6th August in Adelaide for a period of two weeks. In addition, an Ad in the paper yesterday mentions that there will be daily tips in the paper.

I will be buying the paper from next week for the magazine and it will be interesting to wait and see the effect this has on the employees in my organization.

Ten Network in Australia is conducting today, Cool Aid: A National Carbon Test. On the prime time 8:30 PM slot for Sunday, the idea is to empower the individuals in Australia with information on their carbon emissions along with solutions to go on a carbon diet.

It is a big step forward for Climate Change in Australia. With professors, green company heads, the Federal Environment Minister and his shadow minister along with Al Gore and Tim Flannery participating in the show; it is the first “mass-market” show in this area in Australia.

The program follows a simple quality improvement system of: audit, act, change and check again. So use the following information to check out your carbon audit for your lifestyle, see how you can change and then act. If you are really want to take the next step, check out the carbon offsets available.

Before we go ahead lets take a step back. If you are not sure about climate change, check animations from the BBC, a long article from Wikipedia or indepth information from the US EPA or buy/rent Al Gore’s “An Inconvenient Truth” at your local DVD store.

Now let’s look at what you can do. A lot of the links are for Australians, remember that.

(Click on the link below for the rest of the article)

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The BBC Documentary has a 5 part series on India Rising. In this program, “George Arney looks at the effects of globalisation and discovers what economic reforms have done to India and the way it sees itself.”

I have lived all my life in India except the last two years where I am in Adelaide, Australia. Every report from friends returning from India to Australia, my discussions with friends and family in India inform me that India is changing faster than before. I am waiting to visit India this year and see this change for myself. My mother tells me I will not be able to recognize Hyderabad; my home town; when I visit this year.

How much of this is beneficial is debatable and its distribution across the country is something to worried about.

This series provides a good look at what has happened in the past few years across India.

The first part is about the new India. It takes you through Gurgaon near New Delhi in Northern India, Bangalore and Mysore in Southern India and looking at the new malls, spending culture and the possible future of India.

The second part goes to the biggest dissapointment in India, the state of Bihar. The most moving part is about a women, Sukumari Devi, part of people who are called the “rat eaters”; people who actually eat rats; where she collected grains found in rat holes to feed her kids. And also, the second part on the education in Bihar.

The third part is about the effect of Television, Bollywood, and Music on India. The Family Soaps like “Kyu Ki…” are frankly comparable to the worst soap operas you can watch anywhere. In my work at Deeshaa, I learned an important aspect about TV. It is increasing the aspiration of Indians in the smaller cities and the rural parts. This feeling of aspiration is important however, if development does not come soon in these areas these aspirations can move in the wrong direction.

This part tries to understand the culture of India through the ‘idiot box’ and youth culture concentrating on what is called the “pan-India” culture.

Part Four is about understanding ‘oppression’ in the lives of everyday Indians. What is the impact of economic expansion of India on its environment, health of people from pollution, effect on jobs and rights of poor people & tribals. For more on this read the blog of my friend Shekar - Fractured Earth especially the India section.

Part Five is a discussion between people who have been guides to George Arney throughout the series.

Cross posted on WorldisGreen.com

Bio fuels are increasingly seen as a viable alternative to the energy problem. With Brazil showing the way forward with its ethanol program major countries all over the world are planning to implement a similar model.

On the demand side, recent plans have been announced by the Bush Administration and the EU for renewable energy in the coming decades. Bush specifically pushed for Ethanol produced by Corn “to increase production of biofuels to 35 billion gallons (133 billion liters) a year by 2017, roughly seven times the present levels of five billion gallons a year, produced by corn-ethanol refineries.”

NPR has a good story on Ethanol in the US.

The EU Energy ministers agreed to raise biofuels use to a minimum of 10% by 2020 but rejected an EU-wide binding target for renewables, leaving it to member states to decide on specific objectives at national level.

China and India have been increasing their Bio-fuels production and this could make water scarce for food crops.

On the supply side, there are new sources of bio-fuels from native grass in the US.

“Biofuels represent a big part of our energy future, and this proposal represents a groundbreaking new direction,” says Julie Sibbing, National Wildlife Federation Senior Program Manager for Agriculture Policy. “Native grasses, trees, and other plants have the potential to double energy yields per acre, with just a fraction of the energy needed to produce corn-based ethanol. As these new technologies come on line, they will be key to our future clean energy production. The use of these fuels will also help stem global warming by decreasing greenhouse gas emissions and storing carbon.”

And similarly Wild Grass found in Southern Asia and Africa could potentially a bigger source of energy.

Miscanthus, a perennial grass native to subtropical and tropical regions of Africa and southern Asia, was the ideal plant for producing ethanol at a lower cost than corn, currently the most widespread source of the fuel. “To make a pound of alfalfa or spinach requires about 600 pounds of water, while to grow a pound of Miscanthus requires only about 200 pounds of water,” said Chris Somerville, professor of biological sciences at Stanford University.

New experiments are being conducted in Africa and India to create rural energy sources from bio-fuels which in turn will power cellular towers and provide cheap mobile technology in the rural areas.

Lastly, even with the growing concern of conservationists about the effect of biol-fuel production on Indonesia’s forest, the country believes that this is their best chance to provide employment and reduce poverty in the region.

While Indonesia is rich in oil and gas supplies, demand in Southeast Asia’s biggest economy is outpacing production and it is seeking alternative energy sources to secure its future. Last month foreign and domestic firms signed agreements totalling 12.4 billion dollars to develop biofuel projects to turn crops such as palm oil and sugar cane into biodiesel and bioethanol.

Over the next eight years, some five million to six million hectares (12.5 million to 15 million acres) will be planted with bio-fuel crops, he said. But just where all this land — an area far larger than Denmark and a bit smaller than Sri Lanka or the US state of West Virginia — is going to come from is what worries conservation groups concerned about deforestation.

And according to a surprising study by Netherlands-based Wetlands International and Delft Hydraulics, bio-fuel is often more polluting than fossil fuels. Drainage of vast peatland areas for oil palm plantations leads to huge emissions of carbon dioxide as drained peat decomposes very rapidly, the study released in December found.

While energy security and safeguarding the environment are concerns, he said eradicating poverty and tackling massive unemployment were the main focus of the biofuel programme. About 40 million Indonesians live below the national poverty line of 1.55 dollars a day.

Satellite data for Central and Eastern Kalimantan on Borneo island revealed about 4.5 million hectares of unproductive or degraded land which had been logged and abandoned, he said. Hamdi said this land could be improved by growing biofuel crops and provide people with jobs in an area where there were few employment opportunities.

There is always the need to balance different needs. As Indonesia is thinking of reducing poverty through bio-fuels, Europe is concerned through its renewables goal and the US is concerned about its agricultural industry. With water in the balance, this is a complex scenario to manage.

Looking from a systems perspective it is important to understand this issue from many sides.

Britt Bravo writes a blog called Have Fun, Do Good. She created a video about how NGOs are using social media to spread their message.  Check it out.

The Time Podcast talks about how businesses are going Green and why? Most of the information is not new for somebody following the Green trends for the past year or so however, it is worth noting that information like this is going to the general public as it is covered in Time. The sustainability dialogue is growing!

Listen to the Podcast above from 09:51 till 18:55 for this news item.