Category: International
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Doing Nothing Isn’t an Option: How to Avoid the Worst of Climate Change
It’s fitting that the latest Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) report was released during Earth Month. After all, the third chapter of its Fifth Assessment focuses on ways to keep our planet healthy and livable by warding off extreme climatic shifts and weather events caused by escalating atmospheric carbon. Doing so will require substantially…
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A Home That is Heated and Cooled Organically
A team of students at Waseda University in Japan have constructed a prototype for a house that can be heated by composting straw. They dubbed the dwelling the “Recipe for Life” house. Using the heat generating composting process for the purpose of heating a dwelling is not a new idea, but it is definitely one…
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Oil Consultant Turned Whistleblower Exposes Fracking Crimes in Alberta
This You Tube is a compilation of segments from a 90 minute talk. Jessica Ernst worked for more than three decades as an environmental biologist doing research and independent consulting for the Alberta, Canada petroleum industry. One of her main clients was the EnCana Company, which began large-scale fracking in the region of her home community…
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How to Become a Tree After You Die
The firm Estudimoline Barcelona, Catalonia recently came up with a very innovative product, the so-called Bios Urn. Basically, the special urn they sell will let you grow a tree from the ashes of your loved ones, and even your deceased pets. While this idea could be called a little macabre, it is also quite nice…
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Photographer to Travel Proposed Tar Sands Pipeline Route, Questioning Canada’s Energy Future
Robert van Waarden is a Dutch-Canadian photographer whose trade has taken him far and wide to shoot for outlets such as National Geographic Traveler, Canadian Geographic and the British Council. An ambitious new project of van Waarden’s, however, will be keeping him closer to home—and close to the environmental issues that inform much of his…