GE’s Nabil Habayeb connects growth and sustainability without a second thought. Is that still the best model? General Electric has long maintained a presence in the Middle East and North Africa (MENA). In addition to setting up an Ecomagination headquarters at Masdar City, GE has recently helped connect Turkey’s electricity backbone to Europe through smart […]
Will your solar energy be haunted? We pushed and pushed, and finally got what we asked for: non carbon-based energy. After years of weaving through red tape, the Israeli company BrightSource Energy finally received the go ahead to build the world’s largest Concentrated Solar Power (CSP) plant in the California desert. When it is completed, […]
Who says that academia has to be detached from the real world? The world of academia is notorious for being detached from the real world. There are plenty of good reasons why it’s called the “ivory tower”. Because sometimes you just don’t care why Jacques Derrida chose to spell the word difference as differance, and […]
Nimrod Novik of the Merhav Group was not pleased by the frontal attack waged by Delek’s Yoram Turbowitz at an energy conference in Israel this week. The Israel Energy and Business Convention 2010 held this week in Ramat Gan addressed a range of energy-related issues and featured keynote speeches by several government ministers. Of particular […]
Abu Dhabi’s government plans to pump desalinated water underground to prepare for event that its desalination plants are threatened. Relying almost entirely on desalination plants for drinking water, and with approximately 90% of its groundwater unfit for drinking, Abu Dhabi’s water security is deeply uncertain. A major oil spill or a serious case of sea […]
Twenty families own most of the “free” economy in Israel: a recent report points to disturbing trends concerning class and society. Dr. Gotlieb sees fault in the free market policies that injure people and the environment. In his comments on Israel’s invitation join to the Organization of Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) last May, Prime Minister […]
Will the UN Convention on Biodiversity (CBD) in Nagoya, Japan fare better than Copenhagen? It’s easy to bandy about the term biodiversity, but much less easy to pin down its meaning. Harder still is to enumerate just how important biodiversity is to human life. The rate at which species are going extinct is 100-1000 times […]
With insufficient arable land of their own, Arab countries are farming in Sudan to secure their food future. Early last year Karin reported on a troubling trend – a neo-colonial land grab occurring in Africa: Britain, Sweden, Germany, and South Korea have all usurped fertile African land in order to develop various agricultural pursuits. Then […]
Giant lightbulb installation in Abu Dhabi International Airport forms part of a campaign to reduce energy and water waste. How do we best effect change is a question that environmentalists, marketers, and social activists are constantly addressing. In the UAE, one man hopes to stop reckless driving through a campaign that combines emotion and logic, […]
There will be no peace without water. Leaders need to address the Middle Eastern water scarcity with the same urgency as oil. People often associate the Middle East with oil. But in the region’s cities, villages and farms, access to a different resource is becoming rather problematic: water. Addressing this issue can not only ensure a […]
In Tunisia last week, Islamic ministers meet to set a precedent on tackling water scarcity in home countries. In the Middle East and across the Muslim world, water scarcity is becoming one of the most pressing issues related to climate change- but what is actually been done to tackle these problems? Last week, the conference […]
Certain Egyptian Ministries are finally noticing that the Nile River is not healthy. For 17,000 children a year, they are a bit late. One of the most popular tourist activities in Egypt is to travel along the Nile River, and there is no shortage of options for doing so. Hundreds of eager men are ready […]
Syria’s livelihood is going down the drain. Unless the country learns to conserve, their future will be painfully dry. The Euphrates River, which meanders diagonally through the top quarter of Syrian territory, was once a source of agricultural bounty. Expatriates recall a time of lush plenty: orchards blooming with fruit, healthy cotton fields, and sparkling […]
It is no longer necessary to waste gallons of water when washing your car. A new biodegradable product will keep it clean, and protect it from the harsh sun. With virtually no freshwater resources, Dubai relies extensively on energy-intensive and environmentally-destructive desalination facilities to provide water. But the emirate also lies amidst a hot desert […]
Saudi Arabia prepares in advance for a future without oil, putting solar energy in its place. Possessing a fifth of the world’s proven oil reserves, Saudi Arabia has long been synonymous with the petroleum industry, but this is not stopping the kingdom from striving to diversify its energy sources. Renewable sources could account for up […]