Page 267 – Green Prophet

Imagine a new kind of sustainable city in the desert?

Cities

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December 11, 2014

Luca Curci architects studio presents Desert City, a project proposal for a sustainable way to live in the desert. It surely beats the maze of crazy unsustainable cities we see in regions in the United Arab Emirates, save for Masdar the zero energy city outside Abu Dhabi.

The architects say that their theoretical project was born from the interpretation of borders, conceived not only as a line which divides two places but, at the same time, as a meeting point between private and public space.

In these artistic sketches the architects from Italy envision a new kind of community, one based on new characteristics and social identities, a socioeconomic model aimed to cooperation and people participation.

In our world changing it’s important to imagine new paradigms when we build communities from scratch in deserts. Luca Curci Architects give us something to chew on and dream about. Pessimists might argue that we will have no choice.

Aora’s solar tulips start shining in Ethiopia, without water!

Energy
Tech

Karin Kloosterman

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December 11, 2014

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Aora’s solar tulips start shining in Ethiopia, without water!

Investments in solar energy innovations are not dead! Remember those weird and wonderful solar energy harvesting tulips planted in Israel and Spain? Seen miles away the sky-high tulips have found a new commercial home – in Ethiopia, the company announced last week in a press statement.

We’ve covered Aora over the years and thought possibly that this CSP, or concentrated solar thermal power innovation didn’t grow. We were wrong.

The Ethiopian Government, looking for resilient off-grid systems, is now piloting Aora’s system for sustainable development.

Aora’s tulips collect solar energy from 50 small mirrors and then focus the energy to heat oil and air, creating pressure to drive turbines in the tulips. The turbines create electricity. The solution runs without steam and water, important for off grid locations where there is no water.

We all may know that Ethiopia has grand ambitions to grow its economy fast and is creating the Renaissance Dam to hold back water from Egypt’s Nile to create hydro power. But even when this goes online, getting the power to the people through the grid can take 20 years or more.

This is where Aora’s solution may help:

Rural communities and villages in Ethiopia, and all over Africa for that matter, have not been able to develop themselves due to inefficient access to electricity. This affects the daily lives of people, from needing power to run schools, hospitals, and industry, to providing refrigeration for food processing and post-harvest storage.

Aora’s solar tulips collecting solar power in Samar, Israel

We see solar power solutions for Africa out there already like Nova Lumos which has a novel business model to provide solar power for phones and limited residential use (individual units). Where people are poor and not able to invest in the one time fee, Nova Lumos lets people pay in increments – for the energy and system through the phone. Read here about how Nova Lumos from Israel puts power pimps out of business in Africa.

Aora however operates on the community or village level, giving electricity even during cloud cover or rainy days where the unit switches seamlessly to biofuels.

Unlike huge CSP systems (think Brightsource – also from Israel) Aora needs less than acre, or 3,500 square meters per module. Each module can provide 100kWh of solar electricity as well as 170kW of thermal power. The system’s heliostats follow the sun.

Built to be off grid the Aora system doesn’t require intensive investment to hook it up to the energy grid, nor does it require expensive energy storage operations since it can be hybrid and run on alternative power when the sun doesn’t shine.

The Aora systems are modular and farms of Aora tulips can be connected to generate larger amounts of power, together.

How Aora solar energy works in residential areas. So pretty!

[youtube]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e9qO33wGgVM[/youtube]

Their press associate told Green Prophet that the site in “Almeria, Spain, as well as the site in Israel and the site being built at Arizona State University are sites built for testing and research.

“The news announced [last week] about AORA‘s newest site in Ethiopia is different,” she tells us. “This is the first commercial pilot of AORA‘s system from a paying customer. It is the first phase of what should be a much bigger deal.

“Upon a successful pilot of this site, the Ethiopian government plans to expand deployment of AORA’s system to other off-grid communities in rural areas of the country. Each module produces 100kW of solar electricity and 170 wW of thermal power that can be harnessed for many applications including heating and cooling/refrigeration.

Construction of the first pilot plant is expected to begin by mid-2015.

Hoping to learn from mistakes made by the west, the Aora solar energy project is tied to Ethiopia’s Climate-Resilient Green Economy Strategy, in which the country aims to enhance access to affordable and environmentally friendly renewable energy.

The goal is to provide adequate uninterruptible and grid independent power to support the achievement of middle-income status by 2025 while developing a green economy.

“We are transforming our Green Economy Strategy into action and are pleased to partner with AORA to help achieve our vision,” said H.E. Mr. Alemayehu Tegenu, Minister of Water, Irrigation and Energy for Ethiopia. “AORA’s unique solar-hybrid technology is impressive and well-suited to provide both energy and heat to support local economic development in off-grid rural locations in Ethiopia.”

Aora collecting solar power in Almeria, Spain

Dead Sea relic robbers captured at Cave of the Skulls!

Cities

Faisal O'Keefe

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December 7, 2014

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Dead Sea relic robbers captured at Cave of the Skulls!

Last weekend, a gang of antiquities thieves were caught in the act of cave-robbing by inspectors of the Unit for the Prevention of Antiquities Robbery (UPAR) of the Israel Antiquities Authority (IAA), with help from the Arad Rescue Unit. It was the first time in 30 years that relic robbers were captured while plundering. The suspects are six men from Seir village near the West Bank city of Hebron.

The Arad police were conducting routine training that morning and noticed suspicious movement in a cave on a distant cliff in Nahal Ze’elim. They immediately alerted UPAR inspectors who arrived on site with surveillance equipment that enabled them to observe and document the activity.

The cave is known as “The Cave of the Skulls” sited in an area known as “Leopard’s Ascent”.

Robbed by goat cliff

It is 70 meters below the cliff-top plateau and 150 meters above the valley and can only be reached via a narrow goat path that threads through upright bedrock walls.

The IAA said it observed the suspects carrying out “illicit excavation using a metal detector and a large amount of excavating equipment.” The robbers caused extensive damage to the cave by digging through layers of earth while destroying archaeological strata and historical evidence from the Roman period dating 2,000 years ago and the Chalcolithic period five thousand years back.

IAA inspectors captured the suspects at the top of the cliff; the thieves were carrying ancient artifacts, including a 2,000 year old lice comb from the Roman period (image below).

“The robbers attempt to locate and find Dead Sea scrolls, pieces of ancient texts and unique artifacts that were left in the caves, particularly during the Great Revolt against the Romans in 66–70 CE and the Bar Kokhba Revolt in 132–135 CE, when Jewish fighters fearing the Roman army sought refuge in the desert,” said UPAR director, Amir Ganor.

In a press release, Ganor said, “For many years gangs of antiquities robbers have been operating along the Judean Desert cliffs. The robbers attempt to locate and find Dead Sea scrolls, pieces of ancient texts and unique artifacts that were left in the caves, particularly during the Great Revolt against the Romans in 66–70 CE and the Bar Kokhba Revolt in 132–135 CE, when Jewish fighters fearing the Roman army sought refuge in the desert.

“These are sold for large sums of money in the antiquities markets in Israel and around the world.”

He added, “What makes the Judean Desert so unique is its dry climate that enable the preservation of rare leather, bone, and wooden objects, including the scrolls, parchment and papyrus, on which various texts were written. Over the years many of the plundered finds reached the antiquities markets in Israel and abroad, but it has been decades since perpetrators were caught red-handed. This is mainly due to the difficultly in detecting and catching them on the wild desert cliffs”.

A special operation to foil robbers was part of a complex operation which had been underway for over a year.

Excavating in antiquities sites without a license and destroying an ancient site constitute a severe violation of the law, and can result in prison sentences of up to 5 years. Additional suspects will be investigated in connection with this theft and others in the region.

Images used with permission from the IAA

Barnyard supermodels may put you off meat!

Faisal O'Keefe

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December 7, 2014

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Barnyard supermodels may put you off meat!

A stunning series of portraits by American photographer Kevin Horan casts barnyard regulars into supermodels, resulting in anthropomorphic images that capture the personalities of these oft-overlooked animals. I showed them to a Jordanian photographer friend – he says he’ll never eat goat tagine again. Look into the faces of these animals and tell me if you share the same reaction.

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Can you believe earth is running out of sand?

Nature

Brian Nitz

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December 5, 2014

1

Can you believe earth is running out of sand?

British economist Milton Friedman once warned that if you put the government in charge of the Sahara Desert, in five years you’d have a shortage of sand. Whether governments or free markets are to blame, it is possible to deplete abundant resources such as Irish rain.

Now thanks to global obsessions with concrete icons, fracking and poor resource management, even places such as Saudi Arabia are running out of sand.

Sand, it seems, is the epitome of abundance. There are an estimated seven quintillion grains of sand on earth.

That’s 7000000000000000000, count them! But as with oil and water and Helium, the second most abundant element in the universe, we are consuming sand with the false assumption that a very large number is the same as infinity.

Sand may be inexpensive compared to other natural resources but it is extremely useful, even crucial to certain parts of our modern life. Sand is used to make the glass and concrete used in dams and massive skyscraper construction projects in places such as Dubai and Saudi Arabia. It is also being used in 3D printed structures and other futuristic building designs.

The recent obsession with fracking has also caused a rapid rise in the consumption of this limited resource.

In 2009 Green Prophet reported that the massive construction boom caused a shortage of the high quality desert sand used in construction.

So Bahrain and other Persian gulf countries began to restrict the export of sand. Not long after this, sand was being imported to replenish eroded beaches in places such as Cesarea where man-made structures interfere with the normal inflow of sand from the sea.

Peak sand

And while some desert sands are excellent construction materials, these fine-grained sands tend to blow or erode too much to make for good beach sand. So Saudi Arabia has imported beach sand from as far away as Australia.

According to an article published in Der Spielgel, the United Nations Environment Program (UNEP) estimates that 40 billion tons of sand are consumed each year, 3/4ths of it in the production of concrete– enough to encircle the earth with a wall 25 meters high.

Fracking requires yet another type of sand. Companies which were previously focused on the relatively small market of sand for golf course have made hundreds of millions of dollars by strip mining places such as the North American pine barrens where enormous flocks of passenger pigeons once lived.

This sand is then used in hydraulic fracturing (fracking), a process where materials are pumped into the ground at high pressure in order to fracture rock and force the stubborn last few drops of oil out of geologic deposits.

Sand is also being used to increase and decrease the amount of territory belonging to certain countries. Singapore has reportedly imported enough sand from Indonesia and Vietnam to increase its area by more than 20% over the past 50 years.

Hong Kong may be doing the same and China is pouring sand into South China Sea in order to create new territory in the disputed Spratly Islands. Poorer countries such as Cape Verde are smuggling their sandy shorelines away to richer countries in a practice that could complicate already difficult political situations in the Middle East.

So the next time you visit a sandy beach or desert, be sure to dump the sand out of your shoes before you go home.

Slash your UAE utility bill by 20% – copycats welcome!

Energy

Faisal O'Keefe

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December 5, 2014

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Slash your UAE utility bill by 20% – copycats welcome!

A United Arab Emirates-based firm has just concluded what it says is the region’s first water and energy audit of a large-scale housing facility for over 1,000 guest workers. Facilities management company Farnek assessed performance of their staff accommodation center in Al Quoz, Dubai, identifying opportunities to slash annual utility bills by 20 per cent (an estimated $82,000). They aim to incite other UAE facilities to similarly self-audit for immediate environmental – and economic – benefits.

Continue

Hilarious Arab American (and dancing mom) explains why paste is NOT hummous (VIDEO)

Lifestyle

Green Prophet

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December 4, 2014

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Hilarious Arab American (and dancing mom) explains why paste is NOT hummous (VIDEO)

Arabs eat hummous with religious fervour. And it’s true: mamma usually does best. As this Arab American in this video points out, if it comes in a plastic container, it is not hummous. Not the kind you want to eat any way.

[youtube]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cLGUFaizAHs[/youtube]

For a great laugh watch the video above. And for a great hummous recipe you can do at home, click here for Green Prophet’s killer hummous recipe – not that paste!

Also did you know that you can spell hummous and number of ways? The creamy chickpea spread, full of protein is made is with tehina, lemon and oil. It’s also spelled hummus, humus, humous- you name it.

Israeli oil spill catastrophe seeps into desert sands and rivers (PHOTOS)

Energy

Karin Kloosterman

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December 4, 2014

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Israeli oil spill catastrophe seeps into desert sands and rivers (PHOTOS)

Israel’s worst environmental accident, possibly worse than the devastating Carmel fires of 2010, happened yesterday morning. An estimated 600,000 gallons of crude oil (3 million liters) is causing severe damage to the southern port city area of Eilat, endangering also those close to the Eilat border, media outlets confirm.

The damage was caused by a pipeline burst while workers were upgrading the pipeline. The oil spill reached as far as the Evrona nature reserve. Some 80 people from both Israel and Jordan have been taken to the hospital, showing us once again that environmental problems have no borders.

Cleaning up the oil spill and the delicate ecosystem could take months, possibly even years.

Israeli officials say the pipeline burst during maintenance on the line 15 miles from the port city of Eilat at a new section of the pipeline.

The pipeline was breached during maintenance at a spot some 20km from Eilat on Wednesday evening. The oil spill leak has been stopped, but it has caused damage, even leaking into streams and rivers nearby.

Now is the time for winter rains in Israel, meaning that the oil spill could get much worse if the bulk isn’t cleaned up before another downpour.

The Evrona nature reserve is an important part of the Jordan Rift Valley, the natural corridor that runs from the Sea of Galilee in the north, down to the Red Sea. The corridor also extends up into other countries in the region.

Millions of wild birds pass through this corridor twice a year from Africa to Europe and then back again.

The pipeline was built back in the 1960s in better diplomatic times to bring Iranian oil from the Persian Gulf to Europe. After the Islamic Revolution it has been used primarily to transport oil within Israel.

#2 image via Haaretz; top image Israel Environment Ministry; photos 3, 4 and 5 Israel Police

Saudi Arabian women are planting a million mangroves

Nature

Faisal O'Keefe

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December 4, 2014

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Saudi Arabian women are planting a million mangroves

Rewilding Saudi Arabia? Not so long ago, forests of majestic mangrove trees fringed the eastern shores of Saudi Arabia. Official stats now estimate that only 10% of the forest remains. Decades of landfill operations in support of growing urbanization destroyed the rest. Now a group of female environmental activists are battling to protect what remains.

Mangrove trees (also called shura, qurm and Ibn Sina) are evergreens that thrive in saline tidal areas along the tropical and subtropical coastlines. They range from one to five meters in height, and anchor to tidal ground with an elaborate system of exposed root structures which provide essential habitat for many marine species. including shrimp. They also provides a welcome environment for marine organisms to reproduce, particularly the Caridea. These species represent an important part of the coastal ecosystem, supplying and important feedstock for birds and fish.

mangrove walk, abu dhabi — Mangroves in Abu Dhabi have become a feature and the backdrop to a park

Mangrove trees provide other benefits. They increase levels of oxygen and cut levels of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere, helping to reduce global warming. The trees absorb some of the chemical contaminants in their micro-environment, including oil pollution. Further, they increase green spaces, especially in the desert regions, and absorb high energy wave action and storm surge.

Women activists, spearheaded by Najwa Mohammed Bukhari, have been underpinning the cause to “save the mangroves” on the coast of al-Qatif governorate. She and the female members of Supporters of the Environment and Volunteers Association, consider mangrove protection key in the wider mission to protect Saudi’s waterfront. They’ve teamed up with the al-Ataa Charity Association for Women, working to meet their common goals.

Dalal al-Awami, head of al-Ataa’s health and environment team, told Al-Hayat,“We are making strenuous efforts to protect the environment through our communication with supporters. We got in touch with the Saif Association at Saudi Aramco and they agreed to cooperate.”

Saudi Arabia mangroves — Saudi Arabian mangroves. via the organization

Just five women took part in the first campaign, but she stressed that “there has been an unexpected change” in the second and third campaigns. There are now over a hundred female volunteers spanning all ages and backgrounds.

“Everyone is working toward the same goal. Parents (have) encouraged their sons and daughters to join in this work with the aim of instilling in them the importance of volunteering, a concept generally absent from society, particularly in the fields of agriculture and environment,” Awami added, “By raising awareness we elevate the level of culture among people of the region. This might be done by organizing lectures, distributing leaflets and through social networking sites. This is how we manage to attract hundreds of volunteers and receive positive feedback.”

In the two years since the campaign launch, the women have made an enormous impact. Volunteers have attracted political support, which has led to a reduction in practices harmful to the forests. Their actions prompted Saudi Aramco, the world’s biggest oil producer, to announced a plan to plant 1.2 million mangrove trees on the coast of the kingdom over the next four years.

In Saudi, it looks like behind every thriving mangrove, there’s a strong woman.

Gaza Parkour for putting positive change in the air

Faisal O'Keefe

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December 2, 2014

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Gaza Parkour for putting positive change in the air

Stroll around the ruins of Gaza on a late afternoon and you may catch sight of airborne young men, jumping off mountains of rubble and rolling from rooftops. Their extraordinarily athletic running and climbing, swinging and vaulting makes for an urban ballet. This is parkour and free running and this is the best crew in the Arab world.

The sport of parkour developed in the late 1980s from military obstacle course training wherein practitioners aim to get from point A to point B in the most efficient way possible using only their bodies and surrounding infrastructure for propulsion. Sometimes practiced solo, but more often with others – as much for ensuring safety as for inspiring innovation in new moves. Find out more at parkour for beginners.

Free running involves fluid and unrestricted movement through space, based on the act of running. It’s considered a simpler and more inclusive form of parkour.

In 2005, after Israeli forces withdrew from Gaza, two men created Palestine’s very first parkour crew in the southern city of Khan Younis. The aerial antics of Mohamed Algakhbeer and Abdallah Enshasy quickly attracted new followers and the team steadily grew. Today there are 18 official members in PK Gaza ranging from age 17 to 25; parkour demands young, agile bodies.

Update: 2023 a video of fails shows the beautiful streets of Gaza before the war started by Hamas

The athletes use parkour as a positive expression of joy and independence in a war-devastated place. Their interaction with their ruined surrounding results in an incongruous beauty. It usually takes place in urban settings, but these guys work it on the beach and in construction sites.

Parkour has also got practical application, providing young men with a rigorous physical workout in neighborhoods where there are no ball fields, soccer pitches, or gymnasiums. Says blogger Moa Dickmark, “They might not have much, but what they do have is the choice to not let anyone take their dreams and goals away. By practicing parkour on a daily basis and doing shows for various audiences, they spread power in a way that no outside organization or person could ever do.”

The group is seeking a dedicated place to safely practice where they can also teach others about the sport and its underlying philosophy.

Parkour is becoming a recognized sport with events involving established teams from around the world. Currently, PK Gaza stages events in Gaza City and smaller communities. They would like an opportunity to leave Gaza to perform with international athletes, learn, and demonstrate what is happening with the sport in their slice of the world. Until they can leave, the world can come to them through the magic of YouTube.

PK Gaza is showing the world that parkour builds more than strong bodies; it brings positive attention to war-ravaged youth and is an accessible agent for change.

Images from Moa Dickmark taken by Yasser Fathi Quidh and Vycheclav Guz

Lebanese Quince Jam, A Sweet Winter Recipe

Health

Miriam Kresh

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December 2, 2014

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Lebanese Quince Jam, A Sweet Winter Recipe

quince jam — *They dined on mince and slices of quince, which they ate with a runcible spoon: from the Owl and the Pussycat.*

Have you met the quince? You might have come across it in a market and passed it by. It’s yellow, but not yielding like an apple. It looks like a bumpy pear. Raw, it’s inedible. What do you do with it?

The simple answer is: cook it. Quinces under heat become sweet and tender, with a divinely fruity aroma. They cook alongside other ingredients in tajines like this vegetable-based one, but the best-loved way to eat them is as jam. This recipe has all of three ingredients.

You just need an interval when you’ll be at home doing other things – time does most of the work for you.

Quince Jam Recipe

2 pounds of quinces

2 cups of sugar

3 tablespoons fresh lemon juice

A dash of cinnamon

Peel the quince with a vegetable peeler and put in a large bowl and str to the sugar into the fruit and let sit for about 4 hours.

Cook over low heat about 20 minutes, until the jam thickens. Remove any white foam as it rises.

When thick and jammy-like, take off the heat and stir lemon juice in.

Store in sterilized jars or in clean, dry jars in the refrigerator.

Serve on toast, with cheese on the side. A delicious breakfast or snack. A prefect treat for kids while you read them the much-loved Edward Lear poem the Owl and the Pussycat:

The Owl and the Pussy-cat went to sea

In a beautiful pea-green boat,

They took some honey, and plenty of money,

Wrapped up in a five-pound note.

The Owl looked up to the stars above,

And sang to a small guitar,

“O lovely Pussy! O Pussy, my love,

What a beautiful Pussy you are,

You are,

You are!

What a beautiful Pussy you are!”

Pussy said to the Owl, “You elegant fowl!

How charmingly sweet you sing!

O let us be married! too long we have tarried:

But what shall we do for a ring?”

They sailed away, for a year and a day,

To the land where the Bong-Tree grows

And there in a wood a Piggy-wig stood

With a ring at the end of his nose,

His nose,

With a ring at the end of his nose.

“Dear Pig, are you willing to sell for one shilling

Your ring?” Said the Piggy, “I will.”

So they took it away, and were married next day

By the Turkey who lives on the hill.

They dined on mince, and slices of quince,

Which they ate with a runcible spoon;

And hand in hand, on the edge of the sand,

They danced by the light of the moon,

The moon,

They danced by the light of the moon.

More fresh fruit jams here on Green Prophet:

Morocco heats up with 16 new solar energy plants worth 25 gigawatts

Energy

Green Prophet

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December 1, 2014

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Morocco heats up with 16 new solar energy plants worth 25 gigawatts

You might meet snake charmers in the square of Marrakech and also storytellers who tell a good tale. But there is one thing always true about Morocco: the sun always shines.

Foreign firms are eager to bank on Morocco’s attractive feed-in tariffs and catch some healthy profits from our sun.

Solar energy companies like Martifer Solar (www.martifersolar.com) from Portugal already has business in the United Arab Emirates. It’s common for European companies to go to European banks for financing then establish themselves in the Middle East and MENA region. This seems to be the only way forward to advance solar energy in the Middle East, always rife with conflict and instability.

The recent break up of the solar power consortium Desertec has been a huge disappointment to the renewable energy community. The idea was to create a pan-European North African, even Middle East energy grid with solar energy collected in the MENA region which could then be shipped via cables to Europe.

Despite the Desertec collapse (too many industrial cooks spoiled the broth), Europeans are still seeing green opportunities in the MENA region.

The Swiss company Sola Terra has recently announced its plan to set up no less than 16 photovoltaic (PV) plants in the super sunny area of southern Morocco.

The sites, totalling 25 megawatts of energy will be in the areas of Ourzazate, Ain Bni Mathar, Foum Al Oued, Boujdour, and Sebkat Tah. More locations will be announced soon.

Sola Terra has a thing for the Middle East and already operates in similarly shiny places like Bahrain, the United Arab Emirates, Saudi Arabia, Jordan, Oman, Turkey, and Morocco.

“The sun, unlike oil energy, is not part of the economic culture of the Middle East, but that will change,” said an insistent David Heimhofer, Terra Sola’s president.

Israeli recycling video goes viral on YouTube

Faisal O'Keefe

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November 30, 2014

2

Israeli recycling video goes viral on YouTube

A new video highlighting the importance of recycling is going viral on YouTube, garnering nearly 900,000 views in its first week online. The short clip (under two minutes) features young Israelis combining extreme sport with garbage collection. You’ll be scratching your head trying to figure out how they do it!

A pair of gymnasts propels cans into an orange recycling bin with perfect synchronicity. A tennis serve Roger Federer would be proud of whacks a bottle into another. Folks toss milk cartons off a rooftop and bridge for more perfect drops into a cheery recycling can.

[youtube]http://youtu.be/R552n3w8-B4[/youtube]

See a skateboarder jump-kick a bottle into another bin; and a half court shot sends a detergent bottle though a basketball net into its final resting place. The high-energy antics instantly make recycling cool.

The Tamir recycling corporation launched the online campaign to raise public awareness about recycling. The company collects packaging waste from all of Israel; last year they produced a clever animated video to encourage children to recycle. Previously, they had launched a “superhero” television campaign to increase public awareness about recycling packaging waste.

[youtube]http://youtu.be/fR5laRDgNko[/youtube]

Israel has had a Packaging Law in effect since January 2011 that requires manufacturers and importers to take fiscal responsibility for all the packaging materials they bring into the market. Orange bins placed on streets by local authorities around the country enable private citizens to properly dispose of various types of packaging waste.

According to a statistic released last summer by the Israel Union for Environmental Defense and Migal, a Galilee research institute, over 300,000 Israeli households now separate dry and wet waste, representing a 400 percent increase in two years.

Tamir’s message is clear: no matter how you choose to deposit your waste, recycling is the future. Now if only Israel’s neighbors would pick up on that message.

Save energy, stress and greenhouse gas by backing up

Tech

Green Prophet

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November 27, 2014

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Save energy, stress and greenhouse gas by backing up

You know you should have done it. The DropBox folder is there, the extra hard drive is on the shelf. Hey, your partner even set up a wifi link to help you back up your files from any room in the house, without cords. But you have fallen into the trap of laziness. You are human, like me. You do not back up because it is a pain in the a**.

Think about the time wasted, resources purged, stress endured and relationships that have almost ended thanks to not having a back up plan. I am talking about backing up your photos, files, code. We’re all guilty – so what is it that stops us from being so unresourceful in a time when we recycle our bottles, count our calories and go out of our way to conserve food miles. Can there be another way?

You might have seen our lovable post on 15 ways to upcycle your old PC into something super useful. Well this might be the case for your old laptop already. We seriously hope your motherboard won’t be turning into a fish tank with all your family photos still on it.

Avoid a meltdown and back up, people. We buy insurance to avoid a natural disaster. We use sunscreen to prevent cancer. Save yourself heartache and back-up your files now.

If the above options aren’t on the table there are a number of simple online back-up solutions that can be your back up angel that has your back. Backup freeware is the name of the game from companies like EaseUS that offers a backup windows 7 option and other options for Windows which automatically sets up and performs a back-up on schedule as commanded.

I am going to knock on wood while I am saying this because as a Mac user I don’t have to worry about hard to back-up operating systems. The amazing Time Machine does it for me – granted I have enough free disk space.

When I used a PC years and years ago I was always confused on how to back-up the system, and always did it in parts. What a waste of time. Time is money, money is energy, energy is greenhouse gases that could be better saved relaxing on a beach somewhere.

Save the planet: back up your files!

Image of computer files on fire from Shutterstock

I’ve trained Muslim clergy on how to be green. This is what I’ve learned

Lifestyle

Green Prophet

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November 27, 2014

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I’ve trained Muslim clergy on how to be green. This is what I’ve learned

I had an opportunity to conduct a series of green workshops for Imams, or Muslim clergy throughout Jordan. The workshop was funded by Germany’s Friedrich-Ebert-Stiftung based in Jordan.

Here are my thoughts from the workshops which focused on sustainability and energy conservation issues.

In many instances we blame the “other” for not understanding our discipline or worldview while at the same time, it is fair to say that we need to understand the others’ reference frame and body of knowledge. This applies to various disciplines including the debate between economists and biologists on valuing nature or scientists and religious scholars or the average people on “what constitutes truth, happiness, right and good life”.

I do argue that the notion of Tawhid (or oneness or unity) in Islam is critical for bridging the gap between disciplines and cultures.

The key messages I delivered can be synthesized as follows:

• Unlocking the potential for humans is crucial to harvest the “good” fruits through “good” discourse (Kalima Tayyebah). The sustainable flow of dialogue between cultures and within community is attained through empowering and listening to the voices of local people and Imams.

• Articulating a simple discourse about Islam as “a mercy for humankind”, caring for women, environment, and social justice and equity is imperative in an era of global mass media of manipulation of minds.

• Muslims have a duty to effectively and clearly communicate the unifying power of Islam as a common word (Kalima Sawaa) so as to achieve common human goals and address global commons, from saving human lives to protecting the environment and human health.

• Women play leadership role in sustainability as they have the empathy, reason, and responsibility to ensure healthy and resilient families and societies.

• Social justice is a cornerstone in Islam as manifested in Zakah and Waqf. It is illuminating to know that the first Waqf (trust fund) was for water to secure water supply for the needy. Poor education and poverty is the right habitat for extremism.

• Education and enlightenment is a process and a self-discovery and it takes a journey of immersion of other cultures and new disciplines to appreciate and celebrate diversity. Muslim nations need to invest in holistic and enlightened education to avoid this tragic state of “Islam as a threat” rather than a remedy and mercy for humanity. Since we know better, we need to do better.

I do believe that the environment crisis is a failure of the trusteeship and guardianship. A change in worldviews and respect of others (regardless of their gender, ethnicity, color, or religion) are necessary if humans are to meet their test of guardianship.

Ultimately the path to God-consciousness is thus a path along which one lives one’s life in a state of increasing awareness of this oneness, understanding better ones place in the wider creation, and fulfilling ones role as a witness and guardian of the earth.

The Qur’an says: “There is not a thing but celebrates His praise, but you understand not how they declare His glory” (Qur’an 17:44)’.

What is needed is a new discourse of Islam that embodies the notion of Ihsan which means the inner beauty which necessarily emanates outward, transforming every human activity into an art and every art into the remembrance of God. In essence, the inner beauty of the heart is manifested and reflected in outer the beauty to evolve new consciousness and respect of all communities of life (Ummam).

The term maslaha (public interest) is an instrument of ijtihad (innovation).

One aspect of maslaha is to consider the policy that will better off the community at large away from private or self interest. Also, Islamic teachings emphasize the concept of living lightly on earth (zohd), conservation and limit of waste and extravagance (israf). Also, Islam encourages humans to reflect on the bounties of God.

Green lifestyle and local development implies conservation as a way of life and supports small-scale local development models. The newly built Green Mosque in UAE and the several transformed mosques in Jordan reflect conservation of resources including water, food and energy regardless of its apparent abundance. Energy and water conservation is both a rational and ethical imperatives. The current economic model is addicted on fossil oil which is the root cause of climate change challenge.

To produce any commodity, we need natural resources and energy. Energy is essential for manufacturing, processing raw materials, and for shipping final products across the globe. It is the use of energy during these processes that is most pertinent to a discussion on climate change. The different types of fossil energy (coal, oil, and gas) or renewable energy (wind, solar, hydrogen and hydro-power or nuclear or bio-fuels) determine the future of climate and the health of the planet which is based on our policy options, development objectives, and social choices.

Within Islamic worldview, small-scale and people-centered development is encouraged to minimize ecological footprints which are too high due to global trade. This means that production should be more according to need not for maximization of profit and creating demands for luxury goods. The key message is that even if the threats of climate change do not exist, it is imperative for Muslims to embody and follow Islamic principles as act as a median community (ummah wassat) to save the planet and human wellbeing as part of the global commons.

“Mischief (fassad) has appeared on land and sea because of the deeds that the hands of men have earned, that (God) may give them a taste of some of their deeds: in order that they may turn back (from evil) (Qur’an 30:41).

At the core of the current ecological crisis, lies the destruction of the ethical and spiritual vision of nature at the hands of the modern world and in the name of growth and development.

This guest post is by Prof. Odeh Al-Jayyousi. He is the author of the book “Islam and Sustainability” and an independent energy consultant) who conducted several workshops and trainings with local Imams from different communities in Jordan on islam and sustainability thanks to support from FES-Jordan.

The objective of the workshops was to enable Imams to have a better understanding on the value of applying green solutions in water, energy, landscape and buildings so as to communicate effectively and influence attitudes and practices in resource management. The project was a success and will continue ext year on a national level and a regional level.

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