The European Commission has earmarked €71 million to support renewable energy projects in Jordan whilst a report highlights the importance of solar power for Lebanon’s future
Desalination is an expensive and energy-intensive way of removing salt from water to make it potable – Israel hopes it will provide 75% of its drinkable water by 2013
In times of political madness, we have to remind ourselves of the many Israelis who pursue peace and beauty, like Pitsou Kedem.
We don’t usually comment on Israeli politics because there is already so much rhetoric floating around the media machine, but Thursday’s attacks and counterattacks in Southern Israel and Gaza really make us wonder whether Palestinian and Israeli relations will ever reflect the peaceful cooperation that takes place between many ordinary citizens in this region who tirelessly put peace before politics.
We are grateful to have a few celebrations along the way, and designer Pitsou Kedem is one of them. Despite several earlier renovations, Kedem tried his hand at breathing new life into a beautiful vaulted home just south of Tel Aviv, Jaffa, where Green Love “Sticks.” Peeling back decades, Pitsou Kedem broke through a couple of walls and applied minimalist interventions to create a wonderful fusion of old and new with incredible views of the nearby Mediterranean Sea.
Israel’s BrightSource Energy is among the large-scale solar developers happy with the Australian government’s new carbon “tax” that was just carefully shepherded through parliament by Prime Minister Julia Gillard despite the sort of astroturfing hysteria normally perpetrated only in American media.
Science journalist Mike Shanahan took these pictures of dyed chicks while attending a conference in Qatar. He questions how antics like this impact children’s understanding of nature.
Sometimes we come across a story and think “this can only happen in the Middle East.” Renowned science journalist Mike Shanahan, who previously inspired us to consider the antidote to bigger, better, and more, ran across these brightly dyed chicks and bunnies in Doha, Qatar, where he attended the World Conference of Science Journalists, and asked a young journalism student how she felt about the animals being subjected to such kaleidoscopic antics.
Although she sited religious regions for believing that people in Qatar generally consider animals to be superior to humans, that has not been Green Prophet’s experience of how animals are treated in Egypt, the United Arab Emirates, or Morocco, for example, where illegal wildlife trafficking is common. Nonetheless, Mike raised another important question: how does this kind of treatment (it’s only cruel if the animals are licking at the dye, and only then if it’s toxic) affect children’s attitude towards animals?
From small-scale butterflies to large horses, Reuven Fields’ scrap metal sculptures breathe life into discarded pieces.
It takes a lot of energy to mine metals from the earth, and significantly less energy to recycle metals into something new. But if you can upcycle used metal scraps into something else (such as an upcycled aluminum can chair) without it undergoing a significant process? That’s ideal. And industrious. The concept has not evaded Reuven Fields, an Israeli artist currently living and working in North Carolina in the United States whose front lawn and studio are filled with sculptures fashioned out of scrap metal.
The FEMİN-ART Women Artists Association from Trabzon, Turkey, one of the regions worst affected by the Chernobyl meltdown, has been awarded funding to produce root-based paints and distribute them for free.
Chemical-based paints have long been known to cause adverse health effects, from reduced sperm counts in men to raising the risk of miscarriage or birth defects for the children of pregnant women.
The link between organic living and better human health is obvious to residents of Trabzon, along the Black Sea coast of Turkey, an area seriously blighted by the Chernobyl nuclear meltdown of 1986. Now, with funding from the Turkey-European Union Civil Society Dialogue, a female artists’ association from the city of Trabzon will strive to replace standard chemical paints with ones from healthier, organic sources.
Ayran, doogh, dhallë, daw, xynogala or tan is a cold savory yogurt-based beverage of yogurt and water popular across Western Asia, Central Asia, South Asia, Southeastern Europe, North Asia and Eastern Europe. The principal ingredients are yogurt, water and salt. Herbs such as mint may be optionally added.
Need a refreshing, sugar-free drink? Look no further than the container of natural yogurt in your fridge.
Known as aryan in Turkey and drunk plain, the cooling, soothing yogurt-based drink is popular all over the Middle East. Syrians and Lebanese call it laban ayran. In Iraq and Jordan it’s called shenina.
Rather than fill up on drinks sweetened with sugar or aspartame, go for something cool and salty. The salt is part of what makes aryan so refreshing. As we endure the summer heat, we need to replace some of the minerals lost through perspiration, and aryan is a pleasant way to do it.
Aryan, Turkish Yogurt Drink Recipe
1/3 glass yogurt (natural)
1/3 glass water
1/3 teaspoon of salt
1/3 glass of crushed ice
1. Combine all the above except the ice and beat well.
2. Put the ice into a tall glass and pour the blended yogurt in.
That’s it. Try using soda water for a change, or add a little crushed mint to the glass. Then you’ll have doogh, the Iranian version of aryan.
Enjoy!
More lip-smacking Middle-Eastern recipes on Green Prophet:
Gulf conservation groups have teamed up with National Geographic Al Arabiya to showcase 100 stunning images of Arabian species
The Gulf countries of the Middle East may be more famous for their outlandish construction projects, endless deserts and malls than their biodiversity but one art exhibition is hoping to change all that. A large coalition of conservation groups have teamed up with National Geographic Al Arabiya to launch a massive outdoor art exhibition to tackle people’s perceptions and showcase a wide variety of species from the Arabian peninsular.
These innocuous-looking pellets release deadly fumes that killed a young IT professional in Dubai last week.
This is the second pesticide-related tragedy we are covering this week. A few days ago, no fewer than 15 top racing camels in Qatar died after their breeder administered a toxic chemical to their skin, which the owner blames on the poor quality of the product he received. Potentially more serious, though we value all living creatures, several people throughout the United Arab Emirates have died this year as a result of the wrongful application of a pesticide that is typically used to kill moles, rabbits, and rats. The most recent man, Raghavendra Shivaji, died last week Friday after inhaling toxic gases from a neighboring apartment.
From a small office on Bliss Street in Beirut, overlooking the Mediterranean sea, a small team of young Lebanese activists are busy trying to expose environmental injustices, change attitudes, recruit volunteers, lobby and fundraise, in a country where every day politics often comes in the way of any environmental reform.
Fresh out of college, Campaigner Rayan Makarem has his tasks set: complete the programs launched by the founders of Greenpeace Lebanonwhile coordinating with the global and regional offices to initiate new Pan Arab campaigns from the only official Greenpeaceoffice in the Arab world.
Blind as a bat? New research from Israel shows how Egyptian fruit bats navigate in wide areas with internal compass.
If you ever watch nature shows, it might strike you as funny that the ones who apparently love the animals most are causing the most suffering. At least that’s how it appears on camera. Sharks get chunks of skin cut from them for testing, and they are wired with bulky devices that slow down movement and no doubt cause the other sharks to laugh at them, or at least alienate the tagged animal from the non-tagged. I too was involved in animal tracking research once. We trapped small mammals, cut their toes to tag them and then followed them in a rude and rough manner.
Now, a new kind of small GPS advice, fitted to small fruit bats can help researchers track and trace bats in a less invasive way. Researchers in Israel have studied bats in army bunkers. Now researchers wanted to study how bats navigate in large areas, and how they return to individual trees each and every night. Knowing more about their behavior and habitat can help scientists preserve animals and nature. Strengthening bat populations can also cut down on insect pests, since some bats feast on bugs.
It might seem counter-intuitive, but an undeveloped North African nation could be the first in the world to get 42% of its electricity from solar power. It has set its policy to achieve that end. And, startlingly, undeveloped nations actually do now lead the world in the addition of new renewable energy. France has just stepped forward to help. (Paris Gives Morocco’s Solar Plan a Frank Chance)
The extraordinary Moroccan Solar Plan unveiled last November is aimed at achieving a hugely ambitious 42% renewable energy target by 2020, higher than California’s 33% and second only to Portugal’s 45%. Unlike them, it is putting all of its renewable energy eggs in one basket. Solar. All kinds of solar. Fourteen percent is to carved out for just concentrated solar power, CSP. So why Morocco?
The European Commission has earmarked €71 million to support renewable energy projects in Jordan whilst a report highlights the importance of solar power for Lebanon’s future
