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Could a Political Crisis in Saudi Arabia Spur a World Shift to Green Fuel?

Maurice Picow
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Could a Political Crisis in Saudi Arabia Spur a World Shift to Green Fuel?

Can commercial monstrosities like these in Mecca cause political upheaval in Saudi Arabia?

The Kingdom of Saudi Arabia has always had its share of enemies. This is especially true in these times, when both the Islamic Republic of Iran and the Al Qaeda terrorist organization have both expressed great interest in replacing the monarchy there with a government more receptive an “Islamic democracy” as is now the case in Iran. The Saudi royal family has had close relations with the United States and other Western countries ever since the 1930s, when it was concluded that American oil reserves would not last forever. The recent political upheavals in  the Middle East, beginning with Tunisia, carrying on to Egypt, and now threatening Jordan and what’s left of non-Islamic elements in Lebanon is undoubtedly of great concern to the Saudi extended Royal Family.

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Italy’s Solergy Headed by Israeli From the Global Village

Green Prophet Guest
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Italy’s Solergy Headed by Israeli From the Global Village

yoav banin solergyMeet Yoav Banin, CEO of Solergy, a solar power company in California and Italy.

Reared in California by Israeli parents, and married to an Italian wife, Yoav Banin speaks to his two young sons in Hebrew while raising them in Rome. This 38-year-old trilingual Silicon Valley veteran is co-founder and chief executive officer of Solergy, founded in 2007 to create and manufacture advanced concentrated photovoltaic (CPV) technology. Using optics to focus sunlight over 500 times onto special photovoltaic cells, CPV increases solar energy conversion efficiency while reducing the amount of expensive materials that often hamper the practicality of this field.

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Istanbul Shoppers Rendevouz On Giant Green Roof

Tafline Laylin
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Istanbul Shoppers Rendevouz On Giant Green Roof

meydan-shopping-mallThis urban center may look normal, if having lunch on a roof of a mall is normal.

Sadly replacing the traditional Arab Souqs or markets that tourists flock to see, malls are becoming as much an urban Middle Eastern phenomenon as any American city. But if there must be malls, let them be more like the Meydan shopping complex in Istanbul designed by Foreign Office Architects. Urban centers generate significant heat – called the heat island effect – as well as greenhouse gases. And malls, which are usually large and well-lit, eat up a lot of energy. To mitigate these problems, passive design encourages plenty of natural lighting, and best of all, the first-of-its-kind green roof absorbs a lot of the excess heat while also creating a pleasant place for people to spend an afternoon.

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Gamila’s Secret is its Druize Soapmaker and her Galilean Roots

Karin Kloosterman
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Gamila’s Secret is its Druize Soapmaker and her Galilean Roots

gamila secret soapIsraeli Druize, Gamila Hiar, uses local herbs grown in the Galilee to produce her famous soaps.

When Israeli supermodel Bar Rafaeli comes to Israel for a visit (Rafaeli protests against coal and water misuse), she makes sure to stock up on Gamila’s soaps for her glamorous friends around the world. She and other celebrities like Justin Timberlake, Rihanna and Angelina Jolie swear by the stuff, according to Fuad Hiar, the eldest son of Israel’s most lucrative soap maker the 70-year-old Gamila Hiar. Gamila is adept at the role of traditional soap maker. She’s traditionally dressed, and as one would expect from an iconic grandmother figure, she has inherited her family’s ancient “soap wisdom” from prior generations, using recipes from her grandfathers, and herbs from their gardens around the Galilee village of Peki’in.

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Israel Combats Consumption With Comedian Tal Friedman

Tafline Laylin
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tal friedmanThe Environmental Protection Ministry’s New Campaign Urges Israelis “To Start Thinking Green.”

It is certainly one of our pet peeves in Israel: Friday shoppers buying bag after plastic bag chock full of food. And on the market sidelines food waste piling up, rotting. Most of this then lands up in the landfill, instead of in a compost heap (learn how to make one here) where it can be used to create fertilizer. Apparently the Environmental Protection Ministry has had their fill too. Rather than beat citizens down with angry rhetoric though, they’ve opted for the funny approach. Their new “Starting to Think Green” PR campaign comprises a series of billboard, television, and radio advertisements featuring none other than Tal Friedman.

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Motorbikes Produce Almost Half of Tehran’s Sound Pollution

Mehrdad Parsipour
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Motorbikes Produce Almost Half of Tehran’s Sound Pollution

iran tehran motorbikes imageYes, noise is a form of pollution from motorized vehicles that’s bad for your health.

Sound pollution in Iranian cities is hitting an all-time high. The large cities like Tehran are the worst. Sound pollution can be any unwanted or offensive sounds that unreasonably intrudes into our daily activities. When a person drives by open windows in a street, the sound is something like 70 decibels. A whisper is 35 decibels and a normal room has a sound intensity of 40 db. At 45 db a person cannot sleep. At 85, the ears are damaged, and at 120, it can hurt your ears.

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Grow Fish Anywhere – Commercially, Safely In Cities and Deserts

Maurice Picow
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14
Grow Fish Anywhere – Commercially, Safely In Cities and Deserts

grow fish anywhereSea bream, a common fish farm species, can now be grown in cities and deserts, safely.

The seas and lakes of the world are rapidly losing their native fish populations, due to pollution, global warming, and over fishing. On top of this, fish farming, or aquaculture has also proven to be bad for bodies of water in which these fish are raised. But now, at least a partial solution has been found to the problems of over fishing and pollution of sea water from the feces of fish farms.  A group of Israelis from Grow Fish Anywhere have devised a way to raise fish in shallow wading pool tanks, and to detoxify the water the fish are raised in as well. The unique fish farms, innovated by Yaron Gissin, formerly a Foreign Ministry official responsible for technology. It sounds remarkably like the technology Karin had written about 2 years ago, by Prof. Yonathan Zohar (urban fish farming) in the US, but let’s hear their story.

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Eilat-Eilot Conference: The Ins & Outs Of Renewable Energy In Israel

Tafline Laylin
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Eilat-Eilot Conference: The Ins & Outs Of Renewable Energy In Israel

eilat-eilot-renewable-energyEverybody who is anybody in Israel’s renewable energy business ought to attend this event.

There has never been a more critical time in human history. The recent storms in America, and Australia’s cyclone – freak events which Bill McKibben says will now be a part of everyday life – are directly related to our unhealthy appetite for fossil fuels. Now is the time to detox, and to elevate the role of renewables. Since our oil dependence is so deeply entrenched, it is important to suss out the economics and politics behind energy. Despite the natural gas party and attempts to extract oil shale, Israel is fairly committed to alternative energy sources. Attend the Eilat-Eilot Conference to learn more about laws, subsidies, and more.

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Israel’s Science & Tech Commission Denounces Oil Shale Plan

Tafline Laylin
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Israel’s Science & Tech Commission Denounces Oil Shale Plan

oil-shale-rockIsrael Energy Initiatives has received serious opposition to its plan to extract oil from shale rock in the Adullam region.

While the riots in Egypt escalate, potentially compromising Israel’s natural gas supply and casting significant doubt on the region’s energy future, a quieter battle continues to take place in Israel. On January 31, 2011 the Science & Technology Commission held a public hearing to discuss Israel Energy Initiative’s (IEI) proposed oil shale plan in the Judean foothills. Earlier we published IEI’s response to David de Rothschild’s concerns and an interview with oil shale expert Jeremy Boak. The hearing revealed a serious discord between various ministries, and both Knesset members and the Chief Scientist of the Ministry of Infrastructure voiced their concerns.

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Revolution in Egypt May Cut Off Natural Gas to Israel

Maurice Picow
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Revolution in Egypt May Cut Off Natural Gas to Israel

A bad end to the Egyptian crises could mean an end to natural gas exports to Israel

As if the ongoing, and increasingly  violent wave of anti-Egyptian President Husni Mubarak protests aren’t enough to cause worries about regional energy cooperation, a takeover by Muslim extremists in Egypt could spell an end to natural gas supplies to Israel. This fear, as reported in the Jerusalem Post involves Egypt’s exports of natural gas to Israel; which in 2010 alone amounted to 2.1 billion cubic meters, and worth more than $1 billion. Israel has its own natural gas stores, but it will take some years of development to exploit them.

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Artiquea in London highlights the art of recycled glass

Arwa Aburawa
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Artiquea in London highlights the art of recycled glass

The ancient art of glass-blowing and glass recycling is applied to make eco-friendly fixtures

Apart from very few workshops dotted across the region, most of the glass blowing that occurs in the Middle East is for tourists. In Hebron, people are brought in on buses to stare at glass-blowers and then wander around the workshop space filled with bright blue and green glass vases and trinkets to buy as souvenirs. Clearly, it is something of a novelty to see glass vases blown right in front of your eyes but what was good to note was that the glass they used was recycled glass.

Whilst glass can be a nightmare to sort at the recycling centre, glass is the ultimate recyclers dream as it’s one of those few substances that can be melted down and re-used time and time again. So why aren’t we encouraged to use more recycled glass? Considering that the Middle East is the birthplace of various glass making techniques dating back in the 3rd millennium BC, it is a bit of a mystery.

Recycled Glass As Art

One organisation championing recycled glass from the Middle East is the UK-based Artiquea Gallery. Setup in 2008, it sells everything from paintings to antique desks from Syria, Morocco, Egypt and Turkey and aims to “introduce Arab and Middle Eastern artists to the artistic mainstream in the UK.” What caught my eye, however, was their range of eco-friendly recycled glass lighting.

Beautiful Syrian blown recycled glass is used in a variety of vibrant shapes and colours to make some stunning traditional and more contemporary lighting designs. Everything from hand-made glass grape lampshades, iron cage lanterns to a zany octopus-inspired design is available. My favourite is the elegant hand-crafted recycled glass disc light which beautifully merges ancient techniques and patterns with a modern twist.

An Eco Revival of Glass-blowing?

Artiquea Gallery says that the glass-blowing tradition is dying in Syria as falling demand makes maintaining the workshops infeasible, especially as artisans are required to work around the clock as the furnace is never allowed to die down. There is now only one traditional glass-making workshop left in Damascus.

However, if these workshops are able to tap into more eco-conscious consumers they could be revived. According to some reports, for every tonne of glass recycled used 1.2 tonnes of raw materials is preserved. What’s more a net saving of 315kg of CO2 is saved per tonne of recycled glass and that includes logistics and processing of the old glass. Now that’s pretty impressive! Consider that deep sea mining for sand is the opposite of recycling glass and it leads to habitat destruction. More recycled glass please.

For more on recycled glass and glass in ME architecture see:

Think Again: Fill All Those Empty Glass Jars with Light

Architect from Fortune 500 Company Criticizes Middle East’s ‘Glass Monsters’

Cecilia Cohen’s Recycled Glass Artwork

Egypt’s Conflagration is an Advance Warning for an Unsustainable World

Susan Kraemer
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Egypt’s Conflagration is an Advance Warning for an Unsustainable World

egypt riots cairoClimate change, peak oil and too many mouths to feed topples the first of the world’s now fragile economies.

Egypt is just the first nation to see the instability predicted as a result of climate change, peak oil and the unsustainable numbers of people on this planet. But this is where we are all headed, dictatorship-ruled or not. Of course, nobody likes to be governed by a dictator. But anger at 30 years of dictatorial rule came to a head this year because other issues put increasing pressure on the nation. A rising population, rising food and energy prices and reductions in energy production play a big role in this conflagration.

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Lisa Durante: UAE Could Teach The USA About Sustainability

Tafline Laylin
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0
Lisa Durante: UAE Could Teach The USA About Sustainability

lisa-durante-uaeItalian expatriate and Managing Editor, Lisa Durante’s new book is designed to inspire the UAE to lead a “greener” life.

Certain sectors of the United Arab Emirates are savvy about organic agriculture and the environmental benefits of a vegetarian diet. But judging by the ubiquity of mega-malls and towers, not all. Former development journalist and Italian expatriate, Lisa Durante hopes to inspire even more people with her new book. The perfect coffee table book called CleanUAE, it is not a scientific journal but an easy-to- understand source of inspiring material.

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Qatar Ministry To Get A Desert-Loving Cactus Building

Tafline Laylin
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0
Qatar Ministry To Get A Desert-Loving Cactus Building

aesthetics-architecture-cactus-qatarQatar has chosen a building that is both shaped and acts like a cactus as their latest superstar project.

With an area of less than 12,000 km2, Qatar bounced onto the world scene when FIFA announced its decision to award the 2022 World Cup to that country. Because it is exceptionally hot during the summer months, it’s possible and controversial that the festivities will be moved to cooler times. A newly awarded project is similarly bound to get some prickly attention: a cactus-shaped office building. While its Gulf neighbor pursues the tallest buildings, Qatar is aiming for design inspired by nature’s ability to withstand the desert climes.

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Noodles and lentils recipe

Miriam Kresh
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Noodles and lentils recipe
Make pasta and lentils
Make pasta and lentils

A fine Mideast winter dish with protein-rich lentils and comforting noodles.

According to author of The Book of Middle Eastern Food Claudia Rodin, flour noodles have been known here since ancient times and owe nothing to Italian pasta recipes. It’s pasta all the same, but known in the Middle East as rishta, from the Persian word for threads. Mrs. Rodin’s cookbook (one of several) offers a fine recipe for noodles tossed or topped with lentils, which we’ve adapted slightly.

See another popular recipe with lentils and rice, here.

Grate a little pungent cheese over the dish if you like, although it’s not traditional.

A dollop of labneh on top is also tasty. Learn how to make labneh here.

Noodles with Lentils Recipe

Serves 6

1 cup lentils, picked over and rinsed

1 tsp. salt

1 small bay leaf

2 cups water

2 tblsp. olive oil

2 onions, chopped fine

3 cloves garlic, chopped

1 teaspoon ground coriander

1 teaspoon ground cumin

salt and pepper

tagliatelli noodles or spaghetti for 6 servings

optional: grated cheese

Method

Put lentils into the cold water with 1 tsp. salt and bay leaf, cover and bring to a boil. Cook till tender, about 45 minutes. If they are ready before all the water is absorbed, drain and set aside.

In a frying pan, saute onions in the olive oil till golden. Add  garlic, coriander, cumin and salt and pepper to taste. Cook a further 2 or 3 minutes, stirring often.

Add onion mixture to the lentils. Taste for salt and add if needed, adding pepper to taste.

Cook noodles. Drain and mix into  lentils or serve piled onto dishes with topped with lentils. Grate cheese over them if liked, or stir a little labneh in.

Enjoy!

More Middle-Eastern recipes here:

Baba Ganoush recipe

Make your own kibbeh

Creamy Eggplant Soup

 

 

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