Solar power is looking cheaper than the traditional fossil energy that is now used in Enhanced Oil Recovery.
By the end of next month, California-based Glasspoint expects to have finalized a sale in the Gulf of the use of solar CSP to make steam for injecting into oil fields, to help in extracting oil, using a process called EOR (Enhanced Oil Recovery).
Currently, natural gas, a much needed fossil fuel, is burned to make steam for this use.
A Saudi food activist and former vegan questions whether veganism is for your health, and for the planet.
Vegans reading this post might want to think twice about forgoing a slice of turkey this Thanksgiving. Saudi Arabia-based blogger, Tasha of Voracious Eats, runs a well-known vegan cooking site featuring no animal products. This week she made a monumental announcement: Veganism has caused a severe decline in her health, and she has begun eating meat again. And she is back to excellent health.
Of course, the process was not nearly so simple as that. In her post she describes how the vitamin supplements she was taking weren’t being absorbed by her body, leading to fatigue, depression, pain, indigestion, weight loss, and memory loss.
A ten year dream to dig in the Dead Sea for a history of this portion of the earth’s crust has finally become a reality for eager scientists. It’s a study expected to give unprecedented information about climate change.
It is easy to criticize science for failing to predict the exact temperature to which the earth is expected to rise, or what year it will melt under the weight of our carbon blitz. Climate-change “deniers” then use this lack of precision to throw up their arms, buy hummers, and exploit every last drop of oil left on the planet – at whatever cost. But scientists are up for the challenge.
To find the necessary data to plug into prediction models, a US-manned drilling rig travels around the world churning up samples of the earth’s crust. These are are then used to map out the natural history in each area. That rig, after ten years of urging, has finally landed eight kilometers from Ein Gedi, in the middle of the Dead Sea, where for the next forty days and nights researchers will work around the clock using it to drill for sediment samples that will reveal 500,000 years of natural, and even human history.
Interested in getting your child interested in the environment? Why not try a spunky environmentally-themed book?
Communication absorbs our every day. Even so, sometimes knowing how to communicate certain messages is as tangible as algebra. “Green” media struggles to find the balance between providing pertinent climatic information that bears directly on the public, and being painfully didactic. We hang upside down, pull funny faces, scream, and even whisper – all with the admirable intention of persuading people to act on the data we share.
Reaching children is even trickier. How do we teach them to not only love nature (which happens easily if they experience its grandeur), but then find the spunk to protect it? Part of the answer may be hidden in the same pages that taught us about the wolf in sheep’s clothing, except now it is apathy whose sneaky disguise must be lifted.
Israeli GE winners, water shortage plans, Dead Sea insights and more headlines related to Israeli cleantech and the environment.
Israel and Jordan are collaborating on oil pollution combat drills. ETV Motors signed a two-year deal to develop specialty batteries for an aviation company and Israel made its first solar power purchase. For these stories and the rest of this week’s headlines, see below.
The carbon-neutral Masdar City seems to have been a concept for forever, it seems. In my mind, it has long been filed under “noble theory.” So I was surprised to get an email from Foster+Partners today.
The Architects responsible for the Masdar Institute matter-of-factly announced the opening of the first building in the visionary city-to-be this morning. Yet, as one of the first town-sized developments in the world to attempt real carbon neutrality – Masdar City has long come up against all the problems inherent in undertaking such an ambitious plan.
Architecturally excellent, the following five projects are also deemed by His Highness Aga Khan to be the most likely to improve quality of life for Muslims throughout the world.
The Aga Khan Award for Architecture was established in 1977. Every three years since then, His Highness Aga Khan, the Imam of the Shia Imami Ismaili Muslims, has recognized everyone involved with the process of creating projects that aspire to be architecturally, culturally, and spiritually fabulous. All of this year’s 401 nominees (in accordance with competition rules) hailed from regions that have a strong Muslim presence.
Five winners selected from a shortlist of 19 received their awards this evening at a glamorous ceremony in Doha, Qatar, attended by the Emir of Qatar, Sheikh Hamad bin Khalifa Al Thani, Sheikha Moza bint Nasser, and the Aga Khan. First place went to the Bridge School project by Xiaodong Atelier, which closed the gap between two parts of a village in Xianshi, China, becoming the village’s cultural and spiritual focus.
Corruption, poor management, and climate change have driven away nearly half a million Eastern Syrians and impoverished thousands more.
Nearly half a million people have abandoned an area in Eastern Syria near the Euphrates River that has shrivelled under a five year drought. Fierce temperatures and dwindling rainfall, as well as corruption and mismanagement of existing water resources, has led to what Trade Arabia calls the largest internal migration of people since Britain and France “carved the country out of the Ottoman empire in 1920.”
Those that stayed behind must scrape life out of ruined croplands and filthy water – since most of the choice supplies have been diverted to well-connected farm owners. Others irrigate crops with water usurped from illegal wells, but that’s not enough to provide for everyone. Thousands of people are receiving aid from the World Food Program, while others have been relegated to slums.
In the 1980’s, the region that used to belong to the ancient Inezi tribe received 189mm rainfall annually. During the nineties that fell to 163mm and has plummeted to 152mm in the last decade. Meanwhile, thispast summer, Syria experienced 46 consecutive days of temperatures higher than 40 degrees Celsius, according to Trade Arabia.
Only 15% of livestock remain, and locals are unable to till their own land for food.
“Environment Minister Kawkab al-Dayeh told a water conference in Damascus last month pollution had played a role in the deterioration of 59 percent of total agricultural land, with raw sewage being widely used for irrigation,” AT reports.
With more than a hint of nepotism, water trenches divert water to the west, where farms are flourishing, while the nearby lands on the eastern side are parched.
“Jub Shaeer is only 3 km from the canal, but look how dry the land is in the village,” Ahmad al-Mehbash, head of the state-backed Peasants Union in Raqqa province, told the paper.
With a population of 20 million that is expanding at a rate of 2.5%, the antique irrigation system promises to fail its citizens even further in the future. In response, the government has suggested that it must scale back subsidies.
“Subsidies on fertilisers have been abolished, helping to lessen corruption,” agriculture minister Kawkab al-Dayeh told AT. But in the meantime, those that are using 90-95 percent of Syria’s water contribute only 13% to the Gross Domestic Product and tales of suffering are streaming out of the country.
“Mariam al-Falaj is raising five children alone. Her husband found work as a shepherd in Saudi Arabia after his own flock died,” according to the paper. Children are going without vaccinations and government efforts to render the area “drought resistant” has done no more than collect data.
The World Food Program has stepped in to feed nearly 200,000 people, while over 100,000 more are in need of rations.
Thank goodness for that, but how long will aid agencies be able to pick up the government’s slack?
:: Trade Arabia
Try turkey with a Middle Eastern flair this Thanksgiving.
Sometimes an entire roast turkey is just too much. And often there’s so much left over, some of it goes to waste. You like to stick to tradition but need a recipe for a smaller, more intimate Thanksgiving celebration. This succulent alternative, with its fragrance of Middle-Eastern spices, fits the menu. And if you find that there’s still some leftover, try our suggestions for delicious pre-cooked foods.
In the next few days, a pilot project to test destructive oil shale extraction, backed with money from the Rothschilds and billionaire Robert Murdoch (who owns Fox News), is slated to begin. We call on David Rothschild to intervene on Adullam’s behalf.
Dear David:
We have followed your Plastiki initiative with great interest, but now fear that your family’s involvement with the Adullam Oil Shale scheme recently announced by Globes will cancel out your good work, establishing a permanent blight on the Rothschild name. While it is understandable that Israel is eager to discover its oil, and to unlatch its energy supply from the generosity of its Arab neighbors, energy from oil shale – among the most destructive means of obtaining energy – is not the answer.
Your second cousin Lord Jacob Rothschild has been duped into believing that the project is environmentally sound – particularly since the billionaire media mogul Rupert Murdoch is also involved. This could not be further from the truth. Your family and Mr. Murdoch have enough money to live twelve lifetimes. The people who will be displaced if this ruinous project proceeds can barely afford this one. We urge the Rothschild family, and you as its eco-diplomat, to rescind its shares in what could be one of the most devastating projects to hit Israel’s soil.
Which is a bigger environmental sin – imported produce or imported farmers?
For the past few days Israeli farmers have been protesting a governmental decision to cut the amount of foreign workers legally permitted to come work in the agricultural sector, with the demonstration planned to continue tomorrow as well.
The growers have been demonstrating in several junctions across the country, and their most significant act of protest has been to cut off the supply of vegetables, fruits, milk, eggs, fresh fish and poultry to markets and supermarkets all over the country throughout the duration of the three-day strike. Essentially, the farmers are asking that more imported farmers hands be allowed to work so that they can continue to supply the Israeli public with fresh, local produce.
They are asking the government to reverse a decision that would make it extremely difficult for Israelis to be locavores.
Mr. Sawaya makes no claims about changing the world, though his design could use a touch of green blush.
Born and raised in Lebanon, the Italian designer William Sawaya once admitted to admiring the famous Iraqi architect Zaha Hadid. Known for defying all reason and physics, Ms. Hadid’s architecture trumps convention with boundless (and genius) flights of fancy. Is it possible to judge an artist by his or her heroes?
While his architecture and design are decidedly grounded – solid, simple, and elegant, often taking brief sojourns to an earlier, more classical era, Mr. Sawaya also shows signs of whimsy, always managing to put a new spin on the past, reinventing himself with every new collection. Now – as one of Qatar’s “Stars Of Science” judges – he has an opportunity to inspire young Qatari couch potatoes to do the same.
How to make innovation and science as enthralling to a couch potato as contestants in a TV game show? Make scientists and inventors contestants in a TV game show!
The Qatar Foundation for Education, Science and Community Development is trying just that, in an attempt to promote the development of innovation in the Middle East. A glamorous show with high production values is to be broadcast by an unprecedented array of 15 public and private Pan Arab TV channels.
Muslim starts sustainable tree planting operation to make Ethiopia green once again.
Visiting Ethiopia after a thirty year absence, Geshaw Tahir an Ethiopian-born Muslim was struck by one thing. The green landscapes and trees that once surrounded his home had all but disappeared and were replaced with dry fields, eroded and ruined after years of deforestation.
Mountain rivers had dried up, temperatures were rising, malaria was spreading and untold destruction had been done to the environment.
Tahir was so shocked by this sight that he vowed to take action.
Accounting student from Gaza University turns from numbers to chips, and hopes to save lives with his new invention.
When a plant that requires sunlight to grow is stuck in the shade, it will adapt by bending in the direction of the sun. Likewise, Gaza’s residents are adapting to a period of energy depredation by creating alternative solutions. Unfortunately, it is not always easy to be innovative in Gaza.
Either explosions occur that undo months of creative work, or it is impossible to order in necessary supplies. One young man, an accounting student at Gaza University, has developed a cell phone chip that can control generators. He expects that this invention will prevent unnecessary generator explosions that have to date claimed more than two dozen lives.
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