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Sunday, November 22, 2009 05:04 GMT

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ENERGY: Crisis Has Hurt Investment in Renewables
By Emilio Godoy
LEÓN, Mexico - In Latin America, Brazil is the leader in the development of renewable energies, while nations like Mexico, Peru, Chile and Argentina are taking slow steps to change their energy mix.
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Q&A: "We Can't Afford to Let the Planet Get Much Hotter"
Stephen Leahy interviews LESTER BROWN, founder of the Earth Policy Institute
UXBRIDGE, Canada - Lester Brown says his views sometimes appear extreme - because the mainstream media largely doesn't understand the urgency and challenges in avoiding catastrophic climate change.
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CLIMATE CHANGE: Firms Divided Over Obama's Emissions Cuts
By Eli Clifton
WASHINGTON - Momentum is building in Washington for an overhaul of climate policy, with President Barack Obama signing an executive order Monday directing federal agencies to monitor their greenhouse gas emissions and set targets to reduce their emissions by 2020.
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ENERGY-BRAZIL: Putting (Human) Waste to Work
By Fabiana Frayssinet
PETROPOLIS, Brazil - Biodigester technology, which originated in Asia as a natural process for treating sewage waste, is reemerging in Latin America as an integrated system providing cheap energy, improved sanitation, and even attractive landscaping.
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DEVELOPMENT: Resource Crunch Signals Larger Ecological Crisis
By Zarrín Caldwell
WASHINGTON - How would development programmes look if viewed from the position of scarcity, especially the scarcity of food, water, and energy?
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ENVIRONMENT-CHILE: Authorities May Sue Geothermal Energy Firm
By Daniela Estrada
SANTIAGO - The Council for the Defense of the State (CDE), the Chilean government's legal watchdog, is considering bringing a suit for environmental damages against an Italian-Chilean consortium carrying out geothermal studies a few kilometres away from the El Tatio geyser field, a tourist attraction in the northern region of Antofagasta.
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ENVIRONMENT-US: Advocates Fight Mountaintop Removal
By Matthew Cardinale
ATLANTA, Georgia - Environmental groups across the southeast United States, from Georgia to the Appalachia region, are stepping up their opposition to a controversial but widespread practice by coal companies of removing the tops of mountains with explosives.
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ENVIRONMENT: Could Food Shortages Bring Down Civilisation?
Commentary by Lester R. Brown*
WASHINGTON - In early 2008, Saudi Arabia announced that, after being self-sufficient in wheat for over 20 years, the non-replenishable aquifer it had been pumping for irrigation was largely depleted.
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GERMANY: Crisis Shackles New Govt
By Julio Godoy
BERLIN - The economic crisis looks set to reduce the new government's commitments in development and environmental policy.
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SOUTH AMERICA-AFRICA: Summit for South-South Cooperation
By Humberto Márquez
PORLAMAR, Venezuela - South American and African leaders are meeting over the weekend on the Caribbean island of Margarita in their second summit in three years, to forge stronger cooperation between the two regions and discuss their positions with regard to a number of pressing international concerns.
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CLIMATE CHANGE: Time Running Out on Vows to Act, Scientists Warn
By Stephen Leahy
COLUMBUS, Ohio - Promises are easy to make. But promises by world leaders will not halt the heat-trapping carbon emissions that are dialing-up global temperatures and altering the climate, say critics and climate researchers meeting in this U.S. Midwestern city.
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ENERGY: Trees: Out of the Forest and Into the Oven
By Stephen Leahy*
UXBRIDGE, Canada - Millions of trees, especially from the developing countries of the South, are being shipped to Europe and burned in giant furnaces to meet "green energy" requirements that are supposed to combat climate change.
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BRAZIL: Electric Car Revolution in the Making
By Mario Osava*
RIO DE JANEIRO - The electric vehicle - pure or hybrid - will trigger an energy and industrial revolution worldwide in the coming decades, dealing a blow to liquid fuels. But plant-based ethanol will survive and grow, say Brazilian experts consulted for this report.
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ENERGY-VENEZUELA: Great Business for Good Friends
By Humberto Márquez
CARACAS - While Spanish energy giant Repsol and Italy's Eni reported finding huge deep sea reserves of natural gas in the Gulf of Venezuela, a consortium of Russian companies agreed to pay the Venezuelan government one billion dollars to secure access to the oil-rich Orinoco Belt.
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BRAZIL: Green Challenges Posed by Black Gold
By Fabiana Frayssinet
RIO DE JANEIRO - Brazil's discovery of vast offshore oil and natural gas reserves raises the question of how to tap the newfound wealth without causing severe environmental impacts and without leaving aside the development of clean energy alternatives.
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ENERGY: To Fly Around the World - Without Fuel
By Stephen Leahy*
DÜBENDORF, Switzerland - A solar-powered aircraft will take flight next month from Switzerland with hopes ultimately to circle the Earth in 2012, without fuel, and stopping every five days only to change pilots.
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MALI: Technology Transfer So Slow "We’ll Have to Copy Like China"
By Isolda Agazzi
BAMAKO - Cars and motorcycles are stuck because of the heavy rains that have drenched Mali’s capital for the past few days. It is late afternoon and the water, mud and damaged fruit from nearby stalls make the journey for those heading home to celebrate Ramadan even more treacherous.
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DEVELOPMENT: NGOs Question World Bank's Clean Energy Roadmap
By Mary Tharin
WASHINGTON - The World Bank's 2010 World Development Report (WDR), released Tuesday, calls on the developed world to lead global efforts to cut carbon emissions, but some civil society groups remain highly sceptical of the bank's role in brokering climate finance.
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The war in Iraq, fear of one in Iran. Uncertainties in Europe over gas dependence on Russia. Greenhouse gases and the consequent fear of climate change. The battle over sources to power development in Asia, Africa and Latin America. The nuclear option, and its own dangers. One crisis after another round the world is at heart an energy crisis.