Albert Arnold Gore, Jr., more commonly known as Al Gore, was the 45th Vice President of the United States from 1993 to 2001 under former President William “Bill” Clinton. While many know Al Gore for the 24 years he spent as an elected official, today he is more known for his work as an environmental activist. Al Gore has founded a number of non-governmental organizations based around the environment, and created the 2006 documentary film An Inconvenient Truth about the affects of global warming. For all his efforts, Al Gore has won the Nobel Peace Prize for his work as an activist regarding climate change.

1 ) Kleiner, Perkins, Caufield, Byers Climate Solutions Group. Al Gore heads the climate solutions group at Kleiner, Perkins, Caufield, Byers (KPCB), a premier venture capital firm located in Silicon Valley, California. The Wall Street Journal has listed it as the “largest and most established” firm in the globe. KPCB has been championing investment into the clean technology sector since 1999 and has actively invested in a number of ventures that have the potential to solve a variety of urgent challenges associated with the global climate crisis. The focus includes funding technologies that are related to renewable energy, clean water, sustainable agriculture, and next-generation transportation.

2 ) Al Gore Endorses a Green Bank Bill. In 2009, when testifying right before the House Energy and Commerce Committee, Al Gore endorsed a new Green Bank Bill. First introduced by Congressman Chris Van Hollen (D-MD), this bill would create a financial institution that is government-owned and would provide necessary support to qualified energy efficiency and clean energy projects.

3 ) Call to have all Energy in the United States made Renewable in Ten Years. In 2008, Al Gore decided to make the challenge to the United States to get the country to make a switch to completely renewable sources of energy in ten years time. He made the mention that the solution to the current climate crisis will also help in renewing the economy through the creation of more jobs, and it will provide an escape route for the United States when it comes to continually rising energy prices.

4 ) Global Marshall Plan. Al Gore created the Global Marshall Plan in his book “Earth in the Balance,” and provides specific ideas regarding how to save the current global environment. In his book, Gore states, “The model of the Marshall Plan can be of great help. For example, a Global Marshall Plan must focus on strategic goals and emphasize actions and programs that are likely to remove the bottlenecks presently inhibiting the healthy functioning of the global economy. The new global economy must be an inclusive system that does not leave entire regions behind. The new plan will require the wealthy nations to allocate money for transferring environmentally helpful technologies to the Third World and to help impoverished nations achieve a stable population and a new pattern of sustainable economic progress. To work, however, any such effort will also require wealthy nations to make a transition themselves that will be in some ways more wrenching than that of the Third World.” There are five strategic goals, stabilizing the global population, the quick development of technologies that are environmentally appropriate, a change in economic rules of the road in respect to the environment, new international agreements regarding the environment, and a plan to educate the world about the environment.

5 ) Supporter of the Kyoto Protocol. Al Gore has been a huge supported of the Kyoto Protocol. This protocol was formed by the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change and is geared toward fighting the increase in global warming. This international environmental treaty has the goal of stabilizing the carbon dioxide emissions concentrations throughout the atmosphere to a level that would prevent the possibility of dangerous anthropogenic interference with the current climate system.

6 ) An Inconvenient Truth. An Inconvenient Truth is a book written by Al Gore in 2006. It is based on Gore’s lecture tour regarding the topic of global warming and further elaborates on a number of points regarding climate change. It was turned into a documentary film also in 2006 that followed Gore’s initiatives to educate the general public about climate change. The movie won an Academy Award for Best Documentary Feature. Both the book and the movie have been widely credited for increasing international public awareness in regards to the climate change and helped to reenergize the global environmental movement.

7 ) The Al Gore Sustainable Technology Venture Competition. The Al Gore Sustainable Technology Venture Competition is the very first and most prestigious clean technology and sustainably business plan competition in Asia. It was established in 2007 and looks to increase the generation of India’s engineering, technology, science, and management students to start thinking more sustainability and creating sustainable technology solutions that will provide a positive impact on the environment.

8 ) The Climate Reality Project. The Climate Reality Project was founded and chaired by Al Gore and currently has over five million members around the world. It is a nonprofit organization that remains dedicated to providing education to the global community in regards to the importance of the implementation of a comprehensive solution to the current climate crisis. The project emphasizes the requirement to bring together a very diverse range of organizations and individuals to strengthen the global network of people looking to take action when it comes to various climate issues.

9 ) Live Earth. Live Earth was established by Kevin Wall along with Al Gore and “built upon the belief that entertainment has the power to transcend social and cultural barriers to move the world community to action…Live Earth seeks to leverage the power of entertainment through integrated events, media, and the live experience to ignite a global movement aimed at solving the most critical environmental issues.” For example, on 07/07/07, Live Earth produced “Live Earth: the Concerts for a Climate in Crisis,” which was hosted on seven continents and broadcasted in 132 countries.

10 ) Generation Investment Management LLP. Generation Investment Management LLP is a private, independent owner-managed partnership that has offices in New York, New York, London, England, and Sydney Australia and focuses on environmental and social responsibility. It was co-founded in 2004 by Al Gore and David Blood. The mission of Generation Investment Management LLP is to “Deliver superior investment performance by taking a long term investment view and integrating sustainability research within a rigorous fundamental equity analysis framework; create long term client partnerships by delivering unique investment insights and exceptional client service; [and] attract, retain, and develop the best professionals within a passionate investment culture.”

Article by Shawn Lesser, Co-founder & Managing Partner of Atlanta-based Watershed Capital Group – an investment bank assisting sustainable fund and companies raise capital, perform acquisitions, and in other strategic financial decisions. He is also a Co-founder of the GCCA Global Cleantech Cluster Association ”The Global Voice of Cleantech”. He writes for various cleantech publications and is known as the David Letterman of Cleantech for his “Top 10″ series. He can be reached at shawn@watershedcapital.com.

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To produce $1 of sugar, manufacturers use 270 gallons of water. A dollar of pet food takes 200 gallons of water. These figures include the sourcing of raw materials, processing, packaging, and shipping, according to Carnegie Mellon University scientists. A 2010 study published in Environmental Science and Technology, leveraged computer models to estimate water usage by 400 industrial sectors. No surprise, it was discovered that the food and beverage industries account for about 30 percent of what’s being called the “water footprint” or consumption of water during the entire product life cycle.

While water doesn’t get the high-profile attention in conservation that fossil-fuel energy sources enjoy, it is as critical a resource for survival of planet earth and the people on it. Warnings come from diverse sources such as the Second UN World Water Development Report that there will not be adequate water for human, industrial, and agricultural use. Some set the date of 2025 for a kind of Armageddon. That’s when it is anticipated that two-thirds of the global population will be water-short.

The causes are many and they intersect, compounding the possibility of disaster. They include:

• increased industrial activity especially among emerging economies;
• climate change;
• more irrigation;
• intensive dam construction;
• simple waste, usually a result of ignorance or indifference; and, of course,
• increased demand because of population growth.

It’s no surprise that companies, especially multi-national ones, have responded in shrinking water consumption, according to GreenBiz.com. They range from Coca-Cola to General Electric. Part of the concern is, of course, cost-related because failure to be water conscious translates to being fiscally reckless. Further, companies need to comply with regulations around the world about water efficiency, reports demanded by consumers, investors, and activists about the size of the water footprint, and the risk to the brand of being perceived as a kind of water “hog.”

Coca-Cola is typical of how companies are going about becoming water savvy. Frequently, companies, like Coke, team with a third party such as the World Wildlife Fund to identify consumption patterns and how efficiency can be increased. Then, they set a target for achieving their goal. In 2004, Coca-Cola set out to reduce water consumption by 20 percent by 2012. With that deadline approaching, Coca-Cola Enterprises is setting out to reduce production consumption regarding water by an additional 20 percent by 2020.

In addition, Coca-Cola is going the extra mile by investing in ensuring the quality of drinking water in the nations in which it conducts business. For example, it donated $12.7 million to the Water and Development Alliance.

One thing is certain; we don’t know what we don’t know. While companies are focused on reducing water consumption, the first step has to be finding out what they are currently using or, in many cases, wasting. Leaks and faulty systems can wreak havoc on utility bills and consumption totals. The solution is simple. Manage energy usage by measuring it. It’s the only true way to know how much water – and money — is going down the drain.

Article by Bari Faye Siegel, a technology writer and marketing consultant at Noveda Technologies, an innovative leader in real-time, web-based energy management, solar PV monitoring and water management. Noveda also offers real-time collaboration tools that leverage social media to educate and empower stakeholder communities and make the smart grid a reality today. For more information, visit www.noveda.com.

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Duke University researchers have predicted that climate change in California will result in a declining percentage of rangeland. Such a change will have widespread impact on the state’s large cattle industry of California’s Central Valley. No matter if climate change will cause wetter or drier weather, available pasture will decline. Forage areas, known as one of nature’s free services, may no longer be so free. The grasses will either wither as arid conditions creep north, or be pushed out as inedible shrubs and brush take over.

The study has been published in the journal, Climatic Change, by Duke’s Nicholas School of the Environment in conjunction with the Environmental Defense Fund. The change in the rangeland ecosystem is expected to occur gradually over the coming century. Total costs expected to hit California ranchers over the next sixty years may be as high as $209 million a year if the ecosystem dries up.

Less grazing land will mean smaller herds, and less productive herds. Movement of cattle will also be much more difficult because of highways and suburban sprawl.

If the weather becomes wetter rather than drier, biodiversity is expected to increase. However, this will come at the expense of the ranchers. Cattle like to eat grasses, not trees or bushes.

The US Department of Agriculture has estimated about 5.2 million head of cattle in the state of California. Of these, less than 10 percent are raised in large feedlots. The rest can roam across the range, munching on free grasses.

A decline of rangeland may result in an increasing percentage of cattle raised in feedlots, where cattle food has to be bought and fed, adding to the costs of beef production.

California’s cattle industry brings in over $2 billion in total income through about 11,800 ranches. The hit the industry will take will likely affect the state’s overall economy. If similar climate changes occur in states like Texas and Oklahoma where cattle are much bigger slice of the economy, the nation’s economy may be affected.

In order to prevent this, rangeland preservation efforts may be required. This may be legislated through California’s new cap and trade system.

Article by David A. Gabel, appearing courtesy Environmental News Network.

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This is the era of Big Oil. Could the next be the era of Big Efficiency?

A new report by the American Council for an Energy-Efficient Economy suggests the possibility. Re-invented with today’s smart energy technologies, energy efficiency could displace 40 to 60 percent of our total energy needs by the year 2050, according to The Long-Term Energy Efficiency Potential: What the Evidence Suggests.

Sound far-fetched? ACEEE says history backs its assertion. Over the last 40 years we tripled the US economy, “and three-quarters of the energy needed to fuel that growth came from an amazing variety of efficiency advances—not new energy supplies,” said the report. Energy forecasters at the time predicted we would be using far more energy than we do now. The advent of the computer, the Internet, energy savings appliances and other efficiencies saved us a lot of money and a lot of oil. In 1970, our economy required 15,900 British Thermal Units of energy to support $1 of economic activity; by 2010 we needed only 7,300 Btus.

But there is a problem in repeating this feat. Today’s energy policy begins with the premise that we need to build more power plants, more refineries and more delivery systems. We do not try to first achieve greater efficiency. In other words, we build more energy infrastructure before we try to wring more work out of each unit of energy we produce. If we instead pushed efficiency first, the US could save $400 billion per year in energy costs, amounting to about $2,600 per household, according to ACEEE.

“The U.S. would prosper more if investments in new energy were not crowding out needed investments in energy efficiency,” said John A. “Skip” Laitner, ACEEE director of economic and social analysis.

In short, we are thinking small about efficiency, when we should be thinking big.

ACEEE further warns that the deck contains at least three jokers, or unwelcome wild cards, that could threaten our hand if we fail to pursue energy efficiency. These include 1) diminishing supplies of cheap and available energy; 2) a slowing rate of energy productivity and 3) climate change.

How do we keep the jokers buried? The report says it requires “a different recipe of technology investments” than we are now making.

“The question is will we choose to make those more productive investments?” says ACEEE.

ACEEE’s full report is available here.

Elisa Wood is a long-time energy writer whose work appears in many of the industry’s top magazines and newsletters. She is publisher of the Energy Efficiency Markets podcast and newsletter.

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The UN has declared 2012 the International Year of Sustainable Energy for All. Using his platform as a keynote speaker at the World Future Energy Summit, the project’s global launch which kicked off yesterday in Abu Dhabi, UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon called on governments, the private sector, and civil society to make significant commitments to action in support of UN’s drive to promote alternative energy.

“This is the right time for this Initiative,” said the Secretary-General. “Across the world we see momentum building for concrete action that reduces energy poverty, catalyzes sustainable economic growth, and mitigates the risks of climate change. Achieving sustainable energy for all is both feasible and necessary. My Initiative will help us meet these objectives simultaneously. It can be a triple win for all.”

Ban Ki-Monn has made sustainable development one his top priorities for his next term, which lasts five years. The energy issue is central to that. One fifth of the world’s population lacks access to modern electricity and two thirds rely on dirty, rudimentary energy such as wood, coal, and animal waste for cooking and heating. Meanwhile, the developed world wastes energy.

The UN wants to ensure universal access to modern energy services. It also wants energy to be more efficient and it wants to double the share of renewable energy in the global energy mix. The Secretary-General has appointed a High-level Group of global leaders from business, finance, government and civil society to push the alternative energy agenda across governments and corporate boardrooms.

At the Abu Dhabi meeting, the Group met and produced a Framework for an Action Agenda, which proposes several actions at the national and international level, including action to expand energy access, promotion of efficiency standards and policies, and strengthening of investment in renewables.

The plan is to launch the Action Agenda, publicizing the commitments made by all stakeholders to the Initiative, towards the UN Conference on Sustainable Development (Rio+20) in June.

Article by Antonio Pasolini, a Brazilian writer and video art curator based in London, UK. He holds a BA in journalism and an MA in film and television.

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One of my very first posts in 2010 was about what I called the triple crisis. As I noted back then “our economies are crumbling, our climate is warming and our energy supplies are getting scarcer.”

You would think that after two years, we would have started to do something about them. Well, from what I see, we haven’t. Unemployment is still high, we are still as reliant on oil and coal and our climate is getting weirder by the month.

On top of these crises, a fourth one has emerged: government debt. Our economies are completely broken as the richest are getting even richer and as more and more people are struggling.

We are now certain that we are beyond peak oil. The IEA announced it in its World Energy Outlook last November. Since conventional oil supply is not growing any more, any increase in oil supply will come from extreme oil. And with it more pollution per barrel of oil extracted.

Meanwhile, our climate continues to get warmer and weirder as more extreme weather events that have occurred in the past two years. From Texas to Thailand, from Europe to Australia and Brazil in South America, all our continents have been affected.

This would be worrying enough, but with positive mechanisms feedback such as the melting permafrost in Russia or the Amazon rainforest which started EMITTING greenhouse gases, the situation threatens to move from alarming to dire.

The Economist announced that we should  “Be afraid” in a recently published issue. Well, I am starting to be seriously worried for our common future, for my own future…

Solutions DO exist most fortunately:

Energy efficiency, conservation and sobriety can do wonders. This is why I am now preferring efficiency and sobriety over renewables… As we have less and less capital to spend and as a mechanism to engage our chronic unemployment, these mechanisms can do wonders.

Renewable energy sources like solar, wind and many others (geothermal or tidal among others) still have the potential to completely change our ways of life this decade, but they need to be paired with efficiency efforts and behavioral modifications.

Let’s hope we will apply them with the necessary scale and scope… Let’s make it happen in 2012 and after!

photo: Flickr

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The type of agriculture practiced in a given region depends heavily on the climate and weather that region receives. So naturally, with climate change, agriculture will be forced to change. Certain crops will have to be discarded for alternative crops which may grow better in the new climate. In other cases, agriculture will simply be no longer sustainable. Farms may have to close down or move to different latitudes or elevations. The unpredictable nature of climate change will make this quite a conundrum for farmers and the world at large.

One man has attempted to explain it all through a book which can help guide us through a potentially rocky transition. Ariel Dinar, director of the Water Science and Policy Center at the University of California (UC), Riverside, has co-edited the book, “Handbook on Climate Change and Agriculture.” The book has contributions from scholars around the world. It explores direct effects on agriculture, economic impacts, and farmer adaptation.

The writers of the book make the argument that climate change will likely have a significant impact on agriculture around the world. The changes will be in the form of temperature, precipitation, CO2 concentrations, and available water flows.

“Developing countries already face food problems,” said Dinar. “The effects of climate change on agriculture in these and other countries will depend on how well the agricultural sector can adapt through technology institutions, and better management practices. Developing countries are better able to engage in adaptation since mitigation is much harder for these countries to do.”

Dinar first began his studies on climate change in 1994 and realized the effects on agriculture were largely ignored. The effects could be particularly dire for developing countries where farming is still relatively low-tech and there is a strong reliance on steady climate. Livestock as well, would be particularly hard hit.

“It soon became clear to me that people did not know much about adaptation to the effects of climate change,” he said. “The net effect of climate change on agricultural production is still not well understood. It’s not just the production of food from crops that is involved, but also livestock. Agriculture suffers from climate change, but it also contributes to it through land use and abuse, as well as the adoption of practices that are unsustainable where climate change is concerned such as unsuitable cropping patterns and irrigation technologies.”

Article by David A. Gabel, appearing courtesy Environmental News Network.

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Bill Moore, editor of EVWorld.com has written a splendid article on the failure of certain of the early electric vehicle companies, in which he points out:

Breaking into the automotive business can be relatively easy; making a success of it is pretty damned near impossible, regardless of what type of propulsion system you favor: ICE-age or otherwise; and it’s especially tough if you decide to go electric. Beyond this, the reasons for individual failures are myriad and multiple: right product, wrong time, wrong product; wrong time, etc. Management missteps, unrealistic investor expectations and impatience, government responsiveness, inept marketing, unanticipated technical setbacks, product shortcomings, public resistance to change: the list is long.

I don’t dispute any of this, but let’s look at the subject from a “big picture” perspective. As a country, we’re still married to fossil fuels, and we’re doing essentially nothing about it In particular, we have no energy policy. Hell, we’re about to build an oil pipeline, the Keystone XL, right through the middle of the continent, one that may be unnecessary and that even some oil companies think is overpriced.

At the same time, we don’t have an iota of horsepower in Congress examining the big ideas. If I (or you) were there, we’d be saying:

Here’s a list of major reasons (I’ve left out the minor ones) to phase out fossil fuels aggressively:

• National security / terrorism

• Health / lung disease

• Global climate change, ocean acidification and other ecological disasters

• Skyrocketing / crippling debt

• War which we can’t afford, and leave countless dead and wounded

• Peak oil, coupled with burgeoning urban/consumer populations globally

You can argue about the relative importance of each of these, but for my money, we’ve spent enough time arguing about this garbage already. Now the time has come for action, and we’re going to take it, regardless of what the oil companies say. We have a responsibility at this time and place in history, and by God, we’re going to live up to it.

Gullible guy that I am, I still believe that someone in a position of power will ask me to draft a plan that phases fossil fuels out forcibly over the next 25 years, and eliminates them completely by 2050. As always, I’ll be happy to serve.

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One village in Germany is producing more energy than it needs. Best of all, it’s alternative energy sourced from clean sources.

Wildpoldsried, located in the southern German region known as Bavaria and where 2,600 people live, produces 321 per cent more energy than it needs. As a result, it can make money out of this energy surplus by selling back into the grid for a cool 4 million Euro, or US$5.7 million (that’s US$2,192 per person) per year.

The green initiative started in 1997 when the local council set out to create new jobs, attract new industries and keep it all local at the same time. Since then, Wildpoldsried has equipped nine new community buildings with solar panels, built four biogas digesters and installed seven wind mills. 190 private households have solar panels and the district benefits from small hydroplants, ecological flood control and a natural waste water system. The village is so successful that it has created a mission statement called WIR-2020, or Wildpoldsried Innovative Leadership, to inspire others.

The local community has received several awards for its conservation and alternative energy groundbreaking work and they visit other village councils to show them their climate protection (‘klimaschutz’) initiative. Mayor Zengerle even has been traveling abroad to inspire other communities to go green and make money at the same time.

And what is the main lesson we can learn from the citizens of Wildpoldsried? “The mitigation of climate change in practice can only be implemented with the citizens and with the Village Council behind them 100 per cent of the way. This model cannot be forced from only one side,” Zengerle told Biocycle.

Article by Antonio Pasolini, a Brazilian writer and video art curator based in London, UK. He holds a BA in journalism and an MA in film and television.

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Last week I traveled to Durban, South Africa to participate in the Conference of the Parties to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change to highlight the critical and largely untapped potential of women to combat climate change. Studies have shown that it is often women who are on the frontlines of, and suffer disproportionately from, the impacts of climate change. This is certainly important. But we must remember that women are also a powerful force for finding solutions to climate change across the board, including in areas such as agriculture, sustainable forest management, and energy access. 

Agriculture, which accounts for approximately 14 percent of global greenhouse gas emissions and is a sector that can be particularly sensitive to climate variability and change, is one key area where women can play a major role. A recent FAO report shows that women, in many places, are the main producers of the world's staple crops, particularly in developing countries and regions likely to be adversely affected by climate change impacts.  However, globally, only a small minority of women farmers have access to land tenure. This is a problem for many reasons – including that it limits women's potential to combat climate change. Studies have shown that women with the right to property are significantly more capable of investing in climate-smart agricultural productivity; we have a lot of work to do to unlock women's potential in this area. 

Women also have untapped potential for increasing energy access, which directly relates to climate change. For example, nearly 3 billion people globally still rely on traditional cookstoves and open fires to prepare food for their families. In most instances, women are responsible for cooking – not to mention also spending many hours per week collecting fuel, which often puts women at risk of gender based violence. The resulting smoke exposure causes an estimated two million premature deaths annually, with women and young children the most affected. Cookstoves also impact the climate through emissions of greenhouse gases and short-lived particles such as black carbon. Engaging women is critical to tackling this problem. As we work to build a global market for clean cookstoves, integrating women into the cookstoves supply chain will help increase clean cookstove adoption rates while also creating new economic development opportunities. And as Secretary Clinton has noted, women create a multiplier effect in local communities because they disproportionately spend more of their earned income on food, healthcare, home improvement, and schooling.   

The United States recognizes the power of women’s potential in these areas and many others, and is investing in major initiatives including Feed the Future and the Global Alliance for Clean Cookstoves, where women’s role in generating transformative change is front and center.

I went to Durban to highlight the critical role of women in combating climate change. While there, I worked with U.S. negotiators on the Durban texts and participated in public engagement events. Our efforts to build on the gender equality and women’s empowerment language in the Cancun agreements are reflected in several crucial institutional developments, including language on gender balance related to the composition of the board of the new Green Climate Fund, the Standing Committee, and the Adaptation Committee. We also worked to reflect gender considerations in the mission of the Climate Technology Center and Network. USAID Assistant Administrator Eric Postel and I solicited input during a meeting with leading non-governmental organizations working on gender and climate issues, and I hosted a high-level side event at the U.S. Center focused on unlocking women’s potential to combat climate change. The level of enthusiasm among my fellow panelists and the audience at the event was inspirational.

We made progress in Durban, but we can’t stop here. To achieve the future we all seek, we must do more. As the late Wangari Maathai, founder of the Green Belt Movement and ground-breaking advocate on women and the environment said, “We must not tire, we must not give up, we must persist.” The future of not only women, but our planet, depends on it.

Article by Ambassador Melanne Verveer, U.S. Ambassador-at-Large for Global Women’s Issues.

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