by Bill McKibben

Our eight-year interlude from reality draws to a close, and the job of cleaning up begins. The trouble is, we’re not just cleaning up after a failed US presidency. We’re cleaning up after a two-century binge.

Barack Obama won an historic victory this week, and with it the right to take office under the most difficult circumstances since Franklin D. Roosevelt during the Great Depression. Maybe more difficult, because while both FDR and Obama had financial meltdowns to deal with, Obama also faces the meltdown meltdown - the rapid disintegration of the planet’s climate system that threatens to challenge the very foundations of our civilization. (more…)

Al Gore’s speech today is way too important to try to rephrase it in my own words. Please take the time to read it yourself - and see how it might apply to your own country. Al Gore is giving us great material to pressure politicians all over the world for immediate actions to end coal. You can also watch the entire speech on YouTube.

Ladies and gentlemen:

There are times in the history of our nation when our very way of life depends upon dispelling illusions and awakening to the challenge of a present danger. In such moments, we are called upon to move quickly and boldly to shake off complacency, throw aside old habits and rise, clear-eyed and alert, to the necessity of big changes. Those who, for whatever reason, refuse to do their part must either be persuaded to join the effort or asked to step aside. This is such a moment. The survival of the United States of America as we know it is at risk. And even more - if more should be required - the future of human civilization is at stake. (more…)

This Thursday, June 26 2008, the 4′th Taellberg Forum will resume its discussions on “How on earth will we live together?” in Taellberg, Sweden. Leaders from around the world, including ministers, CEOs, world-renowned scientists, NGO representatives, and others will get together to discuss ways in which we can help guide nations towards a sustainable, peaceful and just future. Participants include Desmund Tutu, Kofi Annan, James Hansen and many other great minds who will hopefully be able to find a solution to our current crisis.

Information and background to the forum can be accessed here. Stay tuned for updates on the forum as it develops.

Maiken Winter

By Bill McKibben, reposted from TomDispatch.com

Even for Americans, constitutionally convinced that there will always be a second act, and a third, and a do-over after that, and, if necessary, a little public repentance and forgiveness and a Brand New Start — even for us, the world looks a little Terminal right now.

It’s not just the economy. We’ve gone through swoons before. It’s that gas at $4 a gallon means we’re running out, at least of the cheap stuff that built our sprawling society. It’s that when we try to turn corn into gas, it sends the price of a loaf of bread shooting upwards and starts food riots on three continents. It’s that everything is so inextricably tied together. (more…)

Capturing and storing carbon dioxide (CCS) is predicted to be one of the most important measures to counter the threats to our climate. But the technology still hasn’t been tested in full scale, and the complications and risks it entails may have been grossly underestimated.

This is the conclusion drawn in Anders Hansson’s dissertation at the Department of Technology and Social Change, Linköping University.

He studied documents from the EU and the UN Climate Panel about CCS (Carbon dioxide Capture and Storing), as well as some of the research they are based on. The UN Climate Panel released its most thoroughly considered report ever last year, supported by an uncommonly unanimous research community.

The Climate Panel sees CCS as offering great potential. (more…)

Capitalism, the Environment, and Crossing from Crisis to Sustainability

By James Gustave Speth, Dean of the School of Forestry at Yale University.

Reprinted with permission from Rachel’s Democracy # 956

The remarkable charts that introduce this book reveal the story of humanity’s impact on the natural earth.[1] The pattern is clear: if we could speed up time, it would seem as if the global economy is
crashing against the earth — the Great Collision. And like the crash of an asteroid, the damage is enormous. For all the material blessings economic progress has provided, for all the disease and destitution avoided, for all the glories that shine in the best of our civilization, the costs to the natural world, the costs to the glories of nature, have been huge and must be counted in the balance as tragic loss. (more…)

Press release by the Royal Society of Chemistry, 27 March 2008

Pressure from those with vested interests, including farmers and biofuel manufacturers, plus muddled planning by decision-makers, threaten to take the country down an energy supply dead-end, said the chief executive of the Royal Society of Chemistry today. (more…)

by Steven A. Leibo, Ph.D.
Professor of International History & Politics
The Sage Colleges
International Affairs Commentator
WAMC: Northeast Public Radio
Re-posted with permission by the author

Now I know that in some circles it’s not very fashionable to admit it
but I really don’t like nature
I’d much rather curl up with a good book
or a great old movie
Star Trek keeps my feeling quite hum hum
sure I occasionally walk in the woods (more…)