Posts by: erik

Bursting in Bhutan

I’m going to bet you’ve never heard of a GLOF. I hadn’t, until last week, when I was introduced to the idea of Glacial Lake Outburst Floods, a direct impact of climate change in the Himalayas, and specifically in the tiny kingdom of Bhutan. If you’ve heard of Bhutan, it’s probably because the country measures the health of its society… read more →

New bike time

I should have bought a used bike. I know that, I do. There’s no reason to go out and buy something new when something used would have worked just fine. Other than the fact that my old ride was stolen week before last, and has probably been sold since. How’s that for a dilemma - add to the demand for… read more →

What

Part of me thinks the point of Earth Hour (Saturday, March 27, at 8:30pm) is to raise the question What's the Point? But for whatever reason, the idea of turning off the lights and non-essential electronics for an hour brings out strong emotions. In one corner are those who believe that Earth Hour is an important communal statement: up to… read more →

The climate change debate, live

Early last week, while in Toronto, I happened into a ticket to one of the Munk Debates . This series, sponsored by Canadian businessman Peter Munk and organized by a local Toronto thinker, Rudyard Griffiths, aims to explore the looming challenges of our day with good old fashioned debates. They’ve got a high reputation, so I perked up when I… read more →

Potty time

As our third child approaches his third birthday, my wife and I find ourselves contemplating how best to get him out of diapers. We've been through this drill with our two older children, once in the US and once in France, with one big difference: the social norms for "potty training" in the US suggests that it happen by about… read more →

Beat summer heat with…ice

As the temperature across the country begins to climb into prime air conditioning territory, building managers are preparing to crank up their commercial HVAC units. Because daily temperature peaks tend to coincide with daily electricity usage peaks, air conditioners put an especially heavy strain on the electrical grid. The folks at Ice Energy have a clever way to shift power… read more →

The problem with Earth Day

I'm in a bit of a funk. I've been mulling over why Earth Day isn't a bigger deal. After streaming Earth Day tweets including resolutions for a couple days, and reading them through, I think I've come to a conclusion: Earth Day doesn't work, because it stands for too much. We need to simplify. There's nothing wrong with being inclusive.… read more →

TerraPass becomes first company to list VCS project

  • March 24, 2009
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We are pleased to announce that TerraPass is the first carbon offset company to list a project validated under the Voluntary Carbon Standard (VCS) in the new APX VCS registry. This gets a bit technical, so let me explain. Since TerraPass was founded in 2004, every carbon offset we've sold has been validated using independent, third-party standards to ensure their… read more →

Join Earth Hour next Saturday, March 28 at 8:30pm local time

**Update:** headline typo has been fixed. Earth Hour falls on **Saturday**, March 28 at 8:30 PM local time. For the past few years, World Wildlife Fund has sponsored a worldwide effort to raise awareness of energy use by asking us to stop using energy for an hour. Earth Hour started in Sydney, Australia but has spread quickly to the United… read more →

Hybrid car sales rebound

With the help of Green Car Congress, I've been tracking the percent share of U.S. auto sales attributable to hybrids. Back in November I predicted that hybrids would represent more than 2% of December sales, and missed the mark. But despite the dismal overall trends in the auto industry, I'm pleased to see that for January 2009, hybrids accounted for… read more →
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