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Energy [r]evolution: a sustainable world energy outlook 2015

With all the good news from the renewable power sector, the overall transition away from fossil and nuclear fuels to renewables is far too slow to combat dangerous climate change, according to this report. Introduction The good news first: the Energy [R]evolution is already happening! Since the first edition was published in 2005, costs for wind power and solar photovoltaics (Pv) have dropped dramatically and markets have grown substantially. between 2005 and the end of 2014 over 496,000 MW of new solar and wind power plants have been installed – equal to the total capacity of all coal and gas power plants in Europe! In addition 286,000 MW of hydro-, biomass- , concentrated solar- and geothermal power plants have been installed, totaling 783,000 MW of new renewable power generation connected to the grid in the past decade – enough to supply the current electricity demand of India and Africa combined.   Renewable power generation has become mainstream in recent years. Onshore wind is already the most economic power source for new capacity in a large and growing number of markets, while solar Pv is likely to follow within the next 3 to 5 years. utilities in Europe, North America and around the globe are feeling the pressure from renewables, and the old business models are starting to erode. . In Germany, where the capacity of solar Pv and wind power is equal to peak demand, utilities like RWE and E.on struggle. More and more customers generate their own power. The future business model for utilities will have to change from selling kilowatt-hours to selling energy services if they are to survive.   However, with all the good news from the renewable power sector, the overall transition away from fossil and nuclear fuels to renewables is far too slow to combat dangerous climate change. During the past decade almost as much capacity of new coal power plants has been installed as renewables: 750,000 MW. Over 80% of the new capacity has been added in China, where not only wind and solar power lead their respective global markets, but also new coal.   But there are the first positive signs that the increase in coal use is coming to an end in China. The amount of coal being burned by China has fallen for the first time this century in 2014, according to an analysis of official statistics. China’s booming coal in the last decade has been the major contributor to the fast-rising carbon emissions that drive climate change, making the first drop a significant moment

La «gran mentira» del algodón transgénico

Incluye la nota "Camisetas de algodón agroecológico y local", del Consejo Editor de la Revista Soberanía Alimentaria.La Coordinadora de Organizaciones de Agricultores y Ganaderos (COAG) y la organización ecologista Greenpeace denuncian que el algodón transgénico no trae consigo mayores beneficios para las personas que lo cultivan, tal y como algunas voces señalan. De hecho, el algodón modificado genéticamente resulta finalmente más costoso, debido al incremento del precio de la semilla respecto a las variedades convencionales, a que sigue siendo necesario aplicar productos fitosanitarios (necesidad que se incrementa con el tiempo, porque la resistencia de las plagas se hace mayor en las sucesivas campañas) y a que los rendimientos de estas variedades no muestran diferencias significativas respecto a las convencionales

Energy efficiency and renewables

The debate between exponents of 'supply side' and 'demand side' approaches to dealing with environmental problems like climate change can sometimes become polarised. At one extreme it is sometimes claimed that the potential for energy efficiency and demands reductions is so large that we hardly need to worry about the supply side. At the other extreme it is sometimes claimed that the potential for renewables is so large that we can forget about energy conservation. This paper looks at how these views stand up in the context of both short and long term sustainable energy policy and seeks a pragmatic strategic compromise

Reliability based design of fluid power pitch systems for wind turbines

This paper presents a qualitative design tool for evaluation of the risk for fluid power pitch systems. The design tool is developed with special attention to industry standard failure analysis methods and is aimed at the early phase of system design. Firstly, the concept of Fault Tree Analysis is used for systematic description of fault propagation linking failure modes to system effects. The methodology is conducted solely on a circuit diagram and functional behavior. The Failure Mode and Effects Criticality Analysis is subsequently employed to determine the failure mode risk via the Risk Priority Number. The Failure Mode and Effect Criticality Analysis is based on past research concerning failure analysis of wind turbine drive trains. Guidelines are given to select the severity, occurrence and detection score that make up the risk priority number. The usability of the method is shown in a case study of a fluid power pitch system applied to wind turbines. The results show a good agreement to recent field failure data for offshore turbines where the dominating failure modes are related to valves, accumulators and leakage. The results are further used for making design improvements to lower the overall risk of the pitch system

Marketing and compromising for sustainability:Competing orders of worth in the North Atlantic

The purpose of our paper is to propose that compromising is a constitutive characteristic of those marketing systems that entail matters of public interest or concern. In such markets, actors design compromises as they encounter criticisms of and contending justifications for the market’s products, as these refer to price, efficiency in production and use, regulatory compliance, or ecological sustainability. Tests and justifications are vital in order to determine what is valuable and by which measure. As a theory framework, the economic sociology of conventions (Boltanski and Thévenot, 2006) provides a basis for assessing these contests, compromises and justifications over the issue of worth in a marketing context. Through an ethnographic study of the regulated activities of chemicals service companies supporting the upstream petroleum industry, we assess how actors evaluate and justify the market’s products and services in this environmentally sensitive setting by means of tests drawing from different orders of worth: the green, the industrial and the market order. Our contributions show that by artful and pragmatic compromising around exchanges, actors in marketing systems can balance several conflicting orders of worth over the question of worth without needing to converge on an overriding institutional logic

Justice at Sea: Fishers’ politics and marine conservation in coastal Odisha, India

This is a paper about the politics of fishing rights in and around the Gahirmatha marine sanctuary in coastal Odisha, in eastern India. Claims to the resources of this sanctuary are politicised through the creation of a particularly damaging narrative by influential Odiya environmental actors about Bengalis, as illegal immigrants who have hurt the ecosystem through their fishing practices. Anchored within a theoretical framework of justice as recognition, the paper considers the making of a regional Odiya environmentalism that is, potentially, deeply exclusionary. It details how an argument about ‘illegal Bengalis’ depriving ‘indigenous Odiyas’ of their legitimate ‘traditional fishing rights’ derives from particular notions of indigeneity and territory. But the paper also shows that such environmentalism is tenuous, and fits uneasily with the everyday social landscape of fishing in coastal Odisha. It concludes that a wider class conflict between small fishers and the state over a sanctuary sets the context in which questions about legitimate resource rights are raised, sometimes with important effects, like when out at sea

Fes-te amic dels boscos: manual d'autoajuda: pràctiques quotidianes per millorar la teva relació personal amb els boscos

Forma part de la col·lecció: Guies d'educació ambiental; 28Podeu consultar la versió en castellà a: http://hdl.handle.net/11703/9045

Hazte amigo de los bosques: manual de autoayuda: prácticas cotidianas para mejorar tu relación personal con los bosques

Forma part de la col·lecció: Guías de educación ambiental; 28Podeu consultar la versió en català a: http://hdl.handle.net/11703/9045