Month: August 2009

PublicVoice.tv: A Place to Examine Issues that Matter

- Adam Clare

PublicVoice.tv wants you to learn more about the world around you and share your voice. The site is a fantastic resource for some thought-provoking videos focused on public policy. I encourage you to watch at least one of their videos; it’s like TED but for public policy.

PublicVoice.tv has been created as an online source for leading edge thinking and ideas about critical public policy questions.

PublicVoice seeks to be a forum for those issues that affect us all – and will give you unfiltered access to some of the best minds of our time, providing their unique insight in areas of great policy challenge, including pro-growth economic development, food security, the future of energy, the dynamics of poverty and citizen engagement – to name only a few.

Here’s a video on public service and citizen engagement in the information age:

Fake Plastic Trees

- Adam Clare

I wonder if these fake plastic trees will look like the real thing. Researchers are advocating the use of fake trees that absorbs CO2 and turns the gas into something useful. I wonder if these fakes can be what we need all the time near highways and airports.

The “tree” uses plastic leaves that capture the carbon dioxide in a chamber. The carbon dioxide is then compressed into liquid form. The tree captures the carbon without the need for direct sunlight, which means that, unlike traditional trees, the synthetic trees can be stored in enclosed places such as barns, used anywhere, and transported from one site to another regardless of conditions.
Lackner says the captured CO2 could be used to create fuel for jet engines and cars, the two most common carbon emitters. In other cases, the CO2 could be used to enhance current production of vegetable produce.

I wonder if you’ll need a fake plastic watering can for these trees. I know that doing that would wear me out; if only I could be who the trees wanted.

The only reason I posted this is because when I read the article I couldn’t get this song out of my mind:

Kimberly-Clark and Greenpeace Agree Boreal Forests are Amazing

- Adam Clare

Kimberly-Clark (the makers of Kleenex) and Greenpeace have signed an historic agreement that pledges the protection of the Boreal forest. This is a huge victory for Greenpeace, but it’s even better for those that need the boreal forest to live – that’s you and me.

Implementing the Kimberly-Clark policy

Implementation of the policy will lead to protection of the world’s most endangered forests, increased support for sustainable forest management through Forest Stewardship Council certification and the increased use of recycled fiber in Kimberly-Clark products.

During the evolution of this policy, Kimberly-Clark stopped buying more than 325,000 tonnes of pulp a year from logging operations in the Kenogami and Ogoki Forests. The company managing these forests was unwilling to protect endangered forest areas in them and supply Kimberly-Clark with Forest Stewardship Council certified pulp.

The Boreal Forest and climate change

Protection of the Boreal Forest is crucial to world efforts to stop climate change. This forest is the largest terrestrial storehouse of carbon on the planet, storing 27 years worth of greenhouse gas emissions or 186 billion tonnes. If this carbon is released into the atmosphere it will add to the threat of catastrophic climate change.

Under the policy Kimberly-Clark has set a goal of ensuring that 100 per cent of the fibre used in its products will be from environmentally responsible sources. It will greatly increase its use of recycled fibre and fibre from forest certified to Forest Stewardship Council standards. By 2011, it will also increase the use of recycled and FSC fibre [from North America sources] to 40 per cent from 29.7 per cent in 2007. By 2012, the company will no longer use pulp from the Boreal Forest unless is it certified to the standards of the Forest Stewardship Council.

Bolivia Bans Circus Animals

- Adam Clare

In order to protect animals in the country, Bolivia has banned all circus animals. Sadly, circus animals were being abused in Bolivian circuses and even being killed once the animals were passed their prime. It’s really good to see that the government has protected the animals from further harm.

The law, which states that the use of animals in circuses “constitutes an act of cruelty”, took effect on 1 July with operators given a year to comply, according to the bill’s sponsor, Ximena Flores.

The law was proposed after an undercover investigation by the nonprofit-making London-based group Animal Defenders International (ADI) found widespread abuse in circuses operating in Bolivia.

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