Category: Environment

Taiwan’s Bicycle Makers Love Economic Collapse

my bikeWe all know that the global market is getting shaken around right now and as “the invisible hand” rights (or bails out) the inherent failures of capitalism some people are benefiting from the stress. Bicycle manufactures are benefiting from consumers tightening their belts because bikes are a great way to save money, they also keep you fit, and are good for the environment. Yeah for bicycles!

Exports reached a record high in 2007 of 1.05 billion US dollars with 4.75 million bikes sold abroad, while 2008 looks set to break that record with the export of 2.76 million bikes totalling 635 million US dollars in the first six months, government figures showed.
There is no official data on how many bicycles are sold locally but industry watchers estimate around one million were sold in 2007 on the island of 23 million people.
“Business was booming in 2007 and this year looks to be the best,” said Jeffrey Sheu, spokesman for the world’s leading bicycle maker Giant Inc.
“Our monthly revenue hit a historical high in August and September looks like setting a new record.”
Giant’s August and September group revenue rose 27 percent and 35 percent year-on-year to 3.91 billion and 4.12 billion Taiwan dollars (120 million US and 126 million US) respectively while 2008 revenue is projected to increase by at least 25 percent to 40 billion.

Election Day in Canada – Go Vote!

Yes, it ‘s finally here! All Things Are Good Canadian readers need to make sure they vote today. If you don’t know where exactly to vote check out elections.ca. It’s not a difficult task to vote since you don’t even need to be registered.

Remember that the most important thing you do today (if not this year) is to vote for the environment.

Microwave CO2

Something that I’ve never thought about is happening in New Zealand and that’s using microwaves to store carbon in charcoal.

“The application of microwaves to charcoal making is new,” says Tim Flannery of Macquarie University in Sydney, Australia, an expert on climate change and not associated with Carbonscape. “If it increases efficiency in the charcoal-making process it could prove to be a real winner.”

The plant is months away from running at full capacity, and is currently being used to produce charcoal that can be used to fertilise soil and for academic research.

The use of charcoal as a fertiliser, or “biochar”, is well known. Nearly 500 years ago, tribes in the Amazon used to smoulder their domestic waste, and the resultant charcoal was mixed into the soil. In places in the Amazon, this terra preta, or black earth, is nearly half a metre thick.

Charcoal makes the soil more fertile by binding nutrients to itself and making them available for plants, and is extremely resistant to breakdown. “You do quite often get a very significant boost in soil fertility and water holding capacity,” says Michael Bird at the University of St Andrews, UK.

“The unknowns that remain are exactly how long [the charcoal] stays in the soil. In some circumstances it can be millions of years, or decades, depending on how it is made, and soil conditions.”

Canadian Scientist Create CO2 Scrubber

A researcher from the University of Calgary has create a machine that essentially scrubs carbon dioxide from the atmosphere. The Tech Herald explains:

The team now believes it is close to achieving that goal with the development of a relatively simple machine that can capture, or “scrub” the trace amount of CO2 present in the air at any place on the planet.
“The climate problem is too big to solve easily with the tools we have,” explained Keith, director of the Institute for Sustainable Energy, Environment and Economy’s (ISEEE) Energy and Environmental Systems Group and a professor of chemical and petroleum engineering.
“While it’s important to get started doing things we know how to do, like wind power nuclear power and ‘regular’ carbon capture and storage, it’s also vital to start thinking about radical new ideas and approaches to solving this problem.”

Climate Time Machine

Nasa and the JPL have created a climate time machine to quickly explain to policy makers the effects of climate change.

Because everybody is affected by the weather, it seems like everybody likes to improvise themselves a climate scientist. Amateur theories about global warming are a dime a dozen and, unfortunately, that can make it hard for the general public and policy makers to figure out what’s based on sound science and what has just been made up in 5 minutes by someone who doesn’t know anything about climate science.

That’s the problem that NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) is trying to help fix with Climate Time Machine. Read on for more details.