economics

Rockefellers Got Rich From Oil, Switching to Renewables

- Adam Clare 1 Comment

As the UN climate summit continues there is good news coming from it. It’s worth noting that Canada is not part of any of this good news thanks to the climate-change denying Prime Minister Stephen Harper. The “pro-corprate” Harper is actively doing the opposite of corporations: supporting renewable energy. Even Shell (of all companies!) has called for stricter carbon regulations.

Yesterday it was announced that the Rockefeller family, who made billions from oil, have changed their mind on the planet-destryoing industry. The Rockefeller Brothers Fund is divesting from all oil companies and focusing on renewable energy sources. This means that the efforts of Global Divest-Invest has helped to transfer $50 billion dollars from oil-backing to renewable-backing.

Rockefeller Brothers Fund director Stephen Heintz said the move to divest from fossil fuels would be in line with oil tycoon John D Rockefeller’s wishes,

“We are quite convinced that if he were alive today, as an astute businessman looking out to the future, he would be moving out of fossil fuels and investing in clean, renewable energy,” Mr Heintz said in a statement.

Read more.

Green Jobs in Spain Reversed Economic Downturn

- Adam Clare 2 Comments

The Republican party in the USA has been trying to defend the drilling of oil despite an ongoing oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico, nothing new there. They have also been arguing against progressive economic reforms to make the American economy more efficient and powered by renewable sources.

Thanks to the Republican incompetence I have stumbled across good news from Spain. They tried citing a report that they thought was against green reforms, turns out those reforms have turned a region of Spain from a place of economic misery to a haven of productivity.

Sixty-five percent of the electricity used in Navarra comes from renewable sources — primarily wind — built over the last twenty years. Over those years, the region went from having the highest unemployment rate in Spain to having the lowest rate, today.

“Under President Obama’s leadership,” the report concludes, “the United States’ decisive support of renewable energies…will aid in rapidly overcoming the current economic crisis…”

Read more about Spain’s success

Safe Sex is Good for the Planet

- Adam Clare 2 Comments

Researchers at the London School of Economics have released an argument that posits that family planning is one of the best things we can do to fight climate change.

Every £4 spent on family planning over the next four decades would reduce global CO2 emissions by more than a ton, whereas a minimum of £19 would have to be spent on low-carbon technologies to achieve the same result, the research says.
The report, Fewer Emitter, Lower Emissions, Less Cost, concludes that family planning should be seen as one of the primary methods of emissions reduction. The UN estimates that 40 per cent of all pregnancies worldwide are unintended.
If these basic family planning needs were met, 34 gigatons (billion tonnes) of CO2 would be saved – equivalent to nearly 6 times the annual emissions of the US and almost 60 times the UK’s annual total.

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