While on my summer vacation, I try to isolate myself for a few weeks from the worsening global troubles that beset us all. But this year, try as I might to lose myself in light-reading thrillers and fantasies, worrisome news from the real world kept obtruding.
It was impossible to avoid newspaper and TV reports of BP’s Gulf oil spill, the Harper government’s irresponsible scrapping of the mandatory census form, the continuing economic slump, and the devastating effects of floods, forest fires, and other environmental disasters around the world.
Environment and sustainability
Halifax, Nova Scotia – It is time for Nova Scotia to focus on real energy affordability instead of the dubious and opportunistic politics of energy price increases. In a new report by the Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives-Nova Scotia (CCPA-NS) Energy Cost Politics and the Environment in Nova Scotia, energy analyst Brendan Haley looks at government’s July decision to relax mercury emissions standards on Nova Scotia Power.
On July 22nd, 2010, the Government of Nova Scotia announced that it would delay the mercury reduction standards for the provincial power utility, Nova Scotia Power. The Premier stated that he made this decision because the projected rate increase, which the utility said was necessary to meet the standard, “would have a devastating impact” on Nova Scotians.
Today the CCPA released a new report by myself and Ken Carlaw, an economist at UBC-Okanagan, that looks at industrial and employment strategies the BC government can use to transition to a sustainable economy and create a new generation of well-paying green jobs.
On July 29, 2010 Manitoba Hydro (with the approval and support of the Manitoba government) announced their preliminary preferred route selection for the Bipole III transmission line.
Heated debates are going on again in Brandon and Winnipeg about the most effective way to deal with mosquitoes. In thinking about this issue it is useful to begin with the broad historical context of mosquito control, and then to follow with a look at some recent and current research relating to the fundamental questions being asked in both cities about the repeated use of malathion.
Western cultures have long believed that we can dominate nature, and in fact we have come to see such domination as a key part of what we call “development”. As Gladwell (2001) has observed:
The devastating impacts of climate change are clear. But there are disturbing revelations about how global elites are tackling the issue. Al Gore—on one hand — promotes carbon emissions trading and green technologies as a solution, and—on the other—profits handsomely from his timely investments in those same initiatives. Infamous climate change skeptic Bjørn Lomborg recommends free market solutions to fight global poverty and disease.
Regina — The Saskatchewan office of the Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives has released a new study on the economic costs of pursuing nuclear power in Saskatchewan. "In the Red: The Green Behind Nuclear Power," authored by policy researcher Heath Packman, critically examines the economic costs that the construction of a nuclear reactor in our province would entail.