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Sustainable building in China?

Check out this article in Metropolis about sustainable building in China. The country's Ministry of Construction has announced breathtakingly ambitious plans to reduce all buildings' energy use by 50% by 2010 and to use PV and other renewable energy technologies to power 80 million square meters of building space.

The article notes that, if implemented, the building program would be the most ambitious in world history.

Verdopolis

Earth Pledge is a very cool organization -- they sponsor the Farm to Table initiative on local, organic food, the Greening Gotham project pushing green roofs, and Verdopolis, a project bringing together cultural, political, and business types to discuss and plan for the "future green city."

Verdopolis is throwing a massive bash in New York City, which kicked off yesterday -- here's the agenda. We've got someone there who will be sending us some coverage, and I'll point to coverage elsewhere as I see it. Yesterday was mostly composed of a fashion show, which you can read about on Treehugger. It sounds, frankly, disappointing, and the pictures verge on gross. Apparently the big-name fashion designers who contributed still think, even at an event explicitly devoted to demonstrating the opposite, that greens are frumpy hippies.

Anyway, I'm much more interested in the green building, green healthcare, and green energy portions of the event taking place today and tomorrow. Updates to come.

Titi Twister

Naming rights for monkey species being sold to raise conservation funds A new species of titi monkey found in 2000 in Bolivia’s Madidi National Park will not be named by […]

They’ve Got Huge, Sharp … They Can Leap About … Look at the Bones!

FBI suspects eco-terrorism in latest case of something bad happening Two months ago, eco-terrorists were suspected of starting fires that destroyed or damaged 26 homes under construction near sensitive wetlands […]

They’re Not Kidding

Anxious over declining population, Italy pays citizens to procreate While many environmentalists fret about overpopulation, Italians are fretting over the opposite. Despite the stereotype of its massive Catholic clans, Italy […]

Politicized science at U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service

Speaking of Chris Mooney, he draws my attention to something that is sure to be hitting the news in a big way tomorrow: The Union of Concerned Scientists, in their words, "distributed a 42-question survey to more than 1,400 U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service biologists, ecologists, botanists and other science professionals working in Ecological Services field offices across the country to obtain their perceptions of scientific integrity within the USFWS, as well as political interference, resources and morale." Despite explicit word from USFWS administrators that they were not permitted to answer, 30 percent of the scientists did.

Many reported political interference, unwillingness to properly use the Endangered Species Act, intimidation, and a lack of proper resources. You can read a summary and find links to the full questions and answers here .

Mooney has more on a particularly hated and feared administrator, Julie MacDonald.

Expect to see more about this in coming days.

The actual for-reals last Crichton post

Readers are well aware that I was not impressed by Crichton's book or his footnotes. In the Boston Globe, Chris Mooney draws attention to another group of unimpressed folks: the very scientists Crichton cites.

New Ford hybrid SUV

Ford recently announced their second hybrid SUV, the Mariner. What I'm saying is, when's the hybrid minivan coming? There's got to be a huge market, no? Take me, for instance. As the patriarch of a growing clan of resource-sucking, overpopulation-contributing children, a minivan looms large in my future. I'd love to be able to show-off my eco-credentials while porting around my clan and their inevitable sports gear, musical instruments, academic awards, etc.

My god, I think I lost half my remaining manhood just by writing that sentence.

Anyway, if you're curious about the Mariner, the place to find more, as with all matters green and automotive, is Green Car Congress.

Update [2005-2-9 12:27:47 by Dave Roberts]: Ah, have y'all heard of this site "google"? It's quite nifty. Anyway, turns out there's already a hybrid minivan on the Japanese market (shocking, I know), and according to HybridCars.com, a hybrid Toyota Sienna may be headed for the U.S. market as early as 2007. Good to know Japanese automakers continue to kick our asses in this department.

Libby, Libby, Libby on the Liable, Liable, Liable

W. R. Grace faces stiff federal charges over asbestos at Montana mine Mining company W. R. Grace & Co. was formally charged yesterday with knowingly exposing mine employees and residents […]

More budget

Green Car Congress has a good breakdown of energy spending in Bush's budget -- think nuclear and fossil fuels -- and Geoff Hand has more.