Tag Archives: development

Restoring agricultural soils for profit, biodiversity and climate resilience

Carbon dioxide emissions from fossil fuels and cement production – from 1750 to 2011 – was about 365 billion metric tonnes as carbon (GtC), with another 180 GtC from deforestation and agriculture.   Of this 545 GtC, about 240 GtC (44%) … Continue reading

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Safe, cheap and abundant energy – back to the nuclear energy future

“To provide [electricity] in today’s world, an ‘advanced reactor’ must improve over existing reactors in the following 4-core objectives.  It must produce significantly less costly, cost-competitive clean electricity, be safer, produce significantly less waste and reduce proliferation risk.  It is … Continue reading

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Failing the test of environmental conservation

I have worked as a hydrologist and environmental scientist for 30 years.  Over that time hope for environmental conservation has given way to fatalism.  Governments of all ilk have failed to reverse environmental and biodiversity decline.  There has been some … Continue reading

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Tax Carbon Pollution or Seize the Day?

“There is a tide in the affairs of men, which taken at the flood, leads on to fortune.  Omitted, all the voyage of their life is bound in shallows and in miseries.  On such a full sea are we now afloat.  And … Continue reading

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Economic growth and environmental management in a global Iriai

The Ecomodernist Manifesto published last month delivers a new and optimistic approach to development and the environment. The bottom line is that: Intensifying many human activities — particularly farming, energy extraction, forestry, and settlement — so that they use less land and interfere … Continue reading

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Food for People – Conserving and Restoring Soils

By Rob Ellison Some of the increase in atmospheric CO2 can be ascribed to a decline in soil carbon following land conversion to intensive farming methods (grazing or cropping).  The decline in soil carbon content following farming is seen in … Continue reading

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Celebrate world toilet day on November 19

By Bob Ellison Development Goal: By 2030, provide universal access to safe and affordable water and sanitation. The Copenhagen Consensus suggests 3 interventions for developing country sanitation. 1. A behavior change program to create demand for sanitation in rural areas: … Continue reading

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