China advances its offshore wind agenda

China is clearly weighing all of its options for improving its economic status and its overall environmental quality. As yesterday's post noted, that includes a heavy investment in nuclear energy -- at least for the time being. The one renewable technology that can compete with nuclear fission with regard to MW output and costs (especially when "externalities" are factored in) is wind energy.

How serious is China about wind? Well, they just jumped ahead of the United States in tapping their vast offshore wind resource. (GW)

China's first offshore wind power generator ready

China Daily
November 29, 2007

BEIJING -- China's first offshore wind power station, located in Liaodong Bay in the northeast Bohai Sea, was officially put into operation on Wednesday.

The wind power station was built by the China National Offshore Oil Corp (CNOOC), the country's largest offshore oil producer, with an investment of 40 million yuan ($5.4 million).

It kicked off trial operation on November 8, and has generated 200,000 kilowatt-hours of electricity by November 26.

The generating unit was fixed to a jacket structure of the CNOOC's Suizhong 36-1 oil field, which is 70 kilometers offshore in the Bohai Sea, with a five-meter-long submarine cable linking the unit with the central platform of the oil filed for power supply.

"This is the first wind power station in the world designed for power supply of offshore oil and gas fields," said Zhou Shouwei, CNOOC's deputy general manager.

The unit is expected to reach an annual output of 4.4 million kilowatt-hours, which is equal to saving 1,100 tons of diesel oil annually and also the reduction of 3,500 tons of carbon dioxide and 11 tons of sulfur dioxide, according to Zhou.

The Chinese government has been promoting the use of renewable energy, including wind power and solar power, amid efforts to shift from heavy reliance on coal consumption.

China's installed capacities of wind power reached 2.3 million kilowatt-hours in 2006, and is expected to hit 5 million by the end of 2007.

The country's installed capacities of wind power are set to reach 30 million kilowatt-hours by 2020, according to the government plan.

China's offshore wind power capacities are almost three times that of onshore capacities, said Wang Jingquan, an academician with the Chinese Academy of Sciences.

Can nuclear energy fuel sustainable development?

China's choices really are few if it intends to fuel its ambitious economic development agenda without destroying its own local environment and the global commons as well. In order to achieve these twin objectives the two primary energy options available to it are renewable energy and nuclear fission.

But is the Nuclear option truly sustainable? Nicolas Sarkozy, President of France (which depends on nuclear plants for about 80 percent of its electricity) and Anne Lauvergeon (above), chief executive of France's nuclear industry giant Areva say it is. Moreover, he's determined to convince China that this is so. (GW)

Sarkozy Says China Must Commit to `Sustainable Development'

By Francois de Beaupuy
Bloomberg.com
November 27, 2007

Nov. 27 (Bloomberg) -- French President Nicolas Sarkozy said China must help build a global consensus to curb greenhouse gas emissions, adding France will seek European Union tariffs on imports from nations without binding goals to cut pollution.

"We absolutely must halve global emissions of greenhouse gases by 2050,'' Sarkozy said in a speech at the Tsinghua University in Beijing today. "China must commit to sustainable development.''

The European Union wants to curb greenhouse-gas emissions by at least 20 percent by 2020, compared with 1990 levels, to help keep global temperatures from rising 2 degrees Celsius. China insists it and other developing nations be given more leeway to emit greenhouse gases as they need to consume energy to generate growth and reduce poverty.

"I will defend the principle of a carbon compensation mechanism at the borders of the European Union toward countries that wouldn't adopt binding rules to reduce greenhouse gas emissions,'' the French president said on the last day of his three-day state visit in China. "It wouldn't be fair that European manufacturers would be penalized'' by unilateral EU anti-pollution commitments.

Environment ministers from 80 countries will meet in December in Bali, Indonesia, to discuss an agreement on climate change to succeed the emissions-limiting Kyoto Protocol, which expires in 2012.

`Differentiated Responsibility'

France approves the principle of "differentiated responsibility'' in efforts to curb climate change, Sarkozy said, echoing the position expressed by China. Still, he added "Your growth can't be at the expense of the environment,'' and "we are at the edge of what's bearable.''

China is poised to surpass the U.S. this year as the biggest emitter of carbon dioxide and other climate-altering greenhouse gases.

"China will invest'' to curb carbon dioxide emissions "because it's already facing phenomena that endanger its development and health: air and water pollution; accelerated desertification and rising waters tomorrow,'' the French president said. "China must set an example.''

Sarkozy and Chinese President Hu Jintao yesterday signed an agreement to cooperate in efforts to combat climate change, while Paris-based Areva SA signed an 8 billion euro ($11.9 billion) agreement to build nuclear reactors in the Asian nation. China plans to build as many as 26 reactors by 2020 as it turns to atomic energy to cut pollution and reliance on oil and coal.

Inconvenient solutions

Thanks to my friend Barbara for turning me on to this op-ed from last week's Washington Post. It is an eloquent and timely reminder that if we're serious about addressing the climate challenge (and we sure as hell better be) there's no substitute for vision, courage, commitment and -- most of all -- hard work.

The truth is that what we need to do to avoid the greatest threat to civilization may not be easy or convenient. Perhaps most important of all, many of the solutions probably won't fit neatly into our preconceived political/ideological frameworks -- or timeframes. (GW)

Going Green? Easy Doesn't Do It

By Michael Maniates
Washington Post
November 22, 2007

Thanksgiving nicely focuses our attention on things of lasting importance: family, friends, community, a rich harvest. None of these blessings come without cost or sacrifice. Today, then, we might consider what we must give of ourselves to preserve such abundance in the face of increasing climatic instability.

One needn't ponder this question in a vacuum. Several best-sellers offer advice about what we must ask of ourselves and one another. Their titles suggest that we needn't break much of a sweat: "It's Easy Being Green," "The Lazy Environmentalist," or even "The Green Book: The Everyday Guide to Saving the Planet One Simple Step at a Time."

Although each offers familiar advice ("reuse scrap paper before recycling" or "take shorter showers"), it's what's left unsaid by these books that's intriguing. Three assertions permeate the pages: (1) We should look for easy, cost-effective things to do in our private lives as consumers, since that's where we have the most power and control; these are the best things to do because (2) if we all do them the cumulative effect of these individual choices will be a safe planet; which is fortunate indeed because (3) we, by nature, aren't terribly interested in doing anything that isn't private, individualistic, cost-effective and, above all, easy.

This glorification of easy isn't limited to the newest environmental self-help books. The Web sites of the big U.S. environmental groups, the Environmental Protection Agency and even the American Association for the Advancement of Science offer markedly similar lists of actions that tell us we can change the world through our consumer choices, choices that are economic, simple, even stylish. Al Gore himself isn't immune. His recent Live Earth concert featured a who's-who lineup of celebrities who said that if we all do our little bit to recycle and conserve -- the simple things, mind you, because that's all we'll need (translation: that's all they think we'll go for) -- we can together rescue the world for our children and grandchildren.

Never has so little been asked of so many at such a critical moment.

The hard facts are these: If we sum up the easy, cost-effective, eco-efficiency measures we should all embrace, the best we get is a slowing of the growth of environmental damage. That's hardly enough: Avoiding the worst risks of climate change, for instance, may require reducing U.S. carbon emissions by 80 percent in the next 30 years while invoking the moral authority such reductions would confer to persuade China, India and other booming nations to embrace similar restraint. Obsessing over recycling and installing a few special light bulbs won't cut it. We need to be looking at fundamental change in our energy, transportation and agricultural systems rather than technological tweaking on the margins, and this means changes and costs that our current and would-be leaders seem afraid to discuss. Which is a pity, since Americans are at their best when they're struggling together, and sometimes with one another, toward difficult goals.

Throughout our history it has been the knotty, vexing challenges, and leaders who speak frankly about them, that have fired our individual and communal imagination, creativity and commitment. Paul Revere didn't race through the streets of Middlesex County hawking a book on "The Lazy Revolutionary." Franklin Roosevelt didn't mobilize the country's energies by listing 10 easy ways to oppose fascism. And it's unlikely that Martin Luther King Jr.'s drafts of his "I Have a Dream" speech or his "Letter From Birmingham Jail" imagined a practical politics of change rooted in individualistic, consumer-centered actions.

This Thanksgiving, the greatest environmental problem confronting us isn't melting ice, faltering rain, or flattening oil supplies and rising gasoline prices. Rather, it's that when Americans ask, "What can I do to make a difference?" we're treated like children by environmental elites and political leaders too timid to call forth the best in us or too blind to that which has made us a great nation.

Surely we must do the easy things: They slow the damage and themselves become enabling symbols of empathy for future generations. But we cannot permit our leaders to sell us short. To stop at "easy" is to say that the best we can do is accept an uninspired politics of guilt around a parade of uncoordinated individual action. What of the power and exhilaration that comes from working with others toward bold possibilities for the future? What of present sacrifice for future gain?

The time for easy is over. We're grown-ups who understand the necessity of hard work and difficult choices. We're ready for frank talk about how we best confront -- in ways rewarding, confusing, creative and hard -- the planetary emergency before us.

The writer is a professor of political science and environmental science at Allegheny Collegein Meadville, Pa.

Could termites hold a key to viable ethanol production?

What better authority to consult about breaking down cellulose for the purpose of making ethanol than the termite? Actually to be more precise -- it's the plethora of microbes living within the guts of termites who are the real experts here.

These tiny creatures may be able to help us understand how to produce ethanol in ways that address many of the energetic/economic concerns surrounding its production. Questions surrounding the ecology of ethanol may, however, remain. (GW)

Termite Guts Could Boost Ethanol Efficiency

A metagenomic study could suggest ways to make cellulosic ethanol.

By Emily Singer
MIT Technology Review
November 23, 2007

A massive genomic study of the microbes living within the termite gut has identified close to 1,000 possible enzymes that break down wood. The plethora of cellulose-digesting proteins could shed light on the insects' renowned wood-eating capacity and suggest cheaper, more efficient methods for generating cellulosic ethanol.

"The hard part [in producing cellulosic ethanol] is obtaining the metabolic intermediates from things like wood, but that's the problem the termites have solved," says Frances Arnold, a scientist at Caltech in Pasadena who was not involved in the research. "This paper provides an explosion of information about the genes involved in wood degradation in the termite."

Cellulose is a fibrous complex carbohydrate that makes up plant cell walls. Biofuels made from cellulosic biomass, including cornstalks, woodchips, perennial grasses, and weeds such as switchgrass, could provide an alternative to corn-derived ethanol, which requires a large amount of energy to produce. However, breaking down cellulose into simple sugars that can be fermented into ethanol is currently a complex, inefficient, and expensive process. Scientists are searching for new enzymes that can more efficiently break down the hardy molecule and allow the production process to compete with corn-based ethanol.

In the new study, Jared Leadbetter, a microbiologist at Caltech, and his colleagues collected Nasutitermes termites from Costa Rica and isolated DNA from the microbial contents of part of their digestive tract. Scientists had previously theorized that these termites' wood-digesting powers come primarily from the microbes that live in their gut. Using a metagenomics approach (see Metagenomics Defined), researchers sequenced and analyzed the genomic material from many different types of bacteria, searching for particular sequences known from other studies to be linked to the ability to break down cellulose. They identified nearly 1,000 candidate genes for glycohydrolases--enzymes that break down complex plant carbohydrates, such as cellulose.

Leadbetter and others will use the findings to figure out how termites, which derive virtually all their nutrients from wood, break down the material so efficiently. "Termites have been turning wood into their own biofuel for 200 million years," says Leadbetter. "How does the system dismantle and degrade wood? If there's any hope of engineering a system to make products we want, we need a better understanding of the system and take the best components for what we want to do."

The next step will be to figure out exactly what the different enzymes do. "The functional analysis is really important," says Arnold. "Are these better cellulases than the ones we have? Are there mixtures that can be useful?" One of the biggest hurdles in developing an efficient method of cellulosic ethanol production, says Arnold, is getting access to the solid cellulose matrix, a process that requires specific mixtures of enzymes.

The project, whose paper was published today in the journal Nature, was a collaboration between Caltech, the Department of Energy's Joint Genome Institute in Walnut Creek, CA, and Verenium, an industrial enzyme and biofuel company in Cambridge, MA. Verenium is currently testing the wood-digesting ability of some of the newly identified microbial enzymes, as well as searching for combinations of enzymes that work together synergistically. Geoff Hazlewood, senior vice president of research at the company, says the microbial genes from the termite gut already appear to have several enzymes from a class known to be particularly powerful, as well as a wide variety of accessory enzymes necessary for the digestion process.

The termite gut microbial genome is likely to contain more genomic bounty. The researchers found 34 groups of genes with unknown function, including one specific sequence identified in a dozen other cellulose-digesting bacteria. Says Arnold, "Maybe we haven't even found the biggest surprise yet."

The remarkable rise of wind energy

For reasons that, I find it difficult to understand (given the current state of the environment), society continues to set a higher standard for evaluating wind energy technology compared to other energy sources be they fossil fuel, renewable or nuclear.

Wind energy has clearly come of age technologically. That is not the same thing as saying it is perfect. No technology is.

Wind energy is certainly clean and renewable. That does not mean that it is free of any environmental impacts.

The wind resource is clearly variable. But there may be ways of addressing that challenge with strategical wind farm layouts based on taking the complimentary of adjacent meteorological zones into consideration (see past posts on Airtricity's "Supergrid"). By the way, the offshore wind resources of the United States (unlike the inland wind corridor stretching from Texas to the Dakotas) are in proximate to the major load centers along the coast.

Bottom line: wind energy is capable of delivering clean, renewable, indigenous energy into the global electric system today and prices that are competitive with conventional (polluting) sources. Given the conclusions outlined in the final report of the International Panel on Climate Change (IPPC), its time to acknowledge the important and effective role wind energy can and must play in addressing global climate change -- as imperfect as that may be. (GW)

Sweden Turns to a Promising Power Source, With Flaws

By Mark Lander
New York Times
November 23, 2007

MALMO, Sweden — Steadying himself on the heaving foredeck of an inspection ship recently, his face flecked by spray, Arne Floderus pronounced it a good day for his new offshore wind farm.

A 30-mile-an-hour wind was twirling the fingerlike blades of a turbine 380 feet above his head. Around him, a field of turbines rotated in a synchronized ballet that, when fully connected to an electrical grid, would generate enough power to light 60,000 nearby houses.

“We’ve created a new landmark,” said Mr. Floderus, the project manager of the $280 million wind park, one of the world’s largest, which was built by the Swedish power company Vattenfall.

The park, in a shallow sound between Sweden and Denmark, testifies to the remarkable rise of wind energy — no longer a quirky alternative favored by environmentalists in Denmark and Germany, but a mainstream power source used in 26 nations, including the United States.

Yet Sweden’s gleaming wind park is entering service at a time when wind energy is coming under sharper scrutiny, not just from hostile neighbors, who complain that the towers are a blot on the landscape, but from energy experts who question its reliability as a source of power.

For starters, the wind does not blow all the time. When it does, it does not necessarily do so during periods of high demand for electricity. That makes wind a shaky replacement for more dependable, if polluting, energy sources like oil, coal and natural gas. Moreover, to capture the best breezes, wind farms are often built far from where the demand for electricity is highest. The power they generate must then be carried over long distances on high-voltage lines, which in Germany and other countries are strained and prone to breakdowns.

In the United States, one of the areas most suited for wind turbines is the central part of the country, stretching from Texas through the northern Great Plains — far from the coastal population centers that need the most electricity.

In Denmark, which pioneered wind energy in Europe, construction of wind farms has stagnated in recent years. The Danes export much of their wind-generated electricity to Norway and Sweden because it comes in unpredictable surges that often outstrip demand.

In 2003, Ireland put a moratorium on connecting wind farms to its electricity grid because of the strains that power surges were putting on the network; it has since begun connecting them again.

In the United States, proposals to build large wind parks in the Atlantic off Long Island and off Cape Cod, Mass., have run into stiff opposition from local residents on aesthetic grounds.

As wind energy has matured as an industry, its image has changed — from a clean, even elegant, alternative to fossil fuels to a renewable energy source with advantages and drawbacks, like any other.

“The environmental benefits of wind are not as great as its champions claim,” said Euan C. Blauvelt, research director of ABS Energy Research, an independent market research firm in London. “You’ve still got to have backup sources of power, like coal-fired plants.”

Mr. Blauvelt publishes an annual report on wind energy in which he discusses its flaws. People in the industry would accuse him of propagating myths, he said. Now, the criticism is more tempered.

“One of the big problems with wind is that people tend to get hyped up about it, very emotional,” Mr. Blauvelt said. “The difference is that the arguments are becoming more rational.”

None of this is to say that wind power has peaked. On the contrary, Mr. Blauvelt figures the industry is adding capacity at a five-year compound annual growth rate of 26.3 percent. That is faster than hydroelectric power in its early days and twice the recent growth rate of nuclear energy.

The United States, which is considered a pioneer in wind, added more generating capacity in 2006 than any year on record. With 11,575 megawatts, the United States is the world’s third largest wind country, after Germany and Spain, and it is adding more capacity than any other.

Among new countries with significant wind capacity are Britain, Canada, Italy, Japan and the Netherlands.

“What we’re seeing is a second wave of countries, which are starting to invest more heavily,” said Christian Kjaer, the chief executive of the European Wind Energy Association in Brussels.

He said wind energy would benefit from two parallel trends: rising oil prices and a global push to tax carbon-dioxide emissions. “It’s very good way of hedging against volatile oil prices and potentially volatile carbon costs,” Mr. Kjaer said.

In Germany, where 20,000 wind turbines generate 5 percent of the electricity, advocates say wind will be critical to meeting the government’s goal of generating at least 20 percent of all power from renewable methods by 2020. But the industry’s growth is slowing for a variety of reasons.

Germany is running out of places to put the turbines because of restrictions on the location and height of the devices. And rising raw material prices are making wind farms more expensive to build.

“Under the current circumstances, Germany’s climate protection targets are not achievable,” said Hermann Albers, the president of the German Wind Energy Association.

Open land is not a problem in the United States, but wind parks have faced resistance, particularly in scenic locales near the shore. A private developer, Cape Wind, wants to erect 130 turbines in Nantucket Sound, off Cape Cod. It has drawn protests from some well-connected locals, including the Kennedy family.

Cape Wind said it hoped to obtain all the necessary permits by next year, which would enable it to be up and running by 2011. “It’s been a long road,” said Mark Rodgers, a spokesman for the developer.

For a socially conscious society like Sweden, wind turbines exert a fashionable appeal.

Today, they account for less than 1 percent of Sweden’s electricity generation. But the government wants to increase annual wind power production to 10 terawatt hours, or 10 trillion watt hours, by 2015 from less than 1 terawatt hour now (the park off Malmo will produce a third of a terawatt hour).

Vattenfall hopes to develop an even larger off-shore park in the Baltic Sea, between Sweden and Germany. In all, the government has identified 49 sites that are suitable for wind parks.

Sweden has historically invested little in wind projects because it has two reliable sources of energy, nuclear and hydro, which each supply roughly half its power. And because hydro is renewable, Sweden already does well on the environmental balance sheet.

But these energy sources have their vulnerabilities: hydro, to low water levels; nuclear, to technical breakdowns. The Swedish government has also pledged not to build any new nuclear power plants.

“One of the key energy priorities for Sweden is to establish a third leg of energy production,” said Anders Nyberg, political adviser in the Ministry of Enterprise, Energy and Communications.

Of course, Sweden does not need to build wind parks to get wind power. It could simply buy more surplus wind power from Denmark, which it uses, as does Norway, to pump underground water into elevated reservoirs. The water is later released during periods of peak electric demand to drive hydroelectric stations.

In this way, hydro acts as a form of storage for wind energy — addressing one of wind power’s biggest shortcomings. Sweden’s strength in hydro makes it a good candidate for greater development of wind power, according to analysts.

Sweden is subsidizing wind power through “green” certificates, which favor the use of renewable energy. The small extra cost is passed on to consumers.

While Swedes staunchly support wind energy, they are as susceptible to the not-in-my-backyard opposition as people elsewhere. For years, residents opposed the wind farm near Malmo, known as Lillgrund, particularly after the builders obtained permission to raise the height of the towers. But the campaign to block the project failed.

Still, Mr. Floderus said the process took far too long, and Vattenfall is urging the government to speed up the approvals next time.

As his inspection ship followed a zigzag course through a field of 48 turbines, Mr. Floderus pointed to Malmo’s two other landmarks, visible in the distance: Oresund Bridge, a 10-mile engineering marvel that connects Malmo with Copenhagen, and the Turning Torso, an eye-popping 54-story skyscraper designed by the Spanish architect Santiago Calatrava.

Soon, Mr. Floderus said, the whirling blades of the Lillgrund wind turbines would take their place alongside those landmarks as symbols of the modern age.

Sarah Plass contributed reporting from Frankfurt.

Twelve degrees of Bob Dylan

Last Thanksgiving I posted an editorial from the New York Times that commented on the mythic status of Bob Dylan:

"No one living has a better appreciation for the sneaky and unnerving power of American myth than Bob Dylan. In the fall of 1975, the United States was gripped by what the playwright Sam Shepard, who had been hired to work on a film about the tour, called “Bicentennial madness.” With 1976 fast approaching, America was obsessed as never before with its origins, and as Mr. Dylan knew perfectly well, there was no better place to launch his tour than the mythic landing ground of the Pilgrims.

Mr. Shepard did not end up contributing much to the film, but he did publish a log chronicling the tour’s first six weeks. Included in the book is a bizarre photo showing Mr. Dylan and several fellow musicians peering over the side of the Mayflower II, a reproduction of a 17th-century vessel berthed at Plimoth Plantation. A stiff breeze is blowing, and two of the party are desperately hanging on to the brims of their cowboy hats as the front man of the Byrds, Roger McGuinn, speaks on a huge, ’70s-style portable phone."

This year, on the eve of Thanksgiving, a new Dylan-inspired movie called "I'm Not There" was released. Directed by Todd Haynes, it has been designated a Critic's Pick by the film reviewers of The Times. It sounds as if Mr. Haynes has exercised all 12 degrees of freedom in creating this work. (GW)

Another Side of Bob Dylan, and Another, and Another ...

By A. O. Scott
The New York Times
November 21, 2007

From Andy Warhol to Lonelygirl15, modern media culture thrives on the traffic in counterfeit selves. In this world the greatest artist will also be, almost axiomatically, the biggest fraud. And looking back over the past 50 years or so, it is hard to find anyone with a greater ability to synthesize authenticity — to give his serial hoaxes and impersonations the ring of revealed and esoteric truth — than Bob Dylan.

It’s not just that Robert Zimmerman, a Jewish teenager growing up in Eisenhower-era Minnesota, borrowed a name from a Welsh poet and the singing style of an Oklahoma Dust Bowl troubadour and bluffed his way into the New York folk scene. That was chutzpah. What followed was genius — the elaboration of an enigmatic, mercurial personality that seemed entirely of its moment and at the same time connected to a lost agrarian past. From the start, Mr. Dylan has been singularly adept at channeling and recombining various strands of the American musical and literary vernacular, but he has often seemed less like an interpreter of those traditions than like their incarnation.

His persona has been as inclusive as Walt Whitman’s and as unsettlingly splintered as that of Herman Melville’s Confidence Man. Vulnerable as Mr. Dylan is to misunderstanding (“I couldn’t believe after all these years/You didn’t know me better than that” in “Idiot Wind”), he also actively solicits it (“Something is happening here/But you don’t know what it is/Do you, Mr. Jones?” in “Ballad of a Thin Man”). So it is only fitting that Todd Haynes, in “I’m Not There,” his incandescent rebus of a movie inspired by Mr. Dylan’s life and music, has chosen to multiply puzzles and paradoxes rather than solve them. Not for nothing does one of Mr. Haynes’s stories take place in a town called Riddle.

Among its many achievements, Mr. Haynes’s film hurls a Molotov cocktail through the facade of the Hollywood biopic factory, exploding the literal-minded, anti-intellectual assumptions that guide even the most admiring cinematic explorations of artists’ lives. Rather than turn out yet another dutiful, linear chronicle of childhood trauma and grown-up substance abuse, Mr. Haynes has produced a dizzying palimpsest of images and styles, in which his subject appears in the form of six different people.

Not one is named Bob Dylan (or Robert Zimmerman), though all of them evoke actual and invented points in the Dylan cosmos: Billy the Kid, Woody Guthrie, the Mighty Quinn. They’re not all musicians: One is a poet named Arthur Rimbaud; another is a movie star.

These divergent visions of Dylan are played by two different Australians (Heath Ledger and Cate Blanchett); a young British actor (Ben Whishaw); a prepubescent African-American named Marcus Carl Franklin; Richard Gere; and the most recent Batman. Their stories collide and entwine, adding up to an experience that is as fascinating and inexhaustible as listening to “Blood on the Tracks” or “The Basement Tapes.”

It is unusual to see a masterwork emerge from one artist’s absorption with the work of another, though Mr. Haynes came close with “Far From Heaven,” his 2002 homage to the director Douglas Sirk. And while “I’m Not There” is immersed in Dylanology, it is more than a document of scholarly preoccupation or fan obsession.

Devotees of Dylan lore will find their heads swimming with footnotes, as they track Mr. Haynes’s allusions not only to Mr. Dylan’s own music but also to the extensive secondary literature it has inspired, from books by David Hajdu and Greil Marcus to films, including D. A. Pennebaker’s 1967 documentary, “Don’t Look Back,” some of which Mr. Haynes remakes shot for shot.

But the film is anything but dry, and like Mr. Dylan’s best songs, it is at once teasingly arcane and bracingly plain-spoken. Mr. Haynes, switching styles, colors, film stocks and editing rhythms with unnerving ease (and with the crucial help of Jay Rabinowitz and Edward Lachman, the editor and the director of photography), has held his cerebral and his visceral impulses in perfect balance. “I’m Not There” respects the essential question Mr. Dylan’s passionate followers have always found themselves asking — What does it mean? — without forgetting that the counter-question Mr. Dylan has posed is more challenging and, for a movie, more important: How does it feel?

As you watch the mid-’60s renegade folk singer Jude Quinn — embodied in Ms. Blanchett’s hunched, skinny frame and photographed in silvery Nouvelle Vague black and white — pinball through swinging London, subsisting on amphetamines, Camel straights and gnomic talk, it feels like a pop earthquake. The ’60s, man! As Mr. Ledger’s character and his wife (Charlotte Gainsbourg) meet, marry and fall apart, it feels like the heartbreaking aftermath of a moment of high promise and possibility. (That would be the ’70s.)

Riding the rails in 1959 with a pint-size, wisecracking hobo who calls himself Woody Guthrie (Mr. Franklin) and saddling up with Mr. Gere’s Billy the Kid in Riddle, Mo., in the 19th century, you feel a piercing nostalgia for a pastoral America that probably existed only in legend. With Christian Bale, playing a star of the Greenwich Village coffeehouse scene who resurfaces as a Pentecostal minister in Los Angeles years later, you experience a prickle of confusion and morbid curiosity. As it all unfolds, there may be other feelings too, including awe at the quality of the performances and occasional exasperation at Mr. Haynes’s sprawling, hectic virtuosity.

Still, I would not subtract a minute of this movie, or wish it any different. Nor do I anticipate being finished with “I’m Not There” anytime soon, since, like “Subterranean Homesick Blues,” it invites endless interpretation, criticism and elaboration. Instead of proposing a definitive account of Bob Dylan’s career, Mr. Haynes has used that career as fuel for a wide-ranging (and, if you’ll permit me, freewheeling) historical inquiry into his own life and times. In spite of its title, “I’m Not There” is a profoundly, movingly personal film, passionate in its engagement with the mysteries of the recent past.

“Live in your own time.” That’s the advice young “Woody Guthrie” hears from a motherly woman who offers him a hot meal and a place to sleep. It’s sensible advice — he’s daydreaming of the Depression in the middle of the space age — but also useless. It’s not as if anyone has a choice. To slog through the present requires no particular wit, vision or art. But a certain kind of artist will comb through the old stuff that’s lying around — the tall tales and questionable memories, the yellowing photographs and scratched records — looking for glimpses of a possible future. Though there’s a lot of Bob Dylan’s music in “I’m Not There,” Mr. Haynes is not simply compiling golden oldies. You hear familiar songs, but what you see is the imagination unleashed — the chimes of freedom flashing.

“I’m Not There” is rated R (Under 17 requires accompanying parent or adult guardian). It has sex, swearing, brief violence and drug use.

I’M NOT THERE

Opens today nationwide.

Directed by Todd Haynes; written by Mr. Haynes and Oren Moverman, based on a story by Mr. Haynes; director of photography, Edward Lachman; edited by Jay Rabinowitz; production designer, Judy Becker; produced by James D. Stern, John Sloss, John Goldwyn and Christine Vachon; released by the Weinstein Company. In Manhattan at Film Forum, 209 West Houston Street, west of Avenue of the Americas, South Village. Running time: 2 hours 15 minutes.

WITH: Christian Bale (Jack/Pastor John), Cate Blanchett (Jude Quinn), Marcus Carl Franklin (Woody Guthrie), Richard Gere (Billy), Heath Ledger (Robbie), Ben Whishaw (Arthur Rimbaud), Kris Kristofferson (Narrator), Charlotte Gainsbourg (Claire), David Cross (Allen Ginsberg), Bruce Greenwood (Keenan Jones/Pat Garrett), Julianne Moore (Alice Fabian), Michelle Williams (Coco Rivington), Richie Havens (Old Man Arvin), Peter Friedman (Morris Bernstein), Alison Folland (Grace), Yolonda Ross (Angela Reeves), Kim Gordon (Carla Hendricks), Mark Camacho (Norman), Joe Cobden (Sonny) and Kristen Hager (Mona).

EU aims to be world's best in developing clean energy technologies

European Union leaders see the opportunity to make green by being green and they want to be the world leaders in developing clean energy technologies. The first step in achieving that goal is to realize the potential and go after it. In that regard the EU is leagues ahead of the United States.

This should come as no surprise. U.S. oil barons are digging in deep for a final standoff. They don't intend to give in to the greens -- that is not until they figure out how they can command and control the technology and the profits. By that time, the EU will already have established itself as the primary supplier of the next generation of offshore wind turbines and other clean energy technologies.

The EU has seen the light and felt the heat. The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Changfe (IPCC) has issued its final Synthesis Report and it is not the least bit optimistic about humanity's prospects for survival if we stubbornly continue down the path of "more of the same".

The EU has a plan designed to turn things around. Is it sound? Is it practical? Will it work? Who knows, but it sure beats the one the U.S. has yet to develop. (GW)

EU seeks 'world leadership' in energy technologies

EurActiv
November 20, 2007

On 22 November, the Commission will publish a Strategic Energy Technology Plan (SET Plan) to help the EU reach targets for renewable energies uptake and CO2 emissions reductions. Brussels hopes the plan will boost a 'clean' technology sector plagued by high costs, market barriers and under-investment.

Background:

Technologies are seen as a key part of the development of an Energy Policy for Europe, officially launched with the Commission's publication of a 10 January energy and climate 'package' that was endorsed by EU leaders in March.

A SET Plan communication, presented as part of the January package, argues that "the European Union and the rest of the world have not reacted quickly enough to increase the use of low-carbon energy technologies or to improve energy efficiency" in order to deal with the challenges of rising oil prices and greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions.

Issues:

The purpose of the SET Plan will be to "accelerate the availability of energy technologies and at the same time engage European industry in the process so that it can gain world leadership in this sector", the Commission said in a 19 November statement.

Citing "accumulated under-investment due to cheap oil", the Commission laments that the "energy technology and innovation process has structural weaknesses, such as long lead times for (bringing) new technologies to mass market, locked-in infrastructure investments, diverse market incentives and network connection challenges".

Energy R&D funding and private sector investments have declined across the EU since 1991, according to the Commission, which will use development efforts in the US and Japan as a comparison to EU efforts in a 'technology map' to be included in the SET Plan. The purpose of the map will be to indicate "where we are now and what we can expect in the future" in terms of energy technology development.

While it is not yet certain what the SET Plan will contain in detail, the Commission points to the potential of 14 energy technologies and the need for a long term policy framework.

Renewables, such as solar and wind, are listed along with nuclear and 'decarbonised' fossil fuel power generation for their short term potential. Fusion energy, hydrogen, fuel cells and 'new generation' nuclear reactors are listed as part of a long-term vision that will require significant innovation to reduce costs and facilitate market uptake, according to the press release.

In its January communication, the Commission also indicated that "creating the framework conditions and incentives for the development and take-up of energy technologies is a matter of public policy", and proposed a number of national and European-level measures, including:

• EU research funds and favourable financing backed by the European Investment Bank (EIB);
• EU legislative instruments that 'pull' demand for technologies - these include targets, minimum requirements, emissions trading, labelling, green certificates, etc.; and;
• increased coordination of research and education efforts, including through the European Institute of Technology (EIT).

The annex of the communication contains several 'key future technology options', including geothermal, carbon capture and storage (CCS - see a recent EurActiv related news) and ocean energy.

And a number of technology 'success stories' are highlighted by the Commission in its 19 November press release: the wave dragon offshore wave energy converter in Denmark, the Sol Air Project that convers solar thermal energy to heat water, the CASTOR carbon sequestration project and the NULIFE nuclear research project.

Latest & next steps:

• 22 Nov. 2007: Commission to present Strategic Energy Technology Plan (SET Plan).
• March 2008: SET Plan, including financing options, to be discussed at Spring European Council.
  

In Cairo necessity is the mother of recycling

News that the World Wildlife Fund and the Global Footprint Network have both concluded that Cuba is the only nation in the world that is successfully achieving sustainability surprises many westerners. Equally surprising is the fact that Brazil has become the first nation to successfully wean itself from foreign oil. So many will no doubt raise their eyebrows when they learn that Cairo is one of the world's leading recyclers.

Cuba's embracing of sustainable practices is as much a product of necessity as ideology. The U.S. trade embargo against Castro and the fall of the Soviet Union being two major driving forces. Political and economic realities (in this case the economic emergence of China) are also the source of Cairo's obsession with using, repairing and reusing material objects of all kinds as often as possible. (GW)

The Unintentional Recyclers of Cairo

By Anna Johnson
The Washington Post
Thursday, November 18, 2007

CAIRO, Egypt -- In advanced countries, someone whose cell phone breaks down or becomes outdated usually tosses it and gets a new, fancier model. Ditto for the DVD player, Sony PlayStation, and even radios and watches.

Not so in the developing world. Here in Cairo, whole side streets and alleys are packed with electronics repairmen laboriously fixing circuits, keypads and compact disc lenses -- charging around $5 for a standard repair.

As recycling has become the craze across the West, Egyptians have continued to reuse almost everything, recycling not as a fad but as a necessity.

Tiny repair shops are not unique to Cairo _ they are a way of life for cities in Africa, Asia and elsewhere where people cannot afford to buy a new electronics device every time something breaks down.

But even Egypt is slowly transforming into a disposable goods society as cheap electronics arrive from China, causing some Cairo repairmen to fear their generations-old shops _ and the informal recycling industry they support _ won't be around forever.

"The next generation won't take over because China is flooding the market with cheap stuff," said repairman Osama Farouk. "They will buy new instead of getting it repaired, even if it is poor quality."

El-Attar Street in downtown Cairo, where Farouk works, is probably the most famous repair area in this sprawling city of nearly 20 million people. The two-block street is crammed with workers fixing almost everything _ from blenders to boom boxes, cell phones, video game players, and even antique phones and radios.

Stereos blast Arabic pop music, and scooters swerve past the repairmen whose shops consist of a chair, tools, spare parts and sometimes a small wooden or glass stand set along the street.

Farouk works in front of a wall full of used circuit boards at the north entrance of El-Attar. The 35-year-old, second-generation repairman prefers Japanese brands and charges about $9 for the typical DVD lens repair. The quality of his work keeps customers coming back, he says.

On Fridays he heads to the nearby Souk el-Gomaa, a haven for small electronic parts and stolen goods. Often, the repairmen buy not just parts but the entire product _ only to disassemble it for its components.

"We buy everything old. So if you have a cassette player you don't want, you can bring it here and we'll buy it," Farouk said.

Farther down El-Attar Street, Hassan el-Turki sits in front of shelves packed with various telephones, from current office sets to old rotary phones -- even a 1920s Ericsson black model.

"I love the old phones. The new ones are not as well made and won't be working 80 years from now," the second-generation repairman said.

But when asked if they feel they are helping Egypt's environment by reusing electronic parts, Farouk and the other repairmen seem confused by the question. For them, their business is all about money _ not cutting back on landfill waste.

Salah el Haggar, a mechanical engineer at the American University in Cairo, said poverty drives the developing world's repair industry. In Egypt, for example, more than 20 percent of the country's 76.5 million people live under the poverty line, according to the World Bank.

"Egypt is one of the best recyclers in the world because of the need," el Haggar said.

But he complained the repair work is uneven because it's not regulated by any government body.

Still, El-Attar Street's reputation is such that Tarek Galal, on vacation in Egypt from Toronto, immediately headed here when his cell phone stopped ringing.

"Everybody in Egypt knows about this street," Galal said. "The labor is too expensive in Canada, but here it is cheaper."

High water everywhere

It very well may be coincidence that the hurricanes that slammed the U.S. Gulf coast two years ago and the torrential rains that fell upon Mexico earlier this month both resulted in massive flooding considered to be among the the worst natural disasters ever to hit these two regions. However, there are many who feel that this is evidence that the effects of climate change are already making themselves felt.

One thing is certain. The images depicting the aftermath in both New Orleans (2005) and Tabasco (2007) are startling similar: thousands of poor people wading through waist-to-chest-high waters seeking high ground while others stranded on rooftops wait to be rescued.

If scientists are correct, eventually climate change will catch up to the vast majority of us. The states of Tabasco, Mississippi and Louisiana may be a preview of things to come. (GW)

After flood, long-term test for Mexico

As thousands remain homeless in Tabasco and business and agriculture suffer, many are pressing government to address extended support and future prevention efforts.

By Sara Miller Llana
The Christian Science Monitor
November 16, 2007

Mexico City -The floodwaters that have devastated Tabasco – at one point covering some 80 percent of the Mexican state – are finally receding.

But the challenges ahead are vast. Tens of thousands of residents remain homeless, businesses have been ruined, and almost all the state's crops, including bananas, beans, and corn, have been destroyed.

Mexican President Felipe Calderón has received praise in many corners for his quick response to what he declared one of the nation's worst natural disasters. He has visited the state a half-dozen times in the past two weeks and quickly sent in thousands of troops to help rescue the stranded and restore order. He has called for more efficient distribution of supplies and called on Mexicans not to forget the needs of an estimated 1 million people affected.

But as the rescue shifts to recovery, many are asking tough questions about who is responsible for flooding that, in part, is blamed on inadequate control measures. Some say they fear the administration will not plumb the root causes of what they see as not just a natural disaster but a policy failure.

"The most difficult time is now," says Francisco Sanchez Ramos, an opposition federal legislator who represents Tabasco. "[We] want admissions from the [state and federal governments] for the responsibilities they bear."

Floods and landslides in southern Mexico, including Tabasco and Chiapas, have killed nearly two dozen people, say officials.

Two weeks after record-breaking rainfall produced Tabasco's worst flooding in over 50 years, efforts have shifted to vaccinating residents, pumping water out, and planning fumigation efforts.

Mexicans and residents across the globe have donated tons of supplies: President Calderón said 6,000 tons of food, blankets, clothes, and basic provisions have been collected.

"There's been a massive amount of resources coming into Tabasco, from the federal government and state governments. Health brigades have come from northern states to pass out medicines and vaccinate," says Erica Dahl-Bredine, country manager for Catholic Relief Services's Mexico Program.

The US ambassador to Mexico, Tony Garza, praised Mexicans for their solidarity. "The strength of the Mexican people in the face of a disaster of this magnitude is a tribute to the human spirit," Mr. Garza said in a statement.

Still, Calderón said that the distribution of supplies, which some residents and opposition politicians say has not reached some very remote communities, needed to be improved, and urged politicians not to fall into partisanship.

In many ways, his actions signal of a more open democracy, after former President Vicente Fox's victory in 2000 ended 71 years of one-party rule. Many say that has translated into a more open culture of emergency response.

George Grayson, a professor at the College of William & Mary in Virginia, compares Calderón's take-charge aura to the infamous inaction of the federal government after the 1985 earthquake that devastated Mexico City. Then-President Miguel De La Madrid's downplaying of damage is remembered as a low point and a negative example for future governments, says Mr. Grayson. "Calderón's instincts were to go there and mobilize the government's resources," he says.

But some say that response is one thing, while long-term recovery and prevention is another. Mr. Sanchez Ramos, for example, says that Tabasco, a flat state prone to flooding, received money after a deluge in 1999 to create flood-control systems – money that today, officials say, is not entirely accounted for. He says that shows corruption in past state governments, and that the current governor, Andres Granier, must take responsibility, too.

Dan Lund, head of consulting firm Mund Americas in Mexico City, criticizes Calderón, who blamed the three days of rains that caused the floods on an "enormous climate change," for reaching for singular causes. "They need to ... figure out what went wrong and what can be done," he says. "There is no sign this is coming out of the administration."

For now, most continue to focus on rebuilding agriculture and the thousands of homes and businesses damaged or destroyed. The Mexican Association of Insurance Institutions estimated the damage to be $700 million in Tabasco alone, but many expect a much higher number as few residents are insured. The area that was affected is among the poorest in the country, and Grayson says he expects a massive migration to Mexico City and along the US border.

Calderón urges ongoing action. "As time passes, interest and worry usually diminish," he said on a recent visit. "Help must continue not only for the coming days, but for the coming weeks and months."

Katrina victims suffer more from Bush policies than from hurricanes

You might think that the federal government would have taken full advantage of the quiet hurricane season to provide the needed support and resources to bring about as full a recovery as possible in those communities along the Gulf that were stricken by Hurricanes Katrina and Rita two years ago.

You would be wrong.

Tragically, there appear to be many more steps taken backwards than forwards -- especially in the critically important areas of housing and education. Does it come as a surprise that the most severely and unfairly impacted are the poor and politically disempowered African Americans?

They are justifiably as mad as hell. (GW)

Another outrage in New Orleans

Stop demolition of public housing

Worker's World
November 15, 2007

In what can only be viewed as another racist outrage against Hurricane Katrina survivors—especially those who are still displaced two years after the collapse of the levees—the Bush administration has passed a law calling for the demolition of 5,000 public housing units in New Orleans. They are now scheduled to be demolished on Nov. 19.

Many activists see the destruction of perfectly sound, affordable housing as another indication that the federal government is working hand-in-hand with the big real estate developers and some local and state officials to systematically push out the majority working-class, African-American population—making way for more luxury housing and condominiums for rich, affluent whites.

Along with the real threat of demolition, other developments related to this racist gentrification conspiracy include the privatization of schools, which has led to the massive layoffs of thousands of public school teachers; the lack of health care, especially for the poor; an alarming increase in the homicide rate in the Black community; and more police brutality.

The greatest devastation during Katrina took place in the Lower Ninth Ward, where the majority Black families lost their homes to flooding. To this day these families have been denied insurance coverage and governmental assistance to rebuild.

Progressive forces have called for a national day of protest against this demolition on Nov. 13 in a number of cities, especially where Katrina survivors have relocated. The New Orleans’ Public Housing and Right of Return Movement stated in a recent press release, “We oppose these plans not only because they are a clear violation of Human Rights but also for the corruption involved at every step.”

The statement goes on to say: “This corruption includes local officials’ ties to the federal government’s Housing and Urban Development (HUD). Jimmie Thorns, a businessman and close friend of Judge Ivan LeMelle, the federal judge that approved demolition, recently received a sweetheart $500,000 appraisal consulting contract from the HUD-controlled local housing authority.”

Since Katrina hit, the Housing Authority of New Orleans (HANO) and HUD have only reopened 1,600 public housing units. According to HANO’s records, HUD has approved plans to demolish four major housing developments: Lafitte, St. Bernard, B.W. Cooper and CJ Peete. HUD and HANO have leased the soon-to-be-empty lots to private developers for 99 years to build mixed housing, “mixed” meaning luxury and low-income housing together.

The current 4,600-plus public housing units in these four areas alone will be reduced to less than 750 units—an astounding 82 percent decline, according to HUD. The cost of redevelopment is estimated at $762 million, which does not include any current housing subsidies for low income families. Those subsidies come to about $1,000 per family per month, or $100 million so far.

Although the demolition is set for Nov. 19, there is a legal challenge to push this date to Nov. 28 to allow more time for activists from around the country to travel to New Orleans and participate in direct protests against this blatant injustice.

Rising temperatures impact the food chain

Monster Hurricanes and melting/calving glaciers are the more visually dramatic examples of how our lives might be affected by climate change. But Nature's more subtle (and ongoing) dynamics that are out of view of the average citizen and do not provide as images as interesting to Hollywood or the evening newscasts that major catastrophes do, may be the greatest cause for concern.

The impacts on the food chain is one of those. Anyone who believes that we can easily "adapt" to climate change is fooling themselves. That's because those impacts will play themselves out in Nature's complex web of symbiotic relationships in ways that we don't fully understand and certainly cannot predict. (GW)

Rising temperatures throw nature a curve

By Beth Daley
Boston Globe
November 13, 2007

OFF WICKFORD, R.I. - Once, natural events in Narragansett Bay occurred with the predictability of the tides: Thick ice clung to the shore in February. Giant phytoplankton blooms tinted the water green by March. Striped bass began to move to warmer waters by mid-October.

No longer. Winter surfers off Narragansett Town Beach rarely have to slosh through frozen chunks anymore. Those blooms, which rained nutrients down to bottom-dwelling creatures, have all but disappeared. Fishermen regularly brag about catching striped bass in mid-November.

Narragansett Bay's natural timing is out of sync.

The bay's average annual water temperature has increased about 2 degrees Fahrenheit since 1960, and in winters it has warmed about 3 degrees. There is growing evidence that the temperature changes are breaking down carefully evolved relationships among species and disrupting the vast food web the bay depends upon.

Critical seasonal cues are misfiring, delivering new food sources to some species and new predators to others. A shrimp that traditionally migrated to warmer waters in winter is now staying year-round or returning earlier to eat young cold-water flounder. Luminescent jellies are also staying through the winter, meaning that their populations peak in spring rather than summer, exactly when fish larvae and eggs are plentiful. Scientists fear that the voracious jellies could be reduc ing fish populations and competing with them for food.

"The temperature change may not seem very big, but it gets amplified in the food web," said Jeremy Collie, professor of oceanography at the University of Rhode Island.

The multitude of changes taking place in Narragansett Bay illustrates a critical lesson as the world warms: Large ecological change may come from the smallest break in the food chain.

The bay's winter warming roughly parallels a 4.4-degree rise in New England's average winter air temperature since 1970, a trend scientists ascribe, at least in part, to the release of heat-trapping carbon dioxide from power plants, vehicles, and factories. Scientists deduce that the warming of Narragansett Bay is tied to this trend because they know that estuaries and bays are heavily influenced by air temperatures. Other partially enclosed coastal waters, such as Woods Hole and Long Island Sound, have also warmed during the same period, giving researchers confidence the warming in Narragansett Bay is not an anomaly.

The bay is also one of the places where researchers would expect to see the effects of warming first, because it is on the dividing line between southern and northern waters. In the summer, the bay is flooded with migratory species attracted to its warm water, some near the northern edge of their range. In winter, the waters are dominated by resident bottom-dwelling fish, some near the southern edge of their range. As a result, many of the species are vulnerable to temperature changes.

Because URI's Graduate School of Oceanography is located on its shores, the bay has some of the best long-term scientific records of temperature, fish abundance, and algal blooms in the Northeast, allowing scientists to document changes over time. Already, they have seen a sharp decline in commercially valuable northern fish species such as winter flounder and a rise in traditionally less-prized southern fish such as scup, and those changes cannot be explained by overfishing alone.

Disappearing food supply

Standing firm against 2-foot seas rocking a research boat a mile off Wickford, URI graduate student Jason Graff threw a red bucket overboard. Tugging on a heavy rope attached to the bucket, he hauled up a water sample and knelt to pour the water carefully into bottles that would later be measured for phytoplankton, or microscopic plants, and other barometers of the bay's health.

Almost 40 years of such weekly samples gave researchers one of their first hints that the bay was changing. A late-winter phytoplankton bloom long formed the foundation of the bay's food web. As days got longer and sunlight increased, the bloom would grow to cover almost the entire 25-mile-long bay. By early spring, the bloom would die naturally, and organic debris would settle to the bay's bottom, where creatures such as worms would feed on it and in turn become meals for fish such as winter flounder.

In the 1980s, the winter bloom stopped growing as large, and by the late 1990s it was all but gone. In temperature-controlled tanks at URI, marine biologists figured out why: It is being eaten.

Tiny marine animals called zooplankton are normally sluggish eaters in the winter. But researchers found that even a 1.4-degree increase in water temperature caused them to be more active in the tanks and to eat more, curbing the size of the bloom. Today, a longstanding summer phytoplankton bloom has become a more important food source, but it mostly feeds migratory, warm-water fish species, such as scup and bay anchovies. Without a significant winter bloom, the cold-water fish may be missing their meal.

URI oceanographers hope to identify other changes from the bucketfuls of water students scoop out of the bay every Monday morning from the deck of the 53-foot Cap'n Bert. Among the questions: Are new types of microscopic marine plants or animals moving in that could further change the timing of the bay's food supply? "The winter bloom is as important to the bay as grass and leaves are" on land, said David Borkman, a URI marine research associate. "It's the beginning of the productive part of the year, it gets the ball rolling . . . and it doesn't happen anymore."

Predator stays in winter

Times are not good for Narragansett Bay's winter flounder, once a prized catch of Rhode Island fishermen.

New England populations of the tasty flat fish plummeted in the 1980s, partly from too much fishing. While the stocks have recovered in some places, they have not in the bay: Winter flounder populations there are now only about 10 percent of what they were before the crash.

A one-two climate punch is probably why. The flounder may not be getting enough food because of disapperance of the winter phytoplankton bloom. And now, the warming bay has fostered a new predator. The flounder has long had a winning strategy for survival: the cold. Young flounder grew in the cold waters on the bay's bottom when few predators were around. By the time hungry predators showed up when waters warmed, the fish were big and fast enough to escape.

Now, an aggressive sand shrimp called crangon is waiting for those juvenile flounder, no bigger than a pinkie nail. The shrimp has traditionally moved to warmer waters when the bay's temperature dipped. But in recent years the water has been warm enough for them to stay year-round or to return earlier to the bay and feed on whatever they find.

If the warming continues, scientists say, it is unlikely that winter flounder, already near the southern edge of its range, will bounce back in Narragansett Bay.

Uncertainty for fishermen

At the start of this decade, Rhode Island fishery biologists realized that other bottom-dwelling fish were disappearing from Narragansett Bay, too, including species no fishermen wanted: hogchokers, oyster toadfish, and grubbies. That meant that overfishing could not be the only reason, and persuaded researchers that the bay's temperature rise was probably driving the decline. In addition, scientists noticed an increase in species that like warm water, such as summer flounder, black sea bass, scup, and squid. There aren't fewer fish in Narragansett Bay overall, but the players have changed.

And some fishermen say the rules about catching them need to change too. "Global warming is changing habits in the bay, and fishing quotas have to be adjusted to deal with it," said Richard Fuka, president of the Rhode Island Fishermen's Alliance. Fuka said state officials need to relax limits for species that are becoming more abundant.

State officials said quotas were adjusted upward in 2005 to account for the increasing number of scup, black sea bass, and summer flounder. They said they are being cautious about further quota increases to make sure that overfishing does not begin anew.

If Narragansett Bay continues warming at the same pace, water temperatures could climb nearly another 4 degrees by the end of the century. While scientists say the bay is not going to die, its ecology will continue to evolve. For fishermen, that means uncertainty, and that can translate to lost income. "A fisherman's logbook is like a set calendar, things always happen within a week of when it happened before," Fuka said.

That is what fishermen base their livelihood on, he said. "But now, it's like having a misguided calendar."

Hoping to God it will rain

To the world outside my tears I refuse to explain,
I wish it would rain (oh how I wish that it would rain)
Rain, rain, rain (oh how I wish that it would rain)

(Written by Penzabene, Strong and Whitfield. Sung by the Temptations)

The drought in the U.S. Southeast has become so severe no option is being overlooked. (GW)

Georgia Governor Prays for Rain

By Greg Bluestein
Associated Press
November 13, 2007

ATLANTA (Nov. 13) -- Georgia Gov. Sonny Perdue stepped up to a podium outside the state Capitol on Tuesday and led a solemn crowd of several hundred people in a prayer for rain on his drought-stricken state.

"We've come together here simply for one reason and one reason only: To very reverently and respectfully pray up a storm," Perdue said after a choir provided a hymn.

Georgia and its neighboring states are caught in an epic drought that threatens public water supplies. Perdue has ordered water restrictions, launched a legal battle against the release of water from federal reservoirs and appealed to President Bush.

"It's time to appeal to Him who can and will make a difference," Perdue told the crowd.

The hourlong event was billed as an interfaith ceremony but only three Protestant ministers joined Perdue, who is a Baptist, and Lt. Gov. Casey Cagle.

Nearby, some 20 demonstrators from the Atlanta Freethought Society staged a protest against the holding of a religious observance at the seat of state government.

Meteorologists said earlier this week there was a slight possibility of rain Tuesday, but less of a chance of precipitation was predicted for the rest of the week.

"I believe in miracles," declared Pastor Maurice Watson of Beulahland Bible Church. "How about you?"

In China, everything is possible, but nothing is easy

"IPods, along with thousands of other goods churned out by Chinese factories, from toys to rolled steel, pose a question that is becoming an issue in the climate-change debate. If a gadget is made in China by an American company and exported and used by consumers from Stockholm to Sao Paulo, Brazil, should the Chinese government be held responsible for the carbon released in manufacturing it?"

This question was raised by Jane Spencer in an article in the November 12th edition of the Wall Street Journal. This concept is called "blame-the-buyer" and it is turning into a popular negotiating tactic. How effective an approach it is remains to be seen. However, the answer to this and similar questions may play important roles in shaping China's ultimate "agreement" to cut its carbon emissions over time.

China "will agree to cut its carbon emissions"

By Michael McCarthy
The Independent Online
November 13, 2007

China, now the world's biggest greenhouse-gas emitter, will eventually agree to cut its soaring carbon dioxide emissions, one of the country's leading environmentalists forecast yesterday – but only on the basis of a deal with the United States and the rest of the developed world.

The Chinese would be very unlikely to set their own unilateral target for reducing CO2, said Professor C S Kiang, the founding dean of the College of Environmental Science at the University of Beijing. But they would join in the next, post-2012 stage of the Kyoto protocol, the international climate change treaty, and seek to reduce their emissions to a definite figure, as long as this was part of a global agreement that involved all countries acting together – including the US – and the transfer to China of modern energy technology, he said.

However, no agreement was likely at next month's major international meeting in Bali, Indonesia, of the parties to the protocol, which will seek to define the way forward in the treaty, said Professor Kiang, who is in London to give a speech at the Be The Change environmental conference from Thursday to Saturday. The professor, a former atmospheric scientist in the US, has close connections to the Chinese leadership, but was talking to The Independent on a personal basis.

He also said agreement was unlikely to be met with the negotiating forum of the "G8 plus Five" – the rich countries of the G8 bloc in climate change talks with the five leading developing nations of China, India, Indonesia, Brazil and Mexico, a formula instituted by Tony Blair at the G8 summit in Gleneagles in 2005.

In the G8 plus Five, the developing countries were only observers and there needed to be a more equitable formula, Professor Kiang said. He is proposing a high-level summit on climate change between China and India, so that the developing countries can set up their own powerful negotiating block.

He also suggested no agreement would be possible until after next year's US election. President George Bush's withdrawal of the US from Kyoto in 2001, with the abandonment of US climate targets, has been a major stumbling block to developing countries. "But by 2009-10, we might see light at the end of the tunnel," Professor Kiang said.

The Chinese have ratified Kyoto, but in the first phase of the treaty they, like the rest of the developing countries, do not have to make any commitment to cut their emissions.

Professor Kiang said the Chinese leadership was fully aware of the global warming threat and the need to combat it, although he did not see this as being perceived yet by the man in the street.

He said that the Chinese President, Hu Jintao, had spoken at the Communist Party Conference last month of the need to build an "ecological civilisation", and pointed out that in the 11th five-year plan, which began last year, there was a target to improve energy efficiency by 20 per cent – the first time in modern Chinese history that any consideration about energy had been considered other than security of supply, or that any such target had been set. There was also a similar target to cut pollution nationwide by 10 per cent. But to make major changes was difficult. "China has spent 30 years concentrating on economic growth, without paying much attention to the environment," he said. The government did not centrally control all the new energy infrastructure, and in some ways did not control economic development itself.

He added: "To have people living in harmony with nature is a very ancient Chinese value – but it's very different from the class struggle of communism. So it's not easy when you make such an ideological change. In China, everything is possible, but nothing is easy. You've got to know China. They will never ever say no. But their yes – well, that may take some time."

The coffee economy

Mm! how sweet the coffee tastes,
more delicious than a thousand kisses,
mellower than muscatel wine.
Coffee, coffee I must have,
and if someone wishes to give me a treat,
ah, then pour me out some coffee!

(Johann Sebastian Bach - "Coffee Cantata," 1735 )

Coffee has been called the most universally used legal drug ion the planet. It is unquestionably the world's largest agricultural commodity.

Ethiopia is probably the place where coffee originated. So why would Starbucks resist Ethiopian coffee producers from trademarking their product to ensure that they get their fair share of the profits when it is sold in the global marketplace? Back in 2002 the editors at the Whole Earth Review had similar questions:

"So what is it about Starbucks? Megathreat to community diversity, our groundbreaker for specialty coffees? Symbol for everything wrong about globalization, or company with a conscience? King of greenwash, or pioneer in wedding commercial success and good works?" (GW)

In trademarking its coffee, Ethiopia seeks fair trade

The move could help the country's coffee growers to earn some $88 million more per year.

By Matthew Clark

The Christian Science Monitor
November 09, 2007

Yirgacheffe, Ethiopia - Nestled in the hills of southern Ethiopia lies a resource that could catapult this nation forward: coffee.

Connoisseurs worldwide savor the beans from Yirgacheffe for their distinctive flavor. And at a time when more consumers are targeting specialty brews, Ethiopia is poised to reap the rewards of a product that commands $10 per pound in the United States.

But while upscale consumers are willing to pay top dollar for the beans, farmers in Ethiopia sell their product for a pittance – less than $1 per pound. "It's like growers of Dom Perignon Champagne getting the same price as growers of bulk wine," says Ron Layton, founder and chief executive of Light Years, IP, a Washington-based group that helps producers in poor countries get better prices.

But Ethiopia recently shook up the industry with a new tactic: trademarking its specialty coffees. Overcoming resistance to the idea from distributors – notably Starbucks – the country is hoping to empower its coffee industry to earn an estimated $88 million more per year, according to Oxfam America. The move could inspire producers of other commodities throughout Africa to harness branding and capture more value from the goods they sell to consumers in rich countries.

"It's quite innovative for a branding initiative to come out of the developing world," says Seth Petchers, the director of Oxfam America's coffee program. "It's about getting [farmers] to realize the value of what they have.

"It's a big deal," adds Mr. Petchers, noting that producers from other developing countries are already asking: " 'If Ethiopia can do it, why can't we?' "

Obtaining trademarks for coffee grown in Harar, Yirgacheffe, and Sidamo allows Ethiopia – the birthplace of coffee – to decide which distributors it will grant licenses to sell those specialty coffees, and under what terms. More control over distribution will boost Ethiopia's economy, which relies on coffee for more than 40 percent of its export earnings, according to Mr. Layton and others who specialize in intellectual property rights.

"I'm very certain that five to 10 years down the line, specialty coffee farmers will make much more than they make now," says Getachew Mengistie, the head of the Ethiopian Intellectual Property Office, the governmental group that spearheaded the trademarking initiative. "They could make 75 percent to 100 percent more."

Mr. Mengistie's office is organizing a move to educate farmers, small traders, and exporters of Ethiopia's specialty coffees about the licensing deals with international distributors so that they understand the potential to earn more and have a greater incentive to increase production and quality.

"With this initiative, a network of licensed distributors will sit down with producers and exporters and discuss common interests," Mengistie says. "This will benefit everyone in the coffee chain, from the farmer to the end distributors."

Expensive product, poor farmers

In lush hills of Yirgacheffe – one of the areas that stands to benefit the most from the licensing deals – farmers barely make enough to pay for essentials.

Children run barefoot along the steep mud roads, clothed in tattered rags. People's jaws drop when they learn that a single cup of coffee in the US costs between $1.50 and $2, more than 10 times the going rate for a pound of coffee here: 17 cents.

"Everything here is green, but people's lives aren't like that," says Dessalegn Jena, assistant general manager of the Oromia Coffee Farmers Cooperative Union, one of the country's largest coffee producers. "They are suffering. The can barely buy the things they need to survive."

Still, coffee farmers here are hopeful about the government's moves to trademark Yirgacheffe coffee.

"We hope it will solve the coffee price problem," says Genene Gelegelo, chairman of a coffee cooperative of more than 900 farms in Yirgacheffe. "We expect a better life than today. We expect the price to improve and living standards to improve."

The community has already benefited from "fair trade" initiatives, whereby profits from specially labeled coffee purchased in Europe and the US went directly toward building a health clinic, two schools, and a clean water well over the past few years.

But Mr. Gelegelo says he would rather people pay good money for his coffee because they prefer it to other options, not because they want to help poor farmers. "Fair trade is a kind of humanitarian concept," he says. "This doesn't have longevity. Rather than charity, we want to sell the best quality coffee at a decent price."

Better roads mean better business

If the trademarking and licensing initiatives do improve prices, Gelegelo says that the cooperative would first seek to improve the rutted, muddy roads that prevent faster trade and often render the farms inaccessible for days at a time. The cooperative would also seek to upgrade the basic health clinic to a hospital and add four grades to the local school, which now goes only through 8th grade.

To be sure, trademarking is no panacea.

"It's important for the country as a whole, but that's not enough," says Mr. Jena. "The government needs to give special emphasis to ensuring the quality of coffee to maintain the reputation for specialty coffees," he says, adding that the government must crack down on false labeling of beans and mixing inferior beans into bags of premium beans.

Above all, says Jena, Ethiopia's specialty coffees must be skillfully marketed in the US and Europe.

He considers that task an uphill battle, lamenting that Ethiopia is still seen first in the West as the place where thousands of children died in the famines of the 1980s.

"No one expects good products to come from Ethiopia, which is a huge problem," he says.

"[The trademarking initiative] is all about potential," says Dean Cycon, owner of Dean's Beans, an organic coffee roasting company in Orange, Mass.

Mr. Cycon worked as an intellectual property lawyer for decades and advised the Ethiopian government on the trademarking initiative. "[Trademarking] has the capacity to bring in more money [to farmers] than fair trade or organic coffee," says "The next step is a major marketing campaign to teach people about Yirgacheffe."