ICLEI Links: 23 October 2015
Welcome to the latest edition of ICLEI Links, our roundup of sustainability-related news and commentary from around the web!
City Stories
A Dutch City Makes Room for Its River and a New Identity – interesting article about Nijmegen’s flood-control plan, which involves moving dykes back from the river, excavating the new area to create a larger flood plain, and using the excavated land to build an island.
7 cities that don’t have any cars – mostly through history and circumstance, but once by design, these towns and cities operate without any cars. All look well worth a visit!
How to Fix Climate Change – Cities – a neat little feature from National Geographic, and part of a series that looks at the different actors involved in tackling climate change.
E-Mobility works (VIDEO) – a short animation on how cities and businesses can work together on greener transport.
NASA: City Vegetation Limits Urban Warming – the best responses to the urban heat island effect are often debated. This new study, which looks at the entire continental US, states that the presence of vegetation is an essential factor.
Climate Change Stories
What Is COP21? The 2 Minute Guide (VIDEO) – think of climate change negotiations as a bus. It’s stuck on the road to delivering the change we need. In the past, we’ve tried to get a tow truck to pull it out of the quagmire. But now there is a different solution…
How the Third Industrial Revolution Will Create a Green Economy – Jeremy Rifkin explains his predictions for a new global economy based on the Internet of Things, where sensors will be embedded into every device and appliance, allowing them to communicate with each other and Internet users.
Europe’s greenhouse gas emissions fall to record low – the good news is that they’re at a record low; the bad news is that the pace of emissions reductions is slowing.
Climate change threatens future of Canada’s northern hunters – in parts of the Northwest Territories, average annual temperatures have already risen more than 3 degrees Celsius in the past two decades, leading to a dramatic decline in the moose population that sustains indigenous hunters.
Energy Stories
Isis Inc: how oil fuels the jihadi terrorists – a thorough report on how Isis has taken control of oil producing regions, with the technology and expertise to produce and export the oil. Those within the region, even if they are fighting Isis, have no choice but the buy the oil and add to Isis’s funds.
India’s Energy Crisis – almost 70 percent of India’s electricity today comes from coal-fired plants. If it continues on its current trajectory of population growth and energy production, it will make climate change inevitable. This long feature from the MIT Technology Review looks at how the government is trying to avoid such a scenario.
Google Pumps Funds into Africa’s Biggest Wind Power Project – the move is Google’s 22nd investment in clean energy infrastructure, spanning a total of 2.5 gigawatts of power and more than $2 billion.
