Technology

We often forget about our roofs, allowing them to become wasted space.  But roofs are good for many things.  Here’s a look at what Egypt is doing…

The following bills deal with different aspects of alternative energy, natural resources, and budgeting. “H.R. 3183: Energy and Water Development and Related Agencies Appropriations Act, 2010″ just passed the House. “H.R. 2965: SBIR/STTR Reauthorization Act of 2009″ just passed the Senate.

This year marks the 40th anniversary of the Apollo 11 mission.  Today is Space Settlement Day, encouraging humans to stop keeping all our eggs in one basket and to establish permanent outposts off Earth.  Further details appear on the Bloggers Unite event page.

Recently the EPA announced that California has the right to set more stringent standards for vehicles than the government standards.  This is a good idea; the government should set minimum standards and states or other organizations should be free to set their bar higher.  On the downside, there is a huge time delay before California may tighten its standards, during which the globe will continue to get warmer.  We really need to move more urgently on climate change issues.  These delays could destroy us.

Currently we face an assortment of challenges, each of which makes it harder to cope with the other ones.  This comes clear especially in transportation, where the collapsing economy, peak resources, and climate change demand conflicting responses.  A recent transportation summit revealed some worrisome trends.

President Obama is pushing for a significant increase in fuel efficiency for American cars.  This is an improvement over the current situation, which is wretched; but it’s not perfect.

In a previous post about green buildings, we touched on the idea of skyfarms, also known as vertical farming.  In the future, urban areas may produce a significant amount of their own food in large buildings designed to maximize growing space.  Architects are creating more and more designs for such buildings, so watch for more exciting news in this field.

Future Scenarios: How Communities Can Adapt to Peak Oil and Climate Change by David Holmgren.  Chelsea Green, 2009.  Full-color trade paperback, 126 pages.  ISBN: 978-1-60358-089-2.  Three stars.

As the title implies, this book attempts to map out several possible paths the future could take regarding energy use and the complexity of civilization.  First it presents an overview of historic energy use and how that has affected humanity and the Earth.  Then it describes four broad types of energy future: techno-explosion, techno-stability, energy descent, and collapse. 

To observe Earth Hour, people will turn off their lights at 8:30 PM (local time) on March 28.  Here are some other things you can do to save electricity and protect the Earth.