Author Archives: John Gibbons
There Will Be Oil!
The prolific American author Upton Sinclair died 40 years ago, but his novel Oil, published in 1927, has recently had a second coming, being the book upon which the Oscar-winning film There Will Be Blood is based. Another of Sinclair’s … Continue reading
Posted in Energy, Global Warming, Habitat/Species, Irish Focus, Sustainability
Tagged Al Gore, climate, CO2, Coal, CSS, Lenny Bernstein, Oil, Upton Sinclair
3 Comments
Friends, countrymen, lend me your processors
Writing regularly about climate change and related issues is great – up to a point. However, the prospect of being able to chip something in to the actual science part might seem a little far-fetched for those of us such … Continue reading
Posted in Energy, Global Warming, Sustainability
2 Comments
A vision of beauty
Nature is under relentless assault, entire ecosystems are being obliterated, an area of natural forest the size of Croke Park is burned or cleared every second. Around every 12 minutes, yet another species goes extinct. The news is, to put … Continue reading
Posted in Global Warming, Habitat/Species, Sustainability
Tagged climate change, extinction, species loss, Sustainability
2 Comments
Time to put a lid on bottled water
‘Only two things are infinite, the universe and human stupidity, and I’m not sure about the former’. That’s the view of no less an observer than Albert Einstein. Though his judgement may seem a little harsh, the strange story of … Continue reading
Posted in Global Warming, Habitat/Species, Irish Focus, Sustainability
Tagged bottled water, carbon, environment, Perrier, plastic, pollution, Sustainability, Volvic
2 Comments
Corporations get in on the Green act
‘Over the last 150 years the corporation has risen from relative obscurity to become the world’s dominant economic institution. Today corporations govern our lives. They determine what we eat, what we watch, what we wear, where we work and what … Continue reading
Posted in Global Warming, Sustainability
2 Comments
Getting some real wind in our sails
You only have to look at a map of Ireland’s rugged western seaboard to get some idea of the power of wave and wind in shaping our coastline. In Connemara the sparse tree cover leans away from the sea at … Continue reading
Posted in Energy, Global Warming, Irish Focus, Sustainability
Tagged Biofuels, carbon, electricity, ESB, Ireland, turbine, wind, wind farms
3 Comments
Forget chocolate – 40 steps to cut carbon for Lent
The Tearfund is a UK-based development agency which has come up with a novel idea for this Lent. Instead of cutting down on treats, how about reducing your carbon instead? They are clearly placing the effects of climate change as … Continue reading
Posted in Global Warming, Habitat/Species, Irish Focus, Sustainability
Tagged climate change, fair trade, Lent, Sustainability, Third World
3 Comments
At the edge of the Olduvain abyss?
The year 1900 is little more than two generations ago. It’s the year before my maternal grandmother was born. At that time, she was one of some 1.6 billion people then alive on the earth. A hundred years, two World … Continue reading
Posted in Global Warming, Habitat/Species, Sustainability
Tagged climate change, collapse, Dr Richard Duncan, Olduvai, Peak Oil
4 Comments
Under pressure
Our closest living relatives on this planet are the 625 species of primates. We share over 98% of our DNA with them, so the similarities are more than skin deep. In the whole of the turbulent 20th century, not a … Continue reading
Posted in Global Warming, Habitat/Species, Irish Focus, Sustainability
Tagged apes, EPA, extinction, land use, primates, Richard Leakey, vegetation, Wolfgang Lucht
2 Comments
The heat is on for patio burners
If you sat down to design a more environmentally unfriendly product, you’d be hard pressed to come up with something worse than a patio heater. Ten years ago, these were relatively rare in Ireland, but with the upsurge of ‘decklanders’ … Continue reading
Posted in Energy, Global Warming, Irish Focus, Sustainability
1 Comment
All-party consensus on climate – what are the odds?
Earlier this evening representatives of all six major Irish political parties joined a panel discussion entitled ‘Three percent a year: How will Ireland cut emissions?’. The meeting, chaired by environmental broadcaster Duncan Stewart, was hosted by Cultivate in Dublin’s Temple … Continue reading
Posted in Global Warming, Irish Focus, Sustainability
2 Comments
Is the Lucky Country’s luck running out?
Australia is, and has been for generations, a paradoxical place. Though it’s more than ten thousand miles and 12 time zones from England, it has still looked longingly over its shoulder to the ‘Mother ship’, many decades after the British … Continue reading
Posted in Energy, Global Warming, Habitat/Species, Sustainability
1 Comment
The health impacts of climate change revealed
For many people in Ireland, the state of our health system is of far greater concern than something as abstract as climate change and global warming. After all, it’s a ‘real’ issue as to whether or not your elderly relative … Continue reading
Posted in Global Warming, Irish Focus, Sustainability
2 Comments
A Giant step backwards
It’s not the easiest place on the island to locate, and when you do eventually get there, your first impression may be to wonder what all the fuss is about. But as you head on foot from the visitor area … Continue reading
Posted in Global Warming, Habitat/Species, Irish Focus, Sustainability
1 Comment
