August 4, 2010
In Google’s spat with China, the legacy of colonialism still echoes
Illustration by Matt Daley. When Google, citing concerns over security and censorship, pulled their operations out of China in March this year, they were widely praised for taking a stand for democracy. But Google’s move wasn’t the first time a Western entity had taken the moral high road in regard to China. In fact, almost 200 years ago, the British government also stood up for its beliefs. After... [More >>]
August 3, 2010
As green-collar jobs boom, Canada is mired in the tar sands
Canada and Abu Dhabi share one big trait: an economy addicted to oil. But while Canada doubles down on the tar sands, the emirate quietly plans a renewable energy hub in a gleaming zero-emissions city in the desert. Can either of these bets pay off? Artist's rendering of a Masdar public square. Click to enlarge. Looking out over the site of Masdar City in Abu Dhabi, it takes some imagination to... [More >>]
June 15, 2010
How bad science stifles rational debate about wind power
Stormy weather: pro-wind campaigns suffer from a lack of good, freely available data. Wind energy ought to be a shoo-in. Yes, the infrastructure costs a lot of money but the fuel is free and plentiful, turbines produce no emissions, and no mountaintops need to be removed. And unlike nuclear power, no long-term radioactive waste needs to be stored for millennia. Yet, bizarrely, small groups of committed... [More >>]
May 25, 2010
Bike share programs may finally be picking up speed in Canada
A Bixi bicycle stand in Montreal. Creative Commons photo by Flickr user pdbreen. When Toronto launched Canada’s first bike share program in 2001, many saw it as a miracle project. Mirroring the popular-abroad systems of Paris and Vienna, the system allowed cyclists to grab their bikes at one hub, cruise the streets, and then drop the bike off at a rack nearest their destination—all for a daily... [More >>]
April 26, 2010
Don’t save the economy. Make a better one
The golden age of the welfare state wasn’t that golden. The real solution is economics that actually promotes equality Remember the good old days when Canadians used to think the government was supposed to help everyone share in economic prosperity and prevent anyone from shouldering the brunt of economic adversity? We thought we’d learned the bitter lessons about the perils of the free market... [More >>]
April 20, 2010
7 environmentally friendly moves to quit the bottled water habit
In 2006, Canadians spent $731 million consuming 2.1 billion litres of bottled water, with most of those plastic bottles ending up in landfills. If you’re tired of slowly destroying the planet while building the bank accounts of companies like Coca-Cola and Nestlé, here are a few tips for going back to the tap. 1. Create your own “pure” water by investing in an at-home water filtration system.... [More >>]
March 29, 2010
Innovative Ethiopian food-aid scheme starving for funds
When Ethiopia asked the world for food aid last October, former subsistence farmer Terefi Tekale was not among the 6.2 million people desperate for help. Though his family’s long-held plot in Ethiopia’s Konso region has done poorly in recent years—the soil is sterile, his corn stunted and his hillside eroded—an ambitious new development plan means Tekale is not without hope, or without food. Managing... [More >>]
March 23, 2010
“Slow Steaming” cuts costs and carbon for global shipping
A container ship carrying cargo. Slowing the pace of shipping can save money and carbon It’s been a tough couple of years for the shipping industry. First there was the recession, which led to almost 12 percent of the world’s cargo ships spending last December empty and anchored. The industry has also come under fire by environmentalists for its contributions to climate change and air pollution. At... [More >>]
March 17, 2010
Baby boomers sit atop a ticking pension time-bomb
The notion that a failure to plan is nothing more than a plan to fail is one of the more heavily trafficked pieces of common sense, but it appears that the baby boomers are exempt from its wisdom. Instead, it will be their children who will be forced to cover the costs associated with their failure to prepare for retirement. At least, that was the message that emerged from December’s “pension summit”... [More >>]
March 10, 2010
Counting the Vancouver 2010 Olympics’ broken promises
One of Pivot Legal Society's Red Tents on the streets of Vancouver during the 2010 Winter Olympics. Photo by The Blackbird. The five-ring circus has rolled out of Vancouver, but the tents are still up. Hundreds of red tents, which became as much a symbol of our 2010 Games as those maple leaf mittens, won’t be coming down until we get our housing legacy. That’s the pledge of Pivot Legal Society,... [More >>]
