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Myanmar’s junta imposes fuel hike
Associated Press
Myanmar’s ruling military junta imposed a surprise 100 percent hike on fuel at state-owned gas stations on Wednesday, apparently to keep up with global oil prices.
As usual in the tightly controlled country, the price hike was not officially announced and car owners discovered the increases only when they drove up to fill their tanks.
(15 August 2007)
Dubai on Ice
Mark Gongloff, Wall Street Journal (Energy Roundup)
In Dubai’s latest example of conspicuous consumption, the interior of a new cafe, called Chillout, is made entirely of ice. Patrons will be able to forget the UAE’s 111-degree heat by sitting on ice chairs at ice tables, drinking from ice glasses and looking at ice sculptures, according to an Associated Press report.
This, like other Dubai features such as indoor ski slopes, custom-made islands and year-round air-conditioning, won’t do much to ease the UAE’s eye-popping energy consumption; the average person in the Emirates puts more demand on the global ecosystem than any other in the world, according to the AP, citing World Wildlife Fund statistics.
Just to add to the energy drain, the cafe’s 40,000 tons of ice furnishings and sculptures were made in Canada and shipped to Dubai.
Mike Ebenezer, business manager at Sharaf Group, which owns Chillout, defends it by saying it consumes only as much energy as a cold-storage facility for frozen foods. “There are hundreds of cold storages in Dubai,” he tells the AP.
(10 August 2007)
Conspicuous consumption aware of the year. Remember this to tell your grandchildren. -BA
