Media & Communications

A thousand barrels a second by Tertzakian (2007) (review)

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Peter Tertzakian has a double education in geophysics and economics and is “Chief Energy Economist” at a Canadian energy investment company. His book “A Thousand Barrels a Second: The Coming Oil Breakpoint and Challenges facing an energy dependent world” was published in 2007, but was, based on the contents of the book, presumably written up around 2005.

In Defense of Food (audio)

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According to In Defense of Food author Michael Pollan, “…the advent of “nutritionism” has vastly complicated how Americans see food, without doing very much for our health. Nutritionism arose to deal with genuine issues – addressing chronic diseases such as obesity, diabetes and many cancers – but now seems to be obscuring and perpetuating the real problems of the American diet”, says Pollan. This program was recorded in front of a live audience at the Commonwealth Club of California on January 27, 2010.

Energy strategies, or the lack thereof – Feb 4

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-How long before the lights go out?
-Peak Oil Theory: implications for Australia’s strategic outlook and the ADF
-The Iraqi Oil Conundrum
-A New Clean Economy — With Old Sources of Energy
-Business as Usual: Hooked on Foreign Oil
-Stop the Green Tech Coup, Military Industry on the Offensive

Economic Growth And Climate Change — No Way Out? (updated)

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Humankind has reached a fork in the road. The business-as-usual path implies robust economic growth with a rise in the carbon dioxide emissions that contribute to anthropogenic climate change…Considered alternatives invariably lay out a vision of the future in which emissions steadily decline while economies continue to grow. Is such a vision realistic? This essay questions standard assumptions underlying this “have your cake and eat it too” view.

Biofuel pros and cons – Feb 3

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-Shell stakes green future on sugar biofuel in $2bn Brazil venture
-Obama Set to Outline Biofuels Strategy
-Biofuel requirements for cars may help destroy the rainforest, watchdog says
-Biofuels: the Biggest Supply Response to the 2000s Oil Shock

The Radical Homemakers

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Long before we could pronounce Betty Friedan’s last name, Americans from my generation felt her impact. Many of us born in the mid-1970s learned from our parents and our teachers that women no longer needed to stay home, that there were professional opportunities awaiting us…Those of us with academic promise learned that we could do whatever we put our minds to, whether it was conquering the world or saving the world. I was personally interested in saving the world. That path eventually led me to conclude that homemaking would play a major role toward achieving that goal.