It might not have felt like it where you were, but as a global average last Sunday may have been the hottest day since record-keeping began.
Bus Rapid Transit is one of the most promising sustainable transport systems for cities, and it was great to see Senegal inaugurate the first in Africa earlier this year. Hot on their heels is Cote d’Ivoire, who broke ground on theirs for Abidjan last week.
If you’ve ever read a history of the automobile, or a history of oil, you’ll know that they are both intertwined. Neither industry would have become what it is today without the other. So it’s interesting to consider how electric cars will disrupt that power relationship, as Inside Climate News do here.
And in case you’re wondering if electric cars will kick off another power relationship with the extraction industry, here’s the Rocky Mountain Institute on why EVs and batteries are nothing like oil, and need a fraction of the resources.
Just the two articles this week, as a very busy month draws to a close. Working with schools has its own rhythm that I will have to adjust around, I am learning. I have a few days camping now, so I expect this next week will be quiet too.
This week’s articles
Urban mining for a circular economy
In the linear economy that we have grown accustomed to, things are made and used and then thrown away. Materials make a one way trip that eventually ends in the dump. It’s a formula for resource depletion, waste and pollution, and it is ultimately unsustainable. The broad solution to this is a circular economy, where…
What does climate justice look like in tourism?
Tourism presents some thorny questions in a changing climate. Take the Maldives, which has at times been a powerful voice for climate justice. As a low-lying island they are highly vulnerable to rising sea levels, and so carbon intensive lifestyles in other parts of the world are an existential risk. At the same time, tourism…
The Earthbound Report 