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Environment

Categories under Environment

The Auckland Mayoralty campaign

Written By: - Date published: 1:22 pm, May 15th, 2022 - 9 comments

The Auckland mayoralty campaign promises to be a fascinating contest between a right winger promising to spend $1.5 million on the campaign and wants to turn sprinklers on the homeless and Efeso Collins who promises to run an inclusive respectful campaign.

Announcing New Zealand’s low carbon future

Written By: - Date published: 6:05 am, May 10th, 2022 - 33 comments

The climate crisis is no longer something that’s happening to someone else, somewhere else, at some point in the future. It’s happening to us. It’s happening here. It’s happening now. – James Shaw

The politics of opposition to cycleways

Written By: - Date published: 10:30 am, May 8th, 2022 - 53 comments

Opposition to Auckland Council’s Cycling and Micromobility Programme Business Case appears to be motivated by the belief that plans to have more of the population walk and cycle instead of using cars will be unpopular.  Overseas experience suggests that not only can these types of projects contribute significantly to sustainability but they can also be very popular.

XR protestors have stopped operations at a Southland coal mine

Written By: - Date published: 2:15 pm, May 2nd, 2022 - 60 comments

Go you beautiful people!

What if… Dunedin no longer needed so much petrol?

Written By: - Date published: 10:03 am, April 22nd, 2022 - 17 comments

It’s 2032, and we’re looking back at a decade of oil, climate and economic crisis, and how one city found a way through.

The approaching fuel crisis: what if we no longer needed so much petrol?

Written By: - Date published: 10:20 am, April 13th, 2022 - 93 comments

What would our society, communities and lives look like in New Zealand if we weren’t so reliant on fossil fuels?

Luxon’s strange Public Transport take

Written By: - Date published: 8:29 am, April 13th, 2022 - 66 comments

Yesterday Chris Luxon showed the sensitivity and sophistication of someone who owns seven properties and at one stage had 6.1 million Air New Zealand shares by stating that he believed that at least some public transport services should not be supported and that public transport needs to stand on its own feet.

Plant based foods

Written By: - Date published: 8:08 am, April 12th, 2022 - 122 comments

Worrying news has emerged that New Zealand officials sought along with other agricultural nations to remove references to the benefits of consuming plant based foods on climate change from the IPCC report summary.

Climate Action Mondays: after the IPCC report, what now?

Written By: - Date published: 6:05 am, April 11th, 2022 - 87 comments

It’s time to act as if our lives depend on it.

Water and Money

Written By: - Date published: 7:26 am, April 7th, 2022 - 20 comments

If the 3 Waters reforms can survive its attacks and be implemented, a consequence will be that we are going to have a most enormous nationwide economic argument about the price of water and who pays for it all.

Last chance to see or finally acting as if our lives depend on it?

Written By: - Date published: 8:49 am, April 6th, 2022 - 55 comments

That IPCC report telling it like it is. Ball is in our court.

Change nothing

Written By: - Date published: 8:04 am, April 6th, 2022 - 15 comments

You get to a point – and Ardern must be close – where the most you can do is hang on.

Climate Action Mondays: slow fashion

Written By: - Date published: 9:54 am, April 4th, 2022 - 44 comments

It’s time to act as if our lives depend on it. Here are the things we can do and we can require government and business to do.

3 Waters Reform Must Happen

Written By: - Date published: 5:22 pm, April 3rd, 2022 - 147 comments

If you’re out there in ZB land and believe that water management should be democratically elected, you won’t find respite here.  Local Government has done a terrible job dealing with water and change is urgently needed.

Climate Action Mondays Tuesday

Written By: - Date published: 2:45 pm, March 29th, 2022 - 10 comments

It’s time to act as if our lives depend on it.

Crisis, What Crisis?

Written By: - Date published: 8:00 am, March 22nd, 2022 - 88 comments

There is only so much New Zealand and its government can do to soften the blows of the instability that are besetting the world.  And the problem is without dramatic change New Zealand will remain one of the most car-addicted, petrol reliant societies on earth for several decades to come.

Climate Action Mondays

Written By: - Date published: 6:05 am, March 21st, 2022 - 33 comments

It’s time to act as if our lives depend on it.

Who Pays the Price of Sanctions

Written By: - Date published: 4:32 pm, March 20th, 2022 - 194 comments

New Zealand’s sanctions on Russia have not stopped the war in Ukraine. They may have made our parliamentarians feel better, and Tony Blinken was quick to congratulate us on falling into line with the US “high-impact sanctions.” The language is combative, but the evidence shows sanctions do not  work. They can have significant blow-back effects, particularly if not combined with effective diplomacy.

The difference between Labour and National

Written By: - Date published: 9:05 am, March 17th, 2022 - 141 comments

There has been the occasional criticism of Labour for not achieving enough progressive change by people who then propose supporting National.  What are they thinking?

Pick a side

Written By: - Date published: 7:00 am, March 17th, 2022 - 351 comments

Ukrainian President Vladimir Zelinsky has made a direct appeal broadcast to the United States Congress. That will sort out the Putin supporters from the rest.  And with climate change beckoning it is time to pick a side.

The world in 6 months

Written By: - Date published: 8:59 am, March 15th, 2022 - 117 comments

In six months time the world could be in a very precarious position.

The empire strikes back

Written By: - Date published: 8:53 am, March 15th, 2022 - 146 comments

Labour’s announcement of a temporary reduction in fuel excise duties and a halving of public transport fares ups the ante on the debate on how to alleviate hardship caused by overseas induced inflation.

Is This The Boom We Wanted?

Written By: - Date published: 11:20 am, March 4th, 2022 - 65 comments

New Zealand’s time as high end ingredients producer to the world has arrived. But it has big costs.

Two years of living dangerously

Written By: - Date published: 1:53 pm, March 1st, 2022 - 75 comments

Yesterday marked the second anniversary of the first Covid case in New Zealand. What a time it has been.

Dennis Meadows on the 50th anniversary of the publication of The Limits to Growth – Post Carbon Institute

Written By: - Date published: 6:15 am, February 28th, 2022 - 14 comments

Only rarely does a book truly change the world. In the nineteenth century, such a book was Charles Darwin’s On the Origin of Species. For the twentieth century, it was The Limits to Growth.

Free public transport for Auckland is a very good idea

Written By: - Date published: 1:35 pm, February 23rd, 2022 - 66 comments

Efeso Collins has announced his first Mayoral campaign policy and it is a biggie, free public transport for Auckland.

Everyone is over Covid

Written By: - Date published: 8:46 am, February 22nd, 2022 - 134 comments

Jacinda Ardern said yesterday that everyone is over Covid.  She is right.  We all want this to end.

Global Britain fell with Singapore

Written By: - Date published: 10:00 pm, February 16th, 2022 - 4 comments

Today February 15th is the 80th anniversary of the fall of Singapore in 1942, described by many as Britain’s worst military disaster. It was a massive strategic fail, and its effect is still powerful today, most notably with Australia’s lockstep with the US. Current British strategists don’t seem to have learnt a thing.

 

The long cost of Covid-19

Written By: - Date published: 11:56 am, February 13th, 2022 - 47 comments

There has been a depressing large study published looking at the medical risks of having covid-19 on the cardiovascular systems in Nature Medicine. The news isn’t good. Having Covid-19 increases the risks of a range of cardiovascular diseases from heart failure to strokes over a year. It does it across all demographics.

Can this government get re-elected?

Written By: - Date published: 10:56 am, February 13th, 2022 - 34 comments

Where will the votes come from to get Labour a third term? 

Chloe Swarbrick Needs A Reset

Written By: - Date published: 11:01 am, February 10th, 2022 - 42 comments

Chloe Swarbrick has requested that the government help Auckland central’s restaurants.  But in a post Covid pre climate change world this is not going to help.