Clean Equity

Clean Equity Monaco 2008 is about to get started down in Monaco. Whenever I think of Monaco I think of all those obscene
gas guzzling sports cars that I saw on the streets there several years ago. It is good to know that people working to change that type of unsustainable logic are meeting up there, perhaps they can help bring on an era where luxury bicycles will outnumber luxury sports cars in Monte Carlo.

Photo Credit: AFPAs I look at the list of activities and personalities at Clean Equity, I see that Jeremy Rifkin is listed as a special guest. In his text Leading the Way to the Third Industrial Revolution: A New Energy Agenda for the European Union in the 21st Century -The Next Phase of European Integration-, Rifkin writes about what he calls the Third Industrial Revolution:

The key challenge that every nation needs to address is where they want their country to be in ten years from now: In the sunset energies and industries of the second industrial revolution or the sunrise energies and industries of the Third Industrial Revolution. The Third Industrial Revolution is the end-game that takes the world out of the old carbon and uranium-based energies and into a non-polluting, sustainable future for the human race.

I wonder if one day children in school will have a chapter in their history books entitled “The Third Industrial Revolution.” I also wonder if it will conclude with all the benefits that it brought for the planet .

February 19, 2008 2008, Impact Investing, Investment, Sustainability No Comments on Clean Equity

City of the Future?

A zero carbon, zero waste, car-free city is what developers in Abu Dhabi have announced they will build. Masdar City, the “city of the future” is to be completed in 8 years, with a price tag of 22 billion dollars. When completed, it is supposed to achieve a population of 50,000, and be completely self sufficient while producing no carbon emissions. Water is to come from a solar powered desalinization plant, power from a photo-voltaic power plant, air conditioning from natural “wind towers”, and waste water is to be filtered and put back into the city for growing biofuel. Transportation? A fully automated electric personal transit system and monorail.

Naturally there are alot of questions and hopes and fears involved with the project. Will it really produce zero cabon emissions? What happens once the city goes past 50,000 inhabitants? Can plans to shield the city from neighboring Abu Dhabi airport and Abu Dhabi itself really work? What about emergency services, how will they get around the city quickly without vehicles?

The building has begun, so as the old saying goes – we shall see.

Below you can watch a very professionally produced public relations video about the project. Note the very noble sounding voiceover and fascinating sci-fi images. At the very end of the film the narrator declares that “one day all cities will be built like this.” To which I have to defiantly ask, have they ever been to Baltimore?

February 13, 2008 2008, Impact Investing, Investment, Sustainability No Comments on City of the Future?