Friday

Talking About Cool[ing] It

Bjorn Lomborg, "Smart Solutions to Climate Change."

Bjorn Lomborg and Ondi Timoner's approach to the Macro Theme of Global Climate Change is simple:  Dollars & Cents

"I support the carbon tax," said filmmaker Ondi Timoner in a recent interview with Greening Hollywood. "It's only 6 cents at the gas pump and it would raise $270 Billion." Money, she says, that could be used to fund R&D of new clean energy sources and also green jobs.

The best way to silence someone is to destroy their reputation," said Timoner.

Cool It! the documentary about Global Climate Change that opens in major U.S. markets today, follows scientist and professor Bjorn Lomborg as he discusses the issues of global climate change with experts around the world.  This Dane is the editor of the book  Smart Solutions to Climate Change, and the author of The Skeptical Environmentalist, which The Guardian U.K. says are two very different outlooks on the same issue by the same person.

In his new book, Lomborg concludes, "Investing $100bn annually would mean that we could essentially resolve the climate change problem by the end of this century."

In his own defense, Lomborg explained to Greening Hollywood in a telephone interview that, "My fundamental point is not that we shouldn't worry [about climate change]. It's that we need to be led by good information, good judgment. We have to keep asking How big is the problem? And not focusing only on people who shout the loudest or have the cutest animal. We have to worry about [climate change] in the smartest possible way so that we end up doing a lot of good. Not just feeling good."

Ondi Timoner, a Sundance Kid, whose previous documentaries "We Live In Public," and "Dig!" very candidly admitted that she knew very little about the issue of climate change when she first met with Lomborg to discuss the for-hire film project.

About that first creative meeting, Timoner recalled, "I didn't know if Bjorn was legitimate or not but I grilled him for five hours. He expressed his ideas in such interesting ways that when I left that meeting I was convinced that he was worth hearing; he was worth knowing about.  The best way to silence someone is to destroy their reputation," said Timoner.

"I was also overwhelmed by the subject matter. I felt challenged to make climate change an entertaining subject matter, not so dry.  I saw that after 18 years of climate change conferences there was no forward motion. I wanted to make a movie where I could engage the audience so they feel empowered to do something."

One point that Timoner and Lomborg agree on is that there's a need for solutions when it comes to the Climate Change debate.  They both recognize that there's a polarization between the left and the right and their approaches to Climate Change.  Lomborg, a scientist who has become comfortable with and around cameras in recent years, has a good response that just might cut to the quick of that polarization:

"Think forward to our kids and grandkids...It doesn't matter if we've spoken beautifully about climate change. It matters if we have done something about it." - Bjorn Lomborg

Cool It! Trailer HERE.  In U.S. Theaters starting today.

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Wednesday

World Energy Outlook 2010

The 2010 edition of the World Energy Outlook (WEO) was released on 9 November and it provides updated projections of energy demand, production, trade and investment, fuel by fuel and region by region to 2035. It includes, for the first time, a new scenario that anticipates future actions by governments to meet the commitments they have made to tackle climate change and growing energy insecurity. 

WEO-2010 also puts the spotlight on several topical issues, including what more must be done and spent post-Copenhagen to limit the global temperature increase to 2°C and how these actions would impact oil markets; how emerging economies – led by China and India – will increasingly shape the global energy landscape; the costs and benefits of increasing renewable energy, the outlook for Caspian energy markets and their implications for global energy supply, the future role for unconventional oil and the crucial importance of energy in achieving the UN Millennium Development Goals.  Read More....

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Cocobohème = craftiness, whim, aesthetics

Many proponents of green design put the emphasis on the "design" side of the equation. The thinking goes that IF green is going to be a revolution, it must first seduce the consumer by its design. We will buy something not just because it's good for us, but because we would choose it over another model whether the product were eco or not.

Cocobohème embodies this philosophy.  It is a "soft mixture of craftiness, whim, aesthetics," and it is 100% French.  Granted there has been an explosion of eco-friendly consumer products in recent years on the market, but it is nonetheless a challenge to find design concepts that are fresh and purely original.

Partners, Catherine Fouchard, art director, and Christian Mégevand, scenographer began their company in 2003. They like to describe their designs as "poetry with a practical side," and they've dosed up on ethics and making a signature out of using sustainable materials.

Their original creations of potato-starch based biopolymer chalkboard stickers and baby bibs were the first of their kind when they brought them onto the market.   They've since launched with brown cardboard constructed stools shaped as pods, light-reflecting stickers that afix to clothing and bicycle helmets...and glow in the dark. They also offer a line of no glue, self-adhesive window stickers that allow in light while providing decorative themes on the windowpanes.  

Their dining table ware is equal whimsy with birch-based wooden platters embossed with a white-lace doily and an egg cup that neatly cradles a perfectly hardboiled egg. And their light-weight birch salad bowl with matching salad tossers embossed with a black stencil design is chic, light, and comes with some assembly required!

Unique, chic holiday gifts...Cocobohème. [They make Wonderful Eco Friendly Soaps Too!]

Greening Beauty

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