Canada's Environmental Voice
Many people believe that growing our fuel will improve energy security and independence, reduce greenhouse gas emissions and promote rural development. The Biofuel Delusion contends that such perceived advantages are quite simply not the case. Authors Mario Giampietro and Kozo Mayumi dedicate much of this book to energetics – an […]
Former Alberta environment minister Lorne Taylor was reported to have remarked to David Suzuki that without a strong, growing economy, Canadians simply could not afford to protect the environment. Most economists today continue to promote the idea that the wealthier the economy, the more money we will have to reduce […]
The Ptarmigan’s Dilemma: An Exploration into How Life Organizes and Supports Itself, John and Mary Theberge. If I were asked by a visitor from outer space for the best information on the history and ecology of life on Earth, I’d offer this book. Deservedly short-listed for the 2010 Writers’ Trust […]
You are probably aware that nature is dead. This may be why you are gloomy all the time. We tried so hard to ensure that biodiversity wasn’t lost and climate change didn’t spiral (further) out of control, but only an extreme idealist can maintain the illusion any longer. We have […]
In the movie adaptation of N. Richard Nash’s The Rainmaker, Burt Lancaster plays a flamboyant confidence man who promises to bring rain to drought- stricken Texas. How? By using sodium chloride to “barometricize the tropopause” and “magnetize occlusions in the sky.” Are today’s climate engineers the modern equivalent of steam-era […]
What do you call four adults viciously attacking one another in front of a sold-out audience screaming for blood? No, this is not the next generation of ultimate fighting. This is debating, Munk style. The Munk Debates consists of transcripts of the first five debates hosted by the Aurea Foundation. […]
David Wallace-Wells’ 2017 essay in New York Magazine entitled “The Uninhabitable Earth” depicted stark future scenarios for a climate change-afflicted world. It clearly struck a chord: it was the most read article in the magazine’s history. Now Wallace-Wells has released a book of the same title, and it has also […]
REVIEWED by Michael Polanyi AS SOMEONE WHO lives comfortably in a developed country, I struggle, as I’m sure others do, with how to live a meaningful and joyful life in a world that requires a drastic reduction in greenhouse gas emissions in order to avoid uncontrolled planetary warming. I have done […]
THE OVERRIDING QUESTION in Kai Reimer-Watts’ Beyond Crisis is why is our response to climate change “absurdly slow”? Humanity is already experiencing horrific forest fires and flooding – think Fort McMurray and Hurricane Sandy – yet many of us still engage in the flying, driving and beef-eating which bring wide-spread […]
Edging Forward is a hearty, well-informed plea to Canadians across the country to get off our collective butts and start affecting the change we know is needed. Ann Dale, a senior professor in the School of the Environment and Sustainability at Royal Roads University, provides a re-examination of what sustainability […]
