disaster

Oil spill ‘will shape how US thinks about environment’

14 June, 2010 by Einar Thorsen Leave a Comment

Barack Obama:

In the same way that our view of our vulnerabilities and our foreign policy was shaped profoundly by 9/11, I think this disaster is going to shape how we think about the environment and energy for many years to come

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What we can predict is that the availability of fossil fuel is going to be diminishing; that it's going to get more expensive to recover; that there are going to be environmental costs that our children… our grandchildren and our great-grandchildren are going to have to bear.

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PAX: an ambitious and flawed way to create global networks for peace, so let’s try it?

25 May, 2010 by Einar Thorsen Leave a Comment

Charlie Beckett:

PAX is only a draft concept but it hopes to tap into the crowd-sourcing and networking potential of the Internet bringing together the vast amounts of data and expertise out there. This would be combined with grass-roots – perhaps mobile-based – instant reporting on developing situations. A team would aggregate this content in an informed way and use it to persuade/encourage people in power to act and act quickly before the potential crisis becomes a real, happening disaster.

Of course there are people who already do some of these things. The news organisations such as Reuters, AP and BBC all have extensive networks that report continuously on these issues. Specialist NGOs such as the excellent International Alert seek to predict crises. Others such as Global Voices, Ushahid and Demotix seek to harness citizen reporting power.

But none of them quite do what PAX wants to do. That is, to focus on pre-reactive, real-time intelligence gathering and then advocacy action.

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Is this BP’s last option to stop the spill?

25 May, 2010 by Einar Thorsen Leave a Comment

Alex Thomson:

They have 16 men out there experienced in capping the Kuwait wellheads which Saddam’s troops blew up.

I saw what Saddam did in Kuwait and I saw what BP did in the Gulf – the Kuwaiti oil fires were child’s play on every level of comparison. Surface as opposed to extreme depth. In air as opposed to water. Ignited oil as opposed to gushing liquid crude into pristine deep ocean.

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So you have to ask – who on earth are BP to trust when it comes to talking about the terrible mess they have made? Precisely the question they really are asking on Capitol Hill, right now.

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