1. Home
  2. Articles posted by: Rona Fried (Page 2038)

Starbucks Partners with the African Wildlife Foundation

Building on its ongoing global coffee sustainability commitment to coffee farms and cooperatives throughout the world, Starbucks Coffee Company (Nasdaq:SBUX) and the African Wildlife Foundation today announced the launch of the “Coffee for Conservation” project, aimed at promoting coffee quality, environmental sustainability and natural resource conservation in East Africa. The three-year “Coffee for Conservation” project, will focus on providing training for farmers to produce high quality coffee and ensuring natural resource conservation in two East African countries. It will be launched in Kenya in the first year with plans to extend to other regions, such as Tanzania, in the following years. With more than 45 years of experience in conservation and wildlife management in Africa, African Wildlife Foundation will lead and manage the project on the ground in Kenya. Starbucks primary roles will be to provide financial and technical support in terms of training and resources. Starbucks socially responsible purchasing practices include paying premium prices for the highest quality arabica coffee, providing farmers with access to affordable credit, investing in social development projects, purchasing conservation and certified coffees (such as Fair Trade Certified(TM) and organic coffees), collaborating with farmers through the Starbucks Coffee Agronomy Company (Farmer Support Center) in Costa […]

Read More

Trex Gets Decked

URL: [sorry this link is no longer available] Website: [sorry this link is no longer available]     

Read More

Nuclear Power's Scorned Small-Scale Competitors Are Walloping It in the Marketplace

Rocky Mountain Institute researchers today doused the hype about “nuclear revival” in an icy bath of real-world data. They documented that worldwide, the decentralized, low- or no-carbon sources of electricity-cogeneration and renewables – all claimed by nuclear advocates to be too small and too slow to help much with climate change – are already bigger than nuclear power and are quickly leaving it in the dust. “Nuclear advocates are desperately trying to create an illusion that their failed option is being revived,” said RMI CEO and cofounder Amory Lovins, the lead author of the analysis, “so all its remaining costs and risks, which private investors have rejected, can be loaded onto taxpayers. This bailout, now being debated in Washington, is claimed to be vital because nuclear power is the only power source big and fast enough to combat climate change. But industry and official data reveal that claim to be false. While nuclear power dies of an incurable attack of market forces, its derided smaller-scale competitors are already a bigger global power source and are growing very rapidly, while nuclear power continues to fade away.” The analysis appears as the cover story in RMI’s summer 2005 newsletter, published online today. […]

Read More

California to Create World's Leading Center on Energy Efficiency

The California Clean Energy Fund (CalCEF), a $30 million public benefit investment fund created as part of the Pacific Gas and Electric bankruptcy settlement, announced it intends to award a one million dollar grant to establish and maintain the world’s leading university center on energy efficiency. The grant will be awarded to a Northern California university which aspires to international leadership in the development of energy efficiency technologies and the removal of barriers to their rapid commercialization. “Increasing energy efficiency is the single most important step California can take to minimize the long-term cost of reliable energy services,” said Michael R. Peevey, chairman of CalCEF and president of the California Public Utilities Commission. “Establishing a university center on energy efficiency is a natural way to meet the state’s goals by tapping into a wealth of academic expertise in developing and bringing innovative technologies to market.” By creating a university-based center for energy efficiency, CalCEF will bring together its diverse Board of Directors, partnerships with leading venture capital firms, and academic leaders from multiple disciplines to advance innovation and accelerate the commercialization of energy efficient products, services and practices. The center will also reinforce California’s standing as a national and international […]

Read More

Feds Partner with NY Institute to Promote Fuel Cell Research

Jun. 22–TROY — Twenty-eight doctoral candidates will study fuel-cell science and engineering at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute over the next five years, thanks to a new $4.8 million program funded by the federal government and the school. Once the program begins in the fall, doctoral candidates will begin an interdisciplinary program that includes courses on entrepreneurship as well as science and engineering. The program aims “to accelerate the process of moving ideas from discovery to the marketplace,” RPI Provost G.P. “Bud” Peterson said in a statement. The initiative, funded with $3.2 million from the National Science Foundation and $1.6 million from RPI, will bring together disciplines within engineering, science and management, and involve faculty and facilities from six departments and six research or student centers. There are already some commercial applications of fuel cells, which convert hydrogen to electricity. They include the GenCore system developed by Latham-based Plug Power Inc., which is used to provide backup power for telecommunications firms. Researchers at RPI have been delving into fuel cells for several years, but this is the first time a specific course of study has been packaged for doctoral candidates, school officials said. For the last two years, RPI has worked with […]

Read More