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Global Warming
Conservation among keys to coping with water woes
The old quip in the West that whiskey's for drinkin' and water's for fightin' is a tired cliche by now but still rings true.
Only these days, there's more people with a stake in the water fight and a dwindling supply to go around.
Quenching the growing demand for water in the warming West will require a bigger push for conservation, innovative technology and a rethinking of supply and demand, Western governors and water experts said Sunday.
About 600 people gathered in Park City for the first day of the Western Governors' Association meeting.
The three-day meeting focuses on key issues that affect states throughout the West, including water use, climate change and energy. This year—with several cabinet members from the Obama administration and a record attendance—the political landscape has shifted and there's a renewed urgency for swapping ideas and working together, attendees said.
"This is kind of where it all begins," said Utah Gov. Jon Huntsman, WGA's outgoing chairman,
The governors approved several resolutions Sunday, including one calling for a national policy to reduce greenhouse gas emissions.
"Global warming poses a serious threat to the Western economy, public health and environment," the resolution said.
Sunday's main discussion, which included Canadian officials and experts from the Middle East and Australia, focused on managing water amid changing climate conditions.
"As governors and premiers of the West, we're all challenged by this," said Colorado Gov. Bill Ritter.
Although many of the controversies in the West center around urbanization, natural resources and energy development, water—and often the lack of it—comes up again and again.
"Water is connected to all those things," said Peter Gleick, president of the Pacific Institute, an environmental think tank based in Oakland, Calif.
Gleick, one of four panelists who spoke Sunday, said there's evidence of intensified water disputes, ecosystem collapse in some places and a population growth that's driving a sometimes-fractured water management system.
States can no longer rely on simply building more storage capacity, which can be expensive and "politically challenging," he said. The West needs to consider other supply options such as rainwater, use of treated wastewater and desalination plants, Gleick said.
Climate change—which will alter precipitation and the timing of mountain snow melt—also needs to be incorporated into all water management decisions, he said.
Ritter said the region needs to do more to protect the water that's already available.
"Conservation has to become an ethic in the West," he said.
Inevitably, though, there will be hard decisions to make about who gets water and who doesn't, said Doug Miell, an Australian water consultant and former leader of an irrigation council during some of the country's worst drought conditions.
"The bad news is there's no silver bullet," said Miell, who advocated for more information gathering and sharing among resource managers.
Montana Gov. Brian Schweitzer, the incoming WGA chairman, agreed that water needs to be better measured, moved more efficiently and conserved on a larger scale.
"Those of us who are managing water in the West know how important this is," he said.
Monday's agenda includes a session about tapping the West's renewable energy potential. Scheduled speakers include Interior Secretary Ken Salazar, Energy Secretary Steven Chu and Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack.
An afternoon session on climate change is expected to include Robert Zoellick, president of The World Bank and Nancy Sutley, chair of the White House Council on Environmental Quality.
Source: mercurynews.com
Only these days, there's more people with a stake in the water fight and a dwindling supply to go around.
Quenching the growing demand for water in the warming West will require a bigger push for conservation, innovative technology and a rethinking of supply and demand, Western governors and water experts said Sunday.
About 600 people gathered in Park City for the first day of the Western Governors' Association meeting.
The three-day meeting focuses on key issues that affect states throughout the West, including water use, climate change and energy. This year—with several cabinet members from the Obama administration and a record attendance—the political landscape has shifted and there's a renewed urgency for swapping ideas and working together, attendees said.
"This is kind of where it all begins," said Utah Gov. Jon Huntsman, WGA's outgoing chairman,
The governors approved several resolutions Sunday, including one calling for a national policy to reduce greenhouse gas emissions.
"Global warming poses a serious threat to the Western economy, public health and environment," the resolution said.
Sunday's main discussion, which included Canadian officials and experts from the Middle East and Australia, focused on managing water amid changing climate conditions.
"As governors and premiers of the West, we're all challenged by this," said Colorado Gov. Bill Ritter.
Although many of the controversies in the West center around urbanization, natural resources and energy development, water—and often the lack of it—comes up again and again.
"Water is connected to all those things," said Peter Gleick, president of the Pacific Institute, an environmental think tank based in Oakland, Calif.
Gleick, one of four panelists who spoke Sunday, said there's evidence of intensified water disputes, ecosystem collapse in some places and a population growth that's driving a sometimes-fractured water management system.
States can no longer rely on simply building more storage capacity, which can be expensive and "politically challenging," he said. The West needs to consider other supply options such as rainwater, use of treated wastewater and desalination plants, Gleick said.
Climate change—which will alter precipitation and the timing of mountain snow melt—also needs to be incorporated into all water management decisions, he said.
Ritter said the region needs to do more to protect the water that's already available.
"Conservation has to become an ethic in the West," he said.
Inevitably, though, there will be hard decisions to make about who gets water and who doesn't, said Doug Miell, an Australian water consultant and former leader of an irrigation council during some of the country's worst drought conditions.
"The bad news is there's no silver bullet," said Miell, who advocated for more information gathering and sharing among resource managers.
Montana Gov. Brian Schweitzer, the incoming WGA chairman, agreed that water needs to be better measured, moved more efficiently and conserved on a larger scale.
"Those of us who are managing water in the West know how important this is," he said.
Monday's agenda includes a session about tapping the West's renewable energy potential. Scheduled speakers include Interior Secretary Ken Salazar, Energy Secretary Steven Chu and Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack.
An afternoon session on climate change is expected to include Robert Zoellick, president of The World Bank and Nancy Sutley, chair of the White House Council on Environmental Quality.
Source: mercurynews.com
Global Warming Conference: The Science of Climate Change
The first panel at the Heartland Institute today brings together four of the world's best scientists when it comes to climate change study. The first speaker is Anthony Watts, creator of the website SufaceStations.org, "created in response to the realization that very little physical site survey data exists for the entire United States Historical Climatological Network (USHCN) and Global Historical Climatological Network (GHCN) surface station records worldwide." SufaceStations.org is a project that monitors the quality of data at America's 1,221 weather stations. Once a believer that manmade carbon dioxide had a significant effect on the earth's atmosphere, Watts' change of heart is largely based on the lack of credible science.
Watts is widely known in the climate change science community for visiting weather stations across the country. He found that several biases in the location of many of the temperature reading devices. Many are on unnatural surface temperatures: on cinder, asphalt, wood chips, and concrete. They lay on top or roofs or on airport runways. Other spots for stations included spots next to an incinerator, waste management facilities (where it's much warmer) and outside of an air conditioning unit right next to where the warm air is released. One station in Baltimore had readings of over 100 degrees F when no other nearby station did. That station has been shut down but the climate records remain. His conclusion is that most of the weather stations have an upwards bias of 1 degree Celsius and in many cases it's two degrees C. Check out Watts' project, SurfaceStations.org for much more.
University of Virginia professor Fred Singer is up next. His main conclusion is the science is not settled. Singer is also the president of the Science and Environmental Policy project and just published an 800 page report entitled, "Climate Change Reconsidered" that questions and debunks many of the conclusions found by the IPCC report – the report Al Gore and others use as evidence manmade carbon dioxide is a severe problem. Singer's report is one of the Nongovernmental International Panel on Climate Change, mockingly suggesting the conclusions of the original IPCC report came more from politicians than climatologists.
There are too many unsolved problems when it comes to climate sensitivity and the feedback effects of water vapor and clouds. Many scientists purport natural forcings are the chief contributor to global climate change, and scientists continue to study the effects of internal oscillations and the sun's effect on climate change, which leads us to the next speaker.
Harvard astronomer Willie Soon follows Singer. Dr. Soon is known for his tireless work advocating that solar activity and not man-made emissions is the leading variable behind the earth's temperature change. He recently had the opportunity to tell Al Gore he "strongly disagreed" with his stance on global warming. He begins with a joke, suggesting that the reason he gets so hot in his car with the windows rolled up in the summertime is not from greenhouse effect but must be from the carbon dioxide he is breathing, a joke approved by the audience with laughter and applause. He then asserts that carbon dioxide is not an "air pollutant" but food for plants and marine life.
The focus of Soon's speech is removing politics from science, a large challenge. Soon argues the "magical" CO2 knob that we can turn to the right or left to control the weather and climate simply does not exist. He emphasizes that sun-induced climate change theories are making significant progress, which is largely Soon's own doing.
Soon, about 5'9" and 170 pounds uses an interesting analogy to discuss carbon dioxide's effect on the climate. He has three photos on a slide: himself eating a cheeseburger, Tom Brady, and a gorilla drinking water. Soon represents carbon dioxide, Tom Brady represents the climate and the gorilla represents the sun. His point is simple. He can eat as much meat as he wants but at the end of the day, it's the gorilla that can knock Tom Brady over, not Willie Soon. The translation: Even if carbon dioxide is increasing at a rapid rate, because the sun is such a significant contributor, the smallest amount of change will have a much more dramatic effect.
Soon asks an important question: What happens if we find out carbon dioxide is not a pollutant that has significant effects on global temperature and once we spend trillions of dollars to regulate it, it disrupts the CO2 vital for plant and marine life? He warns it could be an ecological disaster.
Rounding up the panel is Harrison Schmidt, a former NASA astronaut, one of the most recent Americans to walk on the moon, an earth scientist and a former Congressman. His talk is more political than scientific. He believes that any attempt to regulate carbon dioxide will be one of the largest losses of liberty our country has ever faced. By regulating just about everything that emits carbon dioxide, the government could force people to significantly change their behavior and reduce consumer choice in ways almost unimaginable. A good message from someone who understands both the science and the politics behind climate change.
Watts is widely known in the climate change science community for visiting weather stations across the country. He found that several biases in the location of many of the temperature reading devices. Many are on unnatural surface temperatures: on cinder, asphalt, wood chips, and concrete. They lay on top or roofs or on airport runways. Other spots for stations included spots next to an incinerator, waste management facilities (where it's much warmer) and outside of an air conditioning unit right next to where the warm air is released. One station in Baltimore had readings of over 100 degrees F when no other nearby station did. That station has been shut down but the climate records remain. His conclusion is that most of the weather stations have an upwards bias of 1 degree Celsius and in many cases it's two degrees C. Check out Watts' project, SurfaceStations.org for much more.
University of Virginia professor Fred Singer is up next. His main conclusion is the science is not settled. Singer is also the president of the Science and Environmental Policy project and just published an 800 page report entitled, "Climate Change Reconsidered" that questions and debunks many of the conclusions found by the IPCC report – the report Al Gore and others use as evidence manmade carbon dioxide is a severe problem. Singer's report is one of the Nongovernmental International Panel on Climate Change, mockingly suggesting the conclusions of the original IPCC report came more from politicians than climatologists.
There are too many unsolved problems when it comes to climate sensitivity and the feedback effects of water vapor and clouds. Many scientists purport natural forcings are the chief contributor to global climate change, and scientists continue to study the effects of internal oscillations and the sun's effect on climate change, which leads us to the next speaker.
Harvard astronomer Willie Soon follows Singer. Dr. Soon is known for his tireless work advocating that solar activity and not man-made emissions is the leading variable behind the earth's temperature change. He recently had the opportunity to tell Al Gore he "strongly disagreed" with his stance on global warming. He begins with a joke, suggesting that the reason he gets so hot in his car with the windows rolled up in the summertime is not from greenhouse effect but must be from the carbon dioxide he is breathing, a joke approved by the audience with laughter and applause. He then asserts that carbon dioxide is not an "air pollutant" but food for plants and marine life.
The focus of Soon's speech is removing politics from science, a large challenge. Soon argues the "magical" CO2 knob that we can turn to the right or left to control the weather and climate simply does not exist. He emphasizes that sun-induced climate change theories are making significant progress, which is largely Soon's own doing.
Soon, about 5'9" and 170 pounds uses an interesting analogy to discuss carbon dioxide's effect on the climate. He has three photos on a slide: himself eating a cheeseburger, Tom Brady, and a gorilla drinking water. Soon represents carbon dioxide, Tom Brady represents the climate and the gorilla represents the sun. His point is simple. He can eat as much meat as he wants but at the end of the day, it's the gorilla that can knock Tom Brady over, not Willie Soon. The translation: Even if carbon dioxide is increasing at a rapid rate, because the sun is such a significant contributor, the smallest amount of change will have a much more dramatic effect.
Soon asks an important question: What happens if we find out carbon dioxide is not a pollutant that has significant effects on global temperature and once we spend trillions of dollars to regulate it, it disrupts the CO2 vital for plant and marine life? He warns it could be an ecological disaster.
Rounding up the panel is Harrison Schmidt, a former NASA astronaut, one of the most recent Americans to walk on the moon, an earth scientist and a former Congressman. His talk is more political than scientific. He believes that any attempt to regulate carbon dioxide will be one of the largest losses of liberty our country has ever faced. By regulating just about everything that emits carbon dioxide, the government could force people to significantly change their behavior and reduce consumer choice in ways almost unimaginable. A good message from someone who understands both the science and the politics behind climate change.
US House committee approves climate change bill
The oil and gas industry joined other industries that responded critically after the US House Energy and Commerce Committee approved a bill May 21 to address global climate change by instituting a cap-and-trade system.
The committee beat the Memorial Day holiday weekend deadline that Chairman Henry A. Waxman (D-Calif.) set by 1 day when it approved HR 2454 by 33 to 25 votes.
"This bill, when enacted into law this year, will break our dependence on foreign oil, make our nation the world leader in clean energy jobs and technology, and cut global warming pollution," Waxman said following the vote.
The bill's cosponsor, Edward J. Markey (D-Mass.), described the bill as "bold action to preserve good-paying jobs here in American and preserve our planet." Markey is chairman of the committee's Energy and Environment Subcommittee.
Markey said he believes more was accomplished in 8 weeks toward energy independence than the US has accomplished in 8 years.
But HR 2454 immediately drew fire from leading oil and gas associations.
American Petroleum Institute Pres. Jack N. Gerard said, "While the bill has laudable environmental and economic goals, its inequitable system of allocations remains intact and, if enacted, would have a disproportionate adverse impact on consumers, businesses, and producers of gasoline, diesel fuel, jet fuel, crude oil, and natural gas."
National Petrochemical & Refiners Association Pres. Charles T. Drevna said, "While this may appear, in the short term, to be a monumental political success, ultimately it represents nothing more than an abject policy failure. The whole notion of capping carbon dioxide emissions, issuing allowances disproportionately to favored industries, and hoping that the false promise of 'green jobs' could gloss over the current and real jobs that will be lost should HR 2454 become law belies the complexity of fairly balancing energy and environmental policy."
'Neither wanted nor needed'
"The role of the federal government is not to choose winners and losers in the business sector," Drevna said. "Such policies, with the back of a hand, cast aside millions of hard-working Americans with the simple message that they and their livelihoods are neither wanted nor needed. Such policies fail consumers by effectively limiting individual preference and choice for vehicle and fuel type."
Waxman delayed marking up the bill, called the American Clean Energy and Security Act, by a week so changes could be made from its original version to secure enough votes for its passage. One of the most crucial changes came when Rick Boucher (D-Va.), chairman of the committee's Communications, Technology, and the Internet Subcommittee, announced that he had reached an agreement with Waxman and Markey to preserve coal-related jobs, facilitate more coal production, and keep electricity rates affordable in his southwestern Virginia district and elsewhere where power comes from coal-fired plants.
"It is now inevitable that federal controls on greenhouse gases will be adopted," Boucher said as the bill's markup began on May 18.
"The [US] Supreme Court ended the debate on whether there would be controls when it effectively mandated 3 years ago that the [US] Environmental Protection Agency regulate greenhouse gas emissions unless the Congress regulates first," Boucher said. "Virtually all interested parties, from the coal industry and electric utilities to the environmental community, would prefer that Congress adopt the regulations rather than have them be adopted by EPA."
Chief executives of some of the biggest US power companies have said that action to address global climate change now is essential.
"I understand the arguments against action on energy and climate with concerns focused on the economy," Duke Energy Corp. Chief Executive James E. Rogers told the US Senate Foreign Relations Committee on May 19.
"However, the reality is we can't afford not to act if we hope to compete and lead," Rogers said. "The right comprehensive energy and carbon legislation can provide not only the certainty and rules of the road by which we can plan, build, and compete; it will also protect consumers, help us advance efficiency and alternative technology efforts, and all while cleaning up the environment."
'Gasoline prices above $4/gal'
The problem is that HR 2454 doesn't fit Rogers's description, oil and gas industry leaders maintained.
API's Gerard said, "As a recent independent analysis shows, this inequitable approach, by itself, will produce additional unemployment, driving annual job destruction totals related to the legislation to more than 1 million. Another independent study projects job losses more than double this: up to 2.7 million net jobs lost annually, even with new green jobs created. According to one of these reports, an average family will pay an additional $1,500/year for energy and 74% more for gasoline. Today, that would mean gasoline prices above $4/gal, an increase nearly equivalent to a ten rise in the federal gasoline tax."
The bill also would compromise the ability of US refiners to compete with overseas oil product processors, Drevna indicated.
"Imports of refined products, not simply crude, could actually increase under HR 2454, thus impeding national energy security," Drevna said. "American refiners, who already face stiff foreign competition in the fuels markets, would be severely disadvantaged with higher compliance costs under the Waxman-Markey scheme. Foreign refiners, whose facility emissions are obviously not addressed in HR 2454 and whose operating costs are much lower, would gain a distinct advantage over American businesses in the marketplace."
But the American Gas Association, which represents natural gas utilities, said the Energy and Commerce Committee took an important step when it passed the Waxman-Markey bill. The bill allocates emission allowances to local distribution companies to cover the carbon emissions of their residential, commercial, and small industrial customers, it noted. Gas utilities' residential and commercial customers would not be covered by the bill's carbon cap until 2016, it said.
In a fact sheet that it distributed following the vote, NPRA pointed out that US refiners must meet the earliest compliance mandate for fuels in 2013, while other sources would not be phased in until 2014. "Compared to other industries, domestic refiners receive a disproportionately low number of emissions allowances to meet HR 2454's requirements: just 2% to cover nearly half of the total US carbon dioxide emissions as covered in the bill," it said.
"Assuming a conservative carbon price of $26/ton with 2% of the emissions allowances, a domestic refinery with 100,000 b/d of capacity would have to spend roughly $330 million annually if it were required to purchase emissions allowances for the fuels it produced. Aggregated, these costs would total roughly $58 billion/year for the American refining community and escalate over time as the cost of the program increases," NPRA continued.
Ability to compete worldwide
The American Chemistry Council said that, while committee members made a number of positive changes in the bill, several key issues related to US energy-intensive manufacturers' ability to compete globally still need to be addressed.
"Specifically, we are very concerned that the emissions allocation provision for trade-vulnerable industries (Title VII, Section 782) treats energy-intensive industries differently from other US sectors," Cal Dooley, the group's president, said.
"The bill assigns a baseline year of 2005 for energy-intensives versus a flexible, multiyear base period for other sectors," Dooley said. "The year 2005 was a low-emission one for the chemical industry due to hurricane-related production disruptions, and the designation puts chemical makers at a disadvantage despite the significant greenhouse gas emissions reductions the industry has achieved over the past 2 decades.
"The bill also employs a different emission allowance schedule for energy-intensive industries as compared with other sectors, reducing allowances over time and unfairly depriving energy-intensive manufacturers of receiving more than 200 million allowances through 2021 at an estimated cost of more than $5 billion."
While the committee's vote on the bill largely followed party lines, not every Democrat supported it. Charlie Melancon (La.) said that he fully backed many of its aspects but still voted against it because of concerns about its potential impacts on Louisiana's energy workers and industries.
"South Louisianians want to reduce pollution in the air we breathe and the water we drink," Melancon said. "We want to slow or even reverse climate change. And we want our nation to become more energy-independent. But we must do so in a way that won't threaten our offshore oil and gas industry, an industry that has provided good-paying jobs to hundreds of thousands of workers in South Louisiana for generations."
API's Gerard said, "There is time to get this right. As the bill moves to the full House, we ask lawmakers to look at all the consequences of the bill, consider the implications on ordinary Americans at a time of economic hardship, and come up with an equitable plan that will address global climate change and improve, not weaken, our nation's energy and economic security.
Paris mayor: Time for change in urban lifestyle
"In the world's large cities, it's time to change the way we travel, consume and generate our energy," Mayor Bertrand Delanoe told colleagues and officials from 70 countries gathered at a meeting on climate change in Copenhagen (Michael von Bülow)
Paris Mayor Bertrand Delanoe on Tuesday urged big cities to help stop global warming by acting to change the lifestyle of urban dwellers."In the world's large cities, it's time to change the way we travel, consume and generate our energy," Delanoe told 700 mayors, local officials, and other delegates from 70 countries gathered at a three-day meeting on climate change in Copenhagen, the city that hosts the UN climate conference (COP15) in December.Delanoe welcomed several cities' efforts already under way, noting that in the Danish capital a third of the citizens get around on bikes and another third use public transport only.He also praised San Francisco for its bio-fuel program that uses recycled cooking oil, and Melbourne's rapidly developing green rail network.
17 percent renewable energy – and on the way up
The proportion of renewable energy in Denmark is to be increased to 20 percent in 2011. In 2020 the proportion is expected to be 30 percent.
In 2007 just under 17 percent of the total energy consumption in Denmark came from renewable sources of energy. The most obvious source is the many wind turbines to be seen in the Danish countryside. 30 percent of the Danish electricity supply is based on renewable energy, and wind power contributes 20 percent. The many small wind turbines that can be seen today have, however, in many ways had their day. Denmark has just under 5,300 wind turbines, but the 250 biggest supply more than 20 percent of the total wind power in Denmark. In the future we will see fewer but larger wind turbines, with many of them being located in offshore wind turbine parks, where they can produce more and are less visible.
The largest part of the Danish production of renewable energy comes, however, from the burning of biomass, including biodegradable waste. When combined with the effective exploitation of fuel in Combined Heating and Power (CHP) plants – which produce both heat and electricity from the same fuel – biomass contributes around ten percent of the total Danish energy consumption.
In February 2008 the parties in the Danish parliament entered into a broad-based agreement concerning Denmark's future energy policy. The agreement means that the proportion of renewable energy is to be increased to 20 percent in 2011. In 2020 the proportion is expected to be 30 percent – the EU target is 20 percent. (Photo: Jørgen Schytte/Scanpix)
In 2007 just under 17 percent of the total energy consumption in Denmark came from renewable sources of energy. The most obvious source is the many wind turbines to be seen in the Danish countryside. 30 percent of the Danish electricity supply is based on renewable energy, and wind power contributes 20 percent. The many small wind turbines that can be seen today have, however, in many ways had their day. Denmark has just under 5,300 wind turbines, but the 250 biggest supply more than 20 percent of the total wind power in Denmark. In the future we will see fewer but larger wind turbines, with many of them being located in offshore wind turbine parks, where they can produce more and are less visible.
The largest part of the Danish production of renewable energy comes, however, from the burning of biomass, including biodegradable waste. When combined with the effective exploitation of fuel in Combined Heating and Power (CHP) plants – which produce both heat and electricity from the same fuel – biomass contributes around ten percent of the total Danish energy consumption.
In February 2008 the parties in the Danish parliament entered into a broad-based agreement concerning Denmark's future energy policy. The agreement means that the proportion of renewable energy is to be increased to 20 percent in 2011. In 2020 the proportion is expected to be 30 percent – the EU target is 20 percent. (Photo: Jørgen Schytte/Scanpix)
A working laboratory for energy technologies
Energy efficiency in Denmark has been created by a range of new technologies, and today, this can serve as an example of how one can create a high level of growth without a corresponding increase in greenhouse gas emissions. (Ministry of Climate and Energy of Denmark)
Maybe number eight does not sound like all that much, but there are reasons to look more closely at the Danish example. A top placement among the world's most energy-efficient and climate-friendly economies has been achieved despite the fact that Denmark does not have any hydroelectric power resources worth mentioning, nor the large forest areas that typically form the basis for a large part of a country's production of renewable energy. Neither does Denmark use nuclear power, which is a large source of CO2-free energy in other countries in the same group.Energy efficiency in Denmark has been created by a range of new technologies and solutions, and this can today serve as an example of how one can create a high level of growth without a corresponding increase in energy consumption or greenhouse gas emissions.
The means to achieve this has partly been a strong political focus on energy policy. Denmark was one of the first countries to set out detailed plans for developing the energy sector back in the 1970s. Added to this has been the strong commitment of the Danish business sector to developing – and using – energy-efficient solutions. The windmill industry is the best-known example of this, but there is much more. A common-sense approach to energy-efficient measures such as insulating houses and cost savings in production has gone hand in hand with high-tech solutions for the whole society. For example there is an electricity supply system that can handle the fact that windmills supply, in periods, more than 100 per cent of the energy required, and in other periods supply nothing at all. And it can do this in a competitive manner.
The last factor is the strong focus on energy saving and a secure energy supply, which has been the case since the oil crises in the 1970s. In 1985 the Danish parliament (Folketinget) rejected nuclear power and opted to focus on new, sustainable sources of energy. Denmark in 2009 is in many ways a dynamic, working laboratory for the meeting of new energy technologies and old common sense in its relationship with nature. (Photo: Eva Rosenqvist/Scanpix)
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