“Treating Plastic as Currency Helps Keep It Out of the Ocean”
Nyoman Dartini used plastic to pay for temple offerings she made for a summer full moon celebration on the Indonesian island of Bali. She plans to use plastic again to buy food and make more offerings during Galungan, a Hindu celebration marking the victory of good over evil.
Not plastic as in a credit card, but the bottles she collects from her job as a sweeper at a market in Denpasar. She brings them to a collection center operated by Plastic Bank, which tallies her deposits and sends her texts updating her balance. “My salary is not enough,” says the 60-year-old, speaking cheerfully about the extra 100,000 rupiah (about $7) she averages every month. The money supplements her own wages as well as those from her husband’s construction work and their son’s job in hotel housekeeping. “If I didn’t have this money, we would have to take out loans.”
“H&M CEO Sees ‘Terrible’ Fallout as Consumer Shaming Spreads”
The chief executive officer of fashion giant Hennes & Mauritz AB says a growing movement that shames consumers represents a very real social threat.
Karl-Johan Persson, the 44-year-old H&M CEO and son of its billionaire chairman, is speaking out as a pattern of shaming that initially targeted air travelers spreads into more industries, including his. The movement has gained traction as Greta Thunberg, the Swedish teen activist, inspires millions of people across the globe to take to the streets and voice their anger over what she says is a climate crisis.
“U.K. Property Prices May Now Be Affected by Car Charging Points”
Homeowners fear the lack of a charging point for an electric car could hit the value of their property, a new study has suggested.
Co-op Insurance said its research among 2,000 adults indicated that one in 10 households have a facility to charge a car, adding it was becoming the latest “must have” for house buyers.
“Booming Green Power Not Enough to Meet Climate Targets, IEA Says”
Electricity capacity from renewable energy is set to expand by as much as 50% in the next five years, bolstered by government support and falling costs. But more would be needed to slow down warming of the globe, the International Energy Agency said.
Those gains represent an increase of about 1,200 gigawatts from 2018 to 2024, equal to the total installed capacity in the U.S., according to a report published Monday by the Paris-based institution. Countries are adding more clean power as a key part of efforts to de-carbonize energy supply, but it’s still not fast enough, said the organization that advises rich nations on energy policy.
“Russia’s Thawing Permafrost May Cost Economy $2.3 Billion a Year”
Russia plans to pay more attention to the impact climate change is having on its vast permafrost area.
Thawing of once permanently frozen ground covering more than half of Russia is putting buildings, pipelines and other infrastructure at risk of damage. With the Arctic warming twice as fast as the rest of the world, that’s a big problem. The economic loss is 50 billion to 150 billion rubles ($2.3 billion) a year, said Alexander Krutikov, deputy minister for the Far East and Arctic development.You’ve reached your free article limit.Try 3 m
“IMF Will Include Climate in Country Analysis, Georgieva Says”
The IMF’s new managing director, Kristalina Georgieva, put climate change high up on the agenda at this year’s annual meetings in Washington, saying the fund is getting ready to incorporate environmental risk into its economic analysis.
“JPMorgan Economists Warn of Black Swan Risks From Climate Change”
JPMorgan Chase & Co. economists warned that standard models on the costs of a “business-as-usual” approach toward climate change may be flawed by failing to incorporate the Black Swan-type risk of pushing the planet into conditions unseen for millions of years.
“There are plenty of non-linear tipping points in the climate system that could make the economic consequences of BAU much more severe,” David Mackie and Jessica Murray, economists at the bank in London, wrote in a note to clients Thursday. BAU stands for business-as-usual. “It is hard to know what weather outcomes will occur. Econometric estimates are based on small deviations in the mean of the probability distribution.”
“Can Komodo Dragons Survive the Ecotourist Boom?”
The fierce lizards are in perpetual decline on their native island. A huge influx of visitors hasn’t helped.
“The massive plastic-cleaning device invented by a 25-year-old is finally catching trash in the Great Pacific Garbage Patch”
https://www.businessinsider.com/ocean-cleanup-catches-plastic-great-pacific-garbage-patch-2019-10
- In 2013, at age 19, the entrepreneur Boyan Slat founded The Ocean Cleanup, a nonprofit that aims to rid the ocean of plastic.
- The organization designed a device to clean the Great Pacific Garbage Patch, a trash-filled vortex in the ocean that’s more than twice the size of Texas.
- The system has gone through multiple iterations since the first version spilled the plastic it collected back into the water.
My Trip To The Amazon 
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