How was your week? I spotted a lot of interesting green stuff, here’s the ones I think you’ll be interested in:
First, the bad news:
Queensland koalas face extinction - their habitats are being cleared for urban development, and numbers have halved in just 3 years. If you’d like to help, check out the Australian Koala Foundation website, Save the Koalas.
Australia set to exceed our Kyoto targets - given that our ‘target’ was an increase of 8% over 1990 levels by 2012, the fact that we’re going over the limit 3 years early is shameful. We can do better!
Key effects of climate change on Melbourne - these will include temperature up by 1.1°C and rainfall down by 4%. The report also includes suggestions for mitigating the effects, including moving to green roofs, stormwater harvesting and a warning system for extreme weather similar to the one in Hong Kong. You can read the report at the City of Melbourne website.
But there’s good news too:
Melbourne has signed up to the Clinton Climate Initiative - I believe Sydney joined a while ago. The program works on 3 main areas: increasing energy efficiency in cities, supporting the large-scale supply of clean energy, and working to stop deforestation. Watch the Cities Go Climate Positive video at YouTube to find out more. (via Treehugger)
Two blokes from Brisbane have come up with a great idea, a Green Pod for cyclists - it’s a small area you get into using a swipe card, that gives you a place to store your bike and gear and have a shower. The idea is to have them at workplaces and public transport hubs to make it easier for cyclists to get around. (via Catapult)
Plus a couple of useful things:
Treehugger has some advice for buying water filtration systems for your home - if you’re trying to cut back on bottled water, but don’t like the taste of your home tap water, you might like to look into getting filters for your taps or water jugs.
And check out this beautiful zero-energy house - butterfly roofs to catch rainwater, angled deeply to get the best position for solar panels, and it’s passively cooled too. Plus another in Australia, the Kangaroo House. They look expensive to me, but the idea could be adapted for many places in Australia, I reckon.
