Germany, Poland[, Italy] snub EU appeal for greater climate ambition
France, the Netherlands, Belgium, Sweden, Denmark, Spain, Portugal and Luxembourg launch EC climate action "non-paper"

Diversity is the key to economic and political evolution.

UN declares ["]war["] on ocean plastic
"UN Environment launched today an unprecedented global campaign to eliminate major sources of marine litter: microplastics in cosmetics and the excessive, wasteful usage of single-use plastic by the year 2022."
BREAKING: UN Decides to Control Global Plastic Waste Dumping

187 countries took a major step forward in curbing the plastic waste crisis by adding plastic to the Basel Convention, a treaty that controls the movement of hazardous waste from one country to another. The amendments require exporters to obtain the consent of receiving countries before shipping most contaminated, mixed, or unrecyclable plastic waste, providing an important tool for countries in the Global South to stop the dumping of unwanted plastic waste into their country.
[...]
The decision reflects a growing recognition around the world of the toxic impacts of plastic and the plastic waste trade. The majority of countries expressed their support for the proposal and over one million people globally signed two public petitions from Avaaz and SumOfUs. Yet even amidst this overwhelming support, there were a few vocal outliers who opposed listing plastic under Annex II of the Basel Convention. These included the United States, the largest exporter of plastic waste in the world; the American Chemistry Council, a prominent petrochemical industry lobbying group; and the Institute of Scrap Recycling Industries, a business association largely comprised of waste brokers. As the United States is not a party to the Basel Convention, it will be banned from trading plastic waste with developing countries that are Basel Parties but not part of the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development.

["]Landmark["] UN plastic waste pact gets approved but not by US

archived plastics
we tortured some folks

Diversity is the key to economic and political evolution.

This @exxonmobile chart from 1982 predicted that in 2019 our atmospheric CO2 level would reach about 415 parts per million, raising the global temperature roughly 0.9 degrees C.

Update: The world crossed the 415 ppm threshold this week and broke 0.9 degrees C in 2017 1/ pic.twitter.com/sLpOVkwzTF

— Tom Randall (@tsrandall) May 14, 2019

Where Lyme Disease Came From and Why It Eludes Treatment
shocking. unprecedented. inconceivable. egregious.

Diversity is the key to economic and political evolution.

I never ever trusted farmed salmon ...

○ Salmon: branded as Scottish but owned abroad
○ Salmon farming giant Mowi (Marine Harvest) probed over chemical use | BBC News |

Norway's richest man John Frederikson ... shipping magnate in choppy waters?

'Sapere aude'

Mass killing of male chickens expected to prompt groundbreaking decision in Germany

In Germany alone, around 45 million male chicks are gassed or shredded every year because they do not lay eggs.

transference?

Diversity is the key to economic and political evolution.

I'm talking about trains like this one

Did you know that they run on diesel, just like VW cars?

DW is funded in whole or in part by Germany government.

Elmed interconnector aims to bring solar power from the Sahara to Europe

On April 30, the governments of Italy and Tunisia signed a deal to lay an underwater power cable between Partanna, Sicily and El Haouaria, Tunisia, aiming to integrate the EU's electricity grid with that of North Africa. A long time in the works, Italian transmission company Terna and Tunisian gas and electricity group STEG have been developing the so-called Elmed Mediterranean power interconnector since 2003.
Speaking of Desertec and such, how fares solar thermal in Spain
[...]
Elmed is currently on the third list of EU Projects of Common Interest (PCI), which includes key infrastructure projects that can benefit from accelerated planning and permit granting...."The EIB is in continuous contact with most project promoters of large scale renewable energy projects and would consider possible financing as the two schemes develop," an EIB source told DW, referring to the Elmed as much as to the TuNur project -- a solar power project presented in 2017, which aims at exporting 4.5 gigawatts (GW) of renewable energy through undersea cables to Malta, Italy and France.
[...]
Elmed would not only diversify supply sources and routes for Europeans, but also increase Tunisia's energy security, the [World] bank said. That is because the project, which was originally conceived in 2003 to export solar power generated in the Sahara to Italy, is now designed to be bidirectional.
[...]
A second reason for support for Elmed is that it fits into the European Union's strategy for Africa. Apart from already established ties with Morocco, such as electricity interconnections between Spain and Morocco, European institutions are now focusing on the Sahel area and Tunisia.

EU-ACP Cotonou successor faces one year delay

The ACP does not include North African countries, and Morocco, Egypt and Tunisia, all of whom have been in talks with Brussels about `cash for migrants' arrangements, modelled on the EU's accord with Turkey, do not want to be part of it.

archived since jesus on a stick with wheels
Massive Saharan Solar & Wind Farms
making rain
TuNur in Tunisia: Another case of energy colonialism
Desert solar project could power 5 million EU homes
Italy and Malta's energy grids are already connected
Some good discussion about Desertec we had here.
Who is "they?"
the north Africans who TuNur is fronting
Siemens CEO badmouths Energiewende
(note to Joe: the Sahara is probably too dry for pineapple plantations)

Diversity is the key to economic and political evolution.