It’s estimated governments have collectively found about $5 trillion to rescue banks and galvanize economies. Now the Head of the United Nations Environment Program and the leaders of some European countries are saying the time is right for the world to invest substantially in renewable energy. They’re calling for a “Green New Deal” to tackle our climate, oil and credit crisis together.

Audio:
Listen to our interview with Senator Christine Milne on the Green New Deal.

Leaders of the G20 countries recently met to discuss what can be done about the global financial crisis. Spending our way out of the crisis seems to be a big part of the solution. Already we’ve seen the Australian government promise to spend more than $10 billion to stimulate its economy.

But exactly how will such vast sums of money be spent?

The “Green New Deal” calls for a massive injection of funds to radically change our economies – to make them more sustainable. It’s an idea which draws inspiration from Franklin Roosevelt’s “New Deal” 75 years ago. A plan which helped pull the U.S. out of the Great Depression.

Video:
Van Jones is the author of the bestseller “Green Collar Jobs”. Watch Van Jones spruik the Green New Deal.

Related articles:
Here’s some interesting articles on the Green New Deal:
‘How green technology can spark economic growth’ from Newsweek magazine.
‘A Green New Deal can save the world’s economy’ from The Independent.
‘Climate crisis: Roosevelt revisited’ from the BBC.
‘7 ways to fund a Green New Deal’ from Treehugger.
‘Green New Deal makes sense but unlikely’ – opinion piece from Reuters.

Useful links:
The New Economics Foundation is a leading economic think-tank in the UK and one of the pioneers of the Green New Deal idea. Their page’‘A Green New Deal will tackle the triple crunch of credit, oil and climate’ describes the idea further.
Here also is a link to the Greens website.

More audio:
Thomas Friedman is author of the book ‘Hot, Flat and Crowded: why we need a green revolution and how it can renew America’. Listen to the ‘Living on Earth’ interview with Thomas Friedman.

Hear Bob Brown on developing a new green economy. And there’s a good discussion on the ABC’s ‘Late Night Live’ program on the Green New Deal – which includes Ann Pettifor from the New Economics Foundation and Nick Nuttall, Executive Director of the United Nations Environment Program.

Photo:
Sparktography, Creative Commons, Flickr

A decade ago Germanys uptake of solar energy was on par with Australia. But thanks to an innovative financial incentive, Germany has surged ahead. So much so, its renewable energy is now a mainstream industry and a leading employer in that country.

Audio: Markus Lambert explains the effect the electricity feed-in tariff has had in Germany.

A key driver of renewables in Germany has been the introduction of an electricity feed-in tariff. The scheme views households and businesses producing renewable energy as mini-power stations and pays them for the power they generate.

Here in Australia, Victoria and South Australia have recently introduced versions of the tariff, and one is about to launch in the ACT. New South Wales is yet to try the scheme, but the State Opposition has vowed to implement one if it’s elected in 2011.

Markus Lambert is a German now working for local renewable energy firm Energy Matters. In this podcast he explains the effect the feed-in tariff has had in Germany.

Useful link: The Energy Matters website explains the difference between a net feed-in tariff and a gross feed-in tariff. And what each of the state governments in Australia are offering. The renewables industry is pushing for a gross feed-in tariff.

At the recent Sydney Film Festival I saw a great new documentary called ‘The Cars That Ate China’. In this podcast the director Stefan Moore discusses the background to the film and we hear a clip with Joe White, China correspondent for the Wall Street Journal.

Joe takes us to the Beijing car show and explains how foreign car makers are piling into China to make a killing in the last big score in car manufacturing.

Audio: Listen to The Cars That Ate China interview and movie podcast – part 1, Joe White and the Beijing Car Show.

Link: More about the film on the makers’ website Jumping Dog Productions.

Photo: Commutr, Creative Commons, Flickr

Western marketing has moved into China in a big way. In this podcast we hear a clip from the film ‘The Cars That Ate China’ with Tom Doctoroff from J Walter Thompson Advertising. He explains how marketers have tapped into Chinese thinking. And specifically why the Chinese have gone so nuts about getting a car.

Audio: Listen to The Cars that Ate China movie podcast – part 2, Tom Doctoroff on Chinese consumer behaviour.

Photo: decade_null, Creative Commons, Flickr.

Audio: Listen to The Cars That Ate China movie podcast – part 3, James Kyng on the implications for the world’s environment.

In this interview Fiona Wain, CEO of Environment Business Australia, tells us about the opportunities for business and some of the interesting green business innovations on the go – some we rarely hear about.

And we have these videos from the Garnaut Forum. In fact you can even rate what he has to say. In this video, the good professor lashes out at the sceptics (in his own gentile way):

Here’s what Ross said when asked why Australia should act when other countries aren’t:

And here’s what Professor Garnaut had to say about compensating the coal industry:

Watch the FuelWatch commercial.

But really, it’s a drop in the ocean compared to how much water goes into the products we consume.

Now an Australian academic has proposed that the amount of water used in making food and other items be clearly shown on product labeling. Listen to the interview with James Hazelton.

To see how much water goes into making different products, check out www.waterfootprint.org.

Professor Gehl was commissioned by the City of Sydney to re-think its centre. He’s proposed to divert cars and give streets back to the people. Sound radical? His plans have been implemented in other cities like Copenhagen and Melbourne, and surprise, they’ve made life heaps better. And, interestingly, not just for people. Businesses have thrived too.

Check this interview out – Jan’s quite a character. No wonder he’s been called an ‘urban planning rock star’.

His next commission, by the way, is to develop a plan for New York City.

Actually, I do have a Commerce degree, and I have worked in the corporate world, but this commercial is pretty good and pretty telling.

But it doesn’t have to be like this. If business worked more like nature (in a cyclical instead of linear way), we’d all be better off. Check out the ‘Ecology of Commerce’ by Paul Hawken for more detail on how and why. And there are businesses which are right now learning from nature. Interface Carpets is probably the most well known.

I intend to feature this kind of new entrepreneurship on The Show this year.

Late last year the Australian government gave the go-ahead to building what will be one of the Southern Hemisphere’s largest pulp mills. The Gunns Pulp Miill is planned for the state of Tasmania, the scene of many epic environmental battles due to its pristine nature. Prior to the recent election, both major parties in Australia supported the mill.

The previous Environment Minister, Malcolm Turnbull, emphasized his decision to approve the mill was based on science. What the minister didn’t emphasize was the limited terms of reference of the review by the Commonwealth’s Chief Scientist.

His review concentrated on threatened and migratory animal species and the effect on marine environment. According to critics such as The Wilderness Society, important issues remain untested. These include the impact of the mill on Tasmania’s wild forests (the source of timber for the mill), emissions from the plant and the impact of the mill on local business. And many still have doubts about the mill’s effect on the marine environment

Following is a link to the video ‘Pulp Friction’ which was posted on YouTube. It attempts to address both sides of the argument.

And this is a link to The Wilderness Society video on Gunns, also on YouTube:

All of which begs the question, what will the new environment minister do? (For our international readers, that’s the bald bloke who formerly fronted the band Midnight Oil.) Peter Garrett ‘played the game’ during the recent federal election in order to win power, but now he’s there what will he do with it? The Gunns story has gone quiet now the election is over, but for how long?

Phil Stubbs spoke to Matt Dever from Emit Environmental Brokers to find out.

For a fuller explanation, I’ve added this link to a video interview with Dr Andrew Sentance who was formerly the Head of Environment for British Airways. It was produced by Warwick iCAST and can be found on YouTube.

And for more on the European carbon trading system (which is well down the track), there’s a link below to a video prepared by European channel EUX.TVand loaded to YouTube.

Above is a link to a great video on YouTube. It provides a good, simple explanation of how and why old-fashioned commerce is damaging the planet. (Part 1 is first up. Click on the ‘menu’ to bring up the other parts after that. Each is a few minutes long.)

What’s the answer? Bring on the second (smarter) industrial revolution where business works in a cyclical way like nature. More on this idea in Hawken’s book ‘The Ecology of Commerce’.