This photo, taken by Katya Evdokimova, won the category of lsquo;Changing Climatesrsquo;, called After The Floods.

More than 55,000 properties were flooded in England in the summer of 2007 and £3bn worth of assets damaged. More rainfall is expected in the future as a result of human-induced global warming, deforestation and over development.

Over 70 images from the competition will be on show in London from September 17th.

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Nick Clegg, leader of the Liberal Democrats, recently addressed the governmentrsquo;s plans for new coal and nuclear power plants.

ldquo;The government has spooked everyone into thinking that we need nuclear by saying: lsquo;Therersquo;s going to be a terrible energy gap. The lights are going to go out in the middle of the next decade.rsquo;

Therersquo;s actually no evidence that that is the case at all. They have raised the wrong problem in order to push the wrong solution.

The real problem is that our energy mix is not green enough and that we are overdependent - as many people now realise because of the crisis in Georgia - on oil and gas from parts of the world that arenrsquo;t very reliable.

I think it is a question of political will. If we have been able to put a man on the moon, been able to create the welfare state, we could revolutionise the way in which we produce energy.rdquo;

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Coal definitely is the (out of) flavour of the summer.

First at the Australian Climate Camp, then outside the proposed site for the first of eight new coal-fired power stations in the UK, Kingsnorth - and now Colorado is on the clean energy map too!

Traditionally a mining center, this state is now demonstrating how to move to a new economy. A major utility company announced it would shut down two coal-fired power plants and in their place build one of the worldrsquo;s largest utility-scale solar power plants.

Good news all round, especially since theyrsquo;re also adding wind power to the game!

Full story here.

This is how itrsquo;s presented: now that people are watching their money a little more closely, they arenrsquo;t going to buy that organic salad anymore.

Well, that may be - but nor are they buying the ten flat screens and three electric hat stands. As Nyree Ambarchian writes in her column lsquo;Shades of Greenrsquo; in the Peterborough Evening Telegraphhellip;

lsquo;Supermarkets are recording a slump in the sale of ready meals with more customers choosing to cook rather than ‘ping’ their evening meal. Sales of teddy bears and spinning tops are up with parents favouring longer lasting toys. UK camp sites are enjoying a 10% increase in bookings as holidays abroad are substituted for the simple pleasures of the great outdoors. People are also taking the greener, cheaper option when it comes to transport with 14% flying less and 6% driving less. Even the amount of junk mail we are receiving through the letter box is decreasing, particularly items from credit card companies.

All this is great news for the environment! We are all doing less of the things that are really damaging (shopping, driving, flying) and doing more of the things that are greener and healthier (cooking from scratch, cycling, enjoying nature).

And really this is all we need to do - a bit less, a bit slower. The credit crunch might have shunted the environment off the front page, but it’s doing wonders for changing the way we live; making us greener, healthier and, dare I say it, happier.rsquo;

True dat.

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Irsquo;ve talked before about Colleen Patrick-Goudreau and Compassionate Cooks, but I thought Irsquo;d share this little clip from a BBQ cooking show. Notice how it talks about the deliciousness of the food, the fun and friends, the health benefits and, oh, by the way, itrsquo;s vegan.

Make it cool and desirable, and people will want it. My mouth is watering!

By the way - Colleen later talked about the experience and it turned out, one of the camera men was thinking of going for a vegetarian diet, and after seeing Colleen at work - he went for it!

Mehr als nur Vitamin B: Über Beziehungen in beruflichen und privaten Netzwerken kommt man schneller an neue Aufträge, günstige Lieferanten oder hilfreiche Hinweise zum beruflichen Weiterkommen. Besonders in der Designwirtschaft hat sich das Arbeiten in Netzwerken als fester Standard etabliert. Aber funktioniert es überhaupt, wenn man im Verbund als Partner kooperiert und gleichzeitig auf anderen Ebenen konkurriert? Wie steht es mit der Fairness innerhalb eines Netzwerkes? Wie kann man erfolgreich kooperieren und intelligent konkurrieren? Und welche Möglichkeiten bieten Netzwerke dem Einzelnen?

Das Forum »Netzwerke und Ethik« aus der Reihe »Improve Design-Business« will hierzu Antworten geben. Experten aus Theorie und Praxis präsentieren Hintergründe sowie Praxisbeispiele und geben Denkanstöße für eine erfolgreiche und ethische Netzwerkarbeit. Im Anschluss daran diskutiert das Referenten-Podium mit den Teilnehmern. Beim anschließenden Get-together mit persönlichen Gesprächen bei Getränken und Fingerfood klingt der Abend aus.

Referenten

Dr. Hajo Eickhoff | Kulturtheoretiker und Philosoph

Klaus Metz | Geschäftsführer der internationalen Modeschule ESMOD Berlin

Ralph Habich | Unternehmertrainer | Habich CI

Lisa Maria Franke | Geschäftsführerin | bayern design.

Die Moderation des Abends übernehmen IDZ-Direktorin Dr. Silke Claus und Joachim Kobuss von DesignersBusiness.

Teilnahme

Die Teilnahmegebühr beträgt 25 EUR zzgl. MwSt. Um Anmeldung wird gebeten. Bitte senden Sie hierzu eine E-Mail mit Ihren Kontaktdaten an improve@idz.de

Zeit und Ort

Freitag, 05. September 2008, 17:00 - 21:00 Uhr

IDZ | Internationales Design Zentrum Berlin

Reinhardtstraße 52 in Mitte

Mehr Infos unter www.idz.de/improve

When we spoke to our Universityrsquo;s Registrar, he asked us to put together an environmental vision for the University of Warwick.

So, itrsquo;s great to read about awesome stuff like this: Oregon University is going to be 100% powered by geothermal power.

This technology uses heat stored under the ground or in the oceans to heat buildings, or generate electricity. They plan to have this up and running within a few years, which would make Oregon Tech the first university in the world to be powered completely by geothermal energy.

Letrsquo;s hope Warwick sees the sense in this kind of thinghellip;

Wir wollten mit dem neuen Design eine stärkere inhaltliche Ausrichtung auf unsere unterschiedlichen Kategorien erreichen und spezielle Unterseiten für andere interessante Bereiche schaffen, die in unserem alten Blog-Design eher untergegangen sind.

Neu dazukommen wird auch eine eigene Seite, auf der ihr zu jedem unserer Autoren eine kurze Beschreibung findet. So könnt ihr euch ein besseres Bild von den Köpfen hinter Nachhall-Texter machen!

Und jetzt wollen wir von euch wissen: Wir gefällt euch das neue Design? Was gefällt euch gut, was weniger? Kommentare und Anregungen herzlich willkommen!

What the announcement has shown: itrsquo;s hard to keep secrets. Obama has been pondering this choice for quite some time, even saying that it will be the most important choice of his presidential campaign.

Only a few people were involved in the decision-making: his wife Michelle Obama and probably his Campaign Manager David Plouffe. They probably also briefed all possible candidates to not say a word to the media on this but simply to test their discipline.

Earlier this week, Obama made his choice. The Obama Campaign said it will announce the decision through SMS and Emails to his supporters first. Yet when the Campaign called other possible candidates to tell them they were not picked, the word leaked out very quickly.

When they finally called Joe Biden, probably sometime on Friday afternoon, the secret could not be kept behind closed doors. Someone, either relatives or friends or staff of Biden, must have notified CNN which were then ready to announce the news really quick.

The Obama Campaign then tried to send around an SMS at 3am on Saturday morning, and they sent an email on Saturday afternoon. In my opinion, this shows some lack of planning. They should have called Biden, ask for his confirmation that he wants to run, and had the SMS-Message and the Emails ready to be sent as soon as Bidens response comes in.

This whole incident shows that itrsquo;s very hard to keep secrets once more than three or four people are involved. So to all you conspiracy theorist who think that the Americans did not land on the moon or that George Bush plotted 9/11, you should first prove why such a secret remained a secret.

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If yoursquo;re the kind of person who enjoys manga or lsquo;graphic novelsrsquo;, then this is for you.

Funny Weather is a brilliant cartoon which takes you through everything you ought to know about climate change, but donrsquo;t.

Filled with dancing old men on top of graphs (rsquo;feeling hot, hot, hot!) - this is definitely for those who prefer Tin Tin to science class.

Now the country song for ever lost its soul

when the guitar player turned to rock amp; roll

When I was a kid, I was enthusiastis about the Olympics. In 1988 in Korea, it was clear that the Soviets would get most medals, followed by the small country of German Democratic Republic. The Opening Sessions were spectacular and massive manifestations of crowd displays.

This year, I watched the Opening Session which was amazing. But when I heard about the repeated manipulations made to the images, I lost interest in the event as a whole. I read some articles on the internet on some sport results, but I never watched it on television.

In 1988, I still thought that the Olympics try to bring people from various countries together. Yet with Jacques Rogge openly admitting its impotence in the face of Chinese Human Rights violations, with Doping being so prominently used in almost all sports, and with commerce dominating sports health, the Olympics have become boring.

The situation in China is too complicated that it fits into the China-Evil-Tibet-Good-Pattern neatly. Itrsquo;s also clear that a Sport Event does not change a countryrsquo;s development overnight. But I think the whole rhetoric about human rights, olympic values, peace and prosperity is nonsense. The Olympic Games is acting like a huge corporation, maximizing its value by appealing to new markets. This however makes the Olympics as interesting as any other Corporate Sport Event.

Maybe London will change things. I still remember the great crowd enthusiasm at the Paralympics in Sydney in 2000. And maybe reforms need it times, if we look back in time, than eight years after the 1936 Games in Berlin, the Hitler-Regime was gone, 10 years after the 1980 Games in Moscow the Soviet Union broke up. Maybe in 2018, China will look very different from what it looks today.

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