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Climate Change in the Arctic & around the globe

Alaska! Prepare to be Unbaked

Well, the rucksack is packed with the winter gear. Fitting the technology into one bag is a bit more difficult. Although everything is much smaller than it used to be, I find myself working with more media than I used to, so laptop, recorders, mics and camera all have to be safely transported.
To remind us of what it’s all about, and since we’re heading for the Arctic coast first, one of my favourite Arctic pics from last year’s Svalbard trip:

I’m meeeting up with the Climate College group in Amsterdam, which is where they collected for their initial briefing.
I’ll be interested to see how this high-powered group fit together. To recap – they have been invited on this field trip to see climate change – and those affected by it and researching into it – first hand. To get this far, they have all submitted climate protecting projects to the “Climate Change College”, which will be put into practice with support from the College.
Cara has a doctorate in Environmental Science and Engineering, but her CC project is all about sustainable home renovation, deriving from her own experiences in Ireland. We’re thinking about more insulation for our own house, so I’ll be listening carefully and hoping for a few tips.
Marie-Laure wants to convince the skiing community to be greener. Sounds goods to me, but she’ll have a hard time, with all those Alpine resorts already creating artificial snow to stop going out of business.
Inés wants to “tackle recycling and deforestation in one fiesta-filled scoop”. The mind boggles just a little.
Filipe is into recycling cooking oil for bio-diesel. We’ve had reports on a couple of ventures like that in Living Planet, let’s see how his is different.
Jakob wants to educate frequent flyers and, from what I gather, make us use the internet more and fly less to business meetings. Hm. The Climate College does offset the flights for the field trip, though.
Erika wants to “worm her way into the food business”. I love that one (Hanno, as master of the puns, this has got to be one for you). Her project is all about composting food waste.
And Aart is successfuly teaching businesses how to go climate neutral.
Well, that’s enough to be going on with. The next blog entry should be from Alaska.

Date

April 28, 2008 | 12:07 pm

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