A Worried View of the Amazon From Within its Forest

clipped from dotearth.blogs.nytimes.com Lou Gold, a longtime commenter who lives in the Brazilian portion of the Amazon basin, is an invaluable member of the worldwide Dot Earth community (people from more than 200 countries have visited the blog). He reacted strongly to my  recent cautiously upbeat statement — made while conducting  an onstage interview with a Brazilian ecologist — about prospects that the rain forests there could persist through this century even as human numbers and appetites crest. Gold posted a series of comments following the Amazon piece, and has consolidated them with a post on his blog,  Visionshare. You can read the full post below.

Your Own Tropical Island Made Out of Plastic Bottles (Video)

On a bad day you might be thinking to yourself, maybe I should do this.

This man has given up his job, family and possessions to build an island that floats on plastic bottles he’s found and used as buoys.

Natural Gas: The New King Of Electric Power

Boom and bust.

clipped from seekingalpha.com On March 24, 2008, Chesapeake Energy (CHK) announced a significant new natural gas discovery in the Haynesville Shale, setting off the ‘great shale land grab,’ natural gas production has grown nearly 14%, which is in sharp contrast to the flat performance of production in the decade before that. While gas production has enjoyed a significant uptick over the last few years, the same cannot be said for consumption.

Steve Cook on Gold

Good information.

clipped from allamericaninvestor.blogspot.com From Steve Cook at CJS Research The price of gold (GLD) traded down last week, touched the lower boundary of an up trend dating from October 2008 and then bounced. It looks like it will open down modestly this morning. All our Portfolios will Add to their GLD position at the Market open. This will bring the size of this position to approximately 9% in each Portfolio.

Night flight for solar plane -- HB-SIA carbon-fiber aircraft

Good slideshow.

clipped from www.reuters.com

Green Building Market to Surge by 2015

clipped from www.jetsongreen.com Over the next five years, according to a subscription report published by Environmental Leader, total United States green building market value is expected to increase from $71.1 billion to $173.5 billion.  The EL Insights report projects a compound annual growth rate of 19.5% in green building market value from 2010 through 2015.  American demand for green building products is expected to reach $80 billion by 2013, according to a separate report by the Freedonia Group, Inc.  The Freedonia report estimated an increase in demand of about 7.2% per year on average over five years.

"Climategate" Leak Report Vindicates Scientists

clipped from www.cbsnews.com An independent British report into the leak of hundreds of e-mails from one of the world's leading climate research centers has largely vindicated the scientists involved, a finding many in the field hope will calm the global uproar dubbed "Climategate." While Russell's report said there was no evidence to show Jones or any other scientist had subverted the peer-review process, it did revisit the now infamous e-mail exchange between Jones and a colleague in which the climatologist refers to a "trick" used to "hide the decline" in a variable used to track global temperatures.