IndEco: Other places to visit on the net

Industrial Ecology

If you're really interested in industrial ecology, you must check out the Journal of Industrial Ecology, and think about joining the Society for Industrial Ecology.

Check out the article A Road Map for Natural Capitalism by Amory Lovins, Hunter Lovins, and Paul Hawken, from the May-June 1999 issue of Harvard Business Review. This paper describes how business strategies built around the productive use if natural resources can solve environmental problems at a profit.

One of the earliest writers on industrial ecology was Hardin Tibbs. An excellent paper he wrote called Industrial Ecology: An Environmental Agenda for Industry ( PDF version) is available on-line from Smart Communities Network. You might also be interested in their pages on industrial ecology, which tend to focus on "eco-parks".

Buckminster Fuller, though best known for his geodesic domes, was an early thinker on a number of key industrial ecology concepts, from the need for a design revolution to meet all the needs of humanity, to copying the design principles nature uses, to life-cycle assessment, and substituting services for products (rent instead of buy). His out-of-print magnum opus, Synergetics is now available on-line. More information about his work is available at the site of the Buckminister Fuller Institute.

The National Pollution Center for Higher Education, at the University of Michigan, has developed an excellent compendium of educational materials on industrial ecology.

The Institute of Electrical and Electronic Engineers (IEEE) Technical Advisory Board white paper on Sustainable development and industrial ecology presents an overview and their position on industrial ecology and sustainable development

For sites discussing sustainable development no site comes close to the depth and extent of coverage of sustainable development that's available on the site of the IISD: International Institute for Sustainable Development.

For another detailed look at sustainable development it is worth a visit to the InterNetwork for Sustainability. This is a data and information centre to support sustainable development by providing access to news, organizations and activities.

Energy Systems

The UNDP and the World Energy Council published a tour-de-force on energy and sustainability in September 2001 entitled: World Energy Assessment: Energy and the Challenge of Sustainability.The work argues that a transition to a sustainable energy system is feasible and desirable, though challenging. A reviewer of the book in Science described it as "the most comprehensive and far-reaching single volume on energy policy every published". The full document World Energy Assessment: 2004 Update provides an update to the original and presents the linkages between energy and the Millennium Development Goals.

The International Energy Agency publishes The World Energy Outlook. The 2009 edition was released 10 November of that year. A climate change excerpt was released earlier in the fall of 2009 and is available for download at the WEO site.

Expanding Access to Modern Energy Services - Replicating, Scaling Up and Mainstreaming at the local level is a recent report published in May 2006 by the UNDP and Columbia University about making progress towards achieving the Millennium Development Goals by expanding access to modern energy services. Another publication, Bridging the Divide Between Poverty Reduction and Climate Change Through Sustainable and Innovative Energy Technologies highlights the need to bridge the divide between climate change and poverty reduction through innovative energy technologies and to bring about transformational impacts to address these dual challenges. The report argues that providing financing for innovative ideas, low-cost, low-emission, and pro-poor technologies are effective measures to harness their potential.

There are a number of other evaluations of alternative scenarios for energy supply and demand, including one from 2001 by Shell International, one by Canada’s National Energy Board, and another by the Pew Center on Climate Change. All three identify key influences as technology, social and personal priorities, and political stability.

If your interest in environment relates to energy use, a good place to start is Renewable Energy Policy Project. Also, be sure to pay a visit to the site of APPrO: The Association of Power Producers' of Ontario, and particularly their page on Renewable Energy and Sustainable Energy Systems in Canada. You will also want to drop in on the Rocky Mountain Institute site.

The U.S. National Renewable Energy Laboratory has a very extensive site, including a photograph library of 7000 photos related to renewable energy and energy efficiency.

The International Renewable Energy Magazine allows you to sign up for a free weekly newsletter which gives you up to date articles on many of the renewable energy sectors.

The Danish Windpower Industry Association Website has lots of information on wind energy, including some stuff on the environmental impacts.

Materials Systems

Gabor Doka recently updated what might be thought of as an LCA portal, the LCA hotlist, with links to major LCA sites, and his annotation, often indicating whether the site is being kept up-to-date.

Carnegie-Mellon's Green Design Initiative has a web site for Economic Input Output Life Cycle Assessment. You can retrieve life-cycle data for 500 commodity or service sectors.

PRé Consultants, in the Netherlands, specialize in LCA (as well as eco-design) and have created a number of software packages to assist designers. Demo versions are available on their web site.

If you are interested in what pollutants are being released into your community and by who visit the Pollution Watch site. This site uses National Pollutant Release Inventory (NPRI) data to allow members of the public to search and rank polluting facilities, municipalities, companies and sectors across Canada and within each province. The service also allows Canadians to type in their postal codes and receive a listing of the toxic compounds released near their homes and the companies responsible for the pollutants. The U.S. equivalent is the Scorecard.

The Story of Stuff was a video that went viral that provides a good introduction to material flows in developed societies. It's now a book and the creator, Annie Leonard also has The Story of Cap & Trade, and other 'stories' are under development.

Information and Technology Systems

Principia Cybernetica Project This is the WWW server of the Principia Cybernetica Project (PCP), an international organization. The Project's aim is the computer-supported collaborative development of an evolutionary-systemic philosophy. Put more simply, PCP tries to tackle age-old philosophical questions with the help of the most recent cybernetic theories and technologies. The PCP site include a bibliography of basic books on cybernetics and systems science, and an on-line copy of Ashby's Introduction to Cybernetics, which is out-of-print.

Another site dealing with cybernetics is the homepage of the American Society for Cybernetics.

If you are interested in cybernetics, you will probably be interested in "complexity". There are several sites dealing with this, including one on Complex systems at the Australian National University, and the home page of the Sante Fe Institute, which is a key centre for this kind of work.

Global Systems

Robert Ayres has written a good piece on economics and climate change for Worldwatch magazine. His thesis is that the analyses suggesting that reducing greenhouse gas emissions will adversely impact the economy is based on demonstrably wrong theoretical assumptions about the drivers for economic growth. The paper, How Economists Have Misjudged Global Warming, is available from the WorldWatch web site (registration required).

A couple of good sites have recently gone up with success stories on climate change initiatives, and advice on what climate change means to you or your business. We were pleased to have the opportunity to work with our friends at Retec (now ENSR, part of AECOM)on the GEMI Business and Climate Change web site. The site focuses on business opportunities and risks related to the growing concern about global climate change. Another site, Climate Change Solutions provides success stories, tools and resources on how to reduce greenhouse gas emissions in your family, municipality, public institution or business. Climate change solutions are also addressed on the Cool Companies website (check out the book of the same name) which includes success stories and how-to guides.

Another good site which helps businesses of all sizes understand and take action on climate change is SafeClimate for Business. This site is a joint project of the World Resources Institute and the Centre for Environmental Leadership in Business, it contains information on understanding climate change, evaluating your organizations GHG emissions and presents solutions to help your business reduce emissions and climate change impacts. This site includes inventory protocols, and sample worksheets for estimating emissions for various sectors.

Climate change science is evolving rapidly, with the definitive integrative work being done by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change. Many governments, including Canada have sites dealing with the scientific issues, possible actions, inventories and plans including Canada’s Climate Change Action Plan. For up-to-date information on greenhouse gas science, visit Greenhouse Gas Online which has news from more than 100 journals, as well as succinct backgrounders on various greenhouse gas issues. RealClimate.org is a blog by climate scientists on topical issues related to climate change science.

For those of you interested in the market-based mechanisms of the Kyoto Protocol, in particular the Clean Development Mechanism (CDM) and Joint Implementation (JI), take a look at the the website of the Prototype Carbon Fund (PCF). The PCF acts as a intermediary and creates a market for the project based emission reductions under CDM and JI. The Operations Handbook on this site describes in detail how to develop a successful CDM of JI project for the PCF.

For a detailed explanation of past, present and future climate as well as a detailed look at the impacts of climate change go to the Global Climate Change Student Guide from Manchester Metropolitan University.

For a look at the global system check out the Earth and Moon Viewer.

If you’re looking for up-to-date information on general environmental issues then visit the Environmental News Network and sign up for the free newsletter.

ECOLEX, is a comprehensive web reference to the world's environmental laws, including information on treaties, national and international court decisions, and legislation. This site is sponsored by the United Nations and the World Conservation Union. Both abstracts or full-text documents are available on this site.

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