Bottom up low-carbon technologies

Hi class,

I am glad to have gotten the chance to share a bit of my project on Solar Water Heaters with you yesterday. I have attached my paper comparing the development, production and implementation of Solar Photovoltaic and Solar Water Heaters in China, particularly through the lens of central and local government actors.

Our wordpress account doesn’t support audio files, but if you would like a copy of my podcast on the usage and implementation Solar Water Heaters in China and beyond, please let me know and I can send a copy to you. It was a great opportunity to explore a bit of my Chinese roots and talk to members of my rural community. It was particularly interesting to hear their perspective on the widespread use of SWH in China.

STS

This is a photo of a Solar Water Heater on the roofs of buildings in my rural village. I happened across this photo by chance when I was showing my friend a photo for a different project and recognized the SWH from this project! I was pretty surprised considering I randomly snapped this photo a few years ago and a SWH is right in the center.

Take a look at my essay for more photos of SWH in China!

Best,

Yi

Nuclear Fission, not the whole solution but definitely a part of it. Learn More.

As the world moves to decarbonize, we need to consider all of our options. Nuclear fission energy is a scary beast when we let misconceptions cloud our judgement. the paper below discusses the common misconceptions of nuclear energy as well as makes a case for its inclusion in the world’s future energy mix.

Enjoy.

Nuclear’s Future

Nexus of Catan

Catan, a widely played board game, deals with the extraction of resources and settlement of an island- the island of Catan. But in such a constrained environment, surely resources are not unlimited? This modification of the rules imposes a cost to resource extraction and a limit on the number of resources on the island. Players must prevent ecological devastation to their home while at the same time trying to accumulate their own points. To prevent a Tragedy of the Commons situation, everyone must, to some extent, work together, while simultaneously trying to win.

---

Rules

Set up:

• Set nexus resource tracks at starting value
  • 3 players: 15
  • 4 players: 18
  • 5 players: 20
• Decide which Bonuses/ Punishments will be in play
  • Ecological Steward (+3) – given to the first player to donate 3 resources and whoever has donated the most afterward
  • Shameful Consumer (-2) – given to whichever player has overexploited the most turns

Game Play:

• Placement of initial settlements proceeds as normal
• Each turn:
  • Roll dice per usual
  • OPTION to collect resources associated with that value
    • Pay nexus cost associated with the resource
    • Roll for failure for each scarce nexus resource (below red line)
      • If the number on the dice is less than the nexus points, a collection of any good associated with that nexus element fails.
    • Trade/Build (with associated costs) but permanently discarding the cards
• On rolling a 7:
  • Robber no longer is in play, instead 3 nexus phases
  • Donate
    • Players can donate resource cards to conservation to increase nexus track by 3x the cost of that good (and get points towards ecological steward)
  • Replenishment
    • Nexus tracks go up a fixed amount (resources replenish over time)
      • 3 player: + 8
      • 4 player: + 10
      • 5 player: + 12
    • Resources discarded from trading and building are replenished
  • Overexploitation
    • Each player can take 0, 1, or 2 resource cards of their choice. Players simultaneously indicate their option.
      • Standard scarcity rules still apply, so you may not successfully get these resources
      • Taking 0: + 4 points to track/ tracks of your choice
      • Taking 1: no effect
      • Taking 2: down double the cost of the resource
    • If any track goes below zero during this phase, the game ends and everyone loses

Game End:

• The first player to 10 points wins
• If a nexus track every goes below zero (during overexploitation) everyone loses
• If all three nexus tracks go to zero, everyone loses

 

Additional Game Components:

 

Nexus Track

Nexus Costs

Calculate the footprint of your lunch!

from Grandfustion.co

How much fresh water is your choice of food costing the planet? What can you change about your diet to decrease your footprint? Follow this link to a FREE interactive meal footprint calculator to find out which of your favorite foods are consuming the most water during their production.

 

How efficient is your choice of protein? Protein is an essential component of a balanced diet, but which protein you choose and how often you eat it can have drastic effects on your water consumption.

Sustainable Agricultural Transition

As our world wrestles with the impacts of climate change and the challenge of living sustainably and justly on this earth, agriculture will remain one of the most important questions we must address. Our current ‘industrial agriculture” is characterized by monocultures, international food trade, and environmentally and socially detrimental practices. For this reason, many believe it is time to transition to a more sustainable model. Agroecology and organic are the two main alternatives. Although promising in several aspects, some raise the concern that these systems will not be able to provide for the growing population. In addition, transitioning the global agricultural system will be a   complicated and hard-won process.

It is important that everyone from consumers to politicians to farmers understand the tradeoffs and possibilities in the different forms  of agricultural management. Everyone consumes food and therefore everyone both affects and is affected by the agricultural system. If you are interested in learning more about these topics, check out these set of infographics.

Sustainable_Agriculture_Infographics

One provides a comparison of agroecological, organic, and industrial agriculture. The other includes information about how different types of countries might transition to more sustainable agricultural systems.

Find Out Deep Truths About Yourself…

…in the form, of course, of a Buzzfeed quiz! Find out here what actor you’d be in a hydropower dam siting situation in South America, in a quiz based on case studies from Brazil, Panama, and Bolivia! (If you want to look at the other possible results, let me know and I’ll post them here too.)

If you want you can post your result here, so we get an idea of the spread of results across the class.

Tag-yourself meme coming later, with even less content. (EDIT: find this above!)

How do NGOs make decisions?

Since the end of the Cold War, more and more foreign aid has been provided by non-governmental organizations (NGOs) instead of governments. Many people support this transition, claiming that NGOs are more accountable for their actions and less likely to be corrupt. But how are decisions actually made by these organizations?

I explored this question with reference to the current project being undertaken by MIT’s chapter of an NGO called Engineers Without Borders. The project focuses on replacing a labor-intensive and failure-prone hand pump with a solar-powered electric pump for drinking water. More information about the decision-making process that led to this project is available here: http://prezi.com/kwibaltp9s6x/?utm_campaign=share&utm_medium=copy.

More info about the club itself can be found in this brochure: EWB Promotional Brochure Final

YOU! Yes, YOU! Coral Reefs Need You.

No matter who you are, you have probably heard the phrases “coral reefs”, “global warming”, “ocean acidification” or “climate change” or maybe all of them. Maybe you know how they are connected, or maybe you don’t. Maybe you want to find out why you should care, or you already do care, and want to find out what you can do to help. No matter what your question is, I’m Seeta and I’m here to help provide you with answers. I have made a video talking about how different people from different areas around the world can help the cause of coral reef preservation and restoration, because we have all collectively contributed to their degradation. Follow this link to broaden your perspective. Show it to your friends, your family and your friends’s families. The more people we have on board, the merrier!

http://www.greenpeace.org/usa/whats-killing-coral-reefs-and-how-can-we-stop-it/

Future Fusion: The Podcast

Hello Everyone,

I recently created a podcast covering the potential benefits of fusion. I invite you to take a listen. It features two people who are on opposite ends of the argument in terms of pursuing a nuclear fusion powered future. It is less of a debate and more of a discussion almost like a Q&A. Although the people featured aren’t actually experts or anyone like that it was an interesting digital communication project where I presented both people with accurate information concerning the pros and cons of fusion and allowed them to discuss in a semi-natural way. I had originally wanted to make this completely scripted but it would be a bit unnatural and instead, I allowed each party to come up with their own conclusions with me being more of a guide that would just double check whether or not their points were fully valid or appropriate. Although the terminology and technical aspects of the discussion are a bit weak as the discussions had to go off their own recollections of knowledge I presented them, they are thorough enough to where you, the listener don’t really need to know too much about the science to understand this podcast.

Here is the Link!

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1YtAoiZzdVd9VFbcqGtWNB7DvirLuIzeL/view?usp=sharing

 

Environmental Justice, Grassroots Activism, and Policy Change

Our readings for today address at least three essential questions in the way environmental movements and policy interact (or not).

1) How activism and environmental justice movements can shape long-term policy?

2) How grassroots activism is effective or not in changing policy, but also social relationships at a local/regional level?

3) How culturally and socially insensitive decision making processes in the arena of both public policy and social activism can reproduce socio-ecological conflicts?

Feel free to reflect on some of the questions above, but let’s also reflect on how applying different corpus of knowledge and analytical frameworks might lead us to see these problems differently. For instance,

What happens if we take an environmental justice approach to critically analyze how environmental activism can reproduce social, racial, and ecological hierarchies?

What happens if we take analytical tools from the literature on comparative/international environmental governance to the study of extractive economies at a national scale?