CHÁ QUENTE #249

Coisas quase tão importantes como as do post anterior...

Global Subsidies Initiative

In December 2005 the GSI was launched to put a spotlight on subsidies—transfers of public money to private interests—and how they undermine efforts to put the world economy on a path toward sustainable development. Subsidies are powerful instruments. They can play a legitimate role in securing public goods that would otherwise remain beyond reach. But they can also be easily subverted. The interests of lobbyists and the electoral ambitions of office-holders can hijack public policy. Therefore, the GSI starts from the premise that full transparency and public accountability for the stated aims of public expenditure must be the cornerstones of any subsidy program.

Biofuels: At What Cost

“Many of these subsidies are poorly coordinated and targeted,” says Simon Upton, director of the GSI. “All indications are that subsidies are being piled on top of one another without policy makers having a clear idea of their potential impact on the environment and the economy. Yet the potential for waste on a grand scale and some spectacularly perverse environmental outcomes is large.”

Ethanol: Boon or Boondoggle?

Not since prohibition has ethanol—that intoxicating compound found in beer, wine, and hard liquor—held such a high profile in America's public policy debate. Whether made from corn, sugarcane, woodchips, or the newly famous "switchgrass" mentioned by President George W. Bush in his 2005 State of the Union address, ethanol is being held up as a solution to a number of public policy concerns, including reducing conventional air pollutants, minimizing greenhouse-gas emissions, ending foreign oil dependency, reinvigorating the family farm, and a host of other ethanol-fueled dreams. In an effort to shed light on a policy issue consuming increasing sums of taxpayer dollars in research and subsidies to ethanol producers, panelists at this conference will examine the benefits and detriments of ethanol fuel.

BMW is planning a Hybrid Car!

BMW plans to offer a car that runs on both petrol and hydrogen within the next four years.
BMW chief executive Helmut Panke said he would include a hybrid 7-Series car in the company's catalogue soon.
"By the time we have those cars, we will probably have a number of hydrogen fuel stations at our retail centres" in the United States, he said. He said there were only a few hydrogen fuel stations in the US at present.
BMW has already driven a test fleet of hydrogen-powered cars through several countries. As petrol prices push higher, the prospect of alternative fuels has become more popular among some drivers.

California Hydrogen Highway Network

California Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger has promised to build hydrogen fuelling stations every 32 kilometres along major California highways.

Conferência Transatlântica sobre Energias Renováveis

Angra do Heroísmo, 8 de Dezembro (C.C.C.A.H.)
Praia da Vitória, 9 de Dezembro (A.R.G.)