July-August Sustainable Development

Read the articles selected in July-August 2016

Overview: Enhancing policy coherence for sustainable development

Source: http://www.asvis.it/documenti-internazionali/

“Policy coherence for sustainable development” goes beyond a “do-no-harm” approach to win-win solutions, whose effects reflect systematically on the well-being of the present and future generations, enhancing synergies between economic, social and environmental actions.

Naomi Oreskes on how to write about science

by Marina N. Bolotnikova

Source: https://green.harvard.edu, 22 July

Climate change is not only a matter of empirical and neutral-value science, it is also an issue of economy, politics, and justice, having to do with an organized denial network, that blame scientists for being ideological and biased and wants to put them at its service.

The sticky truth about economic growth and climate change

by Tali Trigg

Source: Scientific American, 31 July

The transition to a clean energy system is a rapid growth, but it is often an unequal growth, and we can’t ignore the costs and the people who suffer from this change.

Climate change impacts could amplify global inequalities even under ambitious GHG emission policies

by Fondazione Enrico Mattei

Source: http://www.asvis.it/

A new study from Fondazione Enrico Mattei and the Netherlands Environmental Assessment Agency highlights how the costs of climate change mitigation and adaptation policies should be equitably distributed, to not sharp global inequalities.

Progress towards the Sustainable Development Goals

Source: http://www.asvis.it/, 22 July 2016

In its relation at the UN HLPF, the UN Secretary-General said that at every level of government institutions and of the civil society we have to learn to “think differently”, and that we can’t “rest until we have achieved a world of peace, dignity, and opportunity for all”.

Global Sustainable Development Report

Source: https://sustainabledevelopment.un.org/,

A report prepared on the contribution of 245 scientists and experts highlights the importance of interaction between science and action in achieving the Goals of the Agenda 2030 and in understanding the interlinkages of factors that bring people to be left behind.

Israel proves the desalination era is here

by Rowan Jakobsen

Source: Scientific American, 29 July

In the surroundings of Tel Aviv, the Sorek reverse-osmosis desalination plant produces drinking water for 1.5 million people. Water scarcity is a source of dangerous resentments and conflicts in the Middle East but water can turn into a common cause for old enemies.

Consulta l’articolo:

http://www.scientificamerican.com/article/israel-proves-the-desalination-era-is-here/

The nose knows how to kill MRSA

by Anna Nowogrodzki

Source: Nature, 27 July

The methicillin-resistant Staphiloccoccus aureus could be fought by a molecule called ludgunin, produced by the Staphyloccoccus ludgunensis, a bacterium that resides in the human nose. Other sources for new antibiotics are soil bacteria.

180,000 forgotten photos reveal the future of Greenland’s ice

by Quirin Schiermeier

Source: Nature, 27 July

Danish researchers are studying 180.000 aerial photographs of Greenland from the 1930s, comparing the old records with images taken today from the same vantage point, to predict how Greeland’s ice sheet might melt in the future since satellite data only go back forty years and lack information.

E’ possibile creare un futuro senza povertà?

by Donato Speroni and Elis Viettone

Source: http://www.asvis.it/, 17 July

The first Goal of the Agenda 2030 is to halve the poverty in all participant countries, which needs a new development model and more focused policies. The Italian government has presented for the international conference Habitat III a report on human settlements in Italy and on urban policies.

Teaching climate change to skeptics

by Carmen Nobel

Source: green.harvard.edu 9 September 2013

Climate change is often treated as an ideological issue, a problem you can believe in or not. It’s better to explain it as a practical argument, given the human tendency to think in the short term.

Tobacco and oil industries used same researchers to sway public

by Benjamin Hulac

Source: Scientific American, 20 July

Since the 1950s oil and tobacco groups have been using for a long time not only the same research institutes, but many of the same researchers to minimize the public health effects of tobacco and the effects of oil on climate change.

Obama seeks psycological help with climate change

by Evan Lehmann

Source: Scientific American, 16 September 2015

President Obama has been seeking help by social sciences to experiment strategies in order to change citizen behavior in reducing energy use and to make Americans lead longer and healthier lives, helping workers to find better jobs and improving access to education.

New concentrating solar tower is worth its salt with 24/7 power

by Knvul Sheikh

Source: Scientific American, 14 July

In the Nevada desert, a solar tower is concentrating solar energy to store it and make it available on demand when natural resources are at the lowest. This device uses salt to store heat that generates electricity.

Povertà: invertire rotta o 69 milioni di bambini sotto i cinque anni moriranno entro il 2030

Source: http://www.asvis.it/, 7 July 2016

The conditions of extreme poverty of millions of children in the poorest countries, 69 millions of children likely to die by the fifth year of their life from now to 2030, need policies and interventions focused to interrupting generational cycles of injustice that an advanced world can’t tolerate.

Europe investing again

Taking stock of the Investment Plan for Europe and next steps

Source: http://ec.europa.eu/index_it.htm, 1 June 2016

The Investment Plan for Europe presented by the European Commission in November 2014 has had its effects, with more confidence in Europe’s economy and growth that turns out in more investments in sectors critical to Europe’s future such as energy, environment, and climate action.

Metaphor and vision of home in environmental writing

by Alison Steinbach

Source: https://green.harvard.edu/,

As Romantic poets used metaphor to express their affinity with nature, so ecologist writers like Carson and Lovelock use metaphor as mediation between us and nature but in order to render the Earth more understandable and to establish with it an affection relation, moving to action.

Germany enlists machine learning to boost renewables revolution

by Quirin Schiermeier

Source: Nature, 13 July

Germany, emblem of non-nuclear policy and renewable energy, is going to use machine-learning to make wind and sun light, naturally unpredictable, more measurable in previsions and to establish more precisely how much wind and solar power to expect at any time.

Could be a volcano be waking up on the outskirts of Rome?

by Erik Klemetti

Source: Wired, 13 July

Fabrizio Marra in Geographical Research Letters locates in the Alban Hills area on the outskirts of Rome a volcanic district potentially dangerous, considering its past activism and that it has been 36.000 years since the last eruptions.

White paper- Adapting to climate change: Towards a European framework for action

Source: http://ec.europa.eu/

This paper of the European Commission dated 2009 already spots in the transition to a low-carbon economy the key to a creative, knowledge–based economy and the only way to modernization and competitiveness of our economy.

How to feed a hungry world

Source: Nature, 28 July 2010

To feed the world’s population, expected to grow to 9.1 billion by 2050, is crucial “the sustainable intensification of global agriculture”, what challenges agricultural research. But also economic crisis push people all around the world into hunger.

World Development Indicators 2016: Featuring the Sustainable Development Goals

by Antonella Crescenzi

Source: http://data.worldbank.org/

This year the World Development Indicators of the World Bank, linked by http://www.asvis.it/, adjust to the 17 Sustainable Development Goals, in order to help measure the achievements reached by the Agenda 2030 global action.

Project TENDR: Targeting Environmental Neuro-Developmental Risks. The TENDR Consensus Statement

Source: https://green.harvard.edu/

The contribution of toxic chemicals to neurodevelopmental disorders is today an evidence that can be prevented. This project calls for an action to reduce contact with chemicals to which children and pregnant women are regularly exposed.

Paris bans vehicles built before 1997

by Camille von Kaenel

Source: Scientific American, 8 July

While Paris and London are cracking down cars through bans and pricing in order to curb pollution, United States are pursuing different strategies.

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Pubblicato il : 20/12/2017
Modificato il : 04/04/2019

July-August Sustainable Development

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