Pledges made so far by developed countries between 2010 and 2012 are:• EU member states – $3.36 billion a year• France - $560 million a year (20 per cent, or $122 million to reduce emissions from deforestation and degradation)
• Germany - $588 million a year
• Ireland - $47 million a year
• Netherlands - $140 million a year
• UK - $800 million a year
• Japan - $5 billion a year
• US - $776 million in 2010; $1.05 billion in 2011 ($531 million for clean energy in 2010; $711 million in 2011)Total commitments total $7.91 billion in 2010, $8.13 billion in 2011, and $7.13 billion in 2012.
above: pledges relative to 1990 - from New Scientist
It seems that you have to be in Japanese or in Europe to make a commitment to a sustainable future. New Scientist reports that the pledges made to the Copenhagen Accord add up to 3.5C rather than the 2C the accord commits to. It seems we're still having commitment issues.
We've been recording our meter readings for a year now on The Carbon Account and have a whole 12 months of "visual" meter readings. Here is the current carbon profile of our household (two people and two cats).
Note that this footprint includes our old and new houses - the sharp drop in September - October represents our move from an old Victorian end of terrace without cavity walls and to our new semi-detached house which does have cavity walls. There are other differences:
An interesting note, I am quite proud that the old house had an Energy Performance Certificate rating of D (61). The new house a rating of E (45) when we bought it. However, having completed all the easy recommendations of the EPC the new house is likely a C (71) now - whereas the potential we left in the Croydon house was only up to a D - 63. However, I think the scores also show some methodological differences between the two reports, one of the more important criticisms of the UK's EPCs.
Also, the fact that a house - such as our old one in Croydon - can have an EPC that is reasonably good but also perform so awfully shows the limits of an asset rating (such as an EPC, BREEAM or LEED rating). These features of the sustainability landscape are best supported by operational ratings such as DECs or Upstream's Sustainability Benchmarking (a product that I work on).
The above footprint does not include transport. We are, for example, getting a new car next week and will undoubtedly increase that aspect of our household footprint. However, the elephant in the room is our trip to Newfoundland last year which was not on the above chart, but can be seen below:
Ouch!
Like the previous post with comments by McKinsey, KPMG also sees some positives coming out of the Copenhagen summit. Once again, we see the mix of carbon price, energy price and increased legislation provide a context for business to respond to the challenges of Climate Change.
This clip is very interesting and well worth watching. First the points on Copenhagen are important. It might not have been the package we wanted - the lack of legally binding targets is quite a disappointment. However, it is not a failure.
At about 3:30 the speaker, Jeremy Oppenheim, talks about challenges to business. The focus has been putting a price on Carbon but Oppenheim makes the point that there are two environmental concerns that business might find more pressing: that the price of energy is increasing and predicted to continue to rise and that the increased burdens of legislation means greater risk of non-compliance.
Alternative interfaces
The Evernote mobile web application can be viewed using either plain or dynamic interfaces. The plain interface targets a larger variety of mobile devices and has a simplistic navigational design. The dynamic interface targets higher-end devices with browsers supporting Javascript, and with touch navigation in mind. Evernote attempts to deduce what type of interface to use based on the incoming HTTP requests. However, that does not guarantee a perfect match. To specify which interface to use, simply include if query parameter:
For plain interface:
For dynamic interface:
I just found this in the Evernote documentation. I've been using the Evernote Mobile interface on my netbook for small information requests where waiting for the main web UI to load take too long. Of course, unless the web interface defaults to the plain interface - but by using the lower link listed above suddenly the interface is much more usable.
This accesses the site that is presumably used by iPhone and Android browsers. It is much more usable than the plain interface and seems like a good way to use Evernote on my netbook - when connected to the web of course.
Various and Assorted Thoughts and Observations Regarding the Just-Announced iPad
Thursday, 28 January 2010
Automatic Transmission
Used to be that to drive a car, you, the driver, needed to operate a clutch pedal and gear shifter and manually change gears for the transmission as you accelerated and decelerated. Then came the automatic transmission. With an automatic, the transmission is entirely abstracted away. The clutch is gone. To go faster, you just press harder on the gas pedal.
That’s where Apple is taking computing. A car with an automatic transmission still shifts gears; the driver just doesn’t need to know about it. A computer running iPhone OS still has a hierarchical file system; the user just never sees it.
That’s not to say there aren’t trade-offs involved. Car enthusiasts (and genuine experts like race car drivers) still drive cars with manual transmissions. They offer more control; they’re more efficient. But the vast majority of cars sold today are automatics. So too it’ll be with computers. Eventually, the vast majority will be like the iPad in terms of the degree to which the underlying computer is abstracted away. Manual computers, like the Mac and Windows PCs, will slowly shift from the standard to the niche, something of interest only to experts and enthusiasts and developers.
I disagree with this specific analogy and would like to offer another.
Up until the 90s the car engine was relatively simple. This meant that, whilst you didn't have to, you could try to understand the mechanics of the engine. If something went wrong, you could pop the hood and figure it out. I don't know the success rate of this, but it was -at the time - an option.
In the 1990's this became much harder. The modern engine seemed to have become too complicated for the average armchair mechanic to engage with. This was either due to car engines becoming too complex, or car companies understanding that by making the car engine inaccessible, the punters will always return.
Now, I believe there is an element of each. I don't like the motives of car companies, but cars are more complex and more efficient than ever before.
The question is, does this analogy transfer?
I think so. I would have liked to "lift the hood" on my iPod Touch - and did so by jailbreaking it. By doing this I went to such extremes that nobody in the world could have argued that I hadn't voided the warranty and therefore dismissed Apple of any responsibility for product performance on my device.
So, why does Apple care about what I do to the device?
Well, if it was about shifting gears as @Gruber says, I'm opting to shift. I'm shifting down in order to pass. There are metaphorical reasons why someone would override an automatic gearbox.
However, I don't think its about shifting gears. I think Apple wants to keep people from understanding what is under the hood. To me, keeping people from looking at whats under the hood is a cynical idea. It ensures that people can't understand the mechanics of their machine in order to fix it themselves. I removes the transparency of understanding what the engine is doing. It makes the experience more dependent on expensive Specialists to fix problems. Mechanics who can say whatever they like because you as the layperson have not had access to assess the actual problem. Its not about shifting gears, it about ownership of a device.
The thing is, that as far as I understand, the most economical and technologically advanced code (the metaphorical advance car engine) is not found in closed systems that mimic a Porsche engine. Instead some of the most elaborate and exceptional code is open sourced, and therefore the antithesis of any Apple argument that restricting access to the code improves efficiency. So the car analogy only works if you say: by Apple restricting access to the blood and guts of the OS they are improving the possibility you'll return for repair or upgrade of a device rather than simply fixing it, at the trade-off of ensuring the code remains of an equal or lesser quality.
Personally, I'm not keen.
Regent's treat. Indeed.
