Patrick McCully is a US-based environmentalist, writer, and solar advocate and entrepreneur. Since 2010 he has been executive director of Black Rock Solar, a non-profit company affiliated with the Burning Man festival, that is focused on installing solar power and doing lighting efficiency projects for non-profits, schools, Native American tribes, and municipalities in Nevada. He was the formerly executive director of the Berkeley (California)-based International Rivers (formerly known as International Rivers Network, or IRN), an advocacy group that supports communities around the world opposing destructive river development projects, and promotes sustainable and equitable freshwater management and energy policies. [1]
McCully is originally from Northern Ireland, and is a graduate of the University of Nottingham, England. He was co-editor of the UK journal The Ecologist, and editor for a Uruguayan information service for NGOs.[ citation needed ]
McCully has written extensively on water, energy, climate, carbon trading, human rights and development policies and given presentations at numerous conferences and universities around the world including Yale, Harvard, UC Berkeley, Stanford, Columbia, Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México, Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona, Universidade Federal do Rio de Janeiro, Makerere University (Uganda), University of Cape Town, and Kyoto University. He represented international advocacy NGOs on the Steering Committee of the UN Environment Programme’s Dams and Development Project.[ citation needed ]
McCully's is author of Silenced Rivers: The Ecology and Politics of Large Dams (St Martin’s Press 1996 and 2001) which has been translated into five languages and was described by Indian author Arundhati Roy as a "truly dazzling book". [2]
Chile's government is a representative democratic republic, in which the President of Chile serves as both head of state and head of government, within a formal multi-party system. Executive power is exercised by the president and their cabinet. Legislative power is vested in both the government and the two chambers of the National Congress. The judiciary operates independently of both the executive and legislative branches.
Hydropower, also known as water power or water energy, is the use of falling or fast-running water to produce electricity or to power machines. This is achieved by converting the gravitational potential or kinetic energy of a water source to produce power. Hydropower is a method of sustainable energy production. Hydropower is now used principally for hydroelectric power generation, and is also applied as one half of an energy storage system known as pumped-storage hydroelectricity.
A non-governmental organization (NGO) is an independent, typically nonprofit organization that operates outside government control. NGOs often focus on humanitarian or social issues but can also include clubs and associations offering services to members. Some NGOs, like the World Economic Forum, may also act as lobby groups for corporations. Unlike international organizations (IOs), which directly interact with sovereign states and governments, NGOs are independent from them.
Suzanna Arundhati Roy is an Indian author best known for her novel The God of Small Things (1997), which won the Booker Prize for Fiction in 1997 and became the best-selling book by a non-expatriate Indian author. She is also a political activist involved in human rights and environmental causes. She was the winner of the 2024 PEN Pinter Prize, given by English PEN, and she named imprisoned British-Egyptian writer and activist Alaa Abd El-Fattah as the "Writer of Courage" with whom she chose to share the award.
The Sierra Club is an American environmental organization with chapters in all 50 U.S. states, Washington D.C., and Puerto Rico. The club was founded in 1892, in San Francisco, by preservationist John Muir. A product of the progressive movement, it was one of the first large-scale environmental preservation organizations in the world. It has lobbied for policies to promote sustainable energy and mitigating global warming, as well as opposing the use of coal, hydropower, and nuclear power. Its political endorsements generally favor liberal and progressive candidates in elections.
Rodney Jon (Rod) Welford is an Australian former politician from Queensland. He served as a Labor Party Member of Parliament in the Legislative Assembly of Queensland from 1989 to 2009.
The Cambodian Center for Human Rights is a non-partisan, independent, non-governmental organization that works to promote and protect democracy and respect for human rights throughout Cambodia. It focuses primarily on civil and political rights and on a variety of interlinked human rights issues. The white bird flying out of a circle of sky blue on the logo of the organization symbolizes Cambodia’s quest for freedom.
The GLOBAL ENVIRONMENTAL INSTITUTE (GEI) was founded in the U.S. in 2003 and was registered as an independent non-profit organization in the State of Delaware. GEI's mission was to design and implement market-based models for solving environmental problems in order to achieve development that is economically, ecologically, and socially sustainable. GEI was dissolved in October 2011. GEI's sister organization, the independent Beijing Chaoyang District Sustainable Global Environmental Institute in China (GEI-China) remains active.
NGO-ization refers to the professionalization, bureaucratization, and institutionalization of social movements as they adopt the form of nongovernmental organizations (NGOs). It led to NGOs' depoliticizing discourses and practices of social movements. The term has been introduced in the context of Western European women's movements, but since the late 1990s has been employed to assess the role of organized civil society on a global scale. It is also used by Indian writer Arundhati Roy, who speaks about the NGO-ization of resistance, and more generally, about the NGO-ization of politics. Across the world, the number of internationally operating NGOs is around 40,000. The number of national NGOs in countries is higher, with around 1-2 million NGOs in India and 277,000 NGOs in Russia.
Paul F Downton is a sustainable city theorist and activist, ecological architect, urbanist and professional writer on architecture, ecocities, environment and the arts. He designed the Christie Walk development in Adelaide, Australia.
Peter John Hayes is the Executive Director of the Nautilus Institute for Security and Sustainability, a non-governmental policy-oriented research and advocacy group.
Policy makers often debate the constraints and opportunities of renewable energy.
Sohrab Sobhani is an Iranian-American author and lecturer on energy issues, U.S. immigration policies and U.S. policy toward the Middle East.
John J. Berger is an environmental science and policy specialist, prize-winning American author, journalist, and environmental consultant. He has worked for the National Research Council of the National Academy of Sciences, Fortune 500 corporations such as Chevron, nonprofit groups, such as Friends of the Earth, and governmental organizations, including the Office of Technology Assessment of the United States Congress. He co-founded and directed the Nuclear Information and Resource Service as well as founding and directing the Restoring the Earth organization. Berger has authored and edited eleven books on energy and environmental issues, including Solving the Climate Crisis: Frontline Reports from the Race to Save the Earth,Climate Peril: The Intelligent Reader's Guide to Understanding the Climate Crisis, Climate Myths: The Campaign Against Climate Science, Restoring the Earth: How Americans Are Working to Renew Our Damaged Environment, and Charging Ahead: The Business of Renewable Energy and What It Means for America.
Kate Gordon is an American lawyer, urban planner, non-profit advisor, and leader in the "green jobs" and climate risk movement. In 2021, she became Senior Advisor to Energy Secretary Jennifer Granholm at the United States Department of Energy. In 2019, she was appointed by Governor of California Gavin Newsom to lead the California Governor's Office of Planning and Research.
Renewable energy in Thailand is a developing sector that addresses the country’s present high rate of carbon emissions. Several policies, such as the Thirteenth Plan or the Alternative Energy Development Plan, set future goals for increasing the capacity of renewable energy and reduce the reliance of nonrenewable energy. The major sources of renewable energy in Thailand are hydro power, solar power, wind power, and biomass, with biomass currently accounting for the majority of production. Thailand’s growth is hoped to lead to renewable energy cost reduction and increased investment.
Ecocity Builders is a 501(c) non profit located in Oakland, California, that provides advocacy, consulting, and education in sustainable city planning with a focus on access by proximity and pedestrian-oriented development. Ecocity Builders also implements urban design projects utilizing a large network of alliances with city governments, businesses and NGOs. Ecocity Builders' approach is based the work of founder Richard Register, an American artist, peace activist and urban theorist.
Renewable energy in Costa Rica supplied about 98.1% of the electrical energy output for the entire nation and imported 807000 MWh of electricity in 2016. Fossil fuel energy consumption in Costa Rica was 49.48 as of 2014, with demand for oil increasing in recent years. In 2014, 99% of its electrical energy was derived from renewable energy sources, about 80% of which from hydroelectric power. For the first 75 days of 2015, 100% of its electrical energy was derived from renewable energy sources and in mid 2016 that feat was accomplished for 110 consecutive days despite suboptimal weather conditions.
Valeriy Volodimirovich Pysarenko is a Ukrainian politician, nonpartisan, who was a People's Deputy of Ukraine of the 5th, 6th, 7th and 8th Convocations from 2006 until 2019. He is an Honored Lawyer of Ukraine and candidate of Juridical Sciences. In 2006 and 2007 he was elected to parliament as a candidate of Bloc Yulia Tymoshenko. Since then he has been an independent candidate.