Author Archives: Richard Wedekind
Labour delivered nothing
Labour has delivered the second blow to any hope for an aspirational approach to New Zealand’s roll in the climate/economy/environment/extinction crises. National was proud of their first follower approach whereby New Zealand could do nothing until the rest of the world fell into line. Instead Jacinda Adern spoke bravely about our new ‘nuclear-free moment’ and […]
Sculpture in the Gardens
New sculpture at Botanic Gardens
What Obama said to Key?
President Obama upped the ante on the climate debate in his recent graduation address at University of California, Irvine on 14th June. This follows on from his move to reduce emissions from coal-fired power plants through EPA regulation rather than legislative action. A cynic might point out Obama has started talking tough on climate now […]
Solar Power at Orapiu
It’s now over a year since we installed our solar panels at Red Cottage and it’s a good time to analyse how successful we have been in reducing our power purchases from Mercury Energy. First to recap, we installed a PV array on our roof in mid-February 2013. It was supplied by What Power Crisis […]
King Tides – a hint of climate change
There has been significant press coverage of the King Tides experienced around New Zealand last weekend. Localised surface flooding of low-lying roads in the Auckland region, particularly the Northwestern motorway and Tamaki Drive have been reported with peak tides up to 0.7m above normal. These King tides are produced when a normal monthly Spring tide […]
The Two States of the Union
The quagmire of U.S. politics has produced a lame duck President who can’t progress policies for which he has a clear democratic mandate. This impasse boils down to fundamental differences between Democrats and Republicans that seem beyond resolution. Drawing on psychological and political research Chris Mooney has discussed this issue in various forums where he […]
New Zealand’s Ranking on Climate
Tim Grosser was a bit snippy with reporters when he headed off to the latest round of Climate talks in Warsaw last week. Although government projections have New Zealand’s CO2 emissions continuing to rise for the next decade, he only offered fulsome praise for the reputation of New Zealand in this arena and our overall […]
Sculpture in the Gardens About to Open
The bi-annual sculpture show at the Auckland Botanic Gardens is gearing up for its summer run from 9th November 2013 to 16th February 2014. Installation commenced last week and probably half of the works are already in place. My work Weather House was installed without hitch on Monday thanks to the help from the well-organised […]
No Quick Fix for New Zealand’s Economic Woes – Part I
The recent brouhaha regarding the possible contamination of Fonterra milk products has again raised concerns about the lack of diversity in the New Zealand economy. While it is generally acknowledged that primary production underwrites our export economy, it can be surprising to see the full extent of this domination. The Guardian Weekly recently queried the […]
A Good Reason to Plant a Windmill
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