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    One Million Environment-Friendly Homes

    Wednesday, March 25th, 2009

    If you have followed Brazil much in recent years, President Lula’s interest in building “popular housing” for low-income households will not surprise you, and if you read The Temas Blog, you know that many of those being built already are fitted with solar water heaters on their roofs. But the Lula Administration is now taking […]

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    Thermal Power Plants Will Have to Compensate for Carbon Emissions

    Friday, March 20th, 2009

    Brazilian Environment Minister Carlos Minc says he will sign in April an administrative rule (portaria) that will require all thermo-electric power plants (burning petroleum or coal) seeking environmental licenses from the national environment agency, IBAMA, to provide for compensation (abatement) measures for their carbon emissions before they will be granted a license. The portaria will […]

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    Preparing for Accidents with Hazardous Substances

    Monday, March 16th, 2009

    Recently I posted about about how Brazilian states are slowly taking up their responsibility under a 2004 federal decree to create state-level committees or commissions on the Prevention of, Preparation for and Response to Environmental Emergencies Involving Hazardous Chemicals Products (“P2R2”). I think perhaps I might have left the mistaken impressions that (1) Brazil had […]

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    Eco-certification for Tourism: Blue Flag Comes to Brazil

    Saturday, February 14th, 2009

    Desde o Instituto Ambiental Ratones (IAR): Programa Bandeira Azul Em 2008, a certificação Bandeira Azul foi concedida a mais de 3200 praias e marinas em todo o mundo. Atualmente, 38 países participam do programa, representando todos os continentes, entre eles estão quase a totalidade dos países costeiros europeus e do leste europeu, cinco países caribenhos, […]

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    Brazil to Invest R$220 mil. in Recycling / Brasil vai investir R$220 milhões em reciclagem

    Wednesday, February 11th, 2009

    At a meeting for new mayors held this morning in Brasilia, representatives of the Inter-Ministerial Committee for Socioeconomic Inclusion for Catadores (catadores is what waste pickers are known as in Brazil) that federal government investments in various recycling, selective collection and municipal waste management training projects will exceed R$ 220 million in 2009 (about US$95.6 […]

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    A Symbolic Ban of Asbestos

    Thursday, January 29th, 2009

    Brazil’s Environment Minister, Carlos Minc, just banned asbestos. Well, not quite.  He announced at the World Social Forum that has banned, through an administrative rule (portaria), the use of any product containing asbesto fibers in construction or goods acquired by the Environment Ministry (MMA) and its associated organs: the national environment agency, IBAMA, the Chico […]

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    A Unique Environmental Institution

    Tuesday, January 27th, 2009

    Right now, until 05 February, environmental groups across Brazil are electing their representatives on the National Environment Council (Conselho Nacional do Meio Ambiente – CONAMA). The more than 500 environment nongovernmental organizations (NGOs) in the Environment Ministry’s (MMA) National Registry of Environmental Entities (Cadastro Nacional de Entidades Ambientalistas – CNEA) are voting for which individuals […]

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    Deforestation in Brazilian Amazon Drops

    Friday, January 23rd, 2009

    Brazil’s Environment Minister, Carlos Minc, just announced at a press conference that the pace of deforestation in the Brazilian Amazon fell 82% in the last five months of 2008 compared to a similar period in 2007. Minc attributes the drop to two factors: policies put into place by the federal government and regional authorities, and […]

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    Caixa Will Only Loan to Construction Using Certified Legal Wood / Caixa só financiará empreendimentos usuários de madeira legal

    Monday, January 5th, 2009

    The Brazilians have decided that if they are to ever reach their goal of wiping out illegal logging in the Amazon, they need to do more than more than just step up police raids, support sustainable wood use projects, create new parks, digitize monitoring, monitor biomass in realtime by satellite, and target key states. The […]

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    Brazil Will Monitor All Its Biomass by Satellite

    Thursday, November 20th, 2008

    Synopsis in English: The United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) is financing a project by the Brazilian Environment Ministry (MMA) and environment agency (IBAMA) that will expand satellite monitoring to detect deforestation from just the Amazon region (which has been underway since 1988) to all its biomass.  Thus monitoring will be added for the Cerrado, Caatinga, […]

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