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    More Dumps Than Municipalities / Mais Lixões que Municípios

    Sunday, June 3rd, 2007

    I came across this tidbit during my eternal quest for information/data on waste in Latin America and the Caribbean (LAC). [Yes, yes garbologists are strange that way.] It seems that authorities in the northeastern state of Bahia have determined that there 438 trash dumps in the state, even though there are only 417 municipalities, yet […]

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    Serra’s 21 Strategic Environmental Projects for São Paulo

    Monday, April 9th, 2007

    On 02 April the new Governor of São Paulo, José Serra [Brazilian Social Democratic Party (Partido da Social Democracia Brasileira – PSDB)], announced a series of 21 “strategic environmental projects” he said will guide his Administration and help one of Latin America’s biggest economies — and still the industrial and agricultural powerhouse of Brazil (accounting […]

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    Poll on Brazilian Attitudes Regarding Sustainable Consumption

    Friday, March 30th, 2007

    The Foundation for the Defense of the Consumer of São Paulo State (Fundação de Proteção e Defesa do Consumidor – “PROCON-SP“) has just released the results of a recent survey it conducted on the attitudes of Brazilian consumers regarding “sustainable consumption and living.” PROCON is the state consumer protection agency created in 1976, a full […]

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    PAC’ing Brazil IV: Water, Sanitation and Waste

    Saturday, March 3rd, 2007

    In Part I, I provided an overview of what the Program for Accelerated Growth (Programa de Aceleração do Crescimento – PAC) proposed by President Lula is and why it matters to the issues I discuss in The Temas Blog. I also discussed its most direct impact on environment policy, the proposed changes in environmental licensing. […]

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    Trash Photos XI: A Visit to the Landfill

    Thursday, February 8th, 2007

    Someone recently asked whatever happened to my “Trash Photo” series. No, folks, I did not run out of trash- or recycling-related photos — not likely to happen anytime soon! No, I didn’t tire of posting in the series. I’m always ready to “talk trash.” (All right, keep the groans about my puns to a minimum!) […]

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    Parque Nacional do Iguaçu será o primeiro do mundo a receber o ISO 14001

    Wednesday, January 17th, 2007

    Synopsis in English: Brazil’s Environment Ministry (MMA) says that Brazil is about to have the world’s first national park to receive the ISO 14001 environmental management certification. Iguaçu National Park, which includes the famous breathtaking waterfalls on the border with Argentina and Paraguay, is due to receive ISO 14001 certification in March. In order to […]

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    Brasil estimula melhor aproveitamento do lixo em aterros sanitários

    Wednesday, December 27th, 2006

    Synopsis in English: The Environment and Cities Ministries have jointly set up a system to help Brazil’s 30 most populous cities develop projects involving their waste disposal systems that can qualify for “clean development mechanism” (CDM) status under the Kyoto Protocol. Most involve capture and use of biogas. Technical studies will be funded using a […]

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    Como tener éxito trabajando con “basura” en Latinoamérica

    Tuesday, November 21st, 2006

    In Part I I looked at Andreas’ work on building housing and other structures out of discarded materials such as PET bottles and tire rims. Here is a guest blog authored by Andreas himself. I asked him to share the challenges he faced in making such projects successful in a poor country such as Honduras, […]

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    More Construction with PET Bottles

    Tuesday, November 21st, 2006

    In a prior entry I introduced you to Brazilian experiments with constructing homes using PET bottles. Today I’ll introduce you to Andreas Froese, a man who not only did it first in Honduras, but has gone much beyond the experimental stages to actually build over a dozen homes and community centers made of PET bottles, […]

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    Trash Photos V: Municipal Banners & Hard Realities

    Wednesday, October 11th, 2006

    Municipal governments often try to influence their citizenry through slick banners hung from lamp posts that carry inspirational or educational messages. They look good and make nice photos. But they do not always reflect the reality “on the ground.” A case in point: the picture at right was taken in August 2005 along the Malecon […]

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