I’ll take a summer break…

Since April 15th, I’ve tried to keep you up-to-date with information, news and insights on important issues and developments worldwide. As I’m constantly learning when I’m blogging, I’ll keep improving the quality of my posts. The first month was tough with only 10 to 20 visitors a day, so I’m happy that this number has meanwhile gone up to [...]

Global economic party is over

The outlook for the global economy is rather gloomy. Global growth rates are declining, the United States and many EU countries suffer from an economic downturn, primarily caused by the U.S. subprime mortgage crisis and soaring commodity prices, most notably oil. Even China, a guarantor of double digit growth rates, is likely to cool down [...]

“There is no oil shortage.” , Michael O’Leary, CEO of Ryanair

Ryanair is Europe’s largest low-cost carrier and the airline’s chief executive Michael O’Leary, who is always good for a surprise, is about to conclude the company’s biggest deal ever – an order of 400 new aircraft with deliveries starting in 2013. Ryanair is known for ordering new planes at times when the aviation industry is in [...]

Shrinking Asia -> Europe cargo volumes indicating an economic downturn in Europe

Container-shipping companies have been growing rapidly for years, ordering more and more container ships with higher capacities. This year, the capacity of container ships worldwide has grown 15%. With globalization widening the distance between production locations and consumer markets, demand for sea fright has been growing by double digits annually for seven years in a [...]

Amazing opening ceremony of the 29th Olympic Games in Beijing

Excited about Chinese culture and China’s unprecedented rise to the leading global economies, I spent the last 6 hours watching the opening ceremony of the 29th Olympics in Beijing.
A breathtaking show! Really impressive. The approximately 15,000 voluntary performers made a tremendous effort and impressed about 4 billion spectators around the world [...]

Has the bubble popped?

The long standing oil price surge has caused pain at the gas pump for drivers around the world. As you can see on the U.S. gasoline price chart from the Energy Information Administration (Gasoline prices in the U.S….), gasoline prices in America have almost doubled since January ‘07. In January 1999, crude oil was as [...]

Nissan wants to become the Japanese front-runner in electric car technology

Japanese automakers were among the first to mass market fuel-efficient hybrids and are ahead of most competitors in electric car technology. Toyota, now the world’s largest automaker, has early realized that alternatives to conventional cars using (only) gasoline for power could become big business.  With a whole lineup of hybrid cars, Toyota is leading this [...]

Wrong-Way Driver Germany

<<check out my post “the comeback of nuclear energy in Europe” on my new blog >>
With growing concerns about our dependence on fossil fuel imports and the threat of global warming, nuclear power turns out to be a powerful opportunity to combat both. Electricity is the best form of energy we have as it can [...]

Is a global water crisis looming?

The world has resources that are limited such as oil, coal, gold, silver, silicon, iron ore, and resources that are unlimited such as sunlight, wind, geothermic power and water. Especially water appears to be abundant with more than two thirds of the earth’s surface covered with it. The problem, however, is that only 0.65% of [...]

Dongtan eco-city yet another showcase project promoting sustainability in China?

China is extremely likely to become the world’s top polluter in the not-too-distant future. All major Chinese rivers are seriously polluted, acid rain occurs in a third of the country, hazardous air threatens the health of city dwellers and China’s greenhouse gas emissions are skyrocketing. At the same time, China’s energy consumption surpasses the country’s [...]