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-- a _kt75 | reprint     Tweet Over the last two decades, Chinese governments have approved the construction of a cascade of large dams on the stretches of the Mekong River that lie within its borders, prompting disquiet amongst downstream riparian states . Those states — Cambodia, Laos, Thailand and Vietnam — are now set to wage their own battle for control of precious water resources, with China looming large through its role as a willing creditor. Despite hydropower plans for the Lower Mekong dating back to the 1950s, the river still flows freely south of the Chinese border. That may not be the case for much longer. The governments of Cambodia, Laos, Thailand and Vietnam have proposed to build eleven dams on the Lower Mekong — nine in Laos and two in Cambodia. Much of the electricity generated would ultimately be consumed in Thailand and Vietnam through contract agreements between the four states. The first of these proposed dams is alre

-- a _kt75 | reprint   Tweet There is not a single future of mobility. Transport will vary according to settlement size, geography, culture and the existing infrastructure and services that will evolve to provide future mobility. There tends to be a future view of mobility that centres around high-rise megacities and high-tech transport systems - hover cars, jet packs, railroads in the sky. This view has remained the same for almost a century - but I believe the future is oversold and under-imagined. The world's population is growing and becoming more urban. There are currently seven billion people living on the planet, with just over half in urban areas - but beware the word urban, it has no single definition and can refer to quite small settlements. Only 5% of the world's population live in megacities (using the UN definition of more than 10 million people). In Europe, two thirds of the urban population live in settlements of fewer than

-- a _kt75 | reprint   Tweet In the IEO2013 Reference case, world energy consumption increases from 524 quadrillion Btu in 2010 to 630 quadrillion Btu in 2020 and 820 quadrillion Btu in 2040, a 30-year increase of 56 percent. More than 85 percent of the increase in global energy demand from 2010 to 2040 occurs among the developing nations outside the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (non-OECD), driven by strong economic growth and expanding populations. In contrast, OECD member countries are, for the most part, already more mature energy consumers, with slower anticipated economic growth and little or no anticipated population growth. Many economic and geopolitical circumstances add considerable uncertainty to any long-term assessment of world energy markets. Currently, there is wide variation in the economic performance of different countries and regions around the world. Among the more mature OECD regions