Natalie Marquis, general manager of Austin's Habitat Suites, discusses their little hotel's efforts to create a green hospitality business. [Production:Lokey(lead)/Mendenhall]

LISTEN: New Capital Show (February 22, 2007)

Of all the major stories of environmental destruction now occurring in our world, perhaps none is less covered by both governments and media as the state of the oceans and seas.  In 2003, Richard Ellis' book The Empty Ocean appeared to enormous critical acclaim and widespread alarm at the story it told: rampant destruction and depletion of the oceans' capital by commercial fishing operations and the increasingly powerful technologies they employ.  On this week's show, Richard Ellis discusses the state of our oceans, and what can be done to save what's left. 

I also discuss Steven Johnson's article in the New York Times Magazine "The Long Zoom."

COMMUNITY CONTRIBUTIONS

• National Geographic on the Whaling Industry (contributor:Alex)
• Los Angeles Times on Ocean Destruction (contributor:Keith)

LISTEN: New Capital Show (October 12, 2006)

Several weeks ago, the Wall Street Journal ran this article, detailing TXU, the big Dallas-based power utility's plans to build 11 new coal-fired power plants in Texas.  Soon.  In fact, this would amount to about a doubling of existing coal plants, and would certainly be the most rapid buildout of power plants in the history of the State.  Why are they in such a hurry?  The plot thickens when you throw in the fact that Governor Rick Perry last year signed an executive order "fast-tracking" the permitting process for these plants.  TXU says it's just trying to meet demand.  But it appears that TXU is trying to get under the regulatory wire, because the plants it proposes will use the old way of burning coal, pulverizing, rather than the new, developing, cleaner, but more expensive way, gasification.  To help us understand the drama playing out, of which you are a part, Randy Loftis of The Dallas Morning News, who is covering this story extensively, will join me.  I asked environmental and business reporters at The Houston Chronicle to join too: they, regrettably, are not on the story and declined.  I asked the Wall Street Journal reporter to join us, but she declined.  And I asked General Electric to come on and discuss the state of its gasification technology, upon which clean power will depend.  They declined too after I mentioned TXU.  I sense that this issue is getting too hot for some to handle.  But not for New Capitalists.

Also this week:

• We revisit an article on selective memory that I only recently touched on but which deserves more comment.
• In business news, the stock options "backdating" scandal continues to sicken as the indictment of executives at Comverse Technologies reveals some real greedheads
• In energy news, BP shuts down the Alaska pipeline and...SURPRISE! the country keeps going, and a push is on to capture ocean tide power
• In politics, the hearts of the innocent, the young, the weak, and the defenseless continue to break in Lebanon and Israel.
• And in environmental news, protests come to Chile over plans to dam up Patagonia, one of the most dazzling natural places on the Earth.

LISTEN: New Capital Show (August 10, 2006)

A Walmart green makeover has been in the news lately.  I was frankly unaware of the depth of the commitment the company is making until I sat down with some articles appearing this week.  Apparently, CEO Lee Scott has taken green to heart and intends to drive it throughout the company.  Is this for real?  You decide: here are documents for July 27 NCS.

• Green Machine
• How Walmart Went Organic
• Can Walmart Save Seafood?

Other items of interest, time permitting, are the booming private equity business, Texas now leading the nation in wind energy produced, mercury levels in songbirds, the Texas utility TXU and how it wants to build more coal plants in our state - a LOT more, one man's argument in favor of nuclear power, a new book on the Iraq Fiasco, men and their foolish investment decisions, and a Harvard psychologist on why we humans engage in tit-for-tat.

LISTEN: New Capital Show (July 27, 2006)

Richard Lindzen, Professor of Meteorology at MIT appeared on NCS July 13 to discuss his position that there is no consensus that man-made CO2 increases in the atmosphere are causing global warming.  Lindzen's recent volubility on the issue is in direct response to Al Gore's publicity campaign for An Inconvenient Truth, in which Gore more or less claims that consensus exists.  Lindzen's most public expression was an op ed piece in the WSJ.  Part of the problem may be semantic: does consensus mean a majority, a plurality, or unanimity?  What seems important to me is for rational minds to listen to the explanations they hear, and draw their own conclusions.  To that end, I had Lindzen on the show knowing that his conclusions would be unpopular with the audience.  The NCS audience came through yet again: mature, open-minded, everyone I heard from appreciated hearing from Lindzen.  Some followed up in detail.  Don Patterson provided me with this substantial discussion critiquing Lindzen's ideas.  Other listeners had followup comments and one even caused Lindzen to forward an unpublished paper detailing his opinions.  In the end, I'm not persuaded by Lindzen, but I appreciate his position.  A rise in CO2 from 280 ppm to 380 ppm, the rampant reports from biologists around the world, the predictions that physics makes about warming effects, are all more persuasive to me than Lindzen's deferral that we just don't know enough and will have to wait for meteorology to grow up from its primitive state.  Proper risk analysis says we may not have that much time.

LISTEN: New Capital Show (July 13, 2006)

William Ginn is an executive at The Nature Conservancy and the author of Investing in Nature, an excellent survey of advanced financial techniques used in modern "environmental investment banking." 

LISTEN: New Capital Show (June 29, 2006)