Deindustrialisation, Gentrification and the Re-invention of the Inner City: London and Melbourne, c.1960-2008 (journal article)
by Seamus O'Hanlon and Chris Hamnett
from Urban Policy and Research, Volume 27, Issue 3 September 2009 , pp. 211 - 216
"This special issue examines some of the major changes that have taken place over the last
40 years in the economy, social structure, housing markets and physical character of the
inner areas of London and Melbourne. Although the two cities are very different in terms
of their size and global economic position—London having a population of 7.5 million at
the 2001 Census compared to 3.7 million in metropolitan Melbourne in 2006, and London
with New York, emerging as one of the two major world financial centres in the 1980s and
beyond—they have historically shared many economic, social and cultural ties, largely as
a reflection of their common British and Victorian heritage."
See the whole issue of this journal here

Rethinking e-government services : user-centred approaches [online]

Author: Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD)

"Gives a broad description of the shift in governments' focus on e-government development - from a government-centric to a user-centric approach. It gives a comprehensive overview of challenges to user take-up of e-government services in OECD countries and of the different types of approaches to improving it." - abstract.

Urban planning tools for climate change mitigation [book]

Author: Patrick M. Condon & others / Lincoln Institute of Land Policy

"Reviews the relationship between urban planning and GHG [greenhouse gas] emissions as a key component of climate change, provides characteristics of GHG decision support tools, and evaluates the strengths and limitations of a cross section of existing tools using those characteristics." - page ii.

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Energy technology transitions for industry strategies for the next industrial revolution [online]

Authors: International Energy Agency (IEA) / Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD)

"Industry accounts for one-third of global energy use and almost 40% of worldwide CO2 emissions. Achieving substantial emissions reduction in the future will require urgent action from industry. ... [this publication contains] detailed sectoral and regional analyses ... It contains new indicators and methodologies as well as scenario results for the following sectors: iron and steel, cement, chemicals, pulp and paper and aluminium sectors. The report discusses the prospects for new low-carbon technologies and outlines potential technology transition paths for the most important industrial sectors." - abstract.

Heaven + earth : global warming : the missing science [book]

Author: Ian Plimer

"The Earth is an evolving dynamic system. Current changes in climate, sea level and ice are within variability. Atmospheric CO2 is the lowest for 500 million years. Climate has always been driven by the Sun, the Earth's orbit and plate tectonics and the oceans, atmosphere and life respond. Humans have made their mark on the planet, thrived in warm times and struggled in cool times.The hypothesis that humans can actually change climate is unsupported by evidence from geology, archaeology, history and astronomy. The hypothesis is rejected. A new ignorance fills the yawning spiritual gap in Western society. Climate change politics is religious fundamentalism masquerading as science. Its triumph is computer models unrelated to observations in nature. There has been no critical due diligence of the science of climate change, dogma dominates, sceptics are pilloried and 17th Century thinking promotes prophets of doom, guilt and penance. When plate tectonics ceases and the world runs out of new rocks, there will be a tipping point and irreversible climate change. Don't wait up.." - from publisher.

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Carbon markets : an international business guide [book]

Authors: Arnaud Brohé, Nick Eyre and Nicholas Howarth

"A comprehensive and accessible guide to understanding the opportunities offered by regulated and voluntary carbon markets for tackling climate change. Coverage includes: An overview of the problem of climate change, with a concise review of the most recent scientific evidence in different fields; A highly accessible introduction to the economic theory and different constitutive elements of a carbon allowances market; Explanation of the Kyoto Protocol and its flexibility mechanisms; Explanation of how the EU Emissions Trading Scheme works in practice; Ongoing developments in regulated carbon markets in the US; Up-to-the-minute coverage of regulated carbon markets in Australia; Developments in New Zealand and Japan [and] Carbon offsetting and voluntary carbon markets." - cover.

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Postindustrial East Asian cities : innovation for growth [book]

Authors: Shahid Yusuf & Kaoru Nabeshima

"Throughout East Asia, the growth process and its sources are changing in a number of important respects, especially for middle- and high-income economies. Growth is increasingly coming from the strength of innovative activities in these economies rather than from factor accumulation as in the past. Such innovative activities - especially in producer services and the creative industries - are concentrated in high-tech clusters in globally linked cities. Drawing on a wide range of literature and on interviews of firms, this book explores these issues with a focus on six East Asian cities, Bangkok, Beijing, Seoul, Shanghai, Singapore, and Tokyo. It suggests how policies and institutions can induce and furnish an urban environment that supports innovative activities." - cover.

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Renewables Information, 2009 [online]

Authors: International Energy Agency (IEA) & Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD)

Renewables Information is the International Energy Agency's comprehensive annual review of historical and current market trends for renewable energy in OECD countries. This volume brings together essential statistics on renewable and waste energy sources.

Innovation policies for the 21st century : report of a symposium [book]

Editors: Charles W. Wessner, Committee on Comparative Innovation Policy & others.

"How can we better capitalize on national investments in research? More specifically, how can we deliver the fruits of research through products and processes that both enhance welfare and generate wealth? And how do we generate the types of output from our universities and research centers that will help our regional economies grow and meet the challenges of the future? Beyond merely focusing on increasing inputs (such as more funds for basic research) on one hand or setting output targets and mandating results on the other, the innovation ecosystem approach examines the complex processes through which innovations emerge through a variety of collaborative activities to become commercially valuable products." - page 5.
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Consumers think Green is not so cool
Source: IPPR
"Given the runaway popularity of the 10:10 campaign, which the Guardian is backing, it would be churlish to offer it anything but praise. By providing a meaningful, tangible and immediate focus for action, it has been a clear success in attracting the support of thousands of individuals, companies and other organisations that are concerned about climate change.
But just how widespread will its appeal be? In light of new research from the Institute for Public Policy Research (IPPR) published in its Consumer Power report, the 10:10 campaign may actually be failing to resonate with a large swath of mainstream consumers."

Squeezing more oil from the ground (journal article)
by Leonardo Maugeri
from Scientific American, October 2009, pp. 36-43
"Amid warnings of a possible"peak oil", advanced technologies offer ways to extract every last possible drop. Key concepts of tha article are: forecasts that global oil production will soon start to deciline and that most oil will be gone in a few decades may be overly pessimistic; thanks to advanced technologies wells will be able to extract half of the oil known to be underground, up from the current 35%; increased productivity could make oil last at least another century."
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E-government cluster boots up with $250k funding (journal article)
by Georgina Swan
from CIO Government, 10 September 2009
"A technology cluster aimed at supporting and strengthening government ICT industries in Australia will inject $150,000 into the industry in 2010, with a commitment for a further $100,000 per annum through to 2011-12.
The e-government cluster is a partnership between National ICT Australia (NICTA), the ACT government, several major international companies, ACT companies and other research organisations including the ANU.
It aims to develop technology that will enable governments to deliver better services, reduce costs and open up new opportunities for businesses. "

Water Utilities Cite Aging Equipment, Regulations, and Funding As Top Challenges. (journal article)
by Jay Landers
from Civil Engineering, September 2009
"The article presents a survey developed by the University of Cincinnati relative to the most formidable challenges facing U.S. drinking water and waste water utilities for the next 50 years. The survey includes 42 questions distributed to the members of the Association of Metropolitan Water Agencies, National Association of Clean Water Agencies, and the National Association of Water Companies. It shows that the challenges include aging infrastructure and funding shortfalls."

The Oxford handbook of innovation [book]

Edited by Jan Fagerberg, David C. Mowery, Richard R. Nelson

"Looks at the creation of innovations, with particular focus on firms and networks .... Provides an account of the wider systematic setting influencing innovation and the role of institutions and organizations ... Explores some of the diversity in the working of innovation over time and across different sectors of the economy ... Focuses on the consequences of innovation with respect to economic growth, international competitiveness and employment." - cover.

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Abandoning Babylonian principles to rebuild our irrigation infrastructure (journal article)
by Iven Mareels
from ATSE Focus, August/September 2009
"The world's present water management is ... considered unsustainable because of the observed ecological deterioration of most of our natural water systems, but actually estimating the water resource that is readily and sustainably available for human activity is difficult. It is severely hampered by the paucity of quality data. Groundwater data in particular are scantily available. Australia reflects the world water situation well. Australia's water is already recognised as an activity-limiting resource that is further challenged by population growth and climate change: most of our urban communities are used to water restrictions; our farmers are subject to vastly reduced irrigation allocations; and our main river system, the Murray Darling, suffers severe environmental stress. In spite of this, our water infrastructure (like the rest of the world) is still largely fixated in the Deakin era, and our operational practices are definitely Sumerian/Babylonian in nature (although admittedly no longer temple-based) and suffer from low efficiency. This does not augur well for the future. "

Climate change scenarios: David Karoly (video)
Source: SlowTV / The Monthly
"In this talk, climate expert David Karoly lays out the likely future climate change scenarios - and how dependent they are on human actions now - while presenting the latest scientific findings on the earth's climate . Karoly is a professor in the University of Melbourne's school of earth sciences and a member of the Wentworth Group of Concerned Scientists. His work on the Inter-governmental Panel on Climate Change brought him international recognition. "

Influence of research funding and science policy on university research performance: a comparison of five countries (journal article)
by Laura Himanen, Otto Auranen, Hanna-Mari Puuska, Mika Nieminen
from Science and Public Policy, Volume 36, Number 6, July 2009 , pp. 419-430(12)
"The ability of universities to efficiently produce high-standard knowledge has become an important goal in science policies of many developed countries. Thus, many countries nowadays steer universities based on performance monitoring and competition. This article analyzes the connection between the competitiveness of the university funding environment and research performance in five OECD countries in 1987-2006. Besides funding, other science policy factors are analyzed using the framework of four state steering models. Results indicate that the university funding environment has become more competitive in all the compared countries, but the extent and pace of this development varies. Countries also differ in relation to steering models but all have employed policy elements typical of at least two models. In terms of competitive funding environment and research performance, there is no straightforward relationship between the two. With reference to the state steering models, the most traditional model which emphasizes university independence from the state seems to be the most beneficial to research performance. "

The Politics of climate change [book]

Author: Anthony Giddens

"Climate change differs from any other problem that, as collective humanity, we face today. If it goes unchecked, the consequences are likely to be catastrophic for human life on earth. Yet for most people, and for many policy-makers too, it tends to be a 'back of the mind' issue. ... [This book] argues controversially, we do not have a systematic politics of climate change. Politics-as-usual won't allow us to deal with the problems we face, while the recipes of the main challenger to orthodox politics, the green movement, are flawed at source." - cover.

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What Local Policy Makers Should Know about Urban Road Charging: Lessons from Worldwide Experience (journal article)
By Daniel Albalate and Germè Bel
from Public Administration Review Vol 69 No 5 2009, pp. 962 - 974
"Congestion costs are emerging as one of the most important challenges faced by metropolitan planners and transport authorities in developed economies. In the United States, these costs were as high as $78 billion in 2005 and are growing as a result of rapid increases in travel delays. In order to solve the current and severe levels of congestion, the U.S. Department of Transportation has recently started a program to initiate congestion pricing in five metropolitan areas. In this context, it is important to identify factors that influence successful implementation, as well as the problems or difficulties associated with charging projects. The authors review, synthesize, and analyze worldwide experience with urban road charging in order to extract lessons for policy makers who are considering the implementation of congestion pricing projects and for those who are interested in the introduction of traffic management tools to regulate entrance to city centers. "

Defining regional research priorities: a new approach (journal article)
By Hariolf Grup, Sybille Hinze and Barbara Breitschopf
from Science and Public Policy Vol 36 No 7 Aug 2009, pp. 549-559
"This paper outlines a new approach to defining research priorities at a regional level. The methodical approach relies on a combination of bibliometric indicators and qualitative data and aims at the identification, selection and evaluation of medium-term relevant research fields. This type of analysis of quantitative and qualitative data contributes to what is called evidence-based policy making. By linking bibliometric information with questionnaire-based assessments by more than 480 scientists in the federal state of Baden-Württemberg (Germany), strategic research fields were pre-selected for potential policy action. Overall, the study shows that strategic decisions for shaping and advancing research processes demand not only methodical proficiency in bibliometrics but also a broad knowledge of the structure of the research landscape and forward thinking on a broad canvas."