Did you think I was going to end this trip without a comment on what's happening here on the sustainability front? Wrong. Here's what impressed me: solar-powered hot water heaters widespread in cities large and small. Bike riding, compact cars, electric-powered scooters: all super popular. Solar arrays beginning to pop up in the Negev, land of endless sun. Lots of drip irrigation in evidence in city parks, private landscaping and best of all, in agriculture.
But there are some forces, too, in opposition to forward progress when it comes to conservation and zero carbon renewables. Now that Israelis have discovered enormous fields of natural gas in their territorial waters, there's less incentive to subsidize large-scale solar. And now that Israelis are satisfying their water needs using desalinization, there's less incentive to conserve water even though it takes substantial energy to make ocean water potable. Meanwhile, these newfound supplies of water and gas are not making their impact felt in the West Bank and Gaza, where power is intermittent and lands are parched with climate change affecting water levels in rivers and aquifers. But it was heartening to see some small but cooperative projects happening across borders. One in particular makes for a beautiful model. At Kibbutz Sde Eliyahu in
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AuthorSusan. Traveling again. And writing about it. ArchivesCategories
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