What Use Is Nanotechnology?

Technology Review, besides being a great magazine edited by Jason Pontin, who I have known since the heyday of Red Herring, also puts on some great conferences. So I was excited and honoured to be invited to EmTech Spain, a two day conference in Malaga focussing on emerging technologies. Along with my World Economic Forum colleague Javier García Martínez of …

Cleantech in Melbourne: No Worries!

According to JP Morgan, flying to 21186 miles to Melbourne and back for a clean tech conference generated 5.63 tonnes of carbon dioxide, but unlike most conferences on this subject the hot air emissions were negligible. The Sir Mark Oliphant Cleantech: Mainstream and at the Edge conference was refreshing for the positive outlook on cleantech rather than the self flagellation …

Talking Cleantech In Melbourne

The Sir Mark Olifant Cleantech conference has been a lot of fun so far, from Eric Isaac’s opening overview of the the issues (and solutions) to Stefan Hajkowicz’s analysis of megatrends that will shape our future technology development. I’m still struck by how much cleantech seems to be focused in a few rather obvious areas, something which effectively prices a …

Eyjafjallajokull – Bad for Travel but Great for Science

While the eruption of Eyjafjallajokull in Iceland is bad news for some people, it is actually quite interesting from an emerging technologies point of view, and bordering on fascinating if, like me, you somehow managed to shoehorn a big chunk of geology and geomorphology into you education (It’s a frightening thought, but I could have ended up as a geographer!) as well as …

Copenhagen – Where’s The Science?

The next couple of weeks will be dominated by the Copenhagen Summit on Climate Change, and probably some nasty brutish debate with science caught somewhere in the middle. While the negotiators fumble towards a compromise that keeps all the vested interests happy while appearing to be taking tough action, I’ll be busy pushing the idea that we should actually do …