Measured Insights
The latest blog posts from our research projects.
Measuring Progress at Rio and Beyond
This post was originally featured on Sage Magazine and the Yale Center for Environmental Law and Policy blog. This past Sunday at the US-Canada Citizens Summit for Sustainable Development, I facilitated a group discussion on metrics and indicators for measuring...
Apple Kiosk in Kunming Airport – is this for real?
A while ago, my friend Jess reported on freakishly accurate rip-off Apple stores in Kunming, the provincial capital city of Yunnan in southwestern China. If you remember, employees at these stores actually thought they were working for Apple. On my last visit to China this past March, I came across something new – Apple kiosks in Kunming’s airport. I was told by a US-based Apple employee that though very close to being the real deal, there are several things about these kiosks that are dead give-aways for fakes: 1) Apple provides standard-issue wooden tables, which these kiosks lack; 2) employees all wear the same blue t-shirt (which these were not); 3) Apple doesn’t sell accessory items such as smart covers packaged the way they were bundled here.
China's new Air Quality Index: How does it measure up?
Earlier this month, China's Ministry of Environmental Protection (MEP) released the official (trial) revisions to the Ambient Air Quality Index (AQI, which is a notable shift from its previous form as the Air Pollution Index, or API). I wrote last February about how...
Please vote for us!
The 20th anniversary of the Rio Earth Summit is quickly approaching this June. To support the negotiations for a "Future We Want," the Yale Center for Environmental Law and Policy and Center for International Earth Science Information Network have applied for a...
What Jeremy Lin and US-China Cooperation on Climate Change Don't (Yet) Have in Common
This post originally appeared on The Huffington Post. It may not be coincidental that soon after NBA Knicks' Jeremy Lin dazzled the nation with a seemingly infallible jump-shot, China's vice president, heir apparent and avid basketball fan Xi Jinping made an official...
Seeing China’s pollution from space
This post originally appeared on China Dialogue. The Great Wall may not, after all, be visible from space – but Chinese air pollution is. A team of researchers at Battelle Memorial Institute and Columbia University, in collaboration with Yale University, recently...
Measuring Environmental Performance: The Art and Science of Quantification
My colleagues and I released the 2012 Environmental Performance Index (EPI) this past week at the annual World Economic Forum meeting in Davos, Switzerland. Countries that ranked high rejoiced; those low on the list sought explanation. Nobody wants to look bad. The...
The 2012 Environmental Performance Index … coming soon!
The 2012 Environmental Performance Index and the Pilot Trend Environmental Performance Index (new!) will be released this Thursday, Jan. 26 at the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland. In addition to an update to the biennial rankings, we've included a new Pilot...
Beijing releases real-time PM 2.5 data
Under much public pressure to release data on fine particulate matter, the Beijing government has incorporated preliminary measurements in real-time. Of course, there is a lot to be desired - the PM 2.5 is labeled as "for research purposes," and is only from one...
China promotes South-South Cooperation in Durban
As part of its green diplomacy strategy and move to promote a positive image in Durban, China for the first time highlighted its own development aid in the context of South-South capacity building and financial assistance with least-developed countries (LDCs) and small-island states (SIDs).
