(Photo from Harvesting Clean Energy)

Here's an odd story from Reuters today about objections to the World Bank providing funding for alternative energy. I'm not so versed on the interplay between finding alternative energy sources and Australian (or South Korean) politics regarding the Kyoto Protcol, so maybe someone could fill me in on that.

"The Bank has no comparative advantage in this area...," he said, adding that the bank should focus instead on improving access to clean energy.

Kwon was speaking for a group of Asia-Pacific nations including Australia, a big energy producer that has not signed up for the Kyoto Protocol on curbing greenhouse gases.

Brown's drive for new cash follows a request by the Group of Eight in July 2005 to the World Bank to develop a new global framework for climate change that would remain effective long beyond the 2012 expiration of the Kyoto Protocol.

Hilary Benn, Britain's international development secretary, backed the bank to keep analysing options for developing new financing instruments "where they are needed to fill gaps".

In a few other stories over the wire ...

*For job seekers, an overview of recruitment within the Sustainable and Energy job markets.

*At The Economist, solar energy gets better and cheaper ...

*The Netherlands moves wind farms offshore (snide comment from me: Wasn't most of the Netherlands offshore at one point?)

*Kuwait among leading states in adhering to Montreal protocol, (second snide comment of the day from me: I guess they don't count the damage from Saddam's torching of the oil wells there over a decade ago ...)

*World Resources Institute report on World Bank's approaches to sustainable development, via It's the Environment, Stupid.

*Green Futures on "Greening the Dragon" and an Institute for Sustainable Development in the works for Nottingham's China campus near Shanghai.

*At the Worldwatch Institute ... Hydrogen: Fuel for Our Future?

*An MIT student on his 'development disillusionment' ...

*'We need real action on global warming' from South Africa's Cape Times ... via Carbon Planet.