| Excerpts |
page 56
2002/02
| At the dawn of the Mesozoic era 250 million years ago, it would have been possible to walk from Madagascar to almost anywhere else in the world.
All of the planet's land masses were united in the supercontinent Pangea, and Madagascar was nestled between the west coast of what is now India and the east coast of present-day Africa [...]. The world was a good deal warmer than at present--even the poles were free of ice.
In the supercontinent's southern region, called Gondwana, enormous rivers coursed into lowland basins that would eventually become the Mozambique Channel, which today spans the 250 miles between Madagascar and eastern Africa. |
page 20
2007/06
| Jatropha seems to offer the benefits of biofuels without the pitfalls. The plants favor hot, dry conditions and hence are unlikely to threaten rain forests.
There is no trade-off between food and fuel either, because the oil is poisonous... matching plants to growing conditions and maximizing oil yields... small-scale efforts based on hedges or intercropping jatropha with other plants -- a method used in projects in Kenya and Madagascar, where jatropha is planted alongside vanilla. |
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