Debate is hotting up about the viability of nuclear power. The investigation by Ziggy Switkowski exposed the use of nuclear power as a real solution to global warming issues.

Global warming may have been a real issue for some time. What appears to have put solving the issue on the political and corporate agenda is an increasing public awareness. 'An Inconvenient Truth' is a film by Al Gore, which is perhaps the driver behind this change in public opinion.

An interesting article came out this week in a Silicon Valley website, which claimed the demand for energy will outweigh supply by 2008. For this reason several technology companies including AMD are discussing ways to reduce the demand for power by modifying existing technology.

Perhaps reducing supply needs can help manage demand for energy. The flow on effects for society may include reduced greenhouse emissions, lowering business energy costs and an increased capacity for more powerful devices.

What is interesting is the debate in Australia has centred around solutions on the supply side of energy. Proof that there is more than one way to save the world...

Virgin Galactic: Rulers of the Universe?

On Tuesday February 20, US Based Virgin Galactic signed an agreement with Silicon Valley based NASA. The agreement has set terms for the cooperative development of new space technologies including space suits, heat shields, hybrid rocket motors and hypersonic vehicles capable of travelling five times the speed of sound or more.

This cooperative agreement may see Virgin Galactic operate as a monopoly, which is unusual for the Virgin Group. Virgin's Richard Branson has often won publicity by being the underdog in a competitive battle. In this case it appears as though the group will have considerable market power at least during the agreement phase, which is set to last for 2 years.

Although this is a public/ private partnership it demonstrates how private enterprise can benefit by analysing strengths and weaknesses and partnering accordingly. On a smaller scale entrepreneurs may consider specialising in a niche and partnering to fill the void. If you don't get out much, consider joining the Ryze.com or Linkldn.com network. A basic membership is free and might place you in touch with like minded people.

Diary of an E-mail Addict

Chances are you or someone you know have been addicted to e-mail previously. It's time consuming and one executive coach in Pennsylvania claims the true cost to businesses in America is millions of dollars.

The Executive Coach, Marsha Egan, has developed a 12 step plan, which she hopes to teach executives in the coming months to help combat the overload problem. In addition to lost work productivity the flow on effect to personal lives should be considered from a marketing point of view.

Time is an increasingly scarce resource. The balance of family, work (now increased hours because of e-mail hold ups) and life is becoming elusive for many.

Implications for entrepreneurs may include facing the challenge of the seven day weekend and understanding that business may no longer operate Monday to Friday. Just as a home office should be seperate to avoid pleasure interrupting work, so too work should not interrupt leisure and family time.

From a product point of view there may be a way to simplify e-mail or other communications systems. Perhaps a tool to view multiple e-mails at a time could open an introductory paragraph with a one click trash button attached. Deleted and spam e-mail could be emptied automatically after 24 hours. Macro functions could be programmed for one click posting to a jobs list, diary or phone book. Perhaps the sender would be so kind as to fill in their name and phone number in the special new field, which would automatically update in the receiver's phone book.

For now we have to be disciplined and remind ourselves to check e-mail once or twice daily. If the process could be simplified or replaced with a new system, business managers would pay for the gained productivity. Just a thought...

Google founders should stick to the Internet

Yesterday Google's co-founder, Larry Page, suggested to CNN that scientists should be approaching the big issues to make our world a better place. Implications were that Google has made the world a better place through an easier to use search engine. While I am not disagreeing that Google is in fact simpler to use than others, the question has to be raised "was this one of the big issues (Larry was talking about)?"

One of Larry's suggestions was for scientists to work on automated cars in order to reduce fatalities due to human error. It may be a slow process to commercialisation but there are already scientists working to automate vehicles. One such car is known as 'Stanley', designed by Sebastian Thrun (a 39 year old Stanford Professor) and his team. This is being supported by competitive projects at the Pentagon.

With the execption of this error, it may be fair to say that scientists need entrepreneurs. It would also be fair to conclude the reverse is true.

Sustainable business practices include responsibility to the environment and future society. Consider the philanthropic point of view adopted by many scientists who have researched medical ailments and the impact of our actions on the environment. To trivialise this kind of research because it is 'non commercial' is unfair to say the least.