The Center for Energy, Environment and Economics at the New York Institute of Technology is hosting their third annual conference, titled Energy Shock and Climate Change: Sustainable Solutions for Converging Crises. A full day of speakers and panelists, including Post Carbon Cities' Daniel Lerch, will explore the issues of climate and energy uncertainty.

The Washington Chapter of the APA is offering a training series on climate change and sustainability issues. For those who can't make it to the University of Washington, the sessions will be available as webcasts for three months after they take place.

Presentations and reports presented at the 2007 Challenge of Global Warming and Peak Oil for Local Government conference, sponsored by the Municipal Association of Victoria (Australia), illuminate many aspects of the issue for local governments.

The Tokyo Metropolitan Government is showing great leadership in its efforts to address climate change. This article from Japan for Sustainability describes some of the strategies the TMG has undertaken.

The Playbook for Green Buildings and Neighborhoods: Strategic Local Climate Solutions, a web-based resource, provides strategies, tips, and tools that counties can use to take immediate action on climate change through: green building, green neighborhoods, and sustainable infrastructure. The Playbook is designed both for communities that are considering making the first steps toward these, as well as for those who want to take existing efforts to a new level.

The aim of "Resilience, adaptation and transformation in turbulent times - preparing for change in social-ecological systems" is to bring together scientists working with the complex dynamics of interconnected social-ecological systems and to present, discuss, and if possible, summarise the current understanding of resilience, adaptability and pathways of transformation in such systems. Representatives from government, business and other major actors will be invited to discuss the challenges facing societal development, and together with scientists propose directions to go and pathways to avoid.

Los Angeles County, California is considering imposing a fee on drivers in the county in order to generate funds for public transit and congestion-reduction programs, with the ultimate goal of reducing greenhouse gas emissions from vehicles. The bill, which is currently in the state legislature, has been endorsed by the County Metropolitan Transportation Authority.

Laurel shares two videos: In one, Santa Barbara's City Council member Das Williams talks about that city's efforts to address energy and climate uncertainty. The other is from the city of Portland's education campaign about bike boxes. Plus, seven other cities using bike boxes to protect cyclists.

Rob Hopkins is the founder of the Transition movement in the UK, "transition" being the term for a process of creating more resilient and self-reliant communities. The handbook is a good guide and motivator to making changes at the local level and includes a compelling argument that peak oil and climate change must be addressed together.

Clearly an across-the-board reduction in CO2 production will require a more carbon-efficient relationship between transportation and land use, and in the industry and infrastructure that support them. If 60 percent of new development were compact as opposed to conventional sprawl, the total aggregate reduction in national CO2 production over trend would be in the order of 10 percent. This change in the trend, in combination with stringent fuel economy standards, would be sufficient to lower aggregate GHG production attributable to cars and trucks to below 1990 levels. Perhaps of more importance, it would set in place an urban infrastructure far less dependent on the automobile and consequently more resilient to future disruptions in the energy supply.