The environmental community is a few weeks overdue for some good news. Here are three news items to make you smile heading into the weekend.

1. From the Financial Times, the largest charity concert in history is being planned for July 7th. The theme? Global Warming. The Host? You guessed it, Al Gore.

The event is targeting an audience of 2 billion viewers through a series of coordinated film, music and television events in seven cities including London, Washington DC, Shanghai, Rio de Janeiro, Cape Town and Kyoto. The formal announcement is expected by Mr. Gore today in London. Thanks to Lighter Footstep for the link.

2. Al Gore also checked in with Richard Branson today. Together they launched a $25 million contest with the money awarded to the person who comes up with the best way of removing significant amounts of carbon dioxide from the atmosphere.

A panel of judges will oversee the prize, including James Lovelock and Nasa scientist James Hansen. Needless to say, Sir Richard will be footing the multi-million dollar bill.




3. Finally, British scientists are proposing a new method of carbon storage to help reduce Europe's greenhouse gas emissions.

Their cold storage technique would involve storing carbon in crystal and liquid form in cool, high pressure ocean sediments, and have already identified several potential test sites in Europe.

Link via Hugg.