"Somthing is Hinky"

A good little rant from Letterman. And even though Dave points out that it might not matter, I'm compelled to share this more optimistic clip about the president of Unity College in Maine and his new net energy producing house. The coolest part about this is that while it's got enough solar panels to provide 3 times the electricity they need - that has less to do with the number of panels and more to do with the good insulation and efficient lighting for high efficiency, and smart design of the house to take advantage of passive solar and daylighting:

http://www.wmtw.com/video/17593519/index.html

Stay going

Wake Up, Freak Out, Do Something

With regard to the previous post below, check out this short animated film that gives a good quick overview of why climate disruption affects us all...http://www.wakeupfreakout.org/film/tipping.html. stay going.

Methane chimneys

This story hit the Independent yesterday, and I really hope these preliminary findings are exaggerated, or not what they seem:

Exclusive: The methane time bomb

Arctic scientists discover new global warming threat as melting permafrost releases millions of tons of a gas 20 times more damaging than carbon dioxide

By Steve Connor, Science Editor
Tuesday, 23 September 2008

Preliminary findings suggest that massive deposits of subsea methane are bubbling to the surface as the Arctic region becomes warmer and its ice retreats

Earth Overshoot Day

Sadly, today is Earth Overshoot Day. This is based on the measure of the Global Footprint Network, that today humanity has consumed all of the new resources that nature will produce this year. From here until the end of the year, we'll no longer be "living off the interest" and instead will be "eating into our capital." A basic understanding of finances let's us know that this is not good for us - and especially not good for our children and grandchildren, who will be left with that much less, a world that produces less, and as a result a system that is far less resilient.

Often people make the mistake of thinking that sustainability is all about limits, having less stuff, being restricted in terms of what we can do. In fact, it is the opposite. By recklessly pursuing physical growth in a "take-make-waste" economy - thinking we're getting more - we're actually getting less - now and in the future.

As the Footprint Network points out, the financial collapse happening around us right now is a stark reminder of what can happen when debt and spending are allowed to grow out of control, with no responsibility and no acknowledgment of the natural limits that every system is subject to - whether it's the laws of thermodynamics on the planetary scale, or the rules of accounting for a business. You can only cheat the system for so long, and we've been cheating the system for too long. We continue to see examples of organizations, communities, cities, and now entire economies hitting the funnel walls - Enron, New Orleans, Houston/Galveston, Lehman/Bear/Freddie/Fannie/AIG.

Of course the good news is, that to avoid this collapse, all we need to do is be respectful of those limits. And these limits will not limit us. Constraints breed creativity - the rules of music enable artists to create beautiful songs as opposed to jumbles of noise, the rules of soccer make a fun game as opposed to an aimless group of people chasing a ball, tough engineering challenges with unusual constraints spur innovation, the list goes on. And accepting the challenge of operating all of our institutions, organizations, businesses and within the constraints of the sustainability principles will help us come together and engage in the most gratifying work imaginable - creating better lives for ourselves, our families, our communities, those around the world while contributing to the health and well-being of all other life. So we can move-on from this myth that acknowledging the reality of the limits that the laws of nature represent will cause problems for us - it only opens up opportunities and is our way forward for improving our quality of life.

To learn more about ecological footprinting, the Footprint Network, and Overshoot Day, check out: http://www.footprintnetwork.org/

Stay going...

ASU Sustainability Summit

I highly recommend checking out the free video feed of the Arizona State University Sustainability Summit that took place this morning in DC. It's an hour and a half long, but well worth it (and if you stick it out you'll be able to see my bride use her brand new last name when asking a question :) There's a great line up including Bill Ford (Ford Chairman), Rob Walton (Wal-Mart Chairman), Michael Crow (ASU President), US Rep Ed Markey (D-MA), Governor Tim Pawlenty (R-MN), US Rep Fred Upton (R-MI), and our boss Tony Cortese. Very exciting to see a cross-sector dialogue happening around the big issue of sustainability:

http://www.asu.edu/vppa/sustainabilitysummit/index.html

Stay going...

Permaculture garden...

Permaculture is a topic I don't write nearly enough about, and one of which people around the world are not nearly aware enough. Below is a quick teaser for a video from the Permaculture Institute of Australia. It just shows an example of a small working permaculture garden, and talks about how massively productive it is - without chemical inputs or fertilizers, and with low-water inputs. Permaculture is extremely compatible with SSD - it is principle-based, meaning that it isn't prescriptive and can be applied anywhere, in harmony with site-specific conditions. It takes a whole-system approach, in that it take into consideration direct and indirect impacts of activities, both now and in the future, and it recognizes the importance of the relationships between components of the system, and not just the components themselves. It's a set of design principles typically applied to small home and food production systems, but are just as relevant at all scales and in all applications. In 1997 I earned a permaculture design certificate in New Zealand and got to see all kinds of amazing applications in practice. Seeing these sustainable systems produce huge outputs with low-inputs, using often simple techniques, and mostly just relying on good design, was incredibly inspiring. It's also been a source of frustration in that most of us here in the US just can't imagine the possibility of producing large amounts of food and energy crops in a sustainable way. From food prices to ethanol debates, the trade-off mentality persists and most in the debate on all sides assume for a fact that increasing outputs means increasing the amount of land under cultivation and the amount of fossil fuel and chemical inputs (fertilizers, pesticides, farm machinery, transportation). There are better ways!




We are working on implementing a permaculture design at our new place - starting off by watching the sun arch through the sky over the year, and standing out in rain storms to see how the water flows. We've started putting in some berms by hand to get the contours right and slow down the water during storms. Another first step was setting up a good composting system to catch all of the nutrients we can that come through our household system. I've started chipping away at the lawn and putting in some 'experimental' crops - a tiny wheat field that is sort of growing... Fruit and nut trees are another short term step that will need a few years before really paying off, but a great way to diversify the harvest and maximize the use of perennial crops. Even a small plot can get overwhelming, but by just immersing yourself and observing, you can learn a lot, and enjoy the experimentation. The beauty of the diversity is that when a few things just flop, you've got a few dozen more things that will probably do well. If we can imagine a world where everyone does this - in their backyards, apartment balconies, and windowsills - and we get creative with public spaces, parks, highway medians, sidewalk plantings, and the like - we can start to imagine significant shifts in the global food system, and the possibility of sustainable production for 9+ billion. Stay going.

Gore’s Challenge

Al Gore gave an incredibly important speech last week, as I’m sure you’ve heard. The challenge is for the US to dramatically reduce our demand, increase our efficiency, and retool our infrastructure in 10 years to produce all of our electricity with no carbon emissions. Echoing JFK’s man-on-the-moon in a decade vision, the challenge sets an ambitious, but achievable goal.

Of course, not everybody thinks so. The responses have been predictable:

1) 1) Gore is a gas-bag (or something to that effect)

2) 2) It’s impossible

3) 3) It will cripple the economy

4) 4) It’s political posturing

5) 5) It’s out of touch with the rest of the world

6) 6) He didn’t tell us exactly how to do it

Of those, I’d say the only one that has any real merit might be #1, and that’s a matter of opinion. The rest reflect only the assumptions we make about what’s possible, about what we want out of life, about why we’re here, and about what are our moral responsibilities to ourselves, other people in our country and around the world, other species, and future generations. The approach is exactly the kind we need. It recognizes the urgency of the problem, and the scale and scope of what’s needed. It moves us past rearranging deck chairs on the Titanic.

(As an aside, the speech has also brought up criticism that people have been saying “we only have 10 years to deal with this” for over 10 years – I think that’s true, and there’s no doubt we’re locked into real, and painful climate change already. In that respect we’ve already failed. The emissions we are putting out today, will continue to have an effect for the coming 100+ years, changing the climate in ways we cannot predict and will have difficulty adapting to. Now it’s a question of how much and to what degree. So it’s not a “10 years or else” call, we’re already in “or else” now it’s how much “or else” and to set a hard, but achievable stretch goal like this, will hopefully help to wake us up and snap us into action).

The challenge takes a backcasting approach, which is the only way we’ll make the kinds of shifts needed to change our trajectory.

It has the potential to tap into our American drive to be leaders and help others. Something we haven’t shown in quite a while, particularly in the climate negotiations. For a quick eye-opener as to the sorts of reactions our policy is causing, check out this article from the Indian publication Down to Earth. An excerpt:

“In all this, the US has fast-tracked its own climate attack. It had already scored a coup, bringing all major emitters—China and India included—into one group, so blurring, indeed removing, the difference between rich countries legally required to take action and others. It cajoled countries like India by offering amnesty: join my club and I will protect you from taking commitments. Now, with the domestic mood changing, the US has changed tack. Instead of no commitments, it wants China and India to take on voluntary targets—‘aspirational’ in its language. The two are brought in, and the US ends up protecting itself, for the targets for action are set not for the interim (2020), but for 2050. Long enough for it to agree to do nothing, increase its emissions and grow. Climate-murder. But who cares?”

Gore's challenge alone, of course won’t make it happen. But it’s another important piece of a growing puzzle of hopeful developments. More and more sectors are getting started in measuring and planning their reductions, and taking early actions around green building, energy efficiency, and renewable energy. The American College & University Presidents’ Climate Commitment has nearly 560 schools, representing over 4.6 million students developing plans to go climate neutral. The US Conference of Mayor’s Climate Protection Agreement has up over 840 mayors signed on to meet Kyoto targets. The US Climate Action Partnership between big businesses and big greens is calling for federal action. The We Campaign is getting the word out. 1Sky is focusing on federal action. Green for All is driving the creation of a green economy, and is not going to allow politicians to spin internalizing the cost of carbon as a burden on the poor. As Van Jones said on a conference call yesterday “they don’t speak for us – we speak for ourselves.” And 350.org is rallying people from around the world to demand action to get our atmospheric concentrations of CO₂ back down to 350ppm. Even oil man T. Boone Pickens has his ambitious Picken’s Plan to bring huge amounts of wind power from the middle of the country to the coasts (in my view, a case of the means justifying the end).

And there are real solutions out there. My business partner has been deep into research on the potential for developing long-range transmission on a DC grid, a big players from business and government here in the US are starting to take these concepts seriously. Lester Brown just released a great piece on the return to thermal solar plants that can generate the MWs needed to make-up a meaningful piece of our energy mix, while addressing some of the solar-storage concerns (i.e. using solar electricity at night). On the demand side, it’s so much about design. It doesn’t need to cost more – we can build better buildings with lower capital costs and dramatically lower operating costs through smart, holistic integrated design. RMI has a host of compelling case studies, laid-out in a very digestible fashion that shows it’s possible. And don’t forget to put the two together – with dramatically lower demand, ramping up renewable to replace fossil fuels starts to look a lot easier, and the concept of no new coal, decommissioning existing coal, and not having to touch the nuclear waste issue, becomes feasible. So the solutions are out there. And we can get there in such a way that we create domestic jobs, revive local communities, and create the kind of sustainable economic development – the growth of value, not stuff – that we need. What’s been missing, but what we’re starting to see more and more is the vision and political will needed to really get it going. We need to get rid of the perverse subsidies for fossil fuels, and start to account for their true costs. We need to put that price on carbon.

Anyway, watch the speech if you haven’t already. And get behind this idea and all the others that will help us realize this goal and our vision for a sustainable, restorative society. Stay going.