Category — environment

After listening this week to President Bush plead with mother earth for 17 more years to pollute, author Michael Pollan takes up an issue that has been gnawing at me for a few weeks: When it comes to changing your lifestyle to combat global warming, Why bother?

In one essay, Pollan not only effectively shows why each of us must take action to change how we live, he also illustrates why he’s one of my favorite writers.

In a word, Pollan says we must “garden.”

I’m a horrible gardener, mostly because I’m lazy. I’m also allergic to most of the outside world. In high school, I managed to kill most of the grass at my parish working a summer job.

Our current backyard vegetable patch is covered with leaves from 2007.

But, I know that Pollan is right: Without a personal connection to the food we eat, to the planet that gives us life, why bother?

So, the leaves will go next weekend, and time permitting, tomatoes will go in.

Read more: Why Bother?

WASHINGTON, D.C. — After having a good laugh, Al Gore and the Alliance for Climate Protection admitted Tuesday that their new “we campaign” was actually a massive April Fools’ Day joke.

“To think that humans can solve global warming is preposterous,” Gore told reporters Tuesday.

Gore was joined by fellow environmentalist Newt Gingrich, who also couldn’t get over news stories hopefully reporting that their was a solution to climate change.

“What, we’re going to have a ‘Contract with the Earth’?” Gingrich asked rhetorically.

But, for those who dream of a future for humans, there is another green web site you can visit: wecansolveit.org.

(I guess the news that Mother Earth is about to put humans on permanent time out just hasn’t reached policy makers yet.)

So I’ve read it’s blog action day, which is kinda like a Live Earth Concert for Mac users.

Unlike people who think they’re changing the world by watching a concert, here are a few of the things I’ve done over the past two years to reduce my impact on the world:

1. I’m a vegetarian (Read more: What, Me Sacrifice? Take 2)
2. We use CFL lighting (Haven’t changed a bulb in two years + save about $10 a month on electricity) (Read more: CFL invented in Cleveland)
3. We use as many non-toxic, non-oil based cleaners as we can find (Laundry detergent, spot cleaners, etc) (Read more: Trying to turn Mr. Clean into Mr. Green)
4. We recycle most paper, plastic and aluminum. My wife and I also get help from coworkers who collect their empty cans in a bin at my workstation and a garbage can at her work.

So, stop blogging and or reading about change, and be the change.

Here are some links I’ve collected about the environment and global warming.

Sure, they sell a lot of stuff no one needs, but IKEA has decided to start charging for plastic bags. And that’s a good thing for our planet.

The average American family of four throws away about 1,500 single-use polyethylene bags, which do not degrade for around 1,000 years, IKEA said. Less than 1 percent are recycled.

IKEA also noticed that Americans are getting fat, which is why they stopped helping customers load shopping carts long ago — like when our cashier two years back watched us break a glass frame instead of reaching over to steady it after we moved it over the UPC scanner. Those thoughtful Swedes!

Earlier: Is it time for a Cuyahoga County PlasTax?

After purchasing one item at the grocery store tonight — a pre-mixed salad bag — the cashier plopped it into a plastic bag before I could stop her. My plastic bag needed a bag.

When I told her I didn’t need the bag, she said “fine,” and began to throw the blue sack away. Being a complete weirdo, I stopped her and offered to take the bag to recycle it. Rolling her eyes, I got the disposable grub-bag and the pleasure of her smacking her gum at me extra loud.

The whole process reminded me of Ireland’s PlasTax, a tariff on free store plastic bags that dramatically reduced their use on the emerald isle.

Might such a tax herald a new type of sin tax in the U.S.?

For example, Cuyahoga County is currently considering Issue 18, legislation to support the fine arts by taxing cigarettes. Classic sin tax mentality in action here: Get money from a marginalized minority without a voice (smokers) to fund the wants of an even smaller, more well-off group with a voice (art groups, pro-sports teams, etc.).

Wouldn’t a better “sin tax” touch more people and create a positive climate of change — in the case of a “bag tax” by reducing pollution and raising environmental awareness — all without singling out a small group?

Eliminating the silly waste of disposable plastic bags with a small fee makes perfect sense, and would give politicians easy money (at least initially) they can dole out to environmental causes (Subsidizing landfill costs, encouraging more recycling, creating green power incubators) and still have enough to support fine arts or any other number of constituencies.

Sadly, the PlasTax idea is not a cureall. Most stores in Ireland are still stocked with plastic bags, but you have to buy them.

Even without incentive to reuse bags, most people I know still do find new uses for them — holding soda cans to recycle them, as trash bags, picking up dog poop, etc. A PlasTax might get more of us to rethink using disposable bags at all.

Some more PlasTax links:

Draft letter to council, Kicking the plastic bag habit, Attention Shoppers: Another Tax Grab is on its Way!

Ways to recycle plastic grocery bags

Check out Is God Green?, a wonderful look at evangelical Christians who are coming to the consensus that global warming is against the Bible, against Christ. Here are some video clips.

Richard Cizik, of the National Association of Evangelicals, is deserving of special praise. He is a brave man willing to challenge the Republican Party and the old guard of the Christian Right. These conservative evangelicals are joining the fight to save our environment, arguing that man’s stewardship of the planet is a biblical imperative and calling for action to stop global warming

And, while you’re at it, some resources to caculate your own environmental footprint:

• EPA’s Personal Greenhouse Gas Calculator (Simple)
• SafeClimate carbon footprint calculator (I had to look up some numbers)

Jeff Goodell mines the rich history of coal in the United States to unearth the good it has brought and the destruction it has wrought in Big Coal: The Dirty Secret Behind America’s Energy Future

Much like the authors of The End of Oil and Field Notes from a Catastrophe, Goodell paints an alarming picture of our near-future, pointing out that thanks to our reliance on coal fired electric plants, planet Earth will irrevocably enter a warming period in 2017.

In short, our addiction to coal is as perverse and damaging as any addition to oil.

This addiction began in earnest with the brilliant Samuel Insull, Jr., a protégé of Edison. Insull “set in motion a self-perpetuating cycle of rising [coal / electric] use and declining rates that eventually enveloped an urban society in a ubiquitous world of energy.” Heady stuff for one man.

Just as Earl Butz put America on the path to obesity in 1971, Insull hatched our crack-like need for electricity in the 1890s, creating big electric plants as far away from cities as possible, allowing government regulation to create an electric monopoly in a region and stimulating demand for consumer products that required electricity.

The greatest innovation of Insull — flat rate pricing for electricity. Sadly, our dependency on coal is largely invisible. Sure, I have asthma, but it’s hard to pinpoint what triggered it. Yes, coal miners are among the most exploited workers in America, but frankly, I don’t care about what happens to unlucky schmucks in West Virginia when I turn on my TV or recharge my cell phone. And most importantly, the cost to use my central air conditioning cost the same no matter the time of day. Although it costs more to create electricity when demand is high, us end users are “totally disconnected from the price of power.” Instead of a market for electricity, a market that might make our use of coal more rational and better for the world, we are stuck with a system hatched in the 1800s.

Shockingly, a Democrat is trying to do something worthwhile in the House.

Rep. Henry Waxman is pushing the Safe Climate bill that would freeze America’s carbon emissions in 2010 at 2009 levels, and follow with an accelerating reduction thereafter. On its face, it seems a reachable, sane approach to reverse the coming destruction of climate change.

Check it out, and if you agree with it, write to your Representative to ask for their support. You can contact your Representative here

Here’s the pity note I sent to my representative a few moments ago:

Just a quick note to urge you to support The Safe Climate Act (H.R. 5642)

Thank you for your consideration of the Safe Climate Act: http://www.house.gov/waxman/safeclimate/index.htm

I found out about the act from The Inspired Protagonist, the blog of Seventh Generation.

I’m impressed by the Wind Blows viral video contest but not surprised by the lack of feedback.

The idea of the contest — submit a video showing why wind power is good — had a chance of generating buzz because it has a passionate audience of environmental-friendly types who are plugged in (That is, they might know someone with a camcorder).

The site, by Invoke Media is well done, with features like a slick flash video player that follows you as you scroll down the page.

Several of the videos are watchable, if only because they are so cheesy.

However, even with the $10,000 booty, the site only has 11 entries. And the leading entry has a whopping 213 votes.

Yikes! That’s a lot of cash for such a small turn-out.

Time for me to cut a quick video about the sweetness that is wind power.

More on Adrants

Just stumbled upon a digg for the environmental crowd: hugg.com.

The site features nutty stories, such as “Company makes paper out of sheep poop.” Gotta click on that.

Thanks to an add on the hugg.com page, I also got sucked into gotoreviews.com and the mostly-clever: windblows.us video contest that reminds us that wind power blows, oil sucks.