Compromise, Hell!

Wendell Berry | Orion Magazine

Oak Fork, Letcher County, Kentucky

"Can we actually suppose that we are wasting, polluting, and making ugly this beautiful land for the sake of patriotism and the love of God?"

In Our Backyard (A Monsanto Introspective) from Namreblis Ekim on Vimeo.

Letter to a Good Friend Who Calls Me an "Environmental Wacko"

August 14, 2008

Dear Friend, Andy;

Yesterday was my boyhood friend, Nick’s birthday. He is seventy. We became friends in high school. We spent a lot of time at each other’s home, and were essentially adopted by each other’s parents. After high school, he went to Pepperdine and I went to USC. We still spent a lot of time together, but after graduation, he went to dental school in San Francisco and I joined the Air Force.

We saw less of each other, of course, but still kept in touch via PO Box – no email back then. Once he sent me photos of the cadavers the dental school students were dissecting. Another package contained teeth molds he’d made. I got back to LA on leave and went to see him in SF. We went to see a movie about a man who was a career officer in the Royal Scots Regiment, but could never live up to the legend or expectations of his father. A great movie. Can’t remember the title.

Nick was anxious to get away from big city life and settled in a small community in northern California called Avila Beach, where he opened his practice. He bought some property there, which he intended to build on, but when Avila Beach started booming, he sold to a developer, made a bundle of money, and moved to San Luis Obispo, a sleepy little college town roughly midway between SF and LA.

When I talked to Nick yesterday to wish him a happy birthday, he told me that he and his wife, Hedy are planning to move again. “SLO has gotten too big. Traffic is awful,” He said.

I found it hard to believe. The place was idyllic. A little hippy, as you’d expect in a college town, but nice, laid back, unspoiled. Now traffic clogs winding roads that were never laid out to accommodate the population growth, air pollution is creeping up aided and abetted by smog seeping over the hills from LA and Santa Barbara, fishing stinks, as does the air and water. Too bad, but that’s progress.

There’s lots of progress in California. The population of the state has grown from just under 16 mil when Nick and I graduated from college, to well over 36 mil now, not counting undocumented aliens, who, as the name indicates, are not documented. Some estimates of illegals in California reach 3 million, but the number varies from day-to-day, as they are rounded up and deposited back on the Mexican side of the border and take a day or two to get back. They generally start out in San Diego county, whose population has more than doubled since Nick and I drove through there in 1960 on our way to Tijuana, where we hoped to improve our Spanish language skills.

I blame growing up in California for turning me into an “environmental wacko.” You see, I was born there way back in 1938. You can’t even imagine what it was like there then. In the spring, you could smell the orange blossoms, in the evenings, you could smell the night-blooming Jasmine. I could lie on the lawn at night and see the sky lit up with the billions of stars. In the morning, I could look out across the valley and see the San Gabriel Mts. It took us a while, but we could catch the “Red Car” electric streetcar and go to the beach, cross the sand without stepping in blacktar goo, and swim without worrying about used needles bobbing about in the surf. I watched the Hollywood freeway being built at the bottom of the street on which we lived. I wasn’t smart enough to realize what the implications were when it went in and the Red Cars went out.

I’m afraid Nick isn’t moving far enough from SLO – he’s just moving north fifty or so miles to some out of the way place NW of Paso Robles. Another 10 years and he’ll want to move to Nevada, except there won’t be any water there.

But thanks for sending me the op-ed by Daniel Henninger, a conservative columnist who’d rather be clever than objective. Despite Henninger's snarky word invention, the United States absolutely must transform its economy in order to survive and thrive in the world to come. And the transformation should have started long ago – changing a consumption economy into sustainable economy will take a generation, be costly, and be painful. Corporate America will fight it every step of the way, because they are invested in the way things are, not the way they should be. Your conservative credo of letting unfettered market forces take care of things became untenable when corporate earnings started exceeding most countries GDP. Corporations pay to let democracy work for them, not you. Henninger’s “environmania” is not “messianism,” its righteous indignation.

Why you’d want to trust corporations to operate in your best interests is a mystery to me. Try to picture the boardroom of a corporation and look at the people around the table. They are not abstractions. They are people whose livelihoods depend on making money for the organization for whom they work, not on making the world a better place by providing products and services that work to better the lot of mankind and, in the process, making the organization a profit. That would be socially responsible. Forget about it. Corporate officers actively work to circumvent regulations and, when it suits them, break the law. I could give you examples (like Halliburton destroying evidence in the Gulf Oil spill), but you know the history of corporate greed and corruption. You just choose to ignore it, because the facts don’t jibe with your view of the conservative landscape.

You are so skewed in your thinking that you’d relieve corporations of any tax burden. “Why should they pay taxes? Their employees pay taxes.” Well, you might be surprised to learn that revenues from corporate taxes have fallen to historically low levels, due to subsidies, tax cuts, and a wide variety of avoidance strategies, such as moving headquarters to foreign locations. Our effective corporate tax rates are significantly lower than the rate in many other developed nations. The corporate operations are still employing our highways, waterways, airwaves, and polluting whatever they please, but they aren’t paying any taxes to do it. But not to worry, our budget deficits and national debt are now projected to be so enormous that you won’t have to worry about a transformation of our economy. It is in the process of transforming and the result ain’t going to be pretty.

You might as well send a note to your grand kids and tell them about what a great life you had and say you’re sorry they won’t be able to enjoy the same benefits you had – you used them all up. And oh, by the way, send them the Henninger article. I’m sure they’ll get a charge out of reading it, just as I have, and they'll ask themselves, "Were people really this stupid?"

Yep.

Richard

We do not inherit the earth from our ancestors, we borrow it from our children.

Let's Burn More Coal, NOW!

The United States has the biggest reserves of coal in the world. We have so much coal we can ship it off to other countries. That's right. We are a net exporter of the dirty rock. And here we are wringing our hands over our dependence on foreign oil, peak oil, and high gas prices (okay, not half as high as Europe, but higher than Americans want to pay). Why don't we convert our vehicles to run on coal?

Okay, I'll grant you that according to the Union of Concerned Scientists, burning coal is a leading cause of smog, acid rain, global warming, and our toxic air. In an average year, a typical coal plant generates:

• 3,700,000 tons of carbon dioxide (CO2), the primary human cause of global warming--as much carbon dioxide as cutting down 161 million trees.
• 10,000 tons of sulfur dioxide (SO2), which causes acid rain that damages forests, lakes, and buildings, and forms small airborne particles that can penetrate deep into lungs.
• 500 tons of small airborne particles, which can cause chronic bronchitis, aggravated asthma, and premature death, as well as haze obstructing visibility.
• 10,200 tons of nitrogen oxide (NOx), as much as would be emitted by half a million late-model cars. NOx leads to formation of ozone (smog) which inflames the lungs, burning through lung tissue making people more susceptible to respiratory illness.
• 720 tons of carbon monoxide (CO), which causes headaches and place additional stress on people with heart disease.
• 220 tons of hydrocarbons, volatile organic compounds (VOC), which form ozone.
• 170 pounds of mercury, where just 1/70th of a teaspoon deposited on a 25-acre lake can make the fish unsafe to eat.
• 225 pounds of arsenic, which will cause cancer in one out of 100 people who drink water containing 50 parts per billion.
• 114 pounds of lead, 4 pounds of cadmium, other toxic heavy metals, and trace amounts of uranium.

Peace negotiations with a coal seam

I say “so what!” Who listens to scientists, anyway (certainly not Republicans). Our energetic Republican Congressmen hurriedly passed a "Stop the War on Coal" bill (H.R. 3904) just before adjourning so that America can continue to enjoy the benefits of coal without all those burdensome EPA regulations (you know, the ones that protect air and water quality). Of course, the Senate won't pass the bill, and President Obama has promised to veto it in any case, so the House bill is for naught. But it's the thought that counts, right? [So what the fuck are they thinking?]

Our Republican congressional representatives, who some people have the temerity to accuse of being obstructionist, have voted an astonishing 302 times this year to hamstring the Environmental Protection Agency, weaken clean water and air rules, undermine protections for public lands  and coastal areas, and block action to address global warming – all while seeking to make the regulatory climate as favorable as possible for the oil, gas and coal industries. And why not? It’s these folks who are paying "their" congressmen to watch out for their interests.

Robert Semple reports in the September 20th edition of the Washington Post that Russell Train, a lifelong Republican and one of the country’s foremost conservationists of the last half-century, died this week at the age of 92. He served Richard Nixon as the first chairman of the White House Council on Environmental Quality, and later as administrator of the fledgling Environmental Protection Agency – helping shape landmark statutes like the Endangered Species Act, the Clean Air Act and the Clean Water Act. His death serves as a reminder of the G.O.P.’s historic tradition of environmental stewardship, a tradition stretching as far back as Teddy Roosevelt, which the party has now repudiated.

Indeed, it's hard to associate today's Republican Party with anything remotely responsible in so far as the environment is concerned. These Republican heroes are all about job creation and job creators (those are the people who buy their votes). If those "purple mountains" have to have their tops removed to get at coal, so be it. If coal ash removal is a problem, don't remove the shit, just store it behind dirt damns and pray for the best. If acid rain is turning forests brown, it's time to clear cut. And please don't even mention global warming; what a hoax!

Coal ash sludge flood at Kingston plant in TN

Unfortunately the Republicans war on the environment (can I use that term?) makes some people mad, like Philip Bump, who wrote that, "The Republican leadership in the House of Representatives could not care less about the legacy it is leaving for its party, its districts, or the United States. They can’t draw a straight fucking line between the worst drought in decades and the coal plants that, day in and day out, belch out pollution." Now, now, Philip. Try to look at it from the other side of the aisle. If the fossil industry was paying your salary, wouldn't you say and do whatever they told you to? Damn right! Well, unless you had integrity, that is. No worries. We're talking about Republicans.

Purple Mountains Majesty
Mountain top removal coal mining -- there ain't any majesty to it

Mt. Rainier -- What If?

It took a concerted effort of scientists and conservationists to establish Mt. Rainier National Park. Lands within what is now the park boundary had been granted to the Northern Pacific Railroad Company. Northern Pacific, which later became a proponent of the park (because they hoped for tourist traffic on their railroads), employed a geologist, Bailey Willis, in the 1880s, to search for coal deposits on the north slope of Mount Rainier. Imagine if coal had been discovered.

Mountaintop Mining in West Virginia

The End of the Human Species

Nothing lives forever, but as the song says,

"Who wants to live forever?"

We know from the fossil record that on average between 10 and 100 species on earth become extinct every year (we're talking about every living thing, including mushrooms and Republicans). But lately, due to the impact of humans on the earth's environment, we seem to be losing something like 27,000 species per year. The following is extracted from "The Current Mass Extinction," at Evolution Library.

Humanity's main impact on the extinction rate is landscape modification, an impact greatly increased by the burgeoning human population. Now standing at 5.7 billion and growing at a rate of 1.6 percent per year, the population of the world will double in 43 years if growth continues at this pace. By draining wetlands, plowing prairies, logging forests, paving, and building, we are altering the landscape on an unprecedented scale. Some organisms do well under the conditions we've created: They tend to cope well with change, tolerate a broad range of habitats, disperse widely, and reproduce rapidly, and they can quickly crowd out more specialized local species. City pigeons, zebra mussels, rats, and kudzu and tamarisk trees -- these are examples of what biologists call "weedy" species, both animals and plants. Many weedy species will probably survive, and even thrive, in the face of the current mass extinction. But thousands of others, many never known to science, are likely to perish.

And what is the fate of our own species likely to be, if we really are in the midst of a sixth mass extinction? One possibility is that as diversity and abundance wither, the species causing it all -- Homo sapiens, the most dominant species in history -- could also be on the road to oblivion. But another possibility is that Homo sapiens, which has proved to be a very effective weedy species itself, will persist. That's the view of paleobiologist David Jablonski, who sees us as one of the survivors, "sort of picking through the rubble" of a world that has lost much of its biodiversity -- and much of its comfort. For along with that species richness, the ecosystem is likely to loose much of its ability to provide many of the valuable services that we take for granted, from cleaning and recirculating air and water, to pollinating crops and providing a source for new pharmaceuticals. And while the fossil record tells us that biodiversity has always recovered, it also tells us that the recovery will be unbearably slow in human terms -- 5 to 10 million years after the mass extinctions of the past. That's more than 200,000 generations of humankind before levels of biodiversity comparable to those we inherited might be restored.

The Hell with Future Generations!

A House spending bill passed in February 2011 would stop the EPA from enforcing new limits on toxic emissions, such as mercury, from cement plants and from updating air pollution standards on dust and other coarse particulate matter that exacerbate asthma and lung ailments. It withdraws funding for the enforcement of dredge and fill regulations that the EPA recently used to halt a big mountaintop-removal coal project in West Virginia. And of course, it removes funding for climate change mitigation efforts.

Coal ash pond rupture near Kingston, TN, late 2008.

Using the Nation's budget crisis as their cudgel, Republicans are moving aggressively to rollback government policy, regulations, and programs that they have long held in contempt, including programs put in place (with bipartisan support) to protect the health and safety of Americans, and preserve America's incomparable natural beauty.

One of their key targets is the Environmental Protection Agency and its program to curb greenhouse gas emissions, and to boost climate-related research.

Hal Rogers, R-Kentucky, will head the House Appropriations Committee. He will reign in dollars allocated to the "run amok" EPA and their efforts to deal with climate change; efforts Rogers claims will "devastate" Kentucky's coal industry.

The incoming Chair of the House Science, Space, and Technology Committee (believe or not) is 87 year-old Ralph Hall, R-Texas, a major recipient of oil money, who is willing to spend time and money investigating climate scientists, but apparently not on climate research. At his age, he's probably thinking, "why worry?"

Hall's Vice Chair, Jim Sensenbrenner, R-Wisconsin, says climate scientists are frauds and fascists (does it take one to know one?). Paul Broun, R-Georgia, Chairman of the Investigations and Oversight Committee, supports his colleague's view, stating that climate change concerns are a hoax perpetrated by a scientific community bent on getting federal dollars (and no doubt by the perfidious Al Gore, trying to sell his books).

Perhaps my favorite climate change denier is Rep. John Shimkus of Illinois, who heads the Subcommittee on Environment and the Economy, He tells us that global warming isn't something to worry about because God said he wouldn't destroy the earth after Noah's flood.

But Republicans aren't satisfied with gutting climate research; they want to rollback regulations on clean air, clean water, and endangered species.

Nothing "endangered" about these species. Rep. Paul Broun, R-GA, has them preserved in his office.

Representative Broun seems to equate his ideological opponents with terrorists. In his invocation for a GOP-sponsored barbecue in Cobb County he prayed, "Father, there are many who want to destroy us from outside this nation. Folks like al-Qaeda and the radical Islamists. But there are folks that want to destroy us from inside, the progressives and the socialists..."

Broun and his Republican cohorts have devised a plan for countering the Progressives radical attack on America; they will defund clean air and clean water regulations. Apparently, Republicans plan to hunker down in cigar lounges drinking single malt scotch, so will be safe from air or water pollution. Who knows what these wingnuts are thinking?

Ignorance is Bliss for Republicans

A floating restaurant stranded in a branch of the Yangtze River during a drought in Chongqing Municipality, March 21, 2010.
Photo: Reuters/Stringer

House Republicans have proposed a budget that would slash funding for scientific study of our atmosphere and the consequences of the past 150 years of massive carbon-dioxide pollution on our climate. Some representatives seek a $379 million cut in NASA’s programs to study climate change from space that would deprive scientists of essential knowledge about our increasingly chaotic climate. The bill would also devastate America’s clean energy and other scientific research by cutting the Department of Energy’s Office of Science by 18 percent.

In addition to flattening funding for scientific investigation, the House Republicans’ proposed spending bill would devastate the federal government’s ability to study, understand, and communicate vital information about our changing energy sector. It would cut the Department of Energy’s independent Energy Information Agency by nearly one-sixth. EIA is the preeminent collector and disseminator of vital statistics and projections of energy production, consumption, and pollution.

The budget also would wipe out the “Greenhouse Gas Registry” that collects data on companies’ carbon-dioxide pollution. These two cuts would save a paltry $25 million. For comparison, this is just one-twentieth of the $500 million spent on military bands in 2010. The large congressional climate science denier caucus clearly believes that ignoring the problem will make it go away.

Well over half (55 percent) of the incoming Republican caucus are climate zombies. Thirty-five of the 46 (76 percent) Republicans in the U.S. Senate next year publicly question the science of global warming. Of the 240 Republicans elected to the House of Representatives, 125 (52 percent) publicly question the science.

Of the freshmen Republicans, 36 of 85 in the House and 11 of 13 in the Senate have publicly questioned the science. There are no freshmen Republicans, in the House or Senate, who publicly accept the scientific consensus that greenhouse pollution is an immediate threat.

Nearly all the rest of the Republicans in the 112th Caucus either signed the “No Climate Tax” pledge from the climate-denier Koch Industries front group Americans For Prosperity, the “No Cap-And-Tax” Tea Party pledge, or co-sponsored a resolution to overturn the EPA’s scientific finding that greenhouse pollution threatens the American public’s health and welfare.

This post is based on: The Wonk Room @ http://wonkroom.thinkprogress.org/2010/11/19/climate-zombie-caucus/

and The Center for American Progress @ http://www.americanprogress.org/issues/2011/02/budget_cuts_innovation.html

American Power Act

On October 24, Senator Maria Cantwell (D-WA), joined NOAA representatives at a kickoff event for the Fisher Slough Marsh Restoration Project in Fisher Slough, Washington. NOAA awarded The Nature Conservancy $5.2 in American Recovery and Reinvestment Act funds to restore Fisher Slough Marsh, critical to Chinook, Chum, and Coho salmon, in the Skagit River floodplain.

June 4, 2010

The Honorable Senator Maria Cantwell

825 Jadwin Avenue, Suite 205

Richland, WA 99352

RE: Energy and the Environment

Dear Senator Cantwell;

I am writing to urge you to support legislation to cut U.S. greenhouse gas emissions, reduce America’s dependence on fossil fuels and foreign sources of oil, and encourage the development of alternative, i.e., “green” sources of energy, including nuclear power.

There are currently no alternative energy sources – solar, wind, nuclear, or what have you – that, as things stand, are more economical than fossil fuels, because, as you know, their true costs are not reflected in the price we pay for electric power, gasoline, or the many other petroleum-based products we consume. Those costs are familiar to anyone who pays attention: catastrophic health effects, including death; constraints on our foreign policy options; degradation and destruction of the environment; and a real and growing threat to the livability of our planet due to global warming. Even nuclear energy, which many consider a green alternative, has unresolved cost, indemnification, and waste disposal issues.

We seem only to pay attention when 29 coal miners die in West Virginia, or massive amounts of oil spew into the Gulf, but the sad fact is that the long-term consequences of our profligate, wasteful, and just plain stupid use of resources has seriously and perhaps irrevocably degraded the environment and, in turn, our quality of life.

Until the true cost of fossil fuels is reflected in their price, there will be no inherent, and therefore sustainable incentive for the development of alternative sources of energy in the U.S. Other countries, including China, are investing in green energy sources and technology, and leaving the U.S. behind in what will become a green revolution. We must move forward on intelligent and far-reaching energy legislation NOW.

The Kerry-Lieberman “American Power Act” isn’t perfect, but it’s a start. Please work for its passage.

Sincerely,

 / s /

Richard V. Badalamente

Kennewick, Washington

US Energy Sources and Demand by Sector

Where does the U. S. gets its energy?

85% from fossil fuels:
39% from petroleum
23% from natural gas
23% from coal

8% from nuclear fission - all used for electricity

3% from biomass - mostly used for fuel
3% from hydro - mostly used for electricity

1% from geothermal, wind and solar total

What happens to this energy?

55% is utilized:
41% used directly as fuel for vehicles, as feedstocks for industrial products, and heat sources for buildings
14% as electricity output from power plants

45% is lost as "waste heat"
27% lost in conversion from chemical to electrical energy
18% lost in conversion from chemical energy to mechanical energy

What is this energy used for?

31% used by industry
29% used for transportation
21% residential uses, such as heating, cooling and lighting
18% commercial uses, such as heating, cooling and lighting

Source: MIT Technology Review, May/June 2010.

Worst Spill in US History?

A US Coast Guard official says if leaks from an oil well in the Gulf of Mexico are not stemmed soon, they could cause one of the worst spills in US history. About 1,000 barrels (42,000 gallons) of oil a day are gushing into the sea. The resulting oil slick now has a circumference of about 600 miles (970km) and covers about 28,600 sq miles (74,100 sq km).

Oil spills and their environmental damage are another consequence of our addiction to fossil fuels.

Endangered

The Western Lowland Gorilla

In the wild, these primates are under siege. Forest loss is a twofold threat; it destroys gorilla habitat and brings hungry people who hunt gorillas for bushmeat. Farming, grazing, and expanding human settlements are also shrinking the lowland gorilla's space.

You'll noticed a common theme in my recent posts, i.e., the disappearance of the earth's species, animal and plant. Despite the nano second of human existence on the earth relative to biological time, most biologists believe we are responsible for what they call The Sixth Mass Extinction.

Daniel Simberloff, who is Professor of Environmental Studies and director of the Institute for Biological Invasions at the University of Tennessee in Knoxville, says, "I'm actually certain that we're in the midst of a mass extinction. Geologically, there have been five periods in which upwards of 20 percent of the Earth's species, in one case maybe 90 percent of the Earth's species, went extinct, and there've been about 20 or so others in which anywhere from two to 10 percent of species have gone extinct. And certainly over the last few hundred years there are enough extinctions to qualify us in the second category. There's documentary evidence, in some cases, for this. And it's an ongoing process. It's not slowing down -- if anything, it appears to be accelerating. So I think it's quite possible that we'll eventually be in a situation that qualifies as one of the great mass extinctions."

The Golden Lion Tamarin

Despite their name, these rare primates have far more in common with their monkey relatives than any feline. These interesting and beautiful animals are critically endangered, as are many of the forests in which they live. Brazil's Atlantic coastal rain forests are disappearing due to ever-expanding logging, agriculture, and industry, and unfortunately, the golden lion tamarin is in danger of vanishing with them.

Charting the Losses -- of Species

Editorial by Verlyn Klinkenborg, a member of the New York Times editorial board.

Like everyone, I have been reading the graphs and looking at the numbers that measure the convulsions in the global financial markets. And as I do, I keep hearing the echo of another frightening set of numbers - the ones that gauge the precipitous declines in the species that surround us. The financial markets will eventually come back, but not the species we are squandering.

Last week in Barcelona, the International Union for the Conservation of Nature (IUCN) released results of a global survey of mammal populations. It concluded that at least a quarter of mammal species are headed toward extinction in the near future.

Don't think of this as an across-the-board culling of mammals. The first ones to go will be the big ones. And among the big ones, the first to go will be primates. Nearly 80 percent of the primate species in southern Asia are immediately threatened.

The causes are almost all directly related to human activity, including, for marine mammals, the growing threat of ocean acidification, as the oceans absorb the carbon dioxide we emit.

The numbers are not much better for other categories of life. At least 22 percent of reptile species are at risk of extinction. Perhaps 40 percent of North American freshwater fish are threatened. In Europe, 45 percent of the most common bird species are rapidly declining in numbers, and so are the most common bird species in North America.

Similar losses are expected among plants. What is especially worrying is how much the rate of decline has increased over the past half-century as the human population has increased.

These numbers are shocking in their own right. But they don't begin to tell the whole story. These are projections for the most familiar, best studied, most easily counted plants and animals, which, all told, make up less than 4 percent of the species on Earth. It is only reasonable to assume that many, if not most, of the legions of uncounted species are doing as poorly.

What complicates matters further is a simple lesson we might also draw from the present financial crisis: Everything is connected. No species goes down on its own, not without affecting the larger biological community. We emerged, as a species, from the very biodiversity we are destroying. At times it seems as though the human experiment is to see how many species we can do without. As experiments go, it is morally untenable and will end badly for us.

The good news here is the same good news as always - the resilience of nature. Given even the slightest chance, declining species often find a way to recover. But the bad news is also the same bad news - human irresponsibility. In our myopic pursuits, we characteristically overlook the possibility of giving species the chance to recover.

We are watching a global, international effort to stabilize the financial markets. It will take a similar effort to begin to slow the rate at which species are declining. The bottom line is that what is good for biodiversity is also good for humanity.

This includes protecting habitat and finding ways to reduce human pressure on other species. It also includes a concerted effort to slow climate change, which, unchecked, could have a devastating impact on the entire planet.

What we need, really, is a new ability to think selfishly in a slightly different way.

Instead of saving the Sumatran orangutan or the Iberian lynx for itself, it may make more sense to think of saving them for ourselves - not as resources to be harvested somewhere down the road or even as repositories of genetic difference, but as essential elements in the biological complexity from which we arose and in which we thrive.

Without them, we are diminished.

Green Buildings

According to the Sustainable Development International Corporation (SDIC), The building industry increasingly relies on hi-tech, polluting materials and resource-intensive construction methods. As a result, most commercial and residential buildings that are constructed or renovated in the developed world are unhealthy and expensive to build, maintain, and operate. Individuals pay in high rent or mortgages, expensive maintenance, and increased health problems. Companies pay through decreased productivity, costly operations, and increased employee sick leave and medical expenses. Ecosystems pay in reduced biological diversity and diminished ecosystem and species integrity.

A November 5, 2009, presentation and discussion, Progress & Trends Toward Improving the Environmental Footprint of Commercial Buildings will include a discussion on the Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design (LEED) Green Building Rating System, developed by the U.S. Green Building Council. LEED provides a suite of standards for environmentally sustainable construction.

During this 60 minute webinar Robert Watson will present the findings of the soon to be released 2009 Green Building Market and Impact Report that was sponsored by JohnsonDiversey. This report is an integrated assessment of the land, water, energy, material and indoor environmental impacts of the LEED for New Construction (LEED NC), Core & Shell (LEED CS) and Existing Building (LEED EB) standards.

Register by clicking here Building a Sustainable Future and attend a web presentation.

Spiritual Leader Calls for Action on the Environment

The Ecumenical Patriarch Bartholomew has called upon leaders of all faiths to involve themselves and their communities in efforts to rescue the global environment, pointing out that respect for the planet has a profoundly spiritual dimension.

The Ecological Crisis: In Search of a Solution

Today, the dramatic threat of ecological breakdown is teaching us the extent to which greed and selfishness—both individual and collective—are contrary to the order of creation, an order which is characterized by mutual interdependence. (Pope John Paul II, 1989)

There are those who argue that America would be foolhardy to suffer under a self-imposed cap and trade policy in an effort to limit green house gas emissions when China has been building new coal-fired plants at a rate of three per month and, it is estimated will, by 2020, generate roughly the same amount of electricity from coal as the United States does from all sources combined. Why should we saddle ourselves with what amounts to a tax on CO2 emissions when China, and for that matter India, and probably other developing countries will continue to use cheap coal?

The irony of the argument for doing nothing, although it recognizes the reality of an interconnected and therefore, interdependent world, is that it is promulgated by global warming deniers. These people, represented aggressively by the Heartland Institute, among others, with support from major players in US industry, have all along denied the human element in global warming, but in the face of overwhelming scientific evidence to the contrary are now changing tactics. Basically, their argument boils down to, They're doing it. Why shouldn't we? To label this argument juvenile is to give it more credit than it is due. These people are not ignorant of the facts, they simply choose to distort or ignore them in order to further the ends of complicit industrial partners who can't imagine a future in which their bottom line isn't the promised land to which all humanity aspires.

Let's face the facts. The United States, a country just two hundred and thirty-three years old, has pumped more green house gases into the environment cumulatively since 1850 than any other country, including the combined countries of the European Union. America's cumulative contribution to GHG emissions is four times that of China, and fifteen times that of India. China did overtake the US in 2007 as the World's largest emitter of CO2 from fuel combustion, but the per capita CO2 emission in the US is five times that of China. In 2007, the United States alone generated 20% of world CO2 emissions, despite a population of less than 5% of the global total.

The United States has been an industrial powerhouse creating a standard of living for its citizens that is the envy of the world. America's scientific and technological achievements are second to none. Americans on the whole, are one of the World's most generous people. It is now time for America to translate its productivity, its science and technology, and its generosity into comprehensive, wide-ranging action to rescue our imperiled planet.

In his 1989 message, Pope John Paul II made the point that "the newly industrialized States cannot... be asked to apply restrictive environmental standards to their emerging industries unless the industrialized States first apply them within their own boundaries. At the same time, countries in the process of industrialization are not morally free to repeat the errors made in the past by others, and recklessly continue to damage the environment through industrial pollutants, radical deforestation, or unlimited exploitation of non-renewable resources."

The Pope points out that "The earth is ultimately A COMMON HERITAGE, THE FRUITS OF WHICH ARE FOR THE BENEFIT OF ALL. God destined the earth and all it contains for the use of every individual and all peoples (Gaudium et Spes, 69). It is manifestly unjust that a privileged few should continue to accumulate excess goods, squandering available resources, while masses of people are living in conditions of misery at the very lowest level of subsistence. Today, the dramatic threat of ecological breakdown is teaching us the extent to which greed and selfishness—both individual and collective—are contrary to the order of creation, an order which is characterized by mutual interdependence.

The Pope goes on to say that "There is an order in the universe which must be respected, and that the human person, endowed with the capability of choosing freely, has a grave responsibility to preserve this order for the well-being of future generations. THE ECOLOGICAL CRISIS IS A MORAL ISSUE. Even men and women without any particular religious conviction, but with an acute sense of their responsibilities for the common good, recognize their obligation to contribute to the restoration of a healthy environment. All the more should men and women who believe in God the Creator, and who are thus convinced that there is a well-defined unity and order in the world, feel called to address the problem. Christians, in particular, realize that their responsibility within creation and their duty towards nature and the Creator are an essential part of their faith." Evangelical Christian leaders have published their own call to action on global warming.

Pope John Paul II conveys both the critical need for action to rescue the environment, but also the moral responsibility we all have for doing so. He makes it clear that countries and their leaders must work hand-in-hand to overcome the obstacles to effective action. Those obstacles include, among others, distrust, greed, selfishness, and apathy.

According to Pope John Paul II, modern society must take a serious look at its life style. This, I think, is particularly true of American society, where consumerism has been for so long now, the engine that drives the US economy. After former President George W. Bush signed into law an economic stimulus package that, among other things, provided $600 to individuals, there were some who voiced regret that people seemed to be saving the money rather than spending it. The fact that on average, the US tax payer was burdened with nine to ten thousand dollars of annual debt didn't seem to matter. Our commercial sector creates products that are designed to be thrown out, and packages them elaborately in plastic, and cardboard, and paper, and cellophane, and rubber, and we throw that out, too. If America continues to be a throw away society, we are likely to find ourselves throwing away our future.

Therefore the land mourns

"Therefore the land mourns and all who dwell in it languish, and also the beasts of the field and the birds of the air and even the fish of the sea are taken away" (Hos 4:3).

On December 8, 1989, Pope John Paul II delivered a message for the celebration of World Peace Day, January 1, 1990. The message was titled, "The Ecological Crisis, A Common Responsibility." Pope John started by saying, "In our day there is a growing awareness that world peace is threatened not only by the arms race, regional conflicts and continued injustices among peoples and nations, but also by a LACK OF DUE RESPECT FOR NATURE, by the plundering of natural resources and by a progressive decline in the quality of life. The sense of precariousness and insecurity that such a situation engenders is a seedbed for collective selfishness, disregard for others and dishonesty."

In my view, the Pope's message was the most pointed, insightful, and forceful statement on man and his place in nature ever delivered by a leader of a major religious movement at any time anywhere in the world. It was a remarkable lesson in just what it means to be a Christian who believes that, "the Father has made known to us in all wisdom and insight the mystery ... which he set forth in Christ as a plan for the fullness of time, to unite ALL THINGS in him, all things in heaven and things on earth (Eph. 1:9-10)."

The Pope used various biblical considerations to help the followers of Christ better understand the relationship between human activity and the whole of God's creation. But he also stated that, "The profound sense that the earth is suffering is also shared by those who do not profess our faith in God. Indeed, the increasing devastation of the world of nature is apparent to all."

The Pope's message states that the world's current ecological crisis is a MORAL problem and further, that "the most profound and serious indication of the moral implications underlying the ecological crisis is the lack of RESPECT FOR LIFE evident in many patterns of environmental pollution. Often, the interests of production prevail over concern for the dignity of workers, while economic interests take priority over the good of individuals and even entire peoples. In these cases, pollution or environmental destruction is the result of an unnatural and reductionist vision which at times leads to a genuine contempt for man."

The Pope's message points out forcefully that "WE CANNOT INTERFERE IN ONE AREA OF THE ECOSYSTEM WITHOUT PAYING DUE ATTENTION BOTH TO THE CONSEQUENCES OF SUCH INTERFERENCE IN OTHER AREAS AND TO THE WELL-BEING OF FUTURE GENERATIONS...delicate ecological balances are upset by the uncontrolled destruction of animal and plant life or by a reckless exploitation of natural resources. It should be pointed out that all of this, even if carried out in the name of progress and well- being is ultimately to mankind's disadvantage."

In the next post, THE SEARCH FOR A SOLUTION

Clean Coal

Much of America’s coal is mined by blowing the tops off of entire mountains and then dumping the rubble in streams and valleys. Not clean.

We know coal is dirty at the stack, and right now CCS technology is not being used to handle GHG emissions. Not clean.

The coal lifecycle doesn’t end at the smokestacks. Even after coal is burned, we’re left with billions of tons of coal ash and liquid coal slurry/sludge that must be stored and disposed of all across the country. The stuff is toxic, containing elevated levels of heavy metals like mercury and arsenic. Not clean.

Images are from Melange, at Wordpress.

For information on the threats that coal slurries pose, see this New York Times story from 2008. You can also read articles from major American newspapers on coal mining by mountain top removal here.

Bioneers Conference, October 16-19, 2009, San Rafael, California, October 16-18

“Bioneers” is an odd name. It was coined by Kenny Ausubel, who along with Nina Simons founded the non-profit organization and its annual conference in 1990. The word derives from its founders’ belief that humans can work with and through nature to make our world a better place. Bioneers’ “founding perspectives" are:

Natural Medicine. Nature has a profound and profoundly mysterious ability for self-repair. The primary source of healing lies in nature. In environmental restoration as in medicine, the role of the practitioner is to support nature to heal itself. This principle became foundational to Bioneers.

Nature’s Solutions. Nature has solved all the ecological challenges we’re trying to address. Practitioners such as John Todd, Amory Lovins, Wes Jackson and Donald Hammer, as well as traditional indigenous practices, were a primary inspiration. In 1997, naturalist and author Janine Benyus gave this emerging science a name in her landmark book Biomimicry: Innovation Inspired by Nature, the same year she first spoke at Bioneers. Biomimicry has been a core focus since Bioneers’ inception.

Biocultural Diversity. In nature, diversity is the very fabric of life. Because change is the only constant in nature, diversity is the source of resilience to adapt to change in both natural and human systems. Successful adaptation requires keeping open the greatest range of biologically and culturally diverse options. Diversity is also the sacred tree of life, with intrinsic value.

The Bioneers Conference is a leading-edge forum of social and scientific innovators focused on solutions inspired by nature and human ingenuity where you may:

Explore the forefront of positive change in deeply inspiring keynote talks, panels, workshops and intensives.

Connect with leading-edge people and ideas. Network with dynamic changemakers. Experience Moving Image Festival screenings, and networking receptions.

Discover powerful opportunities and strategies for creating positive change in your work, life and community.

You can participate virtually in the conference by registering and downloading the electronic program.

Oceans in Peril

The ocean is the birth place of life on earth. Through a very intricate and complex balance of natural phenomena over several billions of years it has developed into what it is today . The ocean remains home to several hundred thousand different plant and animal species. It is essential to all living beings, both in the water and on land. The oceans provide the most basic needs, such as the oxygen we breathe and much of the food we eat. Ocean ecology is severely threatened by pollution and global warming. Read about the threat to our oceans at Marine Environment.

Eating the Earth

“They're not creatures you can fight--they're an elemental--an 'act of God!' Ten miles long, two miles wide--ants, nothing but ants! And every single one of them a fiend from hell; before you can spit three times they'll eat a full-grown buffalo to the bones. I tell you if you don't clear out at once there'll he nothing left of you but a skeleton picked as clean as your own plantation."

Just as the voracious Army Ants in Carl Stephenson’s short story, Leiningen Versus the Ants, devour all before them, we seem a people insatiable, searching every last shore, aquifer, forest, plain, and plateau desperate for that last barrel of oil, that last board foot of lumber, that last drop of water. We stumble on imprisoned between ignorance and greed, to be delivered into the annihilation that is our god.

The earth has existed for some four and half billion years, created in some cosmic catastrophe of colliding matter and formed from toxic fumes and molten rock, its history replete with cataclysmic events of unimaginable magnitude and violence. It was 800 million to a billion years after the earth’s fiery birth before the first vestiges of primitive life were created in the form of cyanobacteria that ultimately reacted with other elements to transform the earth into an habitable planet. And along came man. But not for billions of years.

Homo sapiens, or “modern man” emerged only about 120,000 years ago. That makes man’s time upon the earth clock about 2 seconds out of 24 -- a blip of miniscule proportion. But, like a bacteria, we have morphed and multiplied many times over.

At the dawn of the first millennium A.D., the world’s population was around 300 million people. Growth into the second millennium was modest, but by the time of the American Revolutionary War, the population of humans on earth had grown to over a billion, despite the ravages of the Black Plague in the thirteen hundreds. Human population is today, some 230 years later, over 6.7 billion and growing exponentially. By 2050, 42 years from now, the number of people on earth will increase by over 40%, to 9.5 billion.

It is unreasonable to expect that a presence of such magnitude and rapacious appetite would not change the earth upon which it dwells. According to some geologists, humans have so drastically altered the earth that the Holocene epoch, which started 10,000 years ago, has ended and we have entered a new epoch - the Anthropocene.

Early humans, hunter-gathers -- had little impact on the planet. But with the advent of technology, the human footprint grew disproportionately. Man is dominant on the earth, and like the cyanobacteria of eons ago, is reshaping the earth dramatically, but not in ways that make it more habitable. We are making the world hotter, drier, dirtier, and biologically less diverse. We have destroyed over half of the world's wetlands and original forests, polluted rivers and the ocean, and poisoned the land. We cause the extinction of an average of 100 species per day. Sociobiologist E. O. Wilson predicts that if we don’t slow our consumption of natural resources, we’ll extinguish half the species of plants and animals by the end of the 21st century.

According to Lord Robert May, Professor of Zoology at Oxford University, and winner of the Royal Society’s Copley medal, the world’s oldest prize for scientific achievement, "We stand on the brink of a global extinction event -- the sixth episode in the history of the Earth." The most recent extinction event, approximately 65 million years ago, closed the Cretaceous period and ended the reign of dinosaurs. "The difference is that the current global extinction event is being caused by the actions of a single dominant species rather than a 'natural' event," said Lord May. We are part of the Earth's great fauna, but we are also its greatest menace.

The human species has become a plague on the face of the earth.

And the Lord said, I will destroy man whom I have created from the face of the earth...for it repenteth me that I have made him.