Change.org's Stop Global Warming Blog

Ban-Ki Moon Wants Religious Leaders to Join Fight Against Climate Change

Mike Smith — 2009-11-06T07:41:00-08:00

Visiting Windsor Castle in England, UN Secretary General Ban-Ki Moon explained to the gathered crowd of religious leaders from a wide variety of faiths that "you are the leaders who can have the largest, widest and deepest reach." Running half of the world's schools, and being among the world's biggest investors and opinion makers, he explained that religious leaders have the opportunity to make a huge difference in combating climate change, around the world, and in every culture.

The Church of England is already promising to cut carbon emissions by 42 percent by 2020, whilst there are Muslim initiatives to make the Hajj pilgrimage more environmentally sound. But perhaps we're not looking sufficiently far into the nature of belief. A man was recently sacked from his job in England due to his beliefs about climate change. He appealed and will now be allowed to contest the sacking on grounds of discrimination due to “religion, religious belief or philosophical belief.” Religion leaders can help fight climate change and would be a huge ally to have onside, but many already have the feel strongly enough in their beliefs to fight it themselves, even when it puts their job and livelihood at risk.

Photo Credit: Ingsoc

Global Warming? The Writing's on the Seawall

Katherine Gustafson — 2009-11-06T06:00:00-08:00

It's getting harder and harder to ignore climate change. Now our favorite ocean creatures are confirming what we already know. As the water gets warmer, the fish are moving away, faaar away, to find cooler habitats.

Researchers at the National Oceanographic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) have published a new study that reveals that half of 36 fish stocks in the Northwest Atlantic Ocean have shifted their ranges to the north over the last forty years, reports Science Daily. Some of the stocks, many of which are commerically fished, have all but vanished from U.S. waters.

Their research, which appears in the journal Marine Ecology Progress Series, illustrates how changing coastal and ocean temperatures are altering the behavior of fish species that range from North Carolina to the Canadian border. The species in question include Atlantic cod, haddock, yellowtail, winter flounder, spiny dogfish, Atlantic herring and more obscure species like blackbelly rosefish.

The researchers took account of historic ocean temperature records, long-term oscillation processes, fishing pressures over time and natural fluctuations in ocean temperatures to arrive at their conclusions.

"The fact that we see responses in many species consistent with what you would expect with warming, but in different types of species that have experienced different historical fishing pressure, suggests that we are already witnessing the response of fish to a warming scenario," said Janet Nye, a postdoctoral researcher at NOAA's Northeast Fisheries Science Center laboratory and the study's lead author, according to Science Daily.

And how will this impact the dinner table? The study's authors said that as fishermen have to travel farther to find the species that are moving offshore, it will eventually stop being economically feasible to catch them. At that point consumers will have to do without.

Photo courtesy of stock.xchng

Kerry-Boxer Climate Bill Passes Committee Over Republican Boycott

Katherine Gustafson — 2009-11-05T11:11:00-08:00

Sen. John Kerry (D-Mass.) and Barbara Boxer (D-Calif.) teamed up to author a climate bill that today passed the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee 11-1 over a boycott by Republicans, reports the Washington Post. The bill would impose a mandatory reduction in greenhouse gas emissions of 20 percent from 2005 levels by 2020. Companies would buy pollution credits, the number of which will reduce over time, or trade permits with other polluters.

Committee Republicans didn't show up to vote, objecting on the grounds that the Environmental Protection Agency hasn't done a thorough enough economic analysis of the bill. Such an analysis, however, would have run up a price tag of $350,000 for taxpayers to shoulder.

That cost is a little steep for a piece of legislation that Kerry and Boxer have always held would just serve as an opening salvo in a long struggle to find agreement on workable legislation. "I have no pretensions, and neither does Barbara, that this will be the final product," Kerry told the New York Times in September. "It is a starting point."

To try getting further than just a step or two off the starting blocks, though, Kerry is working with Sens. Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.) and Joseph Lieberman (I-Conn.) to come up with a compromise legislation that might satisfy members on both sides of the aisles, according to The New Republic.

Photo courtesy of cliff1066™ via flickr

Why is Newsweek Lobbying for the Oil Industry?

Mike Smith — 2009-11-05T10:46:00-08:00

I guess the oil industry really can buy whatever it wants.

Newsweek, a magazine that presents itself as unbiased and independent, got caught this week accepting money from oil industry lobbyists and in exchange co-sponsoring a thinly veiled lobbying event on Capitol Hill.

Yesterday TPM Muckraker reported that Newsweek is partnering with the American Petroleum Institute (API) -- the lobbying arm of the oil industry -- to host a panel discussion entitled “Climate and Energy Policy: Moving?” featuring lawmakers, the American Petroleum Institute’s CEO, and Newsweek’s Senior Washington Correspondent.

In case you don’t know much about API they are a giant in the lobbying world and have spent millions of dollars just this year to try to prevent the US from enacting energy policy reform or addressing climate change.

Now API wants to host “policy forums” with their CEO and members of Congress in Washington, D.C. – and that’s fine; it’s exactly what lobbyists do.

The problem is that API is paying Newsweek to co-host the event in order to make it look like an unbiased “discussion” and not an industry-backed lobbying effort. What sort of “discussion” about climate change happens at an event sponsored by the oil industry where the only confirmed panelist is the CEO of the biggest oil lobby?

Newsweek should know better. Offering their sponsors the chance to slap the Newsweek name on any event in exchange for money just reeks of bias and casts suspicion on the independence of Newsweek’s journalism.

We’ve started a petition here on Change.org asking Newsweek to cancel the event entirely, and it’s already gaining momentum. Take action and send a letter to the magazine right now.

Taking money from oil lobbyists and co-hosting lobbying events masquerading as “policy discussions” is clearly an abuse of public trust and an unacceptable business practice.

Photo credit: Spentrails

Another Way to Cut Emissions: Hang Dry

Katherine Gustafson — 2009-11-05T06:00:00-08:00

We talk a lot about changing our lightbulbs and going easy on the meat in our personal quests to help our struggling planet. But we've been overlooking one big source of domestic energy expenditure: the laundry.

New Scientist reports that a team from Michigan State University has calculated that if Americans would only hang dry their clothes instead of using the dryer, as well as make 16 other simple changes such as washing clothes in cooler water and installing low-flow showerheads, they would reduce their collective carbon dioxide emissions by 7.4 percent by 2019.

I imagine many people don't have room for a backyard drying rack and don't like the idea of washing soiled garments in cool water. There are, however, all manner of drying racks -- ceiling-suspended, wall-mounted, pulley-operated, collapsible, retractable -- that can make drying clothes fit in even the smallest apartments. Washing less-dirty clothes in cool water and saving the hot for the heavy-stain-lifting is one way to conserve on the washing end, as long as you already have enough laundry for two loads and aren't using double the water.

Giving your clothes to others instead of throwing them away after you're tired of wearing them is a good way to reduce consumption and ease pressure on landfills, which a report by a group of waste-reduction organizations claims are a significant source of greenhouse gas emissions.

Levi Strauss & Co. and Goodwill recently announced that they will team up to encourage people to donate their used clothing. The “A Care Tag for Our Planet” initiative will make Levi’s the first major retailer to put messages on its clothing care tags advising people to donate unwanted clothing to Goodwill, according to a Levi Strauss & Co. press release.

“A Care Tag for Our Planet is Goodwill’s first partnership of its kind designed to increase the life cycle of clothing and textiles to address the approximately 23.8 billion pounds that end up in U.S. landfills each year,” said Jim Gibbons, International CEO and President of Goodwill Industries.

If clothes make the man, then washing, drying and disposing of his clothes in conscious ways make the man on a mission to help the Earth.

Photo courtesy of stock.xchng

No Climate Bill Until 2010 at the Earliest

Mike Smith — 2009-11-04T13:16:00-08:00

Is Climate Change being put on the back burner? After Blog Action Day, 350.org's events recently, and all the conferences and gatherings in the run up to Copenhagen, the momentum may lead to domestic legislation passing anytime soon.

With Republicans boycotting the markup of a Senate Environment and Public Works Committee bill (can we call this the billibuster?) before it can even hit the floor, the hopes of a deal being done before Copenhagen now seems unrealistic. The committee could forge ahead despite the boycott but, but other committees still need to weigh in — and they aren't making any plans to do so yet.

Commerce Committee Chairman John Rockefeller (D-W.Va.) said on Tuesday that “Some people are talking about not doing it until after the 2010 election.” That would be a long time to wait, and would hardly show how serious America is about fighting climate change if it takes it that long to get legislation passed. Rockefeller is one of a handful of Democrats who may block legislation, fearing it would harm their coal-dependent economies. As a climate change representative for Algeria said this week, industrialized countries are too concerned with economic and political problems, and not sufficiently concerned about the damage that climate change is already causing to developing countries.

Photo credit: Rob Crawley

Nepal Goes to New Heights to Highlight Glacial Melting

Katherine Gustafson — 2009-11-04T06:00:00-08:00

Like the government of the Maldives, which held a cabinet meeting underwater to point out the threat the country faces from rising sea levels, the government of Nepal is going to extremes to alert the world about alarming glacial melt in the Himalayas.

The Associated Press reports that Nepal's Prime Minister Madhav Kumar Nepal and other members of the country's cabinet will convene on Mount Everest to highlight the dangers of lakes created by melting glaciers, which threaten to drown villages below.

The meeting will take place at the 17,400-foot (5,300-meter) high Everest base camp, which the officials will reach by plane. They have scheduled the gathering just prior to the Copenhagen climate summit in December, when world leaders will discuss coordinated action on global warming.

Glaciers across the Tibetan plateau -- where 15,000 of them spike the landscape -- are melting at what DiscoveryNews calls a "stunning rate." Not only does this create flooding dangers, but it has the potential the interfere with the water supply of the entirety of South Asia.

It seems a shame that the Nepali officials will burn so much fossil fuel flying up there. I know they don't have the time or, probably, the skills or inclination to climb up, but just think what a strong point they could make if they hoofed it.

Photo of Molgolian glaciologists displaying "350" in support of climate action courtesy of 350.org via flickr

African Nations End Climate Boycott, But Chances of Copenhagen Protocol Slim

Mike Smith — 2009-11-03T17:58:00-08:00

African nations have won promises that there will be more in-depth talks about exactly how much rich nations will need to cut their emissions by, ending a boycott of talks. The African countries had been supported by 70 developing countries, arguing that industrialized countries were not making sufficient commitments to cut emissions, with Africa took the brunt of drought and flooding blamed on climate change.

The 55 countries were prepared to provoke a major crisis, calling for a suspension of talks unless rich countries agreed to take much more substantial action. It threatened to undermine the Copenhagen Conference's efforts, with Algeria explaining that rich countries were too concerned with political and economic problems in passing legislation, not the damage that climate change is already doing around the world.

That's the good news. The bad? UN Secretary-General Ban-Ki Moon had suggested that a legally binding agreement is unlikely to be signed at Copenhagen — there may be no Copenhagen Protocol to replace Kyoto. This is likely to further infuriate the developed world; with climate change hitting the poorest hardest, they've got a right to be angry.

[Photo credit: UN Photo/Mark Garten - Secretary-General Witnesses Impacts of Climate Change]

Grants for a Clean-Air Future

Katherine Gustafson — 2009-11-03T06:00:00-08:00

Last week Secretary of Energy Chu announced the Department of Energy's first $151 million in new "Advanced Research Projects Agency - Energy (ARPA-E)" grants.

These grants represent an ambitious plan to jump-start the alternative energy sector in a major way. Speaking at the Google headquarters in Mountain View, California, Chu said the agency would like to do for the energy industry what Google did for the Internet.

"With ARPA-E," he said, "we are swinging from the heels and trying to hit home runs, not just base hits." While there's something to be said for small ball, this apparently is not the time for it.

DoE is swinging for the fences with innovative ideas like these:

producing fuel similar to gasoline by harnessing the power of bacteria and sunlight;

creating "grid-scale energy storage" in an all-liquid metal battery;

employing sensors and software to allow buildings and their users to operate in energy-efficient tandem.

developing an industrial carbon-capture technology based on the enzyme that serves that purpose in the human body's respiration system.

Elsewhere in climate-related grantmaking, the Marin Community Foundation has announced a $10 million program, the Marin Carbon Project, dedicated to helping local residents in Marin, California, increase their knowledge of and get active on climate change over the next five years, reports the Foundation Center.

The project will focus in part on reducing vehicle traffic in the county and on working with scientists, ranchers and concerned officials and citizens to increase the health of the rangelands in West Marin, which can sequester large amounts of carbon.

The Marin Carbon Project's goal is to reduce carbon dioxide emissions by over two million metric tons, which has the same outcome as removing about 326,000 cars from the road. Everybody, apparently, is trying to hit one out of the park.

Photo courtesy of stock.xchng

Toyota Create New Plant Species to Offset Prius Factory CO2

Mike Smith — 2009-11-02T07:08:00-08:00

Toyota have moved into the horticultural industry, creating two new species of flowers specifically developed for the grounds of the Prius plant in Toyota City, Japan.

The flowers are designed to take heat out of the atmosphere and absorb nitrogen oxides. The leaves of the flowers will also create water vapor, reduce the temperature of the factory's surroundings, lowering the amount of energy needed to cool it.

It's not just a smart and scientifically incredible PR stunt, but part of a 20 year effort to reduce the Prius plant's carbon emissions — since 1990 they've cut it by 55 per cent. Last year Toyota planted 50,000 trees to offset emissions from the factory. But you've got to wonder whether they should focus on producing greener cars, rather than reducing the emissions of the production process. "Critics claim the Prius production process creates more CO2 than normal petrol vehicles, nullifying the lower CO2 output of the car itself," report Drive.com.au. Reported reductions in CO2 needs to be balanced against the net carbon impact of the Prius if Toyota really want to please the grass roots.

Photo credit: Alan Miles

Eat Meat to Help the Earth? You Grass-Hugger!

Katherine Gustafson — 2009-11-02T06:00:00-08:00

Eating meat contributes to climate change, right? Hamburgers must be abolished if we are to save the Earth. Many staunchly support this point of view, while others scoff at what they see as radical buffoonery. But it's not quite so black and white. You see, it all depends on what kind of meat you're talking about.

A recent post of mine on the subject over on the sustainable food blog drew an interesting comment from alert reader Harry Hamil: "it is clear that well designed, intensive grazing of grasslands by domesticated livestock offers the quickest and greatest opportunity to reduce atmospheric carbon."

So, producing meat could actually be good for our climate?

Hamil pointed us to a New Mexico-based organization called Holistic Management International (HMI), which promotes a system of land management that coordinates with natural cycles to increase the health of damaged grasslands and the productivity of farms and ranches. The organization's Website boldly states that "Managing land holistically ultimately results in the removal of carbon  from the atmosphere: it offers an incredibly powerful, natural solution  to the problem of global warming."

This model uses grazing animals such as cattle to de-desertify grasslands, which then sequester large amounts of carbon. The system of "Holistic Management Planned Grazing" involves moving concentrated groups of animals according to a specific plan to mimic natural grazing patterns. In doing this, the animals till the hard-packed soil as they walk, disperse fertilizing manure and seed across the land and avoid overgrazing by constantly moving. The result: healthy, vibrant grasslands with masses of CO2 sequestered in the soil and grasses.

Healthy soil and the grasses that root in it, according to HMI, sequester far more carbon than more-visible trees. So the more grass, the better off we are. And the more grazing animals, the better off the grass.

And just as grasslands need animals, sustainable farming is impossible without them. An article in June's Audubon Magazine investigates this issue. Author Lisa Hamilton explains the thinking of a Georgia farmer who raises pigs, chickens and cattle on pasture: the system is "like a bank account: Every time he harvests an ear of corn or a head of lettuce, he withdraws from the soil’s fertility; if he doesn’t redeposit that fertility, the account will hit zero."

So if we need to add animals' fertility back to the soil (unless we want to stick with fossil-fuel-based fertilizers, which are low on sustainability), then we must have animals. And, as Hamilton writes, “In order for pasture-based livestock to become a significant part of the meat industry, we need to eat more of its meat, not less."

So while things are a lot more complicated that this one blog post can analyze, it's worth taking a pause to think about the important role that livestock play in the climate equation. And whether declaring war on meat is really the best way to go about saving the world.

Photo courtesy of stock.xchng

Tackling Climate Change Will Cost Only $150bn a Year Says the EU

Mike Smith — 2009-11-01T18:01:00-08:00

The European Union put the cost of fighting climate change into cold-hard figures last week. They explained that fighting climate change will cost $150 billion a year by 2020. But who's going to pay for it? There's some discussions to be had over whether it's up to the developed world to pay the vast majority of the bill, with many of the Europe's richest countries agreeing that they had to bear the biggest burden. Poland didn't agree, explaining that it was ridiculous for them to give aid to Brazil, a richer country, to help them develop cleaner industries and reduce emissions.

As usual when it comes to tackling climate change, most wanted to avoid making specific commitments, not wanting to go as far as Sweden, Denmark, the UK and the European commission demanded in leading the world to fight climate change. There was some agreement though — $10 billion a year would be needed from January to fast-track funding for the developing world. The EU is promising to pay its fair-share of the eventual full $150bn — one-third seems to be the most likely agreed upon figure for the EU to contribute. If China and the US match that ($30-40 billion a year), we'll be well on our way to tackling climate change.

Don't all of these numbers pale into insignificance when held against Wall Street losses and the stimulus package? After the last few years of billions and trillions, $150 billion a year, spread across the whole world, to save the world, doesn't seem like too much. The best bit? We're not just piling the money up as a sacrifice to climate gods, oh no — this is a real investment in green industry, in our future, and in our planet.

Photo credit: Alfonso Jiménez

Climate Action Goes Creative

Katherine Gustafson — 2009-10-31T06:00:00-07:00

Last Saturday's International Day of Climate Action was, as Mike Smith wrote on this blog, "the most widespread day of political action in the planet's history." Not only that, but it was fun.

The action was structured around the concept of 350, which is the parts per million of carbon dioxide we can afford to have in our atmosphere.

Enthusiastic participants all over the world made visual depictions of 350 -- using everything from their bodies to sandbags to sailboats to a flotilla of yellow balloons -- and photographed them for the world to see. The curious one that heads this post was generated by lantern walkers in Sydney, Australia.

So what's so important about 350 and how can you get in on the fun?

350.org, the entity that organized the action day, explains it well and offers this handy graphic to show where we are now in comparison to where we need to be:

Whether you're just interested in observing the antics of the world's many 350-advocates or would like to give it a try yourself, there are resources aplenty to help you on 350's Website.

To submit your own photo, attach the image to an email to photos@350.org with your city and country as the subject and the caption and credits in the body of the e-mail. Or, sit back, relax and enjoy some other people's creativity in this catchy video:

Photo courtesy of 350.org via flickr

Himalayas Left High and Dry By Climate Change, So a Man Builds Glaciers

Mike Smith — 2009-10-30T08:42:00-07:00

The Man Who Builds Glaciers. It sounds like a cutesy indie film, but in India a man is building artificial glaciers and saving communities. Chhewang Norphel does it because Himalayan communities rely on year-long glacial runoff to grow food. If glaciers continue to melt, run-off will be unpredictable and they may suffer climate-induced emergency like the Maldives — in the Maldives the waters will rise and flood the land, in the Himalayas, the rivers will run dry.

Norphel's scheme involves diverting unneeded winter and autumn water into rock lined ponds. The water will freeze and ponds interconnect to form glaciers which melt in the spring and allow runoff to continue. He's so far built ten glaciers, but they're expensive at $50,000 a pop, and though he's receiving international coverage, no scientists have come to study the effects and lend their support. He's hoping developed countries will fund his work by recompensating developing for years of pollution as a form of "climate justice." Until then, he's doing his best to ensure the next generation isn't left high and dry.

If you want to get an idea of how the world will have to deal with glacial melt and increasing emissions this weekend, then have a go at the Sim City like game Clim'City in which you manage a city and are tasked to reduce its emissions, slash energy consumption, keep your citizens happy, and your farms productive. It's realistic, and shows the tough interplay of politics, environment, and industry when it comes to climate change.

Photo credit: futureatlas.com

Cooling Rumor Debunked: The World Is In Fact Still Warming

Katherine Gustafson — 2009-10-30T06:00:00-07:00

We've been over this before. The climate change debate often seems like one big roller coaster of public opinion. The globe is warming, no it's not, yes it is, what about the natural cycle of ice ages?, this is different, no it's not, yes?, no?, and finally . . . okay, maybe we can agree, yes it is. Yes it is different than the Earth's natural warming and cooling trends, yes it is happening. Yes, the Earth is warming.

We seemed, for a brief, magical moment, to be all on the same page. Then comes this crushing report from Mike Smith: people are skeptical again. Stop this merry-go-round! I want to get off!

But thanks to some statisticians that The Associated Press put to the task of assessing whether the skepticism is justified, we can now state -- yet again, yet again -- that the Earth is indeed warming. The AP gave data on temperatures over several years to the statisticians without telling them what the numbers were and asked them to state whether they could detect a trend. The experts found nothing in the data that indicated cooling.

Some years have indeed been cooler lately, but it isn't that simple. In the last two decades, global temperatures have gone down, gone up, gone down again and are now going up yet again. Experts say that the appropriate method of assessing climate change is analyzing moving averages of around ten years. Comparing the 1999-2008 average to the 2000-2009 average reveals that the 10-year moving averages have been highest in last five years. To whit: warming.

The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration did a double-take on their numbers when they heard all the skepticism chattering around the Internet. But their original conclusion was confirmed. "The last 10 years are the warmest 10-year period of the modern record," NOAA climate monitoring chief Deke Arndt told the AP. "Even if you analyze the trend during that 10 years, the trend is actually positive, which means warming."

When can we stop going around and around on this and just get down the business of addressing the problem seriously?

Photo courtesy of stock.xchng

Astrotruth Peels Back The Turf on Big Oil Supported Astroturf Groups

Mike Smith — 2009-10-29T17:01:00-07:00

Astrotruth.org seeks to expose the 'astroturfing' done by Big Oil and Dirty Coal. Astroturfing is the now all-too-familiar creation of an organization designed to look like popular grass-roots programs when in fact it's a planned public relations campaign that mislead who is behind supposedly spontaneous campaigns. They disguise a commercial entity's involvement, misleading the nature and origin of their opposition.

Astrotruth have so far identified three big-oil and two dirty-coal organizations who are spouting false claims and presenting themselves as legitimate groups. Astrotruth needs your help to uncover and "peel back the turf" to see who's propping up and funding organizations misleading the public.

Astroturfing is dishonest and underhanded at best, fraudulent and responsible for corrupting the political process at worst. Timothy Karr, the campaign director for freepress.net explained to the Guardian that "A healthy 21st-century democracy doesn't need phoney front groups. We need openness, accountability and real debate."

Photo credit: Dmealiffe

Global Warming and Meat: A Debate with a Bite

Katherine Gustafson — 2009-10-29T06:37:00-07:00

Writing about the clean-energy potential of pig manure yesterday got me thinking: We've been writing frequently over on the sustainable food blog about the growing consensus that the meat industry is a major contributor to global warming. More and more people are saying what a lot of others don't want to hear: eating a low-meat diet is one of the most effective ways of shrinking your carbon footprint.

The most high-profile figure to expound this idea is the UK's Lord Stern of Brentford, a leading figure in climate change studies, who recently told the Times of London that "Meat is a wasteful use of water and creates a lot of greenhouse gases. It puts enormous pressure on the world’s resources. A vegetarian diet is better.”

Stern himself is not a strict vegetarian, which is a great illustration of an important point in this debate: You don't have to disavow meat entirely to start using your eating choices to make a difference on climate change.

According to Grist, if all of the US cut meat out one day a week, it would have the equivalent effect on emissions as taking 8 million cars off the road. A "Meatless Monday" movement is starting to make headway; Baltimore City recently became the first US school system to take on the challenge.

Of course Stern's comments have raised the furies of industry leaders, Big Sky Country elected officials and generally misinformed crazies. The Times article notes that UK's pork industry is up in arms, angered that they aren't getting credit for putting emissions-cutting technological advances in place. US News and World Report tells us that South Dakota Senator John Thune called the meat-reduction theory a bunch of bull, stating that the last thing the US meat industry needs right now is "elitist lecturing."

Then there's the hair-brained climate change deniers like Christopher Booker, who writes in the UK's Telegraph today that "even by the Green lobby's standards of self-deceiving absurdity, this must be a front-runner for the most fatuous proposal so far."

Booker claims, without citing any sources whatsoever, that all of agriculture, including meat production, is responsible for a mere 14 percent of global greenhouse gas emissions, most of it from growing rice in China and India. Meanwhile, Worldwatch Institute, a respected think tank, recently came out with a new figure for emissions caused by livestock: 51 percent. The gulf between these two statistics is so wide we could all jump in and drown. Maybe we will once the sea level rises enough.

So what gives? Ironically, Booker himself gives us a clue to this debate. "Livestock farming," he writes, "is not some unnecessary consumer indulgence. When properly managed, it is a vital part of the natural cycle of the land."

The two key words here are "properly managed." And because of those two words, I would generally agree with what he says. I imagine, however, that we might be talking about different things. By "properly managed," I mean "included as part of a solar-energy-powered polyculture small farming environment." Industrial meat production is not properly managed meat production.

All these people saying meat is hard on the environment are making this same point; meat in the quantity we consume it produced the way we produce it in the Western industrial farming system is not environmentally sustainable. The sooner we can all see that, the sooner we can all get on with saving ourselves from destruction.

Photo courtesy of Alex E. Proimos via flickr

Pig Poo into Clean Fuel

Katherine Gustafson — 2009-10-28T14:54:00-07:00

What if we could turn our nastiest waste products into clean energy?

Considering that we have so many millions of animals penned up in concentrated animal feeding (or should I say “fattening”?) operations, their waste is a resource we possess in spades. We’ve long known it’s possible to capitalize on this mess but weren’t sure of the best way to do it.

New research is giving us a clue, reports New Scientist. If you’re ever stuck with a big lagoon of pig poo and you’d rather have electricity instead, your best bet, according to a team from Denmark’s Aalborg University, is anaerobic digestion. The anaerobic digestion process, by which the manure is broken down by bacteria in an oxygen-free environment to release methane that can power gas turbines, gives the best bang-for-your-poo.

If you’d like to ensure the fewest emissions, however, follow the less-efficient process of separating out and drying the solid waste and incinerating it. The incineration process uses the heat from burning of waste materials to boil water and run a steam turbine.

Another option, however, according to Wired, involves a strange little plant called duckweed, which has a taste for animal waste. The plant converts the manure into leafy starch that can then be transformed into ethanol. Considering that we now use way too much land growing corn that can be turned into that biofuel, this possibility is indeed promising for a low-carbon future.

Photo courtesy of The Pug Father via flickr

Indonesia Becomes Third Largest Emitter Due To Illegal Logging

Mike Smith — 2009-10-28T07:07:00-07:00

Indonesia has accelerated ahead of India, Brazil, Japan, Germany and the UK to take bronze medal in the race to become the world's largest emitter of greenhouse gases. What? It's not a race? Well Indonesia are treating it like one. Illegal logging of 10 million hectares and subsequent burning has propelled Indonesia into third place in the list of the world's carbon emitters.

Indonesia has one-tenth of the world's remaining rainforest, but the world-record speed of destruction is accounting for 80% of the country's green house gas emissions. The dictator that ruled for 32 years didn't help things, but the current president hasn't done much to help either. Legal logging continues as unsustainable levels, with the country eager to profit from plantations that require massive land clearance, destroying natural habitats for endangered species. Indonesia welcomes the idea of being paid to conserve its forest (like Ecuador) through UN's Reduced Emissions from Deforestation and Degradation, but even that scheme would be unlikely to compensate Indonesia enough to make it worthwhile. And until a better solution is found, the destruction will continue.

Photo Credit: Ben Sutherland

Momentum Growing for Climate Agreement But Ecuador Holds Amazon Ransom

Mike Smith — 2009-10-27T16:05:00-07:00

At a visit to a sun factory — sorry — solar farm, President Obama urged the Senate to pass emissions caps and suggested that "consensus is building." Sound vague? He continues: "It's a debate between looking backward and looking forward." Amongst the fog of vagueness there was an announcement: $3.4 million to be invested in Smart Grid technology. But as we know, smart grids will only really help if they're fed with renewable electricity.

Meanwhile, exemplifying that this is not a problem that can be solved if we solely consider domestic programs and reductions, Ecuador is asking for money to do nothing. They want the world to pay them to not drill oil in the Amazon, preserving rainforrest. How much is rainforest worth? Considering how valuable it is to storing carbon dioxide, very valuable.

The Ecuador situation is a double whammy with both pristine Amazon rainforest underthreat, losing all the trees carbon feasting benefit, as well as sucking oil out of the ground to burn and further pollute the atmosphere. Momentum for climate change legislation is essential, but we must remember that this problem is an international one, with the preservation of current eco-systems and protection of rainforest from deforestation just as important as installing solar panels in the desert.

Photo credit: Wayne National Forest