Electric Feedback: Use Too Much Energy and This Light Switch May Shock You

Oh, how I wish this were true. From Gizmodo:

The Consumption Feedback Switch is a device that monitors your electricity usage. If it feels you’re within your light quota when you flip on the lights, you’ll see a small, harmless spark. But if you’ve been one of those dolphin-unsafe villains from Captain Planet, reading a few minutes too long at night, a gigantic stream of deadly electricity will mend your ways pending you not die.

Alright, we’re actually not sure that you feel a shock at all since the word “spark” may have been the choice of a liberal Google translation denoting “small glow.”

Damn, I would LOVE to do a product review on a light switch that actually gave you a shock if you were using too much energy. Eco-evil. I with there was an Etsy Alchemy for green tech products.

Link [Consumption Feedback Switch] via [Gizmodo] via [dvice]

Can a Power Company REALLY Be Carbon Neutral?

Yes, it can be done, and a New Zealand power company has been doing it for more than a year.

Worldchanging explains:

Meridian Energy generates around a third of New Zealand’s total energy demand (approx 12,000 GWh) exclusively from wind and hydro sources. The company has a history of advocating a carbon credit marketplace.

But not all New Zealand state-owned enterprises can boast the same carbon neutral certification.

Solid Energy is the largest coal mining company in New Zealand, and also state owned. It’s the company, I’m ashamed to say, that dig up and export New Zealand’s coal to be burned in China—and the ones that intend to create a new open cast mine in Happy Valley.

It sounds like a terrible place for a coal mine—even though I’m not certain what or where Happy Valley is (but then, what do Americans know about New Zealand really, except that it’s where the Hobbits live?). Before we all get too happy about this, I should note that Meridian Energy is carbon neutral in large part because they operate nine hydroelectric projects—big dams, that is, of the sort that would be considered an environmental disaster if they were under construction today, but are somehow okay if they already exist.

Meridian Energy also operate wind turbines—like the one in the photo above, in Wellington—on a really large scale.

Link [Worldchanging]

Photo credit: Wikipedia Commons

Pavlov’s Fish: Researchers Train Fish to Swim Into Nets For Harvest

The march of science, as described by Trendhunter Magazine:

Once again, with the idea of restocking our depleting resources, scientists at the Marine Biological Laboratory at Wood’s Hole, Mass. are testing a plan to train fish to catch themselves using sound.

The fish swim into a net when they hear a tone signaling feeding time. The system could eventually allow depleted fish like black sea bass to be released into the open ocean, grow to market size, then swim into an underwater cage at harvest time when they hear the signal. This way, farmed fish might be better acclimated to the wild when they can be called to feed every few days. The big goal is to help with the costs of fish farming, an important source of the world’s seafood. Trained fish return after several days of feeding saving the farms money on feed and reducing the fish waste released in concentrated areas.

The fish will actually swim into an underwater structure called the Aquadome (someone has been watching old Mad Max movies at Woods Hole).

It was the Russian researcher Ivan Pavlov who conditioned dogs to salivate when they heard the bell that announced feeding time, and the Aquadome works on the same principle. A major hurdle for the researchers will be the question of how many fish are lost to predators. I know from long personal experience that fish are pretty dense, but maybe they can be taught this skill, intricate for them. I wonder, though, if other fish will learn to associate the sound with food. Like sharks.

Link: [Trendhunter Magazine]

Photo credit: Flickr user Florian

When Kenyan Greenbeans Are Better: Why Local Food Isn’t Always The Best Choice

For Mike Small’s family in Fife, Scotland, it’s all about the local ingredients. For the past six months, the Smalls have been dining only on foods and beverages that come from within their home district. That means that on any given evening, the Smalls sit down to a combination of meats like fish, pork and lamb and local veggies such as parsnips, beetroots, kale, potatoes, leeks and other root vegetables. As long as it’s local, the Smalls are down with it.

While it sounds like the Smalls are making big leaps towards reducing their own carbon fooprints, turns out it just ain’t that easy. There are so many factors involved in the production and distribution of produce that it does not suffice to simply “eat what’s local” and assume that the impact that you are making is significant. Here are some reasons why:

• Food grown in areas where fertilizers and tractors are used is hardly carbon-friendly
• Many developing countries that export produce don’t use machinery and use cow crap for fertilizer, which means that even after air-freighting occurs, the carbon impact is less than it may be on a local, diesel-driven farm
• Purchasing local ingredients that are naturally dried instead of cooked and ready (chickpeas, for example) doesn’t mean you’re saving energy – you’ve still got to take them home and cook them, something that emits more carbon when done in small batches than when done in large ones
• Storing locally grown products that are not available year-round requires refrigeration, which emits carbon. Importing seasonal produce from where it is grown, even when done so via air-freight, is often more environmentally friendly than storage.

“The concept of food miles is unhelpful and stupid. It doesn’t inform about anything except the distance travelled.” — Dr Adrian Williams, of the National Resources Management Centre at Cranfield University.

Link [The Guardian]

Dastardly Seal Hunters Die After Boat Flips in Rough Water- No Miracle Seals Come to the Rescue

Karma can be a bitch sometimes.

Breitbart has it:

The annual Canadian seal hunt was marred Saturday by a boat accident in the ice-covered Gulf of St. Lawrence that killed members of the boat’s crew, officials said.

“There have been fatalities,” fisheries department spokesman Michel Plamondon said, but a precise casualty figure was not available.

Rescue teams recovered three bodies and another person was still missing in the waters north of Cape Breton, Nova Scotia, Canadian media reported.

The fishing boat carrying seal hunters from the Magdalen islands capsized before dawn Saturday off Canada’s east coast, Plamondon said. CBC television reported six men were on the boat, and two have been rescued.

The boat flipped over while it was being towed back to port by the Canadian coast guard after encountering steering problems, according to local television reports.

Local radio, citing the coast guard, said the accident occurred at 1:00 am Saturday morning.

The boat, L’Acadia, was on its way to the seal herds when it lost a rudder, prompting an SOS appeal to the coast guard.

Link [Breitbart]

Photo credit: Flickr user Mikebaird

March 29th- Live Blogging Earth Hour: Because Someone Had To

We’re live blogging Earth Hour.

8:10 pm- Ahh…. It’s nice to have the Green Blogosphere all to myself. Treehugger, EcoGeek, GroovyGreen, and WorldChanging are all dark and abandoned ghost towns. I’m sitting in the ol’ living room with all the lights in the house on watching an hour long marathon of Cops. I’m warming my feet with a plug in heater and have a few pieces of toast in the toaster. I’ll make some hot chocolate in the microwave in a bit.

8:18- A good Cops so far, they just took out a guy running from them. Looks like it’s time to bust some crack heads. Stupid cops.

8:22- Nice- only four and a half minutes on high in the microwave to heat up a big ass mug of half and half hot chocolate.

8:25- I just turned up the radio downstairs real loud, every kilowatt helps. You can barely hear it with the door shut.

8:27- Just noticed an outside light that I had missed. Flicked it on.

8:30- First Cops is over, one more to go.

8:32- Plugging in the Foreman Grill, it’s grilled cheese and Fluff time!

8:34- Nice, a good looking lady cop in Sacramento. She’s got the taser!

8:35- We’ve got a chase on our hands!

8:36- Oh yeah, I’ve seen this one on Hulu. The guy had a good hiding spot (in the recycling bin), but the damn dog tracked him down.

8:40- Awesome! I found a big ass light and disco ball in the basement from back in the college days. I wonder how much juice that sucker pulls. I hope everyone in the dark is having a good break away from the grid. I’m thinking of you and doing my part to use the extra energy now flooding the system. I’m helping to stabilize the load- I’m a damn hero.

8:43- Now is a good time to plug in all my rechargeable batteries.

8:44- I love seeing rich white guys get busted on Cops. I also love warm clothes right out of the dryer. Popped in another load to wash and dry.

8:48- The floodlights I plugged in outside is melting down into the snow. I can’t stand how cops just slime their way into searching you and your car. Everyone should see Busted: A Citizen’s Guide to Surviving Police Encounters.

8:50- It’ll be nice when the rest of the world plugs back in. It’s lonely in here.

8:53- Blender is out- mmmm…. super thick milkshake.

8:54- Suspicious Vehicle in Broward County. The guy isn’t getting off the cell phone or rolling down the window.

8:56- Well it’s was a great hour live blogging Earth Hour. Going to make some coffee to ice up for tomorrow in the last few minutes.

8:59- That’s it for me tonight, shutting down and going to sleep. I’ve got to wake up early to go to my second job at Wal-Mart. How else do you think I’m going to be able to pay the power bill from today?

9:01 pm- Welcome back everyone.

Catch Us After You Plug Back In: EarthFirst is Liveblogging Earth Hour Tonight 8-9pm

I’ll be liveblogging tonight from 8-9pm to help celebrate Earth Hour, the 60 minute span when the world is being asked to turn off all lights and electricity. I will be camped out at EarthFirst HQ East (my living room) with all my lights on watching the TV set to something good and trashy while warming my hands over my plugin heater. My posts will cover what I’m watching on TV, any snacks I happen to make, and the general atmosphere in the room as we suck up all the excess energy left on the power grid by the rest of you do-gooders.

If you’re a good little greenie you’ll have to catch up on things after you plug back into the system at 9pm. Woot.

President Bush To Throw First Pitch At New Green Stadium, Up is Down, War is Peace

Oh, the irony. In celebration of opening day for the first green-built professional stadium in the U.S., President George W. Bush will throw out the inaugural pitch. Seriously? Was Carrot Top busy? What about Gary Busey? Anyone else?

The official new home of the Washington Nationals baseball team, the stadium boasts a wide array of eco-friendly elements. Grist beautifully gives us the low-down,

The U.S. The LEED Silver certified ballpark was built on a restored brownfield, and many building materials were produced locally. The stadium boasts efficient lighting and plumbing, drought-resistant plants, a concession area with a green roof, filters to keep stormwater runoff out of the nearby Anacostia River, and proximity to public transit (as well as a shortage of parking).

The stadium will also use air-cooled chillers for concessions instead of water-cooled ones. This will likely result in savings of over six million gallons of water each year. All-in-all, about $611 million was spent on the project. For more, jump here.

Source: [Grist]

Sit In the Dark For An Hour To Save the World-Does Earth Hour REALLY Make Sense?

OK, I see the value of the symbolism behind Earth Hour and appreciate the ‘awareness’ it’s raising, but do we really want to be telling everyone that the way to save the planet from ourselves is by sitting in a dark house? Doesn’t the other side accuse us of wanting to push the world back to a Stone Age of no cars, hot showers, or lighting after sunset? Doesn’t telling everyone that they have to turn off their lights for an hour kinda support that accusation? Isn’t the idea to find a way that we can all stay up after the sun goes down without having to destroy the environment to do it?

I’m just saying…

Link [Earth Hour]

Vanity Fair’s Greenwashed Cover: There’s Nothing Green About Madonna

Why the fizuck is Madonna on the cover of the latest green Vanity Fair issue? She’s a wrinkly ol’ piece of plastic ass with a bigger environmental footprint than many small African nations. Blech.

Link [Ecorazzi]

Do Your Part- April 1st is Energy Wasting Day

Don’t forget, April 1st is Energy Wasting Day. Here at EarthFirst HQ we’ll be cranking up the thermostat to 95, opening the windows, and idling our cars all day long in the parking lot. How much energy can you waste in a day?

Link [Energy Wasting Day] via [Trend Hunter]

This Day in Green History: March 27th, 1513- Ponce de Leon Discovers Florida

On March 27th, 1513, explorer Juan Ponce de Leon discovered Florida, helping to set the stage for the next five hundred years or so for the outright conquest and domination of the Americas and it’s inhabitants by my ancestors (and probably yours) those greedy Europeans. His discovery of Florida made the later formation of the Orlando-based boy band ‘N Sync possible, for which we will forever be in his debt.

Ponce was a Spaniard who accompanied Christopher Columbus on his second voyage to the New World and later was appointed the first Governor of Puerto Rico. In a bit of old world scandal, he resigned from his position when he lost a court case against Columbus’s son Diego and left to explore (and further subjugate) Cuba.

Green Vaporwear, Hucksterism, and Electric Cars- Wired Magazine Unloads on Zap!

Holy crap did Wired Magazine just unload on electric car company Zap!. It sounds like the company is run by a couple of shady hucksters who have enriched themselves at the expense of their customers, employees, and franchisees while screwing things up for all the real green car companies with their constant over promising and under delivering.

Here’s an snip, head over and read the whole article which Wired was kind enough to post in full to their site.

Over the years, ZAP has taken millions from investors and dealers eager to see the company’s line of green cars hit the road. But that line has never materialized. Of nearly a dozen groundbreaking eco-vehicles ZAP has promised in public announcements and on its Web site, only the Xebra and its sibling, a truck version, have ever made it to market. As a result, fans of electric cars have grown disillusioned, while individuals like Youssef have been financially devastated. What’s more, investment firms around the country have become cautious about financing electric vehicles after being repeatedly misled by one of the industry’s most visible companies.

In spite of all this, the pair now running the company, Starr and CEO Steve Schneider, enjoy lucrative employment packages that have made them millions. Their compensation — and ZAP’s continued existence as a business — heavily depends on the continual issuance of new stock shares. And although ZAP has earned an annual profit only once in its 16 years of existence (even that was the result of a one-time debt conversion) and its stock has been delisted from the New York Stock Exchange, Nasdaq, and the Pacific Stock Exchange, Starr and Schneider have managed to keep ZAP shares from becoming worthless. They’ve achieved this almost entirely through a relentless flow of press releases in which ZAP describes itself as “a world leader in electric transportation” and constantly claims to be on the verge of innovations and business deals that will yield breakthroughs in green transportation — claims that consistently fall short.

None of this would be possible without the optimism and naïveté of those eager to put their faith in the electric car future. When it comes to green technology, some people just want to believe. It’s easy to see why: Electric cars, after all, don’t run on gas, so they produce virtually no emissions. They do consume some fossil fuels, since they charge their batteries from the grid, which mostly uses coal and natural gas to generate power. But because electric cars are more efficient than gas cars at turning energy into miles, their carbon footprint averages out to be 50 to 90 percent less than that of traditional vehicles. (And that figure drops to nearly zero if the car is plugged into a renewable energy source like a solar panel array.) Electric cars could decrease dependence on oil, reduce global carbon emissions, and save consumers money. But while Honda, Toyota, Nissan, Ford, and General Motors all toyed with electric vehicles in the ’90s, these companies had effectively ended development by 2003, when California stopped requiring automakers to offer zero-emissions vehicles. Since then, electric car enthusiasts have been forced to pin their hopes on small independent companies — like ZAP.

“They tug at your heartstrings,” says Joseph Gottlieb, a ZAP dealer from the San Diego area who has filed an official complaint against ZAP with the Securities and Exchange Commission. “If ZAP was in any other business, the company would have been dead long ago. But they keep taking advantage of how much environmentalists — like me — want to see electric cars come to market.”

The lesson to be learned here: Greenies are easy to rip off if you tell them you’re trying to save the world.

Link [Wired] via [EcoGeek]

Oh The Humanity! Economic Downturn Impacting Wives of Rich Asshole Bankers

It looks like we’re staring down the barrel of a pretty healthy recession and it’s important to remember the people truly being affected by the economic downturn- the wives of rich bankers. The NY Post reports that the spouses of some of the guys behinds the Bear Sterns meltdown are cutting back on basic necessities like high end interior decorating. They have it:

“We only had about $50,000 worth of final touches [to go], and the wife called me last week and said stop,” said interior designer Darren Henault, whose work has been featured in Vanity Fair and Elle Decor.

“She said they’re not poor, and are never going to be poor,” Henault said, “but their capacity for discretionary income for things like window valances just went out the window.”

It just reminds me how cold and cruel the world can be.

Link [New York Post]

Payback is a Bitch: Treekilling Aussies Get Punked with Huge View-Blocking Box

So you know how your mom used to pull mean shit like washing your mouth out with soap if you used a dirty word or making you do push-ups till you cried when you tried on your sister’s dresses? Well, your mom is a bitch. And so is payback. An awesome, powerful, vengeful bitch- much like the bad ass Mother(earth)lovers of the Port Stephens Council.

A bunch of yuppie tree-murderers in Australia learned that lesson the hard way after the recent disappearance of 20 trees off the coast of Boat Harbor, Australia. The Daily Telegraph reported that after 20 Banksia trees were mysteriously chopped down to create a clearer waterfront view for the surrounding houses, the Council retaliated by slapping down two huge, green cargo carriers right where the trees were. The Council had already warned that chopping down trees was very naughty (and illegal), and they weren’t going to say it twice.

It was time for those bad little residents to pull down their pants and take their municipal spankings. Of course now the residents are whining that they were being treated like children. What do they expect? Break the rules in Port Stephens and you get your ass handed to you. Way to kick ass and take names Port Stephens.

Link [Daily Telegraph]

Bash Back at Bulk Mail: Send a Brick Back to Bulk Mailers on Their Dime- Legally!

Junk mail is a pain in the ass. You get all excited to check your mail, hoping for a fatty paycheck or a steamy note from Gladys in HR or at least your FerretFancy magazine, but instead you get shat on with bills for your most recent bladder operation and a ton of crap catalogues and credit card offers.

Besides being downright disappointing, crap mailings also use up around 100 million trees, around 30 billion gallons of water, and wastes about 300 million dollars in local tax money per year. Makes you just wanna leave a flaming shit on those bulk-mail guys’ doorsteps, am I right?

Well, check out this brilliant trick from the Office of Strategic Influence. Apparently, you can use those handy business-return envelopes to mail your steamy dump free of charge. The best part is that the poor bastards actually have to pay 20 cents per pound to receive your stool sample.

Okay, so it’s technically not legal to send poop, but you can definitely get away with sending something awkward and cumbersome like a brick. And there isn’t anyway they can track you down. Bwahahahaha! So fight the good fight, send a brick to bulk!

Link [Office of Strategic Influence]

For The Millionare Who Has Everything: The CarLoft Means Never Having To Say Hello (To Your Neighbors)

The other day I was wondering about hugely famous people like Oprah Winfrey, wondering if they ever even breathe fresh air anymore. I mean, a lot of celebrities drive (or are driven) from parking garage to parking garage – riding a complex series of elevators and automobiles, chutes and tunnels, until they arrive at their climate controlled destination. But what a bummer to always have to walk down the hall to the elevator that goes to the parking garage, right?

Thankfully, a German company with the ever-so-clever name of CarLoft is putting that long walk down the corridor to the parking garage elevator behind us. This incredible waste of money invention means that hi-rise city dwellers need not mingle with the likes of the creepy parking attendant or dirty up a shirtsleeve while reaching to swipe a parking card at an electric gate. (Again, perfect for celebrities.) No, you can just ease your beautiful ride into the lift, cruise on up and drive the thing onto your balcony. So your dinner party guests, who may have already arrived… via the (oh, how awful) front door… can greet you with a cocktail and then stand around and compliment you on your clear coat.

There’s something all too unnecessary about the CarLof. Not only will this elevator (remember, it’s a CAR elevator, people) consume unreal amounts of electricity, but the potential disasters are almost laughable: warming up the car and leaving the sliding glass door open is not recommended, I would imagine. And then there’s that whole idea about waving extremely heavy objects over crowded city streets. Not really thinking THAT’s a great idea either.

Thank you CarLoft, but I’ll take the stairs.

Link [CarLoft] via [Concept Trends]

Head For the Hills, Stock Up The Larder, And Git Yer Guns Loaded, Another Huge Antarctic Ice Shelf has Collapsed

Stock up the foot, clean the guns, and get your waders on- the collapse of the Antarctic ice shelf is in high gear. The Wilkins ice shelf, an area 160 square miles large, seven times the size of Manhattan, has suddenly collapsed. Scientists had the rare opportunity to film the collapse when they saw it happening over satellite images and diverted more lenses to cover it, even getting an airplane in the air to shoot video and photos.

There are two kinds of polar ice- sea ice and land ice (not the scientific names, but they’ll do here). The sea ice sits in the ocean, most of it sitting below water level. When those ice shelfs break off they don’t have much of an impact on sea levels. When the land ice- the glaciers sitting on the ground above sea level- collapses, it adds new mass into the ocean and can quickly raise sea levels across the globe.

The Antarctic land ice is being held back by the now quickly collapsing sea ice. As the world’s temperature rises snow and ice melt and run down to the ground through the glacier in giant ice tunnels. The water follows the slope of the land down to the ocean and acts like a lubricant between the ground and the glacier ice above. When the sea ice has collapsed enough not to hold up the lubricated land ice, it can all fall apart in a matter of hours and days.

How do you think the world would react to a 20 foot rise in sea levels over the course of a day? It’d be pure chaos and madness, epic disaster movie style.

Someone smarter than me has put together a Google Maps mashup that will show you what rising sea levels look like on a map of the world meter by meter. See for yourself. New York City would be really screwed.

The future will be nothing if not interesting.

Links [Huffington Post] & [The National Snow and Ice Data Center] & [The British Antarctic Survey]

Developing Nations Struggle to Cope with Rising Food Prices, Once Again The Poor Get Screwed

I live on the edge of town, with real farmland about a quarter mile away. The fields in one direction have been in alfalfa for a decade. Around the corner, in a second field, they’ve been growing tomatoes for about as long. A couple of months ago, I drove past and saw machinery in both places, and thought for a dark moment that it was another suburb going in–but no. With the housing market collapse, those days are gone. Instead, wheat sprouted and grew, hundreds of acres of it. The wheat is now tall enough that, when the wind blows through the fields, it looks like it should have its own inspirational soundtrack.

Why did they switch to wheat? Because the price has gone through the roof, which is having grim repercussions all over the world. From the International Herald Tribune:

Egypt’s government is struggling to contain a political crisis sparked by rising world food prices. Violent clashes have broken out at long lines for subsidized bread, and the president, worried about unrest, has ordered the army to step in to provide more.

The crisis in the world’s most populous Arab country and a top U.S. ally in the Mideast is a stark sign of how rising food prices are roiling poorer countries worldwide….

The issue in Egypt centers on subsidized versions of the flat, round bread that is a staple of people’s diets. Acute shortages of subsidized bread, which is sold at less than one U.S. cent a loaf, have caused long lines at distributors, prompting violence at some sites in poor neighborhoods in recent weeks.

At least seven people have died, according to police.

At first, one might hold Egypt’s kludgy government responsible, but as the article explains, economists place the blame “mainly on the rising cost of wheat on the world market, where prices have tripled in the last 10 months.” World food production has been a single integrated entity for a long time now, and it does respond to prices; hence, the ketchup tomatoes down the block from me made way for wheat. The problem is that it will still take months for that food to reach mouths in, say, Egypt, and hunger won’t wait that long.

Link [International Herald Tribune]

Photo Credit: Flickr user MrBologna

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