No North Pole Ice Makes For an Unhappy Fat Man: Letter From A Homeless Santa Claus

You Motherfuckers,

You couldn’t even give me the right warning, could you? Jolly old Nick, hanging out at the North Pole, building toys for all of your little whining brats, most of which take electricity or batteries or some other kind of something that you all choose to supply by burning a couple million tons of coal. That’s fine. I knew what was up. My cost was going to go through the roof I had to start putting clean energy in bad kid’s stockings. Lump of coal? A penny. Maybe. Cut in half. A goddamn solar cell? You get the point.

You don’t hang around popular legend for 200 years and not be able to spot a trend; when the ice started walking back in the 70s, I knew the workshop would have to pack up and move. But then you told me I’d be good until 2049. Guess who was procrastinating because he had to make one too many Tickle Me Elmo EXTREMEs last year and wanted to go on a six month bender? Don’t act like you’ve never done it. Like I said, you told me I had time.

We see how that worked out. Forty-one years away, and the workshop is on it’s way to Davy Jones’ locker. The ice I built it on so that you ungrateful little scamps could have a pretty picture in the TV specials? Disappearing like virgins in a freshman dormitory. We were going to try and hold out for one more year, but after Blitzen got eaten by a polar bear that had wandered off looking for food, we knew it was time to go. Good thing, too, or then you wouldn’t have me, trying to rebuild my operation. And then what would you do with all those sniveling spawn of yours during holiday trips to the mall?

You all seem happy to talk about me once a year, passing along tales of hope and joy, and sacrifice, and occasionally reminding me that I can be replaced by a drug dealer if you feel like it. I got news for you: all I need for Christmas this year is a place to stay. And unlimited access to your liquor cabinet. Santa’s kind of sick of Thunderbird on the park bench, you know what I’m saying? You little bastards owe it to me. Oh, and find somebody else to deliver your damn presents. You got your freebie. Now Santa’s gotta get his.

Up Yours,

S. Claus

EarthFirst.com’s 25 Hottest Girls In Green: 10 We Missed The First Time

Everybody makes mistakes. George Michael kissed Maybe on Arrested Development. Rob Lowe left The West Wing. The framers of the Constitution gave Florida the right to vote. And Earthfirst.com put together a list of the 25 hottest women in green. Of course, we proudly stand by the retina-damaging hotness (and the eco-cred!) of our original 25, but want to make sure to give credit where credit is due: there are a lot of hotties that love the earth out there, and here are ten more.

10. Sheryl Crow

Yeah, not bad for a 46-year-old cancer survivor, huh? Sheryl is an environmental whirlwind, even after her romance with Lance Armstrong gave rise to rumors that cancer was an STD; she’s toured with Laurie David to drum up grassroots support on college campuses, continually addresses climate change at her concert dates, and is instrumental in Reverb, an organization committed to greening musicians and their fans.

9. Colleen Smith

We’re serious: after finding this girl, we had to take a few minutes to wait for our brain to begin putting words in order in sentences again. Of course, the six foot six inch tall Colleen is far more than just one of the world’s best volleyball players–she’s been on the AVP tour since 2002–she also regularly stumps for the planet on her blog, Sixfootsix, and has launched Colleen’s Green Team, a group committed to stopping global warming because, well, she’s a pro beach volleyball player, and if the oceans rise…no more beach volleyball. Wanna join (Emphatic yes–Ben)? FInd one way to change your life for the planet, and go here.

8. Amber Valetta

We know: another starlet. But hear us out, because Amber Valetta is the real deal–we didn’t know who the hell she was until we started searching based on green cred, and we’ve actually seen some of her movies. You can also consider us in mourning of her 1990s relationship with Leonardo Decaprio, which would have doubtlessly resulted in eco-freindly superchildren that were so attractive they made your head hurt. Of course, we’re not in the habit of giving out spots on this list for who your ex is, so here goes: Amber isn’t just effective as a spokeswoman in the environmental movement, where she volunteers her time to Oceana speaking about the multitude of dangers (mercury, overfishing, plastic, anything else we do) humanity imposes on the world’s oceans, she’s also lured Ted Danson (who’s on Oceana’s board) into the public light more frequently, most recently using their fame to support Wild Oats market’s commitment to sustainability and proper labeling on their seafood.

7. KT Tunstall

The Scottish singer-songwriter has long made her feelings on the environment well-known, playing Live Earth and personally ensuring that her tours are eco-friendly. She’s also planning a green renovation of her apartment with Global Cool, who will install solar panels and an energy-saving boiler in order to allow KT to live off of the grid entirely.

6. Norah Jones

Norah, the Bengali-American voice from above, has taken a simple, direct step that we wish other musicians would as well: she’s signed on with Reverb, a nonprofit org founded by Adam Gardner of Guster that promotes eco-friendly touring in all facets: venues, transportation, catering, energy efficiency: you name it.

5. Jill Danyelle

Jill, in addition to being Inhabitat’s fashion editor, may have done the coolest thing we’ve ever seen: fiftyRX3, a project to ensure that she was wearing at least 50% sustainable clothing for an entire year. She’s doing more than her part to make sure that style and sustainability intersect, and looking darn good doing it.

4. Rebecca Carter

Rebecca Carter should probably be on this list twice: she’s a co-founder of Ecorazzi, which keeps us dealing in enough green gossip that this list was far easier to come up with than you would imagine. This proud Florida Gator alum currently lives in Miami, where in addition to Ecorazzi, she runs Greener Miami all by her lonesome. Or, well, did, until Oliver was born–her first child has placed her on maternity leave, even while we’re placing her on the ‘hottest in green’ list.

3. Sarah Meredith Roe

Sarah is a Jetson Green contributor, and all-around environmental star: she’s renovating a home form the 1950s in New Hampshire, and is using her design background to explore sustainable options–including LEED, and the use of prefabricated components. Sarah is also an artist that’s actively seeking to make use of eco-friendly art supplies, a conservationist who wants to protect 10,000 acres in her lifetime, and will be teaching at Phillips Exeter Academy in the fall.

2. Noelle d’Estries

Let’s go ahead and get this out there: you should probably feel a deep, jealous sort of hate for Noelle. Not only is she smart (Rochester Institute of Technology), not only is she versatile (we’ve had other green authors on this list, but we don’t think any of them ever wrote about the environment AND cancer AND a bar scene), and not only is she athletic (4 years on RIT’s basketball team): she looks like that. We’ll give you a moment to compose yourselves. You can see her writing, among many, many other places, on Green Options and Planetsave, where she’s an editor, and her own site, Worst Cook Ever.

1. Majora Carter

Majora is the founder of Sustainable South Bronx, an organization devoted to replacing decaying infrastructure in the Bronx with green space and environmentally friendly community areas, including the demolition of the impassible Sheridan Expressway for riverfront housing. Majora was also selected to carry the Olympic torch in San Francisco this year, when she drew the ire of the Chinese security team by pulling a Tibetan flag out of her sleeve once the torch was in her possession.

Waste Management Inc.’s ‘Greenopolis’ Social Network: One Big Greenwashed Ad?

Is ‘Greenopolis’, the new green social networking site, a cool place for like-minded people to discuss their efforts to lower their carbon footprints and help the environment, or simply a multi-billion-dollar corporation’s effort to greenwash its reputation?

Greenopolis is meant to give people an easy way to communicate about green practices, providing environmental resources and facts. There’s also a ‘green merit badge’ system, that while meant to motivate and reward people for making incremental steps toward being more green, reminds me of the sort of my-shit-don’t-stink elitism that turns the general public off of the green movement (Smug Alert!).

TechCrunch, for one, thinks that Greenopolis is basically just an advertisement, and not a very well-thought-out one at that:

Frankly this should just be an application on Facebook and MySpace, it would get better traction. But that’s not what the consultants told Waste Management (a $20 billion company that, well, manages waste), I’m guessing, since today they’ve launched Greenopolis, a social network for greenies.

They’re committed, they say, to connecting people and businesses on green issues, and teach people about ways to be more environmentally sound. Like other social networks, members can create profiles and add friends. Users also rack up Green Points and have a Green Profile, which shows just how much they care about the environment.

Greenopolis, I suspect, is designed to show that Waste Management cares about the environment more than anything else. So in a way, it’s like an advertisement. See ZeroFootprint, a Canadian company we’ve covered that also creates local social networks around carbon offsetting in partnership with cities.

It’s a good point – is there really even a need for a stand-alone green social network? How many social networks can one person participate in? Are Greenopolis’ features enough to draw people away from Myspace and Facebook? Probably not, except for those people who are already committed to environmental advocacy. They’re not likely to get a huge influx of advertisers’ favorite targets: social-network-savvy teens and young adults with impressionable minds and lots of discretionary income.

One thing I noticed while browsing the member directory is that there are an awful lot of marketing professionals and companies pushing ‘green’ products (along with a whole lot of Waste Management employees). Greenopolis has the potential to become a greenwashed marketing free-for-all. Hopefully Greenopolis members approach product marketing on the site with a healthy dose of skepticism.

There’s also the fact that this is coming from Waste Management Inc., a $20 billion dollar company that rebranded themselves as ‘green’ after several toxic spills and illegal dumping allegations in the 80s and an accounting scandal in 1998. Their own ads certainly border on greenwashing – boasting, for example, that the waste they’ve collected has powered over 1 million homes, when recycling waste saves far more energy than burning it could create – plus, trash incinerators are the leading source of dioxins, super-toxic carcinogenic chemicals. Signs on their trucks say ‘Last year we recycled enough paper to save over 41 million trees’, yet they recycle less than 5% of the trash they collect.

Is Waste Management, Inc. using Greenopolis as a way to improve their image? Joe Vaillancourt, managing director of Waste Management’s organic growth group had this to say in a press release put out by the company: “We believe that by promoting and creating a dialogue about things such as conservation, recycling, and renewable energy that awareness about our environmental operations and our business offerings will increase.”

Is Waste Management America’s largest recycler? Yes – no other company has been able to get their foot in the door. But are they doing enough to legitimately call themselves green? No. You can’t trust when companies put out ads claiming to be stewards of the environment – even monster polluter Monsanto claims to be green. Since Waste Management Inc. has a virtual stranglehold on the trash industry in the U.S., they’ll continue to profit regardless of whether they make advances in green waste management practices. And as long as the public is convinced that they’re a green company, they can take their sweet time getting around to environmentally friendly practices that are expensive or inconvenient for them.

It’s difficult to categorically call ‘greenwashing’ on Waste Management Inc.’s ‘Greenopolis’, since the company has made some strides toward being greener – but not as many as they’d like the public to think (just look at their catchphrase – ‘Think Green. Think Waste Management’.) I’d like to see them take cues from Germany, where no biodegradable waste or recyclable materials go to landfills. Naturally, combating the waste problem here in the U.S. will have to be a joint effort between the corporations who package products, the consumers who buy them and waste management companies, so they can’t do it all on their own – but they can do more.

Efforts like creating a ‘green’ social network shouldn’t distract the public from the actual practices of Waste Management, Inc. The company has set themselves up for intense scrutiny through their green rebranding, so they’d better be prepared to put their money where their mouth is, so to speak. Just being the greenest waste management company in the country isn’t enough when other companies are barely making an effort at all. To truly be green, Waste Management Inc. needs to really step up their environmental initiatives.

Greenopolis may hold some value for people who lack any other forum to connect on green issues, though die-hard environmentalists aren’t likely to get much out of it other than possibly networking and/or educating others. As long as members are aware of the potential for greenwashing – and don’t participate as an alternative to actually being active in their own communities – Greenopolis could act as a portal to get green newbies interested and educated in environmental issues.

Link [TechCrunch] + [Greenopolis]

‘RepRap’ Robot Can Replicate Itself

It’s begun. The robots are taking over – plastic robots, to boot. English researchers have created a robot that can create 3-D replicas of objects like shoes and coat hooks – and can even replicate itself. It’s meant for the average person to have on their desktop, so you can create common plastic items as needed in your own home.

From PC World:

Scientists from the University of Bath in England unveiled an open-source machine that acts like a three-dimensional printer. Instead of printing out documents or pictures on paper, this printer uses blueprints to produce 3-D plastic objects.

The machine has been dubbed RepRap, which is short for replicating rapid-prototyper.

The goal is to eventually build a robot that can produce individual processors and circuit boards so people can build their own computers, according to Zack Smith, director of the RepRap Research Foundation.

Smith explained that unlike a regular printer that uses ink, RepRap heats up plastic and then squeezes it out into a line. The lines are built up into usable forms as they solidify. So far, the robot has made everyday plastic objects, like door handles, sandals and coat hooks. The machine has also successfully copied all of its own structural pieces.

It’ll likely be about 20 years before the robot can fully replicate itself. So, those of us with the sense to realize that giving machines intelligence is a deadly mistake have some time to start preparing.

Seriously though, this machine has the potential to either produce tons of useless plastic junk that will end up polluting the earth – or it could reduce our dependence on China for cheap manufacturing. (Chris DiBona, Google’s Open Source Programs Manager, said “Think of RepRap as China on your desktop”.)

The jury’s still out on how good it would ultimately be for the planet. It certainly seems like it could potentially cause a copyright lawsuit extravaganza as people stopped purchasing everyday items from stores and just created them at home.

Get more details at the RepRap website.

Link [PC World] + [RepRap]

Top Climatologist Wants Oil Company CEOs on Trial for Crimes Against Humanity

Climate scientist James E. Hansen called for putting oil companies on trial for crimes against humanity last Monday on Capitol Hill. Hansen stated that the heads of oil companies, who knowingly delayed action on greenhouse gas emissions, are guilty of crimes against humanity and nature and should be prosecuted thusly.

From Hansen’s speech, via Dot Earth:

CEOs of fossil energy companies know what they are doing and are aware of long-term consequences of continued business as usual. In my opinion, these CEOs should be tried for high crimes against humanity and nature.

Conviction of ExxonMobil and Peabody Coal CEOs will be no consolation, if we pass on a runaway climate to our children. Humanity would be impoverished by ravages of continually shifting shorelines and intensification of regional climate extremes. Loss of countless species would leave a more desolate planet.

If politicians remain at loggerheads, citizens must lead. We must demand a moratorium on new coal-fired power plants. We must block fossil fuel interests who aim to squeeze every last drop of oil from public lands, off-shore, and wilderness areas. Those last drops are no solution. They yield continued exorbitant profits for a short-sighted self-serving industry, but no alleviation of our addiction or long-term energy source.

Hell yeah! We’ll sign that petition. A commenter calling himself ‘blindjester’ on a related story at The Huffington Post Green sums it up nicely: “If you cause the injury of a few people, you get sued. You cause the death of someone, you go to jail. If you’re wealthy enough and powerful enough to contribute to disease and death worldwide, you get to live in a mansion.”

Link [Dot Earth] + [The Huffington Post]

McCain Proposes $300 Million Prize for Alternative Auto Battery

If John McCain has his way, coming up with a new sustainable energy solution will be one big game show. McCain has proposed a $300 million prize to anyone who can develop an automobile battery that best surpasses existing technology.

From CNN:

McCain said the new automobile battery should have “the size, capacity, cost and power to leapfrog the commercially available plug-in hybrids or electric cars.”

“In the quest for alternatives to oil, our government has thrown around enough money subsidizing special interests and excusing failure,” McCain said. “From now on, we will encourage heroic efforts in engineering, and we will reward the greatest success.”

Obama’s response, per the Detroit News:

“When John F. Kennedy decided that we were going to put a man on the moon, he didn’t put a bounty out for some rocket scientist to win — he put the full resources of the United States government behind the project and called on the ingenuity and innovation of the American people,” the Illinois senator said in a speech in Las Vegas. “That’s the kind of effort we need to achieve energy independence in this country, and nothing less will do.”

McCain’s battery proposal is no doubt an attempt to get back in the favor of some moderate environmentalists who disagree with his views on offshore drilling. If he were really serious about improving battery technology, he’d pledge to invest money in research grants and other incentives. Even with the possibility of $300 million at the end of the road, individuals and small companies would be unlikely to afford the research that would be necessary to create such a battery – more likely, the prize would end up in the hands of some huge corporation. Hardly a way to encourage American innovation. McCain might as well just ready himself for the reaming he’s gonna take in November.

Link [CNN] + [Detroit News]
Photo credit: Flickr user aflcio2008

American Environmentalists Helping Iran Save the Asiatic Cheetah

America and Iran may not get along politically, but that isn’t stopping environmentalists in both countries from coming together with a common goal: saving the Asiatic cheetah, a beautiful animal on the brink of extinction. Fewer than 100 remain in the deserts of central Iran. Iran’s department of Environment has now teamed up with the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) to trap and track the cheetahs before they’re gone forever.

From Times Online:

In his recent tours of the Middle East, President Bush urged America’s allies to isolate Iran over its nuclear programme, saying that the safety of the world was at stake.

But the safety of the cheetahs appears to have trumped such concerns. Researchers say that the animals, also known as Iranian cheetahs, once roamed between the Arabian peninsula and India, thriving in the arid, rugged landscape.

After the Iranian Revolution of 1979 the cheetah and its principal prey, gazelles, were hunted, causing their numbers to dwindle dangerously low.

As worked up as Bush is over Iran, let’s hope his administration doesn’t hear about this – they’d just firebomb the cheetahs and use that as a catalyst to start a war.

Link [Times Online]
Photo credit: I.R.Iran DOE/CACP/WCS/UNDP-GEF

‘Pulse and Glide’ to Save Gas

A group of five ‘efficiency aficionados’ drove an unmodified 2nd generation Toyota Prius to a fuel economy record of 109.3 miles per gallon over 1397 miles in Pittsburg, PA using a driving technique they call ‘pulse and glide’. This was in 2006, but many people still don’t know about ‘pulse and glide’ and how it can save them gas – even if they’re not driving a hybrid. It could cut down on pollution, too, due to decreased emissions while the car is in neutral.

From Metrompg.com:

Pulse and glide works like this: let’s say you’re on a road where you want to go 60 km/h. Instead of driving along at a steady 60, you instead accelerate to 70 (that’s the pulse), and then coast in neutral with the engine off down to 50 (that’s the glide). That’s it. Rinse and repeat. And repeat. And repeat…

By doing this, you’re still averaging 60 km/h, but it turns out that pulse and glide is significantly more efficient than driving along maintaining a steady 60 km/h.

Metrompg.com put the technique to the test in a Geo Metro, modifying the technique to eliminate the ‘turning the engine off’ part, since that wouldn’t be practical – he just put the car in neutral during the ‘glide’ part. (If you’re not familiar with hybrids, the engine shuts off automatically when you lift of the accelerator).

With the engine idling, and the car in neutral, the average mpg shown on the ScanGauge in the glide down from 90-70 km/h was 550 mpg. When you average that against the 34 mpg of the pulse, it works out to an average of 64 mpg. Now we’re at an 8% increase over the steady-state mpg.

I would name the difference between the two techniques “full” pulse & glide (neutral, with engine off in the glide) vs. “mild” (neutral, with engine idling in the glide).

So, now you know the next time you find yourself cruising down a lonely road at a steady speed, you’re not getting the best mileage you could. You could be pulsing & gliding to maintain the same average speed, and saving lots of fuel in the process.

This technique isn’t always practical in real-world driving; it’s best for those long lonely roads where they’re aren’t many other cars around. Of course, it’s all a bit more complicated than the summary above - get all the details at Metrompg.com.

Link [Metrompg.com]

Art Etched Into the Dirt on Car Windows

Artists can be pretty resourceful – there are some incredible works out there made from materials you would never have thought could create something beautiful. You could certainly classify works made from recycled materials or ‘found objects’ as ‘green art’. I’m not sure that it gets much more green than this, though: creating beautiful images from the dirt on car windows. Images that will completely dissipate with the first subsequent rain.  These photos might make you think twice about writing ‘wash me’ on the window of a dirty car.

See more at Cool Things and DirtyCarArt.com.

Link [Cool Things] + [Dirty Car Art]

Tough Old Lady Wouldn’t Move Despite Encroaching Development

All Edith Macefield wanted was to live - and die - in peace in her tiny cottage in Ballard, just outside Seattle, Washington. Edith saw her residential neighborhood turn into an industrial area around her over the decades, and refused to move when developers tried to buy her out. She had been offered nearly a million dollars to move and allow her home to be bulldozed, but she didn’t want it. In her mid-eighties, Edith didn’t want to be forced out of her home to live out her remaining days in a foreign place.

When an area reporter wrote about her story in the paper in 2006, Edith received letters and flowers from all over the world.

From The Seattle Times:

“I’m no hero,” she said. “I meant it. I just want to be left alone.”

Edith died Sunday, at 86. She died in the tiny cottage she had refused to leave, not for a million bucks.

“She got what she wanted,” said Charlie Peck, a longtime friend. “She wanted to die at home, in the same house, on the same couch, where her mother had died. That’s what she was so stubborn about.”

He said she was never trying to stick it to The Man. Or to make any larger statement against development or money or anything else.

Yet to look at her house today, it’s hard not to be impressed by her iron will, no matter her motivation.

Today it sits walled in on three sides by what will be a five-story health club and a Trader Joe’s.

Edith has no known relatives, and it’s believed that she left the property to the senior construction superintendent for Ledcor, the company that’s been building up around her house. He had been taking care of her. It’s unknown what will happen to the house now – friends would like to see it preserved as a reminder of Edith and ‘Old Ballard’, the way it was when the home was surrounded by other homes and not 5-story concrete complexes.

What a cool story. That is definitely some iron will – to stay in the house despite construction going on literally right outside your windows.

Link [The Seattle Times]
Photo credit: ALAN BERNER / THE SEATTLE TIMES

China Gets a Bargain on Peru’s ‘Copper Mountain’

One of the most productive copper mines on earth – Mount Toromocho in Peru – is now in the hands of China. Chinese officials plan to exploit the mountain for all it’s worth, sending all of the copper back home to carry out the electrification of the entire country. The deal not only cheats Peruvians out of the true value of the copper mine, since it was sold to China for such a ‘great bargain’, but will displace all of the residents of the area.

From the BBC:

The Peruvian government is happy with the $3bn (£1.53bn) that Chinalco will invest in the Toromocho mines.

The Chinese will be even happier. They have got themselves a bargain.

The copper Chinalco extracts from Toromocho will cost something like US$410 (£210) per ton. Today, the price for copper on the London Metal Exchange was $8,255 (£4,220) - 20 times more.

Chinalco stands to make a 2,000% profit on its investment.

As destructive as it is, there should be a worldwide ban on mountaintop removal for mining purposes. This isn’t just about frightening amounts of power in the hands of China, taking advantage of poor countries, forcing people out of their homes and displacing wildlife. It’s a scary trend that threatens the beauty of the natural world and has the potential to create even more pollution than we’re already dealing with. China has already shown that the environment is far from its top priority, and as the BBC mentions, it has ‘vast reserves of foreign currency’ at its disposal.

Link [BBC]

Photos of the Mud Volcano in East Java, Indonesia

Last week, we told you about the mud volcano that has destroyed a huge section of East Java, Indonesia as it bubbles forth an astonishing 100,000 cubic meters per day. The mud volcano, caused by oil drilling, has displaced tens of thousands of people and caused millions of dollars in damage. These amazing photos, taken by Reuters photographer Sigit Pamungkas, depict the wasteland that the affected area has become and attempts by villagers to salvage materials left behind in the wreckage.

From Boston.com:

Link [Boston.com]

Beleaguered Airline Industry Forced to Start Going Green

Things are looking pretty grim for the airline industry, which has suffered major setbacks in the last couple of years due to rising fuel costs. They’re not just dealing with how to stay in the sky without charging customers outrageous prices, though: environmentalists are forcing the industry to finally take responsibility for the huge amounts of carbon emitted by air travel. All of these factors have airlines scrambling to save themselves, and they’re finally putting some real innovation to work in the process.

From Wired:

Virgin Atlantic recently made a test flight of a Boeing 747 fueled by a mixture of kerosene and biofuel derived from coconut and babassu oil. But the emphasis is on algae, led by Boeing’s recent commitment to the alt fuel and efforts by JetBlue and KLM Royal Dutch Airlines to turn pond scum into fuel.

Christopher Surgenor, editor of GreenAirOnline, says algal fuel is the most promising alternative because “It has the right properties for a jet fuel and can be produced in comparatively large quantities.” But others say it’s too early in the game to pick a winner, and Arvi warns that narrowing the research to one field “is self-defeating. It stifles innovation.”

For all the advancements in engines and airframes, the system we use for moving all those planes around is stuck in the 1940s. Airlines say replacing the radar-based air traffic control infrastructure with a satellite system would reduce fuel consumption and cut emissions by 10 to 15 percent while making the business of getting planes in and out of airports more efficient. Adopting a more efficient means of approaching airports — called “continuous descent approach” — would further cut fuel consumption and emissions while also reducing noise.

Unfortunately, none of these solutions provide a quick fix for the problems that are plaguing the industry today. It’ll be 2-3 years before we see next generation aircraft, and modernized air traffic control is at least a decade away. Analysts say that alternative fuels won’t be anything more than a pipe dream for at least 5 years. And there are some critics who are skeptical that green initiatives will do anything at all for the industry and are simultaneously denying greenwashing accusations: “We care about the environment and we want a clean planet. We just don’t want the industry to get ruined in the process”, says Ernest Arvi, CEO of aviation consultancy The Arvi Group.

They’d better figure out something quick, because with oil prices reaching new heights nearly every day, soon the everyday person won’t be able to afford air travel.

Link [Wired]
Photo credit: Flickr user lrargerich

Officials in California Filling Pools with Mosquito Fish

For months, there have been little mentions here and there about how officials all over the country are worried about mosquitoes breeding in the brackish pools behind abandoned, foreclosed homes. You would think that the standard response would be a) drain the freaking pools, b) put forth some kind of community effort to either get people back in the homes or c) drop some mosquito dunks in there. But, the brilliant officials in California have decided that mosquito-larvae-eating fish are the solution.

From Treehugger:

The mortgage crisis is not only wrecking peoples’ lives, it’s not doing much good for the environment, either. The swimming pools of abandoned homes are perfect mosquito breeding grounds, there are worries about rampant West Nile Virus infections. In California, authorities are using airplanes to find green pools and are filling them with the Gambusia affinis, or mosquito fish, which eats the larvae.

“They are real heroes,” says Josefa Cabada, a technician at the Contra Costa Mosquito & Vector Control District, a government agency, in the Wall Street Journal. “I’ve never seen a mosquito in a pool with mosquito fish.”

The problem (despite the obvious one of, uh, fish in swimming pools) is that these fish wreak havoc on each new ecosystem they’re placed in. They’ve displaced native species all over the world, and are apparently ‘master escape artists’, able to travel in as little as 3 millimeters of water.

Surely, there is a better solution than this – it sounds like a story in The Onion.

Link [Treehugger]
Photo credit: DAVID CARLSON / The Californian

Story of ‘Uncontacted Brazilian Tribe’ Not Entirely True

We got punked, along with the rest of the world. When the Brazilian media released photos of an ‘undiscovered native tribe’ in the Amazon, painted head-to-toe and pointing spears at the airplane that was flying overhead, people around the world were amazed. Now, it’s been revealed that, while this is indeed a real uncontacted tribe, the Brazilian government has known about them for decades – so they aren’t ‘newly discovered’.

It turns out that Carlos Meirelles, who works for the Brazilian Indian Protection Agency, Funai, intentionally flew over the area where the tribe is known to live in an attempt to get a photograph, so that he could both prove wrong those people who insist there are no more isolated tribes left in the world, and so he could call attention to the danger facing them in the form of outside contact. Ironically, flying over the tribe in an airplane and photographing them is, in itself, a form of outside contact.

From The Guardian:

In his first interviews since the disclosure of the tribe’s existence, Meirelles described how he found the group, detailed how they lived and how he planned the publicity to protect them and other tribes in similar danger of losing the habitat in which they have flourished for hundreds of years.

Meirelles admitted that the tribe was first known about almost a century ago and that the apparently chance encounter that produced the now famous images was no accident. ‘When we think we might have found an isolated tribe,’ he told al-Jazeera, ‘a sertanista like me walks in the forest for two or three years to gather evidence and we mark it in our [global positioning system]. We then map the territory the Indians occupy and we draw that protected territory without making contact with them. And finally we set up a small outpost where we can monitor their protection.’

Meirelles wanted proof that the tribes were flourishing, to confirm that the government policy of no contact and protection was working. The aim was partially to convince Peru’s president, Alan Garcia, that the tribe is real, since Garcia has stated in the past that he thinks uncontacted tribes along the Peru/Brazil border are ‘the creation of the imagination’ of environmentalists and anthropologists. Since the photos were released, Peru has begun to re-examine their logging policies – they had been cutting down trees dangerously close to the tribe’s home.

Hopefully all of this will preserve the areas of the Amazon where native tribes still live, so that, in the event that they did become aware of outside society, they would still have a choice as to whether they wanted to join it or continue living as they have been. Imagine how traumatic it would be for them to be forced into modern society due to logging.

Link [The Guardian]

Climatologist Renews Call to Act on Global Warming

20 years ago, climatologist James E. Hansen addressed the Senate with a dire warning about global warming: it was time to act. The climate was already changing, and the heat-trapping blanket of carbon dioxide and other gases in the atmosphere was accumulating fast.

Since then, little real action has been taken; if anything, things have gotten much worse. We’ve continued to release huge amounts of CO2 into the atmosphere as we stubbornly cling to an era of fossil fuels and free-flowing pollution. Now, Hansen says, it’s almost getting to be too late: we’re approaching the red line, and soon there will be no going back.

From The New York Times:

“If we don’t begin to reduce greenhouse gas emissions in the next several years, and really on a very different course, then we are in trouble,” Dr. Hansen said Friday at NASA’s Goddard Institute for Space Studies in New York, which he has directed since 1981. “Then the ice sheets are in trouble. Many species on the planet are in trouble.”

Dr. Hansen said the natural skepticism and debates embedded in the scientific process had distracted the public from the confidence experts have in a future with centuries of changing climate patterns and higher sea levels under rising carbon dioxide concentrations. The confusion has been amplified by industries that extract or rely on fossil fuels, he said, and this has given cover to politicians who rely on contributions from such industries.

Dr. Hansen said the United States must begin a sustained effort to exploit new energy sources and phase out unfettered burning of finite fossil fuels, starting with a moratorium on the construction of coal-burning power plants if they lack systems for capturing and burying carbon dioxide. Such systems exist but have not been tested at anywhere near the scale required to blunt emissions. Ultimately he is seeking a worldwide end to emissions from coal burning by 2030.

Since the time to act was decades ago, it makes it all the more urgent to make swift, far-reaching, dramatic changes to the way we live in order to preserve the planet – and the species that live upon it.

This makes me want to shake global warming skeptics. We’ve seen enough of them drop by EarthFirst and leave comments to the effect of, ‘it’s too expensive to change’, ‘I don’t want to give up my lifestyle’ or ‘I just don’t believe that global warming is caused by humans’. Are you really that selfish and naïve? Do you really believe that you’re so entitled to your current lifestyle of driving an SUV, living in a needlessly large house, profiting off of oil industry stock and whatever else it is that’s so precious to you, you refuse to give it up? What about your grandchildren – what kind of a world are they going to live in? You’re leaving behind a legacy of death and destruction because you’re set in your selfish ways.

Here’s the thing: deny that global warming is caused by humans all you want, or even that global warming isn’t real, as unbelievably stupid as that is. What it comes down to is our way of life is putting a huge strain on our planet. We’re using up precious resources at an alarming pace, removing mountaintops to get to coal, spewing pollution into the atmosphere, killing millions of species, dumping trash in the oceans, creating mountains upon mountains of toxic refuse. We’re poisoning our bodies, our soil, our air, our water, the animals around us – everything that we depend upon to survive. These actions will have consequences, whether you want to face it or not. It’s time to move forward into the 21st century, and take responsibility.

Link [The New York Times]
Photo credit: Flickr user ximenatapia

Fewer Traffic Signals, Signs & Curbs for Better Safety?

Two European towns have proven that you don’t necessarily need road signs, curbs, sidewalks and stop lights to have safe intersections where motor vehicles, pedestrians and bicyclists can share the road. Though this seems counterintuitive, for the Dutch town of Drachten and Bohmte, Germany, it has worked brilliantly to reduce accidents and provide an all-around safer atmosphere for everyone.

I first heard of the idea on NPR back in January, as Kyle James explained Bohmte’s reasoning for removing all traffic control implements in an attempt to manage a busy, often jammed intersection where 12,000 cars and trucks pass through on an average day. Drivers who pass through the area now that it’s been revamped say that traffic moves slower, but in a more orderly way as every person is more aware of those around them. Instead of a free-for-all where each person tries to cut in front of the other in order to get ahead, drivers, pedestrians and bicyclists actually communicate through eye contact and hand gestures to safely navigate the streets.

From NPR:

Advocates of this traffic-management philosophy, called Shared Space, say it works. Ben Hamilton-Baillie is a leading Shared Space advocate based in Bristol, England.

“If you’re faced with a traffic signal, you don’t have to think anymore. Whether you go depends on whether the light is red or green,” he says. “In the absence of such things, we’re perfectly capable of reading and understanding the situation so that if grandma’s in the road ahead of you, you don’t run her over.”

He compares the Shared Space concept to an ice skating rink. It might look chaotic, but people usually navigate the shared area pretty well. In a traffic context, it means cars, bicyclists and pedestrians are in much closer proximity than they usually are.

But common sense and courtesy, as well as drivers feeling more a part of the space they’re moving through, is supposed to cut down on accidents.

OntheCommons.org also explored this idea, citing the case of Drachten, where the main thoroughfare sees 22,000 cars per day. Once they adopted the ‘shared space’ approach, casualties at one junction dropped from 36 over the previous 4 years to only 2 in the 2 years following the removal of traffic lights. Traffic jams no longer occur at all.

From OntheCommons.org:

The idea is to return public spaces to people in order to encourage them to take greater personal responsibility. Monderman explained, “We’re losing our capacity for socially responsible behavior….The greater the number of prescriptions, the more people’s sense of personal responsibility dwindles.”

I think this is a great idea, in that it forces people to stop talking on their cell phones, daydreaming, fiddling with the radio and other things that distract them and actually, you know, DRIVE. Being aware of your surroundings is a huge factor in traffic safety. Navigating the streets of America, you’ll most often find that everyone is so engrossed in themselves and where they need to go that they hardly pay attention to everyone else – they weave in and out of traffic at will and expect everyone else to get out of the way. Removing traffic signs would certainly be one way of making sure people were alert.

One thing that I wonder, though, is how much the training of drivers plays into the success of these programs in the Netherlands and Germany. After all, both countries are known for the rigorous training periods that potential drivers must go through before receiving a license. Many drivers in Holland must take up to 25 two-hour driving classes before obtaining certification. In Germany, a license costs $1500-$2,000 and requires a minimum of 25-45 hours of professional instruction plus 12 hours of theory.

In America, you barely have to meet the low standards of DMV employees for 10 minutes and pass what basically amounts to a memorization test in order to get a license. It’s mind-bogglingly easy to get and retain a driver’s license here, opening the roads up to all sorts of half-blind idiots who don’t even grasp the concept that the left lane is for passing. So, I’m not sure that such a concept would work here without a retooling of the whole driver licensing song-and-dance.

It’s a great theory, though, and I’d love to see more cities adopt it all over the world so we can get a better idea of exactly how well it works. We certainly need some kind of push for drivers to be more conscious of bicyclists and pedestrians, so that the roads are safer for all of us.

Link [OntheCommons.org] + [NPR]
Photo credit: Khuê Pham for NPR

‘Hell on Earth’ in Bangladesh: The Lives of Shipbreakers

There are many moments in life where you realize just how good you have it: you’re clothed, fed, and sheltered, and have a job that doesn’t subject you to constant broken bones, burns, malaria, cholera, dysentery, tuberculosis and great risk of drowning. And that’s enough, isn’t it?

Unfortunately for the shipbreakers in Chittagong, Bangladesh, life is not that good. Every malady I listed is what faces them each day, as they disassemble old, rusting ships sent to India by first-world countries to be sold as scraps. It’s difficult to get to Chittagong – tourists aren’t allowed nearby, and if you try to bring in a camera, you’ll find yourself in jail.

DeviantArt user alexiuss has compiled all of these photographs and the following information on Chittagong, which more closely resembles hell on earth than anything I’ve ever seen.

From the journal entry:

These ShipBreakers scrap the world’s ships with little more than their bare hands.

Despite wretched conditions, they say it is better to work and die than to starve and die.

Using blow torches, sledgehammers, chisels and wedges workers break the mammouth steel behemoths.

Massive slabs of carved up ships, plunge into the water, raising clouds of mist.

After the huge pieces crash into the water like glaciers calving, they are winched onto shore where they are cut up into bite-size pieces weighing hundreds of pounds then lifted and loaded by teams of guys–who sing in rhythm as they walk lock-step carrying the very heavy inch-thick steel plates–onto trucks

These metal scraps are sold (very profitably by the owners who live in huge mansions in town) as scrap metal across the country and Asia (with some reworked into ‘new’ ships).

This ShipBreaking installation exists because of the tide. It is one of those places — like the Bay of Fundy in Canada — where a host of geographical circumstances come together to create exceptionally large differences between the twice-daily high and low tides. Coupled with a soft, shelving beach, the tides at Alang make shipbreaking possible with a minimum of construction. There are no piers or drydocks. Ships are simply run onto the shore, and sometimes even pulled by the ShipBreakers towards their final destination.
ShipBreakers live in hovels built of scrap, with no showers, toilets or latrines. You can see such hovels from space using google map:

Ship breaking is done from 7 AM to 11 PM (same crew) with two half hour breaks and an hour for lunch (supper is eaten after they go home at 11); 14 hours a day, 6-1/2 days a week (off half day Friday for Muslim observations).

Workers in Alang begin stirring around 7:30 a.m.. Some wash from a bucket on the muddy ground outside their huts. Others squat by puddles, dipping toothbrushes in the yellow water and cleaning their teeth. There’s early morning coughing all around.

I don’t know about you, but this sure as hell makes me incredibly grateful that I’m safe and comfortable in my home as a paid blogger. I can’t begin to imagine living such a life as the shipbreakers lead.

Get the whole story on DeviantArt.

Link [DeviantArt]

Chicago Tribune’s Top 8 Anti-Green Celebrities

The Chicago Tribune has released ‘A big, hot mess’ – their top 8 list of celebrities who aren’t going green. We’ve covered some of them before – like #1 Celine Dion’s massive water use at a home in Florida that she doesn’t even use. John Travolta’s fleet of planes, including a Boeing 707 complete with multiple dining rooms, puts him at #5. Most of the others on the list won’t surprise you at all, given their penchant for disgusting displays of wealth.

One choice we have beef with, though, is that of Al Gore. The Chicago Tribune rationalizes his inclusion by saying,

Al Gore’s Nashville home may be considered “carbon neutral,” but in 2007 it was reported that the Gores’ use of electricity (in kilowatt hours) was 12 times that of the average person in the area, according to USA Today. Although a Gore spokesperson said he had bought enough “green power” to balance his electrical costs, the situation nonetheless prompted skeptics to call him a hypocrite.

This is a B.S. reason to put him on a list of anti-green celebrities. Yes, the Tennessee Center for Policy Research, a bunk-ass right wing organization that refuses to disclose its funding sources, wrote a scathing report on energy use at Gore’s Tennessee home. That report didn’t bother to reveal the fact that during the period reported on, extensive renovations to make the home more green were in progress - hence the extra energy use – as well as the fact that Gore offsets 100% of that energy use. Gore and wife Tipper both work from home, as well, so energy use is bound to be higher than ‘the average person in the area’. We’ll go into that more next week when we take a closer look at the Tennessee Center for Policy Research’s allegations and who they really are.

Meanwhile, check out the rest of the Chicago Tribune’s list, ‘A big, hot mess’.

Link [The Chicago Tribune]

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