Tag Archives: Environment

Gubernatorial Forum- Energy & Environment

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On June 29th, a two-hour gubernatorial forum was held in downtown Boston’s historic Old South Meeting House.

All candidates for Governor were welcomed to make a statement, followed by a short Q&A by the audience and two panelists.

The first candidate to speak, Governor Deval Patrick, spoke about Cape Wind, and addressed a question about the alternative of purchasing clean energy from other places, if it were cheaper than producing our own. In response to this, he unwittingly quoted Chairman Mao, “I don’t know who said it, but, we’re going to have to let a thousand flowers bloom,” and concluded that we’ve still got a long way to go, and no avenue should be left unexplored. Other topics he discussed were the state of parks after cut funding, the Evergreen Solar project and Chapter 40B. The overall theme for the Governor’s discussion was that “we have got a long way to go,” but the place Massachusetts is in now shows important progress.

The first new candidate to speak, Dr. Jill Stein of the Rainbow Green party, discussed passionately–

  • The need for transparency in government
  • The significance of Environmental Health factors as relate to human health and health costs
  • What she would like to change about taxes: She’d like to increase income taxes & reduce sales tax with goal of benefiting the lower & middle income folks who spend a higher percentage of their income on consumption. -But ultimately she would like to move towards a carbon tax.
  • Environmental Health issues – open communication of risks including a personal battle- mercury in fish

After Dr. Stein’s enthused and in depth discussion of environmental health and taxes, State Treasurer Tim Cahill took the podium. Mr. Treasurer announced right off the bat his less-detailed knowledge of environmental sciences, and the fact that his main goal was “jobs” and that it would inevitably mean clashing with environmentalists at times. He attempted to stress that he listens to all opinions before making decisions, but if it were environment versus development, he would unquestionably favor development.

Republican candidate Charles Baker had a previous speaking engagement, but he was represented at the event by Senate minority leader Bradley Jones. Mr. Jones was able to clarify that though Mr. Baker may not see that global warming is being caused by anthropogenic activities, he was able to see practicality, economical, and health-related reasons for fighting for cleaner practices.

State primaries will be held September 14, 2010, followed by elections for Governor on November 9, 2010.

Gulf of Mexico Oil Spill Leaks On

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http://www.flickr.com/photos/uscgd8/4542937668/ On April 20th, 2010, in the open ocean 42 miles southeast of Venice, Louisiana, a 560-million-dollar deep-water oil rig licensed to BP, experienced an explosion. Eleven workers were killed and 17 were injured in the explosion, with the other 98 on board exiting safely unharmed. After the initial explosion, the rig burned and two days later sank to the bottom of the ocean.

A few days after this shocking event made headlines, the resulting oil spill became apparent. Oil from the rig’s well immediately began to spew forth into the water column through a damaged well-head, forming a 5-mile long oil slick on the ocean’s surface in short time. Within two weeks, BP had tried and failed to use the well’s blowout protection, President Obama declared dedication of any and all available US resources to the purpose of resolving  the spread of this spill, BP stated that it would take all financial responsibility for legitimate claims and the cleanup of the spill, and began the two-month project of drilling a relief well.

In the following month, a fishing ban was extended to 19% of the Gulf of Mexico’s waters, all new drilling projects in the area were suspended, and several different remedial attempts were made, some simply failing and others actually increasing the oil’s flux into the ocean. The rate of the spill that began 51 days ago has not yet been determined, due to several factors including communication barriers between BP and external scientists, but the official government estimate is between 12 and 19 thousand barrels per day.

Although it was once thought that the spill could be contained offshore, the oil leaking into the Gulf of Mexico has now reached over 120 miles of coastline. Tar balls are washing up on shore, animals are being covered in oil with a plethora of horrifying effects. It is not clear what the effect of the toxic oil dispersants being used will be on the delicate marine and coastal wildlife. Though it sounds extreme, it has been discussed that there is serious potential for this oil spill to be considered ecocide, or to reach that level in the coming months or years. I won’t link you to the videos of oil-covered struggling or already-deceased wildlife—seek them out at your own risk (of heartbreak).

As these negative events continue to affect the shorelines, locals are concerned. The fishing ban is necessary, but is just a concrete representation of the loss of money on the part of the fishing industry. The coasts are soaked in oil, animals are dying, and the tourism business is not looking good, either. “My concern is after everything is cleaned up, if they can clean it all up, and they leave, what is our business going to be like?” said Dudley Gaspard, owner of the Sand Dollar Marina and Hotel on hard-hit Grand Isle, Louisiana. While all of these local businesses are concerned, so are the oil drilling workers who operate in the Gulf. The six-month moratorium on deepwater drilling that has been imposed has the potential to eliminate as many as 20,000 jobs, according to some; the ban on shallow water drilling has been lifted. BP’s stock value has dropped dramatically, as would be expected during a crisis such as this.

On June 4th, a partially successful capturing system was put into place. BP has lowered a cap over the leaking well, sucking some of the leaking oil up through a mile-long pipe it is connected through. There are vents in the dome-shaped cap that allow some oil to escape, and oil is also billowing out from below the hood. While this is not a large step forward, it is a step: some oil is being captured. BP’s most recent estimates suggest they were able to capture 10,500 barrels of oil in 24 hours using this method, and they expect they will soon be able to use an additional containment system to increase this control. They have even made preparations for the event of a hurricane.

Here is a video of the underwater spill in action:

There is some murmur that this oil spill may be the push that the U.S. needs to secure clean energy and energy efficiency legislation. Thus far, concrete statements have only been made about the wish to change legislation revolving around oil drilling. House of Representatives Speaker Nancy Pelosi, after meeting with several committee heads, told reporters a wide range of legislation was being considered, including oil leasing reform, liability reform, ensuring worker safety and the “integrity of the certification process” when oil companies want to start a new offshore drilling project.

All Target stores now have a Recycling Center

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My "red" Target greenbag! by cpt_comet Since the beginning of April, 2010, Target has launched a massive nationwide recycling initiative in its 1,740 U.S. stores. The recycling stations will accept aluminum, glass and plastic beverage containers, plastic bags, MP3 players, cell phones and ink cartridges. Making it easier for some communities without curbside recycling to reduce the amount of material burned or buried, and for others to recycle some specialized goods.

“The launch of store recycling stations allows us to continue to partner with [our guests] to curb unnecessary waste in our stores and our communities,” said Shawn Gensch, vice president of brand marketing.

Target is developing all kinds of sustainability programs to improve its green image, including programs to green its supply chain, use less energy and produce less waste. Of course, one of the motivations of Target is to become more sustainable than its megastore competitor, Walmart, contributing to a ‘race to the top’. But Target isn’t just copying some existing sustainability programs, they’re forging their own path with some unique programs of their own, recently announcing they would no longer sell farmed salmon.

For more information : Target Opens Recycling Centers in All 1,740 Stores

Also, don’t forget that the City of Cambridge also has a mandatory curbside recycling program, with DPW drop-off for many other kinds of items.

LEDs for a smarter street lighting

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The light-emitting diodes (LEDs) are becoming more and more common in traffic lights and are moving into streetlights.

LEDs produce three or four times more light per watt of electricity than standard incandescent lamps do, and they are more than 4 times as efficient as Compact Fluorescent Light (CFL) bulbs, typically lasting  up to 50,000 hours.

The Dialight Corporation, of Farmingdale, N.J., a subsidiary of a British company,  has about one-third of the United States market for LED traffic signals, and is now looking forwards on another target: street lamps. Edinburgh and Pittsburgh are already trying this new lightning system. Even if LED street lamps doesn’t produce much more light per watt than a conventional lamp, it’s strength is to shine in only one direction whereas other lamps shine in all directions. So energy can be save in using smaller and smarter lamps.

For now, these lights are sold between $600 or $700 each, which is at least double the price of a conventional light. According to Roy Burton, the company chief executive, the pay back would take 6 or 7 years. But these smarter lights will be easier to manage, as the company is developing a cluster of lights that communicate wirelessly with one master light equipped with cellphone technology. That should reduce the number of crews out looking for failed lights, he added.

LED can be an innovative solution to reduce light pollution and increase energy savings.

EPA: Greenhouse Gases Threaten Society

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EPA BuildingYesterday, December 7th, the EPA formally declared that greenhouse gases threaten public health and the environment.  In its news release, the EPA stated that greenhouse gases are “the primary driver of climate change, which can lead to hotter, longer heat waves that threaten the health of the sick, poor or elderly; increases in ground-level ozone pollution linked to asthma and other respiratory illnesses; as well as other threats to the health and welfare of Americans.”

The EPA’s finding of “endangerment” opens the possibility for the EPA to limit the output of carbon dioxide and other pollutants produced by large-emitters such as power plants, oil refineries, chemical plants and metal smelters.

According to Jeff Holmstead, a former EPA air administrator under the George W. Bush administration, this is the first time the EPA has ever made a standalone endangerment finding – without a corresponding rule-making.  The timing of the EPA’s decision may be political – as the Senate is still deliberating on a national climate bill, and international climate conferences open in Copenhagen – but that does not discredit the science behind the EPA’s determination.

The EPA’s decision, if nothing else, demonstrates the current administration’s deep commitment to enacting serious climate change policy.


Interest in Global Warming Heats Up

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When you visit the New York times website on Sunday evening, the list of most emailed articles is usually topped by either the big news story of the day, a particularly relevant Frank Rich article or some pithy commentary from Maureen Dowd. This past Sunday  it was a 4,000 word article on noted academic Freeman Dyson, who has been comfortably employed as a big brain for over 50 years at the Institute for Advanced Studies in Princeton, New Jersey.

29dyson1-500Why the sudden interest in a man now is his mid 80s?

Dyson has always been considered a contrarian. As one of his colleagues observed, “… when consensus is forming like ice hardening on a lake, Dyson will do his best to chip away at the ice.”

While Dysons’s latest idea is not quite as ‘out there’ as his contributions to the shuttered ‘Orion’ project (inter-galatic space travel powered by controlled nuclear bomb blasts) his latest opinion–that we might all be overreacting to global warming–has certainly captured the attention of the scientific community and the media.

Several years ago, Dyson attracted attention with his rather curious statement that global warming could be easily dealt with by developing ‘carbon eating’ trees. This idea was based on Dyson’s observation of carbon levels at various times of the year. In temperate climates–such as Cambridge, MA–the level of carbon particles  in the atmosphere are lowest in the fall. Assuming this coincides with the time of the year when trees and other vegetation are in full bloom and more equipped to extract carbon from the air, Dyson saw the possibility of geo-engineering a strain of trees that would perform this task more efficiently.

Recently, Dyson has been given to publicly wondering if global warming is all that bad and accusing Al Gore of being a ‘panic merchant’. The basis of his theory is our development from an agrarian economy to an post-industrial information-based society was powered by carbon-based energy, so how bad could it possibly be?

Warm Home Cool Planet finds it strange that a man of science is taking this position. Our progress as a civilization depends on our ability to develop and adapt new forms of technology that make our lives more convenient, more productive and safer. We discard old ways of doing things when something better comes along. How many people are sticking with a typewriter just because Hemingway wrote on one?

Carbon-based energy has been with us since the invention of the steam train. It is still relatively available and inexpensive–for now. We can already see a point where they will be neither. For the sake of our planet and future generations, it’s time our alternative sources of energy become our major sources of supply.

Time to cool off

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Red Earth

Our Planet in 2220?

At the Cambridge headquarters of Warm Home Cool Planet we’re well served with local scientific opinions-what with the big brains of Harvard at one end of town and the super-colliding intelligence of MIT at the other. Sometimes the smart folks from Tufts University in our neighboring town of Somerville get overlooked.

That might be changing with today’s Boston Globe article covering the controversial theory expounded by Tufts astrophysicist, Eric J. Chaisson. In a recent paper Chaisson has put forward the theory that even if we solve the environmental problems caused by greenhouse gas emissions, the rate at which we are generating radiant heat through the generation and use of non-renewable energy sources could result in catastrophic changes in the earth’s eco-systems and atmosphere within two centuries.

“What this means for humans is that this is the ultimate limit to growth,” said Dennis Bushnell, the chief scientist at NASA’s Langley Research Center, who urged Chaisson to publish his idea. “As we produce more kilowatts, we have to produce more waste heat.”

Some critics have cautioned that it is impossible to predict what technologies will be developed to handle the problem of radiant heat over the next hundred years or so. And, that if we don’t figure out how to limit the damage greenhouse gases are already causing to our environment, it’s kind of a moot point.

After looking at both sides of this argument, it is the opinion of Warm Home Cool Planet that we need to worry about what’s coming out of the tailpipe first before we consider how hot the tailpipe is.