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Wednesday, July 06, 2005
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The Encyclopedia of Chicago includes thousands of historical resources (articles, photos, maps, broadsides and newspapers) related to Chicago's colorful and complex history. It includes entries on the Calumet Region, Environmental Politics, Environmental Regulation, and Environmentalism. Brought to you by the Chicago Historical Society, the Newberry Library, and Northwestern University.
2:44:10 PM Google It! 
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Via sustainablog:
Thanks to Shari Aaron at Fresh Marketing for tipping me off to alonovo, a green consumer site currently in pre-launch. The portal is the brainchild of Earthsite.net principle Joey Shepp and partner George Polisner. From their press release:
alonovo (latin for sustainable change) is a new shopping and information website providing a marketforce that brings together "socially responsible" businesses and aware, concerned buyers. alonovo buyers know that the purchases they make are not just "things they buy" but rather "items they purchase that will shape a better world."
alonovo magnifies millions of "responsible buyers" and "ethical shoppers" and aims their portion of the $64 billion dollar e-commerce industry to companies that support positive
environmental and social practices. alonovo provides buyers with unbiased, trusted and easy to navigate information concerning the environmental, social and ethical performance of today's well-known companies. Buyers shop on alonovo.com for brand name, high quality, competitively priced products made by companies that match their individual concerns for social and environmental responsibility. alonovo.com provides assurance and convenience; allowing this selection criteria to be easily accessed and directly integrated into the shopping experience.
alonovo is an inclusive, inviting people-powered community and meeting ground, open to all political viewpoints. alonovo encourages individuals to work together to dialogue and inspire each of us to learn about our role in fostering responsible business practices. alonovo provides a forum for consumers to act together on the important challenges we face as we work together to create a socially and environmentally sound future. alonovo will kick off in August. In the meantime, they've got a prototype site up, and you can register with them now.
2:15:50 PM Google It!
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Via sustainablog:
Local blogger Steve Patterson has published an essay on Urban Review - St. Louis that considers our prospects in the face of peak oil much as Steve Balogh did with his home town of Syracuse, NY (Must be a Steve thing...). I must admit, I'd love to see some of his predictions come true:
It will take at least a generation to work through the transition from a fossil fuel economy to a more self sustaining one. St. Louis city and the inner suburbs will become increasingly dense and great places to live. Street life will be outstanding, much like it was 100 years ago (without the horse manure). My friends that have young children will raise them in a much more environmentally conscience than we were. Their kids will see the rebirth of St. Louis of a pedestrian St. Louis despite the hardships from the economy. Those of us more set in our ways will need to adjust. Regardless of how things turn out here in the Midwest, I think one of Steve's commenters is absolutely right: we need to have this issue raised here.
2:13:23 PM Google It!
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Via sustainablog:
From GermanCarFans.com via TriplePundit, news of Mercedes-Benz's latest concept vehicle, which is modeled on the boxfish.
Why, out of all things in nature, did the engineers choose this animal?
Despite its boxy, cube-shaped body, this tropical fish is in fact outstandingly streamlined and therefore represents an aerodynamic ideal. With an accurately constructed model of the boxfish the engineers in Stuttgart were able to achieve a wind drag coefficient of just 0.06 in the wind tunnel....
The boxfish, ... is also a prime example of rigidity and light weight. Its skin consists of numerous hexagonal, bony plates which provide maximum strength with minimal weight and effectively protect the animal from injury.
DaimlerChrysler researchers examined this bionic structure and transferred this principle to the Mercedes-Benz bionic car study with the help of a special calculation process. The process is based on the principles of bone formation and for instance allows up to 40 percent more rigidity to be achieved in the external door panelling than would be possible with conventional designs. If the entire bodyshell is calculated according to this bionic principle, the total weight is reduced by around one third with undiminished strength and crash safety. The results?
In addition to superb aerodynamics and a lightweight construction concept derived from nature, the 103 kW/140-hp diesel engine and innovative SCR technology (Selective Catalytic Reduction) greatly contribute to fuel economy and a further reduction in exhaust emissions. In the EU driving cycle the concept car has a fuel consumption of 4.3 litres per 100 kilometres – 20 less than a comparable series-production car. In accordance with the US measuring method (FTP 75) the range is around 70 miles per US gallon (combined), which is about 30 percent more than for a standard-production car. At a constant speed of 90 km/h the direct-injection diesel unit consumes only 2.8 litres per 100 kilometre, corresponding to a range of 84 miles per gallon in the US test cycle. The concept car will make its debut at this year's DaimlerChrysler Innovation Symposium in Washington.
1:58:09 PM Google It!
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Via sustainablog:
From TriplePundit, news that Vermont's Middlebury College has won Clean Air - Cool Planet's "Climate Champion" award for 2005. While many colleges and universities are taking steps to redue their ecological footprint, Middlebury definitely stands out for a range of activities aimed at reducing greenhouse emissions throughou the NE region:
Middlebury:
- Completed a campus-wide emissions inventory, being among the first colleges to adapt and use the Clean Air-Cool Planet Campus GHG Emissions Inventory Calculator;
- Offered "Path to Carbon Neutrality", a winter term course in 2003 in which 15 students led the development of potential carbon-reducing measures on campus;
- Appointed a Carbon Reduction Initiative Working Group to analyze and react to the students' recommendations and create a portfolio of options as a plan of action;
- Offered "Social Movements and Climate Change", a winter term course in 2005 involving 20 students that culminated in a two-day public conference "What Works? New Strategies for a Melting Planet", bringing together national climate change leaders and students to build, share, and test strategies for a new climate movement;
- Offered "Environmental Economics", a spring 2005 course that resulted in the development, by several 2005 Middlebury College graduates, of a credit card that enables its users to become carbon neutral. One percent of the money charged to the card is devoted to the purchase of carbon offsets, canceling out the pollution an average individual causes every day.
Congratulations to Middlebury College for setting a fine example for the rest of us. I'll see what I can do to get the ball rolling in Mid-Missouri.
1:56:06 PM Google It!
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Apparently, animal wastes are just inspiring, as there's even more news of poop to power innovations from around the globe.
The process, called thermochemical conversion, uses heat and pressure to break down carbohydrate materials and turn waste into liquid. The project is still in its infancy.
For now, each half-gallon (two-liter) batch of manure converts to only about 9 ounces (0.26 liter) of oil.
But Zhang believes the conversion process could eventually solve the problem of pollution and odor at modern hog farms, where farmers pay big money to get rid of the waste. And, he says, pig oil could also offer an alternative to petroleum oil.
"If 50 percent of U.S. swine farms adopted this technology, we could see a [U.S.] 1.5-billion-dollar reduction in crude oil imports every year," Zhang said. "And swine producers could see a 10 percent increase in their income—about $10 to $15 per hog." The process also comes with a 1 to 3 input/output ratio. What the article doesn't mention is the CO2 output of burning the oil that comes from the process. While still in its infancy, this is definitely a development we'll want to watch. We definitely won't ever have to worry about "peak" poop...
The Kigali Institute of Science and Technology's Center for Innovations and Technology Transfer (Kigali is the capital of Rwanda) designed and built a 150 cubic meters fixed dome digester in Cyangugu prison. The digester is fed human waste generated by 1500 prisoners and it produces 50% of the energy needed to cook for the 6000 to 10,000 inmates (the number vary depending on the source), cutting in half the £25,000 ($44,000) yearly firewood bill - a lot of money in Rwanda...
The Kigali Institute of Science and Technology has also built a smaller digester (25 cubic meters) for the Lycee de Kigali, solving its sewerage and hygiene problem. "The methane gas produced is used to cook for 400 students and for operating bunsen burners in the school science laboratories..."
Five of the country's largest prisons - two at Gitarama, and one each at Butare, Kigali and Cyangugu - now boast biogas plants, either in operation or under construction, and their effect has been dramatic. [...] As one of our readers commented some time back, "Go, poop, go!"
1:50:38 PM Google It!
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With the rash of recent reports claiming that biofuels such as ethanol and biodiesel aren't all they're promised, members of the Sustainable Blogosphere are questioning the questioners:
- Steve Spence at Green Trust Sustainbility and Renewable Energy has posted a number of links to information about biofuels that support plant-based power.
- Jamais Cascio at WorldChanging also questions the findings of a recent Cornell-Berkely study critical of biofuels, and offers some alternatives to some of the assumptions underlying the study's conclusions.
- Green Car Congress also features the Cornell-Berkely study, and while Mike doesn't directly criticize the findings (he does note "[Professor David] Pimentel has for a number of years been one of the most outspoken critics of ethanol. His conclusions and methodologies are vigorously contested by biofuel supporters, such as Hosein Shapouri at the USDA."), his commenters seem more than happy to attack the conclusions and the methodologies of the study.
In each of these cases, researchers David Pimentel and Tad W. Patzek are coming under fire. I know nothing about either of these scientists, so I welcome any filling in of my significant blanks.
1:48:27 PM Google It!
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Many interesting new developments over the past few days on wind power:
- The birds -- The debate over wind power and bird deaths continues, and a suit against operators of the Altamont Pass Wind Farm demanding action in the face of bird deaths is going forward. At the same time, a new Dutch study suggests that "Wind turbines producing "green" energy kill many fewer birds than previously thought and pose less of a threat to avian life than cars,..."
- Mini wind -- HippyShopper points us to another home-scale windmill that will go into mass production by year's end... Spinneyhead links to instructions on how to build your own small-scale horizontal axis turbine... Alternative Energy Blog takes note of a 13-story building in Manchester, UK, that has created its own micro-wind "farm" that "...will produce 56,000 units of renewable energy each year, enough electricity to service about 5% of the energy needs of the building."
[sustainablog]
1:47:20 PM Google It!
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Pesticide Testing--Ethics
Source: Environmental Health Perspectives
Pesticide Testing on Human Subjects: Weighing Benefits and Risks
"In the debate surrounding testing pesticides on human subjects, two distinct positions have emerged. The first position holds that pesticide experiments on human subjects should be allowed, but only under stringent scientific and ethical standards. The second position asserts that these experiments should never be allowed. In this article, we evaluate what we consider to be the strongest argument for the second position--namely, that the benefits of the experiments are not significant enough to justify the risks posed to healthy subjects." [ResourceShelf's DocuTicker]
1:45:29 PM Google It!
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Almost a quarter of Americans tested for mercury in a nationwide study have higher than recommended levels of the toxic metal. The finding has a researcher warning the nation now faces an "unprecedented public health emergency." Jon Brodkin of the Milford (Mass.) Daily News has the story, 7/5/05. [SEJ: Environmental Journalism Today]
1:44:00 PM Google It!
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In response to health concerns, the European Parliament votes to permanently ban the use of phthalates, chemicals used to soften children's toys. The story from the BBC, 7/5/05. [SEJ: Environmental Journalism Today]
1:43:30 PM Google It!
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As the U.S. economy shifts away from heavy industry, each closed factory risks becoming a brownfield. For the past decade, the federal government has been helping with the cleanup. The Great Lakes Radio Consortium's Shawn Allee explains why the program gives hope to small towns trying to change their images, 7/4/05. [SEJ: Environmental Journalism Today]
1:42:46 PM Google It!
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The Houston Chronicle's Dina Cappiello reports Texas will soon take its battle against air pollution to new heights. State environmental officials will launch a helicopter in the Houston area to film pollution from chemical plants, refineries and pipelines. The idea is to detect smog-forming chemicals invisible to the naked eye, which may go unreported, 7/06/05. [SEJ: Environmental Journalism Today]
1:42:12 PM Google It!
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Via How to Save the World:
Blogging again from Montreal. Actually, I don't travel nearly as much as I used to, but when I do I'm amazed at how much travel contributes to pollution, waste and the use of non-renewable resources. If we had to pay the fully loaded cost of energy (including the cost of replacing exhausted reserves, remediation for pollution damage and other 'externalities' that neither consumers nor producers currently pay -- part of the Tragedy of the Commons), the whole travel industry would grind to a halt. Even if we stopped allowing these wasteful travel costs to be deducted as a business expense, there would be much less needless travel.
But sometimes, face to face meetings are essential, and sometimes you just need a vacation. When that happens, here are some ideas to at least mitigate the damage you do to the environment as a result of your travels away from home (and save some money in the process):
- If possible, take the train. It consumes less energy and produces less pollution per passenger-mile than driving, boating, cruising or flying. And it's an interesting way to travel. Plus it allows you to get things done, if you have to, during the voyage.
- If you stay in a hotel, minimize your footprint. Reuse your towels, minimize use of your room heater/air conditioner, and don't waste water. Better yet, stay with a local -- you'll learn more, conserve more, and save more, and probably have more fun.
- Use recyclables and reusables. Take your own travel mug. Avoid disposable dishes. Don't contribute unnecessarily to garbage, and recycle whenever possible.
- Buy local, natural, organic, vegan foods. And buy other local goods instead of imports, including crafts and souvenirs.
- If you're on vacation consider cycling, sailing, hiking, cross-country skiing, walking tours or eco-vacations instead of combustion-engine powered trips. At your destination, take a coach or public transit (if it's safe) instead of a car or taxi.
- Turn stuff off at home. Don't waste a lot of heat or electricity if there's no one there.
- If you have to drive, use cruise control, don't speed, make sure your tires are properly inflated, and ensure that your car's tuned up. Dress appropriately rather than using car air conditioning or heat unnecessarily.
- If you have to take your computer, use it sparingly and turn it off when not in use.
- If you're visiting businesses, help them save energy, money and the environment by conserving resources, especially by turning off or down heat, air conditioning and electricity at night and when otherwise not in use.
- Buy stuff that lasts. Avoid disposables, cheap clothing, poorly-made souvenirs, overpackaged goods, non-rechargeable batteries, and stuff in non-recyclable containers.
When you follow these steps, let the suppliers -- train companies, hotels, restaurants, stores, travel companies -- know that you're doing so, and why, and that you care about the environment. Give them some extra incentive to care too. By educating others, you multiply the benefits and savings you receive yourself.
Thank you!
[How to Save the World]
1:29:03 PM Google It!
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More than 100 American companies have joined together to reduce greenhouse gases. The venture is called the Chicago Climate Exchange. Members that cut pollution quicker sell their right to pollute to those who can't cut back as quickly. [NPR Topics: Environment]
1:24:53 PM Google It!
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Global climate change will be a major focus at this week's G8 Summit. Scotland, host of the summit, is committed to innovation in the renewable energy sector and, as such, has created a solid industry and government support mechanism to achieve its aggressive renewable energy targets - 40 percent by 2020. [ENN Business Headlines]
1:16:31 PM Google It!
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Draft legislation prepared by Rep. Richard Pombo (R-Cal.) would severely undermine the Endangered Species Act (ESA) and punch loopholes in the law on behalf of oil companies, large-scale developers, timber companies, mining corporations, and other special interests. [ENN Business Headlines]
1:16:00 PM Google It!
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Via Gil Friend:
In celebration of their 3,000th post, our friends at WorldChanging.com have been posting contributions from guest writers, and asked me to be one. They ran this piece which I wrote with my wife (and director of Natural Logic), Jane Byrd. As the recent World Environment Day events recently reminded us, we now live on a majority urban planet. Back to the land? Ain't gonna happen, folks - and probably shouldn't, since six or 10 or 12 billion people spread out across the landscape could make many aspects of the human footprint worse instead of better.
Which may be why "density" is on the lips of so many world changing types lately. Infill and smart growth strategies are doing worthy battle with both traditional developers and well-intentioned NIMBYs (who sometimes seem to think that people shouldn't live anywhere...)
But as with so many world changing initiatives, the exciting - and often most practical - work lies in profound challenges to both the lock-in of status quo and the incremental palliatives of "reasonable" measures; Paolo Soleri's Arcosanti, Richard Register's EcoCity Berkeley, Institute for Local Self-Reliance's self-reliant communities, and the Zero Ecological Footprint city that keeps colonizing my imagination.
The key to surviving urban density: photosynthesis, economy, convivality.
So much surface area. So little time. But what if cities weren't desolate badlands with hard hot surfaces and minimal plant life. What if native plant life could colonize city surfaces, roof tops and walls? And what if it wasn't that hard to do? And oh so easy to live with/within?
What if cities - the inventors of agriculture, according to Jane Jacobs - could one again (or for the first time) be net producers of food, energy, clean water and clean air? A flowering of projects - some new, some quite venerable - address cities as living systems. Living systems with metabolisms - flows and transformations of energy and materials into product and non-product, desired and undesired results - that, if understood, can perhaps guide us to creating cities that, like living systems, produce net value, powered by sun and wind.
My first "environmental" project, 30+ years ago (after a mind-bending month immersed in Bucky Fuller's "World Game Workshop" - at that time a month-long design charrette for "a world that works for 100% of humanity in the shortest possible time through spontaneous cooperation without ecological offense or the disadvantage of anyone"), was rooftop agriculture a little past shouting distance of the White House at the Institute for Local Self-Reliance. ILSR's 20 Year Track Record Promoting Sustainable Communities is up to 31 years now, and the Insitute (which I'm proud to have co-founded) remains a unique resource for linking the visions of environment, economy and social weal long before that was coined the "triple bottom line."
Every year since its founding ILSR has researched the feasibility of communities generating a significant amount of wealth from local resources and has worked with the increasing numbers of communities interested in moving in that direction.
In 1974 our conceptual framework was novel. ILSR was the first to systematically apply the concept of local self-reliance to urban areas. A 1975 PlowBoy interview in Mother Earth News with ILSR's founders presented this concept to readers who had been exposed only to the notion of rural self-sufficiency. ILSR offered a vision of sustainable, self-reliant cities that extract the maximum value from their local human, capital and natural resources. That vision cut across traditional environmental, economic development and community development lines.
Can we imagine cities married to their native plant communities and the bioregional agroecosystems upon which our lives depend. Cities that integrate commerce and ecology in mutual support. Cities as living architectures, oases for soil and souls. Imagining it, visualizing it, calling for it, are the first steps to having it be so.
It's "sex in the city" but even better: buildings revisioned as substrates for soil and plants, as fertile homes for birds and bees and other endangered pollinators thriving on native plant communities climbing walls, hanging garden watersheds, filling pools and waterfalls, green bridge corridors from roof top to roof top garden. Color, commerce, culture, food production, soil and wild habitat creation, thriving together in biodiversifying, climate buffering cities. As living architecture designer Paul Kephart puts it:
What is the purpose of incorporating natural day light, healthy environments, and energy efficiency if, as professionals, we don't simultaneously design for beauty, for ecology, and for culture.
Ecologist Aurora Mahassine, Kephart's design collaborator, combines her experience as a mosaic artist contemporary materials, structural engineering research, and scientific understanding of the bio-region, to turn barren vertical walls - not just rooftops - into beautiful homes for indigenous plants, insects, and birds.
Green roofs? Sure. (And be sure to check out the gorgeous green roof book from EarthPledge.) But beyond industrial lawn green roofs to integrated city-nature systems that weave a sweet symbiosis between people and planet.
What if native plant communities could colonize the vertical walled cement surfaces AND horizontal roof tops of our cities? What if we unpaved parking lots and put in some paradise? What if buried creeks and forgotten watersheds were brought to the surface to nourish city ecosystems with life giving water? What if rainwater was captured with both roofs and permeable paving, and cleansed on site before recharging aquifers all around us, unburdening the oceans of toxic runoff? What if urban life - our inescapable human future - were an ecological delight, as well as - at least come of the time - a cultural delight as well?
Some of this future will appear in brand new cities designed do it right the first time - like the seven new cities in China for which Bill McDonough is developing the planning templates; some from the new high-density infill cities that some of us are developing in North America; some from the re-habitation in place of the structures and infrastructres we've inherited - like Vancouver's 500 acre sustainability district - rebuilding the plane in midflight.
Which ever it is, Dylan (Thomas) said it well:
The force that through the green fuse drives the flower;
Drives my green age...
[Gil Friend]
1:13:09 PM Google It!
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Via Gil Friend:
Speaking of density. WorldChanging.com published a piece the next day, coincidentally, on Density as Efficiency, reporting on research
comparing the energy efficiency of "high-density urbanism" to Energy Star-rated homes. The result was surprising, even to people already inclined towards dense urban environments: even the maximum Energy Star savings was beaten by moderately-dense development of 12 housing units per acre. At 48 units per acre -- a moderate apartment or condominium complex -- the energy savings were double that of maximum Energy Star. The savings arise largely from efficiencies in infrastructure and transportation. The combined effect of higher-density living and usable non-auto transit is called location efficiency.
Jamais Cascio offered a stack of questions on how to extend and propagate those advantages:
- How much could household energy savings be improved using design elements such as R-2000, phase-changing wax insulation, and White LED lighting?
- How can communities now heavily dependent upon autos transition to more energy-efficient characteristics?
- What steps have the best payoff in terms of encouraging location efficiency?
- How can higher-density urbanism attract [the] same desirability [as single-family home ownership]?
- What aspects of higher-density urbanism are in most need of re-evaluation?
- How can we reduce [the] financial cost [of higher-density urbanism]?
- To what degree [are high prices] a function of too little supply and too much demand, and therefore mitigated by increased higher-density urbanism in periphery locations?
- How much of an improvement would come from applying Energy Star (or better) efficiencies to higher-density urbanism? That is -- just how good could we get, if we really tried?
This posting triggered LOTS of comments from readers (don't know whether because of the subject or holiday-time-on-folks hands) including this little gem from Laurence Aurbach:
The Lincoln Institute's Visualizing Density website is a great resource for understanding what density looks like. It's a database of aerial photos showing U.S. neighborhoods at a wide range of densities.
We were discussing density at dinner tonight. One person speculated that people don't like density. They do in Paris, I suggested. Yeah, on vacation, he offered. Ah, but Parisians do too, I responded. I haven't scanned the polls, but I do know this: design, vitality and conviviality have a big impact on how a place feels.
[Gil Friend]
1:12:11 PM Google It!
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Thirty-eight states will receive a total of $26.5 million from DOE as part of its annual State Energy Program grants. The awards, announced on July 5th, are expected to yield more than $190 million in energy savings. [EERE Network News]
1:10:07 PM Google It!
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The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) has unveiled a new benchmarking system that allows automakers to compare the energy efficiency of their assembly plants with the rest of the industry. The tool could be the first step toward energy-saving improvements to U.S. assembly plants. [EERE Network News]
1:09:31 PM Google It!
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Honda has developed an improved gas-and-electric engine for the new Civic compact set to go on sale in North America, Japan and Europe this fall, the Japanese automaker said Tuesday. [ENN Business Headlines]
1:04:13 PM Google It!
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Faced with rising gas prices and increasing concerns about pollution, companies are writing checks to employees to buy cars that are more fuel-efficient and less harmful to the environment. [ENN Business Headlines]
1:03:34 PM Google It!
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The founder of Earth Day, former Wisconsin Governor and Senator Gaylord Nelson, died Sunday at the age of 89. Nelson once said Earth Day was an attempt to get politicians to notice environmental problems. From Wisconsin Public Radio, Chuck Quirmbach has a remembrance. [NPR Topics: Environment]
12:57:24 PM Google It!
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© Copyright
2005
Laura L. Barnes.
Last update:
10/25/2005; 12:11:11 PM.
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