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Make Poverty History! Originally uploaded by rogiro

Just to let one more blogpost deal with Earth Day I want to point everyones attention to Alex Steffens (Worldchanging) blogpost for Earth Day 2009: Ten really big things we can do to save the planet.

Alex makes the following point in his intro:

“Traditionally, this is a day devoted to making green accessible to all. It’s a day when each of us is invited to take small, individual steps toward reducing our carbon footprints, limiting our waste, or restoring the environment. See how easy it is – and how fun – to do your part to save the planet? Whether Earth Day does any good is a subject of some real debate around here.

Admittedly, this year’s goals from the Earth Day Network (EDN) show that the holiday might be heading in the right direction. The EDN calls for action and civic engagement toward renewable energy, sustainable consumption and green jobs … and nods to the approaching COP15.

But in general, Earth Day is still being used primarily to sell crap that won’t make a difference. Our inboxes were still flooded with press announcements touting Earth Day solar bikinis; Earth Day buy-this-thing-and-we’ll-plant-a-tree promotions; Earth Day specials on a greener SUV.”

There are no simple steps worth caring about. We’ll only head off disaster by taking steps — together — that are massive, societal and thorough. Most of what needs to be done involves political engagement, systems redesign, and cultural change. It can’t be done in an afternoon and then forgotten about. So screw the little things.

Here are 10 big, difficult, world-changing concepts Worldchanging can get behind:

1. ELIMINATE NUCLEAR WEAPONS

Czech crowds cheered for U.S. President Barack Obama’s recent announcement that America must lead the charge to eliminate nuclear weapons worldwide. But no matter which nation or alliance takes the helm, reducing the threat of weapons of mass destruction is a critical part of sustainability. Simply put, nuclear weapons have no place in a bright green future.

2. STABILIZE THE BOTTOM BILLION

In order to have a resilient and peaceful planet, we must first meet the basic needs of all the people who live here. Each person deserves clean water, adequate sanitation, and access to health care. But building this basic foundation will also require stability of a more intangible kind, including giving every person access to education, protecting civil rights around the globe, and putting an end to human servitude. As a society, we’ve outlined the plan in various ways, most notably in the U.N.’s Millennium Development Goals. And we have the means to do it in this century, through advances in community empowerment, sustainable development and microlending programs.

3. CREATE A GLOBALLY TRANSPARENT SOCIETY

We write often about transparency, which is part of the foundation for a just, equitable, sustainable and democratic future. This involves transparency and accountability in both business and government. It also includes tools that let us easily see and understand the backstory of the products in our lives, from the homes we live in to the food on our plates. Open-source approaches are excellent tools for promoting transparency, since these collaborative problem-solving systems increasingly eradicate hidden agendas and exclusivity.

4. BE PREPARED, GLOBALLY

Although no one wants to live in fear of uncontrollable, unforeseen disasters, it’s hard to argue against having a well thought out emergency preparedness plan. These plans help people know what do to when a disaster strikes, decreasing the level of panic and improving the probability that more people will escape unharmed. On a small scale, families and neighbors can communicate and coordinate with each other to create plans that provide food and shelter for their communities. And on a larger scale, states and nations can create response plans that effectively deliver aid, as well as short- and long-term shelter solutions.

5. EMPOWER WOMEN

Equality for women is more than a justice issue. By giving women equal rights we also help create a more sustainable world. Research shows that women who have access to education and rights over their own bodies choose to have fewer children, who they can give more to. Overpopulation is a serious issue, with huge implications for problems like climate change. By giving women rights we are investing in what Kim Stanley Robinson calls the some of the best climate change technology available today.

6. ENABLE A FUTURE FORWARD DIET

One of the most readily available solutions for creating a more sustainable world is also one that we might have the most personal control over: our diets. We can greatly decrease our environmental and social footprints by eating locally, organically and mostly meat and dairy free (according to the U.N. report Livestock’s Long Shadow, livestock produce more greenhouse gases than all of the world’s transport combined). But in order for more people to be able to choose better options, we also need to transform the food system. That means not only transparency innovations, such as labels and codes that tell you where your food came from and how it was produced, but also economic and regulatory support for a transformed relationship between farmers, food sellers and eaters.

7. DOCUMENT ALL LIFE

Scientists estimate that our planet is home to somewhere between 10 and 100 million species. We’ve described only 1.8 million: the rest are yet to be discovered. Today, scientists are using new techniques and tools to discover and name more new species than at any other time in taxonomic history. Ironically this “Age of Discovery” is simultaneously the Sixth Extinction, the largest mass-extinction since the Death of the Dinosaurs.

8. NEGOTIATE AN EFFECTIVE CLIMATE TREATY

We need a global treaty that holds all players accountable to decreasing their carbon emissions. This treaty must decrease global carbon levels to 350 parts per million by 2080, if we are to avoid a series of global tipping points that will push us over the edge and make life on this planet unbearable for the majority of life on Earth

9. BUILD BRIGHT GREEN CITIES

We are now an urban planet. In general, urbanization offers many benefits. But we need to design cities that allow people access to their greatest potential within a framework of sustainable prosperity. Bright green cities are designed so that residents have access to public parks, basic goods, entertainment, services and jobs within walking distance. Bright green cities include transit systems and mobility options to allow people to get from one place to another comfortably and on time without the use of a private vehicle. Bright green cities feature carbon-neutral buildings that are healthy for the people who live and work inside them. They use strategies like zero-waste plans and producer takeback laws to channel materials in closed loops.

10. BUILD NO NEW HIGHWAYS

It’s time to stop building highways, and stop developing the disconnected, suburban sprawl they support. Instead, local and national governments in the Global North need to focus their resources on improving the streets and infrastructure that’s already in place, making those streets work for all forms of mobility, from transit to cycling, to walking, to driving and cargo transport. This solution must go hand-in-hand with building comfortable, attractive, bright green cities where people can live densely while living well. If we redefine the model for growth, density and transportation in the industrialized world, we will help rapidly growing nations avoid the problems associated with auto-dependent development.

Source: Worldchanging.

Earth Day Planet Originally uploaded by -Greyson-

Earth Day, April 22, each year marks the anniversary of the birth of the modern environmental movement in 1970.

Among other things, 1970 in the United States brought with it the Kent State shootings, the advent of fiber optics, “Bridge Over Troubled Water,” Apollo 13, the Beatles’ last album, the death of Jimi Hendrix, the birth of Mariah Carey, and the meltdown of fuel rods in the Savannah River nuclear plant near Aiken, South Carolina — an incident not acknowledged for 18 years.

It was into such a world that the very first Earth Day was born.

Earth Day founder Gaylord Nelson, then a U.S. Senator from Wisconsin, proposed the first nationwide environmental protest “to shake up the political establishment and force this issue onto the national agenda. ” “It was a gamble,” he recalls, “but it worked.”

At the time, Americans were slurping leaded gas through massive V8 sedans. Industry belched out smoke and sludge with little fear of legal consequences or bad press. Air pollution was commonly accepted as the smell of prosperity. Environment was a word that appeared more often in spelling bees than on the evening news.

Earth Day 1970 turned that all around.

On April 22, 20 million Americans took to the streets, parks, and auditoriums to demonstrate for a healthy, sustainable environment. Denis Hayes, the national coordinator, and his youthful staff organized massive coast-to-coast rallies. Thousands of colleges and universities organized protests against the deterioration of the environment. Groups that had been fighting against oil spills, polluting factories and power plants, raw sewage, toxic dumps, pesticides, freeways, the loss of wilderness, and the extinction of wildlife suddenly realized they shared common values.

Earth Day is serious. But to celebrate this years Earth Day, the Huffington Post have gathered som of the funniest jokes from late night comedy also. Check the video here.

Climate change propaganda Originally uploaded by Wild-Jungleman

Scientists at the international congress in Copenhagen have prepared a summary statement of their findings for policy makers. This was handed today to the Danish prime minister, Anders Fogh Rasmussen. Ahead of the UN Climate Change Conference in December he will formally hand this statement over to officials and heads of state at the conference. The full conclusions from the 2,500 scientific delegates from 80 countries that have attended the three-day meeting this week will be published in full in June 2009. The congress was conceived as an update of the science of global warming ahead of the UN summit in December. The most recent Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change report published in 2007 is now three to four years out of date.

The scientists’ six key messages are:

1) Climatic trends

Recent observations confirm that, given high rates of observed emissions, the worst-case IPCC scenario projections (or even worse) are being realised. For many key parameters, the climate is already moving beyond the patterns of natural variability within which our society and economy have developed and thrived. These parameters include global mean surface temperature, sea-level rise, ocean and ice sheet dynamics, ocean acidification, and extreme climatic events. There is a significant risk that many of the trends will accelerate, leading to an increasing risk of abrupt or irreversible climatic shifts.

2) Social disruption

The research community is providing much more information to support discussions on “dangerous climate change”. Recent observations show that societies are highly vulnerable to even modest levels of climate change, with poor nations and communities particularly at risk. Temperature rises above 2C will be very difficult for countries to cope with, and will increase the level of climate disruption through the rest of the century.

3) Long-term strategy

Rapid, sustained, and effective mitigation based on coordinated global and regional action is required to avoid “dangerous climate change” regardless of how it is defined. Weaker targets for 2020 increase the risk of crossing tipping points and make the task of meeting 2050 targets more difficult. Delay in initiating effective mitigation actions increases significantly the long-term social and economic costs of both adaptation and mitigation.

4) Equity dimensions

Climate change is having, and will have, strongly differential effects on people within and between countries and regions, on this generation and future generations, and on human societies and the natural world. An effective, well-funded adaptation safety net is required for those people least capable of coping with climate change impacts, and a common but differentiated mitigation strategy is needed to protect the poor and most vulnerable.

5) Inaction is inexcusable

There is no excuse for inaction. We already have many tools and approaches — economic, technological, behavioural, management — to deal effectively with the climate change challenge. But they must be vigorously and widely implemented to achieve the societal transformation required to decarbonise economies. A wide range of benefits will flow from a concerted effort to alter our energy economy now, including sustainable energy job growth, reductions in the health and economic costs of climate change, and the restoration of ecosystems and revitalisation of ecosystem services.

6) Meeting the challenge

To achieve the societal transformation required to meet the climate change challenge, we must overcome a number of significant constraints and seize critical opportunities. These include reducing inertia in social and economic systems; building on a growing public desire for governments to act on climate change; removing implicit and explicit subsidies; reducing the influence of vested interests that increase emissions and reduce resilience; enabling the shifts from ineffective governance and weak institutions to innovative leadership in government, the private sector and civil society; and engaging society in the transition to norms and practices that foster sustainability.

Source: The Guardian

GREEN Originally uploaded by wanchai888

Economist Edward L. Glaeser penned a guest blog for the New York Times about green city living. He points out that people who want a much smaller carbon footprint should live in high-density cities, where travel is less necessary and living quarters are more confined.

Here is an excerpt from Glaesers blog:
Matthew Kahn, a U.C.L.A. environmental economist, and I looked across America’s metropolitan areas and calculated the carbon emissions associated with a new home in different parts of the country. We estimated expected energy use from driving and public transportation, for a family of fixed size and income. We added in carbon emissions from home electricity and home heating. We didn’t try to take on the far thornier issues related to commercial or industrial energy use.

This exercise wasn’t meant to be some sort of environmental beauty contest, but an estimate of the environmental costs and benefits associated with living in different parts of the country. In a recent City Journal article, I gave a brief (and somewhat polemical) synopsis of the results.

In almost every metropolitan area, we found the central city residents emitted less carbon than the suburban counterparts. In New York and San Francisco, the average urban family emits more than two tons less carbon annually because it drives less. In Nashville, the city-suburb carbon gap due to driving is more than three tons. After all, density is the defining characteristic of cities. All that closeness means that people need to travel shorter distances, and that shows up clearly in the data.

While public transportation certainly uses much less energy, per rider, than driving, large carbon reductions are possible without any switch to buses or rails. Higher-density suburban areas, which are still entirely car-dependent, still involve a lot less travel than the really sprawling places. This fact offers some hope for greens eager to reduce carbon emissions, since it is a lot easier to imagine Americans driving shorter distances than giving up their cars.

But cars represent only one-third of the gap in carbon emissions between New Yorkers and their suburbanites. The gap in electricity usage between New York City and its suburbs is also about two tons. The gap in emissions from home heating is almost three tons. All told, we estimate a seven-ton difference in carbon emissions between the residents of Manhattan’s urban aeries and the good burghers of Westchester County. Living surrounded by concrete is actually pretty green. Living surrounded by trees is not.

The policy prescription that follows from this is that environmentalists should be championing the growth of more and taller skyscrapers. Every new crane in New York City means less low-density development. The environmental ideal should be an apartment in downtown San Francisco, not a ranch in Marin County.

Source: The New York Times

no access Originally uploaded by Arezu

Dwindling water supplies are a greater risk to businesses than oil running out, a report for investors has warned.

Among the industries most at risk are high-tech companies, especially those using huge quantities of water to manufacture silicon chips; electricity suppliers who use vast amounts of water for cooling; and agriculture, which uses 70% of global freshwater, , says the study, commissioned by the powerful CERES group, whose members have $7tn under management. Other high-risk sectors are beverages, clothing, biotechnology and pharmaceuticals, forest products, and metals and mining, it says.

“Water is one of our most critical resources – even more important than oil,” says the report, published today . “The impact of water scarcity and declining water on businesses will be far-reaching. We’ve already seen decreases in companies’ water allotments, more stringent regulations [and] higher costs for water.”

Droughts “attributable in significant part to climate change” are already causing “acute water shortages” around the world, and pressure on supplies will increase with further global warming and a growing world population, says the report written by the US-based Pacific Institute.

“It is increasingly clear that the era of cheap and easy access to water is ending, posing a potentially greater threat to businesses than the loss of any other natural resource, including fossil fuel resources,” it adds. “This is because there are various alternatives for oil, but for many industrial processes, and for human survival itself, there is no substitute for water.”

In a joint statement, CERES’ president Mindy Lubber and Peter Gleick, president of the Pacific Institute, urged more companies and investors to work out their dependence on water and future supplies, and make plans to cope with increased shortages and prices.

“Few companies and investors are thinking strategically about the profound business risks that will exist in a world where climate change is likely to exacerbate already diminishing water supplies,” they say.

“Companies that treat pressing water risks as a strategic challenge will be far better positioned in future,” they add.

The CERES report adds to growing concern about a looming water crisis. In the Economist’s report, The World in 2009 , Peter Brabeck-Letmathe, chairman of food giant Nestlé, wrote: “under present conditions… we will run out of water long before we run out of fuel”. And at its annual meeting this year the World Economic Forum issued what it itself called a “stark warning” that “the world simply cannot manage water in the future in the same way as in the past or the economic web will collapse”.

CERES, which has members in the US and Europe, made recommendations, including that companies should measure their water footprints from suppliers through to product use, and integrate water into strategic planning, and that investors should independently assess companies’ water risk and “demand” better disclosure from boards.

Source: The Guardian

The Big Tree Originally uploaded by kellymlacy

Trees across the tropics are getting bigger and offering unexpected help in the fight against climate change, scientists have discovered.

A laborious study of the girth of 70,000 trees across Africa has shown that tropical forests are soaking up more carbon dioxide pollution than anybody realised. Almost one-fifth of our fossil fuel emissions are absorbed by forests across Africa, Amazonia and Asia, the research suggests.

Simon Lewis, a climate expert at the University of Leeds, who led the study, said: “We are receiving a free subsidy from nature. Tropical forest trees are absorbing about 18% of the carbon dioxide added to the atmosphere each year from burning fossil fuels, substantially buffering the rate of change.”

The study measured trees in 79 areas of intact forest across 10 African countries from Liberia to Tanzania, and compared records going back 40 years. “On average the trees are getting bigger,” Lewis said.

Compared to the 1960s, each hectare of intact African forest has trapped an extra 0.6 tonnes of carbon a year. Over the world’s tropical forests, this extra “carbon sink” effect adds up to 4.8bn tonnes of CO2 removed each year – close to the total carbon dioxide emissions from the US.

Although individual trees are known to soak up carbon as they photosynthesise and grow, large patches of mature forest were once thought to be carbon neutral, with the carbon absorbed by new trees balanced by that released as old trees die.

A similar project in South America challenged that assumption when it recorded surprise levels of tree growth a decade ago, Lewis said. His study, published in Nature, was to check whether the effect was global.

The discovery suggests that increased CO2 in the atmosphere could fertilise extra growth in the mature forests.

Lewis said: “It’s good news for now but the effect won’t last forever. The trees can’t keep on getting bigger and bigger.”

Helene Muller-Landau of the Smithsonian Tropical Research Institute in Ancon, Panama, said the forests could be growing as they recover from past trauma.

“Tropical forests that we think of as intact [could have] suffered major disturbances in the not-too-distant past and are still in the process of growing back.” Droughts, fire and past human activity could be to blame, she said. “This recovery process is known as succession and takes hundreds or even thousands of years.”

The research comes as efforts intensify to find a way to include protection for tropical forests in carbon credit schemes, as part of a new global climate deal to replace the Kyoto protocol.

Lee White, Gabon’s chief climate change scientist, who worked on the new study, said: “To get an idea of the value of the sink, the removal of nearly 5bn tonnes of carbon dioxide from the atmosphere by intact tropical forests should be valued at about £13bn per year.”

David Ritter, senior forest campaigner at Greenpeace UK, said: “This research reveals how these rainforests are providing a huge service to mankind by absorbing carbon dioxide from our factories, power stations and cars.

“The case for forest protection has never been stronger, but we must not allow our politicians to use this as an excuse to avoid sweeping emissions cuts here in the UK, says David Ritter of Greenpeace.”

Source: The Guardian

Silvretta cow Originally uploaded by wYnand!

Cadbury, the chocolate producer, is to encourage its cows to burp less to reduce the carbon footprint of its milk chocolates.

The company is working with its 65 dairy farmers in Wiltshire to reduce the emissions of their animals. Production of the famous glass-and-a-half of milk in every bar is responsible for 60% of the chocolate’s carbon emissions, according to experts at the Carbon Trust who audited the carbon emissions from the company’s products.

Cadbury has sent the farmers a guide for low carbon dairy farming, which includes advice on changing the diet of the cows to cut their eructations.

Farmed ruminant animals are thought to be responsible for up to a quarter of “man-made” methane emissions worldwide though, contrary to common belief, most gas emerges from their front, not rear ends.

Studies show that the production of one litre of milk produces the equivalent of 900g of CO2. More than half of this is down to methane. The average cow emits between 80kg and 120kg of methane a year, equivalent to the annual carbon emissions from an average family car.

Ian Walsh, Cadbury’s global head of environment, said the company was looking to reduce the environmental impact of its supply chain. “We are committed to tackling climate change and we rely on scientific research to inform the actions we take.” The company worked with the Carbon Trust to work out the life cycle emissions of the chocolate.

Cadbury is not the first to address emissions from cattle and dairy farming. Experts at the Institute of Grassland and Environmental Research in Aberystwyth have also looked at how the diet of farmed animals can be changed to make them produce less methane, a much more potent global warming gas than CO2.

The altered diet changes the way that bacteria in the stomachs of the animals break down plant material into waste gas. The institute is working on a government programme with the universities of Wales and Reading, to investigate how this process could be improved. A similar project in New Zealand suggested that dietary changes could reduce methane emissions from sheep by up to 50%.

Source: The Guardian

Insulation Originally uploaded by joaobambu

All UK households will have a green makeover by 2030 under government plans to reduce carbon emissions and cut energy bills.

Cavity wall and loft insulation will be available for all suitable homes, with plans to retrofit 400,000 homes a year by 2015. Financial incentives for householders will also be available for low-carbon technologies such as solar panels, biomass boilers and ground source heat pumps, paid for by a levy on utility companies.

The government wants a quarter of homes (7m) to benefit from the schemes by 2020, extending to all UK households by 2030.

The strategy could help cut household carbon emissions by a third by 2020, part of its target to reduce overall UK emissions by 80% by 2050. Currently, homes account for 27% of the UK’s carbon emissions through heating and power.

The plans were welcomed in principle by green groups and energy campaigners, though many were still concerned by the lack urgency in the proposals – which might only begin in 2012 – or detail on how the majority of the plans will be funded.

Energy and climate change secretary Ed Miliband said: “We need to move from incremental steps forward on household energy efficiency to a comprehensive national plan – the Great British refurb.”

“We know the scale of the challenge: wasted energy is costing families on average £300 a year, and more than a quarter of all our emissions are from our homes. Energy efficiency and low-carbon energy are the fairest routes to curbing emissions, saving money for families, improving our energy security and insulating us from volatile fossil fuel prices.”

Read the full article in The Guardian.

CO2 close up Originally uploaded by cstein96

Atmospheric levels of the main greenhouse gas are hitting new highs, with no sign yet that the world economic downturn is curbing industrial emissions, a leading scientist said today.

“The rise is in line with the long-term trend,” Kim Holmen, research director at the Norwegian Polar Institute, said of the measurements taken by a Stockholm University project on the Arctic archipelago of Svalbard off north Norway.

Levels of carbon dioxide, the main greenhouse gas from human activities, rose to 392 parts per million (ppm) in the atmosphere in Svalbard in December, a rise of 2-3 ppm from the same time a year earlier, he told Reuters.

Carbon dioxide concentrations are likely to have risen further in 2009, he said. They usually peak just before the start of spring in the northern hemisphere, where most of the world’s industry, cities and vegetation are concentrated.

Plants suck carbon dioxide, which is released by burning fossil fuels, out of the atmosphere as they grow. Levels fall toward the northern summer and rise again in autumn when trees lose their leaves and other plants die back.

“It’s too early to make that call,” he said when asked if there were signs that economic slowdown was curbing the rise in emissions. And he said any such change would be hard to detect.

“That’s a tricky one to do,” he said. “If we had, for example, a year with an unusually warm Siberian winter, that could cancel the human variation.”

A warm Russian winter would allow more bacteria to break down organic material in the soil, releasing carbon dioxide.

800,000-YEAR PEAKS

Levels of carbon dioxide are around the highest in at least 800,000 years, and up by about a third since the Industrial Revolution.

The increase is caused by “mainly fossil fuel burning and to some extent land use change, where you have forests being replaced by agricultural land,” Holmen said.

The U.N. Climate Panel says rising greenhouse gas concentrations are stoking warming likely to cause floods, droughts, heatwaves, rising seas and extinctions.

Latest data is from December because measuring equipment on Svalbard is being replaced.

“We can see the trend from these winter numbers,” Holmen said. The numbers are higher than annual average year-round figures reported by groups such as the U.S. National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration.

More than 190 nations have agreed to negotiate a new international deal by the end of 2009 to fight climate change. It would succeed the U.N.’s Kyoto Protocol, which sets carbon dioxide limits for 37 industrialized nations.

Source: ENN

2008 Staycation 67 Originally uploaded by mossbak

In an effort to reduce carbon emissions, people have started taking staycations, a vacation where you don’t go anywhere. There is a lot of sense in this. Traveling can be very stressful. Miss a connecting flight in a foreign country, and you might have trouble getting even your most basic of needs met. There is a great deal of sense in eliminating the stress part of a vacation by hanging about locally. It’s also greener. Everyone wins. Here is a list of seven local vacation possibilities.

Art Museum
Most cities have a cultural center of some sort. If the largest art museum in the city is considered “lame” by most, boasting the works of only a few dead Flemish men, it might be time to scope out galleries that support local artists. These galleries are sure to shock you, amaze you and possibly insult your intelligence. What a great way to spend a vacation.

The Library
The library is more than just a collection of books and old women whispering hush. It’s a lively community center with classes, discussion groups and readings by visiting and local authors. Hey. It also has books, movies and periodicals for your enjoyment. It’s all free. (Except for the taxes you pay.)

The University
Your local university is always hosting speakers, panel discussions and readings. They often have their own art museums, sporting teams and libraries inside their borders. And if you don’t like any of that, why not take some classes?

Zoo
The zoo is a great place to see animals. Some people don’t like to see animals caged up. I understand that. But on the other hand, seeing all those animals has probably inspired quite a few people to work to protect wildlife.

Fairs/Carnivals/Festivals
Most places, even the smallest of rural towns, have at least one festival a year. There is Bingo for grandma and a parade for the kids. Larger towns may have craft fairs or festivals. There might be a jamboree or hay rack ride at the apple orchard. Check the living section in your local newspaper for dates and locations.

Historic Landmarks
Something historic happened near you. Take my word for it. You’ll find something historic or significant in a fifty mile radius. 

Sporting Event
A lot of cities have professional sports teams, but many cities have college level or minor league teams. Pick a home team and root for them. You’ll have a blast being a booster. You can also paint a big number on your stomach and shout at those foolish refs.

Source: Planet Green