Test Your Air Knowledge During National Air Quality Awareness Week
Not much, says a team of students at MIT. You can swap the Hummer for a hybrid and diet on lentil curry instead of lamb chops, but it will a have only a limited effect on your carbon footprint (read a PDF of their study).
The students interviewed people from a range of different income brackets. They then calculated how much energy is needed to sustain every aspect of their subjects' lives, from the food they eat to health services they receive....and found there is a threshold energy use that almost no one in the US can avoid, and in global terms it's high.
Take one of the Buddhist monks that the students interviewed. He earns $8500, so his travel habits likely involve Greyhound buses rather than Gulfstream jets. But the monk uses 120 billion Joules of energy a year. That's a third of the US average, but almost double the global mean. For those in better paying professions, emissions can reach 10 times the global mean, or between 400 billion to 600 billion Joules.
The source of this carbon is the infrastructure that no one in developed countries can avoid being part of. It's the energy used to mend the roads and heat hospitals. Even homeless people visit soup kitchens and sleep in hostels. That earns them a carbon footprint around the same size as the monk's.
Does this mean we should abandon attempts to be green? Certainly not. Every saving matters, especially when governments are not doing enough. But the MIT work shows how deeply carbon is embedded into our lives. Real change requires reform across the board - Read full from "Even the homeless have large carbon footprints"
Who is thinking, if we all think alike? - Haase
Unfortunately, the players involved saw the priority as preserving the market rather than as reducing emissions.
Similarly, the CDM market is pretty widely acknowledged to be a failure. The primary claimed goal behind CDM was to develop clean infrastructure for poor nations. (That is why it was called "Clean Development Mechanism," not "Cheap Carbon Credit Provider.")
I would add that that there are serious questions [PDF] about whether CDM carbon credits even represent net reductions, without qualified regulating project-based credit generation.
The evidence is overwhelming that CDM increases emissions.
The world's main carbon markets are all created... with ideological stakes in trading and those with financial stakes in carbon markets lobbying for the interests of these markets over creating actual emissions cuts. That should come as no surprise.
Read full from GAR at Grist...
Labels: CarbCrap
¶ 4/30/2008 01:10:00 AM 0 Comments Links to this post
From: New York Times
It is great to see that we finally have some national unity on energy policy. Unfortunately, the unifying idea is so ridiculous, so unworthy of the people aspiring to lead our nation, it takes your breath away. ...deciding to line up in pushing to suspend the federal excise tax on gasoline, 18.4 cents a gallon, for this summer's travel season. This is not an energy policy. This is money laundering: we borrow money from China and ship it to Saudi Arabia and take a little cut for ourselves as it goes through our gas tanks. What a way to build our country.
When the summer is over, we will have increased our debt to China, increased our transfer of wealth to Saudi Arabia and increased our contribution to global warming for our kids to inherit.
No, no, no, we'll just get the money by taxing Big Oil....Even if you could do that, what a terrible way to spend precious tax dollars — burning it up on the way to the beach rather than on innovation?
Peter Schwartz of Global Business Network describes as the true American energy policy today: "Maximize demand, minimize supply and buy the rest from the people who hate us the most."
But here's what's scary: our problem is so much worse than you think. We have no energy strategy. If you are going to use tax policy to shape energy strategy then you want to raise taxes on the things you want to discourage — gasoline consumption and gas-guzzling cars — and you want to lower taxes on the things you want to encourage — new, renewable energy technologies. We are doing just the opposite.
"It's a disaster," says Michael Polsky, founder of Invenergy, one of the biggest wind-power developers in America. "Wind is a very capital-intensive industry, and financial institutions are not ready to take 'Congressional risk.' They say if you don't get the [production tax credit] we will not lend you the money to buy more turbines and build projects."
If we are not subsidized - If the wind and solar credits expire, said Resch, the impact in just 2009 would be more than 100,000 jobs either lost or not created in these industries, and $20 billion worth of investments that won't be made.
Haase - There is as much wrong as "right" with this NYT article, simply increasing subsidizes without cuts increases inflation... and when the payback on the "clean" energy investment takes 2 decades, why should banks or congress start writing blank checks to "Green Greed" investors. Germany and Japan are NOT models of the climate, economy geography or politics in America. What works there will not work the same here... we are a much larger mass with 10 fold loads. Solar and wind farms from coast to coast in America will not keep the lights on in NY and Chicago very long (sorry it's a math thing). I think Congress knows this.
And simply bashing candidate plans without a opposing plan is called "propaganda". What was Obama's alternate plan?
Earth to America - Billions of tax dollar subsidized investments are not an investment in the economy, it is a withdrawal.
Read more from New York Times Original URL
TIME states: No one yet has a comprehensive plan for how we could do so again, but everyone agrees on what the biggest parts of the plan would be. Here's our blueprint for how America can fight—and win—the war on global warming...
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Tax billion$ in carbon energy sources we "do not like", to invest in potentially higher carbon producing sources that "appear to be" greener
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Invest billions to rehash old ideas that failed for decades under grants and subsides with "hope" of yield ing better results
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Continue to divert billions in wind, solar and bio-energy with "hope" that they become viable enough in the next 10 years to "catch up" with our massive demands
From TIME
U.S. is losing. Indeed, if we're fighting at all—and by most accounts, we're not—we're fighting on the wrong side. ...the U.S. remains the land of the Hummer with vague promises of manufacturing fuel from switchgrass or powering cars with hydrogen—someday... taking a pass on what might be the most patriotic struggle of all.
Environmentalists offer theirs, which too often amount to naive wish lists that could cripple America's growth.
Think I'm Kidding? Read the article here
TIME suggests: devising a coherent strategy that mixes short-term solutions with farsighted goals, combines government activism with private-sector enterprise and blends pragmatism with ambition, the U.S. can, without major damage to the economy, (What kind of vague langue is this?)
TIME - The most important part of a blueprint to contain climate change is to put a charge on carbon emissions. "Cap and trade changes everything," says Krupp.
Soooo wrong their not even "right".
FACT - Krupp. may be fatality flawed in the amount of financial pain and human suffering this carbon market trading will put onto the world. What good for industrialized nations will reign a "holocaust" on the third world. - Haase
TIME Points out - Dramatic reductions in U.S. emissions won't bring the intended environmental benefits if emissions by other countries increase at the same time. The problem is, if we don't clean up our own mess because developing giants don't have to, what's the incentive for them to clean up theirs? "If we don't act, China and India will simply hide behind America's skirts of inactions and take no steps of their own," says Senator John Warner of Virginia.
FACT - The third world has NO means or incentive to follow U.S. actions and we are a decade away from a coherent dialogue.
In fact, carbonizing rapidly industrializing economies may indeed lead to a war...
Particularly when the painful cuts made by North America, Western Europe and a handful of other OECD economies are dwarfed by the emission trail spewing from China and the rest of the developing world.
As OECD countries begin to tax their own economies by charging growing fees on CO2 emissions, their their trading partners will diminish rapidly.... killing the GDP of those countries whose supply chains depend on OECD countries
FACT: Developing World - Principal Source of Emissions (Source )
Total global emissions have risen by a cumulative 25% since the beginning of the decade. But only a small fraction of those emissions came from North America, Western Europe and OECD economies. In fact, emissions in the most advanced economies of the world have grown by a paltry 5%, one-tenth the 50% increase seen of the developing world.
Over the last seven years, China and other developing nations consist of 90% of Emissions Growth...So great has the recent rise in emissions growth in the developing world been that as of 2005, it surpassed the OECD in total emissions at a massive 2,500 million metric tonnes (mmt) or nearly 55% of global emissions.
Within a decade they will account for more than two-thirds.
How much will it squeeze the U.S. Economy?
TIME - 2% of the GDP for a few years...
It's true that there will be costs associated with any carbon-pricing plan; ending climate change won't be free. "You want a clean environment, you have to pay for it," says Peter Fusaro, founder of the green investment group. 
All based on a flawed hope that;...carbon cap with teeth will boost electricity and gas prices in the short term, before carbon-free alternatives can be scaled to market, and that will hurt those already struggling to heat their homes and fill their tanks.
TIME - Offering suggestions that are no better than my Grandmas; America has long been astoundingly wasteful about energy use, but for years, that mattered little because power and fuel were so cheap. "Until recently, using more energy was a way to get more productive," says Kevin Surace, of a green building company. "That doesn't change until energy costs go substantially up."
Think of simple, costless changes like turning off the lights in offices at night—that's "money on the table," Efficiency standards could be put in place for household appliances and lighting as well.
And I would love to see the spreadsheet that depicts this;...in the words of efficiency guru Amory Lovins of the Rocky Mountain Institute. MGI says annual industry-wide investments of $170 billion per year in efficiency improvements like green buildings and higher-mileage cars could yield an additional $900 billion per year in savings by 2020.
TIME - Well it's a crap shoot... go for it!;
But the good news is that there are already thousands of very smart people working on alternative energy...buzzing that "the biggest bubbling is happening in California,"
Adding that:
That's where government can help...whip hand to the process. A firm carbon price will accelerate creativity by making alternatives that much more economical.
TIME - Pointing out that
"There's no shortage of ways to spend whatever money is made available." Solar, Wind power, tidal power, geothermal energy and even nuclear fusion—any of which could take off with enough luck and money.
Suggesting that; Washington should flood the zone with research funding, and refrain from trying to pick a winner... (yikes)
All spending BILLIONS more rehashing a short sighted, misguided future driven by venture capitalist; "developing ways to make better biofuels out of feedstocks like wood chips"???
Finally they suggest more "micropolicies, like tax credits," to further nickel and dime us on feed small misguided projects that offer no ROI.
Summary if we took all the steps outlined by TIME here:
● national cap-and-trade system; to break the economy of third world nations
● tougher energy-efficiency mandates; should be real easy if we throw money at problems
● investments billions more in new public and private green technologies; without strategic investment return projections
● absorbing perhaps 2% to 3% of gdp a year for some time; to force further decline of world economy
Going green: What could be redder... After formally insulting our nation and taxpayers by calling America a "loser" in the global warming fight; Kristin Modesto, hails "California" as the "leader" with Schwarzenegger, leading the way on global warming... and yes, she is from California.
What happened to one nation under GOD?
Why wage "war" when we can enjoy and prosper from the obvious opportunities in world energy and trading?
For over three decades the science and prevention of "global warming" have not changed – but political and media reaction to it has.
I did love the image by Fredrik Brodén in the headlines... very nice TIME;
Now spend more effort on content. - Haase
¶ 4/29/2008 07:03:00 AM 0 Comments Links to this post
Labels: CarbCrap
¶ 4/29/2008 02:28:00 AM 0 Comments Links to this post
The Environmental Protection Agency is poised to release its proposed new standards for regulating lead air pollution, known as the National Ambient Air Quality Standard (NAAQS) for lead.
The ucsusa is requesting experts sign the EPA a letter supporting this EPA standard.
History:
Water is a vital and increasingly rare commodity. It is essential for the maintenance of life which includes cities, towns, small communities, agriculture and industry.
For $9,995, the E-Fuel 100 MicroFueler will use sugar as its main fuel source, or feedstock, along with a specially packaged time-release yeast the company has developed. Depending on the cost of sugar, plus water and electricity, the company says it could cost as little as a dollar a gallon to make ethanol*
For starters, sugar-based ethanol doesn't look much cheaper than gas. It takes 10 to 14 pounds of sugar to make a gallon of ethanol, and raw sugar sells in the United States for about 20 cents a pound, says Michael E. Salassi, a professor in the department of agricultural economics at Louisiana State University. But Mr. Quinn says that as of January this year, *under the North American Free Trade Agreement, he can buy inedible sugar from Mexico for as little as 2.5 cents a pound, which puts the math in his favor. While this type of sugar has not been sold to consumers, E-Fuel says it is developing a distribution network for it.
$25,000 solar install with a 15 year life that only replaces 60% of demand use... sounds like the investors need a economics 101 class.
-worried about the environment, but it's also about money: "I want it to pay for all my electricity," ... Murphy thought installing solar panels would be worth the up-front cost, especially if federal and state rebates made it more feasible. His roof — sturdy and pitched toward the south, unshaded by trees or other buildings, and located in direct sun— seemed perfectly suited for solar energy.
Haase Comments:
The US Department of Energy (DOE) issued a Funding Opportunity Announcement (FOA) for up to $7 million over two years (FY 2008 – 2009) to support advanced research and development in converting non-food based biomass to low-cost bio-oils. Combined with private minimum cost share of 20%, up to $8.75 million would be invested in this research effort.
Recent research has shown that upgrading bio-oils (pyrolysis oil) produced by fast pyrolysis to fungible hydrocarbon fuels—such as gasoline and diesel—by employing conventional petroleum refining techniques, such as hydrotreating and hydrocracking, is a promising pathway for alternate fuels. However, pyrolysis oil has long-term storage stability issues that need to be addressed for this upgrading technology to be commercially viable. In this FOA, DOE is specifically soliciting applications for the development of technology capable of stabilizing the bio-oils.
Under appropriate pyrolysis operating conditions, biomass can be converted to relatively high yields (~70 wt %) of liquids—a mixture of organic compounds (pyrolysis oil) and water. The liquid organics are oxygenated hydrocarbon compounds resulting from the thermal breakdown of lignin, cellulose, and hemicellulose.
Collectively, pyrolysis oil is comprised of a complex mixture of acids, alcohols, aldehydes, esters, ketones, sugars, phenols, furans, and multifunctional compounds such as hydroxyacetaldehyde. The relative amounts of each compound class can vary depending on the biomass feedstock used and the operating conditions employed during pyrolysis.
These characteristics present practical problems in the storage, transport, and processing of pyrolysis oils prior to and during their upgrading to hydrocarbon fuels.
DOE is seeking technical approaches to producing pyrolysis oil with a stability enabling the resulting pyrolysis oil to be transported and stored, in commercial scale tankage, for at least six months under ambient conditions.
Resources Biomass Fast Pyrolysis Oil (Bio-oil) Stabilization
Labels: HybridHype
¶ 4/28/2008 12:31:00 AM 0 Comments Links to this post
The label on Aquafina water bottles will soon be changed to spell out that the drink comes from the same source as tap water, the brand's owner said Friday.A group called Corporate Accountability International has been pressuring bottled water sellers to curb what it calls misleading marketing practices.
Aquafina is the single biggest bottled water brand, and its bottles are now labeled "P.W.S." The new labels will spell out "public water source."
"If this helps clarify the fact that the water originates from public sources, then it's a reasonable thing to do," PepsiCo spokeswoman Michelle Naughton said Friday.
Source: Forbes (via spluch)
Biofuels give us an idea what we can expect from "reactive environmental campaigns". All in the name of "the global warming crisis", ...
According to many environmentalists this has accomplished the following:
- Helped drive up food prices, contributing to a global crisis;
- Led to "increased environmental damage," including dead zones in the Gulf of Mexico so polluted by fertilizer runoff that nothing can live;
- Created "incentives for global deforestation, including in the Amazon basin";
- Reduced U.S. oil consumption by 1% while eating up 25% of our corn production.
If carbon-induced global warming is "Eco-Reactivist's" primary concern then, more food based biofuels will continue to make it worse by clearing agricultural land and rainforests, which absorb massive amounts of carbon dioxide.
The paradox is that "in viral medias" short sighted focus on quick fixes that have proven to fail since the 70's, may in actuality cause a enough to environmental damage and pollution to create "true manmade global warming".
By now everyone has witnessed the devastation of food based, subsidized biofuels. Once started, government initiatives are difficult if not impossible to stop, no matter how disastrous.
Taxpayers will still be subsidizing ruinous biofuels when the next catastrophic solution to the imaginary climate crisis is imposed.
This is a call to ALL regulators, policy makers and academic leaders to address this pandemic push to reactively control our planets finite energy, food, fuel and water supplies by posting your years of data and ignored regulations. (find out more at millionbloggermarch.org)
IF our nations leaders continue : "Base Legislation on newspaper headlines"... "Eco-Reactivist's" may push current energy and environmental problems past the point where even I see a viable solution. - Haase
RE: "How to make more money on food' ..."oil & ethanol see record profits" the same will be said of the food futures market later."
I would like to be wrong but one of the world's largest private companies agribusiness companies has just reported an 86 percent jump in its quarterly earnings.
... noted that these strong earnings are being driven mainly by its commodities division, the booming demand for biofuels, as well as increasing demand in new markets, especially Asia.
Last year, Cargill posted total sales topping $88 billion, and a net profit of $2.34 billion. To put that in context: $2.3 billion is the GDP of Belize.
Seemingly without warning, an additional 100 million people have been plunged into poverty by the abrupt increase in the price of food. Most of the people on Earth could not dream of owning an automobile. For them the doubling of the price of wheat and rice is vastly more serious than $4 gasoline. Contributing to the severity is hoarding, the high price of fertilizer, a shortage of fresh water for irrigation, and yes, the diversion of food crops into bio-fuels. It's been thirty years since the world faced a food crisis of this magnitude, but no one seems willing to mention the Devil's name. A recent BBC report on the Sudan captured the crisis perfectly: "The reality is that there are more people in one refugee camp in Darfur today than there were in the whole of Darfur and Khordofan in the 1930's!" The problem is not too little food, but too many mouths. No matter what advances are made in the human condition, they will eventually be lost if population is not constrained.
4.2 billion.
That's how many rooftops you'd have to cover with solar panels to displace a cubic mile of oil (CMO), a measure of energy consumption, according to Ripudaman Malhotra, who oversees research on fossil fuels at SRI International. The electricity captured in those hypothetical solar panels in a year (2.1 megawatts each) would roughly equal the energy in a CMO. The world consumes a little over 1 CMO of oil a year right now and about 3 CMOs of energy from all sources. Read the full story from News.com.
¶ 4/26/2008 05:44:00 AM 0 Comments Links to this post
UCS currently has exciting new positions open.
Please share these job announcements with anyone you think would be interested. Click descriptions below to see full job descriptions.
SCIENTIST/AGROECOLOGIST
RISK ANALYST
CALIFORNIA PROGRAM ASSISTANT
FOUNDATION RELATIONS OFFICER
CALIFORNIA CLIMATE CAMPAIGN DIRECTOR
ENERGY MODELER
TRANSMISSION POLICY ADVOCATE
¶ 4/25/2008 10:39:00 AM 0 Comments Links to this post
What the 2006 to present "greenwashing" media, social and political blitz has done to environmental issues...
Billions spent on movies, social, political and ad campaigns and there is still no improvement since 2006 film: Gore, and things are looking worse.
Yeah! Were green, their green were all green for what? Green - Completely lost significance...
Greenwashing has:
turned earthday into a big Green Yawn...
made it far more important to Sell Earth Day, than to change.
given people a huge "Why Bother" attitude.
Just like violence and sex in the media we have now made Americans desensitized to environmental issues. Exploitation and dramatizations of extreme environmental scenarios have eroded genuine concern and care for the the most basic interest in environmental problems.
An normal reaction for people on issues that are overwhelming is get a "Why Bother" attitude, as they feel their own actions can make not make a significant difference.
When enough people share a delusion, it loses its status as a psychosis and gets a religious tax exemption instead. - Ronald de Sousa
"green," "environmentally friendly," and "natural.", consumers are naively, trusting...
- 47 percent trust companies to tell them the truth in environmental messaging
- 45 percent believe companies are accurately communicating information about their impact on the environment
- 61 percent of Americans say they understand the environmental terms companies use in their advertising
The Green Gap Survey, found that almost half of those surveyed believing that anything marked "green" or "environmentally friendly" was good for the environment. Not quite a quarter really understood use of the terms in any meaningful way.
"The gap creates significant risk of embarrassment for companies and disillusionment for consumers," ....The result can be accusations that a company is engaging in 'greenwashing' and is misleading the public."
The survey found that consumers want regulation. Over 75% want certification by third party organizations and/or government regulation.
Read more from the Oxymoron source
EPA Invests $12 Million to Secure New York City's Drinking Water Supply
| (New York, N.Y.) Taking proactive steps to protect the nation's drinking water supply through robust investments in water security, the U.S Read full at: yosemite.epa.gov |
The AILs provide summaries, agency contacts, and other information about the rules EPA has approved for development. For example, the March 2008 AIL announces the agency's plans to issue an advanced notice of proposed rulemaking for greenhouse gases in late spring. This notice will solicit public input as EPA considers the specific effects of climate change and potential regulation of greenhouse gas emissions from stationary and mobile sources under the Clean Air Act.
The February and March 2008 AILs are now available. EPA expects to release the April AIL around April 30.
Action Initiation Lists: http://www.epa.gov/lawsregs/search/ail.html
¶ 4/25/2008 12:44:00 AM 0 Comments Links to this post
The plans are called for by the Great Lakes Water Quality Agreement between the United States and Canada to restore and maintain the chemical, physical and biological integrity of the Great Lakes. They are collaborative efforts of the state, federal, tribal and provincial governments, and organizations with an interest in the lakes.
www.epa.gov/greatlakes/lamp/index.html
One has to wonder if this is a "plant" article to drive the price of food futures.
"This is the fastest temperature change in the instrumental record, and it puts us back to where we were in 1930," Dr Chapman...
"If the temperature does not soon recover, we will have to conclude that global warming is over."
"My guess is that the odds are now at least 50:50 that we will see significant cooling rather than warming in coming decades," Source
------------------------------------
-Haase: My conclusion is that if we do nothing to prevent further ecological, energy and water abuse... we will have nothing for hell to freeze over or global warming to boil.
Protecting People and the Planet should never be a "Hot, cold, carbon or social" debate. We are finite as is our planet, lets act like it.
What's the true story on the BPA in water bottles and tin cans?
DO I have to give up storing water in anything but stainless steel?
No silver bullet
Tin, plastic, alum.... and even stainless all have equal or greater dangers dependi