One of the most popular additions to the sustainable mobility arsenal has been the personal mobility device. These small, personal vehicles are usually powered by electricity alone and are designed for use on short trips to work or to the store. While the Segway was the first to enter into the public eye, various car manufacturers have been working on their own concepts
The U3-X
Last year, Honda announced it’s new concept personal mobility device, the U3-X. Unlike the Segway that requires the user to stand on a rolling platform, the U3-X is designed as a high-tech unicycle.
The Vision
Honda engineers worked with the idea of producing a product "in harmony with people". To this end, the movement of the U3-X is designed to mimic the directional movements common to humans. The rider balances on the unicycle, and controls the direction taken and the speed travelled by shifting their body weight. HOT Drive System (Honda Omni Directional Drive System) technology is responsible for this breakthrough. Multiple small wheels adjust the larger wheel in response to commands from the computer interface.
One of the most practical attributes of the U3-X is its portability. It is designed to be lightweight, and has a handle for portability. Foot rests fold up and it can be charged from a home outlet.
A U3-X owner living in an urban environment could potentially use the device to commute to work. The battery charge lasts for 12 miles.
Practical Ramifications
Integrating the use of personal mobility devices into our daily lives would require a fundamental restructuring of our society and our culture. Currently, too many people live more than six miles from their place of work, creating a challenge for anyone attempting to create a battery-powered commuter vehicle. Perhaps embracing new, cleaner technology will also require embracing a new way of life.
Bio: Alexis Bonari is a freelance writer and blog junkie. She is currently a resident blogger at onlinedegrees.org, researching areas of online colleges. In her spare time, she enjoys square-foot gardening, swimming, and avoiding her laptop.
Many people were rightly outraged at recent reports that coins thrown into a whale pool may have contributed to the death of a baby beluga at the Vancouver Aquarium. Regardless of the cause of one-year-old Nala’s death – or of what one thinks of whales in captivity – it was heartening to see that so many people cared.
But it would be nice to see that much attention paid to the stuff we humans throw into the belugas’ natural Arctic habitat. We’re killing more than just one baby beluga with our irresponsible actions.
Of the seven beluga populations in Canada, the Committee on the Status of Endangered Wildlife in Canada (COSEWIC) has listed three as endangered, one as threatened, and one as being of special concern. The other two are not at risk. Along with hunting, the whales are threatened by “habitat loss from shore development, build-up of toxic contaminants and disturbance by commercial shipping, ice breaking and whale watching activities.” Oil exploration and drilling in the Arctic could increase the risk.
Belugas aren’t the only ones we’re harming with the way we treat our oceans. We’re hurting ourselves and our children and grandchildren as much as we’re hurting the fish, whales, corals, and other life in the seas. And just as we can refrain from tossing coins into an aquarium whale pool, we can stop throwing our garbage into the oceans and we can curtail some of the other activities that put marine life and our own lives at risk.
Just consider the giant garbage patches swirling in the Pacific and other oceans. All that plastic and debris doesn’t get there by itself. Some of it comes from nets and garbage dumped from ships, but much of it comes from things discarded on land that get washed or blown into the oceans. These plastics and toxins end up in the stomachs of many marine animals, causing great harm including death. Some of the toxins can also work their way into humans, as we eat the fish and other sea creatures. In fact, all of us carry a mixture of human-manufactured contaminants that have entered our bodies through the food we eat, the water we drink, the air we breathe, and the products and elements we come in contact with every day.
Right now we’re also pouring millions of litres of oil into the ocean, in the Gulf of Mexico. This illustrates how everything is interconnected – even our problems. The disaster in the gulf is a direct consequence of our overconsumption and reliance on diminishing fossil fuels for energy. And that in turn is creating problems beyond pollution in the ocean. Our use of fossil fuels is also causing air pollution and is contributing to the greatest threat facing humanity, climate change.
What this should teach us is that all of us can and must do our part to turn it around. We need to drive less, consume less, use fewer plastic products, throw away less, recycle and compost more, and make sure the products we use are as environmentally sustainable as possible. These individual actions can make a powerful difference, especially because, as more people do their part, this becomes the socially “normal” way to live.
Just look at some of the changes we’ve adopted in relatively short time periods: decreased rates of smoking where regulations and information have made the habit socially unacceptable, more people and stores shunning plastic grocery bags, more cities bringing in recycling and composting programs, more people cycling… The list goes on.
Of course, it will take more than just making changes in our own lives. Action is needed in political and corporate realms as well. But remember that individual people wield the power in those institutions, and they must also respond to societal pressure. That’s especially true of the politicians who are elected to represent the interests of all citizens. We must take democracy more seriously, being politically active to make environmental action a major part of the criteria we vote for. We need regulation and taxation to discourage what we don't want and to encourage what we want.
What we do in our lives affects our entire world – its soils, its rivers, lakes and oceans, its atmosphere, and all the living things that share our planet. We must understand that when we do something that harms the beluga, or the grizzly, or the spotted owl, we are also harming ourselves.
Learn more at www.davidsuzuki.org.
Friday, June 18, 2010
Species loss is a silent epidemic that threatens our planet
Scientists warn that the twin threats of climate change and wildlife extinction threaten our planet’s life-support systems, including clean air, clean water, and productive soil. Awareness about the causes and consequences of climate change is growing, leading some governments to look for solutions in areas such as clean energy. Species extinction, however, has gone largely unnoticed by government leaders.
In an article in the Guardian newspaper, France’s ecology secretary and the World Resources Institute’s vice-president of science and research argue that “Unlike the impacts of climate change, biodiversity – and the ecosystem services it harbours – disappears in a mostly silent, local and anonymous fashion. This may explain in part why the devastation of nature has triggered fewer alarm bells than a hotting-up planet.”
Sadly, this is true. Unlike the devastating forest fires, deadly heat waves, and violent storms that have ravaged the planet as a result of climate change, the disappearance of plants and animals seems only to get the attention of politicians when it results in serious economic and social upheaval – such as when overfishing led to the collapse of cod stocks in Atlantic Canada, throwing thousands of fishermen out of work.
The unravelling of food webs that have taken millennia to evolve is happening all around us. With every patch of forest cut, wetland drained, or grassland paved over, our actions are destroying wildlife habitat at an unprecedented rate.
Scientists warn that we are in the midst of a human-caused catastrophic wildlife crisis. Of the species we know about, some 17,000 plants and animals are facing extinction, including 12 per cent of birds, nearly a quarter of mammals, and a third of amphibians. Some of the species most vulnerable to human impacts are iconic, well-loved creatures. For example, of the eight distinct bear species that grace our planet, six are now in serious trouble, including sun bears, pandas, and polar bears.
The response of our leaders has for the most part been abysmal. The United Nations has declared 2010 the International Year of Biodiversity. Countries are now reporting on their progress in reducing biodiversity loss as required under an international treaty called the Convention on Biological Diversity that most nations, including Canada, have signed. However, the UN has admitted that governments have failed to meet the treaty’s objectives “to achieve by 2010 a significant reduction of the current rate of biodiversity loss at the global, regional and national level as a contribution to poverty alleviation and to the benefit of all life on Earth.”
Despite our collective failure to meet the 2010 biodiversity target, countries are preparing to negotiate new global targets to slow the rate of biodiversity loss. A flurry of international activity is now underway that will include a special session of the UN General Assembly on the biodiversity crisis in September.
It’s easy to be skeptical about the effect these negotiations and meetings in plush hotel ballrooms will have on protecting life on our planet, given the lack of meaningful progress so far. But one recent outcome of the global biodiversity talks gives us hope.
Government negotiators from around the world just met in Busan, South Korea, where they approved the creation of a new global science body that will act as an “early warning system” to inform government leaders on major biodiversity declines and to identify what governments must do to reverse these damaging trends.
This global Biodiversity Scientific Body will be modelled on the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), which, through science, has catalyzed world-wide understanding and action on global warming.
Despite the efforts of huge multinational oil companies to discredit its work, the IPCC has compiled the best available science on the causes and impacts of global warming, as well as charting the most effective ways for us to solve the problem. In doing so, it has ensured that climate change has remained a priority for governments, and has proven to be an invaluable tool to help the media understand and report on the issue – independent of politics or PR spin. We hope the newly created “IPCC for Nature” will play a similar role in educating, inspiring, and mobilizing policy-makers and the public to take decisive action to stem the biodiversity crisis.
Since BP’s Gulf of Mexico disaster begun on April 20, we have all been witnessing how dirty and costly oil can be. Today, however, we will take a look at the leaders ushering in a new worldwide industry—clean energy. According to the Pew Charitable Center, the clean energy sector in some of the world’s largest economies has seen explosive investment growth, since 2005. In fact, it is up 230 percent and is projected to grow by another $200 Billion by the end of 2010. Below is the list of the world’s top ten leaders in renewable energy investment.
China
For the first time, China, the country with one of the world's most dismal environmental records, leads the G20 in clean energy investments. In 2009, China invested $34.6 billion (USD) in clean alternatives. That makes up 30.5% of the G-20 nations’ total investment in renewable energy. From 2005 to 2009, the vast majority of that investment, 71.1%, was allocated to wind power. Solar energy received only 8% of the investment, but China is still one of the world’s largest solar-panel producer.
The United States
The U.S. came in second, with 16.4% of the G-20 nation’s total investment. Although there is not much manufacturing of alternative energy sources done on U.S. soil, the country dominates venture finance and technology innovation. The United States invested $18.6 billion for clean energy, in 2009. The total U.S clean energy investments included wind power (43.1%) and bio-fuel, with 47m liters of ethanol produced, over the past four years.
The United Kingdom
The U.K., coming in third, has also investing primarily on wind energy and allocated 57.1% of its $11.2 billion 2009 clean energy budget to wind towers. The U.K. intends to procure 20% of its electricity and 10% of its fuel needs from renewable energy by the end of 2010.
The European Union
The EU-27 countries, profiled together, invested $10.8 billion in renewable energy in 2009.That makes up 9.5% of G-20 clean energy investments. Again, the vast majority, 62.9%, of clean energy investment went to wind power.
Spain
Spain is ranked fifth with $10.4 billion in the clean energy investment in 2009. Spain went against the wind energy trend and invested 60.6% of its budget on solar energy. Wind energy received (34.2%) of the country’s total renewable energy investment from 2005 to 2009.
Brazil
Coming in sixth among G-20 members, Brazil invested $7.4 billion in clean energy in 2009. Brazil is still the worlds leading ethanol producer, relative to the size of its economy. Over the past four years, Brazil is reported to have the second-highest investment growth rate. Brazil has the world’s largest ethanol infrastructure, relative to the size of its economy and produced over 30 billion liters of sugar based ethanol in 2009.
Germany
Germany came in seventh place with $4.3 billion worth of clean energy investments in 2009. That is up more than 18% from previous years. Germany’s clean energy investments from 2005 to 2009 were divided between solar energy (44.3%) and wind power (31.2%).
Canada
In eighth place, Canada invested $3.3 billion in its clean energy sectors. Most of the investment, 60%, went to wind power. Mini-hydro electric power is another leading sector that Canada has been investing in over the past four years.
Italy
Coming in ninth place is Italy. The country invested $2.6 billion in clean energy in 2009 and its investments have increased by 110%, in the past five years. Wind power was the key clean energy sector for Italy during the past four years getting 61.6% of all clean energy investments.
India
India is ranked tenth on the list with $2.3 billion invested in the country’s renewable energy industry, in 2009. Wind power received 59.5% of India’s clean energy investments, from 2005 to 2009.
It could never happen here. That was Prime Minister Stephen Harper’s assurance in the wake of the massive oil disaster in the Gulf of Mexico, which he referred to as “an environmental catastrophe unlike anything we've seen in quite a long time”.
The company behind the spill off the U.S. Gulf coast, British Petroleum, has three licences to drill for oil in the Beaufort Sea in Canada’s Arctic. BP and other companies have asked our federal government to relax environmental regulations around Arctic drilling. And B.C. is still pushing to get the federal government to lift a moratorium on drilling off the West Coast. There’s also a plan in the works by Enbridge to build a pipeline to carry oil from the tar sands to the B.C. coast, where it will be put on oil tankers for ocean shipping. Questions have also been raised about the safety of an offshore well that Chevron has started drilling off the coast of Newfoundland. It will be deeper than the one in the Gulf of Mexico.
We’ve been assured many times that the technology is safe, but the Gulf disaster shows that no technology is foolproof. Can we really afford the risk?
President Barack Obama has halted plans for further oil drilling in the Gulf until an investigation is completed (although, according to the Center for Biological Diversity, the U.S. has approved 27 other offshore drilling projects since the spill), and California Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger has implemented a similar moratorium on drilling off that state’s coast. Canada, however, has no plans to halt East Coast or Arctic drilling, and the B.C. government continues to push for drilling off the West Coast. When a disaster of this magnitude occurs, we should stop to re-examine the state of our own programs that might have similar risks so that we can find ways to avoid harming our oceans and coastal communities.
B.C.’s coast, which is known worldwide for its rich biodiversity and vibrant tourism industry, is particularly vulnerable to the impacts of an oil spill. A spill would be carried quickly by the nutrient-rich currents, possibly washing up on the mainland, Vancouver Island, and Haida Gwaii coasts. A spill or leak could threaten orcas, salmon, birds, and many other plant and animal species as well as devastating our fishing and tourism industries.
Is this the price we’re willing to pay for a polluting and diminishing source of energy? Oil may seem inexpensive compared to some forms of energy, but if you factor in the costs of these real and potential disasters, not to mention the everyday pollution, it’s not such a bargain.
One surprising response to the spill comes from proponents of the Alberta tar sands who see the Gulf disaster as boon. A cartoon in the Edmonton Journal pictured U.S. President Obama standing in the Gulf with oil on his hands, saying, “On second thought, the Alberta oilsands ain’t so bad…” The tar sands have been linked to ecological, social, and medical problems, including toxic water pollution and excessive greenhouse gas emissions – and none of that is altered by the Gulf spill. The disastrous consequences of ocean oil spills may be more immediately apparent, but land-based drilling can also cause environmental damage. Leaks, spills, blow-outs, fires, and explosions are more common than many people realize.
A more thoughtful response to the spill would be to recognize the huge risks associated with the kind of energy we use and the way we get it. Clearly, the negative costs of tar sands and deep ocean resources should point to the need to work toward a carbon-free energy future.
The problems are only going to get worse as we reach peak oil, when the most accessible sources of oil are all but gone and we must rely even more on the dirtier and harder-to-reach supplies in the deep ocean or tar sands.
We can’t stop using fossil fuels immediately, but we should see this latest disaster as an opportunity to look at the costs of our energy use and where we should go from here. Clearly we must wean ourselves from oil and gas as we make the transition to cleaner sources of energy. If we were wise, we would go more slowly with the resources we do have – in the tar sands, for example – and use the revenues to fund research and development of clean energy.
Friday, May 21, 2010
Alternative Channel merges with Parta Sustainable Solutions Group
We are pleased to announce that Alternative Channel has joined PARTA Sustainable Solutions Group. We believe this partnership will ensure the continued growth of our editorial coverage and strengthen our ability to raise awareness on pertinent sustainable development and social justice issues. By drawing on PARTA’s expertise in E-Learning, Alternative Channel can now better help companies interested in undergoing institutional change by creating platforms that encourage dialogue and open debate. With this new deal, Alternative Channel is bringing sustainable development initiatives directly to institutions and encouraging action.
It looks like streetcars will, once again, be gliding through 22 major U.S. cities in the coming years thanks to a change in the U.S. federal transportation policy.
Last June, the US Department of Transportation (DOT) and the Federal Transit Administration (FTA) reversed policies of President George W. Bush that favored rapid transit, but made it difficult to spend federal funds on green alternatives. The FTA announced that it would now start evaluating applications on the basis of land uses and the economic development transit projects would bring to a city. Speed and efficiency will no longer be the only criteria. Convenience, quality of life and long term economic benefits will now be the primary focus.
The FTA announced that it would now start evaluating applications on the basis of land uses and the economic development transit projects would bring to a city.
In December, DOT announced that it would make grants of up to $25 million each for ‘urban circulator systems’ such as streetcars and rubber-tire trolleys. It noted that these systems foster the redevelopment of urban spaces into walkable mixed use, high density environments.
“A streetcar does not save any travel time,” said Rick Gustafson, executive director of Portland Streetcar Inc. in Oregon. “Rather, a streetcar makes movement within a city more convenient, and helps build up relatively dense, walkable, mixed use corridors. It also reduces dependence on automobiles.”
In the past ten years, he added, Portland has seen an increase in private investment along the Portland Streetcar line, by $3.5 billion USD. Up to 53 percent of all downtown development has been within a block of the streetcar line.
Who derailed the streetcar?
But if the street car is cheaper to operate, better for the environment and good for local economies, why did it ever disappear? To answer that question we have to look back to the beginning of the last century.
In the early 1920s only ten percent of Americans owned cars. The vast majority of commuters traveled by train, or by streetcar. The streetcar was a reliable and efficient means of travel, the city air was clean, and the streets where less congested. But although this arrangement worked well for city dwellers at the time, it did not work for the country’s largest car manufactures.
“We’ve got 90 percent of the market out there that we can…turn into automobile users. If we can eliminate the rail alternatives, we will create a new market for our cars,” Alfred P. Sloan, GM’s president at the time, was quoted as saying in a 1996 PBS docudrama titled Taken for a Ride.
The documentary contends that in 1922, Sloan created a front company called National City Lines, Inc. (NCL), with the intention of undermining the country’s rail-based public transit systems. In 1936, he got other specialized conglomerates on board and reorganized the NCL into a holding company. The defined mission—to acquire all local transit systems in the United States and dismantel them.
"Once [NCL] purchased a transit company, electric trolley service was immediately discontinued, the tracks quickly pulled up, the wires dismantled," noted Edwin Black, in his 2007 book, Internal Combustion: How Corporations and Governments Addicted the World to Oil and Derailed the Alternatives. He said that GM buses soon replaced the trolleys, and commuters, bothered by the uncomfortable bus ride and toxic exhaust fumes, soon abandoned public transit altogether.
In 1949, GM, Standard Oil of California, Firestone, and others were convicted in the United States District Court for the Northern District of Illinois of conspiring to monopolize the sale of buses and related products. The verdicts were upheld on appeal. The punishment? The corporations involved were fined $5000, their executives were made to pay $1 each.
The public mood today is shifting. Citizens are becoming increasingly frustrated with public policies that support the destructive behaviour of greedy multinationals. Obama’s sweeping electoral victory is one example of this. People are demanding change—new policies that will take citizens into account, improve our quality of life and foster new economic development. Interestingly, though, sometimes we have to look back in time to put good ideas back on track.
Cities working on plans to construct streetcar lines within a year or two are:
- Little Rock, Arkansas
- Los Angeles, California
- Sacramento, California
- Fort Lauderdale, Florida
- Atlanta, Georgia
- Boise, Idaho
- New Orleans, Louisiana
- Baltimore, Maryland
- Grand Rapids, Michigan
- Charlotte, North Carolina
- Cincinnati, Ohio
- Columbus, Ohio
- Lake Oswego, Oregon
- Providence, Rhode Island
- Dallas, Texas
- Fort Worth, Texas
- San Antonio, Texas
- Salt Lake City, Utah
- Arlington, Virginia
- Kenosha, Wisconsin
- Tucson, Arizona
- Washington, D.C.
Awesome footage of a streetcar traveling down Market Street in San Francisco in 1905.
Who Killed The Electric Streetcar?
Produced for PBS Frontline by the Center for Investigative Reporting
Every day, we slather ourselves with liquids, lotions, and potions – from shampoo and soap to deodorant and makeup. After all, most of us want to look and feel clean and to smell nice. It's not uncommon for a single person to use 10 or more personal-care products daily.
We don’t usually think of our cosmetics as a source of pollution. But U.S. researchers found that one eighth of the 82,000 ingredients used in personal-care products are industrial chemicals, including carcinogens, pesticides, reproductive toxins, plasticizers, and degreasers.
Take a look at the ingredient list on your bottle of shampoo or hand lotion. Most of us would have a hard time identifying which chemicals in the typically long list of ingredients may be harmful to human health or the environment.
Chances are your personal-care products contain “fragrance” or “parfum” – often the last item on the ingredient list. Fragrance recipes are considered trade secrets so manufacturers don’t have to disclose the chemicals they include. More than 3,000 chemicals are used to create “fragrances”, usually in complex mixtures. Up to 80 per cent of these have never been tested to see whether they are toxic to humans.
These fragrances are not just found in perfumes and deodorants but are also in almost every type of personal-care product, as well as laundry detergents and cleaning products. Even products labelled “fragrance-free” or “unscented” can contain fragrance, usually with a masking agent to prevent the brain from perceiving odour.
The negative effects of some fragrance ingredients can be immediately apparent, especially for the growing number of people with chemical sensitivities. For example, fragrance chemicals can trigger allergic reactions, asthma attacks, and migraines. Researchers have even found evidence suggesting that exposure to some of these chemicals can exacerbate or even contribute to the development of asthma in children.
Other chemicals may have harmful effects that don’t show up right away. For example, diethyl phthalate (DEP) is a cheap and versatile chemical widely used in cosmetic fragrances to make the scent last longer. But it is associated with a range of problems.
The European Commission on Endocrine Disruption has listed it as a Category 1 priority substance, based on evidence that it interferes with hormone function. Phthalates have been linked to early puberty in girls, reduced sperm count in men, and reproductive defects in the developing male fetus (when the mother is exposed during pregnancy).
Some research has also suggested that phthalate metabolites may contribute to obesity and insulin resistance in men. Health Canada has moved to ban six phthalates in children’s toys, after evidence showed that prolonged exposure can cause liver or kidney failure, but it has no plans to regulate the chemicals in cosmetics. DEP is also listed as a Priority and Toxic Pollutant under the U.S. Clean Water Act, based on evidence that it can be toxic to wildlife and the environment.
Fragrance chemicals often harm the environment. Some compounds in synthetic “musk”, which wash off our bodies and find their way into nature, remain in the environment for a long time and can build up in the fatty tissues of aquatic animals. Researchers have found measureable levels of synthetic musks in fish in the Great Lakes, and they’ve found that levels in sediment are increasing.
In response to the sensitivity many people have to airborne chemicals, a growing number of offices and public spaces are becoming “fragrance-free”. This is a great initiative, but what are these and other harmful chemicals doing in our cosmetics in the first place?
Canada’s regulations don’t measure up to standards in other parts of the world. The European Union restricts many fragrance ingredients and requires warning labels on products if they contain any of 26 allergens commonly used as cosmetic fragrances. Europe also prohibits or restricts the use of chemicals classified as carcinogens, mutagens, or reproductive toxins in personal-care products.
The David Suzuki Foundation and other organizations are working for safer products. We’re conducting a survey (www.davidsuzuki.org/whatsinside) to raise awareness and to find out what’s in the products people use every day. We plan to present the results in September, along with recommendations for strengthening laws to protect Canadians and our environment from harmful chemicals in personal-care products.
You can help out by becoming more aware of what’s in the products you use and switching to products that don’t contain harmful ingredients.
Cars and trucks are among the biggest contributors to the heat-trapping emissions that cause global warming. About 12 per cent of Canada’s greenhouse gas emissions come from private automobiles, and up to a quarter come from road transportation in general. That makes driving a good place to start in confronting one of the most serious challenges humans face.
Canada and the U.S. just announced plans to enact fuel-efficiency standards for new cars and light trucks manufactured in the two countries. Canada is expected to match the U.S. standards, which will require all cars and trucks built by a company to get an average of about 35 miles per gallon, or six litres per 100 kilometres, by 2016. Canada’s government estimates that will lead to a 25 per cent reduction in vehicle emissions in 2016 compared to 2008. The government’s next step should be to require more zero-emission vehicles powered by clean-energy sources.
The new-vehicle regulations are good for the environment and the economy – but people who don’t plan to buy new cars can also reduce their driving-related impact on the environment. Maintaining and driving a vehicle efficiently can make a big difference. Of course, the best way to reduce fuel consumption is to get out of your car. Walking, cycling, or using public transit mean fewer cars spewing emissions and less gridlock, which causes pollution as cars waste fuel while idling.
Getting out of the car isn’t always possible, though, especially in rural areas not served by public transit, where travel distances and weather often make walking and cycling impractical. Designing communities around people instead of cars by investing more in public transit and less on roads and freeways is important in the long term, but for now drivers can reduce their current gas consumption by as much as 20 per cent with a few eco-driving tips – something the David Suzuki Foundation’s Quebec office learned with its Drive Smart or Roulez Mieux campaign (www.roulezmieux.ca/).
As with the new government fuel standards, adopting better driving habits demonstrates that doing what’s right for the environment also makes good economic sense. Beyond saving money on gas, drivers can reduce wear on their cars, saving on maintenance and car-replacement costs.
One of the first things you can do is make your transportation more efficient through planning. Instead of making separate trips to get to work and the store, combine the journeys. Joining a car pool is also a great idea.
Keeping your vehicle properly maintained, with regular tune-ups, including air-filter and oil changes, and tires in good shape and properly inflated will allow you to go further on less gas.
Driving habits also help. Avoiding rush hour and driving defensively can help ensure that the fuel you burn will get you to your destination more quickly and efficiently. Shutting off the engine if your car is stopped for more than a minute makes sense too. Slowing down also helps. Going over the speed limit won’t get you to your destination much faster, but it will burn more fuel.
Other good habits include keeping your trunk clean – as less weight requires less fuel to transport – and using the car’s accessories sparingly.
It’s up to all of us to do what we can to reduce the emissions that contribute to climate change. That’s especially true because governments are often slow to act and don’t always go far enough. Sometimes they need a bit of a push, from individuals, communities, businesses, or even other levels of government. For example, the U.S. emissions standards were developed in response to tough standards enacted by the state of California and adopted by other states. (In Canada, Quebec was the first province to implement tougher fuel standards.)
As fossil fuels become scarce, and as our knowledge of the impacts of pollution and global warming increases, the benefits of doing all we can to use less gas just keep adding up. For the new fuel standards, savings at the gas pump will even offset the higher costs of the new fuel-efficient vehicles. The new standards will also lead to more jobs, as new technologies are developed.
We have a long way to go in resolving the issues around our love affair with the car and environmental destruction, but at least we’re getting started.
Somewhere in your city, several renegade environmentalists are huddling around a dimly lit kitchen table drawing out their latest offensive. They make a few phone calls and send out a couple of emails before they grab their shovels and march downstairs into the dark city streets. They call themselves guerilla gardeners and, today, they will be defacing another drab city sidewalk with bright yellow sunflowers and lovely purple lavender.
Guerrilla gardening, a tradition that can be traced back to the late 18th century, consists of people planting crops, flowers and shrubs on land that does not belong to them. At its core, it is a direct action political statement intricately tied to land reform and land rights. However, it has been making a significant comeback in the past few years, according to prominent guerilla gardener Richard Reynolds, because it is simply a fun way to spend an evening.
We here at Alternative Channel have become increasingly intrigued by this blossoming movement. So, we tracked down Richard Reynolds in his London office to find out, why he does what he does, what is behind the movement’s growing popularity, how do guerilla gardeners fund their activism and what are some of the problems they face.
AC: So, for all of us that are not familiar with Guerilla Gardening, what is it about?
RR: It’s about gardening wherever you want regardless of who owns the land. It’s about getting out there and doing it and expressing yourself in a public place. In a place where the land is not being done anything with. It’s not until the last four years that it has caught on because people like myself have been blogging about it and writing about it and talking about it and making short movies about it.
AC: Why do you think Guerilla Gardening has been gaining in popularity?
RR: People want to keep in touch with the land around them. More people are getting the sense that we need to get a little closer to nature again. More people are living in cities. So they don’t have their own garden space. That is how I came to be doing it. Because I moved to London and I had no garden. Not even a window sill, for the first time in my life. But I also got involved for the sense of community. If you’re doing something in public that is generally seen as pretty positive, you are going to meet people. That is the social side of it.
AC: So you have collaborators?
RR: Yes, I do it with others (laughter). These days some of my best friends are from guerilla gardening. And, some of my older friends, who aren’t really gardeners, come on the journey with me.
AC: Watching your video, I noticed you spend a lot of money on this.
RR: Sometimes. Yep. But by no mean does it have to cost that much. It depends on how impatient you are. And there are times when I’m quit impatient. And I want to do something that is really obvious and that means buying plants. But you don’t, by any means, need to spend a lot.
May 1st, for four years now, has been the international sunflower guerilla gardening day. Which is an idea some guerilla gardeners in Brussels conceived. And that’s just about planting a few sunflower seeds around the city.
And, if you get word out people give you stuff as well. Gardeners chuck stuff out and people chuck stuff out of their gardens. They feel guilty about it, so if they can find some positive way to direct it then...
AC: When you have to spend money, do you pay for everything out of your own pocket?
RR: Yes. Or there is a little bit of fundraising going on.
AC: What kind of fund raising?
RR: We sell lavender. Some of the lavender that we planted in the guerilla garden, which you can see on some of the online films, we chop up about once a year anyway, and stuff goes into pillows. And that raises lots of money because we sell them at an extortionary price. (laughter )
AC: Have you ever had any mishaps when guerilla gardening?
RR: There is an online film showing one of my many encounters with police. It is the only one, actually, where I was threatened with arrest. I have a video of it online. It’s quite hammy. It’s quite a bit hyped up to be dramatic, because it was being done for Swedish children’s TV. They didn’t really appreciate that, actually. There was no need to film it like it was some spy movie, because the drama is there anyway.
AC: So that was the only time?
RR: Yes. That’s when it got difficult and I got angry. Normally when the police realize, after brief questioning, that we are not really destroying stuff, they just let us get on with it and turn a blind eye. The wide spread attitude is tolerance. Sometimes we will try to provoke a political reaction, by planting larger plants. Quiet tolerance is usually the response. However, for virtually every guerilla gardener I’ve met, the political objective is secondary to the fun and pleasure of doing it.
In an attempt to refill its coffers and rebrand itself as an environmentally friendly company that has its finger on the pulse of the global economy, General Motors Co. (GM), unveiled its new pod-like electric vehicle in Exo Shanghai 2010, last month.
GM's EN-V, or Electric Networked-Vehicle, is a 1.5 meter two-seater concept car that is both economical and environmentally friendly. But that is not all it does. The EN-V also offers drivers an ‘autonomous driving’ option, which uses a GPS system, digital maps, vehicle sensors, and cameras to pick the best routes and avoid accidents.
Definitely an “interesting” start for the struggling company, says Elizabeth Hirst, public relations instructor at McGill University in Montreal. “It kind of revived any respect I might have had for GM, which until recently has been behaving like a reactive dinosaur,” she said.
Not bad for a company that in September 2006, was sued by the state of California for producing cars that emitted over 289 million metric tons of carbon each year in the United States. That is nearly 20 percent of all carbon emissions in the United States. And as for California, the suit argued that GM was responsible for 30 percent of all carbon emissions in the state. The lawsuit was ultimately dismissed, but the trial was a public relations nightmare.
But things are different today, according to Kevin Wale, GM’s China president. “EN-V reinvents the automobile by creating a new vehicle DNA through the convergence of electrification and connectivity,” he said, in a statement. “It provides an ideal solution for urban mobility that enables future driving to be free from petroleum and emissions, free from congestion and accidents, and more fun and fashionable than ever before."
The EN-V is a positive step for a company that has often been criticized for both, its lack of foresight and its dismal environmental record. GM's insistence on producing large gas-guzzlers, when consumers were moving towards smaller, more environmentally friendly and economical cars, has hit the company hard in recent years.
Since the 1990s, GM has relied heavily on its SUVs as the main profit center. As a result, when the economy started to dive, the company followed closely behind. GM lost $18.8 billion USD during the first 6 months of 2008 and its stock dropped 76 percent by late October.
GM executives failed to hedge their bets to protect themselves from an economic crash and they failed to understand that the vast majority of today’s consumers expect more from their brands.
According to a nine-country survey, conducted by international public relations firm, Edelman, 85 percent of consumers around the world are willing to change the brands they buy to make tomorrow’s world a better place. And, 88 percent said it is their “duty” to contribute to a better society and environment.
However, it must be genuine, insists Hirst. “The main message that people like me want to get across to clients is that if you want to appear green you better be green. You can’t paper everything over,” she said. But the creation of the EN-V, she adds, “ shows they are listening. And, when companies respond to consumers, shareholders, public opinion, government, whatever it is, then that is good. That is corporate social responsibility.”
A price for the EN-V has not yet been set, but GM says will cost less than a small car but more than a moped. GM expects to role out the EN-V within the next 15 years.
Water is one of the most essential elements to our existence. It is vital for all forms of life and it is the defining feature of our planet. But today, in many parts of the world, water is also responsible for snuffing out life, according to an annual report released on Monday by the UN Environmental Program. In fact, more people are dying each year by water related illnesses than by all violent crimes combined, including war.
According to the 88 page report titled Sick Water, more than half of the world's hospital beds are occupied by people suffering from water-related illnesses and 3.7 percent of all deaths, millions of people, are caused by water related diseases, each year. Unfortunately, as is often the case with war and ecological disaster, young children are the most vulnerable. Annually, approximately 1.8 million children under five die because of the water they consume. That means a young child dies every 20 seconds.
Achim Steiner, the U.N. Undersecretary General and executive director of UNEP, is urging quick action. "If we are not able to manage our waste, then that means more people (will be) dying from waterborne diseases," he said. The most serious cases are in underdeveloped nations, where an estimated 90 percent of all wastewater goes directly into rivers, lakes or oceans, untreated. An estimated two million tons of sewage, industrial and agricultural waste is dumped into the world’s waterways each year, causing disease and damaging ecosystems.
However, the report does offer solutions which Steiner underscores. "If the world is to thrive, let alone to survive on a planet of 6 billion people heading to over 9 billion by 2050, we need to get collectively smarter and more intelligent about how we manage waste, including wastewaters."
Sick Water calls for a sustained investment and a firm commitment from the local authorities and international donors. It is not the quantity of investment, the report says, “not one-off, short-term, single-sector investments,” that will make a difference. Rather a paradigm shift is proposed. New approaches that include carefully targeted investments and technological innovation, are needed. “Not one size fits all,” but by ensuring that investments are appropriate to the industries and communities they serve.
In short, effectively tackling this problem requires engagement and commitment that boost economies, increase labor productivity and reduce poverty.
The video below is a commentary by Rose George, the British author of the 2008 book "The Big Necessity: The Unmentionable World of Human Waste and Why It Matters."
What can a 9-year-old teach us about sustainability? Ask Carrick McCullough's dad, Colin from Our Renewable Nation, whose family values include teaching sustainability. Colin, his wife and their two boys traveled cross country in a veggie powered Beetle visiting renewable energy sites and sustainable companies to create a series of eco-videos for kids.
Their latest video is from the Solar Decathlon—a contest of universities across the globe to build zero energy homes and buildings, where Carrick shows off the latest in renewable energy technology, solar power and sustainable building. It’s quite incredible what types of innovation is taking place around green building.
They published their first video with 9-year-old Carrick interviewing Jeff Cresswell, the owner of Klean Kanteen, in Chico, CA that makes eco-friendly stainless steel water bottles a few weeks ago. Jeff talked to Carrick about the benefits of using stainless steel water bottles in regard to sustainability.
Carrick is quite an incredible 9-year-old kid and Change Agent who understands the impact of his actions and the world's behavior. He's using his language and interests to help share eco-friendly information with kids across the country. In the past, Carrick's created an award winning film seen by more than 200,000. They hope to distribute the videos to schools to help empower the youth to create a sustainable and renewable future.
He truly embodies the meaning of being a Change Agent--he's an independent spirit working toward making positive change in this world. Changents is helping Carrick tell his story and share his videos with people around the globe. He's growing awareness and raising support of his projects. Follow his story and show him some support on Our Renewable Nation’s story home on Changents.com.
Last December, I spent three weeks in Japan. As a first-time visitor to the country, I spent most of my time just taking it all in…the people, the food, the cities, the country side, the social norms, and the practices relating to environmental action. Here were some of my observations:
1. Getting Around
The Japanese-made car is one of the most respected in the world and clearly, they love them here too. But more notably, people embrace bicycles, the Shinkansen (the bullet train goes up to 300 km/hour), and super wide-spread and efficient transit systems. As a foreigner, it was simple enough for me to get around, starting from the airport, and including the busy cities of Tokyo, Osaka, Kyoto and the countryside.
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