Krugman: Solar is Here, Fracking is Terrible
Nobel Prize winner Paul Krugman, in the NYT, on why the solar economy is really here, and why natural gas fracking is a lousy idea.
(Thanks for the link, Bobby Cookie Hirtle)
Category: Energy & Sustainability
First Journalist Look at Fukushimi-daiichi
An eerie, devastated, and highly radioactive place, according to the New York Times.
Nuclear power is NOT the answer. It has an abysmal record. The March 2011 accidents are only the latest in a long line of hundreds of mishaps, including earlier accidents at Fukushima going back to 1985.
68% of Americans Support Gov’t Funding of Clean Energy
Even a majority of Republicans, according to this detailed survey of Americans’ feelings on alternative energy in Huffington Post.
A popular slogan during the 1960s was “If the people lead, the politicians will follow.” Might be time to bring that one back.
Thanks to C Gauvin for the link.
Houses From Trash
A lot of visionary people out there are convinced that pretty much anything in the waste stream can be turned to more productive use. And quite a number of them are building low-cost houses out of other people’s discarded junk.
The above link takes you to several articles, with cool photos, about various people who are doing just that. (Note that the first, second, and fourth links all cover the work of one man, Dan Phillips of Huntsville, Texas—but with different pictures and narrative).
What I love about this kind of approach is that it simultaneously accomplishes multiple goods:
- Provides low-cost housing at a time when so many have lost their homes
- Reduces landfill waste, and thus extends the life of our landfills
- Demonstrates the viability of other approaches than throwing stuff to rot slowly in a huge heap
- Reduces the need to harvest virgin materials, and thus cuts back on environmentally destructive practices such as clear-cutting and strip-mining
- Eliminates the release of significant carbon and other greenhouse gases compared to construction from new materials
- Encourages all of us to use our creativity and ingenuity to address the problems of our time
- Shows yet again that one person can make a difference
Paper Made of Beer Waste? Amazing
Here’s a company that’s been selling hand-made recycled art papers since 1998 (think about really cool and classy invitations)—and has just developed a new paper line using post-brewery barley as one of the ingredients—and being smart marketers, billing it as the first beer paper. They sponsored this morning’s HARO, and thus, I learned about them. I clicked over half expecting some very rough page put up by a few carousing fratboys–boy, was I wrong! These people love the earth and love what they do, which is obvious on every page of their site.
The firm is called Twisted Limb, out of Bloomington, Indiana. I love their sustainability page, too.
Permaculture Takes Root at Occupy Wall Street
I love this! Recognizing that they need to be part of the solution and not just the agitation, permaculture experts have started some deep green initiatives including graywater recycling–at Zuccotti Park in lower Manhattan, home to the original Occupy Wall Street demonstration/encampment.
Once again, the protests remind me of the remarkable communities we had during the Seabrook occupation and our subsequent incarceration at various national guard armories, back in 1977.
Note: if they can do permaculture in an impermanent camp in a city park, we should be able to do it all over the country and the world in our permanent dwellings.
Majority of Americans Think Nation’s Progress Too Slow on Renewable Energy
A new poll by the University of Texas shows 76 percent of Americans think we should be doing more on renewable energy—so we’ve made good progress in penetrating consciousness.
Yet only 5 percent see energy or the environment as the top government priorities. Jobs, not surprisingly, topped the list with 37 percent.
Patagonia Grows Its Brand By Telling People to Buy Less
Fascinating article by Marc Stoiber on how Patagonia’s latest environmental initiatives tells customers not to buy what they don’t need, and to make what they do buy last forever. And if it doesn’t last forever, Patagonia will take it back and recycle it for you.
It may be counter to common logic, but Stoiber thinks this will increase sales, and tells why. And I agree, for reasons I cite in my latest book, Guerrilla Marketing Goes Green—that caring and an envirnmental/soial justice agenda build fans and build the brand.
Patagonia is always a great company to watch and learn from, and this initiative does not surprise me.
Conservation Saves 254 Megawatts this Year in the Pacific Northwest
And in the last 33 years, that region has saved enough energy to meet Seattle’s energy needs four times over.
That is A LOT of power savings, and totally replicable elsewhere in the country. Makes a lot more sense than building more coal or nuclear plants!
I was Inducted into the National Environmental Hall of Fame Today!
Earlier today, I was inducted into the National Environmental Hall of Fame, recognizing my 40 years of work for the environment (as a writer, speaker, and organizer). Pretty good, considering I’m only 54. Yup, I’ve been doing this work since I was 14.
Among the accomplishments NEHF cited: my work in founding Save the Mountain, an environmental group I founded in my town of Hadley, Massachusetts to protect the Mount Holyoke Range when it was threatened by a large and nasty housing development…my work in the safe energy movement (my first book was on why nuclear power makes no sense, in fact)…initiating the first nonsmokers’ rights regulations in Northampton, MA (and one of the first in the state)…and of course, my award-winning eighth book, Guerrilla Marketing Goes Green.
In my acceptance, I mentioned that I felt this award was really for all of the several thousand people who worked on these campaigns, and the millions who work on these kinds of causes around the world. I was delighted to accept on their behalf.
Sweetly enough, the range was visible from the award location behind (Barstow’s store)
