We'd Bet on Al and Oprah Too

Though the cost of my monthly bus pass thankfully doesn't vary along with the price of fuel, I loved David Letterman's timely "Top Ten" list on July 28:

Top Ten Dumb Guy Ideas For Lowering Gas Prices

10. Make all roads downhill.
9. Cheaper self-service price if you pump the oil and refine it yourself.
8. Gas comes from dinosaurs, so all we need are more dinosaurs.
7. Invade Iraq.
6. Give Cheney a sawed-off shotgun and have him stick up an Exxon.
5. Tax cuts for the rich.
4. Get Bush and the middle east to straighten everything out on Oprah.
3. Jet packs for everyone.
2. Gas only costs 12 cents a gallon in Venezuela; drive to Venezuela for gas.
1. Get tubby genius Al Gore to figure it out.

While you're waiting for those jet packs to show up, why not try out these simple tips for increasing your mileage? Less money to Exxon means more left over for you.

(Get more ideas for living well and doing good in "The Green Life," a new section appearing in every issue of Sierra magazine.)

Sea Change

The Los Angeles Times is running a five-part series on "the crisis of the seas." Part One: Toxic slime. Part Two: Toxic algal blooms. If you can bear it, see: "Altered Oceans."

Another Way to See

If you have Google Earth installed on your PC, you may be interested in the re-launch of Another Chance to See, a blog inspired by the Douglas Adams book, Last Chance to See, about the late author's worldwide adventure in search of some of the planet's most endangered species. Gareth Suddes, the brains behind the blog, has posted a kmz file featuring the places on the map where Adams and biologist Mark Cawardine went on their journey.

Google Earth was an exhibitor at last year's Sierra Summit and the product has since been put to effective use by the Club and other environmental groups in campaigns where good maps are crucial for grasping the issues.

While you're in Google Earth (it's a free download, by the by), be sure to switch on the National Geographic tab under "Layers" and check out the geo-positioned photos from biologist Mike Fay's "megaflyover" of the African continent.

Au Revoir, Mer de Glace?

Last week, I posted an item about the disintegration of a large chunk of the Eiger -- a not-so-indirect result of global warming. For more on the melting Alps, see this February 2006 National Geographic article. While the full article is not available online, maps, photos and other resources on the subject are provided. Among the factoids retailed here:

Some 600 ski resorts now dot the Alps, which stretch more than 650 miles (1,000 kilometers) across eight nations. Scientists predict that as the permanent snow line rises along with temperatures, half those resorts could close by 2050. Less ice and snow cover means less runoff to feed Europe's major rivers. And as permafrost melts, some steep slopes—and the structures built on them—become destabilized.

One of the glaciers pictured on the site is Mont Blanc's Mer de Glace (or Sea of Ice), second-largest in the Alps. The glacier once extended all the way into Chamonix Valley, the reputed birthplace of mountaineering. Today it is barely visible from the tourist mecca. It is not an isolated retreat. The melting trend has been documented in alpine glaciers around the world, and the rate of melting has been rapidly hastening since the 1980s.

Mission Redacted

You may remember when NASA scientist James Hansen went public last January with the claim that he was being muzzled by the space agency's PR apparatchiks. At the time, New York Times science correspondent Andrew Revkin reported that:

In several interviews ... Dr. Hansen said it would be irresponsible not to speak out, particularly because NASA's mission statement includes the phrase "to understand and protect our home planet."

Not anymore it doesn't. Revkin reported last week that:

In early February, the statement was quietly altered, with the phrase "to understand and protect our home planet" deleted. In this year’s budget and planning documents, the agency’s mission is "to pioneer the future in space exploration, scientific discovery and aeronautics research."

The statement was reportedly altered without consulting with the agency's 19,000 employees. A flak-catcher for the agency told the Times that change had nothing to do with Dr. Hansen's use of the phrase. Purely coincidental.

And there you have it. Straight from the Ministry of Truth.

Business Cycles

Slate's man behind the Moneybox, Daniel Gross, looks at the giddy enthusiasm building around alternative energy and sees a parallel:

...extravagant promises about a new technology, investor enthusiasm, grandiloquent statements by entrenched executives, herd behavior from venture capitalists. Oh boy! You don't have to be a Wall Street sharpie to notice that the cultural and financial stars seem to be aligning around alternative energy much as they did around the Internet. And we all know how that ended.

Like most booms it went bust, of course -- and rather spectacularly, too. Which may make Gross's column sound like a warning. It is, but only partly. Gross goes on to say:

As consumers, investors, and workers, in other words, we've all been enriched by the fruits of the dot-com boom. It just took a while. A similar process may be unfolding now in the alternative-energy business. Many of these venture-backed alternative-energy firms will fail, and some of the publicly held ethanol stocks will turn out to be turkeys. But fierce competition will lead to price reductions in energy-saving equipment. The vast sums being plowed into research may lead to incremental improvements or revolutionary breakthroughs. And as more giant companies such as Wal-Mart become consumers of alternative-energy products and services, the industry will gain scale—a development that leads to price reductions for all consumers. So, let's hear it for the Prius Bubble.

What do you think? Are Gross's predictions premature, or are we really on the leading edge of the "New, New, New Thing" and poised for another economic rollercoaster ride?

Hijacked Science

In an Op-Ed piece in the New York Times, scientist Peter Doran objects to the distortion of his findings by the so-called global warming 'skeptics.' Doran was lead author of a paper that appeared in a 2002 issue of the journal Nature. He and his fellow researchers found that, "from 1966 to 2000, more of the continent [of Antarctica] had cooled than had warmed." That finding was happily seized upon by those who wish to conclude that global warming is bunk. Writes Doran:

Our results have been misused as “evidence” against global warming by Michael Crichton in his novel “State of Fear” and by Ann Coulter in her latest book, “Godless: The Church of Liberalism.” Search my name on the Web, and you will find pages of links to everything from climate discussion groups to Senate policy committee documents — all citing my 2002 study as reason to doubt that the earth is warming. One recent Web column even put words in my mouth. I have never said that “the unexpected colder climate in Antarctica may possibly be signaling a lessening of the current global warming cycle.” I have never thought such a thing either.

Our study did find that 58 percent of Antarctica cooled from 1966 to 2000. But during that period, the rest of the continent was warming. And climate models created since our paper was published have suggested a link between the lack of significant warming in Antarctica and the ozone hole over that continent. These models, conspicuously missing from the warming-skeptic literature, suggest that as the ozone hole heals — thanks to worldwide bans on ozone-destroying chemicals — all of Antarctica is likely to warm with the rest of the planet. An inconvenient truth?

Doran is not the first scientist to claim that his research was hijacked by the global warming naysayers. Back in May, Curt Davis, director of the Center for Geospatial Intelligence at the University of Missouri-Columbia, objected to an advertising campaign launched by the Competitive Enterprise Institute (CEI) in which his research was used to suggest that consensus thinking on global warming was dead-wrong. Similar to Peter Doran's findings, Davis's research showed thickening on the Antarctic ice sheet. But as Davis noted in a press release responding to the ads: "It has been predicted that global warming might increase the growth of the interior ice sheet due to increased precipitation" --something Davis says was noted in his paper, but "ignored by CEI in a deliberate effort to confuse and mislead the public."

Not content to give Davis the last word, CEI countered, incredibly, that the professor failed to understand his own research as well as the nature of their ad, which they said was an attack not on the science of global warming, but on "global warming alarmism." Quote:

What CEI’s ads attack is global warming alarmism, as illustrated by the lopsided press coverage of glacial melting as a worldwide catastrophe. Nowhere in those overheated press reports is there any indication that glaciers or ice sheets might actually be growing in certain parts of the world.

The "lopsided press" is a favorite target of both the left and the right, but if you ask me the press is like an armada of unsteady ships, jibing and tacking through a storm of facts. Some of those ships make it to port and others end up on the rocks. Let's go back to the case of Peter Doran, who told Bob Garfield of NPR's On the Media how some media outlets took his findings and drove them into the ground.

PETER DORAN: There were some cases of glorification or sensationalization of the results, especially in the headlines, and if I could read you a few examples, I've got some in front of me. There's one here that says: Guess What? Antarctica's Getting Colder, Not Warmer. New Data May Affect Political Debate over Global Warming. Some other headlines: Scientific Findings Run Counter to Theory of Global Warming. Oh, Dear! What Will the Doomsayers Say Now?

BOB GARFIELD: CNN ran a story in which the lead anchor began the piece by saying quote "A new study is casting doubt on the widely accepted theory of global warming. Now the strange thing about that CNN piece is they quoted you and another scientist saying well, no this really doesn't in any way discredit the conventional wisdom on global warming, and yet all of the body copy, the reporters' copy in the piece sent out an opposite message.

Scientists are understandably left feeling frustrated and abused by this state of affairs, and desperate to set the record straight. For his part, Doran leaves no doubt where he stands. He concludes his Op-Ed unambiguously: "I would like to remove my name from the list of scientists who dispute global warming. I know my coauthors would as well."

No doubt, the deniers will find a way to twist and discredit even that straightforward declaration.

Beyond Belief

Another financial quarter, another record-setting profit for the biggest of Big Oil companies, ExxonMobil: more than $10 billion. As Annie Strickler writes in today's Sierra Club RAW newsletter:

That's a 36 percent increase and the second largest quarterly profit ever recorded by a publicly traded U.S. company. ExxonMobil's revenue rose 12 percent to $99 billion, marking the first time in history that a U.S. company exceeded $1 billion a day.

If you're the kind of person who likes to read the uncooked facts about environmental outrages of a political stripe, RAW is a must-read:

So let me get this straight: Congress is logging an Oscar-worthy performance of acting like they have a clue about how to solve America's energy problems, Americans are paying record prices at the pump and getting a raw deal on energy policies, and by my calculations ExxonMobil is making about $26,000 every minute.

You can read Annie's entire piece, "ExxonMobil's 10 Billion Reasons to Party," and sign up for RAW if you'd like more. RAW comes out once a week.

Rationing Carbon

In the UK, carbon trading may soon get personal. Plans are afoot to launch a pilot program whereby individual consumers would be given identical carbon rations and a swipe card to track their non-renewable energy purchases. Anytime they gassed up, say, or booked a flight, points would be deducted from their account accordingly. Those who used less than their allotment could sell the surplus back to the bank and those who wished to use more than their share would have to buy up the credits. In order to reduce total emissions, the national ration would diminish each year. Simple enough in outline, but the devil will no doubt take refuge in the details.

Car Talk

The Sierra Club's Dan Becker talks about cars, car repair and, uh, the new Puzzler. No, wait, wrong show. Actually, Dan spoke with us about cars, global warming, and uh, the single biggest step we can take to curb global warming, wean ourselves off oil and save ourselves money at the gas pump. Read on. It's all part of our Smart Energy Summer.

Rock!!!!

In a travel column I write for Universal Press Syndicate, (Ann Coulter's syndicate, yes, but also Ted Rall's), I recently did a short piece about how global warming is changing the face of mountains and mountain sports. I reported:

As alpine ice melts, anecdotal evidence suggests that mountaineering may become more dangerous. Retreating glaciers create yawning crevasses, and warmer temperatures generally increase hazards like rock fall and avalanches. With the drastic changes in topography, many guidebooks have gone quickly out of date. And some of climbing's most coveted routes have become too unpredictable to safely attempt.

Little did I know when I wrote those words that the Eiger, one of Switzerland's most famous peaks, was poised to shed a large portion of its face. On July 13th, some 20 million cubic feet of stone came crumbling down. The avalanche lasted 15 minutes and blanketed the valley resort of Grindenwald with dust.

Experts are now warning that, as permafrost continues to melt, many Alpine population centers are at greater risk from rock fall and the potential for meltwater lakes to burst and inundate valleys. Among the towns threatened are such world-famous destinations as St. Moritz and Zermatt. Swiss Glaciologist Michael Zemp warned that:

Especially in densely populated high mountain areas such as the European Alps, one should start immediately to consider the consequences of such extreme glacier wasting on the hydrological cycles, water management, tourism, and natural hazards.

Computer modelling experiments show that the Alps will lose 80 per cent of their glacier cover if summer air temperatures rise by three degrees Celsius. A five degree rise and you can bid the ice auf wiedersehen.

School of Rock

Grist's Sarah Van Schagen talks to Pearl Jam guitarist Stone Gossard about the group's carbon portfolio strategy. For real.

Elsewhere on the dial, Radiohead's Thom Yorke talks to the Los Angeles Times about his new solo project, Eraser, described here as "an evocative portrait of life made slippery by urban sprawl, murky political alliances and global warming — and given hope through individual and communal resistance — with the blips and bleeps of Yorke's laptop excursions coalescing into soulful, politically charged songs."

Life made slippery? Anyway, Grist (them again) reports that the album is at #2 on the charts.

Can Cold Play be far behind? I'm tellin' ya: This is way movements are born.

Don't Be a Wanker

So says Greenpeace UK, in a new ad timed to coincide with the British International Motor Show and, as the site says, inspired by global warming (with a nod to The Office as well, no doubt).

Sagebrush Resistance

The Bush administration's damn-the-torpedoes energy plan is meeting with increased resistance in the West, not just from environmentalists and sportsmen, but also from within GOP ranks. USA Today reports on moves by Republicans, including Montana Senator Conrad Burns and California Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger, to put the brakes on breakneck development of public lands.

Since a 2001 government task force recommended expanding domestic oil and gas production, the Bush administration has pushed federal agencies to expedite drilling on federal lands in the West. Drilling permits approved on federal land jumped from 3,540 in fiscal 2002 to 7,018 in fiscal 2005, according to the Bureau of Land Management.

"In a sense the administration made this happen ... by pushing so hard," says Peter Aengst, who works on energy issues from the Bozeman, Mont., office of the Wilderness Society. "People are saying I don't want to see that happen everywhere."

Sold Out?

Signed, sealed, delivered, he's theirs. That's what John Sellers, president of the Ruckus Society, and Barbara Dudley, former executive director of Greenpeace USA would seem to be suggesting about former Sierra Club President Adam Werbach's reported deal with Wal-Mart.

Werbach, who once called Wal-Mart a "virus, infecting and destroying American culture," has apparently been hired on to consult by the very hand he formerly bit. It's all part of Wal-Mart's avowed intention to go green. So far, there's more talk than action, but the talk is both big and bold.

Sellers and Dudley are having none of it. They write:

Let's be really blunt: there is no such thing as a green big box that is full of exploited workers selling you cheap disposable stuff made in sweatshops on the other side of the planet. Whenever environmentalists help Wal-Mart score easy "corporate responsibility" points in The New York Times, they set back the efforts of working people in their battle with Wal-Mart, and simply reinforce the flaws of the old environmentalism which Werbach and others declared dead over a year ago.

Ouch.

I posted earlier about the new face of Wal-Mart (if that's really what it is and not just green greasepaint) and it strikes me that Werbach is actually just a bit player in the larger narrative. (Think about it: How many people even know his name?) For now, at least, Al Gore is playing a much bigger role, having just delivered his message to a pep rally at Wal-Mart HQ. Writes Amanda Griscom, who witnessed the spectacle:

The pairing up of Gore, this season's It Boy in Hollywood and other left-leaning circles, and Wal-Mart, the goliath retailer loved in red states and loathed in blue cities, seems bizarre on its face -- and couldn't have happened before this year. But now, with Gore trying to spread climate awareness beyond the choir and [company CEO] Scott trying to give Wal-Mart a high-profile green makeover, the match actually makes sense.

Which brings me to my concluding questions. I want to know what you think: Is Gore simply playing into Wal-Mart's hands? Or is he having precisely the impact he's trying to; that is, changing the way America does business? Do think Adam Werbach's a sell-out? Or is he putting his name and influence to good use, where it might accomplish the most? And finally, what should the environmental movement's response to Wal-Mart's green initiative be?

Corny Joke

Author Michael Pollan (The Omnivore's Dilemma, The Botany of Desire) recently talked with Bill Maher on his show Amazon Fishbowl. (Look for his name under 'guests' in the lefthand navigation). You may remember that Maher was the headline entertainer at the Sierra Summit last year, so we like to check in every so often and make sure we didn't damage his career too badly. Apparently, he's doing okay. Pollan has been interviewed by Sierra magazine and his best-selling books have been popular with environmentalists.

The two sat down to discuss Pollan's latest work in which he examines how Americans eat and declares us the 'Children of the Corn.' Corn is everywhere in our diet, Pollan says -- in our soft drinks, in wine, in yogurt, in our beef, you name it. One thing he doesn't mention here, but which is interesting to consider: Corn is also in our gas tanks. I'm not talking about the advent of E85. Corn ethanol has been part of the refining mix for some time -- purportedly to reduce smog, although the National Academies long ago dismissed the claim. The real reason it's in the mix, say some outspoken critics, is the corn lobby. Whatever the case may be, Pollan is probably correct in his assessment that we are the corniest nation on earth.

The Environmental Paradox of Being Born

From NPR this morning, a report on the downturn in family vacations in the national parks. Researchers are at a loss to explain the trend. The leading theory: Video games have stolen kids' interest in the outdoors and kept them from lobbying the folks to take them out to Jellystone.

Upon hearing the story, my first thought was, Hey, that's a good thing. After all, the last thing the parks need (at least when it comes to the most popular parks) is more people. Then I remembered something I read in James Lovelock's new book, The Revenge of Gaia. The visionary Lovelock, who formulated the Gaia hypothesis has doubtless written the most pessimistic of all the current crop of global warming titles. One critic called it, rightly, "powerful" and "disablingly depressing." What a blurb that would make! The feel-bad book of the year! Anyway, to get back to my point, Lovelock writes:

We are, unconsciously, evolving to a state where much of our time is spent using low-energy devices. What a stunningly good invention was the mobile telephone: it exploits the universal tendency of humans to chatter and obliges us to consume hours of the day at minimal cost--it is one of the greatest inventions ever. Small computers of great efficiency are now stealing into our lives to make us spend our time at minimal energy cost, playing games or surfing the net.

These idle amusements are good, in Lovelock's Gaia-uber-alles worldview, because they keep us out of our cars and away from the parks and basically parked on our well-larded butts.

And Lovelock's not the only to have ventured out on this logical limb. Another story that has been making the rounds is about how bicycling, while it may be good for you, is actually bad for the planet. How so? Well, you see, bicyclists tend to be fit and thus live longer and therefore use up more of Earth's precious resources. See: The Environmental Paradox of Bicycling (pdf).

By this way of thinking, then, kids playing their video games are doubly good for the planet: They not only fritter away time on sedentary, largely harmless, low-energy pursuits, but presumably they'll also grow fatter and less healthy because of it, eventually dying young and taking a load off the planet as they go.

Hmmm. I think it's time to pack up the family and head to Yosemite.

Pop Quiz

Which is the fake headline?

A. Shell says biofuels from food crops "morally inappropriate"

or

B. Sunken Oil Tanker Will Be Habitat For Marine Life, Shell Executives Say With Straight Face

Hypertext Discovery

Check out the hypertext version of Spencer Weart's The Discovery of Global Warming. If you don't have time for the whole text (hyper- or otherwise), you may still be interested in the author's "Personal Note."

Hat tip: Real Climate.

Sowing Seeds, and Community

There's an inspiring article in today's San Francisco Chronicle about a group of Bayview district residents who revitalized their low-income neighborhood by turning a median strip into a community garden. The project, which started with two people toting buckets of borrowed water, recently received a grant for a drip irrigation system, and draws volunteers from throughout the neighborhood--and a Stanford University fraternity. "[People] always say, 'I can't do it by myself,'" resident James Ross told the Chronicle. "That's true, but somebody has to start. All it takes is two, three people who want to do it. If nobody gets started, won't nothing happen." What spaces in your neighborhood are ripe for transformation?

(Get more ideas for living well and doing good in "The Green Life," a new section appearing in every issue of Sierra magazine.)

Extraordinary?

Forecasters in Britain are predicting that tomorrow could be the hottest day ever recorded there. The previous record was set during the deadly heat wave of 2003. Says an official of the Met Office: "This is a sign of things to come, with the current temperatures becoming a normal event by the middle of the century."

Clothesline

I was joking with a colleague not so long ago that one good thing about global warming was that women would wear less. (C'mon, it's a joke!) SFGate's Mark Morford seems to have had the same thought.

Historical Perspective

"The average temperature for the continental United States from January through June 2006 was the warmest first half of any year since records began in 1895..."

Smog Alert

Yesterday was a Spare the Air Day here in San Francisco, meaning the city waived fees for mass transit and commuters were encouraged to keep their cars at home. But with soaring temperatures across North America, the Bay Area was hardly alone in worrying about air quality and what to do about it. Seems fitting, then, that Aaron Naparstek from NYC-based StreetsBlog should email this morning to ask, What's wrong with this picture?

Catastrophe Central

From terrorism to landslides to the December 26, 2004 tsunami that claimed 132,000 Indonesians, the island nation has lately been plagued by one catastrophe after another.

Now tragedy has struck again. Yesterday, a tsunami claimed more than 100 lives in Indonesian Java. NASA's Earth Observatory relayed the following from News@Nature.com:

Java received an alert from the newly installed tsunami early warning system, and this might have saved some lives. Other news sources speculated that memories of the severe tsunami on December 26, 2004, might have spurred locals to seek higher ground as soon as they felt the first tremor.

Updated reports, however, say that while the Indonesian government received warnings from the Pacific Tsunami Warning Center and Japan's Meteorological Agency, the warnings were not passed along. Even if they had been, there is no system of alarms or sirens in place to warn residents and tourists. Survivors say they did not feel the 7.7 magnitude earthquake that triggered the tsunami.

Rationalizations

What do climate researchers do in their own lives to reduce their carbon footprint? The Rocky Mountain News talks to five scientists in Boulder, CO -- climate research hotbed (no pun intended) -- to find out. The article ("Think globally, act locally") is an interesting look at how even the smartest and most knowledgeable among us struggle with the problem of what to do in the face of so overwhelming a problem.

To sum up, four out of five scientists interviewed do make efforts to minimize their emissions - everything from ditching the dryer for the clothesline to converting their VW to an electric vehicle. The fifth, whose job it is to oversee "a global network of observatories where greenhouse gases are measured," drives a Ford 5-150 that gets a whopping 8-mpg. He'll allow he feels a "twinge of guilt" when he turns the key but says, "When you look at the big picture, these individual actions are doing practically nothing. ... It's like peeing in the ocean. It makes you feel good, but it doesn't affect the ocean at all."

I once knew a political science professor who didn't vote based on pretty much the same rationale; what was one man's vote stacked up against all that money and influence in politics? I understood his attitude and I adopted it myself for a while. Eventually, I came to think it was lame.

How about you? What do you think?

Word of the Day

Insolation, noun: The amount of solar radiation that reaches a given point on earth, measured by the number of watts per square meter.

That and more in the latest "On Language" column in the New York Times Magazine.

Energy Emancipation

In an interview with Grist, Big Coal author Jeff Goodell tells David Roberts:

When I was working on this book, I spent some time looking at the slavery debate. During the slavery debate there was all this stuff: "Oh, you can't abolish slavery, the farms will collapse. What are you going to replace this labor with? We don't have people -- who's going to pick our cotton? Everything's going to fall apart." The great thing Lincoln said is, that's not the issue. The issue is, is it right or is it wrong? You make that decision first and then you decide how to do it.

Al Gore has also been stressing this point that climate change is not so much a scientific or political challenge, but a moral one. The rhetoric isn't new. Let's not forget that Jimmy Carter told the republic, as far back as 1977 (before global warming began to be recognized as a concern), that the energy crisis was "the moral equivalent of war."

What do you think? Is energy policy really a question of morality -- a matter of right and wrong?

Hotter Than Blazes

The National Weather Service has issued excessive-heat advisories for eastern Pennsylvania, New Jersey and St. Louis as the continent swelters in heat-wave conditions from coast to coast and into Canada. The New York Times reports that "highs of over 90 degrees will prevail over almost all of the 48 contiguous states, except for Maine" today, and that "twenty-one states had at least one location exceed 100 degrees yesterday." In California, energy officials are predicting record-breaking power usage and are asking consumers to help conserve energy. The National Weather Service says high temperatures are the number one killer in terms of weather events. On average, heat kills 175 people per year. Well over 30,000 deaths were blamed on the European heat wave of 2003. According to a modeling study conducted by scientists at the National Center for Atmospheric Research, heat waves will be more intense, frequent and longer lasting in the 21st century, due to the effects of climate change.

All-Time High

The AP reports that "light sweet crude for August delivery on the New York Mercantile Exchange climbed as high as a record $78.40 a barrel in overnight electronic trading. By Friday morning, Nymex oil futures traded at $77.70, up $1 from Thursday's record close." Experts warn a hurricane in the Gulf could nudge prices past the $80 mark.

Exotic Eating

Interesting story on NPR about Asian carp -- bigheads and silver carp -- in the Illinois River, a tributary of the Mississippi. How'd they get there? Seems they were introduced "in the early '70s to control algae in catfish farms in the South. Floods washed them into the Mississippi River in the 1980s. They've worked their way upriver ever since." Now, the fish are taking over, crowding out native gizzard shad and buffalo and threatening to spread to the Great Lakes. As if that weren't enough, it seems the huge fish are frenetic leapers known to jump clear of the water and occasionally smash into boaters and waterskiers. (You have to see the video.) Now, some frustrated fisherman have decided to make the best of it; they've turned the carp into a commercial catch and are selling them on the Asian market. They think they could sell them locally if only they could brand the fish better. Chilean sea bass, after all, was originally known as Patagonian toothfish. My thought is, if people will eat something called 'gizzard shad', (aka 'mud shad'), they shouldn't have a big problem with carp. Now, snakeheads -- those might be a little tougher sell. And yet, they say it's a delicacy.

The Wal-Mart Effect

Four words: Organic cotton yoga outfits.

Seems Wal-Mart sold a gazillion of 'em and has now become the world's largest buyer of organic cotton. That fact jumped out at me while listening to this Marketplace report about Al Gore's screening of An Inconvenient Truth at Wal-Mart HQ. For many environmentalists and progressives, of course, Wal-Mart is something like the devil incarnate, but now that the retailer has jumped on the organic bandwagon (scratch that: it's more like it grabbed the reins) and is now apparently fixing to become carbon-conscious, what are we to think? Charles Fishman wrote the book on Wal-Mart (The Wal-Mart Effect). He tells Marketplace:

Regardless of how you think about Wal-Mart or former Vice President Al Gore, understanding the science behind what's happening with global warming and enlisting the brains at one of the most influential corporations in the history of the world...That's good news.

While Fishman allows there's cause for skepticism, he also insists that, "If the only appropriate reaction is cynicism, then Wal-Mart won't actually behave better."

For more news from inside the devil's lair, see Grist's Amanda Griscom Little's reports here and here.

Corn or Soy? Neither

When it comes to biofuels, which crop wins? Corn (for ethanol) or soybeans (for biodiesel)? Based on the findings of a new study to be published in The Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, the New York Times reports that research,

...points to the environmental benefits of the biodiesel over ethanol made from corn, stating that ethanol provides 25 percent more energy a gallon than is required for its production, while soybean biodiesel generates 93 percent more energy.

The study’s authors also found that ethanol, in its production and consumption, reduces greenhouse gas emissions by 12 percent, compared with fossil fuels. Biodiesel, they said, reduces such emissions 41 percent, compared with fossil fuels.

However, neither crop would appear to be the answer. As the article notes:

...neither ethanol nor biodiesel can replace much petroleum without having an impact on food supply. If all American corn and soybean production were dedicated to biofuels, that fuel would replace only 12 percent of gas demand and 6 percent of diesel demand, the study notes.

According to the Times,

The study concludes that the future of replacing oil and gas lies with cellulosic ethanol produced from low-cost materials like switch grass or wheat straw, if it is grown on agriculturally marginal land or from waste plant material.

Cure for the Summertime Blues

"President Bush told People magazine this week that he's working on a solution for global warming. He says it will be ready in less than six months. It's called winter." -- Jay Leno

Green Beat?

When I think of environmentally friendly destinations, Las Vegas, Nevada doesn't exactly pop into mind. Let's face it, Vegas is the apotheosis of American excess -- a climate-controlled, artificial oasis. A thirsty, profligate, sprawling city that exists in denial of its desert surroundings. So, I was surprised to see it there on Earth Day Network's slick new Summer of Green homepage, which features Google Map and video tours of "five top vacation destinations" in America -- also including Orlando, San Francisco, LA, and New York.

The tours do highlight some cool things. (And I'm diggin' the drummer dude.) Take, for example, the Ethel M Chocolate Factory in Vegas, where the botanical cactus garden is irrigated with wastewater treated on-site by a "Living Machine" that uses "bacteria, algae, protozoa, snails, fish and plants to remove pollutants from the water." Sounds cool -- like Willy Wonka meets Deep Ecology. I'd check it out.

Still, I'm not entirely sure about the overall concept here. Too many of the links offered up are a stretch. I'll accept the inclusion of the Las Vegas Natural History Museum on its educational merits, but am I really supposed to be impressed by the eco-credentials of Green Valley Ranch Health Spa, with its "posh surroundings," aromatherapy and "organic menu of services"? Is that really what we're talking about when we talk about "green lifestyles"? And will someone please tell me what's environmentally friendly about Siegfried and Roy's Secret Garden and Dolphin Habitat? Where is the benefit -- environmental, educational or otherwise -- in keeping Atlantic bottlenose dolphins captive in a casino pool, thousands of miles from the Atlantic?

Don't get me wrong. Google Maps and the Earth Day Network have put together a classy package, here. I'm just not sure what it is they're selling.

Must-See TV

This Sunday, July 16th, at 9PM ET/PT, The Discovery Channel will air Global Warming: What You Need to Know, with Tom Brokaw. The two-hour documentary will cover much of the same territory as Al Gore's An Inconvenient Truth. Brokaw acknowledges as much. As he tells the AP: "It's the same science that we are drawing upon and it's irrefutable."

In advance of the premiere, the Senate Committee on the Environment and Public Works has issued a release denouncing the program as "devoid of balance and objectivity." This from a committee chaired by Sen. James Inhofe, the Oklahoma Republican who declared global warming to be the "greatest hoax ever perpetrated on the American people" -- a statement so completely devoid of reason, that, judging by the committee reaction, I'm guessing Brokaw and crew did a pretty fair job of it.

Update: MSNBC's Keith Olbermann names the authors of the committee release in his "Worst People in the World" countdown and reminds us that our tax dollars pay for this nonsense. Tip o' the hat to Gristmill.

Whodunnit?

Who killed the electric car? I'll give you a clue: It wasn't Col. Mustard in the billiard room with the lead pipe. Good guess, though. Go here to see the trailer.

Not Too Late (Yet)

Whatever the Bush administration hoped to accomplish by muzzling NASA scientist Jim Hansen, it backfired. Hansen has become increasingly outspoken in recent months, calmly and firmly stressing his position that the world is poised to cross a very dangerous threshold unless it quickly gets a handle on runaway greenhouse gas emissions.

In the latest issue of MIT's Technology Review, devoted to energy technologies and global warming, author Mark Bowen (Thin Ice) profiles Hansen (read: "The Messenger"), whom he suggests "may be the most respected climate scientist in the world." Reading about Hansen, not just here but in various other sources, it's clear that he is not, by nature, an alarmist; it's just that the facts in the particular case are alarming. Consider, for example, the following. Bowen writes:

Running future emissions scenarios on a GISS computer model, Hansen finds that if we remain on the path he calls "business as usual," temperatures will rise between two and three degrees this century, making Earth as warm as it was about three million years ago, when the seas were between 15 and 35 meters higher than they are today. There go many major cities and the dwellings of about half a billion people.

Evidence suggests that the seas could rise in a matter of decades or centuries; recent events in Greenland and Antarctica indicate that the process may already have begun. The last great ice sheet collapse, about 14,000 years ago, sent the seas up a total of 20 meters, at the rate of one meter every 20 years for 400 years. Just the first meter would obliterate New Orleans...

That sounds like ample cause for alarm, even despair, but Hansen remains hopeful. In an attempt to look beyond the problem to solutions, he assembled an "A-Team" comprised of NASA scientists and other experts. According to Bowen,

They found that efficiencies based on existing technologies could buy time for a few decades, after which we must employ new technologies to cut global carbon dioxide emissions by 60 to 80 percent.

The A-Team found that growing emissions from coal-burning power plants and transportation posed the greatest threats. "Efficiency of energy end-use in the near term is critical for the sake of avoiding new, long-lived CO2-producing infrastructure," Hansen notes. "Green" building codes, combined with energy-efficient lighting and appliances, would be sufficient to hold electrical needs -- and the number of power plants -- constant for many years. The team also developed an achievable plan for limiting vehicular emissions, a plan that starts by improving fuel efficiency with existing technologies. It is "technically possible to avoid the grim 'business-as-usual' climate change," said Hansen last December. "If an alternative scenario is practical, has multiple benefits, and makes good common sense, why are we not doing it?"

Box Office Bestseller

Al Gore's book, An Inconvenient Truth, (companion to the movie) is in its fifth week on the New York Times bestseller list. Last week it hit #1. This week it's at #2, behind Elie Wiesel's Night.

And according to the Wikipedia entry on "An Inconvenient Truth," the film has also been doing exceptionally well.

On Memorial Day weekend, it grossed $91,447 per theater, the highest of any movie that weekend and a record for a documentary though it was only playing on four screens at the time.

The film has grossed $15,039,000 as of July 9, 2006, making it the fourth-highest grossing documentary in the U.S. to date (after Fahrenheit 9/11, March of the Penguins and Bowling for Columbine).

Both Paramount Classics, the film's distributor, and Rodale, the book publisher, are donating a percentage of their profits to the bi-partisan Alliance for Climate Protection, and from the outset, Gore has stressed that he and Tipper will give 100 percent of the profits to the cause. When Gore mentioned this to Jon Stewart on "The Daily Show," Stewart deadpanned:

"I think that's a mistake. I think what you need to do is get yourself a little piece of that melting action. Anytime something melts, Al Gore should get a nickel."

My Other House is Made of Straw

I just got around to reading an article from last month's New York Times about a recent trend among (presumably rich) folks: incorporating environmentally friendly features into weekend houses. The story, "Second Homes That Put Ecology First," is a bit more even-handed than that title might suggest. While touting the benefits of blue-jean insulation, recycled-concrete flooring (which is also "completely indestructible for the dogs and the kids"), and photovoltaic systems, the author makes room for concerns about the size of some of these homes and the fuel used to get to them. Says one critic, "The greenest second home is one that is never built." What do you think? Is a "green second home" an oxymoron?

(Read more about living well and doing good in "The Green Life," a new section appearing in every issue of Sierra magazine.)

Berkeley Gets a Little Cooler

I was taking a break to check the Daily Cal Web site and see what my son, who's a reporter and editor at the UC Berkeley newspaper, was working on this week. I didn't expect it would be so relevant to what we're doing almost daily here at the Sierra Club.

Seems that at its Tuesday meeting, the Berkeley City Council voted unanimously to include on the November ballot an initiative to reduce global warming emissions 80 percent by 2050. Pretty ambitious, though it's clearly the kind of bold action we have to take. And it averages out to less than 2 percent a year, which sounds less daunting.

It's great to see how so many cities are stepping into the breach to address global warming while the federal government fiddles.

--
Photo of AC Transit's hybrid fuel cell bus by Skyler Reid/Daily Californian

Annals of Philanthropy

All eyes turned to the world of philanthropy last month as investor Warren Buffet gave $31 billion dollars to a foundation headed by the only man in the world with more money than him: Mr. Bill Gates. The Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation has devoted itself to the admirable goal of providing health care to, and fighting disease in, the world's poorest nations. Asked by Newseek whether the foundation would also get involved in combating climate change, Gates said:

I'm already reading some books on energy and the environment, but I will read a lot more two years from now and think whether there's something the foundation should do in those areas. The angle I'll have when I'll look at most things is, What about the 4 billion poorest people? What about energy and environmental issues for them?

His reading will no doubt show that the world's poorest will be hit first and hardest by the consequences of warming. Whether it's the collapse of ecosystems, the lack of reliable freshwater due to drought and melting glaciers, or the inundation of lowlands by rising sea levels, the poor will indeed feel it. Moreover, they will be less capable in coping with and adapting to whatever upheaval climate change brings.

The Gates Foundation isn't the only name in the news. The newly appointed head of Google.org (the charitable arm of the search giant), Larry Brilliant, tells Wired magazine that he is focused on three areas: "climate crisis, global public heath, and global poverty, not necessarily in that order."

It remains to be seen how much impact charitable organizations can have in the effort to confront global warming, but a recent article in the Economist offers this prescription for effective giving:

One secret is to specialize. Small grants scattered across deserving causes are likely to have less effect than concentrated efforts. Expertise helps foundations take calculated risks--as an entrepreneur might and as governments rarely do well--and achieve the economies of scale that make as much difference in charitable work as in any other sphere in life.

Here's hoping that some well-funded "venture philanthropist"--as the Economist calls Gates--will see fit to concentrate its effort on confronting climate change -- before it's too late.

Problem Solving

People magazine interviewed George W. Bush on the occassion of his 60th birthday. In the final question, he is asked whether or not he believes Al Gore is "right on global warming." Bush answers:

I think we have a problem on global warming. I think there is a debate about whether it's caused by mankind or whether it's caused naturally, but it's a worthy debate. It's a debate, actually, that I'm in the process of solving by advancing new technologies, burning coal cleanly in electric plants, or promoting hydrogen-powered automobiles, or advancing ethanol as an alternative to gasoline.

So much is wrong with the response, it's difficult to know where to begin. The "worthy debate" he claims exists -- about whether warming is anthropogenic or not -- is precisely the one we have a consensus on. Not only is the planet warming, but the trend is driven mostly by human-caused emissions. Bush then unwittingly concedes as much with his (bizarre, preposterous, delusional -- you choose the adjective) proposition that he is "solving" the problem by promoting cleaner energy alternatives. If warming were natural, after all, then energy (clean or otherwise) would have nothing to do with it.

As if this weren't enough confusion for one utterance, Bush compounds his mistakes by touting "clean coal" as part of his plan. Sorry Mr. President, no matter how cleanly you burn coal, you still have significant carbon dioxide emissions to contend with. As for ethanol, it is far more problematic than simply raising fuel efficiency standards -- something which would help curb global warming and address our national oil addiction. Bush, however, has shown no willingness to do so.

Not long ago, the president made it clear who was in charge in America. Defending his Defence Secretary, Donald Rumsfeld, from critics within the military, he told reporters at a press conference, "I hear the voices, and I read the front page, and I know the speculation. But I'm the decider, and I decide what is best." Now he tells People that, in addition to being the decider, he is also the solver. But here's the question: If he doesn't understand the problem, then what exactly does he think he's solving? Riddle me that.

Mobile Parks

Four architecture students from Halifax, Nova Scotia, spent the day yesterday walking around town in a grassy wheel to make a statement about the lack of green space in the city. Their clever approach was reminiscent of a project carried out in Sierra's neck of the woods late last year, when the San Francisco-based art collective Rebar turned a downtown parking space into a temporary park. What do you think about art as activism? Can it make a difference?

(Keep an eye on art and the environment in "The Green Life," a new section appearing in every issue of Sierra magazine.)

Acid Test

If the specter of global warming isn't enough to get us to scale back our CO2 emissions, perhaps the acidification of the oceans will do the trick. As reported in an AP report today:

"A most fundamental property of ocean chemistry, pH, is changing and will continue to change as long as CO2 emissions are increasing. That is not debatable. ... In the oceans pH is a relatively constant property, and it has not changed over time scales of hundreds of thousands and probably even millions of years. ... The pH changes that are occurring in the ocean today are truly extraordinary."

Those remarks are from Joan Kleypas, a scientist at the National Center for Atmospheric Research and lead author of a report jointly prepared by NOAA, the National Science Foundation and the U.S. Geological Survey, entitled "Impacts of Ocean Acidification on Coral Reefs and Other Marine Calcifiers."

The authors of the report estimate that some 118 million tons of CO2 -- only about a third of our fossil fuel emissions -- have been absorbed by the ocean so far. In the process of absorbing the CO2, carbonic acid forms in seawater, which, in turn, reduces calcium carbonate levels. That's crucial, because calcium carbonate is vital to many organisms, like plankton, which form the base of the marine food chain.

Kleypas again: "This needs immediate action."

'The' Tipping Point? Or Just One of Many?

Real Climate's Gavin Schmidt looks at the sudden proliferation of "tipping points" and related concepts in media coverage of global warming and warns that:

Much of the discussion about tipping points, like the discussion about 'dangerous interference' with climate often implicitly assumes that there is just 'a' point at which things tip and become 'dangerous'. This can lead to two seemingly opposite, and erroneous, conclusions - that nothing will happen until we reach the 'point' and conversely, that once we've reached it, there will be nothing that can be done about it. i.e. it promotes both a cavalier and fatalistic outlook. However, it seems more appropriate to view the system as having multiple tipping points and thresholds that range in importance and scale from the smallest ecosystem to the size of the planet.

For more, see: "Runaway tipping points of no return"

Quote of the Week

"Don't get me wrong: I love nuclear energy! It's just that I prefer fusion to fission. And it just so happens that there's an enormous fusion reactor safely banked a few million miles from us. It delivers more than we could ever use in just about 8 minutes. And it's wireless!"

- Leading ecological thinker, architect and Cradle-to-Cradle author William McDonough

(thanks Z + Partners)

Life, the Universe and Everything

Speaking of Douglas Adams (see: Bye Bye Baiji? below), not many people are aware that the author of the Hitchhikers trilogy was an environmentalist, but he was--a committed enough environmentalist to climb Mount Kilimanjaro in a rhino suit in order to, well, save the rhino. Adams, of course, saw the absurdity in that stunt; he made an entire literary career out of seeing the absurdity in everything. He wanted us to see it too.

Posting the entry below reminded me of a quote from Adams. It's something he apparently said often. His friend, the zoologist Richard Dawkins, called it one of his "set-pieces." It goes like this:

Imagine a puddle waking up one morning and thinking, 'This is an interesting world I find myself in, an interesting hole I find myself in ... fits me rather neatly, doesn't it? In fact it fits me staggeringly well, must have been made to have me in it!' This is such a powerful idea that as the sun rises in the sky and the air heats up and as, gradually, the puddle gets smaller and smaller, it's still frantically hanging on to the notion that everything's going to be alright, because this world was meant to have him in it, was built to have him in it; so the moment he disappears catches him rather by surprise. I think this may be something we need to watch out for.

Bye Bye Baiji?

The baiji, or Yangtze River dolphin, has the dubious distinction of being the world's most endangered mammal -- or so it's believed. During the Great Leap Forward, they made bags out of baiji skin, but the last survey was only able to find 17 of the creatures. In a last ditch effort to save the species, conservationists are now proposing to remove as many as can be found to an oxbow lake off the chaotic, polluted river channel in the hopes of establishing a safe refuge for a breeding population of the ultra-rare dolphins.

The baiji were one of the species that late author Douglas Adams (Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy) tried to catch a glimpse of in his 1997 BBC radio program and book, Last Chance to See, about some of the world's most exotic and endangered wildlife. I highly recommend the book, and also the blog it inspired, called Another Chance to See, which is where I originally spotted this news. It's hard to take any real solace from the story of the baiji, but it's heartening to learn that, thanks to the desperate efforts of conservationists, they've held on this long.