New Bearings

Tomorrow will be my last day at the Sierra Club. After six years with the organization, I'm leaving to become an editor at California, the UC Berkeley Alumni magazine. While I'm sad to say goodbye, I'm happy to report that Compass will soldier on in my absence, albeit with a new focus.

Come to think of it, it never really had a focus. You may have noticed that, from its inception, Compass's tagline has been "All Over the Map," which was meant as a tongue-in-cheek reference to the catch-all, general-interest, (some might say scatter-brained) nature of the blog. That will now change. The new emphasis will be unwaveringly on energy issues, and the new tagline will be "Pointing the Way."

That is as it should be, as global warming -- which is, at base, an energy issue -- has become the defining challenge of our time. Even without a stated focus, probably four out of five Compass postings were related, in one way or another, to climate.

The fact is, global warming casts a shadow over everything we care about: If you are concerned about wildlands preservation, you have to contend with the warming climate (you can't save the Everglades, to cite an obvious example, without stemming sea level rise); likewise species protection (consider the polar bear), environmental justice (think of the millions who will be made refugees as desertification and rising seas make their homelands uninhabitable).

The list goes on, and it doesn't end with what have come to be called "environmental" issues either. Jobs, the economy, immigration, public health, you name it -- the ramifications of the problem are such that it touches all aspects of life and calls into question our very survival. I know that sounds overblown, but don't take my word on it. The Bulletin of Atomic Scientists recently added global warming to the threat of nuclear annihilation as a primary threat to humanity's existence. The Doomsday Clock is now set perilously close to midnight--closer than it has been since the height of the Cold War.

So, you ask: Is there anything we can do about it? Hell yeah, there is! Plenty. Will we do it? That remains to be seen. It will take not just ingenuity, but also enormous political will and unprecedented international cooperation to meet the challenge. So far, sadly, the signs that we will act in time are not promising. Still, we have to keep trying.

To paraphrase the late, great Bob Marley: One thing me know, you keep on pushing a thing, it turn over.

Thanks for reading. So long.

Auto Trends

The news from the Detroit Auto Show has been awash in green, as the Dodge RAM went hybrid, GM promised to deliver the fully electric VOLT by 2010, and Toyota announced its intention to compete against GM in the race to deliver a plug-in hybrid to American showrooms. Additionally, the convention featured sub-compacts like the Smart car as well as clean diesels and flex-fuel vehicles. Of course, the renewed focus on fuel efficiency (after a 30-year hiatus) and alternative technologies is no surprise, given the high price of oil. And while it's very good news, another auto trend has more troubling and far-reaching implications for the world: namely, the advent of ultra-cheap cars. How cheap? The $2,500 Nano (you read that right) was recently unveiled by the Indian manufacturer Tata to considerable hype, while Renault, Volkswagen, Nissan and General Motors have all signaled their intention to compete for the same low-cost market. As Praful Bidwai reports in the Asia Times, this is a chilling development.

By 2020, some forecasts say, more than 150 million Indians and 140 million Chinese will have cars. If this really happens, it will become nearly impossible to achieve major reductions in global greenhouse gas emissions.

The Beekeeper's Dream

Sir Edmund Hillary, the Kiwi who, along with Sherpa Tenzing Norgay, became the first man to stand atop Mount Everest, the so-called Third Pole, died on Friday at the age of 88. Though he has wont to refer to himself as a mere beekeeper, Sir Edmund was a mensch of the highest order -- an explorer who stuck by the mountain he climbed and the people who made that climb possible. In later years, he lamented the crowds that thronged Everest and the litter (and bodies) that accrued on its slopes, as well as the warming that is altering the face of the Himalayas and threatening human lives. But he also helped improve the lot of Nepalese Sherpas (for whom the mountain is not Everest at all, but Chomolungma, "Mother of the Earth") through the Sir Edmund Hillary Himalayan Trust, which built clinics, schools, and other facilities in the region.

It is important to remember that when Norgay and Hillary climbed Everest, no one even knew whether the feat was humanly possible. Recalling the view atop the summit, he once said, "The whole world around us lay spread out like a giant relief map. I am a lucky man. I have had a dream and it has come true, and that is not a thing that happens often to men."

Ready, Set, Reduce

The Christian Science Monitor's Caitlin Carpenter reports on a new "reality" show which, believe it or not, isn't stupid. Nobody gets voted off any tropical islands or marries any millionaires on this show. Nobody is forced to eat live cockcroaches or shower under surveillance cameras. Nope. In the Energy Smackdown, all anyone has to do is reduce their energy use, as three families engage in a little friendly competition to shrink their respective carbon footprints.

The subject may seem better suited to straightforward informational programming, but in choosing the "reality" route, writes Carpenter, the producer was both banking on the format's popularity and tapping into recent research what inspires folks to do the right thing.

According to a recent American Psychological Asso­­ciation study, people are more likely to make green choices if they think others are, too. And according to Karen Ehrhardt-Martinez of the American Council for an Energy-Efficient Economy, competitions "can be very effective" in inspiring change because "social incentives are often more effective than economic incentives in spurring people to change their behavior."

The results of "Energy Smackdown" are impressive. The winning Cluggish family reduced its carbon output by roughly two-thirds, from 18,692 pounds to 6,850 pounds -- putting them well below the national average of 15,000 pounds. And it wasn't especially hard, says Mrs. Cluggish.

People asked 'Aren't you relieved the competition's over?' ... But it didn't feel like a huge burden. We're paying 25 percent less for electricity, and I don't mind that my kitchen isn't overflowing with plastic bags now that I take tote bags to the grocery store.

Makes you wonder whether utilities couldn't tap into this same competitive impulse to reduce, say, peak power demand and thus the need to build more generating plants. It seems like an idea worth exploring. In the meantime, Energy Smackdown's producer is looking to extend the competition to whole communities for season two. We'll stay tuned.

Power From the People

For years, Iceland has been harnessing geothermal energy from deep within the earth to heat homes and buildings cheaply and sustainably. Now it seems that Sweden has located a new source of heat that is free, clean, renewable, and best of all, is conveniently located in the heart of downtown Stockholm.

Each day at Stockholm’s Central Station, the largest travel center in Scandinavia, 250,000 commuters are heating up the air in the station as they make use of Sweden’s high-speed and regional rail service. (Just think of them as a quarter of a million portable space heaters.) A real estate firm believes the hot air generated by the commuters could supply 15 percent of the heating needed for a 13-story office building going up next door to the station. Warm air will be sucked into vents, then used to heat water which will be piped into the building. Because the station has an existing ventilation system, the necessary modifications will cost just $47,000 U.S. dollars.

But how many millions were invested in coming up with such a radical, blue-sky idea? According to project leader Karl Sundholm, “It just came up at a coffee meeting last summer. Somebody suggested: why not do something with all this heat in the station?"

What do you think? Another brilliant idea from the country that brought us IKEA and ABBA, or just so much hot air?

Defining Endangered

If you're not acquainted with Conservation, the magazine of the Society for Conservation Biology, I heartily recommend leafing through an issue or checking it out online. The slim, beautifully produced, well-written, and advertisement-free publication is not a peer-reviewed science journal, but rather a general interest science magazine primarily concerned with the preservation of species. The latest cover, like the cover of the latest Sierra and many other publications this year -- including Vanity Fair and a recent Patagonia catalog -- features ursus maritimus, the polar bear -- icon of our rapidly changing climate.

With the Arctic suffering the most pronounced effects of that change, the polar bear could become the first species ever listed as endangered due to global warming. But on Monday, the US Fish and Wildlife Service announced it would not meet today's deadline to issue its recommendation on the matter to the Environmental Protection Agency.

The issue isn't as straightforward as one might expect. As the Conservation article stresses, polar bear populations have greatly increased in recent decades, in part due to the oxymoronic-sounding practice of "conservation hunting." The article further explains how listing the bears would likely hurt Inuit communities and could even prove counterproductive to wildlife conservation. At the same time, however, the polar bear's habitat (not to mention the Inuits') is severely threatened, as underscored by the extent of Arctic sea-ice melt last summer, which blew away all previous records. The ramifications of the melting trend are such that a U.S. Geological Survey report issued last year shockingly concluded that two-thirds of the world's polar bears -- and all of Alaska's -- would die-off by 2050. Certainly, that would seem to meet the definition of "endangered." No?

Another One Bites the Dust

Compass has been gleefully tracking the troubles of the Two-Time Losers--politicians noted for being both anti-environmental and corrupt. Today's California Majority Report brings news that yet another has fallen: California Representative John Doolittle (R) will soon announce he has chosen not to run for office again. (Talking Points Memo suggests his excuse will be that he "wants to spend more time with defense counsel.")

For those of you keeping track, that leaves only Rep. Jerry Lewis (R-Calif.)still standing. Will he stay or will he go now?

New SUV Tax

It's not quite the gas tax some folks prefer as a way to tackle global warming, but good old supply-and-demand is combining with high gas prices to make it less and less attractive to own a gas-guzzling sport utility vehicle:

This holiday season has seen an explosion in thefts of expensive, platinum-laced catalytic converters from parked cars, and authorities report that high-clearance sport utility vehicles are the targets of choice for thieves. With a common socket wrench and 90 seconds, they leave drivers stuck with cars that sound like Harley-Davidson motorcycles, and facing repair bills topping $1,000.

Read more in the LA Times.