This, in addition to renewables being the fasted growing energy sector last year. And the IEA declaring that renewables will be the worlds second largest energy source by 2015. Encouraging signs; long road ahead.
And, back
After a long and restful winter break, and as I gear up for another semester of teaching environmental sociology and global sociology, I'll get the blog going again.
"Nature" More Persuasive Than Sceintists
A new poll shows that extreme weather events have more impact on changing the perceptions of climate change in respondents than scientific studies. Natural and socio-natural events, and our perception of them, can shift society's attitudes more than rational discourse and science. Perception/experience vs. rational thought. What does this mean for climate change politics? Well, as more and more climate events transpire, whether due to anthropogenic climate change or not, it's possible that public attitudes and perhaps politics will begin to shift even further in favor of concrete steps to reduce CO2 emissions. Yet, it is also possible that more frequent and extreme weather events, with death and destruction, will only fuel the politics of despair and give more weight to the secular Dooms Day environmentalism that is so popular.
What Do We Owe to the Next Species After Us
The central question of this provocative piece by Emma Marris:
Climate change may not be forever, but it’ll be for a long, long time. Who—or what—will be around thousands or millions of years hence, when the consequences of our casually massive carbon emissions are still playing out? And do we owe them anything?
How Germany Built Its Clean Energy Economy
Lessons: the work of an engaged public and government policy coherence on a national energy transition.
Earth At Night
Amazing images of an urban civilization.
What Could Disappear
Interesting NY Times maps showing large US coastal cities and the portions of them that could be submerged underwater if different climate change scenarios play out (5-ft, 12-ft, and 25-ft sea rise scenarios).
Near where I live, it surprised me to see Sacramento, which is at least 90 miles from the ocean, so vulnerable because of the Sacramento-San Joaquin River delta.
Boston, MA Image NY Times
Bay Area, CA and Sacramento, CA Image NY Times
Greenhouse Gases at Historic High
United Nations' World Meteorological Organization (WMO) reports that greenhouse gases reached a recored high in 2011.
Carbon dioxide levels reached about 390.9 parts per million last year, which is 140 percent of the pre-industrial level of 280 parts per million and nearly 2 parts per million higher than the 2010 carbon dioxide level, according to the WMO report.
Via: Yahoo! News
Everyday Nature
Emma Marris' new blog. Fun stuff. Nature is not only the large vistas, deep canyons, towering mountains, and majestic forests, but is under our feet, in our backyards, growing in the cracks. Nature is also in the spaces humans create; we create them together.
2013 Motor Trend's Car of the Year...
is the Tesla Model S. It is the first time an internal combustion engine automobile has not won the award. To quell any squabbling that this is eco-hype, Motor Trend says, "At its core, the Tesla Model S is simply a damned good car you happen to plug in to refuel."
image via motortrend.com
Class Warfare in the Coal Mines
CEO of Murray Energy fires coal workers after Obama's reelection. Job destroy, not job creator.
Anyway, the coal industry is in decline, not because of Obama, but because of cheap natural gas. That's the real story.
work to be done
With Obama's re-election, those concerned about accelerating an energy transition and addressing global climate change will need to step up pressure, sooner rather than later. Obama's record hasn't been stellar, especially with climate change, but at least there is a President who acknowledges the importance of an energy transition and human induced climate change. Much more work to be done. Note to Congress: extend the wind tax credits!
Blinded By Science: The Allure of the Technological Fix After Hurricane Sandy
This is an article that I wrote about Hurricane Sandy and the dangers of a technological solution to hurricanes, based on the experiences of New Orleans.
It's Global Warming, Stupid
Bloomberg Businessweek's cover story following Hurricane Sandy.
Mining the Great Ocean Landfill
Image via Dwell
Method's new Ocean Plastic line of soap strikes me as classic greenwashing. But, hey, if they want to commodify and mine the gigantic floating island of plastic trash out in the Pacific Ocean, go ahead. However, making and buying these products does not strike me as a good solution to the plastic problem. File under: Shopping Our Way to Safety.
Italian Court Convicts Scientists Over Earthquake Deaths
Six Italian scientists have been sentenced to six years in prison for what a judge said was a faulty forecast of the 2009 earthquake in L'Aquila.
This is a bad precedent.
Via NPR
The Great Dithering
Presidential debates do not determine actual policy, but they do set conversation agendas. After three debates this year, global climate change was not mentioned once. It's increasingly clear that the US political machine is incapable at this time to address the threats posed by climate change. Global climate change is not even on the conversation agenda.
Further, the US political elite have zero coherence on matters of an energy transition. Striking evidence of this fact is that typically celebrated capitalist entrepreneurialism, in the form of renewable, green energy technology companies, are openly ridiculed and lambasted by right-wing pundits and politicians. Yes, some of these companies received government loans and subsidies, and yes a few of them failed, but almost all US businesses benefit form direct and indirect subsidies (roads, highways, tax codes, etc).
Global climate change is a dead policy issue in Washington, but the end around energy transition from fossil fuels to renewables is also so politicized that no policy coherence seems possible. The nascent US wind turbine industry is poised to collapse if congress doesn't renew subsidies for the industry. Contrary to the ahistorical accounts from pundits and politicians, all energy transitions involved policy guided capitalism (see English industrial revolution, or US automobile, oil boom).
Sadly, novelist Kim Stanley Robinson is probably right, in 200 years our period will be known as the Great Dithering.
Geoengineering, Let's Just Fiddle with the Earth
Businessman from the US conducts unregulated geoengineering experiment off the coast of Canada, dumping 100 tons of iron sulfate into the Pacific Ocean. Native American communities were told it was a salmon enhancement project. It was not.
Businessman says of international regulations:
George told the Guardian that the two moratoria are a "mythology" and do not apply to his project.
We are going to see more of these kinds of geoengineering stories and the international governance institutions need to agree on rules, norms, and regulations for these kinds of activities.
Update: The Guardian now reports that members of the Canadian government knew about and was complicit in this experiment.
The chief executive of the company responsible for spawning the artificial 10,000 square kilometre plankton bloom in the Pacific Ocean has implicated several Canadian departments, but government officials are remaining silent about the nature of their involvement.
Community Solar Installation
A cool story from my town of residence, Chico, CA:
Seven homes on a north Chico cul-de-sac had solar arrays installed Saturday in a flurry of activity. Solarthon resembled the old-fashioned barn-raising its organizers likened it to, with a bit of block party thrown in, complete with a D.J. It was a fundraiser for GRID Alternatives, an Oakland-based nonprofit that opened its seventh office in Chico about a year ago.
Image from Chicoer.com
Nest Thermostat's True Value: Social
Nest Labs has released the Nest Learning Thermostat 2.0 nearly a year after 1.0 was released. As Nest continues to innovate in the smart, green thermostat space, marketing and perceived value has always tended towards: how much money does this save me? However, after one year of data collection by Nest, the deeper value in Nest is its social and aggregate value.
Nest is able to collect data on energy use and energy savings (read their stats here and download the whitepaper) Nest translates that into a monetary figure for average money saved. What is really exciting about Nest is its sociological implications for connected, networked based energy production, consumption, and data collection. As Nest Labs continues to collect user data we will begin to learn how people use energy and how we can improve energy efficiency and overall reduction.
Nest Labs markets the Nest as, how we can save you money, but the larger, sociological implications of networked and data producing energy devices is Nest's real social value. And that is more exciting, and in the long run, more important than personal savings.
