I'm Seeing Green

Another Way for Atlantic Yards?

From John Massengale's blog as to the right way to develop Atlantic Yards; his point is that development does not have to done on a mega-scale, with one developer (in this case, Ratner,) doing it all. Why not parcel it out to small developers who would  create individual buildings in context?

As he says, "Robert Moses was wrong. Jane Jacobs was right"

RICHARD BRODSKY and I have been saying the same thing: why aren't more people listening to our words of wisdom?

The Atlantic Yards and Hudson Yards sites are being developed in the wrong way: instead of selling them to mega-developers like Forest City Ratner and Tishman Speyer (who are both having trouble coming up with the cash), we should develop them the way New York was traditionally developed. That means platting the streets and blocks, and selling lots on those blocks. No eminent domain would be involved.

If the New York City Planning Department decides the highest and best use for the land being sold is rowhouses, they can sell lots sized and coded for rowhouses. If they want office towers or apartment buildings, they can sell lots sized and coded for those. Obviously a modern office building requires a larger lot than a rowhouse, and its lower floors should be coded for retail. If the market changes, the lot sizes can be changed if the codes are properly done.

Of course, rowhouses aren't what should be built on either of the railyard sites, because the infrastructure to build over the yards is too expensive: you need larger buildings to share the expense. And Atlantic Avenue is a wide and important street that should be shaped by taller buildings on both sides of the avenue.

The Unity Plan, an alternative to Ratner's mega-project, would involve multiple developers [image from website]

Not on my Horizon

There is no term yet for fraudulent organic claims, as "greenwashing"means fraudulent or excessive claims to be "green." But the business of organic, and the entry of large corporations into the organic food chain, inevitably raises warning flags

After years of buying Horizon organic products (owned by Dean Foods,) I started reading negative press about them. Horizon uses a mass production system much like conventional farming. According to this story from salon.com,  the cows "laze in crowded pens atop the brown hardpan of the Idaho desert," and have access to the outdoors (but only in summer,) but are hardly an example of "Happy, healthy cows produce better milk for you and your family," as the Horizon cartons state. They are also fed a grain-heavy diet which causes them to produce more milk, but is not healthy for them.

Then from the well-named Cornucopia Institute, whose Director Mark Kastel says "Factory dairy farms are playing loose with the organic rules."

After a three-and-a-half year battle with Dean Foods regarding the legality of milk it labels as Horizon Organic, the country’s most aggressive organic industry watchdog filed additional legal actions today. Dean, the nation’s largest dairy processor, with nearly $12 billion in sales and controlling 50 different milk brands, has obtained a large percentage of its organic milk supply from giant factory farms milking thousands of cows each.

The Cornucopia Institute has filed a formal legal complaint with the USDA claiming that one of Dean’s Horizon suppliers, a dairy in Snelling, California, was skirting the law by confining the majority of their cows to a filthy feedlot rather than allowing them fresh grass and access to pasture as the federal organic regulations require.

The Organic Consumers Association is organizing a boycott of Horizon and five other "private label" brands supplied by Aurora organic diaries.

On the one hand, it was encouraging that giants like Wal-Mart (one of the five above) would start selling organic foods. On the other hand, if the word "organic" is to have any meaning at all, it must be strictly enforced. The USDA is somewhat hands-off on this issue, as the definition of organic for milk products is fairly vague and its certification procedure lax.

Streep Sighting

I couldn't resist hanging out on Carroll Street in front of my house yesterday to take in the shooting of the film Julie Julia at Cafe Moutarde next door. Starring Meryl Streep and James Tucci, Streep was shooting a scene with Jane Lynch, suitably decked out in 50's garb and painfully high heels.

Of course, expecting any excitement at a film shoot is about what you get watching paint dry. After checking out the mountains of equipment and trying to watch the video monitors for any sign of activity for what seemed an hour, I gave up and went in.

Then came out again, of course...had to have coffee from Tempo next door.

Several of us Carroll Streeters who work at home (or don't work) were lounging outside the restaurant Al-Di-La and talking loudly in a Brooklyn-esqe way. Since we had identified Streep's trailer, we pointed it out, helpfully, to curious passers-by. Finally Streep's burly bodyguard stared balefully at us, and one of my neighbors shouted out "Don't worry, we're not stalking her!" As if that would be calculated to soothe him. But he merely continued to keep a watchful eye on us and did not come over.

What was surprising to me was that with all the stuff all over, cables everywhere, equipment on the sidewalk and antique cars parked in choice spots (they did not actually seem to be used,) we could walk as we pleased, more or less...occasionally the handlers would motion us, politely, to move back or away. Even regular vehicular traffic was not stopped except in brief spurts.

I was quite impressed at the lack of formality, thinking that this was a good example of "negotiation" between different users of the road space, which happens the world over but is frowned upon in the US. As one of the observers said "I can't believe they let people and cars go by, it's an accident waiting to happen." Spoken in true American fashion.

Clean Coal is an Oxymoron

Both Clinton and Obama have come out for carbon-tax initiatives to counteract global warming effects; both have proposed implementing policies that would cut such emissions by 80% by 2050 over 1990 levels. In general, an environmentally conscious person would have no problems with the stance of either of these two candidates.

But when it comes to specifics, expediency rules...as this from ENN shows:

Both Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama are talking more about "clean coal" and less about global warming as they woo voters in West Virginia and Kentucky -- two states that sit at the heart of the nation's coal economy.

In a bid to draw voters ahead of Democratic primaries in West Virginia on Tuesday and Kentucky on May 20, both candidates are playing up the ascendant role of commercially untested and so far economically nonviable ways of converting America's plentiful coal supplies into electricity without spewing massive quantities of heat-trapping greenhouse gases.

"There is no such animal as clean coal," said Brent Blackwelder, president of the environmental group Friends of the Earth. "We shouldn't be placing our bets on coal to bail us out. We need to be looking at getting rid of coal plants."

The problems faced with creating a "clean coal" burner are shown in this story of failure from Australian Business:

What was touted as Australia's biggest contribution to developing clean coal technology for use around the world in reducing greenhouse gas emissions has been scrapped even before it got to first base. BP confirmed yesterday the $2 billion "hydrogen energy" coal-to-gas plant at Kwinana, south of Perth, would not proceed. The plant was to have been constructed by Hydrogen Energy, a joint venture between BP and Rio Tinto, and was designed to burn coal, converting it into water, hydrogen and carbon dioxide. 

The hydrogen was intended to be used as fuel for a 500MW power plant supplying electricity for 500,000 homes, while the CO2 was slated to be buried in geological strata between Fremantle and Rottnest Island, Perth's holiday playground. The proposed onshore site was close to BP Kwinana oil refinery and Rio's HISmelt direct iron ore smelting plant.

Back home, similar problems have caused "at least eight clean coal plants, more than a third of those on the drawing board, [to] have been canceled, delayed or rejected by regulators this year. Developers cite soaring construction costs, technology hurdles and uncertainty about regulation of greenhouse gases." from  a story in USA Today.

Coal burning plants are considered responsible for over 20,000 deaths every year in the US, and no environmental group seems to believe in the concept of "clean coal."

For other effects of coal mining, see here.

Thinking Past Oil

Some interesting side-effects of the sharp rise in the price of oil and the concomitant rise in the profits of the large oil companies. That increase is making it increasingly harder for the oil companies like BP  and Shell to justify their lukewarm, but encouraging, investments in alternative fuel.

ExxonMobil, which betrayed no such eco-conscious weakness, is laughing all the way to the bank, and shareholders of the other companies are taking note, according to this article in the Guardian.

"BP and Shell announced record profits, they also demonstrated that they are in essence retreating from renewables, perhaps with the exception of biofuels"--- doubly unfortunate as biofuels have more unintended consequences than other fuels and are under wider attack for their influence on food supplies and prices.

The oil giants are recarbonising, wilfully choosing to forget both global warming imperatives and the need for renewables in national security terms. Shell pulled out of the biggest offshore UK windfarm yesterday and BP is losing interest in solar and investing in the tar sands - having once refused to do so on ethical grounds because of the greenhouse gas emitted in processing.

The European oil giants are behaving in this way in part because ExxonMobil became the most profitable of the big players while turning its back on the climate issue and pouring scorn on renewables investment. BP and Shell can no longer resist the calls of investors who demand short-term Exxon-type performance, whatever the final cost.

Author Legget mentions that the Rockefellers (founders of Exxon) are fed up. They want Exxon to "think past oil," in an echo of BP's slogan "Beyond Petroleum". This statement from the clan:

“After years of working behind the scenes to encourage Exxon’s management to approach its industry challenges in new ways, members of the Rockefeller family will publicly explain the concerns held by multiple generations of their family,’’ the family said in a statement.

“A majority of the family is now so concerned about the direction of Exxon corporation that it is urging a major change in corporate governance in the form of an independent chairman of the board and a bigger leadership role for the oil company’s board of directors.’’

However, with the stock up 53% since January 2006, it seems unlikely that CEO Rex Tillerson has much of an incentive to listen to even the mighty Rockefellers, whose shares in Exxon are limited.

Is that Fish Organic?

You'd think that labeling something "organic" is pretty straightforward, as the standards are widely accepted and easily applied. It's not the same for "natural," a much misused label that has no standard and no enforcement, with the result that it has no meaning when used by so many corporate food processors.

Fish should be easier to label especially if caught in the ocean...it's free-range and unlikely to have added antibiotics or hormones. But in reality there is no standard, as this story from the Organic Consumers Union notes, "Fish can't be certified organic in the United States, because federal rules governing organic foods don't cover fish."

 

The short answer is that the "organic" fish are farmed salmon, from British Columbia and Scotland. Their producers say the salmon are being raised in a cleaner environment with more room to swim than most farmed fish. They get better food; some even eat certified organic feed. They're not given antibiotics or hormones. Chemicals aren't used to clean their nets.

The Center for Food Safety is concerned as well:

[It] today sent letters to the Attorneys’ General of 49 states urging the top state law enforcement officials to take action against the misleading practice of labeling seafood imports as “organic.”  The state-based effort to protect the integrity of organic food labels is a follow up to the complaints filed by the Center last year with the USDA and Federal Trade Commission.  To date, these federal agencies have left the complaints unanswered, while U.S. consumers are increasingly confronted with imported seafood misleadingly labeled as “organic”, despite the fact that there are no U.S. organic seafood standards in place. 

In today’s action, the Center for Food Safety calls upon USDA to prevent consumer deception by enforcing existing organic labeling laws and regulations until new standards are finalized.  The Center, which is joined in this effort by Food & Water Watch, has identified the practice of allowing seafood to be labeled as “organic” in absence of regulations as unfair, deceptive and misleading - a violation of the states’ consumer deception and misrepresentation laws.

“Allowing importers to label their seafood ‘organic’ when it does not have to meet any U.S. standards is a disservice to American consumers, who have come to trust and believe in the organic label,” said Joseph Mendelson, Legal Director of the Center for Food Safety.  “USDA’s refusal to stop importers from calling their products organic when many of them use antibiotics, parasiticides, or feed that would not be permitted under U.S. regulations is dishonest.  Consumers have the right to know that the labeling on their food is truthful and accurate and we’re asking the states to protect that right.”

Bloggers Galore

The Brooklyn Blogfest is growing...in its third year, it's attracted over 250 participants to the Brooklyn Lyceum on Thursday night. Last year, when it was at the Old Stone House, the smaller venue was a standing-room only crowd; the Lyceum is a much more enjoyable space. Kudos to organizer Louise Crawford of Only the Blog Knows Brooklyn (OTBKB.) More party than conference, the beer, food, and company were quite enjoyable.

It's most interesting that blogging, an activity that is perhaps less than ten years old, can attract so many people. Looking at the range of blogs available, it's quite astounding that so many can spend so much time...and produce widely different results, from the mundane through the profane to the sublime. It's certainly time-consuming, as I can attest to, and I am hardly a prolific blogger. The most popular local blogs are still run by one person (sometimes two,) and posting several entries a day  must amount to an almost full-time job.

So why do it?

Place-blogs...which relate to a specific area or environment, are the most easily understandable, and most like a journal. Personal blogs are entirely a matter of taste, and your acceptance is dependent on how much you relate to the writer. Most are pretty lame and pointless, but then, it's like publishing your dairy...how interesting is most people's daily grind? And issue-oriented blogs may do a good job of disseminating esoteric or little-known information.

Several of the speakers talked about the "community" aspects of blogging. It's ironic that, using a purely solitary activity, the communitarian nature of the activity is considered so much a plus. But then, to anyone who has read Robert Putnam's  Bowling Alone, that seminal tract on how life in these United States of America has become steadily less civic-minded, should realize, we are less connected and more isolated. The community that blogging engenders is one way, and no doubt a good way, of connecting with people, but it is shallow and ephemeral as any community based primarily on an activity is bound to be...stop blogging and where goes your community? Real community is so much more, and so much more difficult to achieve. In a society that values its wide-screen TVs more than its environment, it's doubly hard to find.

And so we blog on (myself included.) There is of course the sheer egotism involved (which no one actually admits to,) the pleasure of seeing your written words or your photos "published," even if only the spider-engines may take notice of them. I was interviewed briefly by a television station and, enjoyable as the experience may have been (I don't expect to see myself on the segment,) it was hard to answer entirely truthfully about "why I blog" (and harder as to "what do you think your readership is?")

Maybe the best answer is, to paraphrase an old saw, "because I can."

Is it Meat if Grown in a Petri Dish?

So here's one for the Ethicist, that entertaining column in the NY Times which deals with readers who report on their ethical qualms...if you believe that eating meat is akin to murder, how about if the meat were produced in the laboratory? Would you feel the same about eating meat if you knew it did not come from a living, breathing, pain-aware animal?

If you have not heard about artificial or in-vitro meat, join the club. The idea in not new, as the reference to a NY Times article from 2005 shows.

From Peak Energy, this story [and image]:

Animal Rights group PETA recently announced a $1 million reward for the first person to make in-vitro meat (leading Bruce Sterling to dub them "People for the Ethical Treatment of Alien Lumps of Flesh).

But Ingrid Newkirk, one of the PETA's founders, said the decision to pay for a prize caused "a near civil war in our office." Many PETA members, the New York Times reported, "are repulsed by the thought of eating animal tissue, even if no animals are killed."

Artificial meat is a topic usually left to science fiction writers (see Kornbluth & Pohl, H Beam Piper, Samuel R Delany, Frank Herbert, Rudy Rucker or John Brunner for some examples), with a "meat beast" (or some other form of artificial protein produced in a vat) gracing the bowels of many spaceship kitchens and basements of remote arcologies, where raising livestock isn't an option.

Advocates for in vitro meat claim it is safer, healthier, more humane and less polluting to produce - as well as being one way of adapting to rising demand for food and constraints on the supply of inputs to traditional industrial agriculture. But one question remains, should a commercial meat production process ever be put into action - can we get past the "yuck" factor ?

The beat, or the research, goes on. wiki reports that "The Dutch government granted a two million euro subsidy for the project. In Amsterdam the culture medium is studied, while the University of Utrecht studies the proliferation of muscle cells and the Eindhoven university will research bioreactors."

With the awareness that meat cultivation has all kinds of side-effects, from the excessive carbon footprint of the meat to the ethical issues in factory farming, growing meat in-vitro may indeed become a viable alternative.

An Airship in Your Future?

This post by Monbiot reminds me of that time, long ago, when I picked up a book by John McPhee called The Deltoid Pumpkin Seed, about a rag-tag group of ex-Navy types who were designing the air transport of the future...an ovoid airship which had the advantage of having "lift," so was more aerodynamic and faster than a simple blimp like the GoodYear one you see everywhere.

I thought this book was fiction and read almost half of it before I happened to read the back-cover blurb, which corrected me. It was real. A more unlikely story you might not read anywhere, and of course, it's told in McPhee's scintillating signature style.

Monbiot may not be quite as visionary as the group who developed the Aeron (the Deltoid Pumpkin Seed,) which was finally abandoned after decades of trial.... or not quite; in fact the story did not end there for William Miller, now 79, the president of Princeton, New Jersey-based Aeron. He's still trying to convince the US government to continue funding of the project [image from Aeron website].

Monbiot thinks he has the answer to the problems of normal aircraft being major polluters and greenhouse-gas emitters.

From his article(emphasis added:)

There are two reasons why we make such a fuss about flying. The first is that, even as governments promise to cut emissions, everywhere airports are expanding. In the UK, the government expects the number of airline passengers to rise from 228 million in 2005 to 480 million in 2030. Before long, there will scarcely be a patch of sky without a jet in it. The other is that there are no alternative means of propelling people through the air which are not more destructive than burning ordinary aviation fuel. Or so we think.

The airline companies prescribe two cures that are even worse than the disease. Even before they are deployed commercially in jets, biofuels are spreading hunger and deforestation. At first sight, hydrogen seems more promising. If it is produced by electrolysis using renewable electricity, it's almost carbon free. The prohibitive issue is storage. Hydrogen contains just a quarter of the energy as the same volume of jet fuel (kerosene), which means that planes could fly long distances only if they were filled with gas, rather than passengers or cargo.

Even when burning fossil fuels, the total climate-changing impact of an airship, according to researchers at the Tyndall Centre for Climate Change Research, is 80% to 90% smaller than that of ordinary aircraft. But the airship is also the only form of transport that can easily store hydrogen: you could inflate a hydrogen bladder inside the helium balloon. There might be a neat synergy here: one of the problems with airships is that they become lighter, and therefore harder to control, as the fuel is consumed. In this case they become heavier. Michael Stewart of the company World SkyCat suggests burning both gaseous and liquid hydrogen to keep the weight of the craft constant.

Modern airships, by the way, are considerably safer than the infamous hydrogen-fueled Hindenberg. Monbiot notes that "Most of the new designs make use of aerodynamic lift as well as buoyancy (they are shaped like fat planes with stubby wings or tails), which means they are heavier and more stable than the old dirigibles and can land without help on the ground."...shades of the Aeron!

Time to consider Vegetarianism

With the "eat locally grown food" movement on the rise and the term "food-miles" joining  "locavore" in  our vocabulary, this study points out that the majority of environmental effects of our food chain is in its production, not in its transport. So it might behoove us to eat less damaging food...of which red meat is the king.

Substituting chicken, fish or vegetables for red meat can help combat climate change, a new study suggests. In fact, putting these foods on the dinner table does more to reduce carbon emissions than eating locally grown food, researchers report in the May 15 issue of the journal Environmental Science & Technology.

Environmental advocates and retailers urge customers to purchase goods from local sources to. The idea is that food grown locally requires less fuel for shipping to the store. The new study does not argue that point. Yet few studies have compared greenhouse gas emissions from food production to those of transportation.

The production phase is responsible for 83 percent of the average U.S. household's greenhouse-gas burden with regard to food, while transportation accounts for only 11 percent, the new study found. The production of red meat, the researchers conclude, is almost 150 percent more greenhouse-gas-intensive than chicken or fish.

"We suggest that dietary shift can be a more effective means of lowering an average household's food-related climate footprint than 'buying local,'" the researchers write. “Shifting less than one day per week's worth of calories from red meat and dairy products to chicken, fish, eggs, or a vegetable-based diet achieves more greenhouse-gas reduction than buying all locally sourced food.

As much of the developing world gets more disposal income, in addition to the exponential increase in cars, there has been a steady rise in meat consumption. Both are contributing seriously to global warming.

This UN report on the effects of livestock farming concurs; livestock use over 30% of eht earth's entore land surface.

Says Henning Steinfeld, Chief of FAO’s Livestock Information and Policy Branch and senior author of the report: “Livestock are one of the most significant contributors to today’s most serious environmental problems. Urgent action is required to remedy the situation.”