I'm Seeing Green

Zero Waste

From worldchanging.com, this story about a way to improve waste management; it is at present only a plan, but one that is an "an effective tool for discussion." "Lombardi explained that even if we reached zero waste, cities would still need residue facilities, but that zero-waste cities could expect to eventually down actual residual trash to about 10 percent or less of all the waste we throw away."

Eric Lombardi, the waste-management guru behind Boulder, Colo.-based recycler Eco-Cycle, is fighting incinerators around the world with a vision. Although his Zero-Waste Park may never be built, he has been able to use the artistic plan as an effective tool for discussion that has allowed city planners to consider alternative solutions.

The Zero-Waste Park was originally conceived by Lombardi when he was working with a Hawaiian community group called Zero Waste Kauai (we originally mentioned the design in our post on Vancouver's RCBC conference). The island of Kauai was facing a landfill closure, and considering building an incinerator to handle waste disposal. The park is sized to handle solid waste from about 300,000 people (about the size of Boulder County, or the entire island of Kauai).

This is what the park looks like:

The park would be a one-stop dumping ground for truck loads of already-sorted city waste. The park includes a composting facility for organic materials; reuse center for still-good items; a center for hard-to-recycle materials (Eco-Cycle has already successfully created one of these in Boulder); a materials recovery facility for recovering valuable technical nutrients like metals; a residue facility for handling any trash that is leftover after the former; and a public education center.

Aga Ranting

Living  a sustainable life is not only changing energy uses and switching to non-toxic cleaners. What you buy is also an indicator of how green you're living. One might argue that buying, say, a more-expensive appliance is no more pressure on our over-burdened planet than buying a less-expensive one, which is true up to a point. But the more-expensive one typically has a higher embodied energy, that is to say it took more energy to produce it, and to that extent the less-expensive one is "greener"

These thoughts come to mind as I obsessively read the brownstoner, a local blog about the brownstone community I live in. In my many comments on that blog (for which I get regularly excoriated as a socialist and even a communist, how quaint, I thought the use of that word pejoratively went out with the cold war,) I try, unsuccessfully for the most part, to point out the follies of buying something just because you have the money to do so.

I will never be a politician, I probably couldn't convince my 10-year-old.

One interesting thread lately concerned the Aga Cooker (actually the questioner was talking about the newer versions, but my automatic rage when I see the word Aga blinded me.)

What, you might ask, is the issue with the Aga Cooker?

Well, this unconscionable British device is a range that has several burners that are permanently on. You read that correctly, the thing uses a constant supply of precious gas,  24/7.

People who have the Aga rave about it's cooking abilities. They seldom mention the steep learning curve involved; since there's no way to regulate the heat, you control it by...get this...altering the distance from the hot spot to the pan! And it has several ovens constantly hot at different (fixed) temperatures, so you bake cookies in one and roasts in another. Saves you from getting carpal tunnel from twisting the oven temperature knob, no doubt?

But that's not the point.

It's the sheer waste of energy. One comment in a magazine that touted the Cooker said "it uses about the same energy as a dozen 100w bulbs." Do the math. That's like having a space heater on constantly, summer and winter. Well maybe in winter it can heat the kitchen as a side-effect, but in summer? And the waste of money too, with NYC rates, that's about $200/month extra. Add the additional air conditioning you will need in summer.

So people with more money than sense still buy this terminally wasteful device. And claim it works better than an adjustable range, a serious case of delusional adjustment if I ever saw one

Oh, and did I mention that it costs over $12,000? And weighs 910 lbs? And that's for the smaller model?

Sure is a pretty one, though.

Compact Fluorescents II

"Not for use with Control Devices" are the words we see on many CFL sites, meaning that you are not supposed to use then with dimmers (this is more obvious) but also not with timers, light sensors (dusk-on switches) and motion detectors.

When I first bought CFLs from a website called 1000bulbs.com, they were selling the SatCo brand, and I installed them in all fixtures, one with a motion detector and two with light sensors with no problem (actually I hadn't noticed the warning.) Later bulbs, however, of a different brand, burned out in a few days when so installed. I wondered why. It was difficult, even in these days of the ubiquitous wiki and other sites, to get that information.

Turns out that most control devices use a constant, very low level of current, to maintain their state (in the case of timers, to run the clock,) which is routed through the bulb or bulbs they control...which is why, when your bulb burns out, your timer stops as well. This tiny current has no effect on incandescent bulbs, but for some reason damages the electronics in CFL's. Voila...CFL burn-out.

Of course, you may wonder why the CFL manufacturers cannot account for this tiny flow, but that may be another story.

How can you get around this? If you have more than one bulb controlled by the same device, you can put one incandescent, say a 15w bulb, in one socket and CFL's in the others.

This works for many multi-socket hall lights, or multiple outside lights on the same timer, for example. The incandescent bleeds the vampire current and keeps the CFL's safe. Unfortunately there's a lower limit to the wattage of the bulb and 15w seems to be the minimum; if you use less, the CFL's get too high a proportion of the current and damage ensues.

Of course, you increase your energy usage a bit, but if you have, say 2 CFL's and one incandescent, you're saving 60% instead of 75%.

Or you can pop for special control devices that control CFL's...hard to find, and not always easily installed as they require a "neutral wire" in the switch box, which is not always there. You can use the ground, but that's against code, so I didn't say it.

One such device that actually knows when dusk and dawn are reached and switches lights on or off at varying times during the year (you have to program it with the latitude and longitude of where you are,) is the Aube Solar switch in the image.

It can handle all kinds of loads, including CFL's and small motors. Note that, unlike a regular wall switch,it has three wires, not  two. The third is the above mentioned neutral wire. So it can only be used where the switch box has an incoming neutral wire.

But it won't burn out your precious CFL's.

Compact Fluorescents, I

Have you switched to Compact Fluorescent Bulbs (CFL's) yet? If not, it is the one thing you can do save energy with the least amount of effort. Do not believe the canards associated with CFL's, which still surface regularly:

CFL light is harsh/blue/cold/insert other pejorative adjective. No, it isn't. Hasn't been for quite a while.

It may not be exactly like incandescents, but it's close. For some unfathomable reason, CFLs come in different light "temperatures" in the geek metric called degrees Kelvin. Remember this magic number : 3000°K. That's warm white, very similar to incandescent.  2700°K may be OK, too, but some consider it too warm..aka too yellow. Don't get cold white (why would you, anyway, with the name?) or, worse, full-spectrum, a marketing ploy for doubling the price of bulbs with a cold blue light that only fish could love.

The dreaded mercury problem. Yes, CFL's have mercury, and no, it's not much of a problem. The newest ones have less than half the mercury of the older ones, and you can (should) recycle the bulbs anyway, so it's kosher.

And no, you do not have to worry about a broken CFL, unless you're planning to lick up the remains. Regardless of the overblown EPA guidelines, cleaning up after a broken CFL just requires common sense. Wear gloves if you insist and wash you hands after. It's overkill to open the windows, shoo the cats and kids away,don a moon-suit, or call 311.

They don't fit the fixture. CFL's are getting smaller all the time, and while there may be some fixtures you may have difficulty with, they'll fit probably 90% of existing fixtures.

They are slow to turn on. Somewhat true; most of the spiral bulbs turn on almost instantly, but somtimes take a few seconds to reach full brightness; it also  depends on the manufacturer. IKEA bulbs are notoriously slow and may have single-handedly helped keep this almost-myth alive and kicking. For most applications, it does not matter.

I don't like their looks. Get over it. You're trying to help save the planet.

They are not dimmable. True, you have to pay a lot more for dimmable CFLs which don't dim all the way anyway. If you need that much control (I find that there are only a few lights in my house that I change the brightness of regularly) install halogen lamps in those locations; they are less efficient than CFL's but a few won't do much harm.

They burn out or cannot be used with timers and motion sensors; in fact, most CFL's are marked "not for use with control devices." Ah, this one is interesting as it took me a some research as to why this may happen, and how to get around it. Rest assured, it can be solved.

Answers to above tomorrow.

Even though I don't own a car anymore, and love the freedom of not having to park one in brownstone Brooklyn, I still have a nostalgic regard for the automobile industry. In spite of knowing that the private automobile, while giving us an illusion of unending freedom, has also been responsible for so much destruction and debilitation of the built environment.

I look at a site called Autoblog Green a lot, and they're constantly pushing electric cars. Of course, they also had recently an entry on the Cadillac Escalade Hybrid, a $78,000 6.0 litre behemoth that qualifies as "green" only in the wet dreams of an auto executive.

Electric cars...are supposed to be "pollution free", but like a free lunch, it obviously ain't so. The electricity has to be produced somehow, and, unless it's from solar, wind power or other non-carbon-spewing methodology, you're just pushing the issue out of sight. No tailpipe emissions, but they're back there somewhere. Which is a good marketing ploy.

This model car is typical: in my opinion, it's ugly as sin with it's triple eyes, but it's also $20,000, has limited speed and range.

The French are promoting electrics for local delivery vehicles and Post Office vans, a better overall solution.

But there are plenty of electrics in the pipleine:

Of course, the vaunted EV-1 from GM...originally promised in early '09, now slated for '10, but better late than never from the largest US manufacturer of cars.

The mitsubishi iMiEV debuting in California in 2008...the earliest EV from a large manufacturer.

The Triac shown above, from Green Vehicles, scheduled later this year.

 The REVA made in India, at right:

The exotics and the expensive: the $100,000+ Tesla Motors sports car (being delivered to your neighbor as we speak) and Hybrid Technologies' LiX-75, two seaters for the male menopause set.

All in all, plenty of choice.

But to what end? Certainly not to materially reduce the damage that automobiles do, these are band-aids as best.

Gimme Plastic!

Modbury in England gained fame as the first comunity to ban plastic bags in 2007. "Request a plastic bag these days in Modbury and you will be asked politely if you really need one, and if you absolutely do, you will be charged 5p for a corn-starch alternative. "

And there are plenty of places that have followed suit, from Hong Kong to the entire country of China, to enlightened cities in the US like San Francisco and Seattle.

As the anti-plastic bag movement gains momentum, here's an interesting note of dissent, amazingly enough from an organic farmer's market. Turns out that one farmer (whose trucks run on recycled grease, no less,) decided to charge for plastic bags. 25c no less. This seems to have enraged several of the otherwise environmentally conscious, no doubt affluent clientèle; from the Chicago Tribune:

But as wildly popular as Henry Brockman [and his operation [at the Evanston Farmer's market] might be, there was one thing that drove the environmentally friendly farmer nuts. It was the plastic bags. He would hang them up in bunches, the wispy-thin grocery store jobs, and people would grab them up as if they were nothing, stuffing their beans in one, their zucchini in another and so on.

"That just grated on my nerves from the beginning," he said. "I'm an organic farmer, and here I am buying all these plastic bags and handing them out willy-nilly."

His business was slipping more than 30,000 petroleum-based plastic bags into the environment a year, and Brockman's conscience could no longer tolerate the hypocrisy

Brockman got an e-mail from Chicago attorney and longtime customer Joan Ferraro: "While I admire your dedication to trying to change the environment for the better, I have to tell you I find your plastic bag policy offensive. You are in the business of selling produce. If you don't provide something for the people to take your produce home with, you are not good businesspeople [sic]."

Apparently being able to write coherently is not a pre-requisite for an attorney. Another customer threw her vegetables onto the counter on being informed of the charge. If supposedly "green", probably affluent customers like these would balk at being charged for plastic bags, is it any wonder that a ban is the only way to go?

Global Weirding

There's something weird in the air nowadays, maybe we could blame it on global warming. It seems like all kinds of people are behaving in ways counter to their norm.

Or is it global weirding, as Thomas Friedman says in today's NY Times:

Remember: climate change means “global weirding,” not just global warming....And my trip with Denmark’s minister of climate and energy, Connie Hedegaard, to see the effects of climate change on Greenland’s ice sheet leaves me with a very strong opinion: Our kids are going to be so angry with us one day.

We’ve charged their future on our Visa cards. We’ve added so many greenhouse gases to the atmosphere, for our generation’s growth, that our kids are likely going to spend a good part of their adulthood, maybe all of it, just dealing with the climate implications of our profligacy. And now our leaders are telling them the way out is “offshore drilling” for more climate-changing fossil fuels.

And we have Mr. Bush saying this:

"America stands in firm opposition to China's detention of political dissidents, human rights advocates and religious activists," Bush will declare in the marquee speech of his three-nation Asia trip. "We speak out for a free press, freedom of assembly and labor rights _ not to antagonize China's leaders, but because trusting its people with greater freedom is the only way for China to develop its full potential.

All true of course, but it's sure to anger the Chinese, and our dear Decider hasn't exactly been on the side of the angels in denouncing any untoward behavior in the world...maybe being a lame duck has put fire in his spine?

Then we have all those strange ads by McCain, calling Obama, in sequence, an empty celebrity, Moses and the Anti-Christ.

And� then Paris Hilton responds to the celebrity ad by making a YouTube video herself with the classic line: "But then that wrinkly white-haired guy used me in his campaign ad, which I guess means that I'm running for president."; as Seth Grahame Smith notes:

In less than two minutes, she accomplished not one -- but FIVE things McCain himself has been unable to do in two years of campaigning:

1) Come off as intelligent and self-effacing.
2) Present a well-reasoned energy policy.

etc..

Double Green

Here's a good way to be green and green (green squared?) Recyclable pots made of material that can be composted at the end of their life seems like just the ticket to replace plastic pots (which don't last long anyway,) or clay pots (which get brittle in the winter.) And they're available at Whole Foods.

 There are plenty of pots made of recyclable material (some of which can be reccled again,) but these seem to be one of the few you can compost. From apartmenttherapy:

While running in for a bite to eat at a nearby Whole Foods, we stopped to check out this colourful collection of non-plastic garden pots manufactured from the husks of rice, other grains and starch-based, water-soluble binders and biodegradable additives. The ingredients almost sound better tasting than some of the healthy snacks inside the grocery chain...

Wal-Mart's Anti-Democratic Moves

A scary story in the Wall Street Journal details how Wal-Mart is spreading scare stories about the negative effects of a Democratic victory in November. Democrats in power are more likely to increase union power, and of course Wal-Mart as both the largest retail employer and a non-union shop, is worried.

Wal-Mart Stores Inc. is mobilizing its store managers and department supervisors around the country to warn that if Democrats win power in November, they'll likely change federal law to make it easier for workers to unionize companies -- including Wal-Mart.

In recent weeks, thousands of Wal-Mart store managers and department heads have been summoned to mandatory meetings at which the retailer stresses the downside for workers if stores were to be unionized.

According to about a dozen Wal-Mart employees who attended such meetings in seven states, Wal-Mart executives claim that employees at unionized stores would have to pay hefty union dues while getting nothing in return, and may have to go on strike without compensation. Also, unionization could mean fewer jobs as labor costs rise.

Of course, it is technically illegal for Wal-Mart to suggest how its (non-management) employees vote, so the Human Resources personnel walk a fine line:

"If anyone representing Wal-Mart gave the impression we were telling associates how to vote, they were wrong and acting without approval," said David Tovar, Wal-Mart spokesman. Mr. Tovar acknowledged that the meetings were taking place for store managers and supervisors nationwide.

Wal-Mart's worries center on a piece of legislation known as the Employee Free Choice Act, which companies say would enable unions to quickly add millions of new members. "We believe EFCA is a bad bill and we have been on record as opposing it for some time," Mr. Tovar said. "We feel educating our associates about the bill is the right thing to do."

Oddly enough, or maybe not so oddly, Wal-Mart is also hedging its bets in case of a Democratic victory by splitting its donations between the parties:

Now, as the Democrats seem poised to gain control in Washington, 48% of its $2.2 million in political contributions go to Democrats and 52% to Republicans, according to the Center for Responsive Politics, a nonpartisan organization that tracks political giving.