Writing for a Bluer, Greener World
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Green Politics: Politicizing Science

22
February
2012

Yesterday’s 2012 Rutgers Environmental Stewards‘ lecture on “The Limits of Science” was given by Dr. Jan Zientek from Rutgers Cooperative Extension.

It was utterly, completely fascinating. We discussed what science is, what it isn’t, how it is defined by scientists and how it gets used by politicians and everyone else on the way to becoming environmental policy.

Here are his 2010 lecture slides. I’ll update them once this week’s 2012 lecture slides are posted.

With these new ideas in my head, I was especially interested in this news piece about the uncomfortable position faced by Republican climate scientists. Rock, meet hard place.

Via Insideclimatenews, by way of EnviropoliticsBlog:

Republicans don’t want to hear from scientists on climate

Inside Climate News reports today that a number of prominent U.S. climate scientists who identify themselves as Republican say their attempts in recent years to educate the GOP leadership on the scientific evidence of man-made climate change have been futile. Now, many have given up trying and the few who continue notice very little change after speaking with politicians and their aides.

In my opinion, just because you stop listening to the truth, doesn’t stop it from being true.

Posted by Claire Sommer in Green Politics - (0 Comments)

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Green Politics: Keeping An Eye on Budgets

22
February
2012

Whose interests are being promoted when it comes to spending taxpayer dollars on the environment? The answers are in the budget details.

First, NJ Governor Christie’s under-the-radar Clean Energy fund cut. Hat-tip to reporter Tom Johnson for reporting this scoop:

Via NJSpotlight.com:

Christie Quietly Diverts $210 Million From Clean Energy Fund
Administration justifies appropriation by arguing the money is ‘surplus dollars’

The governor did not mention the diversion in his speech to lawmakers, nor was it disclosed at a budget briefing for reporters earlier in the day. It only came to light late in the afternoon when the administration released a 145-page budget summary for the 2013 fiscal year — a single line item identifying $210 million in interagency fund transfers to the general fund.

And two links views on how the environment and clean energy might fare with President Obama’s 2013 budget proposal:

Via CleanWaterAction.org:

The President’s Budget – Do the Math

The proposal includes increased funds for the research, program development, and enforcement of health and environmental laws.  In fact, one of the biggest increases in the EPA budget is for strapped state programs which bear the day-to-day responsibility of implementing federal laws including the Safe Drinking Water Act (SDWA) and the Clean Water Act.  Funding for the Agency’s drinking water program is increased, particularly important for Clean Water Action’s work watchdogging SDWA implementation. These aren’t always headline grabbing activities, but they’re critical to enabling government to carry out the intent of that law – clean drinking water from our nation’s public water systems. We’re also glad to see increased investment in small drinking water systems, who are often most challenged by the costs up-to-date drinking water treatment.

Via RealEnergyWriters.com

Obama’s Budget Good for Energy Efficiency

In all, Obama increases the Department of Energy budget by 3.2%,  bringing it to $27.2 billion for 2013. He allots $2.3 billion for both the efficiency and renewable energy programs in EERE, and maintains Energy Star spending at the same level. Funding for  high-risk research increases 27% and for manufacturing advancement 150%. Obama offers an 80% increase in programs that cut energy use in buildings and factories. He also continues to press Congress to pass the HomeStar bill to reduce household energy use.

 

 

Posted by Claire Sommer in Green Politics - (0 Comments)

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Green Living: Greener Cleaning

21
February
2012

If you want to know what is in your cleaning products, and what might be a potential health risk for your family, pets and the environment, I suggest you do some homework.

I started at the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services database listing ingredients in common cleaning products with potential health effects and safety and handling instructions.

To help American consumers select less-toxic choices, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) offers a safety rating that permits certain consumer products to carry the Design for the Environment (DfE) label.

According to the EPA, “When you see the DfE logo on a product it means that the DfE scientific review team has screened each ingredient for potential human health and environmental effects and that — based on currently available information, EPA predictive models, and expert judgment — the product contains only those ingredients that pose the least concern among chemicals in their class.”

I have issues with the words “least concern” and “based on currently available information” but at least the DfE rating is based on a consistent scientific approach.

All good-sized supermarkets offer cleaning products with the DfE label. You can use the links above to investigate ingredients before you buy.

Here’s where I net out on chemical safety: while one particular chemical might be rated as “safe” for most people, pets and places, I have concerns about the accumulated load of chemicals we all breathe and consume in regular life. Plus, some of us are hardier than others. It just makes sense to lighten the load where possible.

Even better than buying green is to make your own cleaning solutions.

Use plain white vinegar for cleaning, disinfecting and shining and baking soda for scrubbing. Due to its high acidity, white vinegar can be used straight to combat germs and mildew and diluted half-and-half with water to clean countertops and hard surfaces.

Adda few drops of essential oil to a vinegar and water mixture in a spray bottle for a personalized scent.

Baking soda is an effective, gentle abrasive cleaner when mixed with water into a paste. Let time do the hard work by leaving it on overnight for baked-on food or stains.  A neat tip is to put baking soda into a shaker designed for pizza cheese, so it’s handy and ready to use.

Bleach is the big guns, meant to be used sparingly, cautiously, diluted and in a well-ventilated area. Never mix bleach with anything other than water. Bleach’s best partner is time. You can get the same results with a one-tenth bleach solution as with straight bleach if you let the diluted solution sit for 10 minutes. Mix up just what you need for each cleaning session because diluted bleach breaks down after 24 hours. Remember to rinse the cleaned area with water, taking care not to let the bleach solution touch your skin. More safer bleach use tips.

If you come to my house, I can’t promise that my counters will be spick and span, but at least they will be safe and clean.

Posted by Claire Sommer in Green Living - (0 Comments)

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Green Business: Another Word for Convergence–Strategic Collaboration

20
February
2012

Via TriplePundit.com

TrendWatch 2012: From Confrontation to Collaboration

Companies are realizing that their businesses are dependent on the environment and are looking for ways to mitigate that impact in order to ensure their business will survive. …

Partnership with an NGO also indicates to stakeholders that the business is serious about social and environmental concerns.

Posted by Claire Sommer in Green Business | Green Shift - (0 Comments)

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Green Business: How Dow Does Sustainability

20
February
2012

Dow Chemical didn’t cause the 1984 Bhopal gas leak that killed tens of thousands of people, but the clean-up became Dow’s responsibility once it took ownership of Union Carbide in 2001.

Big problems need big solutions. As a leading chemical company, Dow can be at the forefront of inventing the new technologies, products and services that will not only ameliorate the environmental degradation caused by its products and processes today, but move the world forward with innovative solutions for tomorrow.

Read this CRSwire post about Dow Chemical’s sustainability strategy and the company’s efforts to incorporate the value of nature to its bottom line.

Dow Chemical: Extracting Business Value out of Sustainability

Our world is facing pressing challenges including water supplies, energy sources and affordable housing. Mitigating the impacts of these challenges and managing our natural resources worldwide requires the manufacturing industry, and in particular, the chemical industry, to play an enabling role by discovering and implementing new technologies.

As part of its sustainability efforts, the company has pledged $10 million in a 5-year partnership with The Nature Conservancy.

The global organizations will work together to apply scientific knowledge and experience to examine how Dow’s operations rely on and affect nature. The aim of the collaboration is to advance the incorporation of the value of nature into business, and to take action to protect the earth’s natural systems and the services they provide people, for the benefit of business and society.

This is a partnership to watch, because the lessons that come out of this research can be of enormous benefit to everyone.

Posted by Claire Sommer in Green Business | Green Science - (0 Comments)

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Green Science: Calculating Nature’s Value

20
February
2012

“Companies that value and integrate biodiversity and ecosystem services into their strategic plans are best positioned for the future by operationalizing sustainability.”–Dow Chemical CEO

We care for things we value.

What a tree worth today? What’s it worth 20 years from now? Which time frame provides the greater financial and human well-being?

A scientific concept called “EcoSystem Services” helps answer these questions by providing tools to measure and consider the value of natural resources long-term when making business, political and social decisions.

It’s a new idea to me to try to put a financial number on what a forest is worth. But now that I’m thinking about it, I can see the value in treating natural systems as capital assets. By assigning hard-cost value to trees and seas and wildlife today, the full long term value of these resources can be considered, replenished and protected for long-term sustainable human and natural success.

Here’s how the U.S. EPA puts it:

Ecosystem services are rarely considered during environmental decision-making, principally because they are not well identified, quantified, or considered in ways applicable to commerce. The Program research results will enable economists, social scientists, environmental managers and others to incorporate an enhanced understanding of value and risk when making decisions about the costs and benefits of using and protecting ecosystem services. To ensure sustainable human and natural systems, the full long term value of ecosystem services must be considered when making decisions.

The best example I can think of in my life is how the Hudson River’s health has dramatically improved in the last 40 years. Thanks largely to the awareness raised by the Clearwater Environmental Foundation and successful polluter litigation waged by Riverkeeper, the water is cleaner.

Fish have returned to New York Harbor in greater numbers. With more food, harbor seals now live and breed year-round on rocky outcrops south of the Verrazano Narrows Bridge. Dolphins are a common sight. The cleaner water attracts more people who want to live, work, and play on and near its banks. Business, city, environmental and citizen groups profit and benefit from the water in ways not seen since the early 20th century when the city’s piers teemed with ship commerce. Multiple stakeholders have skin in the game to keep the water clean. So they do. (Visit the Metropolitan Waterfront Alliance for more on this interconnected, unfolding success story.)

The Ecosystems Services definitions were formalized by the United Nations 2005 Millennium Ecosystem Assessment (MEA), a four-year study involving more than 1,300 scientists worldwide.

The MEA assigned four broad categories to show the relationships among Ecosystem Services and human well-being. These categories are: provisioning, such as the production of food and water; regulating, such as the control of climate and disease; supporting, such as nutrient cycles and crop pollination; and cultural, such as spiritual and recreational benefits.

MEA: Relationships Among Ecosystem Services and Human Well-Being (click to view larger)

Millenium Ecosystem Assessment

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

All the earth’s resources are  intrinsically linked to our collective well being. They have value. In a way, Ecosystems Services is like a worldwide General Ledger to help us measure, grow and prudently spend from our global bank account.

Ecosystem Services Links:

Wikipedia

EPA’s Ecosystem Services Research

USDA’s Forest Service on Ecosystem Services

Nature Conservancy on Ecosystem Services

Nature Conservancy’s Jan 2012 Partnership with Dow Chemical

 

Posted by Claire Sommer in Green Links | Green Politics | Green Science | Green Shift - (0 Comments)

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Green Business: Business & Conservation Converge

17
February
2012

I had the absolute pleasure of attending a breakfast seminar this morning hosted by the Institute for Sustainable Enterprise at Fairleigh Dickinson University in Madison, NJ. Attendees represented the entire Sustainability space from big industry, academia, and research to innovative small businesses.

Helen Crowley, Conservation & Ecosystem Services Specialist for mega-conglomerate PPR (owner of Puma and Gucci brands, among others) presented a fascinating lecture called “The Convergence of Business and Biodiversity Conservation.” Link to presentation slides.

In a nutshell, if major corporations have all the money, and are responsible for significant ecological and environmental degradation, then it’s in everyone’s best interests for conservation supporters to work with them instead of in opposition. Crowley argued that this convergence of resources, research and responsibilities breaks new ground towards solving global environmental challenges.

In a truly lucky stroke for attendees, Crowley came to the breakfast after spending the last three days in NYC at a global Sustainability Summit hosted by consulting firm KPMG. She shared a link for the summit’s keynote report, Expect the Unexpected: Building Business Value in a Changing World.

This report offers thought-provoking analysis on 10 sustainability “megaforces” facing businesses in the next 20 years and the emergence of environmental cost accounting. (Required reading! Download it now!)

Moreover, it will be a foundation document for the upcoming June 2012 Rio+20 United Nations Conference on Sustainability.

Crowley raised enormously important questions about balancing human consumption with ecological preservation. What happens when an entire supply chain’s true environmental costs are measured and accounted for? How do you even do that? Is profit still possible? How can the conservation arena best create metrics to accurately calculate the value of ecological services? Who is responsible for the full positive and negative impact of  goods and services on a global scale?

In her work at sport apparel brand Puma, Crowley is starting to dig into those questions. She offered her company’s first Environmental P&L statement  as an example of how companies are moving in the right direction. Since this era of global impact transparency is just picking up steam, Crowley had few hard results to share with the group. She did, however, point towards solutions centered on innovative and improved processes, products, materials and sourcing.

I’m inspired by the emergence of integrated reporting–whereby quarterly guidance goes away in favor of longer-term projections and sustainable investments garner more weight. (See Reuter’s coverage of Vice President Al Gore’s Feb. 16 call for sustainable capitalism.)

As Drucker so famously said, “What gets measured, gets managed.” I’m all in for conversations that give companies strategic information they didn’t have before to improve people’s lives, the planet’s health, and business profits.

Posted by Claire Sommer in Green Business | Green Shift - (1 Comments)

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Green Links: U.S. Garbage & Recycling Rates

17
February
2012

Via SustainableBusiness.com:

US Recycling Rate Inches Up: 34.1% in 2010

For 2010, the US recycling rate inched up to 34.1%, reports the US EPA.

That’s a slight rise from the 33.8% recycling rate in 2009, but still nothing to get excited about. The amount of garbage Americans produce is also inching down, from a high of 4.57 pounds per person a day in 1990 to 4.43 pounds today.

What’s in your garbage? Mine consists mostly of non recyclable packaging and my dog’s waste in biodegradable bags.

All paper and plastics that come into the house go out in my curb-side recycling.

All organic material goes into the compost bin to feed the worms.

Read the EPA’s Report

Posted by Claire Sommer in Green Links | Green Living - (0 Comments)

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Green Shift: Climate Change & Consensus

16
February
2012

All politics is local. So is climate.

The micro-climate of my backyard is a specific growing terrior with its own proclivities and advantages. My garden warms and cools and drains and grows in a way that differs from every other patch of ground on the planet.

That said, trends hold true. I might get lucky with overwintering a rosemary one year out of 10, but overall my Zone 6B location means it’s a heartbreak waiting to happen.

As my local garden grows, so goes our collective global garden.

Whether my rosemary dies or thrives, the time to argue whether the earth is warming (Or cooling. Or melting. Or experiencing extreme weather events.) is over. The worldwide scientific community is in consensus on these facts.

Likewise, there is broad agreement and understanding that human activities are accelerating climate change.*

We can argue till the cows come home as to who set the fire, but in the meantime, let’s work together to put it out.

When I encounter people who want to deny the facts in front of them (see also: Confirmation Bias), my next line is inquiry is to follow the money (see #3).

While there may be short-term financial gains for climate change denials, in the end we’ll all lose.

*Bonus Climate Change Acronym: AWG (Anthropogenic Global Warming, meaning human-caused)

Three links:

1. Via OmniClimate: The Climate Change Consensus – In Five Points

2. Via Wikipedia.org: A starting point for major points, players and positions

Global warming refers to the rising average temperature of Earth‘s atmosphere and oceans, which started to increase in the late 19th century and is projected to keep going up. Since the early 20th century, Earth’s average surface temperature has increased by about 0.8 °C (1.4 °F), with about two thirds of the increase occurring since 1980.[2] Warming of the climate system is unequivocal, and scientists are more than 90% certain that most of it is caused by increasing concentrations of greenhouse gases produced by human activities such as deforestation and burning fossil fuels.[3][4][5][6] These findings are recognized by the national science academies of all the major industrialized nations.[7][A]

3. Via Treehugger.org:  Leaked Docs,  Reveal How Top Think Tank Turns Oil Money Into Climate Denial

Posted by Claire Sommer in Green Links | Green Shift - (0 Comments)

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Green Politics: Monsanto Pinned for Poisoning

14
February
2012

If you sell you something that makes you terribly sick, who is to blame?

Seems like an obvious question, right? Especially if you are applying chemicals that are designed to kill living organisms.

The thing is, it’s often a very hard thing to prove, especially when it comes to illnesses linked to toxic chemicals and pesticides exposure. U.S. agri-giant Monsanto has relied upon this absence of causal scientific  linkage–the proverbial “smoking gun”–to maintain its lack of culpability when people get sick from their products.

Until today. A French judge has found Monsanto directly culpable and responsible for a farmer’s illness after exposure to one of the company’s pesticides.

Via the Guardian:

Monsanto found guilty of chemical poisoning in France

French farmer Paul Francois says he suffered neurological problems after inhaling Monsanto’s Lasso weedkiller

A French court has declared the US biotech giant Monsanto guilty of chemical poisoning of a French farmer, a judgment that could lend weight to other health claims against pesticides.

In the first such case heard in court in France, the grain grower Paul Francois, 47, said he suffered neurological problems including memory loss, headaches and stammering after inhaling Monsanto’s Lasso weedkiller in 2004.

He blames Monsanto for not providing adequate warnings on the product label.

The ruling was given by a court in Lyon, south-east France, which ordered an expert opinion of Francois’s losses to establish the amount of damages.

“It is a historic decision in so far as it is the first time that a [pesticide] maker is found guilty of such a poisoning,” Francois Lafforgue, Francois’s lawyer, told Reuters.

Monsanto said it was disappointed by the ruling and would examine whether to appeal against the judgment.

“Monsanto always considered that there were not sufficient elements to establish a causal relationship between Paul Francois’s symptoms and a potential poisoning,” the company’s lawyer, Jean-Philippe Delsart, said.

Previous health claims from farmers have foundered because of the difficulty of establishing clear links between illnesses and exposure to pesticides.

This “burden of proof” is a really interesting element to the whole discussion of causing harm and assigning responsibility. United States law has traditionally flowed from a risk assessment strategy that favors trade and enterprise over public and environmental safety. Weigh the outcomes, then proceed. Assume the best, deal with the rest.

In contrast, European Union law rests upon a a precautionary mindset. If you want to sell it, you have to prove that it’s not harmful before you proceed.

From wikipedia.com:

The precautionary principle or precautionary approach states that if an action or policy has a suspected risk of causing harm to the public or to the environment, in the absence of scientific consensus that the action or policy is harmful, the burden of proof that it is not harmful falls on those taking the action.

The problem, of course, with betting on things being OK is that they are–until they’re not. Once illness strikes or a watershed is bespoiled, we all suffer the consequences. There’s no unringing the bell. No matter who was to blame in the right place.  That’s good enough reason to stop throwing dice with our health and our environment.

Posted by Claire Sommer in Green Business | Green Politics | Green Science - (0 Comments)