VT Transportation system efficiency report submitted

As I mentioned in a previous post, I've been helping write a report for the VT legislature on how to improve the efficiency of the transportation system. It's been submitted and posted to our website. You can download the pdf here.

Working with EarthRights

So, I'm pasting what I wrote on Facebook, below. (You are right, Elaine, there is a lot of overlap between blogs, facebook and diary - invariably something loses out). One thing I've been thinking about since I wrote this, though, is the need for basic climate education in developing countries. These are the people who will be (are) affected the most by climate change. Giving them a basic understanding of the science behind climate change - the carbon cycle, the greenhouse effect, the difference between climate change and the ozone hole - is empowering. It gives them knowledge they will need if they choose to fight back....

Here's my post:

So some of you (Elaine, Erin and Ryan, ahem!) know I'm really sick of thinking about biofuels. You'd think that traveling in Asia, I'd get to forget about it for a little while. No such luck. I taught at EarthRight's Mekong school (which has 2 students each from each country in the Mekong region - Cambodia, Vietnam, China, Thailand, Burma and Laos) on biofuels this morning. It was fascinating to hear their experiences with it. There is some really horrifying stuff going on with jatropha in Burma (see http://www.terraper.org/key_issues_view.php?id=17), which I heard about first-hand from the Burmese student.

The students were very engaged and kept asking really complicated questions requiring drawings and long explanations of the carbon cycle, eutrophication, carbon trading, U.S. politics, international climate agreements, etc. Since I'm so sick of thinking about biofuels, I was happy to go off on tangents. One of the Chinese students felt that all countries should sign on to the next climate agreement, but that the U.S. should reduce more, say, "by half." She asked how willing Americans are to change their lifestyle. They all seemed a little shocked when I told them how attached Americans are to their consumptive lifestyles. But I mentioned Obama's acceptance speach - how for the first time in a long time, sacrifice was tied to patriotism. They seemed excited about Obama, but a little cynical. One of the students asked how he would be able to accomplish his goals if the big corporations went against him. She also asked if I thought he'd be assassinated. Ouch. I told her I was more optimistic than scared, and she agreed with me.

Anyway, it was a great experience. The students are so well-spoken and inspiring. I know they'll all go on to do great things. I think the EarthRights model, giving people the tools to fight for their rights (human and environmental) in their home countries, makes so much sense. It's cool to see it in action.

Insider info please!

Ryan - tell us about the environment team appointees! What's the scoop?

doh...

We didn't make the finalists' circle on that proposal we submitted to Home Depot. They will be doing their sustainability in cities work without us...too bad for them! I feel bad for my boss, he's taking it kinda rough as his first proposal submitted at his new, although no more than might be expected.

little fish in a big pond

ISC is an international org, although the vast majority of our work is at the community level. (We are doing some provincial-level partnerships in China.) It attracts some pretty high powered talent in my opinion. Both facts are contributing to me feeling like a little fish in a big pond. I've worked for the last few years on climate change issues at the municipal and occasionally state level in Vermont, which is quite a small pond. This weekend I had a good heart-to-heart with my former boss/mentor/friend at 10% Challenge, Deb Sachs, after a conference she and partners put on (the first annual statewide VECAN meet up, Ryan! It was fab), and she reminded me not to abandon my experience as irrelevant or too small for this new context, but to bring it as my strength. Small communities need help too with climate change mitigation, and that's where my relative strengths are compared to my new boss. Vermont's experience in some ways is ahead; in other ways our mistakes can be lessons for others. So I brought that up with my boss in reporting about the event, and he agreed it was important.

So I guess the lesson was, don't be shy about bringing whatever it is to the problem/solution table. Whether it's hula-hooping skills, or canning, or invention on the fly...it's bound to be relevant to somebody.

Climate delinquency (sp?)

I'm currently in the Singapore airport (which already tells you a little about my climate crimes), and they don't have automatic spellcheck - making me realize how much I depend on it. So, watch out.

I, unlike my colleagues, am seriously slacking off. After getting married, and post-grad school, in between jobs, my husband and I decided to take off for awhile and live abroad, something I've wanted to do since graduating college but hadn't found the time. In a way, it's a really, really, really elaborate trip chain. I had to go to Thailand for an EarthRights International board meeting, so we bought round the world tickets and are stopping at several places on the way there and back. We stopped in Spain first, and climbed for a few weeks. We are headed to Thailand now. The board meeting is tomorrow night. I will be teaching at the EarthRights School (a session on biofuels), and then we'll be playing it by ear. We were going to help build homes for refugees along the Thai-Burma border, but that fell through. Who knows, we might continue to slack and climb hard for a while (see if I can maybe get it out of my system, so it's not such a life-ruling distraction?).

Our next major stop is NZ, where we hope to work on an organic farm. We haven't really planned that out, either. One step at a time.

So, I'm feeling pretty guilty about my carbon footprint right now and my lack of positive engagement, but (see previous post on guilt), it's not actually changing my behavior. I'm wrestling with that a bit, trying to figure out how the guilt could be constructive, or maybe how I can constructively learn to deal with it. I'm hoping to take a meditation course in Thailand, which I think would help with many aspects of my life - hopefully help me use emotion when helpful and let it go when it's not...

I've procrastinated posting for a little while, not wanting to admit my sins. Mea Culpa!

Happy Thanksgiving, Carbonators and friends!

A quick update on what I've been up to: I was hired as a temp by the UVM Transportation Research Center to work on a report assessing how Vermont might achieve a more efficient transportation system, energy-wise, because it was related to my thesis work. The study was legislated in a bill earlier this year and we're to report out to the Vermont Agency of Transportation and the Vermont Legislature. (The bill itself was passed because a handful of people (including Rebecca and me) made a big stink about it to the right people, so keep that in mind next time you want something done by legislation and think you don't have the power to make it happen! Highlights of the report are that lots of fixed route bus service in Vermont will NOT save energy, whereas focus on expanding ridesharing, vanpooling for employees, and public outreach on energy efficient driving WILL save energy. When a public version becomes available I'll post it.

At my other job, the Institute for Sustainable Communities (where I'm the 'Climate Programs Fellow') we applied for what to me is a humongoid grant to assist two pilot U.S. cities work towards sustainability over three years. There's enough money and vision behind it that I think we might actually accomplish something. In the meantime I've been privileged to provide some support to their existing climate-related programming in Guangdong Province, China (which has more manufacturing jobs than the entirety of the U.S.) and the Gulf Coast, U.S. (related to post-Katrina efforts). More detail in the future.

Incidentally, where is Sally? Hope she gets on soon! and Erin, post some news! Thanks for getting us rolling, Ryan and Rebecca!

Re: Rebecca's request for the inside scoop...

I'll post a more thorough breakdown sometime soon. But for now, cap and invest is really the best idea in the opinion of most enviros. We want a sizable chunk to go to development and deployment of clean tech. Of course, for political viability, another sizable chunk of revenue will have to go to consumers, especially low income consumers, to mitigate increased energy costs in some way or another. But really, we want to use revenue to jump start the green economy and create opportunities through green jobs, etc., rather than give it all back. Then there are all sorts of other issues like whether you auction all allowances or give some away for free, how you ease the burden for energy intensive industry, how you handle offsets, international... and of course, getting the targets right! I'm actually putting together some briefing binders on all these details for our team. If anyone wants some light reading, I could probably hook you up.

Carbonator in DC

Thought I'd drop in and add my first carbonator alum post. So, I'm living in DC. For those who don't know, I am the Global Warming Legislative Fellow at the National Wildlife Federation. For at least the next year or so, I'll be here fighting the war on global warming. So far, it's been awesome. I'm mainly providing support in several capacities to our global warming solutions team. But I've also had the opportunity to attend a bunch of briefings on the hill, as well as strategy meetings with all sorts of environmental groups. I've been learning about all the ins and outs of climate and energy policy at the national and international levels. No doubt, information overload is common in grad school, but hanging around all these policy wonks is a whole other story. Sometimes, trying to absorb it all is like trying to drink from a fire hose. For all those who might be wondering, things here are looking more promising... we're getting closer to a deal. I'll keep you posted. 

Political Action

So, I've railed in favor of political action in the past. With such a big election, how could I NOT get involved? Mike (my husband) and I stayed at Erin's house in Harrisville, NH, and volunteered for Obama for the week before the election. Here's a little video montage of our experience there:

Welcome Carbonators!

I am excited to announce a transition, one that I hope is symbolic of a much larger trend: I am turning this blog over to a group of friends called the Carbonators.

Erin, Elaine, Ryan and I started the Carbonators while we were at UVM. Initially we were just a couple of grad students studying climate and energy issues and looking for support from our peers. Gradually we expanded, taking on more people and becoming more active. With the help of Sally, who joined us a little later on, and some of the newer rock star Carbonators, we got the University of Vermont to adopt guidelines to vote in favor of climate change resolutions at the corporations in which it invests. We also got UVM to become only the second university to join a $5 trillion dollar network called the Investor Network on Climate Risk.

While the Carbonators are still thriving at UVM, Sally, Elaine, Ryan, Erin and I have moved on. This blog is now a way for us Carbonator Alums to keep track of each other and share our experiences with the rest of the world.

So, this is no longer an individual blog, run by a loner discussing my personal feelings and thoughts on climate change. It is a communal blog, symbolic, I hope, of a movement toward collective action. And it is no longer just about musings - emotional, spiritual and intellectual ramblings on climate (though those are still valid); it is also about action.

Welcome Carbonators!

Cynicism

So, in case you haven't noticed, this blog has, of late, been an attempt at self-inspiration. Yes, I've been cynical lately. The problem is not so much the problems, but the solutions. I'm having a rough time envisioning a future that feels "right." Or rather, I can envision that world, but I can't see a way to get to that world without (a) a lot of pain and suffering on the road from here to there, or (b) a global cultural transformation just short of a miracle. I'm just not feeling that optimistic right now. Which is tough, not just because it affects my outlook on the world, but because it affects my outlook on my life. What is the point of all this passionate grinding work if I can't even make a dent...?

But we humans have a myopic linear vision of the future. It is difficult to forecast the unexpected. We focus on the probable, when in fact improbability is the trend. It is the foundation of our existence.

Bill Bryson starts his book A Short History of Nearly Everything with a welcome:

"Welcome. And congratulations. I am delighted that you could make it. Getting here wasn't easy, I know. In fact, I suspect it was a little tougher than you realize.

"To begin with, for you to be here now trillions of drifting atoms had somehow to assemble in an intricate and intriguingly obliging manner to create you. It's an arrangement so specialized and particular that it has never been tried before and will only exist this once...

"Atoms are so numerous and necessary that we easily overlook that they needn't actually exist at all. There is no law that requires the universe to fill itself with small particles of matter or to produce light and gravity and the other physical properties on which our existence hinges. There needn't actually be a universe at all. For the longest time there wasn't.

"So thank goodness for atoms. But the fact that you have atoms and that they assemble in such a willing manner is only part of what got you here. To be here now, alive in the twenty-first century and smart enough to know it, you also had to be the beneficiary of an extraordinary string of biological good fortune. Survival on Earth is a surprisingly tricky business. Of the billions and billions of species of living thing that have existed since the dawn of time, most - 99.99 percent - are no longer around...

"Not only have you been lucky enough to be attached since time immemorial to a favored evolutionary line, but you have also been extremely - make that miraculously - fortunate in your personal ancestry. Consider the fact that for 3.8 billion years, a period of time older than the Earth's mountains and rivers and oceans, every one of your forebears on both sides has been attractive enough to find a mate, healthy enough to reproduce, and sufficiently blessed by fate and circumstances to live long enough to do so."

And yet, here we are.

I quote Bryson for two reasons:
1. It's important to point out that, as any gambler or mathmatician knows, even a very long string of good luck is no guarantee of future good luck.
2. The improbable is probable. There is just no way to know what the future might bring.

There are many ways to interpret the latter point. But to me it's hopeful. There is room in this vast universe for wild and unexpected occurances. We might even get to play a part in them. We can help our string of good luck continue by fostering hope in the improbable, striving for that unlikely happy future.

Oh, and one more important point, courtesy of Bryson:
3. We should appreciate our existence.

Buddhist Climate Wisdom

Well, I'm feeling better - a couple of weekends enjoying the great outdoors (hiking, climbing, canoeing, biking, and - my favorite - going to the farmers market) cured me of my malaise. Yet, I have some pertinent words of wisdom to add to the last post:

"Our Earth, our green beautiful Earth, is in danger, and all of us know it. Yet we act as if our daily lives have nothing to do with the situation of the world. If the Earth were your body, you would be able to feel many areas where she is suffering. Many people are aware of the world's suffering, and their hearts are filled with compassion. They know what needs to be done, and they engage in political, social, and environmental work to try to change things. But after a period of intense involvement, they become discouraged, because they lack the strength needed to sustain a life of action. Real strength is not power, money, or weapons, but in deep, inner peace.

"If we change our daily lives - the way we think, speak, and act - we change the world. The best way to take care of the environment is to take care of the environmentalist." - Thich Nhat Hanh

Don't forget to breathe!

Badnews Affective Disorder? (BAD)

Whenever I'm feeling low (and I've been low lately), I submit myself to a maddening interrogation: Are my expectations of myself to high? Are they too low? It is because I'm going through a transition - I'm in limbo? Is it because my jobs aren't fulfilling? And so on... I'd like to note that the relentless interrogation never actually helps me feel better; it only adds frustration to sadness - not a pretty combination.

You'll notice a theme in my self-interrogation: I, me, my... In their book Coming Back to Life: Practices to Reconnect Our Lives, Our World, Joanna Macy and Molly Young Brown make an astute point:

"[The source of pain] lies less in concerns for the personal self than in apprehensions of collective suffering - of what happens to our and other species, to the legacy of our ancestors, to unborn generations, and to the living body of the Earth.
"What we are dealing with here is akin to the original meaning of compassion: "suffering with." It is the distress we feel on behalf of the larger whole of which we are a part. It is the pain of the world itself, experienced in each of us...
"That pain is the price of consciousness in a threatened and suffering world. It is not only natural, it is an absolutely necessary component of our collective healing. As in all organisms, pain has a purpose: it is a warning signal, designed to trigger remedial action.
"The problem, therefore, lies not with our pain for the world, but in our repression of it." (Macy and Brown, pp. 27).

They go on to discuss several sources of repression, including fear of pain, fear of appearing morbid (or, as I would put it, fear of being "Debbie Downer"- see earlier posts), fear of guilt, fear of causing distress, fear of appearing weak and emotional and belief in the separate self. I am guilty of most of these, but the last one is what really gets me:

"It is hard to credit our pain for the world, if we believe we are essentially separate from it...So, people have come to assume that feelings of fear, anger, or despair about the world are merely a reflection of personal inner conflict...We find it hard to believe that we can suffer on behalf of society itself, and on behalf of our planet, and that such suffering is real and valid and healthy." (Macy and Brown, p. 31)

The remedy for "pain for the world" as Macy and Brown call it? Grieve!!

When I first read this book last summer, I took their words to heart, bawling on the back porch, book in hand. It was cathartic. Macy and Brown suggest a series of practices to deal with "pain for the world," which so far, for all the reasons they eloquently describe, I have neglected to do. For one thing, you're supposed to do them in groups. I have a hard time with the notion of inviting a bunch of friends over to bawl with me, though I know it would probably be good for all of us. But everybody is so busy, and so on... All the typical excuses...

For now, it's a good start to remind myself that the source of my sadness is not necessarily internal. The constant barrage of bad news takes a toll. And it's okay to cry for it...

The tip of the Iceberg

Icebergs are a common symbol of climate change: icebergs cleaving off glaciers, icebergs melting, a polar bear standing on a lone iceberg drifting out to sea. Do we ever consider what lies beneath?

The current climate conversation is just the tip of the iceberg. It doesn't delve deep; it has no weight to it. We talk in parts per million, chemistry, symbols (graphs and polar bears), statistics and acronyms - endless acronyms. But we are communicating in code - skating across the surface, so to speak. The statistical banter and alphabet soup (IPCC, ppm, CO2, G8, etc...) is the visible portion of something much larger.

I'm not drawn to climate action because I enjoy thinking about pounds of CO2 per gallon of gasoline or because I enjoy reading long-range transportation plans. As it happens, I do enjoy the subject matter, but that's not why I care. The dry portion is just much easier to articulate than the remainder of the iceberg, buried deep in dark water.

My passion for climate and environmental work is a spiritual passion. It emanates from my love of this Earth and all things in it - a deep appreciation for all life. This love bears with it a responsibility. Not a responsibility to "save the world," but a responsibility to try to maintain an equilibrium habitable to the genetic bounty I am a part of. A responsibility not to take up too much space. In many ways this is a selfish duty - I'm looking out for the world I love. I know perfectly well that in its absence another world would flourish on this same Earth. It wouldn't take long, from a geological perspective, to grow a new genetic medley as prodigious as our own. But I don't live in geologic time and neither will my children. Neither does any other sentient being who rises with tomorrow's sun.

And it's not just other species that concern me. We would be foolish to think humans exempt. Which brings me to another contour of the iceberg's belly. Last winter, the minister's wife at the Burlington Unitarian church gave a speech articulating her sense of God. She described God as arising from the connections and relationships between people - love and community. It is going to take many, many people working in tandem, bound by a love of each other and love of the Earth, to tackle climate change. By her definition, it will truly take an act of God - something I'd like to be a part of. Climate action offers an excuse to rise above our own selfish desires and become a part of something much larger, a community of beings working in concert for the good of all life. So, my passion for climate action is religious in nature. It is a calling - a challenge - to step out of and beyond our individual selves and achieve as a species what cannot be achieved alone.

There is more to the iceberg than I can currently articulate - lying in unexplored waters. But as an illustration to accompany the previous paragraph, I want to share a short video:

http://www.wherethehellismatt.com/

Happy climate musings...

So, getting married was sufficient to fully distract me from thoughts of climate change. Hence the blog hiatus. We had an incredible wedding: perfect weather, wonderful friends and family, delicious food, beautiful place. It was better than I dared to hope.

Now I'm back to the grind. I just began working on a research project looking at various transportation and growth scenarios in Maine towns. Today I got to read about trains. Cool! I started fantasizing about trains as the new "bling." Billionaires are spending millions on boats these days - why not trains? Mike, my husband (ahhh!), once helped to build a $65 million boat. How much cooler would it be to have a train? Way longer than a limo! And no more getting stuck in traffic with the plebes ;). The train project I read about today would extend the commuter rail from Portland up to Brunswick. It would cost about $60 million. So, hypothetically, some billionaire (the same sort who would buy a $65 million boat) could chip in $60 million to rehabilitate the commuter line. I'm sure for an extra $5 million he/she could have a sweet, pimped-out private car. And he could credit himself (or herself) for offsetting tons of carbon by getting people out of their cars and into public transportation. Now that's bling!

I also re-read Maine's Climate Action Plan (written in 2004). And I read the most recent progress report (released in December 2007). Though undoubtedly written through rose-colored glasses, the progress report was upliftingly optimistic. Though some action items had failed, others are now expected to surpass original emission-reduction estimates. It concluded that Maine is on track to meet its emission reduction goals by 2010 and 2020. Though I take this report with at least a few grains of salt (it's basically a self evaluation), I allowed myself to be taken in at least somewhat, just for the fun of it. I allowed my cynicism to dissipate and revel in state government actually doing something - a stakeholder process turning into an actual plan, at least some of which is actually implemented, perhaps even producing actual results! A government taking action on climate change and making actual progress!! Good climate news? As Michael Franti sings, "tell me lies, lies, lies, sweet little lies - help me make them all come true." There's some truth in that...

Maybe I'm just still giddy from getting married, but, hey, today's climate musings put me in a good mood. I'm gonna roll with it...

Good news?

I'm getting married in a week = MIA. In the meantime, amuse yourself with this: http://www.fugue.com/pics/goodnews.html

Heads in the oil sands...

I've been listening to the radio for the past hour or so - slowly waking up my brain as I make breakfast and wash dishes... So far I've heard 4 stories on how Americans are beginning to adapt (not just to climate change, but to the "cracking" - see the post below) - one on co-generation, one on growing vegetables, one on airlines charging for checked luggage and one on boat owners cutting back on joy rides.

I was in the midst of washing a pot while the cogeneration story played, so I couldn't hear all of it. Instead, my mind started to wander to a lecture I heard about a year ago. A cogeneration consultant talked about how Dubai is leading the field with tons of huge new cogeneration projects. Seemingly in possession of all the cheap oil in the world, and Dubai is investing in cogeneration... food for thought.

My mind wandered further down this track. A couple of years ago I traveled to Libya with my grandfather. We had the opportunity to hear a presentation from Qaddafi's administration on Libyan economic development. Ever the trouble-maker, I asked a question: "These economic development plans sound great, but they all seem heavily dependent on cheap oil. And your projections do not show oil lasting forever. What are you going to do when the oil runs out?"

The speaker looked me in the eyes for a moment and paused before proclaiming, "We're going to fill the desert with solar panels and export hydrogen to the first world."

Well, at least someone has a plan!! Of course, given the small scope and slow pace of American adaptation - a few more bucks for checked baggage, a few less joy-riders, a vegetable here and there (as much as I love veggies...) - we'll still be dependent on Middle Eastern dictatorships for our energy, even in a new energy era.

What happened to American innovation? As long as we keep burying our heads in the oil sands, we'll never see our way out of this one...

Scattered Climate Thoughts

My brain isn't organized enough right now to put these into any kind of extended post, so this is just an update - scattered ponderings...

I'm feeling much better since I last wrote, though I did have a dream about petroleum monsters: I'm in the middle of a pristine place, which I think of as a forest, but it is all white. I am trying to move through it undetected, but these hands keep touching me through the air - as though they're from another dimension. I try to run the edge of the forest, but there are these really tall, black, tree-like creatures with what look like cobwebs - big sticky strings - hanging down from them. At their feet is a fleet of black shiny vehicles. I find out somehow that every night they move their fleet forward, encroaching on the forest with their sleek cars. They use their shine and advertising slogans to distract people from their behavior. I try to attack them but get stuck the black cobwebs and flung back into the forest. Weird!

* * *

I've been thinking lately about what a narrow frame "climate change" is. Climate change is really only one aspect of a much, much larger, systemic problem, that we don't even have the vocabulary to address. When I say I'm depressed about climate change, that's only part of the story. I'm depressed about the cyclone in Burma and the terrible dictatorship there, about the rising poverty, the economy, food prices...and these things all seem interrelated in a way that I'm not yet capable of articulating. They all seem interrelated because they seem like fractures in an egg shell, each a separate crack, all emanating from the same cause, all leading to the same fate.

In fact, that's a great way to think about it! A fractured eggshell. That is what this blog is about. The shell is cracking and it's scary as hell, but it holds the promise of new life - transformation (as discussed in an earlier post). But we need a new language to discuss this - a new frame that doesn't just look at each crack in isolation.

After my friend's recent thesis defense on climate solutions, the audience was practically climbing out of their seats, clamoring to ask questions, pose points of view. We need more public fora for discussing this issue. But we also need a new public language to capture the complexity - to allow us to see things afresh. Perhaps we should call it "the cracking." Other suggestions?

* * *

It seems like we're past the point of no return. Mitigation is still important, but adaptation is increasingly on my mind. How will we cope? Not just to climate change, but to "the cracking." We need resilient communities prepared for a new kind of self-sufficient existence. It seems there is untested opportunity in the idea of adaptation, however. What if we prepare low-income communities for high energy prices by equipping them with solar hot water or solar pv? We not only address issues of economic justice and help prepare communities for what lies ahead, but we also help reduce GHG emissions. And somehow it seems more politically palatable. Much of politics and policy is about playing with perception (see Deborah Stone). Policies that have concentrated benefits and diffused costs are much more likely to be successful than those that have concentrated costs and diffused benefits. Hence, the climate problem - concentrated costs, diffused benefits = inaction. But if we start thinking more about adaptation - improving resiliency - we might be able to change people's perceptions of benefits. When you start talking about equipping a community to survive economic/ecological disaster, suddenly the benefits seem much more concentrated than when you talk about "reducing carbon footprints."

Environmentalists have been hesitant to focus on adaptation because they fear that it will distract from mitigation. But, at this point, we need both. And the two can go hand in hand. We can call it "adigation," or perhaps just "action."

Dwelling on the Dark Side

"Scientists at the Mauna Loa observatory in Hawaii say that CO2 levels in the atmosphere now stand at 387 parts per million (ppm), up almost 40% since the industrial revolution and the highest for at least the last 650,000 years.

The figures, published by the US National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) on its website, also confirm that carbon dioxide, the chief greenhouse gas, is accumulating in the atmosphere faster than expected. The annual mean growth rate for 2007 was 2.14ppm - the fourth year in the past six to see an annual rise greater than 2ppm. From 1970 to 2000, the concentration rose by about 1.5ppm each year, but since 2000 the annual rise has leapt to an average 2.1ppm.

Scientists say the shift could indicate that the Earth is losing its natural ability to soak up billions of tons of carbon each year. Climate models assume that about half our future emissions will be re-absorbed by forests and oceans, but the new figures confirm this may be too optimistic. If more of our carbon pollution stays in the atmosphere, it means emissions will have to be cut by more than currently projected to prevent dangerous levels of global warming." Guardian - UK

I was in a bad mood before I read that. Then I stumbled across another article - read at your own (emotional) risk: http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/environment/article3883272.ece. It's about how Greenland is psyched that the ice is melting, so they can access their oil reserves. (Fh@7&$%**!!!)

Here I am graduating, getting married in less than two months. How do I go about planning for my life ahead? Should I just go about my business, pretending nothing will change? Should I start farming, hunkering down and learning survival skills? Neither of these options seem that practical at the moment. My education has supposedly prepared me to make positive change - positive change in a business as usual world - incremental, glacial. Actually, glacial change is would be great - if I could only make change as fast as the glaciers are melting (ha!)

Normally, I try to put a hopeful spin on it, but right now, the truth is, I'm pessimistic and grumpy. Dark days ahead...

No, I can't end this post like that. I don't know what lies ahead. This is where faith comes in, I suppose - a faith in something greater than myself - the Earth, and the community of life - God, if you wish. I see myself as the whole, but I must practice seeing myself as a part, erasing the boundaries that separate. When I remember to think about it - to feel grace and gratitude, to revel and share in the beautiful chaos I'm a part of - this larger vision strengthens me. It gives me hope. I need to breathe, to reinvigorate my spirit, my sense of awe, my connection with something so much greater...

It's hard to articulate faith in a paragraph, especially when it's as amorphous as mine. The point is not so much to articulate it, but to remember it. We may have to fortify ourselves outwardly for the dark days ahead. We must also fortify ourselves inwardly - in whatever shape or tincture you prefer.

"Built to Last"

The guys at the shop pronounced my 5-year-old Mac "vintage." I brought it in this morning with a fuzzy, vibrating screen, hoping they could doctor it back to health. To my resigned disappointment, however, the technician started off with the usual speech, "well it will probably cost you more to fix it than..."

"I'm an environmentalist," I interrupted. He looked at me patiently from across the counter - sympatheticly, even. "I don't want to buy a new computer," I explained. "How much will it cost to fix it?"

"$200 for labor and $600 for parts." Ouch.

Next to me, another technician was counseling a fellow victim, "hard drives only last between 3-5 years," he explained matter-of-factly.

I recently replaced my hard-drive. In fact, I replaced everything wrong with my computer last summer. And now this. A five-year-old "vintage" computer, with a broken part they don't make anymore. Gaaaaaarrrrrghhhh!

We are building a disposable society. How can we expect to build a society to last when every component is vintage, outmoded, obsolete, after five years?

My frustrating morning reminded me of a German video that depicts human society from the perspective of "rock people." Check it out - it's worth a watch: http://youtube.com/watch?v=0fp5hbwdW3E

This speaks for itself.

In the meantime, I didn't buy a new computer. Mike and I are sharing computers for now, which is not exactly a state of deprivation. We'll see if it lasts...

Yeeeeeesssss!!!!!

Read this NYT article by Michael Pollan! He articulates it so well...

It's another great day for gardening, so let's get started.

And again, happy Earth Day!

Web Jam for Earth?

I'm sitting here drumming my fingers, getting all antsy and annoyed because the website for the Earth Day Network is taking forever to load, and I need to get the number to call Congress and ask for action on climate... Then I thought to myself, maybe it's taking forever to load because there are so many people trying to access it? Frustration turned to excitement in an instant!

Well, it just finally loaded.

In case you are also waiting to get through the Earth web jam, the number to call is 202-224-3121.

Here are the instructions: "Tell them the current global warming proposals in Congress are inadequate. Tell them you want:

• A moratorium on new coal-burning plants,
• Renewable energy,
• Carbon-neutral buildings
• Protection for the poor and middle class in the new green economy."
  

Happy Earth Day!

Collapse... or transformation?

Financial firms out of business, student loan companies bankrupt, $116 per barrel of oil, bee colonies collapsing, airlines in turmoil, thousands of Americans losing their homes... are these the first signs of collapse?

A couple of years ago, I was seated on a bus next to a right wing, neo-classical economist. Both of us were stunned to see how differently we viewed the world. We were talking about Kerala, India, a socialist state that I had read about in Bill McKibben's book "Hope, Human and Wild." McKibben uses Kerala as an example to illustrate how it might be possible to reduce consumption and still have a high quality of life - Kerala has a low GDP but high rates of literacy, life expectancy and other quality of life indicators.

The economist took a different view. Kerala saddened and puzzled him. How could a place with such high quality of life indicators not develop economically? This exchange bewildered both of us. The economist asked me why it would be necessary to reduce consumption or economic growth - why that would be a good thing. 'Because,' I explained, 'I am worried that our current rates of consumption will outstrip the world's resources.'

'But Malthus [who, about 200 years ago, predicted that population growth would outstrip our ability to grow food] was wrong,' argued the economist. 'We are capable of sustained economic growth.'

I argued that 200 years or so is not enough time to discredit the basic premise of Malthus - that infinite growth is not possible in a finite system.* I had recently read "Collapse" by Jared Diamond. 'The Anasazi lived in the American Southwest for much longer than 200 years,' I explained. 'They are no longer there today.' Easter Island, the Maya, the Greenlanders, the Anasazi, they all probably took the same short-sighted view that we do now. Collapse is possible - 200 years is not long enough time to disprove that.

Diamond defines "collapse" as "a drastic decrease in human population size and/or political/economic/social complexity, over a considerable area, for an extended time." Sometimes I sense that colleagues/students of mine almost look forward to collapse - they see it as the only way to regain a balance with natural systems. But I challenge them to accept the moral consequences of that. What does it mean, from a moral perspective, to look forward to a drastic decrease in human population size? Disease, war, freezing in the dark? Maybe that doesn't evoke empathy if it occurs in the distant Third World (though in my mind it should), but what if it's your own grandmother or your own child? Certainly, this Earth is overextended. It is our challenge to find an ethical and moral way to bring ourselves back in balance - to move away from a collapse towards a transformation. Either way, I feel we are on the brink of great change.

I was feeling pretty grim about the state of the world when I first woke up this morning. Then I checked my email. 7 unread messages. One was from the Front Porch Forum, a community list-serve for my neighborhood, the Old North End. One of the posts advertised a "Lawn to Garden Workshop" inviting community members to "transform 2 neighborhood lawns into veggie gardens in a hands-on workshop." Cool! I checked the next email, from my friend Elaine. She sent me this video, of UVM students and staff this past Friday commemorating the anniversary of the Waterman take-over and 20 years of student activism and engagement by freezing in place for 5 minutes. It's pretty inspiring.

Are these the first signs of transformation?

Last Sunday, the Youth Group led the service at the Unitarian Church I sometimes attend. The teenagers began the service by reading quotes on change, one of which stuck in my mind: "Change is not necessary. You do not have to survive."

Collapse or transformation? We decide.

------------------------------------------------------------------------------

*Not that I like Malthus - he was classist and some of his ideas were downright loony. He is also at least partially responsible for environmentalists' obsession with population growth. Not that population growth isn't a problem, but it is over-emphasized, placing the burden of environmental problems and solutions disproportionately on the Global South. We must recognize that consumption is also a problem and take responsibility for curbing it.

Solutions to sustainability - an organic approach

I get frustrated that the road map is so unclear. Grassroots or top-down? Market or moral? Diplomatic or radical? But then I remember that nature doesn't work like that. We keep trying to turn ourselves, our world, our solutions into a machine. Michael Pollan describes this in "Omnivore's Dilemma" - the reductionist, mechanistic mindset applied to plants and agriculture, as if we could reduce the complexity of an ecosystem, the interrelated roles of microbes, fungi, minerals and plants to a simple formula for growing: N-P-K (at our peril). Where is our formula for solving climate change? There is no blueprint - no road map. We have to grow our solutions the good old fashioned way, with dirt and hard work. And, as any conservation biologist will tell you, there is strength in diversity. Though it's tempting for solutions to compete with each other, there's no way to know which will succeed, so the more the better.

I find this a comfort. I'm graduating with a Masters in a month. My fiance seems to think that must mean I know what I want to do with my life. Ha! But thinking about sustainability solutions as an organic rather than industrial process takes some of the pressure off. I don't have to find the right solution, I just have to find something I'm passionate about, something I enjoy, and go for it. I will cultivate that solution strain, let it grow and evolve - maybe it will help, maybe it won't. There is no way to know. But there is strength in diversity.

And the nice thing about being a human being is that we don't have to wait for our particular solution strain to die to know it won't work; we can learn from our mistakes and improve our strategy before it fails. This is yet another argument for an organic rather than blueprint approach. David Korten (1980) articulates this in "Community Organization and Rural Development: A Learning Process Approach." He notes that organizations capable of learning and changing - those organizations that embrace error and integrate research and evaluation with practice - tend to be more successful than those that design a blueprint at the start of a project and stick with it. So, it doesn't matter if we've got it right from the outset because we can - should - learn and adjust as we go.

Washing dishes the other day, I listened to Senator George Mitchell on the radio. He was reflecting on his successful peace negotiations in Northern Ireland. He noted that throughout the process, the press kept asking him when he would come home, since he'd failed to secure an agreement. And, as he astutely put it, up until the day they signed the peace agreement, he had failed: "we had about 700 days of failure and one day of success." This optimistic interview applies perfectly to climate change. Though we should learn from our mistakes and adjust accordingly, we must also be persistent and maintain hope in the face of seemingly endless failure.

We cannot see the future. We are not omnipotent machinists drawing blueprints for a sustainable world. We must instead mimic nature, drawing on diversity, learning from our mistakes. We must be persistent in the face of perceived failure.

It's a great day for gardening, so let's plant some sustainability solutions and see which bear.

Spring & Hope!

It's hard not to feel hopeful when it's finally so incredibly, lusciously, scintillatingly beautiful outside. And warm - sigh (52 degrees :)) Ahhh, spring! It makes me giddy just to wake up in the morning. It makes me giddy to hear the cardinal with its saucy chirp, to breathe in deep the smell of thawing earth, to feel the sunlight - glorious, warm sunlight. What a Sunday!

We started the morning making a usual Sunday breakfast feast - sausage and pancakes - while listening to NPR. In honor of her 80th birthday, Lynn Neary interviewed Maya Angelou:

Neary: "What does it mean to you that, in your own lifetime, you're seeing this election where both a woman and a Black man have a real shot at the White House."

Angelou: "It's so exciting! And you know, I had someone ask me, 'but things haven't changed, have they?' Please! Are you kidding? Things have changed. We have to admit that we've come a long way, so that young people would not be encouraged to say, 'you mean to say, with the lives and deaths of Martin Luther King, and Malcolm X, and the Kennedys and Mahatma Gandi, you mean to tell me things are no better? Well then what's the point of me trying?' Young people must be told, yes, things are better. Not nearly as good as they will be when you put your shoulder to the wheel."

Hearing this statement of hope felt just the same as walking outside after breakfast, feeling the sunshine, the warmth - a new lightness spreading through me. Yes, things are getting better. We have a lot of work to do, but we must also celebrate the accomplishments, celebrate spring.

We played outside all day today - our first day of the season climbing on real rock. I still feel the sun on my face and the delightful weariness from a day in wind and sunlight. I still feel hope burgeoning within me: "yes, things are better. Not nearly as good as they will be when [we put our] shoulders to the wheel." But things are better.

Earth Hour Rocks!

Fortunately, Google (my second brain) reminded me that Earth Hour was from 8-9 last Saturday. Otherwise, I would have missed out on my new favorite climate action - turning the lights out. Yeah, I know I'm exposing my privileged first world life when I say that I really enjoyed an evening by candle light, but there's no sense pretending... It's a luxury to be able to turn the lights on. It's also a luxury to be able to turn them out.

Our Earth Hour was even better for spending the evening at my friend Rachel's house. Rachel used to work as a chef and whipped up a five-star meal complete with a chocolate dessert to die for, ever so much better eaten by candle light. We sat around talking, laughing, sharing stories. Good old-fashioned entertainment. Mike and I liked it so much we did it again Monday night. It's a good way to reconnect - to take away the distractions and foster conversation. We hope to celebrate Earth Hour on a regular basis.

To use the climate policy jargon, Earth Hour has great co-benefits. It's great for building social capital - getting us to turn off the TV and talk to each other. It's a great way to reduce stress - nothing seems quite as urgent by candle light. It's a nice way to take a moment to reconnect - with ourselves and with each other.

Even if you missed the global event last Saturday, I suggest giving Earth Hour a try...

Problematic solutions

You know how I was bragging in a previous post about how we changed most of our light bulbs to compact fluorescents? Well, the other day we got exposed to the dark side of CFLs: mercury. These highly efficient bulbs have a tiny amount of mercury vapor inside them, which releases when they break. Bummer.

CFLs aren't the only climate solution with a dark side. Hell, even "walking" got accused of releasing more CO2 than driving in a recent Times article (if you eat only industrially-farmed beef.) (Major aside: I'd like to see the carbon footprint of the health care impact of obesity. Though, maybe, if you really wanted to be cynical about it, you'd count all those shortened lives as a carbon credit - yuck!!! Oh yeah, and I'd imagine most people would eat the same amount of calories whether or not they walk - just in one case they burn them, and in the other case they get fat. I prefer to walk).

Biofuels are currently the poster child for problematic climate solutions. They are increasingly controversial - accused of starving the poor, polluting land and water, using more energy than they contain to produce them, etc. Two recent articles in Science (Searching et al, 2008; Fargione et al 2008) studied the land-use impacts of biofuels and concluded that, unless the fuel feedstock will store and sequester more carbon than the current land use, clearing land to grow biofuels will incur a carbon deficit that will take years to pay back through displaced fossil fuels. Even if no land is cleared, but agricultural land is used for fuel production, this will (according to Searchinger et al) displace food production, leading to indirect emissions as land is cleared elsewhere to grow food. Another article (Righelato & Spracklen, 2007) concludes that much more carbon could be sequestered by converting land to forest than using it to grow feedstocks for biofuels.

So, yeah, trees store and sequester a lot of carbon. Are they the solution? Well, trees can release methane, another greenhouse gas (Keppler et al, 2006), and planting trees in higher latitudes can reduce albedo, which causes the Earth to absorb more heat. More problematic than these caveats is the fact that, in order to get people to start growing trees (and stop cutting them down), we're going to have to value the carbon they sequester. But according to Sinks Watch, paying people to plant trees justifies burning fossil fuels, won't sequester carbon permanently, and tree-planting projects can violate indigenous land rights and encourage sterile monocrops. Depressed yet? I am!

It seems the only "solution" without a dark side (except for perhaps damaging our growth-dependent economy - to be addressed in a future post) is less - less flying, less driving, less consuming, less throwing away... But this solution is problematic for other reasons: 1) it's difficult to change people's behavior, and 2) it's politically unpalatable, so politicians won't touch it.

Boy are we in a pickle!!!

Only we're not, really. All of the solutions discussed above (except obesity!!) are real solutions. They are just not THE solution. To repeat the cliche: "there is no silver bullet." Think of this as analogous to medicine. When you're sick, and you go to the doctor, she doesn't tell you to pour your penicillin on your breakfast cereal every morning. She doesn't tell you to gouge your heart with the thermometer in order to take your temperature. She tells you to lay off a bit, take care of your body, be sure to take your medicine with food and only twice a day. Oh, and eat your local green beens and drink your local milk. Eat some protein, but not all day long every day.

Likewise with climate medicine:

Compact fluorescents actually reduce the amount of mercury in the environment because they require less electricity and therefore reduce emissions from coal-fire power plants. I'm going to be careful with them (especially when they break) and be sure to dispose of them properly, but I'm not going to stop using them.

Likewise, I still believe biofuels have a role to play. I could go on and on about this (and I did, in my thesis and comprehensive exams), but there are many cases where biofuels can be made from waste or made in a way that makes sense with existing farming practices (ie, canola is a great rotation crop with potatoes, killing potato fungi - growing canola for biofuels can reduce the need for chemicals, and help potato farmers stay in business, protecting farmland from suburbanization). But I don't believe we can replace all or even a quarter of our petroleum needs with biofuels (at least with current technology) without serious negative consequences. Biofuels should be a niche solution, used where they make sense, to the extent they make sense.

I like trees, too (well, duh - I'm a tree hugger). And I think they have a pretty big role to play in all of this. But policies and carbon markets have to be designed to maximize co-benefits and minimize unintended consequences.

Oh, yeah, and using less? I think that's a great idea. It's going to be hard, but we do need to change our behavior, and I believe we can. Likewise, I think we can convince our leaders to help us. This solution is going to take social capital - it will take a community movement (as discussed in the "sharing the load" post). But it is possible.

Oh, and I'm still going to walk to school. I just won't power myself on a pure beef diet (why would I want to, anyway?). The beef I do eat will be locally-grown, largely grass-fed and delicious!

forgetting

The purpose of this blog is to document the emotional/spiritual/intellectual impact of climate change. To, as I said in my first post, answer the question, "what were they thinking?" I am trying to answer that question truthfully. And the truth is, right now, not much. Yeah, I'm not thinking much about climate change, or really anything, for that matter. I just finished my thesis, defense and comprehensive exams. My brain is on a much-needed vacation. I made delicious local cranberry pancakes for breakfast, and it's toasty in my apartment (well, I have a blanket over my knees and a hat on, so I'm cozy), and I'm watching the snow fall outside - big fat, lazy, swirling flakes. I'm struggling to make myself do my homework and grade. Actually, I'm struggling to make myself do anything other than stare blankly out the window. One of my assignments was to read an article by Andy Revkin on science writing and the challenge of talking about climate change in the mainstream media. Even that couldn't penetrate my blissful bubble. So, here I am documenting the forgetting. It's nice to do every once in a while. I think I'll go make myself a cup of tea...

Sharing the load

Part of recognizing and appreciating my connection with a greater whole - both humanity and nature - means accepting the fact that I can't do it all. It's going to take all of us. Well, some folks aren't pulling their weight right now (ahem, U.S. federal government! - not to name names or anything), but that doesn't mean I have to make myself miserable trying to overcompensate.

I'm doing what I can right now, but I need others to help me. We need others to try to reduce their carbon footprint. We need others to call their congressmen. We need a community movement - not just a few borderline burnt-out grad students trying to fight the tide. I need to know I'm not alone.

In my public involvement class, we've been reading Robert Putnam's Bowling Alone, which documents the staggering decline in social capital (community organizations, schmoozing, bridge clubs, dinner parties, political organizations, etc.) over the last fifty or so years. We recently read Putnam's chapter on generational change, in which he lambastes Generation X: "In both personal and national terms, this generation is shaped by uncertainty..., insecurity,.. and an absence of collective success stories - no victorious D-Day and triumph over Hitler, no exhilarating, liberating marches on Washington and triumph over racism and war, indeed hardly any "great collective events" at all." Ouch.

At the final rally for Focus the Nation, one of the undergrads got up to "speak out." He talked about how his has been called the "quiet generation." "That's great," he said. "I just can't wait to tell my kids how we were the 'quiet generation.' How we started community movements through Myspace and Face Book." Ouch.

And here I am, staring at a computer screen, writing about my personal, individual feelings about climate change, and how, I, as an individual, am burning myself out trying to do it all myself. As Bill McKibben says, "the only thing missing from this movement is the movement." Tackling climate change is not the type of thing we can expect to achieve from the quiet, lonely space of our desktop computers, or worse, television. What we need is a "great collective event" - now is our chance, Gen X-ers! But it's going to take social capital. It's going to take organizing, talking, networking, delegating, socializing, demonstrating...

So, in the wise words of Macy Gray:

"Get up get out and do something
Don't let the days of your life pass you by
You got to get up get up and do something
How will you make it if you never even try?
Get up get out and do something
Can't spend your whole life trying to get high
You got to get up get out and do something
'cause you and I got to do for you and I"

Hee, hee! :)

Heh, heh, heh - check out this New York Times article on the recent climate skeptics meeting in NY.

What's my motivation?

I have thus far refrained from ranting about the destructive consequences of climate change - we get a lot of that from all directions... But I thought it would be interesting to try to articulate why I personally think this is such an important issue - not to convince others, but rather to understand it myself. So, here's the beginning of an attempt to articulate my motivation - a work in progress, perhaps:

• The consequences of climate change will be devastating for all life. I won't go into much detail here - see "The Weather Makers" by Tim Flannery for more information. This, in itself, is a reason, but it also feeds into deeper motivations, both as an individual and as a part of a greater whole:

• I want to protect myself and the things I love. I plan on having kids some day. I feel a responsibility to them to pass on this world as intact as possible, complete with biodiversity, clean drinking water, peace, and the opportunity to live a fulfilling life. It sounds trite, but this is a motivating factor. Sometimes I'm inclined to get cynical about the human race (both about civilization's future survival as well as whether we deserve to survive at all). But then I remember all the individuals in my life and how much I love them. Humans really are worth working for. So are all the places and species, the natural communities, the rocks, mountains, rivers and lakes that I experience and enjoy.
  
• I'm part of a greater whole. That statement is true on a spiritual, scientific and philosophical level - the fate of the Earth and the community of life impacts me on a spiritual, physical and intellectual level. I'm not just worried that 3 out of every 5 species are expected to go extinct by the end of the century under a business as usual scenario (Flannery, 2005) because I think polar bears are cute (though I do). It upsets me because I am intrinsically connected; the devastating loss of life and diversity devastates me because I am a part of all this. Likewise, even if I'm not one of the 200 million people displaced by rising seas (Stern Review, 2007), I am part of a global community, the wellbeing of which affects me.
  

• As a first world citizen from the world's greatest perpetrator - the US of A - I feel responsibility for the consequences of climate change. Likewise, I feel a responsibility to do what I can to stop it.
• Sometimes I think climate change presents an opportunity (?): a chance to rethink and reconstruct not only our relationship to the Earth but also our relationship with each other; a chance to rekindle the dwindling community spirit, a chance to revise our systems and institutions to make them more equitable; a chance to disrupt the power structure from the local to the regional to the global level.
  

I get really cynical sometimes. For example, I recently found out that emissions in the last several years have surpassed the IPCC's worst-case scenario (Raupach et al, 2007). Surprisingly, I suppose, a sense of hopelessness and inevitability does not decrease my drive. This is a moral quest, not an intellectual one (yes, I'm taking the word "moral" back from the Right). The passion that I feel cannot be easily diminished by poor odds. Just as I would do all I could for a loved one who only had a 1% chance of survival, so will I continue to fight.

The Peace of Wild Things

When despair grows in me
and I wake in the middle of the night at the least sound
in fear of what my life and my children's lives may be,
I go and lie down where the wood drake
rests in his beauty on the water, and the great heron feeds.
I come into the peace of wild things
who do not tax their lives with forethought
of grief. I come into the presence of still water.
And I feel above me the day-blind stars
waiting for their light. For a time
I rest in the grace of the world, and am free.

Wendell Berry

If a squirrel eats your prayers, do they still get to God(s)?

According to my father, who gave me the Tibetan prayer flags, Tibetan Buddhists believe that as the prayers weather and fade, the words reach the Deities. So, is a squirrel's digestive track a fast track to God? The answer is probably no. Though it would appear to speed up the weathering process, out of respect for the ancient beliefs of Tibetan Buddhism, I rescued the flags from the hungry squirrel. He was busily shredding them and stuffing the colorful tatters into his mouth.

Watching this act of squirrel sabotage reminded me of a great book I read last year - Suburban Safari: A year on the lawn, by Hannah Holmes - with a picture of a mischievous-looking squirrel on the cover. Packed with information and good humor, it documents nature in a suburban backyard. The very premise of the book challenges the human/nature dichotomy - the Wilderness as (human free) Eden that Abbey, Muir, Thoreau and a long tradition of nature writers portray.

I bring this up for two reasons. Firstly, I don't want to perpetuate the wilderness myth. I want to clarify that, in my post on guilt, I was not intentionally glorifying Wilderness as Eden. The point is to open our minds and souls to nature all around us (within us) rather than burning fossil fuels to bring ourselves out to the Wilderness (though, I admit I enjoy that too:)). In a culture indoctrinated into the myth that humans are separate from nature, and nature is only to be found in remote places with high adventure, it is difficult to notice nature between the cracks, so to speak. It is a learning process to open our eyes and our senses - to be present enough to appreciate the first chickadee spring call from the cedar shrubbery, to admire the red buds on the street trees or even the house plant or how the willow in the neighbor's lot retains its yellow hue throughout the snowy months. It is even more difficult to see nature in our microwavable dinner, in our desks and computers, in ourselves (I'm working on this...).

Secondly, overcoming this human/nature dichotomy is essential for combating the cultural roots of climate change. We have to begin to see ourselves as part of a much larger whole, as intricately connected. If we continue to pretend that humans are somehow distinct and autonomous, we can continue to bury our heads in the sand. And how can we envision a world where humans live sustainably with nature if we don't begin to see ourselves as a part of it? This world view precludes solutions. (For a more thorough discussion and help with myth-busting, see the work of William Cronon and Charles Mann.)

It's snowing outside as I write. A woodpecker (a hairy, I think?) just landed on the home-made, scrap-metal feeder (the product of a weekend welding workshop) hanging from an old climbing rope in our apartment yard. She takes a peanut from the feeder, flies to the red maple leaning over our porch, and nestles it carefully in a scarred, peanut-sized hole where a branch was pruned. She uses the hole in the tree as a cup to keep the peanut still as she pecks it into beak-sized pieces. In the nursery playground beyond the fence, four-year olds in colorful, puffy snow suits bat at the snow with mini red shovels, screeching and tumbling about, covered in snow.

Careful observation can begin to break down the chasm between our species and the rest. It can begin to broaden our awareness and bring nature to us, so that we don't always have to go somewhere else to get it (puffing CO2 all the way).

While the squirrel probably won't help deliver my prayers to the Heavens, he did provide a moment of mindfulness. I stopped work and darted outside to shake my fists. After terrifying the squirrel, I paused out on the porch and felt the cool air on my cheeks and in my lungs, listened to the neighborhood hum - the rumble of a car blended with the creaking trees and the distant squawk of a jay.

Top ten FUN ways to reduce GHG emissions!!

So, my last post got me thinking - it can't all be bad, right? There has to be a silver lining... And, in fact, worrying about climate change and trying to reduce my impact has led me to learn about several fun solutions:

1. Going to the farmers' market: I love dogs, fresh vegetables, farmers, sunshine, and happy-looking people (boy, that sounds like a personal ad:)). The Farmer's market has all these things in abundance - going to the farmers' market is, perhaps, my favorite climate solution
2. Eating local: a bunch of my friends and I took a pledge to "eat local" for the month of September - if you enjoy cooking and you want to get better at it, this is a great way to it. We learned how to make pasta from scratch, bread, tortillas, salsa, pasta sauce, cheese, granola, etc. I also spent a lot of time stocking my freezer with fresh vegetables and fruit. Now (in February) I'm reaping the rewards, with ricotta cheese cake made from scratch (ie, we made the ricotta) and strawberry sauce from my freezer bounty - yum. For recipes, check out www.vermontlocalvore.org. I also recommend Animal, Vegetable, Miracle by Barbara Kingsolver, and the Omnivore's Dilemma by Michael Pollan, as resources. Now we're part of a winter CSA that I'm really enjoying.
   
3. Alternative Transportation - I've said this before, but I don't like driving. I also like being outside and exercising - cross country skiing to school, biking to work, canoeing to breakfast, taking the bus...I like it all. Mostly I just walk in the winter and bike in the summer.
4. Living in a city. A lot of my enviro classmates would like to live in the woods (where you generally have a much higher footprint). Fortunately for me, I like living in the city. I like being able to walk to anything, and having a whole range of activities at my fingertips.
   
5. Do it yourself anything - Growing your own food, knitting, wood-working, brewing your own beer - Fun! Not to mention the excuse to hang out with others and enjoy their company through parallel play.
   
6. Renewable Energy - I know I'm a geek, but I think all things renewable are cool, whether you're making your own biodiesel or charging your i-pod with solar panels. And, yes, I know too much to think that any of these things is a panacea, but I still think they're fun.
   
7. Raising a ruckus - I know I'm a minority, but I enjoy being an activist. I like taking to the streets. I like ruffling feathers. I like actively working for change, particularly when there's a solid group of others working with me.
   
8. Not worrying about having the latest gadget, or the latest anything. I don't have a TV. I limit my ad consumption, and I think this makes me a happier person. This is not to say I never feel social pressure, but I think I feel less of it than most people, and that's a nice freedom to have.
   
9. Snuggling to stay warm? 'Nough said.
   
10. Craigslist - finding cool, used things...
    
11. (The Carbonators - my moral and intellectual support group.)

Okay, so I can't stop there. There are a bunch of things that I don't really enjoy doing, but I don't mind either. These fall in the boring, but doable category:

1. Turning down the thermostat (though not THAT much - I'm a cold wuss)
2. Turning off my computer at night - I'm trying to get better at this
   
3. Turning off the lights -duh
4. Recycling
   
5. Changing out my light-bulbs (I think we only have compact fluorescents now)
6. Keeping my tires pumped up
7. Unplugging appliances (I'm trying to get better!)
8. Composting (this was not so fun when I had the worms inside the apartment and we accidentally introduced three species of fruit-fly - wash your fruit! - otherwise, I kind of enjoyed it, in a second grade, science experiment kind of way. Now our compost is outside - post fruit-fly coup)
9. Shopping responsibly
10. Carpooling, reducing, combining trips
11. Voting - DUH!!
    

Alright, that said, here are some things I don't like and only sometimes do (I'm trying to be honest here):

1. Forgo fun activities (booh!)
2. Drive 55 mpg... I drive 65 on the highway, but 55 is a rough one...
3. Travel less
4. Forgo fun outdoor equipment that I don't really need...
5. Wake up earlier - align my schedule with daylight (?)

Okay, I'm actually kind of struggling... I thought of five. I'm sure there are others. But I guess that's a good sign? My personal climate change solutions are, on the whole, more fun than annoying and hard with a lot in between...

What am I missing? (probably lots, since I'm just doing this off the top of my head...)

Guilt. What is it good for?

Like most people studying the environment, I feel a lot of guilt. In fact, I think it's a little disingenuous to have a blog on the emotional impact of climate change and not talk about guilt. But I often avoid discussing my guilt because it makes others feel guilty, and I don't like making other people feel bad. But should I avoid making others feel guilty? How should I deal with my own guilt? Some would say that Americans, as a whole, are guilt deficient. But I'm not convinced of guilt's utility to our cause.

I took the weekend off from working - woohoo!! I had a great time skiing with my family. Ah, skiing. I paid a wealthy corporation a lot of money to fragment ecologically sensitive habitat on slopes with high rates of erosion and then burn a ton of fossil fuels to carry my lazy ass up a mountain, so I could slide back down again. Not to mention giving suburbanites an excuse to buy SUVs. As I rode the chair, admiring the spectacular view of the Greens in crystal, snowy sunshine, the guilt bubbled up. But guilt is a little like bad weather - it makes your experience slightly less enjoyable, but it doesn't necessarily change your behavior. I kept skiing. Moments like this are a regular part of my life - struggling to improve a problematic society without entirely exiling myself from it.

Waiting to get into one of Burlington's many over-crowded restaurants post-skiing, my mother told us stories of how her mother (my grandmother) got involved in the environmental movement and became the stout, white-haired radical we knew and loved. I was reminded of a story my aunt told me (apocryphal perhaps) of great grand-daddy Wilson, the big union Democrat. Every night at the dinner table, he would ask his children (including my grandmother) what they'd done for their country. "Recombinate" that with my great grandpa on my father's side ("every right implies a responsibility; every opportunity an obligation; every possession a duty") and you get my brother and me, equipped with a driving sense of responsibility and an overdeveloped sense of guilt. Maybe we should spread it around a little? Share?

Though Americans might be generally guilt-deficient (at least according to the rest of the world), guilt is not that persuasive. Ted Norhaus and Michael Shellenberger lambasted the environmental movement in their now famous "Death of Environmentalism" for dwelling on the "nightmare" - the guilt. Other environmental theorists note that dwelling on all the bad stuff makes folks turn off, tune out.

Well, fine, but this is a blog about the emotional impact of climate change. I am guilty. We all are guilty. This is a major barrier to the climate movement - we can't rail against the perpetrators because we are all perpetrators. We are all guilty.

Because it's Black History Month, one of the campus coffee shops has a prominent display of Black literature. In a rare moment of killing time, I picked up a book of Martin Luther King's work and opened to a chapter. This essay was on love - love as a central organizing principal for his movement (a little reminiscent of my post on balance, though much better articulated). In the essay, he noted that his movement was never against people - never against Whites. It was a movement resisting the injustice within people - within all of us. Extolling the virtues of non-violence, he fought violence with love - a kind of love he called agape.

I think this is the approach we have to take. And, if we don't subscribe to the dominant philosophy that as individuals we are complete rational wholes, if we allow for the fact that we are more complex than that, with many conflicting desires and personas, then we don't have to let the guilt overcome us. We can recognize and resist the "injustice" and greed within ourselves, as Martin Luther King suggests, resisting it through love. Which means we have to cultivate the capacity to forgive ourselves, also.

And then, of course, Edward Abbey and Mary Oliver (other inspirations) would remind us that we have to spend some time enjoying nature as well, noticing, reveling, being present to the wonderful gift of the Earth, with gratitude. We can't feel guilty all the time, or we'll forget to save our one "wild and precious life." My friend Erin just sent me this Abbey quote:

"One final paragraph of advice: do not burn yourselves out. Be as I am -- a reluctant enthusiast ... a part-time crusader, a half-hearted fanatic. Save the other half of yourselves and your lives for pleasure and adventure. It is not enough to fight for the land; it is even more important to enjoy it. While you can. While it's still here. So get out there and hunt and fish and mess around with your friends, ramble out yonder and explore the forests, climb the mountains, bag the peaks, run the rivers, breathe deep of that yet sweet and lucid air, sit quietly for a while and contemplate the precious stillness, the lovely, mysterious, and awesome space. Enjoy yourselves, keep your brain in your head and your head firmly attached to the body, the body active and alive, and I promise you this much; I promise you this one sweet victory over our enemies, over those desk-bound men and women with their hearts in a safe deposit box, and their eyes hypnotized by desk calculators. I promise you this; you will outlive the bastards."
[Missoula, Montana, 1978]

And Mary Oliver would add:

"The Journey

One day you finally knew
what you had to do, and began,
though the voices around you
kept shouting
their bad advice--
though the whole house
began to tremble
and you felt the old tug
at your ankles.
"Mend my life!"
each voice cried.
But you didn't stop.
You knew what you had to do,
though the wind pried
with its stiff fingers
at the very foundations,
though their melancholy
was terrible.
It was already late
enough, and a wild night,
and the road full of fallen
branches and stones.
But little by little,
as you left their voices behind,
the stars began to burn
through the sheets of clouds,
and there was a new voice
which you slowly
recognized as your own,
that kept you company
as you strode deeper and deeper
into the world,
determined to do
the only thing you could do--
determined to save
the only life you could save." - Mary Oliver

I need these reminders. Let not the guilt overcome me, nor the drive to save all life be so great that I forget to live, forget to save my own. Let me resist the injustice and greed within myself and within others with love and forgiveness. Let the Earth, the present moment, and my enjoyment of it - my gratitude - help me to cultivate that love. Experience the guilt - learn from it - but let it not overcome me.

In the final passage of Martin Luther King's essay on love, he reiterates his belief that the creative forces of the Universe - whatever we choose to call them - are on our side in our pursuit of justice in the world. Perhaps when we connect with the Earth, as Abbey suggests, we reconnect with this force within the Universe, and it reinvigorates us, strengthens our capacity to resist.

I'm not implying that commercial downhill skiing is the best way to do this. In fact, I think connecting with nature is probably a lot easier if we're not simultaneously destroying it. I'm just wrestling with the guilt, struggling to find that balance between E.B. White's well-articulated struggle: "I wake each morning torn between the desire to improve the world and the desire to enjoy it. It makes it hard to plan the day."

Our crazy, lovable species

It's funny the little things that cheer me: the broad, open smile of a stranger passing on the sidewalk; riding the bus, an old man lecturing the college students to "slow down and say 'hi' to people;" some ruffian teens, the requisite ear buds and hoodies, who suddenly notice the moon. There's a lot to love about this crazy species when you stop to notice. We are worth working for.

Generation Green

Check it out - this made my day!!!! :) :) It's a news article on how enviro little kids are - harassing their parents into action Generation Green

My Sixth Sense - I see externalities

Shopping with me is a lot of fun. Just kidding! I'm a pain in the ass. That's because I have a sixth sense - I see externalities. Take a cellphone, for example. This item is on my mind because T-Mobile just decided to cancel me. When I walk into, say, Verizon or Radio Shack, I don't just see a bunch of cute, stylish cellphones on display. No, each cellphone has its own set of demons surrounding it. According to NYT Magazine, just the mining of gold for a single cellphone circuit board creates 220 pounds of waste - there's one hulking ghoul, 800-times the size of the phone, drooling toxins on the floor. And that's not even taking into account the waste from the other components. Then there's the carbon footprint - a towering, floating specter, not unlike the dementors of Harry Potter fame, glowering down on me. I pick up the cell and look at the tag - hmm, "Made in China." Thoughts of human rights abuses swarm around me like pestering insects. I could go on...

You might think I have an overactive imagination. I think I just know too much. Actually, I think the rest of the world knows too little. The more we can get these demons out in the open - make them visible - the easier it will be to conquer them.

To stop feeding the Externalities check out the Better World Shopping Guide. To learn a little more, check out The Story of Stuff.

Finding balance

Rough day. I am burnt out - sick of plugging away, hour after hour. Sick of logging weekends holed up indoors, sick of running my gears, spinning my wheels, and wondering if any of it will yield any benefit to anyone, if any of it is worth it. Sure, it's all a great learning experience, a great intellectual activity - but does anyone benefit? Will the Earth benefit? What am I doing all this work (my masters thesis) for again?

We watched a movie the other day - a Japanese anime flick called Princess Mononoke - which captures some of the complexity of environmentalism in a way that I have not seen in Western films. That is to say, it recognizes that there can be good in those destroying nature, that there are trade-offs to be made between the welfare of people and the environment, and it seems to, rather than champion the people or champion the environment, call for balance and non-violence, and ask the people to back off a bit to regain this balance. Balance. It got me thinking about how little balance there is on any side of this issue (global warming). Even with potential solutions - biofuels for example - proponents push them to the extreme, rather than letting them fill a niche where they make sense - finding balance. People and issues are polarized. Another word for balance is equilibrium. We (humans) are out of equilibrium - pushing both our consumption and our population well beyond a point that the Earth can sustain. And we are all encouraged to take sides, but perhaps what we need to work towards is a philosophy of balance rather than one specific solution or another - everything in moderation, the golden mean - and to recognize that we are taking more than our fair share.

In yoga class the other day, my teacher talked about the philosophy of non-violence, another word for which is "love," telling us not to push ourselves too hard, or we defeat the purpose of the practice. If we can practice non-violence - love - towards ourselves, we can begin to practice it towards the world. She was talking specifically about yoga, but her words apply to my entire life. I have not been practicing "non-violence" or "love" towards myself, of late. The incessant deadlines, late nights, the stress, the perfectionism, the ever-expanding work week - this is not love. For both my sanity and to improve the impact and benefit of my work, I need to strive to find a place of balance, to practice "non-violence," and let my work come from there.

This is a global issue, as well as a personal one. To strive towards a cultural and natural equilibrium, we must strive for equilibrium within ourselves. To strive towards a culture of non-violence and love, we must start with our own lives.

I'm going to go do some yoga.

Let it snow!

I don't really like winter that much. Well, it's hard to like winter because I don't actually like being cold. I know, that's kind of anathema coming from a Mainer living in Vermont, but it's true. And winter and I, we got off on a really bad foot recently - well, I lost my footing and landed on the pavement. It's been rainy, sleety, icy, snowy, 45 degrees then frozen again. In February.

They say Vermont will have the climate of Virginia in 50 years under higher emissions scenarios and the climate of North Carolina in 100 years - "can't you just see the sunshine..." But the road to Carolina weather is dangerously slick, and it's getting to me.

And then it snowed. It snowed and snowed and snowed. And this blanketing white, quieting everything, bending the pine bows deep, has pacified me, too. And I walk through the soft, peaceful wood at dusk, admiring the beauty of the world etched in black and white, and I am grateful to have the opportunity to indulge my nostalgia - to remember what winter really is.

Vote! - the 2 weapons of climate action - personal and political

Get out and vote! It's SUPER TUESDAY!! If you still haven't decided yet, check out Grist: http://gristmill.grist.org/story/2008/2/4/23617/54464

There are two ways to combat climate change - personal action and political action. We need both. Unfortunately, all too often, climate activists will do one or the other but not both. This is a little like equipping our army - some with shields, and some with swords, but none with both. We would be twice as effective if we all had both swords and shields. There appears to be a division in personality types, however. I'm sure you all know the archetypes I refer to: the Personal Activist - your friend who wears only hemp and never showers, but, ooops!, forgot to vote in the 2004 Presidential Election; or the Political Activist - your neighbor who chairs three amazing non-profits, but, ooops!, drives an SUV and owns three homes.

To the Personal Activist: I know, I know, you're an idealist - you don't like the dirty game of politics. You don't want to vote for a candidate who doesn't perfectly represent your values, and who, God forbid, compromises. Think of political action as comparable to taking out the compost - it stinks a little, and you might get your hands dirty, but it's better for the Earth.

To the Political Activist: I know, I know, it's hard to say 'no' when excess and luxury are available to you (and all of society is telling you to go get it). But, think how much more politically effective you'll be if those intent on undermining you can no longer use "hypocrisy" as their weapon. I'm not saying you have to be perfect, just a little better. Besides, personal action can be glamorous, too. The most gourmet meal I ever ate was all locally grown. Biking to work keeps your physique healthy, and if you telecommute, you don't have to change out of your silk bathrobe ;)

Let's equip our army with both swords and shields - not just one or the other.

Get out and vote! (and drive less) :)