Reforesting Zambia

Unsustainable farming practices coupled with harmful traditional cooking and heating techniques have plagued the Zambian Rainforest. The non-profit Greenpop is trying to do something about it.

By Daniel Hills

Greenpop is a South-African non-profit organization is responsible for planting 17,000 trees in Zambia since opening its doors in late 2010. Many parts of Zambia’s rainforest have been devastated because of reckless farming and detrimental living practices.

In 2012 Greenpop launched Trees for Zambia, a 21 daylong eco-awareness project that’s goal is to educate Zambians about deforestation, climate change, environmental sustainability, and green energy alternatives. In 2012 Greenpop’s Trees For Zambia and its 200 volunteers planted 4135 over a 3-week period. This year’s Trees for Zambia 2013 project aims to plant 5000 trees over the same 21-day period. Founded by 3 friends, Misha Teasdale, Lauren O’Donnell, and Jeremy Hewitt, Greenpop was originally conceived as a means to offset carbon emissions through the planting of trees, but has grown into an entire social awareness project.

Unsustainable farming practices coupled with harmful traditional cooking and heating techniques have plagued the Zambian Rainforest for the past 30 years. Slashing and burning, monocropping, and highly acidic fertilizers have led to extensive deforestation and soil deterioration throughout Zambia. Traditional methods of cooking and heating involve the use of charcoal cut from trees.

Greenpop: Trees for Zambia’s mission is as much about education as it is about reforestation. Greenpop is educating Zambians about the negative long-term environmental impacts of reckless farming practices, and traditional heating and cooking methods. Greenpop is hosting a series of workshops throughout July that will educate and inform Zambians about sustainable farming and environmentally conscious land management. In addition to educating the public about proper farming techniques, Greenpop gives out solar cookers to residents as a sustainable alternative to cooking with charcoal.

Greenpop: Trees for Zambia 2013 is entering its third and final week of the project. You can get involved yourself by planting trees, gifting trees, or volunteering. Greenpop is constantly monitoring recently planted trees, searching for new plantation sites, and in 2013 hopes to launch a more extensive solar awareness project. For more information visit greenpop.org.

Rising from the marshes

 

In 1991 Saddam Hussein all but destroyed the Mesopotamian Marshes, but today the NGO Nature Iraq has successfully regrown them to more than 50% of its original size.

 

By Daniel Hills

 

Photo: Goldman Environmental Prize

 

In Southern Iraq nestled between the Tigris and Euphrates rivers lie the Mesopotamian Marshes. A fertile patch of earth often referred to as “The Birthplace of Civilization,” because agriculture, the wheel, and the written word were all conceived of in this corner of the world. These beautiful wetlands that provided a habitat to a lot of wildlife, were destroyed by dictator Saddam Hussein’s regime in 1991, shortly after the First Gulf War. But now, the once decimated wetlands are on their way to flourish again.

 

Hussein burned and drained nearly all of the Mesopotamian Marshland in an effort to ‘smoke out’ native Shia insurgents who had taken refuge in the tall reeds that surround the marshes. Azzam Alwash, native of the Mesopotamian Marshland was heartbroken by the destruction of his home. “It is one thing watching satellite pictures showing my former Eden becoming a dead desert,” Alwash explains, “It is another thing seeing it up front and personal.”

 

Alwash decided to found Nature Iraq, a nonprofit whose mission is to protect, restore, and preserve Iraq’s natural environment. Their first project is to bring back to life the Mesopotamian Marshes. In April 2013 Alwash was awarded the Goldman Environmental Prize, an honor bestowed to grassroots environmental heroes, and shortly after in July the Mesopotamian Marshes became Iraq’s first National Park. Alwash hopes that winning the Goldman Environmental Prize, which comes with a $150,000 no-strings-attached purse, will aid in restoring the rest of the Mesopotamian Marshes as well as establishing a series of “Peace Parks” along the Iran-Iraq border.

Commit to spending $10 at your farmers market

Commit to spending $10 at your farmers market by Robin Shreeves

American Farmland Trust morphs the America’s Favorite Farmers Market contest into the I Love My Farmers Market Celebration by asking shoppers to pledge to shop at local farmers markets.

For the past several years, I’ve told you when the America’s Favorite Farmers Market contest, sponsored by American Farmland Trust, kicked off each season. For their fifth year of celebrating farmers markets, the organization is changing it up and sponsoring the I Love My Farmers Market Celebration in its place.

The goal of the celebration is to put money directly into the pockets of family farmers by having consumers pledge dollars they intend to spend at their local farmers markets. The celebration starts today, May 28 and runs through midnight on September 9. Each pledge someone makes is a promise to spend $10 at a specific local farmers market that week.

After the celebration gets rolling, there will be an up-to-the minute, 100 Most Celebrated Farmers Markets showcased on the I Love My Farmers Market Celebration homepage. Those 100 farmers markets will be the ones that have received the most dollars pledged. When the campaign is over, the final 100 will receive a “special seal that they can put on their outreach materials in the coming years.”

Through the pledges, American Farmland Trust hopes to secure at least $1 million in pledges to support family farmers and local farmers markets nationwide.

If you’re planning on going to the Farmers Market sometime this week, it will only take a moment to pop over to the website and pledge. You can pledge each time you’re planning on going to the market if you wish.

‘More Than Honey’: A film to fuel the fight to save bees.

Swiss director Markus Imhoof‘s new documentary balances microphotography with compelling storytelling. The film will debut on June 10.

By Sami Grover  Fri, Jun 07 2013

“The ‘Citizen Kane‘ of bee documentaries.”

That’s how one reviewer at Ain’t It Cool News described “More Than Honey,” a globe-spanning documentary on the crisis in honeybee populations. Meanwhile Eric Kohn over at Indiewire described it as an“effective melding of science and aesthetic delights.”

Made on a budget of 2 million euros (about $2.6 million) by Oscar-nominated director Markus Imhoof, the movie features “Microcosmos”-like microphotography of bees in flight and in their hives including a chilling depiction of a hive infected by mites that the movie synopsis compares to a discarded scene from David Cronenburg’s “The Fly.” (Imhoof directed “The Boat Is Full,” which was nominated for the Academy Award for Best Foreign Language Film.)

With beekeepers worldwide continuing to experience devastating losses from colony collapse disorder, Imhoof’s documentary takes a much-needed global perspective — not just on the causes of the crisis, but its devastating impacts, and possible solutions too.

From visiting with Chinese agricultural workers now charged with hand-pollinating crops because of a lack of bees, through an aerial tour of the vast expanses of California almond orchards that receive truck loads of bee hives from around the country, the trailer for “More Than Honey” promises an almost Orwellian overview of the current state of affairs.

Whether it encourages more people to plant forage, garden without pesticides or buy organic; or bolsters calls for adopting a similar precautionary ban on neonicotinoid pesticides like Europe has just implemented, this film should continue to fuel the public outcry at the state of our honeybees and the debate as to what should be done about it.

“More Than Honey” launches on June 10 in the United States and there is a DVD release planned for later in the year. Check the film’s website for information on showings in your area.

San Antonio developer threatens famed bat cave

San Antonio sprawl threatens famed bat cave by Matt Hickman

   A San Antonio developer plans to build a nearly 4,000-home subdivision adjacent to a protected reserve that’s the seasonal residence of the world’s largest bat colony.

Just north of the suburban hinterlands of San Antonio in rural Comal County, the subterranean summer home of the world’s largest bat colony is under threat from, you guessed it, sprawl.

For thousands of years, Bracken Cave has served as the seasonal (March through October) residence of about 10 million Mexican free-tailed bats — the same critters you’ll find hanging out under Congress Avenue Bridge in Austin and on Bacardi rum bottles — and, when populated, is considered home to one of the greatest concentrations of mammals on Earth. (I’m getting a phantom ammonia headache just thinking about it.)

The cave is also truly in the middle of nowhere, surrounded by 697 acres of remote Texas Hill Country that’s owned and protected by Bat Conservation International (BCI). However, the definition of “middle of nowhere” is being put to the test as the San Antonio burbs continue to bleed into once-remote areas. Now, developer Brad Galo has hatched a highly controversial plan to erect a 3,800-home subdivision dubbed Crescent Hills on a 1,500-acre plot of land located directly under the nightly flight path of the massive colony of medium-sized bats. To be clear, the proposed subdivision isn’t exactly within a stone’s throw of Bracken Cave itself but for BCI, the location, which would directly abut the reserve, is still way too close for comfort.

As reported by NPR, the group worries that permitting thousands of McMansions to be built in the ecologically sensitive area — and the gas stations, traffic lights and mini-marts that would most likely accompany them — could disturb the colony, resulting in potentially devastating consequences that would impact both regional agriculture (the Bracken Cave Colony alone can consume 100 million tons of crop-damaging insects each night) and beleaguered Texans who tend to get eaten alive by skeeters.

And so, BCI has launched the Save Bracken campaign to raise public awareness and to, ideally, halt the development of Crescent Hills.

Explains BCI director Andy Walker in a letter that outlines the situation while also urging bat-loving Texans – and bat-loving non-Texans – to contact city officials and voice their concerns:

Texas law leaves little or no room for consideration of environmental issues. The San Antonio Water System (SAWS) has granted Mr. Galo the water and sewer hookups he needs for 3,800 homes, but SAWS is not permitted to determine if adequate water supplies exist or to comment on the wisdom of putting nearly 4,000 homes in the middle of a protected recharge area. This project will ultimately come before the San Antonio Planning Commission for approval, but even the Planning Commission lacks the authority to take environmental concerns into account. In fact, if the Commission does nothing, the development will be automatically approved after 30 days.

We’ve been told by our attorneys that the San Antonio City Council and Mayor Castro are our only real recourse, and that our hopes for persuading them to take action rest in our ability to make this a significant public and media issue. Aside from the ecological issues, we’re concerned about putting 10,000 people next to millions of building-loving adult bats and millions more juvenile bats learning to fly that will be attracted to the insects gathering around the porch and street lights of these homes. Should some poor child or parent come into contact with a sick bat or a pet that picked up a sick bat and contract rabies, it won’t matter that the bats have been there for 10,000 or more years. There will be a growing call for the city health department to deal with ‘this threat to public safety.’

This, in fact, is the greatest threat to Bracken’s bats.

Brandishing a 13,000-signature-strong petition and backed by representatives from Sierra Club, Audubon Texas, the San Antonio Zoo, and others, members of BCI appeared before the San Antonio City Council on May 29 to chat Bracken. Apparently, the meeting was deemed a “success.”

Still, no decision has been made whether or not to green light the Crescent Hills subdivision as no formal master plans have been submitted to San Antonio’s development department at this point, according to NPR. Says Mayor Julian Castro: “There is a science to figure out in terms of whether development would or would not actually harm the bats.”

Remarks Walker: “You’d like to think, also because this is Texas, where there is a will, there is a way. And people have good horse sense here and we can figure out a solution to this.”

Head on over to the Save Bracken homepage for additional information — and maps! —on how you can speak out if you’re also of the opinion that a plan to erect nearly 4,000 homes adjacent to an extremely crucial bat reserve is, well, a load of guano.

Composting Is Key to New Business Sector and Green Jobs

WASHINGTON – May 8 – Composting is a major job creator, according to a new report released by the Institute for Local Self-Reliance nonprofit think tank in Washington, DC, in conjunction with International Compost Awareness Week. According to the report, Pay Dirt: Composting in Maryland to Reduce Waste, Create Jobs, & Protect the Bay, 1,400 new full-time jobs could be supported for every million tons of yard trimmings and food scraps converted into compost that is used locally.

Collectively, these jobs could pay wages ranging from $23 million to $57 million.

With compostable materials making up almost half of what Americans set out at the curb, this is good news for communities seeking to balance environmental concerns with the need to create good jobs. “When sent to a landfill or trash incinerator, banana peels, broccoli stalks, and other leftover food scraps are a liability. But when composted, they are a valuable asset,” stated Brenda Platt, lead author of Pay Dirt and director of ILSR’s Composting Makes $en$e project.

Based on a survey of Maryland composters, Pay Dirt found that, on a per-ton basis, composting sustains twice as many jobs as landfilling and four times the number of jobs as burning garbage. On a dollar-per-capital-investment basis, the number of jobs supported by composting versus disposal options was even more striking: 3 times more than landfills, and 17 times more than incinerators. Many of these jobs are skilled jobs such as equipment operators, with typical wages in the $16 to $20 per hour range.

Compost is a dark, crumbly earthy-smelling material produced by the natural decomposition of organic materials. It is a valuable soil conditioner with many applications – agricultural, landscaping, wetlands creation, sediment control, to name a few. When added to soil, compost adds needed organic matter, sequesters carbon, improves plant growth, conserves water, and reduces reliance on chemical pesticides and fertilizers. ILSR’s companion paper, also released today, Building Healthy Soils with Compost to Protect Watersheds, details how compost use can reduce watershed contamination from urban pollutants by an astounding 60 to 95 percent. Because compost can hold 20 times its weight in water and acts like a filter and sponge, it can reduce soil erosion and prevent stormwater run-off, huge issues impacting the Chesapeake Bay and other impaired watersheds in the United States.

Markets for compost are growing thanks to the expansion of sustainable practices associated with green infrastructure such as green roofs, rain gardens, and low-impact development. “For every 10,000 tons per year of compost used for green infrastructure, we found that another 18 jobs could be supported,” says Platt, who adds that “Support for composting equals support for a made-in-America industrial sector.”

“We have to stay focused on both job creation and protecting the environment. Composting marries the two perfectly,” said Delegate Heather Mizeur (District 20). “We’ll continue to reduce regulatory burdens and confusion so businesses know their composting operations are engines of the green economy and are welcomed here in Maryland.” Mizeur sponsored successful composting legislation in 2011 and 2013 allowing state agencies to update permitting regulations and make recommendations on how to improve composting in the state.

In Maryland, like much of the country, there is insufficient capacity to compost all the food scraps discarded in the state. In ILSR’s survey of Maryland composters, regulations and permitting were the most frequently cited challenges to facilities’ financial viability and their challenges for expansion. Another reason is the State’s embrace of trash incineration and State policy that provides renewable energy credits to incineration, a technology that requires wasting and waste, thus competing with the development of non-burn options like composting. Pay Dirt recommends policy changes to encourage a diverse and in-state composting infrastructure in order to maximize job creation and community benefits.

Several small-scale food scrap composting operations have opened in the last 3 years, demonstrating the viability of locally-based systems: ECO City Farms, an urban farm in Edmonston; Chesapeake Compost Works, a private enterprise in Curtis Bay, Baltimore; and a Howard County government site to process material from a residential pilot. According to Vinnie Bevivino, owner of Chesapeake Compost Works, “Organic waste like food scraps should be processed as local as possible.” He adds, “Not only does this keep the jobs and fertile soil in the community, it also greatly reduces the carbon footprint of transportation.”

Pay Dirt calls for a moratorium on building new trash incinerators while new regulations and support for composting are put in place. By doing this, Platt contends that “our communities will benefit from cleaner air, more jobs, enhanced soil quality, healthier watersheds, and more resilient economies.”
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The Institute’s mission is to provide innovative strategies, working models and timely information to support environmentally sound and equitable community development. To this end, ILSR works with citizens, activists, policymakers and entrepreneurs to design systems, policies and enterprises that meet local or regional needs; to maximize human, material, natural and financial resources; and to ensure that the benefits of these systems and resources accrue to all local citizens.

Conservatives prefer wasting energy over protecting the environment, study finds

“Why do conservatives like to waste energy?” asks Tim McDonnell about a disturbing study on attitudes towards energy conservation:

A study out today in the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences examined attitudes about energy efficiency in liberals and conservatives, and found that promoting energy-efficient products and services on the basis of their environmental benefits actually turned conservatives off from picking them. The researchers first quizzed participants on how much they value various benefits of energy efficiency, including reducing carbon emissions, reducing foreign oil dependence, and reducing how much consumers pay for energy; cutting emissions appealed to conservatives the least.

The study then presented participants with a real-world choice: With a fixed amount of money in their wallet, respondents had to “buy” either an old-school light bulb or an efficient compact florescent bulb (CFL), the same kind Bachmann railed against. Both bulbs were labeled with basic hard data on their energy use, but without a translation of that into climate pros and cons. When the bulbs cost the same, and even when the CFL cost more, conservatives and liberals were equally likely to buy the efficient bulb. But slap a message on the CFL’s packaging that says “Protect the Environment,” and “we saw a significant drop-off in more politically moderates and conservatives choosing that option,” said study author Dena Gromet, a researcher at the University of Pennsylvania’s Wharton School of Business.

English: Al Gore (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

The author of the study says that political polarization of climate change is the reason conservatives choose to avoid products marketed as green, even though they may also save money in the long run. That may be the case, but I suspect it also has something to do with the right-wing framing of global warming as a hoax concocted by people like Al Gore to make money. They may see any product touting its greenness as putting money into the pockets of their political opposition or as a deception to be avoided.

I was also reminded of examples of people intentionally wasting energy out of spite due to their dislike for environmentalists or liberals. For example, the libertarian/conservative think tank, CEI opposed Earth Hour by encouraging people to keep the lights on. It’s also not at all uncommon to see Facebook posts or tweets like these of people touting their poor MPG on their vehicle or plans to litter, because they dislike “tree huggers.”

Why do you think conservatives are avoiding products marketed as green? And what should be done about it to make the issue less divisive?

UPDATE: At the Dot Earth blog, Andrew Revkin points to a 2009 study that found a similar pattern.

America now has more solar energy workers than coal miners

by Michael Graham Richard

Still a nascent industry, but growing fast

The Solar Foundation, which has been releasing reports for a few years on the state of the solar industry in the U.S., has just launched a very cool interactive map that breaks the stats down state by state. This allows us to see that there are only 80 solar jobs in Alaska (not too surprising), and over 43,000 in California. Add all 50 states together, and solar employs 119,000 people in the country, a growth of 13.2% in 2012.

Another interesting way to gain perspective is to compare these solar jobs to the number of jobs created by other sectors. Looked at it this way, the Solar Foundation (using stats from the Bureau of Labor Statistics) found that there were more solar energy workers in Texas than ranchers, that solar workers outnumber actors in California, and that across the whole 50 states, there are more solar workers than coal miners.

Solar foundation/Screen capture

The top 3 states for solar jobs are California, followed by Arizona, and New Jersey.

© Solar foundation

© Solar Foundation

One interesting stat is the number of solar companies HQ’ed in each state. For example, California has over 1,700! They also give all kinds of useful into on solar practices in the state, such as net metering and renewable energy portfolio targets (if any).

Flickr/CC BY-ND 2.0

Another interesting stat on Arizona:

Arizona saw a huge spike in solar employment (from 4,786 in 2011 to 9,800 this year), mostly due to the completion of a number of large utility-scale solar projects. Though California installed more solar than Arizona overall last year, Arizona had far more utility installations, which often rely on industrial and residential construction workers. Without the installation of such a large amount of utility-scale solar, these workers might otherwise be struggling to find employment in a depressed construction market.

Most jobs in solar energy in the U.S. are in installation. It doesn’t pay like being a hedge fund manager, but at around $38k/year (around $18/hour), it’s above the median national wage of $34,750, and as the industry grows further (it’s just getting started), there’s the real possibility that shortages of qualified workers will make salaries go up, as they did historically in other fast-growing industries.

Study shows a walk in the park fixes a fuzzy brain

By Jaymi Heimbuch

Urban living gives you brain fatigue. It flat out makes your brain tired of constantly being alert and aware. And a walk in the park can go a long way to clear up the resulting fuzziness.

I like how Fast Company explains it: “Pedestrians get drained because they have to remain vigilant of all the madness that’s around them, being forced to use directed mental attention–a limited resource–to get from one block to another without being run over by something with two legs or four wheels. In contrast, the environs of a park, unless there’s a stroller festival afoot, can put you into a state of soft fascination,the aaaaah-inducing feeling of taking in the space around you. By being in a green space, that ever-so-scarce resource of directed attention is able to renew itself.”

A new study from Scotland helps to prove this. New York Times writes that researchers at Heriot-Watt University in Edinburgh and the University of Edinburgh used portable EEGs to monitor the brain activity of 12 healthy young adults. Different participants walked through different areas of Edinburgh — one was an historic shopping district, one was a park-like setting, and one was a busy commercial district.

You can guess which walkers were the least stressed and frustrated — those in the park. While this is a small study, it still helps to underscore what we already intuitively know. We relax in quiet, natural settings much more than we do (or ever could) in urban settings.

Jenny Roe, a lecturer at Heriot-Watt’s School of the Built Environment, who oversaw the study, told the New York Times that while natural setting still engage our brain, the engagement is effortless: “It’s called involuntary attention in psychology. It holds our attention while at the same time allowing scope for reflection.”

From the New York Times:

The study suggests that, right about now, you should consider “taking a break from work,” Dr. Roe said, and “going for a walk in a green space or just sitting, or even viewing green spaces from your office window.” This is not unproductive lollygagging, Dr. Roe helpfully assured us. “It is likely to have a restorative effect and help with attention fatigue and stress recovery.”

It’s certainly worth taking a walk in a quiet park yourself to test out this theory and see if you’re calmer and more clear-headed when you return home.

Tesla Model S electric cars

In the first three months of 2013, more people bought Tesla Model S electric cars than equivalent (more or less) models from Mercedes, BMW, and Audi. Obviously, these aren’t very high-volume models, but still, not bad for a company that wasn’t making any cars at all a few years ago. It shows that Tesla‘s strategy is working. If you make a really good electric car – Consumer Reports called it the best car they’ve ever tested – you can easily go head-to-head with gasoline models and beat them. That’s important, because in some places (ie. big cities) cars don’t make much sense and we should make more efforts to improve walkability, bike lanes, transit, etc. But outside those big cities, people will be driving for a long time to come, and electric cars will make a huge difference, especially as our power grid becomes cleaner over time.

So hopefully when Tesla comes out with its third generation platform in a few years (the first was the Roadster, the second one is the Model S and its derivatives like the Model X), they can compete with high-volume mass-market models and push forward the transition away from oil in transportation.

I don’t know exactly at which market segment Tesla will take aim; will it be more like a BMW 3 Series, or a top of the line Honda Accord? But regardless, there’s a clear trend, and Tesla or some other electric car maker will eventually make very affordable high-quality EVs with more than enough range for most people, and gas cars will become a thing of the past. The faster the better.

In the meantime, remember that the biggest difference you can make is not driving. But if you have to drive, it’s best to get the most fuel-efficient model that meets your needs.

Via CNN