Green Options

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For Teddy Roosevelt it was the creation of our system of National Parks. For Richard Nixon it was the passage of landmark environmental reforms found in the Clean Air Act, the Clean Water Act, and the National Environmental Policy Act. For Bill Clinton it was an eleventh-hour preservation of millions of acres of public lands. For George W. Bush it will be tackling the issues of global warming and climate change.

huh?

In light of my recent post about the demoralizing effect this administration has had upon EPA scientists and other agency ‘lifers’, I was more than just a little surprised to hear about the story leaked in Monday’s Washington Times that reports President Bush is “poised to change course and announce as early as this week that he wants Congress to pass a bill to combat global warming, and will lay out principles for what that should include.”

White House spokeswoman Dana Perino declined on Monday to confirm rumors that action was imminent, though she would not rule it out. She said the administration’s discussions are building toward an expected debate on climate change in the Senate in June [watch video of White House press conference here].

If President George W. Bush throws his support behind mandatory carbon dioxide regulations, it would indeed be a major shift away from his insistence that placing binding caps on emissions would harm the U.S. economy.

Top international environmental news for during the week of April 6 - 13:

Europe — World’s first commercial tidal turbine installed (EcoGeek)

“The world’s first commercial tidal turbine has been installed in its home in Northern Ireland’s Strangford Lough.

Though it has yet to be turned on, it will be the first commercial power-producing tidal generator when it is (sometime later this year). The turbine has two 16 meter-wide rotors and will be able to run for 18-20 hours a day. The turbine was installed off the coast in an area known for fast moving waters, and because the rotors will only spin 10-20 times in a minute, it is unlikely to disturb marine life.”

Source: EcoGeek. Hot in media: Digg EcoGeek, Digg TimesOnline.

Africa — Tree-Nation (Tree-Nation)

“Tree-Nation is an ecological project with a focused objective: To plant 8 million trees in Niger, Africa to fight desertification! Large-scale plantation of trees will increase the land’s productivity and re-generate the soil.

It’s been an intriguing week for British environmental activists, with the discovery of a spy in the camp at UK aviation protest group Plane Stupid.

Ultimately the spy, an employee of C2i International who specialize in ’special risk management’ (otherwise known as industrial espionage) was little match for Plane Stupid, who described him as “more Austin Powers than James Bond”.

Accounts of the episode reveal that Ken Tobias (real name Tobias Kendall), made a number of basic errors, including:

• Wearing expensive designer clothes (which he attempted to disguise by wearing a Palestinian scarf to give some environmental credibility)
• Turning up to meetings consistently early
• Demonstrating an unusual eagerness to reap mayhem on British airport infrastructure by suggesting the grandest and most aggressive schemes
• Allowing information on planned activities to be published almost immediately in the press

In case you missed them the first time around, here are the top 10 international environmental headlines that made news in the blogosphere for the week of March 31 - April 6.

1. Asia — United Nations Climate Change Talks: “Kyoto II” climate talks open in Bangkok

“The first formal talks in the long process of drawing up a replacement for the Kyoto climate change pact opened in Thailand on Monday with appeals to a common human purpose to defeat global warming.

‘The world is waiting for a solution that is long-term and economically viable,’ U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki Moon said in a video address to the 1,000 delegates from 190 nations gathered in Bangkok.

[kml_flashembed movie="http://video.google.com/googleplayer.swf?docid=2499788127752613053" width="400" height="326" wmode="transparent" /]

Reducing the amount of water you use is good for the environment, and good for your wallet. Better yet, you don’t have to sacrifice water pressure to do it. Check out the best water faucet aerators of 2008.

Source: MetaEfficient.com

Video Courtesy of Google Videos

It looks like Hillary Clinton has another “3 a.m.” political ad out. This time it’s about the economy.

I’m not sure what it is about these ads that have captured the nation’s imagination; John McCain has his own version of it, and, of course, it inspired scores of parodies on YouTube and among late-night talk show comedians.

Still, I wonder if the candidates will get around to making one of these ads about the environment.

It’d be really easy to do, actually. All you need is a ringing phone…and no one to answer it.

That’s because the environment has somehow become a non-issue during this campaign season. All three candidates have fairly progressive views when it comes to addressing climate change, and they all tout the benefits of weening ourselves off foreign oil, so we’ve basically been told by the media that there’s nothing more to discuss on the topic.

The only problem is that voters WANT to discuss it.

George Bush and Hugo Chavez, former political enemies, announced plans this morning to dismantle the North American Free Trade Agreement, or NAFTA, replacing it instead with the North American Fair Trade Agreement, also NAFTA.

“The new agreement marks a turning point in US-Venezuela relations,” said Juan Johnston of the North American Monitor of Bribery in Latin America (NAMBLA). “It also underscores the magnitude of recent growth in demand for ethically produced goods.”

This has been a great month for Gas 2.0, and in no small way due to the incredible stories we’re hearing every day about new green-car tech, non-food based biofuels, and big scientific breakthroughs.

Besides getting back into the swing of things after some down-time in February, we were lucky to add Benjamin F.T. Jones to our writing team. Ben’s covered some of the most popular stories here this month, including the Subaru’s STI diesel, the all-electric Lightning GT, and a Japanese man’s attempt to sail across the Pacific in a wave-powered boat. See all of Ben’s posts here.

If you don’t want to miss the news next month, you can subscribe to Gas 2.0’s RSS feed here.

To recap, these are some of the top stories from March 2008:

The top 10 headlines in international environmental news for the week of March 24 - 30.

1. World — Earth Hour 2008

As the clock struck eight in the evening, people across each time zone turned off their lights on March 29. It’s activism en mass and it’s called Earth Hour. The purpose: to inspire people to take action on climate change and to demonstrate that massive and immediate action is possible.

Earth Hour began as a city-wide voluntary blackout in Sydney, Australia, in 2007. This year, they’ve moved the date ahead two days and invited the world to join in. Even Google’s joined in. People from roughly 35 countries participated in this global event, which has become a yearly call to action. Read more: EcoWorldy, CNN.

2. Asia — Japanese Man Crosses Pacific with Wave-Powered Boat

A Japanese man named Kenichi Horie is attempting to be environmentally friendly by boating across the Pacific without sails and without fossil fuels.

How does he do it? With a wave-powered boat. Wave power has been discussed quite a bit recently, with a lot of applications including traditional grid energy generation. However, Kenichi is taking things to the next level by powering his ocean going vehicle with the very thing it bobs atop. Read more: Gas 2.0.

Amy Winehouse

If you appreciate irony, as I’m sure you do, then you’ll understand there’s something quite beautiful about the fact that Amy Winehouse will shortly be securing a $700,000 deal to sing at the opening of a nightclub in Rotterdam, Holland.

Irony, yes, because the club will be powered by widdle and Amy’s career is going down the pan due to a vicious circle of relapses. (Rehab? No thanks.)

Image source: http://timblair.net | Lights out for Sydney, Australia 2007

An http://greenprinteronline.com dispatch. 

Earth Hour is tonight, March 29th from 8 to 9 pm. The idea is to turn off the lights as a symbolic gesture that us citizens, business owners, uber-corporations (hello, Google’s black screen, hello McDonalds in Toronto saving 10 000 kilowatt hours) local governments and non-profit groups are taking climate change seriously.

Despite gripes that Earth Hour falls on the NCAA basketball regional, it’s lights out for over 23 major cities worldwide like Toronto and Bangkok.