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Russia contaminating Arctic ecosystem

2012-05-25T08:04:00.001-07:00

Online Director, Green

peace USA

"I have to see it to believe it," was the reaction to my Russian colleague, Jon Burgwald, when he told me that every spring the rivers in Northern Russia turn black with oil saturated ice.

He sent me the pictures last night from his visit to Usinsk which borders the Arctic and has the unenviable title of Russia's oil capital. Before oil was discovered here in the 1970's Usinsk was a pristine area, with rivers villagers could drink from, teeming with life.

Now the winter thaw marks the annual running of the black ice. You have to see it to believe it .

Jon tells the story in his own words here, describing it as "Russia's oil leaks -- a forgotten disaster."He writes:

We also visited Kolva, one of the local villages in the area. Here the locals told us about their everyday life and how it has been affected by the oil industry. They named the village after the river, which the village is located next to. The Kolva River used to be the villagers' source for fresh water and food. They used to be able to drink the water directly from the river and the fish used to be plentiful. Today the river is more known for transporting ice painted black by the oil. In fact, oil slicks cover almost the entire surface.

There is a famous saying by the American theologian Tyron Edwards that goes like this: " Some of the best lessons we ever learn we learn from our mistakes and failures. The error of the past is the wisdom of the future."

Right now I feel we are at a crossroads. Right now a drilling rig is slowly making its way to the Arctic ocean. It is one of the last untainted, unspoiled places we have left on the Earth. So will we learn from places like Usinsk? Or are we doomed to repeat the same mistakes?

Will Arab uprisings bring a lasting peace to Middle East?

2012-04-17T07:29:00.000-07:00

by Steven Strauss, Huffington Post

The Arab Spring presents a unique opportunity to envision a better Middle East, joining the global community with dignity and prosperity. If the people of the Middle East embrace this vision, America should provide significant support in achieving it, because a successful Middle East is our best defense against terrorism and our best guarantee of stable oil supplies.

The post-World War II Middle East has experienced: decolonization, autocratic governments, the 1948 War, the 1956 Suez Crisis, the June 1967 War, the Yom Kippur War, the Iran-Iraq Wars, the Egyptian-Israeli Peace Treaty, Iraq's invasion of Kuwait, the Oslo Process, America's invasion of Iraq, and many other dramatic events.

The current period, however, presents the most significant changes in regional alliances since WWII. To name a few: Hamas' partnership with Syria has ended, Hezbollah is less able to rely on Syria's support, Syria's ability to intervene in Lebanon's affairs has been reduced, and Egypt's cooperation with the U.S. will likely decrease. Perhaps most disturbingly, Iran may (subject to many caveats) become a de-facto nuclear power within several years, challenging Israel with a threat to its existence.

American goals have not changed. The U.S. wants: a stable Middle East that provides secure oil sources; non-discriminatory democratic governments, subject to the rule of law; a two-state Israel-Palestine solution, just and equitable for both parties; and the prevention of nuclear proliferation.

The Arab Spring presents a once-in-a-generation opportunity to shape events to achieve these goals. Unfortunately, President Obama and Secretary of State Clinton's policies (while well-intentioned) have been merely reactive, day-to-day, and ad hoc. And some approaches outlined by Republican presidential candidates would be disastrous (e.g., Newt Gingrich referring to the Palestinians as an 'invented people').

The time has come to shape the future. Consider America's greatest foreign policy successes: Japan's post-WWII rebirth, Europe's post-WWII revival through the Marshall Plan, China's reintegration into the world system post-1979, and integration of former communist bloc countries after the Warsaw Pact collapse. They occurred because these countries shared a vision, and were willing to work to achieve it. The U.S. offered that vision, together with support to make it a reality.

Translating this to the Middle East, U.S. policy could look like the following:

Israel/Palestine: Offer incentives to both sides (paid for by the U.S. and other interested parties) that provide real reasons to make painful compromises. For both Israel and Palestine (conditioned on their achieving a real peace treaty) -- Entry into NAFTA (or analogous trade concessions) on favorable terms to promote economic growth. For Israel -- Entry into NATO, with a significant number of NATO troops stationed in front-line positions (so an attack on Israel becomes an attack on NATO), and reimbursement of costs for settlers evacuated from the West Bank. For the Palestinians -- Payment of all claims for people displaced during the various wars (by payment directly to the refugees), and citizenship in Western countries for any Palestinian refugees who cannot be resettled in the Middle East.

Egypt: The U.S. currently provides ~1.5 billion/year to Egypt of which 80 percent is military aid. Many Egyptians don't want this money, so the current aid package should end. In its place, we should offer (conditioned on Egyptians requesting the aid), a much larger package of incentives directed to the economic development of the Egyptian people. The new aid package should be conditioned on the Egyptian government achieving human rights, democratic and other soft goals, and its support for whatever peace agreement the Israelis and Palestinians reach.

For the broader Middle East: A similar package of incentives that encourages people to focus on improving their societies.

Will this be expensive? Yes. The 1947 Marshall Plan for Europe cost 5 percent ($12 billion) of America's 1947 GDP ($254 billion), equivalent to ~$750 billion in today's terms. However, the combined Afghanistan and Iraq wars cost ~$3 trillion, our 2011 defense budget was $700 billion, and we currently spend ~$350 billion/year importing petroleum products. Real peace in the Middle East will repay our investment with substantial dividends in increased trade, reduced military spending, stable oil supplies and (most importantly) lives saved.

In 1947, America was recovering from a war that killed 400,000 Americans, and staggering under a federal debt that exceeded GDP. The challenges of ending segregation were just ahead, and everyone feared a return to the Great Depression. Congress was controlled by Republicans and the Presidency by Democrats. However, that generation of Americans understood the world needed its leadership, and rose to the challenge. It's time for us to live up to their example.

Steven Strauss was founding Managing Director of the Center for Economic Transformation at the New York City Economic Development Corporation (NYCEDC). He is an Advanced Leadership Fellow at Harvard University for 2012. He has a Ph.D. in Management from Yale University and over 20 years' private sector work experience. Steven has advised a number of Middle Eastern governments on various strategy projects. You can follow him on twitter at: @Steven_Strauss

Methane-reducing "Manhattan Project" a crucial step to survival

2011-11-02T12:38:00.000-07:00

Methane and the Fierce Urgency of Now

by Nathan Currier, Senior Climate Advisor, Public Policy Virginia; Classical Composer

With its Koch brothers funding and climate denier affiliations, the Berkeley Earth Project finally laid 'Climategate' to rest last week, affirming the climate data of NASA and others. So now we return to the more complex questions of what to do -- with denial coming from a very different direction. Shining the light of truth onto this denial is a single graph in a major new United Nations Assessment about to be released, showing that even aggressive reductions of CO2 emissions have no effect on warming until about 2040. This is largely because many primary CO2 emission sources co-emit aerosols with CO2. Aerosols on balance cool the planet, but being very short-lived we lose this cooling much more quickly than CO2's warming declines. In stark contrast, the same graph shows that methane and black carbon reductions can achieve considerable impacts on warming very soon.

"Comprehensive" plans like Waxman-Markey could bring mild near-term climate benefits, but 100% of that comes at first from non-CO2 reductions or increasing carbon sinks through risky credits. With recent drought, flood and fire bringing a foretaste of the costs of climate disruption, shall we continue aiming for such a "comprehensive" plan? Politically, the approach has already been in deep trouble. What has not been clear, however, is why it is unwise for the climate and what should be done instead.

Our biggest challenge will be drastic cuts in CO2, perhaps down to near zero by mid-century, as we'll need a planet after 2040. But central to this UN graph is that those CO2 cuts must be decoupled from methane cuts, and the methane cuts must be strongly 'front-loaded' to help preserve near-term climate. The multi-gas strategies value the non-CO2 gases against CO2 using an inappropriate 100-year time frame which undervalues methane by up to 400%, impeding rapid methane drawdown. It makes much more sense to combine methane with black carbon in a separate package for near-term protection. Indeed, we have no choice about this: this is the only emissions policy that can effectively impact the climate changes we are experiencing right now. To claim otherwise is its own form of denial.

In an appeal to developing nations, the United Nations report focuses on measures beneficial to both climate and health, and thus black carbon, causing an appalling number of deaths, is emphasized first. But methane's climate effects are far more certain than are black carbon's, and so while we should do both, we must focus more on methane at first, aiming black carbon cuts mostly towards sources that save lives (cookstoves), while scrutinizing their effectiveness and increasing them greatly if very helpful for the climate.

Skeptics will likely still claim for a while that global warming is not caused by us. They are wrong, but might soon be right: that is, if we let the arctic continue melting, and the methane stored in the Eastern Siberian shelf come out, the problem won't have much to do with us any longer, as even just a few percent of it would swamp all attempts to control warming, shifting the planet rapidly to a new state. So, while CO2 is surely the largest chunk of human-induced warming, the "fierce urgency of now" in climate is methane. We either reduce our methane emissions sharply now, giving ourselves a fighting chance to deal with the CO2 problem over the coming decades, or we seriously risk letting 'non-human' methane push Earth to a hotter state. Perhaps we can finally close the debate with deniers through methane: no one can contest how much methane is stored in the Siberian shelf, no one can contest what it will do if released. And no one should contest any longer that its state is changing: just recently the NCAR HIPPO project concluded three years of the highest-tech greenhouse gas readings yet. Its first big surprise: background levels of methane are rising over large areas of the arctic ocean.

Robert Watson, the former IPCC chairman, admirably started the Global Methane Fund (GMF) in 2009 saying we need near-term cooling and methane is the best way to start. The GMF later joined the U.S. EPA's Methane to Markets to form the Global Methane Initiative, which estimates it could cut by 2020 50% of those methane emissions costing less than $40/ton, if it can greatly leverage an initial $200-300 million. But that is less than half of what should be achievable in even less time.

'Methane Apollo' is my name for what might help us -- an Apollo-like half-decade project centered on massive methane reductions from gas and oil, coal mining, landfills, agricultural waste, and wastewater. Scientists call something that perturbs our planet's energy balance a 'radiative forcing', adding warming if positive, cooling if negative. With rapid reduction of methane emissions by a third, methane should restabilize around 1250 parts per billion over fourteen years, reducing radiative forcing by almost a third of its increase since industrialization. If some recent studies of black carbon are correct, then the methane and 20% black carbon cuts together could temporarily cut by almost half (~45%) all the radiative forcing added since industrialization. These measures should be particularly effective in the arctic, moreover, because of the roles there of ozone and black carbon. Unlike the "350" movement for CO2, the "1250" goal for methane with added black carbon cuts makes for a practical immediate goal.

The total 'cost' would be around $250 billion, but is effectively far less. Some of the methane provides a profit stream from captured emissions producing energy, attracting investment. Methane to Markets leveraged their modest $50 million expenditures by almost eight times. If G20 nations put up amounts between just $1-5 billion, averaging about $3 billion each, then this $60 billion would only need to be leveraged about four times. Let's do it, fast, and let's hope it is not already too late.

Matt Damon: Is safe water and a basic toilet too much to ask?

2011-11-02T11:42:00.000-07:00

by Matt Damon and Gary White

By the time you finish reading this paragraph, one more child will have died from something that's been preventable for over a century. Nearly 40 percent of the world's population is still unable to secure a safe glass of water or access a basic toilet. While we continue to rally around the goal of ensuring safe water and sanitation for all, the real question we are left asking ourselves: how do we truly confront this in a way that results in realizing our vision within our lifetime?

Even today, as solutions are known and available, lack of access to safe water and sanitation continues to claim more lives through disease than any war claims through guns.

This painful reality has driven philanthropic efforts to help stop the suffering. There are conferences, master plans, frameworks, legislation, new institutions, and even more resolved resolutions. Money is raised, wells are dug, ribbons are cut. But even after decades of charity, subsidies, multilateral aid, and investments on the part of governments and outside non-governmental organizations (NGOs), the system remains inefficient and largely misses the goal of providing relief for those at the base of the economic pyramid (BOP) in their daily need to secure water. The intentions are good, but the relief is not trickling down.

On average, those living in slums pay 7-15 times more per liter of water than owners of nearby five-star hotels. This is because subsidies are largely delivered through unrealistically low water tariffs -- if you are too poor to afford a water connection, you can't capture the subsidy. Similarly, if you are a poor day laborer in Port-au-Prince and you want a drink of safe water to quench your thirst, you will pay 250 times more than the cost of New York City tap water. Those who lack cash pay with their time -- hours each day spent scavenging for water from public taps that frequently run dry, rivers, or even drainage ditches. There are nearly a billion people in this trap of water insecurity and about 2.5 billion lack a sanitary toilet.

Instead of viewing this as an ocean of people with their hands out waiting for charity-driven solutions, what if we see many of them, or even most of them, as potential customers. In the past decade we have seen a paradigm shift in how we understand the BOP -- a shift that holds much promise for tackling the water and sanitation crisis. Microfinance has been a catalyst in this, democratizing access to capital. Water.org has tapped into the power of microfinance to demonstrate that its principles can spill over into meeting the water and sanitation needs of the poor.

Through WaterCredit, we have explored the application of microfinance to water and sanitation needs. With the support of the Pepsico Foundation, we have reached more than 250,000 people with loans that allow them to pay connection fees for house taps and to construct toilets. This was done at an average philanthropic cost of $24/person, which, in turn, leveraged more than three times that amount in the form of commercial capital to complete the finance package for each household. We are now taking this to scale with an $8 million grant from the Pepsico Foundation announced last Thursday and a $3.8 million grant from the MasterCard Foundation. We project that this philanthropic capital will leverage an additional $36 million in commercial capital, reaching about one million people. In the case of India, we will drive the philanthropic cost per person served down even further, to $10 by the end of the grant.

Access to capital -- philanthropic, social and commercial -- is certainly a choke point in achieving universal access to water and sanitation. But neck and neck is lack of accountability to those living in poverty on the part of their governments and water utilities. Unfortunately, about half of investments that do find their way to water and sanitation infrastructure misses the mark due to corruption, incompetence, inadequate maintenance, and subsidies captured by those who could pay for services.

The potential of microfinance to democratize access to capital is paralleled by the potential of technology and social media to democratize access to information. In the same way that social media and mobile devices allowed those driving the Arab Spring to find their voice in holding their leaders accountable for principles of democracy, we believe they can be used to allow the poor -- citizens in their own right -- to hold their leaders accountable for investments made into basic services such as water and sanitation. More people now have access to a cell phone than a toilet. What if a cell phone became a tool for the poor to better hold their elected officials accountable for fulfilling their mandate to provide sanitation?

Approaching this crisis in a way that truly yields lasting and scalable solutions requires that we tap into orthogonal forces -- trends that are swirling around us that, at first, seem unrelated to the business of addressing the water and sanitation needs of the poor. New tools have been placed in our toolbox -- often, when we in the water sector were looking the other way, drilling another well. Microfinance and social media are just two examples of these tools.

While the issues surrounding water poverty are complex, at a fundamental level they need to be addressed from the bottom up. Philanthropic capital should be used catalytically to jump-start markets for the hundreds of millions who can afford to meet their own needs if only given the right tools. It should be used to help drive transparency and accountability around public funds already targeting this crisis. It should seek to back those initiatives that can continue to democratize those forces and tools that we in the United States take for granted, whether poor or affluent, in leveling the playing field.

We call on ourselves and other NGOs, governments, utilities, philanthropists, and influencers to recommit to approaching this crisis from the perspective of the poor. This call includes directing more resources towards experimentation and discovery, and doing so in a way that taps into and channels the intrinsic power of the poor as customers and citizens. It also includes raising the stakes by putting the global water and sanitation crisis on the map in a way that it truly deserves. This is a challenge worthy of the next global movement, similar to what was needed to sound the alarm around the fight against HIV/AIDS.

This is that next movement and we are honored to have the opportunity to work with Arianna Huffington, who pledged herself and her team to give this movement an incredible kick-start with the launch of a new section of Huffington Post -- a section that will be dedicated to giving coverage to this cause, the doers, the solutions, and the discourse that is needed to change the world. In the end we know that we cannot fund-raise our way out of this crisis. Ultimately, it will be creativity, innovation, and collective action that will allow us to achieve universal access to water and sanitation, and do so in our lifetime.

Gary White and Matt Damon are the co-founders of Water.org

Climate change escalating wild weather patterns

2011-11-02T11:34:00.000-07:00

BY SETH BORENSTEIN , HuffingtonPost.com

WASHINGTON -- For a world already weary of weather catastrophes, the latest warning from top climate scientists paints a grim future: More floods, more heat waves, more droughts and greater costs to deal with them.

A draft summary of an international scientific report obtained by The Associated Press says the extremes caused by global warming could eventually grow so severe that some locations become "increasingly marginal as places to live."

The report from the Nobel Prize-winning Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change marks a change in climate science, from focusing on subtle shifts in average temperatures to concentrating on the harder-to-analyze freak events that grab headlines, hurt economies and kill people.

"The extremes are a really noticeable aspect of climate change," said Jerry Meehl, senior scientist at the National Center for Atmospheric Research. "I think people realize that the extremes are where we are going to see a lot of the impacts of climate change."

The final version of the report from a panel of leading climate scientists will be issued in a few weeks, after a meeting in Uganda. The draft says there is at least a 2-in-3 probability that climate extremes have already worsened because of man-made greenhouse gases.

The most recent bizarre weather extreme, the pre-Halloween snowstorm that crippled parts of the Northeast last weekend, cannot be blamed on climate change and probably isn't the type of storm that will increase with global warming, according to four meteorologists and climate scientists.

Experts on extreme storms have focused more closely on the increasing number of super-heavy rainstorms, not snow, NASA climate scientist Gavin Schmidt said.

By the end of the century, the intense, single-day rainstorms that typically happen once every 20 years will probably happen about twice a decade, the report said.

The opposite type of disaster – a drought such as the stubbornly long dry spell gripping Texas and parts of the Southwest – could also happen more often as the world warms, said Schmidt and Meehl, who reviewed part of the climate panel report.

Studies have not yet specifically tied global warming to the continuing drought, but it is consistent with computer models that indicate current climate trends will worsen existing droughts, Meehl said. Scientifically connecting a weather disaster with global warming is a complicated and time-consuming task that can take more than a year and involve lots of computer calculations.

Researchers have also predicted more intense monsoons with climate change. Warmer air can hold more water and impart more energy to weather systems, changing the dynamics of storms and where and how they hit.

Thailand is now coping with massive flooding from monsoonal rains – an event that illustrates how climate is also connected with other manmade issues such as population growth, urban development and river management, Schmidt said.

In fact, the report says, "for some climate extremes in many regions, the main driver for future increases in losses will be socioeconomic" rather than a result of greenhouse gases.

The panel was formed by the United Nations and World Meteorological Organization. In the past, it has discussed extreme events in snippets in its report. But this time, the scientists are putting them all together.

The report, which needs approval by diplomats at the mid-November meeting, tries to measure the confidence scientists have in their assessment of climate extremes both future and past.

Chris Field, one of the leaders of the climate change panel, said he and other authors declined to comment because the report is still subject to change.

The summary chapter did not detail which regions of the world might suffer extremes so severe as to leave them only marginally habitable.

The report does say scientists are "virtually certain" – 99 percent – that the world will have more extreme spells of heat and fewer of cold. Heat waves could peak as much as 5 degrees hotter by mid-century and even 9 degrees hotter by the end of the century.

From June to August this year in the United States, blistering heat set 2,703 daily high temperature records, compared with only 300 cold records during that period. That made it the hottest summer in the U.S. since the Dust Bowl of 1936, according to Weather Underground Meteorology Director Jeff Masters, who was not involved in the study.

And there's an 80 percent chance that the killer Russian heat wave of 2010 would not have happened without the added push of global warming, according to a study published last week in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.

Scientists expect future hurricanes and other tropical cyclones to have stronger winds, but they won't increase in number and may actually decrease.

Massachusetts Institute of Technology meteorology professor Kerry Emanuel, who studies climate's effects on hurricanes, disagrees and believes more of these intense storms will occur.

And global warming isn't the sole villain in future climate disasters, the climate report says. An even bigger problem will be the number of people – especially the poor – who live in harm's way.

The 18-page summary report isn't completely grim. It says some "low-regrets measures" can help reduce disaster risks and costs, including better preparedness, sustainable land and water management, better public health monitoring and building improvements.

University of Victoria climate scientist Andrew Weaver, who was not among the authors, said the report was written to be "so bland" that it may not matter to world leaders.

But Masters said the basic findings seem to be proven true by actual events.

"In the U.S., this has been the weirdest weather year we've had for my 30 years, hands down."

Autumn of Inspiration in 71 countries, 719 cities

2011-10-12T20:23:00.000-07:00

United for Global Change movement launches October 15th, 2011

The American Autumn of Inspiration is spurring a global protest movement unseen since the 1960s. People everywhere are rising up to let the powers that be know that enough is enough, and the average Joe has been squeezed for too long.

Statement for Canada and Canadians in United for Change Movement

People are rising up all over this beautiful spinning planet to claim their rights and demand a true democracy. Now it is time for all of us to join in a global non-violent protest.

United in one voice, we will let politicians, and the financial elites they serve, know it is up to us, the people, to decide our future. We are not goods in the hands of politicians and bankers who do not represent us.

Time and water are running out, the Earth is heating up, and it is time for a global green revolution, a grassroots movement, a coalition of wonderfully diverse forces with common goals. We want a more humane, egalitarian, equitable, just and sustainable society.

In Canada we will march for legalized marijuana, assistance for the poor, more education and health funding, for equality among sexes and ethnicities, to protect the rights of workers and to preserve our ecological heritage through a diverse, permaculture economy.

On October 15th, we will meet on the streets to initiate the global change we want. We will peacefully demonstrate, talk and organize until we make it happen.

It’s time for us to unite. It’s time for them to listen.

People of the world, rise up on October 15th!

Egyptian-brokered Israel-Hamas deal may be a light at the end of a tunnel

2011-10-11T20:06:00.000-07:00

Israel to trade 1,027 prisoners for release of Gilad Schalit

One has to be heartened that any deal has been done involving Israel and Hamas, bitter enemies with no love lost between them. Props to Egypt for keeping the pedal to the metal on this agreement.

The key development is Hamas willing to do the deal without Marwan Barghouti as part of the exchange. It's a dose of realpolitik for Hamas, who needed to play a trump card equal or greater than Fatah's UN statehood bid.

It shows an elevation of understanding from the Palestinian side. They have accepted that Israel will trade more than 1,000 prisoners for Gilad Schalit, however, if they want M. Barghouti as their leader, they now know he only comes back as part of an enduring peace deal.

Arab Spring of Hope, American Autumn of Inspiration

2011-10-04T16:39:00.000-07:00

They say the darkest hour is right before the dawn
They say the darkest hour is right before the dawn
But you wouldn’t know it by me
Every day’s been darkness since you been gone

- Dylan

Occupy Wall Street is off to a solid start and gains momentum tomorrow, October 5th, with major NYC unions joining the protest.

In Ontario, the Occupy Toronto Market Exchange begins next Saturday, October 15th. It will be revealing to see whether anything sustainable can be set up near Bay Street, as the political and economic climate is a lot different in Canada than it is in the USA. Still, with the majority Harper government pursuing antiquated, vindictive, inefficient and overly expensive anti-pot laws, things are about to start heating up.

Google to finance residential solar electricity construction

2011-09-28T13:01:00.000-07:00

NEW YORK -- Google wants to buy solar panels for your house.

The search giant announced Tuesday that it will provide $75 million to build 3,000 residential solar electricity systems across the country. Google will own the panels, and get paid over time by customers who purchase the electricity the panels produce.

Google is creating a fund with a San Francisco company called Clean Power Finance that local solar installers will be able to tap so they can offer financing plans to prospective buyers. The plans allow homeowners to install a $30,000 solar electricity system on their house for little or no money up front. Instead, customers pay a monthly fee that is the same or less than what they would otherwise be paying their local utility for power.

Google will earn what it calls an attractive return on its investment in two ways. It gets the monthly fee from homeowners, and, as the owner of the systems, Google will get the benefit of federal and state renewable energy subsidies.

The systems will not carry the Google brand, however. Instead, local installers will offer the financing deal under their own brands.

Solar power has gotten dramatically cheaper, but the up-front cost for a homeowner remains formidable. A typical home system costs $25,000 to $30,000. Federal and state governments offer subsidies to help defray the cost somewhat, but it is still far too much money for many homeowners to shell out.

Solar financing plans are offered by a handful of large solar companies such as SunRun, SolarCity and Sungevity, and they are growing in popularity. Google established a $280 million fund with SolarCity in June to help SolarCity expand its offerings.

But Google's new fund will flow instead to small, local installers who would otherwise not be able to offer these financing plans. Google says there are 1,400 solar installers in all 50 states.

"Cash sales (of solar panels) have been good, but once you add financing, sales can go through the roof," said Rick Needham, Director of Green Business Operations at Google, in an interview. "It's an opportunity to significantly expand the market."

This is the second such fund established by Clean Power Finance. The company declines to name the investor in the original fund, but says the amount of the fund is larger than Google's. Google hopes its investment will show a way for other investors to team up with installers to finance many more home solar systems and make a profit in the process.

This is the latest a string of investments Google has made in renewable energy, now totaling $850 million. Google has invested in wind farms in North Dakota, California and Oregon, solar projects in California and Germany, and a project off the East coast meant to help make offshore wind farms possible.

Google has said it is disappointed that it can't buy renewable electricity for its power-hungry data centers so it is investing to help renewable power expand in scale.

One of Google's ten philosophical pillars is: "You can make money without doing evil," and reducing the environmental impact of its business has long been a focus of co-founder and CEO Larry Page. The company says that since 2007, it has completely offset its emissions of greenhouse gases by paying for projects that remove greenhouse gases from the atmosphere.

Source: HuffingtonPost.com Green

Bacca Blues (original poem from Canada)

2011-09-13T15:55:00.000-07:00

Bacca Blues

by Yuya Joe College

September has begun
There's a piper to pay
Change must be coming
Passing the flame

Love up your children
Give thanks to your teacher
Nobody knows what I've
Been thru but U

And U R just reading this now
Jesh and Selassie I light up the sky
Deep mystery and sparkling awe
Why R we here and where R we going?

Best get ready for the winter
Stay warm and healthy
Cut down on tobacco
Or leave it behnid

Green Party of Canada / NDP merger in the works?

2011-08-31T07:06:00.000-07:00

Though it may take a year or two for the national parties to merge, it seems that if the New Democratic Party and the Green Party were to merge at the provincial level, that could be arranged in a matter of months.

PEI, would you like to found and revitalize a new Canada, again?

Quebec, would you care to inspire and foster a revolution?

Green Democratic Party of Canada movement website

Suburban Visions: Arcade Fire's " The Suburbs" versus Rush's Subdivisions

2011-08-31T06:57:00.000-07:00

In an extraordinary alienation-off, here we pit Arcade Fire's 21st Century tune The Suburbs against Rush's 20th Century song Subdivisions. Vote for your fave by leaving a Comment below!

The Suburbs

by Arcade Fire

In the suburbs I
I learned to drive
And you told me we'd never survive
Grab your mother's keys we're leavin'

You always seemed so sure
That one day we'd be fighting
A suburban war
your part of town against mine
I saw you standing on the opposite shore

But by the time the first bombs fell
We were already bored
We were already, already bored

Sometimes I can't believe it
I'm movin' past the feeling
Sometimes I can't believe it
I'm movin' past the feeling again

Kids wanna be so hard
But in my dreams we're still screamin' and runnin' through the yard
And all of the walls that they built in the seventies finally fall
And all of the houses they built in the seventies finally fall
Meant nothin' at all
Meant nothin' at all
It meant nothin

Sometimes I can't believe it
I'm movin' past the feeling
Sometimes I can't believe it
I'm movin' past the feeling and into the night

So can you understand?
Why I want a daughter while I'm still young
I wanna hold her hand
And show her some beauty
Before this damage is done

But if it's too much to ask, it's too much to ask
Then send me a son

Under the overpass
In the parking lot we're still waiting
It's already passed
So move your feet from hot pavement and into the grass
Cause it's already passed
It's already, already passed!

Sometimes I can't believe it
I'm movin' past the feeling
Sometimes I can't believe it
I'm movin' past the feeling again

I'm movin' past the feeling
I'm movin' past the feeling

In my dreams we're still screamin'
We're still screamin'
We're still screamin'

Subdivisions

by Rush

Sprawling on the fringes of the city
In geometric order
An insulated border
In between the bright lights
And the far unlit unknown

Growing up it all seems so one-sided
Opinions all provided
The future pre-decided
Detached and subdivided
In the mass production zone
Nowhere is the dreamer or the misfit so alone

Subdivisions --
In the high school halls
In the shopping malls
Conform or be cast out
Subdivisions --
In the basement bars
In the backs of cars
Be cool or be cast out
Any escape might help to smooth
The unattractive truth
But the suburbs have no charms to soothe
The restless dreams of youth

Drawn like moths we drift into the city
The timeless old attraction
Cruising for the action
Lit up like a firefly
Just to feel the living night

Some will sell their dreams for small desires
Or lose the race to rats
Get caught in ticking traps
And start to dream of somewhere
To relax their restless flight

Somewhere out of a memory of lighted streets on quiet nights...

Subdivisions --
In the high school halls
In the shopping malls
Conform or be cast out
Subdivisions --
In the basement bars
In the backs of cars
Be cool or be cast out
Any escape might help to smooth
The unattractive truth
But the suburbs have no charms to soothe
The restless dreams of youth

White Riot, by UK's The Clash

2011-08-08T10:24:00.000-07:00

Joe Strummer lives on in social justice movement

White Riot by Joe Strummer and Mick Jones

White riot - I wanna riot
White riot - a riot of my own
White riot - I wanna riot
White riot - a riot of my own

Black people gotta lot a problems
But they don't mind throwing a brick
White people go to school
Where they teach you how to be thick

An' everybody's doing
Just what they're told to
An' nobody wants
To go to jail!

White riot - I wanna riot
White riot - a riot of my own
White riot - I wanna riot
White riot - a riot of my own

All the power's in the hands
Of people rich enough to buy it
While we walk the street
Too chicken to even try it

Everybody's doing
Just what they're told to
Nobody wants
To go to jail!

White riot - I wanna riot
White riot - a riot of my own
White riot - I wanna riot
White riot - a riot of my own

Are you taking over
or are you taking orders?
Are you going backwards
Or are you going forwards?

Fukushima disaster a "hot particles" nightmare

2011-06-23T12:19:00.000-07:00

Radiation releases many times greater than reported

Here are some excerpts I've just read about Fukushima's nuclear meltdown / melt-through disaster:

The exposed reactors and fuel cores are continuing to release microns of caesium, strontium, and plutonium isotopes. These are referred to as "hot particles".

"We are discovering hot particles everywhere in Japan, even in Tokyo," he said. "Scientists are finding these everywhere. Over the last 90 days these hot particles have continued to fall and are being deposited in high concentrations. A lot of people are picking these up in car engine air filters."

Radioactive air filters from cars in Fukushima prefecture and Tokyo are now common, and Gundersen says his sources are finding radioactive air filters in the greater Seattle area of the US as well.

The hot particles on them can eventually lead to cancer.

"These get stuck in your lungs or GI tract, and they are a constant irritant," Arnold Gundersen, a former nuclear industry senior vice president, explained, "One cigarette doesn't get you, but over time they do. These [hot particles] can cause cancer, but you can't measure them with a Geiger counter. Clearly people in Fukushima prefecture have breathed in a large amount of these particles. Clearly the upper West Coast of the US has people being affected. That area got hit pretty heavy in April."

"Largest industrial catastrophe in history" claims nuclear scientist

"Fukushima is the biggest industrial catastrophe in the history of mankind," Arnold Gundersen told Al Jazeera.

Japan's 9.0 earthquake on March 11 caused a massive tsunami that crippled the cooling systems at the Tokyo Electric Power Company's (TEPCO) nuclear plant in Fukushima, Japan. It also led to hydrogen explosions and reactor meltdowns that forced evacuations of those living within a 20km radius of the plant.

Gundersen, a licensed reactor operator with 39 years of nuclear power engineering experience, managing and coordinating projects at 70 nuclear power plants around the US, says the Fukushima nuclear plant likely has more exposed reactor cores than commonly believed.

"Fukushima has three nuclear reactors exposed and four fuel cores exposed," he said, "You probably have the equivalent of 20 nuclear reactor cores because of the fuel cores, and they are all in desperate need of being cooled, and there is no means to cool them effectively."

TEPCO has been spraying water on several of the reactors and fuel cores, but this has led to even greater problems, such as radiation being emitted into the air in steam and evaporated sea water - as well as generating hundreds of thousands of tons of highly radioactive sea water that has to be disposed of.

"The problem is how to keep it cool," says Gundersen. "They are pouring in water and the question is what are they going to do with the waste that comes out of that system, because it is going to contain plutonium and uranium. Where do you put the water?"

Even though the plant is now shut down, fission products such as uranium continue to generate heat, and therefore require cooling.

"The fuels are now a molten blob at the bottom of the reactor," Gundersen added. "TEPCO announced they had a melt through. A melt down is when the fuel collapses to the bottom of the reactor, and a melt through means it has melted through some layers. That blob is incredibly radioactive, and now you have water on top of it. The water picks up enormous amounts of radiation, so you add more water and you are generating hundreds of thousands of tons of highly radioactive water."

Independent scientists have been monitoring the locations of radioactive "hot spots" around Japan, and their findings are disconcerting.

"We have 20 nuclear cores exposed, the fuel pools have several cores each, that is 20 times the potential to be released than Chernobyl," said Gundersen. "The data I'm seeing shows that we are finding hot spots further away than we had from Chernobyl, and the amount of radiation in many of them was the amount that caused areas to be declared no-man's-land for Chernobyl. We are seeing square kilometres being found 60 to 70 kilometres away from the reactor. You can't clean all this up. We still have radioactive wild boar in Germany, 30 years after Chernobyl."

Radiation may be affecting newborns in USA Northwest

Japan's Nuclear Emergency Response Headquarters finally admitted earlier this month that reactors 1, 2, and 3 at the Fukushima plant experienced full meltdowns.

TEPCO announced that the accident probably released more radioactive material into the environment than Chernobyl, making it the worst nuclear accident on record.

Meanwhile, a nuclear waste advisor to the Japanese government reported that about 966 square kilometres near the power station - an area roughly 17 times the size of Manhattan - is now likely uninhabitable.

In the US, physician Janette Sherman MD and epidemiologist Joseph Mangano published an essay shedding light on a 35 per cent spike in infant mortality in northwest cities that occurred after the Fukushima meltdown, and may well be the result of fallout from the stricken nuclear plant.

The eight cities included in the report are San Jose, Berkeley, San Francisco, Sacramento, Santa Cruz, Portland, Seattle, and Boise, and the time frame of the report included the ten weeks immediately following the disaster.

"There is and should be concern about younger people being exposed, and the Japanese government will be giving out radiation monitors to children," Dr MV Ramana, a physicist with the Programme on Science and Global Security at Princeton University who specialises in issues of nuclear safety, told Al Jazeera.

Dr Ramana explained that he believes the primary radiation threat continues to be mostly for residents living within 50km of the plant, but added: "There are going to be areas outside of the Japanese government's 20km mandatory evacuation zone where radiation is higher. So that could mean evacuation zones in those areas as well."

Bin Laden's ideology died before he did

2011-05-01T20:34:00.000-07:00

Arab Awakening based on universal human value

Though Bin Laden's death marks the end of an era, the fact that it occurred on May 1st, 2011, means that the context is wholly unlike that of even one year ago. The man on the street in the Arab world is no longer afraid of anachronistic despots, and the world at large is no longer afraid of the Arab street. People everywhere feel a kinship with the North African and Middle East uprisings, and the global village has shrunk considerably. As the yearning for freedom stretches eastward, Syria is now in the grips of it, while Iran, Pakistan and China watch nervously.

Peace 2 All,

Yuya Joe

Wael Ghonim Egypt revolution leader

Gigi Ibrahim Egyptian journalist

Young Arab leaders of Middle East and North African revolutions

Stand By Me - Street singers globally, mixed together

2011-04-15T06:09:00.000-07:00

Here's an innovative video featuring street singers from all over performing Stand By Me, expertly mixed together for your enjoyment and deep satisfaction:

Gaza Marathon an opportunity to illustrate peace in Palestine

2011-04-09T20:21:00.000-07:00

Let us pray that the people of Gaza, Palestine are able and willing to come out in the tens if not hundreds of thousands to cheer on the runners in the first marathon to be run over the full 42 kilometre length of the Gaza Strip, Inshallah.

I believe that if the weather is nice it will be a beautiful site for people to see the men, women and children of Palestine encouraging the runners on.

May 5th to feature first ever full-length marathon in Palestine

According to the Edmonton Journal:

The race, organized by United Nations Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA), will take place on May 5 with the aim of raising funding for the UN refugee agency's Summer Games programme which is held every year in the Hamas-run territory.

The route runs from the northern town of Beit Hanun and heads south along the coastal road until it ends in Rafah, a sprawling city on Gaza's southern border with Egypt, said Gemma Connell, an UNRWA employee who is organizing the event.

"Anyone that's ever worked in Gaza has thought about doing a marathon here because it is exactly 42.2 kilometres (26 miles) long," she told AFP.

Although only a handful of people are expected to run the full 26-mile route, more than a 1,000 local children and young people will take part at various stages along the way, running in a relay format, she said.

Palestinians waste weaponry and momentum with new barrage

2011-04-09T08:14:00.000-07:00

Gaza militants launched over 100 missiles; Debka.com

It is really time for Palestinian Youth to take to the streets and reclaim their country from the self-destructive warlords currently in charge. While the whole world watches and huge swaths of the free, democratic areas are yearning for more democratic revolutions to support (admit it, Tunisia felt good and Egypt was a temporary nirvana), for some reason Palestinians want to go against the trend and incite violence and war.

I've written it before and I'll say it again: If a million Palestinian women, children and men walk into Jerusalem without a weapon among them, they will have their country within months, and a nation with such strong foundations will prosper and be long-lived.

Debka reports 110 rockets and mortar rounds were launched from Gaza on Friday and Saturday, while Jpost claims 70 were counted. Hamas missile attacks rarely achieve anything significant militarily (10 Israelis were injured the past two days, plus the usual property damage) and they damage the cause politically. It's time to make the IRA move and bury these obsolete, nation-destroying weapons, and fully embrace an open, transparent and fully democratic election process.

Towards a peaceful, loving and prosperous Palestine!

Inshallah

Debka.com story on Gaza missile attack on Israel

Jerusalem Post article on missile attack from Gaza

Aljazeera English-language news

Nuclear Power - Moratorium is fine; REAL answer is phasing out old plants

2011-03-26T10:55:00.000-07:00

As my fellow greenies fight hard for moratoriums, I would ask the medical community to step forward and explain to politicians and the public the essence of the true solution, and that is rapidly phasing out the oldest, most dangerous atomic energy plants.

In the eastern GTA region of Ontario we have the Pickering plant, which was built in the 1960s using 50s technology, and we have Darlington, constructed in the 70s utilizing 60s technology. At the moment we are holding hearings on expanding Darlington, so tactically it is correct to fight for a moratorium at these hearings. If the government can place a moratorium on offshore wind due to primarily emotional concerns, then a clear mandate to postpone new nuclear plants should be within reach for the Liberals. It can be superbly argued on economic merits alone, as green energy creates far more jobs and export opportunities, and installs a more sustainable, equitable society.

Pickering was designed for 30 years of operation and I believe it's now been running for over 40 years, In the USA the situation is equally dire, as many plants are running at 110% of capacity, long after their shelf-life has expired.

In Ontario and significant areas of US northeast, we are faced with the opportunity to phase out BOTH coal and nuclear power, and by doing so assume a co-leadership position in the global green energy industry. States such as Ohio, New York, Pennsylvania and Michigan could form a BIG FIVE Great Lakes Green Energy Initiative with Ontario, and co-ordinate a complete transformation of the area's grid, taking it off of coal and nuclear and onto wind, solar, biogas, geothermal and other renewable clean energy sources. Natural gas can be a valuable transitional fuel as we evolve an Infinite Energy-based Electro-Hydrogen Economy.

Having Lake Ontario and Lake Erie governments declare clear timetables for closing down coal-fired and uranium-fueled electricity plants would create thousands of new companies and lead to hundreds of thousands of new jobs over the next 5 to 7 years, injecting life and stability into many hard-hit, financially depressed communities.

Telephone and email your local, regional and national representatives to let them know you support phasing out toxic plants in favor of green energy industries development.

Supermoons link Japan earthquake with Indonesia and Haiti

2011-03-12T20:45:00.000-08:00

2011 Japanese earthquake / tsunami and Supermoon connection

On February 18, 2011, there was a SuperMoon. On March 19/20, 2011, an extreme SuperMoon will occur. A major earthquake (8.9) and tsunami occurred on the Japanese coast of on March 11, 2011.

2010 Haiti earthquake and proximity to Supermoons

On December 31, 2009 there was a SuperMoon and one month later, on January 30, 2010 there was an extreme SuperMoon. Right in the middle of these two Supermoons, there was a major earthquake, a 7.0 event in Haiti on January 12th, that the country is still recovering from.

Supermoon near 2004 Indonesian earthquake and tsunami

The 2004 Indian Ocean earthquake was an undersea megathrust earthquake that occurred at 00:58:53 UTC on Sunday, December 26, 2004, with an epicentre off the west coast of Sumatra, Indonesia. The quake itself is known by the scientific community as the Sumatra-Andaman earthquake. The resulting tsunami is given various names, including the 2004 Indian Ocean tsunami, Asian Tsunami, Indonesian Tsunami, and Boxing Day Tsunami.

AccuWeather Facebook fanpage member Daniel Vogler adds, "The last extreme super moon occurred on January 10th, 2005, right around the time of the 9.0 Indonesia earthquake. That extreme super moon was a new moon. So be forewarned. Something BIG could happen on or around this date. (+/- 3 Days is my guess)"

Understanding Supermoons and Extreme Supermoons

Super Moon - A new or full moon at 90% or greater of its closest perigee to Earth has been named a "SuperMoon" by astrologer Richard Nolle.

Extreme Super Moon - Occurs when a Super Moon when passing closest to Earth. Specifically, an extreme "SuperMoon" is when the moon is full or new as well as at its 100% greater mean perigee (closest) distance to earth. By this definition, last month's full moon, this month's and next month's will all be extreme "SuperMoons".

History of Supermoons and global flooding, earthquakes, tsunamis

Accuweather.com blogger Mark Paquette article on Supermoons

New solar atlas of Los Angeles a valuable energy planning resource

2011-03-12T19:56:00.000-08:00

Photovoltaic solar power potential of Southern California

UCLA's Luskin Center has released a crucial new study focusing on the plentiful photovoltaic solar energy resouces available in the Los Angeles, California region. The atlas (linked below) is designed to help cities and electricity utilities understand their own solar rooftop potential so that they may be better stewards of these resources. Each map presents the geographical distribution of solar potential across neighborhoods and parcels. The maps are accompanied by a description of how the solar potential varies across single- and multi-family residences, commercial and industrial parcels, and non-profit and government parcels since the economic benefits and policy incentives may vary accordingly. Because cost-effectiveness increases with the size of a solar installation, the atlas also presents, for each jurisdiction, the number of potential solar projects by size as well as the total rooftop potential.

Los Angeles County has over 19,000 megawatts of rooftop solar PV potential, while the City of Los Angeles has over 5,500 megawatts.* These maps, which are based on aerial photography of the solarusable rooftop space,** should be viewed as providing long-run estimates of rooftop potential.

Solar Energy Capacity Statistics of the City of Los Angeles

Area 484.3 square miles
Population 4,003,500 (2009 estimate)
Total Potential Sites 464,325
Commercial & Industrial 8.2%
Multi-family 20.9%
Single Family 70.1%
Government or Non-profit 0.8%

Median Rooftop Availability 14.5%
Median Potential of Parcels 3.6 Kilowatts
Median Solar Density Index 8.2%
Total Rooftop Solar Potential 5,536 Megawatts

View online pdf of City of Los Angeles Solar Atlas

Online Guide to Green Energy Investing: Stocks, Mutual Funds, ETFs

2011-03-12T11:17:00.000-08:00

Please bookmark this page in your Favorites, for easy access to ethical green mutual funds, clean energy technology, sustainable investing and alternative energy exchange traded funds.

Renewable Power Stocks, Clean Energy technology websites and blogs

Top Green Energy Company Stocks List

Best Ethical and Green Mutual Funds ETFs

Geothermal Power company stocks symbols

Wind Energy Stocks to Watch

Solar Energy and Renewable Power companies links

PV Intell - Photovoltaic publicly-traded pv solar stocks

21st Century Architecture - Sustainable Green Buildings

Wind Intell wind power investing blog

Rare Earth Strategic Metals investing website

Water Intell - Water purification, tidal energy, wave power technology

A Green Realtor Sustainable Development resources blog

Next stage for China: Secular Humanism

2011-03-05T20:16:00.000-08:00

Chinese leadership put the lie to communism a long time ago, yet the word remains in the name of the nation's largest political party. China is neither communist nor capitalist, it is China-ist, which can be roughly translated as "socialist."

I would venture to claim that China is already moving into secular humanism, and their foresight shown by the rapid expansion of green energy technologies will benefit both their image and economy. Previously I have xpounded on a plan for peaceful democratic evolution in China, and I continue to believe the leaders and people will both benefit more from channelling the democratic energy, rather than fighting it.

It is time for China to officially move beyond the outdated tenets of communism, and join the progressive forces on the planet, the secular humanists.

China needs to let Bob Dylan sing

2011-03-03T13:58:00.000-08:00

Bob Dylan with the recently deceased Suze Rotolo

Dylan tour dates in Shanghai and Beijing under review

Last year Bob Dylan cancelled his entire Asian tour after the Chinese Government denied his application to perform in the country. Ya gotta admire Zimmy's fortitude, as he is right back at it and trying to play in China next month, April 2011.

Robert Allan Zimmerman (Dylan's birth name) is the greatest songwriter of the 20th Century, and of the modern era. China is a major world power, and this crucial artist's tour will be another indication of whether China as an emerging dominant nation is truly ready for the big leagues. Fifty years after the writing of Blowin' in the Wind, it's high time for Dylan to be allowed to sing in front of his Chinese fans.

7-point plan for peaceful democratic evolution in China

Canada suspends diplomatic relations with Libya, closes Tripoli embassy

2011-02-26T08:48:00.000-08:00

PM Harper expected to announce Canadian sanctions on Libya

Six embassy officials plus eighteen other Canadians were among the forty-six people spirited out of Libya overnight, as Ottawa is suspends diplomatic presence in a country now mostly controlled by the democracy protesters, yet whose government clings to power utilizing foreign mercenaries.

The two dozen Canadians were part of a group of British and Australian nationals flown to Malta aboard a C17 overnight Friday.