EclecticLip

(Written May 18.  Posted with minor adjustments June 17.)

The EPIC conference is coming up again — the consumer-oriented kin to the industry-oriented GLOBE conference, it tends to draw a more idealistic crowd.  (And not necessarily as knowledgeable one…)  None the less, when it comes to freebies, it’s a more interesting and rewarding than its businesslike cousin — I use a “shoofoo” bamboo hand towel freebie from Epic 2009, to wipe off my desk at work.

The hand towel is probably a representative microcosm of the stuff flogged at this show: bamboo grows with a virulent quickness, so is assumed to be a “green” material.  But most bamboo products come from China… which doesn’t tend to follow environmentally sound practises.  Analogously, a lot of IKEA wood comes from Russia — which is in the same boat.  (As a side-note, this doesn’t reflect on our formerly-Communist friends — every developed country went through a growth-at-all-cost phase; environmental regulation tends to appear once enough enough people achieve a certain level of material comfort, and presumably political influence.  And admittedly, by this standard Alberta isn’t a developed country yet.    )

Fortunately, Shoo-Foo has respectable third-party certification to ensure its bamboo is grown in an environmentally conscious manner. 

Tickets are $10.  Exhibitors of interest (to me at least) include:

• Metro Vancouver, who would’ve been the hosts of my now-abandoned team-building trip to the local landfill.  Funny how there was a lot more enthusiasm for visiting the local wind turbine.  
• Salt Spring Island Coffee, who reduced their carbon footprint substantially by shipping their beans on the California-to-Vancouver leg of their supply chain, instead of trucking them over, as they used to.*
• EasyPark Vancouver, who — as a parking lot operator — would be an ideal candidate for implementing horizontal geothermal heating-and-cooling for nearby buildings (which is what Wal-Mart is doing in one of their new stores, in Alberta no less, wouldntcha know)
• BCAA, who recently introduced bike-assistance services
• BC Sustainable Energy Association, whose founder’s recent book “101 Solutions to Global Warming” was, uh, “somewhat populated” with errors.  Still trying to figure out how to broach that subject politely… 
• Clif Bar, whose booth is always crowded with freebie-seekers 

…and many, many, many others from the “D-Z” portion of the alphabet.    

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* emissions (and costs) associated with overseas shipping are usually dwarfed by emissions (and costs) from local transport.  This makes sense, since a truck might hold 10 tonnes of goods, but a boat might hold 100,000 tonnes.  Even though the boats emit a lot more than the trucks (they use much dirtier fuels, for one) on a per-tonne basis, they cost and emit much less.  As such, arguments that high fuel prices will reduce globalized trade are likely to be incorrect.  (I’m looking at you, Jeff Rubin!    ) 

High fuel prices causing recessions and decreased demand for goods in general — *that* will more likely hit trade (and thus globalized trade) a lot more.

(Originally written April 19; posted May 12) 

The unpronounceable Icelandic volcano (”Eyjafjallajokull”) that recently disrupted air travellers — including my then-Dubai-bound brother — is small enough that it probably won’t have a cooling impact on the global climate, like other volcanoes.

As such, 2010 remains on-track to exceed 1998 as the hottest year on record based on satellite measurements, as per these charts.  1998 was particularly hot on account of that year having a strong El Nino (2010 in contrast has a moderate El Nino). 

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My employer recently gave me permission to make our book reviews available to the public (once company-specific information was removed), for which I am deeply appreciative.

Here’s the summary for the book club’s first book, The Geography of Hope. 

If you find the review useful, please consider supporting the author by buying the book. 

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The Geography of Hope - summary

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(Originally written March 15.  Posted March 28) 

We’re back from the Diamond Capital of North America(tm), with tales of our quartz-priced travels and gypsum-level accomodations. 

On the flight over, I was struck by the vast expanse of the north — most of the landscape was as empty as the mind of a Zen adept.  It was astonishing, thrilling in a way, to see an entire landscape under the horizon, unoverrun by civilization and unblemished by the mark of man.

On the other end of the spectrum, I was hoping to catch a glimpse of the oil sands from 35000 feet, but sadly Fort MacMurray and its environs were crowded over.  So much for seeing one of the “7 eyesores of the industrial world” with my own eyes.*

The first thing I noticed when stepping off the plane and into the frosty frontier, was that the airport was very small.  You walk off a ramp onto the tarmac and into the terminal building.  Mind you, Yellowknife does have a third small baggage conveyor, to Whitehorse’s two.  And it’s got bilingual ads at the airport — English and Japanese!  Playing to the tourist base, the audio tour of the legislative assembly building is also available in Japanese, as well as the expected English, French, and nine other official languages of the territory.  While there seemed to be more Japanese folks in Yellowknife than Aussies at Whistler, it’s apparently a big draw for German tourists too.  Which means *both* sides of my family tree predisposed me to visit.  In a sense, it may have been my genetic destiny!  (That and invading Russia…  hmm, maybe it’s an Arctic wanderlust thing.)

Back to the igloo-esque legislature building: it’s open on weekends, staffed by a volunteer and a security guard.  Built in 1993, it’s the first permanent legislative building for the Territories.  Prior legislatures met in the ballrooms of Yellowknife hotels, with occasional “road trips” hither and yon; maybe an attempt to neutralize the Yellowknifers’ home field advantage.    The NWT flag was actually designed by a Manitoba high schooler, who in 1969 won $1000 for his inspiration, about thirty times what graphic design student Caroline Davidson was paid three years later, for designing the Nike Swoosh.  (To Phil Knight’s credit — did I just write that? — he later gave her an envelope-full of Nike stock.)

Fair to say that things are pretty relaxed up in the Territories — someone outside can look all the way into the legislative chamber while they’re in session.  Reinforcing this impression, the security guard at the offices of Joint Task Force North told me that, even though the Canadian Forces were a “diet Coke of a military” he was “pretty sure” the building didn’t offer tours.  He then suggested a couple tourist venues I might consider visiting during my stay.

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* this is my list, in no particular order; readers’ private lists may vary:

- Ohio’s pride, the Cuyahoga River, which caught fire a record thirteen times over the years  
      (note: since cleaned up)
      (note 2: I sure hope that’s a record…)

- the great manure lagoons of the factory farms of the American midwest

- the Yanacocha Mine in Peru: a “cyanide fortified” open pit gold mine as big as the tax havens where its investors probably hide their winnings: bigger than Luxembourg and Liechtenstein, it’s a whisker smaller than the Cayman Islands

- the Great Pacific Ocean Garbage Patch         (filed in Wikipedia under that very name!) 

- the Chernobyl Exclusion Zone 
      (note: in the quarter-century since 300,000 people were evacuated, wildlife seem to be thriving there)

- Alberta’s oil sands tailing ponds

- Exxon Headquarters in Texas - scientific illiteracy central

(incidentally, three score and ten years before Exxon started funding global warming deniers, the President of Union Oil bankrolled the publication and distribution of three million copies of the first American Christian Fundamentalist tracts.  Fun guys, those oil barons…)

Newsweek ran a story awhile back on how “big oil’s gone green for real”.  (Though the correct phrase would be “big oil’s gone greenwashing for real”.)

A sample looks-good-at-first-glance sentence is the following:

In fact, while companies like BP and Shell are cutting back on commercial projects in wind and solar, Big Oil is taking a closer look at how they might be used to increase efficiency internally, or to free up increasingly profitable fossil fuels, like natural gas, for commercial sale.

If going green means cutting back on alternative energy programs, George W Bush should’ve won the Nobel Peace Prize.    Increasing efficiency is something any good business does, so that’s not a real mark of improvement.  And the stated reason for pursuing natural gas is money-green, not sustainability-green.
As it turns out, this is a case of advertiser-funded media gone awry.  From ClimateProgress:

Newsweek since 2007 has sold advertising packages to the oil industry’s biggest influence group that included the right to co-host forums on energy issues, including two where members of Congress sat side-by-side on panels with the association’s president.

American Petroleum Institute ranks among advertisers that have reached a spending threshold that allows them to attach their name to a Newsweek event and have their top executive as a panel speaker…

…journalism and ethics experts decried the arrangement.

“You’re selling access,” said Edward Wasserman, Knight professor of journalism ethics at Washington and Lee University in Lexington, Va. “Newsweek is using its reputation as a great news organization to convene these officeholders to talk about public policy. Then it’s renting out a space at the table for one of its customers who would not be at the table if not for giving money to Newsweek”…

To mark this occasion, and in light of the current goings-on at Copenhagen, I put together a “Big Oil Hierarchy of Denial”, along the lines of Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs and the Five Stages of Grief.  Sort of a guidebook to the different stages that Exxon & co have gone through, over the years.  Enjoy!

Note: the list is to be read from the bottom up. 

We went on a double date on Saturday with some friends, to the Metro Vancouver landfill in Delta.  (There was an open house, and being the romantic type that I am…)  We spent a couple hours there and saw all the highlights — the mountains of garbage, the compost piles, huge machinery (sitting idle), and Teamsters (funnily enough, also sitting idle). 

Some of the trucks were basically steamrollers with spiky knobs on the wheels; the vehicular equivalent of high heels, I suppose.  The knobs concentrate the weight of the vehicle, compressing the mountains of trash.  (And there are several mountains.)

There were maybe a dozen booths set up — like a small farmer’s market — where one could pick up materials from BC Hydro PowerSmart, local composting or wildlife groups.  Unlike any farmer’s market I’d been to though, they had volunteers grilling up hot dogs and burgers (free ones!).  There was pop, but no bottled water, funnily enough. 

There were also some falconers — falcons are brought in occasionally to scare away seagulls; some contractors even train the falcons not just to intimidate, but to kill.  With that in mind, I asked if the falcons could be used against Canada geese; but it seems the latter don’t scare easily.  I believe the falconer’s words were “oh, no - they’d probably kill [falcon’s name which I’ve forgotten]”.  Frankly, I’d've thought a pirate with a falcon would have gotten more props than pirates with parrots, but what do I know?  I’d've thought the frilly, puffy-sleeved shirts didn’t convey menace very well, either. 

I did ask Metro Vancouver Wastewater Treatment if they had open houses; sadly, they don’t.  I’ll have to book a private appointment.  They did say that they can tell when each period of a playoff game ends, ’cause everyone gets up and uses the washroom at once.

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As for the Eat! Vancouver show, all the usual suspects were there — Freedom 55, Club Intrawest (time-shares), Tourism Barbados…

As is now the custom at these shows, they handed out reusable plastic bags at the entrance, this time from Bosa Foods.  Puzzlingly, my resuable bag contained a disposable plastic bag in which the freebies were placed.  (My two co-show goers’ bags were disposables-free.)  Given how popular these are as handouts, one wonders how many reusable (but unused) plastic bags now line the continent’s closets and pantries.  Marc Jaccard, who studies the effectiveness of climate legislation at SFU, points out that most people have unused compact fluorescent lights in their closets, because — like him — they bought more than they could install.  The underlying point is that these devices don’t save energy (or in the case of the bags, plastic) unless they’re actually used.

The folks from Liberation BC (an animal welfare group) were there; from them I learned that the SPCA actually has a certificate program to identify livestock producers who treat the animals less cruelly.  They were seated beside a local pork farmer, and seemed politely resigned to their situation’s irony.  The fellow sells sausages at the local farm markets, so presumably doesn’t use factory farming techniques, which are fairly capital intensive.

They also pointed me to the Rabbit River Farms booth, home of BC’s first SPCA-approved eggs.  Looking at the surprisingly richly-hued contents of the egg basket they’d brought, I realized that I’d come to assume that not only did eggs only come in white or brown, but that they only came in one specific shade each of white or brown.  The baskets contained eggs which were Small, Medium and Large, and a few half again as large, euphemistically referred to as “Ouch”.  Apparently, as hens get older they produce fewer but bigger eggs.  Sort of like Beethoven with his symphonies, I guess.

The folks from Island Farms were there too, with samples of cantaloupe-flavoured ice cream, which comes in containers labelled with bigger Chinese characters than Western.  Melon-flavoured ice cream is pretty big in Japan, so I suppose they’re targeting Asian tastes.  Avalon Dairy was there also.  The purveyors of bottled milk had developed an Omega-3 enriched milk product, sold as Vitala.  (Before I continue, I can’t help commenting that the impact of making and transporting glass bottles is almost certainly larger than the impact of a landfilled-after-one-use Tetra Pak.  It’s a case where a twentieth-century packaging solution is better than the older nineteenth-century one.)

But I digress.  Vitala milk is Omega-3 enriched.  I asked whether they feed the cows a high-flax diet (a trick used by some companies to make eggs’ yolks a deeper yellow, and allow Omega-3 claims to be made) — and that was true.  But there was more.  Their diet is tuna-enriched.  (Our cat doesn’t even get a tuna-enriched diet!  Well, not all that often.)  Tuna, which sits near the top of the marine food web, reduced to a bovine nutritional supplement…  (”Mercury-fortified”!    )

While the cows get factory dregs (the “mechanically separated meat” equivalent of the fish-food industry) the predator-to-prey ratio is like a pyramid: you need a lot at the bottom of the food web to support a few at the top.  (Hmm… not unlike manager-employee ratios, come to think of it…)  Taking the top levels down to the base of another pyramid is astonishingly inefficient; it’d be like growing wildebeest to feed lions to fatten giraffes.

I’ve been contacting folks from various sectors in the past couple months to get a better understanding of what authentic sustainability implies.  Having started correspondences with folks in manufacturing, I recently turned to mining.  And so it was that I had lunch last week with a friend of a friend — or technically, an acquaintance of an acquaintance — with the purpose of learning about the environmental considerations (or lack thereof) in mining nowadays.  Somewhere along the way, we got sidetracked and at one point wound up discussing the difficulties early Mahayana Buddhist missionairies had translating their sutras from Sanskrit to Chinese, given that the former is an alphabetic Indo-European language and the latter, pictographic Sino-Tibetan.  I can only imagine how much they struggled with chopsticks…

Turns out he’d majored in Sanskrit and minored in (classical) Chinese back in the day.  As you might imagine, he had noooooo idea about technical matters, but gave me the names of several folks who do know that stuff, to follow up with.  He paid for lunch too, which was great; though if he’d told me in advance, I’d've ordered dessert. 

I did find out that a mid-nineties American poll ranked mining companies even lower than tobacco companies in public perception — and that was fifteen years of environmental devastation ago!  Also, Rio Tinto Alcan (generally regarded as one of the world’s most progressive miners nowadays, they even got kudos from Jared Diamond in Collapse) takes its name from a region in southern Spain, where mining has gone on since Gilgamesh wrestled Enkidu in ancient Sumeria.  (In fairness to Enkidu, Gilgamesh was an unwelcome wedding crasher.)  The Tinto River is so acidic that after the medieval Arabs discovered sulfuric acid, they named the Tinto the “river of vitriol” in its honour.  Extremophile microbes are actually responsible for the acidity, which drops the river pH down to 2.0 — three times as acidic as Coca-Cola!  (Coke has a pH of 2.5, but pH being a logarithmic measure, a pH change of 1 unit represents a tenfold acidity difference, and 0.5 units a roughly threefold difference.)

That said, we who recoil most at scabrous mine sites — open sores on the world’s natural splendour — are generally the greatest recipients of their bounty, through our laptops, iPods, autos — even our electrical wiring and indoor plumbing.  To misquote Al Gore, it’s an irritating truth.

As a follow up to the Peter Senge lecture (previously noted here) I should note that there was an awkward moment during the Q&A when a participant demanded to know why Mr. Senge hadn’t discussed the need for ethical vegetarianism, alongside his discussion of the need to reduce greenhouse gas emissions, and the other damage we are wreaking on the environment. To his credit, Mr. Senge deflected the question nicely, acknowledging the reduced footprint of a vegetarian diet, then segueway-ing into a discussion on the need for collaborative instead of confrontative approaches.

Because the other participant — as well meaning as they were — was a fratricidal ally, turning their fury on the very like-minded people they need to leverage, to get their own message heard. Such splintering seems pretty common in environmental circles; I can imagine an activist vegan calling out the aforementioned participant and arguing that ethical vegetarianism wasn’t enough, and that veganism was the way to go.  And so forth.  It’s like the scene in Monty Python’s Life of Brian where the People’s Front of Judea, the Judean People’s Front, the Judean Popular People’s Front, and the Popular Front of Judea don’t speak to each other.
On the far-left side of Canadian politics, the Marxist-Leninists and Communists certainly don’t seem to talk, as evidenced by data from the last election.  On the other end, it took a very long time to unite the Canadian right, with the Progressive Conservatives (”right lite”) and Alliance party (”far right” by historical Canadian standards) eventually merging into the Conservative Party, after a decade of counter-productive internecine strife.  (I’m counting from the 1993 election, a breakthrough for the Reform Party, to the 2003 merger.)
Fratricidal allies make it tougher for an umbrella movement (in this case the environmental movement) to gain critical mass, as they disrupt the umbrella movement’s messaging. Such withering criticism would be seized on by opponents to delegitimize the umbrella movement’s efforts, ultimately impairing the fratricidal ally’s own goals.
A more productive long-term strategy would probably be to gain buy-in from the umbrella organization.  But as long as there are absolutists out there, I suppose there’ll be plenty of people trying to catch flies with vinegar instead of honey.  Given the urgency associated with climate change, I can see how various groups might feel there’s not enough time to build influence in the greater movement, and thus switch from “friendly” to “fratricidal” tactics.

I attended the Peter Senge lecture at the Vancouver Board of Trade yesterday. He’s the MIT lecturer who wrote “The Fifth Discipline” years ago, about learning organizations. His latest is “The Necessary Revolution”, about corporate efforts to develop true, legitimate, authentic sustainability. He made some very interesting comments, detailed below the fold:

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This is the most encouraging news I’ve seen coming out of Alberta in a good long while. Sadly, the Globe and Mail still has a ridiculous paywall policy for anything more than a week old.  So, in case this is being read after end-Feb, the news is this: the tar sands lobby has splintered!

Like Joe Biden in a Vice-Presidential debate, I’ll repeat that one more time: the tar sands lobby has splintered!  Good to see the dirty-oil campaign has won some success.

This is a classic divide-and-conquer victory: fracturing your opponents and getting them to outflank each other, instead of you.  Wonderful stuff.

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Basically, newer tar sands players using maybe-not-quite-as-lethally-destructive steam-assisted gravity-drainage extraction (SAGD) are trying to separate themselves from traditional tar sands miners.

The process is even more energy intensive than traditional tar sands mining, but it should be possible to extract the bitumen without denuding the boreal forest above.  The process should use less fresh water, and eliminates the need for visible-from-space tailings ponds.

While the only “clean” tar sands are the ones left in the ground, I think SAGD could be marginally less environmentally destructive, on the whole.  Whether a lifecycle analysis confirms this or shows otherwise, it is absolutely refreshing to see the tar sands lobby splintering.