Green Connections Radio

Lynne Cherry on Earth Day 2013

greenconnections — Sat, 04 May 2013 15:07:29 +0000

“Kids have power.. and once kids know how much power they have to make change, they start acting.” Join in with Lynn Cherry, film producer and author of over thirty children’s books pertaining to climate change, during this year’s Earth Day celebration at Union Station in Washington D.C.

Indian Women and Energy

greenconnections — Mon, 22 Apr 2013 02:42:57 +0000

Why the two are inextricably connected

Hinsi Hazda, rushes to finish her daily chores as the sun sets in Tentala, Odisha, India. Like many rural hamlets in India, Hinsi’s village of Tentala is off the power grid, and the only way to see well enough to complete her daily chores is by the light of the sun.

Living in the U.S. now, it’s hard to see my home country on one hand developed, on the other hand very much developing, and plagued by poverty and violence against women. New Delhi, once fondly recalled as my birthplace, is now infamous worldwide for a rape case.

According to some 2011 estimates, there are currently 50 million missing women in India. This gap in males and females can be attributed to a variety of causes, from gendered abortions before the female children are ever born, to infanticides and female brutality after the women are actually brought into the world.

Hinsi’s story brings these two together. In villages throughout India, the duties of procuring the sources for the energy fall upon the women. They are the ones given the task of gathering wood for their fires, and they are the primary users of their household’s energy. Currently, around 400 million Indians do not have access to electricity. That’s 25 percent more people than currently live in the U.S. altogether.

On a larger scale, India only has the capacity to meet 90% of the population’s energy demand, which has led to the slowing of industrial production, and thus, a major hit to the economy. Moreover, two thirds of the electric sources in India are fossil fuel based, with a whopping 56.65 percent coming from coal.

Kerosene and firewood are also popular sources of heating and power in rural India. Besides being environmentally unfriendly, on a micro-economic scale, this is an extremely expensive and inefficient way for India’s poorest to power their homes. Kerosene is an extremely expensive fuel long-term, and besides being expensive, many health issues are attributed to the use of this fossil fuel.

Many NGOs and multinational organizations have put the two together to create a win-win: targeting women’s energy habits may be a way to help mitigate fossil fuel usage in rural India. Their programs increase the women’s knowledge base and change their energy usage habits to change the distribution of energy sources in the country.

A majority of the programs provide the villages with solar lanterns and solar powered light bulbs as a replacement for kerosene and wood burning. The kerosene and wood burning are a major source of pollution and respiratory disease within the rural households. Calculations on the effectiveness of solar lanterns illustrate that just one solar lantern with a 10-year life reduces 1.5 tons of carbon dioxide emissions and replaces hundreds of gallons of kerosene.

The solar initiative programs are changing the energy structure in India in a variety of ways. Some seek to educate women so they can build and maintain their own solar powered light bulbs and sources. The Indian government, the United Nations Foundation and an NGO called The Social Work and Research Center have implemented these projects all over India. Women are trained to run the energy programs in their villages, and they sell this energy to others in the vicinity of the microgrid. This grants them the ability to independently contribute to the financial requirements of their family.

Other programs, like those of Lighting a Billion Lives and The Self-Employed Women’s Association provide solar lanterns to women, allowing them to start and run their own small businesses.

Empowering Women – Both Economically and with More Power and Light

The solar lanterns initiatives allow women to have lighting at night. This gives them the ability to manufacture goods in their home without infringing on the time they need to spend on domestic duties. They can sell the goods they manufacture at a profit, thereby creating a small-scale matriarch run business. Much like the solar engineers, the solar powered entrepreneurship effectively increases the social and economic capacity of rural Indian women.

The success stories from satisfied women emerge from all over India: villages that have never seen electricity suddenly have power. Women are now given the ability to be economic contributors to their household. They are given technical and entrepreneurial training in a country where gender selective education is a major issue in households.

That is a big step for rural Indian women. These women serve as role models to the youth, showing their daughters and nieces and younger siblings that they too can be scientists and engineers. Green energy gives women in India the ability to enter the market.

In Hinsi’s village of Tentala, women like Dumini Murmu and Arati Mahanta have become entrepreneurs. In the light of the solar lanterns, these women create goods that can be sold to town vendors, adding to the income of their household. Suddenly, these women have the ability to earn substantial income for their families and have greater stature in the community — and to serve as an inspiration to women around them. Hopefully, they will teach Hinsi these skills soon too.

I watch with pride as my homeland ignited, village-by-village, by the shining light of progress.

Listen to Aneri Patel of the U.N. Sustainable Energy for All initiative tell Green Connections Radio™ host Joan Michelson about programs that are bringing both light and economic empowerment – and the increased safety that comes with them – to parts of rural South Asia. http://www.greenconnectionsradio.com/aneri-patel/

Blog Written by Arzoo Malhotra, Production Assistant & Researcher

Fact Sources:

http://www.nytimes.com/2005/11/24/opinion/24iht-edswami.html?_r=0

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-19059213

http://www.nbr.org/research/activity.aspx?id=181

http://labl.teriin.org/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&
id=6&Itemid=137

http://www.indg.in/rural-energy/rural-energy/re-women-energy/

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/01/04/india-rape-capital-delhi-self-defense_n_2406866.html

http://www.undp.org/content/india/en/home/ourwork/environmentandenergy/successstories/renewable_energyforrurallivelihoods/

http://labl.teriin.org/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=12&story=27&Itemid=133

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/betwa-sharma/post_1716_b_821762.html

http://www.waterprofessionals.com/pdfs/fuel_energy.pdf

http://large.stanford.edu/courses/2011/ph240/machala1/

“Green Gadgets – Some We Like, Some We Don’t”

greenconnections — Tue, 16 Apr 2013 01:26:17 +0000

Nest: A Winner for Your Home/Office Energy Bill

Thermostats control half of your home’s energy. So being able to program yours can save you a lot of money in the long run – up to 20% on your heating and cooling bill. Yet most people don’t do it. Why? Because, well, it’s complicated. This is all according to the website of the new Nest thermostat. Nest is hoping to simplify it.

The Department of Energy concurs that, “By turning your thermostat back 10 degrees to 15 degrees for 8 hours, you can save 5 percent to 15 percent a year on your heating bill — a savings of as much as 1 percent for each degree if the setback period is eight hours long.”

The new Nest thermostat is designed to be user-friendly, to make it easier for you to control the heating and cooling of your home – and therefore save money and energy. After just a few days, the technology claims to learn your preferences and program itself automatically.

According to Nest’s numbers, 89% of programmable thermostats waste energy – that comes out to an average loss of about $173 a year in your energy bill. Considering these potential savings, the initial spending seems to pay off.

One feature I think is cool allows the homeowner to view their heating and cooling history for the past ten days online via new smartphone apps. This way, you can see your thermostat and home temperature sendings from wherever you happen to be.

Another feature, called Airwave, “can cut cooling costs up to 30% by shutting off the air conditioner early and using the fan to spread cool air,” explains an article on green news site treehugger.com.

Leadership Team of First-Class Innovators

Nest CEO Tony Faddell and Co-Founder Matt Rogers brought their experience at Apple in innovative product development, where they designed the first iPod. Fadell led iPod and iPhone development for eight years, and through 18 iPod generations, while Rogers worked in the iPod division of Apple, leading 30 engineers.

The impressive credentials of the Nest team bodes well for their success. Yoky Matsuoka, the Vice President of Technology at Nest – and the only female member of their 10-member leadership team (according to the website) – is the former Head of Innovation at Google, and was a professor of Computer Science and Engineering at the University of Washington before joining Nest. Her impressive resume also contains an MS from UC Berkeley and a PhD in Electrical Engineering and Computer Science from MIT. As if that wasn’t impressive enough, Matsuoka also won the MacArthur Genius Award for her work in robotics and neuroscience.

Will it Break the Bank?

The price for the most current Nest is $249.95 at Amazon, the home improvement store Lowes, Best Buy, the Apple Store, and on the Nest online store. It is also available for purchase through local certified professionals – you can find one near you here. But that’s not the only cost.

There is the additional cost of professional installation; Nest.com quotes the installation fee as $199 for the first installation, and $25 for any additional installations in the future. Most conventional thermostats sell for under $200, so the Nest is slightly pricier.

The average U.S. home utility bill is $103.67 a month, and heating and cooling costs make up 54 percent of this. This means that the average monthly cost of heating and cooling a home is about $55.98; annually, that’s $671.96. Saving 5 percent to 15 percent per year, means that you’ll recoup the costs of your Nest thermostat and installation fee in as soon as five years.

“Conventional” thermostats nowadays are digital, electronic thermostats that are not programmable – although some old-fashioned, dial-operated thermostats do still exist. ConsumerReports.org provides an analysis of the best kind of thermostats to purchase for your home.

Thermostat Type	Cost (approximate)	Benefits
Digital	$150.00- $200.00	Affordability, including lower maintenance costs; control the temperature in a specific room
Programmable (like Nest)	$249.00	Annual savings of up to $180; user-friendly; can be set remotely

On top of all of these benefits, people in the in technology industry are applauding Nest’s efficiency. Jim Rogers, CEO of Duke Energy (the largest utility in the U.S.) mentioned Nest as an example of consumer technologies that are reducing demand for electricity (on Platt’s Energy Week in March 2013).

So, whether or not you go for Nest depends on whether you see savings for your home, want to do your part to reduce energy consumption, and whether you like fun new gadgets.

Blog By Carly Buchanan, Production Assistant and Researcher

Image from www.nest.com

Martin Luther King and The Call to Direct Action On Climate

greenconnections — Tue, 16 Apr 2013 01:18:26 +0000

Posted: 14 Apr 2013 09:31 AM PDT from the Center for American Progress

Van Jones and I have published the following op-ed in “The Miami Herald” and many other McClatchy newspapers. It will be the first in a series on the moral dimensions of climate change.

“Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere,”wrote Martin Luther King Jr. from a Birmingham jail on April 16, 1963. “We are caught in an inescapable network of mutuality, tied in a single garment of destiny.”The Atlanta-based King was explaining why he was in prison for nonviolent demonstrations so far from home, responding to a critical public statement by eight Southern white religious leaders.His words are timeless and universal in part because King was a master of language but primarily because he viewed civil rights through a moral lens. The greater the moral crisis, the more his words apply.The greatest moral crisis of our time is the threat posed to billions – and generations yet unborn – from unrestricted carbon pollution. Now more than ever, we are “tied in a single garment of destiny,” cloaked as a species in a protective climate that we are in the process of unraveling.Many have criticized the demonstrations against the Keystone XL pipeline, which would open a major spigot to the Canadian tar sands, as unwarranted and untimely – unwarranted given our broad dependence on fossil fuels and untimely because of our struggling economy. We disagree.We think there has been far too little direct action, given the staggering scale of the threat. As the International Energy Agency has explained, we must leave the vast majority of fossil fuels in the ground if we are to preserve a livable climate and avoid levels of warming that “even school children know” will be catastrophic for us all. The tar sands would be near the top of any list of the largest, dirtiest pools of carbon that must be forsaken for the sake of humanity.

King explained in his letter, “In any nonviolent campaign there are four basic steps: collection of the facts to determine whether injustices exist; negotiation; self purification; and direct action.”

Has there ever been a problem where more facts from more unimpeachable sources have been collected and ignored than climate change? Every major scientific body and international group has taken to begging and pleading for action.

Last fall, the World Bank – no bastion of eco-consciousness – issued a report aimed to “shock us into action.” It warned that “we’re on track for a 4-degree Celsius warmer world marked by extreme heat-waves, declining global food stocks, loss of ecosystems and biodiversity, and life-threatening sea level rise.”

If we don’t act now, then, within decades, a large fraction of the world’s 9 billion people will find themselves living in places whose once stable climate simply now can’t sustain them – either because it is too hot or arid, the land is no longer arable, their glacially fed rivers are drying up, or the seas are rising too fast.

The overwhelming majority of those suffering the most – in this country and especially abroad – will be people who contributed little or nothing whatsoever to the problem.

This would be the greatest injustice in human history, irreversible on a time scale of centuries.

Has there ever been a problem subject to more failed negotiations? The international climate talks have been going on for a quarter century, full of sound and fury, but thwarted in large part by a U.S. Senate that itself talks to death every serious climate bill.

By “self-purification,” King meant preparing the group of protestors for the rigors and trials of nonviolent demonstration. But it’s his thoughts on another group that strike nearest now: “I have been gravely disappointed with the white moderate,” he wrote in words that apply to today’s moderate, status quo intelligentsia of every color. “Shallow understanding from people of good will is more frustrating than absolute misunderstanding from people of ill will. Lukewarm acceptance is much more bewildering than outright rejection.”

We understand why the fossil fuel industry works to block Congressional inaction and funds what has become the most effective disinformation campaign in history. We are bewildered by those who claim to accept climate science, but feel no urgency to act.

As King put it, “We will have to repent in this generation not merely for the vitriolic words and actions of the bad people but for the appalling silence of the good people.”

Especially relevant are King’s words about time: “All that is said here grows out of a tragic misconception of time. It is the strangely irrational notion that there is something in the very flow of time that will inevitably cure all ills.”

As King explains, time “can be used either destructively or constructively. I am coming to feel that the people of ill will have used time much more effectively than the people of good will.” We feel the same.

Certainly nothing compares to the centuries of racial injustice King was impatient about. But each year brings an ever-worsening array of megadroughts and superstorms juiced by global warming like a baseball player on steroids. Each year brings higher emissions and ever more dire studies.

We know we’re fast approaching climatic tipping points — the loss of Arctic sea ice, the disintegration of the great ice sheets, the release of vast amounts of carbon from the permafrost, Dust-Bowlification of much of the world’s arable land – that are irreversible and catastrophic.

Even once-reticent climatologists are speaking out because, as Dr. Lonnie Thompson has written, “Virtually all of us are now convinced that global warming poses a clear and present danger to civilization.” Others, like James Hansen and Jason Box, have themselves joined direct action and been arrested for it.

It is past time for many more to speak out, and for many more to join direct action.

We end with King on the need to act now: “There comes a time when the cup of endurance runs over, and men are no longer willing to be plunged into the abyss of despair. I hope, sirs, you can understand our legitimate and unavoidable impatience.”

ABOUT THE WRITERS

Van Jones is president of Rebuild the Dream and author of “Rebuild the Dream.” Joseph Romm runs ClimateProgress.org and is author of “Language Intelligence: Lessons on Persuasion from Jesus, Shakespeare, Lincoln, and Lady Gaga.”



Silver Linings Playbook: Exxon Says Wildlife Hit By Arkansas Spill Were Mostly ‘Reptiles, Primarily Venomous Snakes’Posted: 14 Apr 2013 08:06 AM PDT

Oily snakes — or snake oil?

Sure, you thought nothing good could come from ExxonMobil’s pipeline spill of some 200,000 gallons into the residential streets of Mayflower, Arkansas. After all, it was “low-quality Wabasca Heavy crude oil from Alberta.” And a technicality has spared Exxon from having to pay any money into the fund that will be covering most of the clean up costs — a 1980 law ensures that diluted bitumen is not classified as oil.

But ExxonMobil reports from the Mayflower Incident Unified Command Joint Information Center that even this cloud of oil has a silver lining:

The majority of the impacted wildlife has been reptiles, primarily venomous snakes.

Strangely, HuffPost reports, “According to its Facebook page, the Helping Arkansas Wild Kritters (HAWK) Center, which has worked to help scores of animals hurt by the March 29 spill, has not rescued any venomous snakes, but has cared for many birds.”



Is 70 Percent Renewable Power Possible? Portugal Just Did It For 3 MonthsPosted: 14 Apr 2013 06:06 AM PDT

Alto Lindoso (Image credit: Energias de Portugal)

Portugal’s electricity network operator announced that renewable energy supplied 70 percent of total consumption in the first quarter of this year. This increase was largely due to favorable weather conditions resulting in increased wind and water flow, as well as lower demand. Portuguese citizens are using less energy and using sources that never run out for the vast majority of what they do use.

Hydropower supplied most: Hydroelectric power supplied 37 percent of total electricity — a 312 percent increase compared to last year.

Wind turbines broke a record: Wind energy represented 27 percent of the total share, which is 60 percent higher than last year. This is 37 percent above average and good for the highest amount generated by wind in Portugal, ever.

2.3 percent less energy used: Energy consumption has fallen every year since 2010 and is now at 2006 levels. Some of the drop this quarter was due to fewer working days and a warmer winter, but even controlling for those factors, there was still a drop of .4 percent.

Not so much solar: Solar energy supplies only .7 percent of total energy demand, according to 2012 figures (Q1 2013 figures were not available for solar). This constitutes 225.5 MW in total photovoltaic capacity.

Dropping the fossil fuel habit: Portugal’s electricity had 29 percent less coal and 44 percent less gas in it from 2012 figures. The country must import the fossil fuels it burns.

For sale: Portugal exported what would have been 6 percent of total electricity consumption to other countries. It will also be able to sell a chunk of its allotted carbon credits offered by the EU’s carbon trading system.

Actually 70 percent isn’t unheard of for Portugal. For a few hours in 2011, Portugal was entirely run on renewable power. Yet this was the first time so much was sustained for a quarter.

Portugal’s investment in modernizing its electricity grid in 2000 has come in handy. Like in many countries, power companies owned their own transmission lines. What the government did in 2000 was to buy all the lines, creating a publicly owned and traded company to operate them. This was used to create a smart grid that renewable energy producers could connect to (encouraged by government-organized auctions to build new wind and hydro plants). In 2010, the New York Times reported on Portugal’s renewable energy push that started in earnest in 2005:

Five years ago, the leaders of this sun-scorched, wind-swept nation made a bet: To reduce Portugal’s dependence on imported fossil fuels, they embarked on an array of ambitious renewable energy projects — primarily harnessing the country’s wind and hydropower, but also its sunlight and ocean waves…. Nearly 45 percent of the electricity in Portugal’s grid will come from renewable sources this year, up from 17 percent just five years ago.

There was a massive amount of skepticism over the plan at the time. The Prime Minister at the time, José Sócrates, noted that the nation’s network of electric car charging stations elicited ridicule — including former Italian Prime Minister Silvio Burlusconi who jokingly offered to build him an electric Ferrari. While a totally electric version isn’t available, the fastest Ferrari ever wasunveiled last month, and it’s a hybrid.

Some locals complained about higher utility bills or the green economy bypassing them, while others were thrilled. The Mayor of Moura explained that the reason his town got the nation’s largest solar plant was because it “gets the most sun of anywhere in Europe and has lots of useless space.”

So now that it demonstrated the ability to generate 70 percent renewable energy for 3 months, where does Portugal go from here? Oddly enough, it does not have much in the way of offshore wind capacity — only 2 MW. The recent economic situation and austerity programs have endangered not only jobs and commerce, but continued investment in renewable energy and electric vehicles. Yet saving on the cost of having to import fossil fuels will be helpful for decades to come, and as its economy improves, it will have a strong renewable electricity grid to rely upon.

Other countries have been making steps of their own on renewable power production. The U.S. had a record-breaking year for wind energy in 2012, growing by 28 percent. Sweden is looking to haveno dependence on oil by 2020. Australia could be looking at 100 percent renewable energy by 2030. Global solar power world will soon be a net-positive energy source.

Transformational Technologies on the Frontier of the Green Economy

greenconnections — Sun, 31 Mar 2013 17:21:15 +0000

What technologies today offer credible solutions to “green” the economy and provide a hard dollar return on investment?

There are plenty of “nice ideas,” but the key is for them to be economically sustainable and pragmatic. Pragmatic. That means they work and can improve profitability or reduce costs substantially and attract investment to deploy them. This is the stuff that drives business and responsible government leaders. Without wide deployment, the environmental impact will still be only on (recycled) paper. Here are two that could make a real difference, and are still under the radar:

Transforming Industrial Waste into Valuable Green Chemicals:

New Sky Energy is transforming industrial waste into valuable chemicals through award winning CO2-negative chemical manufacturing technologies. They make clean chemistry and water treatment profitable by converting companies’ industrial wastes into the chemicals many industries buy every day.

They do this with a patented new version of industrial electrolysis, or electromechanical conversion, combined with a special reverse osmosis process that also generates useful carbon-negative by-products. Its by-products include: carbonates (e.g., soda ash, limestone), acids (e.g., sulfuric or hydrochloric acid), bases (e.g., sodium hydroxide), and gases (e.g., hydrogen, oxygen).

Why would any company buy it? New Sky says that it can save industrial company customers significant amounts of money and help them gain control over their supply chains, while also cleaning up their industrial wastewater, allowing them to eliminate harmful chlorine and reduce CO2 emissions. For example, New Sky inked a deal last fall to help 212 Resources convert wastewater from oil and gas operations into cleaner “engineered water” that can be used in oil and gas drilling and production, reducing the need for environmentally-unfriendly chemicals to be used in the wastewater.

Their new process reduces purchasing costs, eliminates salt and CO2 waste, minimizes transportation costs, and reduces emissions. They also use renewable and off-peak electricity. New Sky won the 2012 Imagine H2O Prize and was a top national finalist in the national 2009 Clean Tech Open.

Watching How Your Driving Style Might Reduce CO2 and GHG, and Lower Your Fuel Costs:

How much gas do you use and emissions do you emit with your driving style? It’s sobering to see your lead foot have a price other than the perennial speeding ticket risk. The premise of Driving Change is that fast starts and hard stops, speeding, and idling all increase the amount of fuel vehicles burn by as much as 30-40 percent and increases carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions as well.

Enviance claims that by accurately and precisely measuring your driving behaviors, and putting in place driver-feedback mechanisms to improve them, drivers will save significantly on fuel costs and emissions. Driver-heavy companies might also improve their “green” reputation by having Driving Change on their fleets, for example.

So how does this work? A telematics device installed on each vehicle transmits data on idling, speed, aggressive driving, and fuel consumption via a wireless data network to an Internet system that analyzes that data and produces reports and ‘dashboards’ that show real time fuel consumption and CO2 emissions. Drivers can securely access personal driving and emissions information through this website anytime. Managers and fleet supervisors will also be able to access “roll up” reports that compare performance, and provide tools to help managers set goals for improvements (and compare how departments perform).

The goal is that with this data, managers can implement strategies that change behaviors that in turn reduce costs, both environmental and monetary. Driving Change is also working on new enhancements that will provide driver friendly tonal feedback in real time to inform drivers when they approach and exceed thresholds.

The first pilot of Driving Change was by the City and County of Denver, which claims it helped improve their fuel efficiency by 15 percent, including using team competitions and positive driver incentives. Applying that result to a fleet of 1,000 vehicles, major fleets might realize savings up to $500 thousand each year, the company says. GSA and the Department of Defense have federal pilot programs underway at Camp Lejeune with the goal of reducing fuel use by 20 percent, and reducing the corresponding emissions.

It should be interesting to see how those pilot programs work — and if any major automakers are interested in making this technology standard on their vehicles. That seems to be where the major economic and environmental value would be.

Written by David Bingaman, our own Operations Advisor and Business Correspondent

Check Out EarthPreservers.com

greenconnections — Thu, 21 Mar 2013 19:57:49 +0000

Earth Preservers is here to educate and expand the green business world through environmental newsletters and relevant website links. Click here to learn more about how to find jobs in the green realm and also understand the importance of green jobs and business!

Economics of Green Energy

greenconnections — Mon, 18 Mar 2013 18:27:17 +0000

Secretary Chu and Elon Musk, participating in a fireside chat at the ARPA-E convention. Steve Clemmons moderated the event.Photo Credit: Sarah Gerrity, Energy Department Date Taken: 02/26/2013 -14:18

In the current global economic climate, does the investment in green energy make sense?

With the U.S. mired in political gridlock, “sequester” spending cuts taking effect, and an economy riddled with unemployment, does a focus on green energy make sense in this financial climate? Will there be a job for me in this field when I graduate college in 2014?

The speakers and panelists I heard at the 2013 ARPA-E 2013 helped me answer these questions.

Tesla and Space X founder and CEO Elon Musk said sustainable energy is one of the biggest problems we face as a global population and will lead to an economic collapse if the issue is not addressed.

Outgoing Energy Secretary Stephen Chu said, In areas where the US needs to compete globally, we did not grow,” between 1980 and 2000. According to Chu, the manufacturing side of the US economy has not grown, thereby limiting the competitive capacity of the US in the global market. By investing in industries that manufacture green tech and green energy products, the US could expand sectors of industry that produce exportable goods.

In the “Developing the developing world” session, the panelists focused on the strategies used in the developing world to bring cleaner fuels to the bottom level of the economic population pyramid. They identified the market demand for small scale, low cost, energy technologies in the emerging and developing markets.

According to the Executive Director of the Energy Access Initiative of the UN Foundation, Richenda Van Leeuwen, there are 1.3 billion people currently without access to electricity, and the UN’s “Sustainable Development for All” Millennium Development Goal, there is clearly a large market of people to supply clean technology to. The panelists agreed that the market is primed for green energy.

Kate Steel, an Associate for Energy and Sustainability for Google.org, discussed some of the strategies used by the NGO’s and companies involved to try to keep the price of electricity low, since affordability is a real issue for these communities. These strategies include the use of microgrids, pre-paid electricity plans, and moving away from kerosene and battery power, which in the long-term is an extremely expensive way for these populations to get their power. Expansion is possible in these populations; it just takes more innovative strategies and smarter technology.

Thus, according to those speakers, investments in green energy sectors does not only promote growth in industries that create exportable goods, but there is also evidence for a global market demand for green technology and innovation. If the prices of these goods could remain affordable in the global market, I see great potential for America’s investment in green energy to be a profitable one.

Seems like I might just be able to find a job in this industry after all.

This article was written by our own Arzoo Malhotra.

Photo courtesy of haringeygreens.blogspot.com

Recyclable Packaging and Products: From Valentine’s Bouquets to Disappearing Packaging

greenconnections — Mon, 18 Mar 2013 18:24:11 +0000

As I opened my new set of headphones, I kept thinking, “They must not really want me to use this product.” Why else would they make it so hard to open? And, as an eco-conscious person, how would all this plastic damage the planet? My brain went from my garbage can to the landfill to the ocean and some poor fish trapped in plastic hell. After some research, I found that according to 2010 EPA statistics, packaging accounted for 30% – and 76 million tons – of our total waste for the year. There must be a better way.

Searching for better options, I found Beats by Dr. Dre, a popular and relatively new line of headphones designed by the famed rapper and producer himself, are packaged much more lightly. The box is made from cardboard, not plastic, and cool graphic designs on each side make the packaging just as appealing as the ones I was wrestling with, but are recyclable.

Packaging has become lighter and more efficient in recent years, though I still find myself wrestling with skin-slicing plastic clamshells way too often.

Farhad Manjoo was fighting the same battle and wrote about it in Slate. Called “A Christmas Miracle: Packaging Is Less Infuriating,” published on December 26, 2012, he explains that since 2008, “some of the world’s largest retailers and consumer-product companies have launched initiatives to improve how their goods are boxed.” Included in these companies, he adds, are Amazon.com and Walmart, who are taking action to eliminate “a billion feet of wire twists ties from…toys” as well as “excess packaging materials such as hard clamshell casings [and] plastic bindings.” But while Manjoo praises these companies for their redesigned packaging, he also cites Logitech, BodyMedia, and Apple products as some of the most difficult to open. For example, he says that consumers will “need a hammer to crack open the hard plastic box,” of Apple’s new Earpod headphones.

Apple Reveals Its Footprint

Apple? Why would such a cutting edge company fail to use environmentally conscious packaging standards? Adam Lashinsky’s 2012 book Inside Apple: How America’s Most Admired – and Secretive – Company Really Works, paints a hilarious picture reminiscent of a Saturday Night Live skit: “A packaging designer was holed up in this room performing the most mundane of tasks – opening boxes.” He also writes about countless iPod box prototypes that were tested to determine the emotional response the customer feels opening the product. Can you imagine recording the choice words you uttered as you tackled that nasty thick plastic?

Steve Jobs – a.k.a. “design guru” – focused on the look, feel and use of the sleek Apple designs, not their impact on the environment.

But with “eco” top of the mind for much of Apples’s top market, they have posted “The Story Behind Apple’s Environmental Footprint,” an intentionally revealing breakdown of their carbon footprint, from “Manufacturing” to “Facilities.” Under the category of “Transportation,” the packaging question is addressed: “Apple employs teams of design and engineering experts who develop product packaging that’s slim and light yet protective. Efficient packaging design not only reduces materials and waste, it also helps reduce the emissions produced during transportation.” And in terms of the big picture, the site also reports that a mere 5% of Apple’s carbon footprint comes from transportation: an umbrella category including, but not limited to, packaging. Considering they are shipped from the far east, I’m skeptical…

Valentine’s Day Goes Green

The most romantic holiday of the year just became much more eco-friendly, as British retailer Marks & Spencer (M&S) launched a new initiative this Valentine’s Day to save 10,000 liters of water from flower deliveries. The company is using a new process called Modified Atmosphere Packaging (MAP), which “seals flowers in an airtight bag, slowing down their respiration rate and allowing them to be transported without requiring water.” M&S, based out of the United Kingdom, delivers to 80 international locations – many of which are quite far away – so the amount of the water saved will have a considerably positive effect on their carbon footprint.

A slew of other products are now being re-packaged as part of the Disappearing Package Project, spearheaded by designer Aaron Mickelson. This article from Tested.com gives one example of his clever new packaging designs, explaining: “Glad trash bags normally come in a box, which Mickelson’s site says adds up to 68 pounds of garbage per pallet. In Mickelson’s design, the bags are rolled together and can be pulled out from the center one-by-one…No box required.” In addition to his Glad bag design, he has created revamped packaging for Tide detergent bars, Twinings tea, and – my personal favorite – Nivea bar soap. The box washes away when you take it into the shower, leaving no garbage.

Perhaps more companies or designers will adopt similar projects. In the meantime, it appears that products and their packaging have both become more eco-friendly, but not fast enough or eco-friendly enough. Maybe we need to demand it more and louder? Could the end of needing to wear gloves to open your new gadgets be near? Let’s hope. The landfills will thank us.

This article was written by our own Carly Buchanan.

Photos courtesy of flowermuse.com, digitalstreetsa.com, designer-daily.com and ops.org

Ann Feldman of waterpressures.org

greenconnections — Mon, 18 Mar 2013 18:06:11 +0000

Which uses more water: tea or coffee? Chicken or a hamburger? How many gallons of water does it take to make a pair of jeans? Listen to Ann Feldman of Waterpressures.org tell GCR host Joan Michelson the amazing things she learned about the world’s water use and availability, and what YOU can do about it.

Watch Ann’s documentary Waterpressures this week on PBS or click here to find out where you can watch it

Phyliss Cuttino of the Clean Energy Program

greenconnections — Sun, 17 Mar 2013 18:51:03 +0000

How does policy affect CleanTech business start ups? Click here to listen to Phyliss Cuttino, Director of the Clean Energy Program, Pew Charitable Trust, discuss this and their new research on the energy sector . This interview took place at the 2013 ARPA-E Summit in Washington, DC recently. Click here to listen