Back to the Future

In 2005, a group of interested citizens and organizations began a dialogue to create a more sustainable food system for Metro Atlanta, resulting in the creation of the Atlanta Local Food Initiative.

Some of the group’s partners include the CDC, DeKalb County Board of Health, UGA’s Cooperative Extension and Center for Urban Agriculture.

The group “envisions a transformed food system” made safer, more affordable and one that will “rebuild Southern foodways in harmony with the land.”

One of the group’s goals is to launch a farm-to-school program, which are popular in other urban areas surrounded by thriving agricultural communities. Atlanta certainly fits the bill in that regard.

 Some other goals:

• Preserve greenspace
• Reduce petroleum
• Promote healthy eating
• Build local economies
• Create new jobs

Check out the initiative’s brand-spanking new report. It’s comprehensive but not in a dull way. And, maybe report isn’t the best way to describe. It’s more like a plan, a roadmap to actually accomplish the goals ALFI has set.

Could this document outline some of the key steps that could lead to a prosperous, sustainable and yummy future for the Atlanta region?

We’re always focusing on the future on this site, but this report suggests that looking at the past is just as worthy an exercise. Back in the day, local markets sold local produce that was chemical-free and grown in a way that didn’t ruin watersheds or require barrels of oil.

And since that food wasn’t trucked half-way across the country, it was less expensive, too. Today, prices – whether gasoline or groceries -  are a big concern for most of us.

We’ve got a lot to learn, a long way to go and every little bit helps. Thanks, ALFI.

Cometh the Climate Change Cavalry?

Last Thursday, the White House released a new study on the effects of human-induced climate change on the United States.  The New York Times reports that the study concludes, as you might expect, that spread of warmth-loving pests and loss of low-lying lands to rising seas are potential effects of the climate change.

 

The study also comes to some new conclusions:  “An increased frequency and severity of heat waves is expected, leading to more illness and death, particularly among the young, elderly, frail and poor.”  Additionally, the report included new projections of how the poor, elderly and communities with lagging public-health and public-works systems will face disproportionate health risks from warming.

 

To us at Fifty Forward this is a particularly timely report.  The aging of the Baby Boomers and all the potential attendant impacts to our society are beginning to seriously capture the attention of policy makers.  And the issues of health care are becoming increasingly important in our national debate. 

 

Both of these issues take on new significance in light of this report, which raises some hopeful questions.

 

Are regulations on carbon emissions far behind?

 

Will the EPA finally grant carbon emissions the status of a threat to human health, as the Supreme Court says it should?

Can Coke Cool the Planet?

Well not alone they can’t, but they are making a run at it.  In an AJC article today, Craig Simons highlights Coke’s plans to buy 100,000 new beverage coolers that work using compressed carbon dioxide as opposed to hydrofluorocarbons.  Given that these flourocarbons are 1000 times more potent as greenhouse gases than is carbon dioxide, this is a significant step for one of the Atlanta region’s major international corporations.

 

While speaking at a lecture in Beijing organized by Greenpeace, Coke’s CEO Neville Isdell said, “We cannot wait for consumers or governments or technologies or price to move us towards sustainable solutions … so we’re doing what we can within our own business.”

 

These coolers cost about 25 percent more than the current industry standard.  So, Mr. Isdell and Coke are to be congratulated for going to the extra expense to help protect the environment we all share.

 

But there is more that can be done. Coke replaces 1 million refrigeration units annually.  With that kind of buying power, Coke is poised to help drive down the cost of these environmentally friendlier coolers.  Hopefully, other corporations will follow suit.

 

Coke isn’t a perfect company, but it’s adding its waves to a ripple effect that might one day lead to a more sustainable world.

If You Can’t Stand the Heat….Capture It!

When power plants generate electricity, a lot of heat simply goes up the chimney, so to speak. Estimates are that for every three units of fuel — like coal, natural gas or oil — that are burned to make electricity, two are lost in the process, most of it as waste heat that just drifts away. Likewise, many manufacturing operations such as steel mills produce waste heat.

 

Ten years ago, an Indiana steel mill began capturing heat above its coke ovens to make electricity. That operation, along with other energy recycling processes employed at the plant, creates about 250 megawatts of power every day, about half of the plant’s needs for electricity. In the process, the company says it has reduced CO₂ emissions by 1.3 million tons a year.

What would happen if more companies and electric utilities captured heat and used it to make electricity? It’s a common practice in Europe. Denmark generates close to 55 percent of its electricity this way. In the Netherlands and Finland, the figure is closer to 40 percent, and in Germany it is 35 percent. But, energy recycling in the U.S. accounts for only 8 percent of the nation’s electrical power, according to the U.S. Department of Energy.

 

Recent EPA and Department of Energy studies suggest U.S. industries waste enough heat to generate an estimated 200,000 megawatts of power — nearly 20 percent of what this nation uses. That’s enough electricity to replace up to 400 coal-fired power plants.

So what’s the problem?

State and federal laws often prohibit companies like the Indiana steel mill from selling excess power, and few electric utilities have chosen to install energy recycling equipment at older power plants because under New Source Review, they will then be subject to newer, stricter environmental regulations.

We recycle beverage cans. Wouldn’t it make even more sense to recycle energy, to use the waste heat that goes up the chimney to produce electricity and, in the process, save millions of tons of carbon from entering the atmosphere?

Full Disclosure

On April 13, in the New York Times, Abby Schultz points out that all three of the current presidential candidates say they are in favor of some type of cap on carbon emissions and astutely concludes that any such legislation could have significant impact on power companies.  More specifically, such caps will likely increase the cost of electricity generated through the burning of fossil fuels.

 

In the article, a senior analyst at Innovest Strategic Value Advisors suggests that not all of these costs will be able to be passed on to consumers.  Some of the costs will have to be absorbed by shareholders in the power corporations.  Obviously, some companies will be better prepared for carbon caps than others…and consequently a more attractive investment.  See our previous post “Carbon’s Gonna Get Expensive” which highlights the Big 3 financial institutions’ decision to more closely scrutinize loans for the construction of new carbon emitting power plants.

 

The Carbon Disclosure Project attempts to analyze the investment risk in corporations based on their environmental practices.  The organization has published a report for the last six years.  The report was published on behalf of 315 investors who manage assets worth $41 trillion.  This is enough to get anyone’s attention. 

 

One potential way of reducing the cost of the production of electricity, as well as a improving company’s rating in the Carbon Disclosure Project report is through investment in cleaner power generation technologies.

 

We understand that the looming carbon crises did not materialize over night.  It took decades for us to arrive at this point and will likely take decades for us to correct the problem.  But if we don’t start soon, where will be 50 years from now?

Drought and Climate Change

Over the last year, drought caught up with traffic as THE topic of conversation around the region. When we began the year, better than half the state was experiencing ‘exceptional drought,’ most severe rating the U.S. Drought Monitor has.

 

The question arises: How will climate change affect water supplies and water quality?

 

There growing consensus that, while we probably won’t have more frequent droughts, the ones we have are likely to be more severe and perhaps last longer.

 

Warmer temperatures are likely to lead to increased water use, at a time when stream flows are lower.

 

We are likely to experience more weather extremes, including more powerful thunderstorms, hurricanes and tropical storms. That could mean more flooding, more run-off and more erosion.

 

Increased water temperatures will lead to lower levels of dissolved oxygen affecting aquatic life in rivers, streams and lakes. Pollution may be more concentrated.

 

What’s the answer in a future that may be marked by wild swings in rainfall and accompanying variations available water supplies?  

 

More conservation? More reservoirs? Desalination?

Don’t just sit there, do something

At the end of “An Inconvenient Truth,” Al Gore urges us to change out our light bulbs. Such a small act in face of a big problem. Some might ask, “Why bother?”

 

There are a lot of reasons to bother, not the least of which is that small changes in behavior can make a big difference when millions of people adopt them. But as Michael Specter said, in a recent New Yorker piece on carbon footprints, “Personal choices, no matter how virtuous, cannot do enough. It will also take laws and money.”

 

Mr. Gore now has a new slide show about climate change. His message is not about changing light bulbs or buying hybrid cars. It’s about political action.

 

We won’t solve our climate crisis, he says, until we solve our democracy crisis. As citizens we have to demand action on the part of our government by contacting our elected officials, by showing up at public meetings, by paying attention to the debate and by shining light on the process.

 

When was the last time you sent an e-mail or a fax to an elected official weighing in on an issue, making the case for or against a piece of proposed legislation? More important, when was the last time you actually showed up in person to make your voice heard? When was the last time you actively campaigned for a candidate you admire, not simply sent them a check?

 

If we’re too busy to act, if we leave action to others, if we don’t demand change, maybe we really get the government we deserve.

Shall we put it to a vote?

This article, Don’t Railroad Taxpayers into Transit Subsidies, asserts that “…no rail line should be designed or constructed unless approved by majority vote at the ballot box.”

Good idea. After all, this is a democracy, right?

So the next logical step here is to make sure that a majority of the public is on board with any significant investment in new infrastructure. That would mean putting any new roads up to a vote, too. After all, it’s only fair.

Luckily, we do live in a democracy and we all do get to vote. But some people aren’t too keen on letting us vote on the issues that matter most to us.  In the last legislative session of the Georiga General Assembly, approval of a referendum on a consitutional amendment for a new transportation funding source failed.

A new survey by the Transit Planning Board indicates that there may be more interest in public transportation in the Atlanta region than many choose to believe.

Given the staggering growth projections for this region, given the aging of the population and their future transportation needs and given that we are, today, gridlocked, the least state leaders could do is allow citizens to choose whether or not they want to pay for transit services.

That’s just the bare minimum. That’s just a start.

Eventually, the folks who blocked the vote on the transportation sales tax may want to start thinking about how we’ll get around 50 years from now.

How do you envision the Atlanta region’s transport system 50 years from now?

Development and Climate Change

Georgia has grown and benefited from automobiles and associated development for over 40 years.While this growth has led to prosperity, it has also led to development patterns that induce automobile dependency and greenhouse gas emissions that will have a negative impact on our future.In fact, a new study has labeled Georgia and other southern states among the worst in the US for creating these emission inducing development patterns.

ULI, Smart Growth America, and other organizations recently summarized existing research in a report entitled Growing Cooler. In it, they determine that development and traffic patterns are major contributors to climate change. 

The good news is that state and local governments in Georgia can impact greenhouse gas emissions by making decisions regarding land use policies and policies that lead to cleaner fuels and vehicles.

We can no longer ignore that our development patterns are a major problem for our state’s future. Some cities in the state are already taking action by signing the US Mayor’s Climate Protection Agreement. Mayors for the cities of Alpharetta, Athens, Atlanta, Augusta, Decatur, East Point, Macon, and Tybee Island have signed on to the agreement. These mayors represent 910,726 people, or roughly 9.6% of the sate’s population.

Though these eight cities are taking action to ensure that our state has a sustainable long term future, Georgia may already be a decade behind other states with regard to responding to climate change. And as a coastal state, this should worry us.

Under the Georgia constitution, local governments have substantial authority to guide land use and future development. It is time for local governments to start making land use decisions with our 50-year future in mind.

Food for thought

 

On average, everything we eat travels 1,500 miles before it gets to our table. We find grapes from Chile, shrimp from China and lamb chops from New Zealand at our supermarkets.

 

But in an era when oil prices are skyrocketing, how long will we be able to afford food that has traveled half way around the world to reach our plate? As food costs continue to escalate, we may have little choice but to shift our food purchases away from well-traveled meat and vegetables to ones that are produced locally.

 

Fortunately, the number of farmers’ markets in the United States has grown from some 340 in 1970 to more than 3,700 in 2004. The first community-supported agriculture farm was established in 1985. Now, there are more than 1,500, including more than 15 in metro Atlanta.

 

During World War II, a campaign — “Plant more in ’44!” – encouraged Americans to plant Victory Gardens. Nearly 20 million of us did so and these gardens produced some 40 percent of the fruits and vegetables we ate in our homes.

 

In our fight against climate change, are we looking at a time in the coming decades when most of us will have victory gardens in our yards or on our balconies or when we must look to farmers’ markets for our food? Eating locally may be one way to reduce greenhouse gases (and combat ever higher food prices).