tagged w/ Copenhagen
-
-
Anne Sofie Madsen has quickly become a shining star in Copenhagen's Fashion Week. Her fascination with dark fairy tales carry each collection, through with a captivating narrative achieved by illustrated textiles and the meticulous craftsmanship. HerAnne Sofie Madsen has quickly become a shining star in Copenhagen's Fashion Week.... more
-
-
Kopenhagen Fur works with leading designers and luxury brands to ensure a innovative approach to fur design. New modes of thinking and novel ways to enhance the development of fur, as fashion's most luxurious material are on a top of the agenda. InternatKopenhagen Fur works with leading designers and luxury brands to ensure a innovative... more
-
-
For every kilometer traveled by bike instead of by car, Copenhagen saves 7.8 cents in avoided air pollution, accidents, congestion, noise and wear and tear on infrastructure.
~~~
Whenever I mention to Americans that I have worked in Copenhagen, I’m invariably asked (after an alarmingly large number confuse the Danes with the Dutch) about the bikes. For good reason.
Yes, the Danes love their bikes, as I came to love mine – even when peddling to work on dark, frigid, wet January mornings. Statistics only hint at the scale of the phenomenon (in 2010, 35% of all trips to work or school in Copenhagen were made by bike; for Copenhagen residents, the figure is 50%).
More persuasive than the data is experiencing yourself the exhilaration (and brief panic) that comes with merging into the peloton hurtling south along Nørrebrogade, Copenhagen’s busiest bike corridor, toward the city center during the morning commute.
I like to think of the ubiquitous bikes, however beneficial, as a symbol of much else that is right in Copenhagen on the sustainability front. A new report from *Green Growth Leaders, a Copenhagen-based global alliance of cities, regions, countries and corporations, collects data and case studies on the overlooked, but in no way marginal, benefits of Copenhagen’s environmental protection efforts.
Copenhagen – Beyond Green (PDF) illustrates the economic and social benefits that come with busy bike lanes, a swimmable harbor, and smart, integrated transit. Here’s the crux of the authors’ argument, from the foreword:
“Investing in cycling lanes not only cuts CO2 emissions and improves citizens’ health and quality of life, but improves the bottom line of the city. Cleaning the water in the harbor not only improves the environment, but increases real estate values, local business life and tourism. Investing in an integrated public transport system not only reduces traffic congestion, but saves billions of dollars and keeps the city efficient and competitive. Homegrown energy not only produces electricity, but allows local businesses to become strong and competitive.
The environmental benefits of convincing commuters to choose bikes over cars – avoided carbon emissions and localized air pollutants such as soot – are obvious. The City of Copenhagen took the analysis one step further by comparing the money saved in the shift from cars to bikes.
Researchers found that for every kilometer traveled by bike instead of by car taxpayers saved 7.8 cents (DKK 0.45) in avoided air pollution, accidents, congestion, noise and wear and tear on infrastructure. Cyclists in Copenhagen cover an estimated 1.2 million kilometers each day – saving the city a little over $34 million each year.
With so many residents commuting by bike, Copenhagen reaps additional benefits. The report authors cite one study which found that cycling for a half-hour daily increases mean life expectancy by 1-2 years. Not only can motorists who switch to a bicycle expect to live longer, they’ll be saving themselves (and other taxpayers) money.
The City of Copenhagen found:
“The health benefits of cycling also include fewer sick days, fewer medical expenses and treatments. Tallied up, the total health benefit of Copenhageners cycling is 5.5 DKK per kilometer – making the benefit per year a total of DKK 2 billon or $380 million.
Let’s take the analysis beyond the familiar bikes. Fifteen years ago, nearly 100 overflow channels carried wastewater into Copenhagen harbor after heavy rains. The water posed a serious health risk, and made the harbor not fit for swimming. The City of Copenhagen invested in infrastructure – rainwater reservoirs and conduits – that store wastewater until the sewage system is able to process the overflow. Seven years later, in 2002, the city had opened a public swimming facility in the harbor and closed 55 overflow channels.
In 1995, the water in Copenhagen harbor posed a serious health risk. Just seven years later, the city opened a public swimming facility in the harbor. Credit: Justin Gerdes
The Copenhagen harbor front today is some of the most sought after real estate in the city. The number of cafes, bars, and restaurants in the harbor area has increased 300% since the public bath opened.
Residents are increasingly choosing to buy homes near the harbor:
“From 2002 to 2011 the prices of apartments close to the harbor increased by 57 percent while apartments in the same area of town but further from the harbor only increased by 12 percent. In addition, the study shows that the price per square meter next to the harbor is 42 percent higher than real estate in the same part of town but not next to the harbor.
For those who can’t bike to work (or who might want to avoid peddling through the worst of the winter slush and chill), Copenhagen is served by an integrated transportation network: a driverless, punctual Metro (with one of the best airport connections in the world), regional trains, and buses.
More at the linkFor every kilometer traveled by bike instead of by car, Copenhagen saves 7.8 cents in... more
-
-
The Bjarke Ingels Group (BIG) in Denmark has developed a modern architectural concept which would connect Denmark and Sweden via a multi-function transportation network. The Loop City project will limit Denmark's increasing urban sprawl while bringing more focus and vitality to existing suburban communities.
Be sure to check out current.com/urbanmobility for more news, community discussions and upcoming videos about Urban Mobility.The Bjarke Ingels Group (BIG) in Denmark has developed a modern architectural concept... more
-
-
Bjarke Ingels is a big deal in Denmark, his architectural design firm BIG (Bjarke Ingels Group) has offices in Copenhagen and New York City. His team has recently been commissioned by the municipalities of Metropolitan Copenhagen to look at the potential for urban development along the city’s train line.
Bjarke initially wanted to focus on designing graphic novels when he went to university, but ended up with a very different career:“Originally I never had any intention of becoming an architect, I wanted to become a graphic novelist. And because we don’t have a comic book academy in Denmark, but we have a Royal Danish Art Academy where they educate artists and architects, that was the path I went”
The Bjarke Ingels Group has an innovative idea that would transform the way Denmark and Sweden use thier existing rail lines. How would you re-design your city's transit system to be more efficient?
Bjarke Ingels is a big deal in Denmark, his architectural design firm BIG (Bjarke... more
-
-
How long is your daily commute? What forms of transportation do you take on a regular basis? How environmentally conscious is your neighborhood?
These are the questions scientists, engineers and environmentalists are asking of their communities. Urban Mobility examines the ways in which innovators are developing new technologies to not only move people but also bring them closer together.
But what we really want to know from you is, how do you define Urban Mobility?
Be sure to check out current.com/urbanmobility for more news, community discussions and upcoming videos about Urban Mobility. How long is your daily commute? What forms of transportation do you take on a regular... more
-
-
-
By Sarah Laskow, Media Consortium Blogger
President Obama and Chinese President Hu Jintao touched on energy issues in the bilateral summit between the two countries this week.
“I believe that as the two largest energy consumers and emitters of greenhouses gases, the United States and China have a responsibility to combat climate change by building on the progress at Copenhagen and Cancun, and showing the way to a clean energy future. And President Hu indicated that he agrees with me on this issue,” President Obama said during a Wednesday press conference.
But can the United States step up as a leader on clean energy? The proliferation of politicians whom The Nation’s Mark Hertsgaard calls “climate cranks” suggests otherwise.
The biggest consumers
In international climate negotiations, the United State and China are the two key players, and if the world as a whole is to move forward on combating climate change, agreement between Presidents Obama and Hu would be a huge breakthrough. Mother Jones‘ Kate Sheppard notes that Hu also said the United States and China would work together on climate changes, but, she writes, “I can imagine, though, that the conversation on this subject wasn’t entirely as chummy as the remarks would imply, however. The US last month lodged a complaint with the World Trade Organization about China’s subsidies for clean energy, arguing that the country is unfairly stacking the deck in favor of their products.”
At AlterNet, Tina Gerhardt and Lucia Green-Weiskel explain the background to those tensions and to the U.S.’s protectionist bent on clean energy projects. They write, “Energy Secretary Chu recently framed the new relationship between the U.S. and China as a ‘Sputnik Moment.’ Referencing the first satellite launched by the Soviet Union in 1957, which demonstrated its technological advantage and led to the Cold War-era space race, Chu warned that the U.S. risks falling behind China in the clean technology race.”
Stumbling blocks
China’s motivations for growing its clean energy sector may not be leafy green; new energy sources feed the country’s rapidly growing economy. But at least the country is committed to green energy sources, unlike our climate change-denying Congress. As Mark Hertsgaard argues at The Nation, this brand of American has become so pernicious, it’s time to stop adhering to the protocol that dubs them “climate deniers” and start calling them “climate cranks.” He explains:
True skepticism is invaluable to the scientific method, but an honest skeptic can be persuaded by facts, if they are sound. The cranks are impervious to facts, at least facts that contradict their wacky worldview. When virtually every national science academy in the developed world, including our own, and every major scientific organization (e.g., the American Geophysical Union, the American Physics Society) has affirmed that climate change is real and extremely dangerous, only a crank continues to insist that it’s all a left-wing plot.
Climate cranks attack
Unfortunately, climate cranks continue to interfere with both climate scientists and forward-thinking energy policy. At Change.org, Nikki Gloudeman writes about the ongoing saga of climate scientist Michael Mann, one of the climatologists embroiled in the Climategate brouhaha, who is still being attacked by climate-denying groups for his work. Gloudeman reports that although Mann has been investigated and found innocent of any misdeeds several times over, a group with a bias against climate change, the American Tradition Institute, is trying to obtain access to his work.
And in New Mexico, the state’s new conservative governor, Susana Martinez, “has attempted to subvert her own state constitution in order to stop [a] plan to begin reducing her state’s carbon emissions,” reports Dahr Jamail for Truthout. The plan, executed through state rules, would have reduced the state’s greenhouse gas emissions by 3%, from 2010 levels, each year. The rules should have been made public, but Gov. Martinez kept them from being published, according to Truthout’s report. A local group, New Energy Economy, is fighting to implement them.
Bright spots
In some states, however, the clean energy economy is moving forward. As Care2’s Beth Buczynski reports, Clean Edge, a clean-tech advisory group, has identified the top ten states for clean energy leadership. They include California, Massachusetts, New York, New Jersey, and Illinois.
“Rankings were derived from over 80 metrics including total electricity produced by clean-energy sources, hybrid vehicles on the road, and clean-energy venture and patent activity,” Buczynski reports.
And, as David Roberts writes at Grist, there is important work to be done at the local and regional level to both prepare for and prevent climate change. His preferred term for this challenge is “ruggedizing”—strengthening a community’s ability to respond to challenges brought on by climate change, such as flooding, droughts, or food shortages. The solutions to these problem, Roberts writes, often have the welcome side effect of decreasing carbon emissions, as well:
For instance, the residents of Brisbane are discovering that when disaster strikes, it’s not very handy to have everyone spread out all over the place and utterly dependent on cars to get anywhere. It’s more resilient to have people closer together, more able to walk or take shared transportation. It just so happens that also reduces vehicle emissions.
The advantage of this type of work—building the clean energy economy, ruggedizing communities—is that leaders don’t necessarily have to agree on the reality of climate change to move forward. But these are only partial solutions, and to address climate change on an international scale, the cranks will need to be quieted.
This post features links to the best independent, progressive reporting about the environment by members of The Media Consortium. It is free to reprint. Visit the Mulch for a complete list of articles on environmental issues, or follow us on Twitter. And for the best progressive reporting on critical economy, health care and immigration issues, check out The Audit, The Pulse, and The Diaspora. This is a project of The Media Consortium, a network of leading independent media outlets.By Sarah Laskow, Media Consortium Blogger
President Obama and Chinese President Hu... more
-
-
Embassy dispatches show America used spying, threats and promises of aid to get support for Copenhagen accord
Hidden behind the save-the-world rhetoric of the global climate change negotiations lies the mucky realpolitik: money and threats buy political support; spying and cyberwarfare are used to seek out leverage.
The US diplomatic cables reveal how the US seeks dirt on nations opposed to its approach to tackling global warming; how financial and other aid is used by countries to gain political backing; how distrust, broken promises and creative accounting dog negotiations; and how the US mounted a secret global diplomatic offensive to overwhelm opposition to the controversial "Copenhagen accord", the unofficial document that emerged from the ruins of the Copenhagen climate change summit in 2009.
Negotiating a climate treaty is a high-stakes game, not just because of the danger warming poses to civilisation but also because re-engineering the global economy to a low-carbon model will see the flow of billions of dollars redirected.
Seeking negotiating chips, the US state department sent a secret cable on 31 July 2009 seeking human intelligence from UN diplomats across a range of issues, including climate change. The request originated with the CIA. As well as countries' negotiating positions for Copenhagen, diplomats were asked to provide evidence of UN environmental "treaty circumvention" and deals between nations.
(click on the link for the full article and to access in-text links and many other related links)Embassy dispatches show America used spying, threats and promises of aid to get... more
-
-
The US diplomatic cables reveal how the US seeks dirt on nations opposed to its approach to tackling global warming; how financial and other aid is used by countries to gain political backing; how distrust, broken promises and creative accounting dog negotiations; and how the US mounted a secret global diplomatic offensive to overwhelm opposition to the controversial "Copenhagen accord", the unofficial document that emerged from the ruins of the Copenhagen climate change summit in 2009.The US diplomatic cables reveal how the US seeks dirt on nations opposed to its... more
-
-
by Sarah Laskow, Media Consortium Blogger
A year ago, it seemed possible—likely, even—that President Barack Obama would sweep into the international negotiations on climate change at Copenhagen and make serious progress on the tangle of issues at stake. The reality was quite different. This year, the expectations for the United Nations Climate Conference in Cancun are less exuberant.
The conference will be held from Nov 29 to Dec 10 and the same issues from 2009 are up for debate. Countries like the United States, Britain, and Germany are still contributing an outsize share of carbon to the atmosphere. Countries like India and China are still rapidly increasing their own carbon output. And countries like Bangladesh, Tuvalu, and Bolivia are still bearing an unfair share of the environmental impacts brought on by climate change.
A very different set of expectations are building in the climate movement this year. If last year was about moving forward as fast as possible, this year, climate activists seem resigned to the idea that politicians just aren’t getting it. Change, when it comes, will have to be be built on a popular movement, not a political negotiation.
Climate change from the bottom up
Last year, climate activists put their faith in international leaders to make progress. This year, they believe that it’s up to them, as outside actors, to marshal a grassroots movement and pressure their leaders towards decreased carbon emissions.
“There’s a recognition that the insider strategy to push from inside the Beltway to impact what will happen in DC, or what will happen in Cancun has really not succeeded,” Rose Braz, climate campaign director at the Center for Biological Diversity, told Making Contact’s Andrew Stelzer. “What we’re doing in conjunction with a number of groups across the country and across the world is really build the type of movement that will change what happens in Cancun, what changes what happens in DC from the bottom up.” (This entire episode of Making Contact is dedicated to new approaches to climate change, at Cancun and beyond, and is worth a listen.)
Fighting the indolence of capitalists
Here’s one example of this new strategy: as Zachary Shahan writes at Change.org, La Via Campesina, an international peasant movement, is coordinating a march that will begin in San Luis Potosi, Guadalajara, Acapulco, Oaxaca, and Chiapas, then converge on Cancun. The march will include “thousands of farmers, indigenous people, rural villagers, urbanites, and more,” Shahan reports.
After they arrive in Cancun, the organizers are planning an “Alternative Global Forum for Life and Environmental and Social Justice” for the final days of the negotiations, which they say will be a mass mobilisation of peasants, indigenous and social movements. The action extends far beyond Cancun, though. Actually, they are organizing thousands of Cancuns around the world on this day to denounce what they see as false climate solutions.
These actions echo the strategy that environmentalist and author Bill McKibben and other climate leaders are promoting to push for climate change policies in the U.S. All this talk about building momentum from the bottom up, from populations, means that anyone looking for change is now looking years into the future.
The U.S. is not leading the way
Of course, ultimately, politicians will need to agree on a couple of standards. In particular, how much carbon each country should be emitting and how fast each country should power down its current emission levels. The U.S. is one of the biggest stumbling blocks to agreement on these questions, especially due to the recent mid-term elections. As Claudia Salerno, Venezuela’s lead climate change negotiator wrote at AlterNet:
Unlike what many suggest, China is not the problem. China, along with India and others, have made considerable commitments to reduce greenhouse gas emissions and are already working to realize them. Other developing countries have done the same, although we only generate a virtual drop in the bucket of global carbon emissions. The key player missing here is the U.S.
China, the U.S. and Clean Coal
The most interesting collaborations on clean energy, however, aren’t happening around the negotiating table. This week, The Atlantic’s James Fallows wrote a long piece about the work that the U.S. and China are doing together on clean coal technology, the magic cure-all to the world’s energy ills.
In the piece, Fallows recognizes what environmentalists have long argued: coal is bad for the environment and for coal-mining communities. But, unlike clean energy advocates who want to phase coal out of the energy equation, Fallows argues that coal must play a part in the world’s energy future. Therefore, we must find a way to burn it without releasing clouds of carbon into the atmosphere. That’s where clean coal technology comes in. So far, however, researchers have had little luck minimizing coal’s carbon output.
A few progressive writers weighed in on Fallows’ piece: Grist’s David Roberts thought Fallows was too hard on the anti-coal camp, while Campus Progress’ Sara Rubin argued that the piece did a good job of grappling with the reality of clean energy economics. And Mother Jones‘ Kevin Drum had one very clear criticism—that the piece skated over the question of progress on carbon capture, the one real way to dramatically reduce carbon pollution from coal. He wrote:
All the collaboration sounds wonderful, and even a 20% or 30% improvement in coal technology would be welcome. But that said, sequestration is the holy grail and I still don’t know if the Chinese are doing anything more on that front than the rest of us.
On every front, then, the view on climate change is now a long one.
This post features links to the best independent, progressive reporting about the environment by members of The Media Consortium. It is free to reprint. Visit the Mulch for a complete list of articles on environmental issues, or follow us on Twitter. And for the best progressive reporting on critical economy, health care and immigration issues, check out The Audit, The Pulse, and The Diaspora. This is a project of The Media Consortium, a network of leading independent media outlets.by Sarah Laskow, Media Consortium Blogger
A year ago, it seemed... more
-
-
by Sarah Laskow, Media Consortium blogger
Congress couldn’t get it together to vote even on the smallest of possible energy bills—the renewable energy standard—before the October recess. That doesn’t change the reality that our energy dependent society needs to find alternatives quickly. Changing up our approach to transportation, one of the biggest sources of energy consumption, is a good place to start.
If more Americans used bicycles as a primary mode of transportation, the country would be closer to getting its energy use under control. So how can we make biking safer, easier, more mainstream? Infrastructure, safety, and education are key. It also helps to replicate model behaviors.
“Last spring, public officials from Madison, Wisconsin, returned home from a tour of the Netherlands, and within three weeks were implementing what they learned there about promoting bicycling on the streets of their own city,” reports Jay Walljasper for Yes! Magazine.
Cities like Portland, Madison, and San Francisco are trying to make cycling a way of life. But for the best answers, American leaders must look abroad, to cities like Copenhagen in Denmark, Utrecht and The Hague in the Netherlands, and Malmo in Sweden.
Safe riding
Improving safety is the first order of business to encouraging cycling, and that means investing in infrastructure specifically for bike use. As Change.org’s Jess Leber writes, “Every time there is a senseless death, there are going to be a group of residents who decide biking is too risky for their tastes.”
Many regular bikers admit that it’s frightening to ride down a street with a gigantic, roaring beast of car quickly approaching. “When I lived in New York City, I myself was too frightened to use my bike in many parts of the city,” Leber admits.
What kind of infrastructure do we need? Designated bike lanes indicate what sort of space bikes need on the road. But bike lanes should also be physically separated from cars. In Copenhagen, for instance, “the busy roadways are lined with cycle tracks (elevated bike paths painted bright blue for distinction),” writes Campus Progress’ Jessica Newman.
In the Hague, bike paths are separate from cars and trucks, Some streets are designated as “bike boulevards,” where bikes take precedence over cars, reports Walljasper in Yes! Magazine.
Ease of use
But safe infrastructure is a waste of money if no one uses it. While cities are out building better bike lanes, they should consider adding other features that will make it as convenient to bike as it is to drive or walk. In Malmo, bike riders stopped at red lights can grab onto railings to keep their balance—”a surprisingly popular feature,” reports Grist’s Sarah Goodyear.
Another Dutch project is to improve the process of parking. “Access to safe, convenient bike storage has a big impact on whether people bike,” as Walljasper reports in Yes! Magazine.
“The car is parked right out in front of the house on the street, while the bike is stuffed away out back in a shed or has to be carried up and down the stairs in their buildings. So people choose the car because it is easier,” one Dutch policy officer told Walljasper.
More mainstream
In both Utrecht and Copenhagen, one strategy for integrating cycling into its citizens’ behavior is to teach the young. In Copenhagen, “Instead of driver’s education classes, children attend biker’s ed in the third and ninths grades, where they learn traffic laws, proper bike etiquette and general agility,” according to Campus Progress’ Newman.
Going back to Yes!, in Utrecht, cycling is also built into the curriculum:
A municipal program sends special teachers into schools to conduct bike classes, and students go to Trafficgarden, a miniature city complete with roads, sidewalks, and busy intersections where students hone their pedestrian, biking, and driving skills (in non-motorized pedal cars). At age 11, most kids in town are tested on their cycling skills on a course through the city, winning a certificate of accomplishment that ends up framed on many bedroom walls.
“To make safer roads, we focus on the children,” [city planner Ronald] Tamse explained. “It not only helps them bike and walk more safely, but it helps them to become safer drivers who will look out for pedestrians and bicyclists in the future.”
Envisioning the future
What does a city with these sorts of programs in place look like? In Copenhagen, you see “streets crowded with bikes, with riders ranging from wealthy, middle-aged businessmen to mothers in tow of three or more kids to poor college students,” Newman reports. Thirty-three percent of Copenhagen’s citizens commute by bike; in Portland, by contrast, it’s just 5.81%.
Yes! Magazine points to another way to understand the difference between biking in an American city, unfriendly to bikers, and in a European city that embraces them. In Riding Bikes with the Dutch, Michal W. Bauch compares transportation culture in Los Angeles and Amsterdam:
Increasing reliance on cycling is not impossible. The tools are already there. American cities just need to use them, and quickly.
This post features links to the best independent, progressive reporting about the environment by members of The Media Consortium. It is free to reprint. Visit the Mulch for a complete list of articles on environmental issues, or follow us on Twitter. And for the best progressive reporting on critical economy, health care and immigration issues, check out The Audit, The Pulse, and The Diaspora. This is a project of The Media Consortium, a network of leading independent media outlets.by Sarah Laskow, Media Consortium blogger
Congress couldn’t get it together... more
-
-
1. Torch Cock Block
2. Take Back our City
3. Heart Attack
4. The Motherfuckin NLG
5. Gord Hill breaks it down.1. Torch Cock Block
2. Take Back our City
3. Heart Attack
4. The Motherfuckin NLG... more
-
-
After competing with cars in Paris, cycling in Copenhagen's a welcome pleasure.
Here's documenting the short trip on bikes to the beach this weekend — a short film featuring Hanna, Copenhagen in June, Alex's bicycle, and a trip to the beach on a not so sunny afternoon. Soundtrack written in Ableton Live, contains a sample from La Mer by Charles Trenet.After competing with cars in Paris, cycling in Copenhagen's a welcome pleasure.... more
-
-
rnrbt
-
added this
-
1 year ago
- |
-
Voted the world's most livable city in 2008, Copenhagen embraces bicycle culture as part of daily life with nearly 40 % of residents riding a bike to work. Blogs and fashion photos are dedicated to bike style, and throughout the city you'll find bicycle bars on sidewalks so riders can rest their feet; green lights that change early for cyclists; and even friendly signs greeting "Hi Cyclist!"
It's no wonder then that Copenhagen is innovating new ways of creating a bike-friendly city with a system of as many as 15 extra-wide, segregated bike routes connecting the suburbs to the center of the city. Technological advances will soon follow, so commuters can detect other riders on the routes, and help them to assemble into pelotons or "bike buses." These groups could in turn emit signals that trip traffic lights in their favor, resulting in a "green wave" of bicycle momentum.
Part of our SCION sponsored presentation: 'Urban Mobility- Rethinking Transportation in an Urban Environment'.Voted the world's most livable city in 2008, Copenhagen embraces bicycle culture... more
-
-
By Sarah Laskow, Media Consortium Blogger
“There’s a dead dolphin on this beach,” Mother Jones‘ Mac McClelland, wrote yesterday in Louisiana. It’s one snapshot of the harm visited on the Gulf Coast by the BP oil spill. Back in Washington, the Senate climate bill, which would put the country on a path to cleaner energy consumption, is on its last legs.
You’d think that after a seemingly unstoppable oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico (official estimates are up to 50,000 barrels a day, as of yesterday) and the hottest spring on record (hello, climate change!), U.S. citizens and elected representatives would recognize that our country’s thirst for resources has consequences.
It’s not just that oil is spilling into the Gulf, even after BP hit on a fix. Besides the blow-out that has dominated headlines, another, more routine spill showed up near the Louisiana coast. The Deepwater Horizon spill is now the larger of two spills in the Gulf Coast, according to Care2. A week ago in Pennsylvania, a natural gas well owned by EOG Resources (formerly Enron) shot a geyser of chemical-laced water 75 feet into the air; and on Monday, in West Virginia, another natural gas well, this one owned by Chief Oil and Natural Gas, also exploded, as AlterNet reports.
Yet BP is still supplying the Pentagon with oil and gas, as Jeremy Scahill writes at The Nation. Senators are still supporting natural gas exploration and off-shore oil drilling. The White House has also abandoned any intention of pushing for strong legislation that would push for better, cleaner energy.
Lifestyle vs. lives
Americans aren’t willing to give up their lifestyle, so wild animals are giving up their lives. One casualty of the BP spill in the Gulf might be bluefin tuna. Their population is 20% of what it was 40 years ago, Inter Press Service reports. Although the effects of the oil spill won’t be entirely clear for a few years, scientists are worried.
“Biologically, bluefin are already unlucky,” IPS writes. “The fish – which can be as long as and faster than a sports car – only spawn once a year and only in certain locations.”
Schools of the tuna, IPS reports, are headed now towards the Gulf of Mexico.
“The spill has been going on during their peak spawning period in the only place the western population spawns, so in timing and location it’s probably the worst place you could have it and during the worst time,” Lee Crocket, director of federal fisheries policy at Pew Environment, told IPS.
All the creatures of the sea
It’s not just tuna that are at risk, either. Mother Jones’ Julia Whitty has been documenting the fate of birds, fish, and other sea creatures that come into contact with the oil in the Gulf. She visited Elmer’s Island, LA, and snapped a shot of one of the dead jelly fish that had washed up on the shore:
“There were dead Portuguese man o’war jellies—one of the few species that weather the travails of the dead zone that afflicts these waters each summer. The dead zone is an area around the outflow of the Mississippi River made hypoxic by too many nutrients flowing downstream, mostly from farms and ranches. If you’re a jellyfish, a dead zone is survivable. Apparently an oiled zone is not.”
BP’s shroud of secrecy
BP has been remarkably cagey with the public about what’s going on in the Gulf. In addition to keeping reporters away from soiled area, the company hasn’t shown much interest in understanding exactly how much oil it’s spilling into the ocean. Initial estimates of 1,000 barrels per day have blossomed into estimates, on the low end, of 25,000 barrels. On Democracy Now!, scientist Ira Leifer said that the company is being more forthcoming with information now than it was originally. But he’d like a fuller picture:
“What there really should be at these kind of sites is some acoustic methods, whether it’s sonar or passive listening devices, or other approaches that continuously are monitoring and waiting for something to happen and then would provide a nonstop, steady data stream, so we could actually learn from what happens….These things, they’re not steady states. They belch. They have large eruptions.”
What that means, Leifer said, is that it’s not necessarily accurate to talk about a definitive rate at which the oil is pouring out. In his words, “the flow today is not necessarily the flow tomorrow.” What’s more, the attempts to stop the spill can make it worse. One concern is that the rock surrounding the pipe could “give out,” Leifer says. In that scenario, the oil would not just come from the pipe but from many sites in the surrounding sea bed.
“This reservoir is massive, and it could easily flow that kind of oil for the next twenty or thirty years, if it was left to go unattended,” Leifer said. “So the amount of oil that could end up in the environment if measures are not successful is at what I would call unimaginable.”
Spin, BP, spin
Given that sort of doomsday scenario, it’s not surprising that BP has plans to promise as little as possible to the spill’s victims. As Justin Elliott reports at TPMMuckraker, the company’s plan for oil spills instructs its spokespeople not to promise anything.
BP’s June 2009 Gulf of Mexico Regional Oil Spill Response Plan reads: “No statement shall be made containing … Promises that property, ecology, or anything else will be restored to normal,” Elliott writes.
Solutions
How to move beyond these horror stories? This week, Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-SC) completely disowned the climate legislation he was working on before, and both Mother Jones’ Kevin Drum and The Washington Monthly’s Steve Benen bemoaned the climate bill’s fate.
Yesterday, the Senate narrowly defeated an amendment offered by Sen. Lisa Murkowski (R-AK) that would have stripped the Environmental Protection Agency of its power to regulate carbon. Although the amendment failed, support from Democrats like Arkansas’ Blanche Lincoln signals that the support isn’t there for even unambitious climate legislation. And at this juncture, it seems like the U.S. has done more harm than good in the international arena.
Coping with Copenhagen
International leaders are at Bonn this week, trying to pick up the pieces from last November’s climate change negotiations in Copenhagen.
“Copenhagen was a pretty horrible conference,” conceded Yvo de Boer, the executive secretary of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC), as IPS reports. “This year it’s about restoring trust.”
For the U.S., passing climate legislation would help.
This post features links to the best independent, progressive reporting about the environment by members of The Media Consortium. It is free to reprint. Visit the Mulch for a complete list of articles on environmental issues, or follow us on Twitter. And for the best progressive reporting on critical economy, health care and immigration issues, check out The Audit, The Pulse, and The Diaspora. This is a project of The Media Consortium, a network of leading independent media outlets.By Sarah Laskow, Media Consortium Blogger
“There’s a dead dolphin on... more
-
-
Posted by Zee on May 18th, 2010
Mukhtar is a bus driver from Copenhagen.
On May 5th, it was his birthday and little did he know it was going to be a very special day…
Watch the video.Posted by Zee on May 18th, 2010
Mukhtar is a bus driver from Copenhagen.
On... more
-
-
“Our clouds take their orders from the stars,” says the Danish scientist Henrik Svensmark. That's the amazing and provocative discovery reported here. Most experts thought the idea was crazy.
The film records ten years of effort by the small team in Copenhagen that, in the end, solved the mystery of how the Galaxy and the Sun interfere in our everyday weather.
It's provocative because Dr Svensmark's revelations challenge the belief of most climate theorists that carbon dioxide has been the main driver of global warming. As a result he has faced never-ending opposition.
But strong support for the cosmic view of climate change comes from astronomer Nir Shaviv and geologist Jan Veizer. In the film they tell how the Galaxy has governed the Earth's ever-changing climate over 500 million years.
The Cloud Mystery is aimed at a wide audience. Astonishing pictures from our Galaxy, the Sun, and cloud formations are mixed with spectacular animations to simplify the science. Comments by astronomers, geologists and climate experts convey their sense of adventure, and give scientific weight to the discoveries presented. The audience is taken on a trip around the world, where scientists from Denmark, Israel, Canada, the USA, and Norway contribute to this exciting story.
Linking all the discoveries is the non-stop rain of cosmic rays – energetic particles from exploded stars that battle with the Sun's magnetic field to reach the Earth. Central in the story is an experiment in a Copenhagen basement. It showed how cosmic rays help to make chemical specks in the air on which water drops condense to make clouds.
The story concludes that clouds are the main driver of climate change on Earth.
The documentary follows Henrik Svensmark in his struggle to find the physical evidence of a celestial climate driver. The film demonstrates that science can be a rough place to be if you are in opposition to the established “truth”.
Lars Oxfeldt Mortensen has produced and directed a number of international acclaimed documentaries. He is the winner of numerous awards including CirCom Regional, Monte Carlo and the Télé Science awards.“Our clouds take their orders from the stars,” says the Danish scientist... more
-
