BBC Climate Challenge

The BBC is hosting a cool online climate challenge game. It is sort of like the Sim_ series of games, but you make policy decisions on every level to try to reduce your carbon dioxide emissions while maintaining enough money, food, water, and your popularity as president of Europe.

On each turn (a decade), you play 6 cards from your stack of options of National, Trade, Industry, Local, and Household policies. Each card shows the cost/income and the effects on the other parameters, along with the popularity of the choice. Supposedly you can get kicked out of office if you make enough unpopular decisions. Also, 3 times during the game, you meet with the presidents of the other continents of the world and try to get them to agree to reduce their CO2 emissions, often requiring you to subsidize them.

The goal is the reduce your CO2 emissions to zero over 100 years while maintaining food, water, and money for Europe, and keeping the people happy enough. I have no idea how realistic the effects of the choices are, but they seem pretty good to a political ignoramus like me.

I think this game is a good exercise for some of the high and mighty out there who believe that going green is a matter of simple choices, and also for those who simply want to try to understand the cause and effect, or unintended consequences, of going green. For example, small scale organic farming is obviously more green than medium or large scale factory farming, but then your people will go hungry and you may have to import food, which produces a lot of CO2 and other pollution in the transportation.

On my first try, I got good grades for meeting my CO2 reduction goals, but I left Europe in ruins as nobody had any money or food to eat.

Cash Cows

I'm pretty much just copying this post from an EPA Enewsletter for lack of time today. It's an interesting topic and one way to clean up the dirty agriculture industry.

EPA and its partners have released guidance that can help farmers manage livestock waste and boost farm earnings while reducing greenhouse gases. Processing livestock manure under controlled conditions can produce biogas, a source of greenhouse gas emissions. Farmers also benefit because the biogas can be used to generate electricity.

"Using biogas has multiple benefits; it decreases greenhouse gas emissions, produces renewable energy for rural communities, and safeguards local air and water quality," said Bill Wehrum, EPA's acting assistant administrator of Air and Radiation. "This guidance will help farmers and potential investors make informed choices about which systems work best for farms, for profits, and for our environment."

Biogas is made up of methane and carbon dioxide. Because methane is more than 20 times as potent as carbon dioxide at trapping heat in the atmosphere, capturing biogas provides significant environmental benefits. Also, farmers and project developers can increase their incomes by using biogas for on-site electricity generation or delivery to a local electric utility.

Waste methane recovery systems, also known as anaerobic digestion systems, are estimated to be feasible at about 7,000 dairy and swine operations in the United States. In 2005, about 110 systems were operational or under construction, and another 80 were in the planning stages.

The standardized guidance was developed jointly by EPA's AgStar program, the Association of State Energy Research and Technology Transfer Institutions, and USDA. The guidance will provide a standardized method that will allow farm operators and investors to compare the effectiveness of available waste methane recovery systems.

AgStar is a voluntary program that encourages the use of waste methane recovery systems on dairy and swine farms. Each year, these systems have reduced methane by about 1.5 million metric tons of CO2 equivalent, while providing enough renewable energy to power over 20,000 average American homes. The program also assists countries throughout the world in developing biogas recovery projects through the Methane to Markets Partnership.

Information on the AgStar Protocol: http://www.epa.gov/agstar/resources/protocol.html General information on Methane to Markets Partnership: http://www.epa.gov/methanetomarkets

Doomsday Clock

According to this article on the BBC, the scientists at the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists (BAS) have moved the minute hand two minutes closer to 12 on the symbolic doomsday clock they maintain in Chicago. Why? Global Warming!

The clock is meant to symbolize imminent threat to human civilization. When the clock strikes 12, it's all over folks. The sky will be falling. They moved it to 11:55 this time, which is as close as it has been since the doomiest parts of the cold war. In 1953 it made it down to 2 minutes, and to 3 minutes in 1984.

Global warming isn't the only reason they're moving the minute hand; there are also the obvious nuclear threats in North Korea and Iran.

I've never heard of these guys or this clock before, and therefore do not know if this group tends to lean left or right. Nonetheless, it's interesting to hear that they view this risk so seriously. They state that "the world has not faced such perilous choices" since the bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki.

I don't view it THAT seriously: I'm only building a raft around the foundation of my house and stocking up on guns.

Chicken Little

Even with almost all of the skeptics now agreeing that global warming or climate change is real and is affected (at least to some extent) by human activity, there still exists a powerful minority of dissenters. I'm ashamed to read the comments (BBC News) of Daimler-Chrysler's chief economist, who has attacked "the quasi-hysterical Europeans" and their "chicken little attitute" towards global warming. He believes, and obviously will try to pursuade DCX, that little should be spent on greener efforts.

My view? I don't know and I don't really care if human activity is affecting the natural cycle of warming and cooling. We do KNOW that humans, and especially Americans, emit way more than we need to. So WHY NOT make changes that we KNOW will reduce our footprint? I'm not talking about going broke trying; I'm talking about making sensible investments that are proven to be sustainable (i.e. let you keep making money in the long run).

The next question: why are Europeans' and Americans' attitudes different? My question is: on what issues are their attitutes the same? Not many I think.

Save the Planet One Book Report at a Time

While checking out at the library a while ago, a high school girl next to me laid her books on the counter and the clerk immediately said, "Someones doing a paper for school." After smirking about the clerk's nosiness, I looked at the girl's collection and they were all about climate change. She didn't appear pleased about the assignment, but maybe she was just smirking at the clerk's nosiness too.

I remember doing my first environmental reports and it was really hard to find any good resources at most libraries. Now, of course, every ex-vice president and his brother have written books on the subject. Many of these books are specialized so you can get decent info on everything from ice caps to the deep see or the boreal forest.

Then last week I picked up the latest BookPage, which can be found at most libraries, and the cover story is about environmental books.

I've not read the five books they feature, but I'll list them here with a quick summary and you can check them out.

Worldchanging: A User's Guide for the 21st Century is one I've heard a lot about. This is a true treehugger book and will present a new way to do everything you do. If you want to change and need ideas, read this.

Hell and High Water: Global Warming-The Solution and the Politics-and What we Should Do has too long a title, but sounds like it might hit the spot on how environmental protection is not about environmental protection - it's more about politics. The review says that the book offers many problems and not many solutions.

The Rough Guide to Shopping with a Conscience sounds very cool to me, as one who wishes to put his money where his mouth is. The review points out that this book is very credible and current, hence useful.

365 Ways to Change the World: How to Make a Difference One Day at a Time is one of those books that offers you some idea every day, from donating money to simply meditating about some topic.

The Business of Changing the World sounds like it has more to do with philanthropy than granola. It's written by the head of Timberland (shoes) and focuses on how companies can make a difference through volunteering and giving. While this isn't directly environmental, it's easy to choose an environmental project or program when considering philanthropy.

Gore = Personality ??

I just watched Al Gore's appearance on Leno and was really impressed. That guy barely displayed a heartbeat for 8 years in the White House and now he's talking about "hot glacier on glacier action" in "global warming gone wild" and doing bad imitations of Governor Arnold! I have not yet seen "An Inconvenient Truth", but hope to soon. The varmints don't allow too many 2 hour downtime opportunities.
Mr. Gore echoed something I said in a post this morning - that everybody can do something little that makes a difference - and saves money: compact flourescents (CFLs), programmable thermostats, etc. Easy, cheap things that will save you money and reduce your energy consumption.