Boston GreenScene

Learning From Cape Wind

2010-03-07T16:29:23-05:00

This April, near the 40th anniversary of the Clean Air Act, Interior Secretary Ken Salazar will make the final decision that seals the fate of Cape Wind. The tumultuous 130 off-shore wind turbine project, in process for almost ten years, has the potential to turn the powerful Nantucket Sound winds into enough clean electricity for approximately 400,000 homes.

No matter how Secretary Salazar adjudicates, however, it is clear that there is a lesson that Massachusetts policy makers must learn from Cape Wind: large projects cannot be the unilateral focus of clean energy development.

While Cape Wind has helped to blaze a critical path for wind electricity generation in New England, it has also shown that such projects can be incredibly controversial. Opponents of Cape Wind believe the turbines would hinder sea navigation, do harm to the local environment, diminish the Sound’s natural beauty, and negatively impact tourism. Additionally, opponents are skeptical about supporting a project in their backyard that appears to only financially benefit the few who have access to the tremendous resources that are required for a wind farm like Cape Wind.

Considering the abject criticism that arises with large renewable energy sites, it is evident that a parallel policy which supports smaller projects should be pursued.

Imagine a policy which allows every Commonwealth resident or business with a parcel of land or a rooftop to prosper from installing their own renewable energy system. A system in which each citizen, not just those with great means, has the ability to produce clean, safe electricity that also increases their financial security. Envision windmills on every farm, solar panels on every home or business, and Massachusetts taking a real step towards energy independence.

This vision is not some policy pipe dream. This scenario is beginning to happen today in several European countries and Canada, and is leading to rapid growth in renewable energy generation. In Germany, a country that is considered a world leader in clean energy production, over 15% of electricity consumed is produced by renewable energy sources. This number is expected to grow to at least 50% by 2050. In Spain, wind turbines supply over half of the national power grid and solar panel installment is on the rise. These surges of clean, homegrown electricity are made possible in part through a simple policy mechanism called a feed-in tariff.

A feed-in tariff, also known as a renewable energy payment, is a guaranteed monetary payment per kilowatt-hour for electricity generated by a renewable source. These guaranteed payments from power companies to renewable producers create a market for clean electricity, reduce the barriers to entry for individual investors, and allow virtually any individual to prosper financially from installing a clean energy system.

Currently in Massachusetts, most of those who produce clean energy can only count on receiving a kilowatt credit on their bill for the unused electricity that they create. This policy, known as net metering, is the most common form of clean energy incentive in the United States and does allow some clean energy projects to be feasible for individuals. Unfortunately, these electricity credits, even when combined with available rebates, grants, and tax incentives, are simply not enough to kick start the renewable power surge that our state needs. In fact, the lack of a singular incentive policy can have the reverse effect and can become too complex of an investment puzzle for potential investors to piece together.

Forty years ago, the Clean Air Act set off a stampede of environmental innovation and investment that our country had never seen before. Recently, Massachusetts has led the United States by enacting several progressive clean energy policies such as the Green Communities Act. Now, on the cusp of the looming Cape Wind decision, Massachusetts residents are calling once again for more progressive energy policy. People are desperate for new jobs, financial security, and freedom from being held hostage by yo-yoing energy prices. Bay State officials should heed these pleas, and enact a smart, comprehensive feed-in tariff policy that allows all citizens to take part in the clean energy revolution that Massachusetts so desperately needs.

Boston Event: Green Mixer - March 18th at Cafeteria

2010-03-06T10:13:56-05:00

You are invited to an exciting social event in Boston, the Green Mixer! This event will bring Boston’s local sustainability-oriented companies and an eco-conscious crowd together in a friendly, intimate atmosphere. In this setting, we can raise awareness of environmentally responsible consumer choices, provide an informal shopping experience, and socialize, have fun and make new friends. Cafeteria Restaurant will serve complimentary appetizers, and, at two cash bars, organic cocktails.

Who: You and your friends

When: Thursday, March 18th, 5-11pm - Show up any time, it's come and go!

Where: Cafeteria, 279 Newbury Street, Boston

Cost: FREE

Also, premiering at this event: The Montague Boston Bike! The Montague Boston Bike is the world's first full-size single-speed folding bike! It is cutting-edge, born from the mind of an MIT grad, and named after our city. While it won't be released at Wheelworks until March, it will be available to try at the Mixer all evening!

Boston - A New Environmental Science Academy

2010-03-01T13:30:05-05:00

By Scotland Willis

Boston City Councilor John Connolly, hosted a meeting to investigate the creation of an Environmental Science Academy charter school. Twenty-three members of an advisory committee (selected by the Councilor,) gathered around the large conference table at City Hall, to listen to the Councilor's vision and guidelines to make this charter school a reality.

After listening to the outline for the vision, the advisory committee provided a list of immediate recommendations to help jump start the work. Ideas came from students, environmental and academic experts, as well as community people. Together they identified some preliminary resources to consider for part of the work. Ideas for the academy ranged from partnerships with A123 battery manufacture, to similar school models established in Europe.

Over the next 8 months, the advisory committee will gather information that can be presented to the entire city council, to help build a case for the creation of the environmental science academy. Part of the vision includes serving k-12, using strategies that will incorporate much of today's environmental technology. Math and science priorities are to be built into the framework, making it eligible for Race To The Top funds at the federal level. This funding increases the likelihood of its creation by the Boston Public School system, if the city council votes in favor of the proposal at the end of the year. As good of an idea as this sounds, major barriers still exist because of already strained budget and contentious issues brought forth by public school teachers. For this reason, the advisory committee will have to work extra hard.

Councilor Connolly has made it very clear that he wants the advisory committee to search far and wide for the best ideas. The academy is consistent with Mayor Menino's objective to make Boston a leader in the green economy. If all goes well, Boston may very well see its first school dedicated to the environmental sciences and sustainability.

Event 2/25/10: Boston CSA Farm Share Fair

2010-02-23T07:21:00-05:00

Want to eat locally this summer? Come meet local farmers at this Arlington fair and sign up for a summer share of fresh, locally grown food!

Community Supported Agriculture (CSA) is a model for supporting and revitalizing local agriculture. Supporters pre-purchase a share of the season's harvest, agreeing to support the farm throughout the season, and assume the costs, risks and bounty of growing food along with the farmer. In return, the farmer provides, to the best of his/her ability, a healthy supply of seasonal fresh produce throughout the growing season, as well as opportunities to connect with the land on which the produce is grown.

Who: Local Farmers & You!
When: Thursday, February 25, 2010, from 6:00pm to 7:30pm
Where: Park Avenue Congregational Church, 50 Paul Revere Road in Arlington Heights
Contact: http://csafairarlington.wordpress.com/blog/
Cost: Free

Making fuel from food waste: Waltham firm must clear hurdles before capitalizing on leftovers

2010-02-22T15:47:00-05:00

By Scott Kirsner

Globe Columnist / February 21, 2010

The Boston Globe

A hungry young company in Waltham is eyeing that half-eaten bagel on your plate, that grapefruit rind, and those first few pancakes that didn’t come out quite right. Harvest Power Inc. looks at leftover food from homes, restaurants, and supermarkets as an underutilized resource.

Today, nearly all of it heads to the landfill. In Harvest Power’s vision of the future - supported by $40 million in funding from investors like venture capital firm Kleiner Perkins Caulfield & Byers of California and the trash-hauler Waste Management Inc. - it has the potential to be turned into compost, electricity, natural gas, or steam for heating.

“Twenty years ago, yard waste wasn’t separated, and it went to the landfill - and the United States produces about as much food waste as we do yard waste,’’ says Harvest Power chief executive Paul Sellew.

Most cities and towns collect yard waste separately and send it to facilities for composting. There are about 30 such facilities in Massachusetts, according to the state’s Department of Environmental Protection. Sellew would like to see the same sort of shift happen with excess food, and policy makers and planning agencies such as the Boston Redevelopment Authority seem interested. Harvest is set to begin building its first energy-producing plant in Vancouver, Canada, later this year, and is proposing another for San Jose, Calif.

“We’re more active on the West Coast, where a lot of cities are talking about the goal of zero waste - nothing going to the landfills,’’ says Sellew, “but we want to do something around here as well.’’

CLICK HERE TO CONTINUE READING

Policy Corner: Feed-in Tariffs Offer Farmers Clean Energy Revenue

2010-02-21T12:33:00-05:00

By Dan Burgess

As we’ve explored over the past few months, Massachusetts has several initiatives in place that aim to promote clean energy generation. Renewable portfolio standards, net metering, tax credits, rebates, and state grants are all helping to ensure that the Commonwealth is a burgeoning renewable energy leader in the United States.These policies, particularly net metering and the streamlining of wind turbine citing processes, now pave the way for a more progressive policy that has proven to be successful in Europe and Canada: renewable energy payments known as feed-in tariffs (FITs).

Put succinctly by renewable energy analyst and advocate Paul Gipe: “Feed-in tariffs are simply payments per kilowatt-hour for electricity generated by a renewable resource. They are the world’s most successful policy for the rapid development of significant amounts of renewable energy... Feed-in tariffs work because they are more equitable than other policies. They enable everyone--including homeowners, farmers, cooperatives, and businesses large and small--to profit from renewable energy.”

As Gipe mentions, FIT policy has proven, both in Europe and in the few times it has been attempted in the United States, to be superior to other clean energy policies. These guaranteed payments from power companies are successful because they allow investors to garner a modest profit from renewable energy generation. A smart FIT payment structure ensures moderate profitability for even small projects and reduces market entry barriers that currently exist for establishing clean energy systems. It’s easy to imagine our state leading the clean energy boom if Bay State households were paid directly as a result of installing solar panels on their roof or erecting a windmill on their farm. As outlined by the National Renewable Energy Laboratory, there are six key elements for successful FIT policy:

Contract stability, typically for 15 - 20 years
Payments based on the cost of a project that ensure a modest profit for the investor.
Incremental payment decreases throughout the lifetime of a contract to account for future technology advancements.
Payments should be dependent on the type of project.
In order to ensure payment, additional costs of FIT payments should be tied directly back to electricity rate payers.
Ensure a FIT approval process in streamline in order not to discourage projects from coming to fruition.

Massachusetts has set formidable goals for clean energy generation and job creation. These goals aim to reduce negative climate impact, create green collar jobs, lessen the Commonwealth’s requirement for fossil fuels, and to produce a more sustainable state for future generations. The most effective way for Massachusetts officials to ensure the Bay State is this leader, is to enact a common sense feed-in tariff system that will ultimately renew, revitalize, and rejuvenate our state. To learn more about FIT policy visit www.wind-works.org or visit the NREL at www.nrel.gov.

Event: HEET Weatherization Barnraising 2/28/2010

2010-02-21T12:18:05-05:00

Home Energy Efficiency Team (HEET) is a grassroots nonprofit that organizes free weatherization parties to teach volunteers hands-on how to lower their energy bills and carbon emissions. HEET consults with energy experts to pass on accurate information and aims to build community, create social marketing for energy efficiency and help facilitate exchanges of ideas. Volunteer work includes weatherizing doors, sealing windows, caulking air leaks, and programing thermostats. You can pitch in to help a neighbor, learn skills to help you save money at home, fight climate change, and meet other concerned Bay Staters! No previous work experience required.

Who: Home Energy Efficiency Team (HEET)
When: Sunday, February 28, 2010, from 12:30-5:00pm
Where: 94 Spring Street, Cambridge, MA 02139
Contact: heet.cambridge@gmail.com, heetma.com
Cost: Free

USGBC National Talent Design Competition Early Registration

2010-02-20T19:05:41-05:00

From now until March 1, 2010. Register Online.

For the first time the Connecticut Emerging Green Builders will be bringing USGBC’s NTDC to Connecticut and the surrounding areas. Students and Emerging Professionals will design a small, affordable, LEED Platinum-rated home for New Orleans, LA. Two winning teams from our area can expect generous prizes and will advance to the National Level Competition! Four National Winners will have their houses built in New Orleans and will win the chance to travel to GreenBuild this year in Chicago. Register your team today!

Student Teams $25 Total. Emerging Professionals $50 Total. For more information or to sign up, click here.

VIDEO: Boston ‘Bike Czar’ Nicole Freedman Talks Bike-Share & Urban Cycling

2010-02-11T17:24:20-05:00

Inhabitat interviews Boston bike czar, Nicole Freedman to talk about how to take Boston from rated as THE WORST city in the world for cycling to inspiring 8 - 10 percent of the city's population to use a bicycle as their main mode of transporation.

Event - GO GREEN 2010: A Community Day 3/4/10

2010-02-11T10:49:10-05:00

Hill House, a non-profit community center serving over 2,000 families in downtown Boston, and Partner of Green Schools, is co-hosting with the Beacon Hill Civic Association GO GREEN 2010: A Community Day for the Environment on Thursday, March 4, 2010 from 3-6pm. Families and community members of all ages are invited to participate in eco-friendly activities and have the opportunity to learn about renewable energy, eco-responsibility and their interdependence with the environment from local "green" businesses and neighborhood partners. The event promises to be a fun-filled educational and inspirational day for all.

Who: Hill House and the Beacon Hill Civic Association

When: Thursday, March 4, 2010 from 3-6pm

Where: Hill House, 127 Mt. Vernon Street (and Charles Street), Boston, MA 02108

Contact: Brian Koslosky, 617-227-5838 www.hillhouseboston.org

Cost: Free

Nissan Leaf Comes to Town - Prizes & Giveaways

2010-02-08T07:03:08-05:00

Nissan’s upcoming all-electric LEAF car has been touring the United States for the past three months, and is making two stops in the Boston area this week. Through the Nissan LEAF Zero Emission Tour, Nissan will be showcasing the electric vehicle and battery technology as well as the company's zero-emission mobility objectives. On Tuesday, February 9th, the five-passenger, five-door, gasoline-free LEAF will be on display at the Boston Museum of Science from 9am to 3pm. It will be available to see later in the day at the Larz Anderson Automobile Museum in Brookline from 6:30 to 8:30pm. Complete details can be found here.

To celebrate the arrival of the LEAF, we are giving away some prizes to our Twitter followers! One lucky follower will win a Nissan LEAF Zero Emission Tour t-shirt, $150 TerraPass gift certificate and a Eco Touch green car cleaning kit. To enter, simply head over to twitter.com/magreenscene and follow the directions in today’s tweet. Contest runs through March 1, 2010. A winner will be announced on March 2, 2010. Make sure that you are following TWITTER to be eligible to enter!

Renewable (Energy) Portfolio Standards: What they are and why they're important

2010-01-12T13:37:59-05:00

by Dan Burgess, Boston GreenScene's Policy Corner Commentator

Massachusetts has taken several legislative steps in an attempt to stimulate renewable energy growth. One such step is the introduction of Renewable Portfolio Standards (RPS). What are they? RPS are mandated clean energy objectives for utility companies. These objectives dictate that utility companies create or purchase a certain percentage of their overall energy portfolio from clean energy generation sources. RPS were originally introduced in Massachusetts in 1997 and are established in twenty-nine states and the District of Columbia.

States with Renewable Portfolio Standards and Goals by DSIRE

While originally introduced in 1997, RPS were significantly expanded as a part of the Green Communities Act. The Green Communities Act mandated that qualifying Massachusetts utility companies comply with a RPS that increases by 1% per year until 2020, to 15% of total generation. According to a 2008 study performed by the Department of Renewable Energy Resources (DOER) and the Renewable Energy Trust, “Projects in Massachusetts currently under construction, design, or consideration, if approved and developed, would generate 3.7 million MWh. Completion of these projects would meet roughly half of the RPS obligation, leaving an additional 3.8 MWh to be met from other renewable sources.”

To meet the RPS mandated by Massachusetts, utility companies will solicit competitive bids from large clean electricity producers. If these utility companies do not meet the renewable standards set, they will be forced to submit an alternative compliance payment derived from the Consumer Price Index of the preceding year. While this process, known as tendering, will help to encourage an additional 3.8 MWh of clean energy production over the next eleven years, it is ultimately unclear that this RPS will have a positive economic impact on more than a few clean energy investors.

Utility companies will attempt to fill this 3.8 MWh clean energy gap with large projects and these sizable projects likely will not positively impact small, individual clean energy producers. In addition, these large projects take substantial time to come to fruition and can be unpopular with local residents. A clear example of this is the long-delayed and controversial Cape Wind project. Overall, Renewable Portfolio Standards will ensure that Massachusetts utility companies are providing residents with more clean energy, but further action should be taken to ensure utility companies support a broader cross-section of clean energy projects.

Policy Corner - Net Metering

2009-12-15T22:14:48-05:00

by Dan Burgess, Boston GreenScene's Policy Corner Commentator

Over the past week, the world has turned its attention to climate negotiations in Denmark. This greatly anticipated global meeting seeks to find a collective agreement among over 200 nations regarding climate change policies and emissions reduction goals. This event is almost certainly the most important gathering to be focused on the environment in the history of the planet. If somehow you aren’t convinced the entire world is focused on Copenhagen, read last Monday’s editorial that was printed in 56 newspapers in 45 countries (or turn on your TV, listen to the radio, or open an Internet browser)

Unfortunately for me, life does not take a break to follow the events and I am unable to write about Boston GreenScene’s high hopes for success in Copenhagen. I am however, fortunate enough to be researching Massachusetts clean energy policy and in light of this research, this week’s Policy Corner will focus on an integral policy in Massachusetts clean energy strategy: net metering.

Net metering is one of the most common forms of clean energy incentives policies in the United States. Generally stated, net metering is a state policy that allows energy customers to use and get credit for unused electricity that is created by a renewable energy system. According to the National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL), “42 states, four territories, and the District of Columbia have net metering policies.”

The below map shows a snapshot of states with net metering policies as of July 2009.

Net metering was originally introduced by the Department of Public Utilities in 1982 for small clean energy systems in Massachusetts. As a part of the Green Communities Act, net metering was greatly expanded and is now a major component of Massachusetts’ strategy for clean energy production. The Green Communities Act placed net metering facilities into three separate classes. These classes provide a strong framework for private renewable energy system classification. Additionally, they represent a significant expansion on previous net metering systemization from 60 kilowatts up to 2 megawatts. These parameters were also expanded to specifically include agricultural energy facilities, such as biomass facilities and anaerobic digesters. This permits Massachusetts farmers the opportunity to create, use, and credit their unused produced energy. In combination with other state and federal incentives, law makers expect that net metering will greatly increase private renewable energy generation in Massachusetts.

Overall, net metering policy has been successful in the United States. According to the National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL), “states that had implemented net-metering legislation in 2005 had significantly more renewable energy generation in 2007 (in terms of total generation, as a percent of total electricity generation, and per capital) than states without the policy.”

Unfortunately, there are also numerous drawbacks of net metering for Massachusetts. The first being that net metering is often not enough of a stimulus for private investors to seriously invest in clean energy production. As the policy is credit-based, the investment return time is likely to be significant. This gap in return on investment ensures that those who insert capital to install a renewable energy system will need a large sum up front. This limits the amount of projects that could be developed, ensures that potential producers are not likely to invest heavily, and limits who can invest.

While net metering provides Massachusetts residents with a decent incentive to invest in renewable energy generation systems, there are other policy initiatives that Massachusetts should authorize. In the upcoming weeks, I’ll discuss other Massachusetts initiatives that are currently in place as well as other policies the Commonwealth should considering enacting.

Video: Shades of Green New England Showcases EcoFish and GG2G

2009-12-07T22:37:26-05:00

This pilot episode of Shades of Green New England profiles EcoFish, a New Hampshire based seafood distributor that sources high quality, all natural seafood from sustainable fisheries and delivers them to Boston based restaurants like Blue Ginger, and the fashion design firm GG2G, “Green Goods 2 Give and 2 Get,” founded by two young women who create trendy bags, belts, headbands, and wallets from used billboards.

Policy Corner: Renewable Energy Snapshot

2009-12-01T19:11:37-05:00

by Dan Burgess, Boston GreenScene's Policy Corner Commentator

As the environmental policy debate continues to ramp up both abroad and here at home, a useful new report from the National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL) was released and provides us with a snapshot of how the United States, and the state of Massachusetts, are performing. The NREL report, titled ‘State of the States 2009: Renewable Energy Development and the Role of Policy,’ is a comprehensive snapshot of the United States renewable energy production by state. Derived from renewable energy information collected between 2001 and 2007, the report clearly demonstrates how effective, or futile, the United States clean energy strategy has been and the role Massachusetts is playing in comparison to other states. While the data does not show results from the most recent legislative efforts made by Governor Patrick, the figures do serve as a good yardstick to gauge overall efforts. The following comes from the 212 page report:

United States

Renewable electricity resources supplied 8.5% of the total electricity generation in the United States in 2007 which is down from 9.5% in 2006. This drop is due to a decrease in hydroelectric energy production and is a result of climate instability: less rain, less river currents for electricity generation.

Of the total 8.5% produced by renewables, hydroelectric generation represents the largest portion at 70%. The next largest are biomass at over 15% and wind at over 9%.
Wind resources experienced the largest growth of the renewable energy technologies in recent years, increasing 30% from 2006 to 2007.
Astute state legislation works, and works relatively quickly. States with renewable portfolio standards and/or net-metering systems in place produced greater amounts of clean energy than those without.

Massachusetts

Massachusetts ranked as the 31st state in total renewable electricity generation.

As a percentage of total state electricity generation, Massachusetts produced 4.3% from renewable energy. This ranked 27th.
Between 2001 and 2007, the Commonwealth’s clean energy production grew 1.1% for a rank of 33rd. However, as a percentage of total state electricity growth, renewable generation was -17.4% for a rank of 40th.
The Commonwealth ranks 33rd of 36 states in total capacity for wind generation with the ability to produce 5.4 megawatts (note: 2008 numbers are most recent data, does not represent current 2009 capacity).

There is certainly a narrative that can be told regarding and explaining these statistics, particularly relating state data to implemented renewable portfolio standards (RPS). Overall, however, this data makes clear that the United States and Massachusetts have sufficient space to raise the renewable energy bar. I’ll be covering more policy initiatives that should be considered over the next few months, but its important we keep these statistics in mind when discussing the potential for growth in our public discourse.

Policy Corner: Cash for Caulkers

2009-11-24T17:09:14-05:00

by Dan Burgess, Boston GreenScene's Policy Corner Commentator

In a slew of clean energy policy news this past week, the most intriguing idea I’ve heard is that of a ‘Cash for Caulkers’ program. This initiative, as explained by David Leonhardt in the New York Times, would provide federal subsidies to encourage home weatherization in the United States.

Much like how the Cash for Clunkers program helped buoy the automotive industry by encouraging car owners to purchase more energy efficient vehicles, the Cash for Caulkers measure would provide incentives for homeowners to make their homes more energy efficient. Household energy efficiency would be gauged through energy audits and money would then be provided by the federal government to homeowners to help offset the overall costs of the weatherization. There are numerous benefits to this idea and it should be enacted as soon as possible.

This program would undoubtedly reduce energy use immediately. In the article, Leonhardt mentions that the consulting firm McKinsey estimates there could be a 28% reduction in energy use over the next decade with proper weatherization in the United States. This reduction not only would make our country less reliant on unclean energy sources, but also would provide immediate financial relief for struggling families in Massachusetts.

Cash for Caulkers would also create jobs in every corner of the United States immediately, and at a fixed cost. As the Massachusetts unemployment rate nears 10%, Deval Patrick’s administration is desperate to find ways to create new jobs. Unfortunately, the Commonwealth is currently running one of the highest state deficits in the country and is unable to make the type of investments required to fund major employment projects that are common during recessions. Patrick needs aid from the federal government, and this weatherization program would certainly help improve employment numbers in Massachusetts.

While the details of the Cash for Caulkers plan will evolve over the next three to six months, the basic idea is sound and would have enormous and immediate benefits for Massachusetts residents.

It should be noted that Massachusetts, through the Department of Energy Resources, already has numerous projects focused on helping residents save money through energy efficiency. A thorough list of resources can be found on the DOER website. One such program is MassSAVE, a private/public partnership that provides support for Massachusetts residents looking to make their homes more energy efficient. Additionally, nonprofit organizations, like the Home Energy and Efficiency Team in Cambridge, have begun taking up the cause and are a wonderful examples of the effects home weatherization can have.

Without question, the energy efficiency and home weatherization programs in Massachusetts are critical to a more sustainable future. However, only with a strong federally-funded and promoted effort can these efforts be truly successful.

International NonProfit "Ocean Alliance" Seeks Administrative Volunteers

2009-11-24T07:24:12-05:00

From the Editor's Desk

Have some extra time between now and the end of the year? Looking to get your foot in the door as an administrator at a green organization? If so, the following call for volunteers published by Ocean Alliance might interest you:

Ocean Alliance, an international nonprofit whale and ocean research organization located in Lincoln, Massachusetts, is seeking volunteer administrative assistance to help with year-end tasks and New Year outreach.

Responsibilities will include normal office duties, including filing, mailings, donor stewardship, and basic banking. We are Mac-based (with MS Office applications) and work in a converted barn in a very casual environment.

Hours are flexible and schedules can be developed around availability. This volunteer position can lead to a permanent, part time position based on future organizational funding and the successful applicant’s fit with the team.

More organizational information can be found at www.oceanalliance.org.

Send brief resume/job experience and cover letter to patrickw@oceanalliance.org. No calls please.

Composting, Sustainability: Here’s the Dish

2009-11-22T12:53:43-05:00

by Daniel E. Walsh Author of Our Sunday "History & Reflections" Series

The Candy Man makes everything he bakes satisfying and delicious
Now you talk about your childhood wishes, you can even eat the dishes

Candy Man, Leslie Bricusse and Anthony Newley, sung by Sammy Davis, Jr

Well, you can’t eat these dishes, but you can make them from leaves from the ground—attractive dishes made from fallen palm leaves using just heat and water. You can bake in them, wash them, and re-use them. Proudly set a holiday dinner (particularly if you order them by this Tuesday for expedited delivery!). You can throw them away. No guilt.

Michael Dwork, while interning in India, noticed the locals making dishes from palm leaves gathered from the ground. The simple steam and heat manufacturing process piqued Dwork’s interest. He saw the possibilities. He viewed the dishes as not only a viable business opportunity, but as a very sustainable commodity.

VerTerra is now the realization of that vision. You can view their products online or buy them at select retailers. The company operates in South Asia and is committed to the locals they employ. VerTerra pays fair wages and provides access to healthcare.

Dwork designed a technique for replicating the dishes. He refined the process to make upscale disposable tableware that he felt would resonate with the American consumer.

Though built as a throwaway, the dishes can actually be used many times. The manufacturing process and lack of artificial sealing elements requires Verterra to sell the dishes as throwaways. But, as they report on their website, many of their customers attest to repeated uses.

The dishes are not recyclable, but are compostable; this is because of the natural content, i. e., palm leaves and water. For guilt-ridden consumers, composting may be an offset to the inherent laziness of those inclined to disposable items. Composting is work. For tips and composting strategies check out the BPI website.

In the Boston area, VerTerra products can be found at Harvest Co-Op and Pemberton Market in Cambridge, Shubies in Marblehead, Tilly & Salvy’s Bacon Street Farm in Natick, and The Green Egg in Manchester.

This product fits in well with American go-go society. Realistically, you can take this green thing to the extreme. You have to recognize the current tastes. If not, we’re in East Germany peddling around in Flintstones cars. That’s not likely to happen. Tweak something here, reduce something there, and the result over a broad front is dramatic

This Thanksgiving, if you want to cash in on some convenience and do it in style, and check out VerTerra. Firstly, be thankful if you have a table to pile some food on and be grateful for that food. Then you can be thankful that a conscientious sustainability movement is afoot. And rest those feet. Watch some football. Don’t get lost in the dogma. Relax, be an American. The dishes? Hell, throw them away!

Green Job Growth: What is it? Where is it?

2009-11-20T15:16:54-05:00

by Anneli C. Olila, Editor-in-Chief of Boston GreenScene / Principal of Olila Documents & Communication Strategies

In my recent discussion of green job hunting myths, I argued against the mystique surrounding the green job industry and the psychological and other barriers this presents to those hoping to transition into a green career. Responses from readers ranged from disbelief, to hesitant hope, to specific questions regarding qualifications and resources. In this article, I start to provide some data that may be useful to readers in understanding the projected growth of the green job market and where they might fit in.

What Do We Mean by 'the Green Job Market is Growing'?

According to the United States President's Council of Economic Advisers (CEA), green jobs are everywhere, and the growth of the green job market is anticipated to continue to outstrip the growth of other markets. In its July 2009 report, the CEA cited data compiled by the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) showing projected growth in environmentally-related occupations to be 38% more than all other occupations combined by 2016. This is depicted in the following figure, reproduced from page 8 of their report:

To put this into perspective, it is worth noting that the occupations they considered were actually in a fairly limited range. Specifically, the BLS projections drawn from in the CEA report are based on data for the following occupations only:

environmental engineering technicians
environmental engineers
environmental scientists and specialists (including health)
environmental science and protection technicians (including health)

Including the likely corresponding increase in ancillary and surrounding jobs (IT, administration, and HR, to name just a few) would likely increase their projections significantly. In fact, echoing others, the CEA notes specifically that, "... it is currently hard to classify “green” jobs as they cross standard industry and occupation definitions," and that "the BLS has begun to consider a new classification system to learn more about these jobs. This will allow researchers to track changes in this rapidly evolving sector." (p. 9)

In October 2008, Global Insight published their own green job projections in a report developed for The United States Conference of Mayors and the Mayors Climate Protection Center. This report, "Current and Potential Green Jobs in the U.S. Economy," predicts the highest growth of green jobs will be in renewable power generation, residential and commercial retrofitting, and renewable transportation fuels. Global Insight includes in their projections not only 'direct' green jobs (such as hands-on manufacturing and retrofitting jobs), but 'indirect' green jobs, which they identify as engineering, legal, research, and consulting positions. Their projections for potential green jobs through 2038 for the US as a whole, totaling 4,214,700, are represented in the following graph:

Massachusetts and Connecticut

The Global Insight report also presented projections by state. For our Massachusetts and Connecticut readers, I have reproduced the projections for specific metropolitan areas here below:

Global Insight concludes its report with the following statement regarding where green jobs will be found:

"There are many Green Jobs in our economy already, but that figure stands to grow tremendously over the coming years due to market forces, legislation, and local initiatives, or some combination thereof. The vast majority of Green Jobs are not location dependent, so future Green Jobs will be located in cities and metropolitan areas that are currently the most attractive for investment, or in areas that actively increase their attractiveness relative to competing areas. The good news is that traditional industries continue to be replaced by new opportunities, and we have only just begun to tap into many of them."

Here again, however, the data compilers are not reflecting the many ancillary and supportive jobs (at all levels) that will necessarily be created by these projected increases. From the perspective of those looking to green their careers, adding these in would more accurately reflect the opportunities that are or will be available.

Local Student Writes President Obama in Effort to Save the Oceans

2009-11-20T11:18:53-05:00

VIA WickedLocal Wenham

Photo credit: Wicked Local photo by David Sokol

Hamilton - Eight-year-old Margaret Brown is on a mission to save the earth’s oceans and stop pollution around her. After a class trip to study tide pools turned up more trash than sea treasures, the Hamilton resident was spurred to action.

“I got a piece of paper and decided to write a letter to the president. When I was finished I went over to my Dad and asked if we could look up the address of the president,” Margaret said.

For months, she waited anxiously for a reply from 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue. Finally, just a few weeks ago, she received her answer.

“It was great. My grandmother writes in cursive like this,” Margaret said, referencing the envelope, “so I thought it was from her. Then my mom said ‘look at the return address,’ so I did, then I screamed. So, it was pretty cool.”

Pretty cool, indeed. The Buker School third-grader received a reply from the White House thanking her for her letter and encouraging her to continue with her academic goals and service. The letter ended, “Young people like you inspire me and give me great hope for the future. Thank you, again, for being in touch. The First Lady and I wish you all the best.” And it was signed, Barack Obama.

Margaret’s passion for the environment began at an early age. When asked when her interest in the environment began, she said, “It just started in second grade, and first grade. I just really want the planet to be a better planet.”

She went on to describe seeing the movie “Wall-E” which features a future world covered in trash. Of the movie, she said, “I just don’t want the future to be like that.” This fictional account along with the very real world around her has kept Margaret working for change.

Her parents fully support her endeavors. They have two composting bins in the backyard and use reusable grocery bags. They have even supported her to the point of buying a more expensive lunch kit that allows Margaret to have a waste-free school lunch. The kit was purchased online from Kids Konserve. Her mother was sold on the kit after reading statistics on the company’s Web site.

“They had some interesting statistics on the amount of trash generated by kid’s lunches every year,” Mary Jane Brown, Margaret’s mother, said. For example, 3.5 billion pounds of garbage is generated every year from school lunches.

Margaret has also been inspired by footage she and her mother watched on the Internet about the Great Pacific Garbage Dump. Margaret was horrified to learn that there is a stretch of ocean from California to Japan that is littered with garbage, most of it plastic. As they researched online, her mother found a story about baby birds whose parents saw plastic floating in the water, and, mistaking it for food, fed it to their chicks. They watched a video on this Web site about a “baby bird who died and when they cut his belly open there was no fish in it, only plastic,” Margaret said.

This kind of problem is too common, and one that Margaret hopes President Obama will help to stop. When asked what she would like readers to take away from her story she said, “You should only throw away as little as possible and always recycle.”

Margaret’s recycling tips

Recycle your plastic whenever possible.

Carry reusable bags to the store instead of getting more plastic bags.

Select items that are packaged in glass over plastic.

Use a reusable container.

Make sure recyclable trash ends up in the trash or recycling bin and not in the street because most of the trash in the street goes down the storm drains and ends up in the ocean.

Squashing Some Green Job Hunting Myths

2009-11-12T21:32:38-05:00

by Anneli C. Olila, Editor-in-Chief of Boston GreenScene / Principal of Olila Documents & Communication Strategies

Each week, I spend hours talking to job seekers of all levels—from those just graduating from school to highly-experienced C-level executives. Many are contemplating a green career, either out of their passion for the environment or simply because other markets are tight and the green market shows promise. Often, what I hear is a fatigued and resigned voice on the other end of the phone saying, “I’d love to join a green company, but they all want you to already have vast experience in the green industry.”

When anyone, let alone a top-level, international, well-accomplished executive, says this to me in the midst of cataloging his or her milestone achievements—such as dramatically increasing revenue, efficiency, and organizational prestige; adeptly handling countless mergers and acquisitions; building exceptional cross-cultural and cross-functional teams; applying proven project management and Six Sigma skills; and achieving numerous patented inventions across regulatory environments—I am astonished. I am astonished as editor-in-chief of a green information portal, and I am astonished as a communications specialist who works closely with companies, schools, recruiters, and job seekers. I am also astonished just as a thinking person. There is an apparent and unfortunate mystique built around the green industry—and, frankly, around the job search industry itself—that is completely unwarranted.

Fact 1:

For many functions, changing to a green career is no more complex or mysterious than making any other career change. There are fundamental, logical steps that go into the process that are applicable to any shift in professional direction. Usually, making a career change involves leveraging the skills you have gained and how you have applied them in other arenas, identifying and articulating these transferable skills, and making a coherent argument as to why these are transferable and applicable. This is not mysterious; it just requires thought, logic, and some well-developed writing and argumentation skills.

Fact 2:

Green companies are still companies. As far as I know, companies typically have at least some common elements and functions. Commensurate with their size, most companies across industries still need accountants, purchasers, managers, leaders, coordinators, assistants, trainers, researchers, and so forth. Any company worth its salt that is seeking, for example, an effective project manager is going to want you to have a proven history as a project manager and is going to expect that you have the ability to apply your project management skills to different types of projects. You can be as green as you like, but if you do not possess the required project management skills, you will most likely not get that particular job.

Fact 3 (related to Fact 2):

Companies like to hire people who are good at what they do. If you are a top-notch accountant, you will likely be a top-notch accountant whether you work for an oil company or an alternative energy company. You will be equally valuable to—and equally qualified to work for—each company. Certainly, there may be nuances and pockets of knowledge that will help you to perform your job better in your new environment, but if you have a proven track record in your field of expertise, most companies will assume you can learn the additional nuances and pockets of knowledge in a reasonable amount of time and they will be willing to provide the needed training. I seriously doubt that green companies are so myopic in their vision that they will only hire those who are steeped in knowledge of things ‘green,’ thereby overlooking their need for seasoned experts in the different facets of effectively and competitively running a business.

Before sitting down to write this article, in fact, I conducted some research on green jobs currently available to see what the requirements were for different functions at different levels. Of course, I found that, for example, an aquamarine specialist should have an aquamarine biology or related degree and that a LEED specialist should be LEED accredited, but I also confirmed my hunch: that green companies and companies in the process of greening some or all of their operations want applicants to first and foremost be good in their specific field. Alongside that, they would like applicants to have a strong interest in and—sometimes—existing “knowledge of” environmental affairs and issues. For most entry-level positions, an expressed interest in or commitment to the environment was sufficient.

Fact 4 (related to Fact 3):

We live in a Jim Collins, et al, management theory era. Jim Collins, author of “Good to Great” and “Built to Last,” argues that the best companies hire competent, intelligent people and then find the right position (the ‘right seat on the bus’) for them, and are willing to make the expenditures to train them on details and specifics. I personally have experienced working in a $2 billion, stable, highly reputed company that routinely does just that. Given the number of Jim Collins’ books sold, read, and followed religiously by management consultants and companies alike, I imagine the company I worked for is not the only one that either already put this theory into practice or did so after reading his books and the books of others that echo this theory.

Fact 5:

Hiring managers are thinking people in living, breathing, unpredictable environments. They are not automatons or computers. This means that when they are presented with a specific ‘package’ (the job applicant), they will consider the pros and cons of each applicant’s assets and deficits—none of which will match the stated job requirements exactly. This is true in any hiring situation, not just in relation to green careers. The trick is simply to adequately summarize, market, and portray your specific package in a way that presents the correct value proposition to the employer you are approaching.

Fact 6:

The growth of the green industry is currently exponential, albeit slowed by the recession. The fact of the matter is that there are not enough people already specifically trained in this industry to go around. Many people will adapt their skills and expertise while on the job. If the green industry is counting on a vast pool of green industry experts to make their companies run efficiently and competitively, they have a few years to wait as people re-school themselves. Most companies won’t be willing to wait that long—and they don’t need to, given that right now there are plenty of highly skilled, highly educated, and proven practitioners out there looking for work that could help these companies succeed.

Fact 7:

The job search industry is an industry. I know this, because I am in it. And, just as in any other industry, those selling services to job seekers are trying to get and keep a competitive advantage. They work hard to convince you that you need their services or product and, like others, they are jumping on the supposed green gravy train. It is to the benefit of companies serving job seekers if you believe there is a ‘secret formula’ or some highly specialized knowledge that you can’t even guess at necessary to switch to a green career. If they can convince you of that, you will hire them at top dollar prices to do what you supposedly could never accomplish on your own: find a green collar job.

Well, I have news for you—and I tell this freely to people in my workshops everywhere: if you can think clearly, can write, have the time, and walk through the necessary steps, you can get a job or make a career shift on your own, or at least without my help. Yes, you can. I just offer to do it for you to make your life a little easier and because I have done it numerous times for others and am probably a little better and quicker at certain aspects of it. However, I readily admit that any intelligent and resourceful person who puts their mind to it can figure out how to switch to a green career. So, those trying to sell you books and guides containing, for example, the ‘Top 6 Secrets to Greening Your Career’ are, in my mind, selling you snake oil.

Shortly, I will write a follow-up article providing specifics for topics I have touched on here and providing some tips on how to transition into a green (or other) career. For now, however, I want to drive the following messages home: You are qualified. Many will find you qualified. The fact that you are good at what you do makes you qualified. You may have to expend some extra effort—just like anyone making a career shift or just starting out in their career—to further qualify yourself or to learn on the job, but there is no mystery, no mystique, no secret formula. Anyone who tries to sell you anything on the premise that there is, is either wrong or simply trying to profit off of you.

Olila Documents & Communication Strategies is located south of Boston and provides, in addition to other writing, editing, and design services, job search coaching and career document development services for job seekers.

Boston GreenScene's Policy Corner: The Green Bank

2009-11-10T21:10:58-05:00

by Dan Burgess, Boston GreenScene's Policy Corner Commentator

As the national health care debate in the United States begins to come to a legislative end, the next issue to take center stage will be close to this website's heart: climate change and the environment.

We are truly at a pivotal moment. In the next year, for the first time in almost a decade, our country will seriously consider national legislation and international treaties that have the potential to curb the industrial damage we are causing our earth. As we have seen through the health care discussion, this discourse will be heated, and there will be an astounding amount of misinformation promulgated by those special interests that stand to lose money through successful legislation. If you think the health care lobbyists and conservative activists were fierce, you haven’t seen anything yet.

The industries that will be lining up against environmental protection and regulation include oil and gas, coal, manufacturing, and political interests like those who were shouting ‘Drill, Baby, Drill’ in the most recent Presidential election. This combination of interests will dwarf those that were against United States health care legislation in both money and vitriol.

In order to help inform, and combat the misleading information that is bound to bog down this compelling debate, I’ll attempt to highlight a green policy initiative or idea every week.

This week’s policy proposal to highlight is that of a Green Bank. First introduced by John D. Podesta and Karen Kornbluh earlier this year through the Center for American Progress, a public Green Bank would provide needed investment dollars specifically to the clean energy industry.

Podesta and Kornbluh believe a Green Bank could potentially:

“...lead to the steady and reliable creation of clean-energy jobs and would be a crucialelement of the transition to a clean-energy economy. Working in partnership with the private sector, a well constructed, public Green Bank would open credit markets and motivate businesses to invest again. It would enable clean-energy technologies—in such areas as wind, solar, geothermal, advanced biomass, and energy efficiency—to be deployed on a large scale and become commercially viable at current electricity costs.”

While the United States federal government does provide loans and tax breaks that help to spur green investment, these incentives have been allowed to run out in the past and the clean-energy industry does not find the incentives reliable. The European Union, the World Bank, and the European Investment Fund already have investment programs that are far more advanced than United States policy. Additionally, Podesta and Kornbluh soberly point out that countries in Asia are spending a much higher portion of their Gross Domestic Product on clean technology investment:

“In Asia, China is investing $220 billion of its economic stimulus package in green programs—over 3 percent of its total gross domestic product of $4.4 trillion. South Korea is investing 1.2 percent of its total GDP, or about $30 billion, into new green strategies to drive their own economic recovery. Meanwhile, the United States is investing less than one half of 1 percent of our GDP on clean-energy stimulus programs.”

The creation of a public Green Bank would provide much needed investment funds and would send a strong signal to business leaders and entrepreneurs that the U.S. is serious about clean technology investment. Personally, I would like to see this public bank be extended to help small to midsized farms (what’s more green that freshly grown ag-products?). But even without this addition, the creation of a Green Bank would be sensical policy and should be considered by Congress.

Hi Boston: Are you answering a call to action?

2009-10-24T10:40:40-04:00

by Heather Burns-DeMelo

When I first sat down at my computer nearly three years ago, which was at that time sandwiched between my washer and dryer, I was determined to figure out how to launch a blog chronicling the environmental movement in New England. Aside from being technically challenged, I had only one problem: I was certain that 95 percent of the people who lived and worked here couldn't care less.

Today, with thousands of you visiting the Boston GreenScene website every month, our dedicated writers, and those of you who email us with your latest news, I am happy to say I WAS WRONG!

October 24, 2009 marks the largest day of Global Climate Action in our history. Around the world, and in more than 179 countries and over 5,000 different events, people are showing their support for leaders at the UN Climate Summit in December to adopt a fair, just and binding climate policy that will bring carbon in our atmosphere down to a safe upper limit of 350 ppm.

From tolling the Paul Revere Bell to Boston Under Water 350 Festival: a regional tongue-in-cheek creative event to ACORN and Boston Climate Action Network's Mission Hill energy fair, the Boston area has dozens of registered 350.ORG events happening through the day. Check out the INCREDIBLE photos and video and click on "find an action" for an interactive map to locate an action near you.

I hope you'll get involved. It feels great.

Cat People, Green is for the Birds

2009-10-18T18:07:59-04:00

by Daniel E. Walsh Author of Our Sunday "History & Reflections" Series

’Questions regarding the value or inutility of the domestic cat, and problems connected with limiting its more or less unwelcome outdoor activities, are causing much dissension. The discussion has reached an acute stage. Medical men, game protectors and bird lovers call on legislators to enact restrictive laws. Then ardent cat lovers rouse themselves for combat. In the excitement of partisanship many loose and ill-considered statements are made.’

Those sentiments recorded in a 1916 report to the Massachusetts Board of Agriculture by Edward Howe Forbush are echoed in today’s struggle with the very same issue. Cats kill birds and they kill them for the hell of it - a penchant they share with humans and few other species. Uncomfortable as that fact may be to those who like cats; the reality is that this issue requires frank assessment when the cat problem is raised. This problem affects various city ecosystems and is a part of a community’s carbon imprint in indirect ways.

Cats kill birds that nest in the city’s trees. That’s a plain fact and not in dispute. The killing lowers the numbers of birds and then increases the number of pest insects, which can have deleterious impact on the health of trees. Healthy trees contribute to clean air and lower the temperature around them. In general, lower temps and cleaner air diminishes the carbon imprint of a city.

This controversy places into conflict forces that seem to have come to their positions along similar paths. The folks who advocate for either cats or birds may have many similar emotional reasons to feel the way they do. Advocacy can often breed an intolerance of opposing views. In the extreme, and in a most peculiar manner, these factions can be seen to be at odds. The resolution of these matters or at least the attempts to come to some agreement has implications for other groups similarly conflicted. Cat advocate groups such as Alley Cats Allies paint a bleak picture for the future of the tens of millions of stray or feral cats in the US. Many of these cats live in colonies, also known as clowders, centered on a food source (often this source is a sympathetic human feeder). The life expectancy of these animals is about two years--conversely, domestic cats live an average of twelve to sixteen years. The stray cat’s ability to procreate is staggering. This biological fact is the crux of the matter as it creates difficulties in arriving at solutions that can be agreed upon by all concerned.

Cat lovers, such as Wendy Anderson (a self-described jeans and cat paw sweatshirt wearing “cat lady” and legal director of Alley Cat Allies), argue that the most humane way to lower the numbers of strays is a process called —Trap, Neuter, and Release (TNR). This method is thought to be more considerate than straight forward eradication. The funding for this process is another huge hurdle. There are observers who say that while apparently more humane; this approach is in practice—ineffective, because of the cats’ ability to rapidly repopulate. The estimated percentage of neutered cats necessary to reduce a is 85%. In other words to reduce a clowder of 100 you would have to TNR 85 of them. Catching these streetwise, resourceful creatures is exceedingly difficult.

TNR is gaining momentum, and is currently the guiding light for state and municipal legislation that governs the management of stray and feral animals. Reading through the Alley Cat Allies website and others like it, an observer may pick up on a righteous tone that permeates through the message. As in other pursuits, the focus and emotional content of the existence of the organization becomes crystallized to the detriment of opposing views. Zeal for a cause—notwithstanding the merit—can often breed a closed mindset.

Another group famously motivated by fondness for animals is birdwatchers. Birders have a reputation for gentility and civility. Birding is an outdoor activity not usually included in the rougher, more physical woodland pursuits such as hunting and rock climbing. There may be those that would dispute the stereotype but most would say that birders tend to be nonviolent types. Thus, the actions of gun-toting Texas birder, Jim Stevenson in 2007, took the nation by surprise.

Stevenson, an avid birder, alarmed by the sight of a feral cat “creeping up on three snowy and two piping plovers, and several sanderlings”--took action, good ole boy Texas style action. Stevenson potshot the one-eyed tabby with .22 Caliber rifle and killed it. He was arrested and tried for cruelty to animals (a mistrial was declared and the matter was not pursued). This extreme act is a prime example of zeal for a cause gone wild.

Other voices have weighed in on the subject. In her book, Silence of the Songbirds, Bridget Stutchbury illustrates the predation problem in a calmer, more pragmatic manner. Stutchbury describes the devastation of songbirds by cats of all types and other natural predators such as hawks and cowbirds. These birds usually build their nests on lower limbs. They forage on the ground to build the nests and are easy prey. She writes about humane methods of control such as the campaigns of the American Bird Conservancy: Cats Indoors! And the Humane Society of the United States: Safe Cats. These campaigns illustrate that simply keeping pet cats inside greatly reduces the overall problem (remember cats kill for practice!).

To combat the predation of migratory birds, the city of Boston and the Mass Audubon Society (founded by Forbush) have sponsored a voluntary program called Lights Out. This program, in effect during the spring, has the goals of removing a danger to migratory birds, reducing greenhouse gases, and saving dollars on electricity. The program targets tall buildings to dim lights during the migration period. The lights from the buildings confuse migratory birds causing them to stray from their path and expend their limited energy reserves, leading to death in some cases.

The stray/feral cat problem has implications for ecosystems throughout the many regions of the country. As the struggle for humane solutions continues, calm and reason practiced by folks with heartfelt concern for the competing species hopefully will prevail. Enthusiasm and passion are admirable qualities. Many are grateful for the issues that are brought to light because of passion and zeal. Where would the green movement be without its passionate and vocal advocates? But keeping a closed mind and taking up weapons? Holy Cats! That stuff is for the birds!

Recycle Your Books and Open Doors

2009-10-10T15:59:54-04:00

by Dan Burgess

Like many other people who live in Boston, I rent an apartment. My lack of home ownership, for one reason or another, has consequently meant moving, and moving often. Each time I organize my belongings and pack up what seem to be a never-ending amount of boxes, I find myself asking, “Why in the world do I have so much stuff?” This is especially true when it comes to packing up my bookshelf.

In my most recent move, I found a book on Greek Mythology from high school, a Stephen King novel I read the summer before college, and multiple unread books that were each purchased with the best of intentions before boarding a plane at the beginning of a business trip. I had no idea what to do with this unused, but perfectly decent literature. I didn’t want to throw these books out, but I was tired of lugging them from one apartment to the next. I had no idea, that is, until I found out about the Prison Book Program (PBP).

The Prison Book Program is a nonprofit organization run strictly by volunteers that provides prisoners with free reading materials. Those who are incarcerated in our country’s correctional facilities are often desperate for literature. A wide array of reading and learning materials are not made available to prisoners in their respective prison libraries and the Prison Book Program is often their only source of text. This fact is a glaring indication of a systemic failure evident in our correctional system, but that’s an affair for
another website to tackle.

Having recently visited the Prison Book Program’s headquarters in Quincy, MA, I can personally attest to the good works that this program is doing and assure you that your recycled books will not go to waste. Quite the contrary. Books donated through this program will get passed between prisoners, on average six different times. While I was there, I learned that some of the most requested books from prisoners, besides legal text, were dictionaries. Many of those imprisoned do not read at a particularly high level and still more do not speak English as a first language. Providing them with a dictionary can quite literally be the key to turning their lives in a more positive direction.

Finally, these donations are greatly appreciated by those who receive them. The PBP specifically highlights one man’s insightful appreciation on their website:

“.... the real struggle is for growth. In prison you don’t truly grow as a human being; you just sort of grow old. People grow (hopefully) through experiencing the world around them, even if it’s simply their community. In the prison world, we fear what we can grow into. For many prisoners, the path to their social, political, spiritual and educational growth and development can be tracked by following the “footprints” of the worn volumes of books they’ve read and in some instances fought to possess. PBP provides the intellectual and spiritual nutrients for a healthy and balanced growth.”

In addition to thank you notes, artwork and poetry can also be found on their website.

Click here to find out how to recycle your books through the PBP donation program. I hope you’ll join me in supporting the Prison Book Program and those incarcerated individuals looking to grow through literature!

The New Clean Energy Industry

2009-10-01T17:47:59-04:00

by Dan Burgess

The time for the United States to seriously invest in the burgeoning clean energy industry was yesterday. As highlighted in recent op-eds by both Thomas L. Friedman and Ronald Brownstein, we are already falling behind the competition and are losing clean energy manufacturing business to other countries. These countries, particularly China and India, have seen the proverbial writing on the wall and are attracting serious investors to their developing nations. The United States desperately needs to bring these investors to America, or we may risk becoming the ‘Detroit’ of world industrial economies.

In preparation for Cleantech Forum XVIII, a clean technology trade show earlier this month, state officials patted Massachusetts on the back for almost doubling the amount of jobs in the solar sector. Solar energy employees rose from 1,086 in 2007 to 2,075 in 2008. These employees are vital to our economy, and this should absolutely be seen as a step in the right direction to a sustainable energy future in Massachusetts. Unfortunately, this growth appears to have been almost entirely in the installation and maintenance of solar. It also seems that the majority of future funding will be going toward more training in these job fields. While growth and support of this portion of the industry is very positive, Massachusetts desperately needs new manufacturing jobs in our state - jobs like the ones that are being shipped overseas to companies in China.

Massachusetts’ large university talent pool and available workforce make leadership in increased clean energy investment a very reasonable goal for our state. Deval Patrick’s administration must recognize this same need for clean energy investment and address the issue similarly to what was done to encourage biotech investment in the Commonwealth a few years ago.

The Commonwealth has already lost approximately 25,000 manufacturing jobs in the latest economic downturn, and more are sure to follow as clean energy goes overseas.

At one time, Massachusetts wisely invested to bring biotech companies to our state and, as a result, we are now often called the ’Biotech Silicon Valley.’ We need to invest again, this time in the new clean energy economy. Massachusetts voters are smart enough to realize a good investment, and if the Patrick administration does not take immediate steps to bring these clean energy manufacturing jobs to our state, these same voters will think hard during the next election.

If you listen closely enough, you can already hear Tim Cahill and Charlie Black’s respective green campaign slogans being assembled.

Mad Men: Don’t Cry for Me

2009-09-27T20:10:30-04:00

by Daniel E. Walsh Author of Our Sunday "History & Reflections" Series

I have decided to leave you forever
I have decided to start things from here
Thunder and lightning won’t change
What I’m feeling
And the daffodils look lovely today

Delores O’Riordan (The Cranberries)

The AMC hit TV series, Mad Men, portrays the business and personal lives of advertising execs at the height of the Golden Age of American consumerism. The show is focused on the personalities and interactions of the ad execs and office staff. The great American consumer culture is the backdrop for the various story lines. Some of the personal habits of the era depicted are clearly seen today as unhealthy or outright wrong. Then those habits were in the full bloom of cultural normalcy.

In one scene, Don Draper, the main character, his wife, and children pull over the family sedan for a picnic on some roadside grassland. When they are done and preparing to leave, they simply shake the trash they've generated from the picnic blanket and leave it behind them on the ground.

The portrayal of an American family’s blatant disregard of the consequences of littering is shocking when viewed through today's environmentally-enlightened prism. There are those (perhaps Ayn Rand fans) who could say, in a purely scientific light, that the trash disposed of in that manner has no more effect on the overall environment than the debris we landfill today. While experts may debate those issues, a landscape devoid of drifting paper and rotting garbage is undeniably more livable.

There has been a definite improvement in the appearance of the general landscape from that era. The last time we looked, the Cuyahoga River wasn’t on fire. Small gestures on our parts, such as simply throwing trash into a designated receptacle, easily create a nicer experience for those who follow.

If an act that flagrant and careless was witnessed today, many of us, in addition to being shocked and appalled, would be moved to ask the offenders if perhaps they had left something behind by mistake—and not so nicely! The anti-littering campaign was largely funded by the Keep America Beautiful organization. While the motives of the creators of the Keep America Beautiful organization are subject to some skepticism, the effect of its ads as epitomized by the Crying Indian is undeniable.

The Crying Indian commercial and the cynicism of its creation would be a great knee-slapper of a victory for Don Draper and the boys (and Peggy) of the ad agency. If they had done that work, the cocktails would have been flowing.

However accomplished, roadsides and parkland are measurably cleaner than before and the habits of keeping them in that condition are firmly ingrained in the culture as a whole.

In other episodes, Mad Men features similar content as it portrays an America in the nascent stages of a cultural revolution that would soon address this and other perceived shortcomings: women’s place in the workplace, sexuality issues and, most of all, the dangers of cigarette smoking among them. The America of Mad Men was a place built for consumption without regard for consequence. At this they excelled, but the aftermath of their brand of madness became our set of problems. The health tab from those now ailing cigarette smokers is a defining example of one such residual problem.

While it’s doubtful that we would ever return to the profligate waste of the Mad Men era, there is reason to be concerned for the future. Simply picking up trash and keeping it out of sight is a good start. But the far-reaching outcome of the buildup of waste deserves to be examined through to its end. Even the Italian-American actor who played the Indian might force another tear at the impending costs of cleaning up the waste generated in this country in the last half of the century.

A quote from Iron Eyes Cody:

"Nearly all my life, it has been my policy to help those less fortunate than myself. My foremost endeavors have been with the help of the Great Spirit to dignify my People's image through humility and love of my country. It is my sincerest wish to reach the hearts of the people of the world by my Keep America Beautiful film of 'The Crying Indian' so they will be more aware of the dangers of pollution facing the world today. If I have done that, then I have done all I need to do!"

Well, “se non è vero, è ben trovato,” as the actor’s father may have uttered. So what if it’s not true? It was a great show! Mad Men everywhere can drink to that. Just - when you’re done, pick up your trash!

Greening a New Generation: One Course at a Time

2009-09-24T12:49:08-04:00

Professor George Buckley and Harvard Extension Set up a Big Tent for All Fledgling Environmentalists

by David Pierotti

By now everyone has heard of green jobs. Headlines with that phrase have been ubiquitous for months. President Obama has made them a key aspect of his economic recovery program and studies show they comprise one of the fastest growing economic sectors, even during the current recession.

But who will fill these jobs? And how will they develop the knowledge and skills to grapple with the challenges energy and environmental issues pose for every type of business?

This was not purely an academic question for me. Seeking a way to stimulate my career and my mind, I went looking for academic programs that might do both. I found a couple of gentlemen at the Harvard Extension School who have gradually been providing answers to those questions. Professor George Buckley and his fellow professor and longtime friend, John Spengler, pioneered a unique set of courses that has evolved into the Sustainability and Environmental Management degree program.

Over 30 years ago, Buckley and Spengler jointly taught a basic environmental management course at the Extension school. It proved popular, so they added another course. The same thing happened. And so on and so on. One course at a time, with student demand the driving force, a program was built. In 1994, they had enough courses to issue a certificate for successful completion. In 2004, the first graduate of the Masters program matriculated. Last year, 21 people received a Masters in Liberal Arts, Sustainability and Environmental Management. From the simple idea to teach a basic course in ecology, Buckley and Spengler wound up creating one of the first professional masters programs for environmental management in the country.

According to Professor Buckley, “the majority of students aren’t changing careers. Teachers, architects, lawyers, government, non-government: they are using this for professional development and professional enhancement. A smaller number are thinking of career changes and getting an entirely different degree or a second masters.”

As for myself, I was one of the minority embarking on a career change. With a B.A. in history and political science, I had wandered, somewhat aimlessly, from field to field always with an eye on environmental issues. At the ripe age of 35, I needed to find a niche and, more importantly, had to believe in that niche. I wasn’t looking for simply a career, but also a purpose: a paycheck with meaning. But, for me, environmentalism isn’t simply the noble, virtuous, and occasionally self-righteous battle against pollution and consumption. It is also an exciting, dynamic field where innovation and cutting-edge technology is slowly shifting the ground beneath our feet, or more precisely, the floors, walls, windows, and roofs. I didn’t want to simply be filled with apocalyptic foreboding, I wanted to be inspired by solutions. Baby steps, perhaps, but pragmatic, possible, common sense baby steps nevertheless.

Diversity is a common buzz word in higher education. In this case, however, it has a couple of different meanings. I was immediately struck by the diversity in the backgrounds of my fellow students. Some had PhDs in other sciences and were looking to either broaden or focus their education. Others were just starting out and simply pursuing an interest or curiosity. Buckley calls it a “hugely diverse student body. Diverse in terms of age, of educational background and types of interests. But the great commonality is that people all want to know more about the environment, environmental management, and human impacts on planet earth.”

There is also the diversity in course selection. Buckley says “there are now 25 courses with five new ones added this year and more in the planning stage.” This is a natural outgrowth of diversity in the faculty. The program grants professors and instructors great freedom to craft a course around their own passions. “Each of us comes from different backgrounds - air, water, culture, development, climate change, geology, and economics,” says Buckley. This flexibility permits new courses to be added that respond to timely issues or developments in the environmental field. The concept of sustainability is an example. This was not a term heard frequently too many years ago but is now a regular part of the environmental vocabulary. The program has adapted to this with several course featuring sustainability, including Spengler’s own “Sustainable Buildings: Design, Construction and Operations” This importance of the concept was emphasized and institutionalized by incorporating the word in the title of program.

Not having a background in science myself, this variety of material is part of what appealed to me. I chose as my first class “Critical Thinking in Environmental Issues,” taught by author and experienced reporter David Roepnik. The class was an eye-opening and thought-provoking primer on how the media interprets and, in some cases, distorts important environmental issues. Instead of science, this dealt with issues of manipulation, propaganda, paranoia, ethics, and policy. Instead of a microscope, this was a macroscop. Roepnik challenged us to pull back and detach from issues in order to eliminate bias and preconceptions, and discern truth beneath layers of hype and conflicting agendas. The critical thinking skills developed were not only applicable to any career, but also invaluable as citizens in a media-saturated society.

But the program doesn’t just serve those who are committed to a degree. According to Buckley, there are “roughly 225 students enrolled in the program. However, lots of others just take a few courses relevant to their profession.” This brings us back to the notion of green jobs. One of their goals is to “give people the knowledge they need to understand how vital environmental issues impact municipalities, communities, and businesses.” They then return to their businesses or institutions armed with this knowledge and ready to apply it to their particular circumstances. In this sense, it is probably more accurate to speak of the greening of jobs rather than green jobs. The Extension program is preparing people to incorporate green principles into existing businesses.

As Buckley says, “Businesses will probably have a green sustainability officer. Harvard has added one. A lot of people in the program are in industry and they need more knowledge about green issues. We see people leaving here and bringing their knowledge back to their companies or they have started new companies.” The program is proving timely and relevant in part because it has always been demand driven. “We are constantly talking about how to respond to our clientele, about how to supply them with what they need in their career.”

Harvard has done more than add a sustainability officer. There is the Harvard Office for Sustainability and the Harvard Green Building Services. Both departments are part of an institution-wide commitment to changing the infrastructure and the social practices of this enormous campus towards a more sustainable future.

The process of refining and adapting the program is ongoing. Buckley seemed particularly excited over plans to develop course content in association with the management school. “What we’re looking at is a joint program with the management department to develop the concepts of entrepreneurial management along with environmental management in order to better understand how industry and environment can mesh.”

Other features in the planning stage are Hazmat (hazardous materials) certification and energy audit training. A career development office is in place to assist students as well as a thriving sense of collaboration across disciplines. For instance, last year students were able to participate with Alexandra Cousteau as she continues her father’s work of exploring and promoting the endless biodiversity of the oceans.

Several other features highlight the student-centric focus of the program. Citations are offered for people who don’t want to commit to a full degree. But for people who are pursuing a degree like myself, we can choose either a traditional thesis track or a capstone project, which is more hands-on learning and less rigidly academic. More and more of the courses and videotaped and posted online. This is a considerate realization that adults with jobs and families sometimes have their schedules interrupted. If so, they can just watch the class afterward at their leisure.

Asked what he would say to someone considering the program, Buckley answered, “Come join us and learn about earth’s environments, the living and nonliving, how we interact with those environments, and how we can improve our relationship to the natural world.” And that, of course, is the real goal. Career development and personal enrichment are important to us as individuals, but collectively it is our relationship to the natural world that must be reevaluated, realigned and reinvigorated.

For more information visit www.extension.harvard.edu/envr/default.jsp

Mayor Menino Raises the Green Roof on Runoff

2009-09-20T08:29:09-04:00

Harvey the Hoverfly II

by Daniel E. Walsh Author of Our Sunday "History & Reflections" Series

When I come home feelin' tired and beat
I go up where the air is fresh and sweet (up on the roof)
I get away from the hustling crowd
And all that rat-race noise down in the street (up on the roof)
On the roof, the only place I know
Where you just have to wish to make it so
Let's go up on the roof (up on the roof)

~ Goffin and King

Harvey the Hoverfly* is a little confused. He and his antecedents have hovered around the Hub for eons. Until quite recently things had been tough and growing tougher for the average hoverfly to do what hoverflies do. Pesky humans and their swatting -- unfortunately for the hoverflies, they look like wasps, only smaller, and folks like to whack them.

For the flies in this urban setting there are fewer places to land; there is smoke and bad air to contend with and that music! What’s the point? Why it’s enough to poke your eyes out, all 5 of them! That’s the question raised around the haunts of the hoverfly. But, now I’m into something good, hums Harvey. This is nice - freedom up in the air and plenty of Bailey’s Gold to land on and a surfeit of aphids to eat, say the flies. Hoverfly heaven. From Yarmouth Town to Brockton the buzz abounds. What could be causing all this Diptera fluttering and excitement? Why, it’s the green roofs popping up around Boston!

In addition to the comfort they bring to our striped hovering insect friends, green roofs bring huge savings and multiple benefits to the city. Storm water run off is improved as the specially selected roofs’ plants and soil hold water. That water does not run down the street assimilating chemicals that find their way into the treatment plant and then leach into the water system. There are cost savings that can be earned through tax incentives and grants in some cities. Storm water runoff is measured and charged according to gallon volume by many large municipalities. The roofs last longer than asphalt roofs although initial costs are higher. Very little maintenance is required; sensors are in place to detect leaks. A green roof cools the air. With a variety of plant arrangements the roofs are quite aesthetically appealing.

The plants used for green roof such as Bailey’s Gold (sedum floriferum) are usually from the sedum family. The word is from the Latin sedo ('to sit'), because these plants tendency to grow anywhere a seed can sit and find a scant amount of soil. Not surprisingly, a green roof requires a hardy plant that spreads outward but is not too tall and needs no trimming; the thickness of the soil needed is extremely important as it affects the weight of the roof. The plant scheme on most roofs does not require a deep layer of soil, though there are grass roof designs that do. These plants are imports, for the most part, and in nature are found growing in tight places such as sidewalks and walls. They must also be able to retain water and manage through drought conditions. These plants attract the hoverflies and that is why they are sometimes planted as a garden border to fight pest aphids. The flies’ larvae like to nosh on aphids.

Mayor Menino, in his 13-year commitment to the greening of the city, has made Boston the 3rd greenest city in North America, according to Popular Science Magazine. In his tenure as mayor, green roofs have proliferated around the metro part of his ongoing commitment to make Boston a showcase of urban sustainable living. Apex Green Roofs has built the green roofs at the WGBH building. The Rowland Institute at Harvard, The Simmons College School of Management, Cambridge School of Weston, and The Four Seasons Hotel - just some of the buildings sporting a new green ‘do.'

Green roofs aren’t for every structure. Supporting the weight of the roof is a major concern. But buildings with green roofs attract attention and not just from the hoverin’ hoverfly. Folks like looking at them; they are something to marvel and a big upgrade from the drab precedents. The roofs impact a city’s heat island effect; that is a phenomenon that affects the climate around a large metropolis. Green roofs alleviate the heat around them in a dramatic difference than conventional asphalt or rubber-based roofs.

All of these developments are a boon to humans and to wildlife like Harvey the Hoverfly and his winged companions alike. Mayor Menino’s Boston is going green and it’s not just from Celtics banners; this is a green you can see from the air and feel in the air. A cooler more attractive city with less storm water runoff to worry about – now, that’s creating a happy buzz around this town!

* Most folks call the yellow striped flies flower flies; I call them hoverflies like our British cousins. Harvey the Flower Fly?

Green on the Big Screen

2009-09-18T07:43:25-04:00

by Dan Burgess

Throughout modern history creativity has thrived during times of hardship, turmoil, and adversity. This creativity spawns from necessity as people invent and imagine as needed to survive. Fortunately, this creativity is also expressed artistically and some of the most celebrated works of art, literature, and music have been created as a result. It is during the darkest days that the light shines the brightest, and most urgently, for many artists and activists.

This has certainly been true in American history. The Great Depression, both World Wars, and the struggle for Civil Rights have all generated extensive pieces of beautiful and powerful compositions. These works are some of the most revered our country has.

While it is debatable that the recent political and economic turmoil our country has seen is on par with the Great Depression and the Civil Rights movement, it is for certain that many Americans have felt a great deal of despair over the last decade. A combination of economic turbulence, foreign policy disharmony, and environmental concerns have inspired artists of all kinds to produce an amazing amount of work in the last five to ten years.

One area that we have seen a surge from artists and activists is on the silver screen and in particular documentaries that aim to promote environmental awareness and activism. Just this summer, three films of this theme have been released that are worth checking out.

The first film, No Impact Man, is an inspiring look at a man that ‘decides to completely eliminate his personal impact on the environment for the next year' and the trials and tribulations that he and his family go through in the process.

The second documentary, Tapped, aims to shine a bright light on the big business of bottled water. Just the trailer itself will make you think twice before purchasing another bottle of water.

The third picture, Food, INC, was one of the most successful documentaries this summer. Food, INC takes a sober look at our country’s food industry and makes a strong case for changing the way we eat. This film features heavy hitters Michael Pollan and Eric Scholosser and will undoubtedly change the way you think about your dinner.

Boston Organizations Play A Key Role in Corporate Citizenship Initiatives

2009-09-12T10:38:35-04:00

by Terry Catchpole, Founder and CEO of The Catchpole Corporation
The Catchpole Corporation consults with firms on their executive visibility initiatives in regard to corporate citizenship.

In the face of unprecedented economic uncertainty and rigid fiscal requirements, corporate executives are nonetheless increasingly embracing a traditionally “soft” facet of business practice: corporate citizenship. This practice, also known as Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR), sees firms allocating scarce budget and personnel resources to address their activities in areas such as environmental impact, diversity practices, and ethical sourcing.

There are several reasons for this unprecedented corporate activity we see in this area, none of them more important than businesses’ escalating concern over climate change and appreciation of the role that they can play in reducing carbon emissions and thereby doing their part in helping to head off the threats of global warming. Companies are noting the Obama Administration’s commitment to aggressive legislative action as regards climate and carbon, as well as the fact that the UN Climate Change Conference in Copenhagen in December is mandated to produce a new global treaty, supplanting the Kyoto Protocol of 1997, that could well ultimately have significant impact on global businesses of all sizes, in all markets.

There are several Boston-area organizations that are currently working with businesses in the US and internationally to help them address the full range of their corporate citizenship concerns, including their real or potential environmental impact. Following is a capsule summary of the most prominent of these organizations.

Boston College Center for Corporate Citizenship
The Boston College Center for Corporate Citizenship (BCCCC) was founded in 1985 under the aegis of BC's Carroll School of Management and is self-described as "committed to helping business leverage its social, economic and human assets to ensure both its success and a more just and sustainable world." The Center focuses on the management side of corporate citizenship, using its academic and research resources to help member companies leverage core business competencies to implement successful corporate citizenship programs. The Center prides itself on having created a community of corporate practitioners who can freely exchange challenges and ideas in a trusted space. The Center's overriding focus is on what are the core competencies of successful corporate citizenship management; what does a professional in this area need to do; and how does one learn to do this.

Ceres
Ceres is a coalition of more than 100 corporations, investment firms, environmental organizations, and other public interest groups founded in 1989 with a mission to "integrate sustainability into capital markets for the health of the planet and its people." To this end, Ceres pursues a "vision of a world in which business and capital markets promote the well being of human society and the protection of the earth's biological systems and resources." Coalition members include more than 50 corporations that endorse the "Ceres Principles," a set of 10 initiatives collectively designed as "a code of corporate environmental conduct." Ceres also coordinates the work of the Investor Network on Climate Risk (INCR), a group of approximately 80 institutional investors and asset managers in North American and Europe that collectively own or manage more than $7 trillion in assets. INCR's mission is to promote a "better understanding of the financial risks and investment opportunities posed by climate change."

Corporate Social Responsibility Initiative at the Harvard Kennedy School of Government
The Corporate Social Responsibility Initiative at the Harvard Kennedy School of Government was founded in 2004 as a collaborative effort among The Mossavar-Rahmani Center for Business and Government (M-RCBG); The Joan Shorenstein Center on the Press, Politics and Public Policy; The Center for Public Leadership; and The Hauser Center for Nonprofit Organizations. The CSR Initiative also works with Harvard University’s Business, Law, and Public Health Schools, as well as with outside CSR organizations, government agencies, and businesses. The CSR Initiative’s activities fall into three main categories: Evaluating What Works, “through research and faculty engagement aimed at advancing scholarship in the areas of private sector governance and accountability and the role of business as a partner in international development”; Developing Leaders, “through active student engagement, education, and experiential learning aimed at inspiring and developing the next generation of leaders”; and Supporting Policy and Practice, “through outreach to external audiences in the public, private, academic, and civil society sectors aimed at making a contribution to and having an impact on the decision-making of practitioners.”

MIT Sloan Initiative for Sustainable Business and Society
The MIT Sloan Initiative for Sustainable Business and Society was launched in 2007 with a mission to “change the way businesses, NGOs, and nonprofits view, use, and manage resources.” Under this mandate, MIT offers a Sustainable Business Lab (S-Lab) course that allows students to work with public and private sector organizations to “study existing cases, build sustainability-based strategies and, in some instances, create management tools to identify and measure such pressing concerns.” The Initiative also hosts the Sloan Sustainability Speaker Series, which draws leaders and experts to MIT to discuss sustainability related topics, and conducts faculty research and sustainability-focused coursework activities. The Initiative strives to “enable people, communities, businesses, organizations, and the planet to flourish while taking an in-depth, integrated look at existing structural models; and to redefine the notion of sustainability by incorporating social equity, economic development, and environmental restoration at all levels.”

Progressive Business Leaders Network
The Progressive Business Leaders Network (PBLN) is an educational organization for executives that aims to "promote the best practices of business leaders committed to socially and environmentally responsible economic growth and the public policies that advance it." PBLN policy focus is liberal/left-of-center, and its founders included several Massachusetts business executives who supported Deval Patrick’s successful 2006 campaign to be Bay State governor. Founded in 2007, the group has approximately 100 senior executive members whom it "encourages and assists" in engaging with policy groups and initiatives that "seek to advance socially and environmentally responsible economic growth." Among PBLN’s five areas of focus are energy and the environment, as well as education, healthcare, life sciences, and housing and economic development.

The Green Architecture: Style and Function

2009-09-07T17:52:48-04:00

by Daniel E. Walsh Author of Our Sunday "History & Reflections" Series

The city is built
To music, therefore never built at all,
And therefore built forever.
~ Alfred, Lord Tennyson

Labor Day, an American holiday birthed in the aftermath of the labor wars of the late 19th century, has become a day to reflect on our labors and the pride we take in them. Some who labor in disciplines that incorporate green and sustainability values may take an extra measure of pride. Increasingly, there has been much to be proud of—and this figures to help shape a better future. Architecture can be seen as a combination of style and function. Within the architectural style is the music of the culture. The spirit of the architect is expressed in the design for the assigned purpose. An overall shape takes place and thus is created the identity of a city or culture.

The pride of a civilization is seen in its cities and in the building of these great centers. The style of a city identifies the best qualities that the builders see inside themselves and in what they are charged to do. The élan of Paris, the steadfastness of London, the hustle and bustle of the great Eastern cities in the U.S., with Boston among them, and the spiritual ascension of the capitals of the Mayan people all can be seen in the city’s architecture.

Today an impressive skyline attests to the financial might of a culture. Cities are the population centers and they reflect the spirit of the citizens. Sustainability, conservation, and green are the buzzwords that shape much new architecture. Many disciplines are incorporated and no part of the construction is too insignificant to be considered. Like the care we are now giving to the appearance, as well as the cost and effectiveness of lighting in these structures, our cities will shine through to the people of the future. We are now starting to see a green style throughout this land.

Each year since 1997, the American Institute of Architect’s Committee on the Environment bestows an award called the Top Ten Green Project Award to the ten best architectural projects that meet a set of standards based on the building’s currency in the areas of social fairness, sustainability and harmony with physical/natural surroundings. In successive years the greater Boston area has been represented on the top ten lists. This year the World Headquarters for the International Fund for Animal Welfare located on Cape Cod at Yarmouthport made the list; the project creatively used the site’s brownfield status to its advantage by having a restored natural grass meadow be a part. Another interesting tidbit about this project is that the designers incorporated design elements of a popular sailboat frequently seen around the Cape.

In 2008 the Macellen Building Condominiums of South Boston and the Garthwaite Center for Science & Art at the Cambridge School of Weston won Top Ten Honors. The Macellen earned consideration for the green roof, water condensate retention and the non-use of potable water for irrigation; the project focused on creating a green, sustainable living space in a largely industrial area. The Garthwaite faced the challenges of creating a popular space for students within the existing tree patch. Many of this building’s green processes such as toilet composter and wood pellet boiler have been left open to view for the student’s educational benefit.

As seen on the Boston AIA site, the green issues have assumed great prominence and certainly will mark these times. Many architects strive to achieve the LEED certificate and banner it prominently in their correspondence and advertising. This gives these values their currency and the striving for those goals becomes the designer’s muse.

On this Labor Day, some of us may reflect on our work effort or, more likely, we’ll be gearing up for school year and the new football season. We may take a moment to consider our work in a greater light; we may see our effort as a contribution to a composite of our times; each a small part of the whole. We may not be the architects and builders, but they have to shape their art to what we want to see and hear. Americans take pride in being worldwide leaders. That pride is now reflected in many ways in the greening of our cities. The music heard in the spirit of the labor and seen in the resulting design may resonate through an American future.

Green Fantasy: Not to See a Panacea

2009-08-30T18:55:13-04:00

by Daniel E. Walsh Author of Our Sunday "History & Reflections" Series

Practitioners and scholars who fall into panacea traps falsely assume
that all problems of resource governance can be represented
by a small set of simple models,
because they falsely perceive that the preferences and
perceptions of most resource users are the same.
Going Beyond Panaceas

A panacea is a word that is defined as a universal remedy, a cure-all. The search for panaceas in various disciplines goes forward. As the opening quote suggests, there is an illusory effect to this yearning in that a single universal solution to any major issue simply cannot exist. There are too many variables in the realm of human behavior for such a magic bullet to exist. The Tower of Babel story epitomizes the fractious nature of human conduct. A pragmatic and methodical approach to addressing problems with a multi-level strategy seems to be the most effective way to go. As the search for solutions to environmental concerns continues, the word gets bruited about and the thought of an easy fix can be seductive.

Ethanol was looked upon in some corners as a panacea to the problem of American dependency of foreign—especially Middle Eastern—oil. Advocates hailed its regenerative powers. The stuff grows right out of the ground and is easily sustainable—they trumpeted. The ensuing ethanol debate pitted region against region; understandably, corn growing states were firmly on board.

Transforming corn into ethanol turns out to be very expensive, however. At first flush, the process seemed to be the next greatest thing and cheap to boot, but then voices weighed in that pointed out how government subsidies were actually hiding the high cost of the product. While that debate endures, ethanol can certainly be said to not be the panacea for the oil crisis. However, as an important part of an overall strategy to break oil dependency, ethanol must be factored into the debate.

An apparent successful multi-level strategy is Denmark’s approach to the same oil dependency problem. After the Arab Oil Embargo of 1973, Denmark decided to act. Denmark is a small country with a largely homogenous population making a consensus easier to obtain. Using a plan that included many different measures, the Danes have virtually freed themselves from Middle Eastern oil. They drilled for oil in the North Sea, use bicycles, and developed wind energy – in fact, Denmark leads the world in the export of wind technology. Further, their gasoline is taxed (try this in America) and is among the most expensive in the world. Denmark now boasts the lowest per capita energy use while producing the highest percentage of energy from non-petroleum sources. A hard common sense approach with multiple tactics proved to be successful.

As the pressure to find green solutions increases in this country, many new and reexamined old ideas have been put into play. Biodiesel fuel from waste sources is a great example of this. Wind energy is being enthusiastically embraced as a source of energy and a way to make a buck. Some electrical plants have switched from coal to natural gas and hydro power. The scramble is on to perfect hydrogen cell batteries. The list goes on and there are many additions. None of them, though, are a panacea or a replacement for concerted effort at many different levels.

"For all those whose cares have been our concern, the work goes on,
the cause endures, the hope still lives and the dream shall never die."
Ted Kennedy 1932 - 2009

Time to Close Newbury Street?

2009-08-27T09:03:03-04:00

by Dan Burgess

A recent headline from the Boston Globe read, “As Boston businesses struggle, Menino looks to fill vacancies”. The image that ran with the online story was painfully fitting for the event: Mayor Menino in a walking cast, standing outside of a vacant storefront. According to the article, Mayor Menino was taking potential investors on a bus tour of the vacant spaces along Newbury Street and around the Fenway area. Menino was quoted to say that he was, “being aggressive in the marketing of our city”.

Along with the Mayor-guided tour, the article indicated that investors who sign a lease before December 2009 would receive ‘advertising space on two outdoor displays in the city’s downtown for a month, a
value of $5,000’.

The Globe piece mentioned that there were almost twenty empty storefronts, and counting, along Newbury Street and in the Fenway area. These areas, especially Newbury Street, are known for having the type of retail shops that are struggling as people see their 401ks drop as drastically as they have in the last 18 months. While investment tours and free advertising offers are a good start toward revitalization, the city and its struggling business community should think green as they attempt
to improve the city’s business climate.

One green initiative that makes sense for Boston, is to close Newbury Street to automobiles and make the street a pedestrian-only shopping district. Ridding a section of Newbury Street of cars would provide numerous benefits for our city. This measure would increase the amount of green space that our city
has and would be a strong sign of our city’s attempt to curb our aggregate carbon footprint. Mayor Menino is actively attempting to do this through his Climate Action Leadership Committee that he recently announced with Former Vice President Al Gore, and this would be an excellent way to draw attention to the carbon reduction cause.

Closing Newbury Street would also attract more people (think consumers) to the shopping district, which would help ease the financial stress that area businesses are experiencing. Boston was recently ranked the third most walkable city in the United States and the fact is that people like to walk our city’s streets. This is true particularly of the Back Bay-Beacon Hill area, which was ranked as the most walkable neighborhood in the city. Despite this, as I wrote about here, the Boston Common (located directly between Back Bay and Beacon Hill) is poorly attended by visitors. The Boston Common is the oldest park in the United States and is located directly between our most walkable neighborhoods, but is only the 37th most visited park in the United States. This does not bode well for any surrounding local businesses and is an obvious indication of the need for change.

Moreover, there is recent precedent for a large United States city closing down busy streets to vehicles. Early this summer, in an attempt to improve how their streets are used, New York City closed down sections of Times Square to automobile traffic. New York is doing this temporarily and will wait until the end of the year to make a final decision on the street closure, but their government officials should be praised for their willingness to improve the status quo in the face of severe skepticism.

Boston should follow New York City’s lead and attempt a similar strategy by temporarily closing the section of Newbury Street between Clarendon Street and Massachusetts Avenue to automobile traffic. This temporary closure could be done in numerous ways: selected days or weeks, for a whole season, or just for special weekend events. The cessation could also be coupled with decreased parking fees under the Boston Common and at the Prudential Center or even discounted lowered MBTA fares. These details would ultimately need to be worked out with Back Bay residents and business owners but it’s clear that in order to rebound, Boston’s businesses need creative solutions like this from City Hall.

If done in a smart and responsible way, eliminating traffic on Newbury Street could help revive the struggling area, bring more visitors to the poorly visited Boston Common, and send a strong signal as to Boston’s intentions to reduce its carbon footprint. Win. Win. Win.

There Comes a Day

2009-08-23T18:51:12-04:00

by Daniel E. Walsh Author of Our Sunday "History & Reflections" Series

“And we'll have fun fun fun now that daddy took the T-Bird away”
The Beach Boys

Out of sight, out of mind. For so many of us this simple phrase is a way out of a nettling situation. Rodents, holiday decorations, the runny-nosed urchin from up the street that asks all those-impossible-to-answer questions; all of these can be safely placed out of mind.

Some things put aside can come back to haunt. Take our current waste disposal system. The clean street evident after the trash has been whisked away is an illusion; a mask over the fact that the disposed material will have to be dealt with. With a sense of relief many feel that tomorrow will be the time to handle that problem. But there comes a day.

There comes a day. There comes a day when the mail and the phone calls you’ve ignored go away and the sheriff is at your door. There comes a day when that nagging little thing you didn’t look into has you staring at the bright white light from a hospital gurney. There comes a day when the fighting stops and your lover leaves a goodbye note on the kitchen table. And there will come a day if we are not mindful when that trash we have carefully tucked away in rural outposts will return to us in insidious and noxious ways.

In her book, Gone Tomorrow, The Hidden Life of Garbage, Heather Rogers shows how the change of trash disposal method that occurred in the early part of the 20th Century created this sense of out of sight out of mind and its resulting explosion in the amount of trash we produce. America has slipped in many international rankings but, not to worry, we have an insurmountable lead in the amount of trash per capita we produce. Consumerism thrives on convenience; convenience spawns packaging. The advent of gasoline powered automobiles created the need for cleaner streets (and helped them get cleaner by replacing the horse and its messy byproduct). Trucks with the addition of on-board hydraulic compactors made the transporting of trash to those countryside hidey-holes all that much easier and tidier.

Ms. Rogers describes the various waste disposal methods extant before this mass revelation of the joys landfilling hit all American cities in a roughly two decade period, 1930 to 1950. Composting, rag picking and hog farms were used until the cost factors drove the decision. Trichinosis scares and the plain ugly looking processes also helped to get the stuff out of the way.

Like teens not “at the library like you told your old man, now” Americans went nuts with the garbage making. The invisibility of trash in many ways spawned this mass proliferation. “Cheaper to get a new one” is the mantra uttered at almost every appliance marketer. Shocking mounds of plastic and chemical waste are the backwash of the technological revolution.

When things get easier we get, well, lazier. When in the past garbage was rendered and something called garbage grease was produced, homemakers would fabricate their own soap and candles. When the waste was taken away the process of making your own became much more difficult and thus the purchase of those items became the smart option.

All this convenience and ease brought on the packaging phenomenon. The reckless consumerism reached its apex in the 1950s deemed the Golden Age of Waste by Ms. Rogers. The decade was a perfect storm of highly tuned production capability, planned obsolescence and advertising designed to keep consumers chasing the next best thing. The uses of plastic grew exponentially. Now packaging constitutes 30% of all landfill material. Not all bad news; some packaging has a basis in health concerns and safety in the wake of the Tylenol murders.

There are many ideas circulating about that address the concerns of waste management in creative and green ways. Boston firm IST Energy for example has a GEM of an idea; a portable “post-consumer waste” compactor that converts trash to green energy and powers itself.

As one expert in personal finance recommends the first step in addressing a problem is to put it on the table and admit its existence. Then you call your creditors and deal with things. The process of reconciliation can be exhilarating to those who had lived in denial and shame. At the end of her book Ms Rogers favors a zero waste approach and also a look at waste at it source, the manufacturers, and ways to shift the responsibility of disposal/reuse onto them. Some Europeans countries, most notably Germany and Denmark, have done this with policies that force the producers of waste to be responsible for the whole cost of their product, i.e., the cost of disposal.

A book like Gone Tomorrow can be like that first day of reckoning. Discussion of the problems surrounding waste control in venues like Boston GreenScene or your next city council meeting can be like those first calls to creditors. We’re all in this no matter the political stripes you wear. The conversation has to happen because there comes a day.

Eco-Labeling: How Sustainable is "Organic"?

2009-08-20T06:31:09-04:00

by Lyon Graulty, an associate at More Than Sound, an audio production and publishing company dedicated to deepening our understanding of the human experience.

A growing number of supermarkets are committing to green building, but how sustainable are the products inside? As major food retailers progress towards making their stores more sustainable, it's easy to forget about the great strides that still need to be made in the sustainability of the food itself.

Hannaford Bros new LEED certified supermarket in Augusta, ME

Hannaford's newest store, which opened July 25th in Augusta, Maine, is the first supermarket in the world to be Platinum-certified by the U.S. Green Building Council’s Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design (LEED). Their use of geo-thermal heating and cooling, solar power, and recycled and locally-sourced materials is part of a movement helping to create a more sustainable world, and they deserve recognition for their commitment to reducing their environmental footprint.

As this eco-friendly building opens its doors, many other supermarkets are following suit. The Whole Foods in Sarasota, Florida has been LEED certified with a Silver rating, and Food Lion just broke ground on a store in Columbia, South Carolina that is on track to LEED certification. As the green building and retail food industries forge new partnerships, this progress highlights a growing void: the lack of a common set of guidelines to transparently access the sustainability of the wide range of ecological, health, and social impacts involved with food production and distribution.

True, we have the Certified Organic label, which has made advances in restricting the use of toxic chemical pesticides, herbicides, and fertilizers on our food. But the Organic certification system fails to recognize the wider ecological impact of a product. "Saying the product is organic is not enough anymore," says UC Berkeley Industrial Ecologist and GoodGuide founder Dara O'Rourke. "In 2009, you need to know, okay, it's organic - but is it healthy? Was it produced locally? How far did it get shipped?"

Much of the organic food that is bought every day in the U.S. actually comes from China. Newsweek reported last year that while there are 21 separate agencies that claim to certify organic farms in China, only one of them is considered legitimate outside of the country. Consider this with the fact that it’s estimated that roughly half of the organic garlic we import is coming from China. It’s hard to imagine all that garlic is certified by the recognized agency, and all this is complicated by the fact that our government doesn’t keep track of the country and farm of origin of organic food imports. In fact, we only inspect a little over 1% of all food imports. A few years ago, Wal-Mart had to pull a bunch of Chinese produce labeled organic from its Chinese stores after they tested it and found out it was loaded with pesticides.

Ironically, even in the US, as the organic label becomes more in demand, organic farms have been further industrialized to produce higher yields, and we begin to see more Certified Organic products with questionable ecological impacts. So with the rise of "industrial organics", comes a whole new crop of organic food mass-produced by companies with unproven ecological accountability and questionable workers' rights practices.

Organizations like Fair Trade and TransFair USA have been established to ensure fair wages and treatment for farmers and are working towards making more of the food they supply organic. But both these systems lack a comprehensive view of the product - from its origins to its packaging and disposal, and thus fail to recognize the depth and breadth of the product's impacts. Moreover, the Fair Trade label is only applied to certain industries that are especially susceptible to worker exploitation, more often than not in developing nations. For the rest of the food supply, there is no established method of accessing and certifying a truly sustainable supply chain.

It seems to me that we need to recognize and confront the health and social impacts associated with our food supply while giving equal attention to the ecological impacts. Right now, the best we as consumers can do to gain insight into the broad range of consequences associated with a given product is to do the research ourselves.

Fortunately, there are rating systems that can help consumers assess the various impacts of products. GoodGuide is a rating system designed by O'Rourke that rates products in three categories: social, health, and environmental, and organizes them according to users' preferences in each area. As O'Rourke states in Ecological Awareness, GoodGuide provides "the most comprehensive, and credible information in the world to shoppers right at the moment when they're making a decision about a product or company." GoodGuide has recently added food to their ratings, and though the information is incomplete, it's a step toward a comprehensive system.

There is a growing portion of consumers willing to pay more for healthy and sustainable food. As these changes are recognized by the large food retail companies, they begin to adapt their own practices to match the evolving buying habits of their customer base. With the help of a comprehensive certification system, supermarkets could select their products based on verified information instead of unregulated claims. And as large food retailers develop relationships with sustainable food producers, their support drives down prices of sustainable food and makes it economically feasible for more of the customer base. As the price of sustainable options drops closer to that of unverified products, we begin to reach an important watershed, where companies who do not adapt will be left behind as consumers favor the sustainable product that is now affordable as well.

In Great Britain, the shifting marketplace, driven by the desire for more data on carbon impacts, is helping to push the sustainable movement towards this important watershed mark. Sir Terry Leahy, CEO of Tesco, Great Britain's largest supermarket chain, has implemented a store-wide rating system that tracks the carbon emissions associated with all 70,000 of their products. This embrace of transparent practices is spreading within Britain to the point where, according to Daniel Goleman in Ecological Intelligence, "the British government has undertaken an initiative to create a uniform measure for evaluating the carbon footprint of not just foods but a wide variety of consumer goods." (p. 114)

In developing this initiative, called the Carbon Trust, the British Government has taken an important step toward developing a comprehensive rating system that, with the cooperation of other governments and companies around the world, could develop into a LEED-style certification system. The comprehensive nature of the LEED system is what makes it so effective, and the food industry would be wise to take a cue from the green building industry and put more energy into developing an integrative product certification system.

Blackberry Pie: That’s How You Do It

2009-08-09T02:26:12-04:00

by Daniel E. Walsh Author of Our Sunday "History & Reflections" Series

Many persons have a wrong idea of what constitutes true happiness.
It is not attained through self-gratification but through fidelity to a worthy purpose.
~ Helen Keller (1880 - 1968)

Do you know how to make the ache of an overworked back, the sting of scratched hands and arms, the sweaty unease from a day spent in the summer sun, and the bone weariness from hours of tedious labor disappear with one act? You bake a blackberry pie from the fruits of those efforts. You serve it warm in the cool, late evening, honeysuckle scented air with a glass of strong sweet homemade iced tea. That’s how you do it!

As far back as the Mesolithic era, humans have sought berries for their nutritional and medicinal value. Blackberries don’t grow in any orderly fashion. The plant clings to any fence, stump and bush that the vine can latch onto. They seem to flourish in hard to reach places. There is probably an explanation that involves survival and predators, but this author doesn’t know what that is. I know that the berries are very hard to get to. I learned that long ago in the summer of youth.

We were sent out with a motley assortment of pails, pots and pans to gather the berries. We would head out in the early morning and work until mid afternoon. We went with missionary zeal because we knew what would be coming later. If the work had been isolated from the tantalizing reward, I can’t imagine that we would have stayed on task for more than fifteen minutes. A quiet oft-heard life lesson—if you labor at something you love, you never work a day in your life. We were stretching, straining, fighting bees, worrying about snakes and getting scratched like tomcats—but we didn’t notice.

There were usually three or four of us; that made the competition fierce as we each tried to outdo the other. If you found a patch with plump, juicy berries you plunged in and picked no matter the obstacle. You picked at a very quick pace because you knew you would have company if the others saw your bounty. I think though when you scored like that there was one berry eaten for each that made it into the pail. So, if you had trouble chiming in on the incessant banter that accompanied the outing, your mates would be onto you because they knew why you had your mouth full.

Back to the house in the afternoon we would scamper with our teeming pails. The mother would start the process by cooking the berries on the stove top. After our late lunch, we would be scooted right back outdoors where we were expected to stay until called in for dinner. The house was cooled in the hot summer by a combination of tree shade, electric fans and low activity, especially of the kid variety. That kitchen heat from the bubbling saucepans and the oven—must have been intense, but that labor was done with a different excitement—the cook’s joy in the delight of children.

That pie! The ambrosia of a childhood dream. Never before—or since—has the reward of an effort ever been so clear. Purple-faced grins, the winking of lightning bugs in the still summer night, the absolute contentment and the shared satisfaction shine through the years. Scratches cleared, lives separated and the berry patches were plowed under; life offered new thrills and delights. I can’t help but think that those pies were most perfect expression of happiness—were it ever so clear again.

Note: If after thinking about it, pie suddenly sounds good and you’re not inclined to gather pails, brave the brambles, and break out the rolling pin you can hit the Ever So Humble Pie Company located in East Walpole and available frozen in various locations throughout the Boston metro area. This pie shop has been featured in many publications and their all-natural, vegetarian pies are a favorite among health conscious seekers of the taste of home.

Sleeping Soundly Using Natural Scent

2009-08-08T13:24:34-04:00

by Cher Kore, www.KHealing.com

Sleep is another world; it’s deep peace, healing the body and mind and allowing us to wake well-rested and joyful. When sleep is disrupted, the body’s balance is in upheaval. The sleep deprived may survive the day, but it’s hard for them to enjoy it.

Insomnia is a widespread problem that is due to varying causes: anxiety, stress, pain, sleep pattern interruption, and more. It takes many forms. Some find it hard to go to sleep. Others fall asleep, yet wake several times during the night. Many people sleep, yet toss and turn so much they never reach a deep enough sleep to recharge.

Too many people turn to expensive and sometimes addictive pharmaceuticals when there are so many safer, more natural methods. Aromatherapy is an often ignored method to aid peaceful sleep. Essential oils (EOs) are all natural and biodegradable, thus safe for the environment. Also, when making your own sleep treatments, you can reuse bottles and add your own water or salt, thereby reducing packaging waste and shipping emissions.

Aromatherapy has been very successful and it is by and large safe and economical. Many EOs not only help you fall asleep quickly, but also induce a higher quality of sleep. If you wake during the night due to noise or a full bladder, many scents may lull you back to sleep. EOs, alone, are not suggested to cure any serious illness. However, many kinds of sleep difficulties may be remedied with aromatherapy. Whether using a single oil for mild relaxation or a blend for deep rest, there are three main methods you may implement.

Bed-Time Bathing

A warm bath can bring on a sleepy feeling. Adding 3-8 drops of relaxing EOs in the water may multiply this effect. Add about ½ cup of Epsom Salt for to help soften and pull toxins from skin. Be careful not to get so drowsy you can’t safely get out of the tub.

Diffusing

Diffusing your bedroom (for an hour or so) before you go to sleep can be a great sleep aid. A diffuser is simply a bowl on stands. The bowl holds water and EOs; under it you place a tea-light candle. As the water and oils heat they are vaporized into the air so you smell your blend by breathing through your nose. Use 10-15 drops of EOs to 1-2 ounces of water. To give your diffuser a jump start, boil the water before you add it.

Scenting Pillows and Bedding

This may be enough for the mildly restless. It’s so simple to scent cotton puffs (with 4-6 drops of EOs), let them dry, and put them in the linen closet between your bedding. You may also put perfumed puffs inside your pillow case. Aromatherapy misters make for aromatic pillows, blankets and sheets. To make a mist, combine 15-20 drops of your blend with 2 oz of distilled water, in a fine mist spray bottle. Shake well and use immediately or up to six months later. Simply take aim and spritz.

BLENDING A SLEEP FORMULA

Use the EO guide below to get an idea of oils to try. There are some oils you should not use in a sleep blend. These include: patchouli, peppermint, eucalyptus, pine needle, clove, cinnamon, allspice, black pepper, and other awakening oils.

Use the heady EOs as base notes. In the list below, these are: Clary Sage, Neroli, Sandalwood, Rose, Valerian, and Vetiver. These oils should account for 5-15% of your blend.

Middle Notes should account for 50-60% of your blend. Good middle notes are: Geranium, Lavender, Marjoram, Pettigrain, and Ylang Ylang.

Tops notes are light. They should account for about 30% to 40% of your blend. Good tops notes include: Roman & German Chamomile, Geranium, and Mandarin.

You may use several oils to create each note. For instance, blend a few drops each of Clary Sage, Valerian, and Vetiver to create one intricate base note.

SOME ESSENTIAL OILS RECOMMENDED FOR INSOMNIA

Roman & German Chamomile

These Chamomiles are gentle enough for babies. Roman Chamomile has a bright apple-like scent, while velvety blue German Chamomile has a pleasantly medicinal scent. Both are used to ease the nerves and are recommended for sleep problems.

Clary Sage

Clary Sage oil is sweet, rich, and highly relaxing. It has been known to induce colorful dreams, as well as aid in a deep, peaceful rest.

Geranium

Dry with a rosy undertone, geranium oil can be very relaxing. It is also wonderful for helping to balance female hormones, thus it is good to add if your sleep is disrupted by menstrual or menopausal symptoms.

Lavender

Highly floral and mildly herbaceous, Lavender is considered the most versatile EO. It often helps balance one’s energies. Lavender oil can be extremely relaxing and has been used to heal a host off ills, including migraine headaches and mild insomnia. It’s also gentle enough for infants and children.

Marjoram

Marjoram is an anaphrodisiac meaning it reduces sex drive. It is said to be comforting, warming, and strengthening. It is often used when treating insomnia. It is also used to help ease mental strain, anger, frustration, hostility, and more. It has a warm, woody, and somewhat spicy/camphorous scent.

Mandarin

This light, sweet, citrus oil has a very relaxing aroma. It is very gentle and is one of the few EOs recommended for children (toddlers and up). Its scent is used to aid depression, anxiety, and feelings of emptiness. It is highly recommend to aid in a good nights sleep.

Neroli

This rapturous floral oil comes from the orange blossom. In addition to its comforting qualities, it boosts the spirit and may help one sustain confidence. It is expensive, but often just a drop or two is all that is needed.

Pettigrain

This mesmerizing scent is created from the leaves and twigs of the bitter orange tree. Pettigrain oil has a bright floral-citrus aroma, similar to the very costly Neroli oil, which is made from the blossoms of the same tree. Pettigrain, like Neroli, is recommended to help sleep problems.

Rose Absolute

Deep, rich, and floral, the fragrance of true rose absolute oil is unmistakable. It is very soothing and can be of great aid during blue moments. Being very expensive, this oil is used in moderation. Luckily, it only takes a little to enhance a blend.

Sandalwood

Rich, musky, sandalwood is traditionally burned as an aid to meditation. The EO is known for its calming and grounding effects. It is sometimes used when treating insomnia. It's rich, woody scent helps to anchor blends.

Valerian

Highly sedative Valerian oil has had a high rate of success when treating insomnia. Its medicinal scent is an acquired taste. The common pharmaceutical sedative Valium got its name from the herb Valerian. To keep its power, yet ease its pungency, mix with complementary oils such as Clary Sage or Pettigrain to make a base note.

Vetiver

This smoky, woody oil is said to strengthen the central nervous system, restoring balance and focus. It is employed to stabilize energy and help with a good nights rest.

Ylang Ylang

This exotic, floral scent is relaxing and euphoric. In the correct dosage, it has been used to calm both the mind and nerves.

OTHER SLEEP AIDS

I also recommend looking into herbal teas (try organic chamomile, catnip, or valerian), relaxing music, and meditation. Find ways to avoid sleep disruptions. A fan (you can turn it around if you don’t want it blowing on you) can provide white noise to block outside sounds which may wake you. Eliminate light, even from an answering machine button (just put a piece of tape over it). Keep an uncluttered bedroom, so your mind will feel clear and uncluttered. Use creative visualization and image yourself in a relaxing environment: a cave, the beach, a forest… whatever is comforting to you. Realize you are safe, cozy, clean, and warm and the best thing you can do is escape, fall into your dreams, and sleep.

Cher Kore is the Founder of Kameleon Healing, Inc. www.kHealing.com. She has created countless recipes for body, face, hair and home care. Her vast knowledge of essential oils and natural bases oils allows her to mix synergist blends and teach others to mix oils safely and effectively. Email Cher@kHealing.com for inquiries or to order custom blends and/or raw ingredients for home crafting.

Public Green Space - How Does Boston Measure Up?

2009-08-03T10:46:31-04:00

by Dan Burgess

Like many Bostonians searching for summer respite, I have a few favorite green spaces in the city that I head to when the sun is shining. It’s a place to bring a book or an iPod when we need to unwind or somewhere to meet friends with picnic food and a football to toss around. Mine happens to be a certain section of grass on the Charles River that is fairly crowded, yet pleasantly serene.

While waiting for friends this past weekend I settled onto my blanket and took in the usual scene: families walking dogs and pushing strollers, tourists snapping photos, couples holding hands, and annoyed bikers and runners trying to avoid them all. Seeing this as if for the first time, I began to wonder, just how much of this space does Boston have? Is it enough, and how do we compare to other cities?
Fortunately, the answers to these questions were only an online search away. The Trust for Public Land, a non-profit land conservation organization, maintains a website that has an abundance of city park facts. The following is what I found out:

As a percentage, a good portion of our city is green space. Of those cities which The Trust for Public Land characterizes as having a population density of high, Boston ranks 5th in the country for park acres as a percentage of city land area, at just over 16%. Boston's total land acreage is about 31,000 and we have just over 5,000 total park acres. This puts Boston almost 5 percentage points above the city average of 11.6% for comparable cities.

The four cities ahead of us?

New York - 19.6%
Washington D.C. - 19.4%
San Francisco - 18.0%
Jersey City - 17.1%

We don’t have large public green spaces. Our city is home to its fair share of parks, but out of the 150 largest parks by acreage in United States cities, not one of them is in Boston.

We do however, seem to have a good balance of green space to citizens. Boston, among high population density cities, ranks only behind Washington DC in park acreage to city residents. There are 8.1 acres per 1,000 residents in Boston (Washington DC has 13.1 acres per 1000 residents).

We have historically significant parks, but they aren’t visited as often as you’d think. The Boston Common is the oldest city park in the United States. Established in 1634, the Boston Common is the beginning of the Freedom Trail and is close to 50 acres in size. Despite the historical significance of Boston’s inner city park, the Boston Common only attracts 2 million visitors per year. This makes it only the 37th most visited park in the United States. To be fair, the Boston National Historical Park (which contains the Old North Church, Faneuil Hall, and the Bunker Hill Monument), ranks 36th and attracts an additional 2.2 million visitors a year. Adding these two together however only moves Boston’s parks up to somewhere around the 20th most visited in the country.

Overall, while disappointed with the small number of visitors to the Boston Common, I was pleased to find that Boston seems to measure up quite well to other cities in the United States. The next time I'm laying out a blanket in my favorite public green space, I'll be sure not to take it for granted.

Curious how Boston compares to cities in other categories? Check out The Trust for Public Land’s entire City Park Facts web page. You’ll find everything from statistics on dog parks, baseball diamonds, ice rinks, and swimming pools to how much money Boston spends to maintain all of this space as compared to other cities.

The Lesson in Rice: Wisdom in Planning

2009-08-02T09:42:30-04:00

by Daniel E. Walsh

“One generation plants the trees, and another gets the shade.”
~ Chinese Proverb

First the rats and mice proliferated. They swarmed and multiplied until the food stocks left behind by the humans were depleted and they returned to a harder existence. The domesticated farm animals left untended foraged where they could until they fell to predators or died from starvation.

Now spurned by humans because of the radiation, the vast area abandoned after the Chernobyl nuclear accident is prowled by wild dogs, feral pigs, and cats. Roads are dusty tracks and buildings decrepit hulks overgrown with vegetation.

This occurred in a mere generation; the incident took place in 1977. We are wards of nature and subject to its fickle whims. Careful maintenance of this gift of a planet and the goal of sustainability aren’t the sophomoric notions of an ephemeral political movement—they are necessary duties for our continued existence.

Faced with a burgeoning population and diminishing resources, the Chinese took measures to sustain their environment and tend to their future generations. They figured out a way to conserve water, while developing a plant that produces more calories per acre than most others. The product of the plant has a dizzying array of uses and with a little added protein has sustained thousands of generations. The plant: rice. The time: circa 5000 B. C. And yes, Virginia, the government had to impose a few laws to make this happen.

While the conditions of life in those long distant lands were probably not quite as sophisticated and complicated as ours today, the basic experience has many parallels. Fierce tribal competition created many roadblocks to more cooperative relations among the multitude of states largely governed by dictatorial warlords. Thus there was little in the way of intrastate commerce and infrastructure.

Seven thousand years later and we’re caught up in the wonder of it all. The twin conundrums of our time: those who think they have discovered the phenomenon of sustainability as opposed by the unthinking, delusional, and loudly opinionated voices who think that everything is going to be all right as if by magic.

The true folly is in pretending that the awesome force of nature capable of swallowing up a whole province –as evidenced by the aftermath of the abandonment of Chernobyl—in just a few years—can be fooled and manipulated by simplistic notions of how things ought to be. The dogs that nap at our feet and beg for the biscuits - we think they will always be there, but they may someday circle our fires with eyes gleaming hunger.

Rice worked for the Chinese. Rice is still working for a huge portion of the world’s population. The plant wasn’t built in a laboratory and spat out in a week to be the savior. Time had to pass and many tests had to be done. There may have been a social commentator who thought they saw folly in the endeavors. They may have noted that there was plenty to go around, but wiser heads prevailed. Today, those that scoff at, for example, the recycling of plastic bottles may be in some literal sense correct—for now. The effort to find the most effective way to package and distribute food is in its nascent stages. There will be much trial and error along the way. And much to ridicule.

History teaches the wisdom in planning. Rice worked after hundreds of years of patience. The current sustainability movement is wisely involved in planning, but more patience is required.

GREEN COLLAR JOBS SPOTLIGHT: WIND ENERGY

2009-08-01T09:30:02-04:00

from the Editor's Desk

As Boston GreenScene and Olila Documents & Communication Strategies team up to explore the burgeoning green collar job market and how we can jointly serve those considering a green career, we are finding some excellent resources.

One such resource is Green Careers Guide, an online portal offering nuts-and-bolts information on various green professions, the projected growth of related markets, as well as a job search function. The following article spotlighting wind energy jobs is just one of many matter-of-fact explorations appearing on the site.

FOUR WIND ENERGY, GREEN COLLAR JOBS

by Ezra Drissman, Green Careers Guide

As wind technology advances so does wind power jobs. Wind jobs are green careers because wind is a natural, renewable energy source. Wind and Solar power jobs are uniquely connected with the new smart grid that is being constructed. Due to the huge amounts of electricity that can be harnessed, smart grids will provide the much needed mechanisms to push wind electricity around the country. While this is happening, wind energy jobs are opening up all across the United States. Here are some great jobs to think about:

Wind Turbine Machinist

A Wind Turbine Machinist is just like a production machinist for any other industry, only in this case they specialize in the production of metal and plastic parts for wind turbines. Wind Turbine Machinist first review blueprints (written or electronic) for the specific wind turbine part needing to be made. Next, they select the tools and equipment needed to shape the piece, and calculate where to cut or drill the material they are working with (steel, aluminum, titanium, plastic, etc.). They use their knowledge of metal properties and skill with machine tools to produce the part to extremely precise specifications.

Wind Power Turbine Installer

A wind power turbine installer must be well acquainted on the physics and science of wind turbines; this explains why a background in applied science is a must for those interested in this career. A wind power turbine installer has to know the different wind speeds and how a wind turbine works because outfitting a home with a wind turbine relies on this technical knowledge.

Wind Analyst

A wind analyst is a meteorological professional who uses advanced scientific models and equipment to predict and measure wind flow. Wind analysts study the effect of wind flow at current wind farm sites, and help plan and develop new wind farm sites. They study meteorological data and estimate wind output to support consulting services in wind energy development.

Wind Energy Technician

Wind Energy Technicians maintain turbines on wind farms. If you are thinking about this field, you will need to have a fairly strong background and understanding of mechanical and electrical principles. You will also need to be in fairly good shape. Taking care of really tall turbines involves climbing a lot of stairs.

Wind Farms will only grow in number. If you are looking to get into this field start now. The opportunity for growth is immense.

How to Create a Sustainable … Green … HR Function

2009-07-29T10:35:07-04:00

by Lizz Pellet, Fellow Johns Hopkins University and CEO of EMERGE International

We’ve all heard that green is quickly becoming the new black. Everyone seems to be jumping on the sustainability wagon. What does that mean for HR? In December 2008, Green Tech Media offered their list of the top ten green jobs of the future. Number two on their list was Sustainability Officer. They say that this is a newly created corporate position. Companies will need to make choices about how to reduce their carbon footprint as well as make their products and services more green.

So, what is a Sustainability Officer? Here is my first pass at what an HR sustainability role would look like and the process HR would undertake in order to “greenify” their company.

Knowledge, Skills, and Abilities (KSAs)

Once the organization establishes that social responsibility and sustainability is important to their business strategy, they must define what this will mean to the company. Once this is defined, it will need to be incorporated into the company’s vision, mission, values as well as touted in their marketing materials, website, and all communication vehicles. No easy task here, but assigning the deliverable to one job function actually makes quite a bit of sense.

The role would be highly visible and would have to form strong communication channels, both internally and externally, so some good PR and platform delivery skills would be required. The person filling the role will need to be a team player with an exceptional attention to detail. Dealing with all the related functions to get the messages created and delivered will be challenging enough, so a good team approach and an ability to influence others will be a must.

A sustainability officer need not have 100 years experience in that one industry, but should understand the business as a business - possessing solid business acumen and be able to connect the soft skill and process dots to hard dollars. Finance background is always good, but we know most HR folks go into HR so they don’t have to deal with numbers all day long! (Side note here: that perception sure is changing!)

Relating to finance, the sustainability officer will be responsible to identify the current carbon footprint. While there are websites that can help you do this, such as www.carbonfootprint.com, this also will take savvy communication and collaboration skills to interface with all functions with in the organization. This is not a “nice to have” activity, it is the wave of the future and a way for HR to align themselves more closely with the CFO and financial accountability.

Recently, it was reported that environmental costs and liabilities associated with preparing environmental disclosure for Securities and Exchange Commission filings can be a complicated process. Many publicly traded company operations are subject to multiple jurisdictional requirements, from very local to international or supranational regimes, according to a Harvard Law School Corporate Governance blog posting.

According to a memorandum by Betty M. Huber and Brianne Lucyk, certain new and proposed changes to environmental accounting rules may affect current and near-term qualitative and quantitative disclosure. The Financial Accounting Standards Board is looking for more footnote disclosure about a company’s environmental liabilities. You want to score some significant green points with the C-suite? Learn more about the new reporting laws and create ways to support your CFO in this requirement. Then I would recommend a three-step process to recreate the HR function, which includes recruiting and all of its processes.

Evaluate

Does the company’s organizational culture, vision, mission, and values support social responsibility? Organizational culture and values congruence is paramount the creation of a green recruiting function. It continues to be abundantly clear that values not only create cultures, but also support the alignment of personal values with organizational values on many different levels. The amount of blogs that speak to values, personal evolution, and enlightenment is staggering. This all feeds into the school of thought that today’s individuals are seeking experiences with deeper meaning, deeper connectivity, and relational activity.

What is the company’s business proposition as it relates to being green? While sustainability is a factor in building an employment brand and HR function of the future, it also applies to retention. Organizations that are not implementing environmental policies or changing the way they’re doing business may lose current employees to companies that have established themselves as an eco-friendly company or offer socially responsible incentives. Some of these incentives include subsidies for buying hybrid cars, on-site farmers’ markets, use of green fuels and solar power, or the ability to donate reward monies to charitable causes. These are just some of the latest trends in going green.

Eliminate

Using proven business process re-engineering, deploy steps to eliminate waste. Total Quality Management and Continuous Quality Improvement are not just for Six Sigma companies. These methodologies are accepted business practices even for the “soft” processes. When I was an internal in Health Care, we deployed the Juran principles to the cycle time for filling vacancies for our nursing positions. After forming a representative team of subject matter experts, we began creating a process map which allowed us to all see the complicated steps that had been created in this process. We worked together to eliminate redundancy, waste, and duplication of efforts. The outcome was that the team reduced the cycle time for the vacancy rates by 60%! Trust me here, you probably have a ton of practices that could use some dusting off and reinvention.

Process re-engineering related to being green might be a chicken and egg situation. When I was investigating whether organizations go green to save money or for more esoteric reasons, I had a conversation with a high level HR professional in the hospitality industry. She explained that her organization did not go green for social consciousness, but more for the realized cost savings and process improvement. That struck me as funny, as I travel so much and have always applauded hotels that have implemented so many green approaches. Not that they don’t leverage their green side, it was just not the impetus I expected for launching their sustainability efforts.

Include your leader in this exercise allowing them to see what needs to be cut and the potential cost benefits from making the commitment.

Illuminate

Bring to life the new concepts, processes, and procedures and communicate them effectively. Don’t allow for “green washing.” You cannot afford a misstep in this communication activity. Focus on creating a congruent and authentic employment brand will help your organization attract, retain, and repel employees. Companies large and small are seeing a significant increase in the ROI of their recruitment and retention programs by creating an employment brand. One component of a significant employment brand is its green recruiting practices. This is not a “flavor of the month” or a new concept. Fortune 500 companies have been doing it for years and your organization might have the right stuff…you just might not be leveraging your green practices and programs in your recruitment efforts.

Way back in June, 2007 Dr. John Sullivan wrote, “While candidates of all generations have begun evaluating potential employers based on their “greenness” few in recruiting have leveraged this hot topic in recruitment communication and activities”. He goes on to say, “individual recruiters need to make the firms’ environmental stance a critical element of their sales pitch to potential applications and candidates”. Does the good doctor have a crystal ball or what?

In speaking to HR professionals around the country over the past year, I know his words to be true. Recruiters are not leveraging green enough. In 2008, while presenting at the HR Star Conference in San Francisco, I asked a room of over 300 HR professionals how many of their companies had an environmental policy. Only 10% of the room raised their hands. But, when asked if their company recycles, over 80% responded yes. I have asked this question in over 20 conferences in the past year with much of the same result. If you recycle, you have an environmental policy! I know, that seems so easy, and it is. While looking at your organization with a new lens or a green monocle may not be so easy, it can be done.

Sometimes reframing is the most cost effective approach to transformation. You are already doing great things, you just might need to rediscover them. You’ll do that in the evaluation phase and the you can repackage them. We all know how much “regifting” can save. Apply the same concept here.

For more information on creating a green employment brand, email: info@emergeinternational.com.

Redefining Terroir

2009-07-25T14:15:44-04:00

by Dan Burgess

terroir [teh-RWAHR]: French for "soil" and used in the phrase gout de terroir ("taste of the soil") to refer to the earthy flavor of some wines. ~www.epicurious.com

A certain romantic quality exists at Terroir Select Coffee and an endearment for fine coffee is almost contagious when you walk through the door and smell the aroma of freshly roasted beans.

Two years ago, I was fortunate enough to attend a coffee tasting, site tour, and presentation at Terroir’s facility in Acton, MA. George Howell, the ivy league educated owner and founder of Terroir who has been called ‘Juan Valdez in a blue blazer’ and ‘a walking encyclopedia on coffee’ by the New York Times, personally walked us through the roasting facility.

George Howell’s love affair with high quality coffee is obvious to even the most casual observer, and to hear him speak of his time spent with single-origin farmers in equatorial lands is reminiscent to reading Ernest Hemingway chronicle his African hunting expeditions. Like the famed Hemingway safari accounts, Howell’s journeys are filled with passion, thrill, and above all, a respect for the people and process involved. Fortunately, his travels differ from Hemingway in that what Howell brings back, we can all enjoy first hand: arguably the world’s finest coffee beans.

“Coffee has progressed from the flatline-quality graveyard of the 1960’s and 70’s to the quality trapezoid of today’s specialty blend market. This trapezoid now needs to be crowned with great single-source, named coffees to become a quality pyramid – for the health of the marketplace, the growers, the growers’ nations – and for our very real pleasure and delight!” - Terroir website.

Terroir, founded in 2004 by Howell after numerous successful endeavors in the coffee world, not only produces some of the world’s best coffee, but does so in a socially and environmentally responsible way. As stated on the website, this endeavor “represents a return for George to his roots: identifying, roasting and discovering the highest quality coffees possible. His Terroir line of single-origin coffees is the next step in this unfolding odyssey as he presses to extend the limits of quality coffee standards. Terroir is based on the simple premise that the apex of coffee quality is represented by single estates, be they farms or carefully focused cooperatives.” - Terroir website.

By 'single origin,' Terroir is not referring to the continent that your coffee beans come from as most coffee conglomerates do. Terroir tells you the origin country, region, and the farm, estate, or cooperative of the beans you are grinding. While each farm may not be certified as organic (this certification is often too expensive and impractical for many small farms), you can be sure that your coffee is grown in the most sustainable way possible. Practicing sustainable farming is the only way these small farms can possibly survive. Small farms and cooperatives rely on cultivating the same land year after year, and must preserve their precious land in order to survive. For example, one of the highest ranked coffees currently at Terroir comes from a farm in Kenya called the Ndiara Estate. Ndiara Estate, is an eight-acre farm.

Howell and the folks at Terroir work tirelessly with these farms to increase the quality of their product. Howell shares his vast knowledge and experience with them and even experiments with different techniques to further the quality of the beans shipped to the United States. While walking through the Terroir facilities two years ago, Howell pointed out new, more advanced packing that they were experimenting with in an attempt to improve the preservation of the beans while in transit.

In addition to working with small farmers and cooperatives, Terroir is continuously educating consumers on quality coffee. To get an idea of how ‘coffee is produced from seed to cup,’ check out the beginnings of what is hopefully a soon to come, illustrated book. You can also hear Howell on NPR’s On Point with Tom Ashbrook, here. But be warned, your steaming hot french roast or flavored coffee may never taste the same.

As the quality coffee movement continues to progress and we begin to see similarities to the growth of the wine industry (think vintages and credit to individual farms and roasters) you can be sure George Howell and the Terroir Select Coffee will be leading the way.

You can find Terroir Coffee in Boston here, and I’ve had especially good experiences with Terroir coffee at Creme Cafe in Harvard Square in Cambridge. Creme only serves Terroir coffee and hangs images of Howell’s journeys on it’s brick walls.

Cool Beans

2009-07-21T23:32:21-04:00

by Daniel E. Walsh

As Confucius said, "It is such a delight to have friends coming from afar."
Dr. Huqu Zhai
President of Chinese Academy of Agricultural Sciences
Chairman of the World Soybean Research Conference VIII Organizing Committee

An important event is taking place in Beijing, China this summer. The World Soybean Research Conference VIII is scheduled for August 8 through August 10. This meeting of multinational soybean producers and policy makers occurs every five years. The soybean a plant of the legume family that emanated from the host country has become an extremely important crop. There have been stunning developments with major global implications in just the last five years that this conference will address. Some of the issues on the agenda are controversial, but, in general, the emergence of this plant has been largely beneficial to mankind and the sustainability movement.

Scheduled to be discussed are biotechnology, the role of soy in animal feed and human health, and sustainable farming practices. The market web of this product makes it a truly global issue. There are presenters from the major players. China and India are the biggest importers. The United States, Brazil, and Argentina are the largest exporters and producers.

Great advances have been made in the area of biodiesel fuel production that uses soy oil as well as canola and recycled restaurant vegetable oil. Dr. Rudolf Diesel would be proud as his engines were originally designed to run on vegetable oil. Biodiesel fuel is usually used in combination with petroleum-based fuel, although it can be used exclusively. The fuel is sustainable and kinder to the environment in many more ways than petroleum. In Massachusetts, you can purchase biodiesel at Burke Oil in Chelsea.

GMO’s, or genetically modified versions of the plant, are a topic of great interest because of the marketing impact. While tremendously efficient in the field, GMOs (introduced in 1996) are not allowed in some major markets, most notably Europe. China, now fourth in exports, finds itself in the curious position of having homegrown soy that is more expensive than imported soy. The reason: China does not allow GMOs to protect the viability of the thousands of varieties native to the country, and they have a shrewd eye on that non-GMO market. The numbers are staggering; China annually imports 30 million bushels and grows 16 million bushels.

GMO’s are also part of a twin controversy in the Southern Cone region of South America. Brazil and Argentina are first and third respectively in soy production worldwide, with dramatic concomitant impact on their economies. Giant tracts of land in these countries are devoted to the raising of soy for a seemingly insatiable Chinese market. Some of this arable land, especially in Brazil, was hacked out of rain forest. Though many see soy as beneficial and a byproduct of the forest razing, there is simmering resentment and concern among ecological activists. Also, GMOs form a monoculture for much of this farmland and that has long-range implications for the sustainability of the land. The amount of production and acreage put in use in Brazil alone are mind-boggling and a quite recent development.

The United States is the second largest grower of soy, with a near record 77.5 million bushels produced last year. The plant was introduced to North America during the great Chinese immigration of the 1800’s. Due to its health and sustainability applications, the plant is rapidly rising in importance in this country. Soy is one of the few plants that have the 8 amino acids necessary for good health. 85% of the product is mashed into animal feed. The remaining 15% has amazing versatility. Candles, inks, paper, milk, hydraulic oil, grease, and biodiesel fuel are some of its many manifestations. The bean is a nutritional superpower—the soy has the highest protein content of any grain or legume, and the plant has a significant quotient of isoflavones that are considered to be very effective cancer fighting agents.

In agriculture, the soybean not only is a great cash crop (the US is the second largest exporter), but also has use in soil management of farms. Legumes such as alfalfa and soy are important rotation crops. As the Romans discovered before the birth of Christ, legumes are a very important asset in the management of farm soil. They used alfalfa crops in between growing grains to “rest” and improve the soil. Thus, addition to being harvestable themselves, the the legumes perform a couple of vital functions that assist soil. The first of these functions is that with their ground cover they aid the decomposition of humus (that part of plants that is desirable to return to the earth). Secondly, the legume roots attract a nitrogen-producing bacteria - an extremely vital function in that, over time, nitrogen is leached from the soil and never satisfactorily returned through the application of human and animal waste. These bacteria actually attract nitrogen from the atmosphere and—though seen as parasitical enemies to the plant—the process is beneficial to the overall soil system.

Far from boring, this little bean has become a major international player in many areas. The conference in Beijing promises to examine processes and policy recommendations with potentially far-reaching effects. While the organization has no power to set policy in the attending countries, its expertise will certainly be given great consideration by the respective policy makers. Suddenly, this ancient plant has been thrust onto the world stage. Impacts to the environment and international market implications are in keen focus. Again, from Confucius: "The expectations of life depend upon diligence; the mechanic that would perfect his work must first sharpen his tools."

Pearl Diving: The Joy of Washing Dishes

2009-07-12T10:02:53-04:00

by Daniel E. Walsh Author of Our Sunday "History & Reflections" Series

Is necessity the mother of invention? Not always. In 1886 Josephine Cochrane became annoyed with her servants. Their offense: chipping her fine china when they washed the dishes. She, the granddaughter of John Fitch, the inventor of the steamboat, put the family talent to work and invented the automatic dishwasher. Her model operated on the same washing principles as today’s machines: spray the dishes with extra hot soapy water, agitate the water to remove soil, drain, rinse, and allow time for drying. Josephine may have been happy with her unchipped china but her bulky energy wasting invention would take a few decades before it became the sleek under-the-counter kitchen appliance it is today.

Not that those servants had anything to worry about if they were concerned about losing their occupation. Washing by hand would endure. Surprisingly, almost half of American households still wash dishes in the sink with varying degrees of impact on the environment--mostly negative. The skill of the hand dishwasher comes into play as to the use of heat and water necessary to do the job.

Professional dishwashers use a combination of hand techniques and large automatic machines. Known in street parlance as pearl diving, this less than honorable menial position is ideal for the youngster on the road to experience, the grizzled, worn-out street character, or the individual living off the grid for reasons best kept to themselves. Such alienated characters slaving away in hash houses and gin joints were mainstay role players in the hard-boiled world of pulp fiction. For a walk in a real dishwasher’s shoes you can check out the adventures of Dishwasher Pete on the radio show This American Life or in his book Dishwasher.

The development of the automatic dishwasher, as a kitchen appliance, paralleled that of the refrigerator. As preservation of food (necessity) has more importance to the consumer than washing dishes, sales of refrigerators far outstripped those of the automatic dishwasher. In America, 99.8% of households have a refrigerator while 56.4% own dishwashers.

Do the machines use more water and consume more energy than a human washing dish by hand? The answer depends on the abilities of the human; the machines are very predictable. Studies have shown that an above-average person hand washing dishes can outperform a dishwashing machine in terms of energy and water use. Maybe a Dishwasher Pete could be more efficient than a machine, but most of us can’t. So as the manufacturers of the appliances drool over that statistic as a sales opportunity, environmentally-aware folks may also want to see that percentage rise to lessen the burden on the ecosystem.

For their part, the manufacturers of dishwashers have seen the trends and have finessed their offerings to reflect environmental concerns. For example, the Bosch Company was named the 2009 Energy Partner of the Year for designing appliances with EcoSense. Bosch dishwashers use 20% less energy than previous Bosch models. Many of the newer models have self-contained garbage disposals and better condition waste as it enters into sewer systems.

Soap companies have responded as well. Traditional powders are very high in alkaline content; typically these powders although corrosive to human touch are very effective in the machines but a detriment to the water system they enter. Seventh Generation and Shaklee are a couple of brands that feature biodegradable dishwasher powders.

Josephine’s invention—born of petulance—has sure come a long way, but has a lot of room to advance if the goal is to become standard issue in the household. Societal factors sometimes provide a boost to market position of products. A pearl of green wisdom, if you will—perhaps the current movement to environmental conscientiousness will cause folks to take another look at the machine as not only a convenience in the home, but as an important way to save energy and water. As a bonus, having no chipped dishes is nice, too.

More ‘Bounty’ for your Buck

2009-07-11T12:06:55-04:00

by Dan Burgess

The City of Boston has rolled out a new program that will make locally grown produce more affordable to residents who are enrolled in the city’s food stamp program. The program uses vouchers, known as Bounty Bucks, and will double the value of food stamps at local farmer’s market, up to $20.00 per person. Details of the program were outlined in a recent Boston Globe article here.

This program is an excellent policy initiative from Mayor Menino and, despite some of the ridiculous negative comments on the Globe’s online article, has the potential to have very positive effects for Greater Boston residents. As I covered here and here, developing a regional food system is vitally important for our state and is common sense policy. This Bounty Bucks program rightly advances this goal and will allow residents who need it most to purchase more healthy, locally grown food while continuing to fortify farmer’s markets in the Boston community.

According to the Globe article, “... officials hope the program will flourish this season by allowing low-income residents to purchase -- when combined with food stamps -- up to $120,000 worth of locally grown fruits and vegetables.” This would be a great start for the Boston community and, with the quality of the produce offered at our farmers’ markets, it should not be a problem.

This latest initiative is another positive step forward towards a sustainable food system in Boston and we look forward to seeing the next policy initiatives that come from Beacon Hill.

To find a farmer’s market in your Boston community (including MA Turnpike Farmer’s Markets), click here.

Going Green is in Good Taste at Toro

2009-07-08T13:02:13-04:00

South End Restaurant Reduces Carbon Footprint Without Sacrificing Taste or Money

by David Pierotti, Boston-Based Freelance Writer

Alyssa Shepherd didn’t set out to be a trendsetter, but all of us should hope she becomes one. Sheperd is the general manager of highly regarded restaurant Toro in Boston’s South End. Toro is one of Chef Ken Oringer’s four area restaurants, the others being Clio (including its attached sushi bar, Uni), KO Prime, and La Verdad.

You may have seen Oringer’s victorious turn on Iron Chef America, but recently it has been Shepherd's turn to do battle - against waste, pollution, and CO2. She, along with the rest of the management team, has set about greening the restaurant as much as possible. “With the growing awareness of climate change, we just felt that, as a restaurant, we should do our part.”

Anyone who has ever worked at a restaurant (and really, who hasn’t?) knows restaurants consume a lot of just about everything: bottles, boxes, water, energy, and more. From all this consumption comes a tremendous amount of waste. But a growing awareness of climate change and the environmental costs of food production and consumption provoked Shepherd to implement some simple, sensible measures to green Toro.

While Shepherd and her staff started with traditional recycling of obvious materials such as cardboard and glass, one of the more innovative changes at Toro has been how they serve the most basic product – water. Most restaurants offer two types of bottled water: regular and sparkling. This means two sets of delivery trucks and two sets of glass bottles. You don’t need a calculator to figure out that the amount of energy used to produce and transport this is tremendous. When you consider it is all for a product that is already piped to its destination, it becomes even more ludicrous. This is the type of conventional wisdom and ingrained habits that Shepherd and associates needed to usurp, and Natura was there to help.

As a manufacturer and installer of water filtration and carbonation systems, Natura offers restaurants an alternative to their traditional water systems. Instead of delivering cases of bottled flat and sparkling water that take up space, Natura provides a premium filtration system that turns ordinary tap water into high quality drinking water - and even offers the option of adding carbonation.

Regarding the transition, Shepherd says, “It wasn’t difficult at all. The company came and installed the tank. There is very low maintenance and we’re not paying for these water trucks to drive miles and miles every week.” It also improved everyday restaurant operations. “They used to have to store the bottles behind the bar and the staff would have to separate them into two different racks and drag them downstairs and then back up when the delivery truck came.”

Another cutting edge step Toro took to reduce their carbon footprint is composting. The restaurant contracted with a Charlestown, MA company called Save That Stuff to collect their degradable waste much in the same way trash is collected. All Toro had to do was add a second trash bin and ask employees to separate their refuse. At the end of the night, they collect the refuse and put it out back. Save That Stuff then takes the organic matter to local composting facilities where it eventually is used by landscapers.

The third creative but simple change made at Toro was to team with Smartfuel, a company that collects used cooking oil from area restaurants and brings the used oil to its processing plant in Seabrook, NH. The oil is then turned into biofuel and sold for automobile usage. While another collection service might sound like an added expense for the restaurant, Smartfuel pays Toro, not the other way around. Depending on the price of crude oil, Toro receives somewhere between $0.50 and $1.00 per gallon for a substance they are glad to be rid of. Additionally, while much of America’s restaurant grease is traditionally sent overseas, Smartfuel keeps this product in the area, stimulating the local economy and turning a waste product into an alternative to fossil fuels. According to Smartfuel's website, this type of biofuel results in 67% less greenhouse gas emissions.

Shepherd says all of the changes have proven to be cost-neutral, employees have had very little trouble adjusting, and customers have not noticed a thing. Given these considerations, how can other restaurants possibly justify remaining in their old ways?

If, as a diner, you want to ensure your food dollars are going toward restaurants that make the right choices - the obvious choices, visit dinegreen.com to find a green restaurant near you.

Shock and Trance: Diagnosing a Culture of Indifference

2009-07-06T21:39:38-04:00

by Michael Brooks and Joshua Summers, associates at Sati Solutions (Boston, MA), a mindfulness-based consultancy providing strategic guidance to ecologically-minded organizations.

Recently, a flurry of new literature in the meditation world has investigated the link between contemplative practices and perhaps the most pressing issue of the day: global warming. In response to this dialogue, we see the opportunity for a powerful synergy between meditative skill sets and recognizable actions that will supplement and facilitate the aims of sustainability.

As a general overview, there seem to be three categories of responses to the climate crisis: 1) those who get it, are alarmed, and are working like hell to avert catastrophe, 2) those who get it, are alarmed, but who are too overwhelmed by the complications and busy-ness of their everyday lives to take it beyond curb-side recycling, and 3) those who don’t get it, aren’t alarmed and, therefore, scare the hell out of Types 1 and 2.

Of these three, the group that holds the most potential for environmental change is, obviously, Type 2. One of America’s most eminent meditation teachers, Joseph Goldstein, recently self-diagnosed himself as a Type 2 in Tricycle, the Buddhist Review: “Although I am aware of the magnitude of the problem, perhaps like many others, I have not spent much time reflecting on it or seriously considering what I could do about it. It was this response that then piqued my interest. Why hadn’t I spent time thinking about one of the major problems confronting our planet? Why had it slid to the back burner of my interests?”

President Obama had an answer. Before his inauguration, Obama was asked about last summer’s hike in oil prices. In responding to the question, Obama captured the analysis with a terse phrase: “We go from shock to trance.” In other words, oil prices hike, and the culture of consumption enters an emergency response of shock. The need for change and action seems pressing. People entertain hybrid cars, drive less, plan stay-cations, call for investments in new technologies, and the green movement subsequently swells with anticipation of the culture’s tipping point towards all things green.

But not so fast… Oil prices then drop, the cracks seal over and the trance of numbing indifference returns. In great simplicity, Obama identified a trend that encompasses our individual and collective psychology – a trend which stands smack in the way of genuine transformation.

We contend, albeit boldly, that meditation – a process of sitting down, getting still and relaxing into awareness – holds the very key for stepping off this endless wheel of shock and trance, nudging Type 2’s towards more pro-active participation. First and foremost, meditation trains and strengthens the faculty of awareness without which behavioral change is a non-starter. But on a more subtle level, meditation exposes and uproots the very causes of the shock and trance cycle itself, and it does so in two ways.

One, meditation – at its heart – is a discipline that subordinates immediate pleasure for a rugged, long-term happiness. It cultivates a strategic awareness, which over time values enduring sustainability instead of immediate gratification. Such an inner-reorientation between actions and their protracted results is necessary for establishing sustainable systems.

Furthermore, we believe the shock and trance pattern to ultimately be driven by the same forces of mind that meditation endeavors to overcome, namely: greed, aversion, and delusion. In the face of environmental shock, a common response is to express an unfocused indignation but then to lapse back into complacency, deluded by one’s seeming impotence. As Goldstein has written, “We have probably all had moments of what we might call a sudden awakening to the truth of global warming… Yet those moments can quickly pass, and the beginningless habit energies or forgetfulness, other desires, and basic ignorance resurface once again.” In other words, back to trance.

So it follows that, because meditation is also a practice of ‘waking up’ from our inner-trance, we are less inclined to be numbed into larger trends of trance and stay immediately current with the issue at hand. Ironically, without this inner training of mind - a training of engaged presence and open receptivity - more information, more vociferation is actually part of the trance itself because people do not have the skill sets to metabolize such information.

Far from being a warm-and-fuzzy solipsistic escape, meditation attenuates automatic default behavior patterns and enhances reflective modes of thinking that shift one’s center of gravity from constricted spheres of self-centered care to more inclusive domains of global care.

In our forthcoming installment, we will articulate specific applications for socially-engaged green wisdom.

Sati Solutions can be reached at (781) 710-5215 and js@joshsummers.net or info@satisolutions.com.

Alluring Green Offenders

2009-07-05T16:35:33-04:00

by Daniel E. Walsh Author of Our Sunday "History & Reflections" Series

“Oh thou weed, who art so lovely, fair."
~Othello to Desdemona

Wildflowers abound this time of the year. They provide a nice accent to the overall full blossom of summer. At once enticing and dangerous, these variegated agents of nature are at their essence survivors. We pretend that they are the intruders when it is mankind who pushed into their world. Unwittingly, we introduced this threat to our native world and in doing some created a vexing problem for those who must wrestle this green nemesis to create a more natural, native environment with green sensibilities.

Concrete and asphalt connective ribbons are laid across the land and highway engineers are mandated to create beauty at their side. In this effort we are thwarted by the uncomfortable presence of plants whose very nature makes our plans meaningless. We label them as the enemy. Many of the major offenders are from an unintended side affect of progress as diverse cultures shifted continents and brought their plants with them. Weeds are a serious threat to water quality, wildlife habitat, and native plants and increase the necessity of mowing and spraying. And yet, while it takes up a lot of time and energy to fight them—some sure are pretty.

That pretty purple stuff that highlights the highways leading away from the ocean? European import Purple Loosestrife is one of the most dreaded. The magenta tops tantalize the eyes, while the taproot burrows in for water as this fighter holds on to its turf with a ferocious tenacity. Its presence bedevils the planners who are trying to control water flow and erosion from the roadsides. The plant also tends to choke out rivals and takes over wide swaths of land—thus the flowing purple.

A 1987 modification to the national commitment to beautify the American road system (the Highway Beautification Act of 1965) initiated by First Lady Lady Bird Johnson mandated that natural elements to enhance a holistic approach be included in those efforts. States hungry for federal dollars struggle to find ways to comply. Along the way they’ve encountered some persistent green-stemmed pests. Noxious weeds. Forbs. They make lists like the Most Wanted lists at the post office. Thistles, especially Canada Thistle—another European interloper, Giant Hogweed, and an old friend—Cannabis Sativa, are some of the names on this list. Imagine the arrogance and the folly of this seemingly destined-to-be-lost battle against an enemy who has outlasted every sort of foe for all of time.

There is a lot at stake for us as this war rages. Noxious weeds affect water quality, by increasing water flow into lakes and rivers. The plants favored by highway departments have fibrous roots that retain water where it falls. Wildlife is adversely affected as well; our forest friends don’t like to nosh on nasty things like thistle either. The resulting increase in mowing and spraying leads to many more greenhouse gas emissions to areas already choked with them. Their hardier foreign attackers easily crowd out native wildflowers. Increasing the native natural plants is the reason for the mandate in the first place.

For a view of how ugly these takeovers can be, witness the dark green predominance of the Kudzu in the southern US. This grim choke artist vine hails from China and Japan and is winding it way through the South and threatens to go further. The Kudzu’s act – it grows at such volume that host trees are simply taken over by the vine’s sheer weight and the aftermath is a landscape of ogre-like green hulks.

The wildflower can possess ineffable beauty. For the seeker the thrill is the sight of a carpet of elusive delicate trillium under a dark woodland canopy or the surprise appearance of the seductive morning glory. Prized for their beauty the delicate flowers have their legions of admirers and defenders. Just as Othello’s jealousy and doubt of Desdemona overtakes his reason, some of these plants have despoiled attempts to beautify our landscape and make it work for the overall environment. The alluring green offenders have to be rooted out with a frank and realistic approach. For some, that would be to not quit trying—though the problem seems insurmountable. For others, some of these beautiful plants are just plain no good.<

Getting Ready for the United Nations Conference on Climate Change

2009-06-30T11:29:28-04:00

by Terry Catchpole, Founder and CEO of The Catchpole Corporation
The Catchpole Corporation consults with firms on their executive visibility initiatives in regard to corporate citizenship.

The United Nations Conference on Climate Change this December in Copenhagen is likely to bring to light the good, the bad, and the ugly for US companies, including those in the Boston area.

The “good” will be for companies whose climate-impact and other sustainability practices measure up well on the Dow Jones Sustainability Index and other measurements. The “bad“ will be for companies that fall a bit short on these indices, but not demonstrably so. The “ugly” will be those who not only fall short, but whose executives publicly question the received wisdom regarding climate change, global warming, and other shibboleths, and otherwise run afoul of the more vocal factions of environmental activism.

Make no mistake: The UN Conference will afford a veritable global stage for environmental activists of all stripes and businesses worldwide will be in the crosshairs. If the conference attendees fulfill their stated mission, the outcome will be a sweeping global treaty establishing ambitious goals regarding carbon emissions and greenhouse gas production. The pressure will then fall on the world’s developed nations to endorse the treaty.

We have seen much of this before, of course, when what is formally known as the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) passed the Kyoto Protocols in 1997, setting out a specific timeline for signatory countries to achieve ambitious goals regarding global warming. The United States and China, among others, refused to endorse the Protocols, claiming that the penalties proposed fell unfairly on developed nations that, by definition, produced a disproportionate amount of greenhouse gases.

But that was then. Since 1997, citizens of the US and other developed countries have developed a keen appreciation of risks to the climate and other Inconvenient Truths, and sentiment favoring support of an aggressive new global treaty is expected to be considerable. Add to that the fact that President Obama, in his overriding policy ambition to be the non-Bush, is pushing Congress to pass dramatic new carbon emissions standards, while his Administration is lobbying the Chinese government to join the US in supporting new carbon policies. If these efforts are successful, it would follow that the Obama Administration would likely support a new treaty written by the UN conference delegates and ultimately affecting the sustainability practices of virtually every mid-sized to enterprise scale business in the world.

Environmental activists, however, are not expected to sit around and hope for the best. Among their tactics is expected to be pressure put on US businesses to urge their congressional representatives to support the President’s climate control legislation; and for businesses to pressure their peers and colleagues to do likewise. Whatever the specific tactics, the pressure will be intense, sometimes good, sometimes bad, and sometimes downright ugly.