What is Bill’s Climate Lab?

Bill Nye’s Climate Lab is the brainchild of Chabot Space & Science Center, nested in the Oakland hills of California. It’s an interactive, educational initiative that brings us down to Earth to explore the impact that our changing climate is having on the planet. We launched the web site BillsClimateLab.org in March, which stands alone as an interactive educational game about climate change solutions.  But BillsClimateLab.org also serves as a companion web site to the physical exhibition, Bill Nye’s Climate Lab (opening November 20, 2010) that our team is extremely busy working on.

If you’re a Gen-Yer like me, you probably remember Bill Nye as “the Science Guy” who taught you everything you know about science. For the purposes of this initiative, we’re thrilled to be collaborating with Bill Nye as “the Climate Guy.”

In the physical exhibition, visitors journey from space to Earth on an urgent mission to thwart climate change by discovering exciting clean energy opportunities and solutions. With Bill Nye as commander of the Clean Energy Space Station, visitors will explore the science of climate change, meet scientists, consider new ideas and express their opinions. New scouts, excited to continue working toward sustainable energy use on Earth, are invited to extend their experience, through online games and activities atwww.BillsClimateLab.org.

The aim of the project is to both educate the public about the science behind climate change and inspire kids and families to reduce energy consumption and discover solutions to our warming planet. Of course the Web site has the ability to reach young people across counties and borders. But the online experience is certainly enriched by visiting the physical exhibition and vice versa.

What is your job with the Climate Lab?

I am the Associate Producer of Web and Digital Media for Bill Nye’s Climate Lab. I divide my time between working closely to make sure the digital and interactive media in the physical and online exhibitions align. I also work on social media campaigns to help spread the word about Bill’s Climate Lab to as many youth and educators as possible.

Have you met Bill Nye? Was he wearing a bowtie?

I have met Bill! (I had the honor of pinning Bill’s blue lab coat for the perfect fit in some photo opps.) At the end of June Bill flew up specifically to shoot some video footage for the exhibition. He wasn’t wearing his signature red bow tie when we met, but he does have quite an impressive collection of red bow ties that he brought to the studio with him. The video shoot went really well, and, as Bill likes to say, included some hilarious moments of science comedy. He did an Oscar-worthy performance in a battle with paper airplanes and he was very funny in a remote control helicopter chase. Bill is a pro and amazing at adlibbing. He really made our jobs easy, fun and memorable.

What’s coming up for Bill’s Climate Lab that we should check out?

Our benefit, Global Cool is coming up on November 13. Bill Nye is the honored guest for the evening, which will include the exhibition unveiling, entertainment, views of the cosmos, and more. We’ll also be auctioning off great prizes — one of the items up for grabs is Bill’s bicycle as featured in the exhibition. At 9pm Global Cool(er) is the after party for all the do-gooders.

The physical exhibition is opening in less than 3 months! So if you happen to be in the Bay Area on or after November 20th you should definitely come up to Chabot Space & Science Center and see the exhibition in its physical form. Without giving too much away, there is a life-size submersible replica, hot air balloon, and a simulated bicycle ride with Bill Nye, himself.

Also, we are hosting a campaign that invites individuals and groups to respond to questions related to climate change, for a chance to be featured in the Bill Nye’s Climate Lab exhibition. More details will follow on our social media pages. And of course, to get the timeliest news related to Bill Nye’s Climate Lab, you can follow us onFacebook.com/billsclimatelab and Twitter @billsclimatelab.

What is something you do in your own life to fight climate change?

I simplify. There’s so little we need in this world to be happy and functional. And climate change, we are learning, seems to be the result of excess. So I do what I can. I bike as much as possible. I shop locally. I carry reusable bags with me. I turn out the lights when I’m not in a room. I take that extra moment to think about which bin to throw my trash into. Here’s a good one: In the past few years I’ve also started taking freezing cold showers which must shorten my time in the shower by 90%, saving energy and water! I guess when it comes down to it there is no single silver bullet or panacea to the problem of climate change. And while I’m not suggesting everyone give up their leisurely morning shower, I do think that there are small things we can each do that, when tallied collectively, add up to a whole lot when it comes to preserving our planet.

Thanks Kathryn! I think I’m going to go watch some Bill Nye The Science Guy now.

To learn more about Bill Nye’s Climate Lab, check out this post from fellow Inconvenient Youth member, and fantastic blogger, Shilpi Misra. You can also learn more about Inconvenient Youth.

- Grant

HumanCar is the life’s work of engineer Charles Samuel, who has been working to perfect the human-powered vehicle since the late 1960s.  Now, it looks like his car is actually being prepared to start production.  The “human-electric” hybrid vehicle has electric plug-in capabilities, so it can still run if only one person is operating the hand-crank in a rowing-like motion.

When four people are all rowing, it can run on human power alone.  The adaptable chassis can work with different kinds of batteries and technology in the future without requiring an entirely new vehicle.

A few front-to-back pulls on the two-hand crank gets the car moving, and the company says online that a senior citizen in decent shape could handle it.  The dressed-down open vehicle is intended for warmer climes, but apparently there is an all-weather shell available.  Future models are slated to include airbags, but no power windows are necessary here.

The car is expected to cost $15,500 when it goes on sale next year, according to the HumanCar site. With 100 pre-orders, production will begin when they reach 800.

Most notable, in light of the “range anxiety” that exists with all-electric vehicles, future cars with backup human power mechanisms could generate significant consumer interest – similar to hand-crank emergency radios.  Kind of Flintstone-esque, but like I said at the beginning, what goes around comes around.

Besides, getting where you’re going, having a light workout while driving and encouraging teamwork and carpooling are all good things – maybe even an answer to both the energy and health challenges that plague our modern era.

A few weeks ago, when Julia Gillard called an election, it couldn’t have come at a better or worse time for the Australian Youth Climate Coalition. I worked as the Interim Online Director for the AYCC from March-May and during that time we were plagued by uncertainty. When should we hold regional powershifts? What was our election campaign? How could we plan something creative and hard-hitting without being way too early or late? Well, you act on what you know, fake the rest, and charge full steam ahead.

As it turns out, the election was called the weekend after the last Powershift conference. Perfect. It also meant that the organization was at 110% capacity to put on three conferences, and then had to implement a many-part election campaign on top of that. Not so perfect.

What did they do? What any good organization should: they set their sights even higher, raised more money, brought on more staff and volunteers, and set about making it happen. The AYCC has rolled out a full-blown election campaign with stunts, calls to politicians and a TV ad encouraging people to vote. I know a lot of them haven’t slept in weeks, but it’s amazing:

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ePn1K1WrrJk]

How did this all come about? It started with picking the dates for three regional Powershift conferences to energize youth in key areas of the country and train them up to run amazing election efforts. The three medium-sized cities had some AYCC volunteers, but having Powershifts there put them into high gear. Here’s a recap from Adeliade leader Joel Dignam:

July 30th was the last day of my life before Power Shift 2010 Adelaide.

In bed that night, I thought back to June 2nd – barely 8 weeks earlier, when Adelaide had hosted a ‘Power Shift Strategy Session’. Attended by almost 20 eager volunteers, the session began a recruitment journey during which every member of the group would challenge themselves, connect with others, and spread a simple message: that Power Shift will give us the tools to build a generation-wide movement to solve the climate crisis.

Powershift Adelaide (seen here) finished last weekend. Powershift Canberra is concluding as I write this, and Powershift Geelong will start next weekend. And the next weekend is the election.

In a flurry of activity after the election was called, media stunts were organized, a TV ad was produced (above) and the Power Vote campaign was assembled. It consists of a scorecard ranking the three major parties on how they stand on climate change solutions, and an automated call service. People who join the campaign tell the system their name and zip code, and it then automatically dials their politicians office to inform the politician that “Ellen Sandell” of Melbourne is voting for climate champions. After all, enough politicians authorize robo-calls to voters, it seems appropriate that they get inundated with an equal number of reminders of what voters are thinking about.

The score card, the ads, the massive number of phone calls, the energized Powershift volunteers and the savvyness of the organization have been turning heads. Climate change is a top issue for Australian voters, and the combination of a viable third-party option, a country already feeling the effects of changing climates and the best renewable energy potential of any continent mean things are ripe for a change. Unfortunately, the two major political parties response has been to circle the wagons and reach an even more absurd consensus of inaction. On August 21st, the day of the election, we’ll see if the AYCC and their allies can shift that dynamic. If their luck holds and they keep taking the opportunities they have, I think we’ll see a youth climate movement emerge as a significant political force.

Another recent development gives the Australian youth a big leg up. Voting is mandatory in Australia – it’s a crime not to vote in a federal election. Unfortunately, voters need to have their registration updated to their current address in order to vote. This means that over 1/3rd of young people are not enrolled to vote and suffer no consequences from ‘breaking the law’ and not voting.

The previous conservative government created a policy that the last chance to update voting enrollment was 5 weeks before the election – the end of the day that the election was ‘called’. Just last week, GetUp.org.au, another progressive campaigning organization in Australia, won a major court battle challenging the legality of the enrollment policy. This means that 100,000 young voters can now vote who were previously prevented from doing so. Score!

Will it be enough to break the deadlock? Perhaps, but there’s nothing like a good media narrative to really turn up the heat on a tight issue, and creative stunts, at their best, are the perfect tool to do that. That’s why I was thrilled to see the ‘elephant in the room’ quite literally, burst into the room last week to demand why the two major parties weren’t talking about climate change solutions. The media loved it. Keep up the great work AYCC, folks in the US are watching and hopefully taking notes.

Climate change protester Ahri Tallon waits for Federal Opposition Leader Tony Abbott to arrive at a hotel in Sydney on August 5, 2010. (Tracey Nearmy)

Another year of record breaking heat.  We wonder do these temps cause our leaders to think more about the negative impact of Climate Change, or just, move inside and turn up the AC?

BTW – here is a funny, not so funny thought.  In the winter we throw logs on the fire to get warm….well – in the summer believe it or not we throw coal on the fire to get cool!  Yes we are pretty clever creatures.   But, in the end we may not be clever enough to solve our global climate challenge if we ignore it forever, and keep fueling the fire to avoid the hear.

Cooking with fresh produce is good for the planet. And you.

In this economy we’re all looking for ways to save money. Here’s an idea that will save you some cash and help the planet in the process: plan a weekly menu.

Planning your meals ahead of time can be green in a couple of ways. First, if you know what you need before you hit the grocery store, you only have to make one trip.

Obviously, it’s best to get your herbs and seasonal produce from a farmers’ market if you can, so you may have to make two stops, but that’s so much better than four or five unplanned trips throughout the week.

Second, sticking to your list will make you a more strategic shopper, and you’ll be less likely to buy a host of mismatched items that could potentially go to waste. You’ll also save some serious cash this way. So many of us pop into the store when we’re hungry and we’re tempted by ready-made snack foods. Prepackaged or frozen foods are costly. They also contain unnatural additives and involve a lot of plastic and cellophane packaging.

When you plan a menu, you can also cut costs and waste by selecting recipes with overlapping ingredients. For example, in a given week you could make a pasta puttanesca, chicken piccata and a Caesar salad. (We’ll save the vegetarian debate for another time, but do buy organic, free-range if you’re the carnivorous type.)

The anchovy paste leftover from the puttanesca can be used for a Caesar dressing, while the jar of capers can be used for the chicken piccata as well as the puttanesca. The piccata will require lemon juice, as does the Caesar dressing. You will not need the entire can of chicken broth for the piccata, so consider using the rest as a soup stock.

Start with one recipe, and then use its ingredients to inspire other dishes. If you’re not the kind of cook who makes Caesar dressing from scratch, there are ways you can make simpler meals and still employ the same principles. For example, if you buy cheddar and celery to make your own tuna melts, you could use the leftover cheddar and celery on a chef salad later in the week.

Quiches can also be a great way to use leftover cheese and vegetables, and they will last a few days in the fridge. They don’t freeze well, however, so they’re best eaten quickly.

Another great way to use up bits of cheese is with homemade macaroni. No one will complain about a six-cheese mac made from of slivers of Swiss, cheddar, mozzarella, fontina, Gouda, and parm….

You can also reduce waste by making your own breadcrumbs instead of buying the packaged kind. If you have leftover sourdough or baguette, put it in the food processor and grind it into bits. The crumbs freeze well and can be used as topping on your macaroni as well as a base for a pastry-less quiche.

If this all seems completely foreign to you, put a few ingredients into a search engine and see what recipes come up. This is a great way to find inspiration. The more you cook, the more overlapping ingredient patterns you’ll detect.

If you don’t have a lot of time to cook during the week, consider cooking your weekly meals on Sunday. Make foods that freeze well and defrost them throughout the week. Stews, chicken noodle soup and chili all freeze well, and so do many red sauces and meatballs.

Bon Appetit!

So – these are big numbers – but I wondered how big are theyreally?

Well – lets pick four oil firms – BP, Exxon Mobil, Royal Dutch Shell, and Chevron – how do they look as a group?

The four together have revenue of over $1 Trillion US dollars per year!  No kidding – over $1 Trillion dollars.  That is a lot of income!  In fact as a group that is more annual income then all but 11 countries in the world – and is about a tie for 12th spot with Russia.

Is money power?  Yes, and it is really no surprise that as an industry oil can have its way with global political leaders.  Just think – short of using bullets – the financial power of these four firms is concentrated into four men – CEO’s, who answer to boards – so maybe 40, or 50 people all together – that is amazing.

I do remain (generally) committed to my free-market roots, but also think it is important for citizens to consider the incentives, wealth, and persuasive power of these firms.

by Sarah Laskow, Media Consortium blogger

Yesterday, Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-NV) introduced a limited energy bill that responds to the oil spill and promotes energy efficiency. Reid’s action is a signal that the Senate will not pass climate legislation before November, although Sen. John Kerry (D-MA) said that a climate bill could come up in the lame-duck session following the election.

“The Senate’s climate bill is officially dead,” Kate Sheppard writes at Mother Jones. “And given that Democrats will almost certainly hold fewer seats in Congress next year, major action on the climate is unlikely to be revived anytime soon.”

Since 2009, expectations for a bill regulating carbon emissions have steadily declined. After this latest failure in the Senate, the best near-term hope for addressing climate change comes from the Environmental Protection Agency, which still has the power to regulate carbon emissions.

At the Washington Independent, Andrew Restuccia reports that Sen. Reid’s bill will likely hold oil companies more financially accountable for spills by lifting the cap on their liability for economic damages and will nudge homeowners towards energy efficiency.

But, Restuccia writes, a sources tells him that “significantly…the bill might not include a renewable energy standard.” Such a standard would require an increasing percentage of the country’s electricity to come from sources like wind and solar.

The energy bill could create jobs

Sen. Reid has often emphasized that an energy bill is also a jobs bill: Innovation in the clean energy sector creates employment opportunities at a time when they’re sorely needed. Dropping the renewable energy standard could also mean diminishing the potential for job creation.

Public News Service reports that in rural areas, a standard could create thousands of jobs.

“The Department of Energy says, if we get to 20 percent of the nation’s electricity from wind by the year 2030”—one of the less ambitious standards proposed—“it would mean 3,000 to 4,000 new jobs in most of our states,” Chuck Hassebrook, executive director of the Center for Rural Affairs, said. “There’s not a lot of things out there bringing that kind of new economic opportunity to rural America, so it could be a great thing for us.”

The Gulf Coast connection

The need for job opportunities extends beyond rural areas. In the Gulf Coast, for instance, even fishermen left idle by the oil spill are hoping the oil industry resumes drilling soon. Their communities need those jobs. As Jerome Ringo, who worked for two decades in the oil industry, writes at The Progressive, “With unemployment still in the double digits across the nation, and the people on the Gulf Coast struggling to survive, we need far more clean energy job growth than what we’re seeing right now.”

That’s not going to happen without a long-term commitment to clean energy from the government, Ringo argues. “Businesses need this signal to know how to invest, and, with this signal, they will move in a direction that creates many more jobs in areas like renewable energy and electric cars for people like me who once worked in oil and gas.”

Climate refugees

That transition won’t happen overnight, but it’s important to start in that direction as soon as possible. In the United States, the effects of climate change are affecting people—farmers dealing with strange weather, for instance—but the impact is not obvious in the every day lives of Americans.

Not everyone has that luxury, though. LinkTV’s Earth Focus reports on the plight of climate refuges in New Guinea. In a new film, Jennifer Redfearn documents the story of the country’s Carteret Islanders—the first group to organize a community-wide evacuation of their home in the face of climate change. As the sea level rises around their island, storm surges increase and fresh water becomes salty. Carteret Islanders are looking to move to Bougainville, a neighboring island recovering from civil war.

“I’ve heard about you Carterets. You are an easy-going people,” one leader tells them. “Here it is totally different.”

The longer Americans wait to start scaling back our energy use, the more people around the globe will be displaced.

Hydrofracking

When moving towards clean energy, however, it is important that leaders in Washington and on the state level watch emerging energy companies closely. For instance, The New York Times reports that Reid’s bill will promote natural gas production. But as natural gas grows more popular as a bridge fuel, communities and legislators are discovering more dangerous environmental impacts from the hydrofracture drilling process that companies use to extract the gas from shale deposits.

Josh Fox’s recent documentary, Gasland, showed that residents across the country in fracking areas have had their drinking water contaminated. The natural gas industry is pushing back hard against the claims his film makes. Truthout reports that “Energy In Depth (EID), an information service created and funded by the oil and gas industry, recently posted ‘Debunking Gasland,’ a point-by-point argument against the Fox’s startling discoveries. EID paints Fox as a ‘purveyor of the avant-garde’ who is guilty of ‘flat-out making stuff up.’”

Fox isn’t the only one to voice concerns about water quality, either. GritTV recently heard from residents in the Delaware River Basin about their concerns. “No water for gas” is their rallying cry.

Water, water, everywhere

Fox is fighting back, but the response to his film shows that the industry is ready to push back against any criticisms of its practices. It has also resisted effects by regulators to require disclose of the chemicals it uses in its extraction process.

But as the Washington Independent’s Restuccia reports, “Momentum is building in the House to pass new regulations on the controversial practice of hydraulic fracturing, in which water, sand and a mixture of potentially harmful chemicals are injected into the ground in order to gain access to natural gas.”

Unfortunately, if the fate of the climate bill is any indication, any environmental legislation, even with momentum, has little chance of moving through Congress right now.

This post features links to the best independent, progressive reporting about the environment by members of The Media Consortium. It is free to reprint. Visit the Mulch for a complete list of articles on environmental issues, or follow us on Twitter. And for the best progressive reporting on critical economy, health care and immigration issues, check out The Audit, The Pulse, and The Diaspora. This is a project of The Media Consortium, a network of leading independent media outlets.

In the midst of the biggest oil spill in our nations history, and the warmest summer on record – our leaders in Washington have finally caved in and “shelved” (killed) Cap and Trade.

Big Oil and King Coal must be thrilled!  The one serious device we could use as a nation to curb carbon emissions has finally been put to sleep.

The Democratic leadership on the Hill, and the President have totally failed the environmental community.  The priorities of this Administration did not include energy, carbon, cap and trade.  What was celebrated a year and a half ago as a true changing of the guards has become a fiasco.

Very disappointing.

The following is further background information on Jessica:

Jessica Morey is the Board Chairwoman and co-founder of Climate Lab, a non-profit dedicated to building web-based tools for knowledge sharing and collaboration that drive action to address climate change. Climate Lab launched a public climate change wiki in 2009.

For her day job, Jessica is the Washington, DC Project Director with the Clean Energy Group (CEG), a nonprofit organization that works with state, federal, and international organizations to promote clean energy technologies.  Ms. Morey works primarily on CEG’s International Climate Change Technology Innovation Initiative as well as assisting CEG’s Clean Energy States Alliance (CESA), a multi-state coalition of public clean energy funds working together to support clean energy technologies and markets. Jessica manages the State-Federal Partnership building project and directs CESA’s DOE Marine Energy Acceleration project. In addition, Ms. Morey acts as CEG’s liaison to the Sustainable Energy Finance Initiative (SEFI) of the United Nations Environment Program (UNEP).  She manages research on public clean energy finance mechanisms for the UNEP-SEFI Public Finance Alliance, an international consortium of publicly backed funding agencies dedicated to building sustainable energy markets.

Before joining CEG, Jessica worked as a clean energy analyst in the World Bank’s central energy unit. Her projects included mainstreaming low carbon analysis into Bank energy projects and improving coordination and knowledge sharing across the Bank’s energy practice and international development partners. She has also consulted with the Natural Resources Defense Council on the Carbon Neutral Costa Rica campaign and worked as the International Fellow at the Pew Center for Global Climate Change.  She received her Bachelors in Environmental Engineering from Dartmouth College, a Masters in International Affairs from American University and a Masters in Sustainable Development from the UN University for Peace in Costa Rica. Jessica’s other interests include practicing and teaching yoga and insight meditation- particularly with teenagers.

Congratulations again to Jessica and keep up the great work!

Please take the time to look……Cap and Trade – US EPA.