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Dare to dream

Is Pombo in trouble?

Roosters, meat, and biodiversity

I ran across this article looking for information on avian flu. South Carolina is the capital of the poultry industry, but even there, nobody wants to live next to a commercial chicken house. Thomas Brickle, who owns three egg houses in the area, made one comment I found particularly inspiring:

"We have flies," he said. "We had flies before we had chicken houses, and we probably had flies before we had chickens."

OK, so, what has no fur, struts around on two legs, thinks he is good looking (but isn't), and likes the sound of his own voice?

This little light of Pete’s

In Congressional Quarterly, via reader SCB:

Light it up, and don't fret about the electric bill. When House Speaker J. Dennis Hastert, R-Ill., flips the switch tomorrow to light the Capitol Christmas tree, "significantly less energy will be used thanks to the first-time addition of Light Emitting Diode (LED) holiday lights." So says Senate Energy Chairman Pete V. Domenici, R-N.M., whose home state not only produced this year's giant tree but also is home to Sandia National Laboratories in Albuquerque, a leading center of research and development for LED lighting. Domenici said the bulbs use about 90 percent less electricity than traditional holiday lights and last 20,000 hours (the equivalent of more than 100 holiday seasons). Guess someone had better take them off carefully after New Year's and stuff them away for next year.

Thanks, Pete! That energy bill? Forgiven!

In other CQ news, the cover story this week is called "Getting a Grip on Carbon." Sadly, I can't read it, since I'm not a subscriber.

Charity gift certificates

All you folks worried about rampant materialism this holiday season should check out charity gift certificates. It's just what it sounds like: You buy a GC and the recipient goes to the website to choose what charity they'd like to donate to.

Here's the environment section.

Another one falls for AP6

A surprisingly non-wacky column on Tech Central Station about the developments in Montreal, by Ronald Bailey (via H&R).

It's non-wacky, but I also think it makes a mistake -- a mistake made all too often over the last five years -- namely: Believing in the Bush administration's good intentions when they say something that flatters your ideological preconceptions. (See: liberal war hawk.)

Specifically, Bailey notes that several participants in the Montreal meetings are pushing the notion that economic development and environmental protection can go hand in hand. For instance:

Holey Moly

Antarctic ozone hole may persist 20 years longer than expected Remember that hole in the ozone over Antarctica? The one we fixed? Big environmental success story? Turns out it may take roughly two decades longer than expected for it to fully heal — until around 2065, instead of 2040 to 2050 — because sizable amounts […]

Fry Me a River

China’s benzene spill flows toward Siberian tiger territory in Russia China’s latest claim to international infamy — a Songhua River-borne, 100-ton, 90-odd-mile-long benzene spill — is expected to reach the Russian city of Khabarovsk, on the Amur River, next week. Conservationists in the region worry that the toxic slick will further imperil the extremely endangered […]

Cheers and jeers for the GM seed giant.

Two takes on Monsanto crossed my path yesterday. One came from the stock market, the other from Fedco, the small vegetable-seed purveyor that supplies many small, sustainable-minded farms across the land, including my own Maverick Farms.

The market applauded Monsanto Tuesday, driving its share price to an all-time high; Fedco, in its 2006 seed catalogue that arrived at Maverick the same day, gave it the finger.

Canadian city elects progressive red-green city government

The recent local elections in Montréal might spark some ideas for attendees of the COP11 summit: a pro-urban, "red-green" political party has surfaced in City Hall.

The new Projet Montréal party secured a city council seat in the dense, diverse Plateau neighborhood, winning 12% of all votes cast citywide in a three-way election against two established parties. Its platform brings the spirit of the red-green (social-democrat and environmentalist) urban coalition -- the governing majority in major European cities like London, Paris, and Berlin -- to North America.

Unlike most stateside Green political parties, which take a skeptical stance towards urban growth, Projet Montréal embraces population and housing growth as a way to curb car use and suburban sprawl. Its leader, Richard Bergeron, is a transit-agency technocrat whose political heroes (link in French) include mayors Ken Livingstone in London and Bertrand Delanoë in Paris. In London, a wildly successful downtown toll has cut traffic by nearly 20% even while a crop of new, environmentally friendly high-rise office towers rises. In Paris, city officials heckle SUV drivers, close roads to cars for weekly "Paris Breathes" days, and will soon convert a riverfront highway into a beach. The "red" in the coalition comes from a strong appeal to working-class voters with new public-works projects and affordable housing.

Obama ’08?

As a confirmed Obamaphile, I feel obliged to note that speculation is afoot.