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Spearheading transit for livable cities at 93

I recently ended 100 days without Grist. And wouldn't you know, the title of the first post I saw, "No climate for old men," spoke directly to the reason I was away.

No, I wasn't with the McCain campaign. Rather, I was immersed in a project, spearheaded by a really old man, that could become a terrific tool for beating back the climate crisis.

That man is 93-year-old Ted Kheel, legendary New York labor-lawyer-turned-environmentalist. His project is a study of the feasibility of financing free mass transit in New York City through congestion pricing and other charges on driving. I directed the study (PDF), which has just been released, and I think its implications could be huge, not just for New York but for every city in the U.S. and around the world.

Bush will sign economic stimulus bill sans green incentives

President Bush will sign an economic stimulus bill Wednesday, meaning you may have a check winging your way after tax time. Not included in the bill: funding for clean-energy credits and green jobs, which were dropped from the Senate version after narrowly failing to get enough votes. Undeterred, Democrats in the House of Representatives may […]

A little of this, a little of that

This week I am, officially anyway, on vacation, spending a week in a condo at the bottom of Mt. Hood, snowboarding by day, soaking in the hot tub by night. Yes: sweet. I will nonetheless be posting occasionally, because, well, I just don’t know how to quit you. Before I go I want to clear […]

World inches toward becoming paper-free

Worldwide paper consumption has plateaued worldwide after rising steadily for the past two decades, and the world’s richest countries saw a 6 percent decline in paper use between 2000 and 2005. Some folks forecast that a paper-free world is nigh, and trends back up that prediction: in more and more homes, you’re more likely to […]

We’ve borrowed more than we can afford to borrow, sprawled more than we can afford to sprawl

There are a lot of moving parts involved in the current, sputtering condition of the economy, which can’t yet be declared a recession but may well become one. I’ll summarize as best I can. Very cheap credit led to a housing upturn, which became a boom, which became, in many parts of the country, a […]

U.N. General Assembly holds climate gathering in New York

The United Nations General Assembly convened a two-day climate conference, starting today, at U.N. headquarters in New York City that it hopes will keep up and/or spur momentum in the lead up to a meaningful post-Kyoto climate agreement by 2009. The event is being billed as a “thematic debate” and has attracted celebrities including New […]

Brown pelicans to be removed from endangered species list

The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service announced it will remove brown pelicans from the endangered species list within a year. Brown pelicans have been listed as endangered since 1970, even before the Endangered Species Act was born, due to the effects of the ultra-toxic pesticide DDT that thinned their eggshells, causing rapid population decline. But […]

Obama takes Maine in a wicked pissah

Looks like Obama has won Maine in something of a blowout. This was a state that was widely expected to go to Clinton, and in which she had a commanding lead in the polls through late last year. At this point she’s got to be wishing everyone could just go to sleep until the Texas […]

DOE erases ‘most successful’ weatherization program from website

Late last week, Rep. Ed Markey (D-Mass.) raked Energy Secretary Bodman over the coals -- the best possible use for that fossil fuel! Within days of uncompassionately zeroing out the low-income weatherization program at a time of record energy prices, Bodman's DOE altered the DOE website.

Until a few days ago, the website of the Office of Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy (EERE) Weatherization Program describe the effort as "this country's longest running, and perhaps most successful energy efficiency program" (click on "cached text" -- thank you, Google). Having run EERE, I can certainly attest to the accuracy of that description. Once Bush/Bodman whacked the program, that phrase was whacked too (click here), like something out of the Ministry of Truth -- Minitrue -- in the book 1984.

You can see how Samuel "deer in the headlights" Bodman responded to Markey in this video clip.

Just for the record, as the website notes, over 30 years, the DOE weatherized the homes of "more than 5.5 million low-income families," reducing:

... heating bills by 31% and overall energy bills by $358 per year at current prices. This spending, in turn, spurs low-income communities toward job growth and economic development.

So what does the administration do? Zero the program out during an economic slowdown that itself has been driven in part by record energy prices. You just cannot make stuff up!

Below is Markey's press release and a picture of the website before and after:

National Geographic’s ‘Six Degrees Could Change The World’

I haven't read the book -- who has time? Oh, but TV or a YouTube video -- well, that's another matter:

This Sunday, February 10th at 8pm EST on the National Geographic Channel, "Six Degrees Could Change The World," which offers a hypothetical look at how the world might change, degree by degree, if we don't curtail our emissions: