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A virtual walking tour of the South Bronx

New York's South Bronx was once a getaway for the rich; now the defining landmarks of the community are power plants, landfills, and parking lots. Where some might see hopelessness, though, resident Omar Freilla sees opportunity. Freilla founded Green Worker Cooperatives to salvage reusable materials from trash and demolition waste, creating a neighborhood that is healthier both environmentally and economically. In a virtual walking tour of his community, Freilla discusses his vision of creating hundreds of jobs out of the abundance of "things that nobody else wants."

Alan Hipólito, creator of green jobs for low-income folks, InterActivates

Alan Hipólito is putting low-income residents of Portland, Ore., to work restoring ecosystems with native plants. He is director of Verde, a new nonprofit that trains residents of affordable housing for new eco-friendly jobs and careers. As this week's InterActivist, Hipólito chats about his aversion to authority, his plan for livening up your city council meetings, and his desire to see everyone benefit economically from environmental protection. Send him a question of your own by noon PST on Wednesday; we'll publish his answers to selected questions on Friday.

Montana Governor wants to turn coal into a liquid diesel fuel

Anyone channel surfing last night that happened upon 60 Minutes might have recognized a familiar face: Montana Governor Brian Schweitzer. Last month, Grist published a story about Schweitzer, who is now promoting his latest big idea: turning Montana coal into a liquid diesel fuel.

It's not enough to completely break our addiction to foreign oil, but a start. Most coal today is used for electricity but the governor's plan is to turn Montana's billions of tons of untapped coal into a liquid diesel fuel for our cars.

Schweitzer wants to take coal that's been pressurized into a gas, and then use something called the Fischer-Tropsch process to convert that gas into a clean diesel fuel, similar to what is made at a demonstration plant in Oklahoma.

The governor handed Stahl a jar of this synthetic fuel, which looked and smelled clean. "Chanel No. 37," Schweitzer said, laughing. "It is diesel. You can pour that in your diesel car or truck right now."

Lesley Stahl also interviewed Dr. Robert Williams, a senior energy scientist at Princeton, who informed viewers that this fuel would be cleaner than conventional diesel since pollutants aren't being emitted into the atmosphere, but a lot of carbon dioxide would be released -- "twice as much carbon dioxide than traditional petroleum."

So what is Schweitzer's plan for dealing with the CO2?

"This spent carbon dioxide, we have a home for it. Right back into the earth, 5,000 feet deep," the governor explains.

He plans to sell that carbon dioxide to oil companies that use it to boost the amount of oil they can pump. "It's called enhanced oil recovery. It's worth money to the oil business," Schweitzer said.

Read more about the segment and watch a clip at CBSNews.com.

Alan Hipólito, creator of green jobs for low-income people, answers questions

What work do you do? I run a very small, very new nonprofit organization called Verde. What does your organization do? What, in a perfect world, would constitute “mission accomplished”? Verde offers a helping hand in the form of green jobs for low-income folks. Photo: iStockphoto. The mission of Verde is to increase the economic […]

There Once Was a Man From … Alaska?

Nantucket Sound wind farm could be doomed by Don Young amendment There’s plenty of local opposition to the controversial Cape Wind project in Nantucket Sound, but the final blow (ha!) may come from an Alaskan. After the House and Senate passed versions of a Coast Guard budget bill, Rep. Don Young (R-Alaska) introduced an amendment […]

Shell Shocked

Nigerian court orders Shell to pay $1.5 billion for pollution A Nigerian court has ordered Royal Dutch Shell to ante up $1.5 billion in damages to communities in the Niger Delta, citing oil spills that polluted regional rivers, spoiled crops, and poisoned fish. The Friday ruling is a major victory for the region’s Ijaw people, […]

Is This the “Safe, Clean” Nuclear Power We Hear So Much About?

Illinois nuke-power operator criticized for leaks and “incidents” Quantity doesn’t equal quality with Chicago-based Exelon Corp., which runs all six nuclear plants and 11 nuclear reactors in Illinois. There were at least four “incidents” at Exelon plants last week, including a false alarm at one generating station that initiated the first “site-area emergency” at a […]

Rumblings in the Bronx

A virtual walking tour of the South Bronx New York’s South Bronx was once a getaway for the rich; now the defining landmarks of the community are power plants, landfills, and parking lots. Where some might see hopelessness, though, resident Omar Freilla sees opportunity. Freilla founded Green Worker Cooperatives to salvage reusable materials from trash […]

Jurassic beavers and hairless skunks.

So, how do you tie a story about a Jurassic beaver in with one about a hairless skunk? Looks more like a shaved weasel to me, by the way (maybe that's because skunks are in the weasel family). Random genetic mutations like that seen in the skunk are what drive evolution. Given enough global warming, we may start to see more of them. The same mutation imparted an evolutionary advantage to naked mole rats. In fact, a similar mutation happened in our past, which eventually lead to the evolution of clothing (via a December post on Biopolitical).

Which brings me to an analogy. Periods of rapid change in an environment spark bursts of evolution where new designs are tested out; similarly, global warming, combined with peak oil, is creating a frenzy of new technology designs in human cultures, all being tested in the crucible of the free market. It will be interesting to see what shakes out.

A virtual walking tour of the South Bronx with Omar Freilla of Green Worker Cooperatives

New York’s South Bronx was once a getaway for the rich; now the defining landmarks of the community are power plants, landfills, and parking lots. Where some might see hopelessness, though, resident Omar Freilla sees opportunity. Freilla founded Green Worker Cooperatives to salvage reusable materials from trash and demolition waste, creating a neighborhood that is […]