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Mmm … prefab

Man do I love me some prefab. Over at Worldchanging, Jill Fehrenbacher and Sarah Rich have a great roundup of some new prefab projects in Australia. I particularly dig the deck_house.

Mike Millikin's Week in Sustainable Transportation is worth reading too, as always.

LEED condos

Speaking of condos receiving LEED certification, I just found out about a week ago that literally right across the street from me, they're in the process of building what is to be Seattle's first LEED Silver Certified condo building: the Hjarta. Seems I bought too soon.

Then again, prices will probably be through the roof.

Kolbert report

This week's New Yorker has another fantastic piece from Elizabeth Kolbert on global warming: "Butterfly Lessons." It's a fairly detailed look at the effect of climate change on a range of butterfly and frog species.

It's not online (yet?), but Kolbert is rapidly becoming reason enough to subscribe to the magazine. I can't wait for her book.

Just because General Motors calls it green doesn’t mean it is.

Joel Makower reports that General Motors will lead a joint demonstration project "to learn more about consumer awareness and acceptance of E85 as a motor vehicle fuel by demonstrating its use in GM's flexible-fuel vehicles."

The California Department of Transportation will use some flex-fuel vehicles and work with Chevron Technology Ventures to make sure there are filling stations that offer E85 (gas w/ 85% ethanol). A company called Pacific Ethanol will provide the liquid fuel. Filling stations that sell E85 will be receiving "a lucrative federal tax credit."

Joel passes rather lightly over the central problem with biofuels, a problem advocates have never satisfactorily resolved. We're always told that biomass for ethanol could come from crop waste, fryer grease, turkeys, or what have you, but what it inevitably will be made from is whatever's cheapest.

Right now it's cheapest to use corn, sugarcane, soybeans, and palm oil -- heavily-subsidized agribusiness products. Joel holds Brazil up as a model, boasting that it just became a net exporter of sugarcane ethanol. But right there in Brazil rainforests are being plowed down to plant crops, making carbon sinks into carbon sieves.

If there were more confident predictions and fewer just-so stories about how genuinely renewable sources of ethanol will become cheaper than biodiversity-destroying, CO2-increasing agricultural crops, I would feel more comfortable biofuel boosting.

I'm not ready to walk blindly into this future, holding General Motors' hand for comfort.

All Awkward Pauses Considered

I was on the radio, doing a humorless slow-drone thing when I think maybe they wanted some zest and wit and, um, brevity.

New EPA fuel economy regs

The EPA's long-awaited and more accurate fuel-economy calculations will debut next week.

Over 150 activists send letter asking Kennedy to reconsider position

Cape Wind Associates' plan to build a big wind-power farm off the coast of Cape Cod has been dividing enviros for years, but the disagreement got a lot more heated last month when Robert F. Kennedy Jr. ran a high-profile op-ed railing against the project in The New York Times.

An excerpt:

These turbines are less than six miles from shore and would be seen from Cape Cod, Martha's Vineyard and Nantucket. Hundreds of flashing lights to warn airplanes away from the turbines will steal the stars and nighttime views. The noise of the turbines will be audible onshore. A transformer substation rising 100 feet above the sound would house giant helicopter pads and 40,000 gallons of potentially hazardous oil. According to the Massachusetts Historical Commission, the project will damage the views from 16 historic sites and lighthouses on the cape and nearby islands. The Humane Society estimates the whirling turbines could every year kill thousands of migrating songbirds and sea ducks.

That didn't sit so well with many enviros who see climate change as the big environmental issue and therefore think renewable-energy projects should be welcomed in all our backyards. More than 150 green leaders and activists this week sent a letter to Kennedy asking him to reconsider. Word is Kennedy said he'll meet with them to discuss. We'll keep you posted.

Meantime, here's the letter:

Enviros plot to beat Pombo in November

Just a week into this election year and already environmental strategists are up to their elbows in plots to snatch Congress from the grip of anti-environment GOP leaders and turn it over to a conservation-minded majority. Leaders of green groups including the Sierra Club and Defenders of Wildlife are hatching plans to help political allies […]

According to Wired.

1. Your property value will decrease.
2. They're ugly.
3. You'll hear noises similar to those Nazi troops used to torture Jews with during the holocaust.
4. They'll cause strokes.
5. Women will menstruate five times a month.

At least some people think so, according to a Wired article about the battle against wind farms in upstate New York.

Poor safety enforcement led to the tragedy

The Sago mine disaster was first and foremost an incredible tragedy. (I challenge you to read this story and not get a tear in your eye.) I haven't said anything about it because in my experience most initial reports around accidents like this are exaggerated or plain wrong -- and that was certainly the case in Sago.

But now that the dust is clearing a little bit, there seems to be a growing consensus that the accident was, if not the direct result, at least indirectly related to a woeful lack of enforcement on the part of the Mine Safety and Health Administration. And that, of course, has to do with the coal industry's extraordinary friendliness with the Bush administration (though previous administrations, including Clinton's and Bush I's, share plenty of responsibility).

Start with today's NYT editorial, but for details and background, check out the guest posts from Ellen Smith, the editor of Mine Safety and Health News, over on Washington Monthly: here, here, and here. ThinkProgress also has some good stuff here, here, and here.

Update [2006-1-6 14:28:57 by David Roberts]: More from Jordan Barab.