Articles by Maywa Montenegro

Two crazy environmental stories via podcast

I've been catching up on a backlog of podcasts this week (I haven't used my iPod in weeks; in New York City you almost feel alien if you walk the streets without cables in your ears). From one of my favorites, the NPR Environment podcast, two surprising stories.

The first is from their excellent Climate Connections series, created in conjunction with National Geographic. Who knew that Nigeria's natural gas flares are so big they can be viewed from space? As horrifying as it sounds, apparently, "every year, millions of dollars are literally going up in smoke in Nigeria," as oil-drilling companies burn off unwanted natural gas produced during crude- oil extraction.

What makes this practice so egregious, beyond the fact that it contributes more CO2 to the atmosphere than any other activity south of the Sahara, and beyond the fact that the noxious fumes are destroying the respiratory health of Nigeria's people and dirtying their drinking water, is that the very people who live next to these perennial blow torches often don't have electricity themselves.

Only cyclists and walkers remain calm

At around 4:30am today, a powerful storm swept through New York City and surrounding areas, dumping nearly two inches of rain over Central Park in just one hour before spinning into "tornado-like" gusts in Brooklyn.

The downpour was over soon enough, but the sudden surge of water flooded our subway system, causing every major line to be shut down. Service on buses and trains into the city was either suspended or delayed, right in the midst of rush hour on a sweltering hot day.

By now, most people have either made it to work or given up trying, and at City Room, a blog in the NY Times regional section, many are weighing in about their morning commutes.

New York Sports Club kicks in to conserve

The other day at the gym I was engaging in classic attention-deficient media trawling -- attempting to read my magazine, watch the morning newscast, and work up a sweat all at the same time.

So it didn't bother me too much when the TV kept shutting off. The equipment at these high-traffic fitness clubs is renowned for breaking down, so I chalked it up to an electrical glitch. Today I learned that in late July, the New York Sports Clubs reprogrammed their televisions to automatically turn off when not in use (this doesn't account, I guess, for those who want to watch without listening, but you can always plug in your headphones without putting them on).

When one person makes an effort to conserve energy, it's a good thing; when a facility with as much daily energy consumption as the NYSC network tries to conserve, it's great. Hat tip to the sports clubs for a simple and effective step in the right direction.

Back(ground) in black

It's called Blackle -- a black version of Google -- and according to this blogpost, it could save 8.3 Megawatt-hours per day, or about 3000 Megawatt-hours a year globally: