There are worse things than hypocrisy

A reader sent along a link to this George Monbiot piece with the somewhat accusatory question:

In a recent column, George Monbiot excoriates environmental superstars for not walking the talk. So what about the Grist luminaries? How do you live in reality?

One often sees this sort of thing, and ... well, I wish one wouldn't.

At least once a week we get a letter from some fruitcake saying: "You [or some celebrity or writer] can't support [some environmental change or policy] until you give up your car, grow your own food, and live by candlelight." Otherwise -- gasp -- hypocrisy!

This is, in fact, a favorite right-wing talking point on the environment -- it's all part of the modern-day conservative attempt to reduce everything to "personal responsibility," thereby freeing the centers of financial and political power from any structural restraints. When well-meaning greens echo the line, they do themselves a disservice.

Let me be clear: Of course there's nothing wrong with living an environmentally exemplary life. It would be better to live that way than to not. It would be better to devote oneself to charity, too, or go to Africa and work on poverty relief. For any given individual, he or she could be living a more virtuous life.

But that's more or less a distraction.

French constitution gets a dash of green

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Debunking the rainforest myth.

Henry Chu writes in the LA Times this morning on the myth that the Amazon rainforests are the "lungs of the world." June is the start of the burning season in the Amazon, which sends up "inky billows" of smoke every year. Some tidbits:

"It's not the lungs of the world," said Daniel Nepstad, an American ecologist who has studied the Amazon for 20 years. "It's probably burning up more oxygen now than it's producing."

But setting those inky billows aside:

Even without the massive burning, the popular conception of the Amazon as a giant oxygen factory for the rest of the planet is misguided, scientists say. Left unmolested, the forest does generate enormous amounts of oxygen through photosynthesis, but it consumes most of it itself in the decomposition of organic matter.

Chu still implies that treaties like Kyoto need to provide incentives to discourage rainforest destruction.

Regarding the resilience of the perception that the rainforests are the lungs of the earth, I'm reminded of that infamous framing guru and the aphorism, "If the facts don't fit the frame, the frame stays and the facts bounce off."

Bibbidi-Bobbidi-Build

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On green building, urban development, and reviving rural America

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Pedi Cure

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Huh?

There's a good interview with Christie Whitman over on Environmental Science & Technology. I go back and forth about Whitman, but she definitely puts her best -- and by "best," of course I mean, "most sympathetic to my own views" -- foot forward in this interview.

I found this a bit bizarre though. When asked about climate change, she says:

In fairness, I think we can do more. I think we can get a cap on carbon that would give utilities time to reach it without so dislocating the industry that it will drive the costs of energy out of sight. And I think, ultimately, we will have a cap on carbon. But you also have the studies, I think two years ago, from NASA showing the impacts of land change.

So there are still scientific differences on where to focus the dollars. The president has acknowledged that climate change is occurring. But then Michael Crichton, who is enormously popular, writes a book [State of Fear] saying that it's not happening. And that sets you back. So it is not as widely accepted as it should be.

Michael Crichton: single-handedly thwarting the social consensus on climate change that President Bush so desperately wants.

And then later:

It’s not just a partisan issue. I haven’t read the book, but Michael Crichton cites studies that show climate change is natural and that we are not in immediate danger. Then you have that movie, The Day After Tomorrow, where the world is coming to an end immediately if we don't do something tomorrow. When you have those two images in the popular media, it's hard for the people to figure out what's right. That's one of the reasons the administration hasn't been that engaged, and why they haven't felt any pressure.

Hm ... what do they call it when an administration champions an issue of great import that isn't receiving enough public attention ... oh, right!

Leadership.

Arctic Refuge documentary is beautifully made, but ultimately a tad too restrained for its own good.

U.N. World Environment Day is being held in San Francisco this year, from June 1-5. The associated Green Screen Environmental Film Festival kicks off on June 1 with Oil on Ice, the award-winning documentary on the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge by co-directors Bo Boudart and Dale Djerassi.

Oil on Ice is a handsome film, impeccably made. Virtually every frame contains an image of beauty: One goal at which it unquestionably succeeds is to refute the obscene contention by certain Alaska politicians (who shall remain unnamed) that the Refuge is nothing but a snow-seared wasteland. It also sparks a strangely wistful sense of wonder that the U.S. still contains an untouched swath of territory, as one commentator puts it, "just for the animals." That is, when you think about it, quite a remarkable thing in this day and age. Once surrendered, it can never be recovered.

The film is a slim 40 minutes long, and it attempts to cover a great deal of territory. It indicts the oil industry for the damage done elsewhere in Alaska, particularly the Exxon-Valdez spill; it visits indigenous Alaskan communities and illustrates their fragile relationship to wildlife migratory and spawning patterns that could be warped by new oil development; it celebrates the variety of wildlife that exists year-round in the Refuge, and in particular the dazzling explosion of life that descends on the North Shore during the four-month warm season; and it investigates the politics of oil, showing how powerful oil service companies and Alaskan politicians are driving the debate, obscuring the fact that changes in auto technology could preserve far more oil than could be pulled from the Refuge.

Within its time constraints, none of these arguments can be made decisively, but their accumulation is ultimately persuasive.

None of it will be new to those who have been following the issue, though some factoids may surprise. What Oil on Ice does is present the various facets in compact, digestible, gorgeous form. The website also contain volumes of background information and resources for further action -- in particular note the short introductory film, notification on upcoming screenings, and of course, a place to buy the DVD.

It's an all-around laudable undertaking and deserves wide exposure.

My one complaint is about tone: