Gristmill

Score one for the WaPo

Congrats to the Washington Post, winner of the 2005 Selden Ring Award for Investigative Reporting for their series on lead in D.C. water pipes. Details, and the other winners, below the fold.

We heart China, honest

Last week, Daily Grist reported -- somewhat tongue in cheek -- that China had surpassed the U.S. as the world's largest overall consumer. It's all part of our ongoing obsession with China's boggling growth, which is, from the environmentalist's point of view, probably the single most significant socioeconomic trend in the world right now.

We've gotten several letters since then yelling at us for being "anti-China." You see, China has four times as many people as the U.S., so on a per capita basis, Americans consume much, much more and produce much, much more waste.

Yes, yes, Americans are the evilest, forever and always. Bring me my hairshirt! Can we have our green credentials back now?

But still. The fact that China recently passed us, and has four times as many people, means that it's going to get way bigger. Huge. Fast. If it develops along the same lines as the U.S., using the same technologies and fuel sources, we are all screwed. The earth cannot handle another U.S.-style consumer, four times the size of the original.

The answer is not to try to stop China from developing -- as if such a thing were remotely in the realm of possibility -- or to demonize it. The answer is to do everything we can to try to make China a showcase for every sustainable development trick in the book. The Chinese want prosperity, just as we do, so let's help them leapfrog, get there without sucking up the rest of the world's oil and accelerating climate change. Given its closed political system, there's a limit to what Western greens can do, but at the very least we should be paying attention and doing what we can. There's evidence that China's government gets this, anyway.

Obviously, this should be done in conjunction with -- not instead of -- working to make Western industry and lifestyles more sustainable as well.

Lights, camera, activism

Here's some greenish "news" filtering through all the Million-Dollar Oscar hype: buncha stars are going to show up in Priuses instead of limos. And since they'll be using chauffeurs, it probably even counts as carpooling!

For the third year running, hybrid-minded actors -- including Charlize Theron, Leonardo DiCaprio, and, of course, Susan Sarandon and Tim Robbins -- are taking part in "Red Carpet, Green Cars" to raise funds for Global Green U.S.A. As a token of thanks, Greenfeet will provide them with eco-goodies including hemp napkins, organic wine, and ... disposable bamboo plates. Which sound super sustainable.

Anyway. The whole event, says Greenfeet founder and president Valerie Reddemann, will "show that leaving softer, greener footprints on the earth is hip and downright cool." O, how I wish she were downright right.

Warming oceans

There was a flurry of stories recently on some new studies that tried to get a handle on the extent of global warming by measuring ocean temperatures. For all you science geeks out there, a new post on the invaluable RealClimate explains why that's a good idea.

Geoff on death

I would be remiss if I did not point out that Geoff Dabelko, director of the Environmental Change and Security Project and regular Gristmill contributor, was recently interviewed by Wildside News, an environmental radio program, about the "Death of Environmentalism" controversy.

You can hear the interview here and the full show here.

It's a wide-ranging interview and quite effective at providing a larger perspective on the issue. Give it a listen.

I’m lovin’ it!

Okay, sorry I put that song in your head.

This NYT story is interesting: Apparently McDonald's entrance into the fresh fruit and veggie market -- driven by pressure to offer healthier options, salads and such -- has made it, almost overnight, one of the biggest players in the $80 billion American produce industry.

Two bits from the story, one funny, one significant:

Alive and not-so-well in the Andes

This weekend, news outlets reported that an American hiker in the Andes had discovered items belonging to a survivor of the plane crash made famous in the movie "Alive." (You know, the one where the protagonists discovered that their less-fortunate seatmates made for a tasty nibble?) The wire story said the loot -- including a wallet, jacket, and roll of film -- had been buried in the snow for the last 32 years.

Gee, wonder how they surfaced?

Don’t know much about history…

Just how did we get to this holding pattern on multilateral environmental agreements? What are the political roots of today's international sustainability debates? Didn't attempts to integrate environment and development start with the Brundtland Commission's 1987 Our Common Future?

A new working paper from Harvard's Center for International Development takes the long view and provides critical historical context needed for understanding today's current state of affairs. In "The Quest for Global Sustainability: International Efforts on Linking Environment and Development," scholars Henrik Selin and Bjorn-Ola Linner analyze policy attempts to integrate environment and development in the post-World War II period up until the 1992 Earth Summit. They convincingly maintain that too many of today's sustainability debates occur in an ahistorical vacuum unaware of these earlier efforts.

One take-home message of their investigation is the need for greater recognition of just how much North-South politics drive (or derail) these processes.  As we focus considerable (and needed) attention on the poor health of the transatlantic environmental relationship, we must also keep our eyes on the larger prize (and frankly more difficult gap to bridge) of North-South environmental relations.

And yes even more Verdopolis

When I asked Emily Gertz to cover the Verdopolis confab for Grist, I requested that she focus mainly on what I considered the more weighty topics -- green energy, green urbanism, and green markets. This was, in part, to counter the impression -- found even (gasp) among some Grist staff members -- that the "bright green" movement celebrated by Verdopolis is mainly about a chic lifestyle or a set of consumer products. It is much, much more.

However, it does include a chic lifestyle and consumer products. To wit, Emily's coverage of the last day of Verdopolis over on Worldchanging describes presentations from makers of eco-friendly jeans, furniture, and meat. As excited as I am about reimagining cities and energy grids, I must admit I also look forward to being able to buy a pair of pants with a clean conscience.