>> Sustainable Works’ 2012 Los Angeles Green Living Workshops are back this year! Get solutions to some of today’s greatest environmental challenges and save money in the process. The first workshop is this Wed., Jan. 25 from 7 – 8:30 pm at G2 Gallery, 1503 Abbot Kinney Boulevard, Venice. Cost: free for residents of Santa Monica and Los Angeles Districts 5 & 11. Register online.

>> Steve Glenn, founder and CEO of LivingHomes, gives the talk “High Design; Low Impact. Building LivingHomes” on modern, prefabricated homes that combine world-class architecture with an unparalleled commitment to healthy and sustainable construction this Wed., Jan 25 from 7-8 pm at CODA Experience Center, 10250 Santa Monica Blvd., #133, Los Angeles. Cost free, though RSVP required: concierge@codaautomotive.com.

>> Find the freshest and most healthy ingredients, enjoy personally crafted foods from home cooks and local kitchens, and discover healing foods both old and new at Eat Well Market. They will feature hand-made and hand-grown foods from backyards and kitchens around LA. Join the fun Sat., Jan 29 from 12-3 pm at Camp Mariposa, 615 E. Mariposa St., Altadena. Cost: free.

>> Get a closer look at the precious resource right beneath our feet and learn about the science of soil with our experts at the Natural History Museum of Los Angeles’ Sustainable Sundays this Sun., Jan. 29 from 9 am – 3:30 pm at 900 Exposition Blvd., Los Angeles. Cost: free with museum admission. Tickets are $12 for adults, $5-8 for children.

>> Los Angeles Bioneers is hosting Shannon Biggs who will talk about her work on passing a “Sustainability Bill of Rights” ordinance in Santa Monica, which would strip personhood rights from corporations and give rights to ecosystems instead. Takes place next Tue., Jan 31 at 7 pm at G2 Gallery, 1503 Abbot Kinney Blvd., Venice. Cost: free with RSVP to srnichols@mac.com.

>> Come learn about the money available to SoCal homeowners who make energy-saving improvements. There is currently up to $8000 available per household, with some of the rebates will expiring in March. $200 in rebates will be given away. Come for a presentation about the program with contractors available to answer questions next Tue., Jan. 31 from 6:30 – 8 pm. Cost: free.

2 Comments

>>  The Green Living Workshop 101 is a condensed version of the 6 week Green Living Workshop which covers the following topics: water, energy, waste, chemicals, transportation, and shopping & food. Sustainability tools will be raffled off to help participants carry out the solutions discussed during the workshop. Workshop takes place this Sat., Dec. 3 from 10 am – 1 pm at the Santa Monica Main Library, 601 Santa Monica Blvd., Santa Monica. Cost: free, though please register through Eventbrite.

>>  Your banana peels, sandwich crusts, lawn clippings, and coffee grounds are precious resources that can be cycled back into the garden. Come participate in a composting lesson at the Natural History Museum by getting your hands in the mix! Workshop takes place on Sat., Dec. 3 from 1-4 pm at the Natural History Museum, 900 Exposition Blvd., Los Angeles. Cost: admission to the museum is $12 for adults, $5-8 for children.

>>  Come out to see the documentary “Tipping Point – The End of Oil”, which addresses the largest industrial project in human history – the Alberta Tar Sands.  Speakers and the q&a will address what we can do to help heal the destructive impact of this project and options for an alternative energy economy.  Takes places on Sat., Dec. 6 from 7-10:30 pm at All Saints Church, 132 North Euclid Ave., Pasadena.  Cost: $15 suggested donation.  RSVP to info@burbankgreenalliance.org.

Image retrieved from wilderutopia.com

0 Comments

>> Low-income shoppers can’t afford food justice advocate’s eats. Bob Comis tells a touching tale about his experience as a vendor at the farmers market:

I had set out in farming with a mission, to offer ethically and ecologically raised meat at the lowest price possible…. But, I quickly discovered that this was a pipe dream. I couldn’t sell pork chops for less than $7.00/lb. and keep the farm going, and even at that price, my wife would still need to continue subsidizing the farm…. I had set out to make meat broadly affordable, but instead, I was selling exclusive, high-priced meat to the well-off.

Though not quite as meaty, I wrote a post about how eating locally-grown food doesn’t have to be expensive for KCET’s The Public Kitchen. Read it to get a recipe for wallet-friendly, cheese veggie quesadillas!

>> Calif.’s environmental law suspends Calif.’s climate change law. Greenwire points out that “A California court ruling suspending the implementation of the state’s landmark climate change law came with a large dose of irony”:

That’s because San Francisco County Superior Court Judge Ernest Goldsmith found that the state had failed to comply with another landmark law, one that is beloved by some of the same environmental groups that are critical of the ruling, the California Environmental Quality Act.

Essentially, a major environmental initiative is under threat because the state failed to correctly carry out the appropriate environmental analysis.

While environmental lawyers work out that snafu, pro-business groups still pushing the “environmental laws kill jobs” argument are stepping up their attack on the California Environmental Quality Act.

>> Wind and wave energies are not renewable after all. “Build enough wind farms to replace fossil fuels and we could do as much damage to the climate as greenhouse global warming,” reports New Scientist. This conclusion comes from a physicist whose findings are too complicated to summarize here. A quick look at the problem:

Using a model of global circulation, Kleidon found that the amount of energy which we can expect to harness from the wind is reduced by a factor of 100 if you take into account the depletion of free energy by wind farms. It remains theoretically possible to extract up to 70 TW globally, but doing so would have serious consequences.

Although the winds will not die, sucking that much energy out of the atmosphere in Kleidon’s model changed precipitation, turbulence and the amount of solar radiation reaching the Earth’s surface. The magnitude of the changes was comparable to the changes to the climate caused by doubling atmospheric concentrations of carbon dioxide

Confused and conflicted yet? Welcome to the wonderful world of environmentalism :)

Photo of a bison vendor at the Santa Monica Farmers Market

0 Comments

Do you think corporations have too much control over our government? Annie Leonard — the narrator of the popular eco-minded short video, The Story of Stuff — thinks so, and says 85 percent of Americans think the same in her latest video, “The Story of Citizens United v. FEC.”

This video tells “the story behind the story of stuff,” according to Annie. The gist: Corporations have been given too much power — and even some very generous first amendment rights — to influence government. Yet corporations also have to have profit as their single-minded top goal — meaning other goals important to people, ranging from a clean environment to safe neighborhoods, end up getting ignored.

That makes for “a democracy in crisis,” according to Annie, who calls on viewers to take democracy back from corporations. Watch the video to hear her argument. If you believe — or even suspect — that Annie could be right, you’ll likely also enjoy moving a riveting full-length documentary about this issue, “The Corporation.”

Earlier: Film review: The Yes Men Fix the World

0 Comments

Think the Environmental Policy Act protects the environment? Think again. It’s actually lawyers who protect the environment — by suing under this and other Acts.

That is just a slight exaggeration of the tone in “A Force For Nature: The Story of NRDC and The Fight to Save Our Planet.” In this memoir, John H. Adams recounts and retells the story thus far of National Resources Defense Council, the environmental nonprofit he helped found and lead. NRDC was created by lawyers who specifically wanted to sue to protect the environment — so as you can imagine, in the story “A Force of Nature” tells, lawyers are rockstars!

To be clear, I’m not discounting the huge role NRDC has played in protecting the planet. And I’m certainly not discouraging you from reading this book. In fact, if you feel a little lost when it comes to the history of environmentalism in the U.S., “A Force For Nature” will serve as an entertaining textbook. NRDC was founded in 1970, the same year that the Environmental Protection Agency was created (thereby allowing lawyers to start suing the EPA!). So the story of NRDC covers the modern environmental movement — and catches you up to the state of the planet today.

Yes, “A Force of Nature” covers a lot of environmental lawsuits. You’ll get a general sense of the long and tortuous legal process that’ll help you understand, if not appreciate, why good environmental changes often take so long to happen. Reading through the list of legal steps alone may try your patience!

Even more interesting are the stories in the book of tough negotiations that happen behind the scenes, when green nonprofits, government agencies, community interest groups, and giant businesses all come together to come to an agreement about environmental concerns. The “we’ll give you this area to pollute in if you leave alone this other area with lots of endangered species in it” type agreements described in “A Force For Nature” are often fascinating — and at times unnerving.

“A Force of Nature” also answered a big green question I’ve wondered about for a while: Why, if energy efficiency improvements [or insert some other economically beneficial green change here] save companies a lot of money as we hear about over and over in the media, don’t all companies make these green changes? Here’s how the book explains it, after NRDC learned the hard way through a partnership with none other than Dow Chemical:

If a company could make $5 million a year from a one-time investment of $3 million and reduce pollution, we assumed it would do so. But we learned that this wasn’t necessarily true. If other capital investments yielded a higher rate of return, those would be preferred. Not only did pollution prevention need to be profitable; it needed to be more profitable than any other investment being considered at the time.

Californians may especially enjoy “A Force For Nature,” since many of the environmental fights described happen in the Golden State — fighting smog in Los Angeles, decreasing sonar testing in the Pacific Ocean, hashing out a deal for the San Joaquin River Restoration Act — even creating the relatively new Marine Protected Areas.

“A Force For Nature” is co-written by John and his wife Patricia Adams with the help of George Black — but told from John’s first person point of view. At times the book can be rather overly rah-rah lawyers and too relentlessly positive — describing what seem like rather devastating losses as mere setbacks or partial successes. Then again, I suppose the history book of the modern environmental movement is still being written, pending the end result of global climate change. Catch up to what’s happened so far by reading “A Force For Nature,” out in hardcover for $24.95.

3 Comments