Sustainability

Values and Data Meet at a Vatican Workshop on Sustaining Humanity on a Flourishing Planet

By ANDREW C. REVKIN
A photo montage created for Sustainable Humanity, Sustainable Planet, Our Responsibility, a meeting organized by the Pontifical Academies of Sciences and Social Sciences.A photo montage created for Sustainable Humanity, Sustainable Planet, Our Responsibility, a meeting organized by the Pontifical Academies of Sciences and Social Sciences.

I’m headed to the Vatican to participate in a novel workshop at which economists, theologians and seasoned researchers from many branches of science convene under the auspices of the Pontifical Academies of Sciences and Social Sciences to consider a subject that transcends the realms of data and values: Sustainable Humanity, Sustainable Planet, Our Responsibility.

My role will be to offer a concluding comment after four days of presentations and discussion. You can explore the agenda and list of participants here.

Presumably, the meeting will help inform Pope Francis, who, according to the National Catholic Register, is preparing an encyclical on “human ecology.” (Pope Benedict XVI made the environment a priority, as well.)

But the planning goes back at least a year or two and the main organizers are Partha Sarathi Dasgupta, a Cambridge University economist, Veerabhadran Ramanathan, an atmospheric scientist at the University of California, San Diego, focused on reducing sooty pollution and climate change, and Archbishop Roland Minnerath of Dijon, France, who is also a professor of history and ethics at the Pontifical Academy of Social Sciences.

The three men explain their goals this way in conference documents:

Our idea is not to catalogue environmental problems. We propose instead to view Humanity’s interchanges with Nature through a triplet of fundamental, but inter-related Human needs – Food, Health, and Energy – and ask our respective Academies to work together to invite experts from the natural and the social sciences to speak of the various pathways that both serve those needs and reveal constraints on Nature’s ability to meet them.

I’ll be reporting back on Twitter (@revkin) and here as much as time allows.

[Disclosure note: My travel costs are being covered by the United Nations Foundation, but there are no constraints on what I write or say.]

disasters

Dome it! Schools Can Affordably Survive Tornadoes

By ANDREW C. REVKIN
A domed building at the Dale, Okla., elementary school doubles as a tornado shelter and cafeteria.Monolithic DomeA domed building at the Dale, Okla., elementary school doubles as a tornado shelter and cafeteria.

It had been very quiet in America’s tornado zone of late. But the deadly tornado outbreak Sunday night illustrated, once again, why it’s time for communities at risk to consider some new approaches to building — and learning — safely in harm’s way.

One is to think outside the box — and inside the dome.

The interior of the domed tornado shelter at the elementary school in Dale, Okla. The building is also the school cafeteria.Monolithic DomeThe interior of the domed tornado shelter at the elementary school in Dale, Okla. The building is also the school cafeteria.

This is particularly true when a steel-reinforced concrete dome meets Federal Emergency Management Agency standards for a tornado shelter. A growing number of school districts in tornado or hurricane hot spots, many with grants from FEMA, have chosen this option. I spoke Monday with David B. South, the co-inventor of a dome manufacturing process 37 years ago whose company, Monolithic Dome, has been erecting storm-safe domed school buildings from Sarasota, Fla., through Geronimo, Okla., and Lumberton, Tex., and even west to Payson, Ariz. (where the benefits include the big energy savings that come with thick insulation and concrete).

There are ways to build a safe haven into a conventional school design, as well. But old building codes, tight budgets and simple inertia continue to get in the way of change.

I was led to domed designs for tornado-resistant school buildings as I sifted for information on the particularly devastating tornado that struck Vilonia, Ark., Sunday night (the tornado hit three years and two days after a deadly tornado in 2011).  [Eleven more tornado-related deaths were reported in the South on Monday.] Read more…

web

A Fully Wrought Life – Stones Pianist, Tree Farmer, Green Blog Pioneer

By ANDREW C. REVKIN

Any time you think you’re packing as much into your life as is humanly possible, you meet someone who has taken things to another level.

That was my reaction when I first met Chuck Leavell in 2009, the year he and Joel Babbit, a longtime public relations and advertising executive, launched Mother Nature Network, which has since become one of the leading environmental news and lifestyle sites on the Web. (In 2012, Treehugger became part of the same web business).

Chuck Leavell is a longtime keyboard player for the Rolling Stones.Kevin Mazur / Getty ImagesChuck Leavell is a longtime keyboard player for the Rolling Stones.

That’s all a nice achievement. But Leavell is also one of the world’s most renowned rock ‘n’ roll keyboard players, from his early days with the Allman Brothers through his current work with the Rolling Stones. He and his wife also own a large plantation and managed forest in Georgia, a side of his life illuminated in two of Leavell’s three books, Forever Green: The History and Hope of the American Forest, and The Tree Farmer (for children, with Nicholas Cravotta and Rebecca Bleau).

I recently recorded a Skype interview with Leavell that I think is worth sharing. I finally had time to transcribe most of it (with a couple of trims and edits for clarity). Please watch or read below.
Read more…

film

Darren Aronofsky on Floods, Fanaticism, the Big Bang, Warming and More

By ANDREW C. REVKIN
Andy Revkin interviews the filmmakers Darren Aronofsky and Ari Handel (center and right).Andy Revkin interviews the filmmakers Darren Aronofsky and Ari Handel (center and right).

I hope you’ll take 40 minutes to catch my onstage interview on Tuesday with Darren Aronofsky, the filmmaker known for his obsession with obsession, whether it’s in a mathematician, ballerina or — most recently — Noah. Also weighing in at the capping event at The Times’s Cities For Tomorrow meeting was Ari Handel, Aronofsky’s co-writer on “Noah,” “Black Swan” and “The Fountain” (and a neuroscientist).

 

We talked about the filmmakers’ efforts to convey the creation story in a way that meshed the storytelling power of the Bible with time scales and images reflecting scientific understanding of the origins of Earth and species.

Aronofsky described the environmental subtexts in the plot, including, of course, the deluge in relation to human-driven global warming and Noah’s passion for not taking more than was needed from the environment. Read more…

energy

A Deeper Look at a Study Finding High Leak Rates From Gas Drilling

By ANDREW C. REVKIN
A drilling rig in Washington County, Pa.Bloomberg NewsA drilling rig in Washington County, Pa.

Updated below with Skype chat with the study lead author, 10:07 p.m. |
Most efforts to slow the natural gas drilling boom in the United States have focused on questions about the environmental impacts of the process called hydraulic fracturing, or fracking, which occurs deep underground after a well is drilled.

That’s why a great deal of attention was paid last week to the results of a two-day aerial survey over gas fields in southwestern Pennsylvania that calculated emission rates of methane (the main component of natural gas) from two well pads still in the drilling phase. The emissions rates were between 100 and 1,000 times higher than what would be consistent with Environmental Protection Agency leakage estimates.

The study, “Toward a better understanding and quantification of methane emissions from shale gas development,” was published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences and undertaken by Dana R. Caulton and Paul B. Shepson of Purdue and a host of co-authors, including Anthony Ingraffea and Robert Howarth, Cornell scientists who are prominent foes of fracking, along with Renee Santoro of Physicians Scientists & Engineers for Healthy Energy, a nonprofit group that has been critical of fracking* (Ingraffea is affiliated with the group, as well).

Much of the news coverage and commentary was greatly oversimplified, implying that airplane measurements taken on two days in 2012 and showing high methane levels over a handful of wells (and nothing unusual over almost all the other wells in the region) pointed to an extraordinary new pollution and climate change risk. A case in point was this Climate Central post: “Huge Methane Leaks Add Doubt on Gas as ‘Bridge’ Fuel.”

In fact, the study is consistent with other recent work covered here that shows there are specific and tractable issues that can be addressed, making gas production far less leaky and thus a legitimate successor to coal mining.

This section from the paper says as much (I added the paper links to the citation numbers):  Read more…

cities

Beneath the Surface of China’s Great Urban Rush

By ANDREW C. REVKIN

At The New York Times Cities for Tomorrow event today, I led a discussion of some big social and environmental issues that lie beneath the surface of China’s urban rush.

Watch live streaming video from nytcitiesfortomorrow at livestream.com

 

Yu Gao, the China director for Landesa, a group working on land tenure issues, focused on the lack of what he called “social infrastructure” in China — mechanisms to protect the rights of those on the move in the country’s great urban migration.

Andrew Stokols, a writer and analyst of urbanization, discussed his recent travels in what he calls “China’s Wild West.”

Carolyn Kissane, academic director at the New York University School for Global Affairs, described China’s intensive push to cut its use of coal in its choking cities.

Karen C. Seto, a professor of geography and urbanization at Yale University, warned against too much of a focus on China’s “eco cities” and megacities, given that the greatest migrations — and greatest prospect for change lay in a constellation of small cities far from the central government and media spotlight.

Here are the other sessions, which — before the day is out — will include my panel on transportation issues and opportunities in New York City and other metropolises and a fun conversation with the filmmaker Darren Aronofsky, who infused various environmental themes into his new epic feature film, “Noah“:

Watch live streaming video from nytcitiesfortomorrow at livestream.com
environmental policy

No Time to Waste: Students Pursue Environmental Progress Instead of Exam Grades

By ANDREW C. REVKIN
Pace University students in an environmental policy clinic pursue initiatives instead of test scores. (Click here for their identities and more on the course).John CroninPace University students in an environmental policy clinic pursue initiatives instead of test scores. (Click here for their identities and more on the course).

This is an Earth Day shout-out to the dozen undergraduate students in the inaugural semester of our new Pace University Environmental Policy Clinic, a year-round course in which student teams, instead of studying for tests, work with nonprofit groups, communities or other partners to pursue achievable environmental goals.

You can learn about the four current initiatives in posts on ePolicy, the new class blog. Here are excerpts and links:  Read more…

psychology

A Risk Analyst Explains Why Climate Change Risk Misperception Doesn’t Necessarily Matter

By ANDREW C. REVKIN
A portion of a sculpture in Aspen, Colo.Andrew C. RevkinA portion of a sculpture in Aspen, Colo.

David Ropeik, the risk communication consultant and author of “How Risky is it, Really? Why Our Fears Don’t Always Match the Facts,” had some concerns about the way I characterized our “inconvenient minds” in my TEDx talk in Portland, Ore., over the weekend.

He’s right, of course. The 19-minute presentation on how, with sustained work, we’re a perfect fit for a complicated, consequential century was necessarily oversimplified. Here’s his “Your Dot” piece filling in many blanks, and noting that no one should presume better climate change communication is the path to action on global warming:
Read more…

China

A Green Group Sees Hope in ‘The End of China’s Coal Boom’

By ANDREW C. REVKIN
A tourist boat navigated through a haze in the  Guangdong Province of China this month. The country’s coal-burning power plants are a big source of such pollution.Alex Lee/ReutersA tourist boat navigated through a haze in the  Guangdong Province of China this month. The country’s coal-burning power plants are a big source of such pollution.
A report from Greenpeace charts slowing growth in China's coal use.A report from Greenpeace charts slowing growth in China’s coal use.

Through much of its history, Greenpeace has been big on what I call “woe is me, shame on you” messaging on the environment. As I explained at a TEDx event in Portland, Ore., over the weekend, fingerpointing (including Greenpeace’s) is appropriate in many instances, but doesn’t work well with human-driven global warming. The blame game too often ends up resembling a circular firing squad.

This is why “The End of China’s Coal Boom,” a valuable new report from Greenpeace’s East Asia office, is so refreshing and worth exploring. I was led to it by a Twitter item from the group’s outgoing director, Phil Radford, that focused on a telling graphic: Read more…

wildlife

White House Pressed to Protect Ailing Monarch Butterflies

By ANDREW C. REVKIN

A monarch butterfly fed on silky red milkweed at one of the 7,450 Monarch Watch way stations spread along migratory routes.Steve Smedley/The Pantagraph, via Associated PressA monarch butterfly fed on silky red milkweed at one of the 7,450 Monarch Watch way stations spread along migratory routes.

All too often, species that humans care about only get attention when they are in crisis. Such is the case with monarch butterflies. The insect, famed for its remarkable annual migrations, faced declines in habitat on both the Mexican and American ends of its range for decades, but now is the focus of an urgent push for a rescue. The latest step is a letter sent on Monday to President Obama and relevant cabinet members by a group of scientists, educators, farmers, and other concerned citizens organized by the Xerces Society and other conservation groups focused on these butterflies. The letter (read it here) describes policies the administration could pursue on both public and private land along the butterfly’s migratory path.  Read more…

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