We need a system of cooperative public-private infrastructure financing, a national infrastructure bank. But we also need to use that fabric of cooperative investment and output to foster specific areas of major improvement to our national economy. The model could be replicated across the world, but the US is uniquely positioned to deploy this solution and to vastly improve its chances of restoring vibrancy to the wider middle class by doing so.

Two parallel projects are necessary to make the infrastructure redevelopment and economic recovery strategy a success:

• a renewable energy infrastructure bank – to help target some of the wider funding options to the project of building a sustainable, smart energy economy, free of the massive externalized costs of carbon-based fuels
• an economic opportunity bank – to aggressively, specifically and persistently direct funds to businesses that are hiring, building capacity at the community level, and restoring real wage gains to the middle class

The first is our topic here: a national renewable energy infrastructure bank. To build such a bank, we would need to first establish how a cooperative public-private infrastructure financing scheme would work. Ideally, it needs to work much like an investment bank, where individual investors see visible gains, but money is kept in the pot for a long enough period of time to produce gain across the full spectrum of investor contributions.

In other words, there has to be commitment to the project, and that shared commitment of resources will yield shared substantial gains to all parties. In the area of clean energy investment, this is possibly much easier than with other types of infrastructure investment, because the industry is entering into a period of massive, and necessary, prolonged expansion. Big investors understand that big investment will help to secure that prolonged expansion.

If Congress acts to incentivize this investment, massive amounts of private-sector capital will flow to clean energy resources. There are three reasons why this will happen:

1. Fossil fuels carry with them massive production costs that have long been externalized; the economy can no longer afford to continue such a strategy.
2. Clean energy technologies offer a major opportunity for prolonged expansion of business value, as information technologies have shown over the last 30 years.
3. There are literally hundreds of billions of dollars of private capital sitting on the sidelines, waiting for directional certainty that fossil fuels cannot provide.

So, how to structure such an operation? The renewable energy infrastructure bank would need the following to reach its full potential:

1. A national price signal or clear set of incentives to direct investment to clean energy
2. An investment strategy that looks at best practices, value to community, prospects for building aggregate demand, and structural resiliency
3. A focus on job-creation, skilled retraining, and positive value feedback loops that favor consumers
4. A legislative charter that sets forth priorities favorable to public-sector, private-sector and start-up investors alike
5. A model for redirecting funding when key elements of a project require support or restructuring
6. A focus on rewarding institutions, individuals and investors who do cutting-edge R&D that is practicable, 100% carbon-emissions-free and scalable
7. Short-, medium- and long-term investment strategies for building, optimizing and utilizing the smart grid

Suggestions for deployment:

1. Implement a national carbon fee and dividend policy, to correct market failures in the pricing of carbon, return control of the energy economy to households and incentivize major private capital investment in the rapidly expanding clean tech sector
2. Identify, build or support and expand, focus facilities in cities and regions across the country, to operate as cooperative laboratories of R&D, start-up incubators, and investment engines (examples might be Brooklyn Navy Yard or Philadelphia Navy Yard, or the Fab Labs project)
3. Motivate scalability planning for distributed clean energy production projects, to ensure sustained investment opportunities, and optimized overlap between community-building, job-creation and investment strategies, for higher overall cost efficiency
4. Ensure legal support for avoiding corrosive business models, favoring generative ones, to ensure Investment flows to the new technologies and collaborative strategies that build future prosperity, not to extraction-oriented investments
5. Reward rapid ramping up of high-efficiency clean energy tech, because this will build structural resiliency, favor the highest-value market-healing technologies, and help to revive the middle class

We can begin doing this nationally tomorrow, if:

• We focus first on wind and solar, due to their naturally occurring US domestic supply far outstripping total demand and all possible demand growth
• We commit to decentralizing innovation, influence and income-growth in the energy sector, so community and regional economies are empowered by the transition
• We recognize the need to fully develop leading-edge infrastructure at all levels
• We identify and elevate the pioneers who already know how to motivate and execute this transition
• We charter public-private partnerships to manage investment flows to stakeholder-defined initiatives

The clean energy economy is coming, and to fully enable its expansion, the US needs to flex the muscle necessry to turn the ship of state, to wrest from entrenched industries and financial investment patterns rooted more in extraction than in generative payoff the ability to decide what comes next. There is nothing beyond clean and renewable in terms of energy production and distribution, except the work of achieving the most advanced efficiency gains and making robust power generation an ever more ephemeral affair, at an ever faster rate.

To lead in that new economy, we need to be the first to build its value.

 - – -

Originally published October 12, 2011, at ProjectQuipu.net

Futurismo Verde :: Desde el comienzo de la civilización humana, el proceso de montar sociedades organizadas, formular historias compartidas y diseñar visiones del futuro humano, el ser humano ha buscado maneras de profetizar y de pronosticar. La ciencia moderna ha descubierto indicios fiables que ayudan a describir el mundo, pero para saber qué vendrá después del momento actual, tenemos que aprender a medir la salud de los sistemas naturales que deciden cómo vivimos.

El hecho es que la Tierra es un complejo de sistemas naturales, separados de los ecosistemas terrestres más remotos sólo por la intervención de otros ecosistemas. De alguna forma, todo el material del planeta, orgánico y no orgánico, está en constante comunicación a través de esta red de interacciones. El mundo viviente prospera debido a la interacción sana y sustentable de distintos sistemas naturales, alternando entre competencia y colaboración, y ganando por esa relación sana más flexibilidad de adaptación, más elasticidad.

La crisis vital viene a un ecosistema cuando deja de ser lo bastante elástico como para enfrentar el desafío sistémico del momento. Esa rigidez puede nacer de muchas causas distintas, pero suele arraigarse en una tendencia a la uniformidad y a la reducción de contacto dinámico con otros sistemas contra los que tendrá que competir, en un momento u otro.

La intervención humana, entonces, ¿qué significa para un ecosistema? Eso depende del tamaño y de la intensidad de la huella que deja esa intervención humana. Si se trata de construir una ciudad, es posible que la inmensa mayoría de los ecosistemas naturales desaparecerán o se desplazarán de forma integral y posiblemente fatal. Si se trata de eregir por dos días una tienda de campaña, y comer sólo lo que existe en el ambiente, sin dejar rastros de química sintética o productos industriales, la intervención será mínima, y todos los ecosistemas ambientales seguirán su curso, casi sin interrupción alguna.

Para la mayoría de los seres humanos del planeta, la decisión de intervenir o no en un ecosistema ha vuelto una decisión pasiva: las ciudades ya existen, los pueblos ya tienen su huella física y ambiental, y las decisiones de aumentar el terreno ocupado por un asentamiento humano suelen ser decisiones organizadas y municipales, no de un sólo individuo.

Por lo tanto, es fácil distanciarnos del problema sin darnos cuenta del serio y duradero papel que nuestras actividades tendrán en los sistemas naturales de los que dependemos y de los que depende el medio ambiente más extenso. Esta distancia conceptual influye no sólo en nuestro imaginario cultural y económico, sino además en el futuro tratamiento mutuo entre la economía humana y la naturaleza.

Los servicios naturales más valiosas—producción de oxígeno, agua limpia, ritmos y corredores fiables de lluvia, la corriente global del océano profundo—exceden por mucho todo el valor económico de la actividad humana en conjunto. Privilegiar y promover elasticidad y resistencia en los sistemas naturales es la única manera de prevenir los efectos corrosivos a largo plazo de una industria inconsciente de sus efectos.

Un nivel adecuado de elasticidad y resistencia ecosistémicas es necesario para asegurar el suministro alimenticio global y el suministro de agua limpia. Es necesario para asegurar un promedio de estabilidad climático: la diversidad de influencias promueve la estabilidad sistémica a largo plazo; la reducción de influencias promueve precariedad sistémica.

Una referencia útil sería la inversión financiera: un rango mínimo y más uniforme de inversiones expone a uno a mayor probabilidad de fracaso y pérdida de valor total; un rango más diverso y variado de inversiones protege a uno de la inestabilidad de valores y proporciona mayor estabilidad y mayor probabilidad de aumento de valores.

El futuro económico, a escala global y local, depende definitivamente del nivel de elasticidad y resistencia en los sistemas naturales de los que toda la actividad humana depende. La economía humana se funda en la biología, el organismo humano, y las necesidades vitales del conjunto de todos los seres humanos. El medio ambiente es un sistema en el que participamos, y la elasticidad de ese sistema decide nuestra resistencia ante los cambios emergentes o sorprendentes que pueden presentarse en un momento dado.

Futurismo Verde :: En servicio al proyecto del Foro sobre Política y Crisis, la Red Hot Spring de innovación y debate plantea una conversación global sobre la seguridad alimenticia y la escasez crónica de agua y comida en África. Las lecciones de este experimento en investigación y brainstorming colaborativos se podrá aplicar a otras situaciones de crisis y escasez alrededor del planeta.

Los temas principales de debate serán:

1. Problemas relacionados con el abastecimiento alimenticio global, sobretodo en aplicación a las poblaciones más necesitadas;
2. La degradación medioambiental: o sea, servicios ecológicos y medidas de bienestar ambiental;
3. Deficiencies en las políticas de uso terrenal: cómo mejorarlas;
4. Caza furtiva de animales y cosecha furtiva de leño;
5. Tendencias corrosivas económicas;
6. La corrupción y la deficiencia urgente de presupuestos;
7. Medidas cooperativas para extender el suministro alimenticio a las zonas de conflicto;
8. Cómo superar los límites de la infraestructura de transporte;
9. Las enfermedades comunicables: tratamiento, educación, efectos socio-económicos;
10. Fallos comunicativos: cómo hacer llegar los datos tanto investigados como anecdóticos a los servicios relevantes.

La meta será idear y modelar soluciones calibradas a los desafíos al parecer imposibles de resolver, en relación a la seguridad alimenticia en diversas regiones del continente africano. Esperamos poder proporcionar ideas nuevas y factibles, prácticas y económicamente virtuosas, para que las poblaciones locales interesadas puedan comenzar a desplegarlas en su entorno.

Click aquí para agregar sus comentarios al foro…

El ser humano se ha vuelto tan influyente en los proceso naturales que los científicos ahora temen que la naturaleza ha perdido capacidades vitales de resistencia

Futurismo Verde :: En una reunión de científicos europeos, en Estocolmo, el hombre que inventó el término ‘antropoceno’ para describir una nueva época geológica—en la que la influencia humana domina los proceso naturales—ha anunciado que el término ahora se está aplicando desde múltiples campos de estudio. La importancia real del término es que la información ecológica es cada vez más imprescindible para poder llevar a cabo las ambiciones humanas de una forma responsable y sostenible.

The Financial Times, de Londres, ahora informa que “The EuroScience forum in Stockholm heard on Thursday that climate change was the most obvious of a complex range of man-made effects that is rapidly changing the physics, chemistry and biology of the planet.” [En el foro EuroScience, en Estocolmo, el jueves pasado, escucharon que el cambio climático era el más obvio de un complejo tejido de efectos de la actividad humana, que están cambiando rápidamente la física, la química y la biología del planeta."] Otros efectos tendrán que ver con la resistencia de la cosecha, fertilidad de la tierra, elasticidad de habitat vital para especies de sustento.

El alba de la época Antropocena, en la historia geológica, conlleva una cantidad importante de desafíos y oportunidades. En sentido de llevar a cabo una transición rápida de ubicuos modelos económicos a una metodología sostenible, hay una gran oportunidad de aumentar la producción económica potencial de la economía global. Hacerlo, sin embargo, exigirá cantidades masivas de inversión y de innovación acelerada.

Un grupo de 21 de los científicos e investigadores más respetados ha publicado su estudio de la cronología geológica en GSA Journal, y han confirmado que ocurrió un cambio fundamental a una época geológica definida por el efecto humano en el medio ambiente, a principios del siglo XIX. Lo que ocurre ahora, más allá de eso, es que se está desarrollando una conciencia del impacto severo de 200 años de expansión industrial agresiva, incluyendo explotación de recursos, construcción urbana y remodelación terrenal sin precedentes.

Estamos llegando a un punto de inflexión, después del que la ciencia no podrá evitar la necesidad de reconocer y manejar los impactos de la actividad humana en los sistemas naturales. Se ve ahora alteraciones fundamentales en la sedimentación, calidad de tierra, patrones geológicos y habitat biológico, hasta en la misma flora y fauna que habita los sistemas naturales afectados, y en la atmósfera respirable.

Específicamente:

From the beginning of the Industrial Revolution to the present day, global human population has climbed rapidly from under a billion to its current 6.5 billion (Fig. 1), and it continues to rise. The exploitation of coal, oil, and gas in particular has enabled planet-wide industrialization, construction, and mass transport, the ensuing changes encompassing a wide variety of phenomena, summarized as follows. [...]

Humans have caused a dramatic increase in erosion and the denudation of the continents, both directly, through agriculture and construction, and indirectly, by damming most major rivers, that now exceeds natural sediment production by an order of magnitude [...]

Carbon dioxide levels (379 ppm in 2005) are over a third higher than in pre-industrial times and at any time in the past 0.9 million years [...]

The projected temperature rise will certainly cause changes in habitat beyond environmental tolerance for many taxa (Thomas et al., 2004). The effects will be more severe than in past glacial-interglacial transitions because, with the anthropogenic fragmentation of natural ecosystems, ‘escape’ routes are fewer.

Los mecanismos principales de resistencia ecológica se ven erosionados, y el medio ambiente natural se encuentra menos capaz de adaptarse a los cambios en los sistemas naturales y su manera de competir dentro de y entre sí. El estudio también cita evidencia de un nivel acelerado de extinción de especies y de la creciente probabilidad de una ola masiva de extinciones, resultado directo de la actividad humana.

La comunidad científica ha comenzado a elaborar modelos informáticos del sistema natural integral, un complejo de ecosistemas e interacciones a nivel planetario. Esos modelos servirán para averiguar hasta qué punto la actividad humana influye en el medio ambiente y cómo se puede actuar para mitigar esos impactos y lograr un futuro más sostenible, y más capaz de seguir proporcionando los beneficios naturales necesarios como base de la civilización humana.

La idea del periodo Antropoceno es más que una clasificación cronológica del momento en el que nos encontramos. Se trata de una conciencia cada vez más desarrollada de la necesidad de modificar nuestras tendencias para colaborar con los sistemas naturales de los que dependemos tanto para la supervivencia. Es un despertar al efecto que tiene nuestro nivel de vida, nuestra producción y consumo industriales, y a lo que significa la integración de las sociedades alrededor del planeta, en una red global de comunicación y un mercado global de intercambio material y cultural.

Es posible ahora hablar de una creciente conciencia global de la necesidad de cambiar las motivaciones básicas de la política estatal, el negocio privado, el consumo y los mercados en general. Es posible ahora hablar de un momento en el que la evidencia existe para darnos cuenta del poder que tiene la industria de una civilización globalizada sobre el medio ambiente.

La época Antropocena existe porque el impacto medioambiental ya no se trata de un impacto local, en un ambiente limitado, sino de un impacto a nivel global, con secuelas en ecosistemas que no parecen tener contacto directo con la causa de su malestar. El cambio de pensamiento que ahora viene tiene que coincidir con una creciente capacidad de imaginación y colaboración, para dejar atrás la dependencia peligrosa que nos ata a los combustibles fósil.

• Geological Society of America: “Are we now living in the Anthropocene”
• Financial Times / MSNBC: “Scientists warn of a new Anthropocene age”
• About.com Geology: “Introducing the Anthropocene”
• Max-Planck-Institut für Chemie: “Anthropocene” [article that coined the term]
• Resilience 2008: “Resilience, Adaptation & Transformation in Turbulent Times” [Conf., Stockholm 14-17 April]
• Albaeco, Sustainability School: “Masking Environmental Feedbacks”

As early as one day after the March 11 tsunami sparked the (still ongoing) nuclear crisis at the Fukushima Daiichi plant, Japan’s government had advanced radiation fallout and atmospheric modeling showing the area most likely to be hit by fallout from the explosions and the ongoing seepage. The government allegedly concealed this information, to prevent mass panic, but the result may have been the evacuation of large numbers of people to the most dangerous zones.

According to the New York Times:

Given no guidance from Tokyo, town officials led the residents north, believing that winter winds would be blowing south and carrying away any radioactive emissions. For three nights, while hydrogen explosions at four of the reactors spewed radiation into the air, they stayed in a district called Tsushima where the children played outside and some parents used water from a mountain stream to prepare rice.

The winds, in fact, had been blowing directly toward Tsushima — and town officials would learn two months later that a government computer system designed to predict the spread of radioactive releases had been showing just that.

But the forecasts were left unpublicized by bureaucrats in Tokyo, operating in a culture that sought to avoid responsibility and, above all, criticism. Japan’s political leaders at first did not know about the system and later played down the data, apparently fearful of having to significantly enlarge the evacuation zone — and acknowledge the accident’s severity.

Officials of the Japanese government have admitted there was a pattern of concealing information, denying known facts, even of releasing data that were modified to achieve more politically expedient outcomes, even as the nation and the world were waiting for a thorough and serious crisis response. The government reportedly withheld crucial modeling projections from the System for Prediction of Environmental Emergency Dose Information, also known as SPEEDI.

According to the Times, Seiki Soramoto, a former nuclear engineer who was asked for information by the prime minister, said “In the end, it was the prime minister’s office that hid the SPEEDI data, because they didn’t have the knowledge to know what the data meant, and thus they did not know what to say to the public, they thought only of their own safety, and decided it was easier just not to announce it.”

Though at least three of the six reactors were in meltdown, and were known to be, and the government was permitting the Tokyo Electric Power Company (TEPCo) to dump huge volumes of radioactive waste water into the Pacific Ocean, the status of meltdown was repeatedly denied, and was not acknowledged for several months.

In June, it was revealed that tellurium 132, an isotope that indicates a meltdown has occurred, was detected on the second day of the crisis, but the readings were kept from the public for three months. It is not clear how the alleged campaign of distorted data and concealed modeling might have impacted the crisis response, but scientists and engineers have expressed concern that the nuclear emergency response was stunted by inadequate information and poor decisions.

There are also likely to be new investigations into the public health consequences of the concealed information.

creative prosperity is sustainable prosperity

To build a future of vibrant open democracy and robust and sustainable economic prosperity, it is necessary to privilege creative activities and constructive solutions to the challenges we face. Addressing major challenges in constructive, innovative ways, is the single most significant driver, historically, of sustained economic booms. In short, we need to move deliberately and swiftly toward a creative prosperity agenda.

The first consideration, then, is to examine how the creative prosperity agenda would differ from what we are doing now. At present, we are wrestling with the complex fabric of consequence related to long-running economic distortions, most of which we have not yet corrected. Healthcare reform and financial regulatory reform were comprehensive in scope, but moderate in impact, cautious and rooted in the prevailing model; energy reform needs to move forward rapidly and do more to prioritize innovation.

We are facing a major, civilization-wide transition from one way of conceptualizing political and economic power to another. We stand at the dawn of what should be the global solidification of open democracy as the standard for elevating and defending human dignity and freedom of thought. But we need to build creative prosperity into that future, and this will require a fundamental shift in the dominant view which holds that power is more effective when concentrated in fewer hands.

That view comes from ancient times—from prehistoric times, in fact—when the governing principle of human life was the need to survive in competition with forces far more powerful than any one individual, family or band. Power, then, was a combination of accumulated resources and raw force. In that light, power is a destructive force, requiring intense concentration of resources and the ability to draw a line between the inside and the outside of the power circle.

the feudal (concentration) model

Economically, the fact of human society was that there was not enough technology, enough resources, enough liberty, to deliver real comfort to most or all people. In fact, there was only the material wealth to deliver substantial comfort to about 1 in every 100 people. The model of concentration allowed those in that 1 percent to cling to comfort and fight off would-be attackers.

The only way into the circle in which power, means and comfort were concentrated was to pay the toll for access. That might be done by force of arms, or by handing over significant sums of wealth. Paying the toll perpetuated the model, and won significant privileges for those who helped to make sure that system remained viable.

This developed eventually into authoritarian empires and the medieval elevation of aristocracy. The logic of the model of concentration held: those inside the circle must remain there, and the society must be organized to keep them there. They were, it was presumed, worth more than other people, and so they were able to treat their privilege as if it were part of a life of service—maintaining law and order—to those with less.

the democracy (decentralization) model

Modern democracy posits an entirely different model: the model of decentralization. Modern democracy, according to the ideals of the American revolution and the French revolution, requires a comprehensive departure from the status quo of feudal dominance. It requires the engineering of a model for economic and political activity whereby power cannot be concentrated, and where excessive concentration of power brings disadvantage.

A creative prosperity agenda for public policy and economic renewal would put aside the bias of the old model, once and for all, asking enterprises large and small to join together in a fabric of imaginative competition, prioritizing localization, innovation and service value to the marketplace. It would help to recapture the energy of modern democracy, wherein monopolies and juggernauts sputter and trudge, slowed by their weight, and individuals and small businesses are better able to take the field, to effect positive change, to feed a generalized economic expansion.

The key to that model is the vibrancy of an expanding and upwardly mobile middle class. Achieving that means doing what the United States did so effectively in the 1950s and 1960s, decentralizing the levers for creating wealth, allowing more free people to participate not only as citizens but as leaders and entrepreneurs.

losing our former focus on creative (decentralized) prosperity

A period of intensive deregulation in key industries has led the United States’ economy into a period of prolonged slow growth, because it has led to the hyper-concentration of wealth and of access to the levers of wealth-creation generally. Average household income has dropped by about $2,500 since 2000, even as the gap between average pay and the earnings of the wealthiest has expanded to historic highs.

There is a problematic knock-on effect of this, which is that innovation is no longer a priority, as major conglomerates seek first of all to secure their position. Upstarts like Apple are not emerging at the rate they were during previous periods of economic expansion, and the most powerful, most concentrated interests—Apple now among them—are controlling the field of play.

recapturing momentum: how to build a creative prosperity agenda

There are a couple of key changes that need to take place to move toward a creative prosperity agenda:

1. Move from a bias favoring large conglomerates to one against them;
2. Move away from subsidies for high-polluting, low-yield fossil fuels;
3. Move toward clean energy technologies that favor rapid innovation, brainy startups, more robust job creation, and local economies;
4. Revive national commitment, public and private, to infrastructure redevelopment;
5. Provide direct tax credits for real job creation (payable on a per-job basis);
6. Establish sustainability incentives for municipalities (ref: Sustainable Jersey), states and businesses;
7. Establish an aggressive Renewable Portfolio Standard;
8. Prioritize higher education spending, including post-graduate studies incentives for businesses looking to sponsor their employees;
9. Introduce critical thinking, macroeconomic studies, engineering basics and public policy debate, to public high schools—judge these as more valuable than test scores;
10. Make sure tax reforms are not regressive; make sure they prioritize family and community-level “thriving”, i.e. asset-building, quality of life and spending power;
11. Tax derivative financial instruments at a higher rate than direct capital investments in enterprise, innovation and hiring;
12. Apply national policy to correct market distortions relating to fossil fuel costs.

The outcome of this process of reform would be:

• accelerated, more widespread innovation;
• entree for creative small business models;
• unprecedented opportunities for sustained hiring;
• more vibrant, resilient local economies;
• a consumer-centered smart electricity grid;
• cleaner air and water;
• a sustainable economy where growth is not tied to the promotion of vast negative externalities;
• more robust civic engagement from citizens, communities and creative thinkers…

The United States is perfectly capable of achieving this kind of virtuous cycle between democratization, decentralization, creative thinking, entrepreneurship and the expansion of the middle class. But substantive policy changes need to be made—to remove the incentive for corrosive activities that favor the unhealthy concentration of wealth and productive capacity and motivate the revival of generative activities that favor the healthy decentralization of assets and productive capacity.

A vibrant middle class—where the best ideas can come to the fore and be implemented and the dignity and worth of citizens and communities takes priority over the naked pursuit of profit—is better suited to fostering creative, sustainable prosperity. The first step is to recognize where we favor profit over people, and then work to change the prevailing model and free human creative talent to achieve that goal.

TheHotSpring.net :: Yemen may be where the Arab spring, this sweeping current of democratic upheaval in the Arabic-speaking world, takes a turn definitively toward violence or toward civic solutions. The regime of Ali Abdullah Saleh, a tribal dictatorship using feudal power tactics, based in the capital Sanaa, is now waging one war against extremist Islamists and another against non-violent pro-democracy protesters.

Yemen is an intensely poor country, likely to see its dwindling fresh water resources 100% depleted before any nation in the world, and could be the global home-base for jihadist extremists. Yemen could also, however, be a sparkling example of how peaceful democratic change can bring sustainable prosperity and security to an otherwise impoverished society ruled by feudal warlords and kleptocratic dictators.

The gap between the democracy movement and the regime is stark: while protesters are lawyers and doctors, university professors and economists, the dictator Saleh has only a high-school-level education. Saleh’s former allies have tired of his brutality, and are demanding that he immediately cease all violence against civilians, and honor his multiple pledges to leave power, allowing for a peaceful democratic transition.

Much of the country is illiterate, and tribal politics continue to be an easy way to sow division, to justify cold-blooded killing, and to undermine the progress promised by peaceful protesters. Even the government seems unable to comprehensively put down the Islamist militia vying for power in the deep south. And neither the protesters nor Saleh have been able to fashion a secure plan for bringing prosperity back to Yemeni ports on the Gulf of Aden.

The Yemeni democracy movement is well read, well educated and rooted in a commitment to nonviolence. Yet there are grave concerns that if the regime succeeds in applying the tactics of Col. Muammar Qadhafi—the once and possibly former Libyan dictator of four decades—Yemen could descend into a failed state status reminiscent of its neighbor across the water, Somalia.

Heavily armed Somali pirates—linked to a vast black-market criminal network which feeds the ongoing Somali civil war—have become a menace to global shipping through the Gulf of Aden, the main southern route of entry into the Suez Canal. That vast criminal network has expanded the power of Islamist militia in southern Somalia, and has contributed to the intensification of drought, famine and social collapse.

Yemen may be more at risk than Somalia in many ways, should collapse follow the atrocities committed by Saleh against the Yemeni people. The pro-democracy movement needs to maintain its non-violent approach, but plan for significant innovations and improvements in the process of governing and of economic development and planning.

Yemen is strategic enough to warrant major foreign investment, debt forgiveness and development aid, and its ports might be able to benefit from a secure, reliable, democratic challenge to the armed chaos in Somalia and throughout the Gulf of Aden. Mokha (on the Red Sea), Aden and Ta’izz could form a powerful new economic hub for regional trade, facilitating passage from the Gulf of Aden into the Red Sea.

Ta’izz, the intellectual capital of Yemen, could develop into the administrative center of power governing the new port industry. Such an outcome would be very much in the interests of the international community, as Ta’izz is the virtual home base of the surprising, liberal and modern pro-democracy movement.

Al Mukallah, in the remote east of the country, could be a first-stop along the coast of safe passage, if such a situation could be cultivated and secured. Mokha could be a Red Sea trading post, bridging the African and Asian continents in ways strategically designed to sow stability, mutual interest and prosperity.

The United Nations would likely need to be involved in helping to secure a fledgling Yemeni democracy against the chaos and sabotage sought by militant groups on the one hand and by regime loyalists on the other. But the development strategy makes sense for the region and for the wider world: instability anywhere inflates risk everywhere, and long-term planning for the Gulf of Aden trading zone is more than worth any time, effort and resources required to lay the groundwork.

An added benefit would come to Yemen, which as a safe harbor state with revitalized, modernized port cities, would be able to more easily gain access to an affordable imported flow of fresh water, and to afford state of the art desalinization facilities. We know that fresh water resource is urgently needed to prevent the total collapse of civil society in Yemen, and brining that resource value to Yemen could raise its profile among Arabian states, building into the fabric of economic cooperation which as of now, eludes it almost entirely.

The road from Mokha to Sanaa, like the road from Aden to Sanaa, should run through Ta’izz, allowing for what could become a virtuous feedback between the ideals of democratic government and the ideals of a vibrant trading culture in which not all wealth flows to or through the hands of the individuals who hold political power. It could create a more balanced and decentralized relationship between the people of Yemen and the power of those who govern them.

In short, the storied and problematic history of Yemen, along with the vast and surging need for new economic development, creates a real opportunity for massive coordinated international assistance to the nonviolent political activists who are seeking to build a modern, democratic civil society, and to build unprecedented cooperative links between Yemeni society and the outside world.

TheHotSpring.net :: The rupture of a pipeline in Montana has caused at least several tens of thousands of barrels of oil to spill into the pristine Yellowstone River, raising concerns about the tar sands pipeline planned to pass through the most important fossil aquifer in North America. The spill is precisely the kind of irreversible and unnecessary environmental disaster conservationists, farmers, energy reformers and local activists across the Great Plains seek to prevent.

The initial reports cited Exxon-Mobil spokespeople explaining that only a few hundred barrels of oil had been released into the river, and that the multinational was bringing in top cleanup experts from across the nation to do the most advanced cleanup work possible. But yesterday the news came that the spill had in fact released at least several tens of thousands of barrels of oil into the Yellowstone River, threatening pristine wilderness, delicate ecosystems, and human health, across several states.

Exxon-Mobil now says its expert cleanup effort is being hampered by Mother Nature. The takeaway seems to be that, more than twenty years after the catastrophic Exxon-Valdez spill, the oil giant has used its routine megaprofits to produce no viable cleanup strategy. It also appears there was insufficient maintenance to an insufficiently constructed pipeline, and a near total disregard for the potential impact on the natural and human environment.

The scale of the disaster was revealed when the multinational’s false reports were shown to be false by huge amounts of oil washing up on farmed land and spilling over the banks of the rising river. Critics say Exxon-Mobil’s complaints that rising waters are responsible for hampering the cleanup effort reflect the company’s frustration with how that same phenomenon revealed it had lied to the press and, presumably, to authorities, about the scale of the spill.

The material composition of the nation’s energy markets has a lot to do with this kind of crisis. Unreasoned overreliance on carbon-based combustible fuels continues even now, in the second decade of the 21st century, to incentivize irresponsible practices that threaten other natural resources, as well as animal life, arable land, aquifers and human health.

Hydrocarbon fuels currently comprise such a significant segment of the overall energy landscape, they are clearly built into our energy future, to some extent, but their current dominance does not reflect their viability as resources that produce optimum benefit to our society or our economy. The Yellowstone spill is just the latest in a seemingly unending chain of events that demonstrate the very serious dangers inherent in depending on fossil fuels as the baseload (or “go to”) energy resource.

The combustion-based energy extraction model goes back to the days when fire was first discovered and harnessed. It has served to help human civilization achieve great advances and humanize the planet, both in terms of resource-use and the expression of ideas. But that does not mean it does not bring with it the drawbacks of a primitive technological paradigm.

The amount of waste built into the combustible fuels model of energy extraction is startling. Only 2% of the energy from burning coal reaches the lightbulb in your home. The other 98% is lost, mostly in the form of uncontained heat. But the risk of uncontrolled spills, into pristine wilderness, delicate ecosystems, groundwater and the food production process, is worst with oil.

The BP spill in the Gulf of Mexico, over several months in 2010, showed that across the entire oil industry, there is still a glaring lack of advanced strategy for doing immediate, effective and total cleanup. The Yellowstone spill appears to show that even on a much smaller scale, that lack of understanding and know-how plagues the industry and threatens the natural and human environment.

We don’t, in fact, have to rely on combustible fuels anymore, as the state of the art in clean renewable resources, like wind and solar, is now sufficient to extract enough energy to power the US economy. All that we are lacking is the state of the art energy infrastructure required to harness clean renewable energy on that scale.

That the nation is undergoing a prolonged job-creation slowdown is just one hint that the time is right for a major investment in new state of the art energy infrastructure. The emerging race with China for the global clean energy future (China is now investing an estimated $600 billion in developing, producing and acquiring advanced clean energy technology) is another.

But it is the massive externalized costs (costs passed on by industry to taxpayers and consumers) that pose an immediate and continuing threat to the economic wellbeing of the nation. The externalized costs of oil include not only the massive costs of even small spills, which are far more frequent and numerous than is widely reported, but also the impact of pollution on human health, the impact of heat-trapping emissions on the stability of climate bands on which all human civilization depends.

Wind and solar energy have no cleanup costs, no hidden human health costs, no climate-band dislocation costs, no long-term costs associated with burning and wasting the resource itself, no world-record military spending costs, and need pose no risk whatsoever to groundwater or the human food supply.

The Yellowstone spill has to be a signal to the American people, the United States Congress and to markets, that the time has come to phase out our reliance on fossil fuels. The way to phase out that reliance is to incentivize a shift to the construction of state of the art smart grid infrastructure and the proliferation of technologies to harness clean, renewable energy from the environment.

As of this writing, Exxon-Mobil now says the scale of the spill could be worse than has so far been reported, but has not yet released new numbers, beyond the latest estimate of 42,000. It appears the pattern of reporting is following the customary pattern for such spills, where the company involved starts with severe underreporting and little by little increases the estimates until an eventual admission of massive, catastrophic levels of contamination of the environment.

TheHotSpring.net :: Citizens Climate Lobby is an international non-partisan, non-profit volunteer organization, working to build political will for a livable world. To do that, they aim to find an ideologically neutral, democratically viable, market-focused way to reduce the amount of carbon trapped in Earth’s atmosphere and speed the transition to clean, renewable fuels. I am proud to be a member of the organization, and one who is inspired by the passion of its volunteers and fortunate to count so many good friends among its partners.

This past week, the organization took its campaign to Capitol Hill, bringing 85 volunteers to 140 office visits in the United States Congress —both houses, both parties— along with the State Department, the Department of Energy and the World Bank. The project is more than a response to fallout from excess atmospheric carbon dioxide; the CCL project involves connecting citizens with decision-makers on Capitol Hill, to take ideology out of the energy debate, and fashion policy more democratically.

CCL proposes addressing the carbon crisis in a new and different way, which in fact avoids the pitfalls of more complex and unwieldy past attempts at reducing overall emissions: the proposed Carbon Fee and Dividend Act of 2011 would put a fee on carbon-emitting fuels at the source, then deliver 100% of that money directly to American families and households.

The plan avoids the need to create burdensome new regulatory infrastructure, does not deliver any new revenue to the federal government, and turns the power to forge a brighter, more economically efficient energy future back over to the American people, the marketplace. By unmasking the massive externalized costs (not paid by industry) of fossil fuel dependency, but covering consumers so the transition is not traumatic, the fee and dividend proposal allows the virtues of a genuine market to operate.

The CCL mission is guided by the principle that when people remain open to one another, to differences of opinion and to opposing views, they can fashion a dialogue based on common vocabulary and put aside ideological biases. This, then, should allow for intelligent people, working to serve their nation in the most forthright and meaningful way possible, to work together to craft practical solutions to practical problems.

Climate destabilization has been turned into an intensely partisan issue, in which ideological assumptions and partisan strategy trump cooperative civics and negotiated problem solving. This is bad for democracy and bad for the human environment, in which impacts from inaction are mounting, and the economic fallout looks to be accelerating, certainly beyond the current window of opportunity to act.

The challenge of the political moment is to find a way around the intense partisan divide, and that is no small task.

On Capitol Hill, there is frustration on both sides of the aisle with the inability of Congress to work together in a responsible way on practical issues, and much of the gridlock is due to ideological bias interfering with sound policy judgment. But the United States now faces another moment of urgency regarding climate and energy: China is racing ahead with massive investment in clean energy resources, even as it expands at record pace its use of the dirtiest form of fuel, coal.

The Chinese agenda, to take control of the global marketplace for new technologies, not by manufacturing alone, but by developing the newest, most cutting-edge technologies that will build the future economy of the world, means the United States now sees its dominance in technological innovation and research and development threatened. If we, as a nation, do not succeed in building the foundations for the global clean energy economy of the 1st century, our ability to compete internationally, and to thrive domestically, will face constant pressure.

The most advanced intelligence work of Pentagon analysts has found that sustainability and security are now intertwined and cannot be disentangled: economic sustainability, environmental sustainability, the sustainability of alliances, of political borders, of nation states, of an economic model that allows us to thrive in relative peace and security, are all linked, and the emerging national strategic narrative [pdf], capable of addressing the complexity of the global environment, needs to rethink the paradigm of threat and risk, and view such challenges as opportunities to shape and influence the landscape of human civilization, for the better.

The great success of this week of CCL lobbying on Capitol Hill was that individual volunteers, the citizen-based movement as a whole, and some of those who sat in meetings with the organization, experienced breakthroughs in terms of openness and interest in dealing with this issue as one of practical problems demanding practical solutions.

It is CCL’s mission to work with members of Congress of all variety of ideological inclinations, many of whom have never been able to share a constructive conversation about climate or energy, with one another, to build a coalition based on citizen interest and a shared vocabulary for building a vibrant and resilient, cutting-edge clean energy economy, through which sustainable American prosperity and quality of life can be secured in this century.

It will be citizens who build, manifest and deliver the political will to achieve these vital goals, and success will mean the strengthening of our democracy and our economic future.

Weekly Address: “Instead of Subsidizing Yesterday’s Energy Sources, We Need to Invest in Tomorrow’s”

WASHINGTON – In his weekly address, President Obama laid out his plans to address rising gas prices over the short and the long term. While there is no silver bullet to bring down prices right away, there are a few things we can do. This week, the Attorney General launched a task force dedicated to rooting out fraud or manipulations in the oil markets. The President called for finally ending the $4 billion in taxpayer money that the oil and gas companies receive annually. And, we need to continue safe, responsible production of oil at home. But in the long term, we need to invest in clean, renewable energy. That is why the President strongly disagrees with a proposal in Congress that cuts our investments in clean energy by 70 percent.

Remarks of President Barack Obama
Weekly Address on Gas Prices
Saturday, April 23, 2011
Washington, DC

This is a time of year when people get together with family and friends to observe Passover and to celebrate Easter. It’s a chance to give thanks for our blessings and reaffirm our faith, while spending time with the people we love. We all know how important that is – especially in hard times. And that’s what a lot of people are facing these days.

Even though the economy is growing again and we’ve seen businesses adding jobs over the past year, many are still looking for work. And even if you haven’t faced a job loss, it’s still not easy out there. Your paycheck isn’t getting bigger, while the cost of everything from college for your kids to gas for your car keeps rising. That’s something on a lot of people’s minds right now, with gas prices at $4 a gallon. It’s just another burden when things were already pretty tough.

Now, whenever gas prices shoot up, like clockwork, you see politicians racing to the cameras, waving three-point plans for two dollar gas. You see people trying to grab headlines or score a few points. The truth is, there’s no silver bullet that can bring down gas prices right away.

But there are a few things we can do. This includes safe and responsible production of oil at home, which we are pursuing. In fact, last year, American oil production reached its highest level since 2003. On Thursday, my Attorney General also launched a task force with just one job: rooting out cases of fraud or manipulation in the oil markets that might affect gas prices, including any illegal activity by traders and speculators. We’re going to make sure that no one is taking advantage of the American people for their own short-term gain. And another step we need to take is to finally end the $4 billion in taxpayer subsidies we give to the oil and gas companies each year. That’s $4 billion of your money going to these companies when they’re making record profits and you’re paying near record prices at the pump. It has to stop.

Instead of subsidizing yesterday’s energy sources, we need to invest in tomorrow’s. We need to invest in clean, renewable energy. In the long term, that’s the answer. That’s the key to helping families at the pump and reducing our dependence on foreign oil. We can see that promise already. Thanks to an historic agreement we secured with all the major auto companies, we’re raising the fuel economy of cars and trucks in America, using hybrid technology and other advances. As a result, if you buy a new car in the next few years, the better gas mileage is going to save you about $3,000 at the pump.

But we need to do more. We need to harness the potential I’ve seen at promising start-ups and innovative clean energy companies across America. And that’s at the heart of a debate we’re having right now in Washington about the budget.

Both Democrats and Republicans believe we need to reduce the deficit. That’s where we agree. The question we’re debating is how we do it. I’ve proposed a balanced approach that cuts spending while still investing in things like education and clean energy that are so critical to creating jobs and opportunities for the middle class. It’s a simple idea: we need to live within our means while at the same time investing in our future.

That’s why I disagree so strongly with a proposal in Congress that cuts our investments in clean energy by 70 percent. Yes, we have to get rid of wasteful spending – and make no mistake, we’re going through every line of the budget scouring for savings. But we can do that without sacrificing our future. We can do that while still investing in the technologies that will create jobs and allow the United States to lead the world in new industries. That’s how we’ll not only reduce the deficit, but also lower our dependence on foreign oil, grow the economy, and leave for our children a safer planet. And that’s what our mission has to be.

Thanks for listening, and have a great weekend.

In more than 100 years of Nobel Peace Prizes, only a dozen women have ever won. Civil-rights and peace activist Jody Williams, received the award in 1997 as the chief strategist of the International Campaign to Ban Landmines, which established the ?rst global treaty banning antipersonnel mines.

Williams believes that peace is de?ned by human (not national) security and that it must be achieved through sustainable development, environmental justice, and meeting people’s basic needs. To this end, she co-founded the Nobel Women’s Initiative, endorsed by six of seven living female Peace laureates. She chairs the effort to support activists, researchers, and others working toward peace, justice, and equality for women and thus humanity. Williams also continues to ?ght for the total global eradication of landmines.

The following text is an official transcript of Pres. Obama’s remarks to a joint session of the Indian Parliament, as delivered on Monday, 8 November 2010, at Parliament House, New Delhi, India

5:40 P.M. IST

THE PRESIDENT: Mr. Vice President, Madam Speaker, Mr. Prime Minister, members of Lok Sabha and Rajya Sabha, and most of all, the people of India.

I thank you for the great honor of addressing the representatives of more than one billion Indians and the world’s largest democracy. (Applause.) I bring the greetings and friendship of the world’s oldest democracy —- the United States of America, including nearly three million proud and patriotic Indian-Americans. (Applause.)

Over the past three days, my wife Michelle and I have experienced the — and dynamism of India and its people — from the majesty of Humayun’s Tomb to the advanced technologies that are empowering farmers and women who are the backbone of Indian society; from the Diwali celebrations with schoolchildren to the innovators who are fueling India’s economic rise; from the university students who will chart India’s future, to you —-leaders who helped to bring India to this moment of extraordinary promise.

At every stop, we have been welcomed with the hospitality for which Indians have always been known. So, to you and the people of India, on behalf of me, Michelle and the American people, please accept my deepest thanks. (Applause.) Bahoot dhanyavad. (Applause.)

Now, I am not the first American President to visit India. Nor will I be the last. But I am proud to visit India so early in my presidency. It’s no coincidence that India is my first stop on a visit to Asia, or that this has been my longest visit to another country since becoming President. (Applause.) For in Asia and around the world, India is not simply emerging; India has emerged. (Applause.)

And it is my firm belief that the relationship between the United States and India -— bound by our shared interests and our shared values -— will be one of the defining partnerships of the 21st century. This is the partnership I’ve come here to build. This is the vision that our nations can realize together.

My confidence in our shared future is grounded in my respect for India’s treasured past -— a civilization that’s been shaping the world for thousands of years. Indians unlocked the intricacies of the human body and the vastness of our universe. It’s no exaggeration to say that our Information Age is rooted in Indian innovations —- including the number zero. (Applause.)

Of course, India not only opened our minds, she expanded our moral imaginations — with religious texts that still summon the faithful to lives of dignity and discipline, with poets who imagined a future “where the mind is without fear and the head is held high” — (applause) — and with a man whose message of love and justice endures -— the father of your nation, Mahatma Gandhi. (Applause.)

For me and Michelle, this visit has, therefore, held special meaning. See, throughout my life, including my work as a young man on behalf of the urban poor, I’ve always found inspiration in the life of Gandhiji and his simple and profound lesson to be the change we seek in the world. (Applause.) And just as he summoned Indians to seek their destiny, he influenced champions of equality in my own country, including a young preacher named Martin Luther King. After making his pilgrimage to India a half-century ago, Dr. King called Gandhi’s philosophy of non-violent resistance “the only logical and moral approach” in the struggle for justice and progress. (Applause.)

So we were honored to visit the residence where Gandhi and King both stayed —- Mani Bhavan. And we were humbled to pay our respects at Raj Ghat. And I am mindful that I might not be standing before you today, as President of the United States, had it not been for Gandhi and the message he shared and inspired with America and the world. (Applause.)

An ancient civilization of science and innovation; a fundamental faith in human progress — this is the sturdy foundation upon which you have built ever since that stroke of midnight when the tricolor was raised over a free and independent India. (Applause.) And despite the skeptics who said this country was simply too poor, or too vast, or too diverse to succeed, you surmounted overwhelming odds and became a model to the world.

Instead of slipping into starvation, you launched a Green Revolution that fed millions. Instead of becoming dependent on commodities and exports, you invested in science and technology and in your greatest resource —- the Indian people. And the world sees the results, from the supercomputers you build to the Indian flag that you put on the moon.

Instead of resisting the global economy, you became one of its engines —- reforming the licensing raj and unleashing an economic marvel that has lifted tens of millions of people from poverty and created one of the world’s largest middle classes.

Instead of succumbing to division, you have shown that the strength of India —- the very idea of India —- is its embrace of all colors, all castes, all creeds. (Applause.) It’s the diversity represented in this chamber today. It’s the richness of faiths celebrated by a visitor to my hometown of Chicago more than a century ago -— the renowned Swami Vivekananda. He said that, “holiness, purity and charity are not the exclusive possessions of any church in the world, and that every system has produced men and women of the most exalted character.”

And instead of being lured by the false notion that progress must come at the expense of freedom, you built the institutions upon which true democracy depends —- free and fair elections, which enable citizens to choose their own leaders without recourse to arms — (applause) — an independent judiciary and the rule of law, which allows people to address their grievances; and a thriving free press and vibrant civil society which allows every voice to be heard. This year, as India marks 60 years with a strong and democratic constitution, the lesson is clear: India has succeeded, not in spite of democracy; India has succeeded because of democracy. (Applause.)

Now, just as India has changed, so, too, has the relationship between our two nations. In the decades after independence, India advanced its interests as a proud leader of the nonaligned movement. Yet, too often, the United States and India found ourselves on opposite sides of a North-`South divide, estranged by a long Cold War. Those days are over.

Here in India, two successive governments led by different parties have recognized that deeper partnership with America is both natural and necessary. And in the United States, both of my predecessors —- one a Democrat, one a Republican -— worked to bring us closer, leading to increased trade and a landmark civil nuclear agreement. (Applause.)

So since that time, people in both our countries have asked: What’s next? How can we build on this progress and realize the full potential of our partnership? That’s what I want to address today —- the future that the United States seeks in an interconnected world, and why I believe that India is indispensable to this vision; how we can forge a truly global partnership -— not just in one or two areas, but across many; not just for our mutual benefit, but for the benefit of the world.

Of course, only Indians can determine India’s national interests and how to advance them on the world stage. But I stand before you today because I am convinced that the interests of the United States —- and the interests we share with India -—are best advanced in partnership. I believe that. (Applause.)

The United States seeks security —- the security of our country, our allies and partners. We seek prosperity -— a strong and growing economy in an open international economic system. We seek respect for universal values. And we seek a just and sustainable international order that promotes peace and security by meeting global challenges through stronger global cooperation.

Now, to advance these interests, I have committed the United States to comprehensive engagement with the world, based on mutual interest and mutual respect. And a central pillar of this engagement is forging deeper cooperation with 21st century centers of influence -— and that must necessarily include India.

Now, India is not the only emerging power in the world. But relationships between our countries is unique. For we are two strong democracies whose constitutions begin with the same revolutionary words —- the same revolutionary words — “We the people.” We are two great republics dedicated to the liberty and justice and equality of all people. And we are two free market economies where people have the freedom to pursue ideas and innovation that can change the world. And that’s why I believe that India and America are indispensable partners in meeting the challenges of our time. (Applause.)

Since taking office, I’ve, therefore, made our relationship a priority. I was proud to welcome Prime Minister Singh for the first official state visit of my presidency. (Applause.) For the first time ever, our governments are working together across the whole range of common challenges that we face. Now, let me say it as clearly as I can: The United States not only welcomes India as a rising global power, we fervently support it, and we have worked to help make it a reality.

Together with our partners, we have made the G20 the premier forum for international economic cooperation, bringing more voices to the table of global economic decision-making, and that has included India. We’ve increased the role of emerging economies like India at international financial institutions. We valued India’s important role at Copenhagen, where, for the first time, all major economies committed to take action to confront climate change —- and to stand by those actions. We salute India’s long history as a leading contributor to United Nations peacekeeping missions. And we welcome India as it prepares to take its seat on the United Nations Security Council. (Applause.)

In short, with India assuming its rightful place in the world, we have an historic opportunity to make the relationship between our two countries a defining partnership of the century ahead. And I believe we can do so by working together in three important areas.

First, as global partners we can promote prosperity in both our countries. Together, we can create the high-tech, high-wage jobs of the future. With my visit, we are now ready to begin implementing our civil nuclear agreement. This will help meet India’s growing energy needs and create thousands of jobs in both of our countries. (Applause.)

We need to forge partnerships in high-tech sectors like defense and civil space. So we’ve removed Indian organizations from our so-called “entity list.” And we’ll work to remove — and reform our controls on exports. Both of these steps will ensure that Indian companies seeking high-tech trade and technologies from America are treated the same as our very closest allies and partners. (Applause.)

We can pursue joint research and development to create green jobs; give India more access to cleaner, affordable energy; meet the commitments we made at Copenhagen; and show the possibilities of low-carbon growth.

And together, we can resist the protectionism that stifles growth and innovation. The United States remains —- and will continue to remain —- one of the most open economies in the world. And by opening markets and reducing barriers to foreign investment, India can realize its full economic potential as well. As G20 partners, we can make sure the global economic recovery is strong and is durable. And we can keep striving for a Doha Round that is ambitious and is balanced —- with the courage to make the compromises that are necessary so global trade works for all economies.

Together, we can strengthen agriculture. Cooperation between Indian and American researchers and scientists sparked the Green Revolution. Today, India is a leader in using technology to empower farmers, like those I met yesterday who get free updates on market and weather conditions on their cell phones. And the United States is a leader in agricultural productivity and research. Now, as farmers and rural areas face the effects of climate change and drought, we’ll work together to spark a second, more sustainable Evergreen Revolution.

Together, we’re improving Indian weather forecasting systems before the next monsoon season. We aim to help millions of Indian farmers — farming households save water and increase productivity, improve food processing so crops don’t spoil on the way to market, and enhance climate and crop forecasting to avoid losses that cripple communities and drive up food prices.

And as part of our food security initiative, we’re going to share India’s expertise with farmers in Africa. And this is an indication of India’s rise —- that we can now export hard-earned expertise to countries that see India as a model for agricultural development. It’s another powerful example of how American and Indian partnership can address an urgent global challenge.

Because the wealth of a nation also depends on the health of its people, we’ll continue to support India’s effort against diseases like tuberculosis and HIV/AIDS, and as global partners, we’ll work to improve global health by preventing the spread of pandemic flu. And because knowledge is the currency of the 21st century, we will increase exchanges between our students, our colleges and our universities, which are among the best in the world.

As we work to advance our shared prosperity, we can partner to address a second priority —- and that is our shared security. In Mumbai, I met with the courageous families and survivors of that barbaric attack. And here in Parliament, which was itself targeted because of the democracy it represents, we honor the memory of all those who have been taken from us, including American citizens on 26/11 and Indian citizens on 9/11.

This is the bond that we share. It’s why we insist that nothing ever justifies the slaughter of innocent men, women and children. It’s why we’re working together, more closely than ever, to prevent terrorist attacks and to deepen our cooperation even further. And it’s why, as strong and resilient societies, we refuse to live in fear. We will not sacrifice the values and rule of law that defines us, and we will never waver in the defense of our people.

America’s fight against al Qaeda and its terrorist affiliates is why we persevere in Afghanistan, where major development assistance from India has improved the lives of the Afghan people. We’re making progress in our mission to break the Taliban’s momentum and to train Afghan forces so they can take the lead for their security. And while I have made it clear that American forces will begin the transition to Afghan responsibility next summer, I’ve also made it clear that America’s commitment to the Afghan people will endure. The United States will not abandon the people of Afghanistan -— or the region -— to violent extremists who threaten us all.

Our strategy to disrupt and dismantle and defeat al Qaeda and its affiliates has to succeed on both sides of the border. And that’s why we have worked with the Pakistani government to address the threat of terrorist networks in the border region. The Pakistani government increasingly recognizes that these networks are not just a threat outside of Pakistan —- they are a threat to the Pakistani people, as well. They’ve suffered greatly at the hands of violent extremists over the last several years.

And we’ll continue to insist to Pakistan’s leaders that terrorist safe havens within their borders are unacceptable, and that terrorists behind the Mumbai attacks must be brought to justice. (Applause.) We must also recognize that all of us have an interest in both an Afghanistan and a Pakistan that is stable and prosperous and democratic —- and India has an interest in that, as well.

In pursuit of regional security, we will continue to welcome dialogue between India and Pakistan, even as we recognize that disputes between your two countries can only be resolved by the people of your two countries.

More broadly, India and the United States can partner in Asia. Today, the United States is once again playing a leadership role in Asia —- strengthening old alliances; deepening relationships, as we are doing with China; and we’re reengaging with regional organizations like ASEAN and joining the East Asia summit —- organizations in which India is also a partner. Like your neighbors in Southeast Asia, we want India not only to “look East,” we want India to “engage East” —- because it will increase the security and prosperity of all our nations.

As two global leaders, the United States and India can partner for global security —- especially as India serves on the Security Council over the next two years. Indeed, the just and sustainable international order that America seeks includes a United Nations that is efficient, effective, credible and legitimate. That is why I can say today, in the years ahead, I look forward to a reformed United Nations Security Council that includes India as a permanent member. (Applause.)

Now, let me suggest that with increased power comes increased responsibility. The United Nations exists to fulfill its founding ideals of preserving peace and security, promoting global cooperation, and advancing human rights. These are the responsibilities of all nations, but especially those that seek to lead in the 21st century. And so we look forward to working with India —- and other nations that aspire to Security Council membership -— to ensure that the Security Council is effective; that resolutions are implemented, that sanctions are enforced; that we strengthen the international norms which recognize the rights and responsibilities of all nations and all individuals.

This includes our responsibility to prevent the spread of nuclear weapons. Since I took office, the United States has reduced the role of nuclear weapons in our national security strategy, and we’ve agreed with Russia to reduce our own arsenals. We have put preventing nuclear proliferation and nuclear terrorism at the top of our nuclear agenda, and we have strengthened the cornerstone of the global non-proliferation regime, which is the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty.

Together, the United States and India can pursue our goal of securing the world’s vulnerable nuclear materials. We can make it clear that even as every nation has the right to peaceful nuclear energy, every nation must also meet its international obligations —- and that includes the Islamic Republic of Iran. And together, we can pursue a vision that Indian leaders have espoused since independence —- a world without nuclear weapons. (Applause.)

And this leads me to the final area where our countries can partner —- strengthening the foundations of democratic governance, not only at home but abroad.

In the United States, my administration has worked to make government more open and transparent and accountable to people. Here in India, you’re harnessing technologies to do the same, as I saw yesterday at an expo in Mumbai. Your landmark Right to Information Act is empowering citizens with the ability to get the services to which they’re entitled — (applause) — and to hold officials accountable. Voters can get information about candidates by text message. And you’re delivering education and health care services to rural communities, as I saw yesterday when I joined an e-panchayat with villagers in Rajasthan.

Now, in a new collaboration on open government, our two countries are going to share our experience, identify what works, and develop the next generation of tools to empower citizens. And in another example of how American and Indian partnership can address global challenges, we’re going to share these innovations with civil society groups and countries around the world. We’re going to show that democracy, more than any other form of government, delivers for the common man —- and woman.

Likewise, when Indians vote, the whole world watches. Thousands of political parties; hundreds of thousands of polling centers; millions of candidates and poll workers — and 700 million voters. There’s nothing like it on the planet. There is so much that countries transitioning to democracy could learn from India’s experience, so much expertise that India can share with the world. And that, too, is what is possible when the world’s largest democracy embraces its role as a global leader.
As the world’s two largest democracies, we must never forget that the price of our own freedom is standing up for the freedom of others. (Applause.) Indians know this, for it is the story of your nation. Before he ever began his struggle for Indian independence, Gandhi stood up for the rights of Indians in South Africa. Just as others, including the United States, supported Indian independence, India championed the self-determination of peoples from Africa to Asia as they, too, broke free from colonialism. (Applause.) And along with the United States, you’ve been a leader in supporting democratic development and civil society groups around the world. And this, too, is part of India’s greatness.

Now, we all understand every country will follow its own path. No one nation has a monopoly on wisdom, and no nation should ever try to impose its values on another. But when peaceful democratic movements are suppressed —- as they have been in Burma, for example — then the democracies of the world cannot remain silent. For it is unacceptable to gun down peaceful protestors and incarcerate political prisoners decade after decade. It is unacceptable to hold the aspirations of an entire people hostage to the greed and paranoia of bankrupt regimes. It is unacceptable to steal elections, as the regime in Burma has done again for all the world to see.

Faced with such gross violations of human rights, it is the responsibility of the international community —- especially leaders like the United States and India —- to condemn it. And if I can be frank, in international fora, India has often shied away from some of these issues. But speaking up for those who cannot do so for themselves is not interfering in the affairs of other countries. It’s not violating the rights of sovereign nations. It is staying true to our democratic principles. It is giving meaning to the human rights that we say are universal. And it sustains the progress that in Asia and around the world has helped turn dictatorships into democracies and ultimately increased our security in the world.

So promoting shared prosperity, preserving peace and security, strengthening democratic governance and human rights — these are the responsibilities of leadership. And as global partners, this is the leadership that the United States and India can offer in the 21st century. Ultimately, though, this cannot be a relationship only between presidents and prime ministers, or in the halls of this Parliament. Ultimately, this must be a partnership between our peoples. (Applause.) So I want to conclude by speaking directly to the people of India who are watching today.

In your lives, you have overcome odds that might have overwhelmed a lesser country. In just decades, you have achieved progress and development that took other nations centuries. You are now assuming your rightful place as a leader among nations. Your parents and grandparents imagined this. Your children and grandchildren will look back on this. But only this generation of Indians can seize the possibilities of the moment.

As you carry on with the hard work ahead, I want every Indian citizen to know: The United States of America will not simply be cheering you on from the sidelines. We will be right there with you, shoulder to shoulder. (Applause.) Because we believe in the promise of India. We believe that the future is what we make it. We believe that no matter who you are or where you come from, every person can fulfill their God-given potential, just as a Dalit like Dr. Ambedkar could lift himself up and pen the words of the constitution that protects the rights of all Indians. (Applause.)

We believe that no matter where you live —- whether a village in Punjab or the bylanes of Chandni Chowk — (laughter) — an old section of Kolkata or a new high-rise in Bangalore — every person deserves the same chance to live in security and dignity, to get an education, to find work, to give their children a better future.

And we believe that when countries and cultures put aside old habits and attitudes that keep people apart, when we recognize our common humanity, then we can begin to fulfill these aspirations that we share. It’s a simple lesson contained in that collection of stories which has guided Indians for centuries —- the Panchtantra. And it’s the spirit of the inscription seen by all who enter this great hall: “That one is mine and the other a stranger is the concept of little minds. But to the large-hearted, the world itself is their family.”

This is the story of India; this is the story of America —- that despite their differences, people can see themselves in one another, and work together and succeed together as one proud nation. And it can be the spirit of partnership between our nations —- that even as we honor the histories which in different times kept us apart, even as we preserve what makes us unique in a globalized world, we can recognize how much we can achieve together.

And if we let this simple concept be our guide, if we pursue the vision I’ve described today —- a global partnership to meet global challenges —- then I have no doubt that future generations —- Indians and Americans —- will live in a world that is more prosperous and more secure and more just because of the bonds that our generation has forged today.

So, thank you, and Jai Hind. (Applause.) And long live the partnership between India and the United States. (Applause.)

END 6:17 P.M. IST

In Brazil’s hotly contested presidential election, to decide the successor to the hugely popular Luis Inacio Lula da Silva, founder and leader of the Workers Party of Brazil (PT), the failure of any candidate to win more than 50% of the vote has set up a second round between the two leading candidates. But for many, the big news is that the Green Party (PV) candidate, Marina Silva, won nearly 20% of the vote, which means neither of the two leading candidates has a lot of freedom to govern without her support. Silva will now clearly demand that whichever candidate she backs for the runoff agree to enact much of the Green Party’s sustainability platform.

With traditional sympathies often cited between environmental groups, green parties and the labor-focused political left, many believe the PT candidate Dilma Rousseff, an economist who has served in Lula’s cabinet throughout his tenure, will have enough support to win a majority, but Marina Silva and the Greens are intensely critical of many of the government’s development projects in the Amazon region, which they say ignore fundamental principles of sustainability and environmental responsibility.

Ms. Silva’s performance in the voting, winning 19.3% of the vote, is a landmark moment for the ecological movement worldwide. In one of the world’s largest democracies, where many experts across the world believe the keys to deciding the specifics of international cooperation on environmental sustainability, climate change mitigation and emissions reduction, may reside, such support for the Green Party shows the population is willing to say to the ruling elite: development at any cost is not acceptable.

Whether Silva will have the political savvy to leverage her 19.3% of the vote against the popularity of Lula’s administration and the likely progressive support for Rousseff is a complicated question. Rousseff, like Silva, seeks to become the first female president in Brazil’s history, and on many social issues, her policies overlap with the Green Party agenda. Rousseff is waging a campaign against poverty, which also means a campaign for development.

Lula’s government has been successful at implementing an aggressive public works agenda, and Silva is likely to seek to roll back what is seen by many as unfettered depletion of the ecological balance of sensitive regions like the Amazon rainforest. The specifics of how Rousseff proposes to extend that development agenda may now need to be re-evaluated, if Green Party support is needed to reach majority support among the voting public.

José Serra, candidate for the Social Democratic Party of Brazil (PSD), may also now seek to set himself apart from Rousseff and Lula’s PT by courting the environmental vote. The PSD is described as a coalition of liberals, social democrats and centrist progressives, and demonstrates the degree to which Brazil’s electorate is one of the least right-of-center in the world. Serra could feasibly revise his electoral strategy to design a new development agenda that would further the platform focus of the Green Party, or even include Marina Silva as a top minister to ensure sustainability in Brazil’s rapidly growing economy.

This complex multi-party centrist-to-liberal dynamic may be what has candidate Rousseff less than enthused about her performance in the first round of voting. Though Lula himself always won by going to a second round, and Rousseff herself has had to fight through tough allegations and political attacks, there had been a home among PT faithful that she could ride Lula’s coat-tails to a first-round victory. In a nation with three dominant center to left-of-center parties, Dilma Rousseff cannot be assured of winning the progressive support currently held by the Silva’s PV candidacy.

She may find herself having to explain how to alter economic plans that have significant momentum behind them, and answer criticism of development programs under Lula that the Greens say are eroding the natural balance of systems in the Amazon. There is also sure to be a new-conservative line of attack against Rousseff and the PT, rooted in the green conservative model proposed by British PM David Cameron. Rousseff faces a significant challenge to her frontrunner position, if she does not negotiate some kind of ecologically sustainable agenda with Silva and the Greens.

TheHotSpring.net :: Buckminster Fuller was one of the 20th century’s most visionary architects, whose philosophy of socially responsible planning and design has influenced cutting-edge technology research and public policy the world over, through the UN’s development programs and pioneering entrepreneurship aimed at lifting billions out of poverty. His vision was, in his own words, “To make the world work for 100% of humanity in the shortest possible time through spontaneous cooperation without ecological offense or the disadvantage of anyone.”

So Buckminster Fuller made it his mission as thinker and designer to aim for a new paradigm in the use of technology, wherein the ancient and medieval assumption that the world could only provide for 1 in every 100 people to live comfortably could be discarded by the self-evident power of more advanced technology and economic balance, in which 100% of people could live in comfort, freedom and dignity. Metropolis magazine has called the prize “socially responsible design’s highest award”.

According to the Buckminster Fuller Institute website:

The Buckminster Fuller Challenge is an annual international design Challenge awarding $100,000 to support the development and implementation of a strategy that has significant potential to solve humanity’s most pressing problems. It attracts bold, visionary, tangible initiatives focused on a well-defined need of critical importance. Winning solutions are regionally specific yet globally applicable and present a truly comprehensive, anticipatory, integrated approach to solving the world’s complex problems.

The complexity of Fuller’s vision is daunting, because it entails as a foundational principle finding a way to transcend the more primitive tendencies of human socio-political organization which lead us to believe that we can only gain by displacing our costs to terrain inhabited by others. But the embrace of constructive complexity is part of what makes Fuller’s vision so relevant and so important today. The U.S., for instance, must find a way to not only reduce its dependency on “foreign oil”, but in doing so must realize that there is no genuine economic resilience gained by simply causing poorer societies to carry the environmental costs of our carbon-based economy.

So there is a deep optimism, firmly rooted in reason and in scientific imagination, that guides the work of those who seek to carry out Fuller’s vision, by which humanity can only achieve long-term sustainability by also doing something like achieving the ideal. The “challenge” is very much the same challenge Fuller put to himself, and which he demanded all people everywhere rise to comprehend and to pursue. The prize given in his name is a way of driving that optimistic approach to problem-solving forward.

This year’s winner, Operation Hope, describes its function as demonstrating “how to reverse desertification of the world’s savannas and grasslands, thereby contributing enormously to mitigating climate change, biomass burning, drought, flood, drying of rivers and underground waters, disappearing wildlife, massive poverty, social breakdown, violence and genocide”. Solving multiple problems related to a complex and evolving crisis situation is key to why Operation Hope was able to win this year’s Fuller Challenge prize.

To submit ideas for 2011, applicants are asked to

Please choose two of the following issues your entry primarily addresses:

communication and media
community and social systems
economy and livelihood
education
energy
environmental health
food systems
human health
human rights
materials and resources
shelter and built environment
transportation
water

And to answer nine questions such as: “How does your strategy and approach respond creatively and comprehensively to key social, cultural, economic, ecological, and technological issues which shape the condition you are seeking to transform? Why is your strategy a breakthrough and what makes it a preferred state model? (300 words)*”

For more, or to apply or recommend an applicant, click here

Sustainable security is a paradigm shift in foreign policy, economic and defense planning: it entails considering that not only diplomatic relations and military preparedness or alliances, but the full spectrum of connections between our society and the world abroad, determine the degree to which our future security and prosperity can be reasonably guaranteed.

Practices and relations that promote insecurity of the food supply in remote areas of foreign nations, or which drive unstable nations like Yemen toward total persistent clean water scarcity —the total collapse of the fresh water supply— pose a serious and measurable threat to both security and economic stability back home.

The US Department of Defense has recognized this, specifically calling for concerted national action to combat emissions-induced climate destabilization and to promote the protection of ecological systems across the world, as a matter of promoting stability and human prosperity, in order to prevent a domino effect of failing states from destabilizing the global political sphere.

Share ideas here for how to promote sustainable security, including cases where sustainability thinking is creating a framework for sustainable food, water, political and economic security…

• Join the discussion now on The Hot Spring Network

Sen. Olympia Snowe (R-ME) this week called for a move toward building consensus for a scaled back version of the climate legislation pending in the United States Senate. Two possible models, given the nature of the Kerry-Lieberman proposal, as written, would be to either establish at the federal level the kind of cooperative emissions reduction strategy already adopted by a coalition of states across the northeast or a limit on total carbon emissions from power plants only.

25 states, plus the District of Columbia, have renewable electricity standards, a requirement that a certain percentage of power generation come from clean renewable resources, by a certain year. 3 more states have voluntary RES goals, and there are incentives both at the state and federal level for power utilities to develop expanded renewable generating capacity. The state of New Jersey has quickly risen to 2nd nationwide in solar power generation, behind California, despite having no sun-scorched deserts and little eligible open space which is not protected.

New Jersey is also rapidly expanding its commitment to solar energy, incentivizing installations on private homes, factory and warehouse roof-space and corporate complexes, as with the new 4.1 MW solar power installation slated to go online early next year at Dow Jones’ South Brunswick site. Technology innovation —including R&D, manufacturing, energy efficiency improvements, and local renewable generation schemes— is driving New Jersey’s response to the carbon emissions question.

This model could be translated into something that allows for an array of public-private partnerships and aggressive incentives for enterprises, small and large, to commit to energy innovation and to clean renewables. If Sen. Snowe’s push for a utility-focused emissions protocol is built around the northeastern efficiency and renewables standards, a new round of Recovery Act funding for R&D could help speed the transition to clean energy.

Coal-heavy states consistently face the problem of how carbon-pricing (whether by tax or by cap and trade) will affect people reliant on the coal industry for their livelihoods and for affordable energy. Accelerating the pace of technological innovation for improved alternative energy performance is key to lessening the impact of a transition away from coal, but whatever emissions-reduction strategy becomes law, something will likely have to be done to insulate consumers and protect jobs in coal-dependent states.

The hope of those pushing for a tech-centered bill is that renewable electricity standards and incentives to assist in the transition from carbon-based to clean energy will allow coal-dependent communities to diversify their energy supply and their job markets in meaningful ways that make for a more vibrant local economy.

An alternative proposal is the fee/dividend model —proposed by Citizens Climate Lobby*, and with the support of leading scientists like NASA’s Dr. James Hansen—, which would place a fee on carbon dioxide at the point of entry into the US economy (well, mine or port) and return 100% of the revenues to every American household. This model puts the reins of the marketplace back in the hands of the consumer, by allowing families to cover any additional costs that filter through from the carbon fee.

Whether by technological innovation and direct incentives for investment and retooling or by contextual incentives like the fee/dividend proposal, one key focus for honest policymakers must be planning for the rapid diversification of energy supplies and labor markets in regions and communities that are currently reliant on coal or oil production for their economic sustenance.

The famously oil-driven state of Texas is another good example —like New Jersey, where oil importation and refinery have long been key players in the energy sector— where a transition to renewables has not only been recognized as necessary and potentially lucrative, but where the pace of the transition has been accelerating at a surprising rate. Texas is now the national leader in wind-based power generation, with 9,000 MW installed and plans to install another 40,000 MW.

With 49,000 MW of wind-based power generation, Texas would be producing enough power from wind to replace 41 coal-fired power plants. Oil money is now shifting into wind as oil becomes harder to find and harder to extract and investors recognize that yields from wind don’t decline over time, because the resource is renewable, or rather: constantly flowing.

Such energy innovations are helping to provide new sources of wealth to rural communities, as 1 acre of corn can yield roughly $800 at harvest, and 1 acre with 1 wind turbine installed can produce $300,000 worth of electricity. The efficiency in such a shift in power generation is enhanced by the new technologies’ ability to subsidize farming communities, potentially reducing the need for overall government spending relating to agriculture and energy as a combined total.

Sen. Snowe’s office has been keeping any definitive aim or strategy under wraps, while the senator seeks to rally wavering senators in both parties to the cause of emissions reduction, by one means or another. Her coalition building effort will win favor, many policy analysts and activists believe, as soon as it is clear that the technological transition will be rapid and effective and will allow carbon-reliant communities to prosper in ways they presently cannot.

* NOTE: This reporter is a group leader and citizen volunteer for Citizens Climate Lobby, a non-partisan, non-profit national organization working to build the political will for a sustainable climate. Read more about CCL’s efforts on Capitol Hill, on The Hot Spring Network

Between June 21 and 25, Citizens Climate Lobby took its message to Capitol Hill, meeting with 52 different members of Congress, or their energy and climate staff, in both the House and the Senate. The first CCL national conference was fortuitously timed, as the ongoing disaster in the Gulf of Mexico has brought into stark relief the nature of the carbon-fuel problem and the urgent need for action to achieve a civilization-wide overhaul of energy infrastructure, and the climate bill pending in the Senate may not have the votes to override a filibuster.

The “Lobby Day” experience was part of the first annual CCL National Conference, in the nation’s capital. The landmark event brought together climate scientists, oceanographers, environmental engineers, economists, activists, community leaders, small business owners and concerned citizens, to deliver the message to members of both parties that citizens from the community, their own constituents, will support them if they take meaningful, comprehensive action to combat climate destabilization.

Citizens Climate Lobby is a national non-partisan, non-profit organization, working to organize citizen volunteers, by state, county or Congressional district, to lobby elected officials for a strong emissions reduction plan that will prevent catastrophic climate change and speed the transition to clean energy. The group aims to motivate political support, across the political spectrum, for a pragmatic approach to emissions reduction and to speeding the transition to clean energy.

The CCL strategy entails reaching out to all members of Congress, in both parties, regardless of their specific views or past staunch opposition to carbon-reduction legislation. The aim is to listen, to understand what specific elected officials and their constituencies most value and how they prioritize issues of energy and climate, and to work with them to help them achieve their goals in a way that is consistent with establishing a sustainable, responsible climate policy.

As part of the Citizens Climate Lobby myself, I can say it is integral to the organization’s mission to work to transition the United States from a legislative climate of full-time professional lobbyists to a new paradigm wherein ordinary citizens speaking for their communities and for the well-being and rights of future generations, are the preferred interlocutors for shaping the nation’s laws.

The conference was a three-day event, in conjunction with the RESULTS National Conference, from June 20 through 22, where citizen volunteer lobbyists gather to push Congress to act to combat poverty at home and around the world. Sunday and Monday were training and informational days, in which the CCL volunteers heard directly from established scientists presenting the latest science regarding climate destabilization and carbon emissions, and participated in workshops designed to prepare the teams for meetings with members of Congress and their staff.

The specific focus of Citizens Climate Lobby’s efforts on Capitol Hill is to promote proposed language for a fee/dividend approach to limiting and reducing carbon emissions and promoting the transition to a world-leading clean energy economy. The proposed legislation would:

1. fee: place a direct and steadily increasing (year on year) cost on CO2 at the point of entry into the economy (well, mine or port);
2. dividend: return 100% of revenues collected to the American people directly, an equal amount per capita to every household;
3. clean energy: set a price that will make renewables cheaper than fossil fuels within 10 years;
4. level playing field: apply a border adjustment to balance carbon pricing for products from nations that do nothing to increase cost of carbon emissions;
5. pollution: stop construction of all new coal-fired power plants and phase out all existing plants, starting with the dirtiest…

The plan is supported by Dr. James Hansen (NASA’s leading climate scientist), by numerous retired military leaders and by leading members of the faith community. It is designed to relocate the hidden costs of carbon-based fuels (‘negative externalities’, in economics-speak) from the citizen, the community and the small business, back to the interests that seek to profit from the resources that generate those negative externalities for which the rest of us pay.

The CCL approach is intended not to be punitive, but to be clear and transparent. It does not discriminate, and it does not in any way limit the freedom of carbon-based enterprises to join the clean energy revolution. Over time, as the cost of producing energy from carbon-based fuels goes up, investment will move toward clean energy resources, technology and infrastructure, which will allow private enterprise to profit more readily and more consistently than the more costly carbon-based alternative, with its tendency to extreme volatility in pricing.

This method allows citizens, communities and small businesses to pay for any increase in costs that might come from utilities or other industrial enterprises passing along carbon fee costs to the consumer, and to drive demand for a clean energy alternative. The plan allows the American people to build the clean energy future they would prefer, and to drive a new wave of investment in innovation and ingenuity to secure the nation’s energy independence and protect the natural environment against progressive global climate destabilization.

Having met with and listened to so many members of Congress and/or their climate and energy policy advisers, CCL has begun the process of working to find areas of mutual interest and shared principle that can build a fabric of common understanding and common interest between rival political parties, rival community interests, rival ideological camps and even rival industries, to forge the political will to achieve the clean energy revolution this nation needs for its future economic, environmental and military security.

TheHotSpring.net :: There is nothing ideological about the issue of renewable energy resources. Proponents tend to care about the health of the natural environment, which motivates their wish to see renewables replace high-polluting resources like oil and coal, but the technologies, the fact of their economic viability and their usefulness for society at large, are not in any way a matter of ideology.

Neither is there anything ideological about the allegiance of some to carbon-based fuels. The considerations are entirely practical on all sides, and we need to remember this as we try to find consensus on how to move forward, responsibly, as a civilization, in terms of our relationship to energy.

For some people in the political arena, it would appear to make more sense to continue to support carbon-based fuels as the primary resource for energy production, for a number of practical reasons, each of which can be refuted on practical grounds: 1) because those entities that profit from carbon-based fuels donate to one’s campaign; 2) because those entities that profit from carbon-based fuels “create jobs”; 3) because burning things to release energy is easier to understand than more advanced technologies.

There are real ideologically-rooted reasons why the passions can run so deep on either side: for environmentalists, it is morally unconscionable that we continue burning dirty fuels and eroding the natural systems on which all life depends, no matter the reasons; for the pro-petroleum segment of the political spectrum, there are patriotic roots, hearkening back to two world wars and the Cold War, with oil seen as a guarantor of security.

Oil is no longer that, and passions aside, thinking people have to acknowledge that the root of those passions is really practical and not ideological anyway. It makes practical sense to be good stewards of the environment on which we depend for everything that we have, and it was a practical consideration that linked industrial production and national security to the availability of carbon-based fuels.

But now, national security has become so closely linked to energy supply issues that we can no longer rely —again, in strictly practical terms— on a commodity as volatile, finite and problematic as petroleum. The costs to society are too great, whether we are talking about war-fighting —and war-funding, for that matter—, the loss of freedom in terms of shaping our foreign policy, costs in terms of human health or the destabilization of major climate systems.

And coal, while abundant in North America, is so dirty a resource that the environmental fallout alone makes it less than reasonable as a foundational resource for long-term future planning. There may come a time when carbon itself is a resource, required for its chemical properties, but not necessarily as useful as we now pretend, as a combustible fuel. Places where the coal industry has its roots may have to change focus or find technologically cutting-edge ways to justify the exploration for coal.

The reasons for this are hard to understand, if one starts from the assumption that there is something traditional or sacredly local or productive about coal. But if we step back and consider the real adaptability of human populations, we find that no community really needs the coal industry, having no chance of survival or prosperity in absence, in the way the coal industry lobby pretends.

Communities are made up of human beings and are as adaptable as those human beings’ minds, hearts and relationships. The relationship to powerful coal interests is not always a happy one, and this alone can open doors for the development of resources that are more sustainable, more local-friendly, and respectful of future human need in ways that older technologies simply cannot be.

Even the coal industry itself could innovate, diversify, and find ways to turn its operations into major sources of clean renewable energy. At least three renewable resources come to mind: geothermal energy production, wind and solar. Mining companies in many cases own or lease land for which they have not yet devised a marketable use or long ago abandoned, and these can be converted to solar farms, wind farms or geothermal fields.

While international mining companies are outsourcing administrative jobs and moving to more “cost effective” mining sites overseas, some are beginning to use disused mining sites in the US to build part of the new clean-energy infrastructure. Across the southwest, such projects are already in development or being implemented. According to the Arizona Republic:

Both the Bureau of Land Management and Environmental Protection Agency are studying the potential to put renewable-energy projects on mines, landfills and other disturbed lands.

Mines can help avoid many of the expenses solar plants face on pristine desert, experts said, such as environmental rules that require relocating saguaros and other protected plants.

There is no reason why environmentalists seeking to promote clean energy and communities steeped in a long tradition of coal mining or oil drilling cannot come together, free of ideological constraints, to craft the solutions that will make the US a global leader in efficient, profitable, mass-produced clean energy. The ideology that claims this issue is one of ideology is simply a rhetorical framework that serves the interests of the most stagnant and unimaginative coal and oil interests.

Major oil producers could easily invest billions in renewable R&D and become global pioneers in the rush to achieve a fully self-sustaining clean-energy economy. Their resistance is perhaps more linked to a short-sighted ideological prejudice than to a lack of will to be part of the future, but they do not have any real ideological framework to back up their position, and the logic that favors a transition to renewables does not require one.

From a strictly economic standpoint, it does not make sense to continue being near totally reliant upon a way of doing business that carries the wildly exorbitant potential costs of an Ixtoc, an Exxon Valdez, Texaco in Ecuador, or a Deepwater Horizon disaster. If we want to be intelligent about how we achieve “energy independence”, we have to first assess and confront the real costs of doing business the way big oil does business.

It’s not a matter of “a tax on energy” or “a tax on carbon”, it’s a matter of making sure the responsible parties pay their share. Subsidies on an unprecedented scale, have made the oil business look and feel profitable in ways that it actually is not, when the health of the wider economy is considered. Were those wider costs built into the business itself, big oil would not be nearly as attractive an investment as it seemed to be until the Deepwater Horizon well blew out in April.

While an “ideology” that values the natural environment over the right of the oil industry to make profits may rejoice at the opportunity to use such a failure as BP has experienced in the Gulf of Mexico to make the case against oil, that does not make it any less true that BP had no responsible or credible action plan for dealing with an environmental catastrophe of this magnitude, despite deliberately doing everything necessary to bring about the catastrophe.

That such risks can be avoided with a transition to clean, renewable energy resources that do not require combustion and do not require oil or coal to achieve the efficiency gains they aim to achieve, is just as honestly not a matter of ideology. It’s the way it is. And science is now demonstrating that we can produce more than enough electricity, nationally, to power our entire domestic energy consumption through wind and solar alone, if we build the infrastructure.

At the point where the renewable energy infrastructure is pervasive and functional enough to outpace carbon-based fuels in total power generation capacity, there will be no question, practically speaking, whether or not renewables are a more effective method of promoting long-term economic health and prosperity. Where is the ideology inherent in planning for such a virtuous moment of future achievement?

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TheHotSpring.net :: Pres. Obama addressed the nation last night from the Oval Office, on the tragedy unfolding across the Gulf of Mexico, and issued an impassioned call for the entire nation to rally to the cause of breaking its “addiction to fossil fuels”. The president’s vision goes beyond the question of “energy independence”, which tends to favor expanded offshore drilling, to a push for a comprehensive transition to clean, renewable sources of energy and the phasing out of carbon-based fuels.

For more than a decade, ecological economists have been arguing that the United States needs to make a nationwide effort, “at wartime speed” to innovate and commit to clean, renewable power-generation methods. Last night, Pres. Obama became the first US president to echo this vision, reminding skeptics that no one believed the US could build its military capacity as rapidly or completely as it did to fight World War II on two opposite sides of the globe.

Obama said “The tragedy unfolding on our coast is the most clean and painful reminder yet that the time to embrace a clean energy future is now”. He also noted that a nationwide transition to clean energy is an integral part of the nation’s long-term economic recovery, saying “The transition to clean energy has the potential to grow our economy and create millions of new jobs, but only if we accelerate that transition.”

There are some in Congress who oppose this message, but this appears to be mostly from allegiance to the carbon fuels industry and the outdated view that clean energy solutions are not cost-effective. For many politicians from the Gulf coast region, the prospect of a comprehensive shift away from fossil fuels is not only terrifying, but taboo. There is such a deep fear that jobs tied to the oil industry cannot be replaced by any other means and that no other industry can be so effective at “creating wealth” that it is virtually forbidden for anyone in politics to speak of moving away from oil production.

The generating capacity, however, of wind, solar and wave power, has advanced to a level of efficiency where it is feasible to replace the energy production capacity of the Gulf of Mexico’s oil industry with renewables. What is needed is infrastructure, and building it will create jobs as soon as the first project is launched.

Obstruction from pro-petroleum politicians in Washington and across the Gulf region is linked to the 18th-19th century idea that burning carbon-based fuel is the most efficient way to produce energy. But refusal to pour major investment into the transition to clean, renewable resources and the infrastructure needed to make that system a reality is a direct impediment to immediate, widespread job growth in the very areas under siege from the Deepwater Horizon disaster.

The BP spill is in fact, no matter one’s perspective on clean energy, a watershed moment in thinking about energy and environmental policy: it is now clear the incalculable potential costs to every sector of society from the failed strategy of a devotion to carbon-based fuels far outstrip our ability to easily respond to a disaster of this kind, and the logic of using clean energy has suddenly come into stark relief as an obvious and necessary next step.

The call to arms, part of what the president called his “battle plan” for addressing the crisis in the Gulf of Mexico, comes none too soon, as China and India have joined Europe in pushing the envelope of clean energy innovation. China has made the world’s largest investments in clean energy startup incentives and the EU has poured tens of billions of dollars in solar investment into projects in Africa and elsewhere.

But India has also joined the trend, as reported by Shravya Reddy, for the Natural Resources Defense Council:

On May 24, India unveiled the draft of its National Green Mission, one of the eight missions under its National Action Plan on Climate Change.   This is exciting news, especially for NRDC’s India team which is currently in New Delhi discussing climate change with Indian officials and civil society.   NRDC welcomes the draft and is encouraged to see India’s commitment to addressing the challenge of climate change and managing its greenhouse gas emissions.

India’s national green mission is just the latest major national policy proposal designed to not only build toward a new era of responsible environmental stewardship and reduced carbon emissions, but to transition a major national economy toward the use of clean, renewable resources for power-generation, industry and transport.

A dramatically expanded commitment to clean energy resources is no longer just a matter of environmental responsibility, it is now a very urgent matter of direct international economic competition. Denmark and Japan have become the world leaders in the production of advanced wind turbine technologies, while China is now pushing investment in both innovation and production of cutting edge solar and wind power technologies, for export.

Small-government conservatives across the country are up in arms demanding an overwhelming show of government power in the Gulf of Mexico. They demand that the president of the United States establish “command and control” over the activities of private industry and “get this clean up now”. They are shouting from the rooftops and massing in the streets, or so they would like us to believe, at the outrage that government is not able to establish absolute control of the worst ecological disaster in US history.

This morning, as she called for a more powerful response from government, Carly Fiorina then said her campaign is about “out of control government” trying to control people’s lives. There is a fundamental intellectual disconnect between what small-government conservatives say they believe in and what they say they want from government, and that disconnect is matched by the distance between what they say should be true and what is possible in the realm of the physical, finite and real.

Anti-tax, small-government Republicans on Main Street are demanding that Pres. Obama “fix this!” without delay, but will not look at the real problem in the Gulf of Mexico, which is that the oil industry does not clean up its spills, does not have the technology needed to prevent them and does not know what to do in the case of a massive blow-out like Deepwater Horizon. There are tens of thousands of federal employees and National Guard and Coast Guard reserves, local fishermen, volunteers and environmentalists working to clean up the spill, but no one on Earth knows how to stop the oil, because it’s never been done.

The fact is: something went wrong in the construction of the well, and the popular conception (inside industry, with the public and in government) that the oil industry is powerful, rational and capable of an overwhelming technical response, has blinded our entire civilization to the real perils of an industry of the kind that we use to extract petroleum from underground. The entire practice from start to finish is intensely destructive to the environment, and there are no technologies that can “get it cleaned up now”; there are only half measures and incremental approaches.

What we are now seeing is the nature of a crisis which cannot be resolved without a massive, collaborative effort to achieve innovations on the scale of a paradigm shift in thinking about an entire sector of our economy. BP is being forced to face not only the loss of half of its stock value, but also the suspension of its normal corporate dividend payouts and the reorganization of its internal financing, to plan for a black swan event…

Only, there is nothing truly black swan about the rig collapse and the spill; it simply wasn’t planned for. It happens, it has happened in the past, and the industry generally gets away without having to be held truly responsible. The Deepwater Horizon is just the biggest of these blowouts this year, but there was one off the coast of Australia and another offshore well reportedly leaking in the Gulf of Mexico as well, while various oil wells have been leaking persistently since 2004, the result of damage from Hurricane Ivan.

The cry from conservatives for an “emergency response” is part of a lust for authoritarian action, the faith in which gives certain people a confidence that we have control over events. There is comfort in believing that the only reason for a disaster threatening our environment is a failure of powerful people to act powerfully enough. But powerful as humanity may be, among species, it is ultimately not possible in the most extreme cases to seize control over natural processes.

That authoritarian urge is precisely what makes it such an easy sell for conservative politicians and propagandists to persuade like-minded voters that progressive politicians are in fact conspiring to establish some sort of permanent authoritarian rule, because it’s part of their own conceptualization of what power is and how it should be used. What is often not understood, however, is how pro-business politicians match this psychological urge with the philosophy of “limited government”.

The fiercest proponents of “limited government” in the Congress or in local or presidential politics are almost without fail fiercely pro-business. The connection is not what is normally thought: that they simply have so much faith in the good will of good people that they want those people to have more “freedom to innovate”. It is, rather, and very deliberately, a political program designed to give cover to businesses that behave like BP, to limit government in critical ways so that industry can set its own policy, monitor its own ethical standards and conduct business unconstrained by the interests of the rest of humanity.

Then, the limited-government ideologues complain, government is catastrophically limited, and that proves their point. Government cannot be trusted, because it does not have absolute power and is not as authoritative (read authoritarian) as private industry. (Just to be clear, we are not saying private industry cannot have a different attitude or that it is by nature authoritarian and no socially responsible, just that for some ideologues, it feels good to assume that it does constantly aspire to a level of absolute control of which ordinary people can only dream, and this distorts our politics in meaningful ways.)

We don’t need new regulations, we hear, from good-faith businesspeople of the kind that follow the rules and behave ethically. We just need to enforce the regulations we have. These same people say it’s “bad timing” to launch a criminal investigation into BP’s refusal to follow those regulations, despite the fairly obvious appearance that individuals at BP actively lied about what the company was doing to follow existing regulations, or what it could do in response to a system failure.

The question is: how can we impose on BP a requirement that it never violate any regulations? Some argue, absurdly, for more lax regulations, so they’re easier to follow. Others demand “action”, meaning they want their programmatically limited government to act with sweeping, near absolute expressions of raw power, whatever that is. Others say industry can “police itself” and that BP’s competitors will simply punish BP by way of competition… presumably proving they are better at following regulations than BP?

This is the problem with our political discourse: it has veered into the surreal. There is no specific action the government is legally empowered to take that would “get this cleaned up now!” Short of seizing BP’s assets in North America, there is no way to guarantee BP will fund the entire scope of the emergency response or to bar BP from interfering with the most advanced clean-up and containment operations available, as they are alleged to have done.

What has conservatives up in arms are three problems, none of which is the spill itself: first, they are outraged that their vision of power that is limited enough to not interfere with one’s personal life but absolute enough to be capable of a push-button solution to complex problems is not real; second, they are outraged that a progressive is in charge; third, they are distressed at the numerous ways in which the BP crisis illustrates the pervasive moral failings of their own ideology.

The constant drumbeat of blame against Pres. Obama, probably the most ferociously demanding of presidents in US history, in terms of demanding better behavior and cleaner innovation from the entire energy and transport sector, is rooted in this self-aware dismay about how a political program that despises and defunds government actually did lead to one after another calamity in the 2000s relating to government being incapable of taking adequate responsibility, due to its limited mission.

Whether Pres. Obama is committed enough to resolving this disaster is absolutely not in question: he has mounted, from day one, the most comprehensive environmental emergency response effort in the nation’s history; he was alerting the public to the potential scale of the disaster, when BP was still saying the impact would be “very, very modest” and politicians across the Gulf region were demanding kid-glove treatment for BP.

What is in question is who, if anyone, knows how to solve this problem and how did we let things go this far, as a civilization? The answer to the first is that while there are some good ideas out there, there is the very real problem of pressure inside the well and the fact that the well was apparently not built to withstand the kind of pressures rushing through it. The answer to the second is that we have been disastrously naïve and short-sighted; we have refused to recognize the inherent shortcomings of dependence on carbon-based combustible fuels, and we have never planned for anything like this.

The blow-out (explosion and collapse) of the Deepwater Horizon drilling rig and the well 5,000 feet below has brought into high contrast a serious problem inherent in the way we produce energy: we have long refused to calculate the real costs of extracting fossil fuels. Ecological economics is founded on this point: we should calculate the value of the natural ecosystem services disrupted by the after-effects of carbon emissions.

But we now have a clear view of another deficiency in the market economics of oil production: BP did not adequately plan for the eventuality of a catastrophic blow-out and region-wide spill. By not adequately calculating that risk, BP was not able to take as seriously the absolute obligation to ensure the safety and security of its drilling rig at the Deepwater Horizon site. Even now, there is speculation BP still views the potential oil wealth of the failed well to be more valuable to the firm than curbing the catastrophic economic and environmental fallout from the spill.

As David Leonhardt wrote in last week’s New York Times magazine, “The people running BP did a dreadful job of estimating the true chances of events that seemed unlikely — and may even have been unlikely — but that would bring enormous costs.” Leonhardt also points out that this is a generally human quality, the inability to adequately measure the costs of low-probability high-cost events before they occur.

This is why they seem like the rare “black swan”, which changes our thinking about probability and expectation in fundamental ways. The Deepwater Horizon disaster is one of these low-probability high-cost events that was not unforeseeable but whose remoteness made it easy to avoid thinking about, until it happened. Now that we have met the black swan, we can evaluate its true cost and we can plan better.

We need to assess what the real long-term planning costs are, given the obviously inadequate state of the technology needed to address a catastrophic well failure like the Deepwater Horizon blow-out, and how can any enterprise plan to finance such risk? (BP, it must be remembered, lost $17 billion in stock value yesterday alone, and is now reported to be contemplating bankruptcy.)

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The Gulf of Mexico coastline of the southeastern United States has been hard hit by the ongoing BP oil disaster, with catastrophic environmental damage, the collapse of the local fishing and shrimping industry, and tourism bottoming out in some places near zero, just as summer gets going. There is a moratorium on deepwater exploration and drilling, which is putting a strain on the job market across several states. A serious investment in renewable energy resources would build a more vibrant, more reliable jobs market into the regional economy and help prevent the environmental fallout of offshore drilling.

The American Recovery and Reinvestment Act (ARRA) of early 2009, what many refer to as “the stimulus”, which it was not designed to be, is actually a long-term economic reform and investment program, designed to help steer major sectors of the US economy away from abusive practices which impose long-term costs (‘negative externalities’, in economic jargon) on society. So subsidies for destructive practices are rolled back while subsidies for sustainable practices and innovation-oriented enterprise are expanded. It includes the single largest investment in clean energy in US history, as well as a major investment in infrastructure.

What’s more, the ARRA is phased in over several years, meaning there is still money to be invested. The coastal region of the Gulf of Mexico could develop a highly lucrative, highly productive, clean energy infrastructure, designed to harvest wind, solar and wave power, without any need for incurring the environmental risks of deepwater drilling. With the rapid acceleration of the efficiency of clean energy technologies, the Gulf region could, like California or certain states of the Great Plains, become a net exporter of clean energy.

Why is this not being proposed as an immediate, aggressive, well-thought government response to the crisis involving BP’s blown-out oil well? For one, Republican governors have staked their political fortunes on refusing to cooperate with Pres. Obama’s economic recovery and reinvestment plans, so they have either rejected or sought to impede the spending of the federal money they could otherwise get through the Recovery Act. But there is also the pervasive influence of the drilling industry, from rig operators to oil services companies to the big oil firms like BP, who invest heavily in political campaigns.

Gov. Haley Barbour, of Mississippi, a Republican who has bet his political future on the notion that offshore drilling is the best, or perhaps only, way to go economically, has just about called on the media to stop reporting on the spill, alleging that reporting on the impact of the BP disaster has hurt his state economically. Barbour does not have a clean energy plan; he has opposed the spending of Recovery Act money in his state, yet he has requested federal help in dealing with the oil spill, even as he alleges there is no problem in Mississippi and seeks to blame the media and not the oil industry.

Barbour wants offshore drilling expanded and has put himself forward as something of a mouthpiece for big oil’s interests in the Gulf of Mexico, citing his state’s economic interest in attracting “investment” from the big oil firms. What Barbour has not been able to articulate is: why is he not in favor, then, of an economic recovery strategy, already available to his state prior to the spill, which would help Mississippi diversify its energy economy, produce clean energy, reduce the environmental threat from energy production, and create lasting new jobs?

In Louisiana, Gov. Bobby Jindal, also a Republican who has opposed his state spending any money from Pres. Obama’s Recovery Act, a flagrant act of political grandstanding that was specifically calculated to deprive the people of his state of the investment they needed in hard times, in order to make it appear that Pres. Obama was not addressing the economic crisis, has been playing the populist. But even as he attacks the federal government and demands more assistance, he blames the government for the actions of interests he has supported and whose support he has enjoyed.

The truth, it turns out, is not Gov. Jindal’s friend: he has been a staunch ally of big oil and even now is calling for more drilling off the Louisiana coast. He has no serious plan for energy innovation and no willingness to cooperate with the federal government’s most significant investment in clean energy in history, despite the many ways it could benefit the people of his state. In fact, Jindal has been one of the most persistent champions of BP and other drilling interests, both in Washington and in Louisiana.

As reported by Mother Jones:

[The] media’s panegyrics have ignored Jindal’s own weak response to the oil spill and his outsized role in promoting the kind of regulatory cutbacks and dangerous offshore drilling policies that are now wrecking Louisiana’s economy.

In February, 2006, while serving as a member of the GOP-controlled US House of Representatives, Jindal introduced the Deep Ocean Energy Resources Act. Passed by the House a few months later, the bill would have opened up the entire US coast to offshore oil drilling. States could override the law and ban rigs in their territorial waters, yet the law would let them share lease royalties with the federal government–a strong incentive to drill. Adjacent states would have little say in the matter (clearly a problem, given that BP’s spill has marred several states’ coastlines).

In fact, it is astonishing how closely Jindal’s efforts mirror the history of lax oversight and cozy relations with the oil industry that led to the specific situation of the Deepwater Horizon disaster. Using language that is first of all not very legislative in nature and secondly either extremely naive or cynically aligned with big oil, the bill actually asserted that: “(4) it is not reasonably foreseeable that . . . development and production of an oil discovery located more than 50 miles seaward of the coastline will adversely affect resources near the coastline.”

The Deepwater Horizon well is located roughly 50 miles off the Louisiana coast, and Mr. Jindal is now reframing his entire political persona around the notion that this well poses and apocalyptic threat to coastal communities, to local ecosystems, the fishing and tourism industries, the habitability of certain areas and the economic wellbeing of the entire region. What’s more, some observers believe a spill further out would only have resulted in a wider swath of coastline being directly impacted.

Mother Jones goes on to observe that:

As Jindal was pushing to radically increase offshore oil drilling (while accepting more than $100,000 from oil and gas companies), there’s no indication that he saw the slightest need to increase government oversight. His stated governing philosophy is deeply anti-regulatory. In March, 2009, he said: “There has never been a challenge that the American people, with as little interference as possible by the federal government, cannot handle.”

The Jindal saga is common in Gulf coast politics: even now, Gov. Jindal continues to push for expanded offshore drilling, even as he pretends to be a fierce defender of the environmental and quality-of-life interests of the people living along the coast. He wants to have it both ways, to promote the unsupervised abuses of an industry that does not know how to protect the marine or coastal environment, while taking no responsibility for his role in bringing about this catastrophe.

It is this kind of political representation, one could argue, that has left the people of the Gulf coast region without an alternate economic plan to offshore drilling. Jindal, Barbour and many others have long seen oil money as easy money, ignoring the risks and downplaying the very real costs to society at large. But now, the people of the Gulf coast region are faced with a serious challenge to that way of thinking: there is nothing easy or reliable about the offshore drilling economic growth strategy.

What is needed is something new: state of the art offshore windfarms could be built in place of deepwater rigs. New advances in solar-voltaic power-generation technology make it as much as 100 times as efficient as the advanced state of the art over the last decade. The Gulf of Mexico’s strong undersea currents also make it a strong candidate for high-capacity wave-power generation. A combination of the three could make the region into a clean energy powerhouse, if only the political leadership could grasp the nature of the problem and the wisdom of such a solution.

Malaria Kills Millions Every Year in Africa. It is responsible for anywhere from 1 to 3 million deaths per year, most of them in sub-Saharan Africa. Efforts to eradicate the disease are mounting: in the year 2000, just 3% of children under 5, in sub-Saharan Africa, slept with mosquito nets; by 2008, that figure had risen to 56%. Aid groups now project that aggressive preventive measures can protect 100% of the population by the end of 2010 and reduce the number of deaths to near zero by 2015.

Doing so requires an aggressive and coordinated effort by governments across the region, in concert with world health experts, the UN’s WHO, aid organizations and local communities. Malaria, originally named “the bad air” because it was thought to be airborne, is actually a water and blood-borne disease, transmitted by a particular variety of mosquito. The scarcity of safe drinking water across much of the region leads to ill-advised practices like leaving whatever standing water one can find at hand for human consumption.

This allows mosquitoes to breed and proliferate. Advanced plumbing, with enclosed water systems, could help prevent the constant rampant spread of the disease, but other measures need to be taken first in order to secure the region’s water resources and ensure equitable distribution, to prevent water-linked trade and military conflicts and the further deterioration of troubled civil infrastructure, the collapse of which favors contagion. [Complete text...]

What measures can be most effective for ensuring the solutions best suited to combatting malaria in any given location can reach the people most in need? Can transport, agriculture and hydrological infrastructure all be strengthened simultaneously, or do we need a form of engineering triage aimed at doing the most good as quickly as possible? Which international efforts are doing the best work? What local efforts are most effective?

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“The minds on the margin are not marginal minds” is the guiding philosophy of the project Anil Gupta discusses in this talk, aimed at highlighting efforts to find indigenous Indian entrepreneurs who might have the best ideas for shaping a better future, though they lack the resources to get their ideas into the mainstream culture or the realm of cutting-edge science.

Gupta speaks of the serious lack of information regarding the source of knowledge that emerges from ordinary people and indigenous cultures. He said that since there was no way to measure his income as emerging in part from having harvested that information, he was living in a way that was fundamentally unjust.

He decided that such innovators “must not remain anonymous”, so he created the Honey Bee Network, to find, track and give back to the unsung innovators. If the people with good ideas and creative talent can be found, and rewarded, then “they can be paid for what they’re good at, instead of for what they’re bad at”, a clear benefit to local and global society, and to our collective future.

“There must be a place in the world for solutions that are only relevant for a locality, and yet we are able to find them” says Gupta, warning that “Scalability should not become the enemy of sustainability”. We have the technology and the communicative sophistication to decentralize our search for the best solutions, but we tend to ignore this localizing talent of our new media.

The spreading environmental fallout from the gushing Deepwater Horizon BP oil well is likely to continue throughout the summer, barring the discovery of a bold new idea for how to cap a runaway oil well. It appears that BP lied when it allegedly told regulators over a year ago that it had the technology to deal with a rupture resulting in a leak of 300,000 gallons per day. Clearly, none of BP’s standard responses are working.

It is now estimated that between 800,000 and 2 million gallons per day are spewing into the Gulf of Mexico unchecked, making this by far the worst environmental disaster the United States has ever faced. Containment efforts are limited to the surface, and BP appears to have no viable technological strategy for dealing with massive underwater plumes which may migrate by powerful underwater currents throughout the Gulf and the surrounding coastal areas.

Conservation biologists are now reporting the process of ecosystem contamination is well underway, as birds that eat fish caught in the contamination zone spread the toxins, when they die on land or are eaten by larger animals. So the technical response to the crisis must be more strategic than tactical, a widespread, multi-layered technological strategy, not simply one effort to deal with one aspect of the problem: the source.

We need new ideas, from wherever they might emerge, for each of the following:

1. How to overwhelm the massive upward pressure of the well?
2. How to cap the gushing well, pressure reduced or not?
3. How to execute the plan at 5,000 feet below the surface?
4. How to contain 100% of the surface oil slick without toxic chemicals?
5. How to contain 100% of the underwater plumes without toxic chemicals?
6. How to plan for site-relevant immediate response to a blowout?
7. How to clean up the oil in the water, without toxic chemicals?
8. How to clean up the oil on the beaches and in marshlands, without toxic chemicals?
9. How to protect coastal cities from oil arriving by water?
10. How to upgrade all offshore rigs to secure them against similar disaster?

Propose any ideas on these or other technical challenges of the Deepwater Horizon disaster…

The Deepwater Horizon undersea oil well is now the source of the worst oil spill on record. The spreading slick continues to threaten coastal communities throughout the Gulf of Mexico region, and could destroy delicate wetland ecosystems. Rep. Melancon (D-LA) was choking back tears yesterday as he explained the grave long-term harm he fears will be done to Louisiana’s coastal wetlands, saying “everything I know and love is at risk”. BP, it appears, has not been able to determine whether or not its “top kill” operation has succeeded in stopping the flow of oil.

It is now estimated that between 18 and 39 million gallons of oil have poured into the Gulf of Mexico. This far exceeds the catastrophic Exxon Valdez spill in Prince William Sound, which was 11 million gallons. After the initial “top kill” operation had appeared to significantly reduce the pressure of the petroleum emerging from the well, BP has reportedly decided to do a “junk shot”, pouring refuse from tires, bridging materials and other materials into the well.

Video from the site appears to show there is still some mix of mud and oil pouring from the well, though it has been difficult to assess the exact composition of the material itself. A BP spokesman has reportedly suggested it may not be possible to fully overwhelm the pressure of the well in a safe way. With the official recognition by BP that the “top kill” maneuver had failed, the company said it will now work on ways to “contain” the flow of oil, until relief wells being drilled are able to relieve pressure, sometime in August.

According to the Christian Science Monitor:

After BP’s three unsuccessful attempts to stop or siphon the gushing oil, federal officials also appear to be shifting focus. They are subtly but repeatedly emphasizing that their efforts should be judged by the region’s long-term recovery – not on the immediate issue of whether they can stop the Macondo wellhead from leaking 800,000 gallons of oil a day into the Gulf of Mexico.

Addressing the situation in a statement Saturday, President Obama said: “It is as enraging as it is heartbreaking, and we will not relent until this leak is contained, until the waters and shores are cleaned up, and until the people unjustly victimized by this manmade disaster are made whole.”

It appears increasingly to be the case that BP misled authorities about the flow of oil pouring into the Gulf, and those false reports may have had the effect of scaling down the broader response for cleanup and/or containment. MSNBC reports that conservation biologists studying the video say they believe there are likely 2 million gallons of oil pouring into the Gulf on a daily basis.

BP has noted the severe challenges facing the latest containment operation. The BBC reports that:

The Lower Marine Riser Package (LMRP) will use undersea robots to slice through the damaged pipe to make a clean cut that can be connected to a riser, capturing the leaking oil.

However, BP said the operation had never been carried out at a depth of 5,000ft and “the successful deployment of the containment system cannot be assured”.

The hope is the new plan will show signs of having worked to contain the majority of the oil gushing from the well by the end of this week. But, critics have said the engineering does not exactly suggest that scenario is viable: if BP admits it does not believe it can overwhelm the entire flow of oil from the well, the remaining flow may eventually overwhelm the containment device.

Pres. Obama has expressed outrage, and has instituted increasingly aggressive monitoring efforts, but is faced with the hard fact that the US government does not appear to have the engineering expertise for this specific type of crisis situation. Regulatory agencies that would be able to obtain and distribute the information necessary to ensure the Army Corps of Engineers and other government agencies would have the technical expertise and training to stage an immediate emergency response had funding stripped throughout the last administration.

Pres. Obama may not be able to make that case, but it remains a very real problem for the administration, the American public and the environment of the Gulf coast states. The leaking Macondo well is now the site of the worst oil disaster in the history of the United States, and is expected to leak between 800,000 and 2 million gallons of oil per day until it is closed. The new estimates mean that roughly every 10 days the equivalent of the Exxon Valdez spill is released into the Gulf of Mexico.

The massive oil spill, which observers now say may turn out to be bigger and more catastrophic than the Exxon Valdez spill in Alaska’s Prince William Sound, has reportedly made landfall in Louisiana. The smell of crude oil is reported to have filled New Orleans and reached as far inland as Baton Rouge, according to reporting by NPR. It is now estimated that as much as 5,000 barrels or 200,000 gallons per day are spewing from the damaged drill site, five times what was estimated just a few days ago.

A coalition of government and industry vessels and engineers is attempting to seal the leak, and the White House has announced a fleet of some 300 response vessels on air, land and sea, are engaged around the clock in efforts to contain the spreading oil slick.

The fragile ecosystems of the Louisiana coastal region are now considered to be under serious threat from what could be the most severe disaster to strike the area, in terms of long-term irreparable damage. Even as some communities are just beginning to emerge from the devastation of Hurricane Katrina and the subsequent flooding, there is now serious concern that public health, agriculture and the natural environment, may suffer grave, long-term degradation across the region.

According to the New York Times:

As the vast and growing oil slick spread across the Gulf and approached shore, fishermen in coastal towns feared for their businesses and the White House stepped up its response to the worsening situation.

President Obama ordered a freeze on new offshore drilling leases until a review of the oil rig accident that caused the spill could be concluded, and new safeguards put in place.

Obama said he believes “domestic oil production” to be integral to a comprehensive strategy for energy security, but that it must be “responsible”. He added that “the local economies and livelihoods of the people of the Gulf Coast as well as the ecology of the region are at stake”.

Attorney General Eric Holder has sent Justice Dept. lawyers to the region to monitor the response and clean-up, and to investigate events leading up to the explosion, to determine whether key regulations were ignored or laws violated. Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano has ordered the setup of an emergency response command post in Mobile, Alabama, should that section of coastline face direct impact from the spill.

The Times also reports that:

Gov. Charlie Crist of Florida declared a state of emergency in six counties along the Panhandle on Friday. Gov. Bobby Jindal of Louisiana had declared a state of emergency on Thursday and mobilized the Louisiana National Guard to participate in response efforts.

As the emergency response spreads across the Gulf Coast region, the magnitude of the spill becomes all the more evident. With each day bringing a volume of spilled crude equal to several major spills, the Deepwater Horizon disaster could prove to be one of the worst oil-related environmental disasters in American history, the costs of which are as yet impossible to calculate.

Local fishing and tourism are already expected to be gravely impacted and long-term economic degradation could be a direct result of the spill. Gov. Jindal has already requested federal relief aid for the Louisiana fishing industry, and more such requests are expected to follow, as the slick spreads and the long-term impact becomes more apparent.

When the Deepwater Horizon undersea oil drilling platform exploded, last Tuesday, then collapsed into the Gulf of Mexico, two days later —on Earth Day— it began pouring huge quantities of crude oil into the water. It is now estimated that 42,000 gallons of crude oil per day are pouring into the already troubled Gulf ecosystem. As of this morning, the slick is reported to have moved to within 20 miles of the Louisiana coastline, and some of the most fragile wetland ecosystems in the region.

The above image, from NASA, shows the spreading oil slick having reached the size of the city of New Orleans, and continuing to spread, as more oil is spilled uncontrolled into the Gulf and the currents pull the crude closer to shore. There is now a tentative plan to use a “controlled burn” to try to prevent the oil slick from reaching the coastline, as industry and government alike have been unable to close the leaks or prevent the slick from spreading.

According to the New York Times:

A joint government and industry task force has been unable to stop crude oil from streaming out of a broken pipe attached to a well 5,000 feet below sea level. The leaks were found Saturday, days after an oil rig to which the pipe was attached exploded and sank in the gulf about 50 miles southeast of Venice, La.

The explosion will have extremely damaging long-term effects for the local ecosystem, and it has revealed a weakness in the industry’s approach to resource extraction. There is no easy or tested way to deal with this kind of situation, and coastal states and their people are questioning the wisdom of expanding drilling in the interests of commercial enterprise or federal energy policy.

Even as New Jersey’s new Republican governor takes an increasingly hard line on funding cuts for education, healthcare and other vital services, seeking to enforce his party’s demand for reduced spending, he has vowed he will not approve any projects relating to the development of liquefied natural gas or petroleum drilling off New Jersey’s shores.

Red Bank Green reports:

At an oceanfront beach club in Sea Bright to mark the fortieth Earth Day, Christie said that while natural gas is a critical piece of the state’s energy future, “for as long as I am governor, this administration will oppose any application for liquefied natural gas,” according to the Asbury Park Press.

He added: “New Jersey is not going to be a pipeline for New York City for natural gas at the risk of ruining our shores, our beaches and our environment.”

While the Sierra Club and other environmental groups have said Christie is just grandstanding to “cover” for policies that are not conducive to expanded environmental protection, the pledge shows how deeply opposed people are to offshore carbon-fuel development projects in their own backyard. The Deepwater Horizon catastrophe could spur an impassioned wave of NIMBY (“not in my backyard”) activism.

The explosion, collapse and leak, of Deepwater Horizon is not an isolated incident in the offshore drilling industry. Last year, a rig off the Australian coast exploded and spilled massive quantities of crude oil into the sea for 10 weeks. Other rigs in the Gulf of Mexico have suffered “blow outs”, in which dozens of workers have been killed and tens of thousands of gallons of crude oil spilled. And so, though the occurrence is infrequent, it is a constant risk, and difficult to contain or reverse.

Safety measures have gone as far as attempting to classify which personality types should be dealt with in which ways during an emergency. According to the Seattle Times:

Transocean, owner of the Deepwater Horizon, has required workers to put colored dots on their hard hats that, based on psychological tests, indicate personality types, as a way to persuade workers to communicate better during emergencies.

[Mike] Saucier of [the U.S. Minerals Management Service] said rig workers increasingly have unquestioned authority to stop work if they think conditions are hazardous. Rigs with highly mechanized equipment also are on the rise, he said.

The Department of the Interior will join with the Department of Homeland Security to conduct an official probe into the causes of the explosion. Criminal charges could follow, and civil law suits are already emerging.

PR Web reports:

Karl Kleppinger Jr., is a former Desert Storm veteran who spent more than 10 years working on oil rigs. He was a dedicated floorman who worked on the Deepwater Horizon off the Louisiana coast. He was among the 11 workers presumed dead after the Coast Guard officially called off the search on Friday, April 23, 2010. Officials stated that they believed the workers never made it off the oil rig.

On April 22, 2010 a lawsuit (Cause No. 2010-25245, filed in Harris County ED101J015754153) was filed by Houston-based law firm, Gordon, Elias & Seely, L.L.P., against Transocean Offshore Deepwater Drilling, Inc., Deepwater Horizon, and BP Products North America, Inc. on behalf of Kleppinger’s wife and son. The lawsuit claims that the defendants were negligent and that the Deepwater Horizon drilling rig was not seaworthy.

Kleppinger’s wife recalls that in her last conversations with her husband, there was “this feeling that things were bad”, and her husband was desperate to reassure her he would soon be home. The family wants to know what conditions may have led to the accident and why the company has so little information as to what may have happened to their missing relative.

Earth Day 2010 finds our world, in many ways, at a moment of crucial historical importance, on the issue of climate destabilization and environmental stewardship. The combined effects of major scientific advances, which have brought a wealth of hard evidence, the global campaign to raise awareness, and the deteriorating conditions of the carbon fuel sector’s relationship with consumers’ interest, now mean awareness of the urgent need to achieve a more sustainable global economic infrastructure has spread rapidly.

But consciousness is only part of the process: achieving meaningful action will likely be more arduous and more elusive an undertaking, and the entire environmental responsibility movement is now facing a multi-hundreds-of-millions-of-dollar campaign by interested parties aiming to smear the entire field of climate science, sow doubt and undermine progress.

But the early 21st century has given us the clearest signals we have seen, on a global scale, that stewardship of the natural environment is not just a human ethical imperative but that it requires our coming to understand and work together with natural systems, to protect the natural resources and services that provide us with a base of incalculable value for sustaining our civilization and our species. In 2010, climate policy is moving forward in historic ways, and the United States is now coming to grips with the opportunity/obligation to serve as a global leader in responsible energy, development, and climate policy.

2010 will also be remembered as the year when the first all-solar-powered plane took flight, and when the most advanced electric vehicles (EV) to date became available to the consumer market. The Solar Impulse prototype plane cannot carry a substantial passenger load just yet, but it is the major first step on the road to a carbon-free transport future. Tesla’s and Fisker’s stunning inaugural EV models remain too expensive for most consumers, but as the infrastructure, the battery technology and the energy efficiency rapidly advance, they will likely set the standard for 21st century automotive transport.

The Chevy Volt and the Nissan Leaf will also take the EV model to a new level, allowing a far wider range of consumers to really benefit from the option to move away from carbon-only transport fuel, and drive a paradigm shift in fuel-sourcing, clean energy and fuel-efficiency standards. Building the green economy has become an integral part of long-term economic policy in the US and the EU, but also across Asia, the Pacific and deep into Africa.

How effectively environmentally sustainable advances are put into practice, and across how wide a scope, will determine whether we are able to stave off some of the worst effects of comprehensive climate destabilization over the next 100 to 200 years. Even as major cities across the world seek to promote clean-fueled public transport and daily bicycle use, coal-fired power plants are expanding their number at an historic pace, in China and India, and governments are increasingly looking at nuclear energy (far from environmentally neutral or 100% “safe”) as the most powerful alternative to slow this process.

In the US, there is mounting grassroots pressure on the White House and Congress, both controlled by progressive, environmentally conscious Democrats, to make more committed, more aggressive plans for a comprehensive shift away from high-intensity carbon-polluting fuel sources, like coal and petroleum. But sustainability requires astute attention to detail on a range of issues far beyond energy and fuel use: sustainable agriculture, water use, even genetic science policy, all relate to the long-term sustainability quotient of any given nation’s overall policy framework.

On the second morning of the 54th Commission on the Status of Women, Gender Links and the African Woman and Child Feature Service —through the Gender and Media Diversity Centre— hosted a roundtable dialogue involving Marren Akatsa-Bukachi of the Eastern African Sub-regional Support Initiative for the Advancement of Women (EASSI), Francisco Cos-Montiel of the International Development Research Centre (IDRC), Revai Makanje of Hivos, Norah Matovu-Winyi of the African Women’s Development and Communication Network, and Jennifer Lewis of Gender Links as facilitator, with Mwendabai Yeta Mkhize and myself providing event support and reporting.

The discussion opened with comments on statistical analysis of proress toward the goal of achieving 50/50 parity. With a 7% improvement since Beijing, the discussion moved quickly toward the question of how to accelerate the rise of women in decision-making and leadership roles.

With not enough parliamentary-level attention focused on women’s issues or the specific virtues of achieving parity in representation, local government emerged as a potential area of strategic focus, in relation to promoting women’s access to positions of leadership and decision-making. Quotas were raised as a potential policy lever by which to promote parity. Revai Mekanje suggested working to adopt a “more catalystic” approach to fostering support networks and the cultural underpinnings for women to take leadership positions and influence policy.

Leadership, as such, was the next topic: women need access to leadership positions, and women too often do not see themselves as right for leadership positions. These cultural and psychological barriers to accumulating political capital need to be addressed. Francisco Cos-Montiel noted that in studies of Indian political participation, it was clear that women who were able to achieve leadership or decision-making roles, in politics or in the private sector, were almost uniformly from a societal and cultural elite. Similar trends were seen across South America, highlighting the need to build the political capital of women from marginalized communities.

Norah Matovu-Winyi viewed this as the challenge of “decolonization of the mind”, which was then framed by the group as a project of “depatriarchalization”. Matovu-Winyi explained that this problem relates to a psychological colonization, because it involves the ceding of authority to a traditionally or systemically more powerful other who, it is supposed, “knows more than we do”. Personal or community agency is excluded by the prejudice that leadership entails a special inborn quality or elevated worth. In order to counter this surrender of selfhood to disinterested traditional elites, Matovu-Winyi proposed a deliberate effort to “demystify leadership”.

Marren Akatsa-Bukachi suggested this project must also apply to positions of influence in the private sector. Enterprise and community leadership roles, outside of elective political office, can wield significant influence that determines numerous factors of the quality of life for women, girls and whole communities. Without access to leadership roles in the private sector, women are less able to influence policy locally or decide how resources and opportunity are distributed in relation to their communities.

Akatsa-Bukachi also noted the pervasive custom of how even food is distributed among men and women, and linked this to the problem of the colonization of the mind by a systemic prejudice that favors patriarchy. Women are often left only the toes of the chicken, for example, while men enjoy the thigh and breast-meat. This inequity is not only a household custom or a commentary on private relationship dynamics, but is in many ways politically relevant. It illustrates the distance at which women are kept from positions of leadership and decision-making, even in such intimate details of daily life.

Jennifer Lewis, the event’s discussion facilitator, noted this male-female relationship dynamic shows the need to “make the political personal”. Matovu-Winyi noted it’s vital to promote “democracy as a way of life” — without genuine equality in everyday relationship dynamics, the political landscape cannot be authentically democratic.

Lewis also moved the discussion toward the specific question of how to get beyond the numbers. There was consensus among all participants that outreach and support-building efforts need to be “more deliberate”. Cos-Montiel said there needs to be more focus on “strategic” thinking about how to both relay the message that will best build toward parity, but also about how to help women build the cultural capital that will allow them to access the political arena or move into decision-making roles.

Akatsa-Bukachi suggested women need to move away from “staccato involvements”, occasional interactions with the systems, networks and privileges that allow women to take on leadership roles. Women cannot just come to the table “at the last minute”, when a viable female candidate for office gains traction, or a specific issue of controversy comes to prominence, because that temporary support-base will dissolve as soon as the trend shifts.

There is a measurable need for women to build sustained, comprehensive networks of involvement in matters of policy, writing opinion articles, talking about and promoting real change for women, including the rise of strong candidates who will be able to capitalize on this more sustained support.

The “loneliness of leadership” experienced by women was raised as a significant factor contributing to the difficulty of building an sustained base of positions in political and private leadership. Actual efforts to measure such deficits and to explore ways to foster such sustained support communities could help to advance the cause of parity in leadership and to provide young women with a culturally more favorable environment in which their abilities and ambitions will be more directly sought and expected.

Social media may be integral to building the necessary sustained support networks. Examples of how social media and community media can come together to empower women and combat injustice have peppered the discussions of these first days of the CSW. Gender Links is using the UN gathering to cultivate a global debate about what role media play in fostering understanding and progress with respect to the treatment of women.

Lewis asked the discussion participants to propose their main priorities in relation to expanding the role of women in governance. Quotas and the need to transform political parties from within were the first two priorities suggested. Akatsa-Bukachi said the 50/50 goal is a “solemn declaration” that needs to be repeated until it saturates the conversation. She also noted the need to reach out to men, to involve them and make them aware of the real need to improve society by achieving parity. An extension of this priority, she said, is the need to overcome the problem of “feminist faces with patriarchal minds”, while keeping in mind the goal of building a broader long-term alliance for equality that includes both men and women.

Matovu-Winyi said existing systems need to be employed and improved, to make as much headway as possible in the elections —local and national, across Africa and beyond— of the first three years of this decade. She also noted that “no politician just appears on the scene” and called for the creation of substantive institutional supports for women to get involved in public life. She called for “more research” across the spectrum of issues related to why women are or are not empowered to access decision-making roles.

Cos-Montiel called for the inclusion of “women from the margins”, a strategic approach to building cultural and political capital for women, and close scrutiny of what role religious institutions play in sustaining the dominance of a patriarchal narrative or mindset. He noted the combination of hierarchy and patriarchy in the structure of the Catholic church, observing that such institutional structures effect extreme symbolic and socio-psychological influence, which can limit women’s readiness or willingness to push for greater access to decision-making roles in the community, at work or in the political sphere.

The dialogue closed after 44 minutes of lively and engaged discussion, with Norah Matovu-Winyi remarking that political supports for women will be “more authentic” when the narrative driving those social mechanisms is not focused only on the concept of rights for women as inherently virtuous, but deliberately integrates that foundational idea into a more dynamic discourse that gets closer to the daily needs and interests of non-activist women and the communities in which they live.