Happy 4th of July! I hope you are having a great holiday, and doing your best to keep it green. I know it can be hard around holidays, but little changes add up to a big difference. If you do fall off the green wagon today, just work a bit harder tomorrow or the next holiday. Some easy ideas are organic berries, local food and reusables. Today is also a good day to think about energy independence: liberty from polluting fossil fuels, and liberty from foreign sources of energy. Let’s take this Independence Day to heart.
Drill Baby Drill? I Don't Think So.
May 1, 2010 By Leave a Comment
Source: Michael Macor, The Chronicle
Photo taken on 11/8/07, in San Francisco, CA, USA
My heart is breaking as I watch footage of the oil spill, hitting the estuaries of Louisiana. This catastrophe will be worse for the people whom rely on the seafood industry, 1/3 of which comes from the region, for their livelihood, than Katrina was. Estuaries are critically essential to the seafood industry, to the breeding grounds for a multitude of wildlife, and to the economy of the region. I think many of us have forgotten how devastating a gargantuan oil spill can be. We’ve forgotten about the heart-wrenching videos and photos of sea birds and animals soaked in crude.
Drill baby drill? I don’t think so. I know we, as Americans, want to be off foreign oil. I understand that and agree with that. I don’t believe drilling more, and putting more of our coastline in jeopardy is the answer. We need to reduce our demand, plain and simple. We have sustainable, clean energy waiting to be tapped. I was just down in San Antonio, Texas and looked down from my hotel room onto an enormous rooftop begging to be filled with solar panels. The roof was the roof of the convention center, and it was nearly the size of a city block. That is just one example of a wasted opportunity. Think of how many electric cars could be charged from solar power in states like Texas. We have the technology right now. We need to be smart, and use our ingenuity. Clean energy is everywhere. Why are we not using it? Expense? Ha! Like it’s not expensive to build new drill platforms, or clean up an oil slick, or lose an industry for a whole region. THAT is expensive.
I also want to give my condolences for the eleven families that lost loved ones on that oil platform. I can’t imagine how difficult this must be for them to watch the events unfold on the news.
Coal is a Killer
April 11, 2010 By Leave a Comment
I’ve written about the problems, dangers, and inherent toxicity of coal in the past. The horrible tragedy this last week in West Virginia only stands to prove that coal is detrimental for all involved, well, except the energy company owners, like Mr. Don Blankenship. The link I posted shows how corrupt this guy is, and I don’t think he’s an anomaly in the industry. Coal is killing the people who work in the mines, the environments around the mines, and the landscapes around the mines. Once the coal is out of the mines, and burned it releases radiation, mercury, dioxin, sulfur dioxide, nitrous oxide, arsenic and cadmium. It is bad! Coal is killing people every day, but not as dramatically as the poor miners at Upper Big Branch Mine. It is shameful that it takes a catastrophe of this magnitude to highlight the dangers of coal. I could go on, but the article attached demonstrates my point perfectly. We need to stop wasting energy, and be more efficient. We have to support green energy. Cheap energy is not cheap when people die.
