Posts Tagged Green News
Waxman-Markey passes the house, but what is it?
Posted by Jeffrey in General News on July 3rd, 2009
If you’ve been following the news, then you’ve probably heard of the Waxman-Markey Act, also know as the American Clean Energy and Security Act of 2009 (ACES). It is an energy bill that outlines an emissions cap-and-trade policy. It passed in the House on Friday by the House, but has yet to make it to the Senate. After two Bush terms of inaction on climate change, we’re finally moving in the right direction. Maybe.
The blogosphere and newspaper opinion pages are on fire about whether the bill is a nonsense, just what we need, or somewhere in the middle. A Mother Jones article in the week leading up to the House vote does a good job of summarizing the concern over Waxman-Markey: Pass a flawed climate bill now, or wait for a better one?
Here is the meat of the 1,200-page bill:
- Set limits emissions limits of carbon dioxide, methane, and other greenhouse gases: by 2020, emissions need to be 17% below 2005 levels. By 2050, an 80% reduction.
- Set renewable energy production standards: by 2020, any electricity provider who supplies more than 4 million MWh must produce 20% of it’s supply through a renewable source, such as wind, solar, or geothermal. However, part of this requirement can be met through increasing energy efficiency. Alternatively, an energy supplier can pay $25 per MWh to achieve compliance.
- Modernization of the American electricity grid.
- Provides for an expansion in electric vehicle production.
- Makes large increases to the required levels of energy efficiency in buildings and home appliances.
The emissions weren’t a much as President Obama had hoped for, or as much as many European counterparts have adopted, but it’s a start. A new article today pointed out that the new law could upset the voluntary market, such as companies trying to green up their image by buying offsets. The provisions for energy efficiency increases in buildings could lead to some pretty neat things.
However, the bill has yet to be tested in the Senate. With Al Franken making Democrat #60 in the Senate, we’ll just have to wait to see if that means anything.
Starbucks to go LEED-certified
Posted by Jeffrey in General News on July 1st, 2009
A press release by Starbucks last Thursday indicated that the company intends for all new stores to achieve LEED certification beginning next year. Renovated stores are planned to also receive environmentally-friendly updates. This move is part of Starbucks’ “Shared Planet” strategy, which also includes efforts to design stores that fit in better with their neighborhoods. Starbucks says the following will be core characteristics of new stores:
- Celebration of local materials and craftsmanship;
- Focus on reused and recycled elements;
- Exposure of structural integrity and authentic roots;
- Elevation of coffee and removal of unnecessary distractions;
- Storytelling and customer engagement through all five senses; and
- Flexibility to meet the needs of many customer types – individual readers and computer users, as well as work, study and social groups.
Among the environmentally-friendly goals for the new stores, Starbucks lists the following:
- Derive 50 percent of the energy used in company-operated stores from renewable sources by 2010;
- Reduce greenhouse gas emissions by making company-operated stores 25 percent more energy efficient by 2010;
- Achieve LEED® certification for all new company-operated stores worldwide by late 2010;
- Ensure 100 percent of cup supply will be reusable or recyclable by 2015; and
- Make recycling available in company-operated stores where Starbucks controls waste collection by 2015.
Starbucks has always been more “green-orientated” than a number of other companies: earlier this year they opened a LEED Silver-certified roasting plant in South Carolina. However, there is a varying degree of how environmentally they are, could be, and should be. These new green goals of Starbucks are a massive step in the right direction.
Maui: Beautiful Beaches and an Electric Vehicle Infrastructure?
Posted by Jeffrey in General News, Green Cars on June 23rd, 2009
Image from BetterPlace.com
Hawaii is planning on converting Maui to an all electric vehicle island. The Hawaii Clean Energy Initiative hopes to decrease the state’s dependency on oil and focus more on renewable energy. According to the initiative currently 85% of the state’s energy comes from oil. Hawaii hopes to become more self sufficient by introducing electric vehicles to the island of Maui. According to this article the government hopes to have 3,000 electric cars on the road by 2010 and 50,400 electric by 2015.
Hawaii is a perfect place to introduce an electric vehicle network; people living in Hawaii pay some of the highest gas prices in the country, so driving an electric vehicle will likely be a much greater value than in other states. The geography is also conducive to an electric vehicle system since most of the islands are not that large.
To implement their electric vehicle system Hawaii has partnered with Better Place. Better Place will build up to 100,000 battery charging stations around the island of Maui by 2015. While you can still charge your vehicle at home, you have the option to subscribe to their battery swapping service, which sources their electricity from renewable energy resources. The cost is expected to be up to 8 cents per mile. Just last month Better Place unveiled their trial battery swapping station in Yokohama Japan. The article also includes a video demonstration on the process, which at one minute and fifteen seconds is quite impressive.
While no production vehicles are currently compatible with the battery-swapping stations, Better Place is working with auto manufacturers to ensure future electric vehicles will work with their system.
It will be interesting to see the effects the electric vehicles have on Hawaii’s economy once the network has been well established. Better Place is also working on implementing electric vehicle networks in San Francisco, Australia, Israel, and Denmark. To read more about Hawaii’s energy plan visit www.hawaii.gov/gov/energy.
iTunes, Kindle, NetFlix…Green Distribution
Posted by Jeffrey in General News, Tools & Toys on June 22nd, 2009
Green Car Company teammate Frances Ingraham wrote in our June newsletter about some of the green highlights of Amazon’s Kindle e-reader, most notably that it “requires 67 times less water and 140 times less CO2 to produce than printed newspaper; and books use even more water!” There’s lots of analysis out there about how green the Kindle is, but there is a bigger idea behind the “greenness” of the Kindle: digital distribution is green distribution.
Many of you probably have purchased music off of iTunes (or some other online source). This means that you did not buy a physical CD. You didn’t buy that plastic case with the paper booklet that was shipped from somewhere to arrive at the store where you didn’t buy it. Maybe you didn’t buy the physical CD off the internet, which means you didn’t have it shipped, via truck or plane, to arrive at your home. Your digital purchase cut out the production and transportation of a physical object.
Almost ten years ago I was eager to jump on the NetFlix bandwagon: why wouldn’t you want unlimited DVD rentals delivered to your mailbox? Well, now NetFlix, and a few others, offer digital rentals. You pay for the rental, but instead of driving to the store to pick it up, you simply download it. It saves you time, and it reduces not only the number of trips by car to the rental shop, but also the need for a physical DVD to be produced and shipped to that rental shop.
Sure, it will take a bigger cultural shift to get more people relying on digital distribution. Even though you can get digital CD booklets with your music purchase on iTunes, there is still that happy feeling of having the physical CD case in your hand. Even though the Kindle reads nicely and can hold way more than you can possibly read, holding a book still has a nostalgic feeling. Those sort of intangible perks of physical objects are perhaps the biggest obstacle to digital “green” distribution.
To help you get started on the green distribution path, here are a few sources to check out:
- Books: Amazon Kindle, eBooks.com, Plastic Logic (coming soon!), and Cool-er eReader.
- Music: iTunes, Amazon Music, eMusic.com.
- Movies: iTunes, Netflix (if you stream online), Blockbuster Online, Amazon Video on Demand.
The $100k LEED Platinum Home
Posted by Jeffrey in General News on June 18th, 2009
Before I talk about this amazing green home, I wanted to let you all know that The Green Car Company will be at Whole Foods at their downtown Seattle store tomorrow June 19 from 10am to 3pm. You’ll be able to get a good look at the A2B Electric Bike and talk to a couple experts about them!
Image from 100khouse.com
New home uses 50% less energy, 50% less water, is LEED Platinum Certified, and can be built for just $100,000! SOLD!
The 100K House is a project by Postgreen, a real estate development firm in Philadelphia that focuses on green and affordable buildings. When they say “green” or “affordable,” they mean it. Take a look at the 100K House, which is nearing completion.
First of all, the house is on pace to achieve LEED Platinum certification. (The wiki page makes it a little easier to understand.) Because of it’s incredible design, this home will be able to significantly decrease energy and water requirements.
Perhaps most impressive of all is that, like the name says, the house can be built for $100,000 in supply and labor costs.
The people behind the 100K House have a completely different vision for the future of housing. While still being a for-profit business, they put sustainability and affordability at the top of their priorities. Their 100k House project has an impressive goal in mind as well:
The basic concept of the 100K House is to offer an affordable home that places a high priority on quality, design, energy efficiency, health and sustainability rather than “bells & whistles” that can drive the price of new construction out of reach from the majority of home buyers.
Postgreen has plans to make the house plans available outside of Philadelphia, but that could be a while. Right now, they’re proving that housing doesn’t need to cause a global crisis, but it can help us fight the climate crisis!
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