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How 'Communities of Power' are saving the planet - |
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| I'd put my money on the sun and solar energy. What a source of power! I hope we don't have to wait until we run out of coal and oil before we tackle that. Tomas A. Edison Here's what I think the truth is: We are all addicts of fossil fuels in a state of denial, about to face cold turkey. And like so many addicts about to face cold turkey, our leaders are now committing violent crimes to get what little is left of what we're hooked on. Kurt Vonnegut I feel very certain that we will make the transition to a renewable energy economy. And that we have the know-how to do it in time. Dr. Donald Aitken, Former Chief Scientist Union of Concerned Scientists |
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| Sundown for the Age of Oil. Sunrise for the Solar Century. Like so many evolutionary breakthroughs - say, for example, the cellular invention of photosynthesis - it happened without discussion, fanfare or, for that matter, any attention from Fox, CNN or the New York Times. It happened so fast that if you weren't paying close attention to the agenda you would have missed it. On Tuesday, May 11, 2004 the San Francisco Board of Supervisors unanimously passed a so-called Energy Independence Ordinance, a local law designed to change the world. Co-authored by its sponsor Supervisor Tom Ammiano and activist Paul Fenn of the organization Local Power (www.local.org), the trail-blazing measure mandates creation of 360 Megawatts of new 'clean power' capacity, supplying 25% of the city's needs - all to be accomplished without new taxes or rate increases. The result of years of patient foundation laying work by Local Power Co-Directors Julia Peters and Paul Fenn and other activists, the Energy Independence Ordinance establishes a template that is designed to be adopted and developed by other cities around the state, nation and globe. “Our greatest environmental problem is global warming,” says Michelle Perrault, the Sierra Club's International Vice President, who, along with supportive representatives from a number of organizations including TURN (The Utility Reform Network), the Community First Coalition of Bayview-Hunters Point and Greenpeace spoke at a recent news conference hosted by the measure's sponsor, Supervisor Tom Ammiano. “The U.S. is the single largest cause of climate change,” observes Perrault. “The San Francisco Energy Independence Ordinance will create the world's largest solar network, make a significant investment in wind power, create a massive opportunity for efficient peak reduction technologies, breath new life into the Bay Area hi tech sector, and open a door to a solar future now.” Quite a list of potential results. But that's not all. Perrault also predicts, “These green energy technologies will provide major new opportunities for low and high skilled workers both in Hunter's Point and Silicon Valley. This is a Green Public Works project unprecedented in scale.” A Power Shift in Four-wheel Drive The passage of San Francisco's Energy Independence law is also a dramatic indication of a new, unprecedented coalition of forces coming together whose participants see it as nothing less than a renewable energy revolution. It's a movement so new that it hardly yet has a sense of itself as a movement. It's bringing together suburban moms, urban activists, business leaders, labor organizers, lawmakers and public officials who see their common best interests served by one common goal: creating a transition to a 'clean, renewable energy' economy. Van Jones, Director of San Francisco's Ella Baker Center for Human Rights www.ellabakercenter.org sees the emerging coalition as an economic vehicle with four wheels. “The first wheel is the criminal justice movement,” he says. “The second is the ecology movement, including the environmental justice movement. The third wheel is labor and the forth wheel is green business,” Jones explains with persuasive passion. “The only way this unjust, war-making, incarcerating, polluting economy is going to make a U-turn away from self-destruction and toward a clean, rainbow future for the nation and the planet is to have all four of those wheels in gear and on the ground.” That's why Jones' organization is launching a “Green Jobs Not Jails” Campaign to take advantage of what Jared Blumenfeld of San Francisco's Department of the Environment calls the coming “Energy Rush.” “First we had the Gold Rush. Then we had the Dot Com Rush. And now we're going to have the California Energy Rush,” predicts Blumenfeld. Successful entrepreneur Michael Shallenberger, co-founder of the Apollo Alliance, a green investor group, agrees. His organization (www.apolloalliance.org) has released a report titled 'New energy for America,” putting forth a 10-year national investment project which “…meets the pressing challenges to our economy, environment, national security and public infrastructure by promoting clean energy…. The Apollo program (1) jump starts our economy, (2) creates good jobs (3) offers substantial benefits for the environment, (4) revitalizes our cities, and (5) improves national security….” UC-Berkeley Professor George Lakoff, speaking recently to a packed house, explains it this way: “The Apollo Program says we make a massive investment in renewable energy. Now, what does a 'really massive investment' mean? If you do it massively enough, you create millions of new jobs, and they're not exportable jobs. They're jobs building wind mills and making and installing and maintaining solar facilities and so on - jobs and jobs and jobs. “Secondly, its a health program: you clean the air, you clean the water. “It's a global warming program, a non-specific global warming program, you start taking the products of fossil fuels out of the air. “Next,” says Lakoff, “its a foreign policy program - you limit dependence on middle-east oil, and, if its done big enough, you eliminate dependence on middle-east oil. “And I think that something that isn't talked about when people speak of renewable energy, is the effect on the Third World. This is the best Third World development program there is. Why? Every dollar invested in energy in the Third World is multiplied by a factor of six. If you have renewable energy, people don't have to buy oil. They don't have to borrow money to buy oil. They don't have to pay interest on the money they borrow to buy oil. And they don't have to pollute their environment. They don't have to pollute OUR environment, our common global environment,” Lakoff concludes. The pro-active optimism of the Apollo Plan - named, says Shallenberger, to evoke the can-do U.S. spirit that put Yankee footprints on the moon - is echoed on the international level by the 'Energy Transition Plan' put forward by author Ross Gelbspan and an international team of experts. Gelbspan, whose investigative book “The Heat is On” helped put global climate change on policy-makers' radar screens, says his group's plan will not only fight climate collapse, but provide investment and employment “that will drive a world-wide economic boom." www.heatisonline.org A growing number of investors have caught the same vision and are already joining the energy rush. At the recent 4th annual “Cleantech Venture Forum,” held April 28-30 in San Francisco's upscale Fairmont Hotel, two awards were given reflecting a new choice of heroes among the Investing Class. The Cleantech Venture Network (Cleantech) describes itself as “…a grouping of member investors managing over $3 billion in clean tech venture assets. The company believes 'clean technologies' - from solar energy to water purification - are the next and necessary wave of venture investing.” www.cleantechventure.com This year, Cleantech's Investor of the Year Award went to CalPERS, the California Public Employees Retirement System, the nation's biggest pension fund. www.calpers.ca.gov According to Fortune's Marc Gunther, “With assets of $154 billion and a willingness to throw its weight around, CalPERS is one of the world's most influential investors….” Calling CalPERS “a hotbed of shareholder activism,” Gunther reports “When AIDS activists from Los Angeles wanted to pressure GlaxoSmithKline to lower the prices of drugs in Africa, they sought help from CalPERS -and got it. 'CalPERS is the 800-pound gorilla,' says Tom Myers, general counsel at the AIDS Healthcare Foundation.” Seems the Renewables Revolution has at least one 800-pound gorilla on its side. Cleantech's “Emerging Enterprise of the Year” Award was accepted by Apollo principal, Tom Dinwoodie, CEO of the Berkeley-based PowerLight Corporation of Northern California - a fast-growing firm which is handling the contract for San Francisco's trail-breaking 50 megawatt solar generation facility atop the Mosconi Center. PowerLight Corporation calls itself “the nation's leading designer, manufacturer and installer of grid-connected solar electric systems.” www.powerlight.com According to Cleantech, the Emerging Enterprise Award is presented to a company or its CEO that experienced rapid growth and/or provided a high realized return to investors in 2003 by bringing a clean technology or business model to market. “We are honored to present this award to PowerLight, a company that represents the future of clean technology,” said Nicholas Parker, co-founder and chairman of the Cleantech Venture Network. “Under Tom Dinwoodie's guidance, PowerLight has emerged as one of this country's fastest growing and most reputable clean technology companies. We congratulate Tom on his achievements and thank him for his leadership in helping to accelerate the growth of the clean technology industry.” According to its website the Cleantech Venture Forums “…aim to give event attendees the following: --Selection and presentation of the highest quality investment candidates available --Participation and involvement of key investors - business angels, venture capitalists, fund managers, investment bankers, and corporations --Interest of the media, business press, public officials and other leaders and decision makers --Leading edge information and research on the investment opportunities from leading thinkers on clean technology innovation and trends According to Parker, “The Cleantech Venture Forums are the only capital forums designed exclusively to facilitate the finance of companies commercializing clean technologies by bringing together clean technology entrepreneurs and venture investors, thus providing them with a venue in which deals and relationships can originate and incubate.” SURFING THE BILLION DOLLAR “GREEN WAVE” In yet another sign of the emerging energy rush, California Treasurer Phil Angelides has launched what he calls a "Green Wave" initiative to promote a cleaner environment while boosting financial returns for California retirees. www.treasurer.ca.gov/news/greenwave.htm Angelides is part of a growing number of investment managers who understand that, as his PR material puts it, “There's plenty of gold in green technologies where U.S. companies already enjoy a big competitive edge. And conversely, companies that don't pay attention to the future costs associated with poor environmental practices are going to lose plenty of long green in the long run.” Like Angelides, investment managers who understand both of these economic realities are beginning to demand that corporate leaders disclose their environmental records as a matter of basic bottom-line good business practices. Angelides has launched his Green Wave as a member of the board of two of America's, and the world's, largest public pension funds, the afore-mentioned California Public Employees Retirement System (CalPERS) and the California State Teachers Retirement System (CalSTRS), which have combined assets totaling $250 billion, Angelides' Green Wave has four purposes: 1.demanding environmental accountability and disclosure by corporations to investors; 2.encouraging greater investment in environmental science and technology; 3.directly investing in environmentally responsible companies; and 4.auditing real estate portfolios for sound environmental and energy practices that increase their long-term value. Under this initiative, CalPERS and CalSTRS will invest up to $500 million in the form of private equity, venture capital and project financing in environmental technologies, and another $1 billion in corporations and stock funds whose environmental practices have been carefully screened. Studies have shown that environmentally screened funds have consistently out-performed their non-screened counterparts. (In 2001-2002, screened portfolios grew by 7 percent despite an overall market downturn.) And expanded investments in environmental science and technology are beginning to look very shrewd: The World Energy Council estimates that the global market for renewable energy should reach $625 billion by 2010 and $1.9 trillion by 2020. Auditing the California pension systems' $16 billion in real estate holdings for "green building" standards look like it will pay off as well. California's own tough energy efficiency standards are expected to save $57 billion in energy costs by 2011. But the Green Wave may be most influential in convincing investors and corporations alike to get serious about the costs associated with poor environmental practices. Experts say the consequences of global warming could add up to a 15 percent hit to major companies' market capitalization, and could slice the value of shareholders' investments by 5 to 7 percent. The Investor Network on Climate Risk, launched by managers of 10 major pension funds with more than a trillion dollars in long-term investments (including Angelides, his counterparts in New York and Connecticut, and the heads of several major labor union funds), said this in a recent statement: "We believe that climate change consequences that could affect us and our beneficiaries long into the future." Investors and corporations alike are beginning to see things the same way. The American Electric Power Company and Cinergy Corporation recently announced they would release company studies estimating how greenhouse gas regulation could affect their operations and financial health. More broadly, initiatives like the Green Wave reflect a trend toward a much stronger role for investors in ensuring corporate responsibility to shareholders as well as to society. "The corporate scandals over the last couple of years have made it clear that investors need to pay more attention to corporate practices that affect long-term value," says Angelides. He and other pension managers are acting on this belief, and making Green Waves in the investor and corporate communities that they believe will ultimately create a rising tide of better environmental stewardship and smarter business practices across the country. Banking on the Sun - From Petro-Dollars to “Solars?” Worldwatch, a Washington-based NGO that monitors trends reports that solar and wind power are the world's fastest growing energy sources. Around the world, more and more nations have recognized the benefits of renewable technologies and adopted consistent, progressive policies to promote their use. In Germany, Japan, Spain, and a handful of other countries, clear government commitments to renewable energy and strong, effective policies have overcome barriers and created demand for these technologies, leading to dramatic growth in renewables industries an driving down costs. "Political will and the right mix of policies --not vast resource potential -- have made wind and solar power the world's fastest growing energy sources over the past decade," said Worldwatch research associate Janet Sawin, author of Mainstreaming Renewable Energy in the 21st Century. (For the full report: http://www.worldwatch.org/pubs/paper/169/ ) Already, says Worldwatch, new renewables -- including wind, solar, geothermal and modern bio energy -- supply enough electricity for more than 300 million homes worldwide. In 2003, an estimated $20.3 billion --about one-sixth of total global investment in power generation equipment -- was invested in new renewables. Within the next decade, this is expected to approach $85 billion annually. The growth rates of some renewables are closer to those of computers than the single-digit growth rates of today's energy economies. "Some people dismiss this rapid growth rate in an industry they consider tiny, but this thinking is short-sighted and mirrors the attitude of IBM toward Microsoft in the early 1980s," says Sawin. But to fully grok the investment-in-renewables picture, it's necessary to glance briefly at the global economic house of cards itself. Back in the '60's and early '70's, about the time - under the governorship of Jerry Brown, when the 'wind tax credit' law authored by Ty Cashman was helping California become (temporarily) the innovative wind and solar technology capitol of the world - Richard Nixon and Henry Kissinger were quietly moving the country in the opposite direction, deeper into petro-dependence. As James Quilligan of the Brandt 21 Forum ( www.brandt21forum.info ) tells the story - first, with the dollar already the world's dominant currency, Nixon announced publicly that the U.S. was abandoning the so-called 'Gold Standard,' according to which each dollar was backed by a set amount of gold. The dollar was to henceforth be a 'fiat' currency, deriving its value only from the “trust” other countries had in the 'full faith and credit' of the U.S. government. Dick and Henry held their breath. When the rest of the world community docily accepted this public move, Kissinger quietly met with Saudi and other oil producers to sign an agreement stipulating that all future oil transactions would be conducted in U.S. dollars. Though not publicized, this agreement effectively moved the world economy to the “Oil Standard,” while leaving the U.S. free to print unlimited amounts of dollars. So crucial is this arraignment to the maintenance of America's status - as the world's largest consumer, most profligate polluter, most powerfully militarized rogue state, leading incarcerator, and largest debtor nation - that Hussein's mere threat of denominating Iraqi oil sales in Euros may well have been enough to trigger a U.S. invasion, WMD's, fake al Qaida connections or not. Howsomeever - and this is something renewables advocates need to take as seriously as the Fossil Fools Faction of the ruling elite undoubtedly does - a little-discussed implication of moving from fossil fuels to renewable energy sources is the inevitable demise of the Almighty Petro-Dollar. Changing energy policy inescapably requires a simultaneous shift in monetary policy. And that means a macro-shift in U.S. foreign policy - from 'Full Spectrum Dominance' to 'Full Spectrum Cooperation.' The stakes have never been higher. Reversing The Endarkenment Process First we have 'Global Warming.” Then, according to Fox's disaster flick The Day After Tomorrow, we have 'Global Freezing.' Now, according to a new report that 10%-37% of the sunlight reaching the earth is blocked by industrially produced atmospheric pollution, we have 'Global Dimming'. Lump them all together and you've got 'Global Climate Change.' Warming in some places. Cooling in some places. Worldwide ocean level rise. Dimming just about everywhere - except maybe under the ozone holes. Oil and Endarkenment Track these problems back to their sources and what do you find? Carbon is the culprit. Yup. That's right. The burning of carbon-based fossil fuels - oil, gas and coal - in electricity generation, transportation, agriculture, industry and war. Our carbon economy also means rampant environmental, economic and social injustice in oil-producing regions abroad and at home. It means a childhood asthma epidemic. It means permanent petro-war for the planet's remaining oil supplies. Oil, war, climate change, world endarkenment - they all go together. Civilizations and their economies run on energy. The energy ours run on is oil. Petroleum dollars fuel the engines of world finance and the engines of Bradlee Fighting Vehicles. That makes the whole shebang very vulnerable to disruption of production in key exporting nations like, say, Saudi Arabia, which at this writing seems increasingly unstable what with terrorist attacks and squabbling among the royals. Robert Baer, a former CIA officer, is convinced that the kingdom's vast oil infrastructure is vulnerable, and with it the Western economy. In his recent book, “Sleeping with the Devil: How the U.S. Sold Its Soul for Crude,” he writes that "taking down Saudi Arabia's oil infrastructure is like spearing fish in a barrel". The kingdom has five giant fields connected by 10,500 miles of pipe work, most of it above ground. According to Mr Baer, a co-ordinated assault on five or more key junctions in the system could put the Saudis out of the oil business for two years. A successful assault on the giant Ras Tanura complex "would be enough to bring the world's oil-addicted economies to their knees, America's along with them," he writes. But as Mike Davis points out in his recent article “The Empire at Oil's End” (www.tomdispatch.com ) “Latin America - Mexico, Venezuela, Columbia and Ecuador - currently supplies more oil to the United States than the Middle East, and, from the very beginning, the White House has defined the War on Terrorism as including counterinsurgency in the Western Hemisphere.” Energy policy and foreign policy are very co-dependent. Davis observes, “From Kazakhstan to Ecuador, American combat boots are sticky with oil.” The demand for oil is projected to rise steeply and soon, as China and other 'developing counties' ramp up their oil consumption to match and even exceed that of Europe and the US. At the same time, there is a growing consensus among petro-geologists, oil executives, investment brokers and military planners that world oil supplies are already about half gone. That's right. As the title of Richard Heinberg's recent book, sub-titled 'Oil, War and the Fate of Industrial Societies, puts it: The Party's Over. And it isn't only oil production that is going over the peak of its bell-curve toward inevitable decline. Natural gas production is, too. Julian Darley, and author of the forthcoming book, High Noon for Natural Gas, and co-founder with Heinberg of the Post-Carbon Institute (www.postcarbon.org ), puts it bluntly, “America is running out of gas.” The Post Carbon Institute 'kernel idea,' Darley explains, is to explore in theory and practice what cultures, civilization, governance & economies might look like without the use of hydrocarbons as energy and chemical feedstocks. Having surveyed the data and the experts in depth, Darley has little doubt that, as he puts it, “the oil peak is upon us, and now, for Canada and the US, natural gas peak is here too. How much more warning do people need? It's time to get off the horrific hydrocarbon addiction. Time to re-localize and recreate local self-reliance - for villages, towns and cities, for local communities and economies to take back control. It's time to say 'Enough!'” Nevertheless, advocates of a fantasized liquefied natural gas (LNG) boom are poised to commit California ( and the country ) to a budget-busting build-out of new LNG 'infrastructure' - seaside terminals, pipelines and a new fleet of supertankers to bring the dwindling supplies of deep-frozen gas from remote, insecure corners of the world at great cost to the environment and the human rights of indigenous peoples. Our civilization is at an energy crossroads. Drill and kill and burn and carbonize the planet into ecological collapse. Or use our smarts and dwindling petroleum to facilitate a managed transition to renewables, peace, national security and regional energy independence. California is at an energy crossroads, too. It can regain its lost glory as the leader of the world's wind and solar energy industries. Or it can lead the lemming herd over the carbon cliff into 'petroblivion' - petroleum-fueled oblivion. The Dark Side of the Energy Rush: California's RACE Between Green Power and Gas Power Despite the fact that world natural gas supplies are limited and that discovery and production may have already peaked, the Bush Administration, working through the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC), is attempting to preempt the authority of the California Public Utilities Commission and force a Liquefied Natural Gas (LNG) terminal on Long Beach. States' rights aside, there are a lot of things wrong with this. It's the thin end of a wedge of a plan by LNG interests to, in effect, foreclose a renewable energy future for California by diverting available investment resources into a huge and expensive build-out of LNG infrastructure including port terminals, ocean tankers, pipelines and power plants. Not only are LNG terminals are known to be terrorist targets, but LNG tankers, terminals and adjacent power plants highly combustible and dangerous to neighboring communities. In January, an LNG facility in Algeria caught fire, and a fast-moving blaze killed over 276 workers and shattered windows up to seven miles away. A proposed import site in Long Beach harbor would be built on unstable landfill, and near an active earthquake fault. Here again, citizen groups are leaping into the breach. In the last 14 months, citizen activists in Vallejo, Tijuana, and Eureka have resoundingly rejected the import terminals proposed for their communities. A growing coalition has sprung up calling itself the Ratepayers for Affordable Clean Energy (RACE). RACE already includes Amazon Watch, Border Power Plant Working Group, Environmental Protection Information Center (EPIC), Greenpeace, Local Power, Long Beach Citizens for Utility Reform, Marin Clean Alternative Energy Now, Northcoast Environmental Center, Pacific Environment, Public Citizen, Synapse Energy Economics and Vallejo Community Planned Renewal (CPR). RACE has called for the California Public Utilities Commission to hold evidentiary hearings on the multiple contra-indications of the LNG build-out plan. "The industry is exploiting fears of rolling blackouts to make California dependent on imported foreign gas," says energy analyst Paul Fenn, of Oakland-based Local Power, "but the CPUC has to remember that gas shortages didn't create the blackouts of 2001 - energy supply manipulation by the gas suppliers did. Some of these same companies stand to benefit from this import scheme, and will have even more market power to manipulate gas and electricity prices." Fenn goes on to point out that the drilling of gas also has severe global environmental consequences. According to the California Energy Commission, methane leaks from gas pipeline make gas no better than oil in terms of its impact on climate change. Moreover, new gas drilling to serve western countries threatens pristine environments around the world. One of the sources of the newly imported gas is Sakhalin Island, in Russia, where energy companies such as Shell and Mitsubishi are drilling in the habitat of the critically endangered Western Pacific Gray Whale, of which there are less than 100 left remaining. Another source of gas, says Fenn, would be the Peruvian Amazon, where Halliburton and Hunt Oil are bulldozing a pipeline highway across pristine rainforest, causing severe damage to one of the earth's most diverse ecosystems, and disrupting indigenous peoples in the process. The Energy Rush and Environmental Racism Disadvantaged peoples in distant climes are not the only ones impacted by a fossilized energy policy. In the Bay Area, one need look no further than across the Bay at Richmond, where Henry Clarke and the West County Toxics Coalition continue to battle to get Chevron to clean up the refinery that's contaminating their neighborhood ( www.toxiclinks.net ). Another egregious example - overshadowed by an old, pollution-belching PG&E power plant - is San Francisco's own Bayview-Hunters Point, a community of approximately 30,000 people, according to the 2000 U.S. Census, of whom: o 48% are African American, 1.3% American Indian or Alaskan Native, 28% are Asian and Pacific Islanders, 17% Hispanic and 10% are White. o 16% are unemployed. o 22% of families and 22% of individuals exist below the poverty line. o The median family income is $37,000 a year. The City's Human Rights Commission Report, “Environmental Racism,” published December 2003 notes, “Bayview/Hunters Point is a neighborhood suffering from a shockingly high degree of environmental degradation and contamination. Not coincidentally, it has among the highest rates of breast, cervical and prostate cancer, asthma and respiratory illnesses in California.” Edward Rush of the Center for Health, Environment and Justice explains the phenomenon this way: "Environmental Racism is not a science, but the result of a power dynamic. The dynamic that causes environmental inequity occurs when people who have power in society choose not to have environmental hazards in their community. This environmental inequity becomes environmental injustice when environmental hazards are placed in a community of disempowered people." Local activists like journalist Marie Harrison, and Maurice Campbell of Community First Coalition ( http://mecresources.com ) have been fighting for years to shut down the power plant, though they know such a shutdown wouldn't solve all the community's problems. As the Human Rights Commission Report observes, “Bayview/Hunters Point has no supermarket and its health center has been without a medical director for nearly five years. Over half of the land in San Francisco that is zoned for industrial use is in Bayview/Hunters Point. The neighborhood is home to: - A highly contaminated naval base, including two superfund sites - A sewage treatment plant which handles 80% of the City's solid wastes and emanates noxious fumes - 100 Brownfield sites (a Brownfield is an abandoned, idled, or underused industrial or commercial facility where expansion or redevelopment is complicated by real or perceived environmental contamination) - 325 underground petroleum storage tanks - More than a third of the city's 1,263 hazardous waste generators 0 Over half of the land zoned for industrial use in San Francisco” Nevertheless, closing the Hunters Point power plant will have a major impact on the community's childhood asthma epidemic. And the build-out of solar generation now projected under San Francisco's Solar “H” Bond program and Energy Independence Ordinance finally make shutting down that plant a real possibility. Bayview's case is a dramatic reminder from the local to the global that the stakes involved in moving to a renewable energy economy are high indeed. Beating the Clock - A Societal Jump Through the Closing 'Window of Opportunity' If a post-carbon, post-petroleum world seems too weird, abnormal and unimaginable, consider this: the so-called Oil Age is a short hundred-year blip on the long historical timeline of human energy use. “It's not an 'age,' it's an 'era,' explains energy consultant and architect Dr. Donald Aitken, “and highly limited in time in comparison with the evolution, past and future, of civilizations and societies. For most of human history sustainable resources were the sole world supply even in nascent industrial development well into the 1800”s. So, it's critical for governments to view what remains of the fossil fuel era as a transition.” Aitken, former Chief Staff Scientist at the Union of Concerned Scientists and the designer of Sacramento's successful renewable energy program, recently authored a White Paper study for the International Solar Energy Society entitled, 'Transitioning to a Renewable Energy Future' ( http://whitepaper.ises.org ) “My conclusion in a nutshell,” says Aitken, “is that the window of time during which convenient and affordable fossil energy resources are available to build the new technologies and devices to power a sustained and orderly energy transition is short. The renewable energy transition must start now, or it will be too late. Governments, cities, companies, and people must cooperate in moving it beyond the first difficult steps, knowing that great societal, environmental and personal rewards will come. Solar energy, the source of all life on Earth, will be the underpinning of a sustainable, safe and sane future energy policy. I'm absolutely certain we can make the transition, but we've got to start now.” Enter Solar Enlightenment - Dawn of the 'Sunshine Society.' With the release of “The Day After Tomorrow” and its phantasmagoric portrayal of sudden climate change it might seem time to paraphrase Mark Twain's quip: “Everybody's talking about global climate change, but nobody's doing anything about it.” It doesn't quite work though. First of all, disaster movie-goers aside, not everybody's talking about it. Although the relatively few who are - like the majority of the world's climatologists, the Pentagon and Britain's Chief Scientist, Sir David King - take it very seriously. “Climate change,” says King, “is a far greater threat to the world than international terrorism.” But second, and probably more important, somebody IS doing something about it. In fact, a growing number of somebodys are doing something about it. The Renewables “Evolutionaries” But you won't find them in the Bush cabinet or the EPA or the Congress or the Pentagon. You'll find them in living rooms and church basements and labor halls and city councils and state legislatures across the country and the globe. You'll find them in the boardrooms and executive cubicles of green business start-ups. You'll find them in the storefront and garage offices of NGO's, citizen's groups taking the lead, from the grassroots up, in an orderly, vision-driven transition to an economy based on clean renewable energy sources. An exemplary example is the hard-charging start-up citizens' group MarinCAN! (Marin Clean Alternative Energy Now www.marincan.org ) in the county just north of San Francisco made famous by George Bush, the Elder when he was forced to apologize publicly for dising it's citizens' hot tub habits. MarinCAN organizers Rebekah Collins and Pam Hartwell-Herrero are working with County Supervisor Hal Brown on community solutions to global climate change. Brown - cousin of Oakland's Mayor and former Governor, Jerry Brown - made renewable energy a key plank in his recent successful election campaign, and is working in support of MarinCAN's ambitious, but attainable goal of reducing the county's greenhouse gas emissions “20% by 2020.” MarinCAN co-founder and mother of three Rebekah Collins, wants her county to follow the lead of San Francisco. “Energy independence for our community,” Collins says, “will give us the freedom to make the best choices for a good economy, a healthy environment and a stable climate.” Political Tool Kits for An Orderly Energy Transition Collins' view is shared by many sister and brother citizen activists around the country. If energy policy is going to be liberated from the strangle-hold dictatorship of the energy monopolies, they've concluded, it seems clear that the same ol' same ol' REactive, exhausted (and exhausting) remedies of writing your elected representatives and carrying signs on the capitol steps is not going to do it for us. So renewables 'evolutionaries' are developing a whole new kit of PROactive legislative, economic and political tools for seizing the initiative. Cities for the Planet One of them is the Cities For Climate Protection Campaign. The CCP is a campaign of the International Council for Local Environmental Initiatives (ICLEI). Formed in 1993 under the auspices of the UN, ICLEI (www.iclei.org/ ) is a democratic international association of local governments implementing sustainable development. Its mission is to build and serve a worldwide movement of local governments to achieve tangible improvements in global sustainability with special focus on environmental conditions through cumulative local actions. The ICLIE-sponsored Cities for Climate Protection , says its website ( http://www.iclei.org/co2/ ), “is a performance-oriented campaign that offers a framework for local governments to develop a strategic agenda to reduce global warming and air pollution emissions, with the benefit of improving community livability. ' As of April 2004, 579 cities worldwide had joined this effort - 249 cities in North America (most in the U.S.) In order to become a participant in the CCP, the elected council or an appropriate bureaucratic authority must adopt a Local Government Resolution. In most local governments, the draft resolution is prepared by staff and eventually approved by the full governing body of the local authority. Once it has become a CCP participant, the local government proceeds to undertake and complete five so-called 'performance milestones:' - Conduct an energy and emissions inventory and forecast relating to its building and facilities - Establish an emissions target - Develop and obtain approval for the Local Action Plan - Implement policies and measures - Monitor and verify results So far, the CCP has affiliate programs with cities in Africa, Australia, Canada, the EU, Italy, Mexico, the Philippines, and South America. Five hundred local governments are participating in the Campaign, representing 8% of global greenhouse gas emissions, and the numbers are growing. The CCP process raises collective awareness of pollution levels and sources and gives communities the baseline data from which to build realistic goals for change. In California's Sonoma County, organizers like Ann Hancock in the Sonoma County Climate Protection Campaign have built on the momentum generated by all eight of the county's cities joining the CCP. The Campaign, which includes local elected officials, County and city staff, teachers, students, business people, activists, and regular concerned citizens, has succeeded in getting governing bodies to move from measurement to action. (www.skymetrics.us ) The Sonoma County Board of Supervisors approved a 20% reduction target for its internal operations in the summer of 2002. On May 11, 2004, the Rohnert Park became the first Sonoma city to set a target to reduce the greenhouse emissions produced by the city's internal operations. The Council unanimously approved a target of a 20% reduction by the year 2010. And on May 18, 2004, the Sebastopol City Council unanimously passed a resolution approving a target of a 30% reduction in greenhouse gas emissions produced by internal operations by the year 2008 - the most aggressive climate protection target set so far in Sonoma County. Faith-Based Power and Light Believing that “Global warming threatens Creation,” churches, synagogues, and mosques in California are not waiting for the Bush Administration to clamp down on global warming - they're taking action in their own houses of worship. Under the banner “Our faith, our responsibility, our planet -- a religious response to global warming,” some of California's religious leaders established in January 2001 a new initiative to combat global warming. Called California Interfaith Power and Light (CIPL), it has as its goal to activate California's 50,000 congregations to respond to global warming by promoting energy conservation, energy efficiency and renewable energy. ( www.interfaithpower.org ) According to the San Jose Mercury News, "California Interfaith Power and Light is among the country's biggest and most influential eco-spiritual groups." Rev. Sally Bingham's Regeneration Project continues to be the coalition leader in the national Interfaith Power and Light movement with 15 other state campaigns now in existence. California continues to be the model in this national movement. “In our view, global warming is fundamentally a moral and ethical issue,” says Rev. Bingham, now CIPL Chair. “It is unjust for the world's richest nation to pollute the atmosphere upon which all life depends. As religious leaders, it is our responsibility to address this situation, and to be part of the solution,” Rev. Bingham states. California Interfaith Power and Light's 225 member congregations collectively prevented over 19,000 tons of greenhouse gases from being released into the atmosphere over the past year. The congregations achieved this impressive result through utilizing energy conservation and renewable energy alternatives. Some congregations made major investments by installing solar arrays alongside the steeples on their rooftops, while others took steps as simple as changing a lightbulb - an incandescent one to an energy saving compact fluorescent. “We are really pleased with the impact we are seeing from our members' collective efforts to conserve energy. Over the past year, the emissions we prevented was equivalent to taking over 3,800 cars off the road for a year,” says Rev. Bingham. By setting an example for their communities, CIPL congregations hope to inspire others to embrace energy stewardship. Congregation Shir Hadash in Los Gatos became the first synagogue in the western United States to go solar last year, at a cost of over $25,000 to the congregation. “We made a commitment to raise the funds for solar panels because we take seriously the teaching of Tikkun Olam which means to heal and repair the earth,” said Rabbi Melanie Aron. “We hope the example we set will cause others to consider the religious reasons for protecting the planet.” The cumulative results of all of these measures are encouraging. In total, over the past year, CIPL's savings resulted in: o 29,181 megawatt hours saved through conservation o $3.4 million saved on energy costs o 2,124 megawatt hours of clean energy produced (through onsite solar and subscriptions to green electricity) Clean Energy Campaigns: 'Community Choice' Given the presumably temporary control of U.S. national energy policy by the powerful and well-funded Fossil Fools Lobby, the strategy is to squeeze the ruling Oilyarchy between international pressures from without, and state, county and municipal pressures from within. Key to the state-level component of this strategy is the passage 'Community Choice' laws by state legislatures. Conceived and authored by Paul Fenn and Julia Peters of Local Power ( www.local.org ) - and now enacted by five states - 'Community Choice' laws codify the rights of local elected authorities to mandate the sources of their energy supplies. The 9-0 vote of San Francisco's Board of Supervisors approving the Energy Independence Ordinance, follows a recent California Public Utilities Commission decision to make room for communities like San Francisco to break away from utility power contracts to control their own energy destiny under California's Community Choice law (AB117), sponsored by State lawmaker Carol Migden and written, like the San Francisco law, by Paul Fenn of Local Power. Though they don't, in themselves, mandate renewable sources, Community Choice laws do make it possible for cities' residents and businesses to switch to a new power supplier for electricity service - and to finance a network of renewable energy and energy conservation projects that will dramatically reduce dependency on natural gas and nuclear power plants. Over a dozen cities representing three million residents - and over ten percent of California's investor-owned utility market - are now actively seeking to implement the new law with at least 40% green power in their mix - twice the level required by state law. Millions of Americans already receive energy via Community Choice laws drafted and/or consulted on by Local Power and passed, in recent years, in Massachusetts, Ohio, and New Jersey and Rhode Island, as well as in California. Power Contract Aggregation With the urgency of the need for greenhouse gas reduction and energy independence comes the issue of scale. Of the three main energy sectors, transportation, agriculture and electricity generation, the latter is both a major contributor of greenhouse gas emissions and the sector most speedily convertible to renewable sources. And while solar panels on private homes are a great idea, in order to have the necessary global impact on reducing greenhouse gases, a massive shift of governmental, commercial and industrial power generation to a mix of renewables is necessary. Another new economic and democratic tool in the kit assembled by Local Power is combining the electricity contracts of business, residential and municipal customers, not only within one town or city, but between groups of cities as well. Renewable energy pioneer Ty Cashman, the man who wrote the legislation that made California a leader in wind energy once upon a time in the 1970's, calls such groupings 'communities of power.” Cashman agrees that such strategies can help California recapture its lost leadership in renewable energy development. He points out that power contract aggregation makes it possible to use the collective economic clout of many customers to put out bids requiring a specified mix of renewable sources like solar, wind and biomass, from competing suppliers. Aggregation contracts can also require suppliers to assume the risk for fluctuating power supply rates, guaranteeing a set rate to the contracting authority. One such aggregation in Ohio involving over half a million customers has already achieved a 33% greenhouse gas reduction in its electricity without a rate increase. In Southern California, rancher, entrepreneur and former Culver City Mayor Albert Vera has organized an Energy Consortium of 12 neighboring cities, representing a huge concentration of electricity buying power that can be focused on renewables. Solar 'H' Bonds Passage of the Energy Independence Ordinance by the Supervisors also answers a 2001 voter mandate for green power from San Francisco's 2001 Solar Bond Authority, Proposition H, a $100 million bond initiative - another innovative tool devised by Paul Fenn and Julia Peters of Local Power. On November 6, 2001, San Francisco voters approved a ballot measure Local Power drafted giving The City unlimited revenue bond authority to build solar, wind and conservation on residences, businesses and government buildings. City voters approved a $100 million bond initiative in 2001 to pay for solar panels for municipal buildings. Proposition H, written as the financial vehicle for a proposed 50 megawatt San Francisco Solar Power Facility, amended the city charter to give the Board of Supervisors authority to issue revenue bonds at will to develop renewable energy facilities and implement conservation in both the public and private sectors. The model plan, sponsored by Supervisor Tom Ammiano, calls for the City initiate competitive bidding for construction of a 50 MW solar photovoltaic “Community Power” network that will be the world's largest solar utility. Fenn explains, “This will produce six times the output of the Sacramento Municipal Utility District's system, which is currently the largest. Depending on the technology used, the Plant will cover at least 138 acres of rooftops throughout the city. This could serve 50,000 apartments with 1kw systems, 450 large commercial buildings with 125kw systems, 167 extremely large commercial buildings with 300kw systems, or 50 Wal-Mart-scale monster buildings with 1MW systems.” Fenn says the Plant will serve 5% of the entire community's peak electricity consumption, - the threshold for a Stage 2 Power Alert - and result in a massive greenhouse gas reduction. Campus Clean Energy Campaigns On April 1st, 2004, students and youth across North America joined with Greenpeace and a diverse coalition of organizations to promote clean energy on U.S. campuses. Students at over 130 schools made their demand for “Clean Energy Now” by organizing press conferences, rallies, campus blackouts and meetings with campus Presidents and Governors. ( www.cleanenergynow.org ) Greenpeace Campaigner Kristin Casper, who helped launch the growing movement, says she knows there are many hurtles yet to clear in the race for clean energy. But she's encouraged by recent developments. She points out that the California Public Utilities Commission will renew its funding for renewable energy to the tune of $125 million/year, providing money to the state's rapidly growing clean energy industry until 2008. “This program has already resulted in a doubling of large solar systems in California over the last two years,” says Casper, “so we can expect even more giant leaps for the solar industry over the next five years.” This funding will be critical, Casper says, in the implementation of what she sees as four recent victories for solar power in California, as San Francisco, The Los Angeles Community College District, The University of California and the City of San Diego will be using this funding to add 110 Megawatts of solar energy to the California grid. Synergies All this grassroots activity is beginning to pay off. WorldWatch's web page listing regional activities is replete with encouraging examples. A sampling: Twenty-eight states have created, or are currently preparing, programs or strategies to reduce their emissions of greenhouse gases, and several have enacted legislation that mandates reductions. During 2003 alone, at least 24 states introduced 90 bills to build frameworks to regulate GHG emissions. Renewable Energy Laws - One-quarter of all U.S. states have enacted Renewables Portfolio Standards (RPS), which mandate an increase in the states' share of electricity generated with renewable energy. Renewable Energy Funds - About half of all U.S. states have established renewable energy funds to provide subsidies for installation of renewable energy projects, or for the production of renewable electricity, for energy efficiency projects, and for energy education and awareness programs. The Road To Renewables Civilization runs on energy. The “cheap oil” energy our civilization has been running on for the last century is not only causing asthma epidemics, wars and global climate change. Its running out. Its not only California, but our global society as a whole that is at an energy tipping point. UN Director General Koffi Annan puts it this way, “Imagine a future of relentless storms and floods. Islands and heavily inhabited coastal regions inundated by rising sea levels, fertile soils rendered barren by drought and the desert's advance, mass migrations of environmental refugees and armed conflicts over water and other precious recourses. Then think again. For one might as easily conjure a much more hopeful picture of green technologies, livable cities, energy-efficient homes, transport and industry, and rising standards of living for ALL the world's people, not just the fortunate minority. The choice between these two competing visions is ours to make.” Like many other mothers, like Rebekah Collins of MarinCAN, or Bayview's Marie Harrison, Local Power Co-Director Julia Peters has made her choice. Outside the meeting room on the day San Francisco's Energy Independence Ordinance was approved, four-year-old George Peters-Fenn noticed his mother, with infant brother Ivan on her hip, fighting back tears. “How come you're crying?” he asked. Julia Peters brushed at a wet cheek as she tried to figure out how to explain to her puzzled son the complexity of her feelings. “Your Dad and I have been working on this since before you were born, George,” she said. Then she took a deep breath, unconsciously squaring her shoulders a little. “And, now that it's passed, we have keep working to make sure it gets implemented.” That's the kind of tireless commitment it's going to take if George's generation and their kids are going to get to live in a peaceful, post-carbon society powered by renewables. But there are signs, as we've just seen, that, with much more hard work, with many more 'communities of power,' our generation can be successful in making their era the Century of the Sun. ================================ James Heddle is a documentary film maker and Co-Director - with his partner Mary Beth Brangan - of EON, the Ecological Options Network. Their forth-coming Documentary “Energy Rush” will be released this year. His e-mail: eon3@earthlink.net |
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