June 2009 - Sustainability - list.sfgreens.org

[Sustain] Berkeley Says Bye To Biodiesel
by Eric Brooks 11 Jun '09

11 Jun '09

http://www.contracostatimes.com/berkeleyvoice/ci_12536568?nclick_check=1 Berkeley says bye to biodiesel By Doug Oakley Berkeley Voice Posted: 06/06/2009 04:24:15 PM PDT Berkeley has ended its six-year attempt to save the world by burning biodiesel in its trucks and machinery amid concerns it actually increases greenhouse gases worldwide and exacerbates hunger. The city stopped receiving shipments of biodiesel derived from soy bean crops last month. The City Council will consider formalizing its policy on the matter in September. "Four years ago we looked at this and thought it was a really good idea to do biofuels when there were no crop-based biofuels, but the situation has changed beneath us," said Robert Clear a member of the city's Community Environmental Advisory Commission which recommended the city change its policy on biofuels. In 2003, the city started using 100 percent biodiesel in its more than 100 cars and trucks that run on diesel fuel. But that biodiesel was derived from recycled frying grease. Over the years, the supply changed to a crop-based biofuel. New thinking on that product and its implications for global warming have changed for the worse. Although biodiesel pollutes less than regular diesel when it comes out of a tail pipe, the farming involved to produce crop-based biofuels actually increases pollution worldwide, city officials say. Clear said American farmers who are now converting their crops to grow soy beans to meet the biodiesel demand are decreasing the amount of land used to grow food for people and cattle. That in turn has caused an increase in demand for land to grow food in South America and South East Asia where farmers are burning down virgin forests. The burning of the forests releases carbon into the atmosphere and there is a decrease in the amount of carbon the plants suck out of the atmosphere: two big negatives for global warming. Add that to the fact that American farmers are growing less food because they are using their land for biodiesel production and you have a crimp on worldwide food supplies that contributes to global hunger problems. Both of those issues are something Berkeley policy makers don't want on their save-the-world agenda even though local pollution is reduced when their trucks are burning biodiesel. "It no longer looks like a thing to encourage," Clear said. "It's really too bad, because we'd love to see some magic bullets." One option is going back to using biodiesel from recycled fryer grease, but there just isn't enough of it to go around and it's hard on the engines, said Deputy Public Works Director Andrew Clough. In 2005 the city had two diesel truck engines explode when the city got a bad batch of biodiesel made from recycled fryer grease. "Right now it doesn't sound like there is a good option," Clough said. "What seemed like a really good idea maybe isn't such a good idea as we thought because of all the considerations." Reach Doug Oakley at doakley(a)bayareanewsgroup.com <mailto:doakley@bayareanewsgroup.com> ### -- "I am not a liberator. Liberators do not exist. The people liberate themselves." -- Che Guevara

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[Sustain] Action Alert: Leno's Lennar Toxic Trade - (we should never have endorsed him)
by Eric Brooks 08 Jun '09

08 Jun '09

Hi all, This toxic trade bill is now in the California Assembly, so calls opposing SB 792 should be made immediately to *Fiona Ma: *916-319-2012 and *Tom Ammiano:* 916-319-2013 http://www.sfbayview.com/2009/unfair-trade-sen-leno-wants-to-give-lennar-ou… *May 30, 2009* Unfair trade! Sen. Leno aims to give our clean parkland to Lennar, toxic land to the people <http://www.sfbayview.com/2009/unfair-trade-sen-leno-wants-to-give-lennar-ou…> /*by Alicia Schwartz */ By traveling to Sacramento with Caravan for Justice III on May 26, these precious children are learning to stand up for their community. Will you stand up for them and express your outrage about Sen. Leno's land grab? -- Photo: Francisco Da Costa By traveling to Sacramento with Caravan for Justice III on May 26, these precious children are learning to stand up for their community. Will you stand up for them and express your outrage about Sen. Leno's land grab? -- Photo: Francisco Da Costa Sen. Mark Leno's Senate Bill 792 would allow for the transfer of clean parkland at Candlestick Point to the San Francisco Redevelopment Agency for private development by Lennar and replace it with toxic land that is not an even exchange. Lennar, a developer that has endangered the community by exposing it to toxic dust from the Hunters Point Shipyard, is planning to build 10,000 luxury condominiums on the site as part of a brand new neighborhood they plan to build inside the boundaries of Bayview Hunters Point. Not only is this a prime example of environmental racism, it is also a marker of what is to come in our community if we don't make our voices heard right away. SB 792 will be voted on by the full state Senate very soon. Read the bill here <http://www.totalcapitol.com/?keywords=SB792>. POWER is gathering 500 letters for Sen. Mark Leno from San Franciscans and community based organizations everywhere who are concerned about the future of the Bayview Hunters Point community specifically and African American communities and working class communities of color broadly. If you want to sign the letter, contact POWER at (415) 864-8372 or alicia(a)peopleorganized.org <mailto:alicia@peopleorganized.org>. Or contact Sen. Mark Leno directly at (916) 651-4003, senator.leno(a)senate.ca.gov <mailto:senator.leno@senate.ca.gov> or State Capitol, Room 4061, Sacramento, CA 95814. Dear Sen. Leno, I am writing to register my opposition to Senate Bill 792 Tidelands and submerged lands: City and County of San Francisco: Candlestick Point and Hunters Point Naval Shipyard. *I am in opposition to SB 792 because this bill offers an unfair exchange of land for the residents and families of Bayview Hunters Point.* The bill authorizes an exchange of parkland that currently benefits the neighborhood for land that is not equal to the original parcel and land that is currently contaminated by toxins. *As you are aware, African American communities are disproportionately adversely impacted by environmental racism, and there is a long history of environmental hazards that have affected the health of families in the Bayview neighborhood.* Eighty percent of San Francisco's sewage comes into Bayview through the sewage treatment plant; the neighborhood is bordered by major freeway thoroughfares that daily expose residents to diesel and car emissions; Hunters Point Naval Shipyard hazards have plagued the community since it closed in the early 1970s; 50 percent of neighborhood residents are estimated to have cancer or respiratory illnesses as a result of radioactive elements and other toxic inorganics being left behind by the U.S. Navy and other polluting industries. Exchanging a clean piece of parkland, whose occurrence is rare in the community, for a polluted area would result in the state of California engaging in environmental racism. Giving clean land to a multibillion-dollar developer while providing dirty land in exchange to a working class African American community is environmental racism. The priority of the state of California should be to clean the Hunters Point Shipyard to residential standards, in accordance with Proposition P, passed by 87 percent of San Francisco voters, thereby ending the practice of environmental racism in one of the last remaining African American communities in San Francisco. Giving clean land to a multibillion-dollar developer while providing dirty land in exchange to a working class African American community is environmental racism. *I urge your office to oppose SB 792 as an unfair and unequal exchange of land that will adversely impact the residents of Bayview Hunters Point and the City of San Francisco as a whole.* /Alicia Schwartz, co-director of People Organized to Win Employment Rights (POWER), can be reached at (415) 864-8372, ext. 305, or alicia(a)peopleorganized.org <mailto:alicia@peopleorganized.org>/ -- "I am not a liberator. Liberators do not exist. The people liberate themselves." -- Che Guevara

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[Sustain] Earth 2100,
by Don Eichelberger 03 Jun '09

03 Jun '09

I just finished watching the ABC News Special, Earth 2100, and while the advertisements of it appeared rather sensationalistic and "over dramatic", I found it to be a mostly thoughtful presentation of future "as it could be if we don't...". But I was concerned about a main underlying premise that might slip by someone who was not hard wired to watch out for subtle propaganda supporting nuclear power. Seems in this dramatization, the future hinged largely around the 2015 Climate Summit. And that summit was undone when the US refused to give China and India nuclear power technology. It was a fleeting connection, but clearly there. I do not believe nuclear power will get us out of the threat of global warming without presenting several larger frying pans: costs, security, safety, waste issues and weapons proliferation. I do not believe this was inadvertent on the part of ABC News, but a carefully planted (verging on subliminal?) seed that could have repercussions for the upcoming Copenhagen Climate Summit. I keep thinking with the current economic meltdown and climate crisis, anyone getting the billions of dollars and 10-15 years it takes to build a nuclear power reactor is unlikely. Yet there are also persistent efforts on the part of the nuclear industry to get in on all the money going to "clean energy technologies", which could get funding from carbon credits. I'd like to stop worrying, but can't while "all energy options remain on the table" for this administration. Nuclear power enthusiasts are nothing if not persistent and wily. I will remain alert. Don

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