A Japanese animation about food security - what it is and how to get it. Very well done.

Planning for climate change and rising ocean levels.

The Maldives, a tenuous chain of 1,200 islets southwest of Sri Lanka best known for its spectacular reef-rimmed lagoons, is considered one of the world’s most vulnerable countries in the face of rising sea levels in a warming world. I have a short article in today’s paper on how the Maldives, under its first democratically elected president, will establish what amounts to a global warming relocation fund using revenue from tourism. The idea would be to buy land elsewhere as a new home for the country’s 400,000 citizens should the worst-case scenarios play out.

Some of the atolls in the Maldives. (Credit: NASA/ GSFC
/METI /ERSDAC /JAROS)

For the moment, it relies on sea walls, built with money from Japan, to protect its one-square-mile capital, Malé, which constitutes the world’s most densely populated island. Population growth — taking the Maldives from 200,000 to nearly 400,000 people in just 20 years — is make the real estate problem worse.

The Maldive islanders’ long-term investment in a relocation fund seems smart given the nature of the climate problem. While the near-term rate of sea-level rise remains uncertain, the long-term picture of rising seas in a warming world is crystal clear. The plan reminds me of Abu Dhabi’s investment in a center for energy research — the cornerstone of a nonpolluting car-free “city” in the desert — as a means of building its post-oil economy, even as oil still flows from the ground.

It still seems rare for human societies to invest for the long term, plan for the worst case while hoping for the best, and favor resiliency over last-minute response (any relationship to the financial collapse here?).

NY Times Nov. 11, 2008

We are writing to seek your participation in a campaign this fall to prevent Metro Vancouver from building up to six waste incinerators/gasification plants in our region – a dangerous plan that will encourage waste, put public safety at risk and pose a permanent obstacle to waste reduction.

This sudden shift in our waste management policy has received little publicity and has not received approval from the provincial government. However, Metro Vancouver politicians have already approved the authority to borrow a quarter-billion dollars for solid waste incineration/gasification facilities and begun expropriation of the Canfor property in New Westminster as a possible site.

Read the complete Post.

By Rick Balfour, VPO

Plan B Questions are mandatory for all civic, provincial and federal politiicans.

Poor answers or no answers deserve no votes; we need leaders with both guts and vision.

We need action, not more talk. We have little time to change.

1. How high is your own concsciousness, relative to Global run away impacts on our communities, about Peak Oil, Global Warming and the inevitable shift in job markets and mass migration from difficult areas to highly preferred areas. Is it higher than most, are you ahead enough in the issues to lead and be proactive?

Take a page or ten minutes. No excuses, no glib answers.
Read the complete Post.

Climate change will dramatically affect rainfall patterns in the Lower Mainland in coming years. But as Metro Vancouver engineers like Stan Woods prepare our water infrastructure for the future, will it be enough?

Michael McCarthy
Vancouver Courier
Wednesday, September 10, 2008

A heavy rain hammers down on tiny Rogers Lake. High above, a spectacular waterfall plunges hundreds of feet down from Palisades Lake at the peak of the Capilano Watershed. Far below, down at the Cleveland Dam, the floodgates stand ready to open. With late summer rains, the reservoirs are already filling, and with winter coming soon Vancouver is perched on the edge of a precipice. Global warming is changing world weather patterns in ways nobody dreamed about. Heavy storms and flash floods are sweeping the planet.

According to those in the know, Vancouver won’t escape unscathed. Our rainfall may increase as much as one-third, all of it coming down during the very wet winter months. And Vancouver’s water infrastructure isn’t prepared for the coming deluge. Read the complete Post.

Opposition to the provincial government’s Gateway Project is heating up. But it may be too late.

Michael McCarthy
Vancouver Courier
Original article
Friday, September 26, 2008

From Anthony Perl’s condo in Coal Harbour you can see small commuter planes, cruise ships, freighters loaded with containers and the Seabus trundling towards North Vancouver. At writer Richard Gilbert’s Gastown apartment, you can view the CPR yards, the West Coast Express, a helipad, tourist buses, a car rental company and heavy trucks working the port. What they all have in common is their dependence on fossil fuels, a resource rapidly escalating in price as it diminishes in supply. It’s also a resource that the B.C. government has picked as the backbone of its multi-billion dollar Gateway Project.

Perl, professor of political science and director of the urban studies program at Simon Fraser University, predicts the days of fossil-fuelled transportation are coming to an end. In his new book Transport Revolutions: Moving People and Freight without Oil, co-authored with Gilbert, Perl says that any urban planning centred around the use of fossil fuels is extremely shortsighted and bound to fail. Many other local urban planners, neighbourhood groups and activists also see Gateway as a politically motivated quick fix that is bound to have negative ramifications on the Lower Mainland in the future.

“I’m not suggesting any sort of conspiracy,” says Perl, “or that selected people are getting together in back rooms to plan this, but obviously some people stand to make an awful lot of money from building low-density, unclustered, single-family developments throughout the Fraser Valley.” Read the complete Post.

Freaking people into states of fear is not productive. However, simply coddling the desire for “positive” news is also not productive.

To the extent that we desire only the truth, as elusive as it may be, the stronger and more prepared we are to deal with the challenges we face as our society inevitably changes.

Is there truth with optimism?

I often speak to high school and university students. Many are terrified and/or angry about the state of the world, the wastefulness of society, and visible ecological destruction. Such reactions remind me of my learning in my youth that our world could be vaporized by nuclear weapons. What? Are these people insane? Turns out, yes, some of our leaders are literally sociopathic and not that bright. When we’re young, our families and teachers protected us from certain disturbing realities. If we remain naïve or just ill-informed, the discovery of alarming truths about our world may create shock to our emotional system. We might react with denial, rage, or mindless television. However, the best way to never again be disillusioned is to not be illusioned in the first place.

I’m optimistic. I believe society can change. I’ve witnessed society change to achieve civil rights, women’s rights, to end slavery, or cure disease. But before we can be optimistic we must be realistic, otherwise our optimism is delusional.

Okay, most people can grok that. So then, here’s the realism: CO2 in the atmosphere is warming the planet, ancient methane now bubbles up from deep Arctic permafrost, we lose forests and topsoil daily, energy is limited and will decline, deserts grow, toxins kill land and water, aquifers shrink, rivers dry up, seafood species decline, 24,000 people will starve to death today, 75 million new humans are added to the planet each year, we now face the inevitable laws of exponential growth in natural systems, and our leaders remain virtually clueless and certainly ineffective. Our naïve presumptions of population and economic growth are not remotely tenable in timescales that account for the next few generations.

Okay, take a deep breath. This is just natural reality demanding our attention. First point on the optimism track is this: our solutions must work on the same scale as the problem. We’re not going to change this with vegan shoes and hybrid cars. We need a vast new socio-ecological paradigm shift. All the little “baby steps” are fine, but not remotely enough. So yes, change the light bulbs, get a bus pass, take out your compost, make soil, recycle everything. Great. That’s just the baseline of common sense.

But now that we’ve been realistic, we can see that the optimistic track will demand a large-scale paradigm shift, and as far as I can see it comes down to this:

1. ecology
2. community.

The two things that industrialism has trashed.

So: Take back your local community and integrate it with your local ecology. This transition will be as much about resilience as about “solutions.” Learn how ecological systems work. This is not about integrating “green” into all our bad habits, but rather about integrating humanity back into the ecology that sustains life. All human enterprise must – absolutely must – conform to ecological laws, demands, patterns, and systems. We are talking about a transition from poor, proud, mistaken Homo Industrialus to a more modest, but much happier Homo Ecologus. This is not a question of piddling around with “10% recycled paper” in Starbucks coffee cups.

So, by being realistic, by facing our anxieties, we’ve actually arrived at an authentic path to optimism rather than the delusional.

Rex Weyler
www.rexweyler.com

It’s time to tell the Province: NO TRUCKIN’ FREEWAYS!

Attention all! The time has come to bring the Gateway Project crashing down.

WHERE IS GATEWAY NOW?

The government of BC is trying to tell us that the Gateway Project is a done deal. They are doing preliminary work to prepare for the twinning of the Port Mann bridge and are taking steps towards building the massively destructive South Fraser Perimeter Road. The environmental, social and economic effects of these measures would be tragic and irreversible…for residents north and south of the Fraser, through the Valley, and throughout the region.
However, the Province still does not have federal approval for either of these projects, and no contracts have been signed with the companies that will actually do the work. With the Provincial election months away,and federal and municipal elections happening as we speak, politicians are trying to paint themselves “green” and hoping that Gateway will NOT become a big smelly public election issue, so that they can move ahead on it after the elections. So, NOW is the perfect time to bring Gateway back to the front pages – to draw attention to how disgusting the idea really is and to show the region that ALL of our communities, along with environmental groups, economists, decisions-makers and especially VOTERS, stand together to say NO TO GATEWAY.
Citizen action has stopped freeways here before. We can do it again.

NO TRUCKIN’ FREEWAYS!

On Saturday September 27 there will be a giant rally in a park at the foot of the Port Mann bridge, at the point where the SFPR and an expanded highway #1 would intersect. This symbolic location will be a staging ground for bringing together people concerned about all the aspects of the foolish and backward proposal we call Gateway.

The Rally is at Robin Park in Birdland, in Surrey. Birdland, at the foot of the Port Mann Bridge, is one of the communities that stands to be most devastated by the proposed 80km and hour, 6-lane SFPR highway to accommodate all the new the diesel trucks coming off the expanded Delta Port. Robin Park would be paved over by the SFPR if allowed to proceed and the highway would drastically reduce the quality of life in this neighbourhood immediately.

THE RALLY - Saturday September 27, 1pm
Robin Park, Birdland, Surrey
Featuring inspiration by community leaders, environmental activists, elected officials, and YOU.
Bring signs and banners and drums, tell your neighbours, bring your family and friends! Together

WE CAN STOP THIS.

Download a flyer at www.gatewaytowhat.org, to copy and distribute to your neighbours – and check that site for more details.

There will be a FREE SHUTTLE BUS from the Gateway SkyTrain Station to the rally.
Please carpool, take transit, or organize buses to the rally if you can!

LAWN SIGNS
Concerned citizens in Surrey and Delta have joined forces to produce lawn signs (see www.gatewaytowhat.org) to illustrate their frustration. The signs say WE DON’T WANT THESE TRUCKIN’ FREEWAYS! These will be available by donation at the Rally, or feel free to make your own and start distributing them to your neighbours. To get Lawn Signs contact edoherty@uniserve.com

FOR MORE INFO ABOUT GATEWAY AND ACTIONS TO STOP IT
www.gatewaytowhat.org
www.gatewaysucks.org
www.wildernesscommittee/gateway
www.bridgeviewmatters.ca
www.bolivarheights.ca
http://sites.google.com/site/lastexitforgateway/
See you all out on Saturday, September 27, to witness the historic beginning of THE END OF GATEWAY!

…pass it on…

FOR RALLY INFO CONTACT

Ben West | Healthy Communities Campaigner
Wilderness Committee | Canada’s largest membership-based wilderness preservation organization
ben@wildernesscommittee.org
w: 604-683-8220 | c: 604-710-5340 | www.wildernesscommittee.org

By Michael McCarthy,
Environment Editor
Original in The Independent
11 September 2008

The threat of global warming is so great that campaigners were justified
in causing more than £35,000 worth of damage to a coal-fired power
station, a jury decided yesterday. In a verdict that will have shocked
ministers and energy companies the jury at Maidstone Crown Court cleared
six Greenpeace activists of criminal damage.

Jurors accepted defence arguments that the six had a “lawful excuse” to
damage property at Kingsnorth power station in Kent to prevent even
greater damage caused by climate change. The defence of “lawful excuse”
under the Criminal Damage Act 1971 allows damage to be caused to
property to prevent even greater damage – such as breaking down the door
of a burning house to tackle a fire. Read the complete Post.