Beautiful New Brammo Empulse Electric Motorcycle Finally Unveiled!
Check it out from all angles! It's a beauty, and it runs entirely on electrons, so you can live your mid-life crisis without waking up the neighbors.
Check it out from all angles! It's a beauty, and it runs entirely on electrons, so you can live your mid-life crisis without waking up the neighbors.
New Bill Unveiled to Kill $113 Billion in Fossil Fuel Subsidies
The "End Polluter Welfare Act" would strip federal handouts to the nation's most profitable companies.
Organic farming: Beyond the yield debate
Yields from organic farming may not match those produced by farmers who use synthetic fertilizers and pesticides, but there are other good reasons to buy and support organic–its health benefits, the good that it does for farm workers, even its animal-welfare rules.
So, at least, say executives of the Organic Trade Association, a Washington-based group that represents about 6,500 organic farmers, producers, retailers and suppliers.
“Yield is only one window into organic farming,” says Laura Batcha, executive vice president of the trade group. Organic farming is “good for the environment. It’s good for local economies. It’s good for the farmer incomes.”A 2008 USDA survey of organic production found that organic farms had average annual sales of $217,675, compared to the $134,807 average for U.S. farms overall. Overall, the US organic industry, including fiber as well as food, generated about $31 billion in 2011, up from just $1 billion in 1990. Despite the US’s sluggish economy, organic food and farming remain growth businesses.
I went to see Laura and Christine Bushway, who is CEO of the organic trade group, at their offices on Capitol Hill to talk about several issues, including the push to require labels on food containing genetically-modified organisms, the Farm Bill and food safety, including a recent incident of mad cow disease in California. But we talked a lot about yields because it’s in the news: A recent survey of 66 research studies published in Nature, which found that organic yields lag those of conventional farming, has stirred up a bit of a brouhaha. [See my blogpost Organic food is not as green as you think, and the comments.]
Yield is an environmental issue, of course. As demand for food increases on a planet with limited resources, we’ll want to use of land, water and other inputs efficently. But, as Laura Batcha notes, maximizing yield is not the only way to feed today’s global population of 7 billion, which is expected to grow to 9 billion. “Poverty drives hunger. War drives poverty,” she said. “It’s a lot more complicated that bushels per acre out of Iowa.” We can also eat lower on the food chain (more vegetables, less meat), reduce food waste, stop growing corn for ethanol, etc.
Still, Laura says, yields are important. Agricultural research can help drive them higher. One goal of the OTA is to secure a bigger share of the USDA’s research budget for organic growers. Right now, a version of the Farm Bill approved by a Senate committee sets aside $16 million for research into organic farming; that’s less, proportionately, that organic’s share of the retail food market, which is about 4 percent.
Less than 2 percent of the acreage in the US is farmed organically. Laura is herself an organic farmer; she and her husband have been growing vegetables and berries in southern Vermont for about 20 years. So I asked her why, if organic methods are more profitable for farmers, so few farmers choose to use them?
It’s partly a matter of habit and tradition, she said, and partly the fact that most ag schools teach conventional methods. Because it takes three years of harvests for a farm to be certified as organic, making the transition is a challenge. “Organic farming is hard,” she said. “You have to learn a new way to farm. You have to manage pests and weeds without chemicals. It’s easier said than done.”
As for the other benefits of organic, some seem clear, while others are unproven or a matter of debate. Soils managed organically have less runoff, Laura says, reducing water pollution in places like the Chesapeake Bay. Organic methods clearly reduce the use of pesticides, which have been shown to harm farm workers.
When it comes to health and nutrition–the main reason most people buy organic–the OTA’s website cites a number of studies showing nutrition benefits, and Laura and Christine noted that a 2010 report from the National Cancer Institute’s President’s Cancer Panel said that Americans face “grievous harm” from unregulated chemicals in their food, water and air. “People are much more attuned today to the connections between health and longevity and their personal lifestyle,” said Christine. But a survey of research, published in the American Journal of Clinical Nutrition, concluded that “evidence is lacking for nutrition-related health effects that result from the consumption of organically produced foodstuffs.”
Still, I learned some things about organic agriculture during my visit to the OTA that made me feel better about buying organic food (particularly milk and produce) and paying a premium for doing so. Animal-welfare standards for cows, pigs and chickens are all higher under the organic standards than they are for conventional livestock and poultry. The organic rules also say that cows can’t be fed “mammalian byproducts,” that is, parts of other cows, a practice that is otherwise permitted and a potential cause of mad cow disease.
On the controversial issue of GMOs, the OTA supports the petition asking the FDA to require labels on foods containing genetically engineered ingredients. “If GMOs are going to be used, consumers have a right to know,” Christine says. To those who argue that there’s no reason for labels because there’s no meaningful difference between genetically-engineered plants and those developed by conventional breeding, she says: “Apparently, they are different enough so that (genetically engineered methods) can be patented.”
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For more on the benefits of organic ag, take a look at the websites of the Organic Farming Research Foundation and the Organic Center (HT to Melissa Schweisguth).
Tom Philpott of Mother Jones put the Nature study in a broader context here.
Finally, here’s a comment from Navin Ramankutty, an author of the Nature study.
First, all of the authors of the study were/are biased toward organic. My family buys produce from a CSA each summer, because we like our farmer and like buying food from someone we know, love visiting the farm with our 2.5 year old, etc. We buy a lot of organic food. Our reasons for doing so are partly for health, but mostly for environmental reasons. The main reason my co-authors and I have chosen to work in the area of agriculture is because we recognize the huge environmental degradation wrought by agriculture. In fact, 99% of what I have written about or talked about in the past is related to this. If you don’t believe me, here’s a profile McGill did about my work recently (http://publications.mcgill.ca/reporter/2011/04/navin-ramankutty-feeding-the-world-without-destroying-the-planet/). So, I still strongly “believe” (although not sure about the evidence) that organic farming has environmental benefits. But one of the biggest criticisms of organic has been that it will take up more land because of its lower yields, thereby needing the clearing of forests, release of carbon dioxide, and loss of biodiversity. To test this argument, looking at yields is important. In research, we often focus on one particular issue in order to do a thorough analysis. But we haven’t forgotten the other dimensions, especially the environmental dimension, where organic may well strongly outmatch conventional, but also the livelihood dimensions (i.e., what’s good for farmers?). We do plan to look at these other issues. Unfortunately, there wasn’t room in our paper (Nature restricts us to ~1500 words) to provide a lot of context, and especially the personal context.
I applaud Navin, Jonathan Foley and Verena Seufert for their work. When it comes to sustainability, there should be no sacred cows–organic or conventional.
Koch Bros Half Century of Dirty Tar Sands Support Uncovered
Inside Climate News has pulled back the curtain on just how extensive the Koch Brothers have been in the Canadian tar sands industry. It's well worth a read.
CBO Report: Boosting Oil Production Won’t Protect Americans From Gasoline Price Shocks
More domestic drilling does not make America less susceptible to global supply disruptions or protect consumers from gasoline price volatility, according to a new analysis from the Congressional Budget Office.
The CBO report reviewed different policies intended to make the country more energy secure, concluding that the only effective tool for shielding businesses and consumers from price spikes is to use less oil.
Because oil is sold on the global market, CBO concludes that increasing domestic oil production would do little to influence rising gas prices in the U.S.
These findings back up historical experience. According to an analysis of 36 years of gasoline prices and domestic oil production conducted by the Associated Press, there is zero statistical correlation between increased drilling and lower prices at the gas pump.
The CBO report creates a dilemma for drilling proponents. Even if increased drilling did substantially lower gas prices — which it has not – the agency says those lower prices would actually make the country less secure from price shocks:
Policies that promoted greater production of oil in the United States would probably not protect U.S. consumers from sudden worldwide increases in oil prices stemming from supply disruptions elsewhere in the world, even if increased production lowered the world price of oil on an ongoing basis. In fact, such lower prices would encourage greater use of oil, thus making consumers more vulnerable to increases in oil prices. Even if the United States increased production and became a net exporter of oil, U.S. consumers would still be exposed to gasoline prices that rose and fell in response to disruptions around the world.
In contrast, policies that reduced the use of oil and its products would create an incentive for consumers to use less oil or make decisions that reduced their exposure to higher oil prices in the future, such as purchasing more fuel-efficient vehicles or living closer to work. Such policies would impose costs on vehicle users (in the case of fuel taxes or fuel-efficiency requirements) or taxpayers (in the case of subsidies for alternative fuels or for new vehicle technologies). But the resulting decisions would make consumers less vulnerable to increases in oil prices.
The solution is clear: the only way to make America more energy secure is to use less energy.
Even Mitt Romney understood this in 2007 when he admitted that “these high gasoline prices are probably here to stay” and advocated 50-mpg fuel efficiency standards, public transportation, electric vehicles, and renewable alternatives.
However, today, Romney champions opening up virtually every possible area of the U.S. to oil drilling — disingenuously claiming it will make consumers more secure.
“The best thing we can do to get the price of gas to be more moderate and not have to be dependent upon the cartel is: drill in the gulf, drill in the outer continent shelf, drill in ANWR, drill in North Dakota, South Dakota, drill in Oklahoma and Texas,” Romney said at a recent campaign stop.
Even as the analysis piles up showing that increased domestic drilling is not an effective solution to high gas prices or energy security, political leaders continue to repeat these false claims.
We need creative, proven ideas to help us make America more efficient and less dependent on oil — not a hollow Drill-Baby-Drill mantra that does nothing to address the problem.
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Consent for Largest Wind Farm in England and Wales
Largest onshore wind farm in England and Wales gets green light
UK Energy Minister Charles Hendry has granted consent for a controversial 76-turbine wind farm located between Neath and Aberdare in Wales, paving the way for the biggest such facility in the UK.
Developer Vattenfall predicts the Pen y Cymoedd project will power the equivalent of up to 206,000 homes a year. The turbines will be up to 145 metres high and have a total capacity of 299 MW, reports the Western Mail.
According to the Department for Energy and Climate Change it will have “the highest generating capacity of any onshore wind farm in England and Wales”.
Vattenfall stated that it will cost £300m ($484m) to build the wind farm, creating or supporting around 300 jobs in Wales, and once a final investment decision has been taken construction could start next year with the first electricity generated in 2016.
Piers Guy, Vattenfall’s head of onshore wind development in the UK, said: “Pen y Cymoedd is a major project that could be worth more than £1bn to the UK economy. We have consistently stated our commitment to making sure that we maximise the value of Pen y Cymoedd to the region and to Wales. This is now our priority.”
A Welsh Government spokesman said: “This project has the twin benefits of not only producing clean energy, but will also bring money into the local community. The community benefits are said to be £55m and we look forward to getting further details of these and working closely with the company to make sure this scheme delivers real benefits to those who live in the area.”
Allen & York specilaise in renewable energy jobs throughout the UK and Europe. Related Job Opportunities include:
Salary: £25k-£40k
Location: South Wales
I Want My TLC: Attaining Transparency, Longevity and Certainty in the California Renewables Market
Back in 2009, Deutsche Bank Climate Change Advisors ("DB") published a study tracking 270 major climate policies in 109 countries. The study concluded that successful programs were those that offered investors "TLC" — transparency, longevity, certainty — a comprehensive, stable, and predictable set of rules that infused markets with a sense of clarity and security. The research went on to find that the United States lacked TLC and was lagging behind other countries, notably China and Germany. A more recent DB paper found little to cheer about at the Federal level in the U.S. Referring to the gridlock in Congress on energy policy, the paper noted "…while Congress stumbles, the U.S. stands to fall behind."
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Thanks to Fracking, PR Industry is Booming
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