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Global Warming Requires Local Solutions
Cities should use bonding authority to promote energy conservation. The savings would easily pay back the expense.
More than 650 cities around the country, including Minneapolis, have formally agreed to honor the Kyoto Protocol and reduce their greenhouse-gas emissions. That's very good news. The bad news is that many of these cities, according to a news reports, are counting too heavily on the federal government to pay for their efforts.
Mayor Douglas Palmer of Trenton, N.J., president of the U.S. Conference of Mayors, was quoted recently as saying, "A lot of cities don't have the money to do the kinds of things that are necessary." He added, "The budgets are tight; we just can't do it."
Certainly one can't blame these "Kyoto cities" for using their collective political force to go after some $24 billion of proposed federal money that would be used for local global-warming initiatives and planning over the next five years. But even if they manage to persuade Congress, you can envision that this money will come with many strings and a whole lot of paperwork attached.
These cities should not wait to take action. They should do what they can on their own, and they should do it today. Palmer thinks they don't have the money. They do have money. Lots of it. Cities should leverage their bonding authority to create a substantial pool of money for citizens and businesses to implement a massive community-wide energy conservation program.
Addressing global climate change, from a local perspective, must focus on reducing energy consumption. The economic benefits are clear. The options are many: Make buildings tighter. Maximize passive solar applications. Substitute higher-efficiency appliances and motors. Encourage telecommunications instead of physical travel. And the list goes on and on.
Expenditures to fund these initiatives should be included in cities' capital budgets. And they should be considered investments, with the knowledge that they will often have dramatic paybacks. Cities should be willing to provide low-interest, long-term financing for any measure that would repay itself in half the life of the bond used for that financing. Loans for these projects would be paid off through energy savings. And once they were paid off, the homeowner or business would accrue the financial benefits for the remaining life of the improvements.
A small increase in construction cost (2 to 5 percent) can cut energy consumption in half. The additional cost will pay itself back several times over the life of the bond and many times over the life of the building. Many existing buildings can reduce their energy consumption by 25 to 50 percent with investments that also repay themselves from energy savings.
According to building industry estimates, up to 80 to 85 percent of all buildings will be newly constructed or rehabbed or renovated by 2035. Actions taken today will have profound impacts on the future stock of buildings and how much energy they consume.
When cities borrow money, they almost always do it to invest in a public infrastructure that is not expected to pay for itself. Thus they must raise taxes. But a city that invests in energy efficiency will achieve the opposite; in the long run it may need less money, because operational costs will be lowered.
As cities look for global-warming solutions, they should start looking no further than their own back yards. If the federal money ever does come in, these entrepreneurial communities will be far along the learning curve and will have the financial and psychic satisfaction of contributing a local solution to a profound global problem.
John Bailey is a research associate at the Institute for Local Self-Reliance and author of the recent report "Lessons from the Pioneers: Tackling Global Warming at the Local Level," available at www.newrules.org.
© 2007 Star Tribune
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10 Comments so far
Show AllThe article doesn't address changes cities can make that don't cost anything at all. Like changing zoning laws that stipulate where and which properties can be commercial or the requirements of mixed use buildings, building codes designating the density, size and value of housing, or transportation standards and codes.
Those who still debunk the consensus of the non political & dedicated international scientific community join Bush right wing's war on science, & our planet.
Rather than pursuing even modest effort to understand the effects and consequences of mans activities they follow the deceptive data issued by the right wing and energy cartel.
Evidence linking carbon pollution to warming has long been as close to certain as science can be. Its causes, consequences, and mitigation requirements have been documented by many dedicated environmental organizations including The Union of Concerned Scientists.
The dangerous manipulation of essential scientific data used by Bush's team to conceal and derail corrective measures for this threat and other vital environmental reforms has always been apparent--and all indicators show no change in their direction.
Often overlooked is the fact that the same measures needed to mitigate global warming would be necessary even if it were not an issue. Conservation, alternative energy development, anti- pollution refinements, etc are essential for other vital environmental reforms such as air and water quality, reductions in toxic waste generation, land preservation, etc.
Contrary to right wing assertions, greenhouse gas reduction measures could only improve our economy by lessening our trade deficits, and improving our security by reducing our dependance on foreign oil. We could also regain some of our lost world respect resulting from our opposition Kyoto while arrogantly contributing disproportionally to carbon pollution.
The immeasurable environmental and social destruction from our indifference to carbon pollution and related environmental measures can only worsen if we allow this reckless and unlearned president, guided by special interests to continue their war on our planet.
Support local green initiatives or people running for local government that support them. Even better, run for local government and start the green initiative yourself. :)
Pathetic.
And long-term unrealistic.
While not objecting to these efforts, I here to hell you that's it's way too late for these measures by themselves to have a significant impact on carbon released into the runaway meldown that we are in the middle of. Even if these buildings were 50% more efficient, it will not stop the largest increasing source of carbon release in the world: unchecked population.
In the U.S. we are only 300 million out of thousands of millions of carbon producers in the world. Never mind that most of them do not drive SUV's and slave for corporations who drink energy, most have very inefficient cooking fires going, fueled by: you guessed it: Charcoal. The Billions of Chinese, Indian, South American, African, and Southeast Asian peasants slash and burn forests to produce this charcoal, and clear rainforest to make way for individual farms. You can patch up skyscrapers all day long and it will not impact this much more serious problem.
Millions of corpses floating in the water in Bangledesh is a much greater a risk for our health over here thanks to daily 747 service that will serve as a vector (transmitter like a mosquito) for serious pulmonary diseases.
The hour is much later than you suspect.
Hey Al. Please let us know soon if you're going to run or not. If not, I'm thinking of sending money to Kucinich.
It's already too late. We'd have to stop driving, using electricity, shut down the Internet (GOD, do massive datacenters eat up electricty), stop burning any kind of fuel for heat, stop manufacturing anything, basically stop living.
We're done. It was really great being alive in the 20th century, but it's over. The Ice Cream Topping on the Earth is melting.
Sad thing is, there won't be anyone to miss us when we're gone.
Let's face reality. Minnesota fucked up a long time ago. Where are the trolley cars and lines that were used decades ago? My greatgrand father was a trolleycar conductor in the Twin City area and I'm in my mid fifties.
What about 1,448 barrels of toxic shit that the Army Corp. took from Honeywell and dumped in Lake Superior 50 years ago, and it still remains there because they claim it's too dangerous to remove? The MN Pollution Control Agency works for big polluting business. They even give one half off for NON cooperation. The fines are a Bad Joke.
I don't know how they make charcoal but I did read somewhere that burning wood is = to whatever amount of carbon a dead tree decomposing would be.
In a culture with business schools and media propagandists preaching monopolization of markets, cultivation of consumption, and private control over public policies, how can city planners be expected to specify energy efficiency in building designs?
The capitalist establishment resists energy efficiency in order to benefit energy profiteers. It refuses to extend building lifespans in order to benefit construction profiteers. Isn't this pattern evident across most industries in the United States?
There is a grappling for economic growth by any means and at any cost. It's the only way the capitalists can think of to keep control over the people. But the people can emanciplate themselves at any time.
It's now time for local communities to disengage from the capitalist establishment. The beast capital must be banned from the town hall and shoved back into the harness where it belongs - to take orders from the people.
it is neo-cons and nefarious nabobs,that cause global warming.....they need to leave the planet.........
Nanoo,
Regarding trolley cars, do some internet research - you will find that trolly companies were bought up wholesale by the oil and bus companies and destroyed, the few cities that refused to be manipulated or were already far advanced in rail techology are the only ones with excellent subway systems. Many research papers have been written about this.
PAcplyer,
regarding third world energy consumption - do some research regarding BIOMASS fuel - rural china, rural india have been leaders in this simple basic technology for hundreds of years - farms have simple clay digesters and they pipe the methane into their houses and burn it for cooking. Africa is the main culprit for charcoal use.