Green Car of the Year?

From R. Thelonious, the infrequent, but dead on balls accurate poster.

My wife and I were driving down the highway the other day. Actually we were stuck in traffic. Parked on the highway. To our right was a ginormous billboard announcing the 2008 Green Car of the Year:

2008 Chevy Tahoe Hybrid!!!

"What the fuck?!" we said to ourselves. Turns out this earth-friendly gas guzzler gets 21/22 mpg est. compared to its non-hybrid brother which gets 14/19 mpg est. Apparently, everyone is gaga that they managed to get a 50% increase in city driving fuel efficiency. Notable, but not laudable. Other hybrids on the market get 30/34 mpg est. So why did Carl Pope, President of the Sierra Club, vote for the Chevy Tahoe Hybrid? Because it "ends the argument that efficiency and vehicle choice are incompatible." In the ongoing debate about the wisdom of partnerships between corporate interests (polluters) and environmentalists, score a point for the cynics who see this as the polluters opportunity to put green lipstick on their pigs.

And then I see this op-ed from Krugman. Though he and I are not very friendly due to his unexplained disdain for Obama, I still read him especially when he informs me that "the average German car uses about a quarter less gas per mile than the average American car. By and large, the Germans don't drive itsy-bitsy toy cars, but they do drive modest-sized passenger vehicles rather than S.U.V.s and pickup trucks." Not only that, but "over the course of the 1970s and 1980s, the average mileage of U.S. passenger vehicles rose about 50 percent, as Americans switched to smaller, lighter cars."

Ok, I am done venting. Thanks for listening.

hang it up

since i spent part of the day air drying my laundry despite some drops of rain... and reading my middlebury magazine... a shout out to a fellow middlebury alum who is the founder of project laundry list. alexander lee is a full on air-drying advocate who helps green activists promote the "right to dry."

from the sierra club,

Alexander Lee

Concord, New Hampshire

Founder and executive director, Project Laundry List

"When I was a child, my mother always hung out our clothes to dry. At the time I didn't think much of it, but when I was in college, Helen Caldicott gave a speech at a peace symposium. She said one step to shut down the nuclear industry was for us all to dry our laundry on a clothesline. That really made me stop and think.

"Dryers use a lot of energy: 6 to 10 percent of residential electricity usage. Clotheslines are a great alternative. Your clothes will last longer and smell better, and you'll save money on your energy bills. The sun basically does all the work for free.

"Project Laundry List was created at Middlebury College. We launched National Hanging Out Day and asked people to 'hang your pants, stop the plants' and 'put yourself on the line.'

"I've gotten hundreds of e-mails from people all over the country saying that they're going to try putting a clothesline in their backyard. It's an easy step anyone can take. The problem is that in a lot of neighborhoods, community associations see hanging laundry as a flag of poverty, and they have banned it in public. In Columbus, Ohio, you're not allowed to hang clothing out to dry in any historic district, and there are other restrictions around the country. We're trying to pass legislation in North Carolina and Vermont that would say community association boards can't prohibit people from using clotheslines. We are also championing right-to-dry language in any national climate-change legislation.

"Taking the time to hang out your clothes is a consciousness-raising activity; it makes you rethink other parts of your life. Plus, you can save up to $85 a year in energy costs."

--interview by Orli Cotel

HANG IT ALL

Just line drying your clothes in the spring and summer can prevent about 700 pounds of carbon dioxide emissions per household, based on Energy Information Administration averages. To keep jeans and towels from getting stiff, add a half cup of white distilled vinegar to the rinse cycle or give them a brief spin in a clothes dryer.

ON THE WEB

For more tips on how to use less energy to wash and dry clothes, visit laundrylist.org and www.eere.energy.gov/consumer/tips/laundry.html.

bring your own bag

thanks to my ma for this news...

whole foods market is getting rid of the plastic bag option!!!!! hurrah!!!!!! whole foods wants customers to bring their own bags to shop... and you get a 5 cent discount for each bag you bring...

although it's pricey to shop there, whole foods is leading the way... nice move.

marion cotillard regrets nothing...

another reason to love oscar winner parisian marion cotillard -- not blindly accepting what governments tell us is truth.

the british paper, the telegraph reports today that because of comments she made last year about 9/11, she faces embarrassment and a backlash in the US. blah blah! i hope it only earns her more fans and praise for speaking her mind. good timing to trot out those comments now after her new found fame...

"I think we’re lied to about a number of things," she said, singling out September 11.

Referring to the two passenger jets flown into the World Trade Centre, Miss Cotillard said: "We see other towers of the same kind being hit by planes, are they burned? There was a tower, I believe it was in Spain, which burned for 24 hours.

It never collapsed. None of these towers collapsed. And there [New York], in a few minutes, the whole thing collapsed."

Miss Cotillard suggested that the towers, planned in the early 1960s, were an outdated "money sucker" which would have cost so much to modernise that it was easier to destroy them.

the article also notes that the actress (who gave us the incarnation of edith piaf so beautifully), "is an environmental activist, who once worked as a spokeswoman for Greenpeace."

sorry, sarkozy, but not every parisian is kissing american ass these days.

GARBAGE SOUP FOR DINNER, ANYONE?

with super tuesday and the super bowl -- giants mania (ick!) gripping our attention lately, i wanted to devote a little space to my main everyday worry -- mother earth.

walking around hoboken, jersey city and nyc, i'm reminded that we haven't heard the message to conserve. lots of plastic bags, bottle and to go cups. one trip bags for a few items that are soon tossed, a coffee cup -- once consumed, littered.

barista boy sent me this super alarming article about "a 'plastic soup' of waste floating in the Pacific Ocean [that] is growing at an alarming rate and now covers an area twice the size of the continental United States, scientists have said."

the details get worse:

"The 'soup' is actually two linked areas, either side of the islands of Hawaii, known as the Western and Eastern Pacific Garbage Patches. About one-fifth of the junk – which includes everything from footballs and kayaks to Lego blocks and carrier bags – is thrown off ships or oil platforms. The rest comes from land."

scared? we should be... this soup ends up as our dinner...

"These pollutants act as chemical sponges attracting man-made chemicals such as hydrocarbons and the pesticide DDT. They then enter the food chain. 'What goes into the ocean goes into these animals and onto your dinner plate. It's that simple,' said Dr Eriksen."

but i leave you with a bright spot... the irish solution!

the new york times reported this good news last sunday:

"In 2002, Ireland passed a tax on plastic bags; customers who want them must now pay 33 cents per bag at the register. There was an advertising awareness campaign. And then something happened that was bigger than the sum of these parts.

Within weeks, plastic bag use dropped 94 percent. Within a year, nearly everyone had bought reusable cloth bags, keeping them in offices and in the backs of cars. Plastic bags were not outlawed, but carrying them became socially unacceptable — on a par with wearing a fur coat or not cleaning up after one’s dog."

and the good, green irish government news continues...

"Ireland has moved on with the tax concept, proposing similar taxes on customers for A.T.M. receipts and chewing gum. (The sidewalks of Dublin are dotted with old wads.) The gum tax has been avoided for the time being because the chewing gum giant Wrigley agreed to create a public cleanup fund as an alternative. This year, the government plans to ban conventional light bulbs, making only low-energy, long-life fluorescent bulbs available."

can a town like hoboken ever usher in change like this? i'm not so optimistic right now, seeing how cleaning up after one's dog has yet to be conquered, but i'm hopeful one day soon, it will be seriously uncool to carry plastic bags and disposable cups...

it's good to be the 'burbs!

green living in the 'burbs? yeah, right? all that driving, big houses to heat, yadda yadda yadda.

but wait, check out levittown, nassau county -- they are going green!

from my personal bible, the grist list, i read that levittown (our nation's first suburb) is getting green.

tom suozzi, the county executive, rolled out their mission to make it easy for the citizens of Levittown to save money on energy costs by providing special discounts on energy efficient products and services, and their goal to make America’s first suburb into America's most energy efficient suburb with the cooperation of Levittown residents, Nassau County, Citizens Campaign for the Environment and concerned corporate partners.

i hope this initiative has some real meat to it, not just the usual greenwashing, pr junk. stay tuned...

meanwhile, do your part when you shop around town, grab a tote & send an effective message, like becky redman's angry f*** recycle bag.

can you spare a square?

"I propose a limitation be put on how many squares of toilet paper

can be used in any one sitting."

--Sheryl Crow

OHMY! limit squares? maybe i'm just not ultra committed to reversing global warming but limiting TP use? eek! in the movie 2 days in paris, julie delpy whines about her anxiety of using too much TP. don't we have better things to focus on that curb global warming and encourage more sustainable behaviors? am i missing the point? and what about the dining sleeve design? ok yes, we shouldn't use paper products like napkins, etc. but wiping my mouth after meals on my clothes and detaching it? how about cloth napkins that can be washed? simple and practical enough. is she trying to out-green everyone? i'm waiting for larry david's witty and biting reactions to this innovative new trend!

from the BBC news:

Crow calls for limit on loo paper Singer Sheryl Crow has said a ban on using too much toilet paper should be introduced to help the environment.

Crow has suggested using "only one square per restroom visit, except, of course, on those pesky occasions where two to three could be required".

The 45-year-old, who made the comments on her website, has just toured the US on a biodiesel-powered bus to raise awareness about climate change.

She teamed up with environmental activist Laurie David for the shows.

The pair targeted 11 university campuses to persuade students to help combat the world's environmental problems.

"I have spent the better part of this tour trying to come up with easy ways for us all to become a part of the solution to global warming," Crow wrote.

"Although my ideas are in the earliest stages of development, they are, in my mind, worth investigating.

"I propose a limitation be put on how many squares of toilet paper can be used in any one sitting."

The tour ended on Sunday at the George Washington University in Washington DC, where Crow performed with Tim McGraw, Faith Hill and Carole King.

Laurie David's husband, Seinfeld creator Larry David, also appeared.

Crow has also commented on her website about how she thinks paper napkins "represent the height of wastefulness".

She has designed a clothing line with what she calls a "dining sleeve".

The sleeve is detachable and can be replaced with another "dining sleeve" after the diner has used it to wipe his or her mouth.

The shows involved a short set by the singer, a talk by David and segments of Al Gore's environmental film An Inconvenient Truth.

LANDFULL

with all the holiday madness and super overconsuming, it's easy to forget our planet earth, groaning under the weight of all our disposable stuff... i just saw this video on new magazine's website, produced by jersey city's own le arsenal, a video/audio group. a strong, stark reminder of the work we need to do every day to try and lessen our impact on the environment.

BLACKLE--SAVE YOUR SEARCH ENERGY

i've heard about blackle here and there, mostly on treehugger. i always forget to use it for my search engine to save energy. just curious what readers think. do you use it? does it really matter? shouldn't every home page, website, blog, etc. then use a black background to save power? do our energy efficient LCD screens waste that much power? see also google-black for the alternate search tool.

here's how blackle does it:

Blackle was created by Heap Media to remind us all of the need to take small steps in our everyday lives to save energy. Blackle searches are powered by Google Custom Search.

Blackle saves energy because the screen is predominantly black. "Image displayed is primarily a function of the user's color settings and desktop graphics, as well as the color and size of open application windows; a given monitor requires more power to display a white (or light) screen than a black (or dark) screen." Roberson et al, 2002

In January 2007 a blog post titled Black Google Would Save 750 Megawatt-hours a Year proposed the theory that a black version of the Google search engine would save a fair bit of energy due to the popularity of the search engine. Since then there has been skepticism about the significance of the energy savings that can be achieved and the cost in terms of readability of black web pages.

We believe that there is value in the concept because even if the energy savings are small, they all add up. Secondly we feel that seeing Blackle every time we load our web browser reminds us that we need to keep taking small steps to save energy.

THE VAMPIRE EFFECT

before leaving for our recent trip, i thought hmm, let me unplug stuff in our apartment to save some dollars and power. i unplugged the power cords, laptop, clock, lamps, etc. and thought gee, i'm getting something done here!

well, not really. according to the recent good magazine and their monthly spread charts called transparency (such as our outrageous sugar consumption and student debt rates, etc.), i only hit the tip of the iceberg with our lurking vampire energy. even when our appliances are turned off, most still consume electricity, either in passive or active mode. good magazine's chilling vampire chart (not yet online but will be soon) tracks average standby modes and annual kilowatt sucked energy. vampire energy is estimated to cost us consumers $3 billion a year.

the worst culprit in active standby mode? a plasma tv at 1,452.4 kws or 160 bucks. while i did right by unplugging the laptop (144.5 kws, much lower than a desktop at 311) and rechargeable toothbrush (12.3 kws), i didn't unplug our cordless phone charger or TV combo VCR/DVD player (171 kws). we don't have a microwave, but that sets you back 35 kws. and don't forget game consoles -- they eat up lots of active power at 234 kws.

so what should we do? obsessively plug/unplug stuff? buy less stuff? buy with a better conscience?

i suggest all that and investing in smart strips to curb your idle power use or check out the mini power minder (cheap at 15 bucks) that has "the smarts to shut off your computer’s peripherals and doodads when the computer itself is shut down."

well worth the price, right?

GREEN YOUR TURKEY

(from flickr)

we won't be having the usual t-giving feast this year but we plan on keeping it local. here are some tips to keep your day green from the huffington post.

and from the ideal bite, reasons to think local:

The Benefits
*Lower emissions. An Iowa State University study found that people who switched to buying 10% of their produce from local sources produced 5-17 times less CO2 overall than if they'd bought nonlocal.
*Community connections. Sociologists estimate that people who skip the supermarket in favor of farmers markets have about 10 times the number of conversations while shopping...that's 10 more chances to get lucky.
*Supporting family farms. Most conventional foods travel an average of 1,500 mi before ending up on your plate. Buying in your own backyard saves a lotta energy.
*Triumphing in the face of adversity. Amid supermarket aisles full of canned stuffing made in China, a 100-mi Thanksgiving can take some creativity, but that makes it all the more satisfying...and tasty.

*Personally Speaking

Show us whatcha got: Post your local Thanksgiving menus in the blog - the first 25 Biters to do so will win a copy of Paul Hawken's latest book, Blessed Unrest.

*Wanna Try?
100 Mile Diet - read other peoples' stories, and learn how to get started.
Local Harvest - find local farms and farmers markets.

cracking the corn habit

who are these dudes & why are they in a cornfield?

i heard about this documentary, king corn, but haven't seen it yet. king corn tells the story of 2 good friends, an acre of corn and this subsidized crop that fuels our fast food nation.

on october 31st, these 2 buddies decided to take on a "king corn" challenge for the month of november:

The rules of the challenge are simple in theory, but treacherous in their reach, a symptom of the broad adoption of corn byproducts and feed usage in our industrialized food system.

--No corn products, apart from fresh corn on the cob.
--No soda or other products made from high fructose corn syrup.
--No meat, dairy, chicken, fish, or other animals that have been raised on corn products.
--No products that contain corn derivatives.

join them by signing up here or check out their progress here.

if this is just too much to take on now, see the daily green, a new website launched by hearst media that touts itself as "the consumer's guide to the [green] revolution." i found some useful tips (lots of familiar stuff i post from ideal bite or grist) but most useful is the "get local info" menu which directs you to recycling resources, markets, etc.

will this website make green mainstream?

JUNK YOUR CATALOGUES

ugh! holiday madness & ultra consumerism creep up so quickly right after halloween. today alone i received 3 catalogues (2 from the same company). last season, i called a bunch of retailers for removal from their mailing lists. seems like the calls don't really help. but now i found a new approach... catalogue choice (see image top left to link to site) is a free online service that allows customers to choose the catalogs they no longer want to receive in the mail.

check it out, reduce your clutter & impact the earth! the online process is quick and easy...

from emagazine.com:

A study performed by Environmental Defense in collaboration with Catalog Choice examines the impact of junk mailings. Almost 20 billion catalogs are mailed each year, amounting to 3.6 million tons of paper and accounting for the destruction of 35 million trees. Deforestation contributes to about a quarter of all carbon pollution, the main cause of planet-wide climate change.

The study found these mail order solicitations have the lowest recycling rate of all printed raw materials, just 32 percent. The power used to produce these catalogs is enough to power 1.2 million homes a year, and it results in 5.2 million tons of carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions—the equivalent to two million cars on the road. The production, delivery, accumulation, and disposal of catalogs contribute to global warming and water pollution from various sources. Reducing catalog numbers would be a first positive step.

Catalog Choice has amassed a large database of catalog companies and its users “opt-out” through a process similar to a “do not call” list. The initiative aims to improve the efficiency of catalog distribution by reducing the number of repeat unsolicited mailings, and promoting better environmental practices in the catalog industry.

New York Joining Ban on Plastic Bags?

A proposal introduced on Monday requires stores in New York City larger than 5,000 square feet to set up an in-store recycling program and sell reusable bags. New York is seeking to follow an international trend and hopes that this will be a model for other cities.

Some 700 food stores plus large retailers such as Target and Home Depot would have to collect used bags and provide a system for turning them over to a manufacturer or to third-party recycling firms. Stores would be required to use bags printed with a reminder to consumers: “Please return this bag to a participating store for recycling.”

Environmentalists say plastic bags are a scourge and take years to biodegrade and contaminate soil and water.

The bill was expected to come to a vote within several months.

In 2002, Ireland introduced a tax on plastic bags, reducing their use by 90 percent. Some communities in Australia have banned them in retail stores since 2003.

In March, San Francisco became the first U.S. city to ban plastic bags from large supermarkets and the state of California enacted a law in July that requires large stores to take back plastic bags and encourage their reuse.

Americans use an estimated 84 billion plastic bags annually, and the production of plastic bags worldwide uses over 12 million barrels of oil per year, the council said.
Recycled bags can be used to produce new bags plus a variety of plastic products, including furniture.

Estimates vary widely for how long it takes plastic bags to decompose, and some environmentalists say it is impossible to know because plastics have only been used commercially in recent decades.

natalie portman--young green activist!

from treehugger: Recycle It, Renew It...If we can reuse it, Why should we lose it...Show you care...Natalie Portman has been involved in environmental causes from a young age apparently. In what could be an embarrassing video, Israeli-born Portman becomes a World Patrol Kid, and espouses all the virtues of recycling through song and dance.

A comment at YouTube says that Portman hates the video, but her parents always show it to her friends.

Recycle It, Renew It...If we can reuse it, Why should we lose it...Show you care....

reverse graffiti--art less pollution

check out brazilian street artist alexandre orion who creates reverse graffiti and still gets harassed by sao paulo cops. he doesn't tag, he cleans city property. "For over two weeks last year, the Brazilian artist selectively scrubbed soot from the tunnel until the white surface underneath stared through as a cemetery's worth of skulls." read more here about the tunnel of skulls.

see his getaway in this video clip.

...sugar sugar...

halloween is approaching. candy has been packed in the aisles at CVS since labor day. can we munch on chocolate without the guilt of sugar's history? i don't think so. last year i read sweet and low by rich cohen where he detailed his family's history of sugar substitute fortune. more guilt about the sugar trade and production, as well as our addiction to sweets. i basically have stopped eating "regular" chocolate. i've switched to fair trade or organic brands (dagoba, yum) and i would never look back.

i found some icky facts about sugar production from the green guide but also lots of fair trade treat options for the holiday:

Pesticides and fertilizers used in the production of sugar have led to the destruction of aquatic ecosystems. The loss of topsoil to cane fields has destroyed forest habitats. But sugar's sins start with the slave trade, as Europeans brought captured Africans to work in the cane fields of the Caribbean throughout the 18th century, where slaves died in greater numbers than in the U.S. Sadly, this legacy hasn't come to an end: The chocolate trade has encouraged forced labor in Africa as cocoa farmers sell their product at prices well below what they can afford.

Forty-three percent of the world's cocoa is produced in the Ivory Coast, where over a quarter of a million children work on cocoa farms without access to education and apply pesticides without adequate safety gear, conditions deemed abusive by the International Labor Organization. A staggering number, as many as 12,000 children, are likely to be forced laborers. Much of the impetus behind the use of child labor stems from insufficient income for cocoa producers. In 2002, the International Institute of Tropical Agriculture found that cocoa revenues in West Africa average between $30 to $100 U.S. dollars per household member per year. To compensate, cocoa farmers seek out cheaper labor and resort to higher-yield sun-grown cocoa beans, which require significant deforestation. Because sun-grown beans are more susceptible to pests and diseases than those grown in shade, farmers use heavy doses of hazardous pesticides and synthetic fertilizers.

The Goods

Divine Chocolate, partially owned by the farmers of Kuapa Kokoo, sells 100 percent fair-trade-certified chocolate. Pass out bite-sized milk chocolate eggs ($6.50/200 pieces; http://www.lwr.org/). Or give kids a chocolate treasure. Global Exchange is carrying Divine's Fair Trade Gold Coins, which read "Ghana Freedom and Justice" on one side and "Fair Deal for Cocoa Growers" on the other ($3.99/22 pieces; store.gxonlinestore.org).

Visit http://www.divinechocolateusa.com/ to search for retailers by state.

Equal Exchange's organic and fair trade Dark Chocolate Mini's are available for a limited time this Halloween. ($12/68 minis; eeretail.stores.yahoo.net).

For whole chocolate bars, try Alter Eco's certified organic and fair trade chocolate ($4.29/bar; http://www.altereco.com/, 415-701-1212).

Beyond labor issues, help reduce environmental frights by choosing candy made from organic sugar, which is produced without synthetic pesticides and fertilizers with methods that conserve soil. Try the Candy Tree's Organic Mixed Fruit Toffee, sweetened only with organic fruit juices and corn syrup and containing no artificial colors ($2.89/2.6 oz bag of individually wrapped pieces, http://www.veganessentials.com/) and Yummy Earth Organic Lollipops, made with 100-percent natural colors and flavors ($2.69/bag of 15; http://www.veganessentials.com/). Or buy a pack of organic candy mix including organic gummi bears, lollipops, root bear float candy and milk chocolate ($28/80 pieces; naturalcandystore.com/c-natural-candy-mixes).

blog action day -- wrap up

from the blog action day team:

The Wrap Up

The very first Blog Action Day was an unprecedented success and we've got the final wrap up where the site used to be at blog action day complete with statistics, sample posts, details of the huge amount of press coverage we had all over the world, quotes and more. It's a must see. Please feel free to spread the word around as it's great for people to really see what we achieved together.














and my personal favorite environmental friendly blog, these come from trees, where you can buy stickers, post guerrilla style in paper wasting bathrooms... i bought a bunch and stick in offending ladies rooms.

...going to the dry cleaners...

right now, i'm struggling with a life decision. stick with my regular grantwriting gig with lots of freedom & creativity (no 9 to 5er, i) or jump ship, still do good work as a grantwriter but re-enter "the business casual" world of regular schedules, stuffy clothes and office rules... the sticking point: more cha-ching. while i debate my inner demons and figure out what sort of lifestyle i truly want, i wonder about my total change in dress code. and as i think about dress code, my mind wanders to dry cleaning. in this so-called bedroom community for folks who work in manhattan, hoboken boasts (it seems) a dry cleaner on every block. stunning but makes sense. an "organic" green dry cleaner popped up this past spring. is a regular dry cleaner super toxic? is organic cleaning really better? but what's in a name?

i searched & found an article on co-op america -- here's some helpful answers:

Best Bets for Delicate Clothes

Our top recommendations for dealing with your “Dry Clean Only” clothes:

• Handwash your dry-clean-only clothes: Green living expert and Care2.com editor Annie Bond offers eco-friendly instructions on safely handwashing silk, wool, and rayon clothing.

• Use wet and liquid CO2 cleaners: Occidental College recently launched a national directory of liquid CO2 and wet cleaners. (The liquid CO2 cleaners listed do not include Solvair cleaners, which use a toxic solvent as part of their process.) Also, keep in mind that some wet cleaners, like Chicago’s Greener Cleaner, allow you to mail in your clothes and will mail them back to you wet-cleaned and pressed. Contact Greener Cleaner at 888/875-8345.

• Avoid hydrocarbon, greenearth, and solvair CO2 cleaning: Though somewhat better than perc, these methods all use toxic solvents.

• Take our handy wallet card with you: We’ve condensed all the information in this article into a portable card you can take with you. Download the PDF wallet card here.

Presidential Candidates and the Environment

"It is our responsibility to ensure that this planet remains clean and safe and livable for our children and for all of God's children," he told about 200 people gathered at the downtown public library. "But in recent years, science has made it undeniably clear that our generation is not living up to this responsibility. Global warming is not a someday problem, it is now." -Barack Obama-

Last week, Obama released a plan to combat global warming that calls for an 80 percent reduction in U.S. carbon emissions by 2050. Obama said: "we are not acting as good stewards of God's earth when our bottom line puts the size of our profits before the future of our planet."

I am not one for urging the use of God in the public square, but I have wondered where is the religious community in this debate. Why are religious leaders not acting when our future generations are at stake. Obama's plan seems comprehensive and attacks industry directly which is one of the bigger problems: Obama said he would institute a "cap and trade" approach that would require polluters to buy allowances, essentially putting a price on pollution and creating an incentive to cut emissions. I would be one for penalties instead of incentives, but it is a start.

He said $150 billion from the sale of allowances could help drive the development of environmentally friendly technologies, including the next generation of biofuels, expansion of a delivery infrastructure and fuel-efficient vehicles.

Obama also challenged individuals to do their part to help the environment, and he called for making government, businesses and homes 50 percent more energy efficient by 2030. He said he wants all federal government buildings carbon neutral by 2025.

Among other White House hopefuls, New York Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton has said she is intrigued by a carbon auction system but has stopped short of endorsing it. Sen. Chris Dodd of Connecticut has proposed taxing polluters for their carbon emissions. Former North Carolina Sen. John Edwards, who has pledged to have a carbon neutral campaign, also proposes a "cap and trade" system that aims to reach the 80 percent reduction in carbon emissions by 2050. No Kucinich?

Though, Obama's proposal seems urgent and comprehensive it was John Edwards who picked up an endorsement from Friends of the Earth Action.

Of course we all know who environmentalists want to run for President: Al Gore. Paul Krugman today has a column why does Al Gore drive right wingers insane? Krugman answers "the worst thing about Mr. Gore, from the conservative point of view, is that he keeps being right. In 1992, George H. W. Bush mocked him as the "ozone man," but three years later the scientists who discovered the threat to the ozone layer won the Nobel Prize in Chemistry. In 2002 he warned that if we invaded Iraq, "the resulting chaos could easily pose a far greater danger to the United States than we presently face from Saddam." And so it has proved."

Gore for President? Sounds like a sequel or a movie that should have been made. Too bad the movie we are seeing now was far different than the one in 2000.