Week 11: Urban Environments

This kind of ties into what we talked about with urban environments, but urban environments and contaminated landscapes go hand in hand.

In response to the Dharvi slum in India, I believe that the citizens were talking about the new housing being on the outskirts of the city and were going to be homeless between the destruction of the slum and the completion of the new building. If the plan was to build the new housing complex away from the slum area, wouldn’t it make sense for the city planners to allow the citizens to stay during the construction phase of the new housing and then destroy the slum for development? This brings up the ides of efficient city planning to allow urban environments to sustain themselves to their maximum capacity. If these large megacities were properly planned and managed they would be able to sustain themselves from within (with the exception of the global market, of course– international trade is important to any state’s wellbeing).

I was driving home this morning and I saw a billboard for the 2010 Census that said

If we don’t know how many people there are, how can we know how many buses we need?

It kind of brought me to think how true this is. City planning hinges on the knowledge of how many people need to be fed, need transportation, need jobs, need sanitation, and need housing. City planning needs to account for immigration to the city limits beforehand to avoid a situation such as a large slum area.

I’m a fan of global development and focusing on those areas, but every once in a while it is fun to talk about out first world problems, especially when it comes to our cities.  So my brain has digressed into a list of cool suggestions that can be implemented in our large cities, such as…

• Rooftop farming: There has been a large push towards farmers markets and locally-produced produce, but how much local can you get when the rooftop of your building is small produce farm?
• Bike-sharing programs: I have a really crappy car, and I’m not a fan of waiting for the HART bus. I would love to have a bike to ride around the area (if our area was more accepting towards the biking community). In bike-friendly communities, a bike-sharing program can provide an efficient way to travel at a very small cost. Paris has a great bike-sharing program,

“It has completely transformed the landscape of Lyon — everywhere you see people on the bikes,” said Jean-Louis Touraine, the city’s deputy mayor. The program was meant “not just to modify the equilibrium between the modes of transportation and reduce air pollution, but also to modify the image of the city and to have a city where humans occupy a larger space.” (Washington Post)

• Transforming abandoned lots into small parks: Green is much nicer to the eye than abandoned buildings.
• Toilet-to-tap: As long as the water is properly disinfected (read my post from week 6), there should be no major public health crises.

Do you have any ideas to add to this list? Please, feel free. It tends to be our generation that has the great ideas about how to ‘save the world’.

Week 9: Urban Environments

I want to find a career in making cities more sustainable. It’s my passion, and I’m really excited to have finally reached this part of the course.

There is an alternative to landfills for cities. New technology has come up with the water-to-energy incinerator.

Waste-to-energy (WTE) is a technology that incinerates garbage and uses the output for energy and construction uses. Trucks bring garbage into a storage bunker that utilizes negative pressure to seal in any smells. A crane then takes the garbage down the incinerator tunnel, which turns it into ash. The ash is then taken to a special landfill. Water vapor and fumes are released, but special input controls, such as scrubbers, are put into place to prevent the release of chemicals that can have a detrimental effect of health. Sounds pretty simple and boring, right? It’s what happens to the by-products that is interesting.

Following chemistry and physics, making something extremely hot releases steam. This steam can be used to generate electricity, much in the same a steam turbine generates power. There is a WTE plant in South Florida, and it is estimated that the plant can generate more than 66,000 kw of energy for FP&L to supply all of the electrical needs for up to 60,000 homes.

Ash is leftover in the process (WTE is ~90% steam energy and 10% ash), and that remaining ash in inert, making it ok to use in a landfill. However, construction companies are finding use for the ash in projects such as road construction.

There have been claims that WTE is really not well-suited for environmental sustainability. The Global Alliance for Incinerator Alternatives posted a study based out of Fort Meyers. The study claims that “shutting down incinerators and phasing out landfills through recycling would have the same impact as closing one-fifth of the nation’s 417 coal-burning power plants” and sites concerns that scrubbers are not enough to help with the releases.

Charlie Christ has a plan that would have Florida receiving 20% of its energy needs through biomass using WTE. Do you think this is a good alternative to our normal use of fossil fuels? Would you rather see more emphasis on recycling programs than WTE?

Week 7: Finish up water issues

I wonder how many people in our affluent country understand the immensity of water problems abroad. I’m not even talking about some of the more in-depth issues we have talked about in class. I just wonder if the average American citizen realizes just how hard it is at times to get water. I have a roommate who takes hour-long showers every single day. So, I decided to ask her what she knew about water in a developing country.

Don’t they have, like, issues with water? Bottled water is probably $4 or $5 there while it’s only $3.50 here. That’s a huge increase. I’m glad we know how to use water here.

Yes. That just happened. No mention of how easily disease is spread through dumping of waste, both rubbish and poo. No mention of only having access to water for maybe a few hours day or having to pay to use a pump. And if she were to go shopping for bottled water today, she would see that sometimes it does hit $4 or $5 in the United States. If more people could snap out of their bubble and get away from their first-world problems, maybe they could appreciate how much luxury we have when it comes to just surviving on a day-to-day basis.

But, as we have learned, that luxury could be soon slipping away. In class and through the news we realize that our aquifer could be no longer there. Hell, Tampa has a desal plant to deal with the impending struggle, so it is becoming more public knowledge. What happens if we start facing water struggles like other countries do? Do we wait for us to sink that low to finally do something about a pertinent issue? We always hear about saving energy, but how about saving water as well? It isn’t too hard to get used to using reclaimed water for watering lawns, watering lawns less, taking longer showers, or turning off the faucet while washing teeth. I hope that we are all able to take away the knowledge of how lucky we are and start to conserve water for use later. Just because it seems to always be around does not mean it is.

Week 6: Coastal Issues and Rivers, etc

The section in the book about river pollution (pg 147, 4th ed.) made me so excited. I know we have discussed pollution in other aspects, but this particular section went much deeper into pollution. I felt like I was reading my environmental health textbook again. For this entry, I want to get into two things: (1) the steps of the wastewater system and (2) water disinfection and distribution.

We all know that a lot of waste can end up in our drinking waters. I;m sure most people are also aware that our liquid waste system is usually linked to drinking water supplies. How do we get from poop and disease to water that flows into our drinking supplies? It is important to note that what wastewater is really 99.9% water and 0.01% waste, but that 0.01 could have  serious concerns such as Cryptosporidium (Milkwaukee outbreak of 1993), Giardia, or Cholera (Zimbabwe Cholera crisis of 2008). In the wastewater system, water goes through a series of events to clear any possible parasites from it. Without getting too in depth, the wastewater system flows as followed:

• Bar screen: to slow down water movement and remove solid debris
• Grit chamber: to settle any leftover debris
• Primary clarifier: removes most of the settable solids
• Trickling filter: allows for biological decomposition of solids
• Secondary clarifier: removes any remaining solids
• Disinfections:
• Discharge into water supply

(A diagram of the Dallas wastewater system is too big for this, so you can view it here)

So, by the time the water reaches our freshwater supplies, it should be clear of any parasites or other causes of biological harm, but to be safe, before that water enters the tap in your home, it goes through yet another very similar process of disinfection.

• Presedimentation
• Rapid Mix
• Coagulation
• Sedimentation
• Filtration
• Disinfection: with either DBPs or chloramines

So, as you can see, the chances of both of the processes failing and an outbreak resulting from drinking tap water is very slim. To add even more protection, there are a myriad of laws in place to ensure that water is regulated since we had the extremely smart idea to dump our poop in freshwater supplies. The biggest law is the Safe Water Act of 1974, which requires the EPA to regulate public drinking water using Maximum Containment Levels (MCLs), which mandate the amount of a particular substance to be present in water. On top of that, the SWDA also uses Maximum Containment Level Goals (MCLGs) which state a goal level to reach in terms of particular substances in  our drinking water.

When water goes through these two processes, it becomes safer than bottled water. Bottled water is classified as a food product and is therefor regulated through the FDA. It is not required to go through the double process that tap water goes through. Bottled water is normally pulled from the spring, so it has gone through just one process at that point. There could still be something harboring in that water, or it could have picked something up from that water supply. Bottled water has a double whammy effect, because the plastic used to make the bottlers will end up sitting in landfills if they are not properly recycled.

I will end this entry with a little tip. Water is disinfected with chlorine. Does your tap water still have a cholrine aftertaste? Do you use that to justify purchasing bottled water? Try refrigerating it for a few hours. The process of cooling down evaporates any leftover chlorine. It is a cheap alternative if you do not want to purchase a Brita filter right away.

Week 5: Desertification & Ocean Issues

I’m not going to get into the ethics of killing various animals, because that always ends in a negative-sum game. Instead, I want to focus on how this is another form of factory killing for mass consumption, which has a plethora of issues.

I originally went to Youtube to find a clip of Hayden Panettiere crying when she went on a whaling protest, because, thanks to VH1 and pop culture, I cannot think about whaling without a blubbering Hayden popping into my mind. There was a video that showed how mass whale and dolphin poaching goes down, and it really reminded me of the factory farming and calculated mass slaughtering of cows, chickens, pigs, you name it. My environmental health background makes me cringe at the mere idea of factory killing, so when I watched the Youtube videos, all I could think about was the myriad of health concerns that arise with poaching in that manner, especially in the ocean, which can harbor its own environmental health issues before the addition of blood and guts.

Have you ever seen Food Inc (or read the book)? Do you know anything about the health hazards of factory slaughter houses? The chance of the spread of disease rises exponentially in the slaughterhouse, and wouldn’t you say that the slaughtering of dolphins in the video above can be classified as a systematic factory slaughter? I don’t think that much blood spillage can be safe for the other aquatic life in the area. I also don’t think the surge of ocean water into a cavity of an animal meant for human comsumption is safe either.

Week 4: Biodiversity; Movie

I apologize if this comes across as a little convoluted. Just coming off of a stressful GRE is not the best of times to be writing, but I’m on a caffeine kick at the moment, so let’s make this happen.

The film we watched on Wednesday really grabbed me.  In international relations, we deal with power relationships all of the time. I was really shocked when I first started learning about international environmental relations, but now I’m not surprised when I hear something like the EV-1 situation. Trying to not get too conspiracy theory here, but it’s obvious how much pull the oil companies have in our government.  This has a serious detriment to our environment as a whole. Companies like these are solely interested in making a profit, and they will do so at any costs necessary.

To really make an impact in the way society views the ideas of conservation, two changed must occur. Companies must learn to shift their focus away from the “profit no matter what” model of thinking and consumers must shift their focus to a new idea of the American Dream. Companies are one of the main influencers in consumer behavior, so this change must begin with a company. GM was a company that wanted to start influencing consumer behavior. It did so by creating and releasing the EV-1 electric car. Soon after, other companies began to follow suit. After this, consumers (at least a small percentage) began to change their thinking towards a new American standard of living. These consumers may have only been a test market, but the groundwork for real change in the American way of thinking had been laid.

There is a food chain in the business world, much as there is in the natural world. Some profit-driven companies rank higher than others. In the case of GM and their EV-1 car, the oil companies ranked higher in terms of influence and power. This particular relationship occurs with every car manufacturer out there: the oil companies have more power, which means more lobbying opportunities in government, which means power of the car manufacturer. We don’t usually see this particular relationship too often, but it was pretty obvious in the case of the EV-1. A successful test market for an electric vehicle could signal the potential for a successful country-wide electric vehicle market, which could mean less oil revenue overall. No one knows if the EV-1 would have caught on nation-wide, but the potential was there. The film alluded to consumer groups that lobbied governments about the hazards posed by mass use of the EV-1, including using more coal to generate the higher energy demand (for an overview of coal usage in the United States, check this out). But these so-called consumer groups were backed by the oil companies to submit their claims to the government. This is just one example of a giant corporation using their power to influence lawmakers. The oil companies were probably afraid to lose their monetary grasp on America, so they took action before any hypothetical situations could even happen. The government was forced to listen to its constituants, and it began to issue ordinances to GM stating that they had to do something about the EV-1, which, to them, meant taking every single one off the street because of the “possible hazards” they posed.

The idea of the lobbyist is inherent to the concept of democracy. They will always be around. But the goal is to use lobbyists for helpful reasons, not to block something that can have immense benefits to society but may mean an industry is losing revenue. Like I said earlier, change will start with the companies, and one way that can happen is if large corporations and industries learn to use their influence on government for the benefit of society. Instead of lobbying against an electric vehicle, lobby for more research to be invested into created a more efficient electric vehicle.

We can argue for change as much as we want, but it takes everyone to make change effective. That includes profit-driven industries. Everyone must be on board. Talk about a utopia. How can change work with everything that works against it? How can a positive change survive among all of the other interests out there?

Week 3: Deforestation and Soil Erosion

This semester I am doing research for the Patel Center for Global Solutions. I get to focus on how alternative energy can be installed in schools in the Dominican Republic, Panama, and Haiti. Haiti has been especially troublesome. Originally I had focused in on Port-au-Prince, but after the earthquake I had to shift my focus to the countryside of Haiti. I’ve been running into more problems there, specifically what we have been talking about this week in class. For each country, solar and wind energy have shown to be the two most viable options for alternative forms of energy. But, as mentioned on one of the slides, soil can cause energy generation problems.

For a quick history of Haiti’s deforestation problem, check this.

Obviously, if there is nothing to cover the soil on the ground, the wind will pick that up and carry it to far away lands. This has provided me with some interesting challenges. Originally I was looking at using solar energy as a primary source of energy. Since there is less tree cover, there is more open space that receives immense amounts of sunlight, so installing solar panels can harness this resource. It makes sense, right? Well, as we discussed in class, that soil from Far Away Land can end up settling right on top of the solar photovoltic panals, blocking absorption of sunlight to power a building. While you can always budget in giving someone the job to periodically dust off the solar PV panels, it can become a hassle to always have to do that.

So I started to look for possible wind energy projects for Haiti. I haven’t gotten as far with this part yet, but, once again, soil erosion is proving to be problem. Wind turbines basically look like stripped-down windmills.Soil can get caught between the rotor blades and within the gearbox and generator, which slows down rotor blade rotation and, therefore, slows down energy production. Once again, the lack of trees originally seemed helpful because it meant that there would be less structures to block wind and energy production, but it just blows the soil from Far Away Land into the most inconvenient of locations.

As the wikipedia entry on Haiti’s deforestation mentions, there has only been lipservice paid to the idea of reforestation. If this were to become a viable project in the future, actors need to focus on the nutrient loss that soil erosion has caused. Would it even be possible to grow the amount of trees needed to help reverse the effects?

Haiti is in a tough spot, even before the earthquake, on the energy front. Local people are running out of options to power their daily lives. Wood power has been in diminished capacity for a few decades now, and fossil fuels are too expensive for the poorest country in the Western Hemisphere. And the effects of deforestation are hampering possible solutions on the alternative energy front.

Since the earthquake has made the amount of information (that I need anyways) coming from Haiti slow dramatically, Haiti is not the bulk of my research anymore, but it is still a part of it. I will try to keep everyone in the know as I work on this more throughout the semester.

Week 2: Sustainability; Idea of a sustainable business

Last semester I took a class called Globalization Discourse, and we spent 15 weeks debating what the word “sustainability” meant. At the end of 15 weeks, the best I could come up with was “maximizing human quality of life while maintaining the integrity of the environment around us.” It took 15 weeks to come up with that broad definition. This brings up the issue with the sustainability debates and initiatives: what do you focus on? For the sake of this class, I will focus my attention on how urban and natural environments can sustain together with the growing population.

I love coffee. I love Starbucks. I love that Starbucks has a recent initiative known as the Starbucks Shared Planet. This initiative is “a commitment to doing business in ways that are good to each other and the planet” (FAQs). In three ways, Starbucks looks to be a leader in the sustainable business field. The idea of sustainable business is a good example of the merger between the urban environment and the natural environment. Starbucks uses ethically sourced coffee, acts as good stewards for the environment, and actively engages with the community to promote sustainable activities. These activities can be broken down to make more sense:

• Ethical coffee: Starbucks has set a goal of buying 100% of their  coffee as responsibly grown and ethically traded coffee. According the initiative, ethically grown is defined as “farming in a way that protects the environment, preserves biodiversity, and limits pesticide use” (FAQ); ethically traded is defined as following “guidelines to help [farmers] earn higher prices so they can invest in their families and communities” (FAQ).
• Environmental Stewardship: This is the category where a business focuses on reducing their impact on the environment. For Starbucks, this means setting a goal of having 100% of their cups be reusable or recyclable by 2015, recycling 100% of waste generated in their stores, and minimizing use of energy, water, and other resources through renovating stores with new energy-saving technologies.
• Community engagement: Starbucks has realized that, while they can have a major impact on the sustainability revolution, it takes a whole community to really make an impact felt. As the initiative states, “Action inspires action.” Starbucks has a Social Entrepeneurs Fund, which encourages young social entrepeneurs to help Starbucks reach their goals and spread the word.

According to the frequently asked questions, Starbucks states that since it’s founding “being a socially responsible company has been part of [their] mission and guiding principles.”

On it’s website, Starbucks Shared Planet offers a customizable copy of their 2008 Global Responsibility Report. This allows a person to choose what aspects of Starbuck’s Shared Planet initiative to get a closer look at. For the topic of sustainability, what seemed the most interesting to look closer at are the steps Starbucks is currently taking to reduce it’s impact on the environment through creating “green stores.” In this section, Starbucks states “one big first step towards our goal is to have all new company-owned stores worldwide be third-party certified green…beginning in late 2010” (see LEED green building program). In stores that are currently existing, Starbucks has listed its ongoing efforts to reduce environmental impact. Such efforts include allowing air-conditioned stores to reach 75 degrees instead of 72 degrees, installing low-flow water valves throughout stores, and improving lighting efficiency, just to name a few. Starbucks will be opening 10 registered LEED certified stores in six different bio-regions in spring 2010.

Starbucks strives to be on the forefront of mixing business with the environment, combing the urban environment and the natural environment into one that allows the sustainability of humans and nature alike.  Their Shared Planet Program site has so much to explore, and I encourage everyone to look at it and come back here with your opinions on the Starbucks effort.

What could happen if more businesses started taking these initiatives? What other businesses do you know taking initiatives such as the ones described here?

And, for fun, I have given you a link to the USF College Sustainability Report Card for 2009. It’s not just businesses taking these initiatives. Colleges are also on the forefront of sustainable design.

Edit: I just saw this blog that Starbucks posted via their twitter. It’s about overcoming barriers to 100% cup recycling.

I am a senior at the University of South Florida, and this semester I am taking a course called Global Conservation. One of our requirements is to keep a weekly blog about what we are going over in class.

I am an International Studies major, and within that I have focused on Russian studies and, currently, global development. In particular, I am interested in studying sustainable development and am looking for a career in the field post-USF. This course fits perfectly within the realm of global development.