Review of "Two decades of failed climate change policy" by Mark Jaccard

First, I want to apologize because while I heard the second half of the lecture, I couldn't take notes as my battery died half way through (actually, exactly half way through). So, the notes you're going to read are pretty much only from the first half. Since Mark is an academic (and so am I), I think I would be making him a disservice if I wrote what I recall. The rest of my notes are pretty verbatim (I type really really fast) so I think I captured what he said.

Second, my overall assessment. I think Mark's lecture was excellent. I know that a lot of people are going to complain about certain points that he made, or about his particular viewpoints on a number of issues (for example, on why he opposes Gateway). And quite honestly, I do disagree with some of his points as well (particularly in regards to carbon offsets). But the truth is, he really made it easy for a general audience to understand the rather conceptually complex theory behind environmental policy instruments. I think that there is a place for academics like Mark who are able to connect to general audiences and explain these concepts to them in an easy and accessible way. I know three other experts in the field of climate change in Canada who have the same ability, although they are based at UBC (not SFU).

He first started by explaining four broad categories of environmental policy tools to reduce GHG emissions from fossil fuels, based on four methods of reduction:

• Energy efficiency
• Switch to renewable energy sources or nuclear energy
• Pollution control (carbon sequestration)
• Catch-all

In Mark's words, politicians don't do the above. Consumers, households and industry do it. So, governments only have policy tools to lead us to change actions. The four categories of policies he suggested are:

• Information programs
• Subsidies
• Regulation
• Financial charges

Mark made a point that I found interesting - he is NOT an advocate of a carbon tax, as often portrayed in the media, but he said he was an advocate of compulsory policy because research has shown him that's the way to do it. That's not surprising to hear (that his research is often misinterpreted and portrayed in the wrong way on the media - that's happened to a number of other researchers - just ask Robert Putnam and his latest research on social capital, diverse communities and 'hunkering')

Mark also made a point that all previous policies that had been implemented in Canada had failed to meet the target. According to Jaccard, energy efficiency is more costly than we think (what he called the second inconvenient truth), but that doesn't mean that we ought not to do it, we still should do it.

While I have a smattering of other notes, I think that the best I can do is to just give you what were his main points. He suggests that non-compulsory policies (like subsidies, information programs, etc.) are NOT a substitute for compulsory policies.

I was a little surprised (and taken aback) that he apparently doesn't advocate or even like the idea of offsets (as noted below)

With apologies to people who have worked very hard to establish offsets emissions. It can give us a sense that “we don’t need to put in the compulsory policy”. An offset is a subsidy from an individual to another individual. Still has the same problems with subsidy – we have to try to make sure that the money will indeed make people behave differently – how can you be sure of that?

I do like the idea of offsets because (a) at least they're at least a first step in reducing emissions and (b) there are systems that can be third-party audited. But then again, each one of us is entitled to our own opinion.

Overall, I liked his delivery style, and it was an interesting lecture. I think that what VTACC is doing is rather important (educating people on climate change issues). I also think that they can't stop with three lectures and they need to keep this going. You'd be surprised. I got to the Canadian Memorial Church to see a room pretty much full with people who wanted to learn more about climate change. I don't think that VTACC should stop, they should continue the lecture series (and bring lots of other perspectives, even within the academic realm).

VTACC will make his PowerPoint slides available freely on their website (he didn't want us to 'read the slides' so he only showed one or two throughout the conference). If you want to learn more about what Dr. Mark Jaccard does, you can look here.

The Green Living Show recap

My good friend HZ and I were talking about the fact that we already lived 'green' and he pondered "how much greener can I live?" I think that while generally I live a fairly environmentally-aware life (that's what I do for a living, so it would be kind of ironic if I didn't). But the Green Living Show did give me an opportunity to see a number of other opportunities for improvement.

For example, transportation choices. Yes, electric cars can be an option, I think. Since I am not a transportation expert, I can refer you to the blogs of Stephen Rees and Paul Hillsdon if you want to talk about those issues. But definitely, walking or biking or taking the bus are the only options we have.

Another area (rather important to me given my busy social life) was beer consumption. I am not kidding! Organic beer is good :) I will send you to check Rebecca's, Keira's and Phaedra's blogs for very good recaps of the Green Living Show that include the topic of organic beer. Furthermore, a visitor to my blog informed me that the Canadian Wildlife Federation's magazine (Checkerspot) was liveblogging, so check them out too. Here I would like to just make some broader comments about GLC.

First, I really think that BC Place was a very good choice, but I wonder if Canada Place would have been better (just simply in terms of transportation access to the show). Although come to think about it, maybe it was just the fact that I didn't remember how to get to BC Place by transit. I attended the Green Living Show on Saturday morning with Phaedra, and we walked from Our Town Cafe on Broadway and Kingsway all the way down to BC Place. It was a very beautiful walk. But if it had been raining, we probably would have had to take the Skytrain. I really had forgotten that Stadium Skytrain station is very close to BC Place.

Second, the overall theme and design of the show was fantastic. I didn't feel that the show was crowded at all. And they really brought some high-powered speakers (Stephen Lewis, Sheila Watt-Cloutier, Adrienne Carr). Really, that was a very very good idea.

Third, the only thing I was a bit surprised was that Green Table wasn't there. Almost every aspect of every day life was showcased. To give a few examples, soy-based candles, organic beer, water-saving and energy-saving appliances, sustainable and sweatshop-free clothing, organic snacks. But the question in my head remains - why wasn't our very own Sustainable Restaurants Association there? Of course, I can always email and ask :)

Going there with Phaedra was really a highlight of the weekend, because she is really awesome. We have had the chance to e-mail and comment on each other's blogs, but it was very very nice to really hang out outside the blogosphere. It's always awesome to get to know the person behind the blog.

One of the things that really hit home with me was that the organizers realized that the show would have environmental impacts, and looked for ways to reduce them. You'd be surprised how many organizers of environmentally-themed events don't really look INSIDE their event! But this wasn't the case with Green Living Show. If you click here, you can read all the ways in which they reduced environmental impacts.

All in all, I really enjoyed the show, and will definitely do my best to attend next year's. Kudos to the organizers! Now, on the critical side of things - the statistical profile they provide of a typical Green Living Show attendee would suggest (and thus, even possibly confirm) that to be more sustainable you need to make enough money to pay the environmental premium price (just read this fact - 37% of last year's attendees make more than $ 100,000. Wow!).

I am not sure that I like reading this fact, to be quite frank. Saving money is one of the selling points of going greener in this city (given the exorbitant prices of housing and gas). Thus, if you tell me that I need to first make more money and THEN go green, it becomes a hard sell (particularly for those like me whose money-making power is not yet in the six figures realm).

Overall, as mentioned, the show was great and I'm looking forward to next year's.

Please note: This post is cross-posted on both my blogs (Blogger and WordPress) for the time being, but I think that the time is coming for me to just continue on with WP. I'll post an announcement when that happens.

Upcoming climate-change and environmental events in Vancouver

Well, hello sunshine! Today was a beautiful day and thus I had a chance to enjoy the sun for a bit. Worked from home for most of the day, although felt really sleepy at times. Anyhow, for those of you enviro-folks in town, here are some events you can hit.

• Via one of my close friends, here is a link to a lecture that will be given tomorrow by Sheila Watt-Cloutier, sponsored by the Terry Project at UBC, on The Right to be Cold: The Global Significance of Arctic Climate Change. This will be at the(Life Science Institute, West Atrium, Friday Feb 29th, 12noon. If you don't know who Ms. Watt-Cloutier is, she was one of the top nominees for the 2007 Nobel Prize (which ultimately went to Al Gore and the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change).

• Via Keira-Anne's blog, I found out about the Green Living Show (February 29th to March 2nd, 2008). She is going to head there on Friday with Rebecca (aka Miss604) so if you want to check the show AND hang out with two beautiful women, I'd suggest you head there on Friday. I plan to go on Saturday morning as I have a pretty packed social weekend, and most likely I'll go with Phaedra and probably my friend HZ. I wish I could go on Friday but I'm totally booked (so blog updates unlikely until Saturday afternoon).

• Via VTACC (Vancouver's Taxpayers Against Climate Change), I found out about a lecture by Dr. Marc Jaccard on "Lessons for the Future from Canada's Climate Policy Failures", Tuesday March 4th, at 7pm at the Canadian Memorial Church (15th and Burrard). From VTACC website, here's the abstract:
  

Decades of climate policy under different governments have failed to reduce or substantially slow the growth in greenhouse gas emissions in this country. How has this happened? How can we get out of this muddle so that Canada can do its share in the fight against global warming?
Go here for more information

• And, from a colleague of mine, here are the details for a special lecture at SFU Harbour Centre by Professor Michael Grubb: ‘Cutting carbon in Europe to 2020: competitiveness, emissions trading and beyond’, Room 2200 (RBC Dominion Securities Executive Meeting Room), Monday March 3rd, 2008 - 9:00am to 10:30am (yes this is a morning seminar).
  

I am probably going to attend all four. Hope you can make it to at least one of them!

No recap of Green Drinks :(

Sorry guys, but as it turns out, in my intent to be as "non-specific" and "protecting everyone's privacy", my photographs turned out horribly and thus I don't want to post a detailed, non-pictorial recap of Green Drinks. Suffice it to say, it was fun and I had a really delightful time. I think I actually need to bring my business cards next time. And perhaps ask people in advance if they mind photographs, because the ones I got are hideous and really don't show anybody's face.

Green restaurants: More than a gimmick

While reading Morning Brew this morning, I came across a commentary from John Martin (published by The Province). Up until now, I had never heard of Martin, truth be told. But the commentary (provocative and somewhat shocking) made me think that people aren't really aware of what green restaurants (or sustainable restaurants) are, and that in a very similar fashion to carbon offsets, the public is criticizing the idea before really understanding it.

So I went back to the Green Table website to see if they had put up something newer that could help educate the readers (and perhaps Martin himself if he comes across my blog) about the concept of greening a restaurant. They now have an educational video that might be of some use. You can see it here (I copied the original link from Green Table's site).

It is clear to me that being oblivious to the reality that global environmental change is happening is just a demonstration of what I've called the "ostrich technique" (otherwise known as putting your head in the sand). Admittedly, I am one of the advocates of not putting all our eggs in the climate change basket. I want the public to know that there are many pressing environmental problems other than just climate change (e.g. wastewater, hazardous waste, e-waste).

The way Martin frames his article is very much that of the opinion of someone with limited exposure to the idea of sustainability in the food industry, and that's ok too. There is one basic fallacy though, that should be rebutted. Being a sustainable restaurant does NOT mean being a lousy restaurant. That's something people should be very well aware of. The idea of greening a restaurant which is already high quality is important, and I would hope that good restaurants will want to transition to becoming greener restaurants.

Take the list of Green Table members, and tell me which one you think is NOT a good restaurant. Hard to do, right? So, it's not that hard to be greener AND high quality. There will be some trade-offs, for sure. And there are products for which solutions are harder to find (I dare you to pack a steaming curry with basmati rice in a non-styrofoam container).

I can understand the frustration of Martin if the restaurant's efforts aren't legitimate or true. He clearly says in his article that he doesn't want 'pseudo-green gimmicks' confused with real efforts to be energy efficient or water efficient. That's why you have third-party certification and audits. That's why you enter in an eco-labelling scheme. That's why you make sure that restaurants comply with industry codes of conduct. That is precisely the reason why we have an organization like Green Table: to avoid restaurants with poor environmental performance to use green marketing to position themselves without actually making real efforts to improve the environment.

Just my $ 0.02 ...

Green shoes, green taxes, green hypocrisy?

One of the things that really irks me is the announcement of a new budget, because it usually brings the associated element that the Finance Minister wears new shoes. Nobody really knows the origins of this tradition, but I've seen the BC Minister of Finance unveil new budgets and wearing very expensive shoes. As noted in local newspapers, the current BC Minister of Finance, Carole Taylor, will be wearing 'green shoes' to go with her new 'green budget'.

There are several ironies here. First, shoes are very expensive (particularly in Canada). Wearing new shoes when you are about to hit taxpayers with new taxes or to speak about budgets doesn't really reflect very well on you. Second, shoes' manufacturing process is not really environmentally friendly (I do know this for a fact, and if you want to challenge me on this particular area, I dare you). Therefore, to say that you're wearing 'green shoes' is somewhat of a contradiction (yes there are more environmentally-friendly materials for shoes, but I saw a photo of Taylor's and they don't seem to be manufactured in that way). Third, shoes are often the commodity that homeless and poor people can least access. Thus, it's somewhat ironic that Taylor spends a few hundred dollars in a new pair of shoes that could very well be spent on feeding a few homeless people.

Wouldn't it be better if (even if just for PR purposes), every time a new budget was tabled, the Minister of Finance actually auctioned his/her shoes and all proceeds went to charitable causes? Or that the actual money that they were supposed to spend on new shoes goes to those charities? Oh, no... That might actually require to have some degree of sensitivity for the poor and marginalized, something that it is clear, politicians in this province, city and country don't seem to have that much of.

Recognizing heterogeneity in Vancouver's urban form - The pitfalls of EcoDensity

In a very recent post, Stephen Rees links to an article written by Erick Villagomez (a Vancouver-based architect, and I might add a very fine writer) on the actual urban densities in Vancouver. Making use of really nice visualization tools, Villagomez shows that East Vancouver is highly dense (despite whatever people's perceptions may be).

Since Rees asked the question "do you think EcoDensity(R) will make a difference)?" I figured I'd answer with a short essay of my own. Furthermore, I wanted to express some ideas that relate to the concept of urban density and the realities of sustainable urban form.

First off, we need to think about what we define as urban density. The statistical figures offered by Villagomez are in dwellings per acre. While one could criticize his data for not actually including the number of people in each dwelling, these data shed some light on whether there has been an increase in urban density (as measured by dwellings per acre) or not. Let's accept his data for the insights they provide - there are more physical units in more denser areas than there are in less dense areas. We don't know if there are more people there, but we could safely assume that it is the case (imagine 10 houses per acre with 4 people each house, vis-a-vis 10 buildings per acre with 10 apartments each with 2 people - the ratio is 40/200 or 1/5)

Clearly, from Villagomez's map (which you can find here) the Downtown core is the most dense area. There are some surprises with areas like northern Kitsilano having a comparable density to that of downtown (or at least so would appear from Villagomez's map). What I find interesting is that there is now evidence to support the statement that the West Side of Vancouver needs to increase its density.

Villagomez's point seems to be that we should look at homogeneous densification processes (e.g., achieving the same densities in East Vancouver and the West Side). That would be a good idea. The problem is that it would go against the realities of heterogeneity in urban form in Vancouver.

That is the point I am making in this essay: That we should recognize the heterogeneity of communities and populations in Vancouver. The West Side has been traditionally considered affluent and wealthy. The East Side houses more middle-income (and in some areas, low-income) population. There are natural heterogeneities in Vancouver's urban form that have been in place longer than I've been on this planet. We should find rational and smart ways to address these heterogeneities, and first of all, we should recognize them.

Now, don't get me wrong - I am not saying that recognizing this heterogeneity means that we should just keep our arms crossed. Not at all! I think what we ought to do is to call things like they are and tell the politicians that we are aware that there should be a middle-ground where some single family homes may need to remain. However, that doesn't mean that densification shouldn't occur. The chasm between the East Side and the West Side can be bridged with smart densification strategies.

One of the problems I see with urban planning consultations is that they are very prone to problems of NIMBY-ism (Not In My BackYard). Sometimes, communities even go as far as to go BANANAs (Build Absolutely Nothing Anywhere Near Anyone). We should try to make it clear to the people living in areas that are potential targets for densification that the intent is not to bring crime to a certan area, but to reduce car trips, build vibrant communities and strengthen social capital. These would all be good objectives of an EcoDensity strategy. And to respond Stephen's question - no, I don't think EcoDensity is making a difference right now. But I would like it to. So, here's hoping...

Upcoming event - Green Drinks (Vancouver) Wednesday Feb 20th

I have been so insanely busy that I have missed many of the most recent Green Drinks events. However, this coming Wednesday I am NOT busy and thus will definitely be going to Green Drinks. This is a gathering of enviro-minded folks from ENGOs, academia, industry, etc. Yes, there are actually 'green drinks' on tap.

From the Green Drinks Vancouver website:

There's no agenda or other formality - it's just a chance to meet regularly to chat, debate, socialize and connect with others in Vancouver who are passionate about environmental and sustainability issues. Whether you're keen on green building & design, sustainable energy, organic gardening, or something else entirely, you'll find like-minded people. Please feel free to bring your business cards, brochures, info sheets, magazines and newsletters to put on a table for people to take away with them. Do make sure to take whatever you left on the table with you when you leave.

I suggest that you check it out. I am not generally a fan of Steamworks, but it's a great pub for this kind of gathering. Plus, I always end up bumping into lots of friends of mine from the environmental field (kind of the point, isn't it?). Plus, if you end up going, you'll get to see my megawatt smile :)

Upcoming event - Climate change talks organized by VTACC (Vancouver)

Voters Taking Action Against Climate Change (VTACC) is a non-partisan group that is organizing a series of talks on climate change that will take place within the next few weeks. I don't know the first couple of speakers, but I do know Dr. Mark Jaccard and he's a brilliant speaker. Many people may disagree with his views, but he is certainly a rigorous scholar who does good social science and that should not be discounted.

From the VTACC website (all talks take place at the Canadian Memorial United Church at 7 pm, on Burrard and 15th Avenue):

Global Warming: More than Hot Air?
Dr. David Chapman, Professor of Geophysics, Dean of the Graduate School at the University of Utah
Tuesday, February 5th, 7 pm.

Global Warming as Spiritual Crisis and Opportunity
Bruce Sanguin, Minister, Canadian Memorial United Church
Tuesday February 19th, 7 pm.

Lessons for the Future from Canada's Climate Policy Failures
Dr. Mark Jaccard, Professor at the School of Resources and Environmental Management at SFU
Tuesday March 4th, 7 pm.

I am a bit surprised about the fact that very little has been talked about the politics of Canadian climate change policy (that is, about the political climate in Canada and how that is impacting implementation of post-Kyoto commitments). Would be worth examining, I think. And let me know if you attend any of the talks. You're even welcome to guest-blog!

For more information about VTACC:

VTACC is a group of Kitsilano neighbours who are deeply concerned about global warming and want to mobilize people to get engaged politically to call for immediate and deep reductions in emissions.[VTACC website]

Are environmental issues a fad?

This year has witnessed the publication of an environment-focus full edition of The Vancouver Sun, the bestowing of a Nobel Prize to Al Gore and the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, and more recently, the publication of a West Ender with the theme: Green. I am sure I am missing on other environmentally-focused publications and events, but just wanted to provide a small sample.

Despite the fact that I do not live in the West End, I religiously read The West Ender because it has lots of interesting articles. Furthermore, I don't think that there is a Mount-Pleasant-focused newspaper just yet (although admittedly, The Republic of East Vancouver does have some degree of overlap).

Now, the question that lingers in my mind is... are we witnessing a fad or are people really starting to care more for their environment? In a previous post, I indicated that there had been a steady increase in public opinion support for environmental causes and a growing interest in green issues (at some point, environmental issues overtook health as the top concern of Canadians in 2006, if I recall correctly).

So the question is - are we only witnessing a fad or is really environment our top priority? The jury is still out.

Beautiful day in Vancouver

As usual, the Powers That Be are playing games with our hearts and cleared the rain today for A FULL DAY, so the skies were beautifully blue and without almost any clouds, it was bright, shiny, sunny and warm (15 oC). After complaining about the bad weather and how it has affected my mood, I couldn't help but think about recent events and their linkages with climate change.

I (half-jokingly, half-seriously) suggested on Keira-Anne's blog (see her post for Tuesday October 23rd) that Mexico and Vancouver trade a couple of months of rain for sunshine (see my comments on her post). Another commenter said that the weather in California had been so dry that it smelled like smoke everywhere. Well, with the fires in the California region, I can't help but wonder - what can be done to avoid catastrophes like these? How can we decrease our vulnerability to such climatic extreme events?

Post on the comments and discuss [and in the mean-time, my thoughts go to the families that have been evacuated in California].

Carbon taxes in British Columbia - Make your voice heard!

The Kitsilano-based organization Voters Taking Action on Climate Change is encouraging citizens of Vancouver (and British Columbia in general) to provide feedback to the Select Standing Committee on Finance and Government Services in the form of a suggested carbon tax. For the online submission click on the previous link. Questions can be directed to VTACC (here is their Contact Us page).

Sustainable restaurants - myth or reality?

Associating food with environment usually takes one of three avenues:

• Local production and consumption. - The notion underlying the 100 Mile Diet and other similar ideas is that when we consume food that is locally produced we also reduce our ecological footprint by minimizing transportation effects (e.g. carbon emissions from air freight) and other externalities.
  
• Food security.- Closely associated with the previous item, the idea of food security is also associated to the availability of land (or lack thereof) and the varied uses this land can have. Ensuring that we protect enough land and designate it as are able to grow crops for human consumption is part of the food security debate.
• Greening restaurants.- This idea arises from an understanding that food production does have environmental impacts, and that we can minimize those impacts through rational decision-making. The idea of 'sustainable restaurants' may sound counter-intuitive, but it is not that strange. The remainder of this post will describe a couple of ideas I discussed with Jason Antony from Green Table, a Vancouver-based group dedicated to greening restaurants.

Jason and I had a nice chat where we discussed the two basic pathways that Green Table is championing. The first is "greening restaurants" - that is, reducing the environmental impact your current food operation has. The second is "sustainable restaurants" - this idea is related to being the leaders of sustainability in the restaurant business. For example, if you are a small Indian food kind of hole-in-the-wall, maybe you'll want to switch from styrofoam containers to recyclable ones. Or maybe you'll increase the post-consumer recycled content (paper, plastic containers, etc.) of your operations.

Now, if you want to be at the forefront of sustainable restaurants, you may want to engage in a full-fledged green marketing campaign, and include a full in-depth analysis of your operations so that you can find ways in which your restaurant can meet high standards of sustainability.

Green Table also promotes an eco-labelling system (for participating members of the network). Their philosophy can be found here. I think this is an excellent idea and I look forward to knowing more about this!

Kick-off post to Blog Action Day

Don't know how I managed to not appear on the Blog Action Day list given that I had previously registered and blogged about it (see my post here) so I re-registered. Had mixed feelings regarding whether I should post anything during the early hours of the morning, given that I wanted to give my analysis of the roles of Al Gore and the IPCC in bringing climate change to the forefront of global discussions a little bit of visibility. But... since I've already committed to Blog Action Day, I will be ok if my little post doesn't get that much exposure.

So on the menu today (if I manage to get all my work done)...

• Green restaurants - Had a nice chat with Jason Antony of Green Table, so I'll discuss some stuff that we talked about.
  
• The linkages between poverty, urban sprawl and sustainability.
• Numbers, numbers and more numbers (or how people can fool you with statistics).
• Research that is being undertaken in Vancouver.
• Upcoming events on sustainability.

And for now, I have to get back to my 'day job' so I hope you all are enjoying Blog Action Day. Go to their website to see who else is participating. And if you're a Vancouver blogger and are participating, let me know and I'll link to your website.

Al Gore, the IPCC and the Nobel Prize 2007

After hearing the announcement that the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) and environmental activist/politician Al Gore were co-recipients of the 2007 Nobel Prize for Peace, I couldn’t help but recall Marshall McLuhan’s famous phrase "the medium is the message". While, in the eyes of the world, the bestowing of a Nobel undeniably ramps up the legitimacy factor, McLuhan’s axiom that the medium used to convey a message becomes more important than the content of the message itself deserves a refresher.

Many detractors (primarily but not necessarily all of them right-wingers) have consistently focused on Al Gore as the Harbinger of Doom by portraying his apocalyptic "we're going to hell in a hand basket" message as unnecessarily alarming. Positioning Gore as the Chicken Little of the environmental movement allowed the naysayers to deflect attention from the issue at hand – that global warming is not only coming, it’s here – and instead critique Gore for his approach, ergo, the media of McLuhan’s axiom. I think we might be in for a sea-change (rather apt metaphor, don’t you think?) in the acknowledgment of global warming/climate change as a threat we better start dealing with, for the Nobel just might be enough to shift the focus, much to the dismay of the naysayers and their privately-funded scientists, from media to message, and the new reality is that if the media – meaning Gore and the IPCC – has been officially blessed by the Nobel Foundation, then the message is one we had better start taking seriously.

Although Gore and the IPCC have two different missions, their underlying objective is identical: to raise awareness of the climate change debate by bringing it to the forefront of global discussion. As an intergovernmental institution, the IPCC coordinates the findings and research of hundreds of scientists worldwide in an effort to increase our understanding of the patterns of climatic change, and their Summary for Policy Makers, a document that translates their findings into terminology the rest of us can understand, has been their media of choice. After An Inconvenient Truth rightfully raised Gore’s profile, he further spread the message of his documentary not only by relentlessly making the rounds of the lecture circuit, but by forming a coalition of groups and individuals dedicated to further disseminating his Power Point presentations.

Yet if I had to hazard a guess, I’d say Gore's message has had more reach than the IPCC’s Summary. He’s a face, he’s got a powerful, Oscar winning documentary, and – let’s face it – aside from anomalies like Steven Hawking and Einstein, scientists and their statistics tend to lack for great PR. In recent years, naysayers and resource-extraction pals have consistently clung to the tactic of painting Gore and the IPCC as the proverbial messengers whose news are so inconceivable the messengers are obviously making this stuff up; denial and derision have become the default options. Ergo, as a resolution to unpleasant realities, shooting the messenger not only eliminates threats to the status quo, the media can be positioned as tragically misinformed. Bombs away!

Which sort of brings me back to McLuhan. Could the IPCC, in view of a profile now permanently affixed to a Big Cool Friend courtesy of a shared Nobel, attain the same level of Gore's reach? I think so. But I see their roles as complementary, and perhaps that's one of the reasons why the Nobel Prize Adjudication committee thought they should both share the 2007 Nobel Prize: because in their separate but convergent ways, both Gore and the IPCC are sending the same message: climatic change is here. That munitions maker Alfred Nobel’s legacy might yet provide the ultimate bullet-proof shield that allows Gore, the IPCC and countless others to focus on getting the message out instead of dodging fire is an irony that leaves me undeniably optimistic.

And if the message benefits, as I hope it does, from the renewed focus only a Nobel can bestow, we just might witness an irony I suspect even McLuhan might appreciate because, if ever there was a time when the message deserved to transcend the media, this is it.

Disclaimer.- Thanks to my good friend Debra Mc for editing this entry. The ideas, initial writing and analysis are mine, but her superb editing job made this post so much better!

Do Vancouverites have amnesia?

I have lived in this city for over a decade (actually 11 years come to think about it). During this period (specifically in 2001), I had to endure (and survive) a bus drivers' strike that completely screwed my personal, academic and professional life. I spent hundreds of dollars in cab rides, my social life was reduced to nil and my school suffered, all because of the inability of transit authorities and bus drivers' unions to settle on time. It seems to me as though everybody has forgotten about this strike, hence the title of my post.

During the bus drivers' strike, I repeatedly asked everyone who wanted to listen "why hasn't the government settled this strike?" -- I had very little idea of how strikes were supposed to settle (yeah, both parties agree on a common goal and then proceed to write a deal and the strike ends -- at least, this is in theory).

Many businesses and people suffered. Jobs were lost, revenues were not earned, wages not collected and a lot of people suffered irreparable damages to their personal, professional and academic lives, just as I have. The exact same year, while the bus strike lasted over 123 days, the health professionals (specifically, nurses) went on strike. Their strike was not long, though. Less than four weeks into the strike, the B.C. government legislated the nurses back to work.

Now, I am by no means suggesting that the B.C. government should legislate the civic striking workers back to work. I repeat - I am not in favor of the B.C. government implementing back-to-work legislation. There is one thing I am puzzled by, though - why was it that nurses were deemed an essential service and thus legislated back to work, while transportation services were not? And again, I am not saying that this is the best way to go. But someone needs to be providing essential public services (the government) and this is not happening. Right now, trash is piling everywhere (and I continue to read stupid lame reports that 'there are no health risks' - what are these people thinking?) and nobody is doing anything.

The thing that bothers me is that somehow these strikes continue to happen, and that affected people are somehow adapting and coping and either refuse or avoid taking action. Or is it that this is our way of taking action? Just shut up and not do anything? Honestly, what have we done to end this strike? What can be done, realistically?

Once the 2001 transit strike was over, we were given three days -- yes you heard right -- three full days!!! of free bus rides, I am assuming to somehow compensate for having to endure this stupidly lengthy strike. I wonder what the City of Vancouver, or the union, or both, are going to offer in compensation for having to put up with piling garbage.

If citizens' votes are the currency of governments at every level (municipal, provincial and federal), wouldn't shifts in electoral voting be a powerful punishment for having done a lousy job at providing public services and governing? Citizens have a voice, and that voice goes beyond a vote in an election. But electoral votes are powerful still.

Something should be done, and this civic strike should not be forgotten. There must be a lesson here for future governments about what not to do. And, hopefully, when voting and choosing governments, Vancouverites, British Columbians and Canadians will not have a severe case of amnesia.

PS - I don't like the empty promises such as "we hope to end the strike by Labor Day weekend" or "we hope to end the strike as soon as the Thanksgiving weekend". I mean, what do you think, that we are thinking positive thoughts and associating them to the specific statutory holiday "oh geez, we're going to have garbage collection again after Thanksgiving - yay!". No, we are not. We are upset that things have gotten this far. Three months without garbage collection. Wow, unbelievable for a city that ranks so high in the 'livability' scores. What does this strike say to the world in regards to our ability to be civil and negotiate and settle labour agreements? Yes, you are right: it says very bad things.

World Environment Day 2007 - June 5th

For the past few days, I've had the nagging feeling that I'm missing reasons why June 5th was an important day. Two of my best friends are flying back from Europe tomorrow, it is my former personal assistant's birthday (he was simply phenomenal, the best project assistant I ever had). But I still kept thinking "why am I so concerned about June 5th?"

Well, now I know. It's World Environment Day. The slogan for this WED is "Melting Ice - A Hot Topic?", trying to emphasize climate change as an important issue to be addressed. As I have told my good friend H a few times, my real concern is that when people think about environmental or sustainability issues, their heads invariably turn to climate change.

Climate change is an important issue, but not the only one. Urban form, sprawl, food security, HIV/AIDS, homelessness and poverty alleviation are also very important issues. Why do people keep forgetting that climate change is only one of them is beyond me. That being said, and I have said it before, if I have the chance to do some climate change-related project where poverty is directly addressed, I'm happy to jump at the opportunity.

World Water Day 2007 - Coping with water scarcity

I thoroughly believed that World Water Day was celebrated on Wednesday March 21st, 2007 (at least in Canada, since there was an event being held here) but now I stand corrected, it was today (Thursday March 22nd, 2007).

Water is an important resource, one that has deserved lots of attention. The 10 year period from 2005 to 2015 has been marked as the International Decade for Action: Water for Life by the United Nations. Recently, UNESCO released the Second UN World Water Development Report: 'Water, a shared responsibility'

I have studied water (especially wastewater treatment, both from the natural sciences and engineering and now more recently, the social sciences) for over 14 years. I am passionate about water. My "baby steps" included collecting and sampling wastewater in several locations in Mexico, in order to test the effectiveness of activated sludge, bench-scale treatment processes. More recently, I became interested in the social aspects of wastewater management and wastewater policy. I have argued that the "scarcity discourse" can only get you so far.

Before I get bombarded with e-mails that criticize me, let me explain what I mean. If you look at the water cycle, there are several points where we can intervene to prevent environmental damages to water bodies. We could, for example:
a) Change our water consumption patterns at the individual level to reduce the amount of water used.
b) Change our processing technologies to reduce the amount of water consumed.
c) Clean up polluted streams through advanced wastewater treatment.

Shouldn't we stop polluting water in the first place? In a conversation with a professor we discussed this topic at length, when I was informed that the city of Victoria (in British Columbia) lacked wastewater treatment plants. I would agree, but the fact is... we are still polluting water, so it should have at least some degree of treatment. The compounding factor is that building wastewater treatment plants (and operating them) can also have detrimental environmental effects (energy consumption, generation of waste). More recently, more natural treatment processes (such as constructed wetlands) have become more popular. My concern with wetlands is that they might require too much area (and with the changing land-use patterns and increased pressures for compact urbanization, I wonder - who will be able to have a constructed wetland in their backyard, when housing is only available in units of 550 square feet?)

So, are we really in a catch-22 situation that we can't escape? I don't think so. I think that, when examining options for adequate water management, we can apply some complex adaptive systems (CAS) thinking. Professor Donella Meadows, who worked for many years trying to create solutions for environmental problems, argued in one of her last publications that there were twelve leverage points where one could intervene and effect change in a system. She argued that the point where the most change could be effected was in paradigm change.

I concur with this notion. If we were able to shift our own consumptive paradigms and transform our behavioral patterns to reduce water pollution (and attempt to find effective and non-harmful ways to treat whatever water we've already polluted) then I would think that we'd be in a better position in regards to water.

A couple of years ago, I gave a talk to a group of youngsters (probably between the ages of 7-11 years old) that I entitled "Saving the planet, one drop at a time". In this lecture I spoke about the fact that only 2% of the world's water was drinking water and that most of it was in glaciers and other non-easily-accessible points. At the end of the talk I asked them to sign a pledge to change their own consumption patterns and to try and change those of their parents, siblings, friends, so that we could stop wasting water. I was thrilled when I heard their voices all in unison repeating the pledge. I think that we might have found another important intervention point - educating young people.

This post follows the pattern of reflections I have engaged in for the past few years, and I think I will continue along this line of work for a while... in the mean time, please think twice when you open the water tap.

Good references I found include an advocacy guide published by the World Health Organization, the website for UN Water, and of course, the very appropriately entitled Human Development Report 2006, "Beyond scarcity: Power, poverty and the water crisis". One of my very good friends has done a lot of work on energy, poverty reduction and development. My mentor has done excellent work in this field and has strongly advocated to never forget about poverty. And if I had the time, I would go on about the links between water scarcity, pollution and poverty, but I don't... that will be the subject of another posting.

The politics of climate change

Very often, people ask me what I think of climate change. Given the nature of my work, this conversation topic is inevitable. And unfortunately, I am always afraid to venture an opinion because I worry that I am not sufficiently knowledgeable. I can speak about water, wastewater and toxics management at length without any worries because I've worked on pollution control for so many years. But climate change is not my forte.

That being said, I can say that I find it interesting that interest on climate change (mitigation and adaptation) has increased in Canada, particularly in the past few months. A recent poll by the CBC showed that environment was the top priority for Canadians. But that's just opinion. Are Canadians actually doing something to reduce their environmental damages? Are lifestyles shifting? Are we consuming less? What exactly does concern entail?

I worry, though. Is climate change the only concern of Canadians? Can we afford to only focus our efforts on climate change? Wouldn't Canada we be better served by actually using climate change to frame other environmental problems? I am particularly concerned with issues like poverty alleviation. Could we try to correct income disparities through climate-change related projects? I ask myself these questions and I don't have answers yet. But I think that there is value to thinking through these questions. Particularly since I believe that my own work will have to deal with climate change in the not-so-far future.

Finally, we need to admit that climate change is a political issue. There are political agendas behind "greening" strategies. In this regard, I have to say that while a bit skeptical, I am hopeful. If politicians want to "appear to be green" and do some environmental good in the process, all the better.

Sustainable transportation in Vancouver

Today I had a really hard time taking the 99 B-Line. Most buses went through, fully loaded with people. As someone with an environmentally-minded orientation, I should be happy. But I can't be happy because, even though we are making more use of public transit, we are indeed over capacity. The popularity of the U-Pass (a universal bus pass for students at UBC and SFU) has made it commuting much easier (as it covers all three zones of the Lower Mainland).

Sustainable transportation should also be climate-neutral, in my humble opinion. I was talking about this topic with Marcela, who is very passionate about sustainable transportation. For example, she was suggesting that street-light coordination would be but just one of the many ways in which you could streamline traffic in the Metropolitan Zone of Guadalajara. I don't know since I don't work in transportation, but I'll take her word for it :-)