For those of us who work towards a more sustainable future- and, thankfully, that’s a quickly growing demographic- the challenge is in opening our eyes to the gravity of our situation while maintaining a healthy dose of optimism. With all the doomsday reports, it’s sometimes difficult to see our way out of the mess we’ve created.

I once asked Roger Lang, a remarkable conservationist and entrepreneur out in Montana, whether he thought of optimism as a vital component of the environmental movement.  “I don’t think so,” he replied. “I have dark days when I’m convinced developers will pave all these beautiful open spaces. But I think these bouts of pessimism actually keep me engaged- pure optimism is synonymous with naivete. I think to be dedicated to conservation means you better have a good appreciation of the challenges, or else you’ll be blind-sided by them.”

A new study by researchers at the Yale School of Forestry & Environmental Studies provides, perhaps, the right balance of realism and optimism. An analysis of 240 independent studies, it found that most polluted or damaged ecosystems worldwide can recover within as little as 5 to 10 years “if societies commit to their cleanup or restoration.”

The Yale researchers studied seven ecosystem types and their recovery from man-made disturbances (logging, mining, oil spills, overfishing, industrial pollution…) and natural disasters (hurricanes, cyclones…). They found, for example, that forest ecosystems recovered in 42 years on average, while ocean bottoms recovered in less than 10 years. While the damages to these ecosystemss are serious, the researchers see the results as an indication that “if societies choose to become sustainable, ecosystems will recover. It isn’t hopeless.”

The study does conclude that about 15% of damaged ecosystems are beyond recovery. But the researchers suggest that, as bad as things are,  “speculation that it will take centuries or millennia for degraded ecosystems to recover” is, in general, wrong. Holly Jones, one of the study’s co-authors added, “we recognize that humankind has and will continue to actively domesticate nature to meet its own needs. The message of our paper is that recovery is possible and can be rapid for many ecosystems, giving much hope for a transition to sustainable management of global ecosystems.”

[Sources: Yale University, Jeff Kart- Clean Technica]

*repost LTT looks back on first year

Another in Brighter Planet’s series of videos. It speaks to one of the central questions of the eco-movement, how to sell it. Is it enough to sell a product or an activity on the merits of it being ‘green?’ No. We all need to think more creatively about how to coax this cultural shift.

One of the great marketing campaigns of all-time is Nike’s ‘Just Do It.’ It accounts for the fact that exercise can be a drag (should I pull myself out of bed for a morning run?) and that competition can be daunting (will I fail? can I keep up?), but it offers, instead, a mindset that is as simple as it is empowering…just do it!

Skeptics who say the environmental movement doesn’t depend on creative minds and marketing wizardry don’t get it. The folks at Brighter Planet do, and we’re grateful.

A Reason to Bike from Brighter Planet on Vimeo.

Quickly taking the youtube/myspace/current realm by storm, here’s a clip of actress Julia Stiles talking about her “new line of eco-friendly clothes.” It’s Julia Stiles Styles! I’m wearing the ‘Save The Last Shants’ right now!

It’s fitting that the agency that enabled us to view our own planet from a distance, providing mankind with a new environmental perspective, is building a place here on Earth to protect that vision.

Forty years after the Apollo 11 lunar module touched down at Tranquility Base, NASA is creating a research center at its Ames Research Center in Moffett Field, CA that will develop sustainable design, green technologies and other innovative projects.

Sustainability Base will provide a window to the future on Earth. An intelligent, cognitive, intuitive building designed to be native to its place. NASA ingenuity applies lessons from space exploration to living sustainably on Earth.

The building itself will be a state-of-the-art net zero complex, powered by ground-source heat pumps from 72 geothermal wells, solar hot water collectors and a network of sensors to react to changing conditions, such as sunlight, temperature, wind, and energy usage, all monitored by a web-based smart meter.

NASA expects to use 90 % less water than an ordinary equivalent-size building.

“Cradle to Cradle” author William McDonough has been contracted to design and build the $20.6 million building, to be completed by the end of 2011. NASA expects to get the Platinum level LEED certification from the U.S. Green Building Council, the highest level.

“Leadership is often described as being taken to some place you would have never gotten to on your own,” says McDonough. “The kind of leadership has exhibited in space is exactly the kind of leadership we need exhibited on Earth.” He continues, “the world needs a whole new way of thinking about the way we design and make things because the current designs are destructive to the Earth and its systems, and we need new designs that are positive.”

We’ll be following this closely!

[Sources: CNET, NASA]

Aramark, the PA-based food service giant, plans to introduce reusable containers in college cafeterias, a move it expects will divert as many as 2 million disposables from landfills over the next school year.

After a successful pilot program last year at Baylor, University of Florida, UNC-Chapel Hill, Peace College and Salem College, both also in North Carolina, Aramark sees this as an effective way for colleges to move closer to their sustainability goals. The new containers are dishwasher safe, can withstand the cleaning process in campus cafeterias and are recyclable, according to the company, which serves more than 600 colleges and universities.

Last year, we examined the ‘greening of college campuses,’ as many schools began looking more seriously at ways to reduce waste and conserve water on campus. Faced with severe droughts, schools like Georgia Tech and University of Florida have joined the growing list of schools experimenting with no trays. Georgia Tech, with a student body of 18,000, claimed to be saving 3,000 gallons of water a day. Similarly, University of Florida, with an enrollment of 50,000 students, saw its annual savings will be as much as 470,000 gallons that would otherwise have gone to washing trays.

The introduction of the containers and the efforts to phase out trays in cafeterias is part of Aramark’s Green Thread environmental program.

[Source: GreenBiz]

The UK’s Ethical Consumer magazine has produced a list of best and worst innovations, as part of the publication’s 20th anniversary. The mag, “an indispensable read for the ethical and green shopper, or any independent thinker,” asked a range of ‘experts’ (celebrities, activists, politicians) about their favorite items as well as products they’d prefer to see banned.

The list of ‘ethical products’ is as eclectic as it is varied. It includes, Brompton fold up bikes, smart meters, fairtrade (interestingly, several people identified Zaytoun Palestinian Fairtrade and organic olive oil), organic cotton boxers (I’m serious, it’s on the list), locally grown food and electrical vehicles.

On the list of environmental evils, the nominations include the standby option on a television set (allegedly responsible for 2% of Britain’s electrical use), patio heaters, incandescent light bulbs and, from Climate Camp Activists, carbon offsets. The group responsible for organizing some of Britain’s more raucous protests writes, “offsets are part of the elaborate machinery of carbon trading that governments and businesses use to obscure the simple fact that carbon trading will not lower emissions.”

Boris Johnson, London’s mayor and a guest ‘expert,’ opted not to include a product to ban. He writes, “I believe in carrots rather than sticks, and the firm conviction that this way, people will do the right thing for the environment. We are creating a public cycle hire scheme in London to make it easier for people to take to two wheels rather than take more polluting forms of transport.”

For more on the list products (and perhaps more interestingly who was asked to be an ‘expert’) check out the mag’s 20th birthday issue.

Toyota has done more to drive progress in the auto industry in the 21st century than any other car maker. In 2003, the Prius hit the streets and became a phenomenon. In 2007, the Japanese automaker announced that 100% of its fleet would be hybrid by 2020. Recently, rumors have been swirling about a new hybrid that would once again set the tone of the conversation.

Kyodo News has reported that Toyota will release a new medium-sized hybrid, currently code-named the ‘SAI,’ in Japan later this year. The SAI will be bigger than the Prius and share some structural elements with the Lexus HS 250h and some mechanical elements of the Camry Hybrid. It’s expected to help further demonstrate Toyota’s lead over its competitors- particularly the ones over here- and keep it on its path to 100% by 2020.
[Sources: Kyodo, JapanCarBlog, AutoBlogGreen, Green Car Congress]

Robbie at Brighter Planet just sent this over, another clever video from the carbon offset pros. The video irreverently poses the question, how do you plan on dealing with those pesky little emissions?

internet traffic

An algorithm outlined by a PhD student at MIT may help companies such as Google, Microsoft and Amazon reduce their energy use by as much as 40% (and save millions of dollars each year in electric costs). Asfandyar Qureshi and his colleagues at MIT, Carnegie Mellon University and the networking company Akamai say the internet-routing algorithm tracks electricity price fluctuations and rerouts data to locations where prices are lowest on a particular day.

The researchers analyzed more than 3 years worth of electricity price data collected from 29 major US cities and found that energy prices are surprisingly volatile, fluctuating for a multitude of reasons such as seasonal changes in supply, fuel price hikes, and changes in consumer demand.

“The thing that surprised me most was that there was no one place that was always cheapest,” says Bruce Maggs, vice president of research at Akamai. “There are large fluctuations on a short timescale.”

The algorithm weighs the cost of moving data a certain distance- cost goes up with distance- with fluctuating electricity prices. The researchers found that when energy use is proportional to computing, a company could cut its energy consumption by 40% by effective rerouting of the data.

In addition to cost benefits, improved efficiency would also help companies reduce CO2 emissions. As Knight points out, “Google recently built a datacenter in Belgium that relies entirely on ambient cooling–on days when the weather gets to warm, the center’s servers are simply shut down.” But companies like Google that are committed to curbing emissions have been forced to accelerate energy consumption as more and more applications move from desktop computers to the web, leading to significant increases in data traffic. Knight suggests, “for the world’s biggest information-technology firms, this means spending upwards of $30 million on electricity every year, by modest estimates.”

As Marguerite Reardon explains in her piece in CNET, “managing energy and its costs is likely to be big business in the coming years for technology companies. Cisco Systems, the largest networking company in the world, recently said it sees a $100 billion market in helping power utilities better manage their electrical grids using communication technology.” A report published by McKinsey & Company and the Uptime Institute in July 2008 estimates that “datacenter energy usage will quadruple during the next decade in the absence of efforts to improve efficiency.”

Qureshi and co. may have just changed the game.

[sources: Technology Review, CNET]

In May, Better Place’s Shai Agassi unveiled the company’s battery swap system in Yokohama, Japan.  The move is part of the Agassi’s efforts to develop an infrastructure that can support widespread use of electric vehicles. The $500,000 station was a major stepping stone towards that end and can replace a dead battery and get you back on the road in less time than it takes to fill your gas tank. The electric car industry received a further boost yesterday when Renault (in partnership with Better Place) announced plans to produce 160,000 vehicles a year from 2011, initially in Denmark and Israel.

In Denmark, the first model will cost up to 200,000 kroner ($38,000), with Better Place Denmark, the Danish subsidiary of the transport company, developing the lithium batteries fitted in the vehicles.

Electric car drivers will need to sign up for a monthly subscription with Better Place to get access to the batteries. “It will be like signing up for a mobile phone contract,” explains Jens Moberg, chief executive of Better Place DenmarkMoberg. Better Place has not announced how much the monthly fee would be, but Moberg did say the 250-watt battery would cost about $11,500 to produce. “I expect the cost to come down afterwards as production expands.”

Drivers can recharge the batteries at home, which would take several hours, or switch batteries at a “swap station”, like the one in Yokohama.

Close to 100 battery swap stations will be available around Denmark, with plans to expand further.

[sources: Better Place, The Guardian]

KC-135R Stratotanker

Last week, we celebrated the Army’s efforts to go green, with their ambitious new solar farm in the sun-drenched Mojave Desert. The facility at Fort Irwin would generate about 1,250 gigawatt hours per year, enough to power well over 100,000 homes. This week, we’ll salute the U.S. Air Force Academy in Colorado Springs, whose cadets are working on a new wing design for the KC-135 Stratotanker that could significantly increase the fuel efficiency of this workhorse. The KC-135R is, after all, an aerial refueler, so perhaps it’s not surprising that the cadets focused their attention there.

After a year of research, the team predicts that the new and improved wing design will result in up to 8% greater efficiency. Modest but, given the Air Force’s fuel consumption in the KC-135, significant.

The research team looked back through old studies by NASA and Boeing, the plane’s manufacturer, from decades ago and found plans for design improvements that would have achieved a 7% reduction in drag, but these projects were shelved before development. Boeing did, however, improve the plane’s engine. The aircraft with the replacement engine is called the KC-135R, which achieved a 27% reduction in fuel use, an estimated 3.2 million barrels per year.

The KC-135R has already been enlisted in the U.S. military’s shift away from conventional petroleum fuels.  In a test run last fall, a KC-135 successfully refueled an F-22 with a 50-50 synthetic fuel blend.  Aside from helping to reduce the military’s reliance on petroleum products, the Air Force Academy’s focus on redesign may point to more cost-effective ways of enhancing the viability of alternative energy sources for all aircraft, including algae biofuel, fuel cells, and electricity.

[source: CleanTechnica]

You may have seen this video- someone sent it to me last year- but after nearly being run off the road by a road-raging Buick Regal driver this weekend, I started thinking about the more civilized pace of this pedal-powered car in Toronto. The car, the Shared Propulsion Car by 2007 Sobey Award winning artist Michel de Broin, is a 1986 Buick Regal, stripped of its engine, suspension, transmission, electrical system and pretty much everything else (even the windows). Part political statement, part social experiment, the car is propelled by the energy of its passengers, requires no gas, produces no emissions, tops out at about 15 mph and, best of all, evokes Fred Flintstone and Barney Ruble.

The driver, Dean Baldwin, brand-new license in hand, took the car out for a spin in this Toronto neighborhood, assisted by three pedalling passengers. They only managed about nine blocks before Toronto’s finest pulled the car over. According to the Mercer Union blog, “driver and passengers were left to wait for 30 minutes in the car, presumably while the officers determined which law had, in fact, been broken.” After considerable deliberations, the cops ticketed Baldwin with “operating an unsafe vehicle” and a tow-truck was called.

Months later, Baldwin was in court fighting the citation. CBC’s account of the court proceedings:

As the Crown prosecutor tried to make his case Thursday, the court erupted in laughter, and the charges were thrown out.

Baldwin’s legal representative, Terry Fox, said the arresting officer never should have pulled the car over.

“Where’s the evidence it was illegal? There was no objective standard here. Just his opinion is what it was, and that’s not good enough. It’s speculation he based it on,” Fox said outside court.

Baldwin said he was happy with the decision. And what did he want to do after leaving court?

“I’m thinking its a really nice day, so we might go for a drive,” he said.

That’s exactly what Baldwin did. He grabbed three friends, pulled the car out of storage and took it for a spin.

As Mercer Union points out, “in the past 50 years, 200,00 Canadians have died in car accidents. No pedal-car deaths have been reported.”

China wants more clean power to fuel its economic growth. Last week, it began construction of the country’s first 10 GW wind power farm in northern China’s windswept Gansu province .

As the world’s second-largest energy user, with 80% of it energy supplied by cheap but heavily polluting coal, China has set a goal of bringing its total wind power capacity to 100 GW by 2020 from the current 12 GW, part of an overall plan to generate 3% of total electricity from non-hydro renewable energy. The potential of wind power and the degree to which its growth is exceeding expectations has led Chinese officals to aim higher than their original goal of 30 GW by 2020.

To put China’s new goal of 100 GW into perspective, there are currently about 121 GW of installed wind power worldwide, according to the Global Wind Energy Council (GWEC), with the United States, Germany and Spain the top three wind power nations, followed by China.

China’s most celebrated renewable power source is its Three Gorges dam, the 22.5 GW hyrdoelectric dam on the Yangtze River- the world’s largest hydro project.  Earlier this summer, authorities in Gansu touted plans for a “Three Gorges of Wind Power,” a project that would by itself nearly match the dam’s output.

One major issue remains, getting the power generated into grids. Wind facilities have outpaced the grid’s ability to accommodate the newly generated electricity, and, for now, much of the output of is going to waste. According to GWEC policy director, Qiao Liming, “of China’s 12.2 gigawatts of installed power in 2008, only 8.9 gigawatts made it into the electrical gird,” due in large part to the fact that the regions best suited for wind farms are so far removed from the grids.

Anyone surprised to see China so invested in renewables hasn’t been paying attention. Check out our posts on “world’s greenest superskyscraper,” or Pepsi’s “green plant,” and BFD, China’s first electric car.

[sources: Reuters, AFP]

Man! GM can’t catch a break! As we noted yesterday, the struggling automaker was buoyed by the excitement surrounding news that its Chevy Volt would get a whopping 230 MPG. Despite some fuzzy math- the EPA’s new MPG formula is, at best, confusing and, at worst, misleading- GM’s CEO Fritz Henderson seemed to be ushering in a new age.

He didn’t have long to enjoy the moment- shortly after the media event, the EPA issued a statement backing away from GM’s claims. Later that day, Nissan reminded the world that, using the same formula as GM, the new all-electric Nissan Leaf will get 367 MPG. Nissan seemed to relish the opportunity to take another shot at beleaguered GM, writing on Twitter:

“Nissan Leaf = 367 mpg, no tailpipe, and no gas required. Oh yeah, and it’ll be affordable too”

Compared to the Volt’s expected price tag of $40,000, the Leaf will only cost about $25,000. Nissan also claims the Leaf will get 100 miles per battery charge, while the Volt gets just 40.

[sources: AutoBlogGreen, HuffPo]

Late last year, we were wondering if the Chevy Volt could save General Motors. Ten months later, the landscape has changed significantly- GM is emerging from its bankruptcy and reorganization- but hopes are still riding on an electric car that seems to have been in production for eons. Yesterday, CEO Fritz Henderson held a press conference to continue building the hype, and it’s pretty good hype.

The Volt, Henderson announced, is expected to get at least 230 miles per gallon in city driving. Re-fueling a Volt will be significantly less than gassing up at the pump, he said. With an average off-peak electricity rate of 5 cents a kilowatt hours, it will cost about 40 cents to recharge batteries overnight. In real terms, that’s about $2.75 for electricity per 100 miles. “Having a car that gets triple-digit fuel economy, we believe, will be a game changer for us,” Henderson said.

Production is expected to begin in late 2010 as a 2011 model. The Volt will travel up to 40 miles on a single electricity charge- good for the average commute, not great for those long drives to Grandma’s on Thanksgiving. Add its fuel engine, and the range goes up to 300 miles. As a first generatoin model, the cost is pretty high, unconfirmed to be about $40,000, but, as Henderson points out, the car will qualify for a $7,500 federal tax credit and GM is working on bringing down the cost of future generations of the Volt, particularly the battery system, he said.

Currently owned by the US and Canadian governments (60% and 11% respectively), United Auto Workers Voluntary Employee Beneficiary Association (17.5%) and some bondholders, GM needs some good news. If yesterday’s media event is any indication, the Volt just might provide that needed jolt.

[update: here's an interesting perspective from Ariel Schwarz at Fast Company, asking, "230 MPG? So what?!"]

From caviar to convertibles, country homes to cross-country flights, the word ‘luxury’ conjures images of excess. Is it possible to have a green luxury? Does green living mean giving up the ‘finer things in life?’ In some ways, this is the enduring question of the green movement- is it possible to merge a consumer’s aspirations with the environment’s needs?

For the auto industry, going green has long meant major compromises in performance and power. But as car makers have seen sustained interest in sustainability, demand has driven innovation, and that gap between ‘luxury’ and ‘green’ has narrowed. In housing, it’s difficult to make an argument for a ’sustainable McMansion’ - see our video on building a net zero home- but breakthroughs in renewable energy, smart technology and recycled materials will similarly narrow that gap. And making a long-haul flight more green is now as easy as purchasing carbon offsets from someone like Brighter Planet- see our Carbon Offsets 101 video.

The greening of luxury foods, too, has been fueled by innovation and consumer expectations. Greater scrutiny of how food is grown and how animals are treated has brought issues of sustainability to the fore. But in contrast to agriculture, so-called aquaculture - fish farming, shrimp farming and so on- has been slower to evolve, and retailers have been slower to demand it. That’s beginning to change thanks to companies like Whole Foods.

As we noted last year, Whole Foods became the first major retailer to announce a comprehensive set of aquaculture guidelines, adopting strict standards aimed at protecting sensitive habitats, limiting waste and reducing pollution. The move is being welcomed by environmental groups, like the Environmental Defense Fund (EDF) and the World Wildlife Fund, both of which have contributed to the “aquaculture dialogue.” Working with those environmental groups and leading scientists, Whole Foods began visiting its suppliers’ farms to develop a comprehensive set of guidelines, which includes a ban on preservatives, antibiotics, hormones and other chemicals commonly used in fish farming. “Right now, we need a way to source our seafood in a way that meets our customers’ expectations,” says Carrie Brownstein, seafood quality standards coordinator at Whole Foods. “We don’t want to be waiting on the sidelines. We want to be very active in the process.”

One company that has met Whole Foods’ strict guidelines is Petrossian, purveyor of luxury foods such as caviar. Caviar has long been something of a poster child for reckless luxuries, as rampant overfishing of the prized Beluga sturgeon threatened to drive the species into extinction. NYC-based Petrossian has helped revive caviar’s reputation as an eco-minded luxury item, raising the profile and integrity of farm-produced caviar as a viable alternative to caviar from wild sturgeons. Petrossian was the first distributor to work with sturgeon farms to provide an alternative for caviar connoisseurs, helping to continually improve technology and techniques. Monterey Bay Aquarium’s Seafood Watch and the EDF have ranked U.S. farmed sturgeon and caviar as a “Good Alternative” for the environment. With a sticker price that can be as low as 1/3 the alternative, sustainable caviar makes financial sense too.

It’s human nature to indulge in the finer things…so let’s celebrate the greening of ‘life’s little luxuries.’

The U.S. Army announced last week that it will build a 500 MW solar energy installation at its Fort Irwin base in California’s sun-drenched Mojave Desert. Is the Army going green?

You may remember one of our posts from January about that most iconic of Army images, the Jeep, being replaced on bases by electric vehicles, and earlier this year, the Army began reporting its “footprint.” As CNET’s Martin LaMonica explains, “military experts often cite the importance of alternative energy to the security of military installations and personnel.”

According to Army Senior Energy Executive, Jerry Hansen, “the Army is aggressively exploring opportunities such as [Fort Irwin] to leverage renewable energy alternatives and improve our energy security posture.”

The Fort Irwin solar project, being developed by Clark Energy Group and Acciona Solar Power, could supply 1,250 gigawatt hours per year, enough to power well over 100,000 homes.

It’s perhaps not such a surprise to see this particular base serve as a testing ground for a forward-thinking project of this size. Fort Irwin hosts NASA’s Goldstone Deep Space Communications Complex whose main purpose is to track and communicate with space missions.

Go Army!

[sources: Clark Energy Group, CNET]

Another great video from our friends at Brighter Planet. I got a sneak preview of this video at a BBQ last month, and it’s good to see the carbon offset biz getting a creative makeover. The video is to promote the company’s great new YOUR FOOTPRINT feature on their web site, which helps you understand what your carbon impact is. As BP’s Carolyn Barnwell acknowledges in her post, it can be a little daunting to learn the gory details: “When I meet people who have never gotten an estimate before, they often say, ‘Oh, no! I don’t think I want to know.’ I say, ‘Don’t worry, we’re not judging you. But you can’t start trimming your footprint until you understand your impact and where it comes from.’ Go on and give it a go!

Check out Brighter Planet’s YOUR FOOTPRINT calculator.

And for more on Brighter Planet, here’s our Carbon Offsets 101.

Way back in February, we looked at the “cash for clunkers” programs already enjoying success across Europe- Germany, France, Spain, Britain…, where it goes by the slightly less stupid name of ’scrappage incentives’- and wondered if something similar could ever work over here. Well, after the initial $1 billion allocated to the subsidy here in the U.S.- which was expected to last until November- evaporated in under a week, that question was put to rest. The House was forced to quickly vote on another $2 billion in clunker coupons, with the Senate expected to vote to extend the program soon. But other questions remain- is it a good idea? is it good for the environment? is Glenn Beck the craziest man on television?

The 411

The “cash for clunkers” program was designed to achieve three main goals- 1) stimulate the economy by luring the middle class back into showrooms, 2) provide the ailing car industry a much-needed shot in the arm and, if possible, 3) begin the transformation of the American fleet of cars towards more fuel efficient vehicles. The idea is pretty simple. The government will give consumers up to $4,500 to trade in older vehicles (less than 25 years old) that get 18 mpg or less (combined EPA ratings), in exchange for a vehicle that does 22 mpg or better.

Effect On The Economy & Industry?

Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood calls it a roaring success, saying, “the government has proved we can get money out the door and sell almost 160,000 cars.” LaHood and others estimate these transactions to be worth $664 million, suggesting the trade-in program has made an immediate and indisputable impact on the struggling U.S. auto industry. Ford announced on Monday that their July U.S. auto sales were up a strong 2.3% over results from one year ago, a result that company executives linked to “cash-for-clunkers.”

But critics suggest the impact on the economy is negligible. The Wall Street Journal calls it “crackpot economics. The subsidy won’t add to net national wealth, since it merely transfers money to one taxpayer’s pocket from someone else’s, and merely pays that taxpayer to destroy a perfectly serviceable asset in return for something he might have bought anyway.” Former Fed Chairman Alan Greenspan believes the program is an effect of a rebounding economy, not a cause. “It’s an interesting issue,” Greenspan says, “I mean, I have qualms about the concept, but there is no doubt that that very extraordinary response is a very important indicator that the state of confidence in the economy is beginning to pick up.”

Effect on Environment?

Larry Summers, National Economic Council President, said on NBC’s Meet The Press that “the so-called cash for clunkers program has actually been far more successful than people expected, both in terms of the number of car sales it’s generated, and, I should say, in terms of the environmental benefit.” But what exactly is the environmental benefit? The Guardian’s Ryan Avent says the eco-thinking behind the program is based on sound logic: “Cars 13 years old and older generate 75% of all automobile pollution while travelling only 25% of the miles driven…Over the course of 10,000 miles, for instance, an improvement from 18 to 28 miles per gallon (mpg) will save nearly twice as much gasoline as a move from 34 to 50 mpg.”

Still, folks like Cameron Scott (SF Chronicle’s Thin Green Line) are skeptical. Scott argues the current program is a typical Washington half-measure, the effect of which is diluted by the already low emissions standards in this country. “The government requires fleetwide average fuel efficiency of 2009 American vehicles to be just 23 mpg…In Europe the number is 45, and it’s even higher in Japan, leading Japanese cars to trounce their American counterparts class by class in fuel efficiency.” He concludes, “it seems to be working fairly well as an economic stimulus program without actively screwing the environmental pooch.” Faint praise, indeed.

We’ll continue to track this story, but Scott is right to say that until the U.S. can match the fuel efficiency of Europe and Japan, we’ll continue to get trounced. Proof is in the pudding- 4 of the 5 top cars being bought through the “cash for clunkers” program are foreign. After the Ford Focus, which is surprisingly the top-selling new car,  Japanese automakers are dominating: the Toyota Corolla, Honda Civic, Toyota Prius and Toyota Camry. But, on the bright side, of 157,000 trades that had occurred as of Tuesday morning, 80% of the “clunkers” were SUVs and trucks. That’s gotta be a good thing!

(AP Photo/Rick Bowmer)

Earlier this week, NYC’s Mayor Bloomberg outlined more ideas about how his city can run more efficiently (check out previous posts on his “forward-thinking,” like his plastic bag tax, plans for a taxi fleet of hybrids, wind turbines on bridges and skyscrapers, a greener Broadway…to name just a few), this time focused on reforms of NYC’s mass transit.

If you’ve been on any of Manhattan’s crosstown buses, you’ll know it’s sometimes quicker to crawl on your hands and knees than to hop on a bus. I used to enjoy riding on the M23 (down 23rd St) because it would give me time to read the paper, do the crossword puzzle and catch up on some sleep, but then I decided I should probably just walk the two blocks to the subway.

How does the mayor propose making the MTA more efficient? Here are a few ideas from his 33-point plan:

●making crosstown buses free, allowing riders to climb on quickly, rather than queue to pay, and getting the buses moving quickly.

●installing “countdown clocks” on subway platforms, so riders could see when the next train is scheduled to arrive.

●creating an integrated, contactless “smart card” for transit riders — similar to London’s Oyster Card or Hong Kong’s Octopus Card — that could eventually supplant the MetroCard.

●create more “high occupancy vehicle” express lanes, in efforts to reduce commuter traffic and encourage car-pooling.

“Plain and simple: the M.T.A. needs to do more. Much more,” the mayor said at a campaign event at West 34th Street between 10th and 11th Avenues. “Our mass transit system is far behind.” Important to note, I suppose, that he’s running for re-election, but those ideas sound good to us!

For more, check out Sewell Chan AND Michael Barbaro’s piece in the NYT.

Finally a Nixon you can get behind! The lifestyle (surf, skateboard, work hard and play harder) company based in Encinitas, CA got into the watch business 11 years ago fueled by “a frustration at a lack of quality watches that simultaneously do the talking for you and deliver what you need in various high stress work and play environments has grown into a network of athletes, rock stars, retailers, and dedicated loyalists.” As their site explains, “we do the little shit better.”

Nixon has launched a new range of ecofriendly watches, dubbed Volta, that harness the light to charge its built-in battery. The watch features a semi-transparent dial that allows sunlight to pass through and hit the solar panels underneath. The Volta makes its mark as the first rechargeable, solar powered watch in the brands 11-year history. Stuck inside at a desk all day? No worries, any light source will suffice, “so your office fluorescence or tanning beds will also be good sources to recharge your watch.”

The Volta is available now and can be found at all Nixon Dealers or on their site.