The Pentagon has been looking at energy efficiency and conservation for several years now, viewing it as part of national security. Some retired military are now pushing the idea in this report from Solve Climate.
Leslie Berliant at Solve Climate wrote:
In recent weeks, retired military leaders have been stumping for a renewable energy policy on the grounds of national security.
Case in point, U.S. Navy Vice Admiral (Ret.) Dennis McGinn, a member of the military advisory board of the Center for Naval Analysis (CNA) is on a listening tour with former Republican Senator from Virginia John Warner to talk about energy dependence and national security.
Their arsenal for trying to convince members of Congress and the public that climate change and energy dependence are urgent national security issues includes decades of experience, a 2 1/2 year old CNA report, "National Security and the Threat of Climate Change", and a report from May of this year which McGinn co-authored, "Powering America’s Defense: Energy and the Risks to National Security".
McGinn was in Los Angeles this week addressing the city’s Environmental Affairs Commission on the issue of America’s energy posture and national security. The point he wants to drive home is that climate change, energy dependence and national security are a related set of global challenges. Furthermore, energy security and climate change goals should be clearly integrated into national security and military planning processes as well as national policy. ...
McGinn and his colleagues would like Americans to understand the external costs related to oil – environmental, military and health costs – which McGinn says make the current price of a gallon of gas close to $7 (other reports say that price is actually over $11 a gallon).
"We are paying that now," McGinn said, "we just don’t think we’re paying it."
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The rescue begins below and continues after the jump.
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In Whole Foods Loses More Customers, MillieNeon clued us into her search for alternatives: "[L]o and behold, [I] found a great food co-op about to open it's doors here in Chicago. They'll be buying from local farmers year round, local organic farmers, local ranchers, local dairies. When local isn't available, the food will come from fair market and union suppliers.That not only encourages small farmers, it supports the local economy. Local food is also more nutritious because it doesn't have the nutrition drained out by packaging and shipping long distances in hot trucks. So, I join this coop, and today volunteered to woman their table at the Green Market."
terryhallinan had some words of praise for a group of Republicans in Small Geothermal Power For The People: "From KTTU: Hundreds turned out at Chena Hot Springs Saturday to celebrate a major development in geothermal energy -- not just for Alaska, but for the entire world. Sen. Lisa Murkowski, Rep. Don Young and former senator Ted Stevens were on hand for the unveiling of a portable geothermal power unit. The hell you say. Wouldn't you expect that terrible trio to be in a police lineup rather than pushing clean energy? Has the world turned upside down? Yes, indeed it has."
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ek hornbeck has posted the Overnight News Digest.
BruceMcF weighed in with another tale of high speed rail in Ed Morris Duped by Libertarian HSR Hackery: "Freakonomist Eric Morris finishes up his tag-team attack with Ed Glaeser on the High Speed Rail (HSR) policy with a post that confesses to the hack jobs both are doing on HSR policy - but works hard to spin the confession into a defense of the hackery. ... Randal O'Toole, for those who do not know, is the "Libertarian" anti-HSR propagandist working for the Cato Institute, with corporate sponsors that might have an interest in the High Speed Rail debate including: the American Petroleum Institute; ExxonMobil; General Motors; Honda North America; Toyota Motor Corporation; and Volkswagen of America. ...Now, it sure does look bad that Eric Morris' is willing to elevate Randal O'Toole to "articulate critic" status. But, what about the hypothesis that he's just too busy to read O'Toole's work and compare it to non-partisan information sources to understand that O'Toole is a hack? That is, maybe Eric Morris has been duped instead of trying to deliberately mislead?"
DaveVH predicted tough economic times ahead in The price of oil and the future of civilization: "The price of oil and the future of civilization Have you noticed recently that the price of oil jumps up with every upward lurch in the economy? I believe that any significant increase in economic growth will be batted down by rising oil prices. It takes increasing energy supplies, especially oil, which is fungible (meaning basically that if you can’t get it from one source, you can get it from another), but globally limited, to grow an economy. Anyone who follows the global oil situation is aware that 50+ of the 60+ non-OPEC oil-producing nations have declining output, and that production increases equal to current Saudi output every few years would be required to offset current declines from oil-producing regions. I won't go into alternatives, but none of them looks to be able to make up the deficits in future petroleum "demand." In other words, I see no way for a full and complete economic recovery."
green minute began a new series in Green Grassroots: "In the recent months I have encountered a lot of design being produced that is inspired by nature and natural processes. The natural aspect in object design is uniquely integrated into various modes of design and disciplines. Some objects are making a statement, expressing modern world longing for a greener more natural world that slowly is being replaced with concrete, plastic and pollution. Some designs produce real solutions that deal with real problems and introduce not only workable objects that reduce waste and replace dirty energy with renewable alternatives, but they imbue them with natural life and bring us closer to nature, effectively reducing daily stress. Some designs are simply poetic and symbolic or an art object on their own."
lineatus was out in the early hours again so she could write another Dawn Chorus Birdblog: The Merlie Bird Gets...: "Merlins are circumpolar birds, breeding in northern regions, using both open spaces (like tundra) and forest edges. Most of us only see them on migration or on their wintering grounds, where they range across the U.S. and as far south as northern South America. They follow their prey base, small songbirds and shorebirds, as they move. Their hunting style combines the speed of big falcons, but with the low-to-the-ground maneuverability of accipiters. They don't have the mass to do the incredible stoops from above like peregrines, so they use their speed to hunt in open flight. I've watched them over mudflats and marshes and it's a memorable sight; hard to believe they can sustain that kind of speed for as long as they do. The best description I've seen is: ‘That's a merlin heading this way, wasn't it?’"
MichaelNY suggested that there is something we can learn from Low-petroleum organic agriculture in Cuba: "Cuba, a country that has faced economic hardship as a result of punitive, longstanding economic sanctions from the U.S. and an end to subsidies from the defunct Eastern Bloc and Soviet Union, as well as increases in oil prices and other costs affecting the world at large, can in some ways serve as a laboratory for other countries that have not yet faced these problems so severely but probably will later. I believe we can learn valuable lessons from Cuba's experience with organic agriculture, if we are willing to drop some of our assumptions."
wide eyed lib took us on another search for free food in Foraging Amidst Nightshade Confusion: "Most legume plants, for instance, are poisonous in whole or part, so it's crucial to identify a legume down to species before eating it. The same is true of the carrot family (Apiaceae aka Umbelliferae), host to parsley, carrot and parsnip as well as deadly plants like poison hemlock and water hemlock. The most confusing group of all may be the nightshade genus (Solanum). Join me as I discuss some of its lesser-known edibles, dispelling a few myths along the way."
Contributing Editor Devilstower looked back at America’s forests and what befell them in If you go out in the woods today...: "In the end, Redwood National Park did not contain "hundreds of thousands of acres" of the ancient trees. The park totaled 58,000 acres -- including roads and parking lots. In exchange for giving up just 5,000 acres of trees that were marked for logging next to the park, the timber industry was given 13,000 acres of old trees elsewhere. Those trees are now gone. A single giant redwood -- three hundred feet tall and twenty-six feet in diameter -- can yield almost half a million board feet of lumber. But at least those who live along the West Coast still have some places they can go to see an approximation of the forest as it once was. If you squint just right, if you pretend not to notice the foot paths and informational signs, you can see something of what must have confronted the settlers whose wagon trains came out of the plains and desert into the coastal forests of the West."
Eddie C warned in GreenRoots: Killing Our Frogs, a look back at ‘The Thin Green Line’ about Atrazine: "At levels one third of what is allowed in American drinking water [this chemical] has been found to reverse the sex of frogs. The chemical that is billed as ‘our most common drinking water contaminant’ is not only causing male frogs to develop into female frogs, thus causing a sexual imbalance in the shrinking amphibian world. Now there are also serious concerns for humans. ... While the U.S. government chooses the method of research that is most convenient to chemical manufacturers there is evidence of long term effects."