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Can small-scale farmers grow a healthier Central Valley?
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Climate crisis more politically polarizing than abortion for U.S. voters, study finds
What’s next for Big Oil? A carbon tax for them and a whole lotta concessions from us.
5 Reasons Cycling is Better than Driving
May is National Bike Month. What better time to dust off your trusty bicycle and get some fresh air. Why? Because it’s fun, healthy and way better than driving.
Established in 1956, National Bike Month is an opportunity to pay homage to something that makes us all feel like a kid again: the humble push bike.
Cycling is Way Better than Driving
If you’re like most folks, the only thing you have to lose are the extra pounds you accumulated this past winter. Besides, with all the ways cycling trumps driving, why wouldn’t you want to trade in your sedan for a shiny new bicycle?
1. It Beats Sitting in Traffic
Traffic. If you drive a car and have a job, there’s no avoiding it. When you cycle to work you get to enjoy the fresh air and scenery while whizzing past the people sitting in the cars. People assume driving is faster, but think about it: when last did you see a gridlock in the bike lane?
2. It’s Much Cheaper
Between gas, parking, maintenance, toll fees, etc., car ownership is a costly business. When you ride a bike you have to pay for the bike, that’s it. Sure, it will require the occasional service or some new brake pads every now and then, but it’s nothing compared to what you have to shell out for a car.
3. You Meet More People
In a car, you’re ensconced in your metal bubble. You might listen to the radio or a podcast, but aside from that you’re not really engaging in anything but the task at hand. (Which is a good thing, don’t get me wrong.)
On a bicycle, there’s more of an opportunity to smile, say hi and maybe even enjoy a brief chat with a fellow cyclist or pedestrian.?Even if you drive with your window down, you’re not going to start a conversation with the person in the next lane. That would just be weird.
4. It’s Better for the Planet
Cars have a big impact on the environment. Bicycles, on the other hand, could help save the planet. That’s what the IPCC claims in their report on the impact of global warming, anyway.
A smaller carbon footprint is only part of it. According to Viewchange.org, “A simple bicycle can mean transportation, employment, even access to education and healthcare.”
5. It Makes You Healthier and Happier
This one’s a no-brainer. Whether or not sitting is the new smoking, we know it’s not good to sit for extended periods of time. Using a standing desk is a great idea. You know what’s even better? Riding your bike to work.
Cycling brings with it numerous health benefits. It promotes weight loss, improves your mental wellbeing, builds muscles, helps you sleep better and?makes you happier.
Riding a bike also?increases longevity. Maybe not as much as racquet sports, like tennis and baddington, but enough to make a difference.
What to Do During National Bike Month
Celebrating National Bike Month could be as simple as riding your bike. If you’re in the mood, why not rally your workmates and take part in National Bike to Work Week (May 13-19) as a team?
If the whole week is a stretch, you could always take part in Bike to Work Day, which takes place on Friday, May 17. There’s also the option to plan your own event with your friends or local bike club.
The World Needs More Bike-Friendly Cities
Not everyone is fortunate enough to live in one of America’s bike-friendly cities. Fortunately, there are?a number of?things you can do to build a bike-friendly community in your own neighborhood.
The first step is to do a?quick assessment to see what’s preventing people from cycling (or cycling more) in your community. The Bicycle Friendly America program will then provide you with customized feedback to help you move forward.
We spend so much time sitting in our cars that we’ve forgotten there are other ways to get around. Why not make May the month you drive less and peddle more?
In case you’re wondering, you’re never too old to get back on your bike. This 105-year-old man recently broke the cycling hour record for centurions.
Photo Credit: Getty Images
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Indoor Gardening For the Brown Thumb
Do you have a knack for killing your indoor houseplants? While all plants require some TLC, cultivating a green thumb doesn?t need to be hard. If you?ve been known to have a brown thumb, the trick to success is finding some greenery that only requires occasional attention.
Start by choosing a few easy-to-grow varieties and selecting plants that are right for your home. Before you settle on any specific type, pay attention to the natural light from your windows. All plants need some light, but some like it bright, while others do well in lower settings. Be sure to read the plant tags to find one that will do well with the light in your house.
6 easy-to-grow houseplants
Ready to take the plunge into indoor gardening? Start with one or two of these low-attention varieties:
Philodendron
This lush green houseplant is easy to keep vibrant all year. It won?t do well baking in the hot sun all day, but medium-to-bright light is okay. Let it grow long in a hanging basket, or put it in a cute pot and keep it short with an occasional haircut. Don?t worry?trimming won?t hurt it.
Snake
Also known as the mother-in-law?s tongue, the tall spikes on this plant are stunning. This variety can live for a long time and does best in low-to-medium light. It doesn?t like extra water, so always let it dry out before watering again, and pour out any excess water in the pot?s saucer.
Aloe vera
Aloe is a sun-loving succulent that does not like water?an especially good starter plant for a brown thumb. To care for it, place it in your brightest window, let the soil dry before watering, and remove any standing water from the pot.
Umbrella
Also known as a Schefflera, this easy-to-grow plant likes medium light. Let it dry out between watering?start by watering it once a week and see how it does.
Asparagus fern
Lacy and trailing, the asparagus fern is perfect for a tall stand or hanging basket. This plant likes humidity, making it a great choice for a kitchen or bathroom. It does well in medium-to-bright light with frequent watering. One thing to note: Although it has soft foliage, there are thorns on the stem.
Spider
With long, variegated leaves, this plant will add the perfect green hue to your d?cor. This variety prefers moist soil and low-to-medium light. To keep it from drying out too quickly, don?t place it near a heat vent.
Three steps to indoor gardening success
These three simple steps can help you grow an indoor garden you?ll want to show off:
Put your plant in a bigger pot
When you pick up a small, full plant at the garden center, you?ll find the most success by repotting it as soon as you get home. A small pot can only hold a small amount of nutrients and water. To keep it looking as good as the day you bought it, switch it to a bigger pot, so it has plenty of room to grow. Plus, this gives you a chance to move it from the plastic nursery container to a pot that matches your furnishings.
These steps will help you properly repot your plant:
Choose a pot slightly bigger than the current container. It should have a drain hole and a saucer to catch any extra water that escapes.
Place a rock over each of the pot?s drain holes to keep dirt from clogging them.
Place a small amount of potting soil in the bottom of the pot.
Gently remove your new plant from its old container and place it in the bigger one.
Fill the pot with dirt by lightly spooning it around the plant. Leave about an inch of space at the top, so it doesn?t overflow when you water it.
Feed with love
If you don?t have a natural green thumb, you probably don?t use fertilizer very often. Never fear?you have a few easy options. You can choose to sprinkle time-release fertilizer on top or use fertilizer spikes that are pushed into the soil. Both last for months. Note on your calendar when it will be time to fertilize again.
Remember to water
A once-a-week watering schedule is all you need with these suggested houseplants. A few, like the aloe and the snake plant, can skip a week if the soil still seems moist. The trick to remembering to water is to pick a day and stick to it. A reminder alarm on your phone is a great way to get into a watering routine.
Your plant will tell you if it becomes unhappy. You might see it wilt, turn yellow, or get spots on the leaves. If this happens, go back to the basics. By making sure it has the right amount of light and giving it the proper amounts of water, you?ll soon be able to show off your green thumb with a beautiful indoor garden.
A home and gardening expert,?Lea Schneider?has published?advice?in?publications like?The Washington Post, Woman?s Day, Family Circle, Consumer Reports?ShopSmart, and Better Homes and Gardens.?She?covers home-improvement and gardening tips for?Groupon.?You can find savings on gardening supplies and more?on Groupon?s Home Depot page here.
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Los Angeles launched its own Green New Deal
This story was originally published by HuffPost and is reproduced here as part of the Climate Desk collaboration.
Los Angeles just launched its very own Green New Deal, setting up the second-largest city in the country to have a carbon-neutral economy by 2050.
“Politicians in Washington don’t have to look across the aisle in Congress to know what a Green New Deal is ― they can look across the country, to Los Angeles,” Mayor Eric Garcetti said in a statement Monday.
The city’s Green New Deal is an aggressive expansion of the Sustainable City pLAn the mayor created in 2015 to reflect more recent environmental studies that have shown the need for rapid and more radical solutions to combat climate change.
Garcetti was among the handful of mayors and governors to stick with the Paris climate agreement after President Donald Trump pulled the U.S. out of the accord. The mayor said his Green New Deal unveiled Monday is partially driven by his commitment to uphold the Paris Agreement.
The city’s Green New Deal would require all new city-owned buildings and major renovations to be “all-electric,” effective immediately. The plan also hopes to phase out styrofoam and to plant 90,000 trees by 2021, and to end plastic straws and single-use containers by 2028.
The initiative also includes Los Angeles recycling 100 percent of its wastewater by 2035 and building a zero-carbon electricity grid with the goal of reaching an 80 percent renewable energy supply by 2036.
By 2050, the city hopes to create 400,000 green jobs, have every building become emissions-free and halt sending trash to landfills. By then, the city’s plan is expected to save more than 1,600 lives, 660 trips to the hospital and $16 billion in avoided health care expenses every year.
“With flames on our hillsides and floods in our streets, cities cannot wait another moment to confront the climate crisis with everything we’ve got,” Garcetti said. “L.A. is leading the charge, with a clear vision for protecting the environment and making our economy work for everyone.”
Los Angeles joins New York City, the country’s largest and most economically influential city, in working to create more localized climate initiatives as progressive Democratic lawmakers in Washington push for a national Green New Deal, led by Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-N.Y.) who introduced the resolution with Senator Ed Markey (D-Mass.) in February. New York City passed a historic bill on April 18 capping climate-changing pollution from big buildings and requiring massive cuts to greenhouse gases.
The L.A. City Council passed a motion earlier requiring the city to draft a Green New Deal plan to match Ocasio-Cortez and Markey’s resolution, which proposes increasing clean energy development, boosting electric vehicle manufacturing, and guaranteeing high-wage jobs fixing roads and rebuilding bridges.
The resolution in Congress is meant to be more of a guidance to eventually draft federal climate policy, but critics say that it’s a wish list of radical reforms. But the resolution does outline important steps for local leaders to take to combat climate change.
From 2017 to 2018, the number of cities pledging to use 100 percent renewable energy had doubled. More than a dozen states have passed or are considering setting 100 percent clean-electricity targets, according to a March report by consultant group EQ Research.
Some environmental groups, including the Sierra Club, applauded Garcetti for L.A.’s new initiative. But the city’s Sunrise Movement chapter said Monday that the plan will not do enough to combat climate change in time.
“Our generation’s future, as well as the future of Los Angeles and of the world, depends on us reaching net-zero greenhouse gas emissions by 2030. This is not a goal — it is a deadline,” the group said in a Medium post. “With Mayor Garcetti’s current plan for net-zero emissions by 2050, Los Angeles is on track to be 20 years too late. That is not a Green New Deal.”
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Green New Deal activists make first 2020 endorsement in wildfire-burned California
This story was originally published by HuffPost and is reproduced here as part of the Climate Desk collaboration.
The Green New Dealers are making their first endorsement of the 2020 election.
At a rally on Saturday, Sunrise Movement, the youth-led grassroots group whose protests pushed the Green New Deal into the political mainstream, endorsed Audrey Denney, an agricultural educator running to replace Rebulican Representative Doug LaMalfa in California’s wildfire-scorched 1st congressional district.
“She’s spent her life working to help farmers and rural communities in the district put food on the table for their families and be part of environmental solutions,” Varshini Prakash, Sunrise Movement’s co-founder, said in a statement. “Representative LaMalfa’s constituents are dying because of climate change, yet he’s spent his career in Washington cozying up with the same oil and gas lobbyists who profited at the expense of his constituents’ lives.”
The rally, the latest stop on Sunrise Movement’s tour to promote the Green New Deal, took place in Chico, a northern California city with nearly 94,000 residents, which was hit repeatedly last year by deadly wildfires.
LaMalfa, who rejects what he calls the “bad science” behind climate change, beat Denney last November to win a fourth term.
But the Democrat faced extraordinary personal challenges in her debut bid for elected office. She advanced to the general election despite entering the primary race late. But midway through the campaign, she underwent surgery after her doctor diagnosed a football-sized tumor on her ovary. Eighteen hours after her procedure, she shot a video from her hospital bed reflecting on the limited healthcare access in her district.
She lost the race but managed to shrink LaMalfa’s usual 20 percent margin of victory to 9 percent. At the time, Sunrise Movement — then a much smaller operation working on just a handful of progressive campaigns, including that of New York Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez — did not endorse her. But this time the group is betting that its newfound clout and the sobering climate realities that voters in California’s 1st now face will propel Denney to victory in 2020.
Already last summer, the Carr Fire ripped through the district, killing eight. But, days after the election, a utility equipment failure ignited the Camp Fire. By the time its final flames went out, the blaze killed 85, reduced the entire town of Paradise to ash and displaced thousands in the deadliest wildfire in California history. Though mostly spared, the Chico City Council declared a climate change emergency earlier this month.
“In 2018, 93 lives were lost in my district in the Carr and Camp Fires,” Denney said in a statement. “I’m running for Congress because we need a representative who is only beholden to their constituents, not to corporate interests and political gamesmanship.”
Denney pledged to reject money from fossil fuel companies and executives, and she vowed if elected to support Green New Deal legislation in Congress. That stands in stark contrast to LaMalfa, who’s received over $162,330 from energy and natural resource corporate political action committees and over $100,000 from the oil and gas lobby, according to data from the nonpartisan Center for Responsive Politics. A LaMalfa spokeswoman did not respond to a request for comment on Saturday.
Sunrise Movement is expected to play an expanded role in 2020. Last November, the group’s protests mainstreamed the Green New Deal, a movement for a sweeping national plan to zero out emissions and provide clean-energy and climate infrastructure jobs to millions. Ocasio-Cortez and Senator Ed Markey released a joint resolution outlining the core values of a Green New Deal in February. With notable exceptions, including former Vice President Joe Biden, nearly every major contender for the 2020 Democratic presidential nomination backed the plan.
The group is in the midst of a nationwide tour with roughly 250 events at churches, classrooms and town halls meant to drum up support for the Green New Deal.
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Green New Deal activists make first 2020 endorsement in wildfire-burned California
This Explains Everything – John Brockman
READ GREEN WITH E-BOOKS
150 Deep, Beautiful, and Elegant Theories of How the World Works
Genre: Science & Nature
Price: $2.99
Publish Date: January 22, 2013
Publisher: Harper Perennial
Seller: HARPERCOLLINS PUBLISHERS
Drawn from the cutting-edge frontiers of science, This Explains Everything will revolutionize your understanding of the world. What is your favorite deep, elegant, or beautiful explanation? This is the question John Brockman, publisher of Edge.org ("The world's smartest website"—The Guardian), posed to the world's most influential minds. Flowing from the horizons of physics, economics, psychology, neuroscience, and more, This Explains Everything presents 150 of the most surprising and brilliant theories of the way of our minds, societies, and universe work. Jared Diamond on biological electricity • Nassim Nicholas Taleb on positive stress • Steven Pinker on the deep genetic roots of human conflict • Richard Dawkins on pattern recognition • Nobel Prize-winning physicist Frank Wilczek on simplicity • Lisa Randall on the Higgs mechanism • BRIAN Eno on the limits of intuition • Richard Thaler on the power of commitment • V. S. Ramachandran on the "neural code" of consciousness • Nobel Prize winner ERIC KANDEL on the power of psychotherapy • Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi on "Lord Acton's Dictum" • Lawrence M. Krauss on the unification of electricity and magnetism • plus contributions by Martin J. Rees • Kevin Kelly • Clay Shirky • Daniel C. Dennett • Sherry Turkle • Philip Zimbardo • Lee Smolin • Rebecca Newberger Goldstein • Seth Lloyd • Stewart Brand • George Dyson • Matt Ridley
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Joe Biden wants to be the anti-Trump. Here’s what that could mean for climate policy.
Let’s play a game called two truths and a lie:
- Joe Biden is running for President.
- Joe Biden has endorsed a carbon tax and the Green New Deal.
- Joe Biden was the first senator to introduce climate legislation in the U.S.
For all those who guessed that No. 2 is the lie, you are correct! Congrats. The Democrat has not, in fact, endorsed the Green New Deal. Nor has gone on record about supporting carbon pricing, a climate solution embraced by most political moderates.
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Biden announced Thursday morning that he is throwing his ice cream-stained cap in the 2020 presidential ring, which means the already-crowded, left-lurching Democratic primary has its most establishment member yet in the 76-year-old former vice president. In a video that focuses heavily on the 2017 white supremacist rally in Charlottesville, and the current White House occupant’s shocking response to the event, Biden clearly positions himself as the antidote to Donald Trump.
The longtime senator from Delaware has been under scrutiny for months as the media anticipated his official announcement. Dozens of stories have probed his decades-long record. And a month ago, Lucy Flores, a Democratic politician from Nevada, accused him of unwanted touching. Since then, a number of women have come forward with similar stories.
The accusations and the background checks didn’t stop the Democrat from joining the 2020 race. His launch video eschews any talk of issues, so what can we expect from Biden when it comes to tackling climate change? Let’s take a trip down memory lane.
Amtrak Joe was actually the first to propose climate legislation in Congress’s upper chamber — a bill called the 1986 Global Climate Protection Act that would have done what Nancy Pelosi’s Select Committee on the Climate Crisis does now: “Establish a Task Force on the Global Climate to research, develop, and implement a coordinated national strategy on global climate.” Imagine how useful such a panel might have been three decades ago. Unfortunately the president at the time, Ronald Reagan, wasn’t exactly champing at the bit to address rising temperatures.
Between his early days in the Senate and now, Biden’s most notable climate-related accomplishment was serving as Barack Obama’s sidekick for eight years. The administration was especially focused on climate action, especially during its second term (think: CAFE standards, Clean Power Plan, the Paris agreement, among other achievements). Following the 2008 recession, Biden handed out $90 billion in funding for clean-energy programs and called the move “the thing I’m proudest of” from the administration’s first term. In a 2015 speech, the vice president said tackling climate change was “the single most important thing” the White House could do.
Overall, however Obama’s climate record is far from spotless: He bragged about helping the U.S. become the world’s leading oil producer. And part of his energy plan included handing Shell a permit to drill in the Arctic and promoting offshore drilling. Biden might now have to answer for those decisions.
Today, as the chatter left of the aisle centers on the Green New Deal, it’s clear that ideas like the Obama-era “all of the above” energy strategy aren’t going to fly in the Democratic primary. Already, five 2020-bound senators have signed on as cosponsors of the ambitious equity-focused, economy-transforming proposal offered by Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez and Senator Ed Markey. A slew of other candidates not serving in the Senate have thrown their support behind the idea, too.
Biden, however, has so far been uncharacteristically quiet on that front. But, in a speech at the Conference of Mayors in January, he gave the audience a taste of what his thinking around climate is these days:
Lots of renewables: “Today we generate wind power for 24 million homes,” he said. “There’s no reason why we can’t quadruple that, virtually overnight.”
He’s all about setting goals: “There’s no reason that in 2025 all of North America can’t get half its electricity from non-polluting sources.”
Bipartisanship: “There’s unanimity in my party, the vast majority of Republicans agree,” he claimed, that climate needs to be addressed.
Climate change is a matter of national security: “Sea levels rise a half a foot or a foot, you have tens of millions of people migrating,” he explained, shaking his fist. “That’s how wars start.”
Climate change poses an existential threat: “It’s about a matter of survival.”
Biden wrapped up his speech with a call to arms: “We cannot continue down this blind path,” he proclaimed. “We cannot ignore science, we cannot abdicate our duty to lead the world.”
It’s no accident that Biden spent a third of his 30-minute speech expounding on his record on the environment and enumerating ideas to tackle climate change. With the clock ticking on much-needed action, the issue is often on the lips of many challengers vying to take on Donald Trump — and then, hopefully, warming.
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Joe Biden wants to be the anti-Trump. Here’s what that could mean for climate policy.
