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Smash patriarchy, save the planet

by Michalak876 Posted on March 9, 2013

Smash patriarchy, save the planet

Women might make up more than half the Earth’s human population, but we often bear the brunt of the same sorts of policies and destructive ways of thinking that are responsible for global climate change.

Do those things seem unrelated? Well, they’re not, which is why International Women’s Day is a perfect time to remember that the systems that degrade the planet are also the ones that oppress women.

Eve Ensler, the artist and activist behind The Vagina Monologues, connected the dots between abusing the planet and abusing women last month in this interview with Grist, where she called out the global economy’s destructive “pressing rape mentality, which has to do with the powerful getting what they want at the expense of the person they’re taking it from, without an awareness of reciprocity or mutuality.”

From former Prime Minister of Norway and Director-General of the World Health Organization, Gro Harlem Brundtland, writing at Fast Co.Exist:

Conflict and environmental degradation compound the problem in many contexts, leaving women even more vulnerable to violence. Soldiers and militias commonly use rape as a weapon of war. As climate change affects the availability of water, food and firewood, especially in sub-Saharan Africa, women have to travel longer distances to fetch supplies, putting them at greater risk of molestation, harassment, rape and beatings.

We cannot treat these issues in isolation; they are part of a bigger picture of systemic discrimination against women.

Policies that help the planet — such as family planning and flexible and remote work – also stand to help ladies maybe even more than guys (don’t whine too much, dudes, they’re good for you too). And this time, a lot of women are pushing back and vowing not to be left behind yet again. They’re taking the bike lanes, remaking cities, and leading the Idle No More movement (march tomorrow, Toronto!) all in the name of sustainability and equality.

I’d like to end this on a special IWD shout-out to the Ovarian Psycos women of color bike brigade in Los Angeles. “This is our own way of protesting,” says one member. “We think our bicycles are a revolutionary concept.”

Susie Cagle writes and draws news for Grist. She also writes and draws tweets for

Smash patriarchy, save the planet

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Global food giants get bad grades on environment and ethics

by AlvinaiTyler Posted on February 26, 2013

Global food giants get bad grades on environment and ethics

Photo by Oxfam.

They may have located our ideal bliss points, but multinational food companies are far from hitting the mark when it comes to treating workers and the environment decently.

A new “Behind the Brands” report from Oxfam rates “10 of the world’s most powerful food and beverage companies” on their ethics: Coca-Cola, Mars, Nestle, Kellogg’s, General Mills, Associated British Foods, PepsiCo, Unilever, Danone, and Mondelez International (previously known as Kraft). Surprise: They didn’t do very well. The highest grade was a 38 out of 70.

From the report:

“Companies are overly secretive about their agricultural supply chains, making claims of ‘sustainability’ and ‘social responsibility’ difficult to verify; none of the Big 10 have adequate policies to protect local communities from land and water grabs along their supply chains; companies are not taking sufficient steps to curb massive agricultural greenhouse gas emissions responsible for climate changes now affecting farmers; most companies do not provide small-scale farmers with equal access to their supply chains and no company has made a commitment to ensure that small-scale producers are paid a fair price; only a minority of the Big 10 are doing anything at all to address the exploitation of women small-scale farmers and workers in their supply chains.”

“It is time the veil of secrecy shrouding this multi-billion dollar industry was lifted,” Oxfam chief executive Barbara Stocking told The Guardian. “Consumers have the right to know how their food has been produced and the impact this has on the world’s poorest people who are growing the ingredients.”

Not a surprise: A couple of the accused “Big 10″ rejected the report’s claims. “We treat local producers, communities and the environment with the utmost respect,” said an Associated British Foods spokesman, who may be unaware of the generally accepted usage of the terms “community” and “environment.”

Susie Cagle writes and draws news for Grist. She also writes and draws tweets for

Global food giants get bad grades on environment and ethics

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Study questions eco-benefit of vegetarian diet; we question study

by rikkiqlyons Posted on February 13, 2013

Study questions eco-benefit of vegetarian diet; we question study

I feel like the world is constantly conspiring to get me to eat bacon. That was my first thought when I saw this new study from France claiming that a plant-based diet is not actually the planet-saver we all thought. (My second thought was: WTF, I don’t want to eat bacon.)

The study followed nearly 2,000 diners who self-reported their meals to scientists at the National Research Institute of Agronomy in Marseille; the researchers then tried to determine how much greenhouse gas was emitted in production of the most commonly consumed foods. Let the fuzzy math ensue! Reuters reports:

Overall, about 1,600 grams of carbon dioxide were emitted for every 100 grams of meat produced. That’s more than 14 times the amount of greenhouse gas emitted during the production of fruit, vegetables and starches. It’s also about 2.5 times as much greenhouse gas as that generated by fish, pork, poultry and eggs.

That gap narrowed, however, when the researchers looked at how many grams of carbon dioxide were emitted per 100 kilocalories (kcal) — a measure of energy in food.

The most greenhouse gas — 857 grams — was still emitted to produce 100 kcal of meat, but it was only about three times the emissions from a comparable amount of energy from fruit and vegetables.

Wait wait, hold on, Reuters — the lede of your article says that a plant-based diet “might not be the greenest in its environmental impact.” Now you’re telling me it’s only three times better? Oh, wait, and now you’re telling me it’s no better at all?

And when [senior author Nicole] Darmon and her colleagues looked at what people actually ate to get a certain amount of energy from food every day, they found that the “highest-quality” diets in health terms — those high in fruit, vegetables and fish — were linked to about as much, if not more, greenhouse gas emissions as low-quality diets that were high in sweets and salts. …

Darmon said that’s because people who eat a plant-based diet need to eat more produce to get the amount of energy they’d have in a piece of meat.

Roni Neff of Johns Hopkins, who studies food’s contributions to climate change, expressed skepticism about the new research. “[S]he points out that according to the study’s calculations, people would need to eat about nine pounds of fruit and vegetables to make up for a smaller serving of meat, and that may be unrealistic.” Uhhh, may be!

For a very different take on the planet-saving benefits of not eating bacon, check out Shrink That Footprint’s recent math comparing the impact of five kinds of American diets.

Shrink That Footprint

No, you’re not carbon neutral even if you’re a fruitarian, but there are definitely food choices that can make a difference — and they don’t require a gut-busting nine pounds of produce per meal.

Susie Cagle writes and draws news for Grist. She also writes and draws tweets for

Study questions eco-benefit of vegetarian diet; we question study

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Celebrities to Obama: Fix the climate! Obama to celebrities: Sure, you got it

by sreg2 Posted on February 11, 2013

Celebrities to Obama: Fix the climate! Obama to celebrities: Sure, you got it

By Philip Bump

Can Evangeline Lilly, Ian Somerhalder, Malin Akerman, and Phillipe Cousteau succeed where others have failed? I don’t know. I don’t know who those people are. I’m guessing the last is Jacques’ son, and Lilly is an actress, I’m pretty sure, but I’m not going to Google her.

These are some of the 24 (!!!) celebrities who have signed a letter to the president initiated by the Sierra Club. It quotes Obama’s inaugural speech and then reads:

An ad featuring the letter. Click to see big PDF version.

Your legacy as 44th president of the United States rests ﬁrmly on your leadership on climate disruption. Only the president has the power to lead an effort on the scale and with the urgency we need to phase out fossil fuels and lead America, and the world, in a clean energy revolution.

WE SUPPORT YOUR DEMONSTRATING THE STRONGEST RESOLVE IN FIGHTING THE CLIMATE CRISIS ON EVERY FRONT.

Emphasis and capitalization in the original because pay attention, Obama.

The ad ran in the D.C.-politics-focused The Hill, which I’m not sure Obama reads. But maybe! If not, he’ll probably read this post, anyway.

And when he does, he’ll count the celebrities listed and put them into his calculator. Adam Levine is famous enough to represent 10,000 Americans; Linkin Park, 18. He’ll total it up, and if it passes the figure he’s set for “Taking Action on Climate Change” in his Excel spreadsheet — whammo. Leadership.

Philip Bump writes about the news for Gristmill. He also uses Twitter a whole lot.

Celebrities to Obama: Fix the climate! Obama to celebrities: Sure, you got it

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Beijing’s recurring air pollution grounds flights, puts kids in the hospital

by 2KeaheySchoeffler461 Posted on January 29, 2013

Beijing’s recurring air pollution grounds flights, puts kids in the hospital

By Philip Bump

Imagine you’re an airline pilot. Which of the cities below looks like the more appealing one for landing a large jet?

To the left, an image of Beijing’s air taken last week when the pollution monitor on top of the U.S. Embassy measured a fairly low level of particulate pollution (29 parts per million per volume). To the right? The air yesterday, at a level of 462. If you chose the image at left, congratulations. Airlines in Beijing agree with your assessment.

From Huffington Post:

Thick, off-the-scale smog shrouded eastern China for the second time in about two weeks Tuesday, forcing airlines to cancel flights because of poor visibility and prompting Beijing to temporarily shut factories and curtail fleets of government cars. …

The U.S. Embassy reported an hourly peak level of PM2.5 — tiny particulate matter that can penetrate deep into the lungs — at 526 micrograms per cubic meter, or “beyond index,” and more than 20 times higher than World Health Organization safety levels over a 24-hour period. …

Visibility was less than 100 meters (100 yards) in some areas of eastern China, the official Xinhua News Agency reported. More than 100 flights were canceled in the eastern city of Zhengzhou, 33 in Beijing, 20 in Qingdao and 13 in Jinan.

The severe pollution has been a problem on and off for weeks. We first wrote about it two weeks ago yesterday, noting that the city was enacting restrictions on factory emissions and driving in an effort to curb the problem. But we also noted that the problem isn’t Beijing’s alone; much of the soot and haze is created in nearby cities and the countryside, drifting into the capital and settling over the city. It’s a regional problem.

With acute repercussions. Again from the Associated Press:

Patients seeking treatment for respiratory ailments rose by about 30 percent over the past month at the Jiangong Hospital in downtown Beijing, Emergency Department chief Cui Qifeng said.

“People tend to catch colds or suffer from lung infections during the days with heavily polluted air,” he said.

CNN notes that 9,000 children visited a Beijing pediatric hospital with respiratory problems this month. These effects are immediately demonstrable. More insidious? A recent study suggested that soot pollution results in more than 3.2 million deaths a year globally.

In a few days, the problem will recede. (It hasn’t yet; as I write this levels are still listed as “hazardous.”) The question then becomes how urgent the problem remains for Chinese leaders — and for how long Beijing residents will feel the health effects.

Philip Bump writes about the news for Gristmill. He also uses Twitter a whole lot.

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Waste heat from cities can heat up other parts of the planet

by hanhuogekennog Posted on January 28, 2013

Waste heat from cities can heat up other parts of the planet

Cities aren’t perfectly efficient energy machines, you guys. They’re great, especially when transit and density make it possible for city dwellers to use less energy, but cities still release a lot of waste heat out of tailpipes and chimneys. And all that waste heat has to go somewhere.

According to a new study published in Nature Climate Change, that waste heat is disrupting the jet stream and warming up other parts of the world, thawing winters across northern Asia, eastern China, the Northeast U.S., and southern Canada. From Reuters:

That is different from what has long been known as the urban-heat island effect, where city buildings, roads and sidewalks hold on to the day’s warmth and make the urban area hotter than the surrounding countryside.

Instead, the researchers wrote, the excess heat given off by burning fossil fuels appears to change air circulation patterns and then hitch a ride on air and ocean currents, including the jet stream. …

[S]tudy author Aixue Hu of the National Center for Atmospheric Research in Colorado said in a statement that the excess heat generated by this burning in cities could change atmospheric patterns to raise or lower temperatures far afield.

Researchers say this is a “partial story” of where waste heat goes, but all that wandering heat adds up to, they say, a global temperature increase of about 0.02 degrees. I still love you, cities, but it wouldn’t hurt us to put on a sweater and take the bus, right?

Susie Cagle writes and draws news for Grist. She also writes and draws tweets for

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