Old Technology, Just With a "New Spin" :)

Wind power. It lauded as this futuristic form of energy. A possible solution at some point in the future but not commercial ready now.

Nothing could be further from the truth. Wind has been around well forever. It’s the source of all our electricity, if not for the ability to harness the power of wind with a kite, Ben Franklin may have never discovered electricity in the first place!

But obviously it takes more than lightning and a kite to power a society. But Wind power is not a myth, just this week the New York Times ran a story on an ancient italian town generating a surplus of energy off of wind and making a profit!

It might seem like a stretch to link an ancient town in Italy to a thriving modern metropolis like Virginia but this dream is more of a reality than you think! Oceana released a report just this week that stated:

Offshore wind power could exceed Virginia’s current electricity demand and create up to 26,660 in-state jobs, according to a report issued Tuesday.

Written by Oceana, an ocean-oriented environmental group, the report examines the East Coast. It found that wind farms could supply nearly half the region’s current electricity generation and provide up to 212,000 jobs.

The report looked at water that averages at least 12.5 mph winds, is three to 24 miles off the coast, and is no deeper than 100 feet. It excluded 67 percent of these areas due to potential military, environmental and shipping conflicts

Wind has blowing since the time of the dinosaurs and it’s not stopping any time soon. It’s time we start tapping into this infinite resource.

Solar Homes Tour 2010

As green living becomes more popular, more U.S. communities are organizing tours of eco-friendly homes. For the 20th year, Washington, DC-area homes will be open for the public this weekend.

The 20th Annual Washington DC Solar Homes Tour is October 2-3, 2010. Explore more than 100 green homes in the area, including some that are currently on the market. The tour will showcase a remarkable variety of solar design, technology, and sustainable living concepts.

Each touring day has a variety of unique educational opportunities to put a true environmental “spin” on your experience. All the solar tour homes will be listed in your tour guide. Your tour guide will be both your map and “passport” to gain entry to the sites on the tour. The guide will have descriptions, features and directions to each home as well as helpful information on installing a system in your home.

Pick up tour guides throughout the area at these locations, or download a copy online here.

For more information, visit the solar tour website at http://www.solartour.org.

Rahall: Protecting Appalachians Is Harming National Security

This is cross-posted from AppVoices Frontporch blog

A set of so-called pro-coal Representatives have introduced HR 6113 to prove that they care more about Don Blankenship’s approval than their constituents; health. This bill asserts that Obama’s EPA threatens national security.

Continuing their march to ignore evidence, make stuff up, and push for an entirely rampant and unregulated coal industry, coal-bound legislators have introduced what they are calling the Electric Reliability Protection Act” (HR 6113). If signed into law, this bill would defund EPA’s efforts to protect Appalachian citizens from the toxic valleyfills associated with mountaintop removal. In addition, the Representatives assert that the Obama Administration’s very attempt to protect citizens from toxic drinking water is indeed a threat to national security, which we’ll go into below. This is an election season bill that has little chance of passage. However, stunts like this allow Congressmen like Nick Rahall to prove that he needs Don Blankenship’s support more than he needs his constituents to have clean water, a decent job, or an average lifespan. This legislation is as cowardly as it is nihilistic, and just as irresponsible.

Of course, one of Senator Byrd’s final messages was that a majority of Congress opposes mountaintop removal, and it certainly shows in the lack of support for HR 6113. While a good bill like the Clean Water Protection Act (HR 1310) has 172 bipartisan cosponsors, HR 6113 has just 15, nearly all of them with some vested interest in the coal industry.

Continue reading

Going for gold: The challenge of building green

This is a cross-post from Diamondbackonline.com about the University of Maryland by CCAN volunteer Matt Dernoga.

I want to congratulate the university and student activists for their recent major accomplishments on the sustainability front. The 2009 Campus Carbon Footprint Report of our campus emissions recently came out and found that in 2009, the carbon dioxide emissions decreased by 26,394 metric tons, a 10.5 percent reduction from 2005. This means that the university is on pace to meet its goal of a 15 percent reduction by 2012.

When former university President Dan Mote signed the President’s Climate Commitment &- which committed this campus to the goal of carbon neutrality by 2050 &- there was legitimate skepticism of how serious the administration would be in living up to their pledge. And although there have been some hiccups, since signing the commitment, the university has renovated buildings to make them more energy efficient, installed some solar panels around the campus and reduced solid waste emissions by 70 percent.

Just the other day, The Diamondback reported that Knight Hall became the first university-owned building to be certified with a Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design gold rating, the second best LEED standard a building can obtain. Oakland Hall is likely to follow with a LEED-gold rating. What made these accomplishments even more impressive was the fact that the university’s existing green building standard &- which was set in 2008 &- is for all new campus buildings to be LEED-silver. Continue reading

Congress wants to pass the Dirty Air Act?

Ok, here’s a shocking statement (insert sarcastic tone):

As reported by The Hill on September 14th: U.S. Chamber of Commerce, American Petroleum Institute, National Mining Association and National Association of Manufacturers want to block the EPA from regulating pollution that causes climate change!

Is that news to you? Of course the country’s biggest polluters want to stop action that would curb pollution Continue reading

The answer, my friend, is blowing in the wind

Next week, some of the CCAN staff is headed to Ocean City, Maryland, where we’re part of a coalition of organizations organizing a town hall meeting about efforts to harness Maryland’s offshore wind power. The winds blowing off Ocean City’s Atlantic Coast have the strength to power thousands of homes, or provide up to one third of Maryland’s current electricity needs.

Offshore wind power offers many advantages over dirty fossil fuel sources like oil and coal. Choosing to build wind farms off our shores, rather than drill for oil, alleviates the horrifying risk that Ocean City would ever suffer from an oil spill like the devastating spill in the Gulf. Currently, Maryland imports much of its electricity from dirty coal plants in surrounding states, which sometimes makes our energy supply unreliable and costs unstable. Clean, renewable wind power offers price stability because the fuel is free, and it would be more reliable because it would be harnessed locally. Also, a moderate investment in offshore wind development could provide 15,000 new jobs for Marylanders over the next 20 years. This means more stable, year-round employment opportunities for Ocean City, where many jobs leave town with the tourists at the end of the season.

A human wind turbine
Continue reading

Power Vote Kicks Off in Maryland!

Youth across Maryland are ready to make their voices heard this election season: letting elected officials know that they are voting for clean energy and healthy communities. Schools are starting kick off events in style- with BBQ’s, open mic nights and socials! Check out the Power Vote crew at Morgan St. To start the year they blanketed the campus in green Power Vote shirts to collect pledges and hand out flyers for the open mic night. The event was a big success- over 50 people came out to perform and learn more about the campaign.