Creating Value is the Key
This month's Ecos Insight Column: Creating value is the most powerful driver for business action.
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U.S. Energy Legislation Updates
Senate Majority Leader Tom Daschle (D-SD) announced that the Energy Policy Act of 2002 (S.1766) will be taken up by the Senate around February 11, 2002. He committed to a comprehensive energy plan that would place greater emphasis on energy efficiency than the House-passed bill, H.R. 4., which continues our fossil-fuel and nuclear dependency. The Senate bill contains important energy efficiency provisions, such as a legislatively mandated SEER 13 air conditioner standard. The sponsors announced their commitment to add provisions to significantly improve vehicle fuel efficiency and to include tax incentives for highly efficient homes, cars and other products. Until these provisions are added, the bill is promising, but incomplete, say leading NGOs Alliance to Save Energy, ACEEE and the Sustainable Energy Coalition. Greenpeace calls it “Bush Lite.” The bill would avoid opening the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge to oil drilling, but includes nuclear and coal industry subsidies. Says Deb Callahan, president of the League of Conservation Voters, “The debate over a national energy policy is at last moving in the right direction. “After months of negative haggling over old, tired ways to meet our energy needs, voters will finally hear a positive debate about what’s next for America’s energy […]
Ford Recycles Recalled Firestone Tires
When Ford Motor Co. recalled 13 million Firestone tires last May, the company promised to recycle the tires rather than landfilling or burning them. Ford contracted with Recovery Technologies Group Inc. (Guttenburg, NJ) to recycle the tires. So far, RTC has turned 3.6 million of the recalled tires into 40 million tons of crumb rubber to be used in projects around the country like athletic fields, playgrounds and paving projects. 50 miles of road in Phoenix, Arizona is now paved with rubberized asphalt containing 1 million pounds of crumb rubber. Only four states — Arizona, California, Florida and Texas — use significant amounts of rubberized asphalt to pave roads, even though this could be a huge market. Byron Lord, deputy director of the office of pavement technology for the Federal Highway Administration, said Ford’s promotion of crumb rubber “will provide a boost to the technology as well as allow states to evaluate its value in asphalt pavements.” RTG’s Ford contract has also led to its expansion as a company, opening three new facilities since taking on the deal. Recycling contributes 2.7 percent to gross domestic productThis is what a recent National Recycling Coalition study found. Fiber, steel, plastic converters, and […]
New Europe Cutting Edge Programs
EU Tax Reform Campaign Launches“Getting the Prices Right,” is a new 18-month campaign by the European Environmental Bureau (EEB) to build broad support for environmental fiscal reform at both the EU and country levels. Its ambitious goals are :* a minimum 10 percent revenue-neutral shift from taxing labor to taxing natural resource use by 2010; * removal of all environmentally harmful subsidies by 2005; * financial incentives for environmental protection; and * stronger energy-efficiency policies. The EEB is also pushing for approval of the long-controversial minimum EU energy tax rates proposal. If the EU fails to reach agreement on energy tax rates, EEB Secretary-General John Hontelez said that countries should go forward on their own to coordinate environmental taxation outside EU structures. http://www.eeb.orghttp://www.ecotax.info: goes live January 1, 2002— — — OECD Releases U.S. Economic Survey, Urges Environmental TaxesThe Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) last week released its annual U.S. Economic Survey which concluded that the U.S. should implement environmental taxes to encourage citizens to reduce gasoline use and other carbon-emitting fuels. The authors recommend using the revenues to offset social and environmental costs from vehicle-use, including road maintenance, noise and pollution abatement, and automobile accident response. The OECD […]
Organic Industry News
Special Spotlight: Innovative Green Businesses
A green developer is behind the largest urban revitalization project in the U.S. - $1 Billion Charleston, SC. restoration.
Sydney's Solar Ferry
The Solar Sailor – the world’s largest solar vessel and the first to be totally powered by the wind and the sun – sailed for the first time into Sydney Harbor, Australia in June 2000. This revolutionary new ferry has been in service for over a year as a tourist ferry there. It has demonstrated the technical feasibility and commercial viability of this new hybrid power technology. Solar Sailer is the brainchild of Dr. Robert Dane, formerly a country physician practicing about three hours from Sydney. A $1 million grant from the Australian Greenhouse Office’s Renewable Energy Commercialization Program funded its development. Its ground breaking solar wing technology makes renewable energy transport a reality. The mounted wings harness the sun and wind and can be adjusted to adapt to prevailing weather conditions. It uses four power sources: solar, wind, battery and a backup LPG gas generator. They can be used individually or in combination. When fully loaded with 100 passengers it reaches speeds of 5-7 knots on solar power alone, and 10-12 knots sailing in trade winds. Solar Sailor won the gold medal at the 1999 Asian Innovation Awards and the 2001 Australian Design Awards for engineering. With many waterways […]
Electricity From Cows
Every day, the 550 half-ton Holstein cows on Dennis Haubenschild’s dairy farm near Princeton, Minnesota eat 90 pounds of food, produce eight gallons of milk and create 220 pounds of waste and manure.On another farm, cows making a quarter of their weight in waste pose a daily hazard. Manure from dairy farms festers in large lagoons, threatening ground and surface waters. It also creates global warming gases like methane, and the stench keeps neighbors indoors.But at Haubenschild’s, a family farm 10 times bigger than the average Minnesota dairy operation, each cow generates 5.5 kilowatt hours of electricity daily. That lets the neighbors smell the daisies on the windiest days and has eliminated the equivalent of 680 tons of carbon dioxide in 10 months.Haubenschild’s methane-fired electricity generator, engineered with assistance from the EPA’s AgStar Project, is a dream come true. “I’ve been interested in methane digestion since the 1970s,” he says. “I had no doubt that it would work; it just took quite a few years to tie everything together.”When federal regulators’ concern about the damaging greenhouse effects of methane – it’s 21 times as potent as CO2 – and Minnesota agriculture officials’ concern for declining farm incomes coincided in the […]
Hawaii Veggie Fuel
Few people associate clean transportation with the smell of french fries sizzling in hot grease, but used vegetable oil can be converted into an alternative fuel with many environmental advantages. In 1995, the Hawaiian island of Maui became concerned about environmental and health problems resulting from restaurant grease clogging its landfill. Operators complained that static pile fires were becoming more frequent, and the oil could leak into groundwater. Robert King, owner of King Diesel on Maui, spearheaded the formation of Pacific Biodiesel (PacBio) in 1996. PacBio receives used oil directly from pump trucks that service restaurants and hotels, and the company converts this into 150,000 gallons of premium biodiesel each year. This fuel, made totally from recycled cooking oil, is used in generators, commercial diesel equipment, boats and vehicles. More than 40 tons of used cooking oil is recycled each month. Customers range from private businesses to farmers who fill their five-gallon buckets with fuel for their tractors. Biodiesel is safe for use in all conventional diesel engines, says King, and requires no engine modifications. Torgue, horsepower, and fuel economy characteristics are similar to regular diesel fuel. Engine durability may even be increased because lower sulfur content results in more […]
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