Environmental guilt

Over the weekend I had the privilege of attending Activist Camp in Algonquin, IL hosted by ForestEthics and Greenpeace. It was a great opportunity to learn new skills and network with activists from around the continent. For more info, check out the Greenpeace Activst Blog.

One topic that was not brought up, however, was the offsetting of our air travel. Many within the environmental movement seem to disregard carbon offsets because it accepts that which is unacceptable: the use of fossil fuel. However I believe that offsetting is better than not and according to one carbon offset company I consumed 1,310 lbs. of CO2 for the round-trip flight to Chicago from San Francisco. For $11.90 I was able to displace 2,000 lbs. of carbon by investing in clean energy, farm power, and landfill gas capture.

Returning back to the City yesterday, I had the opportunity to pass out fliers promoting the send-off next Thursday. The first stop was the San Francisco Vegetarian Society's weekly vegan dinner at the Red Victorian B&B. After feasting, two friends and I rode down to the bike-in movie sponsored by the SF Bike Coalition.

"Isn't passing out fliers about climate change contradictory," one fellow member asked me. Indeed a question worthy of a thorough explanation.

The fliers were printed on recycled paper that was taken out of a downtown office recycling bin. I sincerely hope that the fliers end up in others' recycling bins but I will regardless take comfort knowing I was able to give the papers one more use before disposal. Now the ink, I must admit, was not necessarily soy-based. With that being said I just hope that the net result of this petition brings more attention to the cause with far-reaching results.

New Zealand now on board

New Zealand's climate change minister Nick Smith announced earlier today that his country will cut its greenhouse gas emissions 10 to 20 percent below 1990 levels by the year 2020. Although a commendable step forward, the target range still falls below the 25 to 40 per cent cut that the United Nations' Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change has said is needed from developed countries as a whole by 2020.

Here in the United States, Todd Stern is the special envoy on climate change. "Bottom line," he wrote in 2007, is to "set binding emissions targets for developed countries and as many advanced developing countries as possible. The targets should be long-term (relative to the five-year timeframe used in Kyoto) and grow tighter over time."

According to John Ashton, the special representative for climate change in the United Kingdom, “we now need to stop talking about talking and start deciding about doing.”