Mid Summer

 Summers are hot, that is what summer is. The hottest period of the year. This year however we have experienced at the end of June, record-breaking hot weather in the Northwest of the USA. The phenomenon called a heat dome produced temperatures about 100 Fahrenheit, 38 Celcius to one day an extreme 116 F (47 C). Many people died caused by this heat. It got to national news. Click here to see CBS's great article about this with an explanation of why it happened. 

NPR photo showing cooling stations

The government at the state and city level acted immediately to help those who needed but the effort was insufficient and people died from the extreme heat. Cooling stations were set where people who didn't have air conditioning in their homes could come and stay. The need was overwhelming and now government officials are planning proactively for the next one that will happen for sure in the not-so-long distant time.

David Wallace-Welch's book "The Uninhabitable Earth: Life After Warming is a good description of what we are witnessing now.

We don't have to wait for a long time to see the devastation that Climate Change and in particular Global Warming is having on our lives. At the same time, we are witnessing flooding and forest fires that are unprecedented.

The question now is what can we do? As individuals? As a community? 

I am an optimist and think that there are many things we can do, and the first one is to get educated in these matters, as for me the main problem we have is a lack of understanding of how nature works and how we humans are part of nature. Being educated on these issues is the first step to get organized and active. The good news is that we are not alone and we are not the initiators of the environmental movement. Many have come before us and many more are side by side with us in this endeavor.

So let us not be discouraged!

January 2021

 Even though today is December 21, 2020, I am focusing on the beginning of the year 2021. Without forgetting that we are in the midst of a pandemic, the Coronavirus (COVID 19) outbreak. There is no doubt that 2020 will be remembered for many reasons, some negative as the hundreds of thousands who have died because of the virus, the lost jobs, and the sacrifice that lockdown has imposed on families and friends. Even church gatherings have to be transformed. For my family in particular a major event, the wedding of our daughter had to be postponed. More difficult to see were the positive outcomes. Mainly because these will need long term progress to be fully understood. The ability to communicate through electronic means, the use of the Internet, has been a lesson that will produce fruitful outcomes for years to come. Innovative ways to continue with our human experience, from commerce to worship, through online concerts have experimented with mixed results but with an overall sense of the possibilities.

"99.366 Winter Solstice" by HelenHates Peas is licensed under CC BY-NC 2.0

Regarding the environment, we have seen an increased awareness of the reality that the environment has been for many years abused. As cities in China were locked down air quality improved appreciably and urban wildlife increased. Almost everywhere around the world, big urban centers reported the same increase in wildlife and decrease in pollution; the environmental impact of lower human activity was without a doubt observed.

Now we are pondering about the ways in which we can go "back to normal' with the understanding the there will be a new normal. Not only the social disparity and injustice that is affecting our society have become unbearable, but the mechanisms for improving the standards of living have changed radically. 

The role of government has been, once again, analyzed through the lens of objectivity (scientifically based) and of the common good. "We are in this together" has become the crying motto of those working hard to stop the pandemic. Front line workers, physicians, nurses, personnel of hospital and other care facilities, and other services like fire and police departments have now been identified as "the" important people in our society. Many of us have recognized how they should benefit from a decent living wage, well beyond what is called "the minimum wage." Many of us have recognized that in order to achieve environmental restoration we need to address the social inequities ailing our society.

The questions we must ask are: 

What now? 

What is my role in this change? 

How can I prepare myself for the task ahead of me?

With whom will I work in this endeavor? 

What Bio-Region Are We Talking About?

Where are we?

It is, always, easy to forget when looking at where we are,  that we are here at this moment.
Normally we look at the geographic situation missing out the historical context. More so when we try to understand our bio -regional reality. It is true that there is a geographic reality that we must take into account, more so today when we witness climatic changes that affect us differently in different regions of the globe. While some are suffering drought, others are suffering floods, and so on.

But we must not forget that all these events are related, take for instance droughts and floods. Water is the common denominator here. How water is distributed over time around the Earth is a climatic phenomenon. About 2/3 of the surface of the Earth is covered by water depending on who you ask. Most of it is not potable, fresh, drinking water.
For more on the amounts visit the U.S. Geological Survey at the following link: https://water.usgs.gov/edu/earthhowmuch.html 

Life is intrinsically linked to water so understanding where water is, is critical for the understanding of our society. One of the most interesting tourist attractions is to travel on rivers that cross old cities in Europe, and elsewhere, where you see the historical development of those towns from the river up. In the PBS series Journey to Planet Earth a video documentary "Rivers of Destiny" makes the case for the importance of rivers in the development and sustainability of cultures around the life on the river backs. http://www.pbs.org/journeytoplanetearth/programs/rivers-destiny/. Without the river, there is no life!

Water knows no borders, even though sometimes it is the border between regions, states, or countries. Air, our atmosphere also knows no borders. Pollution of the atmosphere in one place can, and normally does, other areas. Sometimes the contamination can be felt miles and miles away from the source of contamination. Carbon dioxide produced in China will contribute to climate change in the whole world, like the one produced in the USA, Brasil, Japan, or any other part of the world. 

So we can at least think of two sources of common ground, two things that can contribute to the common good or lack of there off. Studies of the Bio-Region must include these two. water and air,  in order to see how we all are affected and how we all can contribute to the wellbeing or our society.

Business Solutions to Environmental Problems

But, before we start I have to share with you what the regulations are relative to your information.
This is what I got:

"European Union laws require you to give European Union visitors information about cookies used and data collected on your blog. In many cases, these laws also require you to obtain consent. 

As a courtesy, we have added a notice on your blog to explain Google's use of certain Blogger and Google cookies, including use of Google Analytics and AdSense cookies, and other data collected by Google. 

You are responsible for confirming this notice actually works for your blog, and that it displays. If you employ other cookies, for example by adding third party features, this notice may not work for you. If you include functionality from other providers there may be extra information collected from your users. "

I am not using third-party apps so you don't have to worry about it.

So let's get going!

The USA government has released a report that mentions the huge cost of global climate change. So the question is: what are we supposed to do?

An organization of businessmen is proposing that the solution has to be market-oriented. Market-controlled and that it is through taxation that it can be managed. More information can be found at RepublicEn.org.

There is something coming back in this idea, the common good. Since the 70's a move towards more selfish solutions has been strengthened by the success of individual enterprises, even though the cost for the commons, the externalities, have been ignored. 

Cutting Corners and Externalizing Cost

Several times before I have blogged about how capitalists have a double standard. On the one hand, they don't want to pay taxes for the benefit of society, a society that sustains them. But on the other hand, they want society to pay when something goes wrong. They are always expecting the government, that is us, to bail them out when they make mistakes or even fraud. The example I have in mind is the disaster caused by mismanagement of a chemical plant in Texas that caused an environmental disaster when hurricane Harvey poured torrential rain over it. As you can read in the following article in The Guardian newspaper:
  https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2017/sep/01/harvey-shines-a-spotlight-on-a-high-risk-area-of-chemical-plants-in-texas

It was a disaster waiting to happen. Those responsible were aware of the danger but nevertheless opted for saving a few dollars, now we all have to pay. Proof of their negligence these officials were indicted for mismanagement as you can read here https://www.texastribune.org/2018/08/03/arkema-indictment-chemical-fire-hurricane-harvey/

This picture from Arkema Facebook page shows the extent of the flooding at the plant in Crosby TX.

Hurricanes are a common occurrence so how are we going to make those who are responsible for the safety of our society accountable when they neglect their duty.

Sense of Style

Reading Steven Pinker's book "The Sense of Style" helps one think about writing, have a look:
https://stevenpinker.com/publications/sense-style-thinking-persons-guide-writing-21st-century
A master of communication Pinker is clear in defining objectives and critical of the waste many authors create. We must be articulated when addressing an environmental issue, must be direct and clear without distractions or examples that are not relevant.

I am with Prof. Heidi Owsley writing a book titled "Earthkeeping" where we bring together the analysis of human nature and its relationship to how humans relate to their physical environment. We can not forget that the way one behaves relates directly to the way one thinks.

Another aspect of communicating is honesty. Are we communicating to inform? or are we communicating to convince? or are we communicating to mislead? There are ways one have to express an idea so the reader has to be involved in the process. Dave Levitan in his book "Not A Scientist" focus on the misleading tools and artifacts that people use to mislead. Mainly politicians that use this gimmicks for their political gain. http://www.davelevitan.com/not-a-scientist/ 
Natural science is a complex discipline and can be oversimplified both for good and for bad purposes.

One can talk about human evolution in general which is systematic or in particular which is selective. The systematic approach needs to take into account all particularities of its elements and that makes it complicated. For this approach to be effective the elements in the system have to be organized within categories, take for example an organism the categories would be organs and functions. Humans as organisms have organs (hearts, eyes, lungs, etc.) and functions such as senses (sight, smell, taste, etc.) and motions (grabbing,  locomotion, etc.) Individual organs can also be analyzed as systems when parts of it can be defined, this appears to be a fractal relationship appearing always in the universe.

An interesting philosophical proposition.

     

Externalizing Cost and the keystone pipeline

Keystone is in architecture the piece that hold a structure together. Metaphorically speaking is used to talk about the most important element of a system that maintains it working and holds it together, it could be a person in an organization or a species in an ecological system.

 It is in this way the the Keystone pipeline project between the USA and Canada becomes very important, not only economically, but most important politically.

So the question is why are so many people opposed to this project? And why it is so important for those involved in favor of the project?

Economically it makes sense to move resources to where they can exploited more efficiently. That means that if the raw oil extracted in Canada can be refined more efficiently in the Gulf Coast refineries then transporting it there is the thing to do. From the Gulf refineries these refined and processed petrochemicals can be exported to the rest of the world. They can also be transported to the rest of the USA if necessary.

So what is wrong with this picture? Why are so many people opposed? Aren't already lots of pipelines underground in the USA as we can see in this Wikipedia figure?

For one there is this thing about how are we using fossil fuels, and how are we adding green house gases into the atmosphere. Another is how are we supporting or not alternative technologies that are friendlier to the environment and accelerate economic growth?

It is sad that yesterday March 28, 2017 the US administration through executive orders rolled back provisions that regulated emissions from coal power plants and other environmental regulations. Now China is becoming a leader in power generation and transportation technologies such as electric cars that will conform the structure of future society. This structure is multinational, international, and global in character and there is nothing we can do to stop this trend. China on one hand and Russia in the other will tend to dominate markets based on their technological (China) and energy (Russia) resources. The pacific region dominated until now by the USA will shift its fulcrum to China and the Atlantic to Europe.

In the mean time who will pay for this? One thing is to allow free investment in energy like the Keystone pipeline, and another thing is who is going to pay for all the damage to the environment. It is ironic that the same day that the rollback of the environmental protection regulations was signed an oil spill in North Dakota near the Standing Rock indian reservation was detected. For more read here. This spill gives even more support to the demonstrators at the Standing Rock indian reservation that are afraid of the danger and damage their livelihood is facing.

Who will pay for these devastating incidents? We, of course, pay for them. This is how it has been, when ever there is a cost associated with pollution we tax payers foot the bill. The industries causing the damage get aways, sneaking out through the back door, with all the profits and gains.

This is what externalizing costs means. Internalizing gains and profits for the shareholders but making society (us) pay for all costs associated with the damaged environment. Is there anything we can do as a democratic society to change this?