This morning, at 33rd St and 7th Ave in the middle of New York City — right outside of Madison Square Garden and Penn Station — a 70-foot-tall digital billboard displaying a real-time running total of atmospheric greenouse gases was unveiled. The display reflects a measurement of 24 long-lived greenhouse gases (not including ozone and aerosols) named in the Kyoto and Montreal Protocols, and is based on Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) research. The Carbon Counter is part of a "Know the Number" awareness and education campaign by Deutsche Bank's institutional climate change investment and research business, the DB Climate Change Advisors group (DBCCA).

In a press release, MIT Professor of Atmospheric Science Ronald Prinn is quote as saying:

"It is useful to have an up-to-date estimate of a single integrating number expressing the trends in the long-lived greenhouse gases contributing to that change. This number can help convey how fast these greenhouse gases are increasing, and the progress, or lack thereof, in slowing the rate of increase. The number on the Counter is based on global measurements. It shows the total estimated tonnage of these gases expressed as their equivalent amounts of carbon dioxide, with seasonal and other natural cyclical variations removed to more clearly reveal the underlying long term trends driven by human and other activity."

The carbon footprint of the billboard, which includes nearly 41,000 LEDs, is offset using carbon credits.

As a company, Deutsche Bank is working to reduce its carbon emissions annually by 20%, with a goal of carbon-neutrality from 2013. Carbon credits? RECs? It's still noteworthy and praiseworthy. How does your company compare?

The Carbon Counter Number is also available anytime at www.know-the-number.com — or right on your own computer via a free downloadable widget.

It takes place outside. You bring a tent to sleep in. Meals are provided (vegan). You get to be with good, mostly laypeople who care deeply about sustainability in the built environment, learning from world-class practitioners about things like strawbale, cob, cordwood, timber framing, straw-clay infill, permaculture, community-supported agriculture, small-scale living roofs, thatching, natural plasters & finishes, and more. You get your hands in the dirt. You go swimming. Evening presentations as good as any I've seen at mainstream green-building conferences — and often better — are given in a circus tent. Then, exhausted, you either relax around a bonfire or hit the sleeping bag to get ready to do it again the next day.

The sixth annual family-friendly Northeast Natural Building & Living Colloquium — Seven full days! — Sunday, July 26 through Saturday, August 1, 2009 — once again hosted by The PeaceWeavers :: Thunder Mountain — Bath, New York

A hands-on event with an emphasis on natural building and sustainable living in the northeastern climate. From natural building and permaculture to water and energy conservation... from alternative fuels to sourcing your food locally... this event is for everyone concerned about how their lifestyle impacts our Earth.

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It has become a truism that the U.S. is addicted to foreign oil. Heck, even George Bush owned up to it a couple years back. As we're trying to climb out of that addiction, are we about to fall into another?

As a Greenwire.com article points out, a boom in clean and renewable energy sources in the U.S. could lead to a new dependence on imported minerals and metals. We may shed our need for oil from the politically treacherous Middle East, only to replace it with a need for gallium and indium (ingredients in photovoltaics from central Africa, China, and Russia -- places with their own foreign-policy problems.

Says the article:

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On Friday, May 19, the Milwaukee Journal-Sentinal published a damning story based on the leaked minutes of a private strategy meeting of food-packaging executives and chemical industry lobbyists that took place in Washington DC the previous day. The story's authors spoke with the chairman of the North American Metal Packaging Alliance (NAMPA), John Rost, who verified the talking points, but indicated that the summary wasn't complete. "'It was a five-hour meeting,' he said."

On Saturday, NAMPA responded by distributing a press release claiming that the leaked minutes were "blatantly inaccurate and fabricated."

On Sunday, the Washington Post released its own story on the leaked minutes. They spoke with Kathleen M. Roberts, a lobbyist for NAMPA with Bergeson and Campbell. She happens to have been the meeting's organizer, and she also verified that the information in the summary was accurate.

This looks pretty bad for NAMPA.

So here's what happened.

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Paul Hawken gave the commencement address for the University of Portland earlier this month, and it's making the rounds. Deservedly. Its message is as good for the building industry — for anybody living, for that matter — as it was for those graduating seniors. Here it is. Please read it.

When I was invited to give this speech, I was asked if I could give a simple short talk that was "direct, naked, taut, honest, passionate, lean, shivering, startling, and graceful." No pressure there.

Let's begin with the startling part. Class of 2009: you are going to have to figure out what it means to be a human being on earth at a time when every living system is declining, and the rate of decline is accelerating. Kind of a mind-boggling situation... but not one peer-reviewed paper published in the last thirty years can refute that statement. Basically, civilization needs a new operating system, you are the programmers, and we need it within a few decades.

This planet came with a set of instructions, but we seem to have misplaced them. Important rules like don't poison the water, soil, or air, don't let the earth get overcrowded, and don't touch the thermostat have been broken. Buckminster Fuller said that spaceship earth was so ingeniously designed that no one has a clue that we are on one, flying through the universe at a million miles per hour, with no need for seatbelts, lots of room in coach, and really good food — but all that is changing.

There is invisible writing on the back of the diploma you will receive, and in case you didn't bring lemon juice to decode it, I can tell you what it says: You are Brilliant, and the Earth is Hiring. The earth couldn't afford to send recruiters or limos to your school. It sent you rain, sunsets, ripe cherries, night blooming jasmine, and that unbelievably cute person you are dating. Take the hint. And here's the deal: Forget that this task of planet-saving is not possible in the time required. Don't be put off by people who know what is not possible. Do what needs to be done, and check to see if it was impossible only after you are done.

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Even though there are extant and occupied earthen homes scattered throughout the northern states and Canada from the mid-19th century, raw earth as a building material is overlooked in most of the USA. See Richard Pieper's article, "Earthen Architecture in the Northern United States" and these photos of earthen houses in upstate New York that I took in 2004, following Pieper's trail.

Those are the tip of the iceberg, of course. The Earth Architecture website notes, "Currently it is estimated that one half of the world's population — approximately three billion people on six continents — lives or works in buildings constructed of earth."

The Adobe Association of the Southwest hosts a biannual conference, which is now just a week away.

The 5th Adobe Conference of the Adobe Association of the Southwest, AdobeUSA 2009, will take place May 15 and 16, 2009 in El Rito, New Mexico on the campus of co-sponsor Northern New Mexico College in Cutting Hall Auditorium.

Engineering and Architect Professionals will be eligible to obtain Continuing Education Units (PDH) during the conference.

Check out the abstracts, including great-sounding titles like:
   · Adobe 2030
   · ASTM earthen building standards
   · Mechanical performance of nonindustrial building materials manufactured with clay as a natural binder
   · The Effect Interior Earthen plasters and Exterior Lime plasters have on Controlling Temperature and Humidity in Building Envelope

What other natural materials can we use?

The Obamas put in the first food garden (organic, natch) on the White House grounds since Eleanor Roosevelt's victory garden during World War II. We dig that.

Skeptics may scoff that's it just symbolic, but I don't think so. According the The New York Times, the garden will have "55 varieties of vegetables, from a wish list of the kitchen staff. Cristeta Comerford, the White House's executive chef, said she was eager to plan menus around the garden, and Bill Yosses, the pastry chef, said he was looking forward to berry season."

And 1100 square feet can produce a lot of produce — the Old Farmer's Almanac says that "A good-sized beginner vegetable garden is 10 x 16 feet [160 square feet]. A plot this size can feed a family of four for one summer, with a little extra."

It's not likely, however, that the first family or their handlers are going to (publicly, anyway) spice up the reasons behind this good move with the hard arguments of filmmaker Robert Kenner in his high-impact new movie, Food, Inc.:

The myth that plants will clean the air is a seductive one: if true, we could fix indoor air quality problems without expensive changes to mechanical systems and without worrying about what materials we introduce to the indoor environment.

There is scientific evidence that plants clean the air, pulling formaldehyde and other pollutants out of the air and turning CO2 to oxygen (after all, this is what trees and outdoor plants do for the earth). But plants are not necessarily a practical approach to fixing indoor air problems.

Kamal Meattle's talk on TED.com is a good example of how the myth of plants is promising, but not necessarily practical. He claims that three common plants can clean the air in homes and offices, and has shown this in an office building in New Delhi. Sounds great! But then you get to the numbers: four shoulder-high Areca Palm plants per person in a room that need their leaves wiped once a day; six to eight waist-high Mother-in-Law's Toungue plants per person in a bedroom; and several Money Plants, grown hydroponically, to remove formaldehyde.

In his office building in New Delhi, he has 1200 plants in 50,000 square feet for 300 occupants. That's one plant for every 41 square feet (think of a large houseplant in an average office cubicle). In a new project, he has 60,000 plants in a building that's just over a million square feet--one plant for every 16 to 20 square feet!

Meattle's talk is short (that's the beauty of TED talks), and he doesn't get into some of the potential problems with plants in buildings: added moisture levels, insecticides, soil contamination, and so on. Nor does he show any pictures of the office building with such a high plant load.

I'm starting to think of Audrey II, that friendly meat-eating plant in the picture.

(For those who might feel that the Climate Denial Crock of the Week post needs some balance.)

Peter Sinclair is a graphic artist, illustrator, animator, and environmental awareness advocate. He's been posting a series of "Climate Denial Crock of the Week" videos on the internet.

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