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- Written by: Glenn and Rick
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The design professions are not stepping up to address the wildfires problem" We now have scientific proof of the ways we have irrevocably changed the territories and climate of this world, putting us on a path where we cannot yet see the ultimate consequences. Wildfires and their negative effects on infrastructure and health are a clear example that more are experiencing worldwide all the time. The design professions are not stepping up to address the wildfires problem, other than to call for fire-resistant building materials and defensible space.To be sure, these are necessary tactics to be included in any discussion of wildfire response, but are not substitutes for a broader conceptualization of innovative planning, typologies, and disciplinary strategies. Architecture cannot solve this problem. In fact, all the individual design professions are incapable of addressing the magnitude of sheer complexity of the climate crisis alone. As much as we need disciplinary expertise, the problem of wildfire, like other climate crises, requires levels of innovation that are not possible to achieve via a single disciplinary orientation. Thus, what is needed is a new holistic, synthesized, design discipline fusing the ecological systems thinking of landscape architecture, the policy thinking of planning, the cultural and organizational synthetic thinking of architects, and the engineering prowess of civil and environmental engineers. But this is not enough. Additionally, we need to conceive of a new global narrative or mythology that reinstates the interconnectedness of our planet and the irrelevance of human-centered boundaries, borders, or territories that govern our cultural framing and demarcation separate from the realities of the globe. All design is, or should be, a manifestation of a larger cultural narrative, or zeitgeist, and as such we need to establish a new narrative around the climate crisis that can permeate the human condition towards motivating real change. Our current crisis has been driven by two main factors: the continued onset of extreme climate conditions and a housing-affordability crisis crippling millions of Americans, including local governments who, due to NIMBYism and local zoning, need to push new housing outside of city centers to comply with state mandates. Instead, we need to stop living in conflict with our environment. Many cities in the West were born out of a harnessing of resources – the making of a place – instead of co-existing and adapting to found conditions. Indigenous Americans understood the symbiosis between wildlands and humans and, as such, were able to harness fire to their benefit in complex forms of land management and community organization. So too must we rethink the planning, development and stewardship of our built environment to be more symbiotic and adaptive. This will require us to see natural forces as something to engage with rather than retreat from.......read on https://www.dezeen.com/
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- Written by: Glenn and Rick
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For nearly a decade, the Trudeau government has been accused of playing a bad game of three-dimensional chess as it tried to balance the urgency of the climate crisis with the stridency of the fossil fuel lobby and its political enablers. But gradually, the federal climate and energy strategy has begun to look more like a game of poker—in which case it must be the highest-stakes game in history, with hundreds of millions of tonnes of emissions on the table. With the release of the federal Clean Electricity Regulations this week, Ottawa is finally showing its hand. “These leaks represent the tip of the iceberg of methane emissions, the super-emitters, for which there is no justification – these could be radically reduced at little or no net cost,” said Steve Hamburg, chief scientist at the Environmental Defence Fund. If the crowds aren’t going wild, they probably should be. And, weirdly, we may just look back one day and force ourselves to thank the fossil lobby for setting its own trap. Playing a Longer Game.....limate strategy first began to emerge, it seemed as though Prime Minister Justin Trudeau and his ministers were trying to please everyone but satisfying no one. They introduced a price on carbon pollution, but then sent billions of taxpayers’ dollars to a company in Texas tobuy us all an oil and gas pipeline, a sprawling construction megaproject whose price has since ballooned from $7.4 to $30.9 billion. While all of that was going on, Trudeau told the big CERAWeek oil and gas conference in Houston that “no country would find 173 billion barrels of oil in the ground and just leave them there.” They introduced a price on carbon pollution, then sent billions of taxpayers’ dollars to a company in Texas to buy us all an oil and gas pipeline, a sprawling construction megaproject whose price has since ballooned from $7.4 to $30.9 billion. While all of that was going on, Trudeau told the big CERAWeek oil and gas conference in Houston that “no country would find 173 billion barrels of oil in the ground and just leave them there.” Ottawa announced a groundbreaking phaseout of fossil fuel subsidies, but didn’t exclude fossil companies from the public financing available to any industry—even though no other line of business accounts for 28% of the country’s carbon emissions or leads all sectors in annual emission increases. (Surely some smart federal analyst could have figured that one out?). The net result: It’s always easy to find climate hawks who mistrust and reflexively criticize anything Ottawa says or does. Even though direct authority over natural resources lies with the provinces, and as Environment and Climate Minister Steven Guilbeault observed earlier this year, provincial obstruction is the biggest obstacle to ambitious climate strategy. But if you’ve been keeping score, the picture began to shift nearly 18 months ago......read on https://energymixweekender.
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20 Tricks to Keep Your House Cool Without Air Conditioning By Alexa Erickson, familyhandyman.com When the weather heats up, turning on the AC also means emptying your wallet. To avoid the high cost of air conditioning—and to be more environmentally-friendly—
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What can you do for the climate? (Not everything, but start here.)How to find joy in mitigating climate change.What can I do? .........How can I do more? .........Am I doing enough? It’s safe to say everyone in the climate movement has been haunted by these questions at one time or another. An individual can never really do “enough” when confronting a problem as complex and gargantuan as the climate crisis — and it will never feel like enough when we care, as we ought to, for the fate of our planet, our communities, and ourselves. Once you’ve gone vegetarian, should you go vegan? Once you’ve attended one climate protest, should you organize the next one? Once you’ve started volunteering with a climate organization, should you quit your job, sell your car, and devote every ounce of your energy to climate solutions? “You’ll burn yourself out if you think you can be everything all at once,” says Kristy Drutman, an environmental justice advocate, host of the Brown Girl Green podcast, and a 2022 Grist 50 honoree. As a passionate young professional in the climate movement, she’s had to recognize her own strengths as well as her limitations. “I can’t be at every protest,” Drutman says. “That’s not even necessarily the work I want to do.” Accepting that doesn’t make her less of an advocate — it means she’s found more effective ways to direct her unique skills toward solutions. It’s hard to keep guilt and anxiety entirely at bay. But one antidote can be to put real thought into the actions you want to take, then give yourself permission to let go of the rest. “I try to think small rather than think big,” says Nathaniel Stinnett, founder and executive director of the Environmental Voter Project and a 2016 Grist 50 honoree. “I really think the key to joyfulness within the climate crisis is not to always think about the enormity of the problem and how can I, as one person, overcome this enormous problem,” Stinnett says. Instead, he suggests focusing on the climate challenges and opportunities within your own life, and how you can succeed at those. So here are some ways you can succeed: 13 ideas for actions you can take (or leave) for the planet — as suggested by people who spend their time thinking about this — by changing your lifestyle, using your voice, or volunteering your time. Find the ones that spark joy and commit to those, but don’t beat yourself up over the others. It’s not about perfection. It’s about doing the most and the best you can for your planet, your community, and yourself......read on https://grist.org/fix/
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Climate change, pests and unsustainable harvesting have left the Canadian forestry industry vulnerable. But as wildfires across the country decimate large swaths of Canada’s remaining forests, a Vancouver non-profit is helping companies find alternatives to pulp and paper-based packaging in an effort to ease the pressure on Canada's trees. In order to meet its climate targets, Canada must transition away from its heavy reliance on forestry, which contributes $34.8 billion to the country’s nominal GDP and provided 177,693 Canadians withjobsin 2021. The logging industry is one of the highest greenhouse gas emitters in Canada, according to a 2022 report from the Natural Resources Defense Council and Nature Canada. It accounts for more than 10 per cent of Canada’s total emissions, on par with oilsands production. The report also found the Canadian government has failed to precisely report the logging industry’s emissions and has not yet adopted a management plan to reduce them. Without a clear strategy from the federal government, Canada risks missing its 2030 climate targets leaving its boreal forest — one of the largest sections of intact forest on Earth — vulnerable to unsustainable harvesting. Nicole Rycroft is not waiting for an action plan from the government. She is taking forest protection into her own hands by helping companies across the globe transition away from the logging industry. Rycroft is the founder and executive director of Canopy, a Vancouver-based environmental non-profit that has worked with over 900 companies worldwide, including Nike, H&M and Zara, to implement circular supply chains and reduce deforestation. Canopy aims to help companies transition away from single-use paper packaging and cellulosic fabrics that are sourced from logging and instead use recycled, discarded materials and sustainable alternatives. “Between today and about 10 years from now, we'll have 60 million tonnes of next-generation products on the market globally,” said Rycroft. “That will displace one-third of the trees that are currently cut down to make pulp and paper packaging and disposable clothing. It will enable us to ensure that absolutely no ancient and endangered forest fibre is being cut to disappear into a pulp machine.” The pulp and paper industry uses 33 to 40 per cent of the industrial wood traded globally. This wood is often sourced in an unsustainable manner that involves clear-cutting, illegal harvesting and human rights abuses. Many of the forests that are being clear-cut also have high conservation value due to the diversity of species that call these forests home and the amount of carbon they can sequester, preventing the greenhouse gas from accumulating in our atmosphere and contributing to climate change.“When you cut down forests, the carbon that has been stored in the trees and in the soil gets released into the atmosphere, leading to more impacts of climate change,” said Rycroft. “[Climate change] leads to more forest fires and more pest infestations, so you then lose more forests, which leads to more carbon dioxide in the atmosphere. You end up with this very negative cycle.” https://www.nationalobserver.com/2023/06/27/news/how-can-canada-transition-away-forestry-industry?nih=83b12c7d5f1bc35f22e866f5fcef9bc3&utm_source=National+Observer&utm_campaign=468026509d-EMAIL_CAMPAIGN_2023_06_27_01_43&utm_medium=email&utm_term=0_cacd0f141f-468026509d-%5BLIST_EMAIL_ID
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