Stewart and Colbert double team climate change deniers with a satirical approach that ends in a world of eternal darkness.

Our most popular post by traffic criticized both sides of the climate change debate for faulty reasoning. The logic typically goes like this: It’s unseasonably cold and snowing, therefore global warming is a myth. Or, it’s unseasonably warm and this particular weather event is extreme, therefore we’re experiencing climate change in real time. Both positions are absurd.

Jon Stewart and Stephen Colbert took on the issue in an uncharacteristically redundant way. When both shows “cover” a story, it’s typically from much different angles. In both cases, the fake news hosts point out that one could just as readily conclude that night would become a permanent state after the sun had dropped behind the horizon.

Let us know who you think did a better job of illustrating the absurdity of denying (or supporting) climate change based on a single day or weather event.

Incidentally, do you think waning support for climate change action is partly the result of its complexity and the difficulty of communicating the nature of the threat in simple sound bytes? Is the science too complicated to inspire enough people to take the threat seriously? Do we need a different approach in addressing the core problem of climate change without relying on the highly politicized nature of climate change?

By Tom Savage of Bright Green Talent and Simpletom

Who would have predicted the world of science fiction films would prove so prophetic? Our planet is being over-run by machines and we need people like Arnold Schwarzenegger to save us.

In the world of the film The Matrix, robots, machines and other perennially nasty automatons have taken over the world – another normal day in Hollywood. However, it’s a pleasant surprise to find out that the film’s creators have gone so far as to think about the energy crisis that must ensue from such a power hungry group of captors. In order to sustain themselves, the machines grow humans in cozy little pods and use the energy our bodies generate to power their world.

Ingenious really, aside from the fact that our bodies are way more efficient than any machine yet invented – so the energy output would hardly allow them to make a cup of tea (or warm oil), let alone enable them to achieve their (presumably unconscious) goal of world domination. We mere mortals only need a meal or two a day to power something capable of building the pyramids, reconstituting itself, and designing the combustion engine. Of course, we do all this with a handy little bit of consciousness and, sometimes, ethics along the way.

Although reality might not excite science fiction aficionados as much as the Matrix was able to (after all, the film is aided by Hollywood necessities such as flip-phones, leather trench coats and ballet-rich gun battles), the energy fight between man and machine is perhaps as significant. Energy, and our ability to wield it, has arguably been the most important factor in our societal development. It could also lead to our demise. Without it, we would wave goodbye to the advances of the industrial and technological revolutions. With it, if we continue as-is, we might wave goodbye to mother nature, as we know her. Humankind, in this case with the aid of machines, is at war with our planet.

Yet the truth needn’t be this inconvenient. There is more energy than we could ever need at our disposal. We can capture the sun’s rays, the power of our tides, convert the wind and play (perhaps the wrong choice of word) with nuclear fuels. Our problem is the cost that the energy takes to create – not just the economic cost of deriving our energy from coal or from solar or other forms of production, but the holistic cost to the economy and the planet.

The price of our power needs to represent the cost of creation – namely we must include the environmental cost of production and the externalities they cause. In the case of a coal-fired power station, this would incorporate the environmental impact of extracting raw coal, its delivery and the cost of carbon and pollution produced. Renewable energy sources should not be excluded from this examination – we must also lay the same ground rules and establish the environmental cost of a solar field or a new dam. It is only when we can accurately measure the true holistic cost of the power we consume that we can start to determine its value. It is only when we understand the true value of consuming energy that we can judge what constitutes wise usage. If it suddenly costs $100 more to fly from New York to San Francisco (because the true cost of producing energy at 37,000ft has a greater cost), it would better enable the consumer to make a decision about the value of their journey.

If leaving a skyscraper’s lights on at night costs a company an additional $1m/year, we might find that we would see the stars more often. If the holistic cost can be measured, the argument that we mustn’t tax certain industries because of the immediate economic ramifications would no longer hold water. Airlines beware.

It might seem like a pipe dream to be able to measure the externalities accurately, but we’re not as far away as you might think. By putting a price on, and creating a market for, carbon, we’re taking a step in the right direction—the direction toward accurately reflecting the cost of our energy on a global scale. Given the potential ramifications of significant climate change, such as famine, drought, flood, sea-level rise etc., creating a global marketplace for carbon could prove to be a more important world event than the creation of the United Nations.

As Copenhagen rounds the corner, it is up to us – the citizens of the world – to encourage our leaders, somewhat like Keanu in the Matrix, to swallow the green pill (note to Matrix purists, please excuse my choice of color) and shape up to the reality of what is actually happening, rather than that which we’d like to believe.

Only then, will we have Hollywood-esque happy endings.

Day one of the Fortune Green Brainstorm Conference gets right to the point with energy policy, climate change legislation, and an interview with Bill Ford.

The Fortune Green Brainstorm conference could very well be “the premier green business event of 2009.” This hyper-focused leadership conference includes panelists from FedEx, HP, Ford, Dell, IBM, GE, Wal-Mart and many others in the Fortune 100. The title of “Chief Sustainability Officer” appears throughout the program, and the marquis speakers include Van Jones and President Bill Clinton.

By and large, this elite group isn’t here because they’re passionate environmentalists. They’re here because it’s mandatory. They’re here because green encompasses the fundamental business principles of risk management and competitive advantage. It’s a business necessity, and the largest companies have the most at stake when it comes to these uncharted waters. It reflects the clear and growing market for green. Which means that this audience is not here in response to protests or threats but rather demand–demand from their many stakeholders. And that’s precisely how the market should function.

Appropriately enough, the conference kicked off on the topic of climate change and energy policy. The panel ranged from James Rogers of Duke Energy to Fred Krupp of the Environmental Defense Fund. The focus was the cost and price of CO2. The discussion centered on the Waxman-Markey bill, which seeks to reduce greenhouse gases by 20% over the next decade primarily through a cap-and-trade scheme. The devil will be in the details, and the panel debated a few of those. The consensus was that legislation would pass by the first quarter of 2010 (before the end of MG01), and that Obama deserved an ‘A’ for his work thus far. That’s the good news. The bad news is that we’ll settle for an inefficient solution in cap-and-trade, and we can hardly afford to adopt anything but the most efficient means for reducing CO2 emissions and taking ownership for greenhouse gas (GHG) pollution.

Most economists agree that a carbon tax would be a much more efficient mechanism. By putting a fixed price on CO2 emissions, regardless of the source, it would seamlessly factor the cost of GHG pollution into everything we buy and consume. And the only excuse for not pursuing a carbon tax is that it’s politically untenable. No one wants to be seen as “raising taxes,” yet that’s exactly what cap-and-trade amounts to. So it basically comes down to semantics.

This same issue is playing out in the automotive world with government-mandated efficiency standards aka CAFE. A recent article in Business Week pointed out that the new policies currently being pursued in Congress offer paradoxical loopholes.

The regulations are so complicated as to defy quick or simple remedies. The new (and not necessarily improved) version of the rules classifies vehicles by size and assigns them a specific mileage target. So now, starting in 2011, a big SUV such as the Chevrolet Tahoe will have to hit a relatively tame 21 mpg, while Toyota’s Avalon sedan will have to hit 25 mpg.

Sounds reasonable, doesn’t it? But say a big SUV misses its target by one mile per gallon. A carmaker could just make the vehicle a bit larger, allowing it to hit an easier fuel economy target. So General Motors may benefit with its new and efficient Chevrolet Cruze compact, due out in a year, because it’s bigger than the car it replaces.

The whole time we’re reading this article, it’s painfully clear that a carbon tax (on gasoline) is the easy solution, and in the final paragraph, the author acknowledges the elephant in the room.

There is a simpler, more effective solution. European countries have reduced oil use by taxing gasoline heavily. Consumers there tend to buy small cars because fuel costs as much as $8 per gallon. Some members of Congress have talked about raising gas taxes in the U.S. But lawmakers need to get reelected, and new taxes are unpopular. So Washington will probably stick with its imperfect fuel economy rules for a long time.

The greatest moment during Bill Ford’s interview at Fortune Green was when he made the business case for raising gas taxes (a carbon tax). His point was that gyrating fuel prices made it impossible to forecast the types of products consumers would want. We’re often critical of automakers for building gas guzzlers. They’re standard response is, “That’s what people want.” But people only want them because gas costs $2/gallon and they can afford to drive them. As we saw last summer, this can quickly and radically change.

Bottom line, he said, it’s preferable to have a fairly predictable, stable planning horizon rather than even cheap gas for the short-term. In other words, if gas is going to be six bucks a gallon in five years, so be it — at least he can plan for it.

The government is clearly not cut out for this stuff. Whether it’s cap-and-trade or CAFE, these overly complicated and even counter-productive schemes are devised for no other reason than as ways to get around a straightforward tax on CO2 (even though these schemes amount to a tax on CO2). If that’s the case, then we have a simple solution.

If the Bush administration can sell this country on an illegal war based on fabricated intelligence, then certainly these masters of Orwellian doublespeak can come up with something better than a carbon tax. More recently, the Obama administration ended the so-called War on Terror by re-casting it as Overseas Contingency Operations. So we’re confident there’s a better way to approach this.

For the “drill, baby, drill” types we might call it the Patriot Tax, and for the treehuggers we could go with an Eco Tax. Either way, it should be levied as far upstream from the consumer as possible. Again, not because it makes a difference but because it won’t appear like a tax on consumers. When it comes to selling wars and passing good policy, it’s often important to remember that perception is, in fact, reality.

Just because we still have winter in the Northern Hemisphere doesn’t mean global warming and climate change are not a reality.

The impacts of the economic crisis are being felt in many ways. Most are naturally economic. Jobs are being lost in record numbers, and bankruptcies are on the rise with no end (or bottom) in sight. These are the obvious and immediate surface impacts. We can measure and quantify them on a daily basis. But there are deeper and less obvious effects.

The Great Depression impacted the psychology of an entire generation, and it had multi-generational ripple effects. We can recall having to clear our dinner plates, regardless of whether we were hungry or not. This ethos was passed down from our grandparents, who lived through the Depression, and it’s conceivable that it had something to do with the current obesity epidemic. Because, of course, you couldn’t have dessert unless you cleared your plate.

Feast or famine, right? That seems to be our pattern, whether it’s food or the economy. Either way, there’s no denying the psychological impacts of crises such as this, especially when it’s prolonged. Without the benefit of hindsight, we can’t know what they’ll ultimately be this time around, but we’re already noticing a shift in attention away from the need to address global warming and its root causes. It’s back-page news in the mainstream media. It’s as if we don’t have the luxury of worrying about such long-term threats, given the immediate and tangible economic meltdown. It’s also provided an opportunity for global warming skeptics to trumpet a victory of sorts.

The infamous Senator Inhofe of Oklahoma recently declared victory over the global warming conspiracy based on the observation that “his opponents won’t say global warming any more” and instead prefer “climate change”. His argument for victory is basically grounded in semantics coupled with the drop in global warming headlines and the fact that he’s giving this interview during the winter, when it happens to be cold. (He also refers to dubious science.)

The reality is that climate change more accurately describes the various phenomena caused by global warming. The latter simply refers to the increase in global temperature as a result of CO2 emissions and other greenhouse gases. We’re therefore seeing more droughts, floods, and a greater rate of anomalous weather events i.e. climate change. The effect of a warmer atmosphere might, in fact, cause more snow and colder temperatures in some areas with devastating, long-term effects. We don’t know precisely. This is uncharted territory for the planet (in terms of recorded CO2 concentrations) and mankind. Has the climate changed in the past? Yes. At this rapid pace without a reasonable explanation? No.

By the same token, global warming believers should be more thoughtful in how they casually refer to the proof. Just as skeptics cannot disprove global warming by pointing to a cold winter day, it’s foolish to cite an unseasonably warm winter day or a summer heat wave as proof that global warming is real. “I’m wearing shorts in January in Connecticut. Thank you global warming!” one might be tempted to exclaim sarcastically.

Global warming isn’t something happening today. That snow storm or tornado or heat wave was not caused by global warming. This is part of the problem in addressing it. It’s a long-term trend that has been building over decades and will continue. We don’t quite know where it’s headed, but we do know that something has to be done, whether in trying to reverse it, slow it down, or just plain deal with it. (Incidentally, 2009 will be the year we decide that we have to live with it at some level and then consider the best ways of addressing life with climate change.) Weather patterns fluctuate regardless. The fluctuations are occurring within the context of atmospheric warming, but you can’t point to global warming as the cause for a given day’s temperature or a single weather event. That’s not how it works.

Now if both sides would stop with the foolishness, we might be able to actually deal with it. Just as soon as this economic tsunami subsides.

Photo credit

The Big Ask urges us to act now on climate change.

We were just lamenting how we’ve become desensitized to headlines like Greenhouse Gas Emissions Increase in U.S. We’re fully aware of the problem. It couldn’t be more clear, and we’ve moved from understanding the problem to pursuing solutions. We’re taking action. And then our friend Michael Leifer of Swirl sent us this video:

Produced by The Big Ask, it’s one of the more compelling videos on global warming ever produced, and it was no small undertaking. The message, delivery, execution, tone, and music are spot on.

We need strong leadership on climate change. Too many politicians are happy to speak about the issue, but their promises have often turned out to be just a load more hot air. One exception is the United Kingdom, where a climate law has just been adopted, which will force the government to reduce greenhouse gas emissions every year. We need your help to ensure that other governments follow this example.

On 10th August, more than 6,000 people took part in the recording of The Big Ask-video clip at Ostende on the Belgian coast. This was the largest event against climate change ever organised in Belgium. The film clip was made possible due to the engagement of volunteers from Friends of the Earth, and many film industry professionals including award winning director Nic Balthazar, film crews, production houses, actors, … Music has been supplied by Hooverphonic.

The Colbert Report interviews GM Vice Chairman and global warming skeptic Bob Lutz on the new 2011 Chevy Volt.

Bob Lutz is GM’s Vice Chairman and one of the world’s more high-profile global warming skeptics. Stephen Colbert invites him on the show to talk about the recently unveiled 2011 Chevy Volt. Lutz mentions that one of the options will be a photovoltaic roof panel for recharging the batteries or running the AC, much like the 2009 Toyota Prius. To which Colbert responds, “Can I actually charge this thing by plugging it into the cigarette lighter in my Hummer?”

On the subject of global warming, the two have some light back and forth:

Colbert: Why not just call this the Chevy Gore? You don’t believe global warming is real, you’ve said so.

Lutz: I accept that the planet is heated, but I, like many noted scientists, I don’t believe in the CO2 theory.

Colbert: Exactly! I just think that people are leaving their toaster ovens open. [Or] it’s just sun-spot activity.

Lutz: In the opinon of about 32,000 of the world’s leading scientists, yes.

We have no idea where Lutz gets the 32K figure. We’ve heard about the 400 scientists, which turned out to be 19. What’s so puzzling, however, about Lutz’s position and his citation of supposed scientists is that Big Oil has had these “scientists” on the payroll for the better part of a decade, specifically so they could promote this very skepticism. As we wrote in How to Debate Climate Change, “Most are aware that Big Oil supports disinformation campaigns and that it’s paying scientists to write articles undercutting the broad consensus on climate change.”

The irony is that Lutz and his ilk are buying this Big Oil propaganda. Meanwhile, his company’s cozy relationship with Big Oil has lead them to the verge of bankruptcy, unless American taxpayers come through with a bailout. The supreme irony is that the bailout is to help GM meet efficiency standards that it needs to achieve anyway to stay competitive with foreign automakers. When will they learn?

After reading the first chapter of Thomas Friedman’s new book, we’re eager to read the rest.

Thomas Friedman’s new book, Hot, Flat, and Crowded: Why We Need a Green Revolution–and How It Can Renew America, was recently released. He’s been promoting it through so many speaking engagements for months, and he’s still on the circuit. Having read the setup in the first chapter, we’re looking forward to all 16 more. This isn’t to say we think it’ll be especially enlightening but rather validating. Friedman has a great way of presenting and contextualizing information while making his case. Here are a few excerpts from chapter one.

“[The world] is getting hot, flat, and crowded. That is, global warming, the stunning rise of middle classes all over the world, and rapid population growth have converged in a way that could make our planet dangerously unstable. In particular, the convergence of hot, flat, and crowded is tightening energy supplies, intensifying the extinction of plants and animals, deepening energy poverty, strengthening petro-dictatorship, and accelerating climate change. How we address the interwoven global trends will determine a lot about the quality of life on earth in the twenty-first century.”

We often use the current financial crisis as a metaphor for how we’ve managed our energy, food, and general economic security. So does Friedman.

“In some ways, the subprime mortgage mess and housing crisis are metaphors for what has come over America in recent years: A certain connection between hard work, achievement, and accountability has been broken. We’ve become a subprime nation that thinks it can just borrow its way to prosperity–putting nothing down and making no payments for two years. Subprime lenders told us that we could have the American dream–a home of our own–without the discipline or sacrifice that home ownership requires. When the whole pyramid scheme, operated by some of our best financial institutions, collapsed, everyone from simple homeowners to unscrupulous lenders looked to the government for a bailout.”

If we weren’t already leaning toward Obama in the primary, Clinton and McCain sealed our decision with the following supreme act of pandering, and it didn’t go unnoticed by Friedman.

“During the 2008 presidential primary campaign, Senators John McCain and Hillary Clinton both actually proposed suspending the federal excise tax on gasoline, 18.4 cents a gallon, for the summer’s travel season, to give American drivers ‘a break,’ even though they knew–because every expert in the country said so–that it would only increase demand for summer driving and therefore keep gasoline prices high and further contribute to the global warming that both senators claimed to have plans to mitigate. That proposal was the epitome of ‘dumb as we wanna be’ politics.”

We recently wrote about the pending American automotive industry bailout, which can be traced back to the Regan administration and Michigan Democratic caucus.

“When I asked Rick Wagoner, the chairman and CEO of General Motors, why his company didn’t make more fuel-efficient cars, he gave me the standard answer: that GM has never succeeded in telling Americans what cars they should buy. ‘We build what the market wants,’ he said. If people want SUVs and Hummers, you have to give them what they want.

But what the Detroit executives never tell you is that one big reason the public wanted SUVs and Hummers all those years was that Detroit and the oil industry consistently lobbied Congress against raising gasoline taxes, which would have shaped public demand for something different. Big Oil and Big Auto used their leverage in Washington to shape the market so people would ask for those cars that consumed the most oil and earned their companies the most profits–and our Congress never got in the way. It was bought off.”

What Friedman omits is that the taxpayers actually subsidize the price of oil, partly by funding its external costs, which make it considerably cheaper than it would otherwise be in a more open, free-market environment.

Friedman often writes about 9/11 as an historical pivot point, and this book is no different. It’s a coincidence that Hot, Flat and Crowded arrived and we started reading it on the seventh anniversary of 9/11. As tragic as that day was, it presented immense opportunities for America to make our country stronger and safer in so many ways. Looking back on the past seven years, it’s tough to think of anything that has actually improved from the way things were on 9/10/2001. On the contrary, we are less secure and more at risk in every sense of those terms, and it’s a direct result of Bush’s failed leadership.

“After 9/11, I and others argued that we needed to institute a $1 per gallon gasoline tax–a “Patriot Tax”–in order to weaken the very forces who perpetrated that mass murder and to rebuild America’s transport and energy infrastructure. It would have been George W. Bush’s equivalent of Richard Nixon’s going to China–the Texas oilman weaning America off its dependence on Middle East oil. The price of gasoline would have gone up at the pump, but that would have stimulated the American economy to get a jump on the world in moving toward more fuel-efficient vehicles and renewable energy, which would have reduced our exposure to the massive oil-price spike in 2008. Instead, he summoned the nation for massive tax cut, simultaneously making us more dependent on China to finacne our deficit and on Saudi Arabia to fill up our gas tanks.”

We’ll be sure to update this with the more poignant passages. Feel free to leave a quote or two in the comments. In the meantime, we leave you with this insightful bit of dialog from the film The Leopard:

“If we want things to stay as they are, things will have to change.”

As water gets the attention it deserves, the issue can be framed in terms we understand all too well. Here are the 10 ways that freshwater and carbon dioxide are two sides of the same coin.

Water is the new oil. This is certain to be repeated ad nauseum in the coming months and years. But is it? Does it make any sense to compare water with oil? Not really. The more accurate way to understand the impending freshwater crisis is in terms of its atmospheric counterpart, CO2.

Scarcity and abundance. Get used to it. We’ve got too much water and not enough water. Too much pollution and not enough oil. Too many fat people and not enough food. Too many drugs and not enough medicine. Too many people and not enough of the basics for human survival. We’ve been giving this a lot of thought lately, per this fall’s Pop!Tech conference where the theme is…scarcity and abundance.

At first glance these terms appear at odds. But as the above examples show, they can be two sides of the same coin: thesis and antithesis. Put them together, and you get synthesis. That’s quite possibly the way we should view water and carbon.

First, let’s dispense with the oil-water analogy, as they literally do not mix. The comparison appears to make sense on the surface because the common challenge is scarcity. This gives way to the competing forces of supply and demand, pushing up the respective values, which drives profits and puts power in the hands of those who control supply. But this is where the comparison ends.

Oil is not a fundamental component of life. We don’t need oil to live. And while both resources are finite, water is uniquely and infinitely renewable. Whereas water gives life and has purifying qualities, oil causes cancer through its polluting qualities. To be clear, oil can be a fantastic natural resource. It’s just been poorly used and managed. But in the big picture, petroleum doesn’t hold a candle to water. Carbon does.

Indeed, water and carbon are the building blocks of life. We are carbon-based life forms composed primarily of water. Photosynthesis occurs when H2O and CO2 mix in the presence of light. One of its products is oxygen. The problem with these basic molecules of life, however, is that they’re out of balance. Scarcity on one hand, abundance on the other. It’s too little and too much of two good things.

In the following we outline the ten ways carbon and water are more alike than dissimilar, despite this distinction between scarcity and abundance.

10. Sequestration vs. Desalination: This is what it’s come to. There is so much CO2 in the atmosphere that we have find a way to capture and sequester it deep within the earth. One of the more popular places is deep aquifers. That’s right, we’ll create caverns full of Perrier. Meanwhile, we’re going to purify salt water through an energy-intensive process, thereby emitting more CO2 into the atmosphere, in order to sustain arid regions.

9. Conservation: Part of the answer to these troubles is to conserve the resources. Conserving energy limits CO2 emissions. Conserving water relieves pressure on an already taxed system. Neither sacrifices quality of life. With energy it’s a matter of developing zero-carbon sources, whereas with water it’s simply about more conscious use and management.

8. Pollution: Neither CO2 nor H2O is a pollutant, though the former will soon be regulated as one. Why? Because it’s far too abundant in the atmosphere for our own good. Water is subject to many types of pollution, which plays a big role in its scarcity. Just as we need to stop using our atmosphere as a storage tank for fossil-fuel emissions, we have to stop using our groundwater and waterways as storage tanks for toxic runoff.

7. Subsidies & Waste: When we don’t factor the full costs and value of these resources into the unit price at the consumer level, it encourages waste. Taxpayer subsidies for water and energy play a huge role. First, the subsidies need to be eliminated, and then taxes need to be layered on top to both encourage conservation and raise funds to repair the damage done thus far while investing in sustainable systems for the future.

6. Agriculture & Livestock: Sixty percent of the world’s freshwater withdrawals go to irrigation uses, and 18 percent of all greenhouse-gas emissions are tied to livestock. Toxic runoff from pesticides and chemical fertilizers pollutes rivers and creates dead zones downstream. Moves toward more sustainable farming practices not only addresses both of these issues but also presents outright solutions.

5. Technology: The so-called Clean Tech industry is dominated by technologies to address both freshwater scarcity and carbon abundance. There are tremendous wealth-creation opportunities in addressing these crises with the added benefit of saving lives and improving quality of life.

4. Weather Patterns: Global warming often gets too much credit for the water crisis. In the absence of CO2 abundance, we would still have water scarcity. It just wouldn’t be as bad. Still, the abnormal weather patterns of late can be attributed at least in part on a warmer atmosphere. These cause floods in some areas, like the American Midwest, while droughts worsen in others, like the American Southwest and Australia.

3. Bottled Water: When you look up “vicious cycle” in the dictionary, there should be a plastic bottle of Evian. The French company pioneered the packaging of an otherwise free beverage into plastic bottles so they could be shipped half-way across the world. The marketing convinces us that our abundantly safe freshwater supply is not safe. So we buy bottled water from France and Fiji, which requires absurd amounts of petroleum and CO2 emissions to produce, ship, and dispose of. Which erodes the quality of our freshwater supply, and compels us to buy bottled water.

2. Sustainable Levels: When you look at the problems of water and carbon, they really boil down to simple imbalances. And while the solutions are neither simple nor easy, at least we know what needs to be done. We need water and carbon to return to an equilibrium that is sustainable for all life on the planet…especially human life. In many ways, you can’t do one without the other. These issues are attached at the molecular hip.

1. Water Footprint: Water recently adopted the same footprint metric we’ve used for carbon and ecology over the past decade or so. According to Waterfootprint.org, “The water footprint of an individual, business or nation is defined as the total volume of freshwater that is used to produce the goods and services consumed by the individual, business or nation.” As with the carbon footprint, this includes all of the water used to manufacture goods. For example, a glass of beer has a water footprint of 75 liters. A kilo of corn takes 900 liters, regardless of whether it’s used for food or fuel.

It remains to be seen whether we’ll deal with our water footprints in the same way we’re dealing with carbon. We can certainly reduce our net impact through conservation, recycling, and buying lower-impact products (as those products become available). Beyond this, water offsets and so-called neutrality are areas that need to be explored.

H2OConserve.org also has a water footprint calculator. The Worldwatch Institute wrote an excellent piece on the subject, as did Hummingbird604. This is certain to be a topic of much study and debate.

Colbert spoofs the Democratic National Convention’s green efforts and transitions into an interview with Libertarian presidential candidate Bob Barr.

After more than a week off, the Colbert Report returns with a exceptional show. Following a bit where Colbert juxtaposes DNC commentary with B-roll from Burning Man, he explores the convention’s green efforts.

Libertarian presidential candidate Bob Barr then joins Colbert for a quick interview in which he admits that anthropomorphic climate change aka global warming is real. He recounts how he was convinced by attending one of the WE events with Al Gore and, per the Libertarian platform, says that the market should figure it out.

We’ve quoted Libertarians before in reference to climate change and property rights. In principle, we’re very much aligned with Libertarian thought. However, most succumb to the dogma and fail to address issues reasonably. Climate change is a great example.

Global warming and all of its related crises have been caused by government meddling in the form of making oil cheaper than it ought to be through taxpayer subsidies, U.S. military protection, and so much persuasive foreign relations. The full costs of burning oil, coal, and natural gas have not been factored into the unit price; on the contrary, government has functioned to make them even cheaper than they should be. And for what? To line the pockets of corporations who control those resources at the expense of our health, economy, and national security.

Unregulated free markets also give us toys with lead, the mortgage and credit crisis, and a rash of health issues related to our food supply. Markets need to be free to the degree that they don’t do harm. That’s certainly open to interpretation, but the above examples demonstrate clear harm. And if those in the free market do harm, they ought to be held accountable.

Global Warming is about to give way to Global Parching, sharing the international stage among the most urgent and high-profile crises of our time.

Consider yourself warned. Water will soon become the new carbon. Global Parching, as we’re calling it, is poised to give Global Warming a run for its money in terms of media coverage and clean tech investment…not to mention a good measure of armed conflict. Because when it comes to our most pressing environmental, national security, economic, and health issues, water is in a class of its own.

This rather flippant fashion analogy is meant to reflect how big, green causes have been marketed through films, celebrities, concerts, websites, and so much political theater. So let’s just acknowledge and accept that that’s how we spread important messages these days. Water won’t be any different. Moving on…

In the following, we highlight the challenge of fresh-water scarcity, drawing parallels to the challenge of carbon-dioxide abundance and what we might expect to see in selling the public on Global Parching.

Climate change and aberrant weather patterns are often blamed for the current water crisis, but that’s only part of the story. The reality is that a limited and somewhat fixed portion of the world’s water is available and suitable for human consumption. Jack Johnson’s “Sharing Song” for children comes to mind. “It’s always more fun to share with everyone.” That is, until there’s not enough to go around. Here’s the essence from ENN:

Some 70 percent of the earth’s surface consists of water, but only 3 percent of it is freshwater, and less than a third of that is drinkable. The amount of water we consume is increasing, whereas the supply of freshwater is static, which is why it’s running out. More than a third of the world doesn’t have enough water, and the situation is worsening.

As much as we love a good stat, these don’t really mean anything. We obviously get that the oceans aren’t a fresh water source, despite the unsustainable practice of desalination. For these purposes, salt water isn’t really water at all, is it? Why even start there? Instead, the reality is that about 30% of the earth’s fresh water is readily available to us. How much water is that? Well, we’re sure it’s a big number when measured in gallons or shot glasses, but that’s not the point. The significance is that 6.5 billion people share that same fixed supply. In other words, as they say in the real estate business, God isn’t making any more of it. When the global population adds another three billion people in 50 years, that supply won’t change, other than to diminish through pollution and other forms of outright consumption. So global warming is just making this bad situation worse.

If we’ve learned one thing from global warming, though, it’s that a hit movie can really make an environmental issue. We need an An Inconvenient Truth for water. Could Flow be it? It won accolades at Sundance, so it’s following in its Truth’s footprint, so to speak. We’ll get a better sense on September 12th with the film’s limited theatrical release. For now, enjoy the trailer. It’s fairly convincing.

In case you didn’t know, this is World Water Week, which is being held in Stockholm, Sweden. “The theme of the week is Progress and Prospects on Water: For a Clean and Healthy World with Special Focus on Sanitation.” Much of the emphasis is on Asia, where more than 1.4 billion people lack adequate sanitation and 700 million use unsafe drinking water.

WWF is calling for a global water agreement, specifically to help govern and mitigate conflicts with waterways that not-so-conveniently form international borders. They looked good at the time, right? Rivers can certainly make good borders, but unlike fences they don’t necessarily make good neighbors.

WWF Director-General James Leape called on governments to support the entry into force of the 1997 UN Watercourses Convention—an international agreement which could play a key role in water security for about 40% of the world’s population.

If brought into force and widely implemented by the nations sharing the water of river systems and associated lakes and aquifers the convention could greatly contribute to ending the chaos of water grabbing and to improving the health of 263 rivers and lakes in 145 countries. Rivers that cross or form borders, most suffering from non-existent or inadequate regulation, drain half the earth’s surface, provide water to 40 percent of the human population and generate about 60 percent of global freshwater flow.

Meanwhile, coastal regions of Spain are being annexed by the Sahara desert. These areas are suffering from prolonged droughts while adjacent regions enjoy agua aplenty. This report by the BBC shows how water scarcity can lead to very local conflicts between people of the same nation. The desalination solution will only feed into the vicious cycle of increasing greenhouse gas emissions, more global warming, more extreme weather patterns, and more droughts (or floods). Also known as prolonging the inevitable.

Back in the first world, ENN describes the water issue in all-too-familiar terms:

Some 70 percent of the quality drinking water flowing into North American or European homes is flushed down the toilet or used for cleaning. Our water footprints – which include the water used to manufacture the things we consume, as well as the water we use ourselves – are increasing. The further a product, and everything used to make it, has to travel, the bigger its water footprint will be. A typical Belgian consumes 108 liters, or nearly 30 gallons, of water directly each day, and another 4,940 liters indirectly, including part of the 10 that are used to produce a sheet of A4 paper, 11,000 for a pair of jeans and 40,000 for a car.

You can be sure that water footprints will give way to water offsets, water credits, and water calculators (feel free to link to them in the comments). All in an effort to go…water neutral, of course. It would seem that the $45 billion bottled water industry is about to have some competition. After all, the carbon offset market alone is estimated at a whopping $1 trillion.

Closer to home, The Man is cracking down on wasteful water use in Los Angeles. Because we’re in a drought, of course. According to the L.A. Times,

Los Angeles Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa signed an ordinance Thursday that doubles fines for residents who repeatedly violate the city’s “drought buster” rules, including a reworked ban on watering lawns between 9 a.m. and 4 p.m.

The measure bars restaurants from serving water to customers unless it is specifically requested. And the ordinance will quadruple fines for large customers of the Department of Water and Power, mainly businesses, that break the city’s water-waster law.

Under the new rules, DWP customers are prohibited from using hoses to wash down their sidewalks and driveways, unless there is a public safety issue or a pressure washer involved. The law also bars residents from watering their lawns when it rains.

Next time a waiter offers us tap water, we’ll be making a citizen’s arrest. It’ll be Global Parching vigilante style.

Of course, we’ve already written about the Great Water Debate with bottled, tap, and aquifer. T. Boone Pickens is poised to become America’s first water tycoon…or sheik, as the case may be.

When it comes to water causes, we’re big fans of Charity Water. The fact that they charge $20 for a bottle of water, which amounts to a donation of just about $20, effectively mocks bottled water and illustrates all that’s wrong with that industry. Charity Water is running a donation drive next month with a unique approach that celebrates the organization’s second anniversary…in conjunction with founder Scott Harrison’s 33rd birthday.

There’s no question that carbon dioxide has gotten too much attention over the past few years relative to the other environmental issues we face, such as water scarcity and other forms of pollution. If water does become the new carbon in this sense, all we’ll be doing is trading one flawed approach for another. Sustainability and our overall quality of life should be viewed and addressed as systems. We can look to leaders like Charity Water to help educate us about water issues, but this information should be factored into a systems approach that reduces our overall impact and helps us live more healthy and fulfilling lives.

Emma Stewart refers to this single-minded approach as “carbon myopia” and uses some interesting examples to illustrate her point.

[A] singular focus on one ecological system, the atmosphere, may cause perverse outcomes or neglected crises in the hydrosphere or lithosphere. We see this clearly in the rush to produce lower carbon biofuels and the unintended consequences this has had on land use, biodiversity, water and other issues. To put it bluntly, your company does not live by carbon alone, but on water, oxygen, nitrogen, phosphorus, sulfur and hydrogen cycles. For example, beverage, IT and pharmaceutical businesses depend on clean and regular supplies of water from aquifers and reservoirs. Food and agriculture firms rely on crop pollination by insects in order to maintain yields. Electric utilities need flows of cool water, and thus the shade cover that keeps water surface temperature low.

[G]overnment researchers are exploring how regulatory structures could transition away from the silos of air, water, wildlife, etc. to an ecosystem-based approach.

Our friends at Creative Citizen have this down by tracking the impacts of our behaviors and products on reducing emissions, water use, and waste. Not to mention saving you cold hard cash.

So we’re ready for water to get its day in the sun. But let’s not take our eyes off carbon and other issues that threaten our one and only eco system.

Photo: Flickr