This is an incredibly cool idea.  Innovation in wind energy…think reeds in a marsh.  I found this on a facebook friend’s stream.  I never would have seen this otherwise! http://news.discovery.com/tech/wind-power-without-the-blades.html

There is so little that I, as an individual, can control.  I’m not a lobbyist, a political mover and shaker, or even a major opinion influencer.  I try to advocate on behalf of Boomers and beyond.  I write about what I see from my unique perspective as a Canadian expat.  My sense of social consciousness tears me apart as, at the same time, I am able to function as an entrepreneur in the hungriest consumer market in the world.  I think about best choices for my child and worry about her future.  Cook my own food, try to stay purist in buying organic and local.  Take political action as I have the power to, write to politicians and bureaucrats knowing that I am just another number that gets standardized letters of response.  I donate money to worthy causes and for disaster relief, even though my own coffers are tighter, as a small business entrepreneur.

So to combat these overwhelming feelings of powerlessness, I look long and hard (and just about every day) to what I can control, rather than drowning in what I can’t control. 

Which brings me to today.  Today, as I waited for 15 minutes in line at the Costco gas pumps to save $0.15/gallon, my van (a necessity in my pet service business) stood next to a Prius, both of them drinking the expensive brew.  The Prius’ owner (a well-groomed, attractive man in a jogging suit) and I started a conversation.  I told him my tank cost $92.  He looked at me wide-eyed and told me he’d barely reach $36 AND he’d be able to go about 500 miles without a refill.  I’ll go about 400 miles on my $92.  And then he said something that got me. 

I don’t care how much gas prices go up, now…not with this car.  Not even if gas goes to $10/gallon.

Ayay.  At $10/gallon, I’d never be able to fill my tank in one sitting.  I’d have to drastically change all my routing (even though I’m extremely well-routed now.)  So it gave me a good think…about what I can control.  I bought my 2007  Buick Terraza in Januray 2008…and sadly, it is a lemon.  The warranty is about to expire and at this point, GM has spent more money on repairing my car and covering my car rentals while the car has been in the shop than what I paid for it.  Because of its age, it isn’t worth it to try and pursue lemon law legal relief (although I should have much earlier on.)

I still owe for the 0% loan that I took out on the vehicle and, this morning, looking at the beaming, shining, happy face of that Prius owner, I decided that I am selling my van.  He LOVED his vehicle.  I TOLERATE mine.  Big difference. 

Now comes the dilemma.  With the horrible crisis and shortage of car parts from Japan, do I go for a Honda or a Toyota?  Or do I stick with American and take my chances, again, with a higher mileage American made vehicle.  I know a few of you would have strong opinions.  I’m still in need of some sort of utility vehicle (like a Honda CRV, Subaru Forrester), and I like my little accessory luxuries, although I’m willing to do without for the sake of better gas mileage. 

What would you do in my shoes? If you have an opinion or recommendation, I’d love to hear it (even better if you are a lawyer!! or a mechanic!!! or Marine engineer!)  I’ll be making the switch within the next couple of months.  You can post your comment, or email me at wspiegel@genplusua.com

While walking I chanced upon this lovely flower garden & had to share. I love spring

In order to avoid the massive amounts of hormones and antibiotics in beef and chicken from most of the major growers, I switched over to organic meat — meaning the cattle and fowl are free range.  Cows are grass-fed in pastures, chickens in natural sunlight. If they are being fed corn it is not genetically modified…basically they are living a life closer to what nature intended than in the cattle and chicken farms that show very little respect for the lives that they raise and slaughter.  I’m not a vegetarian and I have nothing against raising cattle or fowl for human consumption.  But to see cows standing knee deep in their excrement in vast, acres of excrement and mud…no.  That doesn’t sit well with me.

On the fruit and vegetable end of things, after much deliberation, I’m buying a combination of organic and locally-grown produce.  I’m shopping for most of my food at Whole Foods and Trader Joe’s, which both offer me a good range of meats and produce and they fit my food choice preferences. I get most of my local produce at the Tapia Brothers market (if you are in LA, at the corner of Havenhurst and Burbank) where much of their product is from their farm across the street or brought in from a range of less than 50 miles.  So it is farm-ripened rather than truck/transit-ripened.

Because I’m lactose intolerant, I have to ingest soy milk if I want to have a semblance of milk in my diet or cooking, so I purchase organic and limit my intake to about 8 oz a day max.  (The isoflavins in the soy milk are good for you in small amounts, but not in the large amounts that we are ingesting by virtue of all the soy fillers in most prepared foods.)

AND, the biggest change is that I’m ONLY buying fresh food and making all cookies, cakes and avoiding any packaged goods.  Once I started reading labels and discovering just how much soy and corn is added to just about every packaged food, I couldn’t, in good conscience, continue to keep ingesting it.  My own theory is this:  soy and corn fatten up the cows and chickens, and if we have such huge amounts of soy and corn fillers in OUR foods, then we will fatten up as well.  In addition to this, the changes to our food supply really started within the past 10-15 years — coincidentally the same period of time as I’ve had trouble losing belly fat.  You could say it was my age.  You could say that I wasn’t getting enough exercise. 

In my case, I radically changed the foods  I put into my body and those of my family.  I’m NOT dieting.  In fact, I’m eating whatever I want, whenever I want…however ALL the food is chock full of goodness and not an artificial filler in sight.  I’ve now officially lost about 8 pounds over the past three months.  No diet.  No change in my level of activity.  Just no preserved/packaged foods (i.e. no soy/corn fillers), fresh local or organic produce, and free-range organic beef and chicken.  The fish is often farm-raised, but then I’m making sure it is organic (so even though corn-fed, it is not genetically modified corn) or wild-caught.  I have my own continuing battle over farmed fish vs. wild-caught because of the wild fishing methods being harmful to other sea creatures…so I’ll keep having a think on that one.  I don’t see a clear answer yet on the fish front.

But 8 pounds?  Just from avoiding the fillers?  Does it take me more time to prepare all my foods?  Yes.  Definitely.  From soup stocks to baked goods…a lot more time.  Is this higher quality of food more expensive?  Yes.  Definitely.  However, I’m no longer spending a cent on packaged anything, so it seems to even out.  Am I wasting food?  Very little.  Most leftover bones, and vegetable scraps go into my freezer for soup stock.  It took me a few weeks to realize that such fresh food goes bad more quickly, so I’m heading to the store and local farmer more often, but other than that, it is becoming a fairly easy and enjoyable way of life.   I really feel that I’ll lose another 5 – 10 pounds over the next 6 months to a year as the belly fat continues to dissolve without fillers and excess estrogen (from pesticides and preservatives) to keep it there.

I don’t worry about when I eat out or if my daughter desperately wants something that is filled with corn syrup and fillers, because it is the rare occasion and not the rule. 

I feel incredibly healthy.  So, there is the update.

If you think about it, though, one person made the decision to build an oil rig in the Gulf of Mexico.  You can say that a Board of Directors at BP made the decision, but ultimately, one person put the idea out there and pushed it forward.  One person did something wrong in the construction that caused a weakness and ultimately an explosion.  Doesn’t matter who, for the sake of this argument — but it could have been an overtired worker, engineer, planner, who put or didn’t put, the wrong thingamajiggee in the wrong place at the wrong time.  Or didn’t adequately tighten a bolt.  Or who was smoking next to flammable materials.  Or who approved sub-standard materials in construction.  Who knows?  But it was likely one person who did one wrong thing that has killed a whole bunch of workers and now, untold amounts of marine and marine-dwelling life.

If a nuclear bomb went off, it would be one person who would be responsible for that decision.  In whatever country, at whatever time.  One person would say “go”, or one person would punch in a key code, or one person would turn a key, or one person would push a button, and our world would change forever. 

The earth will continue, even if we destroy it.  But human life and the creatures who live on earth could very well end.  Because of one person.

The general belief is that it takes less muscles to smile than to frown.  But according to one plastic surgeon, who looked at the basic muscle functions needed to create a smile and a frown, it takes 12 muscles to smile and 11 to frown.  One more muscle to go to good from not so good. 

Then, there is the myth of the 100th monkey (thanks to reader, Shelley, for passing that along yesterday), which was based on a real study of monkeys using water to wash sand from yams set out for them on a beach.  As one monkey washed sand off the yams, other monkeys followed suit.  Eventually all the food gatherers washed sand off their yams.  They didn’t achieve critical mass in that the behavior didn’t spread outside their small group, but the concept is heart-warming. 

I’m going to stick with the one more muscle to smile than frown theory, because as I look around my world, I seem to see more people frowning than smiling.  Just a little more effort might be needed to smile.  And as anyone who knows me knows…I’m a smiler.  I’m constantly using that extra muscle.  What if I apply that to the effort I might need to be the one person who adds to the critical mass to make the world a cleaner, healthier, better nutrified, more responsible and respectful place to be?  And what if you do that too?  Then we all add muscle to positive direction. 

My choices?  Shopping local — going to the Tapia Brothers farm down the street and to my local Farmers market.  To grow vegetables.  To compost and put my landfill back into the earth.  To eat grass-fed, free-range beef.  To purchase only free-range poultry and egg.  To avoid corn and soy fillers (and most preserved food).  To impact the multi-national businesses with my few dollars and cents.  To continue to walk 4-5 miles a day.  To be a creature of the planet.  To be kind to animals.  To give love to my child, my family and to humanity.  To be  mensch on this planet.  One person.

What’s your choice?

Beattie is a passionate proponent of saving our planet, coupled with the need of his country to sell coal to Japan — it puts Australia in the same situation as the US with our dependance upon oil.  The equally passionate and insightful Mutsuyoshi Nishimura (Special Advisor to the Prime Minister’s Cabinet; Former Special Envoy of the Government of Japan for Climate Change), made it clear to this audience that each country had limitations on how it could reduce their carbon footprint even though they were greatly supportive of enforcing emissions limitations.  Japan, tiny Japan, currently must burn coal as it has no other resources (and purchases its coal from Australia.)  Both Beattie and Nishimura embrace the need for clean coal (Japan has just opened its first Zero Emissions coal-burning plant) and face two realities. 

1. Japan will continue to burn coal for decades; and
2. In 20 or 30 years, coal will not be a viable energy source.

The other panelist who very humbly shared the incredible strides her company is making with investing in alternative energy was President and CEO of Sustainable Development Technology Canada (SDTC)Vicky Sharpe.  Sharpe explained that for any alternative energy solution to grow and flourish, it had to be scaleable. Her company was invested almost a billion dollars in 181 alternative energy start-ups, with 34 of them commercially viable.  What that means is that SDTC has created partnerships with multinational corporations (think FedEx, Dupont, Toyota) who would be incorporating the technologies and using them worldwide. 

With Copenhagen still fresh, and each of these panelists very compelling positions and directions, Beattie’s voice kept ringing through to me, echoing statements from almost all of the other panelists. 

The United States needs to set the stage for carbon emission reduction and alternative energy. 

Beattie felt that Obama has already done a great deal for changing the world public opinion of the US, but he also stated that in terms of leading the charge on the renewable energy front,  he yet to see true evidence of an Obama backbone.  If the US takes the lead and creates a technology that will surpass the value of fossil-fuel, then that will allow China and India to leapfrog the fossil-fuel era they claim to need in order to develop their economies. 

[There is a...] lack of leadership in the US.  The private sector is the only way forward unless President Obama has a backbone that he hasn’t seen yet…

That is the statement got me.   Obama had raised World Public Opinion of the United States.  A very strong positive. 

Domestically, however, Obama’s goals for change haven’t really seen him dramatically take this leadership role…or at least not in a way that resonates with the American people or in the World Public Opinion.  Bi-partisanship can only go so far, especially when it is a failing concept in the current political climate.  We can’t just all get along.  We need clear direction and decisive and swift action.

I was excited to see what he would say in his State of the Union tonight.  And I wasn’t disappointed. 

He took a strong position, called out where he had to, put the focus on the American people and jobs in a big way.  He laid out the need to take the lead and be the #1 country in the race for sustainable energy innovation.  He called out the politics of politics and basically laid the framework — pushing through with a majority and having the Republican party vote “no” just for the sake of politicking — that is not leadership and leadership is what he intends to provide the people in the years ahead. 

The only thing that would have made me even happier would be to see him say he’d trash the health care reform bill as is and just move to Medicare for all with optional plans available (like the way the plan works for seniors.)  But that would really not be bi-partisan…would it?

But he reminded me of why I voted for him.  And I liked the backbone.

I hope Mr. Beattie was pleased.

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Driving the Alternative Energy Marketplace at the VERDEXCHANGE Conference

Business and Policy Leaders Advance Global Clean Tech Opportunities and Cutting-edge Policy

LOS ANGELES – With the United Nations Climate Change Conference in Copenhagen top-of-mind and the State of the Union address forthcoming, government and business leaders from the Western region and around the world gathered in Los Angeles at the VERDEXCHANGE Conference to advance the growing and fast-evolving markets for green and clean technologies.

“This is my third VERDEXCHANGE Conference,” said the Chair of the California Air Resources Board Mary Nichols. “Each time I think it gets better because we’ve gone beyond generalizations about the importance of climate change and opportunities for the business community into really concrete discussions about areas where investments may be appropriate and ways in which government can do more to help promote opportunities and create jobs within California as well as nationally.”

The 26 expert panels focused on sharing the “game changing” impacts of new regulations and attitudes towards environmental sustainability, climate change and energy conservation efforts shaping the global, trillion dollar green marketplace.

During the event’s first panel Congressman Earl Blumenauer (Oregon) said, “I come to California for inspiration for what we are doing in Washington D.C.” He added that “government policy does in fact work and drive energy policy.”

The conference is a noteworthy occasion bringing together the financial professionals, politicians and the utilities important for increasing energy security and making a new economy, remarked Member of the German Parliament Hans-Joseph Fell.“It is important for all parts of the world to avoid rising oil prices and provide new jobs. When we make new policies like feed-in tariffs, capital will be invested. This conference is a good place for discussions like this,” said Fell.

Regarding a regional low-carbon economy, Los Angeles County Supervisor Mark Ridley-Thomas declared, “We’ve begun to see the long-term payback of green infrastructure. What’s good for the environment can be good for business.”

VERDEXCHANGE, in collaboration with strategic partners the Los Angeles Economic Development Corporation, Southern California Edison, AECOM, SoCalGas/Sempra Energy, PricewaterhouseCoopers, Craton Equities, and the consulates of Canada, German and Japan, once again hosted an unmatched opportunity to learn from and network with global, national, and subnational climate change leaders, elected officials, environmental stewards, investors, and financiers.

Participating speakers also included: Chair of the California Energy Commission Karen Douglas; Western Director of the National Resources Defense Council (NRDC) Felicia Marcus; Former Special Envoy of the Government of Japan for Climate Change Mutsuyoshi Nishimura; President of the California Public Utilities Commission Michael Peevey; President and CEO of Sustainable Development Technology Canada Vicky Sharpe. For the full list of speakers, visit: http://www.verdexchange.org/conference/speakers.

About VerdeXchange, LLC:
VerdeXchange, LLC is an environmental think tank and publisher created to inform and  strategically advise green innovators wishing to diffuse green technology and innovations in the marketplace. http://www.verdexchange.org