Summer 2008 Climate Alert
Climate Change & Food Security [ PDF ]
In this Newsletter:
Climate News
John Englander joins the Climate Institute Board of Advisors
A dynamic entrepreneur and expert in marine environmental organizations, John Englander has been a leader in ocean protection his entire adult life.
In 1974, he took over the struggling Underwater Explorers Society (“UNEXSO”) based in Freeport, Grand Bahamas and turned it into a pioneering institution that would become one of the world’s largest dive operations, operating a fleet of boats, a diversified instructional program, and one of the biggest retail dive stores in the world.
Englander also created the Dolphin Experience, an innovative close-encounter program that allowed for the first time divers and non-divers to interact with dolphins in the open ocean. He headed the diving industry’s non-profit environmental organization, Ocean Futures, and was shortly hired by Jacques-Yves Cousteau to become CEO of the Cousteau Society, where he served briefly until Cousteau’s death.
In addition to extensive experience throughout the Caribbean, he has led scuba expeditions to the High Arctic and Lake Baikal in Siberia. In 1992, he organized a voyage to dive many of Columbus’ alleged landfalls. He has had a key role setting up dive operations in the Caymans, Cozumel, the Yucatan, and the Turks and Caicos Islands.
Since 2004, he has been the CEO of the International Seakeepers Society, “an organization set up in 1998 by a small number of yacht owners to address deteriorating conditions of the seas. Their initial mission has been to develop a compact, automated and cost-effective ocean and atmospheric monitoring system to install aboard their yachts, providing data to scientists on the health of the world’s oceans. This Seakeeper 1000 is now deployed in more than 45 locations around the world, including yachts, cruise ships, ferry boats, buoys and piers.”
Puebla and Climate Institute Climate Awareness
and Education Efforts
The Mexican state of Puebla has positioned
itself at the forefront of climate
change protection. Its Governor, Mario
Marín Torres, has agreed to fund an Outreach
Centre and a Climate Theater in
Flor del Bosque, a State Nature Park in
the city of Puebla, that will serve as the
principal hub for environmental education
and climate protection activities in
Puebla.
The Outreach Centre will link to the Sir Crispin Tickell High
Altitude Global Climate Observation Centre – the world’s
highest Climate Observatory – to be built atop Sierra Negra,
an inactive volcano. Besides its value as a national rallying
point in the climate protection battle, the Tickell Observatory
will fill a crucial gap in the global change observing system.
Its location at a high altitude should make it a suitable site for
calibrating satellite measurements and developing more accurate
regional profiles of greenhouse emissions.
Governor Marín has asked the Climate Institute to maintain and operate the related High Altitude Global Climate Observatory Education and Outreach Centre, designed to enhance climate awareness efforts and provide information on how the public can respond to climate change.
Ernie Stevens’ Involvement for Climate Protection in
Tribal Lands
The Seventh Tribal College Forum held in Haskell Indian
Nations University, Lawrence, KS (August 12-14) was a key
opportunity to welcome a great variety
of speakers from different horizons and
learn from their wisdom, experience and
perspective on climate change. Among
them was Ernie Stevens, Jr., Chairman of
the National Indian Gaming Association
(NIGA) the most significant single group
in philanthropy in the Native American
Community.
An alumnus
of Haskell Indian Nations University,
Stevens directed his first words
to Dan Wildcat, co-convenor of the
Tribal College Forum and a member
of the Climate Institute’s Board of
Advisors, to express his gratitude for
being invited
as a speaker.
He later
announced his intention to approach
the 184 tribes that are members of
NIGA to provide significant support for
the Tribal College Climate Leadership
effort and related activity, and his commitment
to create a Committee on Climate
and Clean Energy. The committee
chairmanship is shared by Dr. Daniel
Wildcat, Director of Haskell Environmental Research Studies
Center, and Dr. Henrietta Mann, Emeritus Chair in Native
American Studies at Montana State University. A significant
component of this support will potentially involve scholarships
or fellowships for young Native American Climate Leaders to
perform research or develop policy experience.
Tom Casten and John Noel
Move Energy Recycling onto
US Agenda
Two Climate Institute Board
members- Thomas R. Casten,
Chairman of Recycled Energy
Development, and John H. Noel,
Chair of the Southern Alliance
for Clean Energy- have played
a pivotal role in moving energy
recycling (also called cogeneration)
front and center in North
American energy discussions. In late December 2007 they
briefed Tennessee Governor Phil Bredesen and top officials
of the Tennessee Valley Authority (TVA) on the potential
for simultaneous large-scale reductions in greenhouse gases
and air pollutants that could be realized by removing barriers
to cogeneration, all while also achieving huge savings to
industries and consumers. Casten has projected the potential
savings in the US to be as much as $70 billion annually while
also achieving about a 20% reduction in US carbon dioxide
emissions.
Tennessee and TVA both decided to embark on a pioneering effort to promote energy recycling. The Tennessee Legislature enacted legislation signed by the Governor fast tracking permit approvals for TVA energy recycling facilities in the State. TVA has begun preparing a Clean Energy Standard Offer Program (CESOP) under which the multistate utility would calculate cost of new facilities, looking at generation and transmission costs, and provide long range contracts to qualified industrial energy recyclers or other clean energy providers that could come in well below those cost estimates.
Governor Bredesen also created a Task Force on Energy Policy charged with making Tennessee a leader in clean energy. John Noel has been a driving force behind this effort that seeks to remove barriers to clean energy and have the State Government become a leader in clean vehicles, fuels and buildings.
Meanwhile, Noel, after being titled Conservationist of the Year in 2007 by the Daughters of the American Revolution (DAR) for his work in saving a several hundred year old stand of white oaks in Hickman County, Tennessee, received additional recognition this past May when the Bon Aqua Woods, where these white oaks still flourish, were named the John H. Noel State Nature Area.
At the same time, Casten has begun to receive recognition in national news media for his remarkable blend of business savvy and policy advocacy. Articles, “Waste Not” in the May 2008 Atlantic, and “Gray is the New Green” in the September 15 Forbes, describe Casten’s work and his message. It’s a message that is apparently also having an imprint in North America outside the US. Like TVA, the Province of Ontario is considering using a CESOP. Concurrently, Luis Roberto Acosta, who leads Climate Institute Programs in Mexico and Latin America, drew an enthusiastic response in his May 2008 speech to the US/Mexico Chamber of Commerce calling for energy recycling to move to the top of the energy policy agenda in both Mexico and the US.
Other Articles in this Newsletter:
Climate Change & Food Security
A Message from the President: Fishes, Loaves and Foresight
The Challenges of Producing Food on a Warming Planet
Reducing Our Food's Impact on Climate Change
Focus: Moving Down the Food Chain
Case Study: Agriculture in Thailand
The Biofuel Debate: Food vs. Energy?