Super Bowl Sunday is just days away, and the NFL is attempting to make up for the approximately 500 tons of carbon dioxide the event produces by planting 3,000 red mangrove trees in Miami. The effort began in August and will continue through May. Now, i'm all about planting trees, but this idea seems a bit too superficial. Trees take in only 1/25 of the amount of carbon emitted by fossil fuels, and every tree that is cut down or killed releases all the CO2 it has gathered back into the atmosphere. But what would the Super Bowl be without all the glamour and grandiosity that define it? Could the two "best" teams (unfortunately the true best team lost to the Colts last weekend...) in the league just play a game, without the NFL experience Super Bowl theme park and the massive generators required to power all of it? This may be a touchy subject, mixing football and environmental babble, but it's nice to see that the NFL is making some sort of effort to combat the damage they've already done. Unfortunately, we're past the point in time when planting trees can control the massive amounts of greenhouse gas that we continue to produce. Perhaps a future half time show will revolve around windmills. Just think-- dancers waving flags around windmills, which simultaneously provide the power to light up the field. It's a little out there, but thats where we're eventually headed!

The NFL's environmental plan also includes buying renewable energy certificates from a company called Sterling Planet. The company creates these certificates by recording the amount of electricity generated by alternative fuels rather than fossil fuels, and business in turn can directly purchase renewable power, or pay for the certificate and continue using traditional energy sources. So the NFL is essentially investing money in alternative power, yet utilizing traditional, CO2 emitting energy at the same time. Again, I praise them for environmental awareness... if anyone can afford to buy off the atmospheric damage they cause, I guess the NFL fits the bill.

Kudos to the Sports industry for making the environment a priority. The World Cup in Germany, the Torino Olympics, and the IndyCar series all have made profound efforts to amend the situation, with organizers of the 2006 Torino Olympics claiming to have offset nearly 70% of the greenhouse gas emissions they produced.

The State of our Union is.... getting greener??

President Bush focused significantly more on energy issues in last night's State of the Union address than in prior years, and we can only hope that the initiatives won't end up in the pile of empty promises that seems to accumulate each year. The President called for measures to wean the country off of foreign oil sources through the use of alternative fuel (mainly ethanol), proposing that we reach 35 billion gallons of alternative fuel per year by 2017, and reduce greenhouse gas emissions by 18% within the year 2012. Along this vein, President Bush also expressed the need to "reform and modernize fuel economy standards for cars," projecting to conserve 8.5 billion more gallons of gas by 2017. Additionally, the President proposed a plan to double the size of the country's Strategic Petroleum Reserve in order to maintain a normal energy level until fuel production changes are carried out.

The environmental focus pleased many progressives, yet many continue to question the feasibility of the plan. Ethanol is in some ways the solution we've been waiting for, but to reach the 35 billion gallon mark would require more corn than the country's entire yield last year, which was 11.1 billion bushels. Hopefully we can supplant that portion with some big advances in cellulosic ethanol (made from woodchips and grass), although the cellulosic technology must undergo significant progress in order to turn a profit, and will require several million more acres of farmland.

President Bush made a somewhat vague reference to the whole global warming issue, avoiding the problems posed by electric power plants, which make up a hefty 40% of greenhouse emissions. Furthermore, liquified coal is likely one of the alternative fuels on Bush's list, which would totally defeat the emission-reduction plan-- liquified coal creates twice the harmful gasses as it's gasoline counterpart. On the whole, the country may be on the way to curbing our oil addiction and gaining indepedence from foreign sources, but it will probably take a few more speeches before we stabilize the State of the Ozone.

Investing more energy in alternative energy

This freakishly warm winter and sky high gas prices are just two of the many dark omens of what's in store if we continue at this rate and manner of consumption. We are certainly not simplifying life, with the constant influx of new gadgets-- I have a hard time finding enough outlets in my apartment for all my "necessities," and the perimeter of my room is a mess of wires and cords.
Environmental activists have been pushing for widespread alternative energy use, and politicians and big businesses are finally gathering behind the effort as well. 25x'25 is an iniative headed by a variety of people across the country with widespread interests, including business, farming, forestry, and environment. The coalition is backed by a bipartisan group of senators and representatives in Washington, and the goal is for the country to consume 25% of total energy from renewable sources by the year 2025. Considering that roughly 6% of total energy consumed in 2004 was renewable, the initiative will require a large commitment.
The Des Moines Register published a story about an eight home neighborhood thats spreads across 16 square miles in Decorah, Iowa, which is ahead of the pack. This "off the grid" neighborhood relies solely on renewable energy, mainly using solar and wind power and heating with wood burning stoves. The families manage to live in relative luxury, but are much more aware of the amount of energy they consume-- something that we should all pay more attention to. The initial investment in solar and wind equipment for one house is in the range of $10,000 to $15,000. It's a hefty addition to the already pricey house-building process, but monthly utility fees over the course of 20-30 years would easily amount to a similar value.
This might be quite feasible for new developments in sparsely populated midwest areas, but what sort of urban counterpart exists? Where might we find space in Manhattan for wind powered water pumps, enough to support all the buildings packed onto each block? The age of sole reliance on alternative energy may be eons away, but we are turning a new corner government and big business commitments to renewable energy.