Tag Archives: environment

The conservative confusion

by

0

I am conservative. But I am not a Republican. Why? Because a large faction of today’s GOP is desperately confused about what being conservative really means.

What does being “conservative” mean?

In fact, much of the United States seems confused about what it means to be “conservative.” The confusion is understandable, but the result is a frightening Orwellian conflation and dramatic oversimplification of rhetoric that seriously compromises the integrity of our political system.

Most presume that being conservative means being Republican. Likewise it’s often presumed being an environmentalist means being “liberal” and thus a Democrat. But these presumptions are erroneous and egregious.

Not all conservatives are Republican, and certainly not all Republicans are conservative. The religious fundamentalist, anti-environment, anti-gay, anti-science, anti-women, anti-healthcare agendas of much of today’s radical Republican Party are actually hyper-liberal in some important ways.

On the other hand, the secular, pro-environment, pro-gay, pro-science, pro-women, pro-healthcare platforms of many Democrats are ultimately rather conservative.

Being conservative, in a pure sense, means believing in conservation on two main fronts: 1) the conservation of individual liberties and self-determination and 2) the conservation of natural, human, and financial resources. The former amounts to protecting individual freedoms from government overreach—i.e. small government—while the latter pertains to minimizing the financial, environmental, human health, and international risks we take as a society.

It’s also important to mention that being conservative also means being in favor of free markets in a relative sense—but this idea is ultimately subsumed by the principle of conserving resources. And it’s only in a relative sense because no one takes the idea of an absolutely free market seriously anymore. Social Security, Medicare, Medicaid, the Anti-Trust Act, worker’s rights, emergency services like Police and Fire Departments, the Military, and the regulation of the financial industry are staples of our prosperous modern society—and are, in principle, socialist institutions. But no one questions their importance or goodness anymore.

Being in favor of “free markets” really means being in favor of efficiency—which in essence means conserving resources. The laws of supply and demand that govern “the free market” naturally produce efficient outcomes, otherwise known as the equilibrium price at which sellers should sell their goods and buyers should buy them. Prices represent real resources, so buying and selling goods at market equilibrium means conserving resources. Clearly this is conservative—but it’s not necessarily Republican.

The idea that free markets will produce efficient outcomes assumes that prices represent true cost, but we know that in many instances today this isn’t the case. Costs to the nonhuman environment and human psychology are often omitted from pricing schemes, as are costs to future generations and distant populations. True cost is also often obfuscated by government subsidization.

Fossil fuels, for example, would be vastly more expensive if costs to future generations, costs to the nonhuman environment, and costs to distant populations were taken into account when determining price—and government subsidies help keep the wool pulled over our eyes by further reducing the direct costs of fossil fuels for consumers. If the price of fossil fuels represented true cost, renewables would be far more competitive than they are, and in turn we’d be consuming far fewer fossil fuels to sustain our energy-intensive way of life. In other words, we’d be conserving more of our fossil fuel resources and conserving environmental quality. Insofar as Republicans support the continued subsidization of fossil fuels, they are certainly not being conservative about the conservation of resources or the environment. It takes a profound level of cognitive dissonance or hypocrisy to call oneself “conservative” and then simultaneously support federal subsidies for one of the most profitable industries in human history. Democrats who support subsidizing fossil fuels aren’t being conservative either, but Democrats generally don’t campaign on conservative rhetoric.

Hyper-liberal Republicans

Somehow, baffling as it may be, Republicans today have convinced the country that being reckless with the environment, opposing women’s and gay rights for religious reasons, taking enormous financial risks (e.g.—paying for wars with credit, forcing a federal budgetary shutdown, deregulating the financial industry, etc.), cutting funding for scientific research while increasing the government’s regulation of scientists, and precluding the provision of health insurance for a huge segment of the workforce are conservative ideas. They couldn’t be more wrong.

Being “conservative” in its historical and etymological sense is more akin to being precautionary or risk-averse about whatever issue is at hand, e.g. – the limitation of individual freedoms by the government, environmental quality and protection, technoscientific progress, etc., than it is to being Republican. In fact, many of today’s Republicans are actually hyper-liberal when it comes to some important issues.

Environmental conservation is conservative

Environmental conservation is a fundamentally conservative agenda. Being conservative about the environment means conserving natural resources and minimizing the environmental risks we take as a society by taking precautionary measures. Preserving biodiversity and natural land conditions makes ecosystems more resilient to changes in the environment—e.g. climate change—which transitively makes human civilizations that are part of those ecosystems also more resilient. Environmental protection is both conservative and in our best interest insofar as conserving environmental quality is both good for us and good in itself.

Sustainability, renewable energy resources, and wilderness conservation are all fundamentally conservative positions in that they conserve natural resources and the state of the natural world. Despite the fact that the EPA and several hallmark environmental statues were passed by Republicans, environmental protection couldn’t be further from most Republican platforms today. The problem is that many of today’s Republicans talk as if being pro-environment is synonymous with being anti-business or anti-economy.

In reality, even command-and-control environmental regulation incentivizes innovation and ultimately conserves the very natural resources upon which business builds itself. Without natural resources, business would have nothing to work from. Moreover, the need today for environmental limitations on corporate freedom (i.e.—environmental rights) is just as obvious as was the need for labor rights during the Gilded Age and early 20th century. Certain human and environmental abuses and exploitations by unregulated industry are simply unacceptable by any modern standard of justice.

Opposing women’s and gay rights is not conservative

Republicans generally oppose same-sex marriage and abortion rights for religious reasons. But while these oppositions may be traditional, they certainly aren’t conservative. Setting aside the fact that legislating religious values is illegal and unconstitutional in this country, regulating away people’s freedoms—whether that be the freedom to marry who you love regardless of gender or the freedom to control your own reproduction—is big government by definition.

When it comes to issues as private as what happens in our bedrooms and within our uteri, Republicans today actually advocate flagrant government invasions of personal privacy and freedom—and think they can get away with calling themselves “conservative.” In fact, they’re just the opposite. Whether for religious or secular reasons, the limitation of individual liberty by the government is a liberal agenda.

Religious dogma aside—when it comes to abortion rights, being conservative actually means conserving women’s rights to control their own bodies, putting self-determination over and above the government’s right to dictate women’s lives. Abortion is taking a life (if life doesn’t begin at conception, then when?)—but it should be legal and it should be rare.

Likewise, same-sex marriage is actually both conservative and traditional. It may not be part of the Christian tradition, but Christianity is not the only relevant tradition pertaining to marriage. Legalizing same-sex marriage means conserving and protecting the rights of all citizens to deviate from heteronormative sexuality from big government. Moreover, same-sex marriages represent monogamy—a traditional conservative value. Banning same-sex marriage, on the other hand, as many Republicans have sought and some succeeded, is an obvious big government move.

Health insurance is conservative

While the Affordable Care Act may create a government mandate, its purpose is ultimately a conservative one. Insurance is a fundamentally precautionary endeavor. Insofar as being conservative means being precautionary about risks—human health and economic alike—taking public action to protect the health of our citizens and thus our workforce works on both fronts. At the end of the day, national health insurance means safeguarding both the health of our citizens and the strength of our economy (considering how much labor is lost to otherwise treatable illness).

Moreover, the argument that we “shouldn’t have to pay for someone else’s healthcare” doesn’t hold water. By buying into any insurance plan—public or private—we are, by definition, paying the bills of our provider’s other patrons whenever we aren’t using our insurance. What’s more, hospitals are already legally required to treat emergency room patients regardless of their financial status, and when those who can’t pay receive treatment, the costs are distributed to the rest of us. If anything, we’ll conserve both human health and economic resources by making sure that everyone has health insurance. Health insurance is conservative. And let’s not forget that we are all legally obligated to have car insurance and no one thinks that’s a bad thing.

Being anti-science, anti-education is not conservative

Finally—and I talked about this at some length in Congress’ assault on knowledge—if being conservative means reducing financial risks, then it’s also safe to say that being conservative about how we invest our nation’s money should mean making safe investments. In contrast, the anti-science anti-education positions personified by climate science-denying, NSF-defunding zealots like James Inhofe and Lamar Smith are polar opposites of safe-investment logic.

Scientific research and public education are among the safest investments society can make. The benefits of an educated workforce are clear. Educated workers are likely to be more efficient, more innovative, more industrious, more entrepreneurial, and more promotable. Likewise, the returns on investment in scientific research are often immeasurable and unforeseeable. Scientific progress is piecemeal, serendipitous, experimental, and unpredictable. While scientific progress can be twisted to serve evil purposes, the positive social gains of scientific R&D are all too obvious. Yet Republicans today seem bent on imposing dramatic cuts to science and education funding, while simultaneously increasing regulatory strictures on scientists and educators; the Inhofe-Smith agenda smacks of big government and flies in the face of safe-investment logic.

Reclaiming conservativism

Many Republicans today are not conservative. In many cases, the Republican Party seems to be a strange blend of hyper-liberal value-driven anti-science religious fundamentalism (“let’s legislate away women’s and gay rights, defund and over-regulate the NSF, and deny the simple physics of climate science!”) and radical xenophobic neoliberal anti-environment social Darwinism (“let’s disenfranchise the poor, minorities, and immigrants—who cares if they get sick?—and do away with as many environmental protections as possible!”). In no way are these conservative positions. And in no way should many of today’s Republicans be allowed to call themselves conservative. If anything, the secular, pro-environment, pro-gay, pro-women, pro-healthcare, pro-science politicians out there should reclaim the word “conservative” for true conservatives and true conservativism. Let’s get it together, humans.

Our new hydroverlords

by

2

The image below is one of four precipitation models published by the National Center for Atmospheric Research (NCAR) that together forecast extreme global drought less than 50 years from now as a consequence of climate change. What follows illustrates predicted global precipitation levels in 2060-2069 assuming a moderate greenhouse gas emissions scenario as defined by the International Panel on Climate Change. Moderate.

Climate prediction map 2060-2069

Precipitation Model with Climate Change: 2060-2069

Take a moment to let all the purple, red, and yellow sink in. These are Dust Bowl conditions and worse. Take another moment.

It is difficult to emphasize enough the gravity of this predicted drought. We should all keep the above image in mind when we consider the value of water. Water is fundamental to the existence of life as we know it. Not just human beings. All life on Earth. For obvious utilitarian and deontological reasons, by the land ethic and the difference principle, by the precautionary and proactionary principles, and by our natural moral sense, water is of the highest non-arbitrary value and it is our responsibility as constituents of the human world and of the Earth itself—if we even entertain such a distinction—to do everything in our power to prevent and prepare for this possibility.

Pause to consider what it would mean for governance, for geopolitics, for the world if we fail to curb climate change beyond this moderate GHG emissions path and simultaneously 1) fail to implement and enforce the universal human right to water as recognized by 122 countries of the UN in 2010, and/or 2) consent to the privatization of water resources by multi-national corporations. I, for one, would not welcome our new hydroverlords.

What’s worse, the map shown above is only the third of four models. The fourth model extends from 2090-2099. Brace yourself for the purple: Precipitation Model with Climate Change: 2090-2099

Water resource management, conservation, and preservation will likely fall into their own compartmentalized regime complexes—as discussed by Keohane and Victor—fragmented from other initiatives focused on mitigating and adapting to the various impacts of climate change. According to Keohane and Victor, there’s reason to be optimistic about the capacities of this regime structure. But simply adapting to new conditions of water scarcity equates to treating the symptom rather than the disease. While adaptation is absolutely necessary, we must simultaneously confront climate change at its source: human greenhouse gas emissions (carbon dioxide, methane, nitrous oxide, etc.) and the several positive feedback cycles that global warming entails.

Atmospheric carbon dioxide concentrations alone are currently around 397 parts per million (ppm), which essentially guarantees an increase in average global temperatures of ~4 degrees Fahrenheit (~2 degrees Celsius). What’s more, unless we reduce GHG emissions by ~80%, we can expect the increase in average global temperature to be even more dramatic.

Confronting climate change means one of two things (and maybe both, but probably not—the former would render the latter largely unnecessary and the latter would likely preclude the former). We must reduce greenhouse gas emissions through 1) an immediate significant reduction in energy consumption or 2) a techno-scientific revolution in renewable energy, energy storage, energy transmission, transportation, agriculture, infrastructure, manufacturing, and architecture.

Coupling either approach with reforestation and afforestation projects would be a good idea too, especially considering the Brazilian government’s recent report that deforestation in the Amazon has actually gotten worse since May of 2012.

In all likelihood, the future holds an increase in energy consumption, not a decrease, so we must—at some level—prepare ourselves to rely on faith in Julian Simon’s infinite resource of the human mind to spark the large-scale techno-scientific advances that the climatic consequences of our industrial behavior demand. We must have faith in progress, despite the paradox therein. A daunting task, to be sure, but we have little choice as we have collectively agreed, both implicitly and explicitly, that the Good Life is an energy intensive one. The climate challenge is upon us. If we are to progress, we must progress toward sustainability—and hopefully to a future with more water than NCAR has predicted. Let’s get it together, humans.

jmk

Texas is doing it right

by

1

If the modern idea of the Good Life is an energy intensive one, life in Texas is the best. Environmental protection and enforcement can be spotty at the state regulatory level, but there’s no denying that Texas is paradisical for developing energy. Oil and natural gas are obvious heavyweights. Texas is a national leader in wind energy development, and has its fair share of jobs in coal, employing just over 2,200 in 2006. Most exciting of all, Texas is 8th in the country for solar power.

Our relationship with the Sun is a special one. It is also an opportunity. Whether in fossil form, biomass, or direct from the source, the Sun enables but does not dictate the purposes we create that make life worth living. Clearly Texas understands this.

Eventually, solar will overtake fossils fuels as they become more expensive to extract–whether by regulation, scarcity, or inaccessibility–answering not only the energy enthusiast’s call, but also the environmentalist’s. While the precautionary and proactionary principles seem dogmatically opposed at a theoretical level, being proactionary about solar and precautionary about the environment go hand in hand. The same resonates about wind power. But the wind only blows because the sun heats the air.

To the sun god!

jmk

The ethics of Ambient Persuasive Technology and the idea of environmental policy

by

3

A friend and colleague from Bard CEP, Taylor Evans, and I were brainstorming the thesis topic of another BCEP’er, Tim Maher, and we came to a point of contention that demanded a new distinction. Tim’s thesis explores the ethics of Ambient Persuasive Technology (AmPT). AmPT uses “smart” technology to subliminally influence human beings to behave in certain ways that address one problem or another. Essentially, in an ideal world, AmPT manipulates the parameters of the choices immediately available to us so that we have no choice but to make morally desirable choices. Clearly, handing such immense power to technology is morally questionable. If everything goes perfectly, we solve our problems without even realizing it. But if things go poorly, techno-paternalism could spiral into hyper-modern Orwellian totalitarianism.

Naturally, given our common interests, Taylor and I were discussing AmPT in the context of environmental policy. Theoretically, AmPT could be used to improve environmental problems, but it could also represent a paternalistic imposition of environmental values on society–eco-authoritarianism. The difference is a matter of ethics—a matter of how AmPT should be regulated. But therein laid the difficulty. Before we could discuss how AmPT should be regulated, we needed to figure out exactly how the ethics of AmPT connect to the idea of environmental policy. We needed to divulge the relationship between principle and policy. To accomplish that, we needed a new distinction within the meaning of “environmental policy.”

The ethics of Ambient Persuasive Technology entail a new theoretical take on the meaning of “environmental policy.” Environmental policy in the typical sense means public policy that compels people to act differently toward the environment—meaning the atmosphere, land, hydrosphere, and all the life therein—whereas “environmental policy” in the ethics of AmPT means public policy pertaining to the environment’s capacity to compel people. But it’s more than that. The values of the designers of AmPT are inherently embedded in the design of the technology itself. AmPT is the environment manipulating people, but ultimately it is people manipulating the environment—the very space we regularly and immediately occupy—that then manipulates people. Not only do we hand over tremendous amounts of autonomy to technology, the technology itself is value-latent. But the ethics of AmPT also connect to the idea of environmental policy in another more specific sense through the how the technology is applied.

Specifically, AmPT can be used to employ the environment to compel people to act different toward the environment. AmPT, in that sense, realigns itself with the typical mission of environmental policy. Hence Taylor and my (and presumably Tim’s as well—we have to wait for the verdict of his thesis) concern.

The ethics of AmPT and its two senses of connection to “environmental policy” involve the implicit distinction between the built environment and the natural environment. For philosophical reasons, the distinction between the built and natural environment ultimately dissolves—humans and our cities are no less natural than bees and their hives. But in practical terms, the ethics of AmPT in the environmental policy context specifically involve people using the “built environment” to influence the human impact on the “natural environment.”

The ethics of AmPT connect to the idea of environmental policy in several important ways. The regulation of AmPT involves regulating the human influence on the environment and regulating the environment’s influence on humans. But ultimately it entails regulating the human capacity to influence the environment’s capacity to influence other humans. But how AmPT should be regulated is a much deeper question. AmPT, like all technology, carries as much opportunity for progress as for catastrophe. Luckily, Tim is on that for us.

EDIT: The “eco-authoritarian concern” is purely theoretical–I only specify “eco” authoritarianism because of the environmental policy context. Eco-authoritarianism is probably the last kind of authoritarianism we need to be worried about if we assume that AmPT will actually be ubiquitous.

Sloperators

by

0

I think it’s fair to say that the adverse environmental impacts of fossil fuel development, while in some cases are inherent (e.g. – you can’t do mountain top removal coal mining without removing the top of a mountain), ultimately depend on the care exercised by particular operators — and, even more so, the individuals who manage their operations. Though sometimes it’s tempting, we shouldn’t castigate entire industries because of the conduct of a few. Some operators voluntarily dedicate extensive resources to ensure the progressive responsibility of their activities, such as partners in EPA’s Natural Gas STAR program. That being said, some operators are sloppier than others — sloperators.

In the wake of BP’s spill in the Gulf of Mexico, reminiscent of Prince Edward Sound, some may have found the Obama Administration’s decision to open the Arctic for oil exploration a bit hasty — though the President did promise an “all of the above” energy policy. No less, however, Shell, in an almost immediate blunder, managed to beach a tanker full of diesel on the Alaskan coast, releasing hundreds of gallons of fuel into the sensitive and protected wildlife habitat — a real sloperation. Chevron’s recent attempt at dodging the court-ordered, $19 billion settlement to remediate the Ecuadorian Amazon after spilling billions of gallons of toxic waste between 1964 and 1992 also comes to mind — earning ChevTex a place amongst presently mentioned sloperators. What’s more, just today, two barges full of light crude and a tugboat (owned by Third Coast Towing and Nature’s Way Marine, respectively) crashed into a bridge on the Mississippi River, spilling a yet unknown amount of oil into the waterway. Another sloperation.

One only hopes that, whatever the Obama Administration decides on Keystone XL, TransCanada will operate with the utmost care. Whether the Canadian tar sands end up in American or Chinese refineries, power plants, and fuel tanks, TransCanada must be aware that slop is unacceptable.

While the continued human reliance on fossil fuels is regrettable, it is also somewhat inevitable, at least for the time being, if we intend to quickly raise billions out of poverty while sustaining our own standard of living. The least we can do is proceed with accountability. In the meantime, small scale sustainable development projects will burn the candle at the other end, promising modern alternatives to utility-scale, fossil fuel driven electrical grids. Let’s get it together, humans.

jmk

A letter to the Denton City Council

by

0

Denton is knee deep in revising its natural gas drilling ordinance. A draft of the revised ordinance was released for public comments on October 2, and I thought y’all might like to read the comment I submitted — it should give you a good picture of what it’s like on the ground down here.

———————————–

To the Denton City Council:

My name is Jordan Michael Kincaid. I live on S. Carroll Blvd in Denton, TX.

I have two comments regarding the draft of Denton’s natural gas drilling ordinance released on October 2, 2012.

1) Please extend the public comment period on this draft of the gas drilling ordinance. This is an extremely dense document. It takes far longer than 11 days to properly understand its intricacies. This is especially true for non-expert citizens. Public comment periods should last at least eight weeks so that each draft of the ordinance released can be fully assessed by the public, and so that the public can return constructive, informed comments to the Council. As it stands, extending public comment periods would require a revision of the current timeline for rewriting the ordinance, as well as an extension of the moratorium, but these actions are in the City’s best interest. Longer public comment periods would mean more informed and more useful comments. Additionally, the draft released on October 2 was only released in English. 20% of Denton speaks a primary language other than English; releasing the current draft only in English disenfranchises 20% of the Denton population. The public comment period should be extended and the draft should be released in both English and Spanish. Thirdly, the first attempt on October 2 to release the current draft of the ordinance was botched — the first release had indistinguishable MS Word Track Changes embedded in the text, meaning that old language was sitting jumbled amongst new language, making the document impossible to decipher. This problem was not remedied until October 3, thus effectively eliminating one of the already too few days for public comments. Because the first release of the current draft was botched, the public comment period should be extended. The three arguments in bold-face text above are why I believe the public comment period should be extended. I also believe that the draft should be released in both English and Spanish. This is especially true given the insufficient provisions of the current draft ordinance, which brings me to my second point:

2) The current draft does not accurately reflect the recommendations of the Task Force, nor does it reflect recommendations of the Task Force Minority Report, the EPA Natural Gas STAR program, or the Denton Stakeholder Drilling Advisory Group (DAG). The draft released on October 2 is insufficient to protect public health and safety. I will include 5 specific cases of insufficiency below:

a) Vapor Recovery Units (VRU). The Task Force and the DAG recommended that VRUs be installed at each gas well, but the draft ordinance currently exempts wells emitting up to 137 lbs of VOCs per day, as well as similar numbers for other pollutants including methane. This exemption compromises air quality, public health, and will exacerbate climate change.

b) Venting and flaring. The DAG and the Task Force recommended that venting and flaring be prohibited, but the draft ordinance only reasserts state regulations, which permit venting and flaring during all production activities and up to 10 days after production is complete. Denton’s drilling ordinance must prohibit venting and flaring in the city to protect air quality, public health, and to reduce greenhouse gas emissions.

c) Compressor stations. The DAG recommended banning compressor stations from the City and the Task Force recommended regulating them, but the draft ordinance contains no new provisions banning or regulating compressor stations.

d) Private water well testing. The Task Force and the DAG recommended that operators submit results of private water well testing to the City, but the draft ordinance doesn’t require operators to test private water wells or to report the results. This compromises water quality and public health.

e) Closed-loop systems. To avoid the environmental and public health hazards of open waste pits, the DAG recommended that the City ban open pits and require operators to use closed-loop systems when producing natural gas. The Task Force also recommended the use of closed-loop systems. Despite these recommendations, the draft ordinance allows for several kinds of open pits, and stipulates only a “close-loop mud system.” This provision is insufficient to protect public health and the environment from the hazards of production waste.

In sum, I submit to the Council two requests for reasons explained above and summarized below:
1) Please extend the public comment period to 8 weeks and release the draft in both English and Spanish.
2) Please revise the gas drilling ordinance so that it reflects the recommendations of the City appointed Task Force, the citizen-lead Denton Stakeholder Drilling Advisory Group, the Task Force Minority Report, and the EPA Natural Gas STAR Program.

Sincerely,
Jordan Michael Kincaid

If Occam were an environmentalist…

by

0

We’ve all heard Occam’s old adage that the simplest explanation is probably best. Well, extrapolate that logic to problem solving, and you get something like the simplest solution is probably best. In January 2012, we graduate students at Bard CEP explored an easy and promising new treatment for a variety of environmental woes. In a hyphenated word: Bio-char.

Short for “biological charcoal,” bio-char can be added to soil to improve crop productivity, reduce expensive, eutrophication-causing fertilizer run-off, mitigate the effects of flooding or drought, and serve as a climate stabilization wedge by sequestering carbon that would otherwise find its way up to the atmosphere. Together, these benefits make bio-char an incredibly simple way to help mitigate several of humanity’s looming environmental concerns. Yet as of now it is relatively unknown and almost completely unregulated.

Bio-char is a carbon-rich material made by burning plant matter in a low oxygen environment, a process called pyrolysis. “Pyrolysis” may sound high-tech, but in reality everyone could do this at home with two, preferably clean, 1-gallon paint cans and an empty economy-size can of tomatoes. I won’t explain exactly how all that’s done here, but look up Hugh McLaughlin (Alterna Biocarbon’s bio-char guru) and the 1-G Toucan TLUD (Top-lit Updraft) pyrolysis unit if you’re interested.

The product is a dark, crumbly substance that looks like the end of a campfire. Crush it up, charge it with nutrients using compost or fertilizer, and mix it into the dirt. You will have officially improved the quality of your soil and sequestered carbon for thousands of years to come. We know this because ancient Amazonians did something similar to maintain their agriculture with what’s called terra preta, and the carbon they put in the ground is still there.

Now, when I say bio-char is good for agriculture, I mean it in two ways. The absorbent properties of bio-char can help farms save money on fertilizer and irrigation, while simultaneously producing bigger yields of larger crops. My colleagues and I recently paid a visit to the Small Farms Institute in Massachusetts where they’re doing some practical experimentation – they were pretty excited about some organic tomatoes they’d grown. Because of bio-char’s active molecular structure, it grabs onto nutrients and moisture and, like a battery, saves them for plants for when they really need it. This means that less water and fertilizer escape as run-off, saving farmers money and water from pollution (non-point source pollution, which the Clean Water Act has trouble controlling anyway).

So bio-char would be good for drought stricken, nutrient deficient regions like the southwest United States today because it keeps moisture in the ground. And, the same molecular structure that can absorb water and nutrients is very porous, which can make flood-prone areas drain faster, while simultaneously providing homes for nitrogen fixing microbes that help make soil fertile. These same principles could be applied to make people’s yards and gardens more water efficient, saving money on home watering costs.

Bio-char could also be of great value as carbon emissions offsets should the United States create a national carbon market and the bio-char community create a protocol for crediting offsets. In the same way it could be a powerful source of carbon offsets for states participating in the Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative (RGGI), the first voluntary market-based regulatory greenhouse gas emissions reduction program in the US. In the meantime, any businesses looking to reduce their carbon footprint and improve their public image could use bio-char for sequestration projects. Not to mention the fact that making bio-char from renewable organic waste streams like down tree limbs and yard trimmings means less space taken up in landfills, and fewer greenhouse gases getting to the atmosphere via decomposition.

Bio-char presents an opportunity to do something simple, cheap, and effective. It could be Occam’s environmental panacea. Of course, anything taken to an extreme can yield unintended consequences, but bio-char is fairly straightforward, and if used in moderation could be very worthwhile. Let’s get it together humans.

JM Kincaid