Just a short video to share some of the sights and sounds from the Green Living Show in Toronto last weekend. I think it is now officially trendy to ‘be green’, and I can’t think of a better trend to jump on the bandwagon with.

While at the Green Living Show in Toronto I had a chance to catch up with Koy Thomson from the UK, who is the Chief Executive of the London Cycling Campaign. He came to meet with a variety of representatives from different cities around the world at a Bike Summit Meeting to share ideas on urban cycling infrastructure and to discuss methods for turning these ideas in to reality. The interview below is about 8 minutes long, and I apologize for the poor audio quality, the ambient noise at the convention was really strong!! Koy had some interesting things to say, so it is certainly worth a listen.

First off I have to say that I think Mr. Kennedy’s speech should have been the one that cost $200, not Clintons; I think considering the fact that Kennedy received a standing ovation and Clinton didn’t was testament to that. Both are doing amazing things for the environment, but Kennedy spoke with certain passion that I really took to.  Below will be my best regurgitation of his speech which was packed with details and facts and stats. One of the key reasons I can relate and respect Mr. Kennedy so much is his honesty about his connection to the wilderness. He states that Nature is not God, but that God communicates through Nature most clearly and powerfully, which is why all the great prophets went out in to the wilderness to allow the great teachings of the ages to come to them.

Near the beginning he remarked that he though of the US as a 14th province of Canada, a nice compliment to us Canadians; and that we must protect nature because it is the very infrastructure of community. He jumped in to the references to Kyoto, much like Clinton did, but made an interesting comparison to the Slave Trade Act. In Great Britain it made up 25% of the economy; they new it was immoral to continue with slavery but were scared to abolish it overnight as it would ruin the economy. When they did abolish it in 1807, there was an economical explosion, the slave trade was holding Britain back, and what followed was the launch of the industrial revolution. In more recent times, such as the 70’s, Iceland was one of the poorest nations, but they were one of the first to recognize the detriment of importing energy, so they kicked the habit, switch over to sustainable methods, and are now 100% sustainably energy independent. In ’96, Sweden was one of the poorest Nations, but moved to abolish carbon emmisions, which spurred entrepreneurs to come up with new solutions which boosted their economic standing to #6 in the world based on GDP. As Kennedy proclaimed “they reward efficiency and punish inefficiency while in North America we do just the opposite.”

The solutions are here, he claimed that the US has enough sunlight and wind to power the country easily, but it is tough to make prompt changes when the worst environmental government in history is in power. Kennedy went in to detailed account of just how corrupt the Bush government has been, and the key factor in this downfall has been the relationship of corporations with Government decisions. Thin Democracy as described by Frances Moore Lappe. As Jim Hightower stated “The corporations don’t have to lobby the government any more. They are the government.”   Corporations have a corosive impact if entangled with government interests. An example Kennedy used was that of the fishing license he takes out every year, and it now comes with a thick guide listing all the places that are illegal to fish in because of high levels of mercury in the fish, and so he thought to himself  “that son of a bitch George Bush”. Others in that situation, he went on to say, don’t seem to make the connection to Bush. The mercury levels in most of these lakes (go to the Waterkeeper Alliance for info, and here for mercury tests kit) is directly correlated with the over 400 illegally operating coal burning power plants who no longer have any responsibilities for their polluting actions, Bush has made that so. The regulations once in place over 7 years ago are no longer enforced. 

One example he gave (and the following below was copied from his recent article in Vanity Fair) to show just how corrupt things have been was the case of Phillip Cooney, “who was the chief of staff for the White House Council on Environmental Quality. His job was to advise the president on the environmental implications of decisions that he makes. Cooney’s previous job had been as the chief lobbyist for the American Petroleum Institute. His preoccupation during his four-year White House stint, according to news accounts, was combing scientific documents issued by the various federal agencies in order to remove damaging statements about the oil industry and the coal industry. He suppressed or altered several major studies on global warming in order to protect the interests of his former clients. After the Times revealed the alterations, in 2005, Cooney left his job and went to work for ExxonMobil.”

Kennedy also said that true freemarket capitalism would be good, and we should try it sometime; right now it is the polluters who are getting rich by making others poor. He stated that 80% of republicans are actually democrats who don’t know what’s going on. He recently did a speech in Alberta for a bunch of oil execs and received a standing ovation (he said that could only happen in canada) and he had people come to him and ask how come I never heard of this before?? Well that answer opens up a new can of worms, media.

In ’88 Regan abolished the Fairness Doctrine which enforced media to use airways to serve public interest, and always tell both sides of the story so citizens can then go on to make rational decisions on critical issues. Now all major media in the US is controlled by just five major corperations, and they alone decide what is broadcast, and these are the same corperations that buy their way in to government policy making.  “There can be no true democracy with an uninformed public”, Kennedy said, and the media channels today ensure that the public remains ignorant. He also shared the obvious fact that “we as a people know more about Brad and Jennifer than that of issues that matter. We are the best entertained and least informed nation.”

Bill Clintons keynote speech lasted about 40 minutes, in which time he covered many key action items he and his team (Clinton Climate Initiative) have been working on. A quick glance around the audience showed a medium age of I would guess about 45, and many political guests were present such as the Green Party’s leader Elizabeth May, Ontario’s Premier, Minister, and many others. I was fortunate to finagle a last minute ticket which I later learned was worth $200, nice!

Clinton jumped right in to the current state of the Kyoto protocol, lamenting the USA’s failure to ratify and by saying that it is because of  the current governments insistance on “supporting yesterdays interest groups instead of investing in tomorrows energy future.” He shared the fact that the countries that are leading the Kyoto Accord are subsequently the ones that have shown the most economical growth, such as Denmark who showed a 50% (whew did I hear that correctly?) growth in their economy; or Great Britain who have taken swift action (creating plenty of new jobs) on energy efficiency and are well on their way to meeting Kyoto targets. This while the USA economy has been stagnent over the last 7 years, and any signs of job growth have been primarily linked with post 911 militarization.

He talked about the importance of citizens to take action starting with the ‘low hanging fruit’, and I’ll refer you to David Suzuki’s Nature Challenge for that.

One of his intitiatives is the C40 Cities Climate Leadership Group, Toronto is one of them. Essentially what they are doing is targetting large infrastructures and upgrading energy efficiency. His example was with an old low income housing community in NY City where they did a full energy audit on the buildings, the energy bill was tallied at 5 million/year. They figured they could garuntee to reduce this bill by 30%, at which point they front the money, install the new technology (whether it be efficient heating or replacing light bulbs, etc) after which the new yearly energy bill was 3.5 million, and the up front money is paid off from the energy savings, viola. He asserts that this process needs to happen on a much larger scale, and it is through the people with the ability to put this approach in to action that need to step up to the challenge, hence the C40.

He acknowledged that no matter how much we do along these lines, that if the developed nations don’t also help the 3rd world countries skip the mistakes we made, that these steps will be made in vain. Both need to happen. China for instance can’t build new coal plants fast enough, this is not good. An example of something he’d like to see in a country such as Liberia, is to have the financial support of the World Bank, and with the technology available build an energy infrastructure that is totally self sufficient, clean, and independent from other nations. If other countries could only see that this is possible, then faster action may spread. 

Another item that he admitted he was no expert on was deforestation, which contributes 18% of the worlds green house gas emissions, whew!! A big part of that is from methane which is actually worse than CO2. He asked the audience that he needed ideas on how to help combat deforestation and claimed to be able to provide the capitol to make some positive changes.

After his speech came a 20 minute Q&A style dialogue with the CEO of Green Living Enterprises, Laurie Simmond’s. Clintons last comment was that action needed to be taken immediately, not just from political leaders, but from all people, and that his generation will never forgive themselves later in life if they delay any longer. I have to agree, I have two beautiful nephews, and 30 years down the road I want to be able to look squarely in their eyes and say that I did everything I could toward creating a clean, happy planet Earth.

Good morning! My alarm went off today at 3:45am (Pacific Time which I’m still on) so I could appear on City TV’s breakfast show. I managed to get the host, Jennifer, who was wearing a skirt, to ride a bike, nice!

Soon after the opening ceremonies for the Green Living Show commenced, and I was taken by the speech of Dalton McGuinty, the premier of Ontario. He gave a sincere reflection (using his own family as an example) of his the importance of ‘greenovation’ in todays world, and the economic benefits that will come from this. Ontario certainly seems to be leading the way, just take a browse through the Premiers website for examples of this, such as lifting the ban on clothelines in the city, banning the sale and cosmetic use of pesticides, and of course being the first province to ban the sale of the ‘Edison’ light-bulb.