The Vancouver area has transformed in to a beautiful winter mountain village over the last two or three weeks. We have more snow in our front yard than many ski areas do. Just yesterday I went to pick up some friends who had been hit in their truck at a stop light by a car sliding in to them, and the drive there was reminiscent of some high altitude Rocky Mountain drive. The trees are just packed with snow, and the roads slippery, no blacktop in sight. But today, the melt begins…

I just finished my bowl of granola, with bee pollen sprinkled on top, frozen blueberries from the Summer pick, and some yogurt and a little milk. I was up fairly early, and got some reading in before the day really gets going. I am immersed in a book called “One Taste” by Ken Wilber; its essentially his diary from the year 1997, and it’s just so fascinating reading about the day to day life of an author I so highly respect. It’s this glimpse in to a strangers life that has made the modern day blogosphere such a phenomenon. 

So I’m heading out to some tool stores today, there are a few house projects coming up, and I’m also making my wood shop bigger; moving the wall so it becomes a 10′x10′ size shop instead of a 7′x10′ shop. Still pretty tiny, but will do the trick. Caryn and I were pretty happy to make most of our gifts this year for Christmas; she turned some wood for pens, and I made spoons and such, I’ll post some pictures later. As much as we were glad to make these gifts, I think we are both blessed with the time to actually make the gifts in the first place; so fortunate.

Hope you are enjoying this time between Christmas and New Years, hopefully you are finding some time to relax and do the things that are so often put on hold during the busyness of daily life.

RL

Gwynne Dyer spoke in Vancouver yesterday about his recent book “Climate Wars”. He has written extensively on foreign affairs and war, but his curiosity soared about climate change when he found some information about the British military’s preparation for climate change related scenarios in the future. He secured a book deal that gave him 18 months of research around the world interviewing politicians, military officials, and scientists, then stringing it together with some bold predictions. Generally the science is bang on and consistent with my own research, the environmental implications based on the science are quite accurate and consistent with the current consensus; the predictions he shares about how humans will handle the situation are somewhat bold and even controversial. Below is a summery of his lecture…

“Scientists are scared”, Dyer proclaimed near the beginning of his talk. The most recent IPCC (Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change) report in 2007 gives a range of climate change scenarios; for instance the one on temperature suggest an average warming of between 2 and 6 degrees Celsius by 2100. Some of the most recent data suggests that even the high-end estimates in the 2007 report are on the low side. For instance artic sea ice coverage is down from 7 million square km’s to 4.3 million. Some predictions have gone as far to say that we could have an ice free artic by 2013.

Dyer explained that the problem with the IPCC is that it is a consensus, thus all scientists involved must agree on the numbers; this inherently biases the numbers toward the lowest common denominator. Also the reports used to base these predictions on are old. The cut off for official documents used by the panel for the latest ‘07 report was the end of ‘05. For the reports to be peer reviewed and published they would have had to be written by the end of ‘03; that means the data must have been from 2002 or earlier. This means our political action today is based on out of date information. This is bad news because climate change is happening at an alarming rate, much faster than even the IPCC had predicted. Dyers research on military forecasts show that they’ll have lots of work, and much of the concern is based on food supply, “eating is a non negotiable activity, without it your carbon footprint will be zero within 6 weeks”.

One scenario of conflict he suggested was between Mexico and the US. American farms will be hit hard because of changes in how Hadley cells distribute heat and moisture from the equator. Mexico will unfortunately lose much of their growing capacity, and will thus look north to America; but with the yanks own domestic shortages, the US may close the border in a militaristic way, which could cause anger amongst the America’s Mexican population which by 2030 could be as much as ¼. Leading to a divided country rivaling that of the civil war.

He suggests similar situation may arise in many parts of the world. Pakistan and India will have conflict on water usage from the Indus River once the glaciers in the Himalayas have melted. Without the water, India could lose approximately 25% of it’s food production; because India has 4 of the 5 tributaries running through it before the water reaches Pakistan, there won’t be much left, if any. So if human nature follows  course, Pakistan will raid its neighbor before letting their children starve. Because he is well versed in the field of war, having written about eight books on the subject, it is hard to discount some of his predictions.

He told us that Australia has conceded that their current drought is actually climate change, because droughts end and this one isn’t….The EU could face hardships when mass immigration northward begins due to loss of growing area in the south…. Negotiating Climate Change treaties such as the Kyoto will become difficult due to countries in peril.

He then talks about the point-of-no-return, which happens when global temperature rise reaches two degrees warmer than 1990 levels. We are already committed to 1.3, and Dyer, along with most scientists, believe we are going to sail right past this point despite the fact that the technology is available to prevent this. Once the point is past, we’ll lose control, meaning that no matter what we do, even if we cut our emissions to zero, the planet will warm dramatically toward the six-degree warmer mark, and perhaps beyond. Reasons for this uncontrollable feedback is due to oceans becoming carbon emitters rather than sinks, and because of the melting of permafrost. As the permafrost melts, large stores of methane will be released into the atmosphere and will act as a heating agent that is 20 times more powerful than CO2.

He is briefly optimistic when talking about solutions such as creating bio fuel out of pond scum (algae) and about the potential for clean energy by combining hydrogen and carbon. Along with the standard solutions such as photovoltaic, wind power, wave energy, and geothermal, he concludes that we have the answers. He then states that he doesn’t believe we’ll implement them fast enough. Bottom line, he concludes, is that we are going hit 400 or 500 or more p.p.m. of carbon in the atmosphere. “So are we doomed?” he asks, his suggestion is no, because human ingenuity may have a couple more tricks to play in the form of geoengineering (the cooling kind of human produced climate change, not the warming kind which we’re already successful at).

The two leading geoengineering propositions he shares are first, to mimic the action of volcanoes, which can cool the atmosphere slightly as Pinatubo did in ‘91. This can be accomplished simply by mixing jet fuel with sulfur dioxide. Whew! The second is to send automated ships out in the ocean that pump up mist from the ocean to thicken the marine strato cumulous cloud coverage, bouncing the excess heat away from the oceans. Dyer believes these measures may be acted on within five or ten years. He claims these (far-fetched) ideas will win us ten to twenty years which will give us time to reduce emissions to where we need them. This is a very controversial conclusion, and a dangerous one to bank on. It can lead toward lax climate change actions based on the thought that science will solve the problem without us having to change our lifestyles. Dyer certainly wasn’t claiming that we can all relax now, he is more alarmed than ever, but at the same time he concludes that his optimism is much higher than when he began his research, and is glad that there is a vision for a way through this mess.

Traffic in Vancouver, like most growing cities, is getting pretty intense. Combine that with rising fuel prices, and extreme suburb commuting, and you get some nasty driving attitudes and road rage. Serving humanity and the greater whole is a key element to finding purpose in ones life. I know an old man whose apparent purpose is to help reduce the stress of the car commuter. He’s the old man at the corner of the Hwy 1 on-ramp at Hastings St. in Vancouver.

You can choose to let the old man put a smile on your face, or choose to look down upon him, and ignore him, like many do with homeless people and beggers. When passing him one direction there is no light so I just whiz by, but he always makes eye contact while waving the peace sign; coming the other way, there’s a light, at that point I see him with his broom and dustpan sweeping the curb trash and debris, I see him smiling and waving, and only when signaled by a driver does he come to the window to accept tips. The times I have signaled him, he comes along with his reflective vest on, and shares a joke that always brings a smile to my face; job done.

I started thinking about street people, and that they probably have one of the smallest carbon footprints in western societies. In a culture that values material wealth more than anything, it might be hard for them to be content with the few, if any, possessions they have. However many world travelers often remark that the happiest people they see are the ones in cultures where there is little material wealth. When I was in Peru filming for Kranked 3, we came across a small village, everyone was gathered around the fire, and they invited us over to join. They lived in little huts, no electricity or plumbing, but they weren’t embarrassed, they gave us nothing but welcoming smiles and great hospitality, and there was this unforgettable feeling of calm contentment and connectiveness. In a documentary I just watched called “Ten Questions with the Dalai Lama”, he suggested that the more you have materially, the more you have to worry about; I can certainly see the truth in that.

Back to commuting, a more sustainable method with enormous benefits on so many levels is by way of bike. Now for someone who does more riding at work than to work, I can’t be too preachy, but the times I do choose to take the bike for errands and meetings around town, everything seems better. Hopefully you don’t live too far off in the suburbs, but if the distance is within riding reach, give it a go! Careful though with your bike commuting ego, as Eckhart Tolle said in an interview I recently read, “A cyclist might have a bigger ego than the man in the SUV, especially if he hates the man in the SUV for polluting the planet and thinks he’s superior.”

Cycling is indeed an important part of the solution to climate change, especially as our savings account of oil dwindles. There is still some debate regarding climate change, but it’s hard to argue with the consensus of 2500 scientists on the intergovernmental panel on climate change, chances are they may know better than your neighbor Joe. In an audio interview I heard with author Karen Armstrong, she said “and I don’t think we’ll save the planet if we don’t’ dismantle these habits of selfishness, even with the environment, not just jumping in to a car every time we feel like it, realizing that we can’t just drive anywhere, we can’t go on poisoning the atmosphere like this, our grandchildren are going to curse us.”

The One Planet Two Wheels campaign tells us that 60% of the pollution created by automobile emissions happens in the first few minutes of operation, before pollution control devices can work effectively. 24% of all trips are made within a mile of the home, 40% of all trips are made within two miles of the home, and 50% of the working population commutes five miles or less to work.

Carpooling has been an important initiative in many big cities, but increasing the number of multi passenger trips has proved difficult. A recent study illuminated the reason why; turns out that because of the fast paced modern lifestyle, the car commute is the only time individuals have to themselves! If you go by way of the bicycle you still get that personal reflective time, you save the planet, and always get to the top of the climb first on the weekend mountain bike ride. Sounds like an extraordinary deal to me!

Ride ON!!

If you are living or working in Vancouver, especially the downtown core, go for a walk at lunch and chill in a hammock! Sounds strange, but Eoin Finn and his Bliss Army are setting up a spontaneous relaxation site by the Art Gallery between 12 and 2 today (Aug 8th). Eoin is a master yogi and is doing his part to help slow down the ever growing pace of life in Vancouver (otherwise we may turn in to Toronto); sure we have the ocean beside us, but that doesn’t guarantee the associated lifestyle. You have to make time to chill, and if you don’t, then hopefully a few minutes in one the hammocks they set up today will help make you realize this!

From one hammock fan, to hopefully another, I wish you a happy Friday!

 

Caryn and I enjoying our handmade hammock while camping

If you haven’t heard of One Day…, now is a good time to check these folks out because it’s Bike Month, and their latest newsletter is about cycling. Not only are the cycling ideas and resources presented valuable, but I thought this link to ‘in season’ food was very useful.

This site is based in Vancouver, but no matter where you live, much of the info presented and the ideas offered in their newsletter is universal. Check ‘em out!

Ride ON!