Greening the Rust Belt

Greening the Rust Belt

In general the news coming out of the industrial cities of the Midwest is fairly grim these days: we have the houses selling for less than $1,000 in Cleveland and Detroit, gas prices are taking a huge toll on the auto industry, and consumer spending, the engine of economic prosperity, has taken a nose dive.

Yet there are signs of hope in the Midwestern rust belt, as many cities and small towns look towards alternative energy sources as a way to save money during the current economic downturn and also find new sources of economic development. For example, in a rural school district in the “thumb” area of Michigan with lots of wind, the Lakers School district has received biodiesel grants, energy smart incentives and most recently, a biomass grant. Three years ago the junior high principal received more than a quarter million dollars from the Michigan Public Service Commission to purchase wind turbines that now provide almost all the power for the elementary school and the superintendent's home.

This spring Lakers junior high school students will press oil from soybeans and sunflowers for bio-diesel and learn how to use the anaerobic processor, which breaks down biodegradable waste into methane that can be used for power. Many see this exposure to “green” technology as a way of giving a new generation important job skills and of stopping the “brain drain” of the young who continue to move out of states like Michigan in search of better economic opportunities, (Amy http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=89369909)

As the federal government has failed to provide incentives for energy conservation, Midwestern cities and local communities are taking the initiative themselves to cut their energy use and reduce their contribution to greenhouse gases. Ann Arbor, Michigan, is replacing the bulbs in its street lamps with light-emitting diodes (LED's) to reduce its energy usage. In Chicago, 15 million square feet of rooftops are being overhauled and landscaped with gardens that can keep reduce temperatures by as much as 70 degrees. The first garden which was planted on top of City Hall cut the building's power bill by more than 10% in the first year. (See Jim Carlton's article, “Nine Cities, Nine Ideas, The Wall Street Journal, February 11, 2008 – http://online.wsj.com/public/article/SB120248655589254033-o_E8MSu_lUbSRP8Bp8Y_xHWoPVg_20090210.html?mod=rss_free).

These local initiatives represent more than just a way for cash-strapped cities and municipalities to save money.

Across the US more than 700 mayors have signed an agreement to follow the goals of the Kyoto Protocols, and their cumulative efforts are fueling grassroots demands that Congress and the Bush Administration get serious about reducing energy consumption and our national dependence on foreign oil.

Last November, governors of Western and Midwestern states followed suit by signing agreements to reduce carbon emissions and to create cap-and-trade systems to meet their targets.

Earlier this month attorneys general from Arizona, California, Connecticut, Delaware, Illinois, Iowa, Maine, Maryland, Minnesota, New Jersey, New Mexico, New York, Oregon, Rhode Island, Vermont, Washington and the District of Columbia, plus representatives of the Pennsylvania Department of Environmental Protection and the cities of New York and Baltimore, and several environmental organizations filed suit against the Environmental Protection Agency to force it to follow last year's Supreme Court ruling that that agency must decide whether to regulate greenhouse gas emissions, including carbon dioxide, from motor vehicles, “States Sue EPA Over Global Warming,” AP, April 2, 2008. See http://ap.google.com/article/ALeqM5iqGMrzmNKuHg8Hmz_YBFYQvY4J4AD8VPQO080.

So if you're feeling a little helpless on Earth Day as the headlines tell us the economy is tanking, gas prices are sky-rocketing, and many feel anxiety about the future of the US economy, it's reassuring to see what can happen on the local level, not just to reduce our energy consumption but to develop new technologies and new “green” industries that generate jobs at home.

Thoughts of Spring

Thoughts of Spring

Okay, so it's a bit past the actual vernal equinox, but Spring never follows the calendar in my experience. It is that most capricious of seasons -- here one day, gone the next -- as if the weather can't make up its mind whether it wants to be blizzarding, blustery or merely gently breezy.

When I was growing up in Michigan, it seemed as if Spring only lasted about two days. We'd have the occasional unexpected snowstorm in April and then a few days when the crocuses peeped out and the lilacs bloomed, and suddenly by Memorial Day, the hot, humid days of summer were in full force.

In northern California where I lived for many years, Spring usually arrives in February with rain and wildflowers and a green so intense you'd think the hills behind Stanford University had been transported from the Emerald Isles. I used to live for those weeks, going outside with sinuses inflamed, sneezing, and with pounding temples, just to enjoy the greenery I knew would have disappeared by the summer dry season.

Here in the New Mexico Spring is more of a conundrum. It's the driest, windiest, and sometimes downright unpleasant season of the year, especially when the wind blows hard enough to kick up clouds of dust so large that cars turn on their headlights in the daytime.

It seems like a small miracle to see the small green leaves on the cottonwoods, the forsythia in golden abundance, and the lilacs starting to bloom when no rain has fallen for months, and the few thin clouds that pass overhead seem to mock us with moisture that remains tantalizingly out of reach.

Fortunately, I live in an area along the river, where families have enjoyed the right to take water from the Rio Grande through a maze of irrigation ditches for hundreds of years. It's the river that saves Spring here, generating a swath of green along its meandering path for miles and miles.

But I am determined to help things along as much as possible so I sow my wildflowers, and plant my first hardy perennials and water by hand until I finally see the ditch fill up and coordinate with neighbors when it's time to open the gates and let my backyard flood.

It's one of the great pleasures of my home that even though I'm technically inside the city limits, I feel as if I were still in the countryside. If I walk a few hundred yards along the irrigation ditch – I run into pigs, geese, ducks, chickens, and goats, as well as horses and fields of hay grown to support them.

Less than a mile away there's an organic farm that grows produce and fields of lavender. Across the road there's a field that when flooded attracts Canadian geese, sandhill cranes, and the occasional pheasant. If you want to encounter more exotic fowl, you just have to drive along another road to find a nearly suicidal flock of peahens and their resident peacock, who is much more cautious about dashing into the road in front of passing vehicles than his female counterparts. The speed limit there is 25 mph, but most people go a lot slower; no one wants to have to carry the body of a deceased peahen to its angry owner.

So for now, while we wait for the monsoon season to arrive and enjoy the windy but mild weather of April, I'll draw on the bounty of the Rio Grande and watch the slow greening of the high desert along its banks.