Mayor Michael Bloomberg has offered proposals to make New York City greener through congestion pricing and other methods of energy conservation. While his specific plans are in need of further study, public and professional input and planning, he is on the right track as far as motivating the City to do its respective part in helping to solve the problem of global warming.
What New York does should be seen as one piece of a larger picture. As the New York Times writes in Saturday's lead editorial, Listen to the States, “For years, most of the important initiatives to deal with global warming have been undertaken at the state and local level, while Washington has largely dithered. This is still true. The hope, as always, is that pressure from below will jolt Washington from its slumber.”
In his Sunday Times Op-Ed, "Did We Do That," (p12) Thomas Friedman wrote, “I flew into Los Angeles last Monday — right through a gray-brown cloud of smoke from the forest fires burning in the hills east of the city. I couldn’t actually see the fires from the air, only the smoke billowing out of mountain caverns, like so many smoldering volcanoes. There was something wild and prehistoric about it. It looked like either the end of the world or the beginning. As I watched from the plane window, I thought to myself, “I’ve never seen that before.”
Just before the fires I returned from a 10 day road trip up and down the coast of California, and to say it was dry is an understatement. It did rain once while we were there, and the local forecasters acted as if it was a rare gift from the heavens. It was. Public service commercials on how to combat fires around your home are now the norm there, as are pamphlets on fire prevention located in various public facilities throughout the state. These are things that I have never seen before.
Friedman continues, “I had had a similar thought a day earlier, playing golf in high-70s weather in Washington, D.C., in late October. Because of the warm weather, the leaves had barely changed to fall colors. I’ve never seen that before.”
In 2004, a movie was released (strangely enough by “News Corporation,” which owns FOX) entitled “The Day After Tomorrow,” about the perils that the future will bring as a result of global warming. Critics and pundits alike scoffed at the absurdity of the premise of the film that showed cities being destroyed by the effects of climate change, whether by freezing, flooding, winds or rain. Some called it fear mongering, others myth making, but much general sentiment among pundits and critics was that the movie sensationalized what was a potentially serious problem.
Roughly a year after its release winds and floods ravaged most of the City of New Orleans in a way the city had never seen before, and it had seen a lot. The film, and the issue of global warming in general, suddenly seemed much less sensational. Like Friedman’s wildfires, Katrina seemed almost biblical, or on the flip side of the coin, wildly scientific. Simply put Friedman is right. At an almost exponential rate there are things happening that we are seeing for the first time.
It is also a strange twist that the same common sense practicality that pundits are always lauding the American public for embodying seems to be absent when the seemingly obvious issue of climate change arises. One wonders why some do not see the issue with the same lucidity as Ted Turner, who when asked how he knew global warming was real wryly answered, “Haven't you been outside lately? It's hotter than hell out there.”
The truth is that as Americans we tend not to believe things until the last possible minute. A healthy, conservative skepticism that may have served us well in our coming of age and growth as a nation does little now for dealing with a problem whose last minute seems to approach more rapidly with every passing day.
Perhaps the best way to make necessary lifestyle changes more palatable to the public is at the local level. Bloomberg’s initiatives are important. It is up to New York City residents to get involved and push hard locally for the best alternative energy plans possible. As Alan Zimmerman of the Sierra Club explained to me, “We should call it global flooding.” He is right. Global warming is too nice a phrase. It sounds as if we'll finally have the opportunity to experience Florida weather conditions year-round. The problem being the beachfront property we all dream of may become a reality sooner than we bargained for.
Zimmerman goes on to make a more important point that may make sense to even the most stubborn of skeptics among us. Even if all we have hypothesized about climate change and its causes is wrong, the positives that will come from trying to ameliorate the problem are almost universally beneficial to our collective well being. We will save energy, rely less heavily on foreign oil (one reason for being in Iraq in the first place), provide more jobs by forcing us to be scientifically innovative, as Friedman suggests in his latest book, “The World is Flat,” and decrease Medicare and Medicaid expenses on the federal, state and local levels by improving our air quality.
In the case of congestion pricing and other environmental initiatives Bloomberg needs to make similar arguments. The improved air quality that will result from decreased traffic will do much to reduce asthma rates among children and adults in hot spots such as the South Bronx, Harlem and Washington Heights, therefore saving on public healthcare expenses. Other ideas like improved insulation on housing can save lower income residents money. Planting trees and plants on rooftops can reduce energy costs, improve air quality and provide more recreational resources. In short, acting locally is a win-win proposition.
Something else I observed in San Francisco was the use of catenary busses and trolleys, connected to overhead wires that Wikipedia says are used “to transmit electrical energy to trams, trolleybuses or trains at a distance from the energy supply point.” This more direct transfer of power is of much greater efficiency than methods using hydrogen fuel, which takes a considerably large amount of energy to produce. This is the type of idea we need to consider in New York. As Rich Wagener, Group Leader of Scientific Information Systems at Brookhaven National Laboratory tells me “Every conversion process loses energy.” In other words, every time you use energy to create another type of energy it becomes less efficient.
President Bush’s push for hydrogen fuel innovation, the largest component of his proposed environmental initiatives, would do little to solve our energy problems. The energy required to make hydrogen fuel to run a car uses roughly the same amount of carbon as is required to run a car directly on fossil fuels. Once again the Federal Government is missing the boat where local municipalities, like San Francisco, are getting on board. To remedy this, Mayor Bloomberg needs to be even more imaginative than he already has been. The contradiction of California is that it is a state that has done so much to help the environment on a local level, yet through fire and flood it disproportionately feels the effects of the pollution created by the rest of us. Localities everywhere need to follow California's lead in both awareness and policy if we are to change our uncertain direction.
Still the Golden State continues to do its part. In Listen to the States the Times also reports, “Next week Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger of California will file a lawsuit against the Environmental Protection Agency for holding up efforts by his state and others to restrict carbon dioxide emissions from cars and trucks.” Environmentalists have a tradition of fostering change from the bottom up. Though not quite at the "grass roots" level, states individually and collectively motivating the federal government to act, whether through litigation, legislation or public influence, has become the most effective way to facilitate the necessary changes in our environmental policy.
In fairness, there are sound initiatives happening elsewhere. Despite our criticism of Governor Eliot Spitzer’s methods and attitude it would be reasonable to say he can do, and sometimes does, good work. In the midst of various scandals, and away from the distractions created by his stylistic and methodic deficiencies, he has managed to, as the Times writes, issue “strong regulations aimed at cutting emissions of carbon dioxide, the main global warming gas, from New York power plants. Mr. Spitzer’s regulations are aimed at meeting New York’s responsibilities under the Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative, an agreement among 10 Eastern states.”
Why Spitzer continues to carry out various objectives, good and bad, without adequately explaining them to his constituency beforehand (or after) remains bewildering. It would benefit him greatly to use this example of smart, local environmental policy as a counterbalance to the circus which seems to perpetually surround him. As Attorney General he did much to influence national policy through local and national litigation on the environmental front. Focusing on such a crucial issue could be essential in forging his path to reconciliation with an exasperated constituency.
Mayor Bloomberg on the other hand is already a reasonable spokesman for what he wants to accomplish. His goal of reducing congestion is worthwhile, and his intention to improve our energy efficiency is a smart one. The plan does have its problems, supporters and detractors. In yesterday's New York Post (p33) Rep. Anthony Weiner offers his own suggestions for conquering congestion. In reference to giving suburbanites credit for their tolls while charging city residents $8 he writes, "If anyone should get a free pass, it should be residents of New York City, not our friends in the suburbs." He is right.
There are many changes to be made and details that need to be ironed out. Nevertheless, when we look at the bigger picture Bloomberg is on the right road. In spirit and in practical terms, Bloomberg’s willingness to act on the local level where the Feds fail to is imperative in ensuring there are fewer and fewer problems arising in the future we'll have the misfortune of seeing for the first time.
B2 11.2.07 1308wds