7th Gen Blog

Random objects of actionable reflection are careening in large number across my perennially cluttered plane of existence this fine morning. All you have to do is reach out with a net and see what you catch. Here’s a few I just reeled in:

For those following the twisted saga of our local International Paper Company plant’s intention to burn tires and sewage sludge in its boiler to save a few bucks on their monthly fuel bill, here’s an update from downwind of the Big Ugly:

Plant officials have announced their intention to conduct their initial test burn sometime in early November. They have to give New York State authorities 30 days notice, and that notice is expected any day now.

To reiterate, as the people living directly in the prevailing atmospheric path of the anticipated pollutant plume (I dare you to say that 10 times fast), we really don’t need to need to breath the airborne garbage the tire burn will produce. And produce it will because International Paper is refusing to install modern pollution control technologies on their smokestack. Even without the tire burn, the facility already produces more than twice as much toxic pollution as all the other polluting facilities in Vermont combined. Cough. Hack. Wheeze.

Everyday as I read through the news, I'm committed to not let it get me down. And as you know… that ain’t easy. Well, it just got a lot harder.

The only computer I’ve ever owned in my life is an Apple. When our IT department told the company that everyone would be using PC’s, I said, "Great, but not me." When Apple came out with their first lap top, a suitcase sized device, I was one of the first to buy it. My 12 inch PowerBook G4 is an extension of me. It’s always by my side or in my backpack. Wherever I go, whatever I do, it’s right there. This blog post has been written on it as have four books, millions of emails, and who knows how many memos.

But right now my fingers hesitate to touch the keys. I’m ashamed and embarrassed. Steve Jobs, please save me. Do something. Green my Apple!
Greenpeace, an organization I proudly serve as a board member just launched a campaign to let the world know that my Apple (and everyone else’s) contains hazardous substances that other companies have abandoned. Needless to say, for a variety of reasons, this is extremely distressing news to me. The toxic materials inside my Mac are cutting lives short by exposing children to dangerous chemicals in China and India, the two countries most of our so-called "e-wastes" usually end up.

Greenpeace is demanding that Apple “Remove the worst toxic chemicals from all their products and production lines” and “offer and promote free "take-back" for all their products everywhere they are sold.”

Come on, Steve. Please do something!

If I could say it any better I would. But Thomas Friedman’s 9/20/06 column in the New York Times on taxing ethanol imports highlights the political and structural obstacles to common sense.

Friedman writes:

Thanks to pressure from Midwest farmers and agribusinesses, who want to protect the U.S. corn ethanol industry from competition from Brazilian sugar ethanol, we have imposed a stiff tariff to keep it out. We do this even though Brazilian sugar ethanol provides eight times the energy of the fossil fuel used to make it, while American corn ethanol provides only 1.3 times the energy of the fossil fuel used to make it. We do this even though sugar ethanol reduces greenhouses gases more than corn ethanol. And we do this even though sugar cane ethanol can easily be grown in poor tropical countries in Africa or the Caribbean, and could actually help alleviate their poverty. Yes, you read all this right. We tax imported sugar ethanol, which could finance our poor friends, but we don’t tax imported crude oil, which definitely finances our rich enemies. We’d rather power anti-Americans with our energy purchases than promote antipoverty.

The question is what do we do to change this ridiculous situation? I’d love to hear your thoughts!