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The front page of the New York Times has a good story on the issue of creating liquid fuel from coal.  Many politicians–both Democratic and Republican–are pushing coal-to-fuel technology as a way of lessening “dependence” on foreign sources of energy.

The problems with coal-based liquid fuel are immense: the costs are astronomical, the greenhouse gas emissions are substantially higher than oil, and the technologies for efficient refinement are unproven.

Nevertheless, there is broad bipartisan support–particularly from Congressional representatives from coal producing states like Barack Obama–and many politicians are referring to coal liquidification when they speak of “alternative” fuels.  Liquified coal may be an “alternative” but it certainly is not renewable and its environmental affects are likely problematic.   This is especially troublesome as legislation winds its way through Congress which will give immense governmental subsidies to the coal industry.

This week’s strike by maintenance workers and mechanics employed by Montreal’s public transit agency exposed the vulnerability surrounding the mobility of lower-wage immigrant populations in the city.

The Montreal Gazette reports that non-immigrant populations were much more likely to have access to automobiles or other transportation options than the city’s immigrants.  The article cites a StatsCan report that found 60% of Caribbean immigrants, 58% African immigrants, and 54% of Latin American immigrants rely on Montreal’s Metro system.  For native-born Canadians, the figure is 21%.

Robert Bullard has discussed disparities in access to mobility options in the US.  It is interesting to note that this is likely to be an issue in metropolitan areas throughout the world.ff

In anticipation for next month’s G-8 summit to be held in Germany, the various G-8 countries have been negotiating an agreement on climate change that will set the stage for talks regarding a successor to the Kyoto Protocol which ends in 2012.

Yesterday, it became clear that US intransigence on the issue is unlikely to wane.  The EU members, led by German Chancellor Anglea Merkel, are unified in their interest in pushing the US to seriously negotiate.

The US, however, is opposing key components of the agreement:

1) They are rejecting that the United Nations be the forum for negotiating climate change.

2) They are against establishing benchmarks for reducing greenhouse gas emissions from transportation

3) They are rejecting a commitment to increasing energy efficiency by 30% by 2030

4) They are rejecting a recognition that the G-8 should limit global temperature increase to 2 degrees centigrade.

5) They are against increasing the percentage of renewable fuels to 15% of total consumption by  2020

6) They want to insert language supporting the expansion of nuclear energy.

7) They want to reject the “call upon all parties to strengthen the global system for effective protection of men, environment, and facilities against nuclear hazards.”

8) They want to add language encouraging the expansion of government-held strategic oil reserves.

These are pretty radical positions and it will be unlikely that any significant bridging of gaps can take place before the June 6 meeting.

The environmental group, Greenpeace, was leaked the draft document [.pdf] complete with US strike-throughs and additions.  The document is a remarkable read and one that does not inspire much confidence in anything substantial happening from the US side on climate change in the near future.

In keeping with the previous post on the effort to enhance local food systems in suburban Vancouver, the Wall Street Journal recently published an interesting article on the small, but growing, trend of US suburban developments with working agriculture themes.

These developments tend to be a modification of the New Urbanist paradigm that incorporate residental and commercial properties with some type of sustainability or small-scale agriculture component.  The most prominent in the Chicago region is Prairie Crossing in Lake County that has its own working farm.

On the one hand, these developments seem like a novel way of minimizing sprawl by preserving productive green space.  On the other hand, they could easily go the way of many New Urbanism developments and serve to justify sprawling development and the lack of regional integration under the cover of sustainability.

Advocates for localized food production in the suburbs of Vancouver, BC are pushing for a decomissioned Canadian Coast Guard site to be transformed into a showpiece for local agriculture within a suburbanized setting.

The proposal includes garden plots, an orchard, gardening educational opportunities, and a food bank for low income citizens.

This proposal represents a growing trend in North America to address the potential problems with a food system that is increasingly globalized.  With rising transportation costs, consumer skepticism about food safety, and increasing interest in diversifying regional economies, efforts to localize food sources will likely continue to grow.

Apparently the Richmond, BC effort involves Alisa Smith and James MacKinnon whose new book–The 100 Mile Diet–documents their attempt to only consume food that originates within 100 miles of Vancouver.  I have not yet read the book, but hope to put it on my summer reading list.

The Advertiser from Adelaide–Australia’s fifth largest city–reports on an innovative urban water conservation strategy being employed in the city’s suburbs.

Many homes in the region already have tank systems that collect rain water for reuse in the form of drinking water and irrigation.  The details are sketchy, but the article suggests that a new program is being developed to recharge groundwater acquifers with the collected rain water.  In much the same fashion as many users of solar power sell their excess energy back to electric companies, the scheme in Adelaide will give consumers credit when excess water from their storage tanks is diverted back to recharge the groundwater.

This seems to fit in with the state of South Australia’s larger goal for sustainable water use and seems to be an innovative policy for encouraging conservation.

On the heels of Tony Blair’s announcement that he will step down as head of the Labour Party next month, his likely successor, Chancellor of the Exchequer Gordon Brown, proposed that new “eco-towns” of approximately 20,000 inhabitants be constructed throughout the country.

The towns would be constructed by private developers on government-controlled land, the first one being located in Cambridgeshire on a decommissioned air base. The aim would be to insure affordability while maintaining zero-carbon output by employing green design features.

This is Brown’s first concrete policy proposal in his bid for leadership of Labour and, as the Scotsman reports, likely aimed at placating leftists in the party who may support more radical candidates.

Brown, of course, has been building up his green credentials for quite a while. The culmination of these efforts was his solicitation of Sir Nicholas Stern last year to develop a report on the economic implications of climate change. He also recently won the support of Blair’s popular Environment Minister, David Miliband, who many Blairites wanted to challenge Brown for party leadership.

It will be interesting to see what happens to Miliband.  Some are arguing that he should be appointed Chancellor while others think he may be tapped for Home Secretary.

As people here in Chicago wait for the International Olympic Committee to announce the host city for the 2016 games, it might be useful to keep a close eye on how another North American city is preparing for its own Olympics.

Vancouver, BC is hosting the 2010 Winter Olympics and is in the midst of completing the infrastructure projects needed to accomodate the thousands of anticipated visitors.  One of the main challenges facing Vancouver is a modest mass transit system.  As part of the effort to improve the SkyTrain, they committed to building a subway connecting the airport (south of the city) to the city centre and Burrard Inlet.

The Globe and Mail today reports that the transit authority has reneged on its promise to bore the tunnel underground in favor of a cheaper–but more disruptive–approach: digging up the streets.

Currently the trendy Cambie Street is apparently completely torn up making it difficult for the small businesses to attract customers.  While the Olympics will undoubtedly bring tourists with money to spend to the city, the small businesses profiled in the article are not sure if they will be able to stay in business long enough to reap the benefits of the games.

On the heels of his recent suggestion that Manhattan should adopt a London-style congestion charge, New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg is hosting a group of fellow mayors from some of the world’s largest cities for a “climate summit” this week.

Sponsored by the Clinton Climate Initiative and the C40 Cities Climate Leadership Group, the summit will bring together mayors for three days of chat about climate change and what cities can do to address the issue.  The summit’s website is a little short on details of the program, so we may expect nothing more than typical political posturing.
Mayor David Miller, of Toronto, however is apparently going to suggest the idea of a “green Facebook” so people can harness social networking tools to battle climate change.  If this is, indeed, the type of stuff they are going to talk about, the meeting’s superficiality is assured.

Courtesy of the Chicago Tribune, we learn that residents in the suburban community of Northbrook are critical of the village’s plan to put sidewalks in certain residential neighborhoods. Northbrook is one of your typical post-War suburbs that was designed primarily for automobiles. In the rush to develop at the least cost, such frivolities as places for pedestrians were discarded.

Seeing the shortcomings of such development, many suburbs are trying to remedy the anachronistic elements of their built form by retrofitting them with sidewalks. Interestingly, the source of discontent from residents is less due to the cost associated with the post-hoc installation of sidewalks, and more due to a general paranoia.

One person interviewed in the article rejects sidewalks because of the unsavory element that it might attract! Perhaps a better reason is the fact that there is nowhere to walk!

Above is an areal picture of a typical Northbrook neighborhood with its cul-de-sacs and poorly-linked streets. While this neighborhood appears to have sidewalks, I am not sure where you would go. Restricted zoning has separated residential areas from workplaces and shopping and the area is not served by mass transit. Perhaps these sidewalk naysayers have a point!