According to a piece in NY1 news, the Yankees are going green with their victory parade:

Atlas Materials in Red Hook, Brooklyn is donating recycled confetti strips for the Yankees parade down the “Canyon of Heroes” in NY’s financial district.  They say parades these days are much more environmentally friendly than ticker-tapes of the past.

“What we’re doing here today is taking 1,200 pounds of shredded, recycled paper to be delivered to the buildings of Lower Manhattan to start the process of what kind of paper should be thrown from the windows tomorrow. It will all be cleaned up by the sanitation department and recycled yet again. So this is going to be a green parade,” said John Cioffi of Atlas Materials.

From the looks of this pic, lots of New Yorkers will be emptying their waste baskets as well.  Wonder if that stuff will be recycled too.  All in all, good news, but small consolation for Phils fans.   Next year, if the Phillies win, there would be no ticker tape parade in NY at all, just a good ol’ fashioned Philadelphia parade.  Now that would be the most environmentally friendly thing of all.  So, wait ’till next year!

PhillyEcoCity has covered the activities of West Trenton based Terracycle Inc.  several times, most recently in this post: Terracycle or How to Turn your Trash into Gold

Until now, Terracycle has been selling its products from kites made of Oreo cookie wrapping material to school bags made out of drink pouches and wall clocks made out of vinyl records  through major national retail chains such as Target and Wall Mart and more recently through its website.

The store is a pilot site where Terracycle’s founder Tom Szaky is testing the possibility of opening a chain of stores that would be selling 200 of products that Terracycle manufactures out of recycled materials and containers. The store is also a collection point for 48 types of waste materials the company uses. For each recyclable item brought to the store Terracycle makes a 2 cents donation to selected charities.

The store is located in Palmer Squarre – Princeton NJ, near the Bent Spoon Ice Cream Store.
Here is a picture of Tom Szaky taken by a reporter of the Times of Trenton NJ, at the opening of the store.

As we previewed earlier this week, today was International Climate Day of Action, including a synchronized global rally featuring photogenic human chains forming the number 350.   I was there. My daughter was there.  I brought my roommate too.  And it was rainy and miserable and inconvenient.

Those of us who care about the environment would like to see a New America. An America that is eco-conscious, that is galvanized to concerted action. An America that believes that the upper limit that some scientists think is safe for the environment, 350 parts per million of carbon dioxide, is still achievable, even though we passed it (we are now at 387 PPM!). Some say that the “horse is already out of the barn” and it’s too late.    A herculean task.  Imagine trying to abolish slavery from all 50 states instead of just the South and certain territories.  Pretty damn hard, and who would be the ones to lead the charge?

The answer to that question today is you and me.  The people from 350.org believe that a New American and global mindset can be created by simplifying the message, and galvanizing around a number, in this case 350. I think they have a point. I brought my 6 year old daughter down on a miserable rainy day to Independence Mall, and when we lined up to form the human 350 as part of the Zero, she said I don’t want to be part of the Zero, I want to be part of the Five! Mission accomplished. With the rain, and the gooey Fall Harvest donut admittedly purchased from Dunkin’ Donuts, and being part of the big human Five, I think she will remember this day for a long time. I brought my roommate too, and she wasn’t so enthusiastic about coming either.

But for me that is the metaphor here. We have to make space in our hearts and souls for the daughters of our daughters to enjoy a safe, 350ppm or whatever the hell the right number is, planet, and this is a little abstract, projecting out into the future. This is a movement that requires one to make sacrifices to help the “theoretical other” — others we may never meet…it is a movement of inconvenience. To quote Creedence Clearwater Revival, “I want to know, have you ever seen the rain, comin down on a sunny day?”

One of the most important thing we can do as a society is to support children in developing a wonderous, reverent, informed relationship with Nature.
Here is what a few dedicated educators are doing to introduce second graders from North Philadelphia to Nature.

Philadelphia has 2 composting firms – PhillyCompost and Bennett Compost and city wide composting efforts are still distant plans.

It’s now illegal to throw your food waste into the trash in San Francisco…what about Philadelphia??

San Francisco inhabitants use green colored trash bins to gather food trash that are collected by a fleet of specialized city trucks.

Considering that San Francisco is collecting 500 tons of food scraps every day – how much food scrap could we collect in Philadelphia and how much money would the city of Philadelphia save on the fees it pays to dump its trash in the regional landfills?

To become the greenest city in the country, Philadelphia will need to take initiatives that may annoy  some people such as: banning plastic bags from stores or getting serious with educating its thousands of employees about good sustainability practices. Good intentions and ambitious goals alone will not make it.

See here for more details: http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=113969321&sc=fb&cc=fp

Climate change is the biggest challenge facing our world. On Oct. 24 stand up with thousand of people around the world and speak out to limit carbon dioxide to 350 parts per million. If you’re in Philly, meet me at Independence Hall: http://www.350philly.org.

Curious about why 350 parts of carbon dioxide per million?
See http://www.350.org/about/science

… Is to make it FUN

For a while now I have written about my struggles with what is it that I can do to move people to dispose of their trash properly and recycle.

One thing I do know – getting angry at someone who throws their bier can or sandwich wrapper out of the window of their car… will more likely get me into a fight than teach the benefits of recycling.

See the Playback Theater Performance on the subject right here >> Making Sustainability FUN

This latest initiative from Volkswagen brings us the factual proof that making it fun works.  I suggest you take a minute to watch this short video clip on the worlds’ deepest Trash bin:

Notice: In one day, the world deepest trash bin collected 72 Kg of trash when a usual trash bin just a few meters away collect 41 Kg less.

Katherine Gajewski, Philadelphia’s New Director of Sustainability speaks in West Mt. Airy in Northwest Philly.  She reveals five tactics as to how she will implement Mayor Nutter’s Greenworks Plan to turn Philadelphia into America’s Greenest City –  including the appointment of a community Outreach Coordinator.

“Well, the chances are against it and the odds are slim. [S]He’s the neighborhood bully.  (Bob Dylan, Neighborhood Bully)

Though certainly not a “neighborhood bully” in the conventional sense of the term, Katherine Gajewski is one focused agent of change.  In speaking to West Mt Airy Neighbors’ (WMAN) monthly gathering of just a few committed folks in Northwest Philly, Gajewski demonstrated a key strategy towards realizing Philly’s dream of becoming America’s “greenest city”: going from community to community and from ‘hood to ‘hood to coordinate the city’s ambitious (overly ambitious?) 15-point plan.  I don’t think Philadelphia can become green without this kind of synchronous, systemic action.  To that end, she told us that she intends to appoint a dedicated Outreach Coordinator to connect with each locality’s sustainability efforts.

Considering that the Greenworks plan is 80 dense pages and contains 169 (!) initiatives Gajewski is smart to follow this strategy.  She called it a living document – “dates will change” and metrics will also change.  She admitted that Philly came into the game late, and is trying to build off the work of other major cities.   Her key strategies also include:

1. Identify external business, government partners
2. Prioritize and divide the plan and divvy up “departments and lead agencies” to help
3. Create project teams
4. Identify champions across government departments and agencies.
5. Stay in contact with community groups

Katherine Gajewski called it a vast “plugging in exercise”, with the goal of “having a presence throughout the City.”  It is too early to handicap her success in implementing the Greenworks initiative.  But we do know that it will only work if local communities – like yours and mine – join her strategy of going “hyperlocal” and coordinating efforts at the grass roots level.

However, I also would like to call her to task for perhaps taking too heavy an analytical approach – to divide up the plan and prioritize – rather than taking a systems approach, which many change theorists say is called for in such a complex effort.  (The analyis of the part can be the enemy of the understanding of the whole.)  This might mean, for example, considering how the plan’s goals interact and intertwine, as well as taking the necessary step of changing our society’s culture and mindset, which is rooted in a carbon based economy that involves everything from taking long showers, driving cars to big box stores, eating nonlocal food, leaving lights on at all times, treating our local forest with disdain, etc…  We didn’t hear enough from her about looking at the “big picture”.

Still, we are grateful to Ms. Gajewski for coming out to West Mt. Airy on a quiet moonfilled August night.  I for one, would not bet against her chances of making great strides towards the ultimate goal of being number one.  We look forward to hearing from her again and meeting the new Outreach Coordinator, when s/he is appointed.

On a hot night in late August, West Mt. Airy Neighbors (WMAN) held its Quality of Life meeting on the greening of Mt Airy. The NorthWest Philadelphia neighborhood of Mount Airy is one of the neighborhoods at the edge of the Wissahickon which is part of the Fairmont Park System. The future of Fairmount Park is of concern to the residents of the neighborhood. The meeting opened with a presentation that represents the kind of broad thinking about sustainability I hope that other sustainability councils and local greening committees will take to heart.

Fall in The Wissahickon Forest

Doris Kessler, the WMAN Streetscapes Committee Chair and David Tukey, Tree Vitalize/Tree Tenders Coordinator, proposed that WMAN expand its mission from simply improving WMAN’s streetscapes and other public spaces to include the stewardship of its urban forest as a whole (emphasis ours).

This proposal to the West Mt Airy Neighbors Association is an acknowledgment that abundant, healthy, life enriching vegetation, of which street trees are a significant element, is critical to a good ‘quality of life’.” In his presentation, Dave Tukey “evangelized” beautifully for the preservation of Mt. Airy’s urban forest, which he defined as expanding well beyond the Wissahickon Park to include street trees and the trees in each homeowner’s front yard. He urged the WMAN board to help raise money and develop programs to not only plant more trees and care for them, but in effect, to expand the minds of residents regarding what a forest is.

A hallmark of cultural change is that before a situation changes, the minds of influencers and participants must also change. In this case, the desired thinking is that a Streetscape is more than a tree planted at a corner, and a Forest is more than a collection of trees off in the distance, somewhere. News to me: Each nearby homeowner’s front lawn is included in botanical definitions of “urban forest”. Migrating warblers go from trees in the Wissahickon, to trees in Carpenters’ Woods (a small forest in central West Mt. Airy) to the trees in someone’s front yard. Dave urged WMAN to educate the community regarding tree identification, and the benefits of homeowners planting trees rather than uprooting them. The Streetscapes Committee made a formal presentation to WMAN’s board to this effect in September. I certainly welcome all efforts to preserve the Northwest Forest, which is in a vulnerable state (see the summary of Sebastian Varela’s research on the Future of the NorthWest Philadelphia Urban Forest).

In no particular order here is a short list of some of the new green offerings I noticed at the 2009 GreenFest Philly:

-  SolarGoose Flash Lights by LED Innovations Inc combines small high efficiency solar panels with Nickel-Metal Hydride batteries and birght, long life LED to make Solar rechargeable Flashlights.

- Farm Fresh Express delivers local, organic groceries to your door year round directly from organic farms in surrounding counties to your kitchen.

- Bennett Compost specializes in removing  organic waste that can be composted such as: dead leaves, pine needles, coffee grounds and filters, eggshells, flowers and fruits and vegetables scraps .  Bennett Compost initially is offering pick-up in South Philadelphia, Center City, Fairmount, Northern Liberties, Fishtown and Lower North Philadelphia.
Bennett Compost is somewhat competing with Philly Compost, although PhillyCompost is focused on servicing the organic waste pickup and composting needs of NorthWest Philadelphia and is focused on volume organic waste producers. Here is the PhillyEcoCity post announcing the opening of PhillyCompost: “Philly Compost launches“.