Greenplans Newstag:www.rri.org,2008:/news//12008-08-21T00:19:24ZMovable Type 3.31EU Climate Change Policy 2009tag:www.rri.org,2008:/news//1.192008-08-21T00:18:46Z2008-08-21T00:19:24ZThe EU is continuing to work on a global and comprehensive post-2012 agreement to be finalized in Copenhagen in 2009. The EU's goals are to curb greenhouse gas emissions in all its areas of activity in a bid to achieve...
http://europa.eu/scadplus/leg/en/s15012.htm]]>
New Zealand's Sustainability and Climate Change Plantag:www.rri.org,2008:/news//1.182008-08-21T00:18:11Z2008-08-21T00:20:03ZNew Zealand has been developing a coordinated plan for implementing sustainability in relation to climate change. The Sustainability Package is composed of 6 initiatives: Helping Households towards Sustainability; Business partnerships for sustainability; Eco-verification: demonstrating sustainability of goods and services; Government...
New Zealand has been developing a coordinated plan for implementing sustainability in relation to climate change. The Sustainability Package is composed of 6 initiatives: Helping Households towards Sustainability; Business partnerships for sustainability; Eco-verification: demonstrating sustainability of goods and services; Government to buy sustainable goods and services; Public service takes lead in becoming carbon neutral ; Towards zero waste. Work on the six initiatives sits alongside much existing work to promote sustainability, including: The New Zealand Energy Strategy; New Zealand Energy Efficiency and Conservation Strategy; New Zealand Transport Strategy; New Zealand Waste Strategy; Climate Change action plan.
Mexico City to Cut GHG Emissions 12% by 2012tag:www.rri.org,2008:/news//1.172008-08-21T00:17:30Z2008-08-21T00:18:03ZMexico City plans to cut its greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions by 12% by 2012, according to Environmental Secretary Martha Delgado. The capital and the surrounding area emit about 60 million tons of GHG per year. The Climate Action Program of...
Mexico City plans to cut its greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions by 12% by 2012, according to Environmental Secretary Martha Delgado. The capital and the surrounding area emit about 60 million tons of GHG per year. The Climate Action Program of Mexico City 2008-2012 will require investment of around 60 billion pesos (US$5.9 million), half of which the city government will provide, the other half to come from the sale of carbon bonds and other investments. Twenty-six actions will be launched to reduce emissions, including the capture of biogas from the Bordo Poniente landfill, and a program of compulsory public transportation to school. "The Climate Action Program of Mexico City represents an enormous opportunity to contribute and curb global warming. As a city we will reduce emissions by seven million tonnes of carbon dioxide equivalent...which puts us at the forefront of this issue."
Netherlands' GIDEON Arrives in 2011tag:www.rri.org,2008:/news//1.162008-07-07T20:21:17Z2008-07-07T20:21:48ZThe NL Ministry of Housing, Spatial Planning and the Environment ('VROM') is creating a single, cohesive infrastructure of geographic information ('geo-information') concerning matters such as road networks, soil structure and environmental quality, relating to almost all major social issues such...
The NL Ministry of Housing, Spatial Planning and the Environment ('VROM') is creating a single, cohesive infrastructure of geographic information ('geo-information') concerning matters such as road networks, soil structure and environmental quality, relating to almost all major social issues such as mobility, care, public order, safety and spatial planning. GIDEON is being built in collaboration with other ministries, government bodies, companies and knowledge institutes. This infrastructure will be freely available to all, enabling citizens, companies and institutes to improve development of products and services. In this way, GIDEON will help reduce companies' administrative burden and improve the delivery of government services to citizens. VROM has not opted for a pre-determined blueprint, but chooses to gradually build up the system in order to increase chances of success and close gaps of knowledge and expertise.
EU Agrees to Outlaw "Green Crimes"tag:www.rri.org,2008:/news//1.152008-05-30T19:27:45Z2008-05-30T19:28:41ZThe EU has approved legislation that will force national governments to apply criminal sanctions for deliberate or negligent damage to the environment. The list of crimes includes, inter alia, unlawful discharges or emissions into the air, soil or water so...
The EU has approved legislation that will force national governments to
apply criminal sanctions for deliberate or negligent damage to the
environment. The list of crimes includes, inter alia, unlawful discharges
or emissions into the air, soil or water so as to cause "substantial
damage" to humans and/or to the environment; waste shipments; killing,
destruction, possession, trading of protected fauna or flora specimens,
except when little or no impact on conservation status; any conduct
causing significant deterioration of habitats within protected sites; and,
production, importation, exportation, placing on the market or use of
ozone-depleting substances. Inciting, aiding, abetting are equally
criminal. Penalties are left to member states' with the proviso that they
be "effective, proportionate and dissuasive". The law is limited to areas
where the EU has competence, leaving national legislation intact in other
areas.
Guidance for New Zealand Resource Management Plans Issuedtag:www.rri.org,2008:/news//1.142008-05-13T02:33:07Z2008-05-13T02:33:53ZThe Quality Planning website of New Zealand's Ministry for the Environment has newly issued Guidance notes on structuring, organizing and writing provisions of regional and district plans under the Resource Management Act. Many plans are at the ten-year stage and...
www.qp.org.nz. The QP website promotes best practices for
officials, consultants, environmental managers, and others involved in
resource management.
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Second New Zealand State of the Environment Issuedtag:www.rri.org,2008:/news//1.132008-05-02T21:46:58Z2008-05-02T21:47:25ZIn January 2008 the NZ Ministry for the Environment issued its second state of the environment report, Environment New Zealand 2007, highlighting the impact and significant improvements, as well as continuing work needed, since the RMA was enacted in 1991....
http://www.mfe.govt.nz/publications.
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Open Access to Environmental Data Moves Forwardtag:www.rri.org,2008:/news//1.122008-04-11T00:34:02Z2008-04-23T00:34:28ZIn a parallel to Resource Renewal Institute's proposed California Environmental Data Platform, the European Commission and Council, promulgated a "Recommendation on the management of intellectual property in knowledge transfer activities and code of Practice for universities and other public research...
In a parallel to Resource Renewal Institute's proposed California
Environmental Data Platform, the European Commission and Council,
promulgated a "Recommendation on the management of intellectual property
in knowledge transfer activities and code of Practice for universities and
other public research organizations." The purpose is to facilitate
knowledge transfer as a strategic mission by taking steps to encourage
open access to research results while enabling the intellectual property
to be protected in a manner that facilitates cross-border collaborations
in research and development and ensures equitable and fair treatment of
participants. The ultimate goal is the circulation and use of ideas in a
dynamic knowledge society. The EU database will be a model and a resource
for RRI's CEDP.
Going green: White hunter, green hearttag:www.rri.org,2008:/news//1.112008-04-10T22:38:18Z2008-04-10T22:39:18ZEco pioneer Huey Johnson still has his guns blazing for the environment Read the full article...
Read the full article]]>
River Warriors Campaigntag:www.rri.org,2008:/news//1.102008-02-11T17:55:42Z2008-02-11T18:00:05ZFebruary 6, 2008 For Immediate Release "Celebrating Big Achievements of the Little Guys" Three-dozen environmental activists and organizations got a nice surprise in the mail this week. The Water Heritage Trust, an environmental think tank dedicated to preserving water for...
"Celebrating Big Achievements of the Little Guys"
Three-dozen environmental activists and organizations got a nice surprise in the mail this week. The Water Heritage Trust, an environmental think tank dedicated to preserving water for nature sent $1000 checks to "River Warriors" in the western United States.
Huey Johnson, President and Founder of the Trust said, "We are celebrating the big achievements of the little guys. Small successes over decades are the reason that we still have any rivers at all."
Johnson, who has been active in environmental preservation efforts for almost fifty years founded the Trust for Public Land, served as Secretary for Resources for the State of California, and has authored several books on environmental problem solving. He was also the recipient of the UN Sasagawa Environment Prize for his championship of the holistic action approach to environmental problem solving called Green Plans.
Johnson said, "When one surveys the emergence of a citizen's movement to save water, the best efforts are those of individuals and small organizations that truly love and care for the rivers they're defending."
Among those groups receiving the micro grants were, Friends of the River, The Smith River Alliance, Mill Valley Stream Keepers, Yellow Dog Watershed Preserve, Trout Unlimited, The Tuloumne River Trust and Friends of Butte Creek.
"These largely unrecognized groups' expertise and dedication will prove instrumental to improving California and Western states' archaic water practices," said Johnson.
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Perspectives On The Will To Change - Annette Gellert Interview, Chair of RRI's Board, by The Rex Foundationtag:www.rri.org,2007:/news//1.92007-11-28T23:02:36Z2007-11-29T23:32:43ZThe following article is available on-line through the Rex Foundation Publications, www.rexfoundation.org PERSPECTIVES ON THE WILL TO CHANGE, Annette Gellert interview by the Rex Foundation Annette Gellert began working on environmental issues and the Green Plan approach to addressing them...
The following article is available on-line through the Rex Foundation Publications, www.rexfoundation.org
PERSPECTIVES ON THE WILL TO CHANGE, Annette Gellert interview by the Rex Foundation
Annette Gellert began working on environmental issues and the Green Plan approach to addressing them some 20 years ago, primarily as a mother concerned for the health of her children. As she watched her three young children blissfully play in the Bay, and then, with the same hands that handled shells, crabs, dirt and other Bay elements, eat a snack or rub their eyes, she wondered, "Is this water safe?" and "Who is managing the water quality to ensure its safety?" There was plenty of news about how unsafe the Bay water was, with warnings that pregnant women or people with any health issues should not eat fish from the Bay due to high mercury levels and toxins from marine activities and industry dumping, yet no information about how these problems were being managed to protect public health.
Annette was also troubled by what seemed to be the combative struggle between environmental and industry interests, as well as a compartmentalized approach that addressed pieces of the problem rather than having a more comprehensive, cohesive approach.
Annette's pursuit of a better approach has included learning about how countries like The Netherlands and New Zealand, and now the European Union, have been using Green Plans to dramatically reverse environmental threats and successfully generate both environmentally and economically sound solutions with a process based on collaboration and trust. Annette wants to see more Green Planning in the U.S. and is exerting her will and energies to make this happen.
Elements Of A Green Plan
The ultimate Green Plan scenario is a process for governance and problem-solving, where at every level - house-hold, community, city, county, region, state and country - there is agreement on the environmental problems to be solved with benchmarks for reduction of toxic emissions and associated shifts in manufacturing methodologies to achieve desired results over a designated period of time, along with a process for monitoring progress and making adjustments as needed. Essential ingredients to a successful green plan include:
- All involved parties - businesses, government agencies, community-based organizations (CBOs), citizen groups, scientists - are willing participants in the process;
- Agreements/covenants are made in the spirit of trust and cooperation;
- A reasonable timeframe for overall change is established;
- There are measurable benchmarks that everyone in the process knows about and agrees to;
- All participants share a genuine desire to solve the identified problems with solutions that enable businesses to survive while also promoting long-term public health and safety.
A California Green Plan
In 2001, Annette established the Women's Environmental Leadership Network (www.wellnetwork.org) as a vehicle to connect with other women sharing her concerns and desires to effectively create a safe and healthy environment for their children and, of course, all people. Annette believes WELL helps demonstrate what might be called the "women's approach" to solving problems - coming together, convening, cooperating and seeking consensus-based solutions to problems. WELL, in conjunction with the Resource Renewal Institute (a 1990 Rex Foundation beneficiary) is working to establish a Green Plan in California. The optimal steps to accomplish this are:
- Identify industry, community, political and non-profit leaders involved in environmental issues, and have them sit down together;
- Agree on scientific experts/resources of undisputed integrity, whose assumptions will be accepted as the basis for identifying the environmental issues to be addressed, such as agreeing on toxic levels of mercury in the Bay that must be reduced and ultimately eliminated;
- Develop solutions to the agreed upon problem(s) and how each participating entity is involved in implementing the solutions;
- Identify ways to ensure economic as well as social benefits;
- Agree on implementation timeframes that are workable for all participants;
- Agree on benchmarks to monitor progress over time, and the process for carrying out and reporting the monitoring;
- Provide ample opportunities to build trust and cooperation.
The Will To Change
Annette believes that a major paradigm shift is needed for the Green Plan concept to take hold. "We need to consider our children's health and quality of life first, with our personal interest and financial rewards second, which is the reverse of the current situation. We must consider how to take care of each other and benefit future generations, not just focus on quarterly profits."
Annette worries that people do not have information that, if fully available and widely dispersed, would produce sufficient outrage and concern to generate the will to change. For example, she says, "How many people know that more and more babies are born with toxic chemicals in their blood, that breast milk is full of chemicals, that sperm count is down by 25% across the United States over the last 25 years?"
From her own experience and from witnessing the successful implementation of Green Plans in other countries, Annette knows that individuals can exert significant influence to bring about Green Plans in the U.S. and the associated shift in thinking that will support their implementation. She recommends that individuals find their voices and:
- Write/Fax their legislators, stating that they want to see the Green Plan way take hold in their communities;
- Write to corporations, directing action to implement environmentally sound practices and take leadership roles in establishing Green Plans;
- See what others are doing to successfully solve problems, such as the Resource Renewal Institute and other Rex Foundation beneficiaries;
- Examine their own living situation and find ways to shift to more environmentally healthy behaviors, such as reducing bottled water consumption, or minimizing plastic bag use;
- Exercise their right to vote! Annette points out that we cannot expect to outspend the interests who want to maintain the status quo; however, we can vote our will to change.
Annette's children are now 18, 21 and 26, yet the questions she raised about the safety of Bay water when they were toddlers are still unanswered. To that end, she and her WELL colleagues are hard at work to shape a Green Plan for California. They seek to have connections with young women and men, women's organizations across the country and internationally, an din general, all women and men who share the belief that we must all do something to ensure the health and well-being of our children for generations to come, and that we can, individually and together, make that happen.
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What It Will Take to Build a Sustainable U.S. by Kenny Ausubeltag:www.rri.org,2007:/news//1.82007-11-26T19:41:51Z2007-11-26T20:07:40ZWhat It Will Take to Build a Sustainable U.S. by Kenny Ausubel, November 1, 2007 We must imagine a new way of life in order to avoid the devastating environmental crises that face humanity, argues the visionary founder of the...
What It Will Take to Build a Sustainable U.S.
by Kenny Ausubel, November 1, 2007
We must imagine a new way of life in order to avoid the devastating environmental crises that face humanity, argues the visionary founder of the Bioneers conference.
The nature of nature is change. Sometimes it hurtles into fast forward, tripping radical shifts. Think of it as nature's regime change. For the first time, people are causing it on a planetary scale.
Andrew Revkin reported in the New York Times that "The physical Earth is increasingly becoming what the human species makes of it. The accelerating and intensifying impact of human activities is visibly altering the planet, requiring ever more frequent redrawing not only of political boundaries, but of the shape of Earth's features themselves."
Mick Ashworth, editor-in-chief of the annual Times Comprehensive Atlas of the World, said his staff of 50 cartographers now updates their databases every three and a half minutes. Commented the editor, "We can literally see environmental disasters unfolding before our eyes."
Environmental disasters are always human disasters. Satellite pictures of Burma over the past three years have recorded the extermination of over 3,000 villages of the indigenous Karen people and nearby tribes, displacing half a million people. The main culprit is the corporate hunger for oil and gas, backed by the murderous local military junta.
Google Earth will leave you google-eyed. An overrun resource base is visibly shrinking at the same time our population keeps growing. Honey, we shrunk the planet.
The bottom line, of course, is we're living beyond our means. Nearly two thirds of the life-support services provided to us by nature are in decline worldwide and the pace is quickening. We can't count on the ability of the planet's ecosystems to sustain future generations. This is new territory.
The big wheels of ecological governance are turning. Regime change is the actual technical term some ecologists use -- for instance, when the climate flips from one state to another. It can be irreversible, at least on a human time frame. These evolutionary exclamation points unleash powerful forces of destruction and creation, collapse and renewal.
We do have a compass of sorts during these cycles of creative destruction. As Charles Darwin observed, "It is not the strongest of the species that survive, nor the most intelligent, but the ones most responsive to change."
Change is not linear, and sudden shifts sometimes remake the world in the blink of an eye. We know we're approaching mysterious thresholds that mark the tipping points of ecological regime change, and we may have already crossed some. The closer we get to each threshold, the less it takes to push the system over the edge, where the degree of damage will be exponentially greater. Societies slide into crisis when slammed by multiple shocks or stressors at the same time. Climate change is propelling both natural and human systems everywhere toward their tipping points.
When huge shocks transform the landscape, structures and institutions crumble, releasing tremendous amounts of bound-up energy and resources for renewal and reorganization. Novelty emerges. These times belong to those who learn, innovate and adapt. Small changes can have big influences. It's a period of creative ferment, freedom and transformation.
Ecological regime change means a radical realignment of the human enterprise with nature's governance. We stand at the threshold of a singular opportunity in the human experiment: to re-imagine how to live on Earth in a good way that lasts.
The name of the game is resilience. It means the capacity of both human and ecological systems to absorb disturbance and still retain their basic function and structure. Resilience does not mean just bouncing back to business-as-usual. It means assuring the very ability to get back. But if regime change happens, resilience means having sufficient capacity to transform to meet the new management.
A network of ecologists and social scientists called the Resilience Alliance outlined some of the rules of the road in their book "Resilience Thinking." The first principle of resilience thinking is systems thinking: It's all connected, from the web of life to human systems. "You can only solve the whole problem," says Huey Johnson of the Resource Renewal Institute. Manage environmental and human systems as one system. Taking care of nature means taking care of people, and taking care of people means taking care of nature. Look for systemic solutions that address multiple problems at once. Watch for seeds of new solutions that emerge with changing conditions.
Resilience thinking means abandoning command-and-control approaches. We're not remotely in control of the big wheels of ecological governance or complex human systems. Greater decentralization can provide backup against the inevitable failure of centralized command-and-control structures. Think decentralized power grids, more localized food systems, and the Internet. Always have a backup. Redundancies are good failsafe mechanisms, not the waste portrayed by industrial efficiency-think.
The heart of resilience is diversity. Damaged ecosystems rebound to health when they have sufficient diversity. So do societies. It's not just a diversity of players; it's the diversity of how they respond to myriad challenges. Each one does it slightly differently with specialized traits that can win the day, depending which curve ball comes at you. Diverse approaches improve the odds. Diverse cultures and ideas enrich society's capacity to survive and thrive.
Ecological governance is also operating on much grander time frames than quarterly reports and mid-term elections. Think dozens, hundreds, even thousands of years. Sustainability means staying in the game for the long haul.
We know some other keys to resilience.
* Build community and social capital. Resilience resides in enduring relationships and networks that hold cultural memory the same way seeds regenerate a forest after a fire.
* Empower local communities to solve their own problems. Governance usually works best when it's closest to the ground and includes all stakeholders across all levels.
* Beware of systems being too tightly connected, because one shock to the system can cause them all to crash at the same time.
* And above all -- learn, experiment and innovate.
The one non-negotiable is to face our vulnerabilities clearly and collaboratively. Windows of opportunity are finite and fleeting. As Yogi Berra said, "I knew I was going to take the wrong train, so I left early."
Fortunately the climate is changing in more ways than one. A starburst of creativity is also warming the globe with what ecological designer John Todd calls "human ingenuity wedded to the wisdom of the wild." With any luck, we may be able to avoid catastrophic ecological regime change by embracing societal regime change.
Some of the most inspiring models are the National Green Plans well underway in the Netherlands, New Zealand, Sweden, and Singapore, as well as in the European Union. In the UK, the movement to Transition Towns is weaning whole populations off imported energy, food, and material goods.
The Dutch National Environmental Policy Plan made sustainability and environmental recovery a national goal. Since its inception in 1989, it has achieved a formidable 70 percent of its mission. This new societal regime aligns business with biology and the state with the public good.
The Dutch took the solve-the-whole-problem approach and had strong political leadership. In 1989 Queen Beatrix used her traditional Christmas Eve speech to appeal to the nation. She reported that although the Netherlands had some of the best environmental regulations in the world, scientists were warning her of the real possibility there would be no Dutch great-grandchildren. In a country where a third of the country lies below sea level and holds two thirds of the population, the threat of rising seas from global warming is up close and personal. The Green Queen's speech precipitated a political sea change.
The Dutch mobilized around a bold goal: total environmental quality recovery in 25 years. They welcomed new ideas. They built on the successes of others, saving loads of time and money. They generated rigorous and transparent data unpolluted by special interests. They've made it freely available to the world because no country can do it alone.
But the process really kicked in only after business got on board and took the lead. Fate lent a hand. Following the collapse of the Soviet Union, some Eastern European nations were eager to establish a market economy. They asked a few key Dutch business leaders to advise them on how they achieved the excellence of Dutch public education, health, and housing, all within a robust business climate.
Upon arrival, the Dutch business leaders literally could not breathe from the out-of-control pollution left by an unaccountable one-party state. Seeing children condemned to grow up in these bereft conditions vaporized their opposition to independent government regulation.
They returned to Holland with a surprising proposal: Have government set the standards, and let business figure out how to achieve them. While business proved pivotal for the first step in the National Plan, government became the key player. Together they developed a twenty-five-year plan, as well as annual plans that report on progress and challenges. If business fails to meet the specific voluntary goals, government will intervene with mandatory controls. To guarantee transparency and accountability, the government funded environmental NGOs as watchdogs to transmit their findings to the media and the public.
The European Union, representing 490 million citizens in 27 nations, has begun to adopt many of the same approaches.
"What planet are we on?" you might wonder from here in the Wild West of Western civilization. Isn't it time for a U.S. Green Plan? We have a golden opportunity to regenerate our waning economy at the same time we seriously correct environmental degradation and rampant social injustices. We are a brittle superpower bedeviled by an aging infrastructure so decrepit the American Society of Civil Engineers gives it a pitiable grade of D. We're ill prepared to deal with disasters, especially the natural and industrial disasters that present far greater threats to the nation than terrorism. Our declining public health and educational systems rank among the lowest in developed countries. Real wages are at a 59-year low and corporate profits at an all-time high. Extremes of wealth and poverty rival the Gilded Age of the robber barons, while the military economy is fast bankrupting our future.
The reinvention of a green economy can begin to solve our bundle of economic and social ills simultaneously. We can create abundant jobs, prosperity, equity and hope. Our new declaration of independence is from fossil fuels and imperial entanglements. We can make the urgent transition to renewable energy at the same time we renew the higher angels of what it means to be an American.
In fact, the seeds are sprouting everywhere. In the absence of federal leadership, large numbers of cities and states are banding together to lead exactly these kinds of changes. It's a meta-trend called the "New Localism." Political power is decentralizing to effectively address bioregional realities of people and place.
Political boundaries are also morphing. A historic convergence of the environmental and social justice movements is crystallizing in the shared recognition that taking care of nature means taking care of people, and taking care of people means taking care of nature. The environmental community is increasingly embracing social justice as central to the mission. Indigenous communities, our old-growth cultures, are providing visionary leadership as guardians of the Original Instructions for how to live in peace with the land and each other. Leaders in the African-American community, including pathfinders such as Van Jones, Majora Carter and Omar Freilla, are organizing around a green economy founded in green-collar justice and the relief of poverty and racial inequality. In 2006, the Latino National Congress put environment at the top of its national political agenda.
Meanwhile, there are mounting numbers of green conservatives, a.k.a. "Crunchy Cons," stepping up under the banner of conserving the Earth for their grandchildren. Evangelical Christians are calling for Creation Care. Networks of networks are getting connected, collaborating and innovating across divides to solve the whole problem. This is resilience in action.
As David Orr puts it, "Hope is a verb with its sleeves rolled up. Hopeful people are actively engaged in defying the odds or changing the odds."
The odds are especially tough here in the U.S. We need to reclaim our government from the corporate shadow government. It will keep trying to hijack systemic changes that threaten its short-term profits, vested interests and power. There'll be enough green corporate spin to knock the Earth off its axis. We need to reject the role of consumers in a "Democracy Theme Park," as Jane Anne Morris calls it, in favor of exercising our political muscle as active citizens. Simply put, we need the separation of corporations and the state.
We need to attend relentlessly to the deep wounds of racism that continue to poison our society and divide us. As John Mohawk wrote, the history of racism is inextricably tied to class war: the history of civilization as "organized violence in pursuit of plunder." The only Gulf War we need to wage is to end the gulf between rich and poor.
A successful U.S. Green Plan depends on our doing all this -- together, with respect, justice and dignity for all people and the circle of life.
The Mayan people call this epic threshold the "Time of No Time." Ohki Simine Forest, a Canadian wisdom keeper of Mohawk descent who lives and works with the Mayan people in Chiapas, describes the Mayan vision in this way. From here on, we're on Earth time. Mother Earth is shaking to her core. It's a time of madness, disconnection and hyper-individualism. It's also a time when new energies are coming into the world, when people are growing a new skin.
The Mayan vision says that we in the West will find safe harbor only if we can journey past a wall of mirrors. The mirrors will surely drive us mad -- unless we have a strong heart. Some mirrors delude us with an infinity of reflections of our vanity and shadows. Others paralyze us with our terror and rage, feeding an empire that manufactures our fear into resignation.
But the empire has no roots and it's toppling all around us. In this time everyone is called to take a stand. Everyone is called to be a leader.
To get beyond the wall of mirrors, the final challenge is to pass through a tiny door. To do this, we must make ourselves very, very small. To be humble. Then we must burrow down into the Earth, where indigeneity lives. On the other side is a clear pond. There, for the first time, we'll be able to see our true reflection.
In this Time of No Time, we can go in any direction we want -- by dreaming it. Our dreaming can shift the course of the world.
That's our deepest well of resilience.
That's what we're here to do together as bioneers: re-imagine the world. It's going to be a long and winding trek across generations. We're already making some of the paths others can walk toward the dream, toward our many dreams. Countless more dreamers will blaze luminous new trails. The dreams are already within us. One day we may awaken to find ourselves living in our wildest dreams.
May it be so.]]>
A Lecture by Huey Johnson on Going Green: A Strategy for Economic Prosperitytag:www.rri.org,2007:/news//1.72007-04-13T23:51:04Z2007-10-30T03:48:13ZGoing Green: A Strategy for Economic Prosperity A Lecture Given by Huey D. Johnson March 19, 2007 In East Lansing, Michigan My topic is The Green Path for Economic Prosperity . I call it the Green Plan Path, which I...UN Concludes Human Activities Cause of Global Warmingtag:www.rri.org,2007:/news//1.62007-02-16T00:56:48Z2007-02-16T01:06:32ZThe United Nations Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) published a statement on February 2, 2007 that "most of the observed increase in globally averaged temperatures since the mid-20th century is very likely due to the observed increase in anthropogenic...
The United Nations Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) published a statement on February 2, 2007 that "most of the observed increase in globally averaged temperatures since the mid-20th century is very likely due to the observed increase in anthropogenic (human) greenhouse gas concentrations." The IPCC is an authoritative body of 2,500 scientists from more than 130 countries, and "Very likely" amounts to a probability of more than 90% in UN jargon.]]>
EU Approves Sweeping Chemical Curbstag:www.rri.org,2007:/news//1.52007-01-30T19:55:03Z2007-01-30T21:35:04ZIn December 2006 the European Union greatly expanded its campaign against industrial pollutants with the EU Parliament, Council and Commission approving sweeping restrictions on chemicals with new regulations coming into effect in June 2007. The new law, called REACH for...
In December 2006 the European Union greatly expanded its campaign against industrial pollutants with the EU Parliament, Council and Commission approving sweeping restrictions on chemicals with new regulations coming into effect in June 2007. The new law, called REACH for the regulation, evaluation, and authorization of chemicals, provides health and safety data for approximately 30,000 chemicals currently used in everyday products. Most of these chemicals have never before been tested for safety and duplication of tests performed on animals will be prohibited. REACH is seen as a positive step with the most dangerous substances being gradually replaced, it offers better protection for people and the environment, and places the responsibility with the manufacturer to provide information about chemical substances.]]>