Activism

The Truth About Clothing Discussed at Columbia Forum

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Yael Aflalo, Catherine Tyc, Sass Brown, Gretchen Jones, and Raz Godelnik
Elsa dress

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

On January 17th, 2013, the Columbia Business School Sustainable Business Committee held a packed forum in Manhattan entitled, “Sustainable Fashion- Timeless or Trendy?,” discussing the sustainability of our clothing. Many audience members were shocked to hear about how toxic the production of fabric is, given the amount of pesticides and chemical dyes used. The panel included several eco-designers (hemperjeans.com; gretchenjonesnyc.com, thereformation.com) who use natural or repurposed fabrics. Also speaking were film-maker Catherine Tyc, and Sass Brown, Dean at the Fashion Institute of Technology in NYC, and author of a beautiful book entitled “Ecofashion” and the blog Ecofashiontalk.com. Q&A centered around how to make more people aware of this issue, and the concept of transparency and labeling requirements for clothing. Several designers brought their designs, and particularly impressive was a NY-based designer who created the “Elsa” dress- simple and classic, made of organic cotton (See Elsa and Me) . Also of note was another NYC company encouraging clothing exchange, called Closet Dash. For more on this event see http://www.cbsacny.org/article.html?aid=1260.

Repost from Climate Reality Blog: 100% Renewables Now!!

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Happy to have contributed to the Climate Reality Blog, on a report released by the organization I work for, Renewable Energy Long Island.

100% Renewable — 100% Doable

09/10/2012 // 2:00 PM //

Source: Renewable Energy Long Island

 

This is a guest post by Beth Fiteni, Program Manager at Renewable Energy Long Island.When Al Gore challenged the nation in his famous 2008 speech to achieve 100% renewable electricity within 10 years, Gordian Raacke listened. As a Climate Reality Leader and executive director of the advocacy groupRenewable Energy Long Island (reLI), Gordian was already powering 100% of his home with solar energy. But he didn’t want to stop there.

He picked up on Mr. Gore’s challenge and wondered whether Long Island could meet the electricity needs of its 3 million people with renewable energy technologies available today. With funding from two foundations and supported by a coalition of organizations including national groups like 350.org, reLI hired Synapse Energy Economics to get some expert answers.

The result is the Long Island Clean Electricity Vision, which found that by 2020 it is possible to meet 100% of Long Island’s residential electricity needs from renewables, and by 2030 to have a 100% renewable, zero-carbon electricity supply. The study finds the cost to be modest: Average customer bills are estimated to increase by roughly 8-12%. On a typical household’s monthly utility bill, this amounts to between $12 and $18, or the price of a pizza. [Read more…] about Repost from Climate Reality Blog: 100% Renewables Now!!

1000 Trained by Al Gore on Climate Reality

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People from 47 U.S. states and 58 countries spent 3 days in San Francisco being trained by Al Gore and team at the Climate Reality Project training, 8/21-23/12. The group included none other than Ms. Bette Midler! (see more on her NY Restoration Project at www.nyrp.org) Mr. Gore presented his entire current slideshow, supported by climate scientist Mike MacCracken of the Climate Institute.

3 new things I learned:

1) Humans emit 90 million tons of CO2 every DAY (we are now up to 390ppm in the atmosphere though scientists say we should be at 350ppm);

2) Some climate scientists are now saying that the high number of extreme weather events around the globe can clearly be attributed to climate change, whereas they had been hesitant to make that connection in the past;

3) Other countries are facing climate impacts so directly that they don’t have the same level of denial we have here. The fossil industry has paid PR firms to successfully plant doubt in the public’s mind in the U.S. It was embarrassing – at one point conference organizers said “people dealing with deniers (Americans) stay in this room, and people from other countries who want to focus on action steps meet in room B.”

But it wasn’t all bad news: last year more was invested globally in renewable energy ($187 billion) than on fossil infrastructure- yay! And San Francisco is an exemplary green city. There is hope….  See http://climaterealityproject.org/ if you would like a presentation.

Beth Fiteni & Gordian Raacke of Renewable Energy LI at training

Conference Promotes Offshore Wind for Long Island

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(L-R) Carol Murphy, Alliance for Clean Energy NY; Peter Grannis, NYS Comptroller's office; Adrienne Esposito, Citizen's Campaign for the Environment; Gordian Raacke, Renewable Energy Long Island; Frank Murray, NYSERDA; Kevin Law, Long Island Association; & Catherine Bowes, National Wildlife Federation

Wind is a free, clean source of energy. Right now, the U.S. produces about 50,000MW (enough for 12.8 million homes) from on-land wind turbines (See AWEA.org), but the number of offshore wind farms stands at zero. A conference held 7/31/12 at the Long Island Association, Melville, NY aims to change that. Sponsored by Renewable Energy Long Island, Citizen’s Campaign for the Environment, Alliance for Clean Energy NY, National Wildlife Federation and Sierra Club, the conference invited key leaders: Peter Grannis, First Deputy Comptroller,  NY State Comptroller’s office, and Kevin Law, Long Island Association, talked about jobs and economic benefits that offshore wind could bring; Karsten Moeller from Siemens Energy discussed the numerous successful projects in Europe, stating that wind turbines are now big enough to produce 6mw each and can be placed further offshore to minimize view impacts. (Most people I’ve met who’ve seen wind turbines think they’re beautiful, BTW…)

Bill Moore, Deepwater Wind, discussed a proposed wind farm between Rhode Island and Long Island. Representatives from NYSERDA, the NY Department of State, and the utility companies LIPA and NYPA contributed status updates on an existing proposal off the Rockaways, for which NYPA has submitted a lease application to the federal government. LIPA has found the area off the south shore of Long Island to be highly suitable for wind power production, and NY State is doing “competitive use” studies right now to determine which areas are best, given shipping lanes, fishing uses, etc.

The main point of the conference was to point out that while no energy source is perfect, offshore wind holds the potential to be a clean energy source with very few negative effects, especially when compared to the use of fossil fuel-burning power plants, so it would be a welcome addition to New York’s energy mix.

Greenbiz Founder Joel Makower Speaks at Greenspaces

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Beth Fiteni & Joel Makower at Greenspaces, NYC

I am fortunate enough to be renting desk-time at Greenspaces, a wonderful location near Chinatown in NYC for green entrepreneurs to set up and work without having to pay for their own office & overhead (www.greenspaceshome.com). It is also home to EcoSalon, a location for events including a recent lecture by Joel Makower, founder of Greenbiz.com, and author of 20 books including “Strategies for the Green Economy,” “The Green Consumer,” and “Beyond the Bottom Line: Putting Social Responsibility to Work for Your Business and the World.”  He spoke about 1) communal consumption — for example, instead of every home buying a power drill, one is shared by a neighborhood, or even, one car being used by multiple people — one person uses it when the other doesn’t need it. This is a way to reduce overall consumption of resources while still meeting everyone’s needs. 2) He said people generally are only motivated to buy “greener” products if they are somehow “better” — either cheaper, or have more value because they work better, are healthier etc. 3) He also mentioned that some companies are doing more to reduce their environmental impacts than they admit publicly, because they fear opening themselves up for criticism that they are still not doing enough. It was a thought-provoking discussion from someone who clearly has an ear to the ground on green trends. See www.makower.com.

“Every week you make dozens of decisions that directly affect the environment of the planet Earth. At work, at home and at play, whether shopping for life’s basic necessities or its most indulgent luxuries, the choices you make are a never-ending series of votes for or against the environment.” — Joel Makower

An Evening with Frances Moore Lappe’s Small Planet Fund

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Frances Moore Lappe and daughter, Anna at the Small Planet Fund Gala & Auction

One of the reasons I love living near New York City is the opportunity to attend events like I did last night. I had the great fortune of spending an evening with Frances Moore Lappe, her daughter Anna Lappe, and 100 of their closest friends. It was the 10th Anniversary of their Small Planet Fund, and an auction was held to benefit this year’s grantee, Real Food Now (see realfoodchallenge.org). The event took place in a beautiful private loft in Soho, NYC, and guests included many from around the region who work to support local food production, fresh food access for all, and healthy options in schools — such as Catherine Gund, maker of the film “What’s On Your Plate?” and Bhavani Jaroff, of Slow Food Huntington. It was a pleasure to meet Frances Moore Lappe, whose seminal book “Diet for a Small Planet” published in the 1970s created such a wave of awareness, and it is doubly inspiring to see how her daughter Anna has followed in her footsteps. They co-authored the book, “Hope’s Edge” several years back, and each have newer books out since then: Frances has written “Eco Mind” about the psychology of changing our attitudes towards the earth, and Anna has written “Diet for a Hot Planet: The Climate Crisis at the End of Your Fork and What You Can Do About It.” See smallplanetfund.org.