Al Gore: fond of israel and cowboy bootsThe invitees to last night’s Dan David Prize ceremony—during which generous awards were given to Former Vice President Al Gore, Amos Oz, and Sir Tom Stoppard, among others—were a mixed bunch. Young Israelis who regard flip flops as formal attire mingled with perfectly-coiffed, elderly American Jewish ladies. Scruffy journalists in t-shirts and Crocs mixed with distinguished diplomats. Israeli politicians and celebrities circulated among the anonymous masses.

A few things unified this mixed bag of guests, however:

1. Regardless of the formality of their dress, young hipsters and elegant elders alike pounced upon the refreshment bar as soon as the doors to the event opened.
   
2. In typical Israeli fashion, everyone had at least one cell phone and used it constantly.
   
3. Regardless of their dress or stature, everyone knew who the star of the evening was: Al Gore.

Al Gore is beloved by Israelis, so despite the fact that he was awarded the Dan David Prize last night in recognition of his contributions to raising awareness about our planetary environmental crisis, everyone attending the ceremony admired him for his support of the State of Israel as well. Israeli President Shimon Peres made this crystal clear when he said, during his address, that “Al Gore has many titles. I will not repeat them. Al Gore is a dear and good friend of the State of Israel.”

Gore, who with his slight Southern accent and cowboy boots (yes, he wore cowboy boots) appeared to be a type of environmental Lone Ranger, received the prize and addressed the audience with his characteristic charisma. After congratulating Israel on its recent Independence Day, he encouraged us all to act urgently in order to push the political tipping point and put renewable energy on the agenda. He said that, among other things, the environmental crisis is a political problem in that it's a matter of getting politicians to address these issues. What we need, Gore said, is “sufficient political will. But as the people of Israel know, sufficient political will is a renewable resource.”

In the meantime, Gore will be sponsoring other kinds of renewable energy. Today he'll deliver the opening lecture at a two-day conference called “Renewable Energy and Beyond” that will be held at Tel Aviv University. Among the topics to be discussed are global warming and geopolitics, Israel’s road to energy independence, and business opportunities for sustainable energy.

So, what is Al doing with his cool $1 million, you might ask? He’s donating 10% to young researchers in the field...and 90% to the Alliance for Climate Protection. And not spending any on new cowboy boots.

Photo credit: Courtesy of Haaretz (Tomer Appelbaum)

Gil Peled: knows how to get resultsOne thing Israelis aren't short on: Talk.  So it’s a reassuring sign of the times that whether it’s climate change, the rapidly shrinking Dead Sea, or the way urban pollution effects everyday quality of life, the environment—HaSviva—is becoming a much more common topic of conversation.

It hasn't always been that way. Gil Peled, an Israeli architect and green building consultant, explains, “Now everyone is aware of environmental problems, but when we had suicide bombers up the road it was the last thing on people’s minds."

Fortunately, converting talk into action is precisely what Peled’s Eco-Housing Pilot Project has been doing. Like so many people in the country, Peled lives in a stone-brick apartment block erected two generations ago when the national priority was ‘building the land’ rather than ‘saving the planet’. But what sets Peled’s building in central Jerusalem apart from the others nearby is that the residents have reduced their ecological footprint by over 30% since the project began in 2002.

The trademark stone floors and thin walls work well in the summer, letting heat escape, but that same lack of insulation becomes a burden during the icy Jerusalem winter. I’m not alone in huddling around an electricity-hungry portable heater from December to February. Not exactly what the Jewish Agency promised… And when it comes to recycling, if there’s a deposit box for newspapers or plastic bottles at the end of the street then you’re one of the lucky ones.

Jerusalem's Eco-Housing Pilot Project: shows that it's possible to turn talk into actionNu, so how is it possible to ‘green’ a 50 year-old building, not to mention stubborn stuck-in-their-ways Israelis? For Peled, the most important thing was to green people’s attitudes. “It’s easy to jump on technological solutions, but it’s really a matter of changing people’s behavior,” he says.

Now, with the full participation of the ten apartments in the building, they have succeeded in reducing their resource consumption via simple changes like recycling, using energy-efficient appliances, and harvesting rainwater from the roof to feed plants in the garden—itself a reclaimed patch of wasteland. “The place was very neglected and in disrepair and we’ve taken responsibility of our environment,” says Peled.

The Eco-Housing Project is the first—and remains the only—green apartment building in Israel. Peled notes that it’s much easier to design green housing when building from scratch, pointing to a number of independent projects in the Negev and Galilee doing just that. However, he argues that “detached housing is, by definition, un-ecological” because of the roads and infrastructure needed, not to mention the extra space required in a land-scare country.

The building, which over 20 people currently call home, has seen tenants come and go, but their enthusiasm hasn’t waned. “They didn’t come here because they were ‘green’, but when they arrived they understood that there is something special here,“ explains Peled with satisfaction.

Israel's Yellow Vented Bulbul: one of ten in the running for national birdIt has recently become a bit of an issue here in Israel that there is no national bird, and so sixty years on, we're finally adopting a bird to symbolize the country. Britain is proud of its little Robin with its red breast, America boasts of its bald Eagle, and Japan celebrates its own aesthetic in the shape of the elegant Crane—now Israel will join the flock.

The scheme to match Israel with her bird representative is the brainchild of Dr. Yossi Leshem, pioneering Israeli ornithologist, senior researcher in the Zoology Department at Tel Aviv University, and Director of the International Centre for the study of Bird Migration in Israel. Leshem is justly proud of the scheme, and explains that “Birds are an essential part of the future of Israel’s landscape and environment. Public awareness will be drawn to Israel’s natural ecosystem and the bird’s habitat.”

Leshem and his co-initiator Dan Alon of the Israel Ornithology Centre, based near the Knesset in Jerusalem, have designed an educational project that gives both schoolchildren in Israel's 4,000 schools (and 9500 nursery schools), and soldiers across all the IDF’s regiments, the chance to acquaint themselves with the birds that have been chosen for the contest. 13 fighter planes from the IAF have been named after birds, and the military is taking an active interest in the project.

In my garden in Jerusalem I am oft woken early to a wonderful trilling that I swear sounds like, “Here’s Gabriel." On Shabbat, it becomes “Swing Gabriel swing,” but none of the experts has as of yet identified it. A blackbird recently built her nest close by, and I often hear her young feeding. It's always a good reminder that we share this environment with such a rich plethora of bird life, all trying to adapt to sharing space with humans.

This past December, over 1000 bird lovers—fondly known in the trade as ‘twitchers’—were offered the chance to draw up a list of 10 species who might fit the bill as Israel's National Bird. Criteria for these 10 include the number of times they are referenced in biblical sources, the color, and the sound of the feathered friend.

Here are the 10 most favored.  To study their glorious plumage in technicolor, check out our photo gallery.

1. The Hoopoe (Duchifat, Heb.)
2. Yellow Tufted Sunbird – (Tsufit). This bird is also known as the Palestine Sunbird, so don’t be surprised if it doesn’t become the feathered face of Israel on a stamp…
3. Barn Owl (Tinshemet)
   
4. Lesser Kestrel (Buz Adom)
   
5. Yellow Vented Bulbul (Bulbul)
   
6. Griffin Vulture (Nesher)
   
7. European Goldfinch (Chochit)
   
8. Spur-Winged Plover (Siksak)
   
9. Graceful Warbler (Pashosh)
   
10. White Breasted Kingfisher (Lavan Hazeh)
    

Whether this will just mean another icon for the stamps, or whether the contest and accompanying educational campaigns will result in real environmental and ornithological awareness remains to be seen. Voting ends tomorrow, May 8, and President Peres will announce which of these birds the nation has chosen on May 29th, at a special ceremony in Jerusalem. Israel-focussed environmental website Green Prophet, where I also blog regularly, is running a special online poll here. So if you know your Hoopoe from your Plover, or your Warbler from your Bulbul, get involved and add your vote.

View the gallery of contenders.

Okay, First Things First: stop shooting at us.The threat of man-made climate change looms larger than any other problem facing the planet, so it's no wonder that the discussion about global warming has turned into a kind of choreographed screaming that drowns out the facts.

Science unequivocally tells us that climate change is real and caused by man, but predictions of destruction on an epic scale don’t stack up.

Consider the plight of the polar bear – a pin-up ‘victim’ of global warming. Some campaigners claim polar bears are dying because of warmer temperatures, but the facts don’t support the hysteria.

Since the 1960s, polar bear numbers have actually grown five-fold. Polar bears will eventually be affected by climate change, but many creatures and plants in the Arctic will do better as temperatures rise. That doesn’t make up for waning populations of polar bears, but we need to hear both sides of the story.

Scare stories are based on faulty assumptions about just one declining bear population. For the sake of argument, let's accept those faulty assumptions at face value. That means we are losing 15 bears a year to climate change. This means that – at most – 15 bears could be saved this year if we could stop global warming right now. Of course, we can’t. The Kyoto Protocol will cost $180 billion dollars, yet will not affect temperatures by very much: it would probably save .06 of one bear each year.

There are smarter alternatives. Hunters shoot between 300 and 500 polar bears each year. We can revoke hunting rights and clamp down on poachers. Surely it makes more sense to save 300-500 polar bears at virtually no cost than it does to spend hundreds of billions of dollars saving just one.

Of course, we don’t just care about polar bears, but also about the human toll of climate change. It seems logical to expect more heat waves and therefore more deaths. But though this fact gets much less billing, rising temperatures will also reduce the number of cold spells. And the cold is a much bigger killer than the heat. According to the first complete peer-reviewed survey of climate change's health effects, global warming will actually save lives. It's estimated that by 2050, global warming will cause almost 400,000 more heat-related deaths each year. But at the same time, 1.8 million fewer people will die from cold.

The Kyoto Protocol, at great expense, is not a sensible way to stop people from dying in future heat waves. At a much lower cost, urban designers and politicians could lower temperatures more effectively by planting trees, adding water features, and reducing the amount of asphalt in at-risk cities. Estimates show that this could reduce the peak temperatures in cities by more than 20 degrees Fahrenheit.

Global warming will claim lives in another way: by increasing the number of people at risk of catching malaria by about 3 percent over this century. According to scientific models, implementing the Kyoto Protocol for the rest of this century would reduce the malaria risk by just 0.2 percent.

On the other hand, we could spend $3 billion annually -- 2 percent of the protocol's cost -- on mosquito nets and medication and cut malaria incidence almost in half within a decade. For every dollar we spend saving one person through policies like the Kyoto Protocol, we could save 36,000 through direct intervention.

The world shouldn’t ignore climate change. Rather than throwing trillions of dollars at a treaty that will achieve little, I advocate a dramatic increase in spending on research into low-carbon energy. If every nation took part, this would be much more efficient than Kyoto, yet cost almost ten times less.

We should remember when we respond to the threat of climate change that other huge challenges face the planet:

• 4 million people will die from malnutrition this year
• 3 million from HIV/AIDS
• 2.5 million from indoor and outdoor air pollution
• 2 million from lack of micronutrients (iron, zinc and vitamin A)
• And almost 2 million from lack of clean drinking water.

Climate change policies are not the most effective way of dealing with these issues.

My latest project, Copenhagen Consensus 2008, will look at the world’s biggest challenges and ask some of the world’s top minds to identify the best solutions to them. Four Nobel laureates and four other top economists will weigh up how much good could be achieved by different approaches to world problems, and will identify the most effective ways to make a difference.

There’s more information at Copenhagen Consensus.

Cutting carbon emissions through Kyoto has become the instantaneous answer to any problem, but we could achieve more through simpler policies.

For one thing, we should stop shooting polar bears.

Bjørn Lomborg is the organizer of the Copenhagen Consensus 2008, adjunct professor at the Copenhagen Business School, and author of Cool It and The Skeptical Environmentalist.

Lobbying for Earth: is easy, essential, and effectiveI've been shlepping canvas bags to the supermarket for over a decade. My house doesn't have a single "old-fashioned" lightbulb. I drive a hyrbid. Yet, the Earth is still warming. In fact, twelve of the last thirteen years were the warmest in recorded history. And last year, scientists from 130 countries declared with 100% certainty that climate change was occurring – and with 90% certainty that human beings are causing it.

Truth be told, the 50 lightbulbs in my house are not going to singlehandedly prevent US carbon dioxide emissions from exceeding 450 parts per million by mid-century. Yet, thanks to a little-known provision in the U.S. energy bill (HR 6), which was signed into law this December, incandescent lightbulbs will be but a dim memory by 2012. And the collective impact of 50 lightbulbs in one-hundred million households across the United States just might keep national emissions in check.

Unfortunately, too many of our political leaders lack the courage to acknowledge the need for aggressive action. No one wants to be held responsible for voting for legislation that may increase electric prices in their District or make it more expensive for their constituents to continue fueling their SUVs.

Our Senators don't know we're willing to accept these comparatively minor inconveniences, and they will never know unless we tell them.

That's my job as COEJL's Climate and Energy Program Coordinator. Each week, I visit members of Congress and tell them the Jewish community supports – even demands – strong national legislation to cap U.S. emissions. I tell them this desire is grounded in ancient texts, which establish our sacred duty to "repair the world." And I tell them our profound concern for U.S. energy security strengthens our resolve. But this message is more meaningful when it comes from you. Here are a few steps to begin with:

• A simple call to your member of Congress is an important first step. Ask to speak to the legislative assistant who works on climate and energy policy. Tell him or her that you are a constituent – and that you support a firm cap on U.S. emissions. Better yet, ask to schedule a visit (either with the Member himself or his legislative aid) – either in Washington, D.C. or at home in your District.

• Write and send an Op Ed or a Letter to the Editor to your local paper.

• Sign up to receive monthly updates about COEJL's education, action, and advocacy campaigns.

• To learn more about how to advocate for effective climate legislation, visit the COEJL website, we're I've prepared simple talking points on the Lieberman-Warner Climate Security Act.
  

I don't doubt the importance of individual action. If we all justify our own bad environmental decisions because of our individual inconsequence, the climate crisis will be insurmountable. Yet, climate change is much larger than you or I, and it can only truly be tackled with larger changes – changes that are mandated by national legislation.

This past December, the Environment and Public Works committee voted to do just that. On December 5, America's Climate Security Act (S 2191) was voted out of committee and it will be considered by the full Senate this June. Call your Senator today and urge her to vote for the bill when it comes up for a vote. As Al Gore recently declared, "It's one thing to change a lightbulb. It's another to change the law."

To learn more about my thoughts on national climate and energy legislation, visit the COEJL blog at www.coejlblog.blog.com

Jerusalem of Green: Bustan Brody community garden Downtown Jerusalem is cluttered enough at any time of year, but rarely more so than this past week. Posters for cleaning services and chametz sales imploring people to burn, sell, or otherwise dispose of their leavened bread in preparation for Pesach were pasted on lampposts and notice-boards on every street. Jews are generally partial to consuming food rather than throwing it away, but this time of year is the exception to the rule.

Only a few minutes from my apartment is another exception to the rule: A place where Jerusalemites come each week to throw away their leftovers, no matter the season. Down at Bustan Brody, part of a city-wide network of community gardens, ecologically-minded Israelis bring their unwanted food to dump on the compost heap. The volunteer-run garden is a green oasis in the midst of five-story apartment buildings—an area which was once slated for development during Ehud Olmert’s stint as Jerusalem Mayor, in a bid to reduce the city’s budget deficit by selling off public plots of land for construction.

“We took responsibility for our own backyard, that’s a revolutionary concept,” says Abba Zavidov, one of the founders of the Bustan, which lies within easy walking distance from the Prime Minister’s official residence. “If we’re going to talk about sustainability then we need to prove it can be done. People bringing their kitchen waste to compost at the garden is a great way of showing how."

In Jerusalem, organic refuse like kitchen scraps and garden clippings make up around 40% of the city’s solid waste. If not recycled via composting, it typically ends up contributing to more of the brown landfill mountains like those straddling the road from Jerusalem to Tel Aviv, which trick you into thinking that you’re still in the Judean Hills instead of speeding across the (once flat) coastal plain.

And God Said, "Are You Gonna Eat That?': compost in the holy land But it’s not just the Festival of Matzo that inspires a frenzy of food disposal: Figures published last week reveal that folks in my native Britain throw out one-third of all food they buy each year, including over four million apples. And they don’t even have Pesach as an excuse. Waste on such a huge scale has been partly fueled by cheap food culture and marketing ploys like ‘two-for-one’ offers, which encourage over-consumption.

I hope that Rabbis in Israel and the Diaspora will be using their sermons during the Jewish festival of freedom as an opportunity to reflect on the merits of environmental responsibility in a world where not everyone can take their food for granted. In any case, composting can offer a green solution to the stale matzo and indigestion-cookies due to be littering kitchens across Israel next week.

Sure, You're Not a Plastic Bag: but are you a good deal?Everyone knows that green is the new black, but what you might not know is that most people are perfectly cool with black. Sure, we'd all love to do our part for the environment, but the general consensus is that a good deal and easy parking are more important than patronizing a market that uses recyclable bags and packaging. So says a recent Nielsen poll, which reported that only 9% of adults prioritize a store's environmental impact and practices when choosing where to shop.

This shouldn't come as a shocker, especially considering the rising cost of food and other basic essentials such as gas and health insurance. Inflation is making things more and more difficult for America's sprawling middle class, and the looming threat of recession can only mean more trouble for them--and for the Green movement.

One market-savvy blogger predicts that, in the face of said recession, the long-term future of the Green movement is grim. "Going green," he says, "is a 'smart, socially-conscious' business move when the economy's booming. One wonders, though, how many CEOs will stay the course when their boards and shareholders squeeze them even harder for improved quarterly profits."

My roommate is my newest blogging muse. She delights in feeding me information that I can turn into blog posts. And I, in turn, take great joy in accepting her great ideas and passing them off as my own.

So, a few nights ago she came downstairs with her Smithsonian magazine in hand to show me an article on Thomas Edison and the evolution of the lightbulb. Apparently, incandescent bulbs are for bad people who don't care about the earth. But compact flourescent light (CFL) bulbs (they're the ones that look like squigly, corkskrew things) are, at least for now, the bulb-of-choice for those who are "environmentally conscious." No Mercury Rising: The lesser of two evils.

For those of you who are concerned: No, I do not often commune with others to discuss the technological advancement of light-emitting sources, though my friend and I have been known to argue about the syntactical nuances of a two-syllable word for an ungodly amount of time. On a good night, though, we realize how nerdy we are and quickly shift to a discussion of whether skinny jeans and high-waisted pants are really a good look for anyone.

She thought I would find the article amusing, though, because it highlighted a nationwide campaign launched by the Coalition on the Environment and Jewish Life called "How Many Jews Does it Take to Change a Lightbulb?" The campaign is geared toward getting Jewish communities to be more environmentally aware.

It's an attempt at proselytization, so to speak -- urging incandescent-bulb-using Jews (and others) to convert to the CFL bulb belief system. It's a cool idea, and very tikkun olam, which I am ALL about.

All good stuff. The problem? I am not "environmentally conscious," it seems. You either are, or you aren't. Yes, I should be. But I'm not.

My roommate, however, is the recycler extraordinairre, queen of the environmentally aware. I, on the other hand, drink a bottle of water every day, and when I am done I throw it in the trash.

I am environmentally challenged. I gripe when my roommate's gigantic box of "stuff to be recycled" takes up too much space in our office. I snarl when she goes through the house trading out my incandescent bulbs for her CFL bulbs. I recoil at countless empty catfood tins in the sink, awaiting their journey into her recycling bag.

And yet, I feel guilty . . .

But she drives an SUV, and I do not. It's a trade-off. And I do charity work when I can, so it must even out, right?

And here's my loophole: apparently (according to the Smithsonian piece), these CFL bulbs have mercury issues, which means you don't want them anywhere near the kitchen where food is being prepared -- if the light were to somehow get bumped, you would end up with a dusting of mercury all over your kitchen counter. That's great -- save the environment, kill the individual, slowly, over time. Death by mercury poisoning, but I've saved the planet.

But then I read this:

Our message is as easy as changing a light bulb: If you could conserve energy and help stop global warming in one simple step, wouldn't you? CFLs use up to 75% less energy than incandescent light bulbs, while lasting approximately eight times longer. This means less production of greenhouse gas emissions, air pollution, and toxic waste. The average CFL will save its owner at least $55 in energy costs over the lifetime of the bulb! Your CFL will pay for itself in energy savings within two to three months (based on a 5-hour/day use and average electricity costs.) If every U.S. household replaced one bulb with a CFL, it would have the same impact as removing 1.3 million cars from the road.

So the ethical dilemma is not a new one: Do I do what will benefit me and my family, or do I take the high road and change out my bulbs in order to remove 1.3 million cars from the road?

Only one other aquarium, the Okinawa Churaumi Aquarium, Japan, (above) keeps whale sharks.

Whale Sharks live for up to 120 years in the wild, but a recent Japanese study showed that in captivity their average lifespan is about 502 days.

At the Georgia Aquarium, a whale shark died earlier this year when his stomach was punctured by feeding tubes used because the shark had stopped eating, according to the NewYork Times:

“Findings show that Ralph’s stomach appeared abnormal, because it was thin-walled and perforated,” Jeff Swanagan, the executive director of the aquarium, said in a news release. “This likely caused peritonitis which led to Ralph’s death.”

[...]Though he [Dr. Robert Hueter] cautioned that it was impossible to know for sure what caused the punctures, he added, “the only thing that came out of that discussion was looking at the force-feeding method and looking at the tube.” He said the panel recommended using tubes with more rounded ends in the future to prevent injuries.

Continue reading...

Via SoMA Review, I discover that Masada is falling!

Masada: Falling and falling foreverMasada, one of Israel's biggest tourist attractions and a symbol of the country's struggle for survival, is in danger of collapse after heavy rainfall four years ago damaged some of its supporting walls.

The 1,400 meters (4,600 feet) of wall damaged by the water must be fixed before irreversible harm is done, Zeev Margalit, head of the preservation department at the Israel Nature and National Parks Protection Authority, said by telephone.

``What collapses today will be gone forever,'' he warned. ``Masada could fall tomorrow, or it could fall a year from now, or even 10 years from now.

And while this may not affect your personal religious journey in any dramatic way, it hit me like a ton of bricks, because I did, in fact, have a pretty dramatic experience visiting Masada.

Maybe it was the altitude that affected me that day, or maybe I’d just been in Israel the right amount of time to have “an experience” but I remember distinctly that it was startling for me to be there, and revisit the story of Masada—the story of how a band of Jews committed mass suicide rather than be taken by the Romans. 

Committed suicide?  Yeah…

Because Judaism strongly discourages suicide, however, Josephus reported that the defenders drawn lots and slain each other in turn, down to the last man, who would be the only one to actually take his own life. The storerooms were apparently left standing to show that the defenders retained the ability to live and chose the time of their death over slavery. This account of the siege of Masada was related to Josephus by two women who survived the suicide by hiding inside a cistern along with five children and repeated Elazar ben Yair's final exhortation to his followers, prior to the mass suicide, verbatim to the Romans.

Now…

Why does this story affect me so strongly? I’m not sure.  I know that, at the time, it seemed wrong to me.  I’d heard the story before, and in my head I’d filed it away with all the other mythic tales of battle-as-faith, but standing there at Masada, it seemed totally messed up.  Suicide, however we sugarcoat it, seemed wrong. Seemed not-so-Jewish.

And yet—I felt conflicted because I was also overwhelmed by the history and power of Israel.  I felt part of a flawed culture, something I couldn’t understand, but also couldn’t dismiss.  The power of the place and the wrongness of the deed seemed to be, in that moment, one feeling.

I don’t know if I can fully explain this, but it was a big part of me becoming who I am right now. A big part of me learning to be a good Jew by becoming a more critical Jew. Not turning away, but facing the flaws in my tradition and faith, and asking them for better answers.  Because there is such a power in it all, undiminished by the flaws.

And the idea that this place is falling.  That it will disappear…upsets me.  It was a big huge physical symbol for me. It still is.

And sometimes we need our symbols.