Fukushima Meltdown

SUBHEAD: A nuclear meltdown is a self-sustaining reaction. Nothing can stop it except stopping the reaction.  

By Dr. Tom Burnett on 27 March 2011 in Hawaii News Daily - 
(http://hawaiinewsdaily.com/2011/03/when-the-fukushima-meltdown-hits-groundwater)


Image above: What people's attention in Fukushima should be turning to this spring - cherry blossoms. From (http://www.panoramio.com/photo/19750114).
 
Fukushima is going to dwarf Chenobyl. The Japanese government has had a level 7 nuclear disaster going for almost a week but won’t admit it.

The disaster is occurring the opposite way than Chernobyl, which exploded and stopped the reaction. At Fukushima, the reactions are getting worse. I suspect three nuclear piles are in meltdown and we will probably get some of it.

If reactor #3 is in meltdown, the concrete under the containment looks like lava. But Fukushima is not far off the water table. When that molten mass of self-sustaining nuclear material gets to the water table it won’t simply cool down. It will explode – not a nuclear explosion, but probably enough to involve the rest of the reactors and fuel rods at the facility.

Pouring concrete on a critical reactor makes no sense – it will simply explode and release more radioactive particulate matter. The concrete will melt and the problem will get worse. Chernobyl was different – a critical reactor exploded and stopped the reaction. At Fukushima, the reactor cores are still melting down. The ONLY way to stop that is to detonate a ~10 kiloton fission device inside each reactor containment vessel and hope to vaporize the cores. That’s probably a bad solution.

A nuclear meltdown is a self-sustaining reaction. Nothing can stop it except stopping the reaction. And that would require a nuclear weapon. In fact, it would require one in each containment vessel to merely stop what is going on now. But it will be messy.

Fukushima was waiting to happen because of the placement of the emergency generators. If they had not all failed at once by being inundated by a tsunami, Fukushima would not have happened as it did – although it WOULD still have been a nuclear disaster. Every containment in the world is built to withstand a Magnitude 6.9 earthquake; the Japanese chose to ignore the fact that a similar earthquake had hit that same general area in 1896.

Anyway, here (http://www.weatheronline.co.uk/weather/news/fukushima?LANG=en&VAR=euradsfc) is the information that the US doesn’t seem to want released. And here (http://xkcd.com/radiation/) is a chart that might help with perspective.

Making matters worse is the MOX in reactor #3. MOX is the street name for ‘mixed oxide fuel‘ which uses ~9% plutonium along with a uranium compound to fuel reactors. This is why it can be used.

The problem is that you don’t want to play with this stuff. A nuclear reactor is meant to bring fissile material to a point at which it is hot enough to boil water (in a light-water reactor) and not enough to melt and go supercritical (China syndrome or a Chernobyl incident). You simply cannot let it get away from you because if it does, you can’t stop it.

The Japanese are still talking about days or weeks to clean this up. That’s not true. They cannot clean it up. And no one will live in that area again for dozens or maybe hundreds of years.

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Permaculture Taking Off in Hawaii

SUBHEAD: Reawakening an appreciation for traditional systems and adding in modern permaculture techniques.

 By Craig Mackintosh on 28 March 2011 in Peraculture RI -
(http://permaculture.org.au/2011/03/28/permaculture-taking-off-in-hawaii)

 
Image above: Setting up a permaculture garden on the Big Island. From (http://permaculturehi.wordpress.com/2010/06/10/permaculture-and-organic-gardens-ive-been-involved-with).
 
The Permaculture Research Institute USA has partnered with Sust`ainable Molokai to embark on the bold mission of permeating the Hawaiian Islands with permaculture goodness. Traditional Hawaiian agricultural systems, before the arrival of Europeans, were ingenious and sustainable.

Indeed, their ahupua`a systems, known as high island ‘Ohana’ systems to permaculturists, are one of the few truly sustainable agricultural systems ever known — an awesome legacy that should instill pride and purpose in modern-day islanders.

Unfortunately, the last century, in particular, is seeing multiple major threats to the island state’s unique ecology — soil erosion, biodiversity loss, and Hawaii has become Big Biotech’s GMO test capital of the world (see video at very bottom of post).
But permaculturists are fighting back, as you’ll see:

  
Video above: Malama Molokai film "Heal the Land". From (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P2Lp8YmJaag)

Seeing millions of tons of topsoil muddying Hawaii’s shoreline was shocking for me to see. It represents centuries of sustainable land use — now getting washed away through ignorance and malpractice. If this remains unchecked, Hawaii could well become a desert island…. 

Reawakening an appreciation for traditional systems and adding in modern permaculture techniques could go a long way towards improving what is a very vulnerable food security situation in Hawaii. Like many places that were once fully self-sufficient in foodstuffs, Hawaii is today almost completely dependent on imports. 

Given the domino effect of collapsing economies, high energy (and hence, food) costs, and increasing unrest in our currently highly globalised world, Hawaii seriously needs to rethink its current trajectory and start phasing industrial agricultural systems out entirely.

The good news is Hawaiians have their own constitution on their side (see quote below), and the Hawaiian Department of Agriculture itself should be a great ally, if their own statements are indeed sincere:

Hawai‘i is located approximately 2,506 miles from the continental United States. Between 85-90% of Hawai‘i’s food is imported, which makes it particularly vulnerable to natural disasters and global events that might disrupt shipping and the food supply.

The Constitution of the State of Hawaii, Article XI, Section 3, says, “The State shall conserve and protect agricultural lands, promote diversified agriculture, increase agricultural self-sufficiency and assure the availability of agriculturally suitable lands.”

Increasing food self-sufficiency in Hawai‘i will require sound public policies, the best available science, an efficient industry, and a public willing to support local agriculture. It requires protecting agricultural land and water, enhancing food safety, investing in agricultural research, and addressing rising costs for labor, energy, and transportation. — A Hawai`i Department of Agriculture White Paper, December 16 2008 (PDF)

Let’s give all the support we can to the efforts of the Permaculture Research Institute USA and Sust`ainable Molokai. Watch the PRI USA’s course listing for courses you may wish to attend.

See "Islands At Risk" about GMO experiments in Hawaii. 

Video above: Pinky Presents "Islands at Risk". From (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zQDOdnRBLqc)

 

Plastics Now and Forever!

SUBHEAD: The only way to limit the amount of plastics in the oceans is to use less plastics.

 By Daniel Pargman on 27 March in Life After Oil -  
(http://life-after-oil.blogspot.com/2010/10/plastics-now-and-forever.html)

 
Image above: Display photo for all plastic Little Tyke's Cozy Coupe II ride-on toy. From (http://www.plioz.com/redesigned-cozy-coupe-is-now-better-than-ever-for-your-kids).
 
This is the independent sequel to my blog post about Alan Weisman's book "The World Without Us" which I published almost half a year ago. In the preceding text, I did not cover the one chapter in the book that dealt with plastic ("Polymers Are Forever"), but rather saved that discussion for this text. First, a super-brief introduction to the connection between plastic and oil, by the (Swedish-language) blogger Jonas sustainable blog:

"In principle, all plastics is made from raw materials derived from oil. Packages, bottles, electronics, furniture, shoes and clothes. All is largely made of plastic. In many applications, plastics is superior to other materials with regards to density and strength. It is also cheap to manufacture plastic products."

The use of plastic materials has virtually exploded after World War II. Small (2 mm) plastic cylinders called “nurdles” is the raw material of the plastic industry. These cylinders are melted and then shaped into anything and everything. We produce more than 5 000 000 000 million nurdles each year (100 billion kilograms). The U.S. is a net exporter of plastic and 4.6% of all petroleum in the U.S. is used to produce plastics (2006).
Of all the plastics ever made, only a minor part has been recycled or burned. Unlike cardboard or aluminium bottles, not all plastic is equal:

”There are so many different types [of plastics], and so much of it really can’t be recovered because either volumes aren’t sufficient or it really doesn’t have a lot of value in terms of the marketplace”

The rest of all plastic ever made, maybe up to 1 billion tons (the U.S. produces 30 million tons of new plastics each year), is still out there somewhere in the environment. Until evolution produces microbes with plastic-degrading enzymes, there is nothing in nature that can break down plastic. This can be compares with the discussion about vulcanized rubber in the previous text.

Plastic on land which is not buried in a garbage dump is broken down slowly by the sun's ultraviolet (UV) rays - but plastic in water is another story. Plastic floating on a water surface is cooled down and may be protected from the sun’s rays by algae. Plastic that does not float in the water is completely safe from UV rays.

Unfortunately, a not unsignificant share of the plastics that have been produced over the past 60 years has ended up in the oceans. For some decades, the same forces that break down stones into sand over time - wind, waves and tides – have grinded down plastic into smaller and smaller pieces. Over time plastic pieces have thus become smaller plastic pieces and then even smaller plastic pieces - but there is no evidence that plastic of any size or shape is chemically degraded and disappears from the seas.

Jellyfish and birds eat small colorful plastic balls in the belief that they are fish eggs (yellow-brown ones are mistakenly taken for krill). For some reason, nurdles and other small plastic fragments unfortunately act as magnets for a variety of hazardous chemicals. What are the effects when the extremely unpleasant PCB chemicals (previously used as softeners in plastics but banned in the late 1970's) are released from the 1960's plastics it is bound to during hundreds of years to come in a worst-case scenario? Nobody knows.

When plastics is broken down into smaller and smaller pieces, it finds its way further and further down the marine food chain. We can be horrified by images of dead birds, animals choking on plastic bags or entangled in the left-behind plastics from a six-pack of beer in the woods, but what happens when krill or even smaller plankton ingest plastic particles? These creatures can not break down the plastics, and if a sufficiently small organism eats a sufficiently small plastic particle, one of two things can happen. Either the plastic particle is not small enough, gets stuck in the intestinal canal and kills the organism, or the plastic particle is small enough and passes right through the organism.

But what happens on the way? Could it be that the plastic particle emits chemicals that have been bound to it, or that the particle at some future date (if or when it finally breaks down) will give off substances that are toxic, or in other ways dangerous to living organisms? Nobody knows, but we know that all living things in the oceans, including the smallest of organisms at the bottom of the marine food chain, will soon ingest a dose of plastic particles. Will the nasty coloring chemicals that are often found in brightly colored plastics become concentrated higher up in the food chain? Nobody knows.

If we humans disappeared from the face of the earth tomorrow, the plastic we have manufactured would persist for a long time. Plastics has been around for only a few decades, and that is not long enough for us to know what the long term effects that these materials have. We may note that of all the hundreds of different kinds of plastics there are, none has died a natural death yet, and we thus have very little knowledge about what such a death looks like.

One may reflect upon the fact that just as there is a lot that we don't know about the dangers of plastic, there was a lot we didn't know and could not have guessed about the dangers of fossil fuels 100 years ago (noise, exhaust fumes, smog, carcinogens, global warming etc.).

Since most plastics floats, the majority of all that there is in the oceans is transported by currents and accumulates on our beaches and in other places. The most conspicuous place where plastic flock when it is about to “die” was discovered (or rather made known to the general public) in the late 1990s and is located in the Pacific between Hawaii and California. That is the home of the country- or maybe even continent-sized North Pacific Subtropical Gyre, also known as the Great Pacific Garbage Patch.

In this huge floating rubbish dump, much of what has blown into the water during the last 50 years in an area the size of half of all Pacific coastlines eventually end up. There are endless amounts of plastic bags, plastic caps, plastic cups, plastic foil, fishing nets, balloons and so on. The total amount of plastic in this artificial continent is unknown but was estimated to weigh 3 million tons and to cover more than 25 million square kilometers in 2005 (i.e. almost 60 times larger than a large European country such as Sweden).

The image of a continent of plastic is actually misleading, since most of the "continent" only consists of (strongly) elevated concentrations of plastic particles at or near the surface of the ocean. These particles can not be seen from a satellite, and the only way to determine the boundary is by taking samples of water and analyze them. Since there is no established boundary between "normal" and "elevated" levels of debris, the estimated size of the Great Pacific Garbage Patch varies by up to a factor of 20.

In addition to the plastics that is located at or near the surface (i.e. most of it), there are plastics in the depths of the sea as well as somewhere inbetween. Since the floating garbage patch is located in international waters, individual states tend not to worry about it too much. Some of those who visit the garbage patch describe the visit as surreal – here you are in the middle of nowhere, thousands of miles from land, encountering both familiar and strange artefacts that suddenly pop up - a motorcycle tire, a life jacket, a construction worker's hard hat and so on. An expedition to the garbage patch found that:

”plastic debris was present in 100 consecutive samples taken at varying depths and net sizes along a 1,700 miles (2,700 km) path through the patch. The survey also confirmed that while the debris field does contain large pieces, it is on the whole made up of smaller items which increase in concentration towards the Gyre's centre, and these 'confetti-like' pieces are clearly visible just beneath the surface.”

Last year, similar plastics graveyards were discovered/mapped in the Atlantic (the North Atlantic garbage patch) and in the Indian Ocean (the Indian Ocean garbage patch), but we now know that there are no fewer than five such gyres in the oceans where plastic is accumulated. They are identified and studied in the project 5 Gyres.

Since most of the plastics in the oceans is not found in large islands of plastics, but rather in numerous tiny small pieces, there is no good way to clean it up. In addition, the oceans are sort of large, which makes cleanup impractical, to say the least. The bottom line is that the only way to limit the amount of plastics in the oceans is to use less plastics and be more careful about what happens with it when and after we throw it away.

In a public relations ploy from last year, Swedish global appliance maker Electrolux scooped up plastics from a number of gyres and built six "showcase vacuum cleaners" from it. This seems rather sympathetic, since the company’s stated goal was to:

“bring attention to the issues of plastic pollution and the scarcity of recycled plastics needed for making sustainable home appliances”

Electrolux for sure have pinpointed the problem, but the solution - "sustainable" home appliances - feels a bit strained. Anyway, Electrolux has put together a nice video (50 seconds at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YIlWzZo0fvo) about the “Vac from the sea" project which is worth watching.

Another multi-million dollar high-profile-PR-project that I feel ambivalent about is the three-month Plastiki expedition of last year - conducted in a catamaran built from recycled plastic. I get similar vibes from this project as I do when Al Gore on the one hand preaches about reduced energy use, but on the other hand owns several luxury homes and flies a private jet. The driving person behind Plastiki, David de Rothschild, illuminates my own ambivalence towards the project:

”People hear it's a kid from a wealthy European family with a beard who's an environmentalist (and think), 'Surely this must be a stunt.' But I'm not afraid of drawing fire. Our culture has slowly disassociated itself from nature. But that's a model that has failed us. We must rethink it."

Finally, I would like to direct you to photographer Chris Jordan and his, "Midway: Message from the gyre" (2009). Jordan writes about this project:

”These photographs of albatross chicks were made in September, 2009, on Midway Atoll, a tiny stretch of sand and coral near the middle of the North Pacific. The nesting babies are fed bellies-full of plastic by their parents, who soar out over the vast polluted ocean collecting what looks to them like food to bring back to their young.

On this diet of human trash, every year tens of thousands of albatross chicks die on Midway from starvation, toxicity, and choking. To document this phenomenon as faithfully as possible, not a single piece of plastic in any of these photographs was moved, placed, manipulated, arranged, or altered in any way. These images depict the actual stomach contents of baby birds in one of the world's most remote marine sanctuaries, more than 2000 miles from the nearest continent.“

All his images thus show albatross chicks that died from suffocation, starvation or poisoning and whose decay allows us to see what their "last meal" contained. An albatross normally lives for 50 years and an albatross female lays only one egg once a year or once every second year. This slow reproductive cycle makes the demise of every single albatross chick extra tragic. It has been estimated that up to 40% of all albatross chicks die as a result of their involuntary plastics-eating orgies.

Our plastics consumption has increased by nearly 10% annually in recent years and one of many problems is all the plastic bottles which are used only once and then thrown away. Some of these bottles find their way to the sea and finally end up in a gyre not far away from you.

Fukushima Water Blessing & Curse

SUBHEAD: Deadly radiation in water detected outside Fukushima nuclear reactor.  

By Michio Nakayama on 28 March 2011 for Bloomberg News -  
(http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2011-03-28/hazardous-radiation-levels-stall-efforts-to-cool-reactors-prevent-leaks.html)



Image above: Suicide mission? Workers at Fukushima Dai Ichi Nuclear Power Station maneuver police water cannon truck normally used to spray demonstrators now focusing on burning reactor buildings. From (http://www.sott.net/articles/show/226000-Courage-of-the-Fukushima-fifty-This-is-suicide-admit-workers-trying-to-avert-a-catastrophe).

Radiation levels that can prove fatal were detected outside reactor buildings at Japan’s Fukushima Dai-Ichi plant for the first time, complicating efforts to contain the worst disaster since Chernobyl in 1986.

Water in an underground trench outside the No. 2 reactor had levels exceeding 1 sievert an hour, a spokesman for plant operator Tokyo Electric Power Co. told reporters in the capital today. Thirty minutes of exposure to that dose would trigger nausea and four hours might lead to death within two months, according to the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency.

Preventing the most-contaminated water from leaking into the ground or air is key to containing the spread of radiation beyond the plant.

A partial meltdown of fuel rods in the No. 2 reactor probably caused a jump in the readings, Japan’s chief government spokesman said today. "There’s not much good news right now," said Gennady Pshakin, a former IAEA official based in Obninsk, the site of Russia’s first nuclear power plant.

"There’re questions arising on how much fuel will leak out, what isotopes will be carried and how quickly they will settle. It’s becoming less predictable." A magnitude-9 earthquake and ensuing tsunami on March 11 knocked out power at the plant, disabling its cooling systems and forcing Tokyo Electric to dump thousands of tons of sea water on the complex as a stopgap measure.

Damage to reactor buildings, including a possible breach in the No. 2 unit’s containment vessel has made it harder for workers to get close enough to fix the equipment without risking their health. Power Outages The number of dead and missing from the earthquake and tsunami had reached 28,550 as of 3 p.m. About 200,000 households in northeast Japan remain without power and more than 350,000 have no gas, the government said today. There are 242,882 refugees living in 2,045 shelters, the National Police Agency said.

Thousands of temporary pre-fabricated homes are being built in Miyagi, Iwate and Fukushima prefectures. Residents evacuated from a 20-kilometer (12-mile) radius of the Fukushima Dai-Ichi plant shouldn’t return home, Chief Cabinet Secretary Yukio Edano said today. Some people had gone back to pick up belongings, he said.

 Elevated radiation levels have been detected in crops grown near the stricken plant as well as the water supply in Tokyo, 220 kilometers (138 miles) to the south, and other regions. This has triggered bulk-buying of bottled water at supermarkets that have been forced to restrict purchases.

Some Success Ever-higher radiation emissions at Dai-Ichi and evidence water has leaked out of the No. 2 reactor’s containment vessel are undermining success at restoring lighting to control rooms and injecting fresh water into the reactor pressure vessels to keep temperatures from rising.

"The high radiation levels seem to have come from fuel rods that partially melted down and came into contact with water used to cool the reactor," Edano said at a briefing in Tokyo, citing a draft report from the nuclear safety commission. "It’s very regrettable, but we’re trying to contain the whole situation while preventing the health impact from spreading." Shares of Tepco, as the utility is known, slumped 18 percent to 696 yen on the Tokyo Stock Exchange, the lowest close since February 1977. Soil near the Fukushima plant will be tested for plutonium contamination, the government said.

The radioactive metal was part of the fuel mix in reactor No. 3 and its presence outside the plant would suggest those fuel rods were also exposed. Tepco said it needs to drain water lying in four reactor turbine buildings to determine where it came from and assess damage to the fuel rods. Water in the No. 2 turbine building is as high as 1 meter (3.2 feet) deep, a company official told reporters today.

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Earthquake & Tsunami hit Tourism

SUBHEAD: Shocked Hawaii tourism reps scramble as Japanese visits drop sharply. By Martin Barillas on 21 March 2011 for The Cutting Edge - (http://www.thecuttingedgenews.com/index.php?article=51612&pageid=37&pagename=Page+One) Image above: Waikiki tourist hotels blot out the landscape. This is the epicenter for Japanese tourism to Hawaii. The area would be devastated if that tourism collapses as a result of the recent disasters in Japan. Photo by Juan Wilson. [Editor's note: On the bright side - as climate change driven oceans rise these empty hotels may one day supply the foundation of artificial coral reefs as part of the restoration of our benthic habitat.]

Fears emerged in tourist-dependent Hawaii following the devastating earthquake and tsunami that hit Japan on March 11. Just hours after the monumental quake in Japan, tens of millions of additional dollars in damage to homes, businesses and boats crashed onto the national economy after a tsunami roared ashore last week. Tourism is the single biggest industry in the Hawaiian archipelago, and hotels, restaurants, tour operators and other businesses dependent on Japanese tourism were concerned that the devastation in Japan would also strike their pocketbooks.

Gov. Neil Abercrombie predicted the economic consequences would be severe for Hawaii, which is already dealing with a projected shortfall of nearly $1 billion over the next two years due to a bearish economy in the US generally. "It's going to be terrible. It's going to be rough," he said following the quake. "It's something that we have to come to grips with."

Some Hawaiian tourism representatives contacted by The Cutting Edge News seem ill-prepared and ill-equipped for the unexpected drop-off. A few were unable to even respond to inquiries.

Visitor arrivals from Japan, Hawaii's second-largest tourist market outside North America, dropped 86 percent immediately following the 9.0 temblor on March 11, according to worldwide media reports. Most of the cancellations came from group tourism, including business meetings and incentive travel.

Underscoring that Hawaii is heavily dependent on Japanese visitors, State Representative Marcus R. Oshiro, a Democrat from Honolulu, confirmed that in the short term, Hawaii will be severely affected by the earthquake and tsunami. "It may be anywhere from $15 to $20 million in state revenues lost just from that tourist market.”

Hawaii had been enjoying something of a rebound in tourism as hotels were reporting occupancy levels in the 90 percentile range.

But Japanese tourism is not what it once was: In 2010, 1.2 million Japanese visited Hawaii, almost half down from a peak of 2.2 million visitors in 1996. The downturn reflects the effects of the worldwide recession but also changing travel tastes of Japanese tourists. By any measure, howeveer, Japanese citizens are a critical part of the tourism industry, which is a fulcrum of the state’s economy. Yet, tourism officials have been slow to develop marketing campaigns to attract vacationers from other areas, including appealing to American travelers who don't happen to live on the West Coast. That may be because Americans spend less when they visit Hawaii.

A typical visitor from the Western United States spent $146 per day last year, while a Japanese tourist spent $274, state officials said. Indeed, while Japan ranks third in the number of visitors it sends to Hawaii, following the Western and Eastern United States mainland, Japanese tourists are much more aggressive spenders and thus contribute disproportionately to the economy. They spend far more money per day on food, hotels and shopping, particularly luxury goods. Visitors from Japan brought about $1.9 billion into Hawaii in 2010, or about 17 per cent of the $11.4 billion overall visitor receipts. There are 13 daily direct flights from Japan to Hawaii, bringing in between 3,000 to 5,000 tourists. Hawaiian Airlines just announced a robust new schedule of direct flights from the Pacific island chain to Japan.

Following statements by President Obama that the US had little to fear from radiation leaking from the Fukushima reactors in Japan, Gov. Abercrombie declared that Hawaii was “back in business,” reassuring potential tourists that no dangerous levels of radiation had been detected on the archipelago. However, two prominent hotels have been closed temporarily because of tsunami damage—the Four Seasons Resort Hualalai and Kona Village Resort. “In comparison with the incidents that happened in the past this is of course much more severe,” said David Uchiyama, vice president of brand management for the Hawaii Tourism Authority. “I anticipate we’ll see again some initial drop-off,” he added, lasting about three to six months, but predicted that the market will then gradually come back.

The Hawaiian people, aware of the cultural and economic connection to Japan, have been moved to respond to the island nation’s time of need as government and civic leaders have been engaged in fundraising for relief efforts. Japanese immigrants arrived first arrived in the Aloha State more than a century ago to work in the fields, while their children and grandchildren have since risen to prominence. About a quarter of the state's population identified themselves as being of Japanese descent, according to the 2000 Census. Telephone service providers are offering free phone calls to Japan. The US Navy's Pacific Fleet, based in Hawaii, is also helping in relief and rescue operations.

Cancellations from Japan after the quake were immediate, resulting in the loss of thousands of visitor arrivals. H.I.S. Hawaii, a travel agency that handles about a fifth of all Japanese travel to Hawaii, saw new bookings drop by half and cancellations triple in the first three days after the March 11 earthquake. However, the cancellation rate dropped to less than 10 per cent starting March 16. Tourist businesses are hopeful that the market will bounce back soon once life returns to some semblance of normality in Japan.

Hawaii similarly experienced sharp declines in the number of Japanese travelers following the deadly 1995 Kobe earthquake and the 9/11 terror attacks. While people of other cultures try to return to normal as soon as possible following a tragedy, travel industry experts say the Japanese tend not to travel or at least postpone in sympathy. So far, airlines are reporting that no significant drops of passengers from Japan have been noted. Japanese visitor arrivals to Hawaii dropped nearly 16 percent a month after the 6.8 magnitude Kobe quake in January 1995 but by year's end were up nearly 13 percent compared to 1994 levels, the Tourism Authority said.

CEO Mark Dunkerley of Hawaiian Airlines said cancellations have been "pretty modest." Bookings are mostly handled by travel partners in Japan and they "continue to demand the level of service that we've already been providing and intending to provide in the coming months." Hawaiian Airlines, which launched its first daily flight between Honolulu and Tokyo's Haneda International Airport in 2010, said it has no plans to change or delay its scheduled launch of daily nonstop service between Honolulu and Osaka in July 2010.

Japanese tourists are woven into the fabric of Hawaii’s economy. Menus are invariably printed in both English and Japanese. Packages of dried seaweed can be found next to potato chips in stores. Despite the concern on the part of business, there is uncertainty as to the duration and effects of a downturn in Japanese tourism, however. Tourism experts say that Hawaii will probably not know for at least a month before it can realistically gauge how severely Japanese travel plans have changed. Even before the Japanese earthquake, a decline in state revenues had been projected in a report to Gov. Abercrombie. The decline may increase the projected shortfall to $964 million, from $698 million. According to an article in the New York Times, Paul H. Brewbaker of the State Council on Revenues said, “Japan is an important market for us. And obviously a cataclysmic event has occurred,” but while Japanese are important, they not as critical as they once were here. “We love them,” he said. “But there’s just not as many as there used to be.”

Japanese visitor arrivals to Hawaii dropped nearly 16 percent a month after the 6.8 magnitude Kobe quake in January 1995 but by year's end were up by 12.6 percent compared to 1994 levels, a spokesman for the Hawaii Tourism Authority declared. The Hawaii Tourism Authority had projected about $2 billion in revenue from Japanese visitors in 2011, a figure that is expected to take a significant hit, said Uchiyama of the Hawaii Tourism Authority. Uchiyama fears that following the March 11 tsunami, he does not expect the industry to bounce back as it did in 1994. "This is definitely a larger catastrophe," in article in the Los Angeles Times stated.

While government and industry officials are stressing that Hawaii is “open for business,” the tourism industry is looking at various markets and alternatives. Jürgen Thomas Steinmetz, president of the privately held Hawaii Tourism Association (HiTA), has made some waves in Hawaii in recent years. He has continously criticized the government-run Hawaii Tourism Authority for not diversifying enough beyond traditional markets such as the U.S. West Coast and Japan. Steinmetz said that the tsunami and its aftermath should impel Hawaii to seek new markets in countries whose citizens are not required to bear a visa to enter the U.S., such as most of Europe, Singapore and Brunei. According to Forbes magzaine, Steinmetz believes that Europe is a particularly promising opportunity, “Europeans not only love to travel but get a lot of vacation time. Where Americans might stay for days, European tourists can afford to think in terms of weeks.” China and India are also promising markets in Steinmetz’s view.

This would mean that Hawaii would need to become more aggressive in touting its wares. According to Steinmetz, while Libya and Afghanistan were represented at the world’s biggest travel industry show, Hawaii did not have a presence comparable to France’s tiny Seychelles Islands, which had dozens of representatives. President Obama, Hawaii's native son, has returned frequently to the islands during his term. A shift in his geopolitical focus for the US towards Asian countries besides Japan could also serve to bring new visitors to the archipelago that has long served asa jumping-off point for the entire Pacific Basin.

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KIUC 15 Years after the Crash

SUBHEAD: Without a clue our suburban power company drives into the future searching their rear view mirror. [Author's note: Mea culpa. Simply put 2023-2008 is 15 not 25. The original title of this article was "KIUC 25 Years after the Crash" and should be "KIUC 15 Years after the Crash". None the less, I don't think we have time time or finances to pull off their plan to keep the 21st century spinning.] By Juan Wilson on 27 March 2011 for Island Breath - (http://islandbreath.blogspot.com/2011/03/kiuc-25-years-after-crash.html) Image above: A Toyota truck crash on NASCAR circuit. From (http://www.autoracing1.com/). This week we learned the results of the Kauai Island Utility Cooperative board of directors election by coop members. On March 24th the Garden Island News ran an article titled "KIUC members vote to stay the course with board" (http://thegardenisland.com/news/local/article_c6ba5684-56ac-11e0-ad9d-001cc4c03286.html). By "stay the course" they meant that the incumbents were all reelected and those expressing a commitment to sustainability on Kauai were defeated. Those we supported who lost included Ken Stokes - 2,098 votes, Pat Gegen - 2,074 votes, and Kuleialoha Santos - 1,854 votes. What this means is that the lifestyle on this island will continue to be more of the same - until we can't be anymore... and then we'll be f#%ked up! We won't have a diverse, distributed, resilient, renewable energy system. We'll be caught in a hell of our own making. KIUC continues believe that our centralized grid will provide all the power we are now accustomed to 24 hrs a day, 7 days a week, 365 days a year, forever. In 2008 KIUC revealed a 15 year strategic plan to generate 50% of Kauai's electricity with renewable alternative sources by 2023. They think they have that much time. They don't. KIUC also thinks they'll have the ability to finance alternative sources (like solar, biomass and hydro), or be able to afford buying electricity from third party providers and then reselling it to KIUC members well into the future. They don't.

• Long before 2023, and perhaps before 2012, the problems of turmoil against dictators in the Middle-East and Northern Africa will raise oil prices beyond the economy killing $147 we hit in 2008.
• Long before 2023 the collapse of the Japanese industrialized economy (due to earthquake, tsunami and a nuclear reactor meltdown, there will be a general abandonment of nuclear energy by many countries in the "first" world. These events will put the kybosh on delivering cheap, abundant, safe power to the global economy.
• Long before 2023 the extremes and irregularity of weather will reduce grain crops needed for an increasingly hungry and overpopulated world. Therefore we will have no ethanol or biofuel available for even the most wealthy economies to fill their tanks.

And long before 2023 the members of KIUC will have gone out on their own and bought small solar voltaic systems, or perhaps a small wind generators, just to fill in times of rolling blackouts that will be experienced by the KIUC community. America will be much impoverished in the next few years. States, including Hawaii, will have public jobs and services slashed just to accommodate the financial disaster of the Great Recession. In the next phase of our economic transformation we will not have $10 trillion dollars to throw at the problem. Thus the Great Retrenchment - all the way back to peak of pre-fossil fueled industrialized civilization. For the Americans and Europeans that would be a technology something like that found between 1750-1800. The corporate consumer sector will likely wither, unable to make money on this distant outpost in the ocean. What business there is will be done by those who are self-employed professionals, operate cottage industries, or provide neighborhood services. By 2023 it is likely that people will be using less than 25% of the energy they are using today - and that will be provided not by KIUC, but by burning renewables at a replaceable rate - wood for cooking and kukui nuts for light. There may even be a few well maintained backyard and neighborhood alternative energy generating systems put into place before the KIUC grid goes down. My advice is to take your federal tax refund and stock up on a few photovoltaic panels, a charge controller, some deep cycle batteries, heavy cables and a 11oVAC inverter. You don't have to set them up now. After the next crash you'll have to wait until the rubble stops bouncing and then get up on the roof. Then that PV system investment will be better than cash in the bank and may get you through some dark nights to see how the KIUC strategy finally works out in 2023. See also: Ea O Ka Aina: Kauai Hydro Projects Power Up 1/18/11 Ea O Ka Aina: KIUC Wailua Dam Plans 1/17/11 Ea O Ka Aina: Westside Solar Farm 2011 1/3/10 Ea O Ka Aina: KIUC $75 million GenX Plant 8/1/09 .

Protect Kauai's Resources

SUBHEAD: Kekaha shrimp farm is an environmental and economic disaster for the county.

In Our Opinon on 27 March 2011 in The Garden Island -  
(http://thegardenisland.com/news/opinion/editorial/article_63f6adc6-5842-11e0-97fa-001cc4c03286.html)

 
Image above: Sunrise Capital employee adding chemicals to test pit in March 2010. Photo by Juan Wilson.
 
As if flushing up to 20 million gallons a day of shrimp effluent into the ocean was not enough to cause a public uproar, Sunrise Capital has effectively muscled $250,000 from taxpayers to put toward the Kekaha facility.

We must do better to protect our limited resources — environmental and financial.
Sunrise Capital claims seabirds are to blame for the facility having to shut down twice in the last seven years due to shrimp infected with the untreatable white spot syndrome virus.

The Missouri-based company says the birds gorged themselves on contaminated shrimp dumped at the landfill, flew to the nearby farm, vomited the shrimp into the ponds and caused the outbreak.
That’s quite a tale. Some county officials think so too, but due to poor solid waste planning they found themselves in a bind.

County officials have said if they had not been racing the clock to expand the island’s sole landfill before it reaches capacity, there would have been sufficient time to fight these absurd claims.

They note that it would have cost millions of dollars — instead of hundreds of thousands — if the county would have gone through a lengthy contested case hearing. This is because the trash would have piled up on top of the space reserved for capping the landfill, requiring the county to re-handle the garbage after finally receiving the expansion permit.

The county should have made more of an effort to buy itself time to do what’s right by putting pressure on the state Department of Health, which administers the EPA permit the farm needs to operate.

There are certainly myriad reasons the county could have cited to effectively prolong the DOH’s permitting process while handling the contested case and figuring out what to do with all our rubbish.
For instance, county officials could have played the tourism card, arguing that hundreds of millions of gallons of shrimp waste in the water each week does not exactly nurture a recreational resource visitors would want to enjoy.

It would be nice if our government by the people, for the people, was already looking out for us based on those concerns, not to mention the impact to locals who routinely utilize the area for fun, fishing and cultural practices.

Instead, the county signed a settlement with Sunrise in October that will cost taxpayers a quarter-million bucks in exchange for the company withdrawing its contested case filing against the proposed landfill expansion.

Sometimes it costs more to do what’s right. We shouldn’t deplete our moral reserves to save paper.
For the sake of argument, let’s assume the county already had a materials recovery facility up and running and we were diverting more trash from the landfill than we were dumping into it. In essence, let’s assume we planned properly for our solid waste needs.

The county should still have spoken up on behalf of its residents and visitors who depend on the health of the island’s natural resources. And so should the state. At least the feds did in this case. The EPA provided a laundry list worth of issues the DOH should address before letting Sunrise pollute the Pacific.
Concerned citizens were basically left out to dry as the DOH in January approved the National Pollutant Discharge Elimination System permit.

Since we can’t undo what’s been done, we strongly urge the government entities tasked with monitoring this monstrosity to do so with all due diligence.

We can’t fathom there being no significant environmental impact with that amazing amount of output.
Even assuming all monitoring occurs as intended, do we really want to put such duress on a fragile ecosystem that takes years to recover?

While the DOH report on the permit says there will be no increased shark presence despite the billions of gallons of shrimp waste pouring into the Pacific each year, common sense says otherwise.
Wouldn’t the shrimp remains be eaten by the little fish who are in turn eaten by the bigger fish who are then shark bait?

In addition to logic, we tend to rely on the surfers out there every day who reported increased sightings and avoided the area entirely when it was operating a few years ago.

The bottom line is two-fold: the county should have stood up for what is right, despite the financial burden; and this facility should never have received a permit in the first place due to its likely environmental impacts.

While we absolutely want to bring new jobs to the island, we have an obligation to maintain high standards. Kaua‘i must be preserved as the special place it is for the sake of this generation and the next.

See also:
TGI: County agrees to $250K settlement with shrimp farm
(http://thegardenisland.com/news/local/article_27b20748-545a-11e0-9c2c-001cc4c03286.html)
 Ea O Ka Aina: Kekaha Shrimp Farm Discharge 9/3/10
Ea O Ka Aina: Kauai Shrimp Waste Dump 3/19/10
Ea O Ka Aina: Kauai Shrimp Effluent Problem 3/12/10
Island Breath: Kauai Shrimp to dump in ocean 8/21/06
 Island Breath: Kauai's Crustacean Crisis 4/23/04 .

Update on County Rules

SUBHEAD: Rule changes will be the subject of this Wednesday's County Council Meeting in Nawiliwili Harbor. By Ken Taylor and Linda Harmon in Island Breath - Image above: Public participation in "Townhall Meeting" by Norman Rockwell. From (http://www.westboylston.com/Pages/WBoylstonMA_AdminBlog/I0272F677). We think these changes will make Kauai government more democratic and encourage public participation. 1.Closed sessions should be scheduled. Often enough, mid way through the meeting the council will decide to break for a closed door session rather than dealing with the matter after or before the public meeting begins as is commonly done around the country. *2. Public comment period. Many councils around the country allow for public comment on matters relevant to the council that are not on the agenda. This is a method of addressing the council as a body and allowing the viewing public to hear both grievance or accolade that otherwise might never get aired. The council is there strictly to listen. The rule of courtesy would have to be met. Each person would be restricted to 3 min. and would take no more than 15 min. at the beginning of the meeting. *3. Consent Agenda. Council is proposing that housekeeping matters like communications from different dept. heads be bundled together and voted on summarily which would save sometimes hours of tedious council voting on one by one. However unlike when looked at individually where the public can ask for clarification and discussion the council wants to be able to pull a matter for further discussion and forbid anyone from the public from doing so. This is an infringement of the rights we now have when such matters are voted on one by one by the councilmembers. The public is now able to ask for clarification and ask questions and make suggestions before the councilmembers vote. 4. Live television broadcasts meetings. This is commonplace in cities and counties across the country and makes for government more accountable and accessible to the public. 5. Following agenda order with matters of greatest importance to the public coming first to allow more public participation. As it is now the council can choose to change the order and in some cases cause public consternation when having to wait out much of the day to testify about a matter that has been moved to the back on the agenda. The council is proposing to allow first come first serve 3 min. public testimony at the beginning ( up to 15 min) of the meeting but only on matter of the agenda. We consider this is a subversion of our proposed public comment period. *6. The posting of agenda with supporting documentation on the county web page. Although the county now posts the agenda at the same time it is posted to the council members it isn’t a rule. Along with the agenda the supporting documentation isn’t available to the public unlike to the council members. There is no good reason for keeping it from the public. Supporting documentation can just as easily be provided with a change of computer program. *most urgent See also: Ea O Ka Aina: County Council Rules Changes 3/18/11 .

Kauai Hindu Sustainability

SOURCE: Linda Harmon (lindaharmon@hawaiiantel.net) SUBHEAD: Kauai’s Hindu Temple - Our Sustainable Neighbors at Wailua-Kapaa Neighborhood Association Meeting.

 By Rayne Regush on 25 March 2011 for Wailua-Kapaa Neighborhood Association -

   
Image above: Meditation pavilion overlooking the Wailua River at Kauai Hindu Monastery. Photo by Juan Wilson.

 WHAT:
Presentation on sustainability of Kauai Hindu Monastery

 WHEN:
Saturday, March 26, 2011 - 2:00 to 4:00 p.m.  

WHERE:
Kapa‘a Library Meeting Room

Guest speakers Paramacharya Palaniswami and Sannyasin Yoginathaswami of Saiva Siddhanta Church, also known as Kauai’s Hindu Monastery, will discuss the important role of self-sufficiency within the monastery’s lifestyle of religious practice. The 353-acre spiritual sanctuary established in 1970 along the north fork of Wailua River, is an outstanding example of a community living sustainably. The monks grow about 80% of their food and tend a small herd of cows for milk.

Organic gardens, herbs, healing plants and hundreds of tropical fruit trees and hardwood trees are cultivated. They mill their own lumber as well. Much can be learned from their sustainable practices -- their exceptional green waste system and approach to soil building, construction techniques, and renewable energy solutions which provide electricity for two of their buildings so far.

The monastery’s initiatives set a compelling example for Kaua‘i in fostering food security and self-reliance, and managing natural resources. Meetings are free and open to the public. A portion will include updates on local issues. For information about W-KNA, to renew your membership or become a new member, please visit www.wkna.org or contact Sid Jackson at 821-2837. .

Radioactivity in Seawater Soars

SUBHEAD: Radioactivity levels in ocean water soars near Fukushima Dai Ichi as U.S. rushes fresh water to nuclear site. By Staff on 25 March 2011 on MSNBC - (http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/42280076/ns/world_news-asiapacific) Image above: Wrecked reactor buildings #3 and #4 at Fukushima Dai Ichi. From (http://liberalironist.wordpress.com/2011/03/17/meltdown-at-fukushima-i-nuclear-power-plant). Japan's government revealed a series of missteps by the operator of a radiation-leaking nuclear plant on Saturday, including sending workers in without protective footwear in its faltering efforts to control a monumental crisis. The U.S. Navy, meanwhile, rushed to deliver fresh water to replace corrosive saltwater now being used in a desperate bid to cool the plant's overheated reactors.

Government spokesman Yukio Edano urged Tokyo Electric Power Co. to be more transparent, two days after two workers at the tsunami-damaged Fukushima Dai-ichi plant suffered skin burns when they stepped in water that was 10,000 times more radioactive than levels normally found near the reactors.

"We strongly urge TEPCO to provide information to the government more promptly," Edano said.

The Nuclear and Industrial Safety Agency, or NISA, said TEPCO was aware there was high radiation in the air at one of the plant's six units several days before the accident. And the two workers injured were wearing boots that only came up to their ankles — hardly high enough to protect their legs, agency spokesman Hidehiko Nishiyama said.

"Regardless of whether there was an awareness of high radioactivity in the stagnant water, there were problems in the way work was conducted," Nishiyama said.

NISA warned TEPCO to improve and ensure workers' safety, and TEPCO has taken measures to that effect, Nishiyama said, without elaborating.

TEPCO spokesman Hajime Motojuku declined to comment.

The government's admonishments came as workers at the plant struggled to stop a troubling rise in radioactivity and remove dangerously contaminated water from the facility, which has been leaking radiation since a massive earthquake and tsunami on March 11 knocked out the plant's key cooling systems. Officials have been using seawater to try to cool the plant, but fears are growing that the corrosive salt in the water could further damage the machinery inside the reactor units.

TEPCO is now rushing to inject the reactors with fresh water instead, and to begin extracting the radioactive water, Nishiyama said.

Defense Minister Yoshimi Kitazawa said late Friday that the U.S. government had made "an extremely urgent" request to switch to fresh water. He said the U.S. military was sending water to nearby Onahama Bay and that water injections could begin in the next few days.

The U.S. 7th Fleet confirmed that barges loaded with 500,000 gallons of fresh water supplies were on their way.

The situation at the crippled complex remains unpredictable, Edano said Saturday, adding that it would be "a long time" until the crisis ends.

"We seem to be keeping the situation from turning worse," he said. "But we still cannot be optimistic."

Suspected breach in plant Efforts to get the nuclear plant under control took on fresh urgency this week when nuclear safety officials said they suspected a breach in one or more of the plant's units — possibly a crack or hole in the stainless steel chamber around a reactor core containing fuel rods or the concrete wall surrounding a pool where spent fuel rods are stored.

Such a breach could mean a much larger release of radioactive contaminants.

Radioactivity was on the rise in some units, Nishiyama said Saturday.

"It is crucial to figure out how to remove contaminated water while allowing work to continue," he said, acknowledging that the discovery would set back delicate efforts to get the plant's cooling system operating again.

Workers have begun pumping radioactive water from one of the units, Masateru Araki, a TEPCO spokesman, said Saturday.

Plant officials and government regulators say they don't know the source of the radioactive water. It could have come from a leaking reactor core, connecting pipes, or a spent fuel pool. Or it may be the result of overfilling the pools with emergency cooling water.

But a breach in the chamber surrounding the reactor core seemed "more likely," Nishiyama said.

TEPCO said late Saturday that a trace of radioactive water had leaked from the Unit 2 reactor building into a sewage line. It was not clear if the source of the water was the same as the other leakage. TEPCO said officials were investigating.

Radiation has been seeping from the plant since the magnitude-9 earthquake and tsunami struck more than two weeks ago. Since then, it has made its way into milk, seawater and 11 kinds of vegetables, including broccoli, cauliflower and turnips.

Tap water in several areas of Japan, including Tokyo, has shown higher-than-normal levels of radiation. In the capital, readings were at one point two times higher than the government safety limit for infants, who are particularly vulnerable to radioactive iodine.

But levels have fallen steadily since peaking Wednesday, and Tokyo metropolitan officials said Saturday that tap water was safe for babies to drink.

Just outside a reactor at the coastal nuclear plant, radioactivity in seawater tested about 1,250 times higher than normal, Nishiyama said. He said the area is not a source of seafood and the contamination posed no immediate threat to human health.

However, tests conducted 18 miles (28 kilometers) offshore found radioactive iodine-131 at levels nearing the regulatory limit set by the Japanese government, the International Atomic Energy Agency said. The tests also detected another radioactive substance, cesium-137, at lower levels.

IAEA experts said the ocean will quickly dilute the worst contamination. Radioactive iodine breaks down within weeks but cesium could foul the marine environment for decades.

The nuclear crisis has added to the misery and uncertainty facing Japan in the wake of the disastrous earthquake and tsunami.

Japanese soldiers and U.S. Marines were clearing away debris so they could keep searching for bodies and bury the dead. The official death toll was 10,418 Saturday, with more than 17,000 listed as missing, police said. Those lists may overlap, but the final death toll was expected to surpass 18,000.

'Life is very difficult here' Overwhelmed by bodies along the coast, government officials conducted more mass burials Saturday. In Yamamoto, relatives wailed and yelled their farewells as the first 11 caskets were buried in one end of a long mass grave in a vegetable patch, with at least 400 more burials planned in the coming days.

In Higashimatsushima, soldiers lowered plywood coffins into a ditch dug at a recycling plant as freezing rain fell on mourners weeping quietly under umbrellas. Funerals in Japan are a highly formalized Buddhist ceremony, and the mass burials are yet another tragedy for the hard-hit coastal towns.

The misery has extended to the hundreds of thousands whose homes were destroyed, many of whom now sleep on crowded school gymnasium floors with few comforts. Those living within a 12-mile (20-kilometer) radius of the plant have been evacuated.

Life was also tough in the ghost towns inside a larger voluntary evacuation zone, with most residents choosing to flee and wary truckers refusing to deliver goods.

In Minamisoma, a city of 71,000 about 20 miles (30 kilometers) north of the plant, all but one or two shops shut their doors because of a lack of goods and customers, city official Sadayasu Abe said.

"Commercial trucks are simply not coming to the city at all due to radiation fears," he said.

Military troops and some private companies took up the task of delivering rice, instant noodles, bottled water and canned foods to eight central spots in the city, Abe said.

He said the city was urging the 10,000 or so still remaining to leave since the situation at the plant remains precarious.

"Life is very difficult here," he told The Associated Press by telephone. "We have electricity, gas and running water, but no food."

Muneyuki Munakata, a 58-year-old firefighter who was evacuated from his home near the plant, has been living in a shelter about 25 miles (40 kilometers) west of the nuclear complex for 15 days. Evacuees have plenty of instant noodles, but not enough rice or fuel for the stove, he said.

"People here are all exhausted," he said. "We all talk about when we can go home, but I don't know when because of uncertainty over the nuclear disaster."

Amazing Mechanical Seagull

SUBHEAD: By taking such a clear cue from nature's design, the SmartBird could help in the development more sustainable flight. By Stephen Messenger on 25 March 2011 for Tree Hugger - (http://www.treehugger.com/files/2011/03/amazing-mechanical-seagull-rivals-the-real-thing.php) Image above: Still from video below of mechanical seagull. It's a bird... It's a plane... Wait, it's both Mankind has long been fascinated with the idea of soaring through the sky like a bird, though oddly enough, many of the early flying contraptions were so bizarre as to seem plucked from thin air -- even though nature had conquered that realm eons earlier. Eventually, of course, we figured out how to achieve sustained flight, though achieving sustainable flight has been an entirely new challenge. One engineering firm, however, seems to have made a real breakthrough in efficient aviation -- by mimicking a design that had been over our noses the whole time. Video above: Mechanical seagull in flight. From (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nnR8fDW3Ilo).

If Mother Nature held patents on her designs, the engineers at the Festo Corporation would probably have a lawsuit on their hands. The group recently unveiled one of the most lifelike and natural-seeming flying machines that I have ever seen -- called the SmartBird, inspired by the flight dynamics of a common seagull.

The corporation's web site describes the inspiration behind the clever mechanical-gull:

This bionic technology-bearer, which is inspired by the herring gull, can start, fly and land autonomously - with no additional drive mechanism. Its wings not only beat up and down, but also twist at specific angles. This is made possible by an active articulated torsional drive unit, which in combination with a complex control system attains an unprecedented level of efficiency in flight operation. Festo has thus succeeded for the first time in creating an energy-efficient technical adaptation of this model from nature.

By taking such a clear cue from nature's design, Festo says that the SmartBird could help in the development more sustainable flight. "The minimal use of materials and the extremely lightweight construction pave the way for efficiency in resource and energy consumption," says Festo.

There's no telling quite yet if the nature-inspired technological advancement could be used towards improving designs on a larger scale -- but it's nice to know they're looking in the right place for ideas.

The Local Food Revolution

SUBHEAD: A revolution aimed at rebuilding food security and food sovereignty for all. By Michael Brownlee on 24 March 2011 in Boulder Weekly - (http://www.boulderweekly.com/article-4806-id-like-to-see-a-study-on-the-relative-cost-for-t.html) Image above: Boulder Belt Farm share. From (http://www.localharvest.org/blog/330/entry/boulder_belt_farm_share_inititiative16). Boulder, Colorado - Anyone living in the area could scarcely have escaped noticing some of the obvious first signs of this revolution: Farmers’ markets are popping up around the county, along with roadside farmstands. More restaurants are sourcing their ingredients from local farmers and ranchers. Municipalities have been compelled to change laws to accommodate the rapidly rising citizen demand to raise chickens, goats and bees in residential backyards. Backyard and frontyard gardens seem to be proliferating everywhere, and local fresh produce is now even being offered in many Boulder County school lunchrooms. Dozens of family farms are now offering CSAs (community supported agriculture), essentially prepaid subscriptions to a share in a season’s bounty. And plastic-covered “hoop houses” are springing up on farms and in yards as gardeners struggle to meet the challenge of extending the Front Range’s famously short growing season. But some of the signs of this revolution are far less visible. For instance, hundreds of people have been signing up for “reskilling” classes on forest gardening, food canning and preservation, composting, vermiculture (worm ranching), seed-saving, food fermentation, greenhouse construction, aquaponics (combining aquaculture with hydroponic plant production), along with rainwater harvesting. Even more have been taking instruction in seasonal eating and cooking, as well as basic nutrition. In addition, over the past four years more than 300 people in the area have graduated from an intense 72-hour permaculture design certification course, and about 50 have gone on to become certified permaculture instructors. Nonprofit organizations — including Everybody Eats!, Growing Gardens, Cultiva!, and Transition Louisville — have been working to stimulate demand for local food, as well as increasing local food production capacity. In 2007, Transition Colorado launched an ongoing countywide EAT LOCAL! Campaign, which now includes a 10 percent Local Food Shift Challenge and Pledge. The organization also publishes Boulder County’s EAT LOCAL! Resource Guide & Directory, and has hosted numerous films and high-profile speakers, conferences and an EAT LOCAL! Week. County government is also involved. In 2008, the Boulder County Commissioners formed a Food & Agriculture Policy Council, with a mandate to convert 10 percent of the 17,000 acres of county-owned open space agricultural land to food production for local consumption by 2012. Why local food? Why the growing interest in local food? The answers lie in understanding our “food predicament,” particularly our dependence on a fragile and increasingly unwieldy global food system. For perspective, it’s useful to know that the latest USDA data shows that Boulder County residents spent $947 million on food in 2010 (up from $662 million in 2007). But how much of this goes to Boulder County producers? Not much. While definitive numbers are still unavailable, it’s safe to say that no more than 1 to 2 percent of the food we consume in Boulder County is produced within the county. For an agricultural county with more than 137,000 acres of productive ag land, that’s surprising. This situation is roughly in line with the state as a whole — Colorado residents spend $12 billion annually on food, 97 percent of which is imported from outside the state. As in most places, since World War II agriculture has become primarily focused on producing exports. Conventional farmers have been told that their mission is “to feed the world.” Thus, 95 percent of all agricultural production in the county is exported. At the heart of the local food revolution is the realization that our ability to meet our basic food needs locally has been thoroughly undermined by big agribusiness, including the “value-added” food processors whose products have added considerable heft to our waistlines and contributed directly to a national health crisis of obesity, Type II diabetes and a host of food-related diseases. The real cost of this arrangement has been very high. Local food advocates are also acutely aware that the globalized food system is highly dependent on fossil fuels for inputs (synthetic fertilizers and pesticides), processing, storage, cooling and transportation. They see increasing signs that dependence on foreign oil — inevitably increasing in price as global oil production peaks — puts big agribusiness and “conventional” agriculture in a no-win situation, and that the misnamed “Green Revolution” (it was a coup!) is exhibiting signs of failure in the face of already devastating impacts of climate change. They also claim that widespread application of synthetic chemicals is jeopardizing long-term soil fertility. “The soil is a living thing, and we are murdering it,” says Carlo Petrini, founder of the Slow Food movement. “Industrial agriculture has embraced the idea of farming without farmers, but at this rate one day we’ll be forced to farm without land.” To complicate matters, as author Anna Lappé concludes in Diet for a Hot Planet: The Climate Crisis at the End of Your Fork and What You Can Do About It, the way we currently grow, process, ship, market and cook our food may be contributing more than 30 percent of all greenhouse gas emissions. All these factors have combined to make food one of the most unsustainable spheres of human activity. Feed the world, or feed our own? Meanwhile, the world population is apparently on the way to 9 billion people by mid-century, necessitating at least a doubling of current food production — at a time when a global food crisis looms on the horizon. While big agribusiness insists that the only way to continue to feed the world is to greatly increase the efficiency of industrialized agriculture (and towards that end to genetically engineer virtually all crops), a growing number of people are seeing this technological approach as not only unsustainable but a clear threat to human freedom and sovereignty. With the likely total deregulation of genetically modified organisms and the absence of appropriate food labeling, consumers and growers alike feel that their ability to exercise choice has been taken away. Meanwhile, even “natural” grocers like Vitamin Cottage admit that the majority of the products on their shelves probably contain GMOs. While GMO labeling is mandated in most EU nations, industry has mobilized to successfully prevent such practices in the United States. A U.N. report released in early March claims that support of small-scale farming using “agro-ecological” methods — i.e., mostly local and organic — could easily double food production in 10 years in critical regions. This study confirms what local food advocates have known for years, that we must begin making the shift to growing most of our own food locally, with bio-intensive methods that restore soil, rekindle connection with the land and rebuild community. Recent studies indicate that the benefits of food localization can be far-reaching. Returning to a fresh, seasonal, mostly organic local diet will significantly improve the health of our communities, especially our children, and dramatically reduce health care costs. Shrinking our foodshed will not only reduce food-miles, but bio-intensive cultivation methods will also sequester carbon in the soil, making food localization one of the most effective approaches to reducing greenhouse gas emissions. Surprisingly, rebuilding our local food system might also be the most important thing we can do to strengthen our local economies — to create new jobs and stem the leakage of dollars. Economist and food system researcher Michael Shuman recently completed a study for the greater Cleveland area that shows that moving to 25 percent food localization in that area by 2020 could produce 27,000 new jobs, generate $4.2 billion of economic activity each year, and produce $126 million in new local and state tax revenues. Shuman, who is director of research and economic development for BALLE (Business Alliance for Local Living Economies), is now conducting a similar study to quantify the potential economic upside for food localization in the Boulder County area. Commissioned by Transition Colorado, the study will identify gaps, challenges and opportunities, and will map the business initiatives, public policy shifts, and nonprofit programs to make 25 percent food localization achievable by 2020. Financing the revolution One of the impacts of the globalization of food has been the gradual erosion of the network of enterprises that once supported a robust local food and farming economy. According to retired Boulder attorney and former Food & Agriculture Policy Council member-at-large Jim England, at the turn of the 20th century Boulder County had six flour mills (three of them in or near the Boulder city limits), canning factories and other processing plants, commercially successful berry and small fruit operations, and thousands of fruit trees (Boulder’s Grove Street is named after the commercial apple and other fruit groves that grew there). There were butchers on Pearl Street, malt houses, a cheese factory in Hygiene and a number of working dairies. “A hundred years ago this was something of a locavore’s paradise,” says England. “And if it once was thus, my hope is it can again be that.” But crucial to achieving any significant level of food localization will be the rebuilding of Boulder County’s local food infrastructure — production, processing, distribution and storage — which will require an infusion of financial investments to underwrite the entrepreneurs and farmers who wish to be part of the local food revolution. In an era of shrinking budgets, where will that money come from? Woody Tasch, a frequent visitor to Boulder County, has an answer: “Slow Money,” which Entrepreneur Magazine dubbed “one of the top five trends in finance for 2011.” Weaving economic savvy with a poet’s penchant for language, Tasch explains that Slow Money represents “the creation of new forms of intermediation that catalyze the transition from a commerce of extraction and consumption to a commerce of preservation and restoration.” It’s a reversal of dependence on Wall Street markets and traditional investment vehicles, which parallels the shift from big agribusiness to local food economies. Tasch says that the recent economic crisis is exactly what one can expect when the relationships between money, community and the land are broken. The most appropriate way to begin building a restorative economy, he says, is to invest locally in sustainable, small-scale food enterprises. The Slow Money approach (www.SlowMoney.org) aims to bring together key stakeholders, investors and entrepreneurs, along with leaders in local food and progressive finance. Slow Money is just now beginning to take hold in Boulder County, with an commitment of $1.5 million from an anonymous donor to seed what promises to become a critical source of capital for local food and farming enterprises. That fund is currently under the stewardship of Transition Colorado, but will soon be established as an independent Slow Money entity. Catalyzing a local network Rebuilding production capacity and increasing consumer demand simultaneously is something of a chicken-and-egg challenge. Some farmers remain skeptical that the demand for locally produced food will continue to follow a supposed hockey-stick trajectory. They wonder: “If we are able to dramatically ramp up production, where will the infrastructure come from that can get our products processed and onto the tables of consumers?” One bright spot may be the recent emergence of a “foodshed alliance” known as the Boulder County Local Food Network, conceived as a cooperative membership organization joining farmers, food and agricultural leaders, local businesses, local governments and community residents in a united effort to stimulate and support the local food economy and to foster increasing localization of the regional food system. The group’s informal motto is “thinking like a foodshed.” Organized as a member of the national Business Alliance for Local Living Economies, the Local Food Network was first announced on Feb. 27 at the “Our Local Economy in Transition” conference, and the group is now recruiting charter members. Founding members include Everybody Eats!, Ollin Farms, Center for ReSource Conservation and Transition Colorado. The group hopes to grow to 200 members over the next two years, including farmers, ranchers, restaurants, retailers, food processors, distributors, food-related businesses, nonprofit and community organizations, county and municipal governments, as well as other local businesses that support the goals and values of the network. Making the transition to local food and farming In 2006, a food working group calculated that the then-current state of agriculture in Boulder County could only feed about 20,000 — less than 7 percent of the total population of 300,000. They then looked at the upside, estimating that with greatly expanded individual and community garden plots, greatly increased farming for food using bio-intensive methods, with reduced calorie intake and a simplified diet, this maybe could be increased to about 185,000 people — a daunting realization, but a useful benchmark of our vulnerability here. The group also learned that there were already about 34,000 food-insecure people — those without secure, reliable access to food — in Boulder County, and those numbers have been increasing dramatically with the recent economic turmoil. Boulder County is proud of its farmers’ markets, and more of them are coming up every year. Boulder’s own market is widely regarded as one of the top 10 in the country, and an estimated 14,000 people show up at the Boulder market on a Saturday. Yet, an entire season’s sales at the Boulder County Farmers’ Markets — Boulder and Longmont together — would meet Boulder County’s food needs for less than a day and a half. Given all this, it’s clear that one of the most important things we can all do together is to completely rebuild our local foodshed — from multiplying backyard and frontyard gardens, to raising chickens and keeping bees, to committing to only buying food that is local and organic, to converting our local agricultural lands to growing food for local consumption, to rebuilding local food storage and distribution systems, to demanding that our supermarkets stop importing food we could produce here ourselves, to training young people to learn farming as a wise and essential — and even sustainable — career choice. Of course, the transition to a re-localized, non-fossil-fuel food and farming system will take some time — because nearly every aspect of the process by which we feed ourselves must be redesigned and rebuilt. But if we do this right, we have an opportunity to build a localized food and farming system that is economically robust, environmentally sustainable, resilient and self-reliant, one that ensures food security and sovereignty for all, one that contributes to the health and happiness of our citizens, and that revitalizes our communities. If we do this right, not only can we reverse the destruction that industrial agriculture causes, but we can replace it with something far better, a way of growing and preparing food that heals our connection with the land and with each other. In the process, we may also find that we’re restoring the kind of democracy envisioned by Thomas Jefferson for his fledgling nation. .

Rally for Labeling GMOs

SUBHEAD: Rally on Saturday, April 26th, 12 to 2 pm at Lihue Airport Entrance.  

By Linda Pascatore on 25 March 2011 for Island Breath -
(http://islandbreath.blogspot.com/2011/03/rally-for-labeling-gmos.html)

 
Image above: Right to know GMO contents. From (http://organicconsumers.org/monsanto/index.cfm).  

WHAT:
Join our rally for labeling of GMO foods  

WHEN: Saturday, April 26th, 12 to 2 pm  

WHERE:
Corner at Entrance to Lihue Airport  

WHO:
Sponsored by GMO Free Kauai, in conjunction with the Institute for Responsible Technology (http://www.responsibletechnology.org/)

 MORE:
The following is from The Institute for Responsible Technology (http://www.responsibletechnology.org/rally-for-the-right-to-know):

Rally For The Right To Know

Genetically Modified Foods need to be labeled!

The national Millions Against Monsanto campaign staff is gearing up for a nationwide day of action on World Food Day, October 16, pledging to make it the biggest action on genetic engineering in US history. To help raise awareness for the campaign, Millions Against Monsanto activist Trish Wright has sent out a call for a demonstration at the White House on Saturday, March 26th and has urged other activists around the country to "Rally for the Right to Know" locally. The response has been tremendous. Millions Against Monsanto is spreading across the country!

Japan's Electric Bottleneck

SUBHEAD: Brownouts will continue. It is unlikely TEPCO can meet the power demand for Tokyo for several years. By John Ydstie on 24 March 2011 for National Public Radio - (http://www.npr.org/2011/03/24/134828205/a-country-divided-japans-electric-bottleneck) Image above: Buildings are seen without illumination in Tokyo's Shibuya district. Rolling blackouts are crippling the town. From original article. Even on a slow day, Tsukiji market, the largest fish market in the world, is a beehive of activity. Motorized carts buzz down narrow aisles carrying tuna carcasses. They're sawed into chunks and shipped to restaurants in Tokyo and around the world. Normally, these aisles would be jammed with buyers. But on a recent day, they're nearly empty. Mr. Kaoru, a wholesaler, blames the blackouts. "I predict one-third of the wholesalers in the market will close the shop, the business," he says. "[The] main reason is the power source." Rolling blackouts continue in the Tokyo area following the loss of power generation at the damaged nuclear plants in Fukushima. Tokyo Electric Power Co., the giant utility that serves the region, has lost 20 percent of its power capacity. Blackouts are crippling businesses from auto producers to fishmongers. The rolling blackouts are also reducing train service, making commuting unpredictable. So people don't stay downtown eating and drinking after work. The result is that fish sales at Tsukiji fish market are down about 50 percent. In the morning, the blackouts mean some rail commuters can't get to work on time. That's a problem for big auto manufacturer Nissan. "Electricity going down creates its own damage," says Andrew Palmer, a senior vice president at Nissan. He's trying to get the company's auto plants up and running. But he's plagued by power outages that shut down production lines and damage equipment. "Certainly the power outages are something we have to work with," Palmer says. "Obviously, it's partially a negotiation with the local authorities." But so far TEPCO, one of the biggest privately owned power companies in the world, says it can't guarantee power to anyone. "When blackouts are required we do not discriminate among our customers, whether industrial or residential," the company says. Blackouts That Could Continue For Years The problem is these rolling blackouts could continue for many months — even years. "This is a real problem for those factories which need uninterrupted supplies," says professor Tatsuo Hatta, president of the National Graduate Institute for Policy Studies in Tokyo. He says the situation might cause some companies to move. "It's clear that from their viewpoint they'd better move their plant to the western part of Japan where electricity is plenty." It might seem much easier to send the surplus power from one side of Japan to the other to ease the blackouts. But that's harder than you might think, Hatta says. "One major problem is that the east and west of Japan have different electric cycles and the capacity of the connectors are very much limited," he says. That's partly an accident of history. Eastern Japan followed the German model and has a 50-cycle electrical power grid. The western part of Japan used the American model and has a 60-cycle grid. Transferring power from one grid to another requires a very expensive facility. And there are only three connections between eastern and western Japan. That bottleneck means the power transfer is just a trickle, even during this national emergency. Creating more capacity would take years. Fear Of A Monopoly Hatta says, up until now, Japan's big utility companies, including TEPCO, liked the arrangement, because it protected their monopoly pricing and made them very powerful politically. "The users of electricity like Japan Steel wouldn't say anything against electric utility companies — they are so afraid," he says. "And also many politicians wouldn't touch those electric utility companies." Hatta says the situation must change to reduce the stranglehold the utilities have on the country's energy users. "One possibility is that on this occasion [the] Japanese government nationalize TEPCO," he says. The government could keep TEPCO's transmission lines and sell off its power plants to smaller producers who would compete to sell power to customers. For the time being, TEPCO says it's doing everything it can to secure more power. The stakes are incredibly high. Power consumption normally doubles during the heat of the summer. Right now it seems unlikely TEPCO will be able to meet the demand, threatening more disruption for Japanese companies and workers, and greater damage to Japan's fragile economy. .