The Catskills

When I was in high school, I would hike around the New York Catskills Mountains. There was one hiking trail that was my favorite because it led to a waterfall on the top of a mountain. The cliff was about 50-75 feet high and depending on the time of year the water pressure would vary. The landscape was enchanting because it was impressive to see something so beautiful that humans had no part in making. Also, I think the allure of it was caused by the fact that I never saw waterfalls in my suburban town.

It was also the combination of a lot of factors. The sun would shine through the trees which gave a golden hue to everything it touched. The water basin was clear and cool. I would drink from the stream. This was probably the most pure water I’ve ever tasted in nature because this water came from the top of a mountain in the Catskills. This in itself was a great experience because I felt connected to the natural world. At that moment, I felt like an equal to the natural world, it was unlike the usual feeling of being a parasite to the beauty the world possesses.

Once I climbed up to where the waterfall began and it was even more spectacular than I could have imagined. I was able to see everything around me and there is something humbling about looking at a large landscape. In the moment you look around you realize how small you truly are compared to the world you dominate and take for granted.

We should concern ourselves to a certain degree with saving nature. The extent to which we should concern ourselves is only to repair what we have destroyed; otherwise it would be unnatural to fix it. For instance, a forest fire started by a person should immediately be put out, but a naturally occurring one should not. As humans, we should not take it upon ourselves to play “god”, but we should be aware of our effects, positive or negative, on the environment.

The ocean, the sand, and me

When I was a sophomore in high school, a friend invited me to go on a sea kayaking trip with her family. It was an amazing experience, a group of ten people going out in the practically untouched islands of the Bahamas for a week with whatever they were paddling for themselves. Having never done anything like this before, I had to learn quickly: how to paddle effectively, what my task in the group was at any given moment, and how to avoid sunstroke. The water was every color blue that you could possibly imagine. We saw a lizard that was bigger than a small dog. I managed to climb to the highest point of the Bahamas, which consequently was not all that high.

During that trip though, my two fondest moments with nature were very peaceful. The first night, I chose to sleep on the beach. With nothing but my sleeping bag and pad, I feel asleep looking up at the stars, which shone so bright. Sunk into the sand as my bed. I felt as if I was truly within nature. The second moment came when I got my first chance to kayak in the one-person kayak. It was just me, working towards this unseen island just beyond the horizon, battling the waves alone, and feeling the water splash in my face. I loved every moment of my experience in the Bahamas.

Consequently, the last island we arrived at was covered in trash. Not only did it annoy me, it was horrible for the surrounding environment. Who knows what had already washed into the ocean or been detrimental to the island wildlife? “Saving nature” is essential to the continuation of human’s wellbeing and the world’s. I want to keep the world a beautiful place to explore but there is also a more dangerous problem that can arise. Ecosystems are fragile, and rely on a cycle to continue. McKibben, in Eaarth, makes the statement that ecosystems have already been forced to change and pushing them further can create more permanent damage. The truth is that we don’t know the full effects of an ecosystem crumbling. Ecosystems have so many complex interactions within themselves and outside. We need to save nature, it would be stupid not to.

Biodiversity and People

Scuba diving would be the most thrilling/ magical/ enchanting engagement with non-human world experience for me. It was such a beautiful world under the sea, and I was very amazed the affluence of biological diversity in the sea when I first time scuba diving experience at Puket Island, Thailand. There were countless colouful fishes, beautiful coral reef, and turtles. Also, Diving in everytime, I had an opportunity to meet a variety of see creatures. This was so excited because I did not know what kind of creature I will meet in next time. It was a vey different world which I have never experienced on the land. This experience and view awake me biodiversity.

I agree that the second half question because human's activity always consists on non-human existence. The reason why we should concern about ourselves in terms of "saving nature" becasue humans are the only creaure either destroy or protect the earth by their activities. In our life, many productions originally come from the grace of the living biodiversity. For instance, our food, clothing, and apartment cannot have without nature. In addition, the oxygen which we need to take in is made by plants, and our clean water have been purifield by microorganisms. Biodiversity is a part of our life rather than just something we have.

Dogs and Nature

The most thrilling moment I had with the non-human world took place some years ago when I was camping, but it did not involve any animal life that I had encountered camping. Rather, it involved my uncle’s dog and his father-in-law’s dog. I woke up early one morning to just take a walk, because everyone else was asleep, including my uncle’s dog. When I stepped out of the tent, however, I encountered his father-in-law’s dog, growling, showing its teeth, and drooling. I did not know what to do, and just stood there, motionless. In an instant, my uncle’s dog, which had been asleep, leaped out of the tent, confronted the other dog. It barked and charged the other dog. All the while, I was just standing there. My uncle’s dog then walked back and forth across me, chased the other dog away, then came back and licked me. It was startling. So much had happened. For one, the situation was completely resolved by animals. I was a “passenger” to the whole thing. Second, it was extraordinary to see the interaction of the two dogs, and understand that there was more than simple aggressiveness. There was a substantial amount of communication going on, which I did not understand, but they did. Granted, dogs are not as smart as humans, but it showed me how complex their world can be.

Whether or not nature should be saved, I think, is a simple question. What does that mean? It is very vague, because the problem seems so hopelessly complex and enormous. Obviously, as the readings said, and as anyone can judge, not all the animal life will survive, so to hope that we can save every single species is out of the question. From here, however, there are no clear-cut solutions. The natural systems are so complex that we do not fully know what is going on, only that there are a lot of interconnected factors. So I would agree with one of the readings that we should study these systems more so, to prioritize what needs to be done. But to what extent can even the prioritized species survive if changing climate and reduced land for wildlife do not ensure a secure area? Sitting back, however, can accomplish little, because there is the massive potential to lose very valuable linkages in the system that can bring the whole work down. Not to sound selfish, but apart from all the beauty, humanity depends enormously on the complex linkages of actions and species in ecosystems, so to the extent that we can preserve these, we should, because our own way of living depends on them.

Peruvian Mountains- my pacha mama experience

When I was 18 going on 19 years old, my family went to Peru together in June before my birthday. Coming home after my first year of college was awful and trying, but the vacation was supposed to save us all from each other. And it did. It was the mountains, for five days, trekking to see Machu Pichu, with the sky and the time to look at the world around us. People would come and go on the trail, but you have to keep walking, just like life. The air was cleaner, the time was there, and we all separated and rejoined as felt natural. There were trees I had never seen before, but my mom, a landscape architect and artist, knew all of their latin names. Birds flew over us that the guide could identify, and monkeys turned up along our path up past the peaks of Salkantay mountain. I walked alongside my father and my sister for as long as we wanted. The whole trip healed me. After a year of the social trials and errors at university, I think I had really lost touch with the reasons I should care about the rest of the world because I had gotten lost in my own head and my own issues. The room for introspection that the 5 days hiking afforded me, and the motion of walking, tirelessly for days, and the very kind Peruvians who hosted us through the trip, just making it so easy to get lost in yourself, while physically guided by them. Peruvian mountains renewed my heart in a way that kept me physically dedicated to a world I had only had implicit faith in before.

Places like Machu Pichu exist because people like the Quechua in Peru felt a spiritual connection to the mountains and specifically sought to live on them instead of under them. Pacha Mama is the name of the benevolent goddess of the mountains' spirit. The Virgin Mary, when brought by Spanish conquistadors to Peru, was depicted as a Blue Triangle figure, another version of the Pacha Mama. Spirituality is not something I usually appreciate, but I have never felt as close to the rest of humanity as when I have been in mountains, with enough space to my self that I can appreciate the world. That connection has to exist for a reason. People need space. People need clean air, open sky, water to swim in, to drink, to spray. People need need need beyond their capacities to provide, "succeeding ourselves to death." Donella Meadows wrote an article celebrating this need for nature as a spiritually fulfilling thing too, however, no matter how you phrase it, if you tell the right person, emotional ties to the world around us, the natural world, will sound trite. It is important to save nature because we essentially all go back to that happy place in our heads. If we lost the battle to save nature, we have lost the battle to save our own sanity. Even when I say it, it sounds trite! But it is true. Put that on your environmentally-friendly Hallmark card.

S*** Heats Up in Uganda

http://allafrica.com/stories/201010120041.html

This example of biogas as a renewable resource option in Uganda demonstrates why environmental solutions are not just a first world issue. The bioslurry, the waste produced by the process, also is used as a fertilizer in the home's garden. Biogas has seen a large social, economic and environmental return when applied in this capacity. By applying a localized solution, the family is also able to gain autonomy in its household economy and spends less money paying for energy in general.

"The inherent differences between fossil and renewable energies suggest that in order to be sustainable, the shift to renewables be include a transition to a more localized economy," http://www.localenergy.org/background.htm . Sustainability is not just a solution available for the first world's homes. There is a need to teach sustainable, achievable processes and make them into universal knowledge- empowerment of individuals and individual households to take up environmental solutions for themselves. By disseminating information and examples like this, environmental solutions seem so much more broach-able. Furthermore, the kind of neighborly, cooperative action that the biogas solutions promote (ie. sharing dung between households) help form a community around the positive environmental steps that they can participate in. The movement of environmental action ultimately comes down to a movement of people hoping that the world survives for generations to come, so the interest of an individual in their fellow man or woman becomes the crux of the environmental movement. A shift towards localized energy means that people become less dependent on international institutions and global markets, and become freed up to consider their futures and the quality of life that they want for their children.

Is it the ultimate localization?

Each country or even each city has particular characteristics for environmental movement.

I always like to see those differences and how it effectively works in that region. In terms of regional differences, the U.S. and Japan have very different model regarding to localization because the size of land is the obvious difference between those two countries. Thus, today I would like to introduce a new Japanese localization method and a new environmental trend by taking advantages of small Japanese region.

Have you heard "plant factory"?

Plant factory is a new productive system which take place inside of the building and use an environmental control technology and automation technology. It means that the computer control plant's temparture, light, amount of CO2, and fertilizer, so plants do not get any extreme weather and season influences. In Japan, this productive system gradually become popular, and people hope to this farming as the new type of localization food. This system is good for especially bug cities like Tokyo because plant factory can farm even at small space.

This news article introduces the new Subway restaurant with plant factory at Marunouchi which is very famous business district, Tokyo

The concept of this shop is ''Tensa Tensho (Local Producton for Local Consumption)."

At the center of this restaurant, there is an installed small plant factory faculityfor growing food stuff from seeds. The Main farming is Lettuce in organic hydroponics. All lettuce for the dishes are grown in the shop, and it takes about three weeks to harvest, the store expects to have about 20 balls per week (approximately 100 servings), and they hope to increase more and more later.

I thought this is a very interesting article when we think about regional differencies. The U.S. does not have such kind of farming method because they have huge land, but Japan have to deal with it's very limited region especially for big cities, so plant factory would be very helpful for them. In order to accelerate localization products as well as reduce transportation cost, this might be one of good mehod to resolve environmental issue and limited land issue for small regional countries.

Suzlon Foundation

www.suzlon.com
www.suzlonfoundation.com

Suzlon Corporation is the third largest Wind Energy Company in the world. It has had a 100% annual growth rate since the start of the company in 2001. The majority of the company’s wind farms are in the desert of India (Northwest) and in rural areas due to the amount of land needed to create a successful Wind Energy Farm. The Corporation has come under social pressures to create a public relations office. I worked in this office during my abroad program in India. I saw first hand the positive affects this company has on poor villagers. This company has many different programs to empower these villagers, such as tree plantation, solar power lights, women self-help groups, animal vaccinations, computer literacy for teachers, education about personal health, deepening of ponds/rain water collection, and the list goes on. Basically, the corporation sends their Public relations office into these poor areas around the wind energy farms and have the employees in this office evaluate what needs to be done to help life these people out of poverty. These impoverished people are marginalized into a role in society and through these programs funded by Suzlon Corporation these villagers are able to have a better quality of life. This may sound like an ad for this company, but when I worked there I saw how genuine the employees were when it came to helping these impoverished people.

Magic or Just Good Science?

Science in Action: Bioinspiration - Hair Mats

My little sister was actually the first person to show me this video. After the oil spill, the school invited someone to come speak to their class about possible environmentally-friendly cleanup options. She then came back home and was excited to show it to everyone.

I had no idea that there was this grassroots movement that had successes with past oil spills and had began working in the Gulf. The idea of human hair may weird people out a little bit, but the innovation is incredible. Other than the transportation costs, the product relies on human hair, recycled hosiery, and bugs; there are no created products and no byproducts in theory. With all the benefits that it provides and its low environmental cost, it seems to have an extra positive impact.

I found this process so special because it completes the sustainability cycle. The decomposition process through compost is so cool. The idea that this is a complete cycle provides the hope that other product cycles can be made sustainable. Taking waste products, using them for good, and then decomposing it so that there is no waste product left seems like a little bit of magic (or just good science).

New York Times: Offshore Wind Power Line Wins Backing

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/10/12/science/earth/12wind.html?pagewanted=1&_r=2&sq=google%20energy%20east%20coast&st=cse&scp=1

The article highlights how Google and another financial firm have decided to invest in an offshore wind energy network. The plan calls for an underwater cable to stretch from Northern New Jersey to Virginia, in a slight trench, connected to wind turbines about 15-20 miles offshore. The turbines would be barely visible to anyone onshore, and would produce the power of about five large nuclear power plants. Furthermore, because the turbines would stretch across a wide geographic area, the energy supply from them will not be confined to a small area and will thus be more predictable. Some say portions of it can start to be built by 2013. Being that this is an innovative project, it appears that its success will influence other like-minded projects in the future.

omnivore guilt

When I turned 11 years old, my parents told me that I could have any party that I wanted- I chose to have a dinner of 11 of my best friends where we ate only Ribs, pork ribs, from my favorite rib joint in Philadelphia, where I am from. The Rib Crib does spicy, mild, and chicken wings. The saucy has molasses and I am sure plenty of things I never wanted to know in it. The point being, from a young age I have loved meat.

Two summers ago I decided to develop my cooking skills so that I could prepare and cook my own dinners which contained meat. I tried to cook every organism with a thigh bone. I looked for meat that was from the District, Maryland and Virginia area. Local meat has been a part of my mother's mantra since I was a young girl because of the flavor that freshness brings. She wanted flavor, flavor, flavor, butter, salt, fresh, good-looking produce, and somewhere along the line I osmosis-ed the whole lesson. When I started learning about the environmental impact of food in college, and tried to tell her she had been doing the right thing this whole time, my mom laughed me off. She believed it, but hated the hackneyed lesson of climate change as an impetus to alter her eating style.

This was never a problem until this past summer, whereupon I decided to take meat out of my diet entirely. She did not understand, she didn't believe that meat raising was effecting enough environmental damage to stop eating it every night. Well, it was a battle for about 2 months, but not too serious, and eventually I proved her right by shrugging off the challenge. I do still eat some meat some times. I still definitely eat seafood, and relish it. However, the pervasive environmental guilt I feel about eating meat means that I never buy it for myself unless I purchase something without paying attention once in a blue moon. All of a sudden I'll find myself halfway through a turkey sandwich when I babysit a kid who is himself munching on chicken fingers. If the meat is free, then I'll take it. My purchasing power is what matters- I don't want to be involved in the customer demand feedback loop empowering retailers to buy more meat.

I go to the farmer's market once a week, but I also go to Giant. I consider my decision to bike or use public transport to access my food retailers an environmentally charged decision in that it limits my use of fuel to get my food. My mother worries that I am not getting enough iron so she mails me beans; honestly, I love lentils and will eat as many as she sends me, but I wish she could send me some ribs from the Rib Crib on Germantown Ave. instead.

Environmentally Eating

When I think about food, there are four things that come to my mind. Most importantly is if the food looks good. Second, the food needs to be accessible to me. My options are limited to what I can buy at the grocery stores that are close by, what I can travel to buy, or what is available to me on campus. Third, from the options I have, I try to pick well-rounded and organic options. I am lucky because my family has the means to purchase organic food even though it is more expensive. Fourth, the price of food is still small factor. There is the debate if I should use my meal swipes, or go purchase a meal, or just travel home to eat my already-bought food.

I do try to purchase local, organic food whenever possible. That does help to ensure a more environmental practice of agriculture, but that is not originally why I choose that food. I choose organic, local food because I believe it’s a healthier and more natural way to eat. The environmental benefit is honestly not my main motivation but an added bonus. I find it hard to take action against mass farms and global transport of food because it is so engrained into the agricultural market in the United States. If you want meat, there is commonly only meat produced in massive amounts. The same exists for rice, wheat, and corn. There is such a low supply of small farm meat that it can only supply those that are willing to seek it out and pay extra. In terms of fruit from around the world, my opinion is that it’s already made the journey to the store, it’s healthy, and I should buy it. Environmental concerns are not usually in the forefront of my mind when dealing with food.

With some thought, I decided that a chicken breast from TDR was the least environmentally friendly piece of food I ate in the past few days. I believe that the chicken breast took the most energy to reach my plate and then be cleaned. Starting from the beginning, huge chicken farms and slaughtering plants produce methane and use a lot of energy (most likely coal driven) in the process. The farm and slaughtering plant could also be in different places, so a transportation fossil fuel emission would potentially need to be factored in. After transportation to the Bon Appetit—the catering company in charge of TDR—warehouse, it would have to be refrigerated. The chicken would then be transported to TDR and refrigerated again. Ultimately, the chicken would be cooked on the grill and kept warm, constantly using energy until I take it. Then, the cleaning of the plate also uses energy and water. There seemed to me to be a copious amount of burning of fossil fuels and coal-generated energy use.

Nom Nom Nom....Mac and Cheese

The first thing I think about when I am purchasing food is the price. As a college student, I am not earning a lot of money to blow on expensive organic food. But, I am a smart shopper and when at all possible I try to buy cheap and organic (I know it’s an oxymoron). What I’ve found is Trader Joe’s is a great grocery store for a shopper like me. When I am choosing the food I will eat I tend to think in terms of health as well. I will try to get fruits, vegetables, protein, dairy, and carbs. I think I do a very good job of picking out healthy choices for myself. Honestly, it would drive me insane if I thought about all the environmental degradation involved in grocery stores. Yet, I try not to buy food wrapped in many layers of plastic and cardboard.

The interesting part about consumerism is the consumer drives the market. However, in the United States we forget that we have the power to choose what we want to pay for. For instance, we can chose from 50 different types of yogurt. Therefore, there is competition between these companies and these companies try to make a product that satisfies the demand. So, if we were to start buying more organic food and more environmentally friendly food. We have already seem a small change in the market, but for the majority of people buying organically is still too expensive.

I am just making an assumption, but I would guess the Kraft Mac and Cheese I ate would probably have the most impact. It seems like the unhealthiest out of all the food I’ve eaten because it has a processed cheese packet to go along with the macaroni. When making it you have to boil water and therefore I used gas energy to boil this water. The box is recyclable, so in terms of the environment that isn’t too bad. Yet, the cheese packet wrapping…I’m not exactly sure what it is, but I know that it is definitely not recyclable and probably the worst environmental impact out of all of these products. The food itself created an impact on the environment. The macaroni probably doesn’t have a huge effect, but the factory used energy to make it. The cheese probably is the worst out of the two food products. But, it tastes so good. Anyway, there are chemicals put into the cheese to make it into a powder these chemicals probably have by-products that need to be disposed of somehow. The cheese packet has the worst impact on the environment because it is most likely a toxic form of plastic and thus has an extremely long half-life. So, the packet from the mac and cheese I ate yesterday will most likely be in a dump when my great grand children are alive.

Invisible Energies Behind of Food

1. When I decide what kind of food I buy, I prefer to have organic food and local production food becuase I thought it would be healthier and environmentally good. However, when I buy food at the glocery store, I would not afford to buy those food every time, so I often choose cheaper one. Price is always matter for me. If I afford to buy organic one, I would buy it. However, regarding to buying fruits and vegetables, mostly I buy those at the Farmers Market which near by my resident because at there I can buy food directly from farmers, and I believe this would be environmentally much less energy compared to buying food at the store. Thus, I would like to say I have environmental consideration, but this concerns often comes after the price. My another concern is health. Good balance of food leads healther body and results of good health, so I often concern balance of food, if I feel I do not eat enough vegetables, I try to take in vegetables.
2. As I mentioned in the first quesion, I often go to Farmers Market to buy food, then I usually cook food for my self with fresh food, so I could control and exactly know what I take in to my body. Also, I try to have food with less energy. Yesterday, I ate spinachi & bean salada and apple cider at cafe, I often think that the process of my order needs much cost and energy because it has more process to come to me. This is the way how people gain money, but I feel inefficiency of this system. This week's reading "Something Under the Sun", the author says the lack of human ingenuity is the part of the answer regarding to environmental change. It is important to concern development and technology to better off our life, but utilizing our positive human ingenuity, people might need to concern more about fundamental things such as people's health and food.

Thoughts on Meatballs

When making my food choices at the grocery store, I take into account a number of factors, although I must admit the issue of environmentalism does not at all come across my mind. First and foremost, I chose food depending on what I prefer. To eat something, I have to like it. Usually, the other most critical factors are health and price. I am not overly concerned with health, but I make sure I get food items from some different food groups. The sodium content, cholesterol, and fat content are things that I scan for quickly in the nutritional facts. With respect to price, I try to find the item that goes along best with my taste and health preferences, but one that is the cheapest. As a college student, I really must focus on stretching every dollar, so if I spot a deal with something I wish to purchase, I will go for it.

Of the food I have recently eaten, I would probably say that my meatballs have had the greatest environmental impact. The meat mixture I use is comprised of three different meats, a portion of which comes from Canada, and the other portion, the United States. This means that there were high transportation costs, aside from all the other costs of raising the meat (pork, veal, beef)which one of the readings noted uses more energy than those products distribute. Aside from the meat itself, the meatball also has cheese, seasoning, bread crumbs, salt, pepper, eggs, oil, and some milk. To get all of these products to one place definitely contributed some type of environmental damage through transportation. All these different ingredients require an expenditure of energy to create, especially the animal-related products, and the fact that they are all concentrated into a ball that fits into the palm of my hand shows how one small piece of food can require a great deal of energy, which in turn can harm the environment. Furthermore, I cooked the meatballs using a gas stove, which is not the most friendly fuel for the environment. All the oil that is left over from cooking is simply disposed of, which also raises the environmental cost because energy was used to create it, and it was not used to its fullest extent.