During Vietnam we used to say that "fighting for peace is like screwing for virginity" (OK, not exactly, but you get the point). I had a flashback of that today here at Gristmill.
A new ad in rotation here from some outfit called the National Outdoor Leadership School invites you to "Traverse a glacier -- before they melt."
In other words, NOLS has decided that there's no point in trying to be part of the solution, and it's better to make a buck making the problem worse, encouraging people to travel great distances to hike over glaciers (before all that travel causes them to melt).
Now with extra marketing power from the used-car school of sales: "These won't last long, get in here today!"
Maybe we can award them a special "George W. Bush Environmental Awareness" plaque for their school.
Climate psychology in cartoons: clues for solving the messaging mystery
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Comments
View as Flat
odograph Posted 6:01 am
26 Apr 2007
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Hooverflagit Posted 11:34 am
26 Apr 2007
NOLS helped develop the Leave No Trace organization and they practice its low-impact ethics on every expedition. I would say that as a result of people participating in these learning expeditions in majestic, far-flung places, they are gaining a respect and sense of responsibility for the world they exist within every day at home.
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JMG Posted 2:54 pm
26 Apr 2007
After all, say the GOP, the Natl. Manufacturers' Assn., the Business Roundtable, the airline lobbies, etc., if the most environmentally ethically advanced beings in the universe think it's ok to keep on traveling to far away places just because of some offsets, then it must be ok for the rest of us to keep right on trucking ...
At some point, people who profess concern for the environment have to stop helping to screw it up in the name of consciousness raising.
"An optimist is someone who thinks this is the best of all possible worlds. A pessimist is someone who is afraid that the optimist is right."
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atreyger Posted 3:08 pm
26 Apr 2007
Do you think about the root causes for global warming or do you like to complain?
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JMG Posted 4:17 pm
26 Apr 2007
But perhaps I'm not thinking about the right things--what should I be thinking about?
Should I follow the course blazed by tens of millions before me and decide that carbon emitted by those with a pure heart (whose values are similar to my own) is less damaging than carbon emitted for base reasons?
Should I decide that carbon emitted from jet travel by people who are clearly aware of and take global heating seriously is less damaging than carbon emitted by H2 drivers?
The phrase "root causes" strikes me as odd, because I've been trained and am quite proficient in root cause analysis as a method for improving safety and in improving organizational performance. I know what I mean by the term, but what do you mean by it? What do you think the "root causes" of global heating are that I should be concerned with?
Part of me probably does like to complain, though. I admit to having always had a fondness for Oscar Wilde's observation that "Discontent is the first step in the progress of a man or a nation."
"An optimist is someone who thinks this is the best of all possible worlds. A pessimist is someone who is afraid that the optimist is right."
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atreyger Posted 4:45 pm
26 Apr 2007
Singling out travelers, who once arriving at the destination hike for hundreds of miles is unfair. Jealous?
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Bart Anderson Posted 5:51 pm
26 Apr 2007
Those of us who love the outdoors are going to have to change, just as everybody else will. For example, we probably should do most of our outdoorsing nearby - get to know our own hills and lakes and deltas, rather than jetting off to Peru.
SF writer Kim Stanley Robinson had a wonderful story about this at GORP: The Future of Adventure
Sports fan Bill Henderson is envisioning how sports need to be re-thought in light of global warming and peak oil: The relocalization of sport.
Bart
Energy Bulletin
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JMG Posted 6:49 pm
26 Apr 2007
I suggest that none of your list of activities that contribute to global heating (the billion cars and people and machines and industry and land clearing and Amazon deforestation and a hundred other[s]) are "systemic causes" at all.
Rather, those are symptoms of a greater root cause, our ability as individuals to rationalize anything we wish to do that benefits us or our kin as good/justified/worthy while we ignore or minimize costs that we impose on others outside our kin group (living now or later). That, I suggest, is a lot closer to a root cause for global heating.
You ask: "Singling out travelers, who once arriving at the destination hike for hundreds of miles is unfair. Jealous?"
How does the fact that NOLS folks hike for hundreds of miles change the equation? What's the difference between them and people who fly to Bali to lie on the beach, or people who fly to Patagonia to climb, or people who fly anywhere to pursue their own private pleasures?
As for my feelings, I experience a feeling closer to despair when I see the NOLS ad, not jealousy. It tells me that even the folks who might be expected to be the most dedicated to reducing global heating carry the same "de minimus" fallacy in their heads as the SUV drivers and the Amazonian loggers: the belief that the damage that I do is so small as to be inconsequential.
"An optimist is someone who thinks this is the best of all possible worlds. A pessimist is someone who is afraid that the optimist is right."
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caniscandida Posted 8:02 pm
26 Apr 2007
So sorry, I am feeling very miserable and cranky.
Rightly so, though, as any writer would understand.
To Bart: By "SF," you apparently mean "sci-fi." Be sure to specify, in the future. "SF" by itself means too many things in different contexts, e.g. San Francisco, Santa Fe, self-feeling, sans-farine, subwarp-frequency, and So Forth.
Kim Stanley Robinson, back in 2000, published a piece, not exactly a story, which deserved to have been received popularly better than it apparently has been received. I like this meaningful fragment:
<<
This is called commodification, turning things you do into things you buy, and it's long since been true that experiences in America are as commodified as things.
>>
I have no knowledge whatsoever of who NOLS are and what they do. I do know that the aspect of the Sierra Club that I like by far the least is their travel industry, in the name of green values and eco-education.
Why in the world is it that young(ish) Americans, with a goodly amount of bucks in their pockets, do not feel that they have truly "experienced Nature," until they have spent a lot of money traveling to distant continents whose names begin with "A," and who expend lots of jet fuel getting there, and who take lots of pictures once they have got there?
There is so much of beauty and interest to see right here in North America. As the old saying goes: "Do you learn more about mountains, by climbing a hundred mountains, or by climbing the same mountain a hundred times?"
Robert H. Mohlenbrock is a terrificly underestimated environmentalist hero. For decades, he has been writing the "This Land" column in Natural History, a great magazine published in some relationship with the American Museum of Natural History here in NYC. Mohlenbrock's blurb reads, "Robert H. Mohlenbrock is distinguished professor emeritus of plant biology at Southern Illinois University Carbondale."
IMHO, I think he is fantastic. He has been researching for decades the national, state and provincial forests of North America, and describing them carefully, mostly with an interest in flora but also in fauna, geology and hydrography.
In each of his columns, he includes transportation information for the place that he has described.
Really, his work is astounding. And we must do much more to assure clueless young well-meaning Americans that there is plenty right here for them to look at and study.
Chickens are our cousins!
So are other sensitive animals!
Enough is enough!
No more factory farms!
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amazingdrx Posted 10:03 pm
26 Apr 2007
Copy and paste into a "draft" in your email and it's safe even if the computer crashes. Belt and suspenders.
It's the only way to be sure of preserving ones creation in the wacky world mr gates hath wrought. I know, apple machines are not designed to facilitate commercial hacking and spying and thus frequent crashing.
But most internet technology does run on the gates model. Easy for corporate, goverenment, and just plain old vandalism to destroy.
http://amazngdrx.blogharbor.com/blog
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amazingdrx Posted 10:23 pm
26 Apr 2007
That's just good green business.
Your critique is in the popular talking point mode, like the fauxnews attack on Gore's home energy use, of claiming personal hypocricy. And this comes nowhere near even the faux credibility of that claim.
http://amazngdrx.blogharbor.com/blog
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atreyger Posted 1:45 am
27 Apr 2007
What I would like to hit upon is the following point that you made:
Rather, those are symptoms of a greater root cause, our ability as individuals to rationalize anything we wish to do that benefits us or our kin as good/justified/worthy while we ignore or minimize costs that we impose on others outside our kin group (living now or later). That, I suggest, is a lot closer to a root cause for global heating.
This is the basis for human success as a species, at least during the period of time when we were Homo sapiens var. sapiens. This is the healthiest attitude that an individual can have without being a martyr, and delving into the religious bullshit that goes along with that. We are mammals, whose sole reason for existence, if boiled down to one reason, is to procreate and insure the survival of our progeny.
Granted, flying thousands of miles to faraway lands in order to undertake risky ventures is not a part of that, BUT while we are here on this planet, we have to occupy our minds with something besides 'sky blue', 'leaf green', and 'river food'. We have become successful as a species by using our legs and minds in order to spread to places where no other primate or great ape has been and have been capable of sustaining our populations in these places with a good consistency.
And on top of that, the people who explore, people who take risks are also the same people who may do better in terms of reproduction, or at least the quality of reproduction, as in finding fit partners, and raising healthy offspring. I know that there is more than one way to spin this tale, but biology is my forte', and that is how I'm going to spin it.
As far as my systemic causes, people who undertook these tasks were not people who did this for the sake of luxury, in many cases they did it out of necessity and that's how they felt about it at the time of the undertaking, especially in a constantly changing world. After all, twenty years ago no one used computers, and now few people in most western circles consider internet a luxury. Anyway, I'm not an apologist for NOLS, I'm sure that the few thousand people that actually took their courses would be able to give you much better arguments, if they chose to do so.
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GreenEngineer Posted 2:56 am
27 Apr 2007
As I'm sure you are all aware, it's quite thoroughly impossible to participate in modern society without externalizing costs and ecological damage left, right, and center.
You can minimize your personal contribution, of course. But once you have eliminated major systematic contributions, like daily car commuting or a 3-meals-a-day McDonalds habit, such efforts become an exercise in making a very, very small contribution to the problem ever so slightly smaller. In the meantime, we each have to live our lives, do our work, and keep ourselves sane and happy enough to be functional in the midst of a world going mad.
The (il)logical extension of the principle I quoted above would have those who are most concerned about the environment undertake a lifestyle of minimum negative impact, which in the context of our current infrastructure equates to minimum activity, minimum travel, minimum communication, and minimum participation in the mainstream society that we are trying to change.
In the meantime, the world continues on its merry way, destroying itself microscopically less quickly thanks to the silent sacrifice of the eco-hermits.
Personally, I think that it is far more important to make as much positive impact as possible, whether that's on the design of infrastructure (my work) or the way that people think about the natural world (NOLS's approach). If this activity leads to a greater-than-minimum negative impact, that's acceptable (within reason).
If anything is going to save us, it will be the positive impacts of caring and involved activists (using the term very broadly). Those impacts will include persuading mainstream citizens to reduce their own most egregious impacts. But arguing that the first duty of every environmentalist is to make their personal impacts an absolute minimum is a good way to get tied up in irrelevancies. It also sounds very much like the "hair shirt" school of environmentalism, the problems of which have been discussed at length elsewhere in Gristmill.
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caniscandida Posted 2:59 am
27 Apr 2007
Dear ATreyger, do you really need to fly to Patagonia to find a "fit partner"? Are there no good women (or whatever you are in the market for) in upstate NY and vicinity?
As for condemning religion-based ethics, which all too often do indeed deserve condemning, I cannot figure out what you mean in this paragraph:
<<
This [as per JMG, benefiting kin as a prevailing motive of human behavior, with disadvantaging non-kin as a morally insignificant consequence] is the basis for human success as a species, at least during the period of time when we were Homo sapiens var. sapiens. This is the healthiest attitude that an individual can have without being a martyr, and delving into the religious bullshit that goes along with that. We are mammals, whose sole reason for existence, if boiled down to one reason, is to procreate and insure the survival of our progeny.
>>
One wonders if even Friedrich Nietzsche could have been satisfied with so purely physical and anti-intellectual a manifesto.
Sure, human beings are mammals, and very many of them are much of the time engaged in begetting brats, giving birth to them, raising them, wiping up after them, and getting them into prestigious colleges.
But could that really be all that our existence is about?
Chickens are our cousins!
So are other sensitive animals!
Enough is enough!
No more factory farms!
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JMG Posted 3:33 am
27 Apr 2007
My problem is that I have observed reasonably long time that everyone considers themselves wonderful people and what they do justified by the rewards that it brings them vs. the costs.
As for whether I advocate a "hair shirt" environmentalism, I would like to note how comfortably that charge would fit on Rush Limbaugh's program or in the materials of the Competitive Enterprise Institute. Apparently when we talk about what "THEY" have to stop doing (factory farming, building superfreeways, coal burning ethanol plants, enormous V8 SUVs, etc.) we are only advocating common sense, but when someone suggests that WE also have to modify our activities then we're guilty of advocating "hair shirt environmentalism."
I'm afraid that, in the absence of a unified global response to global heating, individuals are left to cobble together their own responses, which means making decisions in the face of uncertainty and in the face of evidence that "they aren't cutting back, why should I?" Each person must inquire into their own actions and the ethics of their own choices,including asking that most important question "What is the result if everyone did what I propose to do?"
Just as GW Bush likes to point to China and India whenever it is suggested that the US needs to go on a carbon diet, rich first-world environmentalists like to point out that lots of other people aren't doing enough the instant that someone suggests that they too are overspent on their carbon budget.
What I think "leadership" --as in a "leadership" school-- requires is that anyone who aspires to the title must be willing to face hard truths and to examine their own actions against their values, not just the actions of others.
I'm guessing that NOLS helps produce people who serve the global tourism industry at some level--a small niche, to be sure, but part of that industry nonetheless. People who take spendy and arduous courses in "outdoor leadership" probably don't just allow in those scientists who have to travel and live on glaciers to study them (although, presumably, some NOLS students are such people).
Rather, using the internet to promote their "Get it while it's cool" message suggests that they are mining the same niche market for high-end eco/adventure tourism as Sierra Club and others, and that they are about creating demand for their service rather than just serving it. That's what advertising does: build demand. Thus, presumably, they want to build demand, and if the response is there, to serve it.
I think that the kind of outdoor leadership we need is a lot closer to what Canis suggests--leaders being people who help others identify worthy goals and to attain them. When I see NOLS offring courses in outdoor leadership in Newark and NYC and Oakland and Dallas and OK City then I'll revise my opinion. But in the meantime they seem just like Princess cruises with a green veneer to me.
"An optimist is someone who thinks this is the best of all possible worlds. A pessimist is someone who is afraid that the optimist is right."
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atreyger Posted 4:03 am
27 Apr 2007
I am not particularly fond of philosophical reasons for existence of life, me and everything else around. The reason is not that I do not buy it or that I do not like to think about them and have my own conclusions; it is that they are as ephemeral as that particular school of philosophy, despite the fact that these schools hang on for thousands of years.
My statement comes as close to the ultimate TRUTH as possible. Our existence is quite seriously and unequivocally based on reproduction and continuation of self-organization that is life. I have no problem with people finding their own meaning within this framework; I know I have found it for the meantime, and I will continue finding it throughout my lifetime. But anything besides this TRUTH is really as ephemeral as the individual organism, in our case 80 years if lucky. That is hardly a long enough period of time to have MEANING, considering that known life has existed for 50 million times that period.
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atreyger Posted 4:07 am
27 Apr 2007
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atreyger Posted 5:50 am
27 Apr 2007
JMG,
The problem with voluntary individual responses are that this approach will not work. It's really quite simple, because reasonable people WILL do things that benefit them despite their environmentalist inclinations. Only zealots (or true followers, depending on the perspective taken) will do things that are detrimental to themselves in order to better everyone else. The rest of the five point nine nine nine billion people in the world will do everything to benefit themselves. The true change will not come from cessation of the Sierra Club's or NOLS' or any other eco-tourist organization, which account for a minimal portion of the problem; it will come from political and market forces that change the infrastructure of GHG induced climate change. And in the meantime, it seems almost ridiculous to not take advantage of what is available to us.
Your reason for disliking Sierra Club's/NOLS''green veneer' is that it still creates demand for tourism. True enough, but is education about survival in the wilderness, or education about the ecology of a faraway place bad? Because without education, some people would not be aware of a disappearing species, or people would not bring environmental injustices or problems in those lands. Anyways, this bone that you pick seems like a very minor component of nearly any environmental agenda.
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GreenEngineer Posted 6:37 am
27 Apr 2007
The opposite phenomenon is what I think of as the hy(pe)drogen syndrome: the perception that we can go on living just as we are without destroying the earth if we just deploy the right technologies.
As usual, the truth is somewhere in the middle. We can live very well with a greatly reduced (or negative; i.e. ecologically beneficial) footprint, but TANSTAAFL.
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birdboy Posted 7:46 am
27 Apr 2007
... our ability as individuals to rationalize anything we wish to do that benefits us or our kin as good/justified/worthy while we ignore or minimize costs that we impose on others outside our kin group (living now or later). That, I suggest, is a lot closer to a root cause for global heating.
This may be the root cause for all 'unintended' evil done by man; we see the benefit to those near us but not the harm done to those far away (especially if they are separated from us by time yet to pass).
Atreyger claims, as many have:
This is the basis for human success as a species, at least during the period of time when we were Homo sapiens var. sapiens. This is the healthiest attitude that an individual can have without being a martyr, and delving into the religious bullshit that goes along with that. We are mammals, whose sole reason for existence, if boiled down to one reason, is to procreate and insure the survival of our progeny.
Really, have we not evolved beyond the 'kill or be killed' rule of the jungle? Can we not sympathize with those outside our immediate sphere of interaction, without becoming 'religious martyrs'? I'll not argue that this animal instinct has enabled us to survive difficult times, but those times are long gone from our lives. To continue to survive, in the modern world, we've got to change this attitude to one of understanding and compassion that goes beyond those we can touch and see; in fact, it must go beyond concern for our own species, if the ecosystem which supports life on Earth is to survive (in any fashion we would recognize) our conversion of resources into human flesh and toxic waste.
I find it hard to believe that by flying across the world to trek across a glacier, I would become a more potent force for change in the world. Most of the 'takers' are more likely pleasing themselves, while dumping carbon into the atmosphere. I also seriously doubt that mankind will benefit from their superior genetic contribution. If we are to survive the result of our animal instincts, the next step in human evolution will be societal, not genetic.
a liberal in redsville
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SMLowry Posted 9:47 am
27 Apr 2007
Unfortunately, we are going to have to curtail air travel, and we should start now. I say unfortunately because of my own experiences traveling both for "work" and for pleasure (I often combined them). As my friend and traveling companion says, "Traveling expands your dream time". I found being in certain places, being open to the energy, made me aware of different aspects of myself, especially spiritually, and my relationship with the Earth. My consciousness expanded in some way and the process doesn't stop when you arrive home. I hope this makes sense. That said, getting to know the special energy and character and stories of the places where we live is wonderfully satisfying, and this is especially true when you find a place that speaks to you. You can visit it often, in reality, not just in your dreams.
What if everybody did it? Excellent question. It brought back memories of me being a little girl walking on a path in the woods with my mother and father. I wanted to pick a wildflower. There were several, it's not like it was the only one there. But when my mother told me I couldn't and I asked why, I only want one, she asked, But what if everybody picked just one? I got it, and I never forgot it.
And yes. Businesses are going to market global warming. It sucks but it's the system we live in. We need to change that.
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JMG Posted 10:33 am
27 Apr 2007
=
Ok, so the greenies won't stop flying--despite constant use of global heating as a fundraising tool, like the Sierra Club sending me another appeal today saying "global warming and oil drilling within its habitat are driving this wonderful animal [polar bears] toward extinction." Apparently Sierra Club tourist flights don't cause global warming, other people cause global warming.
Can I ask where will these magical "political and market forces" that you imagine will "change the infrastructure of GHG induced climate change" come from? From Delta and United? Nope? From Exxon and the oil industry? Nope. From Virgin Airlines? Nope. From the tourism industry? Nope. OK, then where then? If you say "Government," then I ask where government will get the cajones needed to impose carbon caps and taxes if the Greenies won't even stop flying around to "educate" themselves.
==
Atreyger: " And in the meantime, it seems almost ridiculous to not take advantage of what is available to us.
Your reason for disliking Sierra Club's/NOLS''green veneer' is that it still creates demand for tourism. True enough, but is education about survival in the wilderness, or education about the ecology of a faraway place bad? Because without education, some people would not be aware of a disappearing species, or people would not bring environmental injustices or problems in those lands. Anyways, this bone that you pick seems like a very minor component of nearly any environmental agenda."
(1) Is it not possible to educate people without travel? Isn't it odd that the generation of people who have the most educational technologies and resources available to them are also the ones who insist on travelling the most?
(2) Are those "some people" who would "not be aware of a disappearing species" the ones taking the eco- and adventure tourism trips? Really?
(3) I weary of trying to make this point but I'll try one last time: If this "bone that [I] pick" is "a very minor component of nearly any environmental agenda" then please explain how we can expect any progress on the big hard bones if we aren't able to progress on this one. You've got a totally discretionary activity that produces essentially no social good at a high environmental cost, and we can't even agree that this is the social equivalent of the canned HC-134 and needs to be banned--then how in heck do we take on pulverized coal plants and plans for 18 lane superhighways to bisect the continent?
I ask again: What are you willing to give up to preserve this activity in a carbon-constrained world? And if the answer is "nothing, it's too small to worry about" or "nothing, until that guy over there stops doing the much worse activity," then please explain how you're going to persuade that guy, whose livelihood might well depend on his bad-for-climate activity, to knock it off?
At a meeting today the speaker said that there are 100,000 new autos registered in Beijing alone (I think he said per month). Given that we are the energy pigs of the world, insisting that we should be able to fly and drive whenever and wherever our budgets allow, how are we supposed to suggest anything else to the Chinese and the Indians?
"An optimist is someone who thinks this is the best of all possible worlds. A pessimist is someone who is afraid that the optimist is right."
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bapalmer Posted 4:19 pm
27 Apr 2007
I'm the admission and marketing director for NOLS. I'm hopeful that you all will read for a few seconds while I try to address some of the concerns raised in this thread.
Grist is the only venue in which we have run the advertisement in question. All of us in our office are avid readers of Grist and we enjoy the "tongue in cheek" humor that Grist employs in bringing us very serious news about our environment. This ad was designed not as a "glacier fire sale", but instead as a way of highlighting our courses in what we thought was a "Grist-like" style. Obviously our attempt at humor has been misunderstood (or was too feeble to stand the scrutiny of this audience). I apologize and we will replace this ad with something more routine on Monday.
We at NOLS view global warming as the most important environmental issue of our time. All of us at our non-profit school feel that the best way to create change is through education. Our goal is to turn out strong, positive leaders with an environmental ethic and our curriculum focuses on three areas: outdoor skills, practical leadership and environmental ethics. Our format for teaching is on extended expeditions (30 days to 6 months in length) in remote wilderness areas.
Our outcomes are well documented and the stories of our graduates who are making a difference in the environmental arena are compelling. The founder of Grist, Chip Giller, is a proud NOLS graduate as is the president of the National Parks Conservation Association, numerous directors for the Nature Conservancy, leaders of the Wilderness Society and many other more grassroots environmental activists.
We recognize and acknowledge that NOLS courses have an environmental footprint. This is from the NOLS website (http://www.nols.edu), "Let's face it.
NOLS students travel the globe to far-flung locations. We use outdoor gear and clothing made from synthetics derived from petroleum. We hike and paddle in pristine wilderness. NOLS is making a mark and not just with the incredible education our students receive."
We recognize the impact, and yet we persist. We believe that our world needs reasoned ethical leaders. People who have seen how simply they can live in the backcountry, "unplugged" from their email, blogs and websites. Away from the cars, and other conveniences that we take for granted.
And yes, our students travel. We feel that while some gains can be made by "acting locally", this is a global problem. It is not one that will be solved by turning inward. We believe that to truly appreciate our planet people need to experience some of it. To understand the reach of our environmental issues we need to meet, talk and learn from people from other nations, regions and tribes. This is what happens on a NOLS course.
As referenced above we know our courses have an environmental impact and we are working hard to mitigate that. This is more from the NOLS website: "Since 1965 NOLS has constantly refined its environmental practices to minimize the footprint we leave, whether it's educating students in the backcountry or conducting business around the world. We research, reduce, reuse, recycle and repent.
Organic gardens, solar, wind power, even the vegetable oil powered "Creating a Climate for Change" bus--NOLS is investing in sustainability, but climate change is happening, carbon dioxide from fossil fuels is the culprit, and we can't change all of our practices fast enough."
As a result we are in the early stages of an external environmental audit to better understand all of our impacts and to develop strategies to lessen our footprint. We are offsetting our electric, heating and on the ground fuel use through a partnership with NativeEnergy.
Again, my apologies to anyone who was offended by the tone our message in the NOLS advertisement on Grist. It was our intent to use humor to get people interested in our courses, not to rile them up.
Just this week I attended a gathering of 15 of Wyoming's environmental leaders and 15 of the state's spiritual leaders. It was the start of a dialog to find common ground between the environmental and faith communities. This meeting was interesting and informative. We found many shared values and intend to work on some initiatives together. This is how our world's environmental issues are going to be solved. Finger pointing and divisiveness are what got us where we are; cooperation and understanding are what will move us forward.
Thanks!
Bruce Palmer
NOLS director of admission and marketing
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atreyger Posted 2:15 pm
29 Apr 2007
My prior statements may have appeared black and white, but I stated them with all shades of gray in mind. But, I would like to respond to JMG:
1) Is it not possible to educate people without travel? Isn't it odd that the generation of people who have the most educational technologies and resources available to them are also the ones who insist on travelling the most?
While one can write a computer program simulating a 'wild' experience, I find this preposterous.
2) Are those "some people" who would "not be aware of a disappearing species" the ones taking the eco- and adventure tourism trips? Really?
Name one disappearing species in Uruguay and tell me something about its habitat, oh and describe it to me, include its smell if its a plant or the kind of a sound it makes if it's an animal.
3) I weary of trying to make this point but I'll try one last time: If this "bone that [I] pick" is "a very minor component of nearly any environmental agenda" then please explain how we can expect any progress on the big hard bones if we aren't able to progress on this one. You've got a totally discretionary activity that produces essentially no social good at a high environmental cost, and we can't even agree that this is the social equivalent of the canned HC-134 and needs to be banned--then how in heck do we take on pulverized coal plants and plans for 18 lane superhighways to bisect the continent?
I agree with this in principle, but you have to put this in perspective: cutting out travel by itself is impossible. You're talking about jets and flying. Well, the ship industry is underdeveloped. Biking down to Patagonia is impractical in our days of schedules and deadlines. What's left?
Our society and infrastructure is what set us on this course, and without a major disruption (from the goverment or a war?) it will not change. Incremental changes in terms of people who are most aware of their impact and who usually fly once a year at most is likely to do little.
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atreyger Posted 2:18 pm
29 Apr 2007
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David Roberts Posted 5:13 pm
29 Apr 2007
On the substance, I'm completely with atreyger on this one. JMG, I think you're being a bit of a crank, which normally I love, but in this case it looks like you're making a stylistic point and trying to pass it off as a substantive one.
First, on this:
If you say "Government," then I ask where government will get the cajones needed to impose carbon caps and taxes if the Greenies won't even stop flying around to "educate" themselves.
The two are utterly unrelated. Since when has the gov't looked to greenies for inspiration? You really think congressional aides somewhere are asking, "hey, are the greenies suffering for this? If not, how do we know it's a serious problem?" That would be an absurd basis for public policy if they did, but if course they aren't.
So, yes: government. Mostly. That fact is that there are thousands of tiny changes governments could make that would avoid more climate gases than grounding the NOLS program, with no perceptible sacrifice on anybody's part. Why not start with those?
And, to make another point that seems obvious: yes, traveling can open minds and change hearts and educate in a way that reading an encyclopedia never could.
You're buying into a right-wing frame if you try to impose a set of rules that would leave NOLS students and Al Gore and Sierra Club conference participants grounded and isolated while the world went on its merry way burning up. Right now we need a change in global opinion more than we need the tiny increments of GHGs that would be avoided by keeping our best leaders and educators out of the air.
Laws and regulations that raise the price of flying will affect NOLS just like everyone else. But until those rules are in place, NOLS closing up shop helps absolutely nothing and measurably hurts efforts to create engaged, committed environmental leaders.
grist.org
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caniscandida Posted 6:10 pm
29 Apr 2007
DR wrote:
<<
And, to make another point that seems obvious: yes, traveling can open minds and change hearts and educate in a way that reading an encyclopedia never could.
>>
Well of course, that is classic, it goes without saying. And who in the world said that a nice reference book could substitute for real physical experience?
Really, the contrast is not between "travel" vs. "no-travel." There is no contrast, actually. It is a matter of a considered judgment: How much travel is it worth while to do?
My own opinion is that a certain amount of extra-continental travel is always educative. But really, such trips should not be habit-forming, certainly not prestigious-seeming, as in that disgraceful Travel section of the NYTimes.
We can dig deeper, everywhere we are. There are very interesting places to dig, everywhere around us. As I tried to emphasize before, with reference to the excellent work of Robert Mohlenbrock, for most Americans, these places are relatively close by, throughout North America. To suggest that we cannot learn, we cannot educate ourselves, we cannot improve ourselves, unless we fly first to a distant continent, is simply crazy.
People-wise, that is a different subject, perhaps. Frankly, as a New Yorker, I feel a fair amount of nausea as I drive westward and enter the Susquehanna and Ohio valleys. But then again, I generally pass out during general election returns on TV, when I hear them announcing from Georgia, and Idaho ...
But really, foreign-language-learning ought to be a much more important part of our curriculum than it historically has been. And we would all do well, to spend some time in another country, in which a language other than English is spoken.
That is why Herodotus is a hero. He went to a number of non-Greek-speaking countries, and learned a great deal. And his sympathy for those non-Greeks ("barbarians"?) is remarkable.
Chickens are our cousins!
So are other sensitive animals!
Enough is enough!
No more factory farms!
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JMG Posted 3:56 am
30 Apr 2007
What I actually suggested was that NOLS could and should conduct its programs in Newark, NYC, OK City, Dallas, Oakland, and all the places in between rather than in places that require jet flights. As Canis has posted several times, it's a big continent. You don't have to fly anywhere to have a leadership school in spectacular settings.
Further, I suggest that NOLS taking credit for "engaged, committed environmental leaders" is nonsense---who signs up for NOLS classes in the first place, people who were otherwise going to go build coal plants or hunt big game? I think not. Taking credit for having produced the quality that people had when they entered your program is as old as Harvard University and beyond--but it's still circular reasoning.
In fact, what I came away with after exploring the NOLS website for a long time is that the outfit boils down to giving rich people what the military used to provide to a thin slice of them (and that it now tends to attract the poor): a chance to join a gang, learn the interpersonal skills of leadership and teamwork, and, with luck, to test oneself against limits while, with luck, not getting hurt or killed doing it.
As for buying into the right-wing frame, not a bit--what I am buying into is the idea that we're never going to get anywhere limiting jet travel if the denialists, confusionists, and millenialists who think that the Rapture is any minute now can correctly note that we're not actually against jet travel enough to stop using it, we'd just opposed to jet travel for purposes we don't approve of (i.e., jet travel by other people).
Here's a question: if NOLS is actually committed to its leaderhip purposes (rather than to its "format" of spending time in distant wilderness places) then wouldn't limiting NOLS trips to North America be a lot BETTER for the organizational goals, since a lot more people could take part and the overall environmental footprint of the activity would go way down?
Moreover, are you saying that NOLS stops when flying stops? If not--and if you actually believe that, as Hansen says, we've got to really get serious about cutting carbon now--then hadn't NOLS better start figuring out a whole new localized model ASAP, rather than trying to build a model based on an unsustainable mode of travel to distant places?
(Also noticed that, according to the NOLS website, the CO2 offsets that Bruce mentioned actually only apply to NOLS bases and ground travel--hmmmm, what huge climate destabilizing activity does that leave out?)
"An optimist is someone who thinks this is the best of all possible worlds. A pessimist is someone who is afraid that the optimist is right."
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atreyger Posted 4:13 am
30 Apr 2007
Also an outdoor leadership class in NYC? I can only imagine the types of lectures and learning expeditions: dumpster diving, sleeping in the tunnels, fighting off the insane panhandler, finding the best soup kitchen. Come on, clearly there is a difference between the K-12 education that everyone in any urban environment should receive and an actual experience where complete disassociation with the amenities of our civilization teaches very important lessons drastically different from: 'where do apples come from?'.
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JMG Posted 4:40 am
30 Apr 2007
As for what people can learn about outdoor leadership in NYC, what is your point? That the "environment" is somewhere "out there" and not in NYC? That there are no 'actual' experiences' civilized amenities available to people in North America without aid of jet engines?
As for the name calling, if you want to go there I'll see your "pro-isolationism" and raise you a hypocritical elitism as "the appropriate response."
"An optimist is someone who thinks this is the best of all possible worlds. A pessimist is someone who is afraid that the optimist is right."
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atreyger Posted 5:00 am
30 Apr 2007
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atreyger Posted 5:02 am
30 Apr 2007
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caniscandida Posted 5:09 am
30 Apr 2007
But the daily evolution of this city is "Nature" too. Including the occasional dumpster.
To suggest that no decent course for a naturalist could be conducted in NYC and vicinity is extremely unimaginative and anti-urbanly prejudiced.
Chickens are our cousins!
So are other sensitive animals!
Enough is enough!
No more factory farms!
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Bart Anderson Posted 6:38 am
30 Apr 2007
NOLS and environmentalists can be instrumental in developing new ways of relating to nature. The NOLS approach was innovative decades ago; now it's time to be innovative again.
95% of outdoor time should be spent within one hour of home.
The other 5% should be very important trips whose purpose cannot be achieved in any other way. Key word: *selectivity*.
Almost all outdoor skills and knowledge can be imparted in areas that are close-by. It is a waste of time/money/energy to go to Baja California to learn to kayak. There are ecosystems and flowers in NYC, as well as in the Sierras.
The emphasis should be on "going local, going deep." Traditionally, people developed close ties to their own area. Required reading: the essay "The Long-Legged House" by Wendell Berry.
We should model should model ourselves after those in-depth travelers who prepare for a year before going on a trip, and then get the most from their time.
Close-by activities that I've discovered in the SF Bay Area:
Native Plant Society walks and lectures.
Sense of Place - a yearlong course in getting to know your watershed.
Outdoor classes in kayaking, hiking, ultra-lightweight backpacking, cross-country skiing, rockclimbing, sailing.
"Primitive technology" - activities that introduce you to the skills of native peoples (basket weaving, arrowheads, using native plants, etc.)
Herbal medicine from local herbs and weeds.
Local history - talks, books, walks.
A treasury of local parks and museums.
What we have in front of us is so rich, so meaningful - why not take advantage of it?
Bart
Energy Bulletin
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JMG Posted 7:36 am
30 Apr 2007
As Cliff Stoll eloquently put it in "Silicon Snake Oil," there's a REAL WORLD not far from your door, with real people to interact with and real nature to study.
Ultimately, the twin carbon challenges of climate change and peak oil require that we drastically learn to relocalize, and part of that means that the world gets bigger again, and the expectation that middle class people (in a world where the middle class numbers more than a billion people) should expect to be able to set foot off the continent of their birth as a matter of right will recede.
Every jet trip to Uraguay to visit the endangered species there helps further endanger that species and thousands of others.
Further, people who have months to spend hiking in the wilderness can hardly plead that they don't have the time needed to travel lightly over long distances--heck, wouldn't sailing and long-haul biking be a fine way to teach all those leadership skills that NOLS wants to teach?
"An optimist is someone who thinks this is the best of all possible worlds. A pessimist is someone who is afraid that the optimist is right."
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wiscidea Posted 8:32 am
30 Apr 2007
Now we are all supposed to stay home and explore the local park. Yes, I said park. I suspect that my road-trip from Wisconsin to the Black Hills of South Dakota a few summers ago was a big no-no, even though I learned about natural environments I had never encountered before and arrived home with a strong desire to become a better steward of the land and give more thought to the people displaced by Europeans. Was I supposed to ride a bicycle there?
This summer and fall I'll be exploring parts of Wisconsin and neighboring states a few hours from my home. That too is probably a no-no. Sorry, not everyone is wealthy enough or obsessed enough to devote months to traveling somewhere. We have other interests, like planting and caring for gardens or devoting time to preserving local flora and fauna. Sometimes a person just wants to see something else, but not necessarily everything between home and something else.
And are the folks criticizing air travel, the same folks who want everyone to live in an urban setting? Aren't those people, those who spend their lives surrounded by concrete, going to want to do a little exploring? They'll go bonkers if you cut them off from travel.
Now, I'm not very fond of flying -- for reasons I will not go into right now, accept to say I'm afraid some idiot might decide my highest pupose in life would be fulfilled by becoming a martyr for Islam or some corporate executive will get a bonus by spending less on rivets -- but I'm certainly not going to deny someone else the joy of visiting strange lands. And I would look forward to them telling me about their experiences when they return. I learned much on a trip to England and Europe over a decade ago and hope to travel to China someday.
Once again, a subgroup of environmentalists want to deny human nature. Our species appears programmed for roaming... for traveling... for intereacting with other cultures... and now we are supposed to suppress another feature of our species that emerged from millions of years of evolution.
It is lovely to say that human nature must change. The world is different now. But it is very difficult, in my opinion, to jettison such deeply rooted evolutionary "baggage". Discussions that wish to find ways of suppressing desire for nature, desire for travel, desire for stuff, desire for security, are destined to failure. We have to find ways of meeting our natural needs without killing ourselves, each other, or the ecosystems that support us.
Rather than condemn the travel industry, perhaps the focus should be on creating a sustainable travel industry. Or impose a tax that goes toward conservation. Perhaps resurrect travel by boat. Or improve rail and ferry travel across North America and to neighboring continents. Come up with a means of permitting humans to continue being human.
Forward!
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spaceshaper Posted 9:24 pm
30 Apr 2007
True, it can be difficult to modify our atavistic nature. Nevertheless many of us manage to do it all the time: individually it's called being a grownup and collectively it's called civilization. I do so hope that your final sentence quoted above will be proved wrong: if it's not we're really in trouble. In the last few years it has become very apparent that if we cannot collectively learn to manage and limit our desires for the various kinds of goodies you mention then we are, as a civilization, totally screwed.
That said, I don't wish to join the ranks of NOLS-bashers. It appears to be a fine (and small) organization whose activities generate a specific environmental cost of which they are very conscious and do their best to limit, and a considerable environmental educational benefit which they do their best to maximize. Would that such a balance applied to a tenth of one percent of all the jetting around the globe with which we have recently learned to indulge ourselves.
The true meaning of life is to plant trees, under whose shade you do not expect to sit.
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atreyger Posted 10:33 pm
30 Apr 2007
I really hope that the above is untrue, because if we as a civilization get to that point, we will have tons of boring people around. I will quickly agree that some people get too far with the 'stuff'.
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Bart Anderson Posted 2:02 am
01 May 2007
It is not human nature to expend tons of GHG gratifying a desire for recreation. This is a modern development... widespread air travel for the middle classes only really got going in the late 70s or 80s.
The GHGs from a foreign airflight outweigh all GHG savings from compact fluorescents and Prius cartrips you can make in a year.
The styles and fashions established in America and Europe will be taken up by people throughout the world. Environmentalists are setting the cultural agenda - so if we don't set a good example, if we don't develop a vision of a good life without GHGs, who will?
In particular, environmental leadership means thinking deeply about these issues.
Bart
Energy Bulletin
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atreyger Posted 2:50 am
01 May 2007
Agreed, land-locked illiterate peasants definitely had no reason to travel, either because they lacked money or motivation. Although at the same time, I doubt that 20 miles was that magic number, it likely varied greatly and up to hundreds of miles with proximity to lakes, rivers, sea shores, affordability or culture of horse posession and presence of land masses.
I agree with your point regarding air travel and I'm mostly posting this for procrastination purposes.
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kmp Posted 2:53 am
01 May 2007
I'm a climber, a biker, a mountaineer, a surfer, a kayaker, a runner, a hiker - yes, I can do most of these things within 2 hrs of my home, and do so, often. But I can't scale a 14,000 ft peak in New York. I can't pit myself, my endurance, my skill, my commitment, against the toughest mountain ranges in the world (Himalaya, Patagonia) in New York. I can't experience Tibetan culture, practise my Thai, or go deep-water soloing in New York.
I love the area in which I live. We have an embarrassment of riches, both urban and wild. But I also love to travel - to experience other cultures, meet people from around the world, connect with a time and a place and a culture the way that you simply can't do from your reading armchair or your computer desk.
I recognize the harm that air travel does to the environment, along with all the other harms that I inflict on a daily basis. And much like in every other area of my "consumptive" lifestyle, I try to reduce my impact as much as possible - and when I hit the wall of reduction, I try to change public policy so that my habits are not destructive.
Frankly, I dislike being told what to do, and dislike being told that I'm not a good enough greenie if I would still consider flying for "frivolous" purposes. Whatever - one woman's "frivolous" is another's "essential." Flying to far-flung places and experiencing the wild beauty therein is one of the things that made me green in the first place, and still one of my major motivations for protecting the Earth - so that I can preserve these fabulous wild places for me, and future generations, to enjoy.
So I'll keep flying off to fabulous places to surf that perfect break, to climb that fabulous line, to drink fermented coconut juice and eat completely unpronounceable foodstuffs and meet like-minded people; all the while trying to influence government and business alike to make air travel less or non-destructive to the Earth.
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Bart Anderson Posted 3:45 am
01 May 2007
None of us likes to think that we're doing something wrong. It's painful and it makes us feel bad.
We lash out at the people who bring up the issue. We call them names. We justify ourselves. We say that our actions are small in the grand scheme of things. We point to other people who are worse.
And deep down we know that we're doing something wrong, something contrary to our values.
May I suggest sticking with this issue, even though it is uncomfortable? Discomfort is the price of personal growth.
Bart
Energy Bulletin
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spaceshaper Posted 4:03 am
01 May 2007
The true meaning of life is to plant trees, under whose shade you do not expect to sit.
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atreyger Posted 4:06 am
01 May 2007
"Analysis of the population problem as a function of population density uncovers a not generally recognized principle of morality, namely: The morality of an act is a function of the state of the system at the time it is performed. Using the commons as a cesspool does not harm the general public under frontier conditions, because there is no public; the same behavior in a metropolis is unbearable."[emphasis original]
The point that I try to make fairly consistently is that in italics. Morality is VERY relative. I see no problem with what NOLS does, but if all 6 billion people in the world wanted to bag all the high peaks in the Adirondacks, I would find that to be a problem. Moderation in our world is key, cessation or prohibition is not, as it only leads to negative effects. If there were all of three hundred people living for three thousand square miles, taking five caribou per season per person will not have any effect on the population. If the population bumps up to thirty thousand and the limit is the same, then we're in trouble.
Similarly, there's little wrong with one flight per year or two per person... on a cessna or something similarly efficient. I would like to find out how many flights per year our sphere would be able to tolerate without a significant impact.
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atreyger Posted 4:09 am
01 May 2007
'Nazis had little pieces of flair that they made Jews wear' in little communities called concentration camps.
But seriously, global community? Are you freaking serious? I have a hard time finding a community in the place where I live, but across the entire globe?
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spaceshaper Posted 4:34 am
01 May 2007
The true meaning of life is to plant trees, under whose shade you do not expect to sit.
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zacaroni Posted 4:36 am
01 May 2007
Before you change your lifestyle, you must first change your mind. NOLS is changing minds.
"The idea of revolution coming from outer conditions, in the industrial field or the so-called reality of economic conditions, can never lead to a revolutionary step unless the transformation of soul, mind and will power has taken place." -Joseph Beuys
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wiscidea Posted 4:46 am
01 May 2007
"May I suggest sticking with this issue, even though it is uncomfortable? Discomfort is the price of personal growth."
Then we need more information. Not having a background in sociology, I cannot advocate one position or another. But I can ask questions.
(1) Does travel foster cross-cultural understanding, generate compassion, and reduce hostility between nations? I view international tension as a threat to the environment.
(2) Does travel to relatively pristine wilderness foster better appreciation of the natural world? Is this communicated in some way to the rest of the culture? Does such an experience enhance the possibility that those returning from such trip will become advocates for endangered ecosystems and species?
I doubt anyone would deny that travelers who write articles and books about their experiences motivate others to preserve Earth's ecosystems. How do we decide who can and who can't travel via jet? Is it only for the fabulously wealthy? Lottery system? Just writer? Appointed ambassadors?
Forward!
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Bart Anderson Posted 5:43 am
01 May 2007
For me personally, I try to be selective. I've probably already used up my "share" of airplane travel, in going to Europe and Guatemala many years ago. The first trips really opened my eyes, but at this point more trips wouldn't be that significant.
If one is going to go, then I think it's important to make the experience as meaningful as possible. Learning something about the language, the history as well as the natural history. A great model to follow are those adventurers who spend a year preparing for a trip. When I went somewhere, I wanted to stay for as long as possible.
As far as outdoor activities, there are so many things close by that I find there's no need to go far afield, despite the advertising from the recreation industry.
The thing that makes me feel conflicted is what George Monbiot calls "love miles" -- seeing family or doing things together. I find it very hard to say no.
Bart
Energy Bulletin
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Pangolin Posted 6:02 am
01 May 2007
Charles Darwin travelled around the world on a completely sustaianable form of transportation known as a sailing ship. I have it on good authority that this form of transportation is still available. Lewis and Clark mostly walked their way across the US. Is there any doubt that they had an adventure.
I would absolutely in favor of packing US youth off wholesale on sail/rail/bike (NO CARS or PLANES) tours of the world for 18 months each. With laptops and a satellite dish a group of 30 students could easily study along the way and form a mobile college.
The kids who returned would have a deeper respect for their relative place in the world. Their parents might not be so inclined to damage a planet they were sending their children out to explore.
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wiscidea Posted 6:27 am
01 May 2007
"The thing that makes me feel conflicted is what George Monbiot calls "love miles" -- seeing family or doing things together. I find it very hard to say no."
This raises an issue separate from the eco-travel problem. One might say the genie is out of the bottle. Extended families -- often on different continents -- were constructed during an era of cheap air travel and lack of concern about global climate change. It is a bit of a bummer that those people will now have to feel guilty about traveling to spend time with their loved ones.
There are parallels, in my opinion, found in other areas... other problems we have to find solutions for. For example, an entire culture built on automombile travel. How do you tell a generation that grew up using automobiles that their habits are no longer acceptable? How do you reorganize an entire nation essentially overnight? The large number of parallel cases -- some subtle and some not so subtle -- is the reason I prefer to focus on finding ways to preserve things like our 1200-square-foot homes and personal automobiles AND reduce harm to the environment. How much cultural upheaval can a population tolerate?
Forward!
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JMG Posted 6:33 am
01 May 2007
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/05/01/us/01climate.html?_r=3& ...
"An optimist is someone who thinks this is the best of all possible worlds. A pessimist is someone who is afraid that the optimist is right."
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wiscidea Posted 7:48 am
01 May 2007
Give them all of the things they want,
and they will see that they do not need them.
Teach them that death is a serious thing,
and to be content to never leave their homes.
Even though they have plenty
of horses, wagons and boats,
they won't feel that they need to use them.
Even if they have weapons and shields,
they will keep them out of sight.
Let people enjoy the simple technologies,
let them enjoy their food,
let them make their own clothes,
let them be content with their own homes,
and delight in the customs that they cherish.
Although the next country is close enough
that they can hear their roosters crowing and dogs barking,
they are content never to visit each other
all of the days of their life."
Lao Tzu, Tao te Ching
Is this what the majority of "environmentalists" want?
Forward!
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spaceshaper Posted 9:32 am
01 May 2007
The true meaning of life is to plant trees, under whose shade you do not expect to sit.
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David Roberts Posted 9:53 am
01 May 2007
Or do we put on our moralist hats and hector a laudable organization that accounts for about 0.0000001% of international air travel? Do we get in the business of lecturing families about how much they should travel, and where, and for how long, and who is and isn't environmentally proper?
grist.org
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GreenEngineer Posted 10:11 am
01 May 2007
On a related note, I wonder if anyone has any figures on the percentage of air travel that is directly business-related, vs. the amount that is for recreation. That would be kind of interesting to know.
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spaceshaper Posted 12:30 pm
01 May 2007
http://www.worldchanging.com/archives/006611.html
The true meaning of life is to plant trees, under whose shade you do not expect to sit.
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JMG Posted 4:35 pm
01 May 2007
==
"Do we encourage more time off and more flexible working schedules for American families, so vacations don't have to be so spectacular and carry so much "quality time" weight, and they can use slower means of transport?"
You mean until voracious, soul-sucking, family destructive capitalism is upended people get a pass on flying because, well, they don't have much time off and have to cram as much experience into it as their frequent flier miles allow?
Let me just take a wild guess here and say that the people who take the MOST flights are the ones with the MOST annual leave and vacation opportunities, not the other way around.
Travel has been turned into a packaged commodity with, as several have noted, lots of status value--hence, high status people, the ones whose paychecks continue even when they aren't at work--consume the most. (These are also the people who suck up frequent flier miles on work trips, another perk for those towards the tops of the corporate ladders.)
Let me say I'm all for a mandatory 30-hour maximum work week and mandatory six weeks a year vacation, but I don't kid myself that many people would suddenly start reducing the carbon impact of their vacation choices as a result--more likely that more of them would suddenly find NZ and Australia and all the other "places they've always dreamed of" within their reach.
=====
"Do we encourage teleconferencing?"
Yes.
=====
"Do we encourage high-speed rail transit across the country?"
Yes. And we encourage it most by taking the rail we have, and joining NARP (http://www.narprail.org) and becoming an advocate for a better system, rather than one of the many people who says "I'd like to take the train, but it's really slow, so we're gonna fly."
=====
"Do we try to revive the sailboat travel industry?"
Yes. Or consider the existing frieghter travel networks rather than a commercial cruise line. Imagine actually going somewhere because the ship was actually going there rather than flying cross country to board a ship going somewhere only because tourists will pay the fare.
=====
"Do we start classes on local ecology? "
Yes. And many have.
=====
"Do we create travel agencies that focus on minimizing travel distance and maximizing quality of time spent?"
Not sure how you're going to compensate them so that they are as well or better rewarded for non-travel as they are for travel, but sure, sounds good.
=====
"Or do we put on our moralist hats and hector a laudable organization that accounts for about 0.0000001% of international air travel?"
Once more: If NOLS is being "hectored" it's simply because they ran a bone-headed ad that seemed, on its face, to epitomize the ugly side of eco-tourism, the side that says that "My flight to Chile is OK because I'm going rock climbing with other groovy green types for a couple of months, but the guy sitting next to me from Wal-Mart, his flight's not OK because he's there to promote salmon aquafarming."
======
"Do we get in the business of lecturing families about how much they should travel, and where, and for how long, and who is and isn't environmentally proper? "
You know, this is the part of social change that people never want to talk about--changing norms is painful, especially when the change is not in the fun/more freedom/more stuff direction that Americans are used to.
Garrison Keillor talks about how Americans who have never lived within miles of a small town have this great culturally acquired nostalgia for them, for a town where everyone knows who you are, where it's not possible to be an overlooked and alienated loner---and then he talks about what it's like to grow up in a town where everyone knows every aspect of your business, has an opinion about you, and feels free to boss you around ...
But, yes, I think we ARE in the business of telling EVERYONE who has ears --- and especially those who claim to value a sustainable environment --- which choices are and aren't compatible.
If flying's on jets is not a serious problem, then we don't need to do any of the many things you started your list with. But if widespread commercial flying IS a serious problem --- if this one industry alone, which essentially didn't exist 50 years ago for more than a tiny elite and which now accounts for a full 2% of greenhouse gas emissions, and perhaps 3x that much global heating impact --- is to be curtailed, then what OTHER way is there except by countering the pro-flying propaganda with the opposite message?
Every day, people in rich countries are told a hundred times that they deserve a flight to a warm beach in Mexico, or to England to see a castle, or that there's a shrimp on the barbie waiting for them in Australia. Heck, we're so committed to this whole system that we'll even go fight wars and send other peoples' kids to die to bring back that cheap oil that makes commercial aviation possible. We subsidize airports like crazy, and treat anyone who refuses to fly like a mental defective.
In other words, flying is where fur was 30 years ago ---- it was seen as glamorous, a form of conspicous consumption involving the young, sexy, and wealthy (and the people who aspired to be or were clinging to those things).
Well, what the world needs now is for flying to stop being seen as fur was, and for it to start being seen the same way fur is seen now: a testament to insensitivity, to selfishness, to a willingness to inflict suffering on others for ones own pleasure and convenience.
Most of the other changes you listed happen when flying is curtailed, not the other way around.
Sorry if NOLS is a sacred cow with you, but they're just like everyone else in one respect: climate destabilization means a change in plans.
When we say "business as usual has to stop" it doesn't just mean for other people--it means for our friends too, and wonderful things that our grandparents and parents and sometimes that we got to do go away.
I'm reading Mike Tidwell's "The Ravaging Tide: Strange Weather, Future Katrinas, and the Coming Death of America's Coastal Cities" (isbn 978-0-7432-9470-6). I wish everyone who tried to buy an airline ticket would have to read it first. Especially those taking discretionary trips.
"An optimist is someone who thinks this is the best of all possible worlds. A pessimist is someone who is afraid that the optimist is right."
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zacaroni Posted 12:09 am
02 May 2007
I've taken off my moralist hat. I'm done with agression and ready for collaboration. JMG: you seem ready for nothing but belligerence.
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kmp Posted 1:54 am
02 May 2007
Where is the alternative for flying? If there were an adequate substitute for flying that was not climate-destructive you can be sure that I, and many others, would jump on board. The problem is that there is no substitute that even comes close. I'd be willing to put up with less convenience, more time, even more cost for an environmentally benign form of travel - but I don't have the luxury of taking 1 or 2 months for a sea voyage, or for paying 10 times the airflight price for a trip. Most of the options available consist of combinations of these things; more expensive, takes longer, less convenient, and climate destructive in it's own way.
Yes, I could decide on moral grounds never to fly again. Of course, I would lose my job, and would be unlikely to find a job in my field that did not require at least occasional air travel. Losing my job would signifcantly impact my quality of life, because while I could really use about a month or two off right now, I have rent to pay. However, even if I were lucky enough to find some way to sustain my income without having to fly, I would still want to fly. Life without travel, IMO, is a life with the joy sucked right out of it. Much like the other, few, environmentally destructive things that I still cling to (coffee, chocolate, French wine, olive oil) a life without travel would be a sad and joyless one for me. One that I hope I never have to endure.
So - no justifications. No "his flight is bad and mine is OK." It's not good to take a flight to visit your poor, sick grandmother just as much as it's not good to take a flight to Bali to windsurf for the weekend. I'm not saying flying isn't environmentally destructive - I'm saying I'm not willing to give it up. So, I'm a bad, bad greenie. My sustainable values suck. I'd much rather be a lousy greenie with lousy values, working for positive change in our culture, in our transportation system, in the way we live our lives, than be a cranky hermit living a joyless, but oh so virtuous, existence.
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nikjsc Posted 2:35 am
02 May 2007
JMG writes:
"When I see NOLS offring courses in outdoor leadership in Newark and NYC and Oakland and Dallas and OK City then I'll revise my opinion."
Ok, How about this?:
http://www.nols.edu/bus/
NOLS on the Road
Creating a Climate for Change
It's all happening at the bus - on, around, and beside it!
NOLS is on the road... and coming to a town near you! Now there's a new way to experience our educational program of outdoor skills, leadership and environmental awareness.
Powered by recycled vegetable oil (RVO), solar power, and sponsored by Stonyfield Farm, the makers of organic yogurt, this educational program on wheels provides an active, environmentally conscious way to learn about the outdoors and celebrate leadership in your community.
So is Minnesota ok?----------------------
Check out the NOLS Bus
NOLS Bus Apple Valley, Minnesota
May 1, 2007
School of Environmental Studies
7:30 a.m. - 2:00 p.m. Tuesday
Located at 12155 Johnny Cake Ridge Rd.
Contact School of Enivronmental Studies at (952) 431-8750
Check out the NOLS Bus
NOLS Bus Maple Grove, Minnesota
May 2, 2007
REI Maple Grove
3:00 p.m. - 7:00 p.m.
Located at 11581 Fountains Drive
Contact REI Maple Grove at (763) 493-7861
Check out the NOLS Bus
NOLS Bus Stevens Point, Wisconsin
May 4, 2007
University of Wisconsin, Stevens Point
9:00 a.m. - 3:00 p.m. Friday
Located at the Sundial
Contact Justin Timmers at (920) 810-1380
Check out the NOLS Bus
NOLS Bus Madison, Wisconsin
May 5, 2007
REI Madison
1:00 p.m. - 5:00 p.m. Saturday
Located at 7483 W Towne Way
Contact REI Madison at (608) 833-6680
Check out the NOLS Bus
NOLS Bus Land O' Lakes, Wisconsin
May 9, 2007
Conserve School
2:00 p.m. - 5:00 p.m. Wednesday
Open to Conserve School students only
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JMG Posted 2:50 am
02 May 2007
But I think it's best just to let this thread die, as it appears that I haven't figured out how to communicate about this topic effectively.
"An optimist is someone who thinks this is the best of all possible worlds. A pessimist is someone who is afraid that the optimist is right."
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caniscandida Posted 7:31 am
02 May 2007
The conversation on this thread has had its less than edifying moments, however, hasn't it, what with some misunderstandings and "touched nerves."
I continue to agree in principle with JMG, as seen through the eminently reasonable and ever clear-gazing lens of Bart Anderson.
Nevertheless, back "during Vietnam," the anti-war activists on campus did nobody any favors by trying to challenge and shame their less engaged classmates with that very clever but very unfortunate slogan, "If you are not part of the solution, you are part of the problem." (A brilliant but sadly right-wing-ish chemistry major, who was valiantly trying to seduce me in the weeks leading up to that infamous last-helicopter-on-the-embassy-roof scene, and whose every advance and ploy I stoutly if clumsily resisted, rephrased the slogan, "If you are not part of the solution, you are part of the precipitate.") One does not rally to one's side whole-hearted allies and friends by such a tactic.
As the Vilna Rebbe used to say, "Zu klug ist halb naerisch," "Too clever is half foolish." (Or maybe it was the Vilna Rebbe's wife. She used to raise a great deal of money for the shul, at bar mitzvahs and weddings, with her renowned three-card monty table.)
And the moral of all of that is, we need discernment to know how exactly to point out the fault of a friend. And I believe entirely that NOLS is a friend of ours. As I think I wrote before, I was charmed by Bruce, their spokesman. And I understand their misery and pain, that their "Traverse a glacier before it melts" joke went flat. (As well it should have.)
Discernment being the mother of all virtues, Moral #2 is that we always need to think -- you know, think -- about what we are doing. Bart says it much better than I can. He suggests that this silly pseudo-moral decision between "Yes yes of course I may fly off to Patagonia" and "No no I am evil and the evilest of worms if I fly off to Patagonia" is a red herring.
On the other hand, dear David Roberts goes chasing after another red herring, woofing in the belief that JMG and I and others are all upset over that 0.000 ... (how many zeroes?, nine?, ten?) ...1 % of global GHG emissions that NOLS patrons are responsible for. As Bart pointed out very clearly, the issue is "leadership," which is what the "L" stands for. Typically, more is expected of "leaders." NOLS is certainly not damned to Hell for encouraging well-to-do young North Americans to fly long distances so that they can tromp on melting glaciers, in fancy boots, hopefully taking some notes on their observations. But we are indeed nudging the NOLS people to rethink their curriculum. A new, local-region-oriented design for prospective students from that region might very well be at least as valuable, and much less costly fuel-wise.
As I think I made clear earlier, I entirely agree with Kaela and our ever lachrymose friend WiscIdea that of course travel is a very good thing, when it indeed teaches new things, and helps people understand one another. WiscIdea's very example, of course, of the influential nature-writer, makes us doubt whether more than a very few need travel.
As for Kaela, she throws the baby out with the bathwater. ("Hey guys, it's getting mighty cold out here on the cobblestones. Plus, the trolley is coming ... ") Am I right to perceive a hint of indignation in her posts, unusually long for her? I have no idea why she should feel that, though. She can do what she likes, regardless of what anyone says or thinks, and no doubt she will. If she wants to set up for herself a schedule for "bagging" mountains, as ATreyger put it, with Northern-hemisphere destinations to jet off to in the Summer and Southern-hemisphere destinations in the Winter, well, good for her.
However, why in the world should she bitterly resent what apparently seems to her an unjust intrusion, and a constraint on her living the "good life," and personal fulfillment, and her "need" to "test herself," etc., if anyone should gently suggest that her "need" to tally up "mountains bagged" looks very much like JMG's "I-Got-Mine School"?
A truly sensitive person, one might think, would let a single visit and climb of a mountain outside one's own continent be an experience totally satisfactory and inspirational for a lifetime. Surely there is no martyrdom in that, is there?
Chickens are our cousins!
So are other sensitive animals!
Enough is enough!
No more factory farms!
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Bart Anderson Posted 4:19 am
04 May 2007
The outlook for global warming is not going to get better soon. The scientific reports paint a grimmer and grimmer picture.
Air travel is a significant contributor to greenhouse gases, and it is increasing. The decision to fly dwarfs all the other actions one can take to decrease one's share of greenhouse gases. No good technical solutions are in sight.
Our political discourse is heavily moralistic and attuned to hypocrisy. People are concerned whether someone is walking their talk.
The big issue is how environmentalists deal with air travel; NOLS is just one of many examples. The comments in this forum make me realize that many of us have not thought very deeply about the issue.
As a result, environmentalist organizations and movements are vulnerable on air travel. They will be attacked by hyper-environmentalists on one side, and anti-environmentalists on the other. They will lose credibility with the general public as hypocrites - asking for other people to change and make sacrifices, while not being willing to take their own medicine on air travel.
Already in the UK, air travel is a hot issue. Tony Blair was skewered for his vacation jaunts via airplane. Prince Charles and the Royal Family also have been criticized (though Charles has been making an effort to improve). Some travel writers have given up air travel, and an essay at the Guardian chided journalists for their free-flying ways. George Monbiot writes about it regularly.
So, air travel is coming as a big issue for environmentalists. It's better think about it now rather than be blind-sided.
Bart
Energy Bulletin
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David Roberts Posted 4:35 am
04 May 2007
grist.org
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kmp Posted 5:06 am
04 May 2007
I'm sure I sounded indignant in my post - I am. I did not mean to sound martyred, nor do I feel that way; I am simply sick to death of these "I'm greener than you because" arguments that so many threads seem to degenerate into these days. You point this trend out wisely in the Vietnam "part of the problem" quote - what I resent is that I am perceived as part of the problem if I take my cherished flight to a far-flung spot to enjoy Nature (all the while doing my level best to decrease my footprint in all areas of my life, including air travel), while someone else is part of the solution if they are "only" flying to visit Grandma in Jolly Ole England, or Detroit, or Kalamazoo. What I resent, in general, are ham-handed mandates passed down from on high, that dictate how I should behave in order to be a good person. (You might have guessed by now that I'm not particularly religious either. :)
I agree that air travel is destructive. I agree that we all need to be more mindful about our choices in travel. In the same way that we need to be mindful about our food choices, our daily transportation choices, our consumer product purchasing choices, our home energy use choices.... the list goes on & on. Demonizing any one thing on that list is, IMO, simply a distracting waste of time.
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JMG Posted 5:38 am
04 May 2007
In a table it would be:
#1 -- Jet air travel
#2 + #3 + ... + 99: all other personal consumer choices, including not driving, not eating meat, insulating your home, not having a TV, etc.
I'm sorry that I have not figured out how to raise this issue more effectively.
But I do think it's urgent that people understand that jet travel is not just another choice like consumer product purchases, home energy use, or any other. Jet air travel is the one that more than cancels all the benefits from those others. it's not what I prefer, but it's the reality.
You've already made it clear that you will continue to fly regardless, so I'm unsure why you resent the opinions of others who think that jet travel is a dangerous and ultimately disastrous activity.
Whether you're a good person is not for me or anyone else to say--but I can note that it's entirely possible for good people to do terrible things to the environment, it happens all the time.
"An optimist is someone who thinks this is the best of all possible worlds. A pessimist is someone who is afraid that the optimist is right."
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wiscidea Posted 6:35 am
04 May 2007
Heating, cooling, lighting, appliances 23,160
Household vehicles 22,287
Air travel 3,107
Industrial sector (including agriculture) 37,020
Commercial sector 19,745
Non-household transportation 9,850
TOTAL: 115,169
Before the debate continues any further, it would be nice to have some hard data on carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gas emissions from various activities. Then we'll know what we are really arguing about.
The above numbers suggest air travel is not such a serious problem.
Does anyone want to try directing us to the definitive set of data, a set we can all agree on?
I found this information indirectly while searching for something else, a rather uncommon event... see next post...
Forward!
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wiscidea Posted 6:41 am
04 May 2007
Assuming that is correct for the moment, there seems to be some neglect of this contributor to global warming. A large part of this, for example, is due to synthesis of chemical fertilizer. Here is where my favorite topic comes into play. If we can engineer our cultivated plants to fix their own nitrogen, we could dramatically reduce the amount of CO2 pumped into the atmosphere (and reduce other pollutants).
Forward!
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wiscidea Posted 6:42 am
04 May 2007
Forward!
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kmp Posted 7:12 am
04 May 2007
What I don't know is how much more serious? What I'd like to know, if someone even geekier than I has done the math, is if all air travel on the planet suddenly stopped tomorrow (yes, I realize unrealistic, but let's just role-play here) what impact would that have on daily/weekly etc., total GHG emissions?
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JMG Posted 7:24 am
04 May 2007
Water Vapor
... What you may not be aware of is that the water vapor from jets is uniquely harmful, because jets pump millions of tons of water vapor up into the atmosphere WAY up there (6 and 7 miles high).
That is why jets do far more to destabilize the climate than their 2% share of greenhouse gas emissions suggests they would.
See this Christian Science Monitor story:
http://www.csmonitor.com/2007/0212/p13s02-litr.html
"Jet engines burn kerosene, which gives off carbon dioxide (CO2), a leading cause of global warming. Airline flights today make up less than 3 percent of man-made CO2 emissions, though they also spew nitrogen oxide, sulfur dioxide, soot, and water vapor that may double their total warming effect on the climate."
Or this about a study published in Nature
http://environment.about.com/b/a/256757.htm
"Overall, aviation accounts for only about 2 percent of carbon dioxide emissions globally, according to the International Air Transport Association, but at high altitudes jet exhaust may cause a warming effect that is two or three times greater than that of carbon dioxide.
Contrails, trails of ice that condense when the hot exhaust from jet engines hits the cold air at high altitudes, can last in the atmosphere for hours and spread to cover thousands of square miles before they eventually dissipate. The icy contrails act like giant mirrors suspended in the sky. By reflecting the sun's radiation, they cause some cooling, but they also block heat rising from the Earth's surface, which contributes to the greenhouse effect and global warming.
At night, the warming effect is magnified, because there is no reflective cooling effect to help counter it. And the problem becomes worse in winter, when cold, moist air is more likely to exist at all elevations. According to the researchers, contrails are almost twice as likely to form in winter than in summer.
The research study, which was reported in the journal Nature, found that night flights accounted for only 25 percent of the daily air traffic but contributed 60 percent to 80 percent of the warming caused by commercial aviation. At the same time, winter flights accounted for only 22 percent of the annual number of commercial flights, but they contributed half of the annual warming effect."
"An optimist is someone who thinks this is the best of all possible worlds. A pessimist is someone who is afraid that the optimist is right."
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wiscidea Posted 7:44 am
04 May 2007
Solving the problem does not necessarily rely on reducing air travel, but...
(1) Cleaning up the fuel so their is less sulfur. Obviously can't reduce the water vapor -- it is an indication of efficient combustion. But reducing the sulfur would get rid of one of the "multipliers".
(2) Perhaps looking into whether the jets might fly at a different altitude. Higher or lower?
(3) Asking people to just slow down. I'm not familiar with the differences bewteen different aircraft, but it seems there is a system here that can be tweeked rather than eliminated. People could still fly across the continent. It might, however, rely on smaller and slower planes. Or perhaps blimps!
Sounds like trips to relatively pristine wilderness and melting glaciers via puddle jumpers is not really a problem.
Forward!
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spaceshaper Posted 7:58 am
04 May 2007
David: If you ask me, it's somewhat naive to think that greens will ever be able to escape charges of hypocrisy from anti-greens.
I don't disagree with David's comment but I don't think it really affects Bart's point. Now is a good time for environmentalists to be getting ahead of the curve on air travel. It will take a major paradigm shift to regard the extra time taken by alternatives to long-distance flights not to be considered as wasted, and for traveling less far and less often not to feel like a deprivation. We have slow food as an example, and it's time for travel and the sense of place itself to be delicately savored once more. It's an issue that will take leadership: and if not us, who?
The true meaning of life is to plant trees, under whose shade you do not expect to sit.
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Smaug Posted 8:11 am
04 May 2007
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Smaug Posted 8:14 am
04 May 2007
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JMG Posted 8:22 am
04 May 2007
If only people used puddle jumpers (prop planes).
But they don't. We replaced trains+prop aviation with jets, and now we have a system where people take long flights to where they pick up the puddle jumper.
And Airbus and Boeing are building fantastically large planes where we're seeing a vicious cycle between fuel costs and plane size, where the designers keep trying to pack more sardines into the cans so that the planes can afford to take off and consume that monstrous amount of fuel, which helps keep the prices of the fuel high, which ...
There is no way to "tweak" a system built around these fantasically expensive jets with fantastically high operating costs--the capitol cost of the jets requires that they be used continuously, their voracious appetite for fuel requires that they be flown with as many people on board as possible, and their advantages in speed only become apparent over long distances.
And the overhead costs of the system (the expensive airports and airline personnel, the costs of regulation, and safety) only get higher on a per-flyer basis if you reduce flying. So once you decide to allow the technology at all, you can expect to see it proliferate and promote its own growth. Rather than regulating air travel as a government utility, we allow profit-seeking corporations to decide who can fly and where they will be able to fly accoding to how profitable it is for the airlines---thus, we get airlines competing to encourage more and more flying by more and more people. "Tweaking" doesn't do anything to that fundamental issue: airlines only make money if people fly, just like coal mine owners only make money if people burn coal.
In other words, like chemical farming, once you adopt the technology it's not possible to "slow down" on the treadmill, even as the marginal benefit declines. The logic of the tool --- everything about how planes fit into the world -- encourages more and more flying.
Also, just wanted to make sure you thought about these implications of the stats you posted from RMI:
(Pounds CO2 emitted per US household)
Heating, cooling, lighting, appliances 23,160
Household vehicles 22,287
Air travel 3,107
Industrial sector (including agriculture) 37,020
Commercial sector 19,745
Non-household transportation 9,850
TOTAL: 115,169
Considering only the top three listed items as being under the control of the householder (as a householder), whereas virtually everyone has some kind of heating/cooling/lighting/applicances, and most everyone has a household vehicle, it is still the case that, even in rich countries, most of the flying is done by a relatively thin slice of people. (I'm trying to run down the stats on who flies--all I have found so far is the total number of boardings, which doesn't get at the issue of the "road warriors" who are responsible for 30 boardings a month.)
Thus, flying is an activity where the few impose costs on everyone. And that cost is high. Jet travel is so terribly inefficient (energy consumptive) that it registers 3100 pounds CO2 per household.
And, no, I doubt you want jets flying lower, although that might help a bit in the water vapor area. Not only is there simply less space (and therefore more collisions) at lower altitude, but the noise inflicted on people on the ground would be as intolerable as it already is to those who are unlucky enough to live near airports.
"An optimist is someone who thinks this is the best of all possible worlds. A pessimist is someone who is afraid that the optimist is right."
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Smaug Posted 8:25 am
04 May 2007
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Bart Anderson Posted 8:56 am
04 May 2007
The burning of the fuel itself.
The special effects that JMG is talking about. I've seen figures similar to those that he is quoting, but I think there is quite a bit of uncertainty - "more study is needed."
Wiscidea cites data from RMI showing that the average emissions for air travel are not that high per American family. That's somewhat misleading, since those emissions are the result of a relatively small number of decisions. Emissions from food, in contrast, are the result of 1000s of decisions over time. Also, it is easier to do without flying than it is to do without eating. What JMG and I are saying is that flying is the single most critical decision that affects the emissions for which you are personally responsible.
David Roberts is right that environmentalists will always be criticized... but with air travel, we are painting a great big bullseye on ourselves. It's not a minor issue like "paper-or-plastic"; in this case I think it's significant.
One last point in this disjointed post. If one believes that supplies of oil will be shrinking, then cheap air travel is in big trouble. Air travel is completely dependent on petroleum. Alternative fuels are problematic, and it's hard to carry enough batteries in an airplane for electric flight. (More details) So whether its from global warming or peak oil, the days of widespread air travel are limited.
Bart
Energy Bulletin
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wiscidea Posted 11:42 am
04 May 2007
"If one believes that supplies of oil will be shrinking, then cheap air travel is in big trouble. Air travel is completely dependent on petroleum. Alternative fuels are problematic... So whether its from global warming or peak oil, the days of widespread air travel are limited."
Don't cheer yet. There is at least one company developing jet fuel from biomass. I'm confident our military industrial complex is quite motivated to ensure air travel is "affordable", even if it continues to depend on subsidies.
Regarding "efficiency", I think it is difficult to assess whether air travel is efficient or not. There is more to the equation than people miles per gallon. Someone who's time is valuable will always be interested in getting from point A to point B as fast as possible. Their time (e.g., someone like Al Gore or the Dalai Lama or anyone else with a useful skill) is better invested in doing their job rather than walking or riding a bicycle across the continent.
Forward!
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Bart Anderson Posted 8:15 pm
04 May 2007
So with no viable alternative fuel in sight, cheap air travel depends on cheap petroleum.
When oil prices start their inevitable climb (now, according to some; in about 25 years, according to optimistic voices in the oil industry), air fares will also climb into the stratosphere. Air transportation will probably be reserved for the military and a few key individuals determined by the state, just as it was during World War II.
In the meantime, however, we can put a lot of greenhouse gases into the atmosphere with our jaunts to scenic locations. That's why it's still important to put a lid on them.
I don't feel happy at the prospect of the end of cheap air travel, wiscidea. It just seems inevitable to me, and the sooner we adapt to it, the better for us and the environment.
Bart
Energy Bulletin
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Pangolin Posted 9:03 pm
04 May 2007
Air travel R.I.P.
The problems with modern jet travel are several fold.
1. The burning of the fuel itself.
2. The special effects that JMG is talking about. I've seen figures similar to those that he is quoting, but I think there is quite a bit of uncertainty - "more study is needed."
Wiscidea cites data from RMI showing that the average emissions for air travel are not that high per American family. That's somewhat misleading, since those emissions are the result of a relatively small number of decisions. Emissions from food, in contrast, are the result of 1000s of decisions over time. Also, it is easier to do without flying than it is to do without eating. What JMG and I are saying is that flying is the single most critical decision that affects the emissions for which you are personally responsible.
David Roberts is right that environmentalists will always be criticized... but with air travel, we are painting a great big bullseye on ourselves. It's not a minor issue like "paper-or-plastic"; in this case I think it's significant.
One last point in this disjointed post. If one believes that supplies of oil will be shrinking, then cheap air travel is in big trouble. Air travel is completely dependent on petroleum. Alternative fuels are problematic, and it's hard to carry enough batteries in an airplane for electric flight. (More details) So whether its from global warming or peak oil, the days of widespread air travel are limited.
Bart
crosslinked from here:Carbon Free Air Travel
No this!!
The White Dwarf is a one person human powered blimp.
Before you go snickering off look at these aiship pages, on the BBC and wiki..
It turns out that lighter than air craft can be wrapped with solar cells like this Solar Impulse world circling plane.
So it looks like no-carbon flight is really a possibility. We just have to give Burt Rutan about 30 million dollars to design a LTA, solar-power airliner. After all he designed this. The first private vehicle to reach space with a passenger.
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