Monday, 07 Mar 2005

It irks Steve Lippman that many big green groups and foundations employ traditional money managers instead of eco-conscious ones, and as a result their financial clout ends up being used to fight against environmental shareholder resolutions. He invites them to join the world of socially responsible investing (SRI) and shareholder activism -- and he invites you to as well. Lippman, an analyst with leading SRI firm Trillium Asset Management, explains how his work has helped to bring about positive change at big-name companies like PepsiCo, Staples, and Citigroup -- in InterActivist, today on the Grist Magazine website. Send Lippman a question of your own by noon PST on Wednesday, March 9; we'll publish his responses to selected questions on Friday.

Everybody's a Critic

New voices join chorus pushing Bush to act on climate change

At this point it's getting hard to keep track, but a couple more notable folks have joined the ranks of those calling on the Bush administration, either implicitly or explicitly, to act on global warming. Perhaps most unexpected is James Baker, former secretary of state and Bush family consigliere, who helped President Bush triumph in Florida in 2000. "It may surprise you a little bit, but maybe it's because I'm a hunter and a fisherman, but I think we need to pay a little more attention to what we need to do to protect our environment," Baker told the Houston Forum Club last week. "When you have energy companies like Shell and British Petroleum ... saying there is a problem with excess carbon dioxide emission, I think we ought to listen." Ya think? Meanwhile, Lord May, president of the U.K.'s most prestigious group of scientists, the Royal Society, is more blunt. He criticized Bush and other leaders who are failing to act, calling them "modern-day Neros over climate change, fiddling while the world burns."


A reader notes that her Florida electric company offers her the option of paying a little extra to support renewable-energy projects. Umbra takes the opportunity to open this Sunshine State reader's eyes to the wide and wonderful world of Green Tags, via which green-minded consumers can buy their way out of eco-guilt. It ain't perfect, she says, but then, what is? -- in Ask Umbra, today on the Grist Magazine website.

You Are Now Free to Emit About the Country

U.K. plans to offset CO2 emissions from officials' airline flights

As part of its sustainable-development strategy announced today, the U.K. is unveiling an innovative program to offset the carbon-dioxide emissions generated by the air travel of its ministers and civil servants. Starting next month in at least three government departments, each time an official flies overseas on official business, an independent assessor will determine how much CO2 will result and how much money is needed to offset it. That amount of money will then be paid into a fund devoted to sustainability projects in developing countries: solar cookers in India, micro-hydro in Sri Lanka, etc. The government estimates that almost $960,000 could be generated by the program. Greens hailed the announcement, but pointed out that the benefits of the program will be swamped by the effects of the controversial aviation bill recently signed into law, which did nothing to regulate airplane CO2 emissions. Airplane travel is widely believed to be dooming the U.K.'s ability to meet its emission-reduction targets.

Berate and Barrel

Open-barrel trash burning becoming a hot issue for states

Not interested in paying the $1- or $2-per-bag fee for trash disposal? Just throw it all in a barrel in your backyard and burn it. That's what thousands of upstate New Yorkers -- and millions of rural Americans -- do, and it's making some environmental activists hot under the collar. But a bill to ban the practice has languished in the New York legislature for several years under fire (ahem) from state agricultural interests, which say that disposing of the waste any other way is cost prohibitive for farmers and rural residents. A number of states have banned backyard burning, and others -- including Minnesota, Wisconsin, and Michigan -- are now at work on efforts to curb it. Trash burning releases cancer-causing dioxins into the atmosphere, along with arsenic, mercury, formaldehyde, and carbon monoxide. The U.S. EPA estimates that 20 million burn barrels across the U.S. produce some 13 million pounds of pollutants every year, making backyard burning the No. 1 quantified source of dioxin emissions in the country.