Examples of the Devil in the Details

In Indonesia, the Boeing 737 MAX's tragic loss of 189 lives illustrates how computerized directions prevented a pilot from executing the right decision. Pilots, unlike astronauts with access to mission control, apparently lack hotlines to aircraft manufacturers that could tell them to flip two switches when they experience the problem Indonesia's plane had. Already, suggestions note the missing detail of highlighting important information about new aircraft systems, such as the Boeing MAX has. These changes need to be written in the language most easily read by pilots, not always in English, and illustrated in a brochure or on a card separate from the aircraft's basic manual.

     Bill Gates observed the detail that new medicines and vaccines invented in the lab do nothing to eliminate human suffering, if  they lack a distribution system. I was reminded of the way I walked two blocks to a schoolyard where I received a drop of the polio vaccine on a sugar cube, a distribution system replaced by doctor's offices today. In Africa, where providing patients with medication that requires refrigeration was a problem, drones had to be enlisted to carry them to clinics in remote villages.

     If there is no use for recycled plastic bottles and containers, why bother with the details of collecting them? A TV segment showed what looked like bales of "dirty" plastic stacked ten feet high at a recycling center. Could dirty plastic items be melted for use in 3D printers to make insulation and furniture for the homes 3D printers now construct from concrete?

     China, once a customer for dirty plastic, now only buys pristine plastic with no labels or other irregularities such as moisture. Those requirements certainly leave out the plastic debris long boom arms collect from the ocean in what's known as the Great Pacific Garbage Patch or "the blob" between California and Hawaii that forms the mass of warm water that seems to nourish the warm, dry winters that dehydrate forests along the northwest coast of North America.

     Then, there are the new members of the U.S. Congress who want to replace Nancy Pelosi as Speaker. First, they need to master the details of passing legislation..     

   

Let's Repurpose Our Mindsets

When I read an article titled, "How to Mine Cobalt Without Going to Congo," I learned Canadian scientists have figured out how to produce the cobalt (and lithium) needed to power electric cars from batteries that fail quality control tests and now end up in hazardous-waste dumps, buried in the ground, or giving off toxic emissions as they burn. When as many as 118 million electric cars take the road in 2030, more batteries will stop working. That means more rare metals can be recycled from old batteries to produce replacements.

The idea of recycling cobalt from worn out electric car batteries started me thinking about how many examples of repurposing I've become aware of lately. It reminded me of how I started noticing how many people wore glasses after I began wearing them in fifth grade.

In the fashion industry, designer Stella McCarthy endorsed the MacArthur Foundation's report that urged increasing the less than 1% of material now made from the used clothing and textiles that end up in landfills. In the July, 2018 issue of VOGUE, eco-conscious model, Gisele, cites the statistic that "between eight and thirteen million tons of clothing ends up in landfills every year."  Already, women in India turn their old saris into quilts. A young designer I know began her path to a career by using the material from her mother's worn hijabs.

On "American Pickers," the TV hosts travel through the U.S. looking for parts to rebuild old cars, motorcycles, and bicycles. They also come across pharmacy cabinets, industrial lamps, moldings, signs, and award trophies that can be used in new ways and as decorative objects in homes and restaurants. When you think about it, eBay made a big business out of giving used items a new purpose in life the way yard sales and thrift stores do on a smaller scale.

I guess I was subconsciously trying out a new repurpose mindset when I read about the "convolute" that ILC (formerly Playtex) designed to enable astronauts to move their arms, legs, and hands while wearing an airtight, protective spacesuit on the moon. To me, the flexible, but somewhat rigid, ribbed rubber and dacron "convolute" looked like a sleeve that could be repurposed to stabilize a person's shaking or weak arms and legs and better enable him or her to hold items and walk.

As Christmas approaches, I'm reminded that the stable in the creche scene at our church was made as an Eagle Scout project by a young man who found the wood in an old barn a farmer was about to burn.

What items have you repurposed? (Also see the earlier post, "Dump the Dump.")

What Can We Learn from Terrorists?

I remember seeing an article that I thought sounded ridiculous until I read it The headline was something like "What We Can Learn from People Who Live in a Dump." It turned out these people found in the dump what they needed for shelter and cooking and the scrap they sold to earn an income. Their livelihood was recycling writ large. It was just like the train loads of scrap iron that become new steel or the discarded rock piles reprocessed to ferret out every bit of copper. In the same way countries with no lithium mines will have to learn to make new batteries out of lithium extracted from used items.

     So, what wisdom can we extract from terrorists? They think about God far more than those who say, "I don't believe in God," and those who blithely assume God created each and every full blown plant, animal, and human.

     In his book, The Kingdom of Speech, Tom Wolfe recounts an exchange between Charles Darwin and a group of naive students who wanted to know how evolution "got under way and how exactly, physically, it started up -- from what?" One student was not satisfied with Darwin's answer that evolution probably started with "four or five cells floating in a warm pool somewhere." He asked where the cells came from and who put the cells in the pool. In 1871, Darwin said he didn't know and in 2017, since no one has created even one cell out of nothing and the greatest scientist has discovered what exists rather than created anything, the obvious answer is God.

     In the Declaration of Independence, Thomas Jefferson expressed the self-evident truth that all men are "endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights." The First Amendment of the Constitution went on to guarantee certain rights, including that Congress could not prohibit the free exercise of religion. Through texts, traditions, the words of learned scholars, and the well-formed consciences of individuals, many religious beliefs related to the existence of God have developed. Is He or She? Is God one person, three, or hundreds? Was Jesus God? Did he rise from the dead or was he a hologram, spirit, or frog-like being stimulated by electricity? Are we here to accumulate wealth or to serve the poor, pray, and adore God? Is God vengeful or merciful? Is there life of the body or soul or both after death?

     Where Muslim extremists go off the rails is when they use Allah to justify killing infidels who  hold different religious beliefs. Similarly, pro-life zealots who use their religion to justify killing doctors who perform abortions are also misguided.

      In summary, we can learn two main ideas from terrorists: 1) God is too big a subject to dismiss without study, and 2) religious beliefs do not justify killing those with different religious beliefs.

(See the earlier post, "This We Believe," to learn some of the beliefs of the world's major religions.)

   

Dump the Dump

You can feel superior to those who throw plastic bottles into the ocean, flip lithium batteries into the trash, and buy new shoes instead of having a cobbler replace worn heels. But a close look at recycling finds even this "solution" has problems awaiting solutions.

     Making it easier for soda consumers to recycle plastic bottles or providing batteries with electronic tags to help pull them out of the ordinary disposal process still sends these bottles and batteries to a waste plant. The problem of disposing of the heavy lithium-ion batteries that wear out in the growing fleet of electric cars is a major matter of concern to these auto makers as well.  Waste plants, such as the Integrated Waste Management Facility at Bukit Nanas in Malaysia, boast about converting waste to electricity, but they downplay the cancer and other toxic disease emissions these plants produce. And what about the average annual rate of 300 fires at waste and recycling plants in the United Kingdom?

     In a recycling industry where price to cost margins are small, there is little incentive to monitor air quality frequently, purchase sprinklers and other expensive fire prevention equipment, keep from stacking recycled materials too high and too close together, provide employees with protective gear, or penalize and shut down illegal waste sites.

     "Repair rather than replace" has a nice ring to it, but when it is less expensive to buy new shoes or a small appliance than to have old ones repaired or even find someone who can do the job, those options aren't considered.

     Knee jerk solutions aren't always solutions. Substituting degradable paper bags and packaging for plastic that requires fossil fuel to produce and years to disappear can deplete forests. Reducing the amount of gasoline cars use by adding 10% ethanol from corn requires more electricity and might mean some people go hungry.

     When I was having a chair reupholstered, I also asked the man I called to do the repairs how much it would cost to recover a sofa chewed by the cat. He told me, "$600." I said something like, "I've seen new sofas advertised for less." He asked how old my sofa was, and I guessed about 60 years. He told me I wouldn't find anything like its interior materials and construction on the market today and that he's recovered furniture for people who go to yard sales looking for old furniture they can buy cheap, because they know the insides of these old pieces are worth the cost of upholstering them.

     Every time we are walking to the trash to throw something out, maybe we should slow down and ask ourselves: what could I do with this, who could use this, why did I buy this in the first place?

   

Keep Closet Rejects Out of Landfills and Oceans

At a middle school reunion we were passing around pictures, when I saw one of me wearing a vest I had made out of an outgrown skirt. For a time, the landfill was spared. Schools where students wear uniforms spare landfills and parents' expenses by hosting back-to-school exchanges to recycle outgrown uniforms to younger classmates. Besides outgrowing clothes and shoes, there are plenty of reasons to get rid of old clothes. Styles change, moths eat sweaters, washing at the wrong heat setting shrinks pants.

In addition to recycling clothes at yard sales or donating them to thrift stores, retailers, such as H&M, are offering new options. Stores have bins and exchange discount coupons for used clothing customers bring in for donations to charities. Some Nike and Converse stores have Reuse-A-Shoe programs that collect any brand of athletic shoes (none with spikes or cleats and no sandals, flip-flops, dress shoes, or boots, however). At facilities in Memphis, Tennessee, or Meerhout, Belgium (whichever is closest), shoes are ground into raw material and used for sport and playground surfaces, apparel, and new footwear. More information about Nike's recycling program is available at nikegrind.com.

There are efforts to keep discarded clothing out of landfills by unraveling sweaters to reuse wool and by turning cotton items into cleaning cloths, insulation, bedding, and home furnishings.

Synthetic fibers are a worse problem, since washing clothes made from textiles, such as polyester and acrylic, with detergents releases micro plastic fibers that slip through wastewater treatment plants and into waterways, where they become "food" for aquatic organisms, such as plankton, and fish. A single fleece jacket can release as many as a million synthetic fibers in a single washing, especially if washed with powdered, rather than liquid, detergent. Fabric softener has been shown to reduce shedding, as does using a short, gentle wash cycle and cool water. Research also has shown coatings like chitosan, a finish derived from crustacean shells, have helped reduce fiber loss. Washing machine devices that trap the synthetic fibers from clothes held in mesh bags and balls that attract fibers also are being tried. When synthetic materials end up in landfills, they can take from 20 to 200 years to decompose.

Overall, the subject of fabric pollution has been slow to attract financing for research and development of recycling processes and ways to reduce fabric pollution. Reducing clothing purchases is one way consumers can instantly help solve the problem.    

What Can Unemployed People Do?

Concern about technological unemployment from AI, robots, sensors, and the like has led to dire observations. In the factory of the future, there only will be two non-machines, a person and a dog, and it will be the dog's task to keep the person away from the machines. In other words, let's prepare for the future by making a list of what unemployed people around the world can do.

1. Do nothing.

Although unemployed, most people still have their physical abilities.

2. Improve athletic abilities by practicing to become a professional athlete

3. Take whatever risky, possibly illegal, demeaning, poor paying job is available

4. Make and repair things from found objects

5. Sell or demand ransom for what they take by force from those who have something of value

Use brain power to study the economic environment and prepare to join it.

6. Learn to develop software

7. Learn how the stock market works and invest

8. Become a supplier to those who are making money: Manufacture robots, identify global exporters and become one of their suppliers, grow produce, operate a food truck, provide leisure entertainment by arranging tours, design websites, teach, invent, provide promotional/marketing expertise, write a story/song/play, provide spiritual guidance--------------------------------------------------------------------

Invest in Water?

At the end of the movie, The Big Short, there was an item about Michael Burry. He was one of the investors who cashed in on the collapse of the housing market built on a shaky foundation of subprime mortgages that was doomed to fail. Supposedly, Burry now only invests in water,

     Could Burry be noticing that progress in some economic sectors is having a negative impact on water resources? When the French company, Perrier, began exporting mineral water in green glass bottles, it seemed like a hard sell. Now, the hard sell is convincing those who drink bottled water at the world rate of 30 litres per person per year that their consumption is bad for the planet. There is the fuel cost of transporting bottles from one country to another that already has its own safe, unpolluted water supply. Plastic bottles pollute the land in dumps. Insufficient recycling limits how much recycled content is used in bottled water, although efforts have been made to produce bottles out of organic sugarcane waste and to reduce the weight of plastic and glass bottles.

     Data from NASA's space observations show groundwater from 13 of the world's 37 major basins is being depleted faster than it can be restored. Not only the amount of water used by agriculture and business is a concern; water quality and contamination needs to be addressed as well.

     Alternatives to fossil fuel have increased the use of water to produce crops made into bioethanol. That adds to the nearly 70% of the world's accessible freshwater already used by agriculture. Moreover, dams used to produce hydroelectricity create reservoirs that cause the evaporation of water that farmers and others traditionally relied on downstream. Alternative energy sources, such as wind, do not require water.

     Water also is under pressure from factories that dump heavy metals and chemicals from recycled electronics into local lakes and rivers. The winner of the Stockholm Junior Water Prize, 18-year-old Perry Alagappan, does have one remedy that filters 99% of heavy metals out of water through graphene nanotubes that can be cleaned with vinegar and reused. The tubes can be fitted to the taps on sinks at home and in industry. To maximize availability of his invention, Alagappan will not patent his idea.

     Water keeps the equipment that processes data cool. Data centers that have used water-intensive cooling methods to improve energy efficiency now are looking at ways to use recycled rather than potable water in their cooling systems. Also, there is an effort to consider locating data centers in climates, such as Sweden's, where outside air can cool facilities all year.

     While fertilizers increase crop yield, they also cause nitrogen and phosphorous runoff that enables aquatic plants to deplete oxygen and create water dead zones where fish cannot survive. Palestinian farmers are attempting to deal with water shortages by building a wastewater treatment plant to provide water for agricultural use. But even with a major use of electricity, existing technology can only remove 10% to 30% of nitrogen and phosphorus from wastewater. Where 90% of sewage in developing countries is discharged without any treatment, research on algal projects that rely on sunlight to grow algae that can break down nitrogen and phosphates in wastewater and produce sludge for biofuel have promise for agricultural areas, where sun is abundant in Africa, South America, and Asia.

     Fracking, which blasts oil and gas out of shale rock, is viewed as a way to help the United States and other countries become energy independent. As the earlier post, "The Lure of Shale Oil Independence," points out, however, the fracking process is suspected of contaminating water.

     These are just some of the water projects that Burry could be eyeing for investment. By going to kiva.org, you already can invest $25 in a water project that will help a household in India, Vietnam, Cambodia, or Indonesia install a toilet and improve sanitary conditions.

(Water is also the subject of earlier posts, "A Healthy Environment," "Personal Response to the World's Problems," and "Good Works Multiply Fast.")

What Are You Wearing in the New Year?

As celebrities walk the red carpets at the Golden Globes, Oscars, and other award shows, reporters ask them who they are wearing, and designers look forward to the publicity they receive from their answers.

     I once heard that President Kennedy's wife Jackie answered the who-are-you-wearing question by saying, "Mine." At every age, we all do say something about ourselves when we get dressed. Think about it. Pictures and sayings on T-shirts might tell what comic book or TV show characters a child likes. These shirts can proclaim, "Future Scientist" or "Daddy's Little Girl."

     Clothes also can be uniforms that show students attend certain schools, march in bands, or play on various teams. The earlier post, "Recess Differs Around the World," shows uniforms worn by students at various schools around the world.

     Judging from photos of men at conferences on climate change or G-7 meetings, world leaders in their dark power suits and white shirts also wear uniforms. Women leaders do too. An article about German Chancellor Angela Merkel, Time magazine's "Person of the Year," told how she presented then US Secretary of State, Hillary Clinton, with a framed copy of a German newspaper with the headline, "Angela Merkel? Hillary Clinton?" The photo accompanying the article showed both women wearing blazers and black slacks. (Their heads were cropped off.) Now that Mrs. Clinton is running for President, she has adopted a new style that older women might begin to copy. Interesting collars and cuffs accent her longer jackets, and she wears pants that are the same color as her jackets.

     Some US school girls have begun wearing hijab head scarves in solidarity with their Muslim sisters. Italian design house, Dolce & Gabbana, has launched a new collection of fashionable hijabs and long abayas for its Muslim and other customers. When I saw Paul Ryan, the new Speaker of the US House of Representatives growing a beard, I thought he might be showing his solidarity with the billion-plus Muslims who are not terrorists, but I learned he was imitating Joseph Gurney Cannon, who was the last Speaker, over 100 years ago, who had a beard. (You can check out the beard of Cannon, Speaker from 1903 to 1911, on the Internet.)

     When students grow older, they may decide to protect animals by not wearing fur or to protect the environment by wearing graphic T-shirts that invite others to "Save the Arctic." (See the earlier post, "North Pole Flag.") A wide variety of the sustainable clothing options now being developed will be available to youngsters in the future. Leftover high-quality luxury yarn that is insufficient to produce a full line of clothes is already being combined into sweaters that can last a lifetime. Clothing manufacturers are exploring ways to make zero-waste garments from recycled materials (See the earlier posts, "The World of Fashion" and "Recycled Fashion Firsts.") and to create new disposal methods that do not add to landfills. Waste-reduction groups are urging consumers to treasure and repair their garments rather than throw them out.

     When I worked in retail, I used to tell customers, who couldn't seem to find anything they liked, that sometimes you need to shop in your closet. Babies, for example, often are baptized in outfits their parents, and even their grandparents, wore for their baptisms. What kids wear next year may be a combination of something they, or their parents, already own.

   
 

Personal Response to the World's Problems

Some effort is better than none. Asked if we are alone in the universe, former NASA astronaut, Barbara Morgan, responded in Time magazine (July 6-12, 2015), "In every crack in the sidewalk, there's something growing....Life seems to want to take hold...." Last year about this time, one bucket of ice water dumped over a person's head helped hope take hold for people suffering from ALS by raising $94 million to find a cure (See the earlier blog post, "Good Works Multiply Fast.")

 Learn that Nestle is filling the plastic water bottles it sells with ground water pumped out of drought-stricken, fire-prone California's San Bernardino National Forest. An even bigger problem: Why would someone in a developed country which has strict health and safety regulations to keep water free of pesticides and pollution drink water transported in plastic bottles from another country?
Response: Fill reusable bottles with water from taps or pumps in areas where water is protected by clean water acts.

Learn that nearly 800 million people in the world don't have enough to eat every day.
Response: Bring a can of soup or fruit to a shelter for homeless people, a food pantry, or church collection center.

Learn that usable items are thrown away in dumps that pollute the land and pose health risks for children tempted to play in them.
Response: Hold a yard sale to sell outgrown clothes and toys. Maybe, even give the proceeds of the sale to a charity.

Learn that a "religious" terrorist group has used a bomb to hurt people it doesn't like.
Response: Read the Barron's book series, This is my faith, or another children's book on religions to find out the true beliefs of Muslims, Catholics, Hindus, Buddhists, etc. that have nothing to do with violence against those who practice other or no religions.

Learn the drawbacks of drilling for oil in the Arctic (See the earlier blog post, "North Pole Flag."), fracking (See the post, "The Lure of Shale Oil Independence."), and greenhouse gases (See the posts, "Pollution Update" and "A Healthy Environment.").
Response: Walk or ride a bike to reduce the need to be driven in a car that burns gasoline and look for ways to use less electricity from coal-burning power plants. What can you do without turning on a light, computer, or TV?

Learn that pesticides can harm the bees needed to pollinate crops and can reduce the milkweed food supply butterflies need to eat. (See the earlier blog post, The Bees and the Birds ".).
Response: In backyard and community gardens, pull out weeds by hand.

Learn that someone has been hurt or killed because of the color of their skin, where they were born, their religion, who they love, because they are girls, or because they want to vote.
Response: Pray for greater understanding, tolerance, and respect among all people in the world.

Recycled Fashion Firsts

Protagonists in  Gone With the Wind, Sound of Music, and Enchanted all knew how to conserve the world's resources by converting draperies into dresses. Ecouterre.com has identified seven of 2014's top designers who have done something similar to these heroines. Their creative ideas are:

• Pleather, leather-looking jewelry and clothes made from inner tubes
• Jewelry made from the fence that imprisoned Nelson Mandela in South Africa
• Jewelry made from Detroit's peeling graffiti
• Leather waste woven into laptop and tablet sleeves
• Denim woven into seats for camper chairs
• Pine needles from discarded Christmas trees made into French designer lingerie
• Rubbish from the United Kingdom made into sneakers. 

All items are on display and described at the ecouterre.com website.

     Just as leather and denim were cut into strips and woven into new products, cut old ties from thrift shops or dad's closet into strips and weave them into squares, sew two together, leave one side open to stuff, sew up that side, and make a pillow. Or make a cat toy by filling a smaller pillow with crunchy wax  paper or aluminum foil. Look around the house to see if you can find a moth damaged sweater you can unravel to make a ball of yarn that an adult can show you how to knit into a dog sweater or a skirt for a Barbie doll.

     See earlier blog posts, "Good Works Multiply Fast" and "I Made This Myself" for other recycling ideas that will conserve the world's resources.

I Made This Myself

"Don't you love it when a plan comes together?" That saying John "Hannibal" Smith used to use on the "A Team" television show expresses the feeling I got when I read about the MakerMovement that encourages children to build what they imagine and crowdfunding by a Kickstarter, RocketHub, or Kiva. Since there is a way for anyone to find investors, anyone in the world who has an idea for a new app, 3D printer creation, programmable device, or, what one visionary has proposed, an automated factory on the moon, now has an opportunity to raise the money needed to make an innovation a reality.


     In an interview conducted by station KQED (kqed.org) in Northern California, Dale Dougherty, CEO of MakerMedia and editor of MAKE magazine, told how he began promoting hands-on learning at a Maker Faire in 2006 and later at MakerCon conferences. He is devoted to the idea that tinkering with the tools and materials for making things can be fun.

     Project Zero, a research study developed by Harvard's Graduate School of Education and tested by classroom teachers in Oakland, California, aims to inspire students to be curious about the designs that make things and nature work. When students looked at a pencil and a snail, they began to ask questions, not only about how they worked, but also what kind of designs could help them do a better job. Some youngsters even suggested ways to make life better for the snail. And there was a crossover to discover the new words needed to describe a design process and to defend ideas of how things are made.

     Since schools can't do everything, there is a greater role for parents, childcare, Boys and Girls Clubs, 4H, community centers, church youth groups, and scouting programs. They can provide the things kids need to help them create, perform, and learn: blocks, LEGOs, Tinker Toys, Erector Sets, computers, 3D printers, pottery wheels, found objects, cameras, watercolors, easels, musical instruments, a stage, and garden plots. It's rather expensive, but, for $16.95 per month, tinker.kiwicrate,com/inside-a-crate will send students, 9 to 16+, a hands-on STEM (science, engineering, technology) inspired maker project.

    Making all kinds of materials available to students helps them discover new possibilities. That's reason enough to provide a place to cook, bake, sew, make jewelry, and knit. Inspired by puffy sourdough and flatter pizza dough an artist combined them and twisted, carved, and painted them into what became an octopus sculpture. A businessman inspired children to create sculptures out of the shredded documents he dumped into a pail of water.

     According to experiments at Hanyang Cyber University in South Korea, involving the body in learning also helps improve memory needed in any subject. When hands manipulate objects, for example, the brain has more cues to remember what was learned. When my mother was a math consultant for the Chicago Public School System, the first thing she did when she visited a school was observe what manipulative devices were in use. If she saw few or none, her next step was to try to find the supply room or closet where they were kept, because she knew that after the Russians sent up Sputnik, the federal government funded purchases of many such devices to aid learning math. I remember seeing one of my favorites, a scale that allowed kids to balance numbers on one side with those on the other. A big "5", for example, would equal a little "2" and "3" on the other side.

      Earlier blog posts have related ideas. See "Transform Spaces into Creative Places," "Back to the Land," "Tin Can Art," and "Global Drawing Power."

Pollution Update

Look around when you attend a music festival, 4th of July celebration, or state fair this summer. Recycling bins, found in schools and at the exits of Target and other stores, have moved outside.

     Paul Abramson, who founded Paolo Verde Consulting, observed that keeping an area clean, especially at potential littering hot spots, during an event eliminates the need for picking up the mess at the end, when everyone is exhausted. He recommends having people (I would suggest cute, smiling teenagers) at bins "making gentle suggestions," such as "You know, that paper plate is recyclable, and we're collecting compost (food scraps) here."

     Abramson also notes that keeping an event site neat appeals to everyone who likes to see immediate results rather than the invisible good their contributions are doing, when they give to the Sierra Club, World Wildlife Fund, or Greenpeace.

     On a larger scale, TIME magazine (June 16, 2014), in an article entitled, "Green Revolution," shows the United States's amazing shift to clean energy in the 21st century. Renewable (water, wind, and solar) power plants went from 682 in 2002 to 1,956 in 2012. While coal plants still provided 39% of U.S. electricity and 75% of emissions from electricity in 2013, cleaner natural gas generated 51% of the electricity added by new plants opened in 2013. Estimates suggest one-fifth of all coal-fired plants have been closed or are scheduled to retire. Although solar and wind power produced only a little more than 5% of U.S. electricity in 2013, they produced 30% of new power added that year and 90% of new power capacity installed in the first quarter of 2014. What is impressive about this added power from wind is the amount by which it decreased carbon emissions, the same effect as taking 20 million cars off the road.

     Even children 6 to 8 years old can learn about the fossil fuel energy cycle from sun to transportation use in Buried Sunlight: How Fossil Fuels Have Changed the Earth by Molly Bang and Penny Chisholm.

     Solar panels, once an exotic that cost $75 per watt generated in 1975, are now available to produce a watt of electricity on home and business rooftops for less than 75 cents. Technology also is meeting the conservation challenge. Products now keep track of individual energy usage and suggest ways to reduce it. Energy efficient LED lightbulbs, compared to incandescent ones, last longer and reduce consumer cost over their lifetimes. It is interesting to note that combined jobs in the solar industry (150,000) and wind industry (50,000) now match the 200,000 in the coal industry.

     Unfortunately, new items, such as plastic bottles and drones, keep multiplying and requiring additional ideas for recycling. According to trendwatching,com, plastic Coca-Cola bottles in Vietnam, and later in Thailand and Indonesia, come with 16 different caps that convert empties into new uses, such as squirt guns, pencil sharpeners, and soap dispensers. Drones also are a new pollution problem. Some have biodegradable wings, but when they crash, their metal pieces and batteries litter the land and oceans.

     Students looking for ways to eliminate pollution and stem climate change can also find a wide variety of suggestions, including the development of bladeless wind turbines, in the earlier blog post, "A Healthy Environment."

   

Tin Can Art

Can beauty come out of the dumps in slums around the world? Recycled materials are already being used in furniture and fashion. "Social sculpture" is providing an environmentally-friendly update to the older idea of a community coming together to paint a mural on the side of a building. In a new way, globalization is showing how it is possible to bring beauty out of museums and galleries and into the lives of people on the street.

     While artists direct social sculpture projects (Read about Theaster Gates in the earlier post, "Global Drawing Power."), people, including children, collect the recycled materials that go into the art and often help develop designs. Victor Castro has orchestrated public art projects in Mexico and Peru. For his social sculpture in Madison, Wisconsin, he invited members of the community to bring cans, bottles, cartons, and all manner of clean discarded food containers to their local libraries. At one school, children worked together to create their own collages of recycled materials. Some of their works may become part of the 2000-piece library mural Castro expects to complete this summer.

     In the later blog post, "Idea Transfer," see how children can imitate the French artist who made sculptures out of toilet paper rolls.

A Healthy Environment

Children are growing up with a concern for the environment. Their textbooks cover subjects like acid rain and pollution. School receptacles help them take recycling for granted. From the first Earth Day on April 22, 1970 to the report from the UN-sponsored Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) on April 6, 2007, young people have seen the environment make news. During their lifetimes, in 2007, former U.S. Vice President Al Gore shared a Nobel Prize for Peace for his contribution to global warming awareness. Some students probably have seen "An Inconvenient Truth," Gore's Oscar-winning documentary film on the subject.

     Carbon dioxide and other gases, such as methane, have the shorthand name, greenhouse gases. The IPCC report, Climate Change 2007: Impacts, Adaptation and Vulnerability, said there was unequivocal evidence that human activities generate the greenhouse gases that trap energy from the sun and cause global warming. Children who know they cannot leave pets alone in a car in the summer are well aware of the dangerous result when glass lets in the heat of the sun without reflecting it back out.

     Greenhouse gases are generated in a number of ways. Garbage dumped in landfills and cattle during their digestive process emit methane. Oil and coal produce needed electricity, but burning these fossil fuels produces trapped heat. Yet, more than a third of the energy consumed in the U.S. comes from oil, and coal generates nearly half of all U.S. electricity. The military requires these reliable sources of power for national security. Throughout the world, the growing industrial and transportation demand for oil, including increased domestic demand in countries that currently export oil, adds pressure to continue an aggressive search for oil shale and other limited oil reserves here and abroad.

     With the growth of world economies fueled by coal and oil, air pollution increases and the greenhouse gases that are heating the earth will continue to melt the polar ice cap and glaciers that reflect heat away from the planet. In 2012, the sea ice in the Arctic Ocean, 1.58 million square miles, was at a record low. Storms build in warm water, and, since the Atlantic Ocean is now warmer than it was in the early 20th century, storms can become more violent. Also, melting ice has caused water to rise, thereby leading to more coastal flooding from storms. As a result of the rising sea level off the coast of India and Bangladesh, New Moore Island disappeared in 2010.

     Glacier melt high up in the Himalayas and the Tibetan Plateau affects the water supply of three billion people in India, Pakistan, China, Nepal, and Bhutan. Increased melting can cause flash floods to overwhelm villages in Nepal and Bhutan. Flooding from Kashmir's record rainfall, the heaviest in 50 years, killed 400 people in 2014. Ultimately, vanishing glaciers could cause competition for limited melt, especially to grow food, among three nuclear powers: India, Pakistan, and China. On March 31, 2017, a court in India granted Himalayan glaciers the status of "legal persons" to give legal representatives a way to protect them. Water shortages are already a fact of life in China, where drought and a dam on the Yangtze River caused the country's largest freshwater lake to drop to 5% of its usual capacity. With China now planning to construct three dams on rivers flowing from the Tibetan plateau, the area's future water shortage could be even more dire. A plan to build a dam on the Irrawaddy River was blocked, because it was expected to produce electricity for China, but flood villages in Myanmar.

    Every year, World Water Day on March 22 calls attention to the fact that the U.N. already estimates over one-sixth of the world's population lacks fresh water for drinking, washing, and cooking. The Water.org website provides information about efforts to come up with solutions to the need for water in developing countries. In a limited way, according to trendwatching.com, a billboard in Peru collects water from humidity in the air. Trendwatching.com also reports that the nonprofit, Water Is Life, is distributing a "Drinkable Book" in Africa, China, and India. The pages not only provide basic health information, but they also act as water filters. Coated with silver nanoparticles, the pages remove 99% of harmful bacteria, when water passes through them.

     All in all, the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change projected the following results from an anticipated three to seven degree Fahrenheit temperature increase. Oceans would rise over islands and coastal areas, and already dry desert countries would suffer greater water shortages. There would be lower crop yields, diseases, extinction of up to 30% of plant and animal species, and intense natural disasters. Some 50 million people could become what the IPCC termed environmental refugees.

     The impact of drought on food production is leading to some solutions. Scientists are developing drought-resistant crops with longer roots to reach water and with genes, such as those from ferns and mosses, that enable crops to recover from dry periods. The Swiss firm, PlantCare Ltd, has developed a system to reduce water used to irrigate fields. Soil sensors monitor the water needs for plants at various growth stages, seasonal temperatures, and time of day before a central computer determines the amount of irrigation to deliver to a field as large as one with a 18.6 mile radius. The company also can deliver mobile irrigation systems to fields that do not have permanent ones. Another promising development is the cross-breeding process that mates animals with breeds from Africa and India that already have developed a tolerance to heat and drought. Trendwatching.com reports a truly innovative idea Korean designer, Gyeongwan Kooz, has for turning chopsticks into plants. He would put a seed under a starch cap on each chopstick. After use, the sticks would be placed tip first into soil.

Student action

From two directions, students can take action to reduce global warming and contribute to a healthy environment for the world's population. They can reduce activities that produce greenhouse gases by consuming less electricity for light, heat, air conditioning, transportation, manufacturing, pumping and purifying water, and running appliances. Secondly, they can reduce the amount of refuse that ends up in methane-producing landfills, explore ways to sop up greenhouse gases before they go into the atmosphere, and identify energy alternatives for oil and coal. The book, Green Is Good by Brian F. Keane, might even give them an idea for a career in which they can take advantage of money-making, responsible environmental opportunities.

     Summer offers students an opportunity, not only to read about ways to implement clean energy solutions, but also the chance to make a healthy contribution to the planet by drinking tap water instead of water from plastic bottles that last forever in landfills. Summer also presents an opportunity to plant a rain garden of flowers at the curb to stop dirty water from running into the street and ultimately into streams and lakes. By planting a vegetable garden, youngsters can eliminate the fossil fuel burnt carrying some foods to market. Raising vegetables and herbs can be a major undertaking (See "How Does Your Garden Grow?" at the end of this post.), but planting seeds or tomato plants in any available plot of ground still helps children learn how to care for the earth by watering their "crop," seeing it grow, removing weeds, and harvesting their own food. Young Explorers (YoungExplorers.com) and MindWare (mindware.com) both provide kits that enable children to watch a few carrots, onions, and radishes grow in a Root-Vue Farm year round. In grocery and other stores, kids might find herb plants or seeds and soil to grow rosemary, oregano, thyme, and mint in containers on sunny window sills.  

      Several science kits from MindWare (mindware.com) and Young Explorers (YoungExplorers.com) also enable young people to gain  hands-on-experience with solar power during the sunny days of summer. They will  see how solar panels can power models, including robots, a windmill and airboat. Another MindWare science kit shows how to make an oven that can cook an egg using sun power, and MindWare's Weather Station kit provides experiments that demonstrate the greenhouse effect, while its Clean Water Science kit helps kids understand the process of desalination. Free Spirit Publishing in Minneapolis offers two books that describe water-related projects for children in elementary school (Make a Splash) and those in high school (Going Blue). The company also publishes A Kids' Guide to Climate Change and Global Warming.

     When it's time to go back-to-school, the Environmental Protection Agency (epa.gov) reminds students to purchase notebooks made from recycled paper. The carbonrally.com website challenges students to strive for waste free lunches by carrying a reusable lunch box/bag and putting lunch items in washable, recycled "butter," sour cream, and cottage cheese containers. Carbonrally also suggests substituting reusable, insulated stainless steel bottles for disposable juice boxes and plastic water bottles that require energy for production and emit gases in landfills. If a school does not elect a Commissioner of Environment to student council, students should suggest the need to add this office. At my granddaughter's school, the Commissioner collects and properly disposes of recycled items from each classroom, suggests projects (planting a tree), and finds ways to participate in energy saving and other contests for students.

     Year round, children can recycle their outgrown toys and clothing at a garage sale or thrift store to eliminate the need to use electricity to manufacture new ones. They can save energy as often as they walk or run outside instead of on an electric-powered treadmill and when they walk, bike, or take public transportation rather than ask to be driven to school, activities, or the mall. Finally, they can help save water by sweeping decks, walks, and driveways rather than hosing them down.

     The same beguiling ways children use to persuade parents to buy a new cereal and scouts use to sell cookies can urge adults to:

• Replace incandescent bulbs that release carbon dioxide into the atmosphere with compact fluorescent lights. Turn off lights (and computers), when no one is using them.
• Buy ENERGY STAR (registered trademark) efficient appliances.
• When information is available on clothing tags, company websites, and apps, buy clothing that has received a high Higg Index score from the Sustainable Apparel Coalition for reducing energy costs, use of water and harmful chemicals, and unrecycled landfill fabric. 
• Buy hybrid cars that burn less fossil fuel and electric cars that run on lithium-ion battery packs.
• Paint roofs white to absorb less heat and weatherize windows and attics to prevent heat loss.
• Cut down on the use of fuel to generate electricity for air conditioning by setting summer thermostats at 78 degrees. Keep warm in winter by wearing a heavy sweater or robe rather than turning up the heat past 68 degrees.
• In hot weather, reduce the need for air conditioning by cooking in the cooler mornings and evenings.
• Rediscover awnings. Investigate and use other ways people kept buildings cool before air conditioning.
• Buy produce a a local farmers' market to reduce the fuel needed for transport, and remind them to carry a reusable sack to market and to store leftovers in glass rather than disposable plastic bags and containers.
• Urge parents to buy a mulching mower that leaves grass clippings on the lawn to decompose and   provide moisture to shade roots and reduce watering needs.
• Conserve water by fixing dripping faucets; taking shorter showers; and wetting hands or toothbrush and turning off water while applying soap or toothpaste before turning the water back on again. 
• Pave walkways, drives, and parking lots with porous concrete that enables storm water to flow back into the ground.
• Start petitions to establish recycling centers for electronic goods and to pad playgrounds with recycled, shredded tires.
• Remind adults to recycle ink cartridges at stores where they were purchased.
• Reduce landfill waste that releases methane emissions and pollutes the soil by recycling glass, paper, cans, and plastic and reusing padded mailing envelopes, plastic bags, and other items. Not only do plastic bags last forever in landfills, but they also end up in water where they kill over 100,000 whales, seals, turtles, and birds every yearSa.
• Save trees by getting off mailing lists for unwanted catalogs and viewing brochures and other information that is available online.
• Keep from contaminating soil and water by using safe community disposal methods for used batteries, oil, computers, and energy efficient light bulbs that contain mercury.
• Visit the website, smartpower.org, to learn about the Neighbor to Neighbor Challenge.

 Absorb less heat

Scientists in the field of geoengineering are discovering ways to control global warming by helping the planet absorb less heat. To counteract the loss of reflective ice from shrinking polar ice caps, they would force the ocean's dark open water to absorb more carbon dioxide by fertilizing plankton with iron and phosphorus. Other geoengineering proposals worthy of pro and con study include: sending giant mirrors into space, injecting reflective sulfate particles into the stratosphere, pumping seawater into clouds to help them block more sun, covering the deserts with reflective sheets, and engineering trees to absorb more carbon dioxide.

     As is, one mature tree already absorbs 48 pounds of carbon dioxide according to the website, planetgreen. discovery.com. The 2004 Nobel Peace Prize Laureate, Wangari Maathai, founded a program to plant a billion trees. The United Nations Environmental Programme reports her idea has resulted in 12 billion trees being planted in 193 countries. At school and at home, students can join this effort by planting trees and going to unep.org/billiontreecampaign to record the number of trees they planted.

     Trees have the added benefit of cutting down on electricity consumption. The Department of Energy reports as few as three leafy deciduous trees placed on the south and west sides of a building block sunlight and prevent summer heat buildup indoors. Once these same trees lose their leaves in fall, they let in sunlight to warm buildings in the winter. Evergreen trees on the north and west sides of a building block wintry winds.

    Another idea to keep an eye on is a light-colored coating for black asphalt pavements. Several colors are being tested. They show promise for reflecting up to 40% of energy.

    

Energy alternatives

The need to reduce pollution and greenhouse gases has set off a race to find quick fix solutions and alternatives for fossil fuels. Much like foods that stress their low fat and high fiber content, but fail to mention they contain lots of salt and sugar, remedies proposed as renewable resources, solutions for a clean environment, and the cure for global warming gloss over drawbacks. The Department of Energy's Energy Efficiency & Renewable Energy website (eere.energy.gov) provides information about alternative energy sources, such as solar, wind, water, biomass, geothermal, and hydrogen and fuel cells.

        Students challenged to develop science fair, scouting, or research projects might want to learn more about the peel-and-stick solar panels developed by Chi Hwan Lee and Xiaolin Zheng at Stanford. Unlike the heavy, rigid fixed panels that now collect solar energy, their process creates a flexible film of solar cells. Students should be able to find many uses for this low cost, peel-and-stick solar cell film that can adhere to irregular surfaces and to paper, plastic, window glass, and other materials.

     Students interested in designing a full scale green city of the future will want to keep an eye on Chengdu, the city in southwestern China that is designed to accommodate 80,000 residents in a central core surrounded by green areas and parks. This city aims to develop solar, water, and waste systems that use 48% less energy and 58% less water than towns of a comparable size.

     Students also need to think about tackling some of the problems associated with the following "solutions."

     Although hybrid and electric automobiles reduce carbon emissions from burning fossil fuel, expansion of the electric power grid needed to supply these cars requires additional fuel. Moreover, these cars are too expensive for most buyers, and more battery exchange or electric charging stations are needed to service hybrid and electric autos. According to the website, trendwatching.com, a company in Italy has come up with a solar powered charger for electric vehicles.

     Without any changes, all automobiles can reduce gasoline consumption by substituting a 10% ethanol additive. However, land needed to grow ethanol crops, such as corn and soybeans, has led to food and animal feed shortages, the destruction of rain forests that sop up greenhouse gases, and reduced animal habitats.

     Biodiesel fuel can be extracted from algae that is fertilized by municipal and agricultural wastewater and even saltwater. The carbon dioxide released from burning algae-based biodiesel fuel is less than the amount of carbon dioxide absorbed during the algae growing process. But the cost of establishing a one acre algae pond mixed by motorized paddle wheels is higher than planting corn for ethanol. Bioreactors that prevent microorganisms from invading ponds increase costs even more. Algae ponds also absorb less carbon dioxide in winter and none at night. At the moment, the cost of extracting and refining biodiesel from algae is too high to be economically feasible.

     Homes and businesses can tap into the Earth's underground heat (geothermal energy) to reduce carbon emissions, but front-end installation costs, including small bore drilling to reach the heat source target, can be expensive. Underground lakes of heated water, not available everywhere, are the best sources of geothermal power. However, the permits and other hurdles involved can delay a geothermal power plant from being built for 5 to 10 years.

     A close look at wind power also reveals drawbacks as well as benefits. At best, one estimate suggests wind could generate only 20% of the energy used in the U.S. by 2030. A less reported problem is the number of wind turbines that have caught on fire. Touted as a non-polluting and renewable source of electricity, wind power proponents also stress the industry's potential for job creation. What has been downplayed is the need to spend billions for new transmission lines to connect remote wind farms to urban areas and the need to develop storage capacity to save wind energy for calm days, since wind speed (and sun for solar power) does not ebb and flow with the demand for electricity.

      Apple is seeking a  patent on a process that addresses the problem of storing wind power energy by enabling the heat generated by rotating wind turbines to be stored in fluid. This concept of turning wind power into heated fluid also is being used to generate electricity by turning solar power provided by mirrors into superheated water that becomes the steam that turns turbines. While solar-thermal plants can generate electricity without the pollution and carbon emissions of fossil fuels, they are more costly than coal and natural gas furnaces. Government guaranteed loans were needed to help finance Ivanpah, the solar-thermal plant on the California-Nevada border in the Mojave Desert. Nonetheless, this plant, which also enjoys the guaranteed purchase of its electricity at above market prices from California's utilities, is a model for interested Middle Eastern desert countries, such as Saudi Arabia.

     Further, besides the problems of transmitting and storing wind power, some are concerned about the effect wind farms have on people, especially those living in wide open spaces where the wind power industry pressures local governments to grant noise control exemptions. Noise from wind turbines is described either as a jet engine or a rhythmic hum. In either case, the sound cannot be ignored while watching TV or trying to sleep. One study at a home 1,280 feet from a wind farm in Brown County, Wisconsin, found that even almost inaudible, low-frequency sound coming from outside caused homeowners nausea, dizziness, headaches, and ear pressure similar to motion sickness. According to a report in the "Wisconsin State Journal" (January 4, 2013), Clean Wisconsin, an environmental group that arranged the test and favors renewable energy, contended the study did not conclude that low-frequency sound caused the health problems, because no peer-reviewed studies found health problems related to inaudible sounds. Headaches, dizziness, and nausea also have been claimed by some people affected by the flicker effect of alternating shadows and sunlight caused by the spinning blades.

     Four years from now, wind turbines developed by the Spanish firm, Vortex Bladeless, could overcome some of the criticisms that have prevented windfarms from serving as an alternate source of energy, especially near homes in urban areas. A smaller version of the Vortex bladeless wind turbine, coupled with a solar panel and small battery, could be available to run three lights, a TV, and a refrigerator in homes in Africa and India in 18 months.

     By eliminating moving parts, bladeless wind turbines don't cause the flicker effect, and they are less visually intrusive, almost noiseless, and safer for birds. Yet they are able to collect close to 40% of energy from the wind (less than the 50% some conventional wind turbines collect and generate). Positioned on a magnetic base, the bladeless mast amplifies the oscillation caused by the swirling air passing by the 150-meter tall turbine. Since there is no friction, there is no need for lubricating oils. The lack of mechanical parts also reduces manufacturing and maintenance costs.

     Like Vortex Bladeless, students might focus on the questions about wind power that need answers. Are people making health claims because they do not like the look of wind turbines and the view they obstruct? Could strategically placed trees muffle sound and prevent flickering light and shadows? In terms of zoning, how close should turbines be to homes? What are acceptable low-frequency and high-frequency decibel sound levels? At what noise level do conventional wind turbines constitute a nuisance? What percentage of the nearby population has to be disturbed in order for a community to get an injunction stopping windfarm construction? Should state and/or federal governments prohibit local authorities from imposing regulations that block or ban wind energy projects?

Conclusion

Books and toys are beginning to tap into the concern children show for the planet. A Child's Introduction to the Environment, which comes with a reusable lunch sack, explains the need to protect the air, earth, and sea and lists 15 easy things to do to help the environment. It also includes instructions for conducting experiments, such as detecting smog. Catalogues from MindWare (mindware.com) and Young Explorers (YoungExplorers.com) come with more and more toys that demonstrate how new power sources work.

     Focusing on the environment means focusing on an interrelated system that includes the natural world and all the peoples that inhabit the Earth. Sometime in a child's future there may be no magazine articles, talk shows, television segments, websites, or documentary films devoted to reducing carbon footprints, water conservation, and recycling. These activities could become such a normal part of life that they would merit no more public discussion that how to order fast food, use an ATM, or wear contact lenses do today. If that day comes, kids can congratulate themselves for the healthy world they helped create.


                                                How Does Your Garden Grow?

Different soils have different needs Get a soil test by the state's cooperative extension service or buy a soil test kit at a garden center. Heavy clay soil, for example, requires added sand and nutrients from peat moss, manure, or compost. Acidic soil may need lime; alkaline soil, sulfur.

Dig up and turn over the top layer of soil before planting Remove weeds, rocks, and other debris from garden plot. Add compost or manure fertilizer. Make organic compost from lawn clippings, leaves, kitchen vegetable scraps, and egg shells. Go to the websites, birdsandblooms.com/mag and planetgreen.discovery.com, for additional composting ideas.

Fence out predators, including rabbits and pets Marigolds may deter rabbits, but, to really deter burrowers, a fine mesh fence needs to extend below ground level. Keeping deer out will require a six-foot fence. Pest control may require treatments matched to specific bugs.

Grow vegetables and herbs Check seed packets for advice about when to plant, how deep to plant, and how far apart to space plants. On little sticks, label which vegetables have been planted where. Tall plants, such as tomatoes and cucumbers, require support by tall stakes or small branches, and they should be planted on the north side of the garden to keep from shading lower plants. Vegetables might include: beets, broccoli, carrots, cucumbers, lettuce, onions, peppers, radishes, scallions, snap peas, squash,  and Swiss chard. Plant herbs, such as basil, chives, oregano, parsley, rosemary, sage, and thyme.

Maintain the garden by watering, weeding, and removing withered growths When possible, water with rainwater collected in buckets. Sandy soil needs more frequent watering than clay. Weeds will take over the garden if not pulled out by the root.

A mini-greenhouse provides a year round growing season. The website, fourseasonfarm.com, lists sources for glass greenhouses.