Inspiration

Maybe?

Density

Tampa, which I believe is the 14th largest metropolitan area in in the country, ranks 31st in density.

via Yglesias.

Clean Cities

From the LeMieux Report and Forbes:

“Want to live where the air is sweet, the water is pure and the streets are clean? Try the country. But what if you don’t like the sticks? Then try Florida.

Led by Miami, the Sunshine State dominates our 2008 list of America’s Cleanest Cities with four metro areas in the top 10–Jacksonville (No. 3), Orlando (No. 4) and Tampa-St. Petersburg (No. all make appearances. Clearly, a state that relies so heavily on tourism and part-time snow-bird residents knows the value of keeping itself spruced up for company.

With the built-in advantage of weather patterns that blow out smog, these large metropolitan areas, together with No. 2-ranked Seattle and No. 5 Portland, Ore., top our 2008 list. But it’s more than just sea breezes pushing these metros up the list. These big cities are also reaping the rewards of investing in efforts to keep clean, even as their populations boom.”

I discussed the natural benefit we have obtained from our weather patterns here.

Smog

The EPA has mandated that Tampa must use special formulations of gasoline that are designed to reduce the emission of pollutants into the atmosphere. I am not surprised, Tampa benefits from an extremely flat geography and the daily summer sea-breeze that allow for pollutants to be blown offshore. In LA, the smog gets trapped against the mountains. Given the city’s rapid growth and car dependence, the geographic effects could only offset the pollution from increased driving last so long.

Coase in Real Life

It turns out St. Pete has a lot of unused parking spaces and the Rays want to use them rather than be forced to build even more parking that will only be used for baseball games. Turns out most of the unused parking spaces are privately owned and the Rays will have trouble getting access to them:

“Anybody that potentially would have spaces available, of course they would be interested,” said Susan Reiter, the facilities director for St. Petersburg College, which has a 170-space garage downtown. The Rays estimate 82 spaces may be available for weeknight baseball games.

“If the stars align, yes we might sit down and talk,” Reiter said. “It would be nice to make money. But to say you’re going to get 82 spaces from us is erroneous.”"

This is, of course, a Coase Theorem problem where the transaction costs for accessing a handful of parking spaces may outweigh the profits for leasing those spots, thereby preventing an otherwise mutually beneficial transaction from occurring. One potential solution is for the government to set the terms of the lease and mandate access to the spots. Thus, reducing the transaction costs and allowing the transaction to occur.

For more on the costs of parking see my earlier posts here.

Recycycle

“Green publication E magazine says you can recycle more stuff than you might think, and offers a reference on the right places to recycle everything from iPods to record albums to styrofoam to batteries to cars. If you’ve got old office supplies and miscellaneous materials, you may be able to recycle that, too:”

from lifehacker.

And there is always freecycle:

“The Tampa Freecycle(tm) Network is open to all who want to “recycle” that special something rather than throw it away. Whether it’s a chair, a fax machine, piano or an old door, feel free to post it. Or maybe you’re looking to acquire something yourself! Nonprofit groups are also welcome to participate too!”

Future Farmers of America

“Steeped in years of talk around college campuses and in stylish urban enclaves about the evils of factory farms (see the E. coli spinach outbreaks), the perils of relying on petroleum to deliver food over long distances (see global warming) and the beauty of greenmarkets (see the four-times-weekly locavore cornucopia in Union Square), some young urbanites are starting to put their muscles where their pro-environment, antiglobalization mouths are. They are creating small-scale farms near urban areas hungry for quality produce and willing to pay a premium.”

more here.

Where our energy comes from (U.S.)

A really interesting diagram of the sources of U.S energy in 2006 and where it goes:

the original is here.

Go Green

If you live in the Tampa Bay Area, Tampa Electric lets you elect to use renewable energy instead of normal mix of:

• Oil & Gas – 37%
• Coal – 48%
• Purchased Power – 15%

to sign up go here.  The cost is $5/month for 200 kilowatt-hours.

Ethano? 2

Following up on earlier doubts about Florida’s investment in Ethanol, the Fueling Station reports that the U.S. Ethanol Boom is responsible for increasing pollution in the Gulf of Mexico.

Of course, our farm subsidies in general are absolutely, completely insane.

Who loves the Sun

Floridians apparrently:

“The poll quizzed 625 registered voters, asking “Do you think the Florida legislature should or should not encourage investment in solar energy?” Eighty-five percent answered “should,” “

Density Preserves the Countryside

“My daughter’s 4,” Veno said, “and I’m not sure she’d recognize a squirrel if she saw one.”

more here.

from M. Ygelsias.

Nukelear

Not sure if I have an opinion about this but:

“Progress Energy tripled its estimate for its new nuclear power plant in Levy County, saying Monday that the new price is $17-billion. Customers could start paying for it next year, with the average residential customer facing an increase of about $9 a month.”

Eat Locally = Less Driving

Another example of how green activities can improve the local economy:

“A full tractor-trailer hauls about 32,000 pounds of produce. On average…this food travels about 1,750 miles from farm to market, in trucks that get about 5.5 miles per gallon. That’s 320 gallons of fuel to transport 32,000 pounds, or about a gallon of fuel for every 100 pounds of food.”

Can I mention how perverse our farm industry is:

“Like most processed foods, the Twinkie is basically a clever arrangement of carbohydrates and fats teased out of corn, soybeans and wheat — three of the five commodity crops that the farm bill supports, to the tune of some $25 billion a year. (Rice and cotton are the others.) For the last several decades — indeed, for about as long as the American waistline has been ballooning — U.S. agricultural policy has been designed in such a way as to promote the overproduction of these five commodities, especially corn and soy.”

Solar Power

” Solar-power-plant company Ausra has released a paper claiming that solar-thermal electric technology can provide 90 percent of U.S. grid electricity, with enough left over to power a fleet of plug-in electric vehicles. The company estimates that such a changeover would eliminate 40 percent of the country’s greenhouse gas emissions with a land footprint of 9,600 square miles, about the size of Vermont (thanks, Kent).The key to the scenario, however, is developing the ability to store energy for 16 hours, thus creating a stable power source through cloudy periods and the night, a feat that has so far eluded engineers.

“If we can do storage,” Ausra CEO Bob Fishman said, “We can take on coal.”
From Wired.

Free Roads

See here.

See also my previous post on free parking.

Eckerd College Enviromental Film Fest

Its been going on for a week now, but if you are in St. Pete today you may want to check out the Eckerd College Environmental Film Festival:

March 1 at 7 p.m.
Up The Yangtze
Presented by: Hong Gu, Eckerd College instructor

To New Horizons

Wow. Check out this pre-WWII video of life in the future. Via Greater Greater Washington.

Building for Mass Transit

Mass Transit only works if cities have sufficient density that riders can walk (1) from their homes to  mass transit and (2) from mass transit to their destination.  That is why the first step in building mass transit is zoning for high density housing and commercial development.

DC has a mixed record on this but is improving their efforts:

“Transit-oriented development concentrates jobs, housing and retail around transit, reducing congestion, greenhouse gas emissions and sprawl.”

EthaNo?

The Buzz links to article questioning whether the State of Florida’s $50 million investment in Ethanol Production is worth the cost, but of course like almost all environmental questions there are secondary benefits that we receive regardless of the environmental impact:

“Jeremy Susac, director of Florida’s Energy Office, stands behind the state’s investment. He believes that the latest science is flawed and that ethanol offers deep cuts in greenhouse gas emissions. Even if ethanol turns out to be a major polluter, he’d still back it.

“Even if it’s a wash, even it’s just as bad as gasoline, why not stimulate production in-house?” Susac asked. “How many wars do you have to have in the Middle East before you say it’s a good idea to reduce our dependence on foreign oil?”

Plus, $50 million dollars is not really all that much money in the context of a budget approaching $70 BILLION.

Green Housing

“In the American Institute of Architects’ fourth-quarter survey of 500 architects, 61% said their clients are interested in “renewable” flooring materials like cork and bamboo, up from 53% a year earlier; 47% said clients wanted high-end appliances, down from 65%.

Being earth-conscious isn’t always easy. Anna and David Porter decided three years ago to trade in their 4,000-square-foot Seattle home for a smaller, greener abode. They paid about $300,000 for an old house on a beachfront lot in Stanwood, Wash., and budgeted $450,000 to renovate it into a green showplace, with kitchen countertops made of recycled glass and concrete, a geothermal heat pump, a tankless hot-water heater, a solar electric system and cabinetry and flooring made from sustainably harvested wood.”

via the WSJ.

The Curse of Free Parking

Rod Goodspeed discusses Donald Shoup’s The High Cost of free Parking:

“Our zoning codes also require a certain number of off-street parking spaces for new buildings. Shoup critiques these requirements as a pseudo-science, complaining they are based on statistically dubious studies measuring “demand” for free parking in suburban locations. The cost of this parking, up to $35,000 per space, is almost never passed along to the parking users. Furthermore, the zoning requires parking to satisfy peak requirements, meaning it sits empty almost the entire year. In the aggregate, Shoup thinks the requirements are a total planning disaster: he argues they encourage auto use, damage the economy, degrade the environment, debase architecture and urban design, burden enterprise, prevent the reuse of older buildings, among a litany of other offenses. In Shoup’s view, “Off-street parking, far more than the interstate highway system, have spurred the dominance of the automobile.’”

via The Goodspeed Update.

Where our electricty comes from

On my electric bill this month I learned that:

“For the 12-month period ending December 2007, the percentage of fuel type used by Tampa Electric to provide electricity to its customers was:”

• Oil & Gas – 37%
• Coal – 48%
• Purchased Power – 15%

Does anybody know more about ‘purchased power?’ Is it Nuclear? Or is it part of TECO’s Green Energy Program? Both?

Windmill/Wind Turbine Explosion

When Wind Power Goes Bad (via BoingBoing):

from www.youtube.com posted with vodpod

For a nicer look at Wind Power see my earlier post.

Green Investment

“A group of nearly 50 institutional investors, made up mainly of US state treasurers and public sector pension funds, and with $1,750bn (£892bn, €1,192bn) under management, agreed to increase their green investments at an “investor summit” held at the United Nations in New York last week by Ceres, a coalition of investors concerned about climate change impact.The investors also pledged to hold funds, fund managers and the companies they invest in to greater account in how they dealt with the challenge of global warming.”

and it has a Florida angle:

“Alex Sink, chief financial officer for the state of Florida, said her state was the first, last October, to require fund managers to disclose how they were incorporating climate change into investment decisions. “We got a whole range of responses. Some were very positive but other investment managers were stunned – they did not know how to react,” she said.”

From the Financial Times.