Melanie Chan/Staff

One of the biggest challenges for sustainable international economic development is the need to control greenhouse gas emissions. Before we can make meaningful progress toward stabilizing the planet’s climate, we need to have an international roadmap for economic growth, job creation and poverty alleviation that still bends the curve on emissions.

Solutions for saving the planet need to be ones that contribute to economic growth! Certainly, for developed economies, we need to have a plan for sustainable growth that includes emerging energy-efficiency technologies, novel green generation technologies and new infrastructures. For the developing world, however, the path to development goes through an increase in per capita consumption of energy. A fundamental sticking point to agreeing to an international agreement on carbon emissions has been the concern in developing economies that such an agreement will stymie GDP growth.

I deeply believe, however, that it is possible to chart a course for economic advancement in both developed and developing economies while still curbing greenhouse emissions. On the demand side, overall energy consumption can be grouped into three categories: buildings, transportation and industry. For example, energy-efficiency technologies have the potential to reduce energy consumption in buildings in an economically viable fashion by as much as 50 percent in the next five years, with the consequent drops in greenhouse gas emissions. In countries in the midst of building booms, new advances in materials and green cement will lead to even higher savings.

On the supply side, new technologies such as smart grids, solar thermal, nuclear and hydrogen fuels hold rich possibilities. The specific trajectory to economic growth, however, will vary from economy to economy, and the overall trajectory will need to be set strategically through a rigorous and vibrant roadmapping process.

This carbon emission quandary, with stalled international negotiations and ineffective policies, is analogous to a problem faced by the semiconductor industry.

Although the semiconductor industry had been doubling every 12 to 18 months for close to three decades, by the late 1980s, the complexity of the semiconductor supply chain began to dampen innovation and cost billions. Semiconductor industry groups, academics and manufacturers met to discuss best practices and fundamental decisions underpinning their industry and created the International Technology Roadmap for Semiconductors in 1992. The plan continues to be updated annually and exists like a living document.

If the current boom in the Information Age and the ubiquity of devices such as smartphones, which rely on cheaper and faster semiconductors by the Silicon roadmap, is any indicator, the plan is working well.

To pursue the analogy between the Silicon roadmap and a carbon roadmap, with colleagues at UC Berkeley such as professors Spanos, Zysman, Ramesh and Doyle, we have launched the Center for Research in Energy Systems Transformation. CREST is under the rubric of the campuswide Berkeley Energy and Climate Initiative.

CREST is working to create roadmaps that are owned by implementers and are cooperatively developed for the purpose of guiding the world’s energy system toward high efficiency while producing fewer greenhouse gases.

The CREST carbon roadmap has two arms. The first is to develop long-term plans for specific carbon-reducing technologies. As a test case, Berkeley engineers are investigating how sensors and networks deployed in smart, green buildings can be designed for easy adoption on different scales. CREST makes use of Berkeley’s deep vein of multidisciplinary, smart building-technology research.

Second, CREST seeks to develop locally adapted tools and technologies that are sensitive to place, politics and culture. That’s why the second part of the CREST carbon roadmap is to identify obstacles to cross-national technology development and implementation. Colleagues such as professors Brewer, Miguel, Gadgil, Wolfram and others power the Blum Center for Developing Economies’ new partnership with USAID in a project called the Development Innovations Laboratory, which includes the development of sustainable energy technology roadmaps in economies such as India, Indonesia, Kenya, etc.

I was recently asked to serve on a new United Nations Scientific Advisory Board, which will provide guidance to U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon on international sustainable development issues, staffed by the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization with its mandate for science and technology.

I look forward to expanding on bringing the work that we are doing at centers such as CREST and Blum to the international conversation about sustainable development.

I am confident we can create a carbon-roadmap-style plan that outlines how equitable prosperity can be reached across the planet and shows that economic growth, job creation and greenhouse gas reduction are not mutually exclusive.

Shankar Sastry is dean of the College of Engineering and the faculty director at the Blum Center for Developing Economies.

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J. Hannah Lee/Staff

In a surprising turn of events that neither his six-month impending chancellorship nor his half-hour interview revealed, the newly reigning Chancellor Nicholas Dirks is privy to basic human emotions, which include enjoyment, laughter and, most importantly, having fun. On his first day in office, Dirks let his Einstein-like composure slip into what closely resembled a smile when the Cal band welcomed him to the campus’s highest office. Later, in an irrefutable confirmation of our suspicions, he claimed that his motto was to “have fun every day.”

How does this stack up against other mottos we’ve come to know?

“You only live once.” Perhaps the most prevalent one-liner that spread through the world since Drake released his album Take Care a little over a year-and-a-half ago, we can definitively say that Dirks beats out the “Degrassi” star here. Sure, the appended YOLO may have inspired people to live life to the fullest, but what’s living life if you don’t really have fun during that one life? It may take a while for Dirks’ slogan to reach the number of people that Drake’s gotten to, but the former has the advantage of a rather catchy acronym: HFED. We’re sensing a collaboration.

“Don’t be evil.” It may astound you that this replaced Google’s infinitely popular previous slogan of “Search, Ads and Apps,” but they do seem like words to live by. This does clash with Dirks’ message to some degree, because it is entirely possible to have fun while being evil, as evidenced by Dirks’ menacing spectacled stare. Google’s does appear a bit hypocritical because it is the closest thing we have to Skynet, while Dirks holds steadfast to his with that charming smile.

“Winter is coming.” It’s no contest here — Dirks wins by a landslide. It’s been three seasons since Ned Stark first uttered this catchy phrase, and it has yet to manifest itself. Having fun every day does seem like a more family-friendly motto than the dark anxious-sounding motto of House Stark, which has almost seen its entire family slaughtered. The House Dirks would undoubtedly play well in the books — we hear that George R.R. Martin is for once having trouble pulling creativity out of his massive beard.

“Help will always be given … to those who ask for it.” Dirks should pay close attention to this, as he may well make use of it considering the numerous problems he has chosen to tackle. First, he has planned to unceremoniously dispose of all the cards and stationery that bear the title “Chancellor-designate” because he has formally shed that moniker as of June 3. Good luck taking that under the Berkeley sustainability collective.

What do you think of Chancellor Dirks’ new motto? Let us know in the comments!

Contact Uday at umehta@dailycal.org or follow him on Twitter at @mehtakid.

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Michael Ball/Staff

Plastics that cannot be recycled will become the focus of a UC Berkeley research center aiming to eliminate waste on campus by the year 2020.

Two weeks ago, the campus secured funding for a zero-waste research center to study where waste on campus is coming from and what can be done to reduce it. The first action the center will take is adoption of the Plastic Disclosure Project, a worldwide initiative asking the business world to report and assess how much plastic waste it is producing.

The project was founded last year by UC Berkeley alumnus Doug Woodring, who witnessed the effects of plastic in local waters and at the North Pacific Gyre, an aggregate of plastic floating in the middle of the Pacific Ocean. Woodring said the project is looking to work with businesses “to hold a mirror up to themselves” and address how plastic production and waste effect plastic pollution in oceans. UC Berkeley will be the first campus in the world to join the project.

“Even though (Berkeley) as a school does not make plastic, as a recipient, it is important to understand what the waste streams are,” Woodring said.

Lin King, manager of Campus Recycling and Refuse Services, said the research center was created as a way for the campus to meet the university’s goal of waste elimination by 2020. According to Lin, 25 percent of the waste that is produced by campus is not recyclable or compostable. A significant portion of what is left, he said, is plastic.

Within the next month, Recycling and Refuse Services will begin a several-month audit of campuswide waste. The study will look at diverse campus buildings — laboratories, student residences, lecture halls — to look at what waste campus is producing, as well as keep an eye on what waste is brought onto campus from outside.

“We are looking at if our vendors are making plastic material that cannot be recycled. We want to make it so that they can take plastic back and make something else from it,” King said. “We are also looking at reuse options. Harvard University, for example, looked at the cost of labware and saw that going back to reusable glassware was cheaper than going with plastic.”

Elizabeth Chan, a 2012 UC Berkeley graduate, was a student in Shanghai when she heard Woodring speak about the project at the nonprofit at which she was interning. She decided to help bring the project to campus.

“I understood the landscape of the environment and knew that Berkeley had a 2020 zero waste goal. I thought PDP would be a perfect avenue for that goal,” Chan said.

After returning to campus the next school year, Chan kept in touch with Woodring and acted as a liaison between the project and campus. She applied for funding for the project through the Green Initiative Fund, a student-funded initiative to support projects to reduce Berkeley’s impact on the environment.

King’s department also applied for green initiative funding for the research center at the same time as Chan. King said the two projects were eventually merged under the same grant because the project fit into the mission of the research center.

Chan, who works on environmental issues in the Bay Area, will continue in an advisory role on the project, but King said he is looking for students to take on implementation of the project in the coming year. After completing a report for the Plastic Disclosure Project, the zero-waste research center will then look at ways to reduce waste.

“I think that it is great that we are not looking to eliminate or ban plastic altogether,” King said. “We are tracking it and working with our vendors to try to find a solution.”

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Anjelica Colliard/Staff

Spring is a busy time for a maize geneticist. Experiments have to be planned, students have to be recruited and thousand of seeds have to be carefully organized and packaged for planting. It is important to get everything just right, because we only get one opportunity to do large-scale field experiments each year.

The cross-pollinations that we do in the summer are at the heart of our research; everything flows from them. Imagine my dismay, then, when I drove by our field this past weekend and saw that it was filled with strangers.

For years, we have been aware that our field space, part of the Gill Tract, was eventually slated for some other form of use. However, the slow pace of negotiations between UC Berkeley, the local government and various citizen groups seemed to ensure that this process would be long and drawn out and would have involved finding us a replacement site and plenty of time to plan our move.

Local democracy is messy, particularly in a place like Albany, where everyone seems to have an opinion and no one is ever completely satisfied. One compromise that had been reached was that a Whole Foods Market and a senior center would be built at another site on the Gill Tract. This was unacceptable to some people, so they occupied our research field.

The aim was to protect the Gill Tract so that it can be used for sustainable agriculture — an admirable goal, since everyone loves urban gardening. The occupiers pulled up the winter cover of mustard plants and proceeded to plant thousands of vegetable seedlings in the best part of the field, which had been carefully maintained over the years by our excellent field staff.

The result was a made-for-TV propaganda coup, with urban farmers of all ages happily occupying what I suspect many of them thought was unused land. Both local and national coverage was generally positive, since no one can resist such appealing images and such a good cause. The rest is just details. But, of course, sometimes the devil is in the details.

Contrary to what was claimed initially, the Whole Foods Market actually had been slated to be built on a nearby empty lot, not our field space. But that lot would have been difficult to farm, and our space had been carefully tended for many years.

What about the scientists who were just about to plant in the field and whose research and education programs are dependent on using it? Well, we were told, you can just go somewhere else. Besides, you work on corn, which we all know is a bad plant.

As reported by Alternet, Robbie Zeinstra remarked, “Most of the research being done here is corn genetic isolation. It could be harmless or it could be used for genetic modification and more of a capitalist approach to agriculture.”  He also pointed out that, “We don’t know if the researchers on this plot are being funded by Novartis, Syngenta or BP. We can assume so.” Well, that all sounds kind of menacing, doesn’t it?

According to the Albany Patch, Ashoka Finley said, “Our position is that we don’t really need any more corn research.” Seriously? The vast majority of our research is devoted to using maize as a model in order to understand basic questions concerning how all plants develop and how they regulate their genes. Surely this is important, unless you believe that nothing useful ever comes from basic research. Further, the research done at the Gill Tract is funded by the federal government, not corporations, and we are not permitted to grow GMOs at Gill.

So it would appear that both the location of the proposed development and the nature of the research that was being blocked by this occupation were either misrepresented or, more charitably, misunderstood.

The activists involved have made a series of poor decisions based on inadequate information. They appear to be unhappy with the messy, slow and unsatisfying process of local democracy and have decided to take matters into their own hands for our own good and in the name of “the community.” To do that, they had to break the law and jeopardize the research and education that normally would take place at the Gill Tract.

Various members of this diffuse group of activists, as well as some academics, tell us that this occupation is part of a larger struggle for sustainable agriculture. They seem to feel that if the work of a few scientists and their students has to be sacrificed for the greater good, then so be it, particularly if that research isn’t the kind of which they approve.

Apparently, we are to be collateral damage in a great and noble struggle. But that, of course, is just the problem. As noble as the goals might be, it is not right for a group of self-appointed guardians of the land to decide for the rest of us how this space is to be used. It is not right for them to block research that is paid for by all of us, and it is certainly not right for them to make unilateral decisions about whose research is or is not acceptable.

Sustainable agriculture is a fine idea, but so is respect for other people. The activists lost the moral high ground when they forgot that.

Damon Lisch is an associate research professional in the Department of Plant and Microbial Biology.

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“Monoculture” lowers crop “biodiversity.” These are big words with negative connotations that keep coming up in the propaganda pieces of the food movement. The reason acres of land are planted with the same crop is so they can be treated exactly the same and harvested on the same perfect day, thus maximizing yield (energy efficiency = minimize inputs and maximize outputs). Monoculture increases risk of crop disease, but there is no risk to biodiversity. (Using the word “biodiversity” must bring with it risk of extinction, and this is not the correct word to use with crops. Crops have their highly valued, diverse germplasms in banks). Removing “the corporation” from agriculture removes the energy efficiency and removes the possibly of the eating of any animal food being different from eating oil.  The developing middle class of the world votes unequivocally to eat more chickens.

I personally love the idea of the woodlot. A modern pioneer owns 40 acres of mixed forest, and with the wood that grows sustainably from the sun’s energy each year, she fires a modern, EPA-certified, Energy Star wood-burning stove that heats the off-the-grid cabin, boils water and is a stove-top. To think that most of our 7 billion people on Earth could live like this is beyond ignorant. There are two reasons our food supply has kept pace with population growth (in everywhere but sub-Saharan Africa), and they’re improved genetic technology and industrialization. “Heritage crops” grown in urban gardens make hobby-food but can contribute almost nothing to feeding the world without using way more land and energy. Much of the “food movement” is about well-off people needing something. What?

I’ve studied the food movement for nine years now and discuss this topic every year with my Plant and Microbial Biology 13 students here at UC Berkeley. I think I’ve found the real need that drives the food movement, and it’s primarily not about food at all but distrust and fear (or hate?) of corporations. I do not like the corporatization of my life, my university or my food. Corporatization seems dehumanizing to me. However, I’m one of 7 billion living in a rapidly warming 21st century. We made way too many babies for our small planet. I hope we regular people learn how to better control our agricultural corporations, but we really should admit how much we need agribusiness for energy efficiency (and that we are getting just what we deserve!). We did not and do not need all of our people! In about 1924, our Earth had 2 billion people on it, and it will again someday. Until then, I suggest that those interested in food learn the facts and the realities. When we do, I trust we all will find the reasoning of the occupiers of the Gill Tract and the activists of the the food movement to be well-meaning but ultimately not properly addressing how we need to produce food. Perhaps fears of monster corporations and dreams of a more egalitarian politic have clouded their minds. Fears and dreams won’t get us out of our pickle.

Because of basic research, we are learning how plants work. In my opinion, crops will either be genetically upgraded or they will fail to produce in our hotter, drier, degraded future (with economic collapse possible). Basic research is — or was — going on at the university’s Gill Tract. Dr. Damon Lisch, in my lab, with the support of the National Science Foundation, hopes to plant his seed at the tract in about three weeks. I’d like to see Dr. Lisch’s and similar cutting-edge research valued by my university and all people.

Michael Freeling is a professor in the Department of Plant and Microbial Biology.

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Yian Shang/Staff

Would you believe me if I told you we are flushing our most valuable resources down the toilet?

It’s simple: we eat, therefore we poop. And though we think of and treat this excrement as waste, it is full of the same nutrients we pump into our diets. Poop has in it water, potassium, phosphorous and nitrogen. Also included are thousands of beneficial bacteria that live to eat and decompose our waste. When given the opportunity to decompose naturally, our poop turns into soil that is healthier than what you can buy at a local nursery.

It just so happens that water, potassium, phosphorous and nitrogen are essential nutrients needed to grow food. Farms use tons of energy-intensive synthetic fertilizers to feed their crops, when instead they could use soil created from nutrient-rich human waste, also known as “humanure”.

It’s not only essential nutrients we flush each time we go to the bathroom. Even the most efficient toilets flush 1.5 liters of potable tap water down the toilet. For those of us in Alameda County, that is 1.5 liters of pure snowmelt from the Hetch Hetchy Reservoir.

Yep. We poop in water we could drink!

So, where does this contaminated water go after we flush it down the toilet? Most toilets in developed areas are hooked up to sewage lines. To clean the water you pooped in, sewage treatment plants pump chlorine and other toxic chemicals into the wastewater. After multiple disinfection and de-chlorination steps (because chlorine is, believe it or not, poisonous for our environment), the water and contaminated sludge are pumped into rivers, deltas, lakes or ground water. In the bestcase scenarios, the treated wastewater and sludge are used in agriculture after further disinfection and after synthetic nutrients are added, where the toxic chemicals still manage to pollute the environment. At worst, sludge is dumped directly into our waterways. Now that’s a waste!

But it’s not only water and nutrients we are wasting. The U.S. spends $4 billion annually to produce the energy needed to power centralized sewage treatment plants. That’s three percent of our total energy budget.

Would you believe me if I told you we can safely and sanitarily capture nutrients in humanure without contaminating water or spending billions of dollars?

Composting toilets look like flush toilets, but instead of flushing excrement down pipes, a ventilated container collects it. Biodegradation set in motion by our thousands of natural body bacteria then generates enough heat to kill harmful pathogens and viruses as well as evaporate 70 to 90 percent of the original mass.

Worried about smell? Just add carbon-rich material (shredded paper or sawdust) after each use, and be sure that oxygen circulates through vents in the container. Amazingly, carbon and oxygen produce an odor-free composting toilet!

As it fills, the container must be emptied onto a compost pile where it decomposes for a few more months, after which it is ready to be incorporated onto gardens or farms.

In place of clean water, energy, and tax dollars, a small amount of labor on the side of the homeowner can make functioning composting toilets a safe, viable alternative to our current wasteful, toxic and expensive human waste management processes.

Benefits of composting toilets are being realized around the world. In lieu of a nonexistent sewage infrastructure, developing regions create composting toilets to save money and fertilize crops. But even more developed countries — Sweden, for example — have implemented composting toilets in homes for decades to reduce water use and rebuild soils. New Zealanders have constructed largescale composting toilets in commercial buildings that generate soil and nutrients to grow enough food for the people who work in those buildings.

State laws require habitable buildings to have flush toilets and say that human waste can’t be transported across property lines without a license. Waste management officials, city planners and public health authorities in the U.S. still have much to learn about the use of composting toilet systems in urban areas in order for us to take full advantage of our poop.

It’s time American cities work with state and federal public health officials to create more homeowner-friendly composting toilet regulations that encourage people to make better use of our poop and our water resources. Our soils, waterways, and budgets depend on it!

Gwendolyn von Klan studies geography and sustainable urban planning at UC Berkeley.

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For the campus, this is part of a systemwide effort across the University of California to cut down on waste as well as a key component of its Climate Action Plan. Similarly, the city of Berkeley also has a climate plan that includes the same goal. These goals were a few amongst many topics addressed at “The Environmentally Sustainable City” panel discussion at Berkeley City College Wednesday night. The conversation revolved around ways the campus and the city can collaborate on sustainable goals such as their zero waste plans, access to public transportation and reducing greenhouse gas emissions.

“Both the campus and the city have very similar interests in terms of making the city of Berkeley the best place it could possibly be,” said Timothy Burroughs, climate action coordinator for the city’s Office of Energy and Sustainable Development and one of four panelists at Wednesday’s discussion. “A lot of the things you can do to make a community better are things that benefit in terms of sustainability.”

The discussion was the second of three in “The University and The City: Ideas for Partnership,” a panel series aimed at fostering a strong partnership between the city that is sponsored by the Office of Mayor Tom Bates, Berkeley City Councilmembers Laurie Capitelli, Darryl Moore and Susan Wengraf, the UC Berkeley Office of Government and Community Relations, among others. The first panel was held Sept. 21 on the possibility of a student supermajority City Council district, and the final panel will be held Nov. 9 on late night activity in the city.

Aside from Burroughs, the intimate audience at the city college heard from Jason Trager, the environmental sustainability officer of the campus Graduate Assembly, Claire Evans, the lead coordinator for the campus Compost Alliance, and Lisa McNeilly, director of sustainability for the campus. The discussion was moderated by Jason Mark, editor of The Earth Island Journal.

Panelists brainstormed different ways in which the two entities can collaborate on improving the environment, such as connecting groups on campus more effectively with the surrounding community and exploring different grant opportunities that could benefit city projects.

One area with room for improvement, panelists said, is collaboration on educating the public about important environmental issues.

“The more I do it, the more I learn how poorly we’ve done communication,” McNeilly said. “We’re really good at getting people’s attention, but we’re not quite as sophisticated in putting out the messaging in a way that really drives permanent behavior change.”

J.D. Morris is the lead environment reporter.

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The article on sustainable meat leaves out critical information.  While “sustainably raised” meat is better than factory farmed meat, it is hardly a “win-win-win.” Beef is the worst product for the environment, sustainably raised or not, because cows produce so much methane. The article also declines to mention where the animals are slaughtered. Industrial slaughtering causes terrible suffering for both animals and workers.  People must be able to consider all of the implications of meat production before deciding how much (if any) to consume.

— Katie Cantrell, 2009 UC Berkeley alumna

__________

The realities of “sustainable meat” and environmental responsibility

Regarding Mary Susman’s article about the opening of a new butchery in Berkeley outlining the supposed benefits of buying and eating meat from local “sustainable ranches” to promote environmental responsibility and stewardship, I am compelled to respond to these claims with facts about the real impacts of meat production and consumption on the environmental and moral fabric of our planet.

The article quotes one of the store owners, who states that “It’s really irresponsible to eat meat that’s raised in a way that’s not responsible for the environment” and while I can appreciate their sentiments to be ecologically conscious, the fact remains that raising animals for meat production is responsible for more greenhouse gases, freshwater pollution, topsoil depletion, deforestation and habitat loss than all other human activities. Indeed, according to a 2006 United Nation’s report, “Livestock’s Long Shadow” raising animals for food contributes nearly 18% of all human induced greenhouse gas emissions. In addition to this ecological devastation, even when raised under so called “humane” conditions these animals are subjected to unconscionable pain and suffering, despite the labels which suggest otherwise.

Eliminating animal-products from your diet would be an integral and powerful step towards fostering ethical, sustainable and responsible relationships with animals, both human and non-human alike, and our beautiful planet.

— Mansheel Singh, Berkeley resident and animal rights advocate

Submit your own letter to the editor by emailing opinion@dailycal.org, or tweet @dailycalopinion.

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