Currents

We may be closer to nature in Canada’s green jewel on the west coast, but the latest numbers just don’t back up all of our environmentally-friendly pretensions.

Just 23 per cent of Vancouver homes compost, 4 per cent less than the national average and a whopping 17 per cent less than in Victoria (yeah, island dwellers have even more reason to manage their environment carefully, but still…). The numbers on switching over to lower-energy light bulbs is comparatively better.

The City of Vancouver has a great website and community engagement vehicle for tips about how to make little changes to your lifestyle to help save the planet. Planet huggers can check out One Day for more information.

Keep it clean, keep it green.

(The video above shows Lois of Family Guy cartoon fame stumbling on a fabulous idea for generating financial support for environmental initiatives)

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There will be critics who note a disconnect as California Governor Arnold Schwartzenegger’s promotes his lofty vision about protecting the environment to Canadians. The sprawling freeways and car culture of major Californian cities, superbly demonstrated in Los Angeles, is the antithesis of Vancouver Mayor Sam Sullivan’s policy of densely a densely-populated metropolis where cars are an option, not a necessity.

High Californian auto emission standards, the highest in North America, are also a bit of a misleading subject - there are no car manufacturers in the state that would have to build cars to those specifications.

But the Governator inherited his state’s freeways and smog-choked cities. At least he’s saying the right things. It’s a stark contrast with the American president, who has had his head stuck in the oil sands on the issue of global warming since he took office.

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Urban sprawl is going to kill us all.

Okay, maybe that’s a little dramatic. But if a Globe and Mail report about urban sprawl in beautiful British Columbia is to be believed, our goal of cutting greenhouse gas emissions in this province by 10 per cent below 1990 levels by 2020 is already being undermined by the phenomenon. Simply put, skyrocketing housing prices in the coastal metropolis of Vancouver is forcing ever-increasing numbers to seek shelter in outlying communities.

The resulting increase in automobile commuting (since not everyone moving out to the boonies is taking the train) is driving our greenhouse gas emissions up. Global warming, here we come.

This isn’t actually news. Urban sprawl has been an issue for decades. The solution is less than clear-cut, though. You can’t force people to pay insane prices for tiny condos in Vancouver when they can still get a mid-sized house for a slightly less insane price just outside the operational range of Skytrain. And until we put all private homes under the direct ownership of the state a la Cuba, there’s no way to keep prices down.

The only way to artificially lower the cost of real estate would be to build coal plants and prisons right in the middle of Vancouver and other big cities like some demented SimCity mayor and watch people start actually leaving this province. I don’t see Vancouver Mayor Sam Sullivan or his metropolitan counterparts going the route of political suicide, though.

Sullivan’s ideas about building density in our city isn’t getting the attention it deserves. We’ll have to see whether Vancouverites and other Canadians will be willing to give up their big house dreams for convenient apartment living - like most people in virtually every other part of the world already have.

Canada’s House of Commons has voted to force the Conservative minority government to create a plan over the next 60 days for Canada to meet it’s commitments to Kyoto.

This isn’t a bad thing. The Conservatives have been reluctant to embrace the new environmental dogma of Kyoto for fear of putting Canadians out of work with Soviet-style economic management.

But now they can - and should.

The Conservatives ought to include in the plan draconian measures like shutting down the Albertan oil sand projects without delay and closing any factories in Ontario that don’t meet newly-drafted environmental standards.

Such a plan will of course have no chance of actually being made into legislation. But it will force Canadians and our elected representatives to think about what kinds of sacrifices they truly are prepared to make. When Conservatives force Liberals and NDP partisans on to the defensive, it might just swing public policy back into realism.

It’s time to get past the rhetoric and partisanship. Per capita, Canadians are the worst offenders to Mother Nature on the planet. It’s time to turn ideas into action.

All the Conservatives, neocons and shills for the oil companies who are denying global warming can go suck on an exhaust pipe.

Frankly, I’m embarassed so many Conservatives in Canada are still shouting from the rooftops (or slightly less noisily on the Blogging Tories forum) that global warming is all just propaganda and junk science. The funny thing is that our Conservative Prime Minister has belatedly signed on to the cause, but far too many of the party membership seems stuck in a 2002-era time warp.

Get with the program, people. We’ve got a planet to save.

Vancouver environmental educator and Canadian icon David Suzuki has challenged Canadians to give their input about how they would help the country to deal with global warming if they were Prime Minister.

Calling Vancouver my home town as well, I could hardly ignore the voice of Canada’s leading environmental scientist. My contribution to the dialogue is posted above. Enjoy.