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Green Financing Explanations

April 10, 2010 by Anonymous

Check out the Q&A on the new Green Financing program.  Monday April 12. On Channel 78 in SF and on UStream on the Internet. Archive should be available at http://www.ustream.tv/mayornewsom after the show.

Green Festival This Weekend

April 9, 2010 by Anonymous

greenfestival posterBut wait, you say, isn't the Green Festival a fall event?  Well yes indeedy, it usually is.  But this year they're trying something new.  Not only is there a Spring Green Festival, in the spring, but the event itself has been restr

PG&E: Corporate Hubris v. Everybody

March 22, 2010 by Anonymous

Featured Guest Blog:

Apparently the gloves have come off in the long-standing conflict between PG&E and, well, everyone else.  PG&E has put Proposition 16 -  the "New Two-Thirds Vote Requirement for Local Public Electricity Providers" - onto the June ballot to put an end to these pesky citizens who think they have a right to get greener power if they want to. Silly citizens. Proposition 16 changes the California constitution in a way that virtually guarantees PG&E a permanent monopoly over their current customers. Then PG&E announced they will spend upwards of $35 million (profits extracted from their customers) on ads and public relations professionals to convince us that only PG&E knows what is best for us.  Their hubris is astonishing.

In response of this direct slap on the face from PG&E, the San Francisco City Attorney joined the Modesto Irrigation District and other utlity districts and government agencies on March 18 to file a lawsuit aimed at removing Proposition 16 from the ballot on the grounds that it is "wholly false and misleading."

San Franciscans who want to be able to choose greener power are very familiar with the shadowy power of the PG&E lobby.  CleanPowerSF, a community choice aggregation program has led the most recent effort for power choice.  The effort has been long and tedious, but San Franciscan's are a determined lot.  Now that community choice aggregation is almost a reality in San Francisco, PG&E's Prop 16 threatens to put a huge roadblock in the way, once again.  It's beyond frustrating for advocates of green power (aka the vast majority of San Francisco voters.)

Does PG&E Own Us or Not?

February 28, 2010 by Anonymous

PG&E has been very open about the fact that they wrote Proposition 16 because they intend to keep the customers they have, no matter what the majority of the customers want. Living too long as a well-fed, pampered monopoly seems to have given PG&E a sense of entitlement. If we want to get our electricity elsewhere, PG&E seems to interpret that as an attack. We are not so much their treasured customers as we are surfs who need to be kept in line. And PG&E has no problem using their gross amount of profits to screw us with our own money.

EPA Snaps Up Blumenfeld

November 7, 2009 by greenie

We're sorry to report that Jared Blumenfeld will be leaving his post as the Director of the SF Department of the Environment.  But San Francisco's loss is America's gain as Blumenfeld will become the EPA Administrator for Region 9. 

Who can blame him for leaving? Yes, San Francisco is great, but a new job with lots of power that involves regular travel to Hawaii can't be all bad. Region 9 covers California, Arizona, Nevada, Hawaii, the Pacific Islands and 140 Tribal Nations. No doubt they are all about to become a heck of a lot greener.  Blumenfeld has been the instigator/implementor of most of the green initiatives in city government over the past 8 years. His greatest hits include: the plastic bag ban; mandatory recycling and composting; the bottled water ban at City Hall; biodeisel buses; the largest municipal solar projects in the country; city solar rebates; and the ban on stryofoam take out packaging in restaurants.

We'll miss you, Jared Blumenfeld.

Green Daze

November 3, 2009 by greenie

There are some fun/interesting green events coming up this week.

Tuesday

  • SF Green Drinks is tonight at 111 Minna. 
  • Somewhat Mysterious event called Green 2.0.  You have to email them to find out the location.  If you go, encourage them NOT to have an event on the same night as greendrinks. 

Wednesday

  • Brown bag lunch called "Our Better Nature: Environment and the Making of San Francisco"
  • SF Bicycle Coalition Volunteer Night

Friday

  • The Right Stuff Awards Dinner

Be sure to save next weekend (Nov 13-15) for the San Francisco Green Festival.  There's no better place to get your green on.

Details for all these events are on the SF Green Scene Calendar at http://www.sfgreenscene.com (Click on the blue titles on the right for details or click on the Calendar for the full Google calendar format.)

Recent Green Haps

October 28, 2009 by greenie

While we were away from this site, San Francisco kept greening it up!  Here are just a few green happenings from the past few months.

Wind Power Makes Sense in SF
The Urban Wind Power Task Force released it's report and recommendations on Sept. 21.  More about this later, but you can read the full 16 page report for yourself.

More after the break....

We're Number 2, We Try Harder

July 23, 2009 by greenie

Once again San Francisco has been identified as the second most sustainable city in the U.S.  This time The City lost out to Seattle in the latest list from the excellent NRDC Smarter Cities Project.  They analyzed data from the Census Bureau, EPA, and various suveys of city governmet staff.

Seattle does have an aggressively green mayor and a cool new light rail system.  They also get a lot of energy from hydro which can be good for clean air, but not always good for rivers and fish.  San Francisco got credit for walkability, the plastic-bag ban, the new carbon offset fund, the solar power program and the local food movement.  Not bad.

One might quibble with choice number 13, Los Angeles.  It's hard to imagine a less sustainable city (ok, Vegas is probably worse.) LA should be working much harder on water desalinization and public transport if they want to be in the least bit sustainable.  With the abundance of sunshine, the whole southern part of the state should be solar powered by now.

How Big is Your Water Footprint?

July 22, 2009 by greenie

You used it this morning and probably didn't think much about it.  When you made your coffee or tea, brushed your teeth, took a shower, put on laundered clothes.  Water is critical to our entire way of life, but we rarely think about how much we are using.   Jaymi Heimbuch has a good post over at Planet Green with links to various water footprint calculators. 

From the article:

"Average water footprints vary greatly not only among people living in the same city but across the globe. According to WaterFootprint.org,
The average person in China has a footprint of about 700 cubit meters
per year, whereas an average person in Japan has a footprint of about
1150 cubic meters per year. Yet towering above that is the average
American, with a water footprint of 2500 cubic meters per year."

Take a 3 day Hetch Hetchy Tour

July 9, 2009 by greenie

The Water Education Foundation is offering a 3-day, 2-night tour of the Hetch Hetchy water system.  See the physical system and learn about the possibility of restoring Hetch Hetchy Valley.  Tour includes the Sunol Water Temple, Don Pedro Dam, O-Shaughnessy Dam and Hetch Hetchy Reservoir.  Tour begins and ends in San Mateo. 

More info:
http://www.watereducation.org/toursdetail.asp?id=839&parentID=821

From Twitter

  • Seems like a great program. Congrats to all in City Gov't who made it real. #greenfinanesf (#GreenFinanceSF live at http://ustre.am/c8zq ) — 20 weeks 5 days ago
  • How does this work for a TIC (Tenants in Common) #Greenfinancesf (#GreenFinanceSF live at http://ustre.am/c8zq ) — 20 weeks 5 days ago
  • What about a solar panel on the dog house? #greenfinancesf (#GreenFinanceSF live at http://ustre.am/c8zq ) — 20 weeks 5 days ago
  • Can use this for a wind power generator on the house? #greenfinancesf (#GreenFinanceSF live at http://ustre.am/c8zq ) — 20 weeks 5 days ago
  • QUESTION: Can someone use this program to put a wind power generator on their house? #greenfinancesf — 20 weeks 5 days ago
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