From NYTimes.com:

BOSTON — After nine years of regulatory review, the federal government gave the green light Wednesday to the nation’s first offshore wind farm, a sprawling project off the coast of Cape Cod.

The approval of the 130-turbine farm gives a significant boost to the nascent offshore wind industry in the United States, which has lagged far behind Europe and China in harnessing the strong and steady power of ocean breezes to provide electricity to homes and businesses.

With Gov. Deval Patrick standing beside him, Interior Secretary Ken Salazar announced at a news conference at the Massachusetts Statehouse that the government had approved a permit for Cape Wind Associates, a private venture, to build the farm.

“I am approving the Cape Wind project,” Mr. Salazar said. “This will be the first of many projects up and down the Atlantic coast.”

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How “Going Green” Can Be New Black For Our Community

A NewsOne Exclusive

With everyone from celebrities and huge corporations to small businesses touting their efforts to “go green,” there’s no doubt that the environmental movement has become mainstream. But does environmentalism include Black people? Between dealing with a struggling economy and the host of other problems afflicting the community, some Black people might feel we hardly have any energy left to monitor our carbon footprints or seek organic foods. But according to Kari Fulton, the National Campus Campaign Coordinator of the Environmental Justice and Climate Change Initiative, Black people were green before it became trendy, and caring about the environment is easier than most believe.

“Every Black person has that one person in their family that tells them to turn that light off. That is a part of thinking green,” she says.

Fulton is an avid environmental activist, and she travels specifically to Historical Black Colleges and Universities (HBCUs) to talk to students about “being Black, but thinking green.”

Fulton believes that HBCU students are open to helping the environment—it’s just a matter of reframing the conversation about environmental justice.

“The way the mainstream markets green-friendly thinking, it is not targeted toward Black people,” she says. “They think we aren’t interested in the environment, but it’s only when they speak of wheat grass and hippies that we lose interest.”

One area in which the green revolution is directly relevant to Black Americans is that of employment. The clean energy bill that passed the House of Representatives this summer includes federal legislation that guarantees a portion of green jobs will go specifically to low-income communities, which will include Black and Latino neighborhoods.

For those who aren’t job-hunting and simply want to go green on their own terms, working-class Black people can go green by making small, simple day-to-day changes: Re-using juice bottles, buying compact fluorescent light bulbs, repairing holes in homes by caulking and adding weather-strips, and using public transportation.

Fulton notes that being an advocate for good public transportation is particularly important. “Black people are getting pushed out of their cities and into the suburbs,” she says. “If we’re going to be living in the suburbs then we need reliable and efficient public transportation.”

An added bonus to using mass transit is that it not only does it reduce your carbon footprint, it saves you money.

“Going green is beneficial to Black people because it can help live within your basic means. Why buy a car you can’t afford and that’s harmful to the environment?” says Fulton.

Black people living in urban communities are especially able to go green. In fact, the New York City tri-state area has the lowest carbon footprint in the country.

There are several urban-specific ways people can work toward green living, beginning with food.

“Food justice is a big part of going green. In our communities, there are nothing but fast food spots,” says Fulton. “We need to change our environment by changing how we eat and live.”

Most cities, including New York, hold farmer’s markets where shoppers can buy local produce. Urban dwellers receiving government assistance need not be deterred: Many farmer markets accept EBT.

Those renting apartments in cities can also become more energy efficient by working with their landlords. Asking building owners to install energy efficient appliances and use fluorescent lights in each apartment can reduce renters’ environmental impact and help lower their electricity bills.

Beyond making small changes in your own life, being Black and thinking green can also be achieved through community involvement. Adding a neighborhood garden, advocating for playgrounds or parks in your area, and encouraging healthy living can all help the environment.

For more information on how green is the new black, visit www.greentheblock.net

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From Slate.com:

It’s true, you’re not going to save the planet by choosing pleather jackets over leather ones, beer over wine, or MP3s over CDs. But each time we stage one of these cage matches, we’re forced to consider just how complicated the idea of “eco-friendliness” can be. It doesn’t just come down to greenhouse gas emissions or energy usage—though those are the two metrics people seem most interested in these days. A complete analysis would also weigh the potential effects of each choice on water pollution, land use, and biodiversity, among many other issues. Plus, studying life cycle analyses—no matter what answers they ultimately provide or how trivial the initial question—reminds us that the products we buy tend to have intricate back stories.

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Still, the Lantern is glad for the reminder to try to see the (rapidly diminishing) forest for the (carbon-sequestering) trees. She’ll happily direct your attention to the most recent issue of the Journal of Industrial Ecology, which is devoted to the topic of sustainable consumption and production. In an introductory article, the issue’s four co-editors lay out some of the key findings from the last several decades of research. The main point is that, when it comes to the environmental impacts of individual households, four areas dominate: transportation, diet, housing construction (i.e., the impacts of manufacturing, transporting, and assembling building materials), and energy-using products (which include appliances, lighting fixtures, and heating and cooling units). In industrialized countries, these categories collectively account for 70 percent to 80 percent of a household’s environmental impacts.

The editors also describe several variables that are likely to determine whether your environmental footprint is going to be heavier than your neighbor’s—or your cousin’s on the other side of the country. For example, urban living is generally greener than the suburban or rural variety, thanks to higher building densities, lower heating and cooling requirements, and less need for a car. Similarly, an increase in the number of people living in one home means decreased impacts, per-person. (Congratulations, recent college grads living six to an apartment: Your penury is a net gain for the planet.) Research has also shown that impacts tend to rise with household income. (Congratulations again, recent grads!)

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Obama Meets With World Leaders To Discuss Environment

SEATTLE — The Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation announced plans Thursday to move beyond seeds, fertilizer and agriculture extension services and into politics and public policy in its efforts to bring a green revolution to sub-Saharan Africa.

The foundation announced nine grants totaling nearly $120 million a few hours before Bill Gates was scheduled to give his first major speech on agriculture as the keynote speaker at the World Food Prize event in Des Moines, Iowa.

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In the past three years, the Gates Foundation has committed $1.4 billion to help small farmers in sub-Saharan Africa and South Asia increase their yields and incomes. The foundation got involved in agriculture after years of trying to solve worldwide health problems.

About half of the grants announced Thursday will go toward agriculture research in Africa, including experiments with sorghum, millet, legumes and sweet potatoes. But several unusual projects were included, including proposals to use cell phones and radio programs to educate small farmers.

The foundation gave the Alliance for a Green Revolution in Africa $15 million to influence agricultural policy in more than a dozen African nations. The alliance won’t be lobbying for policy changes, but they will be doing research on what kinds of policy changes would best stimulate agricultural growth in the region and will be training Africans to advocate for themselves.

AGRA plans to train about 400 agriculture economists at several African universities so they can analyze policies and advocate for change, said Namanga Ngongi, president of the alliance, in a telephone interview from Des Moines on Tuesday.

“Technical solutions can only go so far because there are many blockages to development,” said Ngongi, who is based in Nairobi, Kenya.

Ngongi said many African governments have committed to spend more on agriculture development, but they need help figuring out the most effective ways to spend their money.

“Just spending money and doing the wrong things, won’t help,” he said.

Gates’ speech and the foundation’s grant announcement comes one day after the U.N. Food and Agriculture Organization warned in a report that world hunger is getting worse, and international aid for agriculture continues to plummet.

Asia and the Pacific have the largest number of hungry people — 642 million — followed by sub-Saharan Africa with 265 million. Twenty countries in Africa require emergency food assistance.

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The Gates Foundation sees agriculture as the most effective lever against poverty, said Roy Steiner, deputy director of agriculture development, in a recent interview.

“If you care about the poor, you’ve got to care about agriculture,” he said.

Also announced Thursday was a $10 million grant to create educational radio shows to reach farmers in Kenya, Malawi, Zambia, Mali, Ghana and Tanzania during the next four years.

The foundation is putting $12 million in a program to feed school children that would also benefit small farmers. It likely would work in a way similar to the way surplus food programs redistribute dairy products and other food to the poor in the United States.

Another $4.7 million will go toward training an army of community information people, who don’t need to be experts, but will have access by cell phone to people who will be able to answer any questions a local farmer might have.