Candidates, get hot under the collar about climate!

All politics is local, which may explain the curb-level view of issues being presented in the current municipal election campaign.  No reason to avoid discussing potholes, bike lanes, councillor budgets and garbage pick-up.  But it seems to have escaped the attention of our mayoralty candidates that we just steamed through the second warmest year on record, and a decade of record breaking temperatures are telling us that climate change is not a far off threat – it is happening here and now.

Bike riding: If they can do it right, why can't we?

I have a confession to make.

I have yet to ride a bike on the streets of downtown Toronto. But I make this admission with no shame – at least on my part. Rather, it's the city that should be embarrassed at the sorry state of Toronto's (lack of adequate) bike lanes.

As mayoral candidate Sarah Thomson said last week, “Toronto streets are not safe for cyclists.” And I agree. It's time to stop the foot-dragging; City Hall needs to pick up the pace, and build new bike lanes while revamping old ones.

As a non-rider, many of my friends are surprised whenever I express my desire for a better bicycle network, particularly in the downtown core. While attending the University of Toronto during undergrad, my main mode of transportation was the subway. But oftentimes – especially at the height of rush hour while being squished against the red TTC doors by hordes of commuters getting off work – I wish I rode a bike.

Still, whenever I took one look at the faded lines marking the virtually non-existent bicycle lanes, I recalled the near-collisions I frequently saw between bikes and cars (a.k.a. eternal foes) and would immediately wipe this silly little notion out of my mind.

For the longest time, I always thought that this was the way bicycle lanes were supposed to be. After all, I grew up in Toronto and these were pretty much the only lanes that I saw on a regular basis. That is, until I travelled to Northern Europe with my family three years ago, and saw the exceptional quality of bike lanes and programs that they had there - a quality that Toronto is capable of reaching and to which it should aspire.

In Copenhagen, Denmark, bold white lines and a bicycle symbol clearly demarcate the lanes for cyclists. In Helsinki, Finland, there are elevated paths – one for cyclists and another for pedestrians, each lane indicated by the appropriate symbols. In Stockholm, Sweden, there are metal barricades on both sides of the lanes, protecting cyclists and pedestrians from moving traffic.

And in all three of these cities, the lanes are wide enough to be safe and comfortable for one or two cyclists to travel side by side. Moreover, Copenhagen, Helsinki and Stockholm have had bicycle sharing programs for years – something City Hall only recently approved.

Toronto has the potential to have similar – that is, better – bike lanes and programs. But until we do, many people who want to get around on a bike, won't. Not only is that a shame for the health of Torontonians and for the environment, it's a shame on City Hall.

Copenhagen, Denmark

Helsinki, Finland

Stockholm, Sweden

About Anita Li

Where does Toronto's air pollution come from?

Running for mayor? Running for council? Running a business? Running a household? Want to develop some smart policies and actions to help our city in the face of dangerous and financially risky climate change?

Then you need to understand where our global warming pollution comes from. Just like the old adage says: "you don’t manage what you don’t measure."

In 2007, Toronto Atmospheric Fund collaborated with the city to compile Toronto’s first greenhouse gas (GHG) and air pollutant emissions inventory (see http://www.toronto.ca/taf/inventory.htm ). I admit, it’s not exactly summer beach reading -- unless you’re trying to figure out how to keep our planet from overheating. Here’s what it tells us:

· Heating our homes and workplaces and making hot water using natural gas is the overlooked elephant in the room, accounting for about 40 per cent of our total GHG emissions.

· Transportation is the elephant we see every day on our congested roads. The gasoline and diesel burned in passenger vehicles and commercial trucks produces another 40-ish per cent, and is growing.

· Landfill sites have been a big source of emissions in the past, but this is being reduced by capturing the potent methane gas produced by rotting garbage and greater diversion of organic waste.

· Emissions associated with producing electricity are about 15 per cent of the City’s carbon profile, and will continue to drop as Ontario’s remaining four polluting coal plants are shut down (by 2014 at the latest) and more renewable energy is added to the grid.

As you can see, Toronto has a whole bunch of small, medium and large sources. That means we need a “silver buckshot” not a “silver bullet” approach to reducing emissions. And that’s why my previous and future postings are about solutions that can be implemented in our city -- ideas for how to heat our homes and water without heating the planet, how to get people out of their cars or to at least share a ride, how to reduce truck traffic, how to use electricity more efficiently so we can use a higher percentage of clean renewable power.

Just as we need to keep track of the dollars, we need to keep track of the carbon – it’s a liability that we can’t afford to ignore. A key promise from any serious candidate would be to screen all major decisions and policies – capital spending, operating budgets, programs, by-laws, job descriptions, etc – for their GHG emissions impact.

About Julia Langer

Solar energy can create a healthier city

Toronto has a gas problem -- natural gas that is. We use it for space and water heating and it is the second largest source of greenhouse gas emissions in our city (after transportation). Thousands of gas-fired water heaters and furnaces release thousands of tonnes of carbon dioxide and smog pollution, pretty much at nose level.

If we want a cleaner, greener city, we need to take a cleaner, greener bath or shower. One solution is solar water heating. On warm spring and summer days, the sun will provide all the hot water you need – zero emissions. In the winter, a solar water heater can still give freezing city water a big temperature boost before it hits your conventional water heater, so you use much less gas or electricity. Over a year, a solar water heating system can halve the average Toronto home’s gas or electricity use for producing hot water.

The technology is pretty simple and it technically works: millions of solar water heaters are in use around the world. It would work practically if solar hot water were made a priority. Unfortunately, the federal government cancelled the ecoENERGY incentives (the provincial incentive is still available for now) and with currently low electricity and gas prices (which don’t take into account the real costs of generation or pollution costs), purchasers of solar water heaters now face a long payback on their investment for doing the right thing.

Compare that to the situation for solar hot water’s cousin: solar electricity generation, also known as solar PV. Recognizing the need to get rid of dirty coal power and reduce emissions, the provincial government has established a farsighted program to pay a premium for zero emission solar generated electricity. Called a “feed-in tariff”, these special rates are jumpstarting the creation of a new solar industry in Ontario and driving the cost of components down as demand heats up.

The same approach is needed for solar hot water. Because solar hot water panels actually produce more energy per area, a feed-in tariff rate of less than half of what is currently being paid for solar PV reduce solar water system payback to 10 years, a reasonable investment time frame.

The Solar Neighbourhoods pilot in east-end Toronto -- now the largest community-based solar water heating project in Canada with 100 panels on residential roofs -- proved that installing a solar water heating works for Toronto homeowners; see www.solarneighbourhoods.ca In Germany, Japan and China, the value of using the free energy of the sun to heat their home’s hot water is accepted and the technology is rapidly being adopted.

It’s time we stop questioning investments in clean, renewable energy and instead get moving to deploy a proven emissions reduction technology that can help us meet our emission reduction obligations – and create a healthier city.

About Julia Langer

Idle thoughts on red lights, traffic flow and pollution

While I applaud the city for recently making their anti-idling bylaw more stringent (decreased permitted idling time from three minutes to one minute) to help reduce pollution. I wonder if there are other ways that the city could make changes to help reduce pollution from cars.

I was driving down Bathurst St. last week at around 1 a.m. and somehow I had to stop at every traffic light from Steeles Ave.all the way down to south of Lawrence Ave.

As I was sitting there idling my car at each of the red lights I kept thinking about the amount of pollution that I was creating. I could understand having to stop and start if I was driving in rush hour traffic, however, I was coming down Bathurst at one in the morning!

There was no more than a handful of other cars on the road and I waited at a number of lights where no other cars or pedestrians crossed my path. I think if we could figure out some way to reduce the amount of unnecessary stopping and starting on major streets when traveling straight in one direction, we would be able to probably reduce our pollution by even more then the savings in emissions from reducing the amount of time one can idle their car.

I understand that if I'm driving along and making a number of turns and stops it will be inevitable that I will get some red lights, but when traveling down a major road with two lanes of traffic in each direction, there must be some way to set the traffic lights so that once you get a green light you can continue to get green lights after that if driving at a continuous speed.

I think the city, its councillors and civil servants should be looking at every way to reduce the amount of pollution we emit when driving as the way our city and region has developed often makes it necessary to drive places instead of walking or taking public transit, the ideal, less polluting alternatives.

About Adam Zendel

We need the wind at our backs

The province floated a draft rule last week that windmills need to be more than five kilometres offshore. Frankly, that would sink the proposed Scarborough wind energy project to the bottom of Lake Ontario. Probably other offshore wind projects too. This is not good news for a City that generates less than 2% of its own power and is completely dependent on two long-distance transmission lines to get electricity into its boundaries.

No environmental or health justifications were given for this arbitrary line in the water other than citing possible noise concerns. It is hard to imagine what would be heard from windmills over a kilometre from the shore, or that that they’d be anywhere near the decibels of a lawnmower, leaf blower, air conditioner, speakers, etc -- all perfectly healthy noise sources apparently.

A five kilometre buffer makes little sense here. This is an urban environment, not the middle of Algonquin Park. If we can live cheek-by-jowl with multi-storey buildings and transportation corridors, we can find a way to accommodate wind turbines a kilometre or more offshore. And no one is against careful and responsible the planning and placement of turbines.

The concerns against even putting a wind speed measurement device have to be considered in context. To do anything meaningful to stop accelerating climate change – which unchecked will cause ever-more powerful storms that could pound the Scarborough Bluffs into a new set of offshore islands -- some significant changes are needed around here, and fast. Sticking our heads in the sand is not the answer, nor is drawing simplistic lines on a map.

Toronto’s “Power to Live Green” strategy for reducing global warming pollution requires boosting home-grown renewable energy generation in our city (and definitely not building a third mega-transmission line into the city through neighbourhoods and ravines). In tandem, the strategy also foresees attracting local economic activity and stimulating good green jobs and tax base in our city, facilitated by the Green Energy Act. Not much of a pitch if we can’t even get a few turbines spinning on our own waterfront.

Opponents of wind energy seem to resent the sight of wind turbines to feed Toronto’s appetite for power, but they also oppose the city’s efforts to take some responsibility for its own power needs. It’s not a very coherent or sustainable response to reducing our city’s enormous climate footprint. Arbitrarily cutting off the opportunity for significant offshore wind generation is going to make the job much harder. It’s time for candidates for Council and Mayor to make a stand on this issue.

About Julia Langer

A way Hydro can help revitalize communities

 

The excitement inside City Hall’s Committee Room 4 was palpable while I was waiting to speak at the press conference where the Green Jobs for All at Hydro campaign was launched. On June 7, community and union activists came together under the banner of the Good Jobs for All Coalition to announce an innovative green community economic development strategy. If implemented by Toronto Hydro, this strategy is sure to revolutionize the way the City works directly with the people to address pressing economic concerns that incorporate environmental and social justice needs.

 

When I walked in the room, I was impressed with the huge solar panel resting against the wall and the number of banners from participating agencies. The five Green Change Agents from Jane and Finch who came with me added their own displays and signs. The campaign launch was attended by a diversity of community groups, unions, elected officials, and environmental organizations. Groups in attendance included the Toronto & York Region Labour Council, the Council of Agencies Serving South Asians, the Chinese Canadian National Council - Toronto, the Jane/Finch Green Jobs Coalition, the Green Change Collaborative, the Society of Energy Professionals, and the Canadian Tamil Congress, Environmental Defence, Toronto Environmental Alliance, and more.

 

Through this campaign, the Good Jobs for All Coalition is calling on Toronto Hydro to take advantage of the subsidies available in the Green Energy Act and plan for an aggressive expansion of Toronto Hydro’s role in renewable energy generation in partnership with other public institutions. The strategy calls for Toronto Hydro to install solar panels on schools, hospitals and other public buildings across the City. Under the Ontario Green Energy and Green Economy Act 2009, renewable energy companies, utilities and homeowners can receive provincial subsidies – through the feed-in tariff program – provided they meet domestic content rules, which require 40 to 60% of the goods and services used originate from Ontario.

 

As I explained in my speech, not only will this strategy generate profits for the public utility company, but by engaging community organizations and unions as partners at the table, it will also generate dividends for the local communities by engaging residents and youth in the revitalization and economic development of their own community. This strategy has the potential to see thousands of youth trained and new job opportunities for residents and other equity seeking groups created.

 

The Good Jobs for All Coalition is also asking Toronto Hydro to make local procurement of green products a priority in all activities. With its strong buying power, Toronto Hydro would then be able to attract green manufacturers to Toronto. Furthermore, existing manufacturers would be encouraged to retool and work with local training organizations and Toronto’s Social Development Office to ensure equitable access and inclusion of workers of colour and youth from marginalized communities in new job opportunities in the sector.

 

“Creating good green jobs is the lynchpin that will turn our community around,” says Nigel Barriffe. Currently a teacher with the Toronto District School Board in Rexdale, Nigel is Co-Chair of the Green Economy Committee of the Good Jobs for All Coalition. This strategy could be a game changer for priority neighbourhoods like Rexdale and Jane and Finch that continue to struggle with issues of poverty and underemployment. On the other side of the coin is the emerging trend and related opportunities in the green economy.

 

One young man, Chris Williamson, a pre-apprentice electrician, who recently graduated from the Hammer Heads program also shared his story. Chris - who is 18 - spoke about how his placement as a pre-apprentice electrician gave him the opportunity to start saving up money so he can hopefully sponsor his mother – who currently lives in Jamaica – to Canada.  Chris said he supports the campaign because he can see how it will create stable careers for his community and friends, who, unlike him, still work part time and casual minimum wage jobs at restaurants, movie theatres and the like.

 

Other speakers at the press conference included: John Camilleri, president of the Canadian Union of Public Employees (CUPE) Local 1, which represents Toronto Hydro workers; and Carolyn Egan, president of the Steelworker Toronto Area Council.

 

The Green Jobs for All at Hydro campaign can be formally endorsed at www.goodjobsforall.ca.

About Rosemarie Powell

Electric cars need to be rolled out wisely

Ready to plug into the electric car revolution? Having an electric vehicle parked in the driveway is one way to reduce climate pollution. And impress the neighbours. But really, we’d all be better off (and more impressive) if we took the bus or a bike.

Electric vehicles (including plug-in hybrids and all-electric) can definitely play a role in helping Toronto reduce greenhouse gas and air polluting emissions. Given Ontario’s current electricity mix, fully electric vehicles could cut emissions by 87 per cent compared to a conventional car, according to one estimate. As our electricity gets even greener -- as we phase out coal and bring on more renewable power -- this advantage will only grow.

But having commuters simply switch en masse from gasoline powered to electric powered vehicles won’t solve our climate woes. For starters, despite rapid advancements in electric vehicle technology, it will be a decade or two before a wholesale switchover to all-electric cars and trucks could even happen. We need emission reductions now – the ice caps are melting!

Second, in a city with worse traffic congestion than L.A., bumper-to-bumper electric vehicles aren’t going to add anything to our economic efficiency or quality of life. Our love affair with the private car is costly in terms of resources consumed, green spaces paved over and the energy-intensive sprawling development that it encourages.

Electric vehicles do have an important role to play in where there are fewer options for shifting to transit, telecommuting or using other transportation modes (walking, bicycling). Ramping up the use of electric vehicles in fleets -- including corporate service fleets, public works fleets, taxis and car sharing fleets -- is a good way to reduce lots of emissions since these cars get driven a lot, and often locally.

Fleets can also drive the development of supporting infrastructure, like plug-in points and two-way grid capacity because they create a concentrated demand. Toronto Atmospheric Fund has launched EV300 to accelerate uptake of electric vehicles by public and private fleets in the GTA; more information at www.FleetWise.ca

For the rest of us, getting out of our cars is the true solution to climate change, and a key to improving Toronto’s prosperity and quality of life. Cities, provinces and the federal government need to do their part by dramatically increasing support for rapid, frequent and convenient transit -- both capital and operating costs.

We need to do our part by leaving the car at home as much as possible and by encouraging the development of flexible workplaces that support telecommuting, flex hours, and other solutions that take the stress and pollution out of starting and ending the workday.

About Julia Langer

Rediscovering commuting by bike, and why it's worth a try

In my last post, I described my frustrations with the TTC. The new condos at Yonge & Eglinton have put a real strain on the subway system, and getting on an overcrowded train to get downtown to my workplace at University & College is unpleasant most of the time.

Years ago when I was starting out in the workforce, I made a very modest salary and didn't have the funds to purchase a Metropass; instead, I rode my bike whenever I could, and used tokens on the days when the weather was uncooperative or biking wasn't a good option (for a job interview, for instance).

As I got older and became a mom, my bike sat in the shed and collected dust. Driving was much more convenient and comfortable, especially when towing a baby and all his paraphernalia. I also used the TTC a lot because it's usually convenient and so much more cost-effective and carbon-friendly than driving. But I never really considered biking to be a a viable option. Until recently.

At the end of April, I was standing on the College subway platform, watching the overcrowded train pull out of the station. This train, and the two previous ones, were so full that no one could board. It was a warm day, and the people inside the train were hot, sweaty, weary and annoyed. Forty minutes later, having managed to get to my son's daycare via smelly subway and stinky bus, I was struck by the pure joy my son was experiencing during his own commute between daycare and home - on his bike.

We all remember riding our bikes as kids: it was an intoxicating taste of freedom, moving under our own power, faster on wheels than we could ever go on foot. It was like flying. My son loves his bike and has a sense of pride in his ability to ride well. I figured it was time I dusted off my bike, and get riding.

I've ridden to work several days since the end of April, and it's wonderful. The cooperative weather has made it easy. I even took a huge risk and did not buy the May Metropass - clearly, I'm committed.

The bike lanes I use to commute from my house at Mt. Pleasant & Davisville to College & University are adequate, but as most cyclists will tell you, there is a lot of room for improvement. Fortunately, 80 per cent of my ride can be accomplished using bike lanes, but the lanes are full of cyclists and it's clear to me that more bike lanes (and fixing the existing crumbling, pot-holed surfaces) are necessary.

With the bike lanes being so heavily used, I can guarantee that adding more lanes would improve the cycling commute as well as benefit those in cars who find the mass of cyclists distracting. More bike lanes = more orderly behaviour from cyclists, more people who will opt to bike to work thus reducing the number of cars on the road, which is good for everyone.

I know that commuting by bike isn't for everyone; but for many of us, it is a viable option that I encourage you to try. Don't feel like you have to go hard core by abandoning your car and TTC token for your bike, but why not try it once?

Perhaps consider biking one day per week, when the dress code at work is relaxed or you have no client meetings? I can promise you that in addition to avoiding the hassle of public transit, you'll feel invigorated by the feel of the wind in your face, the cadence of your legs, and the liberation of powering your own transportation. The trees are in bloom and smell wonderful. And, there's nothing better than coasting swiftly past a long line of congested traffic.

My cycling commute gets me to work 10 minutes sooner than by transit, burns calories, and is free. Give it a try -- you may like it.

About Kimberly Silk

Invest in energy efficiency -- it saves tax dollars

Think your energy bill is a high? You don’t know the half of it.

As a taxpayer, you also help pay the bills of the City, hospitals, schools and other public institutions. The City of Toronto alone spends more than $230 million a year on gas and hydro. Ontario’s hospitals rack up about a $200 million energy bill. Ontario universities and colleges shell out about $90 million per year to keep the lights on and the heat working.

So when it comes to public sector cost control, the real action isn’t in curbing paper clip use or other office expenses, it is in increasing energy efficiency.

We could cut institutional energy use by 10 per cent without even breaking a sweat. Kaaachiing – more than $50 million a year saved from just the folks listed above. With a bit of effort, 20 per cent reductions can be achieved -- now we’re into nine figure savings of more than $100 million a year. Push harder, with a longer payback period, and energy use can be slashed by at least 30 per cent -- anyone like the sound of around $160 million a year not being drawn from our tax dollars?

And there’s a double bonus. When our buildings aren’t leaking energy, our city and our province aren’t leaking money (to Alberta to pay for the natural gas). Those dollars will do a lot more good if we can keep them in our local economy and spend them instead on energy efficiency, renewable energy or combined heat and power systems.

Ontario has had a pretty rough ride in this "great recession" and we could use the jobs that come with improving the efficiency of our cities and institutions. Improving building efficiency creates an amazing 14 jobs for every $1 million we spend, and these are "green" jobs with staying power.

Oh, and there’s a triple bottom line: we stop burning energy, we stop burning money, and we stop climate change pollution.

So how are we going to plug the leaks, save some dough and save the planet? One of the biggest hurdles to implementing efficiency is access to capital – you need to invest to reap those savings and benefits for decades to come.

That’s why we need an efficiency-focused revolving fund – low-interest loans provide the up-front capital, are repaid from the savings, paving the way for the next loan...and so on. It's a specialized bank for public sector energy savers, and it pays dividends: lower draw on your tax dollars.

The City of Toronto has been using its own money and the $20 million Better Building Partnership fund to advance efficiency, and Toronto Atmospheric Fund also provides loans. But much, much, much more capital is needed to achieve anywhere near our efficiency potential, which is why provincial and/or federal financing is key.

Imagine -- schools could replace 50-year-old boilers, hospitals could replace inefficient lighting that is on 24/7, city buildings could get some badly needed insulation, recreation centres could get money- saving solar water heating systems, and we’d all be saving rather than "burning" our tax dollars.

So the next time a candidate comes to your door – during municipal elections, next year during the provincial election, whenever there’s a federal election -- and starts talking about cutting public sector expenses, ask them: what is your plan to ensure cash-strapped public institutions cut energy use?

About Julia Langer