CitiesGoGreen -September 2008 - (Page 9) In Motion Sprawl is so 90’s The housing bubble’s “drive until you qualify” standard is over, according to David Stiff (4 pg PDF), chief economist of Fiserv Lending Solutions. Developers, governments and buyers alike are being forced to respond. As gas prices reach painful levels, the cost of commuting is devastating the value of suburban homes. Meanwhile, homes near urban centers and public transit continue to sell, and even see an increase of up to 10 percent in some places. According to a CEOSforCities report, this “is a huge opportunity for urban economic development if public policy responds.” Transition Towns ask themselves, For all those aspects of life that this community needs in order to sustain itself and thrive, how do we significantly increase resilience (to mitigate the effects of Peak Oil) and drastically reduce carbon emissions (to mitigate the effects of Climate Change)? And recognize these points: l That we used immense amounts of creativity, ingenuity and adaptability on the way up the energy upslope, and that there’s no reason for us not to do the same on the downslope l If we collectively plan and act early enough there’s every likelihood that we can create a way of living that’s significantly more connected, more vibrant and more in touch with our environment than the oil-addicted treadmill that we find ourselves on today. In the two and a half years since the movement’s inception in Totnes, UK, more than 50 communities worldwide have become Transition Towns and another 700 are considering it. Transition Towns create a Transition Initiative to facilitate their energy descent, with a focus on local currency, sustainable farming and reducing vehicle use. The new Transition Handbook, written by founder Rob Hopkins, addresses the necessity of confronting both peak oil and climate change, and explains how to create local sustainability. More points of access are the Transition Initiatives Primer and Transition Trainings, conducted throughout the UK, and perhaps soon in the US. Bristol, UK one of more than 50 Transition Towns worldwide. Comments and additional materials at CitiesGoGreen.com Transition Towns Photo courtesy PBP © Peter Fedorco - Fotolia.com A Game Changing Car? Nissan-Renault’s EV, an integral part of Project Better Place’s plan. It’s not the car that’s gamechanging but the system, actually. Project Better Place asks, “How do you get a country completely off oil?” The answer: Give away fast, comfortable, full size, allelectric plug in cars the way phone companies give away cell phones. Install plug-in outlets all over, GPS locatable. September 2008 For trips beyond the 100+ mile battery range, provide stations to swap out batteries faster than filling a gas tank. Most people will take a new car for free, they speculate, with a monthly usage charge. Charging the swap-out batteries will take a lot of electricity, which will be renewably sourced as much as possible. That creates a large and reliable market for clean energy, which will drive the price of electricity lower than coal, and will help trigger a massive switch to clean energy. According to Shai Agassi, founder and CEO, for $100 million (the price of two months of oil imports—with 80 percent of that going to US jobs building the infrastructure for his system) the US could eliminate the need to import oil, going to all-electric, plug in cars. Fantastic? $200 million in investment capital and the sign-on of the Israeli and Danish governments lend it some credibility. Likewise, the Renault/Nissan Alliance is putting up to a billion dollars into developing not just prototypes but mass production for the car and battery set. Mass production for Israel is set for 2011, according to Agassi. .com 9 http://www.transitiontowns.org http://nsidc.org/arcticseaicenews/index.html http://www2.standardandpoors.com/spf/pdf/index/052708_Housing_bubbles_collapse.pdf http://www.independent.co.uk/environment/climatechange/exclusive-no-ice-at-the-north-pole-855406.html http://www.chelseagreen.com/bookstore/item/the_transition_handbook:paperback# http://www.ceosforcities.org/pubs_projects/entry/1641 http://www.transitiontowns.org/TransitionNetwork/TransitionTraining http://Fotolia.com http://www.CitiesGoGreen.com http://www.utah.gov/governor/news_media/article.html?article=1724 http://www.time.com/time/specials/packages/article/0,28804,1819594_1819592_1819588,00.html http://www.projectbetterplace.com http://www.typepad.com/t/trackback/2383206/30426386 http://CitiesGoGreen.com
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