Responsibilities of an Aspiring Post-petroleum Citizenry

Green Transportation

by Jeanne McHale, Co-op Newsletter Volunteer

It would be nice if this month’s Green Transportation column were a laundry list of simple things you can do to reduce the environmental impact of getting around: bike, walk, carpool, etc.  But none of these healthy practices matter in the long run, if Exxon-Mobile and its Canadian subsidiary Imperial Oil are allowed to imperil the planet with their climate-killing mining practices.  The massive Kearl Tar Sands project (250 square miles mined so far, with a possible scope of 54,000 square miles), poses threats to the environment on a geological scale.  In a climate-bashing triple-whammy, this environmental obscenity wastes natural gas to fluidize  a nasty carcinogenic precursor, scrapes off the boreal forest and nullifies its capacity for absorbing CO₂, and would ship the end-product to China where it will be subject to fewer regulations when it’s burned. Leaking tailings ponds are fouling the Athabasca River, causing deformed fish and ruining livelihoods.  Rare cancers are inflicting whole families of people who live near the tar sands.

               Earlier this year, Big Oil had its slimy tentacles stretched toward the scenic Clearwater and Lochsa Rivers.  Now the loads, which were earlier deemed to be “impossible to reduce in size,” have been sliced lengthwise to fit under freeway overpasses, and these stubby behemoths have the green light from the Idaho Department of Imperial Oil Transportation (I.D.I.O.T.) to pound Highway 95 on their way north to the ecological freak show. 

   

            The night of Aug. 25, six brave Moscow citizens were arrested and hundreds more protested the passage of a half-height Exxon-Mobile megaload. Since then, a handful of additional loads bound for Alberta have been met by robust gatherings of resistors. At least 60 more stubby megaloads are idling in Lewiston while B.O. and I.D.I.O.T. rework their travel plan to try to minimize opportunities for free speech, much of which has been expressed within blocks of our food co-op. 

            Biking and walking are small contributions made by individuals.  Massive social change to prevent dire environmental consequences, on the other hand, requires a lot of people acting together to affect policy. Come downtown and participate in peaceful demonstrations against megaload madness.   Reject Moscow’s participation in genocide and climate change.    

                Jeanne McHale thanks the members of Wild Idaho Rising Tide for their hard work and recommends friending them on Facebook to keep abreast of tar sands resistance work.   

  

 

The Sustainability Review – Rainwater Geometry

By Mike Forbes, Co-op Volunteer Writer

I’ve written about rainwater systems for several years now, specifically about our experience with installing, filtering, and using it.  I’ve received many questions in that time regarding everything about our system.  There is one question that keeps rearing its head.  How much water can I collect off of my roof?

I remember doing the calculations years ago and quickly realized that in our circumstance that we would have more water falling on our roof than we could easily store.  Storage became our issue but for you it might not be since our roof is rather large.  My point in writing this is that it’s important to know what your water capture potential is and design your storage and useage accordingly.  I’m not going to go through any of the techniques or roof materials of rainwater collection as I’ve done that in the past, this article is purely theoretical.  Previous articles can be found on the Co-op website or from me directly.

Let’s walk through the math with an imaginary 20’ x 20’ small house.  Time to put on your high school geometry thinking cap. The most important thing here is to visualize the roof area that the rain is falling on, not the length of the roof line. The slope of the roof isn’t important here. The dimensions we are looking for are the lengths of the walls plus any overhang, ultimately the total roof area that the rain will see.  With our house we have a 20’ x 20’ roof giving us an area of 400 sq. ft.

Next we need to know how much rain comes out of the sky.  Where do you find this data? www.weatherbase.com.  There are various sites out there with specific data for a location but this one is a simple to use and easy to decipher.  Many other sources require you to dig a bit and don’t give a good overview.  Simply input your zip code and scroll down to Average Precipitation.  For Moscow, Idaho this is 23.7 inches. 

Imagine a roof of 400 square feet with 23.7 inches (1.97 feet) of water sitting on top of it.  This is our potential rain resource.  In order to get to something we understand better we must convert to gallons.  To do this, we must convert those numbers to a volume like cubic feet by multiplying our area by the depth of water.  Everything must be in feet to do this so the equation looks like this:  Area (in square feet) x depth (in feet) = cubic feet.  Our example: 400 square feet x 1.97 feet = 788 cubic feet.

Now we can convert this cubic foot measurement to gallons.  Looking this up we find that there are 7.48 gallons per cubic foot.  Multiplying we get a grand total of 5,894 gallons falling on our roof. This is a lot more than most people can easily store and this is for a small roof.   

What do we do with this number? We start the design process of storage and useage.  In our next article we’ll talk about the design process and walk through the steps.  I’ve created a spreadsheet that looks at monthly rainfall and useage to assist in this process.

 

I think it is common to think we live in a dry area and that rainfall isn’t a significant source of water for us on the Palouse.  The math doesn’t lie and it will become quite apparent after doing the math that we do have a good resource by which we can offset our use of precious groundwater.

Mike enjoyed the cool summer and can be reached at mike@technicalrescue.net.

Has been hot Green Transportation: Jim LaFortune and the MAMBA Challenge

By Jeanne McHale, Co-op Volunteer Writer

            
This column is written with a divided heart.  It features a man who left a wonderful legacy of trails enjoyed by hikers, bikers and skiers on Moscow Mountain.  In his 51 years, Jim LaFortune had more fun outdoors than three normal people. I am obliged to tell you about his generosity and the continuation of his trail-building work, and yet I want you to keep it secret. A web of well-maintained trails laces Moscow Mountain, accessible from Foothill or Moscow Mt. Rd. and roughly centered at Four Corners.   The trails are the work of Moscow Area Mountain Bike Association, with co-operation from Bennett Lumber and private landowners. Moscow cyclists love these trails and drive their cars to use them. How do I work that into a column about Green Transportation?

In the early 90s Jim and Kathie LaFortune were new to the area. Jim and his dog Bones began to explore Moscow Mountain looking for trails. In those days, the land was littered with shotgun shells and beer cans. The first trail Jim and friends cleared was North Contour in 1991, now a 1 mile “beginner” run. Soon he was collecting money for trail-building tools and developing a partnership with Bennett. Thanks to this groundwork, cyclists are now seen as good stewards of the mountain, and so is Bennett lumber.  But Kathie says Jim’s devotion to carving these trails was really a selfish act.  “He realized that Moscow was going to be his home for quite a while and needed a place to ride.”

The popular Headwaters Trail makes a roly-poly loop above Pond 9 on the west side. Its meandering switchbacks suggest a trail built for entertainment rather than transportation. Some of the trails are obscenely difficult to bike. The ridge road, which I used to climb on my road bike, is tame compared to Deep Vee.  I wonder if I could ever be as good a biker as Jim was, even in the last few months of his too-short life. I can’t handle the black diamonds on MAMBA trails, but I’m not scared of a little gravel and regularly cycle-commute from our home near the west parking area to town.  

I would like to thank the 500 or so MAMBA members who maintain the trails for all to enjoy.  

If you’d like to help, meet at Rosauers at 8:45 am on Aug. 6 or 27, bringing water, snacks, and gloves.   I would also like to issue this Green Transportation challenge.  Consider designating Foothill Road one of the official trails, call it “Washboard,” and letting your Moscow Mountain adventure begin right in your driveway.

Jeanne McHale looks forward to circumnavigating the wild Weitas Roadless area by bicycle on her upcoming vacation.

Green Transportation- The Thermodynamics of Bicycle Commuting

Jeanne McHale, Newsletter Volunteer

            Bicycling is an extremely efficient form of transportation.  A typical cyclist burns about 400 calories per hour, less than is required for swimming, jogging, or cross-country skiing.  Those calories must be replenished, or cyclists would literally vanish into the sunset.  In this column, I consider the energy cost of bicycle transportation as opposed to driving a personal vehicle.  You may find some of this data rather shocking, but please read on before you make out your shopping list.

             Food calories as a unit of energy are actually kilocalories (kcal). When converted to units of kilojoules (kJ), they must be multiplied by 4,184.  So the apple I just munched, nominally 80 calories, provided me with 335 kJ of energy.  But the apple didn’t grow in my yard, it had to be transported.  Agriculture accounts for a considerable portion of our fossil fuel consumption.  According to Barbara Kingsolver, author of “Animal, Vegetable, Miracle,” a typical food item travels 1,500 miles to reach your dinner plate, and the average American’s food consumption accounts for about 400 gallons of oil per year.  My husband and I rack up about 3,000 mile per year on our Toyota, which translates to about 100 gallons of gas per year.  Yikes, could we be burning more oil by eating then by driving?

            Let’s look at this more closely.  As often as I can, I commute to work on my bicycle, a 32 mile round trip.  This takes me about two and half hours, consuming about 1,000 food calories or 4,200 kJ. The same trip in my car would burn a gallon of gas, which provides about 125,000 kJ, based on the heat of combustion of isooctane. This is 30 times as much energy as that required to fuel the engine of my bike, which burns “fat” instead of “oil.”   Sounds better to bike, right? But according to Kingsolver, each food calorie consumed requires dozens or even hundreds of calories from fossil fuel to raise, market, and transport it.  So unless I make local food choices, replenishing those food calories spent cycling could actually increase rather than decrease my fossil fuel consumption!

            The solution to the problem is to cycle and eat locally.  The Co-op, the Growers Market, and the Moscow Farmer’s Market provide many tasty alternatives to petroleum-intensive food products.  Food tastes so much better when it’s been raised locally and even better after an appetite-stimulating bike ride.  See you on the trail.

Green Transportation is written by Jeanne McHale, who notes that her own efforts to grow food this Spring have required petroleum input in the form of polyethylene sheets to protect seedlings from frost.  

The Sustainability Review - The Hay Box

By Mike Forbes, Co-op Volunteer Writer

When you cook food much of the heat energy from your stove is used to overcome heat loss from your food to it’s surroundings.  Couldn’t we insulate our food so heat isn’t lost as rapidly thereby using less energy to cook it? Definitely.

Rice. Theoretically, once the rice boils the heat energy needed to complete cooking is present.  The heat leaves the rice because the food is insulated poorly. We overcome this loss by turning the burner down low and simmering it for 30-40 minutes, wasting electricity or fuel. 

What if we boiled the rice and then quickly put it in an insulated box where the heat energy couldn’t escape and the rice would then finish cooking? 

The catch is building a box that heat can’t escape from. What I’ve done successfully for years is build various insulated boxes from commonly available items.

I use them primarily for keeping food hot for a LONG period of time and cooking beans, millet and quinoa.  I’ve also been known to use it for steeping grains and preparing yeast in the beer making process…  If I put a hot food into the box I can pull it out 2-4 hours later still piping hot.

The trick to maximizing efficiency is to build a box that has as little air in it as possible with the largest pot you expect to use. My boxes are built from rigid foam insulation with a radiant barrier (shiny aluminum coating toward the inside).  I glue them together with hobby glue or foam adhesive (Natural Abode and MBS both carry non-toxic, low VOC glues that work well).  I put little strips of wood on the inside bottom to keep the hot pots directly off the insulation.  The door is just a rectangle of foam that wedge fits into the box. It is critical to make the door tight fitting, if you put a slight bevel to the door it will create a much better seal.  Using a table saw to make your cuts makes the process very easy and accurate.  Options for dressing up your box cosmetically are endless.  I typically wrap them in wood to make them more visually appealing but for years had a silver box wrapped in duct tape sitting on top my refrigerator.

If you build the box to your largest pot you can still use smaller pots with good success if you add more thermal mass to the box.  I found that filling small jars with hot water works well to eliminate these air spaces.

Currently we are planning on converting one of our kitchen cabinets into a haybox.  We’ll incorporate insulation into the door with the taper fit foam as mentioned earlier.   It is my understanding that this concept is old and that traditionally hay was used in the boxes as insulation, hence the name hay box.

Mike welcomes questions.  He can be reached at mike@technicalrescue.net.

Green Transportation

By Jeanne McHale

Not In My Backyard –Un-green transportation in the Pacific Northwest

             Lately I’ve been thinking about the size of the proverbial backyard. Our planet is small and easily perturbed by our energy dependencies.  A careless decision creates an oil slick visible from space.  A nuclear reactor survives an earthquake, but not the tsunami.  Politicians permit the conversion of scenic byways into industrial corridors, and our neighbors to the north find their drinking water polluted.  

            Highway 12 skirts the Clearwater and Lochsa Rivers in parallel to the Nez Perce Historic Trail and the path of the Lewis and Clark expedition. Throngs of visitors find solace in the syringa and soaring eagles here.  Part of the proposed route from Lewiston to the tar sands of Canada, Route 12 also parallels the TransAmerica Bike Trail. This popular bike route follows the Northwest Passage Scenic Byway on route to Missoula, the headquarters for Adventure Cycling.

Outspoken critics of the industrialization of Idaho and Montana bike routes, Adventure Cycling grew from an idealistic bicycle tour of the US that took place in 1976.  We could use a little of that bicentennial spirit these days.     

            At the Alberta tar sands, two tons of earth are excavated to get one barrel of tar. Pollution associated with the bitumen extraction process has led to increased cancer rates among First Nations people. Gooey tailings ponds are death traps for wildlife.  Clean natural gas is being burned to make the dirty tar, and a criminal amount of CO₂ is being released.  Making the equation even worse, a huge swath of the CO₂-absorbing boreal forest has been clearcut. Our governor, who recently told Congress that Idahoans don’t care much for wilderness, made us an unwitting partner to this planet-wrecking project by secretly approving the corporate takeover of Idaho roads by Big Oil.

            On March 20, a group of Nez Perce and non-tribal members from our backyard gathered in Kamiah for the Heart of the Monster Solidarity March, a show of unity for the First Nations people of Canada who are impacted by the Tar Sands.  At the Nez Perce National Historic Park, we gathered to hear an elder’s prayer, and people spoke of their local and global concerns. The struggle straddles numerous cultural divides: cyclists, fisherman and women, tour guides, and all who are spiritually connected to the land.  Not in our backyard, not in anybody’s backyard.

Green Transportation is written by Jeanne McHale, a lifetime member of Adventure Cycling and a veteran of the Northwest Passage Route. 

GM Search Update

By Andrika Kuhle

And the search continues…………….. The search committee is hard at work, with little exciting news to report. We are getting the word out that Moscow Food Co-op is hiring a new GM. We’ve posted announcements in numerous venues such as our local and regional newspapers, and organizations such as Tilth Producers, Sustainable Food Jobs and Cooperative Grocers’ Information Network. Do you know of a strong candidate that you would like to nominate? If so, please let the search committee know by sending an email to search@moscowfood.coop. We will begin screening applicants April 18. Stay tuned!