Thurs Sept 17: A Sea Change, 2008, 85 mins.
Fri Sept 18: The Garden, 2008, 80 mins.
Sat Sept 19: Burning In the Sun, 2009, 65 mins.
Rain Date for any of the above: Sun Sept 20

For trailers and descriptions, please visit http://solar1.org/events/film.

Thursday September 17

Short: Bird Bath Bakery (from From Elegance to Earthworms)

Feature: A Sea Change
To focus public attention on the dangers of ocean acidification, film maker Sven Huseby embarks on a picturesque odyssey that leads him to small fishing villages whose cash crop is at risk, native communities whose way of life is being threatened, activists working to combat the crisis, and individuals who are changing their lifestyles to make a difference at the most local level.

Speakers: Angela Alston & Baerbel Hoenisch

In addition to making the award-winning film Reclaiming Water (2003), Angela Alston has served as publicist/outreach director for her own work and for other projects, including the Loisaida Cortos Latino Film Festival, Listen With Your Eyes, and Alwan for the Arts. For two years, Angela was Workshop Director for CineWomen NY. She also served as Public Affairs Coordinator for Cornish College of the Arts for three years and is the former Technical Director of Democracy Now!

Baerbel Hoenisch’s research interests focus on understanding the role of the ocean and the effects of marine carbonate chemistry on global climate change. As she was originally trained as a marine biologist, her way of approaching paleoceanographic questions often includes a biological component. She is specifically interested in the validation and application of the boron isotope proxy for past seawater pH.

Saturday, September 12th, 7pm

Short: Loyale (taken from From Elegance to Earthworms)

Feature: FLOW: For Love of Water

Experts are calling the World Water Crisis the most important political and environmental issue of the 21st Century. This film presents the case against the growing privatization of the world’s dwindling fresh water supply with an unflinching eye on politics, pollution, human rights, and the emergence of a domineering world water cartel.

Speaker: John Mundy, Project Manager, Majora Carter Group

John Mundy serves as Project Manager for the Majora Carter Group. The Majora Carter Group is a pioneering consulting group that builds highly productive relationships between organizations and across sectors to help civic, business and nonprofit organizations understand how to meet their needs by working together through green economic avenues.

Sometime in the near future, you won’t even need to think twice about frying up that prize striper you hooked out of the Hudson.

After twenty-five years of court appeals and other evasive measures employed by General Electric, the first of what will be many scoops of PCB-laden sludge was dredged from the Hudson River this past Friday as the result of a “good-faith” agreement with the EPA.  The massive effort, only Phase One of the project, is expected to require the around-the-clock operation of twelve dredges six days a week through 2015; assuming this phase runs its course, this would equal 48,672 hours for the removal of sediment that has been accumulating since the end of the Wisconsin glaciation period around 12,000 years ago, but took two GE plants and other chemical facilities only thirty years to contaminate.  The dried sludge will then be trucked to a landfill in Texas, while the river water will be pumped through a filtration plant and returned to continue its meandering course.

Nearly 200 miles of the river from Hudson Falls to the tip of Manhattan, just under two-thirds of the Hudson’s total length, was declared a Superfund site in 1984, and though GE has now adopted a veneer of compliance, it also continues to challenge the constitutionality of the legislation – the 1980 Comprehensive Environmental Response, Compensation, and Liability Act (CERCLA) -that determines Superfund status and culpability.  As part of the agreement, GE has also given itself an out clause – it will review the status of the project in 2010 and can then decide to opt out.  The total cost of this phase is estimated at $750 million but could be much greater, though GE has declined to provide an estimate, a decision that, compounded by these other compromises, does little to alleviate the pervasive skepticism within the environmental community.

Still, the fact that the clean-up project is now more than simply a contentious point of debate is cause for at least tepid celebration.  I imagine most of those keeping a close eye on this will remain patient until the 2010 review process is complete before any claims of restitution will finally be made.  Meanwhile, for the past quarter century, those PCBs and their fellow contaminants have been just sitting there in the river bottom ooze, waiting for the party responsible to own up and make that first move.

Sources: “Dredging of Pollutants Begins in Hudson”, The New York Times, May 15, 2009;“”Reclaiming a River”, The New York Times, May 16, 2009; “Shaking Off “Man’s Taint, Hudson Pulses With Life”, The New York Times, June 9, 1996; “What was the Wisconsin Glaciation?” Wisegeek.com;“25-Year-Old Hudson River Cleanup Plan Starts Today”, Running Scared (blogs.villagevoice.com), May 15, 2009; “Pollution and the Hudson River”, Cary Institute of Ecosystem Studies (www.ecostudies.org); Hudson River Sloop Clearwater (www.clearwater.org).

Harbor Seal at Stuyvesant Cove Park

On Saturday March 28th at about 8:00am Stuyvesant Cove Park had a visitor stop by for a while….a Harbor Seal!

It was hanging out on the rocky outcropping in the East River at about 20th street. Many people gathered around to see the seal and to make sure it was okay.  According to CRESLI

“Population counts over the last 12 years have indicated a dramatic increase in the number of seals utilizing Long Island’s waters, as well as a shift in the species composition of the region…”

So to see a seal hauled up on a rock in the East River or other bodies of water around the city is not such an uncommon occurrence.  Look at CRESLI for viewing guidelines when you see a seal.  This however was the first one that we know of that came to the rocky outcropping since Stuyvesant Cove Park was built. For more information on marine mammals and rescue efforts go to Riverhead Foundation

At about 10am just after the police and fireman had arrived the seal, which didn’t seem to be hurt or in distress, slipped back into the water and swam away. Photographers from a few different newspapers came by to get a glimpse of the seal, but the above photo (taken by park manager Melissa McDonald) with the exception of a few cell phone pictures, was the only photo to capture the seal.

The seal looked like a yearling, which means it is between the ages of 1- 2yrs old and a length of 3.5′-4′. Harbor seals mature between 4-6 years and live for about 25 years. The increase in seal sightings in the Hudson River Estuary and around Long Island are a testament to increased water quality as well as a reaction to the Marine Mammal Protection Act of 1972.

The potential of wind turbine technology to provide for our growing electricity needs on a utility scale increases every year as technology improves and its costs decline versus rising fossil fuel prices. However, wind power is limited by two key factors: time and location. Put simply, the wind doesn’t always blow and the areas with the highest wind resource are often located far away from population centers or in areas where development is controversial.

Developing turbines miles off shore along coastal shelves, where wind is more constant, speeds are higher and the imposing 30-story scale of today’s turbines are minimized to the size of thimble from land, may help mitigate both of these obstacles going forward. In spite of these advantages, recent large scale project proposals to develop offshore wind in the the Northeast have either succumbed to local opposition or escalating project costs. However, new proposals, including a few in the New York City harbor area, are again on the table, and important allies – including Mayor Bloomberg – have come to advocate for its development in the region.

KC Sahl, the New York Project Director for Bluewater Wind, one of the nation’s leading developers of offshore wind projects, will speak about offshore wind turbine technology and potential in the local context. 

The Solar-Powered Film Series returns to Solar One for the 4th year with two programs of environmental features and shorts, plus games, contests, a scavenger hunt and director Q&As and discussions with experts on various environmental topics. Presented by Solar One and Green Edge Collaborative; for full schedule and more information, click here. Limited chairs will be available, first come first serve; please feel free to bring your own. Please note that documentaries may contain language unsuitable for children.

Thursday August 21 at 8PM
Environmental Art:


Running Fence, 1978, 58 mins.
An engrossing document of Christo and Jeanne-Claude’s efforts to build a 24 1/2-mile-long, 18-foot-high fence of white fabric across the hills of northern California.


Christo’s Valley Curtain, 1973, 28 mins.
The first collaboration between the Maysles Brothers and Christo and Jeanne-Claude, and recipient of an Academy Award Nomination.

Friday August 22 at 8pm
Water Shorts:

Gimme Green, 2007, 27 mins.
Gimme Green peers behind the curtain of the $40-billion industry that fuels our nation’s largest irrigated crop—the lawn.


Invisible Creek, 2004, 8 mins.
Travel down the most polluted waterway in America, Newtown Creek, located on the border between Brooklyn and Queens in New York City.


City of Water, 2007, 30 mins.
City of Water explores the aspirations of public officials, environmentalists, academics, community activists, recreational boaters and everyday New Yorkers for a diverse, vibrant waterfront at a time when the shoreline is changing faster than at any other time in New York’s history.
Plus a discussion of CSOs (Combined Sewer Overflows) with Cortney Worrall of the Coastal Marine Resource Center

Saturday August 23 at 8pm
Green Building:


The Greening of Southie, 2008, 81mins.
Building Boston’s first LEED Gold-certified building turns out to be harder than anyone thought. The Greening of Southie shows what happens when you try to build the city of tomorrow… today.
Plus Q&A with director Ian Cheney

See you at the movies!

Water is heavily utilized in all forms of electricity generation. In fact the cooling needs of nuclear plants use much more water than even a hydro-electric dam. When you conserve energy you save $$, carbon emissions, and water. Win, win, win…. I like it.

Check out a great article on CNet here.

By now you’ve probably heard most of the doomsday scenarios regarding global warming. Temperatures and sea levels are rising, glaciers and ice caps are melting, and shifting weather patterns are wreaking havoc with ways of life that have otherwise changed little for centuries. Climate change has been connected with everything from water-rights squabbles to failing crops to an increasing prevalence of malaria and dengue fever. Some scientists have speculated that these scenarios may be avoided by sequestering greenhouse gases in large bodies of water, but this short-sighted approach begs the question: what exactly are these emissions doing to our oceans?

“Ocean acidification” was a hot topic at the recent meeting of the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS). According to researchers, our oceans have lower pH levels now than at any point in the last 40 million years, and at the present rate these levels will drop by another .3 units by the end of the century. This is due to the chemical reactions that result when carbon dioxide is dissolved in water, forming carbonic acid. Over the long term, this process could affect the food chain in significant ways. First, many organisms will not grow as large or will produce fewer offspring, as increased levels of CO2 render respiration and other physiological processes less efficient. Also, the absorption of greenhouse gases is likely to create dead-zones at some depths where the CO2-oxygen ratios are too low to support life. This is apparently already happening and is somewhat similar to the poisonous volcanic crater lakes that exist in central Africa, where high levels of CO2 and other gases are kept at the lake bottom due to water pressure — until something stirs up the water, leading to the release of noxious plumes that can have lethal, large-scale consequences, such as the 1700 people killed in Cameroon in 1986.

It is unlikely that the presence of such dead-zones in the oceans will present any significant danger to human populations, except in that such zones will lower the productivity of the ecosystem, affecting subsistence fishermen and others who rely on the sea for their sustenance and livelihood. But there is one more way in which ocean acidification could have serious consequences. Shellfish, coral and echinoderms may not be able to form their exoskeletons, as the calcium carbonate on which they depend dissolves during carbonic acid formation. One researcher referred to the massive volcanic explosions at the end of the Permian period 250 million years ago which caused oceanic pH levels to change suddenly, leading to the extinction of 90% of oceanic species, particularly those that make shells from calcium carbonate. Another researcher, looking into the combined effects of acidification and temperature increase, conducted experiments on purple sea urchins that replicated the ecological conditions that will exist in 2100 if emissions levels continue unabated. Her results indicated that the urchins had to work up to three times harder to create their shells, and that these shells were often deformed.

All this goes to show that you can’t simply shrug off greenhouse gases by pumping them underwater.

Water, which is already in trouble for droughts around the country, has been shown to be a huge ingredient in the production of biofuels. In a recent study by scientist Michael Webber at University of Texas, he found biofuels to use from 40 to 130 times more water per gallon than gasoline, mostly from the water needed for irrigation. It’s just another of the many complicated factors as we try to improve our energy portfolio and make it safer for future generations.

From Treehugger

Source control strategies that decrease the amount of stormwater entering the wastewater treatment system are valuable tools to reduce the occurrence and volume of CSOs and other stormwater discharges. Effective source control strategies also provide other benefits, such as decreased energy consumption and economic benefits associated with supporting local markets for source control strategies. The Council finds that the development and implementation of a sustainable stormwater management plan is vital to improve water quality in the City and thereby better protect the public health through the restoration and protection of the ecological health of the City’s waterbodies and to the enhanced use and enjoyment of the City’s waterbodies for recreational activities.

Among the strategies to be considered in drawing up the plans are green roofs, permeable pavement, cisterns and rain barrels, and tree/vegetative cover. This is all great news for the city and its waterways, which currently absorb up to 27 billion gallons of untreated waste water each year via CSOs. It’s also great news for beaches and other water-based recreational opportunities as part of the plan will include a more comprehensive system of warnings to protect public health when CSOs do happen.

Of course, legislation like this doesn’t happen without the hard work of a lot of dedicated people, in this case the folks at the S.W.I.M. coalition. Congratulations to them for everything they did to get this legislation passed.

For more information on water resources, check out our East River resource page. And if you haven’t already, take a look at our plans for Solar 2, which will include many water-saving and recycling techniques.

Gateway National Park… Ever been there? It’s one of the largest urban national parks, but a full half of New Yorkers don’t even know it’s there. It stretches around much of Queens and Brooklyn along the waterfront, as well as parts of Staten Island. Chronically underfunded, but culturally significant, Gateway is headed for a redesign. The National Parks Conservation Association is showcasing five of the competing design ideas and asking you to vote on them and submit comments. All the comments will then be given to the National Parks Service on January 31. Some of the designs have new ideas about water, some, new ideas about land. All take an advanced approach to materials used, native plants, and the usual.

Prod your boss to get the office a present this holiday: a waterless urinal. (I know, I know…ewww! But hold on one second,) Waterless urinals eliminate the most unsanitary part of the bathroom–standing water. By utilizing the fact that oil always floats on water, and they never mix, the devices use sanitary, clean smelling oils to push urine down the drain and keep the room smelling fresh. Far from dirty-hippy toilets, waterless urinals and low-water, high pressure toilets are clean modern products, and evidence suggests that they help stop the spread of bacteria.

Though state law prevents the treated waste water from flowing directly into the taps of Southern California homes, the hope is that the replenished groundwater will be able to accommodate current needs and the needs of the projected 500,000 additional people who will live in the county by 2020. And while the treatment process leaves the resulting liquid “as pure as distilled water,” there are those who question how clean the processes can really make the water. Never mind that testing it seems like it would be a very simple way to find out just how clean it is, or that the same people skeptical of the science involved might never bother to question other contaminants that they come into contact with every day like the pesticides used to grow the food that we eat.

Part of the water filtration process used in the system

At any rate, it’s nice to see communities taking actions like these, even if dire circumstances are the main instigation for doing so. If this venture succeeds, we hope it will lead to more proactive efforts to manage wastewater in other areas like, say, New York City.

For more details, check out the Groundwater Replenishment System website.

Blame it on global warming.

It’s the obvious modern liberal thing to do, and one never wants to jump to unresearched conclusions, but the more once-in-a-lifetime disasters we have bunched together right when the scientists say they will happen, the harder it is to ignore the urgency to take pressing measures to mitigate climate change.

At the current rate Atlanta will run out of water in 90-120 days. The entire Southeast has a drought unmatched in scale by any region in American history. The NYTimes reports on the gravity of the situation and the passionate pleas that public officials are making to get residents to conserve water.