Feb 26: Sustainability Salon on Efficiency, Electrification, and the IRA

Photo from Pixabay via Pexels.com

To open our 12th year of salons, we'll start a short series inspired by some new legislation that will enable major environmental improvements, on a human scale.  The 133rd Sustainability Salon on Sunday, February 26th (4 p.m. to 7 or so), will look at Energy (on March 26th, we'll be talking about Plastics).  

As we know, in order to reduce the effects of climate change in the years (and centuries) ahead, humanity needs to escape our dependence on fossil fuels.  We need to reduce our energy use (through conservation and energy efficiency), and we need to shift away from fossil carbon for the energy that we do use (electrification, combined with a move to renewables on the grid and in distributed installations).  Since most air pollution comes from fossil fuel combustion, that'll mean better air quality, indoors and out!  And although a great deal needs to happen in industry and public infrastructure, there are plenty of things that individuals can do to make this energy transition, and last year's passage of the federal Inflation Reduction Act and the state Whole-Home Repair legislation can help make the up-front costs more affordable.

IR image from a home energy audit;  
photo courtesy of Rhett Major

The cheapest energy is always the energy one can avoid using, so we'll start with home energy efficiency.  In order to figure out what measures to take first, there's nothing like a detailed energy audit.  Jonathan Nadle conducted hundreds of building energy audits through a nonprofit called Conservation Consultants, Inc. (CCI, no longer operating), evaluated weatherization programs, and taught principles and techniques of home performance to contractors and homeowners.  While at CCI, he also authored this helpful checklist of home energy efficiency measures.  He's the president of the Group Against Smog & Pollution (GASP), and serves on the Penn State Greater Allegheny Energy Engineering Advisory Board.  Jonathan will explain the hows and whys of home energy audits, and also how this all relates to indoor air quality.  

It also relates to the budgets of everyday people.  Energy prices have risen sharply over the past year, hitting many households hard -- so it's even more important for low-income folks (both owners and renters) to have efficient homes to reduce their "energy burden" (known internationally as "fuel poverty").  Drafty doors, single-pane windows, and walls and attics lacking insulation all contribute to big bills and difficult living conditions -- but not everybody can afford the necessary renovations.  State Representative Sara Innamorato, who proposed and pushed through the Whole-Home Repair program to address these concerns, will join us to talk about this statewide legislation -- which will enable low- and moderate-income homeowners and small landlords to make repairs and updates to homes across Pennsylvania, and create jobs in the process.  

We'll also talk about Action Housing's program providing free home weatherization services to low-income Pittsburghers.  

Even the most efficient homes use some energy;  the key to shifting away from fossil energy sources is electrification.  Over 40% of our energy-related emissions stem from decisions that Americans make around our kitchen tables -- what kind of transportation we use, how we heat the air and water in our homes, how we cook our food and dry our clothes.  The only way to eliminate these emissions is to have our households run on machines with plugs, not pipes -- devices like heat pumps in place of furnaces or boilers, and induction stoves in place of gas.  Some of our neighbors have managed to complete that process, detaching their homes completely from gas lines!  We'll have a brief panel with some of the local folks who have done this (Kirsi Jansa, Lou Reynolds, Mark Dixon, and Christine Benner Dixon), sharing their experience and fielding your questions.  

So how to pay for all these modifications?  It just became a little easier, especially for lower-income residents and those in environmental justice areas.  The federal Inflation Reduction Act, passed just last summer, will release $369 billion for "Energy Security and Climate Change" -- rolling out rebates, tax incentives, and other programs to help households conserve energy and to electrify.  What is in these programs, and how can you take advantage of them?  Dr. Lucyna de Barbaro, another former CCI staffer (who resides in a super-efficient Passive House) will outline the actions households can take (some now, some later in the year when more regulations are finalized) to reduce our contribution to global warming and our long-term energy costs.  The IRA has been called the single largest investment in American history -- you can be a part of this change!  

Please check back here for updates and additions -- in the meantime, some other items of note:

Clean Air Council has set up a directed donation fund to help residents affected by the train derailment just over the Ohio boarder.  You can contribute here.

•  Feb 15:  Allegheny County Council sustainability committee hearing on plastic pollution (live and on Teams).  

•  Feb 16:  Learn about the powers of the Allegheny County Executive in this webinar hosted by the Pittsburgh Green New Deal discussion group.  6:30-8;  register here.

•  Feb 18:  Allegheny County Democratic candidate forum.  1. p.m. in CMU's McConomy Auditorium (in the University Center).  

•  Feb 19:   Zoom panel on moving from environmental racism to environmental justice (7 p.m.).  More information and registration here.

•  Feb 19-26:  A series of events in support of Cop City resistance efforts in Atlanta.  Details here.  

•  Feb 21:  Wild Ones Western PA hosts a virtual workshop on Winter Sowing, a practice using old milk/cider jugs as tiny greenhouses for easy seed-starting (7:30-8:30 on Facebook Live).

•  Feb 23:  Green Drinks with GASP (6-8 p.m. at Mary's Vine in Rankin;  FB event here.)

•  Feb 23:  Book Launch for Patricia DeMarco's In the Footsteps of Rachel Carson (6-8 p.m. at Chatham;  details and RSVP info are provided in this Allegheny Front interview.

•  Mar 26:  Sustainability Salon on plastics legislation

•  Forests are threatened nationwide.  Wildfires, fossil energy and petrochemical projects, and other development projects.  Three more petitions:

•  Tell the Forest Service to do its job and protect our forests from further fragmentation by gas pipelines. This will likely lead you to another petition, encouraging the Army Corps of Engineers to deny permits for the same pipeline, the Mountain Valley, to cross waterways.  

•  Tell Atlanta to keep their promise to keep their biggest urban forest the centerpiece of their resilience plan, instead of a giant police and fire training facility (in the middle of a majority-Black community already dealing with environmental contamination as well as a long and troubled history with policing).  More information at that site, and also in this article which looks at many different perspectives.  Three Pittsburghers were arrested in the January 18th raid that also killed one other.  

•  Students at Shaler Area High School have partnered with the Allegheny Land Trust to protect open space in their community and enhance butterfly habitat with native plants.  They've put together a fundraiser to help acquire a parcel of former farmland.  

•. During the Climate Convergence in June, we placed a countdown Climate Clock in the Pennsylvania Capitol.  We petitioned to make this installation permanent, and were largely successful!

•. The petition we spoke about a few months ago is also still relevant:  https://www.fixharrisburg.com/

•  PRC continues to hold online workshops about composting, rainwater harvesting, and waste reduction.  

•  The Rachel Carson EcoVillage is still looking for a few more members, so they can start construction!  Curious?  Check out this introductory video -- or even better, sign up for an introduction session or sign up as an “inquirer” to have more information sent to you.

•  Did you see the film The Story of Plastic, or the PBS doc Plastic Wars?  (and/or join us for Plastic Paradise at a winter film salon six years ago?)  ...What if you could bring up imagery of the toxic impacts of plastic production, and commentary by the people and communities living with them, over the world?  You can do all that with the interactive Toxic Tours tool.  Check it out!  

•  Mask update:  Breathe99 masks (featured at November's salon on Pandemics and Air (video), and one of TIME's 100 Best Inventions of 2020) are now being distributed by Our Children Our Earth, a local purveyor of alternatives to disposables (as well as classy wooden toys).  Contact Dianne via OCOE's Facebook page, or call (412) 772-1638 to coordinate a curbside pickup.  

Talks and discussion will run from 4 p.m. to 7 or so on Zoom (sadly, no potluck supper these days).  You're welcome to join the call for informal conversation after 3 p.m., and we aim to start the main program right around 4.  If you're new to Zoom, you may find my Zoom Reference Guide helpful.  If you RSVP via Eventbrite, you'll receive the Zoom registration link right away.  If you're not already on my Eventbrite list, please email me (maren dot cooke at gmail dot com) with salon in the Subject line to be added -- and let me know how you heard about salons!

For the uninitiated, a Sustainability Salon is an educational forum; it's a mini-conference;  it's a venue for discussion and debate about important environmental issues;  it's a house party (if there weren't a pandemic) with an environmental theme.  Each month we have featured speakers on various aspects of a particular topic, interspersed with stimulating conversation, lively debate, delectable potluck food and drink, and music-making through the evening.

Past topics have included the UN's COP process for climate negotiations, alternatives to single-use packaging, our region's air (part I and part II), activist art and America's Energy Gamble, advocacy opportunities, social justice games, fixing Pennsylvania state government, climate action, forest restoration, the history of American consumerism, regional air quality, preserving Pittsburgh's forests, climate modeling, approaches to pipelines, pipeline hazards, the legacy of the Fukushima nuclear disaster, the judiciary and fair elections, consumption, pandemics and air,  election law and activism, air quality and environmental justice, social investment,  local economies, the economics of energy, mutual aid networks, ocean health, the rise of the radical right, the back end of consumption, approaches to activism on fracking & climate, air quality, technology, and citizen science, single-use plastics, election activism, election law, whether to preserve existing nuclear power plants, advanced nuclear technologies, passenger and freight trains, consumption, plastics, and pollution, air quality, solar power, youth activism, greening business, greenwashing, the petrochemical buildout in our region, climate/nature/people, fracking, health, & action, globalization, ecological ethics, community inclusion, air quality monitoring, informal gatherings that turn out to have lots of speakers, getting STEM into Congress, keeping Pittsburgh's water public, Shell's planned petrochemical plant, visualizing air quality, the City of Pittsburgh's sustainability initiatives, fossil energy infrastructure, getting money out of politics, community solar power and the Solarize Allegheny program, the Paris climate negotiations (before, during, and after), air quality (again, with news on the autism connection), reuse (of things and substances), neighborhood-scale food systems, other forms of green community revitalization, solar power, climate change, environmental art, environmental education (Part I & Part II), community mapping projects, environmental journalism, grassroots action, Marcellus shale development and community rights, green building, air quality, health care, more solar power, trees and park stewardship, alternative energy and climate policy, regional watershed issues, fantastic film screenings and discussions (often led by filmmakers) over the winter with films on Food Systems, Climate Adaptation and Mitigation, Plastic Paradise, Rachel Carson and the Power Of One Voice, Triple Divide on fracking, You've Been Trumped and A Dangerous Game, A Fierce Green Fire, Sustainability Pioneers, films on consumption, Living Downstream, Bidder 70, YERT, Gas Rush Stories, and food, food, food, food, food, food, food, food, food, food, food, food, food, food, food, food, food, food, food, food, and more food (a recurrent theme;  with California running out of water, we'd better gear up to produce a lot more of our own!).