The Dark Side Of 'Green' Power

This debate (or discussion really) is similar to lifecycle energy analysis. I wish I knew more about this area, but once you open the pandora's box of reducing ecological footprints it does raise important issues. I think the important thing to remember is that these discussions are valid and important.

Here's two example:
1. Anti-transit advocates often argue that an under-utilized bus pollutes more than those passengers each driving newer cars. (Obviously a simplified argument that ignores equity and land use issues, ie. the bus wouldn't be under-utilized if it connected supportive, more dense land uses.) P.S. Charles do you know where I can find some information on this?

2. I was talking about big box retail with my mother-in-law in No. County San Diego. I was complaining because I've seen people go into an Office Depot, come out with their plastic bags, get into their car, and drive across the parking lot to a Starbucks !!! I said, for all their problems at least inside traditional enclosed shopping malls, people still walked. However she pointed out that traditional shopping malls probably consumed more electricity in air conditioning.

These kinds of two-sided discussions about trade-offs between alternatives make a novice planner's (me) head spin. That being said I think the easy option of just saying "ignore the naysayers" is the wrong way to go. Power lines through pristine habitats does raise important issues. For example is this just a transfer of pollution issues from the urban to rural areas. So I say bring on the debate and lets see some real study of these important issues even if it can be frustrating.

During the early days of New Urbanism, many environmentalists were against density. In the most famous example, the Sierra Club stopped housing in Brooklyn designed by Peter Calthorpe. Calthorpe was still mad at the Sierra Club in the 90s, when we invited him to a meeting of a committee that was developing an urban growth policy for the SC Bay chapter. But we ultimately adopted a policy supporting compact development, inspired partly by new urbanism, and the national Sierra Club now has also adopted a policy favoring compact growth.

Duany should be saying that some people who call themselves environmentalists oppose higher densities. Most environmentalists - I would say all real urban environmentalists - support higher densities.

I expect the same is true of power lines. Most environmentalists realize that we have to shift to alternative energy even if it means running more power lines through the countryside, even if those who oppose the power lines call themselves environmentalists. There are undoubtedly some special cases where land has special value as habitat and the power lines should take a more round-about route, but those are the exception, not the rule.

Charles Siegel