Last week I covered the SmartPower and YouTube Clean Energy Ad Challenge. SmartPower is a nonprofit marketing agency that promotes renewable energy, and their challenge to the YouTube community was to create a compelling public service announcement for the agency with the idea that “clean energy is real. It’s here. And it’s working.”

The winner was announced on June 18th. Dan Sheppard, age 19 and a student at the University of Nebraska at Lincoln, was awarded the $10,000 top prize for his ad “Telephones.” Although it didn't fall into my top favorites (you can see the top 10 finalists here), but it was simple, well-made, and earns a chuckle. Congratulations!

What do you do when you’ve got a problem like communicating the need for renewable, efficient energy to hundreds of millions of people? Harness the web, of course.

SmartPower, a nonprofit marketing organization that promotes clean energy, used YouTube to form the Clean Energy Challenge. The aim was to create an ad for SmartPower around the belief that “clean energy is real. It’s here. And it’s working.”

After reviewing 150 submissions (not a ton, but not bad for such a wonky topic whose actors have virtually no chance of finding a mate on national TV), the $10,000 winner has been chosen. But in the true style of any reality show, the final results are drawn out over several days. The top 10 ads were posted on June 10th and for every day until the 18th one ad will be removed, finally leaving the “last ad standing” on Monday.

The winner will be announced via webcast at 5:00PM on June 18th and all finalists voted off are highlighted on the SmartPower Blog.

I was impressed with the quality of most of the finalists – these weren’t all made in someone’s basement. I’m a big fan of “Reading Light” and “Time Machine” because they made me laugh. And the kid in “It’s Your Choice” is really quite good. What's your favorite?

SmartPower

Glaciers are considered “global thermometers” and their shrinking numbers are watched closely by climate change scientists. Germany’s glaciers are suffering a faster fate than many, and locals dependent on the Zugspitze glacier for their livelihood are struggling to slow its demise.

In an area known for its winter skiing, and in a nation dependent on glaciers for drinking water, the melting of Germany’s last glacier is spurring some innovative – some say futile – attempts to save it. Giant anti-glare shields have been spread over the glacier each spring for the past 14 years, with tons of loose snow piled on top. The shields deflect the sun, keep the surface cool and shield the glacier from warm summer rain that speeds the melting. During the winter months, workers set off explosives to generate controlled avalanches on surrounding slopes to push snow onto the glacier and fences are erected to slow wind erosion. But the end is still inevitable, said the Zugspitze’s cable car operator, Frank Huber:

"We're doing all we can to preserve it as long as possible, but I'm not God and there's only so much we can do…the other things we're doing are only going to slow the process down a little bit. We aren't going to be able to save it….I grew up with the glacier and it's sad to think one day my children's children won't know what it feels or looks like.”

No one will say how much these efforts cost, other than that the investment is considerable.

Scientists report that rising global temperatures from climate change are causing the melting. The United Nation’s Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change has also stated that small alpine glaciers will disappear while larger glaciers will shrink 30-70 percent by 2050. The Zugspitze glacier was over 260 feet thick in 1910, compared with less than 150 feet thick today.

In the U.S.’s Glacier National Park, only 27 glaciers are left, down from 150 in 1850. Some estimates predict the park will be without glaciers by 2030.

CBS News
Reuters, via CNN

This post isn’t exactly related to my daily accounts of clean energy goings-on, but since I’ve been hunting since I was 12 (don’t ask about my record), it caught my eye.

The impacts of global warming are starting to hit home for a lot of us, and those out in nature see some of the earliest effects. In Culebra Creek, Colorado, locals are reporting very early run-off from the mountains. This means less water in the summer and fall, according to Jack Williams, a scientist with the conservation group Trout Unlimited. Fish like trout need cold water and become stressed on hot summer days. He told Reuters:

"We are finding a lot of concern among anglers and hunters about climate change. These people value traditions and their family and it will affect their children and their ability to enjoy these kinds of outdoor experiences.”

Goose hunting is another sport that’s been affected by a warmer climate. One guide on the Canadian province of Prince Edward Island estimated that hunters only bagged about 40 percent of the geese they normally get. Warmer temps allow the birds to stay longer in coastal areas that used to freeze up, and allow for an earlier grain harvest. That means there’s less food in the fields to attract the birds when the hunting season begins in the fall.

According to the National Wildlife Federation (NWF), more than 40 million Americans hunt or fish and they spend $70 billion a year on licenses, equipment, and supplies. That sort of participation and money, of course, leads to political influence. In fact, anglers and hunters played an important role in securing congressional protection from oil and gas drilling last year for the Valle Vidal area in New Mexico and the Rocky Mountain Front in Montana.

Eighty percent of anglers and hunters surveyed by the NWF said they believe the U.S. isn’t doing enough to fight global warming, especially our addiction to oil. Their lawmakers had better be listening. In particular, the Republican Party – which counts on sportsmen and women for a strong base of support - has often been reluctant to move decisively on global warming in the past. Anglers and hunters have a great opportunity to reel in their sluggish elected officials on this issue.

National Wildlife Federation
Reuters, via Planet Ark
targetglobalwarming.org

Image: Sports IllustratedThe guys and some gals may disagree with me on this one, but the cover for the hottest Sports Illustrated cover is…global warming.

Clearly, environmentalists aren’t the only ones talking about global warming anymore: it’s affecting ski resorts, insurance companies, and a host of cultural institutions like the wide world of sports: The Miami Dolphins have built a climate-controlled bubble to avoid the extreme Florida heat during practices, seven World Cup ski racing events in Europe have been cancelled this season because of warmer temperatures, and Alaska’s Iditarod dogsled race hasn’t started at its traditional location in five years because of lack of snow.

So what is the sport world’s part in fighting global warming? Make sure stadiums are easily accessible by mass transit and install renewable energy systems (solar or wind) on stadiums are a few ideas. But many professional organizations and athletes are taking action now:

• Gillette Stadium in Foxborough, MA has a water filtration and reuse system that collects and recirculates "black" and "gray water" to make the most of all that beer and all those flushes.

• Saints safety Steve Gleason runs his Dodge Ram pickup on biodiesel.

• The NFL planted 3,000 trees around Florida to try to offset Super Bowl XLI’s estimated one million pounds of carbon dioxide emissions, a main contributor to global warming.

• NASCAR driver Ward Burton's foundation is pledged to habitat management, land conservation and environmental education in his home state of Virginia.

Ken Rakoz of Centralia, WA built the first biodiesel-powered dragster. He told Sports Illustrated:

"In the environmental movement there's way too much preaching to the choir. There are people sitting on the fence, and Joe Sixpack doesn't really know about [biodiesel] until we do something like racing."

As it impacts us all more and more, creative and meaningful action from all sectors of society will be critical to fighting it. There’s no wild card for the planet in the league of global warming.

Sports Illustrated

I’m still on the ski kick – probably because Utah’s mountains kicked my butt and my hobble shows it. The lack of snow out there was a bit depressing, and ski resorts around the country are becoming more and more concerned about how global warming will affect business.

Over 50 ski resorts across the nation are using renewable energy, and one of the most recent resorts to join the green ranks is Crystal Mountain in Michigan.

Crystal Mountain – ranked the #1 Midwest ski resort by Ski Magazine in 2005 – buys wind power from a third party to power its high-speed chair lift. The carbon dioxide pollution saved from using clean power instead of coal is about the same as taking 55 cars off the road. Crystal Mountain's Joan O'Neill told the Detroit News:

Global warming does affect our business…we want to make sure we combat it as best we can and lead by example.

Unfortunately, the electric grid doesn’t allow power from closer states like Minnesota to be directed to Michigan. Instead, Crystal is buying the equivalent amount of power it takes to run the high-speed lift from Colorado-based Renewable Choice Energy, which then pushes that amount of power onto the grid, displacing more dirty forms of energy with clean ones.

Crystal Mountain is encouraging its customers to be part of the solution as well. It offers free or discounted lift tickets to those who sign their homes up for green energy.