The David Suzuki Foundation [DSF] made a pragmatic decision to use the Olympics to leverage green change; that's their mandate and their expertise. But times change and the science has gotten way worse. I've been trying to make the point that we need deep systemic change if we want to have any hope of not going over impending tipping points and there is an obvious systemic change that needs to happen to the Olympics and I wrote it up this way in my Olympics and Denial: Give the games back to the athletes at one Olympic venue and tell the spoiled rich partyers to stay home and watch on TV.
Offsets and new energy systems, etc make the Olympics only marginally less Greenhouse Gas [GHG] producing. Agree to Lillehammer, for example, tell the people not to come except for athletes and family and a very few dignitarys and press, and give the world an example of the global rich caring enough to do the right thing.
But because of DSF's strictly within Business As Usual [BAU] mandate and the carbon addict denial that permeates this big party and adfest, no green group makes the key argument and so it's off to Russia in four years, etc. etc.
I think this is a super important metaphor for how Big ENGOs do business and fail us at this crucial time. I think tinkering with pleas for green energy and offsets for a green Olympics is DENIAL for all of us to see and as I said before ' forget about battling the stupid deniers in the Mainstream Media [MSM] - work instead upon the delayers who know the science and who should know better but remain in denial about the need for systemic change. Bill Henderson
And GlanGolf wrote: Really!? Does that include the trucking in of snow and the huge diesel generators that provide power at the Stadium? (BTW, why didn’t they get Hydro to fire up the Burrard plant for the festivities instead – less pollution than the diesel generators – for sure) And what is that about a huge supply of natural gas going into BC Stadium via gigantic, newly-laid, subterranean pipes?
Bob at The Mud Report says: Even the buildings that Suzuki says are the reason for his support aren't green at all if you look closely. Nowhere, in the buildings, or the overall games themselves, does VANOC even consider the embedded energy involved. Everything takes energy to produce, concrete, rebar, the deisel dumptrucks hauling snow from Manning Park, everything. So when VANOC talks about its carbon footprint it's always talking throughput consumption. Everyone i meet is outraged by the pollution caused by the hauling and helicoptering of snow. The closer the flame comes to Vancouver the stronger the opposition and outrage becomes. How much more upset will folks be when the true economic and envirmental costs now being hidden by VANOC and the various governments oozes out into view?
