Listen up ya’ll,

Tune into It’s Hot in Here, (Ann Arbor’s own biweekly dose of environmental news, eclectic grooves and exxxpertise for the sustainable set) for a conversation with Ahmina Maxey and Rocio Valerio of the East Michigan Environmental Action Council. Hear about their fantastic Motor City Mentoring, Clean Air Programs and details on the upcoming US Social Forum in Detroit in 2010 today from 12-1.

Also Today:
Updates on the Senate version of the Climate Bill with Jesse Worker
Your sustainable fish of the week with Gina G
What’s in Season with Rachel Chadderdon
Paul Explains the Smart Grid with Paul Mansoor
What’s up with Salvage Logging? with George Bekris

Links

East Michigan Environmental Action Council – http://emeac.org/
Alliance for Healthy Air campaign – http://allianceforhealthyair.org/
United States Social Forum – http://ussf2010.org/

Links

East Michigan Environmental Action Council – http://emeac.org/
Alliance for Healthy Air campaign – http://allianceforhealthyair.org/
United States Social Forum – http://ussf2010.org/

Join us Monday, October 12 from noon to 1.

A Greener UM: Students Lead the Way To Sustainability

With special guests from the U of M Student Sustainability Initiative and call-ins from Brian Lipinski and Jesse Worker

Check out: Climate Ground Zero

Coal WAS West Virginia, courtesy of the Sierra Club

Check out the blog post. Here.

IN and Out on Geoengineering
IN: From the New York Times, “The Earth is Warming? Adjust the Thermostat” by John Tierney:

Out: From the Atlantic, “Re-Engineering the Earth” by Graeme Wood:

Toxic Tangent: What’s in Your Sunscreen?

Join us this week for an auditory tour through the collegiate halls of sustainability with special guest Mark Rabinsky, Director of Sustainability for Michigan’s own Jackson Community College.

Check out UM’s Initiatives or take your own Sustainability, Live it Love it

Also servin’ up our weekly green side dishes:

What’s in Season with Rachel Chadderdon: Stone Fruits!
Toxic Tangent with Aviva Glaser: Pesticide Free Schools!
Fish Ain’t Biting with GG: Take a pass on seabass – try Pacific Cod instead!

Summer is a sizzlin’ on Hot in Here. Join us today for a culinary cruise from garden to grill with local food exxxpert Rachel Chadderdon. We’ll be dishin’ out foodie grooves to stoke your appetite and legislative news to whet your whistle. Stow your luggage, grab your sea legs and come get Hot in Here.

WhatsOnMyFood.org
FoodMed.org

SNRE’s own recently minted M.S. and MBA Devon Treece schools us on the history and future of carbon trading.

From factories in the Rust Belt to forests in the Amazon, from acid rain to potential global gain we learn how we got where are and contemplate where we need to be.

Music = a Caribbean twist on American soul.

As always, with exxxtra special guests (so special, we’re not even sure they can make it)!

LCV.org keeps us up to date as usual, like telling us who in congress to contact regarding Clean Energy.

Carbon Caps = Hard Hats

Exxxtra special Earth Week Edition: It’s Hot in Here.

This week we get real drrrty with “clean coal.” From the scene (i.e., mostly the bar) of last week’s Proposed Bay City Coal Plant hearing, we take you on a carbon filled journey through time and space. Interviews recorded from the hearing as well as live interviews with some State of Michigan Sierra Club folks, and an activist from coal extraction state West Virginia.

Joining us in the studio again is class act[ivist] Andrew Munn.

News coverage of the hearing.

Take Action: CleanEnergyNowMI.org or MIPowerShift.org.

Union brothers and sisters (co-hosts are part of the GEO and LEO unions)… rest assured we are in favor of jobs, but we want them to be stable, long-term, sustainable jobs… like these skilled trades millwrights, carpenters, electricians, quality assurance managers, plant managers, customer care, and engineers jobs coming to Michigan at a wind turbine factory.

Also, check out the state sponsored conference on May 11th Green Today, Jobs Tomorrow.

By the end of the show we decided to stop using the word clean in front of coal, even in quotes, as ThisIsReality.org campaign suggests.

Appropriate Technology Collaborative (ATC) joins us in the studio… More specifically, we are joined by John Barrie (the Executive Director), Ben Connor Barrie (Special Projects Manager aka “Special Ops”), and Jeff Tenza (volunteer engineer). ATC is a non-profit organization based out of Ann Arbor, Michigan whose purpose is “To design, develop, demonstrate and distribute appropriate technological solutions for meeting the basic human needs of low income people in the developing world.” We hear about their operations, their recent trip to Guatemala, and some of their exciting design ideas.

More info:
Appropriate Technology Collaborative (ATC) website
Appropriate Technology Collaborative (ATC) blog
Sustainable Design Update (SDU)
SDU-Ann Arbor

Additionally…
Get on the bus to Bay City Coal Plant protest.
GROCS 09 Exhibition at the Dude(rstadt).

Today we take a journey through the Caribbean as we discuss how the region is responding to both long-term and immediate climatic hazards.

Joining us in the studio is Dr. Emma Tompkins, University of Leeds, School of Earth and Environment. She is a prolific author and much research that looks at current societal responses to natural disasters in order to anticipate climate change adaptation. Some of her other interests include: sustainable adaptation to climate change; climate change decision making; scales of governance in enabling and constraining climate change responses; identifying the psychological, social and cultural and economic limits to adaptation.

News

Ice bridge ruptures in Antarctica, adding to fears that it’s worse than scientists had thought.

Climate is the loser at the G20 meeting, but optimism abound for transforming lemons into a 100% natural and fresh squeezed lemon drink through a so-called “green New Deal.” It’s creative destruction.

Takin’ it to the streets: Coal protests in Bay City, MI.

Small islands are livid, and you would be too if your home was slowly drowning.  The Alliance of Small Island States pleads for action from the world.

Thresholds

Algae sucks.  Trophic cascade due to human overfishing and climate pressures has led to the collapse of our pristine Caribbean reefs.  First the sea urchins reigned, but even they couldn’t compete with the tenacious resiliency of brown algae.  See more detail from the Resilience Alliance.

Fish

Don’t eat grouper.  Ever.

Musical Stuff

A digital tour through the bins of long forgotten Caribbean grooves, including Mighty Sparrow, the Professionals, Grupo Ikare…

May I reccommend this fine series of compilations from Numero Group? – pure solid gold jams (and the source of 4 of today’s songs)!

Join us as Gina G, Shannon B and OR Johns heat things up with two exxxtra special guests.

Lisa Anne Richey Associate Professor of Development Studies in the Department of Society and Globalisation (yes,  that’s Globalization with an S) at Roskilde University in Denmark and author of Population Politics and Development: From the Policies to the Clinics schools us on the politics of our “population problem.”

John Perkins, NY Times bestselling author of Confessions of an Economic Hit Man and the Secret History of the American Empire heat up the WCBN studios. Gina “J.J” Gettup, Shannon and yours truly will interview the former eminent economic hitman, John Perkins. Get prepared for some incendiary vitriol and lime juice to the eye action.

Butt first…

The weekly standards: News roundup, “Thresholds: The Curse of Akkad,” and “Fish Ain’t Bitin’?” (try a delicious Striped Mullet (not just for NASCAR fans anymore)).

Mentioned early on in the show WashtenawLocalFood.net is your portal on the interwebs for getting to know the Ann Arbor area local food community better: includes a calendar that reveals such special events as an Open Space Technology event “Everyone Has To Eat” this Tuesday (6:30pm 1024 Dana Bldg. Central Campus) and “Localizing Agriculture: How Will We Eat on 80% Less Energy” lecture by Dr. Tom Princen on Wednesday (5:30pm 1024 Dana Bldg. Central Campus).

SO! Lock and load. Pull the trigger. Bite the bullet.  And pour some sugar on me.

But first the news…
Some examples of new manufacturing and business innovation ideas in Michigan: WindTronics 760 wind turbines out of Muskegon, Affordable Green Energy LLC out of Essexville. Plus, our watch continues on the brewing fights over new coal-fired power plants.

And the Sustainable Fish of the Week!

Back talking with our guests we discuss the details of the Natural Area Preservation unit which is a nationally unique city program that employs folks like ornithologists while reaching out to the community to volunteer to help inventory and maintain the ecology of the city’s natural areas. Lean much more and get involved here:

Natural Area Preservation – www.a2gov.org/nap
Adopt-a-Park – www.a2gov.org/adopt-a-park
NAP Blog – a2nap.blogspot.com

And lots of good links regarding bird volunteering, birds, bird safe-passage, birding, and more:
NAP Volunteering with Bird Inventory
http://www.terrain.org/articles/15/kousky.htm
http://www.cityofchicago.org/Environment/BirdMigration/sub/lights_out_chicago.html
http://www.nycaudubon.org/home/BirdSafeBuildingGuidelines.pdf
http://www.detroitaudubon.org/safe_passage.html
http://washtenawaudubon.org
More about fatal light attraction for birds from night lighting:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qtb8WcZBT5I
Video Regarding Light Attraction at the 9/11 Memorial

Finally, some tips via grist.org for Drinking Green and/or Green Drinking
How-To Get Wasted and Waste Less

And since we are discussing Green Drinks, check out the Green Drinks mixer this Wednesday at ABC at 7pm and other local food events listed at the Washtenaw Local Food Portal calendar.

We’re joined this week (about 4 minutes in) by soon-to-be Cosmology doctorate Brian Nord who helps us explore the universe.

Brian Nord: Our Cosmologist in Residence

It is also pledge week so consider showing some love (online even) for WCBN!

Space Junk

Butt First

A little news:
the EPA is re-thinking a few things like dioxin clean-up ideas….

Then intermixed with our discussions of Space and Cosmology:

The tragedy of our orbital commons: This week’s Thresholds examines all that junk up there in Earth’s orbit.
a Sustainable Fish of the Week…Tilapia (AGAIN!)

a check in with our Washington correspondent Kerry Duggan at the League of Conservation Voters…

and of course some tunes.

You can read more about the Great Lakes round-up of news bits here

Read more about the exciting Power Shift 2009 and Capitol Climate Action here!

Sarah Cwiek (a.k.a. Gwen Hetfield) joined us as a Motown correspondent from the studios of WDET FM in Detroit and brought us greatly up to date on proposed coal plants in Michigan among other things.

DNA and Dogs!@@#$!

Our Washington correspondent Kerry Duggan….

checked in from the nation’s capitol and the League of Conservation Voters. (She mentioned the Coen Brothers “Clean” Coal spoof – see previous post below.) Check out her Great Lakes’tivities.

And a Toxic Tangent regarding bottled water and whatnot:

This week Gina Gettum and guest cohost Aviva Glaser [Hot in Here's own Chemical Correspondent!] pepper news you can use, oscar reviews and stone cold grooves with helpful hints to reduce our own greenhouse gas emissions!

The News

• Climate Change is top national security threat and according to eminent economist Nicholas Stern if not contained “what we’re talking about then is extended world war.” Whoa.
• Bisphenol A is bad for your babies, your babies babies, and your babies babies babies.
• If a beaver lives on the shores of the Detroit River, but no one’s there to record it, is it really a beaver?: First beaver sited in Detroit since the 1930s!

Breaking news from our IHIH Style and Celebrity Correspondent Brian Lipinski – the Oscars de-greened themselves , BYO[tote]Bag is the new Vuitton and DeCarprio’s fixin’ to run an ecoresort island in Belize.

And finally we get down to the lady business…

• Green Cleaning: Make Your Own Non-Toxic Cleaning Kit.
• Make Up: Freshen up without slowly poisonin’ yourself.
• Knowledge is Power: Calculate your Body Burden Score.
• Cookin’: Buy fresh, not frozen.

Our Washington Correspondent Kerry Duggan takes us from the League of Conservation Voters to Capital Hill for Great Lakes Day.

Join the Virtual March to Stop Global Warming!

‘Til next week, keep it green friends and get up with the Get Down.

We also had Greg Vendena from the Clean Energy Coalition based in Ypsi join us briefly on the phone (so a trifecta of energy experts as it were).

But First….

The News…

• Climate change will cause key fish species to move towards the poles in search of their formerly cold water climes, bad for commercial fisheries, but great for reuniting lost fishy family members.
• Birds are feeling the heat as well. A study by the Audubon Society has demonstrated that half of N. American bird species have been spending their winter vacations on average 35 miles further North than 40 years ago. At least they can fly.
• Thought we had to put on serious airs to show our sexual fitness? Check out these birds.
• New studies point out some vicious climatic feedbacks as sub-Arctic tundra begins to thaw, potentially releasing billions of tons of greenhouse gases.
• And! A ray of hope (the glass is one-tenth full): Paris (disambiguation: the city) digs deep to harness Earth’s green energy.
• Al Gore: on civil disobedience and COAL.

Fish Ain’t Biting? Great Lakes, Great Fish

• Try out one of Lake Michigan’s own delicious lake whitefish (Coregonus clupeaformis).
• Check out Great Lakes Whitefish, for more info and recipes so you can fully enjoy this “Best Choice/Good Alternative” great fish.

Eat me!

Thresholds:

• This week we look at the 1973 Oil Embargo and its effects on the global economy. The response was dramatic around the world, as our oil junkie veins had a serious bout of petrol withdrawal (c’mon man, front me just one barrel!). Naturally, we draw parallels with the modern day: dwindling supplies and an Obamian (Obaman?) “planet in peril.” Yet to keep it optimistic a discussion of creative destruction.

Uploaded with plasq’s Skitch!

Be Informed:

• Science: Organic agriculture can feed the world. UifM press release.
• Top ten non-organic veggies to avoid.
• Find the major pollutants/polluters in your backyard.
• And!  You should be familiar with PALINDROMES.

Yes, we still giggle when we say gonads.  Sorry Moms.  Shout out to all the Mothers!

IHIH 2-9

Join us this week for the news (including rethinking carnivorousness), an update from our always fabulous Washington Correspondent Kerry Duggan, and a journey through the nerdery of social-ecological systems theory to the dusty steps of Mongolia, the squishy shores of Lake Victoria and the Great Lakes of Michigan:

• With three different names for winter disasters [Xar, Tsagaan and Tumur Dzud] and temperatures rising at twice the global average, Mongolian herders and their herds are suffering. Big time. In the winters of 2000 and 2001 alone Mongolia lost more than one third of the nation’s livestock.  Summary of a Science article.
• With climate change comes variable rain, more storms and more cholera, malaria and fishy trouble in Lake Victoria and the Nile Basin.  (With tangential reference to the Maccinni and Yang’s study of long-term effects of early life rainfall on development in Indonesia.)
• The Great Lakes are changing [but still great] here’s the report we’ll get into more in weeks to come.  Confronting Climate Change in the Great Lakes Region: Impacts on Our Communities and Ecosystems

The climate really is a changin’, here in Ann Arbor, we’ve had the most snow [through January 30th] ever recorded… see this pdf for more details.

Music:

• Tsetseg Nuriin Tovoo by Morin Khuur
• Xux Tobolton by Altan Urag
• Wetende Mukolwe, Sukuma Bin Ongaro and the Sukuma Band
• It’s Your World by Gil Scott-Heron
• Chase the Devil by Max Romeo

Human and environmental justice activist  Zo Randriamaro heats up the WCBN Studios with her wisdom, passion and careful thoughts.

If you are short on time, skip the news recap and head right to Zo at minute 16. You you’ll be happy you did.

Zo tells us that average temperatures in Madagascar have risen over 1.5 degrees C in the past 50 years.  Deadly cyclones, like this one last week, have increased in number. Addressing climate change should be President Obama’s number one priority. Zo makes a plea that addressing poverty and economic development must go hand in hand with environmental conservation.

Zo tells it like it is on the role of international financial institutions, the recent land deal in Madagascar leasing 50% of the islands arable land to the South Korean company Deawoo and the current state, and the importance of giving voice to those unable to speak for themselves.

In four short days President Obama vowed to close Gitmo, follow the Geneva Convention and freeze the salaries of his top officials.  Check out his weekly address here.

In related news:

EU Calls for Global Carbon Market.

Updated 2/2: New York Times: Madagascar Power Grab Fizzles

A special Martin Luther King day and pre-inauguration show… We started live with both our It’s Hot In Here co-host Gina Gettum as well as our Washington correspondent Kerry Duggan on the line from Washington DC. They joined us from a League of Conservation Voters sponsored National Day of Service event at John Phillips Sousa junior high school in DC where solar photovoltaics were being installed on the roof among other things. Future Energy Secretary Steven Chu was even onsite and our intrepid remote reporters were going to try and talk with him offline and report back on future shows. Gina and Kerry told us additionally of the pre-inaugural festivities they’ve already attended on Sunday as well as all the energy surrounding the main event tomorrow where apparently over 4 million people are expected to flood into DC.

Our other remote correspondent Hugh was going to provide a perspective from Canada regarding the US changing of the guard, but was unable to join us, so we’ll check in with him at a future date.

We talked next with Lara Peterson who normally hails from inside the beltway where she serves as the Coordinator for the Russia, Europe and Near Asia Program within the International Programs of the United States Forest Service. She gave us some perspective from inside a federal agency during a transition from one administration to another, and told us all about the USFS International Programs.

Finally, switching gears, we spent the last 15 minutes talking trash with Tiffany Threadgould from Brooklyn, New York. Tiffany told us all about the history and motivation behind her business RePlayGround: “where discarded materials take on new life!” With way more energy than your average person would have discussing garbage, Tiffany told us all about her mission to re-brand garbage, giving examples of her products and designs – including a refocus room divider that she described made out of 1000 used film canisters. Her website RePlayGround.com also details various do-it-yourself (DIY) projects and how RePlayGround likes to support other organizations that share similar beliefs. You can get a sense of those core values by reading the RePlayGround Blog and the FAQ page… who doesn’t love FAQs… my favorite part from the FAQ page:

Q: What will you do when there’s no more waste in the world? Like when we reduce our waste to 0%?
A: We’ll be very happy people when that happens. Perhaps we’ll catch up on movies on a low-energy flat screen LCD. Or we’ll ride our bikes more. Cook more with locally raised food. Drink more organic wine. In the meantime, there’s a lot of scrap out there for us to tackle.

Happy Martin Luther King Day!

Enjoy the Music Playlist for 19 Jan 2009, with a couple of extra songs we didn’t get to of course.

In 1984, a UM SPH student just happened to discover abnormal concentrations of a known carcinogen, 1,4-Dioxane, in the Third Sister Lake in UM’s Saginaw Forest (just west of Ann Arbor).  This prompted subsequent discovery of dioxane in the area’s groundwater at various levels from the surface all the way down to bedrock, some places more than 200 feet deep.

1,4-Dioxane is an industrial solvent and stabilizer that is fully miscible in water.  It doesn’t adhere to soils like many other industrial pollutants, but goes whereever water goes.

For 20 years, from 1966 to 1986, Gelman, Sciences Inc (now Pall Life Sciences) used a reported 800,000 pound of dioxane manufacturing high tech filters and allowed an unknown amount of the toxic substance to get into groundwater surrounding their property on Wagner Road.

Multiple lawsuits, cleanup efforts and backroom deals later, several plumes of the stuff still continue to exist, with the major ones moving at about one foot per day through Ann Arbor towards the Huron River and maybe even Barton Pond (where Ann Arbor gets 80% of its water for 150,000 people in the area.).
Listen for an in-depth discussion of past and future of the clean water struggle and remediation efforts with Roger Rayle, Co-Chair of Scio Residents for Safe Water.  Roger has dedicated 15 years of his life to addressing this problem, making AMAZING maps of the plumes, and protecting our water!

Check out their Google Group for more detailed maps and info.

Who was that anonymous caller?

Please share your eco-resolutions below in the comments! AND if you have a name for a person who eats meat once a week, post that too!

In the audio above which starts a couple minutes in we had the news, food news, and eco-resolutions for the new year discussions including 10 easy ways to go green in the kitchen and some suggestions from callers and over the interwebs.

COAL is NEVER CLEAN: Sign Here to tell your Congressfolk to ban new coal plants and to invest in genuinely, CLEAN, RENEWABLE energy technology.

Promised links to the following are forthcoming:

• Scientists responses: should we be developing a plan b to adapt to climate realities?

• Sustainable Fish of the Week!!!

• Rep. Conryn Drill Baby Drill news.

• NYTimes article discussing some of the drawbacks of renewables in the winter, like the likely rare possibility of killer ice falling from wind turbines… “those icicles have been known to kill people!” a la The Christmas Story. Personally, DJ Local will be happy to sweep off his Solar PV panels in the winter.

Music playlist coming soon.

We had our usual news roundup… but we had a not so usual special guest in the studio with us the whole time: Homeless Dave. Dave shared with us: the premise for his blog Teeter Talk (voted best local blog 3 years in a row by readers of the Current), what’s up with his nickname, his bicycle delivery and hauling business, and his pedal-powered clothes washing/wringing, among other things!!! You may know Homeless Dave under his shall we say pen name Dave Askins… you can see some of his local reporting, photography, and illustrations at a new local news source called The Ann Arbor Chronicle which he helped his wife Mary Morgan start recently.

We had a weather, power outage, and climate discussion. Link to hand-crank/solar radios. Link to University of Michigan professor Ricky Rood’s Weather Underground blog and his recent climate post.

Towards the end we shared a 2008 Top Ten List from TreeHugger.com. Since everyone loves Top Ten Lists here’s another one: top ten green stories from 2008 from grist.org.

Music playlist:
Winter Song by Sara Bareilles with Ingrid Michaelson
Worrisome Heart by Melody Gardot
Big Jim Hawkins by Great Lakes Myth Society of Ann Arbor, Michigan
See and Be Scene by The Hard Lessons of Detroit, Michigan
Gotta Be Somewhere by Johnny Headband of Detroit, Michigan

We were a little late getting started, so about 7 minutes into this podcast… We had a lengthy news roundup of lots of news bits and pieces. Included is some discussion of the current EPA and forthcoming EPA, Climate Change talks in the EU, and a brief chat with Greg Vendena over at the Clean Energy Coalition based in Ypsi.

We bid Hugh a fond farewell as an in-studio CoHost but he promises to join us as a remote correspondent… from wherever that may be.

We had our general news roundup plus special guest Molly Notarianni with us in the studio. Molly is the manager of the Ann Arbor Farmers Market and spoke of the environmental benefits of shopping locally at a farmers market among other things.

Shannon Brines, aka Brines.net, aka Brines Farm, aka Dj Local joined the show for his first stint as full Senior CoHost in charge of Environmental Talk Radio and Farming. Always smooth, never gritty.

This week two exxxtra special guests steam up the WCBN studios and serve up expert advice and commentary on the way forward (with a side of delicious grooves).

UM’s own Andrew J. Hoffman, Holcim Professor of Sustainable Enterprise and Associate Director of the Erb Institute for Global Sustinable Enterprise, lends his wisdom on the possibilities unfurling at the confluence of humans our economies and our environments.

and…

Kerry Duggan, IHIH’s own Washington Correspondant/Campaigns Project Manager @ the League of Conservation Voters, fills us in on what we planet lovers want (and need) from President Elect Obama and turns us on to the 2008 Environmental Facebook.

This week, Sean Ledwin of the University of Michigan’s School of Natural Resources and Environment joined us to share insights about shrimps, shrimping, and the ups and downs of environmental certification programs.

Remember, get your greens locally, and triumph in the face of diversity.

But first a word from our sponsors.

This week’s playlist:

Listen in this week for exxxtra special guest Dan Fahey from UC Berkeley, expert on resources and conflict in the Great Lakes Region of Africa. Future Dr. Fahey schools us on why our cellphones and i(solationist)pods are fueling violence in the ‘Democratic’ Republic of the Congo. Also, a new ‘Eco-Warrior’ segment and more from Vijay Vaitheeswaran of the Economist on carbon offsets.

• Congo: from the NY Times
• This just in: 61 trees per person!
  
• Raw off the line: Blue Ocean Institute’s Sushi Guide
• California passed Proposition 1A to construct a high-speed rail link.
• The first legal sale of African ivory since 1989, but you won’t be buying it on Ebay.
• NEW EPA Rule: No new coal plants without “Best Available Control Tech” for CO2!!
• Dry Cleaning: It blows, and may result in: depression of the central nervous system; damage to the liver and kidneys; impaired memory; confusion; dizziness; headache; drowsiness; and eye, nose, and throat irritation. Repeated dermal exposure may result in dermatitis.  No joke. here’s why.

Goloco: What’s not to love?

We’re not saying there wasn’t any environmental news to report this week, we’re just saying we had too many smart people to talk to to get around to it. Specifically:

• Joseph Romm, author of many books on climate change and other topics of energy and the environment, Senior Fellow at the Center for American Progress and former Assistant Secretary for Energy. He maintains an excellent blog on energy issues at climateprogress.org. Go there now, you can read and listen at the same time.We asked Joe what exactly offsets, cap and trade, and renewable energy credits are, what they do and what they don’t do. His message: don’t count on ‘em.
• Howard French, professor of journalism at Columbia, former senior writer for the New York Times and the International Herald Tribune. Howard is author of A Continent for the Taking: the Tragedy and Hope of Africa, and was in town last week to give a talk in the Africa Workshop series. We talked with him about the implications, social and environmental, of the expansion of Chinese industry in Africa.

This week:

• Co-host Gina Gettum made a progress report from Uganda. She told us about the illegality of the only fish which can be eaten, and what it’s like to have dinner in a revolving restaurant with arms dealers while missing your own interview on national TV.
• We spoke with Gary Peters, congressional candidate for Michigan, who is campaigning with our Washington Correspondent Kerry Duggan of the League of Conservation Voters. Gary is on the last day of the campaign trail, and he easily convinced us to endorse him in the 9th District (for the third time over).

  
  Actual photograph of Kerry and Gary calling in from the campaign trail.

Howard French, former senior writer for the New York Times and author of A Continent for the Taking: The Tragedy and Hope of Africa, suffered a major spatiotemporal-decorrelation event, and we didn’t get him into the studio in time for the show. But we were able to sit down with him later in the day and that interview will be featured on a future episode.

Next week: Gina makes her triumphant return from Uganda, and we talk with Joseph Romm, Senior Fellow at the Center for American Progress and editor for ClimateProgress.org.

(Apologies for the ragged start, we had a theme-music failure and had to jump into the gap.)

First, the news:

• Earth Policy Institute is bullish on a new energy economy in the U.S.
• Britain ups it 2050 carbon target to 80%, is struggling to get wind going in the meantime, but going hard on algae.
• In India, climate change is linked to tiger attacks, but they’re still shopping for U.S. coal mines.

This week we talked about Detroit. It wasn’t nearly enough time, but we began to ask the question: what does environmentalism look like in the big and weird city? Thanks to Michelle Martinez from The Greening of Detroit and the Sierra Club, and Kerry Duggan of the League of Conservation Voters, active Detroitist, and Domiana Carter and the crew at Detroiters Working for Environmental Justice. Thanks also to the School of Public Health for helping organize our Toxic Tour field trip.

With music selections by Rob Linn of WCBN’s From Belle Isle to 8 Mile. Just a few of his cuts, listen to his show Tuesdays at 12 for a whole world of Detroit music:

(Co-host Gina Gettum is away in Belgium and Uganda this week, fighting to bring more fish stocks up to Sustainable Fish of the Week levels, but we’re hoping to check in with her via telephone next week.)

Listen in for our first ever Get Your Health on edition of IHIH. Rachel Chadderdon, Market Master of the Ypsilanti Farmer’s Market joins us in the WCBN studios for some majorly uplifting updates on her (and other’s) impressive efforts to de-desertify the food desert of Washtenaw County.

• This just in: Florida AND California are saving money and saving the planet by going green!
• Which is freakin’ brilliant, given that the autumn temps in the Arctic Region, according to NOAA, are the second highest on record! It is Hot in Here!
• The credit crunch is especially bad new for wind power.
• The Union of Concerned Scientists has released their annual Federal Agency Report Card. Rock on NASA and the Nuc Reg Commission for your B’s. Shame on you EPA, NOAA, BLM and the Consumer Product Safety Commission for your D’s! No dessert for you!
• Bush gives 13 billion to Amtrak via the new railroad-safety law.
• Next week: Check out the new sustainable sushi guide, but for now know that U.S. Farmed Abalone (awabi), North American Albacore Tuna (shiro maguro) and Farmed Artctic Char (iwana) are excellent choices. STAY AWAY from Bluefin Tuna (toro), Monkfish (ankoh), Red Snapper (tai) and Freshwater Eel (unagi).
• LVC Releases the 2008 Scorecard! Check out your local reps!! Vote Green!
• Canada’s sour gas situation explodes, literally

This week’s musical cuts:

While Ann Arbor enjoys near-record highs, and the good folks of Saskatchewan soldier on through heavy snowstorms, what better time to tune in to environmental radio?

Another strong focus on economic issues this week. Who knew the environment and the economy were linked?

• Climate change could force millions from homes.
• Nature Loss Dwarfs Banking Crisis
• An economic crisis is a good time to buy a bike or an electric car.

And some environmental stories whose economic impacts are as-yet unknown:

• A frightening new climate prediction from James Hansen et al.
• New species of pollution-adapted fish evolve in Lake Victoria.

And the crime beat:

• Environmental crimes on the rise globally
• And in US parks, thanks to gro-op cartels

Sustainable Fish of the Week: the Atlantic Herring (although we’re currently dubious about the Marine Stewardship Council, so careful with that website.)

This week’s playlist:

Next week: A Toxic Tour of Detroit City. Stayed tuned to your environment.

Out guest this week: Dr. Thomas Princen, winner of the International Studies Association 2007 award for his latest book the The Logic of Sufficiency (2005) – the “best book for the study of international environmental problems.”  Commited to intellectual exporation, historical grounding and active learning, Dr. Princen shares his insights on the need for “localization,” “sufficiency” and “appropriately placed buzzwords.”

Learn more about Dr. Princen here.

Pick up The Logic of Sufficiency in Ann Arbor at Shaman Drum, or online used or through Amazon. While there, have a look at his other books… restraint in consumption, not in thinking.

In other news…

• This just in – size matters, so keep your kids away from harmful plastics!
• Politics and the dinner table.
• Keep your cold old growth free!  Here’s how.
• Ecuador grants constitutional rights to… nature
• Making jet fuel from canola, coconuts, soybeans, palm tree oil, algae and other things we’d rather you not make jet fuel out of.
• Economic Sufficiency. It’ll keep you alive.

Something pity to look at, Emptied Oceans, a short from Randy Olson and Shifting Baselines:

Al Gore’s staid and sober advice:

Our audio extract: Download audio file (goreCGI9sep08extract.mp3)

Full: transcript, audio, video.

Science Mag on ITQs to save fisheries forever.

Climate-change driven beetle outbreak driving climate change

Scientist hear’s the ticking of the methane time bomb.

African hunger blamed on Western organic trends.

Canada hopes the US will take it’s eye off the dirty-oil ball.

Join us for top enviro headlines, a few musical biscuits and candid, contentious and contentious chat about the upcoming election and your candidate’s stance on important environmental issues.  Special guests and special music guaranteed.

Vitrually Visit

• The Obama Campaign
• The McCain Camp
• LCV.org’s Scorecard
• Pew Forum’s Overview
• Pretend you’re Canadian: calculate your green tax shift pay-out.

And a few non-electoral chasers:

Peter Schwartz from Global Business Network burning down peak oil

Peter Schwartz on climate change:

Stephen Colbert burning down Global Business Network and the arctic generally:

Musical legend for Obama, some music we didn’t get to:

• Two extra special guest, Dr’s Ezekiel Kalipeni and Mark Wilson discuss their work exploring the linkages between environment and human health around the globe, but particularly in Africa. Check their impressive credentials:
  • Dr. Ezekiel Kalipeni
  • Mark Wilson
• Big News This Week: Oil, Hurricanes and Rebels
  • Ike shuts down major U.S. crude oil ports
  • And could yield West Nile and other health effects (warning: Fox News)
  • Nigerian militants declare oil war in Delta
  • Chad plays down World Bank exit from oil accord
  • Malawi goes against the “grain” with positive (and some mixed) results!
    • Subsidies help farmers
    • Bans private sale of maize
    • Promotes irrigation
• Congress-Woman Melinda Jackson Parker, Free Downloads to Cousin Mosquito #1 AND #2! http://www.last.fm/music/Congress-Woman+Malinda+Jackson+Parker
• Sustainable fish of the week! US Farmed Tilapia!!
• Antarctic Winter Ice Gets Bigger, Arctic Ice Still Shrinking
• New Music From Malawi
• Enviro/Human Health Info and Stats
  • WHO on Global Environmental Change: http://www.who.int/globalchange/en/
  • CDC: National Center for Health Statistics: http://www.cdc.gov/nchs/fastats/Default.htm
  • Aviva’s Top 6 Bad Enviro Health Impacts of Chemical Pollution: http://thebirdsandthepcbs.blogspot.com/
  • Environmental Health News: http://www.environmentalhealthnews.org
  • NOAA
  • Human Health at USGS

Join us next week for our “Run for President, but Don’t Ruin My Planet” edition of IHIH where we digest and discuss each candidates stance on key environmental issues!

Join us for groovy jams, news spannin’ the continent, and VERY special guests Rebecca Hardin, Professor of Anthropology and Natural Resources at UM AND our very own Washington correspondent/SNRE success story, Kerry Duggan.

This just in: WCBN Saves Lives, half of the world’s population are women and people eat food!

To learn more about the exceptionally eloquent, devastatingly funny, and dangerously toasty Rebecca Hardin and read of her many multi-media-tic, multi-sited, multi-disciplinary endeavors check out her site.

To stay on top of your Congress-peeps toes, check out LCV.org for all things environmental and opensecrets.org to find out where your Reps get their ca$h.

A few links to today’s content. Feel free to post any related articles/sweet dance vids YOU may find in the comments section!

Banjuka (tu) by DNA, blazing up the pool halls and discotheques of E. Africa.

The Economist calls for radical solutions to the earth’s food crisis.

The Stern Review

National Geographic series on Africa. Check it out here and do let us know if it’s in the AskWith:

Get the freshest news from the Continent @ AllAfrica.com. For enviro specific news head here.

It got so hot in here today we forgot to announce the sustainable fish of the week, sooo take your pick here.

Wow, Tuesday was Earthday – it felt just like any other day. Sorry Mother Earth, we really blew it. I hope you weren’t expecting organic flowers or fair trade chocolates. We’ll try harder next year, we promise.

This is good bye for now to our regularly scheduled time slot, but do check back for irregularly timed shows featuring Gwen, DJ. Who, K. Duggz and the good Dr. Hardin.

Banjuka (tu) by DNA, blazing up the pool halls and discotheques of E. Africa:

• U.N. Panel calls for less oily agriculture production, local seeds and natural fertilizers to ” avoid a social explosion from rising food prices.”
• MI Statehouse passes “Bipartisan Energy Plan to Create Jobs and Lower Costs” (Thanks to MI LCV for keepin’ us abreast on this breaking issue!)
• The blog discussion on the Laws of the Sea: Was the Farley Mowat in International Waters?
• Fish Heads, Fish Heads, eat them up, yum!
• We’ve come full circle people – Eat low, grow your own food, and embrace and deconstruct the linkages in your interrelated-interconnected world.

It was exxxtra hot in here today….

The It’s Hot in Here team, with special guest Kevin Merrill, Communications Director for the School of Natural Resources and Environment, revelled in an SNRE Love-Fest – but don’t worry – we used sustainable protection (for real).

• Check out the Food Systems Economic Partnership for more details on sustainable foods or those cutting edge sisters of the cloth.
• Olfactory-licious dogs, not just for drugs anymore
• (Another) Sustainable Bi-Valve of the week
• The University of Michigan Rocks (100 dollars please), but seriously, it’s true:
  • Cutting edge research and Eco-Events Galore.
• Special Guest Kevin Merrill shares his smooth radio voice and astute insight into the necessary nuances of effective communication strategies.
• SNRE Dean Rosina Bierbaum, Nobel Laureate, Climate Change Expert, and Science advisor to the Stars (a Dean so hot even Alec Baldwin couldn’t get a date) to direct the new World Bank’s World Development Report, the first ever focused on climate and development! Bam! This is a major honor and opportunity for SNRE and the University! (Checks can be sent to It’s Hot in Here @ 2050 When the Polar Ice Caps are Completely Gone, Ann Arbor, MI 4810-HOTT) We’ll keep you updated!
• Kerry Duggan, our “Washington Correspondent” with LCV.org in your nation’s capital announces the newest member of the dirrrty dozen.
• “The Spy who Greened Me” upcoming James Bond film Quantum of Solace features the usual awesomeness and a green-washing villan!!!!

Join us next week for a very special “classes are over let’s get radical” edition of It’s Hot in Here with SPECIAL GUEST, SNRE’s very own, environmental philosopher Dean Bavington. Warm up with his very own episode on the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation’s show Ideas (a series so good it made Hugo into the brilliant thinker he is today), where Dean discusses the role of science in the rise and fall of the Newfoundland Cod Fishery. Listen here and learn.

Gina Ginason, Hugh-go “I Rock the Mic’s” Stimson and special guest Alex Sergay overcompensate for Gwen’s absence today on the fourth ever It’s Hot in Here.

This just in:

• Don’t Tase Me Man: Protesters arrested and tased after locking themselves to bulldozers at a Duke Energy coal plant in North Carolina on Tuesday. More details here.
• Polar bear ventures too far in land to escape the ravages of climate change, gets shot by hunters in “self defense” thinking its a grizzly bear…if only the poor animals knew how to read the animal migration road signs… Check it.
  • Too depressing for you: shoot your very own Polar Bear to ease the pain!
    1 part vodka, 1 part chilled peppermint schnapps, 1 dash crushed ice: Shake schnapps and vodka together until well-mixed. Add crushed ice, shake lightly, then pour to shot glasses. Delish.
• Oil Exec’s wine like babies for access to ANWR, despite record profits. More details here.
• LCV Dirty Dozen, get the word out and learn about Michigan’s own diiirrrrrrtyyy Congressman Joe Knollenberg, who helped get a law banning the USEPA from ever holding informational sessions on climate change for the public. I think I could use a polar bear shot….
• Join the greenest people in the Mitten and surrounding sweet smelling states at Ann Arbor’s own Hash Bash this Saturday from 12-1 on the UM diag. Learn more about the reason for the season, the arrest of John Sinclair and his sentence to ten years in jail for two measly joints. Check out John Lennon and Yoko Ono in some era-appropriate hot pink t’s doing the original version of their tune John Sinclair at the Free John Sinclair Rally at the Big House in 1971.
• For more on the Shafer Commission (that recommended decriminalizing marijuana in 1972, and subsequently ignored by Nixon) and the craziness surrounding the U.S. MJ laws, check out this short format docu, The Color Green
• And if you didn’t get enough green tunes, check out all the ones I hoped to play.

Join us next week for all the environmental news that’s fit to hear.

Right arm earth lovers,

Gina

Very special It’s Hot in Here today! Mrs. Ginason (AKA Jayanna Lee Johnson), fabulous mother of three, woman of the world and 2nd grade teacher from Medina, Ohio joins us to chat about how students impact parental environmental decision making. Mrs. Ginason has taught over 1,200 young people (and countless parents) how to be good people, avoid disposable cups and learn to quell their “Thneeds”

• “Norm-like” Mayor of Curitiba, Brazil goes against the grain and the man with amazing results! link
• Check out and attend the Food System Economic Partnership Conference on April 3r. Come to see the most sustainably rockin’ nuns on the planet, stay for the local foods. More info here: link
• Soon, fish will be trained to catch themselves. It’s expected that within a decade, they’ll be able to coat themselves in batter and hop right into the fryer! link
• While at IHIH, we strongly recommend regulatin’ your own heat the ol’ fashioned way, do check out what Ohio Edison is doing to conserve energy at peak times in Ohio! We’ve got one at the Ginason house and if you live in Ohio, you can too! Mr. Ginason reports on the newest thermostatic innovation:, but you can get more details here.
• Mrs. Ginason recommends that we all check out the Dr. Seuss book, The Lorax, for a nice reminder of why rampant consumerism, and “Thneeds” are just bad news! Here’s a video rendition here.
• Sustinable fish of the week: Mahi Mahi (aka Dolphin Fish) Make sure it’s US caught and you’re free to dine deliciously and safely! More details here.
• Last, but never least, Kerry Duggan of Washington, DC League of Conservation Voters joins us in pre-recorded form – thanks much to Jay, her Communications Director for helpin’ us out! We’re sorry we couldn’t play the whole expertly recorded and informative segment, but do check it out, it’s posted here and full of great info on LCV’s Senate work, the DIIRRRRTY Dozen and your “homework” assignment for the week!

Kerry Duggan/League of Conservation Voters: audio Download audio file (kerry_um.mp3)

Don’t forget to join us next week on 4-3 @ 12:00 PM EST live for a special stickin’ it to the man episode, where we’ll try to dig up Ann Arbors radical roots and rekindle our earthy fire!

Have fun heatin’ things up and see you next week,

Gwen Hetfield, The Hugo-it’s not all for naught, and “The Ginason’s”

This week:

• An interview with Kerry Duggan from the League of Conservation Voters about the environmental voting record of the presidential candidates.
• The coming of spring and the deterioration of ecological synchronaeity.
• Sustainable fish of the week: striped bass.
• Audio that cuts in and out on the right channel.
• Former snerd putting it to the man at the ECO:nomics conference.
• Some other substantive things.

After last week’s guerilla episode we’ve received the official go-ahead from station official go-aheaders. A new era in environmentally themed college talk radio with an emphasis on soul and R&B is born.

Here’s just the part with Kerry Duggan:

Here’s the video of Brihannala Morgan of the Rainforest Action Network rising to speak at ECO:nomics:

Archer Daniels on the Hotseat

And some good coverage from the Santa Barbara Independent:

Activists Infiltrate ECO:nomics, Briefly

Today’s show is a bit of a strange beast. In addition to the usual tunes, about half of it was dedicated to a pilot episode of what might become a regular environmental-themed current events/talky talk show. I asked a couple of friends if they wanted to come on the air, and a few days later they announced that they had worked out a whole show. They’re calling it “It’s Hot in Here”. I kind of like the idea of “producing” a talk show, and it gives me a chance to make unhelpful quips while they try to do something useful and interesting. So we’ll pitch it to the station execs and see. If it flys, I’ll still be doing the regular show, just an hour shorter.

I feel like we managed to fit a tonne of good music in there anyhow. The stretch from Fred Eaglesmith to John Vanderslice felt downright blessed. (Not bad, given that our chief engineer was ripping and tearing at the patch cords trying to figure out why one of the CD decks was failing at the time.) And Jen, or Gina, or whatever the hell she’s calling herself (what’s up with these dj’s with ambiguous names?) has pretty ace taste in music to play in between the talky talk, so it all adds up pretty well. I had never heard that Rahsaan Roland Kirk song. Good stuff.