Ted Auch

BOTE stands for Back-Of-The-Envelope and is a common phrase applied to macroscale or overly coarse calculations done kinda haphazardly. Well given this caveat I came across an article from The Telegraph (UK) titled “Detroit to Bulldoze Thousands of Homes in Fight for Survival”, which quoted the following statistic:

“Almost a third of the city’s 139 square miles is vacant or derelict, though its land area would comfortably fit Manhattan, San Francisco and Boston, cities with combined populations of three million.”

I thought it would interesting to apply some of my dissertation data to figuring out how much of Detroit’s CO2 footprint could potentially be offset if this land was reforested. So, here it goes step by step.

(33%*139 Sq Miles)=45.87 Sq Miles of vacant or derelict land

Convert to Hectares=45.87*259>11,880 Hectares

Hectares to Square Meters=11,880*10,000>118,803,229 Square Meters

Grams of Carbon per Square Meter Per Year (From my Thesis work we assume the average for Great Lakes forests is 10,849 g C m-2 yr-1)=118803229 Square Meters*10,849 g C yr-1>1,288,896,240,464 g C m-2 yr-1

Metric Tons Per Year=1,288,896,240,464 g C m-2 yr-1*0.000001>1,288,896 Metric Tons of C captured Per Year IF the 45.87 Sq Miles of vacant or derelict land was reforested!

NOW lets put this number in perspective relative to Detroit’s actual emissions.

If we assume Detroit’s population (For Now!) is 951,270 and residents of the city emit approximately 23.4 Tons of CO2 per person per year that comes out to 22,260,764.4 Tons of CO2 per year for the city of Detroit, which means……..

The figure calculated above for potential carbon captured by reforestation of vacant and derelict land (i.e., 1,288,896 Tons of CO2 per year) equals 5.80% of total city-wide emissions. This number while not jaw dropping is far from trivial and any efforts to implement such plans should be encouraged locally and nationally as 5.8% of anything at that scale adds up and would greatly increase the quality of life in Detroit. Similar projects are sprouting up in neighboring F lint, Michigan as well as places as far off as Chilibre, Panama. Likewise we have data on those areas as well and could do similar BOTEs in an effort to quantify the impact of reforestation, both above- and belowground.

We have an interesting love affair with shopping in this country and I thought it would be illustrative to quantify its influence on our land to capture carbon. First lets quickly look at how much we love shopping and how much our economy (and by association China, Japan, the EU, etc etc) depend on our insatiable appetite for stuff. It is true that we have come down off our Great Depression high of 83% Consumption as  a percent of GDP, but for the better part of the last 63 years we have maintained a relatively static 65% of GDP attributable to consumption.

However, this figure has risen substantially in the last 20 years from 62% in 1981 to 70.8% in 2009.

You might say well what does my local strip mall have to do with CO2? Well your local strip mall displaced some sort of native ecosystem that, up until the big trucks and earth-moving equipment came, was drawing down CO2 via photosynthesis and decomposition of biomass to produce soil carbon.

Well that has had a cumulative effect and I have attached a couple of graphs to demonstrate this phenomenon. Using Gross Leasable Area (GLA in sq feet) per person data back to 1990 we can calculate above- and belowground carbon displacement via shopping center expansion (Blue Line), which sums to about 218 Million Metric Tons between 1990 and 2009, which when subtracted from Total US CO2 Emissions gives us the inset in the figure below.

How you might ask does this relate in-terms of percentages? Well it turns out it is quite similar in magnitude to what I described for Detroit. If we assume - based on EIA assumptions - that Residential emissions is 6.65% of the story here in the US with respect to CO2 emissions than the above removal of native ecosystems for shopping centers translates to anywhere from 2.78 to 3.31% of Residential CO2 emissions across the entire US. However, if we had implemented the type of plain they are considering in Detroit across all fifty states beginning in 2005 we would have had the opportunity to “offset” 3.13% of our emissions per year as opposed to 2.85% between 1990 and 2004. You may say what is the big deal about 2.85 to 3.13%? Well when you consider we are measuring our fiscal and monetary peril here in the US with values like 3 to 12% of GDP and the fact that US GDP is expected to grow by 3.0% in 2010 v. 0.18, a decline of 1.83, and 2.53% in 2009, 2008, and 2007, respectively…Then the numbers I present here start to take on a whole new meaning. The harm inflicted by shopping centers - never mind the removal of capital and liquidity from local markets via large multinationals like Wal-Mart and Best Buy - is not just skin or in this case soil surface deep. It impacts the ability of communities and watersheds to withstand flooding, retain nutrients that would otherwise pollute reservoirs and aquifers, moderate temperature and moisture volatility, and propagate a sense of ownership among residents. The data back it up. Chalk another one up for BOTEs!

Below I have plotted USDA data for Nitrogen (N), Phosphorus (P), and Potasssium (K) applied to crops in the US from 1960 to the present. You will notice two distinct trends (Ex. Fertilizer labels read - for example - 10-10-10 or something like that, which corresponds to 10 Parts N, P, and K Respectively):

1. Nitrogen is and has always been the predominant fraction of fertilizers. However, more importantly N:P ratios have risen at an alarming clip from 1.06 in 1960 to 2.88 in 2007, which translates to 271% in less than 40 years. This in itself is an unsustainable trend that genetic engineering will not be able to offset. Additionally, the ratio of P to K was 134% higher in 1960 with the pivot-point (i.e., more K than P applied) being 1976-1977 (Note: I wonder if it is in any way correlated with the awesome run the Grateful Dead had during that same time frame?).

2. The percent vs. Tons P & K curves, while largely decoupled prior to to 1978 have now converged, which means that more fertilizer needs to be applied - and energy expended - to get the same Energy Return On Investment. This is quite unfortunate given the apparant lake of Global P-Pools and the recent USGS report that quantified global P at 62 Gigatons (ie 1 Billion Tons) and K at 250 Gigatons.

This data demonstrates our reliance on not just Carbon (i.e., Oil) but also N, P, and K alike. It will come to pass that the import of these 3 elements will approach if not surpass that of Oil in the next 50 years mark my words! However, there are tons of ways to ameliorate this trend and they include the application of Industrial Policy to large-scale composting ventures…Not at the Federal level but rather within counties or municipalities. These would produce two sustainable and non-trivial revenue streams via the sale of compost and anaerobic digestion of methane gas. Additionally, these materials could easily be applied to agricultural operations across the country as a dry (No Soluble P or N responsible for eutrophication), nutrient rich, carbon dense amendment. NO ZERO SUM HERE!

My primary concern going forward is what I will call the CNPS Approach, which just means that instead of having such a strong and disproportionate Carbon-Bias policy needs to focus equally on the other two-thirds of the biogeochemical pie, which are Nitrogen (N) and Phosphorus (P) (and Sulfur (S)). Everyone is familiar with the influence of CO₂ and the established as well as nascent efforts aimed at monetizing carbon, but with some very simple modeling we could easily link the former to equally important Upward (i.e., CH₄, N₂O, and N₂) and Downward Flows (i.e., NH₄, NO₃, PO₄, and DOC) via emissions and leaching, respectively.

The importance of GDP to economic growth is exceeded by the importance of CNP in nature

It all started with the discovery by American oceanographer Alfred C. Redfield (1890-1963) that the ratio of Carbon (C) to Nitrogen (N) to Phosphorus (P) (C:N:P) of free-floating marine phytoplankton (seston) throughout the world was quite static and reflected the differences of dissolved nutrients in associated waters. The Redfield Ratio as it is known today is 106:16:1 for C:N:P, which means that for every unit of phosphorus there are 16 units of P and 106 units of C. The importance of this discovery for biologists was equated to Avogadro’s number or the speed of light in a vacuum by some scientists according to Sterner & Elser’s book “Ecological Stoichiometry”. Redfield’s Ratio has since been proven an overly generalized depiction of aquatic C:N:P, with an average of 354.4:20.1:1 across all manner of aquatic phytoplankton (See Chart 1).

Out of this discovery grew a very specialized but extremely important discipline called Ecological Stoichiometry, which is essentially a bunch of balanced equations describing how C, N, and P are transferred and transformed in ecosystems. It is quite a revolutionary and at the same time elementary concept, with detractors noting that Ecological Stoichiometry is either too complicated to be understood or too simple to be true. Another way to look at it is that Ecological Stoichiometry gives scientists the opportunity to quantitatively attach elemental importance to the balance of energy and materials. The name stoichiometry comes from the Greek root stoicheion for element and metron meaning measure. Broadly speaking the field focuses on C, N, P, to some extent sulfur (S), and rarely hydrogen (H) and oxygen (O) or as scientists like to call them “The Big Six” for their ubiquity and import in all organic and some inorganic processes. Every constituent of this planet, whether living or dead, flora or fauna, above or belowground, land or sea has a unique stoichiometric ratio of these elements. Organisms must vigilantly maintain these ratios in order to survive, which is also the case for humans (homeostasis). In their book “The Natural Selection of the Chemical Elements: The Environment and Life’s Chemistry” Williams & Fraústo da Silva hypothesized that evolution from early to late prokaryotes, to unicellular eukaryotes, and eventually to complex multicellular eukaryotes was coupled with an increased affinity for homeostasis.

Homeostatic stoichiometry is the struggle to maintain a consistent internal chemistry, while an organism’s environment particularly the elemental makeup of its food fluctuates quite drastically. Some organisms – usually of the sedentary variety – display a flexible Ecological Stoichiometry. Their lack of mobility means they must capitalize on the resources available at any given point in time. Truly homeostatic creatures, whether they be ants (C:N:P = 4.8:12.0:1), snakes (C:N:P = 4.4:3.7:1), or the Dalai Lama (C:N:P = 13.3:6.3:1) are not, in the strict sense, what they eat, rather they maintain their C:N:P by a variety of unsavory and malodorous activities we won’t expand on here for fear of offending the faint of heart. Needless to say organisms that must maintain a narrow C:N:P will go to great lengths in pursuit of that goal even if it means no one to sit next to in the lunchroom. You know that stuff you accidently stepped in while walking down the sidewalk or in your local park? That present Fido left for you has a C:N:P of 9.7:0.9:1.

The question is why should we care about these ratios? Well for the answer let’s look to the most famous examples of balanced chemical reactions, photosynthesis [Eq. 1] and decomposition [Eq. 2]. After all when you peel away the layers of scientific mumbo-jumbo this is what Ecological Stoichiometry is all about. If you are starting to have horrible images of your Intro Organic Chemistry class now would be a good time to stop reading. Are you still here? Good. These two reactions drive plant growth [Eq. 1] and decay of everything from tree leaves (C:N:P = 18.6:8.2:1) to septic waste (C:N:P = 12.0:2.7:1). These reactions and those that produced the Redfield Ratio rely on what is called the Law of Definite Proportions.

The importance of the “Big Six” in nature is not hard to find. One need not look further than Adenosine Tri (ATP) and Diphosphate (ADP) the primary energy transfer molecules in cells for the importance of phosphorus, while sulfur is crucial to amino acids (i.e. cysteine) the primary precursors of proteins. Researchers have shown that the Stoichiometric formula for humans in number of atoms is:

H_375,000,000O_132,000,000C_85,700,000N_6,430,000Ca_1,500,000P_1,020,000S_206,000

Na_183,000K_177,000C_l127,000Mg_40,000Si_38,600Fe_2,680Zn_2,110Cu_76I14Mn₁₃

F₁₃Cr₇Se₄Mo₃Co₁

Thus, we humans have a “Big Six” H:O:C:N:P:S Stoichiometry of 2.8:1.5:13.3:6.3:5.0:1. This may seem confusing but understanding how these elements flow into and around the human body or for that matter ecosystems tells us a great deal about the so-called “velocity of elements”. Many reading this have heard about the “velocity of money” in recent years and the importance of keeping the flow of money brisk and consistent. Well the same is true of elements and Ecological Stoichiometry is an important tool in determining where elements are backed-up or where they are moving too fast to be utilized. Two interconnected examples of the human condition’s influence on Ecological Stoichiometry are the Haber-Bosch process that fixes nitrogen gas to produce ammonia for N, P, and Potassium (K)-rich fertilizers and the Gulf Coast algal blooms in the US that have created consistent and ever expanding deadzones in the waters off the United State’s Gulf Coast. The latter is a direct function of excessive fertilizer application and manure production in the Mississippi River watershed, with manures having C:N:P of 20.3:7.0:1 and most fertilizers either having equal parts N:P:K (10:10:10) or an excess of P (10:20:10). Thus, Gulf Coast’s aquatic ecosystems are experiencing an increase in the velocity of Ecological Stoichiometry – specifically P – via the Mississippi river, which is leading to increases in algal production and decay all of which deplete the waters of oxygen.

Plants and animals adhere to relatively strict C:N:P (:S), because in theory they are trying to fulfill their maximum growth potential, even though such conditions in actuality might be completely illusory. Living beings want to find that stoichiometric “Sweet Spot”. Ecological Stoichiometry explains why we crave certain foods and can’t stand the sight of others. Ecological Stoichiometry, and specifically the C:N:P:S ratio, is a field of study and a natural process that will receive increasing attention in the coming years given the fact that humans are rapidly depleting the world’s supply of P, with 62 Gigatons remaining according to the USGS’ most recent estimates.

In addition, this ratio and its variability is responsible for phenomena such as acid rain in the northeastern US and Europe, and groundwater contamination in and around areas of heavy agriculture. Scientists have known since Redfield and earlier the importance of understanding the interconnectedness of the “Big Six” and more specifically C, N, P, and S. In 2000 Falkowski and colleagues compared natural and human-induced changes in the stoichiometry of earth and found that the change due to anthropogenic causes was 13%, 108%, 400%, and 113% for C, N, P, and S, respectively. Thus, our fascination with Carbon Capture and Storage (CCS) may be at best myopic and at worst dangerous. Forget the GDP what is your country or state’s CNP?

Complete Chart 1 From Above:

So it appears that Arizona successfully decoupled its laws from those of advanced society when Gov. Jan Brewer (R) signed into Law SB 1070 last Friday whose “…aim is to identify, prosecute and deport illegal immigrants.” The criteria police officers will use rely on something the law calls “reasonable suspicion”, which is about as big an umbrella category is you will find anywhere. Anyone with dark skin (THAT MEANS YOU JOHN BOEHNER!) will be forced to carry with them wherever they go documentation speaking to the validity of their residence in the United States. I find it amazing that the very same folks that pushed this bill out of one side of their mouth are on the other side accusing Barack Obama of being a Fascist. This DoubleSpeak is right out of George Orwell’s opus “Nineteen Eighty-Four” and is the type of rhetoric that has slowly but steadily been percolating up from right-wing hate groups since President Obama’s election. It is even creeping – overtly and covertly – into national politics with Pat Bertroche (R) vying for the 3^rd District Congressional primary seat in Iowa noting that “I actually support microchipping them. I can microchip my dog so I can find it. Why can’t I microchip an illegal?” That’s very True Pat why don’t we just make a minor incision in everyone with dark skin, implant a microchip, and send them on their merry way. That makes complete sense and it doesn’t sound prima facie like it violates anyone’s human rights!

This uptick dovetails into The Southern Poverty Law Center’s documentation of mushrooming phenomena in their latest report “Rage on the Right”, which quantified a 244% increase in the number of “Patriot’ groups, from 149 in 2008 to 512 in 2009. This came at the same time as racist hate groups rose from an all-time high of 926 to 932 in 2009 and “nativist extremist” groups – vigilante organizations that go beyond advocating strict immigration policy and actually confront or harass suspected immigrants – grew from 173 to 309 (+80%) between 2008 and 2009.

This type of trend does not speak well for border states writ large. If Vermonters think that this type of sentiment will not rear its ugly head here with respect to Canadians in general and Québécoise specifically we’re fooling ourselves. The recent legal battle between the Rainsville’s of Franklin County and The Department of Homeland Security is in my opinion the opening salvo in a nascent fortification and potentially militarization of our border with Québéc. Janet Napolitano & Co. feel it is imperative that we fortify a crossing that experiences 2.5 cars an hour or 21,900 per year. If you consider that the monies allotted to this project amount to $5 million that averages out to $228 per car or with respect to the Rainville’s about 4.9 acres we’re talking about $1.02 million per acre. Either way you cut it I am sure Governor Douglas or his successor could find markedly more important things to do with this “stimulus”. For anyone interested in reading more about the Rainville matter I would refer you to Secretary Napolitano’s letter to Senator Leahy on March 10 of this year.

Needless to say we are seeing a growing sense of paranoia and misguided attempts at securing 1,969 miles (3,169 km) of Mexican- and 5,525 miles (8,891 km) of Canada-US borderland. We should work hard here in Vermont to insure that the 90 mile border we share with Québéc never even faintly resembles what those in Arizona are trying to construct. After all it is not immigrants, illegal or otherwise, forcing US-based multinationals to outsource thousands of jobs under the guise of globalized capitalism. How about a little more job protectionism and a little less racism cloaked in pseudo-patriotism.

The following is from last week’s Economist:

“Geoengineering is an umbrella term for large-scale actions intended to combat the climate-changing effects of greenhouse-gas emissions without actually curbing those emissions. Like genetic engineering was in the 1970s, the very idea of geoengineering is controversial. Most of those who fear climate change would prefer to stop it by reducing greenhouse-gas emissions. Geoengineers argue that this may prove insufficient and that ways of tinkering directly with the atmosphere and the oceans need to be studied. Some would like to carry out preliminary experiments, and wish to do so in a clear regulatory framework so that they know what is allowed and what is not.”

What Geoengineering really is is an ingenious group of scientific avenues that will allow society writ large to shrug off it’s (our) responsibilities and hand the myriad of them to future generations. I absolutely believe in some of the techniques/concepts that fall under the Geoengineering umbrella BUT only if society is willing to embrace significant across-the-board electrical, consumption, and natural resource stewardship austerity measures. Otherwise Geoengineering allows us to circumvent a much deserved bout of self-flagellation. When the facts change we must change our mind. Aside from an unfortunate obfuscation of the data at the University of East Anglia the facts have changed for the worse ergo - Geoengineering aside - it is time for us to change our minds and embrace a Blended Climate Change Amelioration Portfolio (BCCAP). This will include anathema (i.e. Nuclear, Geoengineering, Genetic Engineering) to some environmentalists - including myself - but in return it must include the aforementioned flagellation and a bullish embrace of wind, CH4 digestion, ecosystem appreciation vis a vis development or agribusiness, and biofuels that embrace the role of plant-root carbon sequestration.

How bout them apples!

I love it when 1+1 = 3

This figure comes from the truly noble work of Charles Duhigg at The Times. He has been grinding away at the data and the latest piece in this series “Rulings Restrict Clean Water Act, Foiling E.P.A.” along with the articles in the series. I wonder what the math will add up to given the recent Citizens United Supreme Court ruling. This whole mess centers on the use or deletion of the word ‘navigable’ when referring to those bodies of water that are or are not under the EPA’s purview. Anyway what we are seeing here is a full-frontal assault on all laws pertaining to common decency with respect to “natural resources”. When the rivers turn red we will have no one to blame but ourselves, because the solutions are out there and the data is sound, but the will is quiescent.

From The Economist January 14th 2010

“Liberal democratic governments can make all manner of blunders, but they are less likely to commit mass murder. Amartya Sen, a Nobel prize-winning economist, has famously argued that no country with a free press and fair elections has ever had a large famine. And research by those three CFR scholars found that poor autocracies were at least twice as likely as democracies to suffer an economic disaster (defined as a decline of 10% or more in GDP in a year). With no noisy legislatures or robust courts to hold things up, autocracies may be faster and bolder. They are also more accident-prone.”

I wonder how someone who states that “…no country with a free press and fair elections has ever had a large famine.” wins a Nobel in anything let alone theology…..I mean economics. This is the argument you attributed to the economist Amartya Sen. Does Mr. Sen and The Economist for that matter not understand the dangers associated with conflating causation and correlation? Large famines are largely functions of climate, external demand, and agricultural subsidies. Are they related to free press? Doubtful if there is a linear connection. Are they related to fair elections? Probably but this is a correlation that I would not get passed peer-review.

This is a quote used more now than everything sans “Green Shoots” right now and it is purported to have been spoken by former Illinois Senator Everett Dirksen, although there is no question as to whether he ever said or wrote such words. Regardless of whether Mr. Dirksen did or did not construct this phase it seems an interesting thought given that the Obama administration is now discussing upping US food and agricultural aid to nations around the world to $5 billion annually.  Under the Bush administration this figure was about $2.3-2.7 billion. Now given the quote attributed to the late senator from Illinois this sum should ≈ real $$.

I and others contend that no where is this statement more false than with respect to international aid. Should we look to solve all the developing world’s problems, whether they be health or technology? Absolutely not these folks need to stand on their own 2 feet and it is time to clip their wings with respect to funding for weapons and war related infrastructure. However, the figures mentioned above account for 0.0181-0.0335% of our GDP ($14.93 Trillion FY 2008). At the ultra-macro level the US donates about 0.2-0.4% of GDP in toto (http://www.globalissues.org/article/35/us-and-foreign-aid-assistance#ForeignAidNumbersinChartsandGraphs).This is markedly less than the 0.7% of GDP agreed to by rich nations at the UN General Assembly……..in 1970! Yes it is true we donated $25 billion in 2008 as Official Development Assistance (ODA), which is ≥ Germany and the UK combined and realistically dwarfing every nation on an absolute scale. However, as any economist or pragmatic person would admit absolute values don’t say much, while relative figures say a ton.  The US ranks dead last among the 22 rich nations as a % of GDP. Pekka Hirvonen called this Stingy Samaritanism. The only nations that exceed the 0.7% target are Sweden, Luxembourg, Norway, Denmark, and the Netherlands (0.8-0.99% of GDP)……………..Damn Socialists!

Lets just quickly contrast this with Defense spending, which was 4.7% of GDP last year and has a 45yr average of 5.3% ($702-792 billion annually) (http://www.heritage.org/research/features/budgetchartbook/obama-budget-would-return-defense-spending-to-pre-911-levels.aspx). So, why don’t we just take 0.4% of defense and transfer it to international aid. This would still leave 3.73-4.33% of GDP for making tons of bombs, guns, missiles, tanks, etc. allowing us to continue to engage in mismanaged, ill-conceived, spineless, and pointless wars. How can you argue with that Bush, Cheney, et al?

Further folks like Peter Orzag the Director of President Obama’s Office of Management and Budget has noted that if we don’t get healthcare under control it will mushroom from 5% in 1960 to 20% of GDP sometime between 2020 and 2040. If we were to actually shear some of the fat from this beast we could give more generously, but that might actually require a national healthcare option that would apparantly run private industry out of business. However, this is hard to reconcile given that most in the private sector feel the US government would do a horrible job if they got in the business of healthcare. If this is so than what’s the problem?

We have a TRUE Axis of Evil in this country  Defense, Banks, and Healthcare/Big Pharmaceutical. Cutting these folks down to size even if that meant a 5-10% decrease in their nefarious profits, would permit the US government to cut taxes for Joe the Plumber (ie The Common Man and Woman!) and permit more giving to those around the world in desperate need of real aid. Not food in boxes or finished product but rather the tools and knowledge to make their own stuff and feed themselves by themselves.

I must admit rather reluctantly that I did a rough calculation of how much I gave in aid/donations last year and it came out to approximately 1-2% of my income. That is a figure that I really don’t know how to square with others as the data for individual households in this country is scant with respect to charitable donations.

So, it seems to me that a billion here, a billion there does not equal real money when it comes to international aid. This country owes it to the world to stop exporting so much defense related technology and get going on the stuff that makes countries function in the interim. That includes alternative NRG, agriculture, smart-growth, etc. and the myriad skill-sets they need to stop relying on external aid. Its the least we could do.

Dairy farmers are in real trouble and it isn’t the kind associated with stepping in a present left by the resident ruminants. No they will be facing serious decisions in the coming months and years, with many here in Vermont (32 since December 1 2008) already having decided to abandon business they have invested decades in. I am specifically speaking of organic dairy producers who have seen demand for their product climb from approximately 75 million pds. in 2006 to a high of 150 during the later stages of 2008 followed by a precipitous drop this year to 125 million pds. (http://www.nytimes.com/2009/05/29/us/29dairy.html?em) Sales growth has slowed from 20% last November to near zero presently, although projections range from 6 to 12.7%. Many organic farmers owe upwards of half a million dollars from conversion to organic.

Yet, the pain is not exclusive to organic farmers what with the extremely volatile (And getting more so! (http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/02/business/02dairy.html?sq=dairy%20california&st=cse&scp=10&pagewanted=all)) price of milk declining from a high historical high of $19.13 per cwt in 2007 to $12.06 (-36%) presently. Couple this with a steady (1952-2004) and at times marked (1945-1950) aggregate inclination to move away from milk consumption here in the US. While it is true that some of this market decline has been nullified by the doubling of dairy consumption in developing countries and China from 33 in 2002 to 63 pds per year in 2007. Although as with CO2 they pale in comparison to our 580 pound annual habit. Yet, I would ask the Chinese already own a large portion of our debt do we really want them to control our farmers as well?

SO, is it all doom and gloom you may ask? Well the answer in my humble opinion is not so fast my friend! We have only to look inward at Green Mountain Dairy Farm in Sheldon, VT. where the Rowell brothers are getting the most out of their beloved bovines (http://www.nytimes.com/2008/09/24/business/businessspecial2/24farmers.html?scp=1&sq=methane%20vermont%20cow%20farm&st=cse). If we use their calculations and assume that 0.25 Kilowatt Hour (kWh) can be generated per dairy cow and we assume there are approximately 141,000 head in Vermont (1,498,100 in th Northeast) we would could potentially generate 35,250 kWh per day (374,525 in the Northeast) of electricty from our friendly ruminates here in Vermont. This translates to about 1,286.7 MW annually, which would provide electricity to 10% of Vermont housing units (311,434) or 12% of all households (240,634) (http://quickfacts.census.gov/qfd/states/50000.html; vermont-area-sheet-us-census-2005), which no matter how you slice it is not a trivial piece of the pie (Pardon the pun!). Assuming the average price of a kWh in VT is 12.5 cents (12.1 cents in NE (http://www.eia.doe.gov/neic/brochure/electricity/electricity.html)) and a 5-6 cent premium (ie 17.5-18.5 cents) we are talking about a net income of about $2,187,263, however, if scaling up of this type of effort increases efficiency by lets say 0.15 kWh revenue increases to $3,499,620.

Better yet if we use this process as a Heat Generating mechanism, which has been proven markedly more efficient for biomass relative to fuel or electricity the numbers inflate substantially with 27-35% of homes heated, 3,602.5 MW annually and $6,124,335 in revenue.

Yet, there is more and it involves looking to France a country and mindset that in many ways mirros ours here in Vermont. Folks in southeast France ever wary of financial institutions (Yeah those!) have taken to investing in Holsteins, which bring 4-5% returns annually, while basic French banks tend to offer 0.75 interest rates (http://www.nytimes.com/2009/05/12/world/europe/12cows.html?scp=4&sq=france%20cow&st=cse). Yeah I know this is much less than our banks, but the fact is that investing in a neighbor’s struggling dairy or beef operation would I presume give one far more satisfaction. Currently interest rates fluctuate between 1.6 for CDs and 8.8% for home equity. According to Pierre Marguerit managing director of a cattle investment firm in France “People have saved money and don’t want to waste it. Stocks have fallen a lot, and people see it. We need somewhere to put our money for a long-term investment, something more stable. At this difficult time, it’s a much better investment than real estate and much more tangible than the stock market. This is part of the patrimony.”

However, unlike traditional Wall Street related investments the folks in France are finding volatility indices are far lower for cows relative to the latter’s “Masters of the Universe”. The data out of France suggests that such relationships free upwards of 17% of capital for investments and improvement, which in many instances were relegated to the back burner in perpetude.

The fact is that our friends and neighbors in the dairy industry here in Vermont and throughout the country need our help now and I don’t believe they have ever attempted the types of legerdemain the suits in NY, London, and Hong Kong conjured up. They deserve our respect and support during these tough times, because unlike the auto industry they can’t stop feeding and milking their cows. There is huge potential in them there cow patties and it is time to harvest it. Lets show the country and the world the softer side of capitalism!