A mostly empty 110 freeway toward downtown Los Angeles, California on April 28, 2020. Robert Gauthier / Los Angeles Times via Getty Images
The shelter in place orders that brought clean skies to some of the world's most polluted cities and saw greenhouse gas emissions plummet were just a temporary relief that provided an illusory benefit to the long-term consequences of the climate crisis. According to new research, the COVID-19 lockdowns will have a "neglible" impact on global warming, as Newshub in New Zealand reported.
<p>The severe measures that were taken on a global scale to stem the tide of the novel coronavirus pandemic did curb pollution in the atmosphere, but the researchers found the impact will cut global heating by just 0.01 degrees Celsius by 2030, as <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2020/aug/07/covid-19-lockdown-will-have-negligible-impact-on-climate-crisis-study" target="_blank">The Guardian</a> reported.</p><p>"The direct effect of the pandemic-driven [lockdown] will be negligible," said the researchers, whose analysis was led by Piers Forster at the University of Leeds in the UK, as The Guardian reported. "In contrast, with an economic recovery tilted towards green stimulus and reductions in fossil fuel investments, it is possible to avoid future warming of 0.3C by 2050."</p>
<p>The study was published in <em><a href="https://www.nature.com/articles/s41558-020-0883-0" target="_blank">Nature Climate Change</a></em>. To figure out the impact of the lockdowns, the researchers looked at mobility data from Google and Apple in 123 countries that covers 99 percent of <a href="https://www.ecowatch.com/tag/fossil-fuels">fossil fuel</a> emissions. The information gives real-time information on travel and work patterns, which allows researchers to use advanced computations to estimate emissions levels, according to The Guardian.</p><p>Professor Keith Shine, at the University of Reading and not part of the study team, told The Guardian: "It is deeply impressive to get such a near-real-time analysis of the climate impact [of the lockdowns]."</p><p>What they found was that emissions from people using transportation was at its lowest in April, with nitrogen oxide levels falling by 30 percent and carbon dioxide levels dropping by 25 percent, according to Newshub.</p>
<p>Professor Dave Reay, chair of carbon management at the University of Edinburgh who was not involved in the study, told Newshub that the results are not surprising "given the long lifetime of carbon dioxide and the massive pool of fossil carbon already swilling around in our atmosphere."</p><p>The declines show that swift and decisive changes in how people behave have the potential to dramatically impact the environment in the short term. That was evident in the cleaner skies and the suddenly visible animals in Venice's canals and the streets of various cities. In Wuhan, China, the epicenter of the outbreak, air quality improved so much that NASA satellite imagery showed the average density of tropospheric nitrogen dioxide – a toxic chemical that reduces immunity – dropped significantly below normal levels, as Newshub reported.</p>
<p>Of course, those lockdowns came with a steep economic price as people were put out of work and supply chains and distribution were severely disrupted. In other words, lockdowns of that scale are so damaging that they are impossible to maintain. Furthermore, once the lockdowns lifted, emissions levels started to rise again. That phenomenon means the world needs to transition to a zero-emissions economy by investing in <a href="http://www.ecowatch.com/renewable-energy/">renewable energy</a> and burying CO2, according to the researchers, as The Guardian reported.</p><p>"It is now make or break for the 1.5 Celsius target," said Forster, as The Guardian reported. "This is a once-in-a-generation opportunity to really change the direction of society. We do not have to go back to where we were, because times of crisis are also the time to change."</p>
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A company from Ghana is making bikes out of bamboo.
By Kate Whiting
Bernice Dapaah calls bamboo "a miracle plant," because it grows so fast and absorbs carbon. But it can also work wonders for children's education and women's employment – as she's discovered.
<p>Bamboo is abundant in her native Ghana, where she <a href="http://ghanabamboobikes.org/video/" target="_blank">runs a social enterprise</a> that employs women to transform it into bicycles which are exported all over the world.</p><p><span></span>Cycling is well known as being a low-carbon form of transport – but Dapaah is making it even more sustainable.</p><p>For every bamboo plant that is cut down to make a bike, Ghana Bamboo Bikes Initiative plants 10 more. <a href="https://interestingengineering.com/bamboo-as-a-replacement-to-steel#:~:text=Yes%2C%20bamboo%20is%20stronger%20than,noticeable%20lead%20at%2028%2C000%20pounds." target="_blank">Bamboo is stronger than steel</a> in terms of tensile strength and is a cheaper, more sustainable material. It also takes less electricity to make a bamboo bike than a metal one. And the frame is completely recyclable.</p>
<img lazy-loadable="true" src="https://assets.rebelmouse.io/eyJhbGciOiJIUzI1NiIsInR5cCI6IkpXVCJ9.eyJpbWFnZSI6Imh0dHBzOi8vYXNzZXRzLnJibC5tcy8yMzUzMDU2OC9vcmlnaW4uanBnIiwiZXhwaXJlc19hdCI6MTY0MTk1MDcwOX0.6CswX_fjuMOGfmmf7-ZNaPial_yXaDIMr4Be5sponxo/img.jpg?width=980" id="2a3fe" class="rm-shortcode" data-rm-shortcode-id="08b2a7c53915a40a7f0c7c7cf5735489" data-rm-shortcode-name="rebelmouse-image" />
These are the world's most bicycle-friendly cities. Statista
<p>"The reason we use bamboo to manufacture bicycles is because it's found abundantly in Ghana and this is not a material we're going to import," says Dapaah, one of the World Economic Forum's Young Global Leaders.</p><p>"It's a new innovation. There were no existing bamboo bike builders in our country, so we were the first people trying to see how best we could utilize the abundant bamboo in Ghana."</p><span style="display:block;position:relative;padding-top:56.25%;" class="rm-shortcode" data-rm-shortcode-id="a335b5dffdd806bd6bb4debea90c2045"><iframe lazy-loadable="true" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/dxsb9c4HMn0?rel=0" width="100%" height="auto" frameborder="0" scrolling="no" style="position:absolute;top:0;left:0;width:100%;height:100%;"></iframe></span>
Supporting Students
<p>Besides encouraging Ghanaians to swap vehicles for affordable bikes, Ghana Bamboo Bikes Initiative is helping students save time on walking to school so they have more time to learn.</p><p>Each time they sell a bike, they donate a bike to a schoolchild in a rural community, who might otherwise have to walk for hours to get to school.</p><p>Dapaah knows how transformative a shorter journey to school can be to academic performance. She grew up living with her <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sb3joGYmx9A&feature=emb_logo" target="_blank">grandpa, a forester in a rural part of the country</a>.</p><p>"We had to walk three and a half hours every day before I could go to school. He later bought me a bike, so I finished senior high and wanted to go to university."</p><p>The experience inspired her to launch Ghana Bamboo Bikes Initiative with two other students at college.</p><p>"When we started this initiative, I looked back and said, when I was young, I had to walk miles before I could get to school, and sometimes if I was late, I was punished.</p><p>"Why don't we donate bikes for students to encourage them to study and so they can have enough time to be on books."</p><p>To date, they have sold more than 3,000 road, mountain and children's bikes – and Dapaah says they plan to donate <a href="https://www.entrepreneur.com/video/350343" target="_blank">10,000 bikes to schoolchildren over five years</a>.</p>Empowering Women
<p>The enterprise is also providing local jobs. It teaches young people to build bikes, particularly women and those in rural communities, where jobs can be scarce. More than 50% of people they have trained are women.</p><p>Dapaah says they want to boost the number of people they employ to 250 over the next five years and they are looking to partner with NGOs to build a childcare facility so mothers can continue to work.</p>Reducing Emissions
<p>By promoting a cycling culture in Ghana, Dapaah says they're also committed to reducing emissions in the transport sector and contributing to the UN's Sustainable Development Goals.</p><p>"I love the idea of reusing bamboo to promote sustainable cycling. People want to go green, low-carbon, lean-energy efficient," she says.</p>From Your Site Articles
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Increasingly, thinking about the future of cities suggests that chiefly relying on cars as a form of transport has run its course. Andreas Komodromos / Flickr / CC by 2.0
By Kevin J. Krizek
Sticking closer to home because of COVID-19 has shown many people what cities can be like with less traffic, noise, congestion and pollution. Roads and parking lots devoted to cars take up a lot of land. For example, in Phoenix, Los Angeles and New York City these spaces account for over one-third of each city's total area.
<p>When stay-at-home orders went into effect in many parts of the U.S. in March, streets and parking lots went dormant seemingly overnight. Within days, municipalities across the U.S. started <a href="http://pedbikeinfo.org/resources/resources_details.cfm?id=5209" target="_blank">shifting these spaces</a> to other uses that better suit people.</p><p>As a professor of environmental design and transport, I've worked for decades to <a href="https://scholar.google.com/citations?user=lfb0Tu4AAAAJ&hl=en&oi=ao" target="_blank">unravel the many factors</a> that keep people reliant on cars, SUVs and trucks. Weather, time constraints, children – there are many reasons that prevent people from using transportation modes like bicycles. Yet with a simple first step – starting to reconfigure city streets – meaningful change can begin to break down traditional transportation barriers and usher in a new culture of getting around town by means other than cars.</p>
The Dangerous, Expensive Automobile
<p>In large U.S. cities, nearly half of all car trips are <a href="https://doi.org/10.32866/10777" target="_blank">less than four miles</a>. Using cars to travel such short distances has many costs.</p><p>For example, consider traffic fatalities. Two pedestrians or cyclists die every hour on U.S. city streets, a national trend that's been <a href="http://www.trb.org/Main/Blurbs/180624.aspx" target="_blank">worsening</a> in recent years, even though cycling and walking rates are <a href="https://bikeleague.org/content/new-data-bike-commuting" target="_blank">steady or declining</a>. Pollution from cars contributes to climate change and worsens air quality. Designing cities around cars <a href="https://theconversation.com/people-are-stranded-in-transit-deserts-in-dozens-of-us-cities-92722" target="_blank">marginalizes individuals who don't have them</a>.</p><span style="display:block;position:relative;padding-top:56.25%;" class="rm-shortcode" data-rm-shortcode-id="b5c9ddfda1e03726192181fedaef4a35"><iframe lazy-loadable="true" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/h-I6HFQXquU?rel=0" width="100%" height="auto" frameborder="0" scrolling="no" style="position:absolute;top:0;left:0;width:100%;height:100%;"></iframe></span><p>In my view, this is the time to move beyond the "grab the keys" mentality on the way out the door, as <a href="https://doi.org/10.1080/01944363.2015.1057196" target="_blank">millennials</a> and <a href="https://washpirg.org/blogs/blog/usp/don%E2%80%99t-believe-hype-%E2%80%93-millennials%E2%80%99-transportation-habits-are-changing" target="_blank">GenXers</a> already are doing. <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2020/07/09/opinion/ban-cars-manhattan-cities.html" target="_blank">New visions</a> for streets, where cars use less space and are replaced by smaller vehicles built for individual riders, are gaining currency.</p><p>These modes of transport might be <a href="https://electrek.co/2020/06/19/cityqs-enclosed-electric-car-ebike-begins-taking-pre-orders/" target="_blank">new forms of e-bikes</a>, e-scooters or hoverboards. These novel vehicles, which were already <a href="https://usa.streetsblog.org/2020/06/17/four-signs-this-might-be-micromobilitys-big-moment/" target="_blank">attracting attention</a> before COVID-19, complement conventional bicycles, whose <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2020/05/18/nyregion/bike-shortage-coronavirus.html" target="_blank">sales have boomed</a> during the pandemic.</p>
New Thinking, Different Results
<p>Increasingly, thinking about the future of cities suggests that chiefly relying on cars as a form of transport <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2020/07/08/opinion/us-infrastructure-plan.html" target="_blank">has run its course</a>. By minimally modifying the existing infrastructure, it is possible for city leaders to repurpose roads and parking spaces while ensuring the same ease of being able to <a href="https://doi.org/10.1016/j.trd.2020.102336" target="_blank">reach daily services</a>.</p><p>Emerging forms of mobility and changing mindsets can help deliver these opportunities. Bicycles and bicycle-like vehicles provide a catalyst to shift how city streets are used.</p><p>Research demonstrates that people will adopt new ways of getting around town when they are confident that an entire route, including intersections and parking lots, is safe for travel. Some COVID-19-induced street changes that have emerged recently, such as <a href="https://globaldesigningcities.org/publication/global-street-design-guide/designing-streets-people/designing-for-motorists/traffic-calming-strategies/" target="_blank">reducing the number of traffic lanes</a> and <a href="https://www.insider.com/cities-closed-streets-for-pedestrians-covid-lockdowns-2020-5#eventually-new-york-city-aims-to-open-a-total-of-100-miles-of-streets-for-free-use-to-pedestrians-2" target="_blank">closing streets to traffic</a>, are a good first step. But they lack the network component.</p><p>Networks quickly develop the more people use them. The quickest way to build one that is scaled and purposed for people begins by identifying streets used to make short trips. These are places near neighborhood retail districts, schools and other activity centers.</p><p>Informed by local data, leaders can make decisions about which streets should give priority to vehicles such as bicycles, not cars. Changes might include physically demarcated lanes and signs making statements like "Cars are guests." Initially, these changes might require waivers to exempt them from adhering to current engineering guidelines and standards – restrictions that stifle innovation.</p><div id="96008" class="rm-shortcode" data-rm-shortcode-id="3bf9becba1577cd577d5dbdcf6a08dc6"><blockquote class="twitter-tweet twitter-custom-tweet" data-twitter-tweet-id="1264305002203492352" data-partner="rebelmouse"><div style="margin:1em 0">Avenue B, as it should B, as it was meant to B, serving a variety of active road users AND promoting social distanc… https://t.co/KPWPu4wdzu</div> — madamwestbikes (@madamwestbikes)<a href="https://twitter.com/madamwestbikes/statuses/1264305002203492352">1590268776.0</a></blockquote></div>
<p>Now large and small U.S. cities are experimenting with different strategies and contending with long-standing equity concerns about <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2020/07/20/upshot/pandemic-city-planning-inequality.html?action=click&module=Spotlight&pgtype=Homepage" target="_blank">which streets</a> to change. For example, Minneapolis has <a href="https://www.minneapolisparks.org/news/2020/04/03/minneapolis-park-and-recreation-board-announces-three-more-parkway-closures-to-motor-vehicles-to-allow-pedestrians-more-space-for-social-distancing/" target="_blank">closed a number of parkways to cars</a>, reserving them exclusively for cyclists and walkers.</p><p>Pioneering cities like <a href="https://bikeportland.org/2020/04/29/heres-what-to-expect-with-portlands-new-slow-streets-plan-314117" target="_blank">Portland, Oregon</a>, <a href="https://www.seattle.gov/transportation/projects-and-programs/programs/stay-healthy-streets" target="_blank">Seattle</a> and <a href="https://www.oaklandca.gov/projects/oakland-slow-streets" target="_blank">Oakland</a> are using this time to test ways of sharing a broader array of streets among cyclists, walkers and car users. Researchers are providing tools to identify the most promising places to reallocate space for <a href="https://doi.org/10.32866/001c.13421" target="_blank">pop-up cycle ways</a>.</p><p>Enacting change now – in a strategic manner and while travel levels are down – may be an opportunity to reap <a href="https://twitter.com/BrentToderian/status/1280517484362129409" target="_blank">quick gains</a> with <a href="https://twitter.com/Jamesdestafford/status/1278735426312945664" target="_blank">high impact</a>. I believe that a better transport future is within reach by taking advantage of the space dominated by automobiles. This is the time to leverage current low-traffic conditions so that streets and roads can be converted to accommodate new technology and transport.</p>
<p>
<a href="https://theconversation.com/profiles/kevin-j-krizek-1114954" target="_blank"><em>Kevin J. Krizek</em></a><em> is a Professor of Environmental Design, University of Colorado Boulder.<br/>
</em>
</p><p>
<em>Disclosure statement: Kevin J. Krizek does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</em>
</p><p>
<em>Reposted with permission from <a href="https://theconversation.com/with-fewer-cars-on-us-streets-now-is-the-time-to-reinvent-roadways-and-how-we-use-them-140408" target="_blank">The Conversation</a>.</em>
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A Tesla electric car crosses the Golden Gate Bridge using autopilot on Sept. 29, 2018. Thomas Hawk / Flickr
A federal judge rejected a Trump administration lawsuit to put a stop to California's carbon cap and trade program, which regulates the state's transportation sector, as The Hill reported. The transportation sector is the largest source of greenhouse gas emissions as of 2018.
<p>The market-based program is designed to reduce carbon emissions by making companies pay for the excess carbon they use. Since its signing in 2006 by then Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger, it has forced companies to spend billions on carbon credits, according to <a href="https://www.sacbee.com/news/politics-government/capitol-alert/article244312482.html" target="_blank">The Sacramento Bee</a>.</p><p>The California legislation enters the state into a marketplace with the Canadian province Quebec. The administration challenged the program, arguing that California had no authority to deal directly with the government of another nation and that the program usurps the federal government's primacy in foreign affairs, as <a href="https://www.ourdailyplanet.com/story/federal-judge-dismisses-trump-administration-lawsuit-over-ca-canada-cap-and-trade/" target="_blank">Our Daily Planet</a> reported.</p>
<p>The alliance between California and Quebec allows companies in both states to sell carbon credits to each other and, California officials say, broadens the market for credits and strengthens the overall program. The White House argued that the trade deal was equivalent to California signing a treaty with a foreign nation, which it is prohibited from doing under the constitution.</p><p>"California's Governors have defied this clear constitutional structure," federal officials argued in court papers, according to The Sacramento Bee. "They have positioned the State in open opposition to the foreign policy of the United States on greenhouse gas emissions."</p>
<p>However, the judge in the case, U.S. District Judge William B. Shubb, said California hasn't exceeded its legal limits or intruded on Trump's "foreign affairs power."</p><p>The federal government has shown no "concrete evidence that the President's power to speak and bargain effectively with other countries has actually been diminished," the judge wrote, as The Sacramento Bee reported.</p><p>In a tweet, Gov. Gavin Newsom called Shubb's decision a "huge victory in an unwarranted and vindictive lawsuit against California."</p>
<p>Justice Department spokesperson Danielle Nichols told The Hill in an email that the department is "considering our next steps."</p><p>A spokesperson for California Attorney General Xavier Becerra referred The Hill to a past statement in which the lawyer said "California's Cap-and-Trade Program has existed since 2012 and was only strengthened from our collaboration with Quebec."</p><p>"California has long been a leader in fighting <a href="https://www.ecowatch.com/tag/climate-change">climate change</a> for the sake of protecting public health, our natural resources, our economy, and indeed our planet," the spokesperson added.</p><p>The cap and trade program revolves around a series of carbon-credit auctions held every three months by the California Resources Board, the state's air pollution agency. Each credit enables the business buying it to emit one ton of carbon pollution. The number of available credits ratchets down every auction, which forces businesses to find ways to reduce their carbon footprint or buy extra credits on the open market. The market-based approach is designed to give individual businesses flexibility while simultaneously reducing the overall volume of carbon emissions, according to The Sacramento Bee.</p><p>In a sign that pollution is dropping, only one-third of carbon credits were sold in the latest auction, suggesting that the coronavirus pandemic is drastically reducing the amount of greenhouse gases emitted by the transportation sector.</p>
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The downtown Amazon campus on April 30, 2020 in Seattle, Washington. Amazon recorded sales of $75.4 billion in the first three months of the year as many consumers increased their online purchases, up 26% over last year, but net income for the same period fell nearly 31% due to costs of managing the coronavirus pandemic. Lindsey Wasson / Getty Images
Amazon announced that its carbon footprint rose 15 percent in 2019, meaning the online retail giant emits the carbon equivalent of running 13 coal fired power plants all year, according to the CBC. That also included an 18 percent rise in emissions from fossil fuels.
<p>That announcement was made in tandem with a significant investment in clean technologies.</p><p>The company, which has seen its already astronomical value skyrocket during the coronavirus pandemic, is launching a $2 billion venture capital fund that will back companies building "sustainable and decarbonizing technologies," the company said in a <a href="https://blog.aboutamazon.com/sustainability/we-are-all-in-on-the-climate-pledge-net-zero-carbon-by-2040" target="_blank">statement</a> on Tuesday, as <a href="https://www.cnbc.com/2020/06/23/amazon-launches-2-billion-fund-to-invest-in-climate-technologies.html" target="_blank">CNBC</a> reported.</p><p>Amazon had previously <a href="https://www.ecowatch.com/amazon-bezos-climate-crisis-plan-2640454585.html" target="_self">pledged to be carbon neutral by 2040</a>, but that commitment is fraught with controversy as the <a href="https://www.ecowatch.com/amazon-employees-climate-justice-threatened-2643729245.html" target="_self">company has fired employees</a> who supported climate strikes and asked the company to reign in its carbon footprint.</p>
<p>Despite the company's significant uptick in emissions and its willingness to do cloud-based work for fossil fuel giants like ExxonMobil, the new internal $2 billion fund will help the company reach its 2040 commitment by investing in technology that will bring it in line with its goal, according to <a href="https://www.fastcompany.com/90520061/amazon-will-invest-2-billion-in-climate-tech" target="_blank">Fast Company</a>.</p><p>"Each prospective investment will be judged on its potential to accelerate the path to zero carbon and help protect the planet for future generations," Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos said in a <a href="https://blog.aboutamazon.com/sustainability/we-are-all-in-on-the-climate-pledge-net-zero-carbon-by-2040" target="_blank">statement</a>, explaining that the new fund, called the Climate Pledge Fund, will look for companies of all sizes working on solutions in multiple industries, including transportation and logistics, <a href="http://www.ecowatch.com/renewable-energy/">energy</a> generation and storage, the circular economy, and agriculture, as <a href="https://www.fastcompany.com/90520061/amazon-will-invest-2-billion-in-climate-tech" target="_blank">Fast Company</a> reported.</p>
<p>For his own part, <a href="https://www.ecowatch.com/jeff-bezos-climate-crisis-fund-2645179580.html" target="_self">Bezos did commit $10 billion of his own wealth</a> earlier this year to help fight the <a href="https://www.ecowatch.com/tag/climate-crisis">climate crisis</a>. As <a href="https://techcrunch.com/2020/06/23/amazon-announces-2-billion-climate-pledge-fund/" target="_blank">TechCrunch</a> noted, that pledge did little to stop the criticism of Amazon — especially after the company fired eight employees for allegedly speaking out over the company's climate record. In a statement issued during the company's May shareholder meeting, a representative of the organization Amazon Employees for Climate Justice criticized the company for "environmental racism."</p><p>"Toxicity is embedded in our operations as pollution causes stunted lung development, asthma and higher death rates from COVID-19 concentrated in Black and brown communities," said Maren Costa, a spokesperson for the organization, as <a href="https://techcrunch.com/2020/06/23/amazon-announces-2-billion-climate-pledge-fund/" target="_blank">TechCrunch</a> reported.</p>
<p>The group asked Amazon to ramp up its commitments and to pledge for net zero emissions by 2030. It appears Amazon may have listened. In Tuesday's announcement, the company said it would run entirely on clean energy by the year 2025, five years ahead of its initial pledge, according to <a href="https://www.cnbc.com/2020/06/23/amazon-launches-2-billion-fund-to-invest-in-climate-technologies.html" target="_blank">CNBC</a>. However, other tech giants are already there. Google reached that goal in 2017.</p><p>As <a href="https://www.cnbc.com/2020/06/23/amazon-launches-2-billion-fund-to-invest-in-climate-technologies.html" target="_blank">CNBC</a> also noted, the company agreed in April to invest $10 million to help conserve or restore forests in the Northeast region of the U.S.</p>
<p>Amazon has a long way to go to reduce its carbon footprint, which clocked in at 51.17 million metric tons of carbon dioxide last year, up from 44.4 million metric tons in 2018, according to the <a href="https://www.cbc.ca/news/technology/amazon-carbon-footprint-1.5624048" target="_blank">CBC</a>.</p><p>While environmental advocates are shocked at the size of that number, they were complimentary of the thoroughness of Amazon's calculations, which included customers driving to Whole Foods and the energy required to make a Kindle.</p><p>However, it looks as if the company's short term carbon footprint is going the wrong way. As the <a href="https://www.cbc.ca/news/technology/amazon-carbon-footprint-1.5624048" target="_blank">CBC</a> noted, Amazon has leased a dozen more Boeing jets this month so it can keep up with demand and speedy deliveries. It now has a fleet of 80 airplanes.</p>
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An Amazon Prime Air Boeing 767-306(ER)(BCF) landing in Houston on April 25, 2019. Patrick Feller / CC BY 2.0
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The office of Rover.com sits empty with employees working from home due to the coronavirus pandemic on March 12 in Seattle, Washington. John Moore / Getty Images
The office may never look the same again. And the investment it will take to protect employees may force many companies to go completely remote. That's after the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) issued new recommendations for how workers can return to the office safely.
<p>If companies choose to follow the guidelines, it would lead to a dramatic change in the corporate work experience, and likely increase pollution. One of the most striking features of the recommendations is that they upend years of environmental activism that urged people to take public transportation or car-pool. The new recommendations suggest avoiding public transportation and driving to work alone, as <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2020/05/28/health/cdc-coronavirus-offices.html" target="_blank">The New York Times</a> reported.</p>
<p>The CDC's new recommendations suggest making this cost-effective. "Offer employees incentives to use forms of transportation that minimize close contact with others, such as offering reimbursement for parking for commuting to work alone or single-occupancy rides," the guidelines say.</p><p>However, the guidelines did not address the environmental impact of such policies or the health impacts from increasing traffic congestion.</p>
<p>Besides making the commute a lonelier and less environmentally friendly, the guidelines also make the office environment lonelier. The CDC recommends placing workers six feet apart. If that's not possible, then companies should erect plastic shields around desks, remove seats in common areas, and avoid perks like coffee machines and snack bins that encourage communal activities and many people touching them, according to <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2020/05/28/health/cdc-coronavirus-offices.html" target="_blank">The New York Times</a>.</p><p>In another environmentally damaging recommendation, the CDC does leave room for replacing those items with pre-packaged single-serve coffee and snacks.</p><p>"Replace high-touch communal items, such as coffee pots, water coolers, and bulk snacks, with alternatives such as prepackaged, single-serving items," the <a href="https://www.cdc.gov/coronavirus/2019-ncov/community/office-buildings.html" target="_blank">guidelines</a> say.</p>
<p>The guidelines also address the technical aspects of the office. The CDC recommends employers ensure that building ventilation systems are operating properly. It also encourages allowing as much fresh air as possible by opening windows and doors, when feasible, to "increase circulation of outdoor air as much as possible," as <a href="https://www.foxnews.com/health/amid-coronavirus-cdc-offers-guidelines-on-office-reopenings" target="_blank">Fox News</a> reported.</p><p>The guidelines also eliminate many office norms and pleasantries that were once common place. The guidelines tell employers to "[p]rohibit handshaking, hugs, and fist bumps." It also recommends that employees wear a cloth face mask "in all areas of the business," as <a href="https://www.axios.com/cdc-guidelines-coronavirus-office-business-jobs-ab19791a-357e-412a-9a5d-516f78610b4c.html" target="_blank">Axios</a> reported.</p><p>The guidelines encourage daily health checks, including temperature screenings before employees enter the workplace, and to send home sick workers. Then the office should go through enhanced cleaning and disinfection, as <a href="https://www.axios.com/cdc-guidelines-coronavirus-office-business-jobs-ab19791a-357e-412a-9a5d-516f78610b4c.html" target="_blank">Axios</a> reported.</p>
<p><a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2020/05/28/health/cdc-coronavirus-offices.html" target="_blank">The New York Times</a> noted that many white-collar offices have successfully transitioned to a fully distributed workforce and are finding that their office environment is able to continue through video conferencing and Slack channels. With that in mind, companies might find the cost of putting protective measures in place too steep, or they might find that isolation in the office makes it difficult to recruit and retain talent. Businesses may decide to allow their workers to stay home.</p><p>Already companies like Twitter and Square have decided that their employees never need to come back to the office.</p><p>"Companies, surprisingly, don't want to go back to work," said Russell Hancock, president and CEO of Joint Venture Silicon Valley, a nonprofit think tank, to <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2020/05/28/health/cdc-coronavirus-offices.html" target="_blank">The New York Times</a>. "You will not see the drum beat and hue and cry and rush to get back to the office."</p>
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An aerial view shows new vehicles that were offloaded from ships at Wallenius Wilhelmsen Logistics on April 26, 2020 in Wilmington, California. "Vehicles are the biggest contributor to greenhouse gas emissions in America," said California Attorney General Xavier Becerra. David McNew / Getty Images
Twenty-three states and Washington, DC launched a suit Wednesday to stop the Trump administration rollback of Obama-era fuel efficiency standards for cars and light trucks.
<p>The Trump rollback, <a href="https://www.ecowatch.com/trump-fuel-efficiency-pollution-2645597122.html" target="_self">finalized in March</a>, slashed a requirement that automakers increase fuel efficiency by five percent a year through 2026 to 1.5 percent, <a href="https://uk.mobile.reuters.com/article/amp/idUKKBN2332UT" target="_blank">Reuters reported</a>. The lower standard undid the single greatest U.S. attempt to fight the <a href="https://www.ecowatch.com/climate-change/" target="_self">climate crisis</a>, <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2020/05/27/climate/lawsuit-fuel-economy-climate.html" target="_blank">The New York Times pointed out</a>, and the <a href="https://www.ecowatch.com/tag/epa" target="_self">Environmental Protection Agency's</a> (EPA) own scientists warned it could increase deadly <a href="https://www.ecowatch.com/tag/air-pollution" target="_self">air pollution</a>.</p><p>"Vehicles are the biggest contributor to greenhouse gas emissions in America, and pollution-related respiratory illnesses make people more susceptible to Covid-19," California Attorney General Xavier Becerra told The New York Times.</p>
<blockquote class="twitter-tweet"><p lang="en" dir="ltr"><a href="https://twitter.com/hashtag/BREAKING?src=hash&ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">#BREAKING</a>: we’re suing the Trump Administration over its reckless rollback of national <a href="https://twitter.com/hashtag/CleanCarStandards?src=hash&ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">#CleanCarStandards</a>.<a href="https://twitter.com/realDonaldTrump?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">@RealDonaldTrump</a>’s so-called SAFE rule is a job killer and a public health hazard. <a href="https://twitter.com/hashtag/SaveCleanCars?src=hash&ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">#SaveCleanCars</a> <a href="https://t.co/1dILJu88yC">https://t.co/1dILJu88yC</a> <a href="https://t.co/6ceaoC8F2t">pic.twitter.com/6ceaoC8F2t</a></p>— Xavier Becerra (@AGBecerra) <a href="https://twitter.com/AGBecerra/status/1265700972858208256?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">May 27, 2020</a></blockquote> <script async src="https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8"></script>
<p>President <a href="https://www.ecowatch.com/tag/donald-trump" target="_self">Donald Trump</a> has touted the new standards as the most important rollback of his time in office and argued they would help the economy and the auto industry. The industry, however, is split on the new rules, with the Alliance for Automotive Innovation, which includes General Motors and Toyota, backing the administration, while Ford, Honda, BMW and Volkswagen <a href="https://www.ecowatch.com/automakers-emissions-california-trump-2639356453.html" target="_self">have struck a deal</a> with California to follow tougher standards.</p><p>Michigan Attorney General Dana Nessel, whose state has also joined the suit, told Reuters the new standards would actually decrease auto industry employment by four percent.</p><p>Nessel also called the new rule a "gift to the fossil fuel industry" and "a slap in the face to public health," according to Reuters and The New York Times respectively.</p>
<blockquote class="twitter-tweet"><p lang="en" dir="ltr">AG Nessel Files Lawsuit Challenging Federal Government's Reckless Rollback of National Clean Car Standards ➡️ <a href="https://t.co/jSMnG8xhFv">https://t.co/jSMnG8xhFv</a> <a href="https://t.co/1NzIzPIXIF">pic.twitter.com/1NzIzPIXIF</a></p>— Michigan Attorney General (@MIAttyGen) <a href="https://twitter.com/MIAttyGen/status/1265722254371028998?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">May 27, 2020</a></blockquote> <script async src="https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8"></script>
<p>The EPA did not comment on the lawsuit, but defended the new standards as a "sensible, single national program that strikes the right regulatory balance, protects our environment, and sets reasonable targets for the auto industry," according to Reuters. However, the administration's own figures show the new rule would increase greenhouse gas emissions by at least 867 million metric tons compared to the original standards, The New York Times reported. The difference amounts to more than the yearly emissions of many midsized countries.</p><p>This is the 82nd lawsuit California has filed against the Trump administration, according to Becerra, and most of the suits have targeted environmental rollbacks. The suit claims the reduced standards violate national laws requiring the government to issue the highest possible standards for automakers, <a href="https://thehill.com/policy/energy-environment/499770-23-states-sue-trump-over-rollback-of-obama-fuel-efficiency" target="_blank">The Hill explained</a>.</p><p>The states are joined in the suit by the cities of New York City, Denver, San Francisco and Los Angeles, Reuters reported.</p><p>Moments after the state lawsuit was filed, a coalition of 12 environmental groups including the <a href="https://www.sierraclub.org/" target="_blank">Sierra Club</a> issued a separate legal challenge to the new rules, The Hill reported.</p>
<blockquote class="twitter-tweet"><p lang="en" dir="ltr">Bit of a litigious day when you've got ~40 parties suing you over your clean car rule all at once.<br><br>Obama rule: 55 mpg by 2025<br>Trump rule: 40 mpg by 2026<a href="https://t.co/ZLVvFYmxKO">https://t.co/ZLVvFYmxKO</a></p>— Rebecca Beitsch (@RebeccaBeitsch) <a href="https://twitter.com/RebeccaBeitsch/status/1265730658250481665?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">May 27, 2020</a></blockquote> <script async src="https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8"></script>
<p>"This flawed rule — which will increase pollution, endanger public health, cut auto jobs, and further burden American families with higher fueling costs — will not hold up in court, just like the vast majority of the Trump Administration's unjustified actions," the Sierra Club said in a statement reported by The Hill. </p>
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Working From Home During the Pandemic Has Environmental Benefits — But We Can Do Even Better
24 May
Insights + Opinion
Junjira Konsang / Pixabay
By Matt Casale
For many Americans across the country, staying home to stop the spread of the novel coronavirus (COVID-19) means adapting to long-term telework for the first time. We're doing a lot more video conferencing and working out all the kinks that come along with it.
<p>While this particular situation is not ideal for many — for example, I'm currently writing this with an infant in a baby carrier on my chest and our almost-three-year-old belting "Let It Go" in the background — in many ways we're playing out a real-time experiment on whether telecommuting is possible on a large scale.</p>
<img lazy-loadable="true" src="https://assets.rebelmouse.io/eyJhbGciOiJIUzI1NiIsInR5cCI6IkpXVCJ9.eyJpbWFnZSI6Imh0dHBzOi8vYXNzZXRzLnJibC5tcy8yMzMxMzY4My9vcmlnaW4uanBnIiwiZXhwaXJlc19hdCI6MTYxNDc5NTEzOH0.UPtJT4Pjinn-wiHkF4vbFGF_2M2R3DrqPh_VGN_mPxQ/img.jpg?width=980" id="61bc2" class="rm-shortcode" data-rm-shortcode-id="4aeee8da3400abc67c12130a6bbe03ae" data-rm-shortcode-name="rebelmouse-image" />
The author (above) wrote this while working from home, baby in tow. Emily Anderson (author's wife/home office mate)
<p>The coronavirus will pass, but it's looking more and more like remote work will stick around. This time has demonstrated that, despite the ups and downs many of us have experienced, <a href="https://www.brookings.edu/blog/up-front/2020/04/06/telecommuting-will-likely-continue-long-after-the-pandemic/" target="_blank">telework works</a> for way more of us than we knew.</p><p>Even before this we knew that there were several benefits for both employers and employees to sidestepping the office. <a href="https://www.forbes.com/sites/andrealoubier/2017/07/20/benefits-of-telecommuting-for-the-future-of-work/#3f278e0916c6" target="_blank">Studies have shown</a> that it can lead to increased productivity, higher morale and lower employee turnover. It can also reduce real estate and office operation costs for employers.</p><p>We may now also be seeing some larger societal benefits that make the case for taking telework even further. Our current situation has provided a window into how a reduction in driving, buoyed, in part, by a greater adoption of telework, could relieve some of the stress on our overburdened transportation system and help heal at least a portion of the environmental damage it causes.</p><p>Today, roads that would normally clogged at all hours of the day are <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/photos-empty-airports-trains-roads-during-coronavirus" target="_blank">virtually empty</a>, even during rush hour. And the reduced car travel leads to fewer crashes and less air pollution, which harms human health and contributes to global warming. Air that's usually cloudy with smog has cleared. Los Angeles, which has notoriously pollution-choked skies, could recently boast having the <a href="https://www.cnn.com/2020/04/07/us/los-angeles-pollution-clean-air-coronavirus-trnd/index.html" target="_blank">cleanest air in the world</a>. And this year, experts predict, the transportation transformation will contribute to the <a href="https://www.carbonbrief.org/analysis-coronavirus-set-to-cause-largest-ever-annual-fall-in-co2-emissions" target="_blank">largest-ever annual decline in global carbon emissions</a>.</p><img lazy-loadable="true" src="https://assets.rebelmouse.io/eyJhbGciOiJIUzI1NiIsInR5cCI6IkpXVCJ9.eyJpbWFnZSI6Imh0dHBzOi8vYXNzZXRzLnJibC5tcy8yMzMxMzY4NC9vcmlnaW4uanBnIiwiZXhwaXJlc19hdCI6MTYxODAzNTcyNX0.2WzQzdHTSN6ob08B_hb9WcYdlBeUtg53i1RoYGIO1Do/img.jpg?width=980" id="44ac4" class="rm-shortcode" data-rm-shortcode-id="ea0ed6763606e660a909d62f41f9d54f" data-rm-shortcode-name="rebelmouse-image" />
Virtually empty Los Angeles streets on May 7. Chris Yarzab / CC BY 2.0
<p>Clearly not every job can be done from home, and it's not just commuting for work that has come to a halt during coronavirus lockdowns. In 2017 only around <a href="https://nhts.ornl.gov/assets/2017_nhts_summary_travel_trends.pdf" target="_blank">28 percent</a> of total miles driven were work-related. Even if telework continues or expands on a much larger scale, non-work-related car trips — shopping, recreation, visits to doctors and the like — can be expected to go back to normal.</p><p>Still, telework's potential for taking cars off the road can clearly have an impact on global warming emissions and air pollution. Just how much of an impact could telework have? As it turns out, the answer is a significant one — and with a few important steps, the benefits can be even greater and more sustainable.</p>How Much of the Workforce Could Reasonably and Permanently Transition to Telework?
<p>According to the U.S. Census Bureau, <a href="https://www.cnbc.com/2019/10/13/people-who-work-from-home-earn-more-than-those-who-commuteheres-why.html" target="_blank">5.2 percent of U.S. workers</a> — around 8 million people — worked from home in 2017. But that's still just a fraction of potential teleworkers. Earlier this month researchers at the University of Chicago found that <a href="https://bfi.uchicago.edu/wp-content/uploads/BFI_White-Paper_Dingel_Neiman_3.2020.pdf" target="_blank">37 percent of U.S. jobs can plausibly be performed at home</a>. The U.S. workforce reached <a href="https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/CLF16OV" target="_blank">164.5 million</a> in February 2020, before the pandemic, meaning approximately 61 million of those workers could plausibly telework permanently once the economy starts up again.</p><p>Of course, the full economic consequences of this public health crisis are still unknown. It's possible that coronavirus-related job losses will impact the overall number of those employed for some time. But for these purposes, this assumption of 53 million new remote workers will be useful to illustrate the potential impacts of telework.</p>How Much Driving Would Full-Capacity Telework Avoid?
<p>In 2019 Americans drove a total <a href="https://afdc.energy.gov/data/10315" target="_blank">3.23 trillion miles</a>, according to the U.S. Department of Energy. The DoE doesn't break that down by reasons driving, but we know that in 2017 there were <a href="https://nhts.ornl.gov/assets/2017_nhts_summary_travel_trends.pdf" target="_blank">683 billion total commute miles</a> driven. Reducing the commuting workforce by about 32 percent (37 percent of total workers who could telecommute minus the 5.2 percent of them who already do) would theoretically decrease commuting totals by about 219 billion miles.</p><img lazy-loadable="true" src="https://assets.rebelmouse.io/eyJhbGciOiJIUzI1NiIsInR5cCI6IkpXVCJ9.eyJpbWFnZSI6Imh0dHBzOi8vYXNzZXRzLnJibC5tcy8yMzMxMzY4Ni9vcmlnaW4uanBnIiwiZXhwaXJlc19hdCI6MTY1MDE5NzkwNn0.NsQ8r0Opjbst4FFYG9IGfKIkekxBMPGG8viKKCB9Afc/img.jpg?width=980" id="f3198" class="rm-shortcode" data-rm-shortcode-id="bbf1191abdd0b796a70fbb2a36b827e2" data-rm-shortcode-name="rebelmouse-image" />
A traffic jam on January 17. Raphael Labaca Castro / CC BY-SA 2.0
<p>Of course telecommuting won't let us avoid logging <em>all</em> of those miles, since people may occasionally still need to travel to an office for meetings and may need to make new trips they wouldn't otherwise have taken (you can't stop at the grocery store on the way home from work when you work at home). Various studies have found that telecommuting actually reduces driving somewhere between <a href="https://ww3.arb.ca.gov/cc/sb375/policies/telecommuting/telecommuting_brief120313.pdf" target="_blank">60 and 90</a> percent of commute vehicle miles traveled (VMT). We'll split the difference and calculate that telework reduces commute miles by about 75%, meaning the new teleworkers could avoid around 164 billion miles driven.</p><img lazy-loadable="true" src="https://assets.rebelmouse.io/eyJhbGciOiJIUzI1NiIsInR5cCI6IkpXVCJ9.eyJpbWFnZSI6Imh0dHBzOi8vYXNzZXRzLnJibC5tcy8yMzMxMzY4OC9vcmlnaW4uanBnIiwiZXhwaXJlc19hdCI6MTYzODE3NzE2NH0.x6snYt1idN9K7pPfL-rp11ITuPasCu09GYlTXCmZqH0/img.jpg?width=980" id="7175e" class="rm-shortcode" data-rm-shortcode-id="a2862401e39968c61d3a00f932157acd" data-rm-shortcode-name="rebelmouse-image" />
U.S. Department of Energy, Alternative Fuels Data Center
<p>Still, that much of a transformation may not work for everyone, as people will still need to do face-to-face work — and, let's be honest, the other thing the lockdowns have taught us is to appreciate the value of regular social contact. That said, even if most people worked from home two to three days a week and the actual VMT reduction were closer to 2 or 3 percent, the difference would still be significant — especially considering that VMT has been <a href="https://afdc.energy.gov/data/10315" target="_blank">steadily rising</a> since the 1970s, except for a few years during economic downturns. Even if just a quarter of American workers started working from home one day a week, total vehicle miles traveled would fall by <a href="https://www.eenews.net/stories/1063006473" target="_blank">1</a> percent — not a huge amount, but enough to make a difference on a grander scale.</p>Impact on Global Warming Emissions
<p>The cars and trucks we drive every day are major sources of air pollution and global warming emissions. Transportation as a whole accounts for <a href="https://www.epa.gov/ghgemissions/inventory-us-greenhouse-gas-emissions-and-sinks" target="_blank">28</a> percent of all greenhouse gas emissions in the U.S., more than any other source. Light-duty vehicles and medium- and heavy-duty trucks are responsible for<a href="https://www.epa.gov/greenvehicles/fast-facts-transportation-greenhouse-gas-emissions" target="_blank"> 82</a> percent of the transportation sector's emissions.</p><p>The average American car or SUV emits <a href="https://www.epa.gov/greenvehicles/greenhouse-gas-emissions-typical-passenger-vehicle" target="_blank">404 grams</a> of carbon dioxide (CO2) per mile traveled. So reducing commuting by 164 billion miles would avoid 66 million metric tons of CO2 emissions annually. These are significant emissions reductions, but they'd only make a small dent in total transportation-related greenhouse gas emissions, which reached nearly <a href="https://www.epa.gov/ghgemissions/inventory-us-greenhouse-gas-emissions-and-sinks" target="_blank">1.9 billion metric tons</a> in 2018.</p><img lazy-loadable="true" src="https://assets.rebelmouse.io/eyJhbGciOiJIUzI1NiIsInR5cCI6IkpXVCJ9.eyJpbWFnZSI6Imh0dHBzOi8vYXNzZXRzLnJibC5tcy8yMzMxMzY4OS9vcmlnaW4uanBnIiwiZXhwaXJlc19hdCI6MTYwOTEzMDQ2N30.kNeCqEqhHQcOV8p2HMENkbOtLoShEGEsXOycpTdlxco/img.jpg?width=980" id="e7f7b" class="rm-shortcode" data-rm-shortcode-id="ce9e7ab7f9c21489e7487b820813367e" data-rm-shortcode-name="rebelmouse-image" /><p>Nevertheless, it would help us move in the right direction. And while it only represents a small percentage of total emissions, it would still be the <a href="https://www.epa.gov/energy/greenhouse-gas-equivalencies-calculator" target="_blank">equivalent</a> of more eliminating emissions from than 7 million homes' total energy use for one year, or the same as shutting down more than 16 coal-fired power plants.</p>
Impact on Health-harming Air Pollution
<p>People across America regularly breathe polluted air, which increases their risk of attacks and other adverse health impacts, and even premature death. In fact, in 2018 <a href="https://uspirg.org/sites/pirg/files/reports/EnvironmentAmerica_TroubleintheAir_scrn.pdf" target="_blank">108 million Americans</a> lived in areas that experienced more than 100 days of degraded air quality. Our cars and trucks are a major source of this pollution, which includes ozone, particulate matter and other smog-forming emissions.</p><p>There's a reason the air has cleared over many of our major cities during the coronavirus lockdowns. When you remove cars from the road, you also remove smog. The lockdowns have resulted in an extreme reduction of VMT — between <a href="https://frontiergroup.org/blogs/blog/fg/america-pause-vehicle-travel-during-covid-19-and-what-comes-next" target="_blank">68 and 72</a> percent across the country (and in some places closer to 90 percent). Assuming that telework has contributed something close to its peak potential reduction of 7 percent, it seems likely that it has played at least a supporting role in helping to clear our skies.</p>Additional Emissions Reductions From Reduced Traffic
<p>The average American commuter wastes <a href="https://www.cnn.com/2019/08/22/us/traffic-commute-gridlock-transportation-study-trnd/index.html" target="_blank">54 hours</a> a year stuck in traffic. That's lost time with friends and families, lost productivity at work, wasted money, tons of unnecessary stress, and a lot more pollution from idling cars.</p><p>Traffic patterns are complicated because traffic is <a href="https://www.weforum.org/agenda/2014/12/4-steps-to-tackling-traffic-congestion/" target="_blank">non-linear</a>, meaning there isn't a one-to-one ratio of percentage of cars removed to percentage of traffic alleviated. As such, just a <a href="https://www.accessmagazine.org/spring-2017/the-access-almanac-traffic-congestion-is-counter-intuitive-and-fixable/" target="_blank">few extra cars</a> on or off the road can have an outsize impact on traffic. Reducing commute VMT by up to 7 percent would have a huge impact on rush hour traffic (when bottlenecks are at their worst and most of that driving occurs). A greater adoption of telework could give people back some of those 54 hours so they can spend it doing the things that matter to them. And slow moving or stop and go traffic results in <a href="https://www.accessmagazine.org/fall-2009/traffic-congestion-greenhouse-gases/" target="_blank">greater emissions</a> than free-flowing traffic. So freeing up the roads and alleviating traffic for the remaining will result in even greater emissions reductions.</p>What Needs to Happen for Telework to Live Up to Its Potential?
<p>It's clear that telework can have significant societal benefits, including less global warming pollution and cleaner skies. But significant benefits are only possible if everyone whose job could plausibly be done from home has that opportunity.</p><p>To reach that goal, several barriers must be overcome:</p><p><em>Technology: </em>We've all had technical mix-ups when using Zoom or Google Hangouts or one of the other conferencing platforms. But the real technological barrier is access to broadband. <a href="https://www.pewresearch.org/internet/fact-sheet/internet-broadband/#who-has-home-broadband" target="_blank">Roughly three-quarters</a> of American adults have broadband internet service at home, but the rate of access is much lower in rural parts of the country, according to a report by Pew Research Center. Those locations often don't have broadband infrastructure and even <a href="https://www.brookings.edu/blog/up-front/2020/04/06/telecommuting-will-likely-continue-long-after-the-pandemic/" target="_blank">14</a> percent of households in urban areas lack access, usually because they are not able to afford it. States should make funding available to develop broadband capacity in underserved areas.</p><p><em>Employer policies and managerial reluctance</em>: Coronavirus lockdowns across the country have forced employers and managers to adapt to large-scale telework quickly on an emergency basis, meaning these barriers are less likely relevant now than before. But general employer and manager <a href="https://www.gao.gov/assets/690/683455.pdf" target="_blank">reluctance</a> to embrace working from home has slowed this transition. Cities and states can encourage employer acceptance of telework by providing <a href="https://www.boston.com/news/local-news/2019/07/25/gov-baker-proposes-telecommuting-tax-break-for-companies" target="_blank">tax benefits</a> or other incentives for greater adoption.</p><p><em>Car-centered transportation policies: </em>Our current transportation policies often incentivize driving or parking. From commuter and parking benefits to decades of outsized spending on <a href="https://uspirg.org/reports/usp/highway-boondoggles-5" target="_blank">highway infrastructure</a>, we tip the scales toward getting behind an automobile's wheel. In other words, our transportation policies are meant to move cars rather than incentivize things, such as telework, that would take cars off the road.</p><p>We need to rethink this approach and shift toward better "<a href="https://ops.fhwa.dot.gov/plan4ops/trans_demand.htm" target="_blank">Transportation Demand Management</a>." This requires the implementation of a set of strategies aimed at maximizing traveler choices. Those strategies should include greater employer and employee incentives for telework, as well as policies designed to facilitate more walking, biking, ridesharing, vanpooling and public transportation use.</p><img lazy-loadable="true" src="https://assets.rebelmouse.io/eyJhbGciOiJIUzI1NiIsInR5cCI6IkpXVCJ9.eyJpbWFnZSI6Imh0dHBzOi8vYXNzZXRzLnJibC5tcy8yMzMxMzY5MC9vcmlnaW4uanBnIiwiZXhwaXJlc19hdCI6MTYwNzUwNTM5OX0.9ePNI--qrX2Z32AA7sgDeU5lwKBZtReALXYY8Y9b_Sc/img.jpg?width=980" id="a9e3d" class="rm-shortcode" data-rm-shortcode-id="d41b19fddabdda0afee848bbc5b6c005" data-rm-shortcode-name="rebelmouse-image" />
<p><em>Reposted with permission from <a href="https://therevelator.org/telework-environmental-benefits/" target="_blank">The Revelator</a>. </em><em></em></p>Bikeshare in Milan, October 2019. Guilhem Vellut / CC BY 2.0
<p>That's important, because the potential gains we'd see from telework would only be sustained if that shift were paired with other policies to ensure those commuter miles aren't just replaced with other trips. We usually talk about this in relation to widening or building new highways, but when you open up highway capacity, it usually fills quickly. This is what the wonks call "<a href="https://uspirg.org/reports/usp/highway-boondoggles-5" target="_blank">induced demand</a>." People who otherwise would have driven at a different time of day, taken a different route, taken public transportation or would have avoided traffic on the highway some other way, come back to the road. The same could happen here if additional measures aren't taken.</p><p>It's likely that, even after the coronavirus lockdowns are over, telework is going to become more and more common in the American workforce. As it does, the environmental benefits will be significant. In a time when climate change presents an existential threat to life as we know it and millions of people across the world are subjected to unhealthy levels of air pollution, we need to be taking an all-hands-on-deck approach to solving these problems. Telework can clearly be a significant part of the long-term solution — especially if we take further steps to maximize its potential.</p>From Your Site Articles
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Unused rental cars are stored in the parking lot of dormant Dodger Stadium in Los Angeles, California on April 23, 2020. Clearer skies have followed coronavirus lockdowns around the world. Robert Gauthier / Los Angeles Times via Getty Images
The lockdowns imposed around the globe in response to the coronavirus pandemic led to a record drop in greenhouse gas emissions, according to research published in Nature Climate Change Tuesday.
<p>The researchers found that daily emissions fell by 17 percent during the height of quarantine measures in early April when compared with the same time in 2019, the <a href="https://www.uea.ac.uk/about/-/covid-19-crisis-causes-17-drop-in-global-carbon-emissions" target="_blank">University of East Anglia (UEA) reported</a> in a press release.</p><p>"Globally, we haven't seen a drop this big ever, and at the yearly level, you would have to go back to World War II to see such a big drop in emissions," UEA professor of climate change science and lead author Corinne Le Quéré told <a href="https://www.nbcnews.com/science/environment/carbon-emissions-dropped-17-percent-globally-amid-coronavirus-n1210331" target="_blank">NBC News</a>. "But this is not the way to tackle <a href="https://www.ecowatch.com/climate-change/" target="_self">climate change</a> — it's not going to happen by forcing behavior changes on people. We need to tackle it by helping people move to more sustainable ways of living."</p>
<div id="3ed36" class="rm-shortcode" data-rm-shortcode-id="272e0b2caa1eb04b7d262143bed87058"><blockquote class="twitter-tweet twitter-custom-tweet" data-twitter-tweet-id="1262761177408512000" data-partner="rebelmouse"><div style="margin:1em 0">🌍 The #COVID19 global #lockdown has had an “extreme” effect on daily carbon emissions, but it is unlikely to last -… https://t.co/HR0vkyM0w0</div> — UEA (@UEA)<a href="https://twitter.com/uniofeastanglia/statuses/1262761177408512000">1589900700.0</a></blockquote></div>
<p>The research is the first major study of emissions this year, according to <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2020/may/19/lockdowns-trigger-dramatic-fall-global-carbon-emissions" target="_blank">The Guardian</a>, though the International Energy Agency <a href="https://www.ecowatch.com/greenhouse-gas-emissions-coronavirus-lockdowns-2645880717.html" target="_self">projected</a> a record 8 percent decline in emissions for 2020. Because it is not possible to measure the change in carbon dioxide emission directly, since the gas remains in the atmosphere for such a long time, researchers instead relied on data for on-the-ground indicators like traffic, energy usage, flights and manufacturing, <a href="https://www.wired.com/story/carbon-dioxide-emissions-pandemic/" target="_blank">Wired explained</a>.</p><p>That data also revealed the major drivers of the emissions decline, the UEA press release explained. The drop in ground transport, such as cars, was responsible for 43 percent of the decline, while declines in industry and power together accounted for another 43 percent. While air travel was majorly impacted by the pandemic, it only accounted for 10 percent of the emissions drop because it is only responsible for three percent of emissions overall.</p>
<p>The data was gathered from 69 countries responsible for 97 percent of greenhouse gas emissions. At the height of the global response, areas responsible for 89 percent of emissions were under some kind of lockdown. On average, countries saw their emissions fall 26 percent. In the U.S. and the UK, emissions fell by a third, Wired reported.</p><p>While these numbers are dramatic, they also illustrate the challenges involved in lowering emissions enough to avoid the worst impacts of the climate crisis.</p><p>"This is a really big fall, but at the same time, 83% of global emissions are left, which shows how difficult it is to reduce emissions with changes in behaviour," Le Quéré told The Guardian.</p>
<p>She also pointed out to Wired that the 17 percent drop at the height of confinement measures only returned emissions to 2006 levels.</p><p>"So this is really showing just how much emissions are increasing through time every year. This incredible drop in emissions only takes us back 14 years," she told Wired.</p><p>What happens next will depend on political decisions and how soon lockdown measures are lifted, the press release explained. If they are lifted fully by June, emissions for the year will fall four percent. If some restrictions are in place all year, they will decline by seven percent. That is around the yearly decline needed to meet the <a href="https://www.ecowatch.com/tag/paris-agreement" target="_self">Paris agreement</a> climate goals of limiting global warming to "well below" two degrees Celsius above preindustrial levels.</p>
<p>"We would have to have the same speed of reduction that's happening in 2020 every year for the next decade," Zeke Hausfather, a climate scientist at the University of California, Berkeley who was not involved with the study, told NBC News.</p><p>The researchers called on governments to craft economic recovery plans that encouraged the systemic changes that will ultimately make sustainable emissions declines possible.</p><p>"The extent to which world leaders consider climate change when planning their economic responses post COVID-19 will influence the global CO2 emissions paths for decades to come," Le Quéré said in the press release.</p><p>For example, governments could follow the lead of <a href="https://www.ecowatch.com/milan-car-limit-coronavirus-2645805180.html" target="_self">Milan</a> and <a href="https://www.ecowatch.com/car-free-zones-london-2646014436.html" target="_self">London</a> in reopening cities in ways that prioritize walking and cycling over driving. Le Quéré suggested to Wired that governments stimulate the economy by directing money towards electric cars.</p>
<p>One positive development is that people around the world now have an illustration of what emissions reductions make possible.</p><p>"The most obvious change was the beautiful blue skies we saw from India to Indiana," study coauthor and Stanford University Earth system science professor Rob Jackson told NBC News. "People can relate to that more than abstract discussions about greenhouse gas emissions — you could just see that skies were clear."</p>
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Frédéric Soltan / Corbis / Getty Images
By Jessica Corbett
Following in the footsteps of leaders in Milan and New York City who are heeding global calls to #BuildBackBetter from the coronavirus pandemic, London Mayor Sadiq Khan on Friday unveiled plans to create "one of the largest car-free zones in any capital city in the world" to improve local air quality and encourage more walking and cycling.
<p>"This is genuinely exciting," London-based author and physicist Helen Czerski <a href="https://twitter.com/helenczerski/status/1261273671139758083" target="_blank">tweeted </a>of the plans. "Yes, of course, it will be disruptive (and like any change, there will be both winners and loser at the start). But it could also make London a far more human place and a new sort of city, with huge health benefits for everyone."</p>
<p>Environmentalists and public health advocates also welcomed the initiative. The UK branch of the advocacy group Greenpeace declared: "This is a great first step!"</p>
<div id="44da4" class="rm-shortcode" data-rm-shortcode-id="e52c46b4da0147822a1698100ecdd003"><blockquote class="twitter-tweet twitter-custom-tweet" data-twitter-tweet-id="1261292961310167041" data-partner="rebelmouse"><div style="margin:1em 0">This is a great first step!
Putting walking and cycling first means less toxic air pollution - we need these measur… https://t.co/0klzTm2CQt</div> — Greenpeace UK (@Greenpeace UK)<a href="https://twitter.com/GreenpeaceUK/statuses/1261292961310167041">1589550650.0</a></blockquote></div><p>Khan <a href="https://www.london.gov.uk/press-releases/mayoral/car-free-zones-in-london-as-cc-and-ulez-reinstated" target="_blank">announced</a> the upcoming transformation of central London streets — intended to help promote social distancing — in a joint statement with Transport for London (TfL). The government body will release more details in the weeks ahead, but the statement said roads between London Bridge and Shoreditch, Euston and Waterloo, and Old Street and Holborn may soon be limited to buses, pedestrians and cyclists.</p>
<p>Beginning Monday, the city will also reintroduce fee schemes for drivers that aim to cut pollution and help tackle the climate emergency: the low emission zone, the ultra low emission zone, and the congestion charge — the last of which may temporarily increase next month.</p><p>Khan has made tackling London's polluted air a top priority since taking office in 2016. The Labour Party member <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2020/apr/23/toxic-air-over-london-falls-by-50-at-busiest-traffic-spots" target="_blank">released</a> figures last month showing how air quality in the UK capital has "<a href="https://www.cnbc.com/2020/04/24/coronavirus-lockdown-has-dramatically-improved-air-quality-in-london.html" target="_blank">dramatically improved</a>" in the wake of both anti-pollution measures introduced in 2017 and the city's pandemic-related lockdown.</p><p>"Covid-19 poses the biggest challenge to London's public transport network in TfL's history," Khan said Friday. "It will take a monumental effort from all Londoners to maintain safe social distancing on public transport as lockdown restrictions are gradually eased."</p><p>"That means we have to keep the number of people using public transport as low as possible," he added. "And we can't see journeys formerly taken on public transport replaced with car usage because our roads would immediately become unusably blocked and toxic air pollution would soar."</p><p>The mayor urged all of the city's 32 boroughs to support the plans and work with officials to implement similar restrictions. He encouraged all Londoners to walk and cycle more while steering clear of public transit "unless it is absolutely unavoidable."</p><p>Khan also highlighted that the plans have benefits beyond ensuring the safety of transport in London as the city lifts coronavirus restrictions. "By ensuring our city's recovery is green," he said, "we will also tackle our toxic air which is vital to make sure we don't replace one public health crisis with another."</p>
<div id="0d1f5" class="rm-shortcode" data-rm-shortcode-id="73d244f69159b4be4d771e0b5fddc005"><blockquote class="twitter-tweet twitter-custom-tweet" data-twitter-tweet-id="1261268212215398400" data-partner="rebelmouse"><div style="margin:1em 0">JUST ANNOUNCED: our plans to make central London one of the largest car-free zones in any capital city in the world… https://t.co/rK6qoThsJd</div> — Sadiq Khan (@Sadiq Khan)<a href="https://twitter.com/SadiqKhan/statuses/1261268212215398400">1589544749.0</a></blockquote></div>
<p>Theo Highland of <a href="https://www.sustrans.org.uk/about-us/" target="_blank">Sustrans</a>, a UK charity that works to make it easier for people to walk and cycle, called the initiative "a potential game-changer" and echoed Khan's call for boroughs to embrace efforts to make miles of roads across the city more walkable and cycle-friendly while reducing toxic traffic.</p><p>"TfL's bold and ambitious plans to get London moving at this critical time are exactly what's needed right now," said Highland. "All boroughs must now make the changes our streets need to give Londoners space to move around safely and build our spirited city's resilience as we begin to bounce back from this pandemic."</p><p>"Sustrans is also here to help local authorities wanting to transform their streets with new infrastructure and give their residents confidence to cycle," he added. "Taking immediate action will help tackle health inequalities, air pollution, and the climate emergency. And by making successful changes permanent we'll emerge from this pandemic as a healthier, happier, and fairer London."</p>
<p>The Guardian <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2020/may/15/large-areas-of-london-to-be-made-car-free-as-lockdown-eased" target="_blank">reported</a> Friday that David Miller of the C40 Cities Climate Leadership Group, which recently has helped coordinate similar plans in metro areas around the world, congratulated Khan "for showing the world what is possible when we reimagine our cities for the benefit and health of everyone."</p><p>"These measures <a href="https://c40.us6.list-manage.com/track/click?u=529235039ea48b192727b37a9&id=7dd3792851&e=50c10b1cb5" target="_blank">announced in London today</a>, including major car-free zones, will clean the air that Londoners breathe, improve public health both during the Covid-19 pandemic and long into the future, while also helping to avert the climate crisis," Miller said. "This is the future we want."</p>
<p><em>Reposted with permission from <a href="https://www.commondreams.org/news/2020/05/15/future-we-want-london-joining-global-trend-car-free-streets-cut-pollution-fight" target="_blank">Common Dreams</a>.</em><em></em></p>From Your Site Articles
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A cyclists wears a protective mask as he cycles through Manchester city center, UK on March 17, 2020. Jacob King / PA Images via Getty Images
Fears of catching coronavirus on public transportation coupled with drops in vehicular traffic has led to a spike in the sales of bicycles, and safer streets to ride on.
<p>In the UK, where emergency service personnel still need to get to work, a cycle-to-work initiative has led to a 200 percent increase in bicycle sales among people working for emergency services, according to the <a href="https://www.bbc.com/news/business-52564351" target="_blank">BBC</a>.</p><p>However, it is not only emergency service workers hopping on two-wheels. Across Great Britain, the demand for bikes has soared as people look for mobility and exercise amidst lockdown and social distancing orders, as the <a href="https://www.bbc.com/news/business-52564351" target="_blank">BBC</a> reported.</p>
<p>Commuters in New York City, the epicenter of the U.S. epidemic, expressed the same concern.</p><p>"I'm 51 and healthy, but I don't want to get on the subway," said John Donohue, a Brooklyn-based artist who bought a bike two weeks ago, to <a href="https://www.reuters.com/article/us-health-coronavirus-usa-bikes/wary-of-public-transport-coronavirus-hit-americans-turn-to-bikes-idUSKBN21Z1BX" target="_blank">Reuters</a>. Donohue, who doesn't own a car, said he's not sure when he'll be comfortable on mass transit again.</p><p>In Australia, bike shops are struggling to keep up with demand.</p><p>"We're the new toilet paper and everyone wants a piece," Grant Kaplan, manager of Giant Sydney, a bike store in Sydney, told <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/2020/apr/22/bicycles-are-the-new-toilet-paper-bike-sales-boom-as-coronavirus-lockdown-residents-crave-exercise" target="_blank">Guardian Australia</a>. "We can't keep up with sales. Literally the phone is ringing nonstop."</p>
<p>The phenomenon has reached the U.S. too, where more and more people are shelling out over $2,000 to buy a Peloton to make up for their lost access to gyms, as <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2020/05/06/technology/peloton-boom-workout-virus.html?searchResultPosition=1https://www.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/76.0/whatsnew/all/?oldversion=75.0" target="_blank">The New York Times</a> reported.</p><p>Peloton has seen its stock soar 95 percent and <a href="https://investor.onepeloton.com/static-files/1d578332-048e-4b0c-8909-b532c100f65d" target="_blank" title="">said its revenue rose 66 percent</a> in the first three months of 2020 from a year earlier. The company ended the quarter with a "backlog" of bike deliveries and added 1.1 million people to digital-only free trials in March and April, according to <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2020/05/06/technology/peloton-boom-workout-virus.html?searchResultPosition=1https://www.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/76.0/whatsnew/all/?oldversion=75.0" target="_blank">The New York Times</a>.</p><p>"The demand is through the roof," said John Foley, the chief executive, in an interview, as <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2020/05/06/technology/peloton-boom-workout-virus.html?searchResultPosition=1https://www.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/76.0/whatsnew/all/?oldversion=75.0" target="_blank">The New York Times</a> reported. "It's not just people wanting more bikes, but if they have one, they're using it more."</p><p>In the U.S., people are also turning to less expensive bikes that offer mobility. Bike shops in Tucson, Arizona have seen an increase in sales and an increase in the number of people coming in to have their bikes repaired.</p>
<p>Roadrunner bicycles in Tucson has seen its sales increase at least fivefold, to an average of about six or seven bikes per day, according to the shop's owner, Elliot Dumont, as <a href="https://tucson.com/business/bike-shops-enjoy-boom-as-tucsonans-look-to-ride-out-coronavirus/article_0a437a0f-5171-564e-a0fc-09494fb9030d.html" target="_blank">Tucson.com</a> reported. Dumont noted that the bike shop experienced record sales in March.</p><p>"It's a huge increase in entry-level bikes, and a lot more service," said Cory Foster, who manages another bike shop in Tucson. He has seen a number of purchases for kids' bikes since children have outgrown their old ones, as well as an increase in repairs from people stuck at home who are dusting off rarely used bicycles, as <a href="https://tucson.com/business/bike-shops-enjoy-boom-as-tucsonans-look-to-ride-out-coronavirus/article_0a437a0f-5171-564e-a0fc-09494fb9030d.html" target="_blank">Tucson.com</a> reported.</p><p>The government has declared bicycles an essential transportation item, so many bike shops remain open despite the widespread business shutdown, as <a href="https://www.reuters.com/article/us-health-coronavirus-usa-bikes/wary-of-public-transport-coronavirus-hit-americans-turn-to-bikes-idUSKBN21Z1BX" target="_blank">Reuters</a> reported. Many, though, have modified how they operate, no longer letting buyers test bikes and handing them over on the curb rather than inside the store.</p><p>Bicycle sellers might also have trouble keeping up with demand. Wholesalers are also telling bicycle dealers that they may not have any new inventory until the 2021 models arrive in the middle of July.</p><p>However, some bike shops are unable to meet the increased demand because of strict state laws. In Pennsylvania, for example, bike shops are open for repairs but they're not allowed to sell new bicycles.</p><p>"It's sort of stupid that somebody can come in and buy an innertube, but they're not allowed to leave with a bicycle," said Allen Kinkead, owner of a Pittsburgh-based bike shop, as the <a href="https://pittsburgh.cbslocal.com/2020/05/05/pennsylvania-coronavirus-bike-demand/" target="_blank">Pittsburgh CBS News</a> affiliate reported.</p><p>In Texas, the bike business is booming, too. "I thought, 'Wow, this could go either way,'" Ray Atayde, the owner of Ray Jay's Bike Shop in Dallas, told the <a href="https://pittsburgh.cbslocal.com/2020/05/05/pennsylvania-coronavirus-bike-demand/" target="_blank">Pittsburgh CBS News</a>. "I was very concerned. And it's just been going like gangbusters around here."</p>
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