By Craig Pearson
W&M News, July 13, 2006
While problems such as habitat destruction and pollution disturb James Rosenthal, the William and Mary master's student believes that "global climate change trumps all other environmental concerns." Accordingly, as he contemplated how to continue his environmental activities this summer, Rosenthal decided to address global warming by embarking on a zero-emissions road trip.
Rosenthal, who is enrolled in the College's American studies program, has been a friend of the environment for many years. At William and Mary, he has participated in several environmental inititatives. With Scott Owen, proprietor of the Daily Grind, a coffee shop located on campus, he organized a recycling effort when the College administrators canceled their program. As a member of the Student Environmental Action Coalition, he led an energy-use reduction campaign. In addition, Rosenthal worked as a teaching assistant in the environmental sociology class of J. Timmons Roberts, professor of sociology at the College.
Concerning global warming, Rosenthal understands that the associated problems can progressively worsen before people begin to realize them. A consensus among scientists maintains that greenhouse-gas emissions have contributed to significant climate change already and will continue to have potentially disastrous effects in the coming decades. Long-term effects include extreme weather, temperature changes and lessened crop production. Concurrently, any actions taken to reduce the amount of emissions will benefit humanity later. Although one person's actions can make only a small difference, those of a community will benefit the environment greatly, Rosenthal says.
Zero-emission road trips involve calculating the carbon emissions resulting from a person's travel, energy use, food consumption and other activities and then finding and taking compensating measures to offest that energy consumption. Although organizations like Terrapass enable people to purchase carbon credits to offset their emissions, Rosenthal pursued a more active path that allowed interaction with others. He expressed his "romantic ideal" in that he hoped "to plant seeds of awareness and knowledge around the country that will grow and cause other people to be more mindful about what they do" and also hoped people would realize the consequences of their lifestyles. He decided to complete service projects in each community he visited to reduce his net energy use to zero.
His first project involved a visit to the New Town United Methodist Church in Williamsburg, where he studied the congregation's business practices and parishioners' behaviors. In his "plan for improvement," he suggested energy-saving changes such as deactivating lights and appliances when they are not in use, communicating on-line to save paper and carpooling as a means of transporting individuals to church functions. Tom Hassler, building team leader at the church, reported that the assistant minister received the program with a favorable opinion. Hassler plans to implement elements of the plan in phases, which will involve "creations care ministries [for] energy conversation, landscaping/grounds keeping and minimizing the use of toxic materials."
After completing his review of practices at the Methodist church, Rosenthal left the area to travel about the country. His destinations were decided on a whim. He felt that arranging his travel would ruin the spontaneity he would experience while driving. This tactic led to interaction with strangers who often suggested possible projects. After leaving Williamsburg, he arrived in Staunton, Va., where he failed to complete a project but found Cranberry's Grocery and Eatery, the only natural-food store in the area. Its owner, Kathleen Stinehart, retired from a life in education and created the store as a way to combat obesity in her area.
With both a desire to complete more projects and to see the effects of a coal-mine closure, Rosenthal traveled to Grundy, Va. Knowing that its citizens previously made their livelihood from coal, he refrained from attacking mining for its negative effect on the environment; however, he attempted to help reduce the town's carbon emissions by encouraging patronage at stores in the town center. That would lessen oil use while vitalizing the local economy. Unfortunately, he discovered that the Army Corp of Engineers plans to raze the town to control flooding that has been exacerbated by the coal-mining process. While signs state that the town plans to move, he says that "Grundy is not moving. The town is being replaced by Wal-Mart." Although coal mining condemned this town, he realizes that Americans will burn coal while it remains cheap and abundant. To reduce coal's negative impact, Rosenthal suggests that ways be found to make coal burn more cleanly and to lessen the damage caused from extraction.
Rosenthal continued his travels, winding up in Birmingham, Ala. Realizing that he still had recorded no energy savings, he attempted another project, hoping for measurable results. He realized that the Birmingham Public Library served as one of the largest libraries in the Southeast, and he thought that if he distributed some of his carbon-saving ideas there, his suggestions for energy conservation would travel to other libraries. After participating in a self-guided tour, he prepared his findings only to learn that the director had left for the day. Discouraged, he left his proposal and traveled to Louisiana. Thus far, his energy-savings projects consisted only of printing documents about organizational practices and distributing fliers promoting compact fluorescent bulbs. After 12 days, his journey had produced emissions of carbon dioxide at the rate of 542 pounds per year, and he had spent $1,026 without having initiated a successful project and having earned no money.
On the way to Slidell, La., hardship hit when his car died. He continued to travel through Louisiana via a rental car and witnessed firsthand the effects of environmental problems in the form of damage caused by hurricanes Katrina and Rita. Linking Slidell with Grundy, he stated, "Increased coal consumption caused the global warming that most scientists agree elevated the danger of the hurricane seasons." Because most southern Louisiana towns still struggled to recover, he continued into Texas and Arkansas. However, after shipping most of his items home, leaving his bike in Slidell and damaging his computer beyond repair, he returned home to New York after 21 days. His only energy savings during the entire time was the result of his turning off a television set in a train station.
Rosenthal admitted that the first half of his trip resulted in struggles and failed ventures. However, he is confident that the second phase of his journey will enable him to meet his goals. Realizing that waiting for organizations to change takes time, he shifted his focus. He still is traveling without a predetermined path: He journeyed down the Eastern seaboard to Washington, D.C., and Georgia, and then he went west to Chicago, Wisconsin and Dearborn, Mich. Along the way, he has provided various services. One major project concerns cleaning refrigerator coils. He states that "dirty coils can reduce efficiency by 25 percent to 50 percent" and cleaning them twice a year reduces carbon dioxide emissions at the rate of 160 pounds per year. He also has advocated buying local food as "the single most effective action for the environment that someone can take" because transportation accounts for 80 percent of a food's associated carbon emissions. Rosenthal also has instructed people how to remove themselves from junk-mail lists.
Despite the disappointments he has encountered, he considers his trip a success. Even if he fails to completely negate the level of carbon emissions his trek incurred, everything he learned will help him in the future. No matter where he traveled, Rosenthal has encountered enthusiastic audiences who quickly offered him lodging, gave suggestions for trips and learned from his actions. He has realized that "we live in a friendly country" that cares about the environment. Most people just need to learn basic actions they can take to mitigate their impact on the environment without stopping the activities they find enjoyable, he said. Within 12 days of leaving his home for his second stint, Rosenthal estimated he had managed to reduce carbon dioxide emissions at the rate of 622 pounds per year if those energy-saving measures were to continue and had earned $419.