I’m a fan of Thomas Friedman’s mix of doomsaying and praise of innovation. He’s a great cheerleader of the American drive to be the best in the world through innovation. In his column today he outlines two innovators in the green technology space. There’s a truly exciting process that could make coal fired powerplants much cheaper while also producing a useful bi-product as well as a nod to the much-hyped fuel cells from Bloom Energy. To “do good and to make good” is the mantra of green entrepreneurs.

There’s an interesting opinion piece by John Tierney in today’s New York Times, on the eve of Earth Day, that suggests that the wealthier we become the greener we become. He suggests that there’s a natural progression to cleaner energy sources as we move to more urban settings, and that forests begin to reclaim farmland as our wealth increases. He also suggests that there will be no green revolution for energy use or energy sources, but suggests that this is a good thing.

While I appreciate the perspective on the natural progression toward cleaner technology, I disagree about the prospects for the green revolution that’s afoot. This piece ignores the impacts and motivation of climate change. As the cost of renewable energy sources are driven down, more and more people will turn to solar, wind and geothermal sources to drive down their own costs and impacts. The personal energy revolution will necessitate a change at the utility scale for more of a demand-based system, with a better handle on inputs into the grid. And, government mandates on carbon output will necessitate a retooling of our dirtier power sources.

Obama will sign the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act on Tuesday at the Denver Museum of Nature and Science, and I’m thrilled that he’s chosen this city and that venue to sign this bill into law. The venue is green, having recently added a huge solar array on their roof that produces 100 kilowatts of power, and it’s also a place that will emphasize science and technology as the foundation of the solution.

Renewable energy is a focus of the plan and Colorado is at the epicenter of this drive as the home of the National Renewable Energy Lab. The state has made large investments in solar and wind power and our governor keeps touting a “New Energy Economy.” It’s nice to see that this thinking has the president’s ear, and that he’s getting out of Washington to emphasize the impact of this bill on this region and the country as a whole, rather than just to Washington pols.

ESRI has just released a new e-Book in their GIS Best Practices series titled, GIS is a Green Technology. The 50-page publication contains a number of previously published case studies that illustrate how GIS is being applied to environmental and sustainability issues.

The stories included in this e-book detail GIS-based applications for innovative, sustainable solutions to many of today’s common environmental problems. Cascade County, Montana, uses GIS to map the optimum locations for wind farms and promote investment in this “green” energy source. Buffalo, New York, known as the City of Trees, maintains its urban forest inventory with GIS. Air pollution in Jakarta, Indonesia, is severe; in 2004, 46 percent of all illness in the city was respiratory related, but backed by GIS-based scientifi c studies, the government has implemented an ambitious plan to improve air quality. The release of carbon dioxide (CO2) into the atmosphere is the fundamental cause of global warming; GIS is being used in the study and implementation of CO2 sequestration programs, which either capture the pollutant at its source or absorb it through the planting of vegetation. The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers used GIS to restore the natural habitat of the Middle Rio Grande in New Mexico, and the City of Boston, Massachusetts, is implementing an ambitious solar energy program by using GIS to calculate the solar radiation available on city rooftops.

Obama’s energy secretary nominee Steven Chu called a nationwide grid to bring renewable energy online as a project of “national interest.” Today’s multiple grids make it impossible to transmit power from west to east, limiting the national benefits of large wind and solar facilities planned for the western half of the country.

The need for planning such a grid, and determining where to string transmission lines, will certainly take a good deal of time that may preclude this “green infrastructure” from being part of the stimulus plan. Washington insiders are already talking about a separate energy bill with provisions for national grid expansion, smart grid technology and wind and solar incentives. The expansion of rail and other “green” mass transit initiative may also wait for a larger transportation bill that would be proposed later in the year.

Read more in this Chicago Tribune story.

People like to be rewarded, and the element of competition goes a long way toward motivation. Ecology and Environment (E & E) is a company that has done a very good job of combining geospatial and social networking tools into a system that motivates people to make a green choice by opting for ride sharing rather than their single occupant vehicle.

I spoke recently with Tony Gale, a senior analyst at E & E, about their GreenRide software-as-a-service offering. Following is a description of the service:

“GreenRide facilitates ride-sharing by providing a web-based tool to help people quickly and easily identify more sustainable transportation choices that fit their specific needs, so that they can get out of their single-occupant vehicles and carpool, vanpool, ride a bus, train, or some other travel mode that helps reduce their footprint.

Another element that maximizes GreenRide’s success is its ability to help people internalize the value of what they’re doing.  We’ve been a leader in doing that by dynamically providing metrics about how they’re helping the environment by reducing greenhouse gases and asthma causing pollutants, reducing energy consumption and hence reliance on foreign oil, and saving money.

We have extremely sophisticated incentive management tools, because people like to be rewarded for what they do. GreenRide is very unique because it has the ability to identify winners and manage incentives based on multiple reward mechanisms including raffles and points based systems.”

To learn more about how E & E incorporates GIS into sophisticated web-based tools, read the full interview here.

There’s a growing movement of young farmers returning to the land to grow food in a natural way. The website Serve Your Country Food aims to map and create a community for these farmers for advocacy, education and infrastructure. The above map is a creative Google Maps mashup, and there’s a whole page devoted to maps on this site. Turns out that there’s more than one green advocate with a love and advocacy for mapping.

As the G20 countries gather this weekend in Washington to address the global financial crisis, there’s growing movement to pull together a Global Green New Deal. The impetus for the global economic shift comes from many corners of the world, with many strategic underpinnings in common.

The United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP) and leading economists have proposed a refocusing of the global economy, “towards investments in clean technologies and ‘natural’ infrastructure such as forests and soils as the best bet for real growth, combating climate change and triggering an employment boom in the 21st century.”

Economists in the United Kingdom have formed a Green New Deal Group that proposes strong investments in green technology that echo the tone of President Roosevelt’s response to the Great Depression. Among the initiatives outlined by the group are: a ‘carbon army’ of workers for environmental reconstruction, a restructuring of fuel prices that include the cost to the environment, and a low-carbon energy system that makes every building a power station.

In the United States, the Worldwatch Institute has outlined key strategic objectives to the Global Green New Deal that would include: transition to a renewable energy economy, launch of an efficiency revolution, investment in green infrastructure, a circulation of materials, fairer distribution of wealth.

All of these initiatives point to the ‘perfect storm’ of the financial crisis, climate change and our current high-carbon energy infrastructure. While the impetus for such a broad restructuring of the economy has been there for some time, it’s unlikely that so many organizations and institutions would be thinking so boldly without all three of these components coming to a head.

I’ll be watching the deliberations of the G20 nations closely over the weekend, as well as the words an actions coming from Obama’s transition team. It’s increasingly likely that there will be a wealth of new opportunities in the coming year.

Denver is piloting a curbside composting program that’s being tested near me. The bins are rather large (65 gallons), and will be picked up with one of those mechanized trucks with the side arms. I love our huge recycling bin that gets picked up bi-weekly, and usually fill it.

It’s going to be great to just put our compostables in that bin. I read the long list of the items that are compostable and was frankly surprised by some of the things they include: used paper plates, paper milk cartons, fish, left over pizza, lint, chicken bones, hair (pet and human), etc.

I’ve made an attempt at composting here in Colorado, but haven’t had great luck. It’s so dry that you have to regularly water and turn the compost pile. That’s been too much of a commitment among all the other obligations, but curbside would be a breeze.

The test program will hit 3,000 homes this month, and I’m hoping it expands soon.

If you’re interested in learning more, check out http://www.denvergov.org/recycle

The American Farmland Trust undertook a detailed study of San Francisco area farm production to determine if the farms and ranches within 100 miles of the city can produce enough food to satisfy the needs of the area. The study documents the rapid rise in the local food movement, with 150% growth in farmers markets since 1994, and in the organic and sustainably grown food sectors, with average annual growth of 18% from 1998 to 2006.

The desire for local food is a growing trend that aims for a more sustainable outcome, supporting local farmers and reducing the miles our food travels to our plates. This study took a look at food production in 25 California counties within 100 miles of San Francisco. The study acknowledges that data are hard to come by for the source of food products in our grocery stores, so it largely focused on food production capacity.

“Though regional agriculture is capable of meeting much of the dietary needs of the City, not all of the food now consumed by its roughly 744,000 residents and 330,000 daily visitors comes from within a 100-mile radius. And, more to the real point of our study, the local food sector of the agricultural economy of northern California is today but a small fraction of its total production capacity. There is, in short, a lot more potential for the City and all Bay Area communities to take advantage of the cornucopia around it to improve their diet, support local farmers and, by choosing fresh produce in season and reducing the distance their food travels from farm to fork, minimize their impact on natural resources and the environment.”

View the full report here.