http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sOXtNdQxGw8

From "The Nation" Feb 18, 2008 edition.

"At Detroit's premier auto show this January, General Motors unveiled plans for an unlikely 'green' Hummer HX—a 6.75-foot-wide model that will run on ethanol. Eager to appeal to an increasingly petrol-wary public, GM also recently struck a deal with energy company Coskata to investigate cheaper methods of producing ethanol. Overall, ethanol production is on track to reach an estimated 11.4 billion gallons this year and as much as 35 billion gallons by 2017.

Putting aside the hype, ethanol's environmental credentials leave much to be desired. Converting corn into fuel is a resource-intensive process that actually uses more energy than it produces. Corn also requires more insecticides, herbicides and nitrogen fertilizer than any other crop, to say nothing of the 1,700 gallons of water needed to produce one gallon of ethanol. If scaled similarly to the smaller Hummer H3, the HX will require almost 450 pounds of corn to fill its twenty-three-gallon tank with pure ethanol. That's enough corn calories to feed one person for an entire year. At a fuel efficiency of barely fifteen miles per gallon, a full tank will get the 'outdoor adventure' vehicle approximately 345 miles closer to nature."

Chew on that for a while.

Big business throws its money at the government and biofuels are suddenly the miracle fix to our oil crisis. Instead of finding a sustainable, economically viable solution we're taking the shortcut route. (Again.) And, screwing with the world's food supply at the same time.

Ok, so I'm not the most likely person for those who know me to venture into the realm of blogging. However, I was so incensed and inspired after the film I witnessed this evening that I felt incapable of keeping the bubbling brew of emotions, facts, graphs and photos inside me.

This evening the company I work for screened the film "An Inconvenient Truth", a feature documentary about Al Gore's lifetime crusade to reverse the effects of global warming, at the AMC 25--Times Square in a HUGE stadium-seating theater. A move I found admirable. The showing was open only to employees and FREE tickets were distributed via an email raffle. So, when the lights dimmed, the projector cued and the title sequence began playing onscreen at 24 frames per second I was slightly surpised that the theater was not full. In fact, that there were entire empty rows infront of me. As the film continued, I was increasingly enlightened to the massive global crisis our world inevitably faces in a period of as little as 20 years if our current habits don't change, and my former bafflement at the small size of the viewing audience turned to outrage. I couldn't believe that my co-workers hadn't taken advantage of such a tremendous opportunity. One, it was free (not many people I know turn freebies down), two the film had potential to prove very interesting and three the documentary has received a large amount of kudos and media attention, with Vanity Fair in April publishing Gore's manifesto. Why are we so adverse to the idea of giving shit, learning about and taking care of the environment?

It is time to take responsibility for our actions. The "it's not my problem", defeatist, apathetic culture that we live in must start to recognize its effect. In order for the "whatever" attitude to flourish options must exist. Soon if we don't amend our actions there will be no options.

So, the first and one of the easiest steps to be taken is seeing this film. While the actual viewing itself may not be comfortable, the benefit of awareness is key. We must inform others of our knowledge and prove a good example by ratifying our own actions. Get all those that you know to watch this. Make sure the theater is at capacity when this film is screened.

There's an amazing Kenyan proverb on the wall of the Natural History Museum in Manhattan that I will now paraphrase:

The earth is not a gift to us from our parents,
it is on loan to us from our children.

Please give it a shot.