Green Movement

I'D LIKE TO offer Daily News readers an Earth Day IQ test: Can you change the weather by paying more taxes? The Democrats in Washington seem to think they can, so don't laugh! I happen to be pro-choice on CO2 emissions. If my neighbor wants to heat his home, cook his food, drive to work or fly to see his grandchildren, it would be wrong for me, and certainly wrong for Obama, Pelosi and Reid, to try to punish him by making energy too expensive to consume. Yet that is exactly what these lunatics in Washington are trying to do. So before you sign on to "ration and tax," otherwise known as "cap and trade," think about turning over your wallet, and your freedom, to people who want to control every human endeavor since every human endeavor has a carbon footprint.

TEHRAN, Iran - The country's supreme leader told voters it was their patriotic duty to cast ballots in parliamentary elections Friday to send a message of national unity during a "sensitive period" in the nuclear showdown with the West. The election results, expected Saturday, will have no direct influence over Iran's nuclear program or other critical affairs. But the 290-seat parliament is expected to boost the voices of hard-liners and give Iran's leadership a stronger hand in shaping the bigger election next year: picking a successor to President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad.

If he gets his way, Brian O'Neill just may become the poster boy for the green movement in the real estate world. Long an innovator in transforming brownfields, developer O'Neill is now going green. He's banking on a half-dozen "environmentally friendly" commercial office buildings in Bucks County to translate into a greener bottom line for his King of Prussia development company. O'Neill Properties Group broke ground yesterday on the $250 million Horizon Corporate Center, billing it as the largest green development project ever in the suburban Philadelphia office market.

For those trying to hogtie the North America Free Trade agreement, the news from federal court this week couldn't have been more heartening. District Court Judge Charles Richey ruled that the trade pact with Mexico needed a formal review of its environmental impact before Congress could pass it. That could be - in the unlikely event the ruling is not overturned - NAFTA's obituary. It's not that the pact couldn't pass environmental muster. Indeed, many of the issues in contention in the suit brought by three environmental groups are the subject of side agreements that the Clinton administration is negotiating.

How green is the "green revolution"? Is it genuine? Or has it been hijacked by commercial interests focused on a different kind of green? An attempt is being made to hijack it - especially by car and oil companies seeking to appear to be part of the solution rather than part of the problem. Which means it's up to us. For us, "going green" means resisting the lures of commercial packaging - and working hard to live personal lives that are greener and greener. We are still in the honeymoon phase of going green.

Pop quiz: You run an environmental company that has done well in the United States, but now you have the urge to go international. Do you: A. Start foraging for contracts in developing countries, which probably don't have the resources to launch their own ventures to clean up the ecological mess they've created in the process of coming into the 20th century? B. Hop on a plane to the highly industrialized nations of Europe and Asia, where hard-riving economic activity has tattered the environment?

CONGRATULATIONS to Mayor Nutter on naming an invigorating new sustainability director for Philadelphia. Katherine Gajewski is a splendid choice to realize the mayor's ambition that Philadelphia become "the greenest city in America. " Gajewski delivers the essential quality needed to move forward on this most important of issues: She has the full faith and credit of the mayor. (Her appointment also lays to rest the nagging question of whether the director need wear a tie.) Now the crucial question turns to the citizens of the region, the private sector of this most private city.

Van Jones is a rare bird. He's a black social activist in Oakland, Calif., and as green an environmentalist as they come. He really gets passionate, and funny, when he talks about what it's like to be black and green: "Try this experiment. Go knock on someone's door in West Oakland, Watts or Newark and say: 'We got a really big problem!' They say: 'We do? We do?' 'Yeah, we got a really big problem!' 'We do? We do?' 'Yeah, we gotta save the polar bears! You may not make it out of this neighborhood alive, but we gotta save the polar bears!

CONGRATULATIONS to Mayor Nutter on naming an invigorating new sustainability director for Philadelphia. Katherine Gajewski is a splendid choice to realize the mayor's ambition that Philadelphia become "the greenest city in America. " Gajewski delivers the essential quality needed to move forward on this most important of issues: She has the full faith and credit of the mayor. (Her appointment also lays to rest the nagging question of whether the director need wear a tie.) Now the crucial question turns to the citizens of the region, the private sector of this most private city.

This is how it all started: Sherrie Jenkins' grandfather liked to fix things. When she was a girl, growing up in University Park, Md., he'd take her to the neighborhood "trash truck" on Saturday mornings. She'd select a few toys, and he'd take them back to his garage "and magically repair them. I loved it. " When Jenkins was in high school, her mother started taking her to thrift stores. They could afford to buy new, but didn't want to. "I loved it from the get-go. I loved the variety, the option to dress in any decade I chose.

TEHRAN, Iran - The country's supreme leader told voters it was their patriotic duty to cast ballots in parliamentary elections Friday to send a message of national unity during a "sensitive period" in the nuclear showdown with the West. The election results, expected Saturday, will have no direct influence over Iran's nuclear program or other critical affairs. But the 290-seat parliament is expected to boost the voices of hard-liners and give Iran's leadership a stronger hand in shaping the bigger election next year: picking a successor to President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad.

This small village on the Zouma River - inside the municipal boundaries of Chengdu, the capital of Sichuan province - is the site of a fascinating effort to fight one of China's biggest problems: the dangerous levels of pollution in its rivers and streams. "In the last 30 years, China's economic miracle has helped pull millions from poverty, but has put tremendous pressure on its ecosystems," said Ma Jun, whose 1999 book China's Water Crisis has been compared to Rachel Carson's Silent Spring.

ANLONG, China - This small village on the Zouma River - inside the municipal boundaries of Chengdu, the capital of Sichuan province - is the site of a fascinating effort to fight one of China's biggest problems: the dangerous levels of pollution in its rivers and streams. "In the last 30 years, China's economic miracle has helped pull millions from poverty, but has put tremendous pressure on its ecosystems," said Ma Jun, whose 1999 book China's Water Crisis has been compared to Rachel Carson's Silent Spring . "Sixty percent of our rivers are polluted," and "300 million rural residents have no clean drinking water.

I'D LIKE TO offer Daily News readers an Earth Day IQ test: Can you change the weather by paying more taxes? The Democrats in Washington seem to think they can, so don't laugh! I happen to be pro-choice on CO2 emissions. If my neighbor wants to heat his home, cook his food, drive to work or fly to see his grandchildren, it would be wrong for me, and certainly wrong for Obama, Pelosi and Reid, to try to punish him by making energy too expensive to consume. Yet that is exactly what these lunatics in Washington are trying to do. So before you sign on to "ration and tax," otherwise known as "cap and trade," think about turning over your wallet, and your freedom, to people who want to control every human endeavor since every human endeavor has a carbon footprint.

Like sprinters out to shatter Olympic records, Bucknell University student Ali Blumenstock and her housemates race through their showers. Blumenstock may not be the Usain Bolt of the bathroom yet - she clocks a decent 5:30:00 - but the 20-year-old junior from Havertown expects to best her time in the months ahead. "It's really important to make the commitment to change, even if it's small things," said Blumenstock, one of the drivers behind the Sustainable Cooperative at Taylor House, a green residence project formed by the environmental club at the college in Lewisburg, Pa. "It's more than energy efficiency.

CONGRATULATIONS to Mayor Nutter on naming an invigorating new sustainability director for Philadelphia. Katherine Gajewski is a splendid choice to realize the mayor's ambition that Philadelphia become "the greenest city in America. " Gajewski delivers the essential quality needed to move forward on this most important of issues: She has the full faith and credit of the mayor. (Her appointment also lays to rest the nagging question of whether the director need wear a tie.) Now the crucial question turns to the citizens of the region, the private sector of this most private city.

CONGRATULATIONS to Mayor Nutter on naming an invigorating new sustainability director for Philadelphia. Katherine Gajewski is a splendid choice to realize the mayor's ambition that Philadelphia become "the greenest city in America. " Gajewski delivers the essential quality needed to move forward on this most important of issues: She has the full faith and credit of the mayor. (Her appointment also lays to rest the nagging question of whether the director need wear a tie.) Now the crucial question turns to the citizens of the region, the private sector of this most private city.

This is how it all started: Sherrie Jenkins' grandfather liked to fix things. When she was a girl, growing up in University Park, Md., he'd take her to the neighborhood "trash truck" on Saturday mornings. She'd select a few toys, and he'd take them back to his garage "and magically repair them. I loved it. " When Jenkins was in high school, her mother started taking her to thrift stores. They could afford to buy new, but didn't want to. "I loved it from the get-go. I loved the variety, the option to dress in any decade I chose.

How green is the "green revolution"? Is it genuine? Or has it been hijacked by commercial interests focused on a different kind of green? An attempt is being made to hijack it - especially by car and oil companies seeking to appear to be part of the solution rather than part of the problem. Which means it's up to us. For us, "going green" means resisting the lures of commercial packaging - and working hard to live personal lives that are greener and greener. We are still in the honeymoon phase of going green.

If he gets his way, Brian O'Neill just may become the poster boy for the green movement in the real estate world. Long an innovator in transforming brownfields, developer O'Neill is now going green. He's banking on a half-dozen "environmentally friendly" commercial office buildings in Bucks County to translate into a greener bottom line for his King of Prussia development company. O'Neill Properties Group broke ground yesterday on the $250 million Horizon Corporate Center, billing it as the largest green development project ever in the suburban Philadelphia office market.