Blogs

NPR's Weekend Edition for June 27, 2010 ran a story about the Southern Baptist Convention passing a resolution on the BP BlowuP. Especially noteworthy is this comment from Dr. Russell Moore, the dean of the School of Theology at Southern Baptist Theological Seminary: "Simply trusting corporations to go about their business without polluting the water streams and without destroying ecosystems is really a naïve and utopian view of human nature. It's not a Christian view of human nature."

Thanks to its municipally-owned electric utility, the city of Westerville is implementing advanced metering as a first step toward its energy future. Energy efficiency is one of the benefits from advanced metering, enabling residents to have access to more information about their energy usage so that they can make their own decisions about adjustments.

From Scientific American, June 22, 2010: A majority of scientists who dispute global warming lack the climatological expertise to do so.

Cecil Adams of The Straight Dope fame addressed this reader question in the June 18th, 2010 issue of his column. Obviously it's of ongoing interest as we continue to watch the incredible damage to the environment of the Gulf, and BP's so-far mostly futile efforts to cap the broken well. Adams concludes that while there has been some natural cleansing observed in Alaska, oil spills are terrible things.

Our friends at Repower Ohio sent this note about a public roundtable 7:30 pm on Wednesday June 23rd at Trinity Cathedral in Cleveland. Here is their message: "As oil continues to gush into the Gulf and our country spends more than a billion dollars a day on foreign oil, Ohioans are demanding their leaders take action and support clean energy policies. This Wednesday, Cleveland faith leaders and concerned citizens will gather at an interfaith roundtable highlighting the spiritual, environmental, and policy impacts of clean energy on North East Ohio.

"Human Evolution: From Biology to Culture" is a public lecture by Dr. Francisco Ayala, winner of the Templeton Prize in 2010. The lecture will be Saturday June 12th at 3 pm in Kottman Hall's Willard Auditorium on the Ohio State University campus in Columbus.

Sobering projections: a computer model indicates that oil from the massive BP spill in the Gulf of Mexico might extend thousands of miles of the Atlantic coast and open ocean as early as this summer. The modeling results are captured in a series of dramatic animations produced by the National Center for Atmospheric Research (NCAR) and collaborators. (Thanks to Chad Campbell of The Regeneration Project.])

From a New York Times editorial of Sunday, May 23, 2010: "The effort to combat global warming has flagged as other crises have commanded the attention of politicians and the public. New reports from the National Academy of Sciences offer persuasive evidence that it would be folly to put off dealing with the problem any longer."

The Nonprofit Competitive Grant program being run by the Greater Cincinnati Energy Alliance has now closed. The program was open to arts organizations and faith communities in Hamilton County. Officials of the program tell me that 33 applications were received by the deadline of May 18, 2010. The majority were from faith communities, so this was a very good showing from OhIPL's constituency.

About a month ago I had the honor to be offered the position of Executive Director of Ohio Interfaith Power and Light. I'm acutely conscious of some enormous shoes to fill in this role.