![\"\"](\"http:\/\/www.canyoncountryzephyr.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2012\/04\/Jameshansen-300x225.jpg\" "\\"Jameshansen\\"")
<\/a>James Hansen, the NASA scientist whose warnings about human-caused climate change go back 30 years, puts coal at the top of the enemies list. He believes that \u201ccoal is the single greatest threat to civilization and all life on our planet.\u201d He calls coal \u201cthe enemy of the human race\u201d and has proposed a moratorium on all new coal-fired power plants in the United States.\u00a0 He believes that we are at a \u201ctipping point\u201d and that we no longer have the luxury to do nothing.<\/p>\nOn the surface, mainstream environmentalists stand four-square behind\u00a0 Hansen and embrace his dire warnings.
\nThe National Resources Defense Council (NRDC) says, \u201cCoal is America\u2019s dirtiest energy source — and the country\u2019s leading source of global warming pollution….There are,\u201d it insists, \u201cfar cleaner and cheaper ways to meet America\u2019s energy needs. Yet industry apologists are spending millions of dollars to block clean energy solutions and persuade Americans that they can keep using coal without the consequences.\u201d<\/p>\n
The Wilderness Society\u2019s Director David Moulton says, \u201cIf we do not reduce carbon pollution it will reduce us \u2013 our drinking water, our forests, our competitiveness in a global economy. The public is tired of seeing Big Oil and Big Coal dumping their wastes into the atmosphere for free, endangering the public health and the public lands.\u201d
\nHere on the Colorado Plateau, the Grand Canyon Trust notes, \u201cAir pollution is obscuring the vistas of the Colorado Plateau, damaging ecosystems, depositing mercury on the land and water, and potentially impairing people\u2019s health. In addition, the Plateau is particularly vulnerable to climate change caused by burning fossil fuels.\u201d<\/p>\n
And last year the Southern Utah Wilderness Alliance (SUWA) filed suit to stop a new strip mine near Bryce Canyon National Park. Clearly, there is an anti-coal fervor among green groups across the country.<\/p>\n Wendell Berry, the noted author and poet from Kentucky, agrees.<\/p>\n At 75, Berry is one of the most admired and respected writers in America. He has written more than 50 books\u2014poetry, essays, fiction; he lives with his wife Tanya in the same house on the same farm that has been his home for decades. His family has lived in the area for more than two centuries.<\/p>\n Years ago, Berry donated many of his personal papers to the University of Kentucky archives. But last summer, UK named a new basketball dormitory \u201cWildcat Coal Lodge\u201d in response to a major donation from the coal industry. For Wendell Berry, a UK alumnus, this was out of line; he subsequently pulled his papers from the UK collection and severed his decades long relationship with the university. He wrote, \u201cThe university\u2019s president and board have solemnized an alliance with the coal industry, in return for a large monetary \u2018gift,\u2019 granting to the benefactors, in effect, a co-sponsorship of the university\u2019s basketball team.\u201d That decision brought, \u201can end to my willingness to be associated in any way officially with the university.\u201d<\/p>\n He says that, \u201cClimate change is an effect and the causes are greed, pollution, waste and this insatiable appetite we have for convenience, comfort and the rest of it. What we need to be talking about is a change that ultimately is going to be a cultural change, that\u2019s going to be a change in the way we live.\u201d<\/p>\n You would be hard-pressed to find an environmentalist who disagrees with any of Berry\u2019s comments or lifestyle choices. But does their commitment to climate change match his?<\/p>\n Within the mainstream environmental movement, what constitutes a \u201chero?\u201d It depends on who you ask. Forbes values his personal worth at $1.9 billion and he spends much of his time in a Gulfstream jet. He owns two homes, each more than 12,000 square feet, in Aspen, Colorado and Moab, Utah. When he turned 60 in 2002, he threw himself a party. For entertainment, he hired the Rolling Stones. The evening set him back about $7 million. He made his fortune in the private equity market; he is the co-founder and genius behind Texas Paciific Gulf (TPG) which specializes in leveraged buyouts. Among the feathers in his cap:<\/p>\n * TPG took over Luminant Energy, the giant utility company in Texas; the acquisition was hailed by environmentalists, including the NRDC who helped orchestrate the deal, when he agreed to scale back its coal-producing plans. But Luminant moved forward with the three dirtiest plants and negotiated a compromise with the Sierra Club to operate its Oak Grove lignite-fired power station. Lignite is a low-grade \u201cbrown\u201d coal that requires extensive refinement before it can be burned.\u00a0 Five tons of lignite generate as much energy as one ton of hard coal and produce three times the pollutants.<\/p>\n *\u00a0\u00a0 Bonderman oversees Ryanair, the discount airline in Ireland. His handpicked CEO, Michael O\u2019Leary, has also steadfastly and loudly opposed efforts to place environmental restrictions on the airline industry. According to the UK newspaper, The Guardian, \u201cMr O\u2019Leary said: \u2018Most of this environmental hysteria is an excuse for the government to raise tax revenues. People are being scammed here.\u2019\u201d * TPG\u2019s Asian partner PT Northstar Pacific, has invested heavily in exploiting Indonesia\u2019s natural resources. According to Bloomberg\/Business Week, \u201cTPG\u2019S founding partner, David Bonderman, wants…to keep trolling for fresh prospects, especially in the resource sector.\u201d To quote the philosopher, \u201cIt\u2019s a wonder nobody\u2019s written a folk song about him.\u201d<\/p>\n None of the mainstream environmental organizations who benefit from Bonderman\u2019s power and success have ever uttered a word of disappointment or despair for his apparent lack of sensitivity. While green leaders maintain that our planet\u2019s very survival teeters precariously on the brink of extinction, and advocate a less-consumptive lifestyle, David Bonderman almost flaunts his excesses. And, while he should be castigated, he continues to be hailed for his financial contributions.<\/p>\n![\"\"](\"http:\/\/www.canyoncountryzephyr.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2012\/05\/suwa_logo.gif\" "\\"suwa_logo\\""){kind=logo}
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<\/a>For Berry, it was more than a symbolic gesture. For most of his life he has tried to live true to his beliefs, though he is the first to say he\u2019s \u201cnot a fanatic.\u201d He simply finds few pleasures in the 21st Century\u2019s modern conveniences. He does his writing on an old mechanical typewriter and recently told a reporter for the Kentucky Journal that, so far, he\u2019s managed to live without a TV, a computer, the internet, an answering machine and a cell phone.<\/p>\n
\nThere has never been a more bewildering or contradictory hero to the green movement than wealthy financier David Bonderman. He is a major contributor to Utah\u2019s SUWA and Red Rock Forests.\u00a0 He sits on the boards of directors of The Wilderness Society, the World Wildlife Fund and the Grand Canyon Trust, whose president calls him \u201cone of the great conservationists today.\u201d He donates lots of money.<\/p>\n![\"\"](\"http:\/\/www.canyoncountryzephyr.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2012\/05\/bonderman1.jpg\" "\\"TPG")
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\nIan Pearson, the UK Environment Minister responded: \u201cLike every other industry, the airline industry must take its share of responsibility for combating climate change and the European Union\u2019s proposal is the vehicle by which they can do just that.\u201d And he had these words for Mr. O\u2019Leary and his airline: \u201cWhen it comes to climate change, Ryanair are not just the unacceptable face of capitalism, they are the irresponsible face of capitalism.\u201d
\nRecently they installed pay toilets on their jets.<\/p>\n
\nTrolling includes the extraction of large natural gas, coal and copper deposits. The country is also the world\u2019s largest palm oil producer and old growth forests throughout Indonesia and Malaysia have been sacrificed for lucrative palm plantations. Massive quantities of carbon are released as a result, when the forests are cut and the underlying peat bogs are drained.<\/p>\n
![\"\"](\"http:\/\/www.canyoncountryzephyr.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2012\/05\/wendell1.jpg\" "\\"wendell1\\"")
<\/a>Back at Port Royal, Wendell Berry still resides on his 117 acre farm; he still pecks out poetry and prose on his old Royal typewriter in a small studio without electricity. He told a reporter recently, \u201cI go up there and I may build a fire in the winter, and I drink the air on these humid summer afternoons.\u201d![\"\"](\"http:\/\/www.canyoncountryzephyr.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2012\/05\/cover-ap12a-217x300.png\" "\\"cover-ap12a\\"")
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