But common sense can be a daunting adversary in a democracy and as this country’s profligate ways create environmental damage the world can no long afford, it’s creating divisions in Dover and, as we pointed out in last issue, some angst in Austin. NBN predicts that these formally blood-red regions have become, or are soon to become, very local fronts in the latest battle in this long standing ideological war as environmental conditions continue to become a national priority.

Centuries old fishing communities on both coasts are in revolt over the 2010 imposition of the federal catch shares policy, even as the fisheries they depend on disappear from overfishing and pollution. Arizona former senator Gabrielle Giffords is fighting for gun control amidst the nation’s most lax gun laws. Texas, could is developing the nation’s largest renewable energy resources in the middle of an oil soaked economy. How, do voters in these conflicted communities find leaders to accurately represent, and more importantly reconcile, their radically different desires?

They don’t, not without overhauling the U.S. Constitution and the election laws it rests on. Those laws were written for a nation of 2.5 million, not 350 million. That is a qualitative change more than a quantitative change. A constitution that was altered 19 times in our first 145 years, has since been changed another seven times and not once in the past 32 years. Yet the populace this constitution is governing doesn’t even resemble that which it was drafted for. How do you alter a 235-year-old political framework to fit a country that’s added 180 sizes to its waste line?

We start with the basic concept—representative government—and start taking a hard look at everything else. We need constitutional amendments banning the electoral college, gerrymandering, the filibuster and campaign contributions. You can argue that the challenges to enacting such changes are practically prohibitive. You can also argue that these three elements of our electoral process have been perverted to where we no longer have representative government, particularly campaign contribution. Money has so corrupted politics in this country that many of our most influential political leaders are not even elected. They are hired by special interests to create the platforms adopted by those that are elected. How else do we explain the CPAC convention giving top billing to Sarah Palin, who resigned her elected post in Alaska to advocate for soda companies and corn sweetener. The undercard at CPAC went to mobbed up NYC developer Donald Trump who has deified, and makes a living off of, American excess.

 This country was not founded on our right to drink 32-oz pails of high fructose corn sweetener, drive 6,000-pound cars on errands, and live in homes that could shelter a village. It was, however, built by the people who sell us those things, like it or not. Those same folks now know their industries are being threatened like never before simply through the limits of our natural resources. So they are willing to threaten this country like never before, as many other special interests are, by spending everything they can, through the only means they’ve got—our political system. That’s why NBN says campaign finance reform is the single biggest problem, environmental or otherwise, facing this country.

  A New Definition of Sewer Plant
And the Man Dedicated to Writing It 04.05.12

 Breaking down sewage with bananas and rocks  “IPSWICH -- This New England town's very first winter banana harvest is facing an ignominious demise.” Boston Globe: Dec. 8, 2005.

One of the joys of environmental journalism is writing stories like the one that follows this irresistible lead sentence above. Mixing creativity with passion for the environment and having fun along the way. It’s a great way to make a living and it’s how newspapers get staffers with decades of experience to work for wages a McDonald’s counterperson would laugh at. But anyone who truly cares about the environment and loves efficiency would have written the article linked to the headline above for free. It’s about a guy using greenhouses filled with flowers and out-of-place plants as wastewater treatment systems. When I toured such a greenhouse and interviewed the fellow building them eight years ago, I thought I’d met Bill Gates while he was still in his garage. So, when Dave Del Porto’s name turned up on a press release not-so-recently out of Palmer, AK, I was dying to find out how huge his company had grown and what sort of Lamborghini he’s driving.

It turns out Dave doesn’t own a Lamborhini and after he described his latest effort in Palmer, AK, I began to wonder if he is the victim of the same sort of professional zeal keeping environmental reporters at passionate about their work as their paychecks. Or is it just that Del Porto’s systems are a hard sell in a society not as in awe as myself of his ability to turn our most burdensome waste into things of beauty, value and efficiency? As always the answer is as grey as the water Del Porto’s company has dedicated itself to clarifying. His Alaska project hasn’t yet entered the truly innovative second phase where Palmer’s other wastes products, like household trash, are diverted into the treatment plant which then generates biogas to amp-up even further the capacity of the aging plant’s infrastructure. Right now officials there seem pleased enough with Phase 1 of the project which, among other ingenious cost-effective innovations, placed insulating covers over the wastewater treatment plant’s lagoons allowing them to operate at higher, more efficient temperatures.

Such compromise apparently was not on the minds of the Ipswich, MA, biochemical manufacturing plant in the story linked above where Del Porto used a green house full of flowers and bananas to help the company comply with state wastewater regulations. All phases of that project were enthusiastically embraced by the owner and proved such a success the Massachusetts Town of Weston built a similar facility and are adding a whole new meaning to the term sewer plant. But he’s apparently built far too few of them since I wrote my story to suit my obsessively efficient vision of the world. Which brings me back to the original questions which Del Porto didn’t really answer when I got him on the phone two weeks back: why aren’t these plants being built everywhere and where is his Lamborghini?

He has a near out-of-the-box product called the EcocyclET, but it seems Del Porto is at least as interested in finding ways to max out the efficiencies and resources of disposing of municipal waste streams as he is marketing simpler, already proven technologies.There may not be a Lamborghini in Del Porto’s near future, but mixing creativity with passion for the environment and having fun along the way is a great way to make a living. Oh yeah, there’s one more vital point to make here. Del Porto’s work is helping to protect the future of this planet. Thanks Dave!