Go Green

By John Sutter

A ranking of “sustainable” cities released Monday put Oklahoma City and Tulsa among the least environmentally friendly cities in the country.

A green media group called SustainLane ranked OKC 49 and Tulsa 48 on its list, which included the 50 most populous cities in the country. Mesa, Ariz., finished last on the list. Portland, Ore., ranked No. 1, followed by San Francisco. The report takes into account things like climate policy, bus ridership, commute length, city planning, air quality and water quality.

Oklahoma City Mayor Mick Cornett said he was “disappointed” in the ranking, but did not argue with the results. The city is looking to hire a director of sustainability to address environmental issues, he said, adding that quality of life in Oklahoma City is still high.

Commute lengths set the city back in the rankings, he said. He called for a cultural shift away from automobile dependence.

The Wall Street Journal’s “Environmental Capital” blog makes an interesting point concerning the survey:

The big winners are all out west: Portland, San Francisco, and Seattle. The biggest laggards are, too: Las Vegas, Tulsa, and Oklahoma City.

The bottom line: The kind of things that make cities “sustainable” also make them expensive. Take the rankings of “housing affordability.” The cheapest cities—San Antonio, Fort Worth, Arlington, El Paso—also scored the worst on public transit, bike-friendliness, and ability to walk to work. The big winners there are also among the most expensive places to live, like San Francisco, New York, San Jose, and Boston.

The New York Times has a story about the natural gas boom and how some are saying it’s good for the environment. Others question whether or not the boom will last. The story quotes Aubrey McClendon, chairman and CEO of Oklahoma City’s Chesapeake Energy Corp.:

“It’s almost divine intervention,” said Aubrey K. McClendon, chairman and chief executive of the Chesapeake Energy Corporation, one of the nation’s largest natural gas producers. “Right at the time oil prices are skyrocketing, we’re struggling with the economy, we’re concerned about global warming, and national security threats remain intense, we wake up and we’ve got this abundance of natural gas around us.”

Senior Democrats in Congress are getting behind natural gas, portraying it as an alternative fuel for transportation that can serve as a stopgap until renewable sources of energy, like solar and wind power, become economical on a broad scale.

“You can have a transition with natural gas that is cheap, abundant and clean,” the House speaker, Nancy Pelosi of California, said Sunday on “Meet the Press” on NBC.

–John Sutter

By John Sutter

A new green blogging community called Fresh Greens sprouted up last week. The site features 13 bloggers and is devoted to sustainability and environmental issues in the Oklahoma City area. Shauna Struby, president of Sustainable OKC, posted a blog this week on the challenges of finding local foods when you’re out on the road. (Burger King is ubiquitous, but local options are worth searching out, she writes.) You can find other blogs by Struby at Think Lady.

Twelve other bloggers will join her on the site, and it sounds like they come from a diverse and interesting backgrounds. One is a vice-president at Sonic who is new to the green movement. One is a new mom who will write about the challenges of going green with a newborn. Another is Jennifer Gooden (see video above), who was a co-founder of Sustainable OKC and works for the Homeless Alliance. Gooden said over lunch on Monday that she plans to write about social justice issues and how they intersect with environmentalism and energy efficiency. The blog hopes to have two new posts per week.

Struby said the goal of the Fresh Greens blog is to connect people in Oklahoma City who are interested in environmental issues. She sees the blog as a conversation — a forum for public debate. Too often, she said, people who are interested in environmental issues in Oklahoma operate in tight circles, not realizing that a bigger movement is afoot. For example, when Struby set up a Sustainable OKC booth at the recent Dave Matthews concert downtown, people kept stopping by and expressing great surprise that any environmental groups existed here, she said. She wants those people to get connected online.

What are your favorite blogs? Know of any other green blogs in Oklahoma? I’d like to know … considering a story for the paper about the topic. The most random I’ve seen, the Bulgar Bugle, is devoted entirely to getting more bulgar wheat into your diet … Hey, it is a local food, and who doesn’t like tabbouleh.

And if you haven’t seen the Blog Oklahoma network, it’s a cool place to find local bloggers on topics that interest you.

By John Sutter

If you’re lonely and live in Oklahoma, don’t join a dating service, buy a Smart Car.

There’s no better way to get noticed or make a friend than to drive one of these cutesy micro-cars through the herd of mammoth SUV’s in Oklahoma City, according to employees at Crafton Tull Sparks, an architecture and engineering firm that in November will give one of the cars away to an employee.

Some of the firm’s architects at a northwest Oklahoma City office have been trading turns driving the fuel-efficient car. One said he was followed home by a family in a Lexus who wanted to inquire about the car’s gas mileage. Another was approached in a store parking lot by a person who almost demanded to be given a chance to sit in the Smart Car.

“You pull up to a stoplight and you notice people are looking at you,” said Nate Baker, a vice president at the company.

Omar Khoury, another VP, said the car is so small “you could almost pick it up and put it in the trunk” of a sport utility vehicle.

“Your rear is almost on the back wall and your feet are almost on the front wheel,” Baker said.

Underlying all the attention is a sense that fuel-efficient and environmentally friendly cars seem out of place or awkward in Oklahoma, which is a state that’s thrived on an oil and gas economy. But the employees who’ve been given a chance to test out the Smart Car say things are changing. People are gawking, sure, but only because they’re interested, they say.

I took a quick ride in the car (to shoot the video above), and the only difference you notice between the tiny Smart Car and any other compact car is the fact that, if you look behind you, the road is right there. Such close quarters leads some people to consider the Smart Car unsafe, Baker said, but that opinion’s not based on testing. Crash tests indicate that the car’s cage-like design stands up well to impact, earing the car top crash scores, according to the National Safety Commission.

The Crafton Tull Sparks give-away is intended to promote the company’s focus on sustainability. The firm is working on more building projects that use “green” methods, Baker said, and will offer the car raffle only to employees who have passed a certification exam on green building techniques.

[Do you drive a Smart Car? Know someone who does? Have an opinion on them? Feel free to e-mail me at jsutter [at] oklahoman.com or post comments below.]

Sarah D. Wire had this interesting story on the front page of The Oklahoman on Tuesday. It’s about how a family goes green together.

The kids seem enthusiastic:

“I want her to learn to be self-sufficient. That way, if she ever has to grow her own food, she can, and if she doesn’t have to, she can grow it because she enjoys it,” Shauna Struby said.

“Which I will,” her daughter piped in immediately.

Struby is the current president of a local group called Sustainable OKC, which has been one of the loudest voice for sustainability in Oklahoma City for the past couple of years. Struby tells me that the group is soon starting a blog network of its own. I’ll be sure to pass along more information on that when it becomes available. In the meantime, you can visit their site to sign up for a newsletter that’s got lots of information on local meetings and environment-related happenings.

–John