Is NYC's Climate Resiliency Plan Too Shortsighted? Geophysicist Klaus Jacob Thinks So

"We have to have a long term view to create meaningful short term solutions," so says Klaus Jacob, research scientist at Lamont-Doherty Earth Observatory and professor at Columbia University's School of International and Public Affairs.

Jacob warned of New York's vulnerabilities to severe storm flooding long before Sandy and has emerged as a central figure in discussions about post-Sandy New York City.

In an interview with City Atlas, Klaus Jacob talks about flood risks, managed retreat, and taking a long-term view on resilience design. Read more about Jacob's response to NYC's new Special Initiative for Rebuilding and Resiliency report here.

New York City's plan, "A Stronger, More Resilient New York," contains actionable recommendations for rebuilding communities in the wake of Sandy, as well as increasing the resilience of the city's infrastructure. It can be downloaded here. 

Jacob feels that some of the recommendations in the report are dangerously unsustainable because they’re based on short-term assumptions, making climate adaptation even more difficult for future generations. The uncertainty in long-term projections should be actively considered to build a New York that can respond to a range of future scenarios.

"I’m not making any projections what NYC will look like in 50, 100, 200 years," Jacob imparts. "But I don’t want to create solutions now that I know will not survive for those time horizons. That's all I'm saying. Future generations will have to deal with their own problems. But we should not create liabilities now for them." 

Here's the video interview from TheCityAtlas.org:

How Newspapers and Manhattan House Taught Me a Business Lesson

Paperboy. (Getty Images)

Like many Americans of a certain age I had a paper route as a kid.  These days, if papers get delivered at all, it's probably by an adult driving a car, but back then it was us kids on foot or by bicycle -- or if you were lucky you got your parents to drive you.

My mother reminded me this week of a story from my paper route days.  One week I had the flu and she had to do my route, by car, no doubt.  She learned a lot about me that week, including how I avoided the houses with barking dogs (toss the paper from the curb) and why I complained about the paper route so much (it was a long route!).

One thing my mother remembered that I had forgotten was when one of my customers complained about not receiving the color supplements in her Sunday paper.  Confronted, I apparently confessed to ditching the color supplements because they made the delivery bag too heavy and slowed me down on the route.

It was all about efficiency and, I'd rationalized, people didn't need those wasteful supplements full of pleas to buy useless things.

I was wrong to alter the product in that way.  Perhaps it seemed like the right decision from a teenager's point of view -- efficiency was improved, waste reduced (sort of) -- but that was a decision I wasn't authorized to make.  I had challenged a system without really challenging it.  I had taken liberties with my assignment and had neglected to talk to my customer about my decision.  (I apologized later.)

My mistake came back to haunt me a few years later in one of my first jobs in New York City at Manhattan House Stationers on the Upper East Side.  Every Sunday morning, down in the bowels of Manhattan House, I put the Sunday papers together along with Pete, a Jamaican guitar player.  We had to make sure all the sections and supplements were there before Leo, the owner of the stationery store, inspected our work.

Then we delivered the papers throughout the entire building -- all 19-stories and 581 apartments!

What goes around comes around.

What decisions are you making in your organization that will come back to haunt your later?  What assumptions are you making about business decisions every day?  What changes are you making to your products without thinking of your customers?

How Osama Bin Laden Killed My Blog

Image by Getty Images via @daylifeOsama bin Laden killed my blog.

Yes, he did.  From the dead. I did everything right this morning.  Drank three cups of coffee (not tea, because three cups of tea is now tainted).  Walked my dog in the woods.  Did my core exercises.  Showered.  Got dressed.  Sat down at the computer...

...and my fingers froze.  What the hell was I going to write about?  I had no ideas.  None.  Zippo.  The latest potential IPO?  A conference I recently attended?  My thoughts on venture capital and cleantech?  Why conservatives have abandoned conservation?

Stumped.  I was completely stumped.

Aw, just shake it off, you haven't posted in a week and a half, your muscle just isn't working. You'll get it back.  Get up and have another cup of coffee, walk around, meditate. Do something.  

How was I going to compete with the death of Osama bin Laden?  And how was I going to write something that anyone would want to read in the wake of all the news of Obama bagging Osama? 
 
During last night's remarkable news, I thought of my friend Barbara, whose apartment was in the shadow of the World Trade Center on September 11, 2001.  I'll never forget trying to find her on that day almost ten years ago to make sure she was safe.  She was safe, but shaken.

Her life was irrevocably changed that day, as were the lives of many -- of all of us, really.  I reached out to Barbara and found her on her way to New York City from Baltimore, where she now lives. 

But even writing about that seemed half-cooked, uninspired.

Then I thought, maybe I'm really stumped.  After over six years of writing this blog, I'm literally stumped.  It's not writer's block, that I can write through.  No, this feels worse than writer's block.  What's the purpose of a blog that can't compete with a major world event?

Like many things in my life, this blog feels like it's at a crossroads.

I'm in need of a serious rethink and I need your help.

Where does The Green Skeptic go from here?  Where do you want to see it go from here?  What do you want to hear about from me?  What do you want more of or less of?  Would you rather I just retire this blog and move on to other things?

Here's your chance, send me your thought in the comments here or via email (greenskeptic[at]gmail[dot]com.

I want to hear from you.

ThinkEco Introduces "Modlet" for Home

Modlet, CrunchBase
ThinkEco, a New York City-based company that I've written about previously on The Green Skeptic, will debut the home version of its "modlet," at the Consumer Electronics Show in Vegas later this week.

The modlet, which is short for modern outlet, is a wireless "intelligent" outlet that will trim energy waste from plugged-in appliances and consumer electronics.

ThinkEco's modlet will be available for home use this spring for around $50 for a starter kit, including one two-plug modlet and a USB receiver.

"There are more appliances and consumer electronics in homes today than ever before, and many draw power all the time, even if they are not being used," said Jun Shimada, ThinkEco's president and CEO in a press release. "This wastes energy quietly and invisibly, in stark contrast to the very visible waste associated with other resources such as keeping your faucet on or idling your car."

With ThinkEco's modlet, according to the company, you can schedule your outlets to shut off automatically when plugged-in devices are not needed and turn them back on at a scheduled time based on usage patterns. You can even control it from your mobile phone (as long as it is not power-down by the modlet, I suspect).

I'm hoping to test one of these babies in my own home, specifically on an outlet where I charge my BlackBerry overnight and can't be bothered to get up in the middle of the night to unplug it after charging.

Marathon Men (and Women): TNC Running for Nature

TNC protects places like Raja Ampat, Indonesia

I was twice reminded of my old pals at The Nature Conservancy this week.

The first was when the host of a panel I was moderating told me of the passing of a Conservancy legend, Dennis Wolkoff, and the second was when I learned about a group of dedicated Conservancy staff and friends, including CEO Mark Tercek, who were running the New York City Marathon next weekend.

Dennis passed away last Spring, and yet I was only just now hearing about it -- and from a total stranger. How did that happen? I wasn't close to Dennis, but we both shared a passion for the Boston Red Sox and I got to use his Fenway seats on several occasions.

Still, it stung that I'd gotten so far away over the years that I had to hear about his passing seven months after it happened.

My fondest memory of Dennis was beating him in a negotiations workshop a decade ago. Dennis very graciously acknowledged his defeat and, although it was only a game, I could never forget my victory over a master deal maker. His generosity of spirit was in strong evidence that day, as it was every day with his colleagues and with anyone with whom he came in contact.

That's the spirit of the Conservancy; it's a giving spirit.

Which is why it is no surprise that a group of Conservancy staff and friends, including CEO Mark Tercek, are giving of themselves by running to raise funds for the Conservancy's critical work protecting the world's most important lands and waters.

I hope you'll join me in supporting their efforts and cheer them on as they hit the wilds of New York City's streets on November 7th.  My support is in memory of Dennis Wolkoff.

You can donate to the team at nature.org.

NYC ACRE and Varick Street Incubator Turn One Year Old

The New York City Accelerator for a Clean and Renewable Economy (NYC ACRE) turns one year old this month.

NYC ACRE is part of the business incubator at 160 Varick Street in SoHo, which is a joint venture between the New York City Economic Development Corporation, NYU-Poly, and Trinity Real Estate.

"This initiative was built on the strength of our tenants, the support of NYU Poly and NYSERDA, and the desire of the community to grow," says Micah Kotch, operations director for NYC ACRE. "The credibility of our partners -- the City, the NYC Investment Fund, Columbia University, Pratt, and NYU -- has been instrumental in our success."

Among the first tenants was Ecological LLC, which helps the commercial real estate sector reduce costs through improved efficiency. The firm has been one of the most successful ACRE companies, growing from 5 to 14 full-time staff in a year and raising nearly $3 million in funding. Kotch says the firm will soon be graduating to a larger office space.

Of the 35 companies in the Varick Street incubator, nine are cleantech related; the others range from financial services to social media and cybersecurity. Together, Kotch calculates, NYC ACRE and the NYCEDC sponsored incubator have created 125 jobs and attracted $15 million in capital.

In addition to office space, tenants have access to mentors and other technical and strategic advisors, including advisory committee members from SJF Ventures, Braemer Energy Ventures, and Expansion Capital, as well as programming designed to help tenants attract funding and strategic partners. NYC ACRE also runs a Cleantech Executive program to help fill the leadership talent gap in the sector.

One ACRE tenant, M.J. Beck, an economic and strategic consulting firm, recently became the on-demand energy consultant for the City of New York, while another, Wind Products, Inc (formerly AeroCity), will soon install the city's first building mounted wind turbine using their technology.

Two other ACRE companies have been making headlines as well as progress. ThinkEco's product, the "modlet" (or modern electric outlet) was a finalist at the 2009 CEA-sponsored "i-stage" competition and the company recently closed an angel round.

Brooklyn-based SyntheZyme, an early stage green chemistry company commercializing natural biosurfactants developed by Dr. Richard A. Gross at NYU-Poly, is hoping to provide alternatives to toxic methods of cleaning up the Gulf oil spill.

In year two, Kotch hopes to continue to create new jobs, build sustainable companies, and help them get funding. But, as with most things in the cleantech sector, Kotch says, "We need long-term price signals that will allow the sector to grow."

Meanwhile, as Ecological and a few other tenants graduate, there are over 100 applicants waiting in the wings for space at the site. While not all of them are cleantech companies, the success of NYC ACRE tenants speaks to a good start for cleantech at the incubator.

Even New York City Mayor Bloomburg is pleased with the results of the incubator effort. "I'm already impressed by the ideas developed by the entrepreneurs based there," he wrote in a letter about the incubators to John Sexton, president of NYU, and Jerry Hultin, president of NYU-Poly. "The number of companies at the incubator, the additional jobs created by them, and the sense of community on the floor are all testimonies to your outstanding work so far."

Mayor Bloomberg recently announced the NYC Media Lab, a partnership between NYCEDC, NYU Poly, Columbia, and NYC.gov, and NYCEDC has several other incubators up and running, including one for fashion designers in the garment district and a "kitchen incubator" at La Marquetta in East Harlem.

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• 3 Questions For The New NYC Media Lab (businessinsider.com)

Busy Weeks: Good for Business, Bad for Blogging

This is just to say that this has been a busy couple of weeks.

We launched the Cleantech Alliance Mid-Atlantic website last week, we've been planning our 2nd Annual Mid-Atlantic Cleantech Forum, which will be held at the Academy of Natural Sciences in Philadelphia on March 25th.

And I attended CleanLinks New York, our sister organization in the City and its environs, hosted by SJF Ventures, where one of the companies I've been working with, BlackGold Biofuels had a presence. (BGB's CEO Emily Landsburg is part of the first cohort of SJF Cleantech Mentorship Fellows.)

Next up: I'm leading a panel for GoodCompany Ventures on "Entrepreneruship and Social Change" this coming Thursday at GreenSpaces NY (see my previous post or Fred Wilson's here) and then heading to Boston for the MIT Energy Conference on Friday and Saturday.

Meanwhile, my new consulting and advisory venture, VerdeStrategy, is kicking into gear. I'm lining up some very interesting clients. You can read more about what we're offering at VerdeStrategy.com

A busy couple of weeks, leaving precious little time for blogging. But I'll have so much more to blog about after this week is over.

GoodCompany: Can Venture Capital Change the World?

GoodCompany Ventures will announce its 2010 Venture Incubator for Social Entrepreneurs at a launch event next Thursday, March 4th from 6-8 pm in New York City.

I'm excited to be moderating a conversation between some of the most prominent advocates for both early stage investment and social enterprise, including

Fred Wilson, founder of Union Square Ventures, an advocate for early stage investment and author of the influential A VC blog;

Jacqueline Novogratz, author of The Blue Sweater, and the founder of Acumen Fund, a global nonprofit venture philanthropy fund that uses entrepreneurial approaches to solve the problems of global poverty;

Roger Ehrenberg, founder of IA Venture Strategies, one of the most active angel investors in New York, and author of the blog Information Arbitrage;

and Jacob Gray, a partner at Murex Investments, a leading double-bottom-line venture fund, and a GoodCompany board member.

We'll be talking about the power of capital -- early stage and patient -- to catalyze change through investing in entrepreneurs and their innovations. GoodCompany believes that financial and societal returns are not mutually exclusive.

As Garrett Melby, co-founder and CEO of GoodCompany Ventures said in a press release, "Our mission is to help entrepreneurs and investors reconcile purpose and profit. We are excited to have four such influential and innovative investors come together to highlight new models for harnessing private capital to drive lasting social impact"

GoodCompany's 2009 pilot program in Philadelphia was the first incubator in the country to adopt venture capital strategies to the needs of social enterprises.

The 2009 program attracted social entrepreneurs from around the globe, in fields such as Cleantech, Education, Public Health, Social Finance and Community Development. Several companies from the 2009 cohort will do Ignite-style flash pitches at the event.

Applications for the 2010 GoodCompany Ventures Program will be accepted beginning March 5th.

The launch event is being hosted by GoodCompany Ventures, in partnership with Green Spaces, at their Tribeca co-working facility located at 394 Broadway, New York NY 10013.

Green Spaces forwards the sustainability movement globally through widespread local hubs that incubate social and environmental entrepreneurs.

Advance tickets are required for this event and are available at http://gcvpanel.eventbrite.com.


(Disclosure: I am on the Advisory Board of GoodCompany Ventures.)