-Caveat Lector- Chicago moving to embrace 'green' technology By TAMMY WEBBER, Associated Press CHICAGO (June 20, 2001 9:10 a.m. EDT) - Once known only for its meatpacking, smokestacks and skyscrapers, Chicago - the nation's third- largest city - is pushing wind and solar power in an effort to become the greenest metropolis in the United States. Chicago officials say that within five years at least 20 percent of the city's electricity for everything from public buildings to elevated trains will come from renewable sources. It's part of a more ambitious plan to become the nation's manufacturing and development center for green technology, city environment Commissioner Bill Abolt said. Such initiatives make "the city livable and competitive," Abolt said. "The competition Chicago is involved in is an international one to establish itself as the premier environmentally friendly city." Though some smaller cities have been quicker to embrace green technology, Chicago's size and heavy reliance on fossil fuels gives its effort national significance, officials and environmentalists said. The plan may seem far-fetched coming from a city built on industry and big business. Then again, leading the way is bicycle-riding, tree-hugging Mayor Richard Daley. Since Daley took office in 1989, the city has planted thousands of trees, created more than 100 miles of bicycle paths, installed solar panels on several city museums and built a garden on the City Hall rooftop. In addition, the city sponsors Greencorps Chicago, a community gardening and job skills program, and has plans to retrofit 15 million square feet of public buildings to make them more energy efficient. "Mayor Daley and the city of Chicago deserve credit for aspiring to be greenest city in America," said Howard Learner, executive director of the Midwest Environmental Law and Policy Center. "They're not only talking the talk, but walking the walk when it comes to being a greener city." Still, Fred Mayes, manager of renewable information at the federal Environmental Information Administration, said he knows of no city - except perhaps those in the West which rely on hydroelectric power from dams - that gets 20 percent of its power from renewable resources. Earlier this month, New York Gov. George Pataki also ordered state agencies to get 20 percent of their electricity from green sources like wind or solar. Unlike Chicago, he set a deadline by 2010. Whether Chicago actually becomes the greenest city, environmentalists say, is less important than the effort to stem its energy and pollution problems, a legacy of the city's industrial history. Chicago lately has found itself out of compliance with federal smog standards, largely because of its reliance on coal-burning power plants, said Michael Rizzo of the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency. That sometimes results in Ozone Action Days, in which people with respiratory problems are warned to limit outdoor activities. And a recent EPA study showed that cancer-causing PCBs are still entering Lake Michigan from land-based sources in the Chicago area and in Gary, Ind. To begin meeting the 20 percent goal, the city has teamed up with the state and Commonwealth Edison to build a solar power generating station next year in Lake Calumet, south of Chicago, at the site of an old landfill. The landfill will be tapped for its methane gas and will be the site of a wind power experiment, Abolt said. Also, a solar panel factory will open this summer on a formerly polluted industrial site on the city's West Side, and the city plans to find a company to make energy-efficient windows for the city's bungalow and Victorian- style houses. Problems, of course, lie ahead. The city's agreement with Commonwealth Edison, for example, stipulates that the renewable energy come from Illinois. Because there are not enough renewable sources now to meet the 20 percent target, those must be developed. Ultimately, city officials say, the move toward greener energy will produce more financial green for the city. "Livability is becoming more and more of an issue for people," Abolt said, citing Boeing Co. officials' comments that quality-of-life issues played a role in their decision to relocate to Chicago. "There are all kinds of spinoff benefits of being competitively smart." ANOMALOUS IMAGES http://www.anomalous-images.com <A HREF="http://www.ctrl.org/";>www.ctrl.org</A> DECLARATION & DISCLAIMER ========== CTRL is a discussion & informational exchange list. Proselytizing propagandic screeds are unwelcomed. Substance—not soap-boxing—please! These are sordid matters and 'conspiracy theory'—with its many half-truths, mis- directions and outright frauds—is used politically by different groups with major and minor effects spread throughout the spectrum of time and thought. 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