FW: We could use some good environmental news

[Karen Watters Cole]

In case you didn’t see this good environmental news:   Survival plan for ‘urban heat islands’ ‘Green’ roofs among tools to ease heat, health impacts     http://www.msnbc.com/news/791658.asp?0dm=O13NH CHICAGO, Aug. 14 — Living on a desert island might test your survival skills, but try spending the summer in a city suffering from the “urban heat island effect.” This is the phenomenon afflicting cities, where once green areas are now covered by pavements and rooftops — especially blacktop — that soak up heat and worsen smog. To tackle this, Chicago, Sacramento, Atlanta and others are testing a range of thermostat-lowering technologies, old and new.   Tokyo tries green roofs, too @ http://www.msnbc.com/news/790556.asp Assigned to tackle the heat-island phenomenon for Tokyo’s Shibuya ward two years ago, Kojima helped draw up legislation requiring new buildings bigger than 3,230 square feet at ground level to plant gardens on a fifth of that surface. That mandate is the strictest in the country, and has paid off so visibly that even the Tokyo city government is reconsidering its own regulations in the hope of emulating Shibuya’s success. Lately, Kojima says, he even gets phone calls from embassies inquiring about the project. Tokyo passed its own law in April 2001 stipulating that new buildings with a roof area of more than 1,000 square meters must plant greenery on 20 percent of the surface.  To get around the costly task, however, many builders have slanted their roofs because the guideline applies only to flat surfaces…To assist both builders and suppliers, he (Kojima) came up with the idea of having the ward act as a go-between.  The ward would recommend a list of carefully chosen suppliers to a builder, which in return would get a 20 percent discount on services or products from the suppliers.   Portland is making small inroads into this kind of green downtown initiatives. Any reports from your neighborhoods? - Karen