Raised in Arizona, a fact he attests to further down the article, Nelder points out exciting news from metropolitan Phoenix where two solar power projects, if approved, would generate 480 megawatts to power 130,000 homes.
Nelder, an energy analyst and blogger of GetRealList, is one of a growing cadre of sustainability bloggers featured on one of Social Media Today's sister online communities--the Sustainable Cities Collective. With a focus on civic sustainability and urban environmentalism, featured SCC bloggers write about smart growth and urban renewal, preservation and green architectural efforts, alternative energy and electric transportation options, Government 2.0 initiatives, and everything in between.
In "Sand/Stone," published on the site earlier today, Geoff Manaugh, a contributing editor of DWELL magazine, profiles Magnus Larsson's extraordinary proposal to construct a 6,000 kilometer-long wall of "artificially solidified sandstone architecture that would span the Sahara Desert, east to west, offering a combination of refugee housing and a 'green wall' against the future spread of the desert." Have a look at the article, and be mesmerized by the computer-generated imagery depicting what-if future technologies to protect desert-adjacent communities.
"What's Wrong with Cleveland?" probes Indianapolis blogger Aaron Renn in another piece, questioning the urban economics of the northern Ohio city which has 26% GDP growth, a 9.2% unemployment rate, 4% foreign-born population, and both unremarkable and unsustainable economic development efforts.
Aaron elaborates in superb thought-out prose:
There has to be some sort of historical dynamic going on that I'm not aware of. The only angle that makes any sense at all to me is that something poisoned intra-region relations long ago and that carries through to today. Cleveland to me exhibits some of the worst regional cooperation I've ever seen, with tons of in-fighting. Jim Russell rails on them for not including Youngstown in Northeast Ohio. But that's small potatoes. I remember last year when a suburban community called Avon wanted to build an interstate interchange. A developer was even going to pay the cost. But since it was on an interstate highway, it had to be put into the regional transportation plan from the MPO, and since the MPO was controlled by Cuyahoga County, they vetoed it until Avon agreed to a tax sharing deal. In effect, Cleveland is trying to solve its problems by extorting money from its own suburbs at gunpoint. This is terrible. I've never seen anything like it anywhere. Whatever one's opinion of sprawl or regional taxes, this is not the right way to do it.
As of right now, there are 33 views of Aaron's article on SCC. Don't you want to read the rest?
Another blog post of brilliance, pun intended as you'll grasp in a moment, is in Howard Decker's historical commentary on the birth of electricity and the growth of automobiles--and how the municipal landscape has worsened as a result. You read that correctly. Howard, former Chief Curator of the National Building Museum in Washington, D.C., posits that civic life would be much different--for the better--without electricity or cars. You can read more at his blog post entitled "Speed of Light."
Writing from and about other cities spanning the globe, some of SCC's most prolific featured bloggers include urbanists Alex Ihnen of St. Louis; Edward Lifson of Chicago; Chris Bradford of Austin, Texas; David Torke of Buffalo; Ryan Avent of Washington, D.C.; and Daniel Nairn of Charlottesville, West Virginia.
Other collective voices include green attorneys Shari Shapiro, Chris Cheatham, and Stephen Del Percio; environmental public policy researcher Raul Pacheco-Vega; landscape architect Jason King; South African bloggers Nick Van Der Leek and Rory Williams; and Kaid Benfield of the National Resources Defense Council.
Earth Day may have a few hours remaining; but on SCC, Earth Day is every day as passionate bloggers fill their minds (and ours) with ideas and insights to make our planet a greener place to live, work, and play. If you're a blogger (or if you know someone who is) with relevant content on the future of cities, care to sign up today? I recently started working with SMT as a community manager; and you're welcome to email me directly with any questions at ari[at]socialmediatoday.com.
P.S. You can follow SCC's feed on Twitter, too, at @suscitiescollec.