Have any of you come across any insurance liability issues/objections to the creation of a food growing garden?

Have you seen any liability differences

If the garden is
– on public property (behind a firehouse) or private property (synagogue, church, community land)?
– fenced or unfenced

If someone encounters a health problem due to consumption of the food grown at a community garden (food safety liability)
- food is sold to an individual
- food is sold to a participant in a CSA buying group
- food is donated to an organization, which in turn prepares food, and sells the finished product.
.
My thanks to you all for any feedback you or your extended networks can provide

Shabbat Shalom

During the time surrounding the High Holiday period, I had the opportunity to speak to Grade 8 Science classes at a number of the Toronto Jewish Day Schools.

My talks are generally drawn from materials I have access to as a result of being trained by Al Gore as a Climate Reality Project volunteer presenter. Recently, Mr. Gore hosted a 24 hour effort, 1 for each time zone in the world, where local speakers would explain climate change and global warming in the global and local context.

What was new this time were some of the videos and visuals used to get a clear message across, that the time to debate scientific findings is over, and the time for action was now.

The message I wanted to impart on these Grade 8 science students had to be carefully crafted to balance the challenge of climate change and the belief that something can be done about it.

The key message that emerged dealt with questioning and looking for proof around statements and assertions being made on the topic and how to differentiate between propaganda and reality.

Through the videos and slides selected, the conversation with these students helped them understand why it was important to become more literate on the topic of climate change, understand how to put the issue into a Jewish context, and then find some way to ensure measurable energy consumption reduction action going forward.

Fortunately, the schools which invited me to present had also discovered that the best way to learn was to work together. These schools had recently agreed to submit a joint proposal to the ongoing ClimateSpark Social Venture Challenge (http://bit.ly/climatespark-svc).

The focus of their joint Inter-School Conservation Quantification proposal was to find creative ways for students and teachers to quantify measurable energy consumption at school and to become more skilled at quantifying energy consumption at home.

The first level of discovery was expected to be within the individual school branch, looking at real numbers around the consumption of electricity, water and natural gas and developing an understanding of what was actually driving the consumption.

As the numbers were being gathered and visualized, the Grade 8 students were also asked to look at what other students aged 12 – 18 were doing, specific to activities for which energy consumption reduction could be quantified.

From there, the proposed effort could go in 2 directions either into the home or to the sister campus of each of the schools. Once the North / South intra-school effort was in place, the next step envisioned would be an inter-school effort testing out community electronic brainstorming.

The current proposal needs to execute with the Greater Toronto Area. The next logical direction for the proposal would be an inter-country effort linking Grade 8 students in Toronto and Eilat, Israel using the fact based approach and electronic brainstorming to develop a stronger understanding of the differences and similarities to the problem and approaches to solving it.

This is one of almost 50 proposals currently competing in ClimateSpark. On November 1, the schools will discover whether they make the final 20.

winegust@gmail.ca

I recently had the opportunity to spend a few hours with Alex Haruni, the owner of the Dalton Winery. While in Toronto, Alex was promoting the sales of the kosher wines Dalton produces in the Upper Galilee. While we were talking, Alex was monitoring the progress of his grape harvest back in Israel.

What I found interesting is how the Dalton Winery produces its million bottles of wine in a sustainable manner.

One of the important factors required to reduce the amount of energy consumed in wine production is the proximity of the production facility to its main ingredient, the grape. The vineyards are located on a volcanic plateau, 800 to 900 meters above sea level, and combine unique soil conditions, high altitude and a unique climate all within a few minutes of its production facility.

The grapes do not have to travel far from the vineyard to the production facility, thereby reducing the amount of energy consumed in transport. As well the grape growers connected with the Dalton Winery have been using more environmentally friendly methods to deal with pest related challenges, normally handled by pesticides detrimental to the environment.

Water conservation plays an important role in the way the grapes are produced. Irrigation methods used in the Dalton Winery vineyards, include drip irrigation, and use of the normalized difference vegetation index method, which enable precision agriculture, directing water to specific areas of the vineyard where it is most required. By utilizing these methods vineyard grape yields tend to be more homogenous and end up consuming about 60% less water than fruit trees such as apples.

In Israel, just as in Ontario, there has been a government sponsored program known as the Feed-in tariff, which allows a company to sell the solar energy produced at four times the price of what they pay to consume it. In Ontario, the same ratio is ten to one. The Dalton winery took advantage of the economics, to install two photo-voltaic arrays capable of generating about 600 kilowatts per day. “This is enough energy to allow our factory to operate totally on what we generate” according to Haruni.

You cannot directly consume what you produce with solar energy in either country as solar energy output is fed directly into the electrical grid. The power consumed by the Dalton Winery is a mix from all of the sources Israel uses to generate electricity.

As we move through the High Holiday season, and begin to prepare for Sukkot and Shemini Atzeret it is important to realize how each of us, in our own way can support a more sustainable approach to the growing and transportation of the food that we consume, as exemplified by the Dalton Winery.

“Water and rain are deeply tied to these holidays” says Rabbi Daniel Korobkin, the newly arrived Rabbi of the Beth Avraham Yoseph Congregation of Toronto. “We pray that Hashem bring beneficial rain at the appropriate time to nourish crops and fill reservoirs”.

Although the rain clouds can block the energy producing sun, the balance is needed to ensure we live in harmony within our environment.

winegust@gmail.com

How does a community come together to look at new ideas and decide which ones to make a small investment in and see if they will succeed?

The GTA Jewish community brought forward 78 proposals to the UJA Federation’s SixPoints Jewish Venture Philanthropy Fund. Sixty individuals pooled their financial resources and business planning skills to fund and support new and innovative programs, consistent with Jewish values.

Each proposal team was asked to record a short video and write up their project describing the hypothetical community benefit.

Shoresh was the only group to propose a sustainable solution for the Jewish community. (http://bit.ly/6points-shoresh). Their proposal looks for a permanent home for Shoresh’s Kavanah Garden, temporarily located on the Lebovic Campus. Jewish community members from across the spectrum use the garden and its programs to strengthen their Jewish identity, and inspire Jewish social and environmental responsibility.

Shoresh and 35 other entries, agreed to publically show their proposal. The SixPoints funders will be using their expertise to help improve proposals. They will select 3-5 projects to share $300,000 of assembled funding.

Concurrently, the ClimateSpark Social Venture Challenge (http://bit.ly/ClimateSpark) is about to begin under the leadership of Julia Langer, based on a previous challenge mounted by the Toronto Atmospheric Fund. A City of Toronto agency, TAF has helpedcommunity leaders and green entrepreneurs identify and advance emission reduction and clean air ventures for over 20 years.

ClimateSpark SVC is looking for 10 high-impact, self-sustaining initiatives that can lead to significant local reductions in energy consumption and greenhouse gas emissions. As with SixPoints, you need to record a short video to overview your idea. Additionally you need to succinctly describe in words how the idea would work, be able to provide some way to quantify the positive impact it can have on the environment and explain how the project would become self supporting over 5 years.

ClimateSpark SVC offers adiverse group of experts, from professional consultants and community leaders to entrepreneurs and greenhouse gas emissions analysts. Through the power of social networking these experts along with other members of the public will offer their comments and intellectual capital to mentor contestants and strengthen plans being submitted. The 10 selected projects will receive additional private coaching. The final three will be eligible for a pool of financing from grant-makers and private financiers.

Some of the community teams who may have hesitated in bringing an environmentally related project to SixPoints may want to consider proposing their idea to the ClimateSpark community.

“Both ClimateSpark and SixPoints have a similar objective of bringing value to their community” said Adam Minsky, Chief of Community Capacity Building, UJA Federation of Greater Toronto. “I recognize that solicitation of community input through social network crowdsourcing and having different funding sources are two critical differences. There will be lessons to be learned from both models.”

“It is exciting to see open-source contests emerging in different sectors in Toronto,” says Langer. “It shows awareness that complex problem solving relies on accessing knowledge and ideas from many sources, and on mutual refinement that makes good ideas great.”

winegust@gmail.com

The Canadian Association of Retired Persons (CARP) is a national, non-partisan, non-profit organization committed to a ‘New Vision of Aging for Canada’ promoting social change that will bring financial security, equitable access to health care and freedom from discrimination. Their mandate is to promote and protect the interests, rights and quality of life for Canadians as they age.

At the June 2011 IdeaCity conference I had the opportunity to meet and speak with Susan Eng, Vice President of Advocacy for CARP. I asked Ms. Eng where sustainability fit in the priority of advocacy efforts that CARP undertakes on behalf of its members. It wasn’t clear where issues around the environment and sustainability get prioritized, for a group which advocates for its members around financial security, equitable access to health care and freedom from discrimination.

In our discussion Susan indicated that CARP and its members noticed that in the recent Federal election, there was an absence of intelligent discussion on the issues surrounding the environment, energy supply and global warming, Perhaps with provincial elections coming up in seven of the ten provinces, there was an opportunity for CARP members to engage in a non-partisan way on these complex and evolving issues and to promote civil discourse to get beyond polarized and ideological arguments.

To that end, a number of people including myself, were asked to contribute articles for the CARP Action Online newsletter and to provide questions which would be used to solicit member opinions specific to the issue of sustainability and the environment.

My article appeared in the recent newsletter (http://bit.ly/carpenv01). It argued that leaving the world in a better place than when you found it for your children and grandchildren is important. I also proposed that there was a natural fit with current CARP advocacy on behalf of financial security and equitable access to healthcare.

To date, over 3,100 people have responded to the survey (http://bit.ly/carpenvlongsurvey). At the time of this writing, the survey was still available online to capture opinion.

Some quick highlights

84.8% agree that we are going through a period of changing climate and 65.8% believe it is a man-made phenomenon, 74.7% agree or strongly agree that individual actions can have a significant positive effect on the environment, however only 34.5% believe it is possible or very possible to alter our behavior to avert lasting environmental damage.

88.7% of those participating in the survey agreed or strongly agreed that manufacturers should be responsible for their products throughout their lifecycle. 71.4% agree or strongly agree that a carbon tax on industries would create incentives to limit emissions. There is a split on a Cap and Trade approach, with 47.1% in favor and 45.9% opposed, indicating that this approach would be tough to develop a consensus around.

A number of readers of this newspaper are CARP members and can have an impact on the public policy options which need to be identified, prioritized and acted upon.

If you have the time, take the opportunity to shape and influence how this organization, with 80,000+ members aged fifty and over, represents and communicates their opinions and articulates policy options around sustainability and the environment.

winegust@gmail.com

Once a year, Moses Znaimer convenes the Ideacity conference in Toronto. This year, the focus was the concept that the rate of cultural and economic progress depends on the rate at which ideas are having sex. The idea was first proposed by Matt Ridley, author of The Rational Optimist.

Saul Singer, co-author of the book Startup Nation: the Story of Israel’s Economic Miracle, spoke at the conference and made a valiant effort to connect Israel’s transformation from a semi-socialist backwater into a high- tech superpower to the theme of Ideas having Sex.

He related the Shai Aggasi, Better Place, electric car story. When Ontario Premier Dalton McGuinty visited Israel last year, he saw how the electric car infrastructure was being deployed in Israel and opportunity to deploy in Ontario. A Better Place pilot project is in place with by PowerStream, the Local Distribution Company for electricity in the York Region, North of Toronto.

Although Saul’s example and the Premier’s visit did not fully connect the idea of the Startup Nation and IdeaSex, the opportunity for a real idea exchange and idea improvement between Canada and Israel got me thinking about what needs to be done for sustainability.

Perhaps what is needed is a program to engage students between the age of 20 and 30 in Canada and the US and place them in Israeli startups and creating IdeaSex opportunities by bringing Canadian and Israeli ideas together, to create something new, better and different.

Imagine you are a student in a Canadian university or community college. You’ve decided not to follow your parent’s advice to go into a profession, and you decide to pursue your dream to make the world better by making it more sustainable. As part of fulfilling your degree or certificate requirements you are now looking for job experience in the area of the environment, possibly energy conservation, renewable energy, sustainable operations or public policy.

You keep hearing about Israel entrepreneurship in the high-tech and renewable energy space. You want to gain some experience, You are not ready to commit to making aliyah, but you want to gain some experience in Israel, and bring those positive experiences back to your campus, especially to help change the channel when the infamous Israel Apartheid Week arrives at your campus.

The Jewish Agency and the UJA Federation of Toronto have come up with Israel Innovation Internship Program / Career Israel Program. By checking out http://www.careerisrael.com, you can look at internship opportunities and select the environment option to find over 20 positions available to gain experience in the environmental and sustainability space.

Canadian students should find the opportunity to work and gain experience in an Israel startup attractive. Gaining degree relevant experience and returning to Canada with work and cultural intercourse experience is a great example of the potential of Canadian and Israeli ideas having sex.

The experience can produce economic ambassadors who can be deployed on campuses across Canada while connecting the next generation of Canadian Jewry to Israel and their Jewish identity. Are you up to it?

Recycle, reduce, reuse. Last month, my column discussed the challenge of recycling of paper on which Jewish holy words are written. This month, we will focus on some key considerations to help you make sustainable choices about what paper you use as well as how you use, and eventually reuse, that paper.

The three actions mentioned above— choice, use and reuse—help influence what paper options are available in the marketplace. As such, the actions of individuals, organizations and corporations can have a profound influence on the environment.

In business, as in life, decisions are made by weighing the costs and benefits of an action. When choosing what paper to use, whether to use it and how to dispose of it, individuals and organizations usually consider are the cost of the paper in specific dollar terms followed by the look and feel of the paper, and the ability for a printer, copier or fax machine to use that paper.

In addition to pure cost and ease of availability, many individuals and companies now add an “environmental” component to their cost-benefit analysis. A good place to start when making an environmentally conscious choice in paper product is to look for an FSC (Forest Stewardship Council) logo on the product.

The FSC is an international certification and labeling organization dedicated to promoting responsible management of the world's forests. It tracks fibers from certified forests all the way to the consumer through the FSC Chain of Custody system. When you purchase FSC-certified paper, you ensure that the value of conserving forests is maintained, that the rights of aboriginal peoples and local communities are respected, that waterways are safeguarded and that natural wildlife habitats & species are protected.

Choosing what paper to use, however, should be more than a quick scan for an FSC logo: any decision should consider how and where the paper is made.

By placing paper into a blue-box for recycling, you do several things. First, you divert waste away from landfills. This reduces the amount of waste that needs to be burned, buried or stored. Second, you reduce the need to create more paper. As less water and energy are required to create “new” paper from recycled parts—normally 100% post-consumer waste—compared to virgin fiber from newly harvested trees, you reduce the need to use non-renewable, or long-renewable resources.

Even though this recycled paper may be slightly more expensive, due to higher manufacturing costs, many organizations are willing to pay more for this paper to avoid risk to their reputation, especially if it allows them to align their actions with their personal or organizational beliefs. What type of message would you be sending to the community if you or your organization were fundraising to plant trees, but your communications were printed on non-FSC certified paper with no recycled content?

Your decision on paper procurement may come down to a budgetary decision, but increasingly forward thinkers are examining their environmental footprint. By understanding available paper options, considering the full lifecycle of printing needs and reducing paper consumption you can be true to your personal or organizational beliefs, remain within your budget and reduce environmental impact..

winegust@gmail.com

We are now in “sphirat ha-omer,” the count-up to Shavuot—the time of the giving of our Torah.

Our study and transmission of our Written and Oral Laws ("Torah Shebichtav" and "Torah Sheba'al Peh," respectively) has benefitted from technological advancement. We are known as the “People of the Book”—five books of Moses, 24 books of Tanakh, countless written commentaries—but many are beginning to find the content of these books moving from paper to electronic form, soon making us “People of the PDF”.

Historically, Jews have written and accessed their Judaic texts in a physical form. For example, klaf (parchment made from the skin of a kosher animal) is the required medium for Torah Scrolls. As written media developed—papyrus, cloth, vellum and paper—Jews began utilizing those media to write commentaries or carry their own personal copy of such books. With the advent of modern technologies, many Jews now use an electronic tablet or smartphone to access prayers or daily study sessions during the week. Mishna Brurah? There’s an App for that.

We are increasingly living our lives—both Jewish and Secular—through our electronic devices. At first thought, it seems that relying on an electronic copy of a book may be the more “eco-friendly” or “green” solution. The production of paper uses many natural resources—water, wood, glue, energy—and the medium itself has a limited capacity—only so many words can fit in one book. Electronic devices, alternatively, have a seemingly infinite capacity to store information and the files stored on such devices and relatively cheap reproduce. However, the manufacture, use and disposal of electronic devices and the hard drives that are used to save and record content can have a significant energy consumption footprint: no matter which medium one prefers, the issue of sustainable energy and resource consumption is always at play.

For many reasons—Shabbat observance, ease of access, personal preference—many of us will continue to read and collect paper versions of our favourite books and seforim. From a sustainability perspective, there remains a role for paper, as a biodegradable, renewable, sustainable product made from trees.

In order to minimize impact on the environment, the paper used by a publisher to print books, reports and documents should come from sources which themselves have already been recycled, thus minimizing the impact on existing forest stock. If any of these publications contain holy words, they cannot be recycled, only buried, following the principals of “shaimos” or “genizah” which require that such books be stored and properly buried to allow for natural decomposition.

Jewish organizations such as schools, social service and fundraising agencies that use paper based communications and do not print holy words avoid the need for the documents to be buried. They have both the choice of paper to be used, and the opportunity to recycle the paper after use.

Next month, as we get closer to Shavuot, we will explore the lifecycle of paper and the options and impacts of the paper we choose to use as the “People of the Book”.

winegust@gmail.com

Ontario EcoSchools is an environmental education program for kindergarten to Grade 12. Developed and run by school boards,the program allows students to acquire ecological literacy and learn about practices that will make them environmentally responsible citizens. In addition, Ontario EcoSchools helps to improve operations within school buildings in order to reduce environmental impacts. (http://bit.ly/tsj1104-01)

Several Toronto Jewish day schools participate in the program including the Paul Penna Downtown Jewish Day School, the Toronto Heshel School, Bialik Hebrew Day School and the Associated Hebrew Schools, Kamin Branch.

Many of the Toronto District School Board (TDSB) public schools are part of the EcoSchool program. (http://bit.ly/tsj1104-02). TDSB schools have recently added a quantitative element to their efforts using the Zerofootprint Challenge, a program which encourages schools around the world to measure, compare and change their environmental footprint. (http://bit.ly/tsj1104-03)

TDSB gathers monthly data about electricity, water and natural gas consumption from many of its schools. The key is to visually benchmark performances against each other. Data can be manipulated in order to compare usage per student or per square foot of the school. With this information students and teachers can select specific elements of the EcoSchools program to help improve energy conservation measures, the impact of which could be measured over time.

The York Catholic District School Board measures and displays electricity consumption in near real time. Its Eco Champions program enables students and teachers to act when consumption gets too high and to see the impact of their actions within two minutes. (http://bit.ly/tsj1104-04)

What about Israel? Sviva Israel, a leading environmental education organization for school-aged children, develops and implements programs that promote environmental literacy while exploring the connections between Judaism and the Environment. Its website http://bit.ly/tsj1104-05 does not have a quantitative benchmarking capability. A session at the recent Eilat/Eilot renewable energy conference, was on how schools in Israel teach environmental responsibility with a focus on renewable energy. Curriculum development in Israeli schools has begun, but has not yet reached the level of Ontario EcoSchools curriculum integration.

Eighteen schools in Eilat are considering a pilot, using the same application that TDSB is using to make their energy consumption visible. Over time, the information gathered would allow the staff in the Eilat schools to implement exercises for energy consumption reduction and the effects could be quantifiably measured. (http://bit.ly/tsj1104-06)

Unlike the Ontario Public, Catholic and Eilat schools approach, there is no centralized ability for the Toronto Jewish day schools to measure, compare and change their energy consumption. Perhaps the Eilat Schools and the Toronto Jewish Day Schools should partner with each other.

Elements of Ontario EcoSchools which could help accelerate the curriculum development and link environmental and conservation ideas. And the Toronto Jewish day schools could get a better understanding of the value of making energy-consumption data more visible to its community through a centralized effort. This would give them the ability to measure, compare and reduce energy consumption and apply operational savings to educational needs.

Sounds like a possible community engagement project to bring the twinned cities of Eilat/Eilot and Toronto together in joint purpose. Anyone want to help?

winegust@gmail.com

I was recently in Israel to represent the company I am currently on contract with, and to speak at a renewable energy conference in Eilat, co sponsored by the UJA Federation of Toronto.

As part of a delegation, put together by Canada's National Research Council, I wanted to understand the current Israeli state of mind with respect to energy conservation and advances in renewable energy. At the same time I was tasked to determine if there was an opportunity to expand my client's energy consumption benchmarking software to Israel.

Having received no pre-briefing from the Canadian embassy, I started to assemble my own comparative study between the situation in Ontario/Canada and that of Israel.

Some of the factors I used in the comparison included a look at carbon inventories of both countries, electricity generation capacity and consumption patterns between residential, commercial, institutional and industrial users in order to establish a numerical baseline.

It was also important to develop a clear understanding of which ministries in the Israeli government had control of the various programs which would incent various stakeholders either to conserve energy or provide additional energy to the Israeli power grid coming from renewable sources.

To get a bit of a cultural grounding, I pretended to be a new immigrant. I used that perspective to gain an understanding of how the relationship between the customer and the utilities which provide electricity and water worked, at least theory.

I also looked for school based programs in Israel similar to the Ontario EcoSchools program which would teach elementary and secondary school students about environmental issues and allow them to select activities to implement at school in order to learn by experience.

When looking at the schools, it was important to establish whether the people responsible for school building operations were already measuring the total energy consumption of each school, understanding the major energy consumption contributors and then having the ability and financial support needed to execute appropriate energy conservation and/or renewable energy generation measures.

What was also critical was whether school operations had found a way to connect their actions to relevant parts of the school curriculum. Was there a way to show students not only what was done, but how the science behind the conservation effort worked. Were there lessons available to explain the economics behind the decision to implement the solution? Was there a clear connection made to help students understand how the schools actions would have an impact on the overall goal for energy conservation and renewable energy generation in Israel. Would students be inspired to come up with additional ideas and would the operations side be in a position to implement them.

However, what struck me the most was the grassroots effort in Israel to deal with these opportunities. Many Non Governmental Organizations were spending more time soliciting sponsorship, as opposed to executing against an organized plan to collaboratively bring their individual strengths together with the objective of inspiring measurable behavioral change in Israeli society around environmental impact.

Over the next few columns, I will be going into more detail on the discoveries made and how Israel and Canada compare.

What role should a synagogue play in helping its members live a more sustainable existence? Should a synagogue lead by example or just respond to the requirements of their boards and their members. Are we dealing with a business decision or a spiritual imperative?

Rabbi Voss-Altman of Temple B’nai Tikvah in Calgary was one of the first in the Canadian Reform movement to dedicate one of his Shabbat talks to putting a green spin on Parshat Noach. His talk focused on the responsibility mankind was given to have stewardship over the earth and to take care of the planet. The Reform movement has even dedicated time and resources to helping its congregations become more sustainable. [http://bit.ly/tsj1102-01]

The rabbi brought an interesting proposition to his congregation in 2007 after visiting the local Ikea, and finding out that it was powered by renewable energy from southern Alberta wind farms. The synagogue board agreed to the spiritual value of renewable energy and agreed to pay the premium for this power once the Rabbi secured a synagogue member willing to sponsor the effort. The Rabbi succeeded in finding a member connected with the oil industry, willing to be that sponsor. Today, the Temple is “Bullfrog Powered” and draws renewable energy from the Alberta power grid. [http://bit.ly/tsj1102-02]

Alan Levine and Michael Charendoff of the Reconstructionist Egalitarian Congregation Darchei Noam, recently took me on a tour of their building on Sheppard west of Wilmington. The former Adath Shalom Congregation building was bought by Darchei Noam in 2004 and was re-skinned with a new exterior and a third floor addition and reopened in January 2008.

Various congregational committees were involved in the selection of heating, cooling, and water systems, ensuring the building could operate in an environmentally respectful way. Sustainable materials were chosen to create a comfortable and inviting interior, minimizing environment impact.

Today, the congregation reduces its overall energy costs by selling electricity from 22 roof mounted solar panels back to the Ontario power grid. The energy consumption of the building, when normalized by square footage is significantly less than other institutional buildings. [http://bit.ly/tsj1102-03]

In Ontario, electricity rates are expected to increase by 46% in the next 5 years, independent of pre-election 10% rebates. Very shortly, time of use charging will extend from residential homes to institutional buildings such as synagogues and communal organizations funded by the UJA Federation.

Are lower 5 year fixed electricity rates being offered to these institutions really as attractive once you map energy consumption to the time it is consumed? Once you add the Global Adjustment cost into proposals currently in front of these institutions, do the expected savings still remain? [http://bit.ly/tsj1102-04]

“We believe that communal organizations should focus their budgets on providing services to their constituents. More funds are available for the Jewish mission when operational cost savings around energy consumption are put in place. ”, says Gary Siepser , Senior Vice President, UJA Federation of Greater Toronto. “Organizations need to benchmark building energy consumption and make it visible to drive improvements. We are aware of energy efficiency efforts currently underway and will be calling together representatives of our stakeholder community to share best practices, identify programs and methodologies they can leverage and help them avoid known pitfalls”.

In 1975, Mark Mietkowitz and I were co-councilors at Camp Massad, near Torrence Ontario and a year apart at the Community Hebrew Academy in Toronto. I could not have imagined that 36 years later we would be columnists in the Canadian Jewish News.

Mark’s recent columns touched on various aspects of water in Israel, and the innovations that Israeli entrepreneurs and scientists have brought to take what would seem to be a disadvantage in a desert climate and turn it into a world beating export industry.

Perhaps it was a way to welcome me to the writing staff, for my new monthly column, The Sustainable Jew. As my earlier Sukkot essay in the CJN stated, this column will look not only at the issues around environmentalism from a Jewish perspective, but will highlight what people are actually doing about it, interesting perspectives from a thought leadership perspective and how they are either making money, reducing costs or complying with various regulations.

I’ve recently been participating in a crowdsourcing challenge called ClimateSpark. [http://bit.ly/ClimateSpark] This competition was designed for entrepreneurs who have creative ideas on how to reduce the environmental footprint of the City of Toronto and the GTA

Crowdsourcing is a concept first popularized by GE as part of its Ecoimagination effort. [http://bit.ly/tsjjan01] Environmental footprint Is the measurable impact that our consumption of electricity, natural gas and water, as well as products and services which extract raw materials and convert them to usable products and transport people goods and services from one location to another

Julia Langer, who leads the Toronto Atmospheric Fund and Deepak Ramachandran who is on TAF’s Investment Committee, has been the brains behind ClimateSpark and has succeeded in building a community of over 500 registrants of which almost 200 are actively reviewing and rating the business ideas which get re-ranked in realtime. Of the 33 companies participating only the top 9 will proceed to a Dragon’s Den type competition. The winner gets $10,000 and all 9 gain exposure to the Toronto Venture Capitalist community.

One of the expert bloggers Matthew Leibowitz, Investment Director at BEST Funds raised an interesting point in his blog entry “What Excites Investors Today”, the concept of the opportunity to “expand outside their backyard”. [http://bit.ly/tsjjan02]

I wonder if Matthew knows that the UJA Federation of Toronto is twinned with the Eilat/Eilot region on Israel, which is becoming the hotbed of concentration of sustainability entrepreneurs. The 4^thannual Eilat-Eilot Renewable Energy Conference is sponsored by the UJA Federation of Toronto [http://bit.ly/tsjjan03] as part of its ongoing 22 year relationship with the region and will bring sustainability experts from around the world to Eilat from February 22 – 24.l

Wouldn’t it be interesting if the top 3 finalists were given the opportunity to do their dragon’s den style pitch to investors attending the conference? What if top Israeli entrepreneurs were able to bring their innovations to Toronto just in time to offer a counterpoint for Jewish business students on campus who are battling against Israel Apartheid Week. This provides the Canada Israel Chamber of Commerce and Government of Israel Economic Mission to Canada an opportunity to use this crowdsourcing opportunity to enhance two-way trade between Canada and Israel .

With a new Minister of the Environment, and a strongly engaged Ontario provincial government, and an election potentially coming for both, having Canadian entrepreneurs pitching in Israel, and Israeli entrepreneurs pitching in Canada and demonstratably increasing two way trade, can be a big win-win for all political parties.

I’m somewhat concerned TAF’s innovative work may be swept up in the flurry of City budget cuts, even though they don’t draw a penny from the taxbase. TAF has planted a wonderful seed: read what they have done, [http://bit.ly/tsjjan04] and participate in ClimateSpark by commenting and offering your own reviews of the business value of the solutions proposed by local entrepreneurs. [http://bit.ly/tsjjan05] Then, take another moment to contact your local Councillor with a short email or phone call to say you believe TAF is important and why

At the same time, please contact your friends at the UJA Federation, Canada Israel Chamber of Commerce and the Israel I Economic Mission in Toronto, to let them know whether you support this creative way of expanding the trade link between Toronto and Eilat,

Fred Winegust can be reached at winegust@gmail.com

Have you ever thought of Sukkot as a holiday which celebrates the Sustainable Jew

In ancient Israel, Sukkot had a major agricultural focus. The celebration was a thanksgiving for the fruit harvest and the blessings of nature in the year that had passed. Today, Sukkot is a Jewish Festival where we step out of the comfort of our own homes, and enter temporary dwellings where we are exposed to the vagaries of the weather while performing the mitzvah of “Leshev Bsukah”.

As you sit in the Sukkah, think about the roof. The "Sechach" must be made from some product of the earth, which is no longer attached to the earth. Wood of all kinds, including bamboo poles, leafy branches, branches of pine trees are considered good for “Sechach”.

Another aspect of Sukkot is the bringing together of the Etrog, Lulav, Hadassim and Aravot. According to the Midrash , each of these 4 represent different mixes of aroma and taste, and in a way represent the different mixes of Torah observance and good deeds of Jewish individuals. When we bring these four items together they represent a communal whole.

Sukkot is also connected with water. The Talmud teaches that during the festival of Sukkot, Hashem judges the world over its water. On the final day of the holiday special prayers are offered, imploring on High to provide rain and sufficient water.

All of this ties together harvest, lulav, etrog, hadassim, aravot and water; they are all part of a natural system which takes carbon dioxide out of our air and converts it to oxygen. The plants that we use to supply the sukkah’s Sechach and which make up the lulav / etrog combination ,depend on water and are not destroyed in the process, but continue to grow and regenerate year after year.

From year to year, the weather we are in contact with over the Sukkot period changes, depending on the timing of the arrival of the holiday. This small slice of outdoor weather started me thinking about the climate we are living in, and what going into a Sukkah would mean in the years to come.

Are we as a people, in the Diaspora or in Israel, taking actions which minimize our impact on the environment and leave this world a better place for our children?

Do we know what is happening to our environment and why? Do we know the actions we can take that can make a difference? Do we know and act? Do we know yet fail to act? Do we act without knowing the reason why? Do we do nothing?

Are we as Jewish individuals, families, communities or as a people doing what we can to influence others to live a more sustainable life, through knowledge and actions?.

I began to think more about this question since returning from a 10 day family adventure to the American Rockies. The trip provided some hands-on experiences to explore some themes on sustainability with my family.

For years, I have regaled my family with stories of my late eighties business trips to Vail and Boulder. I convinced them of the value of enjoying the fresh mountain air and seeing the snow capped mountains and glaciers, even in the summer. When we finally reached the 14,000+ foot mountains, my family was struck by the lack of snow and the small size of the few remaining glaciers. I’m sure those of you who have made multiple trips to the National Parks in the Canadian Rockies have seen a similar glacial retreat at the Columbia Ice fields.

My youngest son, Zev, wanted to know what happened and where all the snow went. The simple answer to an 11 year old was,” It melted”. The simple comeback of an 11 year old, raised on the Discovery Channel and Mythbusters and his other four siblings who were raised on Bill Nye the Science Guy, was “Why?”

“It melted” was not going to satisfy them but asking them to watch “An Inconvenient Truth” in the van was not going to successfully compete with other more enjoyable “Punch Buggy” and “Cruiser Bruiser” competitions.

It took a visit to the National Center for Atmospheric Research (NCAR)in Boulder, Colorado to put the answer into perspective. The scientists at NCAR were part of a team of 300 scientists, representing 160 research groups in 48 countries who contributed to a report titled “State of the Climate in 2009”.

This report documented measured decreases in snow cover, sea ice and glaciers, and increases in air temperature, humidity, ocean heat and temperature, sea level and temperature both land and sea. The report also lead to the July 29, 2010 Globe and Mail headline “Signs of warming earth are unmistakable” and an August 30, 2010 Maclean’s magazine cover story.”Extreme Weather Warning”.

When the NCAR tour guide found out that I was recently trained by Al gore to be a volunteer presenter for the Climate Project, she asked me to explain the issues behind global warming to the 30 people on the tour. An NCAR exhibit on the second floor enabled me to explain the reasons behind the melting glacier

With the storyboard as my background, I began to explain how the sun emits radiation and how most of this radiation is absorbed by the earth and warms it. Some of the energy is radiated back into space by the earth in the form of infrared waves and some of this outgoing infrared radiation is trapped by the earth’s atmosphere and warms it. Increased levels of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere end up trapping more infrared radiation, causing a further increase in temperatures.

The answer was more than enough to satisfy the curious, but not enough for my eldest daughter, Tamara, “Cousin Jeff says that all of this is occurring due to natural and not man-made causes”. “What are these greenhouse gases anyway?” added my 17 year old son, Marc.

No need to answer all of these probing questions right away, as it was time to go see the dinosaur bones at Dinosaur Ridge west of Denver. Perhaps there was a way for my family to discover that both natural and manmade elements can play a role in global warming and species extinction.

Seeing dinosaur tracks in 60 million year old exposed stone took their mind off the problems of melting snow and global warming. “Great move dad” said my daughter Yardena, “All you need to do is scream ‘dinosaur’ to an 11 year old, and all other questions drop”

The pressure was off for a while, or at least until we reached the Field Museum in Chicago. It was Sue the Dinosaur’s tenth anniversary at the museum. For the family, it was the second time seeing Sue, “Dad, did you see the new evolution exhibit, featuring the dinosaurs?” asked my daughter Adira.

Part of the exhibit hypothesized that the changes we have seen on earth over a period of time have been influenced by changes in climate. One of the key displays focused natural cycles of climate change, explained by the Milankovitch Cycles, These cycles are made up of natural variations in the relationship between the earth and the sun; the orbit of the earth around the sun; the degree of the earth’s tilt; and the direction of the earth’s axis of rotation. This phenomenon is part of existing climate science, where the observed cyclical temperature increases are not caused by increases in greenhouse gases, but due to natural warming and cooling cycles.

The current theory is that the end of the dinosaurs was caused by climate change resulting from a meteor hitting the earth, sending so much particulate matter into the atmosphere, blocking the sun, preventing the sun’s radiation from heating the earth, leading to a dramatic cooling of the earth. In this case the Milankovitch Cycles did not have anything to do with the extinction of the dinosaurs.

The end of the Field Museum exhibit identified that man-made and naturally occurring gases can have a similar climate changing impact, but in the direction of heating the planet. This was my chance to explain what greenhouse gases are, why they affect climate in the way they do, and what steps we might want to take to reduce them to ensure that we can sustain life as we know it on earth.

Different human caused greenhouse gas pollutants are increasing the amount of infrared radiation being trapped, leading to these temperature increases. There are six families of greenhouse gas pollutants, which appear in various proportions which are being tracked, inventoried and targeted for reduction.

Human generated activity such as electricity generation, industrial activities, agriculture, landfill, heating and cooling, deforestation and transportation are just some sources of greenhouse gas emissions. These gasses include carbon dioxide (CO₂), methane, black carbon or soot, halocarbons, carbon monoxide, volatile organic compounds and nitrous oxide.

Measurement comes before management. Yardsticks are needed to size the problem and focus our efforts for improvement at the personal, community and business levels. The National Climactic Data Centre and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration have a critical global yardstick we should all be aware of.

If you remember the earlier part about outgoing infrared radiation being trapped in the earth’s atmosphere and warming it. The measure of CO₂ concentration in the atmosphere was below 300 parts per million (PPM) in the 800,000 years prior to the Industrial Revolution, when scientist believe that the Milankovitch Cycles operated without the need to accommodate for any other human generated activity.

A CO₂ concentration of 350 PPM has been declared the “danger number”. Recent scientific measurements put us at a CO₂ concentration of 390 PPM and the growth in the number is accelerating. With more greenhouse gases in the atmosphere, more infrared radiation is being trapped, leading to more heating. As the PPM number continues to rise, we are seeing the effects of ice melt and the other factors documented in the “State of the Climate in 2009”.

Various environmental accords setting targets to reduce greenhouse gases to 1990 levels, or to percentages of levels measured in an earlier year, by a certain target date are trying to slow the acceleration of atmospheric CO₂ concentration and then if possible reverse it to less dangerous levels.

My hope is that by explaining the facts and facilitating a better understanding of the various sources of greenhouse gas pollution, we can inspire ourselves to take the first steps in personal, community, and business action and become “Sustainable Jews”.

The challenge or opportunity is in front of us all. Can we change energy consumption patterns, alter product supply chains, exploit business opportunities to commercialize scientific discoveries, or find new ways to apply technology to reducing greenhouse gas emissions.

There is an immediate problem and an urgent need to act. There are steps you can take and encourage others to take which will have a positive measurable impact. Changing your light bulbs, implementing home and office retrofits of lighting, heating and air conditioning systems can measurably decrease energy consumption and allow coal generated electricity plants to be turned off are just some of the steps you can take now. There are many more.

Going forward, this column will continue to explore how individuals, students, entrepreneurs, businesses and organizations in the Jewish community both in Canada and in Israel are dealing with sustainability. We will look at these efforts from a Jewish perspective, tying them back directly to greenhouse gas reduction activities as well as cost reduction and revenue generation.

As we enter the period of Sukkot, and put ourselves closer to nature by sitting outside under a green canopy in our Sukkah, we should start to think about the type of world we are living in today, what we will be leaving to our children and grandchildren tomorrow and the sustainable actions we will need to take as Jews, as individuals, as a community, as a country, and as members of humanity, to ensure that we leave the world in a better state.